Italian Wars Total War

[saundersag]

I have moved this thead previously in the entrance hall to hear as i felt that this was the proper place for this thread. I will now sum up all the ideas and development I have done. It will be based approximately between 1300-1500. This will hopefully be a mod with a campaign.
Firstly the Factions
Papal States
Sicily
Savoy
Florence
Siena
Venice
Milan
Naples
Genoa
Turks (unplayable)
French? (unplayable)
The reasons for the turks is that i will include the balkans on the map as on the coast there were venetian colonies. The rest of the balkans were controlled by the turks and the venetians and the turks had a period of warfare. Also the french in 1494 invaded Italy and this was the starting point of italian occupation. I was thinking i could have them working like the mongols in mtw.
Italy in this period was dominated by mercenaries in the early parts there were many foreign mercenaries such as french knights, almograves and longbowmen. However later on they became less depandant on foreign mercenaries and used more mercenaries from Italy. Also earlier on they focused on miltias heavily however they became used less and less later on. The name for mercenaries were conditorri these tended to be heavily armoured knights. To represent the amount of mercenaries around such units as conditorri heavy cavalry and stradiots ( i will describe later) you will be able to build normally however you will need an inn to train them. However foreign mercenaries such as english longbowmen will only be availaible through normal ways.
I also would like to have a different system for miltia as there were different types of miltia units. Therefore town guards will be required for building different types of miltia and also upgrades for town guards will improve the discipline of miltia units. As i said miltia units became more obscure and they were replaced by peramant units called provisionati who were professional soldiers.
Standard Unit List (this shall be the the basic unit list for everyone)
Conditorri Heavy Cavalry
Cavalleria leggiera (light cavalry, conditorri, demi-lances)
Mounted Crossbowmen (conditorri typically)
Miltia Bowmen
Miltia Crossbowmen
Miltia Spearmen
Mounted Nobles (rural petty nobles classed as miltia)
Crossbowmen-provisionati
Targhieri (Pavise Crossbowmen)-provisionati
Schiopettieri (handgunners)-provisionati
Lanze Spezzate (normal heavy knights)-provisionati
Bowmen-provisionati
Arquebuisters-provisionati
Light Infantry (spearmen+large sheilds)-provisionati
Spearmen-provisionati
Rotulari (sword and buckler)-provisionati
Halbedirs-provisionati
Bombard
Carriochas (will discuss later)
The Carriochas were universal in all italian armies they were carts pulled by oxen, the cart carried the colours and heradry of the armies they were souce of moral and a rallying point. Therefore i think i could have it so that they gave your army a moral bonus however if they were ever destroyed then the moral of your army would suffer.
These will be the standard units for everyone at the moment not including mercenaries.
Hear are some Mercenary Units
Landsknechten (german pikemen)
Swiss Pikemen
English Longbowmen
Almograve
I have included all foreign knights into the conditorri heavy cavalry.
Hear are some units for perspecific factions
Stradoti (balkans light cavalry used throwing spears, bows)-venice
Swiss Guard (swiss elite halbedirs)-papacy
Genoese Crossbowmen (fought during the 100 year war)-genoa
Sfakioty (cretan archers)-venice
Arsenalotti (doge's guards)-venice
Here are someother ideas. The milanes were famous for there armourers therefore the province of milan will give troops an armour bonus. Venice was a major naval power as was genoa before it lost to venice. So venice will have a bonus to its ships built in the province venice. The pisans were also quite famous for their crossbowmen so in this province crossbow units will gain have added valour to crossbow units. I would like to thank Angelnessuno as his post in the two crowns forum helped with many venetian units, nomad for telling me about the post, Al Khalifah for adding his views and helpful suggestions, Historycaesar also for his suggestions and views. I am still in the devlopment process and changes can be made at any point so if anyone has any information and suggestions please post. In my next post i may add some pictures. But please express your views and post.
Also if anyone would like to do a part of the mod help would be welcome especially on the camp map.

[saundersag]

Now here are some pictures of some units.

http://img45.exs.cx/img45/6194/veniceandnorth.jpg
On the left is a sienese pavise crossbowmen, then in the middle is a venetian colonial archer and on the right a venetian heavy infantrymen.

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/2755/bombard.jpg
This is a picture of a bombard which was the the main artillery used then.

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/2089/carroccio.jpg
This is a carroccio with faction flag.

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/4960/italianknights.jpg
The cavalry on the left is a light cavalry (demi-lance), he is still quite heavily armoured and on the right is a heavy cavalry.

http://img31.exs.cx/img31/8991/italianmiltia.jpg
On the right is a miltia spearmen and on the right is a miltia crossbowmen and at the bottom is a venetian infantryman.

http://img28.exs.cx/img28/8341/Light1.jpg
The man on the right is a italian knight, the man in the middle is a light infantry man and on the right is a bombard and crewman.

http://img28.exs.cx/img28/212/Milan.jpg
This shows a lombard knight on the right, a handgunner inthe middle and a heavy infantry men on the right (halbedir).

http://img28.exs.cx/img28/2118/pic_italy02.gif
This picture shows two stradiots and then one papal guard on the right.

Please anyone if you are intrested offer help or information.

[saundersag]

I posted this in the original forum but i thought this might intrest you. Hear are the large sheilds for all the factions apart from the papacy, french, turks and sicillians as i am using the origanal ones. Well hear they are

venice

florence

milan

naples

savoy

genoa

siena


I can not get luke map maker to work and i would welcome any volunteers also i would welcome anyone who would like to make some new units graphics and still if anyone knows of any knowledge of this period of history in italy please post.

[Consul Flaminius]

Did'nt Genoa hold some ports in the Crimea once?

[saundersag]

Yes genoa had colonies in the crimea at this time they also had colonies in north africa and the middle east, they became one of the major naval powers after defeating the pisans however later on they were defeated themselves by the venetians and so became less important till the spanish took away all their colonies also the kharnate of crimea took back their main colony Kaffa. Oh and they had the colonies of lesbos and chios the greek islands. But they lost heir colonies after this game is set. At one point venice also had colonies near by but their main colonis were along the dalmatia coast, crete. Also naples had small colonies near greece, they had corfu and a colony called Durazzo. However i think i will only include the baltic coast as this is near by and if i make th map iclude all the colonies than this will take the focus away from italy. To compensate for the lack of colonies the factions will get troops from their colonies. For example the venetians will get the stradiots from the balkans. And also the provinces of genoa and venice will get very high amounts of money to represent the trade with their colonies.

[The Blind King of Bohemia]

The Genoese main colony in the crimea was Kaffar i think. Captured by Tamerlane later on i believe

[historycaesar]

Kaffa(Caffa) and Cerch(Kerch) were the main genovese colonies in the Crimea. The other major genovese colony was Petra across the Hellespont from Constantinople.

[saundersag]

historycaesar do you know if the genoese used any native people from these colonies in their army or did they just trade their. Also i was just wondering if you could describe the map idea you had and whether you were near completion of you draft of the map. Thanks for the info all.

[AlexPeters]

You should have a look at the XVI-XVII mod thread. We've discussed a lot of italian units there in the last weeks and some of them might be interesting for your mod also. There are also some links posted that deal with the military in this area and we only 'extracted' those ideas that were usable for our timeframe.

Alex

[Silver Rusher]

Hold on a minute, i have already started this mod, it's called Citadel Total War.

If you want to help fine but we are quite far and i really don't want anybody taking the spotlight, we have already made the LukUpMap

[saundersag]

I am sorry about the slight conflcition with our mods. However i started this a few weeks ago and i was not aware of your mod. I may change the title of my mod as actually the mod ends with italian wars between the french and spanish. My mod willl probably end 1494 which will mean there will be very little conflict between time periods. Also you are having a wider range of factions i beleive than i will you for example you are going to have the swiss, hospitaller knights etc. Also the units used in the 1500's changed quite a lot so the troops should be quite different for example artillery became more prominent due to the french, the italians started adopting pikemen. I would like to do a seperate project from you preferably, your mod i would think will be finished before mine as is is mainly just me modding it. I have looked at you unit list you have and the majority of it does not conflict with my troops. So i hope we will have no problems with our projects, i look forward to seeing your mod finished and hope you do very well. Thanks Alex Peters i will look into the scapoli and familiga ducale and the corselets. I was very impressed with the mod and the unist graphics on the hussaria wre excellent. The myarmoury website i havee already looked into but thankyou for you help.

[saundersag]

I have recently bought a book on italian miltia and i now have quite a few new units and concepts so i will type out the new revised unit list.
Standard Unit List.
Conditorri Heavy Cavalry
Cavalleria leggiera (light cavalry, conditorri, demi-lances)
Mounted Crossbowmen (conditorri typically or maybe miltia)
Bowmen-miltia
Constabli Elite Crossbowmen
Constabli (permament police troops)
Spadicciono (light infantry spearmen)-miltia
Crossbowmen (Balestri)-miltia
Paversai (units of spearmen with very large sheilds heavy infantry)-miltia
Scuderie (spearmen with small sheilds light infantry)-miltia
Mounted Nobles (rural petty nobles )-miltia
Springarda (balistas)
Bombard
Mortar
Organ Gun (ribauld)
Culverins
Brigandi (low quality troops, rural brigands)-miltia
Targhieri (Pavise Crossbowmen)
Schiopettieri (handgunners)
Lanze Spezzate (normal heavy knights)
Arquebuisters
Roncolerei (billmen)-miltia
Rotulari (sword and buckler)
Polerarms troops-miltia
Carriochas
Javelin Troops?-miltia

Specific Faction Unit List
Stradoti (balkans light cavalry used throwing spears, bows)-venice
Swiss Guard (swiss elite halbedirs)-papacy
Genoese Crossbowmen (fought during the 100 year war)-genoa
Sfakioty (cretan archers)-venice
Arsenalotti (doge's guards)-venice
Sardinian Javelins-Area perspecific
Saracean Bowmen-Naples
Birri(elite miltia act as police force)siena
Multiple firing balista? experimental-venice
Sicilian hunting troops (e.g javelins, bows spears)-sicily
Scapoli (venetian balkan/greek sailors)-venice
Ducal Guard (elite noble cavalry for duke)-milan
Knights of Saint Marco (Mark, they were knights of nobilty harking back to feudal systems)-venice

I have change my mind slightly on the miltia, i have decided to simulate teh way that troops became proffesional rather than miltia is to have some standard troops who in the early stages will represent miltia however there troop types will be able to get lots of upgrades e.g weapon, armour, valour and discipline and this will represent there change from miltia to provisionati. So bulidings like the town watch will have lost of upgrades.

In italy the armour of infantry was fairly light many no longer used mail but hardened leather, this type of the armour was good against slashing attacks but was poor against bolts and arrows, so to represnt this many of the infantry units will be vunerable to missiles, this was one of the reasons crossbows were so effective and dangerous in italy. However the armour allowed lots of the infantry to move quickly They tended to have iron helmets and also many had large sheilds. The paversai were used in the front to absorb cavalry charges and crossbows tended to hide behing them and use them as a wall. Cavalry were unable to avoid missiles easily therefore they did not have shields but very heavy armour.

If anyone is intersted in doing any work on the mod i would welcom any help and if anyone has any knowledge please post, it is quite hard finding units for only speific factions. But i would welcome any help.

[Silver Rusher]

I don't think that it is productive for two mods set in the same era to have a mod war, so, I am moving CTW to RTW, unless RTW is unmoddable, in which case i would like to merge the production. I hope this is OK.

[saundersag]

I have recently being working on the campaign map hear is a pic, it has not yet been finished, borders need to added but i was mainly wondering people thought of it, and especially there views on it. I have also updated the unit list and a building tree is been done. If any one has any ideas or opinions please post and also if anyone has any info.

[Silver Rusher]

I have recently being working on the campaign map hear is a pic, it has not yet been finished, borders need to added but i was mainly wondering people thought of it, and especially there views on it. I have also updated the unit list and a building tree is been done. If any one has any ideas or opinions please post and also if anyone has any info.

What about my map? Have you got another email account other than msn cos I can't send it to ur current 1.

[oblivious maximus]

Italian Wars! Looks like it would be a great little mod.

[saundersag]

Thanks for you Interest oblvious maximus, I have now enrolled the help of my friends, so hopefully the process will get sped up. Currently we are doing the info pics we are probably going to do a similiar style as the shogun total war mod as this is a way i think looks quite good and is pratical. We will probably not add any bulidings but the building tree is being modifed and currently worked on. Also as none of us are very good at unit graphics we are going to use and modify mainly the pac released by Duke John, these are well suited to the mod as they have leather armour and metal barbutes and other types of helmets. So the mainstay of our infantry will be using them, for others we will use the originals or alter them slighlty ii sheild and weapon changes.

As always i welcome any suggestions.

Hear are some pics of Duke John's units pac unmodified.