Countdown to Open Beta - Koinon Hellenon

[Mongoose]

Very nice .......now get back to work on the next preview


j/k

[Abokasee]

very good units....but nothing compared to the strength of bartix stickmen!

[TheTank]

Very very nice EB!, Koinon Hellenon is my favorite Hellenic faction from now on.
I am very eager to play them to kick some Macedonian butt

[Teleklos Archelaou]

Very very nice EB!, Koinon Hellenon is my favorite Hellenic faction from now on.
I am very eager to play them to kick some Macedonian butt

Yeah, the key will be trying to keep from losing Athens in the first few turns (and that was the number one goal of the Macedonians too--to seize it--after 272 was over and they didn't have to worry about that pesky Pyrrhus). You can either bring Areus back to help defend Sparta and Athens (and both are likely to be the object of Mak-Attaks), or you can use him to try and consolidate Crete. It's a lot of tough choices. Unfortunately the AI often leaves Euboia with only a few troops, pulling them out to try and take Thermon or other places. So if you can make it a few years in, you can take advantage of the stupid AI decisions (sometimes, not always) and try to grab Chalkis too. Korinth is much more dangerous, and is best left alone till you get some breathing room. Grabbing Halikarnassos is tough, but sometimes an opportunity will open up, especially if someone else tries and fails to take it.

[Chester]

What about Baktria? Wasn't that region Hellenized?

[Teleklos Archelaou]

It's a three thousand mile trek, and we don't have any proof that Baktrians did compete, but yes, it was Hellenized, and there will probably be a very slight chance that a young and energetic Baktrian general would make a journey to Greece, and *if* he was there he might compete. Very unlikely, but a chance nonetheless. BTW, the text messages are all tailored to these decreased probabilities and faction specific obstacles to competing and winning in the games too.

[Spendios]

Very good job I especially like the Olympic games traits !

[Idomeneas]

The transliteration is from ***ANCIENT*** Greek to modern English. This is not that difficult. These are not "trivial" or "nitpicking" problems, which implies that we aren't paying full attention or don't care about the details, when the extreme opposite is the case. While we might make mistakes occasionally, there is no skipping over lightly the transliterations.

sigma-phi-epsilon-nu-delta-omicron-nu-eta-tau-alpha-iota transliterates very clearly into:
s-ph-e-n-d-o-n-e-t-a-i

Classical Greek pronounces "phi" as an aspirated "p" ("top", where the "p" actually has a very very slight "uh" right after it), not as an "f". We will never have "Sfendonetai". And classical Greek has clear differentiation between a delta and a tau, which is very close to the differentiation between a "d" and a "t" in modern English.

Sphendonetai has a "nu-delta", where Akontistai has a "nu-tau". We will be keeping those as a "nd" and an "nt" respectively therefore. Foreigners mispronounce the *modern* Greek, Idomeneas, in the situation you point out. I totally agree with you there. But the ancient Greek is not the same.

The only thing i disagree Τηλεκλε is the ''Δ'' representation with ''D''. It should be ''TH'' like the words ''this'' ''the'' or at least those come in my mind as more similar to the sound. In greek we dont have in the original indigenous words the sound ''D''. Thats why there is not an assigned letter for it. We reproduce it with ''NT''. You can argue that you are talking about ancient greek BUT the fact is that words may changed through time but not the pronounciation of συμφωνα. Υou propably gonna say ''and how you can proove that''. In case the opinion of numerous greek archaeologists and philologists doesnt count we can examine the eclesiastic language. In Greece the psalms are still in the original ancient language of the evangels. That may not be as old as we want to proove the case here but provides a freeze in time close enough to after hellenistic era so that no great alterations on language are justified. Plus in that i can provide the pontic Greek dialect. I dont know if you ever heard but their dialect is very very close to ancient greek. One more thing. The modern greek as we speak now used to be common people's language. The state's language and educated ones till late 70's was the so called καθαρευουσα. You know all the κλισεις and spirits and a very large amount of pure ancient words. It stopped being used in schools and official documents in 1982. Anyway my point is that certain words can be written differently but individual συμφωνα are still pronounced the same.
As example we can use ancient attic Θαλαττα and modern Θαλασσα

I know sadly i cannot turn in time and have a chat with Leonidas to see how he pronounces Δ but i think so do you . In any case i would be very interested to see the elements that lead you (and other people offcourse) to a safe conclusion about the pronounciation of ancient greek. If you think that we will bore everybody here with stuff they dont care we can do it on another thread

[Birka Viking]

Wow very great preview EB........

[Es Arkajae]

Wait a sec?, is there going to be a Spartan unit and it just hasn't been shown in this preview?

Granted Sparta was on its last legs by the stage this game starts, but they weren't yet finished, a great leader could turn things around. One would like the opportunity for them to become great again

[Dux Corvanus]

Yes, Sparta still existed. But I don't understand why people admire Spartans so. Ok, Leonidas's quest is an incredible lesson in bravery. But, don't forget they were some kind of nazis of the ancient world.

[Shrapnel]

Competitors can come from any of the Hellenistic factions, although it's harder for some than others, due to distance.

Great,thanks.

[Es Arkajae]

Yes, Sparta still existed. But I don't understand why people admire Spartans so. Ok, Leonidas's quest is an incredible lesson in bravery. But, don't forget they were some kind of nazis of the ancient world.

I'm aware Sparta still existed as is blatantly obvious by my post.

As for comparisons with nazis?, wake up to yourself mate.`;)

Has anyone got an answer though?, will Spartans be in EB?

[Chester]

Read the posts, Spartans and Sparta will be in the game. They probably won't be titans among men like they were in Vanilla and other MOD's. I think the Spartan legacy of greatness died down by the opening date for EB.

[jerby]

yeah, it died against the Thebans(guess)..dunno wich battle.

but indeed, spartans also did things you shouldn't be to proud of. they pioneerd citizinship, but it was exclusive donw to the paranoid.

[Forgus]

Sure thing. As far as I'm concerned weekly previews only give you a rough idea of the units available per fraction, say 50%. And of course secretive as they are they reserve the the cream for the release....
Plus if you read back you can read that they are in production.
Still I have reason to suspect that there would be Athenian, Spartite or even perhaps Thebaian units...

So stay tuned

[Dux Corvanus]

yeah, it died against the Thessalians..dunno wich battle.

but indeed, spartans also did things you shouldn't be to proud of. they pioneerd citizinship, but it was exclusive donw to the paranoid.

Two battles -among many- marked the decadence of Sparta: Leuctra (279BC) against the Theban League, and Sellacia (222BC) against Tegea and Antigonos III. The city fell in the Roman orbit in the 2nd century BC.

Spartan society was based on the dominion of a minority -a military aristocracy- over a huge enslaved population, thru repression and terror. To achieve this goal, they sacrificed culture, art, phylosophy, and even their own comfort, to become an austere group of paranoid fanatics whose only aim was perpetuate that status quo by the employment of sheer force and coaction.

So tell me, what's so admirable in the Orwellian nightmare that Likurgan state was. A bunch of guys that sacrifice their happiness and every good thing in life so they become tough enough to reduce a whole nation to slavery thru terror.

[jerby]

well, the devotion to military training is admirable. the Spartan way of life depended on war..they were Soldiers, and that's 'admirable'.
the sad part is that, threw their devotion and skill, they surpressed everything they 'controlled'.

still, Thermopylae is magnificent...ordered gates of Fire, really curious

[O_Stratigos]

These are not "trivial" or "nitpicking" problems, which implies that we aren't paying full attention or don't care about the details, when the extreme opposite is the case.

There was no such thing implied by me, I am fully aware of the depth and detail that the EB team is dedicated to.

We will never have "Sfendonetai".

I am not aware of anyone suggesting the use of "f" instead off "ph"

Sphendonetai has a "nu-delta", where Akontistai has a "nu-tau".

My mistake, I stand corrected, my apologies.

The transliteration is from ***ANCIENT*** Greek to modern English. This is not that difficult.

I don’t know about other languages but “transliteration” from ancient Greek to modern English, is IMHO almost impossible and the best one can hope for is a meaningful translation and an approximate spelling. Transliteration might work quite well for an academic but for the rest is simply confusing.
The speakers of ancient Greek/historians in the EB team will know much better than I all that I am about to say, but for the sake of the average English-non-Greek speaker please let me explain.

In the word "sphendonetai" the second "e" is supposed to be pronounced as an "i" like in the word "in" and the same applies for the word "akontistai", the "i" has –almost- the same sound. I say "almost" because in Greek the I is short whereas the H is slightly longer. It is my understanding that when a Greek "H" (eta) is encountered is spelled by the EB team with an "e" and when there is an "I" (iota) is spelled with an "i". The question here is, how does the average English speaking person without any knowledge of Greek supposed to differentiate and pronounced them correctly?

In "hoplitai" and "Hellenon" the pronunciation problem is even worse and the fact that these two words do not appear in a dictionary -so one might look them up- and are "tailor made" for the mod, does not help either.
The words "hoplite"- "hoplites" are the English translation of the Greek oplitis (οπλιτης) – oplitai (οπλιται) and in English are pronounced "hopl-eye-te" and "hopl-eye-tes".
When the letters –ai are used in the end of "hoplit-es" to denote Greek plural, now the "i" is supposed to be pronounced like the "i" in the word "in"– for convenience lets use the sound of -ea of the word "plea"- so is actually pronounced "hopl-ea-tai" and the Greek plural –ai should sound like the first "e" of the word "ever". Again how is the average person supposed to know this?

The words Hellene- Hellenes are translations of the Greek Hellene-Hell-ea-ne (Ελλην) and Hellenes-Hell-ea-nes (Ελληνες), but where does the word "Hellenon" come from?
Please let me TRY and explain as simply as I can by using these examples; "the Hellenes-Hell-ea-nes (Ελληνες) live in Hellas, Hellas is the country of the Hellenon-Hell-ea-non" (Ελληνων), or " the Hellenes-Hell-ea-nes are covered with body hair, the bodies of the Hellenon-Hell-ea-non are hairy", so -very broadly speaking- if you speak "OF them" in plural it ends with –on. So again the English word "Hellenes" is used adding the Greek plural ending of –on (ων), and we have the word "Hellenon" with the inherent problem of the pronunciation of the letters –e because the average person will pronounce both –e’s like in the word "ever" which is of course wrong since the second –e must be pronounced like –ea of the word "plea".

As you can see it is not as easy as one might think and I believe that some kind of explanation should have been given by the EB team about the origins and pronunciation of some of the names-words.
Well, IMHO most of the above are quiet trivial because although words-names are "tailor made", they are actually working very well for the purpose of the mod, are very cleverly constructed and gives one the sense of actually speaking in ancient Greek just by reading the faction and unit names and I for one really like them.

What might need to be corrected is, that in the description of "Toxotai" and "Xystophoroi" the x is used as an English x, whereas in the description of "Taxeis Hoplitai" is used as the Greek sound of h as in the word "here". Just let me add that the letters –oi in "Xystiphoroi" and in "Koinon" are also pronounced –ea!! Yeah… we Greeks are crazy..

As I mentioned in my previous post maybe for the sake of simplicity and probably consistency as well, the Greek letter H (eta) -when encountered- should be substituted with i or even with ea, so everyone can pronounce the words correctly and without any difficulty.

Finally, I would really appreciate if someone would explain what "Aprakteros" means. Thank you.

O_Stratigos

[shifty157]

Hes using his spear with both hands.

Looks awesome.

[Es Arkajae]

Oh for goodness Dux, who gives a rats arse about what the Spartans did back then?

They could have gone around randomly stealing women, raping cattle and drinking milk straight from the carton for all I care.

What matters is that they were damned cool and they still weren't all the way dead in the period which this game covers. I personally would like to see a Spartan unit hence why I'm asking those here hopefully in the know

[Teleklos Archelaou]

In the word "sphendonetai" the second "e" is supposed to be pronounced as an "i" like in the word "in" and the same applies for the word "akontistai", the "i" has –almost- the same sound. I say "almost" because in Greek the I is short whereas the H is slightly longer. It is my understanding that when a Greek "H" (eta) is encountered is spelled by the EB team with an "e" and when there is an "I" (iota) is spelled with an "i". The question here is, how does the average English speaking person without any knowledge of Greek supposed to differentiate and pronounced them correctly?

The transliteration process we have adopted is (with absolutely no doubt in my mind) the most accurate one (for transliterating into modern English) the academic community in the U.S. and all of Europe (except many people in Greece) can provide. While modern Greeks may insist that they alone know what ancient Greek sounded like, the rest of the world has a different view and though I am sorry that we might disagree, we are following that one.

In "hoplitai" and "Hellenon" the pronunciation problem is even worse and the fact that these two words do not appear in a dictionary -so one might look them up- and are "tailor made" for the mod, does not help either.
The words "hoplite"- "hoplites" are the English translation of the Greek oplitis (οπλιτης) – oplitai (οπλιται) and in English are pronounced "hopl-eye-te" and "hopl-eye-tes".
When the letters –ai are used in the end of "hoplit-es" to denote Greek plural, now the "i" is supposed to be pronounced like the "i" in the word "in"– for convenience lets use the sound of -ea of the word "plea"- so is actually pronounced "hopl-ea-tai" and the Greek plural –ai should sound like the first "e" of the word "ever". Again how is the average person supposed to know this?

Simply and politely put, the transliteration of οπλιται from ancient Greek to English is accepted by the rest of the world (outside of Modern Greeks) as "Hoplitai".

but where does the word "Hellenon" come from?

Genitive plural of Hellenes: "of the Greeks" - Eta's are transliterated from ancient Greek to modern English with a simple "e" unfortunately as the English "e" can represent both the sound of the ancient Greek epsilon and the ancient Greek eta. There is no "ea" sound in the pronunciation of Ελληνων.

As you can see it is not as easy as one might think and I believe that some kind of explanation should have been given by the EB team about the origins and pronunciation of some of the names-words.

Over and over and over again I and other EB team members have detailed all of this. The only people who have ever raised a single peep about it are modern Greeks. While I hope that everyone can enjoy the mod, and the Greek voice mod too, I simply will not be able to be convinced that some, but not all, scholars and laymen in Greece are the only ones who should have the final say in all matters pertaining to their ancestors. We probably wouldn't have a problem here if we just put the ancient Greek characters themselves up there instead of the engish transliterations, but unfortunately we have made the decision a long time ago to force all other languages to be transliterated into English instead of trying to use other alphabets (even when we could, like with Greek).

If anyone sees any inconsistencies in the transliterations or any errors that do not pertain to the insistence by some (and it is clearly a well-intentioned and patriotic insistence, but one that I and the other members of the mod and the academic community at large also believe is wrong) that ancient and modern greek has not changed over two and a half millenia, please notify us of those problems and we will be *more* than happy to correct or to try and correct them. I don't mean to sound harsh, but as I've said we've gone over this numerous times here and at the TWC.net site and there are two clear parties over and over again and it's over the same transliteration issues and I don't know what else to say but that we are sorry that some people don't see eye to eye with us on this decision, but that we hope you can still enjoy the mod -- and I especially hope that you will enjoy the Greek units, naming of cities and peoples, unique sites, and other things that we can't talk about yet but that are still our fervent attempts to portray the ancient Hellenes as accurately as we can in a mod like this.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

Oh for goodness Dux, who gives a rats arse about what the Spartans did back then?

They could have gone around randomly stealing women, raping cattle and drinking milk straight from the carton for all I care.

What matters is that they were damned cool and they still weren't all the way dead in the period which this game covers. I personally would like to see a Spartan unit hence why I'm asking those here hopefully in the know

I care!!! I have to sorta - my work every day when I go into the office is to deal with the ancient Spartans. They are very complex, and the reasons why they did what they did are very interesting, *and* you might be interested in knowing that they thought their system evolved in a different way than we today think that it evolved. Politicians can cause the populace to think they are doing things for reasons that are quite different than the real ones.

For the question about what was good about the Spartans... Well, women had a lot more freedom to act than they did in other Greek societies, but then there wasn't really a family structure anything at all like existed in other cities. And they were thought to be a lot more beautiful too than other Greek women, partly because they exercised a lot too.

[Idomeneas]

The transliteration process we have adopted is (with absolutely no doubt in my mind) the most accurate one (for transliterating into modern English) the academic community in the U.S. and all of Europe (except many people in Greece) can provide. While modern Greeks may insist that they alone know what ancient Greek sounded like, the rest of the world has a different view and though I am sorry that we might disagree, we are following that one.

Simply and politely put, the transliteration of οπλιται from ancient Greek to English is accepted by the rest of the world (outside of Modern Greeks) as "Hoplitai".

Genitive plural of Hellenes: "of the Greeks" - Eta's are transliterated from ancient Greek to modern English with a simple "e" unfortunately as the English "e" can represent both the sound of the ancient Greek epsilon and the ancient Greek eta. There is no "ea" sound in the pronunciation of Ελληνων.

Over and over and over again I and other EB team members have detailed all of this. The only people who have ever raised a single peep about it are modern Greeks. While I hope that everyone can enjoy the mod, and the Greek voice mod too, I simply will not be able to be convinced that some, but not all, scholars and laymen in Greece are the only ones who should have the final say in all matters pertaining to their ancestors. We probably wouldn't have a problem here if we just put the ancient Greek characters themselves up there instead of the engish transliterations, but unfortunately we have made the decision a long time ago to force all other languages to be transliterated into English instead of trying to use other alphabets (even when we could, like with Greek).

If anyone sees any inconsistencies in the transliterations or any errors that do not pertain to the insistence by some (and it is clearly a well-intentioned and patriotic insistence, but one that I and the other members of the mod and the academic community at large also believe is wrong) that ancient and modern greek has not changed over two and a half millenia, please notify us of those problems and we will be *more* than happy to correct or to try and correct them. I don't mean to sound harsh, but as I've said we've gone over this numerous times here and at the TWC.net site and there are two clear parties over and over again and it's over the same transliteration issues and I don't know what else to say but that we are sorry that some people don't see eye to eye with us on this decision, but that we hope you can still enjoy the mod -- and I especially hope that you will enjoy the Greek units, naming of cities and peoples, unique sites, and other things that we can't talk about yet but that are still our fervent attempts to portray the ancient Hellenes as accurately as we can in a mod like this.

The only people who have ever raised a single peep about it are the actual users of that language. Who else was supposed to do it, eskimos?

Anyway as i said before i stopped giving attention in small issues like this cause i can correct them myself. The only reason i discuss it is cause it seems crazy to me that the worldwide schollar community decided to have its own way with even the most basic pronounciation rules denouncing the greek and actual most related community. In previous post I gave you some fragments of arguements (eclesiastic language, pontic dialect) that provide a freeze in time. Offcourse te language didnt remained the same in all these thousands of years BUT it is not as unrelated as you present it. I dont know if you had the chance to visit greece. If you had surely you couldnt expect us to talk like Socrates BUT if you speak with an educated person or scholar who actually USES the range of greek vocabulary you will recognise a tremendous amount of ancient words and not just classical but homeric. Yes some words are not in use in their original form but many times they survive as composites. For example we dont use the homeric αυδή for voice, we say φωνή but a way to say speachless is άναυδος. Its not just patriotic stuberness its the way that things propably are. I say propably cause i dont have a timemachine to provide an actual recording and end this, but the safest assumtion is the one i make (and greek archaeologists). As i said before i would be greatly interested if you could provide me the actual facts and elements that lead non greek schoolars decide so solidly on pronounciation of ancient... greek and put on the side the actual speakers of the language (scholars and educated people offcourse not just any guy).

No offence but as much arrogant i would sound if i was saying that only greek scholars know their subject (ancient greek) that much arrogant you are sounding when you basically say ''they can argue all they want we decided about their language''

I dont know maybe you have a tape with Plato on

its a big subject, i dont question your studies on the subject. I dont know how extend is your physical contact with greece (i mean not just through studies and books) but what can i say is that greek language in its modern form (im not talking about street language or slung) its not so distant as you present it. Inside the ancient form still lives

[Cronos Impera]

Will there be spartan hoplites in EB? Sparta was easily conquered by the Roman Republic! Too easy, in fact. The center of Greek resistance became Corinth. After the Spartan Hegemony came the Macedonian one. The city of Corinth fiercely resisted roman opresion and as a result was burnt to the ground.
Sparta lost half of its male population by the time romans came into action. The helot slaves even managed to free themselves. After a few unsuccessful reforms Sparta fell to ruins. Is there anz reason for keeping spartan fossils for competitive troops. I think not.
Sparta could barely keep itself alive, let alone wage offensive war on foreign soil!
Great work, by the way.

[Big_John]

seriously why not just have a stickied "greek language debate" thread? maybe it's a little late now, but you know this will come up again and again once the beta is released..

[jerby]

well. around 280-260 Sparta attemted a reform..and since RTW is about altering history/reliving it players should have the choice to 'reform' Sparta and get new recruits..maybe

[khelvan]

Forum members are free to make such a thread. From my experience, any further EB-led discussion of this will be pointless.

[Big_John]

well, i could be wrong, but i imagine once the beta is released, having something like a "greek language FAQ" thread would keep the same old discussion out of other threads..

it probably won't be a big deal anymore though.

[Wishazu]

Easily the best preview yet. good job