Map Updates and Previews

[caius britannicus]

took awhile for someone to notice that one. I figured someone would have pointed it out MUCH sooner.

[Ciaran]

Settlement8: the medieval Area 51?

But nice work on the map

[O'ETAIPOS]

How do you fight "distance to the capital" penalty on such a big map?

[caius britannicus]

You have to increase the bonuses from other buildings, pretty much all across the board. So if on a normal map the bonus from say the church was +5 we have to increase it to 15 or 20 (maybe more still have to test). But these increases won't be isolated. Every building will see the increase, so relatively things will be the same. Hopefully you understand what I mean.

[HahnHolio]

w00t, nice map shots there ... since The Wheel of Time mod died, this is my favorite to wait for °° :)

be prepared to get more useless omments from me in the future :)

Greetz

HahnHolio

[caius britannicus]

MASSIVE MAP PREVIEW

Its what alot of you have been waiting for. A full preview of the campaign map. The map its self is done, along with provinces and all its features. Only missing now is adding generals, armies and garrisons. With this preview you will be seeing the layout of the map as it is presented at the beginning of the Crusader campaign. The Saracens control nearly the entire map with the Crusaders holed up in Antioch, Tyre and Tripoli. As well as some of the surrounding areas.

Also featured in this preview besides the map itself are our new strategy map features. Our new agents, armies and ships are being previewed as well as our new Crusader Strongholds and Capital cities. Not to mention the crusader and saracen GUI, character portraits, names, new map textures and new stylized radar map.

This preview has SOOOO much new content it eclipses everything we have released so far. I really hope you enjoy it.

CRUSADER GUI AND LOCATIONS

In this series of images you can catch a glimpse of several things. Firstly, the new GUI. As you can see we spared no expense in giving the GUI a face lift. Every button and background has been tweaked and edited.



Not only that you also can get a look at the Crusader armies and agents (more on them further in the preview.) Hopefully on of the first things you noticed in those screenshots was Antioch. It looks a little different from the rest of the cities does it not? Thats because its a Crusader Capital. Crusader capitals are very important cities. Not only do they possess massive stone keeps and large stone walls to protect the cities they also command the territory around them. By conquering a capital you send a message to the inhabitants of the area. You have the power and the men to defeat any city or town, and so they will surrender themselves to your will expelling their garrisons and turing their cities over to your administration.



You can see much of the same in the second image as the first. However it also highlights another feature of the Crusades. Strongholds. Strongholds are those settlements you see that have only the wall and keep on the map. Examples in the above images are Beaufort and Krak des Chevaliers. These are the homes of the Military Orders. They are strong fortresses with large stone walls and a keep with not much else. Inside there are barracks, blacksmiths and stables. From these fortresses you will be able to recruit troops for the Templar, Hospitaller and Teutonic Order.

In the next set of images you'll see the majority of Saracen held lands at the beginning of the Crusader campaign. Take note of the cities, the distance between them and the scope of the map. Also take a look at the mighty Nile and nile delta. The mighty river of egypt is an actual river that will need ships to cross. A powerful barrier against Crusader invasions.





Saracen cities also feature the Captial feature. Their captials are not differentiated by the keep as they are not given one. They instead contain Saracen citedals and large stone walls. However, the same features are all implemented, take a Saracen captial and several of the surrounding towns and cities will expel their garrisons and turn administration over to you.

AGENTS AND ARMIES

You may have noticed a few things looking at the above screenshots. There are no army and garrison flags denoting the strength of the armies. This is done for a reason. The Crusades is all about gameplay and difficultly and now agents will play a more important role than ever. Simply glancing at the campaign map will not be enough anymore. You will have to use your spies to check garrisons, the size of enemy armies and even the skill of an enemy general or if its even a general (as captians and generals look the same on the campaign map). Your spies can travel and see farther as well as being cheaper to buy and maintain (allowing you to keep more of them in the field). A strong and reliable spy network is more important then ever. Assassins are also included in the Crusades and will function identically to assassins found in RTW/BI. Finally we come to diplomates who, you may have noticed, are missing from the preview. Thats because there are none. With only two factions (plus the rebels) you won't need them, heck who would want peace with the infidels in the first place!

Now to the armies. As mentioned earlier there is only one army model. Captains and Generals look the same on the map and there are no banners to indicate army sizes. You'll also notice that armies don't look like a single person anymore but instead look like a medieval army marching with banners and spears (and unlike other mods our armies don't dissappear underground when they run out of movement points.)

Finally you will see the fleets of The Crusades. The fleets consist of several ships on the map and will function identically to the RTW/BI fleets. Their main role will be transporting troops as the map is quite large but they will also be able to fight.

Crusader Assassin, Spy, Army and Fleet


A Close Up of the Crusader Army


More of the Crusader Fleet


Saracen Agents, Army and Fleet


Thats everything for now. Later we will hopefully have time to preview the Saracen campaign start. I hope you enjoyed the preview. Special thanks to Uranos and his amazing work on the map!

[Geoffrey S]

Absolutely stunning. The polish of the graphics is incredible, more than worthy of the already excellent battlefield models. And that map is massive! Looks very, very promising.

How many of those capital cities are there, and how many settlements would they bring to the cause if captured? And if there are such clearly defined differences between various types of cities, does that mean we cannot upgrade them as in RTW?

And dare I ask it, how is the movement rate when compared to RTW, and how many turns per year are there? Or is that still a secret?

This preview definitely reaffirms your skill and the promise of this mod. Keep it up!