Any new spartan unit in the making?

[fallen851]

You guys are misunderstanding; our unit doesn't have the full red cloak of Spartan tradition, just a small one.

Ok, so it has a small cloak, which isn't traditional for a Spartan unit if I understand what you said correct, and you said it quite clearly, but I think you stated it incorrectly? And the cloak was used as blanket, is it big enough to be that?

Warry uses Thucycdides, Xenophon, and Plutarch as his main sources for that chapter.

I looked into Lykourgos, who Plutarch wrote a biography of, so I'm sure Warry is very familiar with him.

But enough with sources, would you wear your blanket in battle? Too often I think people read into sources as if they are end-all be-all arguements. We need to think "Does this make sense?"

I don't think so. It would be hot, it would blow in the wind into spear points, in melee combat, someone could easily grab it from a distance and drag another one down, and it would just get in you way... it simply doesn't make sense. Who would wear a blanket around them?

Spartans weren't dumb, they would not sacrifice combat ability to "scare their enemies" or whatever. The rest of their battle array was designed for protection and mobility, why hamper that?

I'd say that if EB wanted to err on the side of caution, it would remove the cloak. The sources may differ (I haven't looked at this indepth, but the sources I've read said they were discarded), but one thing is for sure, wearing a cloak in battle is not an advantage.

[Fondor_Yards]

Well I don't know much about the spartans of this time period, but what's wrong with a cloak. Kleruchoi agema and elite african pikemen have them, and I think it's hotter in north africa's deserts then in greece. Which brings up the question if they should have 1.

And I doubt someone can grap their cloaks in combat. If it did, it would be their phalanx was already shattered or they were behind them, which meant they were dead anyways. Unless it's 9 foot long cloak, I don't see how it would get in the way of the spearpoints. Plus in a tight phalanx formation, the wind shouldn't be moving their cloak at all. And a small cloak would not have been a blanket, it would have been a cloak.

Of course I don't know much, but that's just using common sense.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

Warry uses Thucycdides, Xenophon, and Plutarch as his main sources for that chapter.

I looked into Lykourgos, who Plutarch wrote a biography of, so I'm sure Warry is very familiar with him.

It sounds very much like the sources cited are talking about fifth century spartans.

[abou]

Which is a problem because in the time frame that EB takes place Warry concentrates on the Successor States and Rome against Pyrrhos. There really isn't any mention about the Spartans or their equipment after the Peloponnesian War and conflicts with Thebes.

Then again, the Spartans really didn't do anything from my understanding so Warry's lack of coverage is not out of place.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

There is a vast range of ways Spartans of this period could be depicted. THere is going to be very little way anyone could say certain versions along that range would be incorrect.

[Yun Dog]

Im no historian

but I think there something else to be considered when thinking about armor

I would image armor would be handed down through generations - particularly in a militaristic society - I would envisage the eldest son being given the armor of the father who inheritied it from his father

it would be like a prized family heirloom, kept polished and stored in oil skins

so I think it is possible that any particular soldier could posses fairly elaborate armor be it somewhat antique

so when faced with the choice of armor styling it would be reasonable to err to older or antique armor over perhaps later models for this reason

also given the pride the spartans took in their physical appearance - I think it would also be reasonable to assume that some artistry wouldve gone into their families armor - simplicity in design but done beautifully - I would imagine.

and as there is little hard evidence - I think there is some room for artistic licence here - we shouldnt fall into the trap of making them resemble peasants because we thought them to live in primitive times - some of the most primitive people have the most elaborate, colourful and beautiful ceremonial dress - look at the tribes of PNG

[fallen851]

There is a vast range of ways Spartans of this period could be depicted. THere is going to be very little way anyone could say certain versions along that range would be incorrect.

Yes he is talking about 5th century Spartans, however it doesn't make much sense that later they would suddenly decide to keep their cloaks in combat.

And I think your also correct, that there is very little anyone could say would be incorrect, and I did not say there is a "set" way a Spartan should look except for the fact they should not be wearing cloaks in combat. That is like saying Principes wore Lorica. It just didn't happen. It doesn't make any sense why they would do that.

My point Fondar is you want to have every advantage in combat possible. If you've ever seen the UFC fight between Royce Gracie and Kimo Leopold, where Royce essentially destroys Kimo by pulling his hair and thereby holding his head while he punches him in the face, you realize this. If Kimo hadn't had a pony-tail for looks, he may not have lost. It would be very easy to grab a part of the Spartan cloak and rip him to the ground (just like it was easy for Royce to grab Kimo's hair), especially if your weapons (such as some of the ones the Persians used) were unable to pierce his armor.


This thread is done, I can bring all the evidence in the world, I can have people agree or disagree, and I'll never change the minds of the people in EB, who consistently fall on ad-hoc arguments despite my challenges.

Oh well, I'll just have to mod the Spartan myself.

[Ludens]

This thread is done, I can bring all the evidence in the world, I can have people agree or disagree, and I'll never change the minds of the people in EB, who consistently fall on ad-hoc arguments despite my challenges.

I think you are being a bit oversensitive here: TA's remark (the one you cite) was not specifically directed at you, but at everyone in this thread. I am quite sure that the 5th century Spartan hoplite did not wear his cloak into battle. However, this does not mean that 3th century Spartan hoplite did the same. Especially not when the cloak had been shortened so it was not as much of a liability. Other peoples did wear their cloaks into battle and they must have had some reason to do that, even one as simple as not leaving it in the camp to be stolen or looted.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

This thread is done, I can bring all the evidence in the world, I can have people agree or disagree, and I'll never change the minds of the people in EB, who consistently fall on ad-hoc arguments despite my challenges.

Oh well, I'll just have to mod the Spartan myself.

I don't get the drama over the cloak. If you feel the unit is so wrong, the unit that no one here has seen yet (gah), then feel free to mod it any way you like for your personal build. But you act consistantly like EB is so wrong-minded and deaf to comments or criticism - this month because there will be a cloak on this one unit. I know you like a lot of the aspects of the mod, but seriously, it gets rather tiring to see you get upset about something in the mod, that we are making for free, voluntarily, and then get dramatic about it and tell folks you are going to make your own version (be it a whole new stat system or this unit or whatever) and depart in a huff. Where is "all the evidence in the world" for a third century (lack) of a Spartan cloak? I recently saw another depiction of the spartan unit for the third century (that is about as opposite as anyone could imagine from ours) by a very well known skinner/modeler, and it has a cloak too. I don't think I've seen any versions of the unit without them. But *we* won't listen to anyone and are like some big machine that (somehow, for free) runs roughshod over anyone's comments or thoughts on anything.

[Slider6977]

Excellently stated TA. Discussion on the subject is fine, but when you have a person such as this, when opinion is not opinion at all, it is fact, its pretty useless 'discussion'.

This thread is done, I can bring all the evidence in the world, I can have people agree or disagree, and I'll never change the minds of the people in EB, who consistently fall on ad-hoc arguments despite my challenges.

Oh well, I'll just have to mod the Spartan myself.

Last time I checked, I was living in the 21st century, don't know about you. And where is all the evidence in the world to make your point right. It doesn't exist. It is just opinion, and while you complain that you will never change anyones mind, its also true that in your mind your opinion is fact, and no one will ever be able to change YOUR mind. The FACT is, you can not nor never possibly know what they wore in battle, so why attack people that do not share your view on such, especially people who offer their time to provide you will a mod as realistic as POSSIBLE.

Anyway what a great point to make on your 10,000 th post TA .

[Teleklos Archelaou]

We *all* do agree that there is no way we can know for sure what third century spartans looked like. That is good. Our version of the unit will not be liked by some folks, for sure. Like we were mentioning, there is a range of possibilities. Ours is on the higher end of the range for a few different reasons. CB's recent spartans are on the other end. I can't say that all of our details are right, since most of our information does come from earlier periods (for the sparties). But some things we do know about them that greatly affected our view of the unit was that they fought with the king of sparta, and the served as mercenaries from Sicily and Italy and Greece to Crete and probably in much more distant places on occasion too. They used their money to support their families back home, as the helot business had closed up shop by this point in time. Plus this is the third century, not the fifth, so some changes in armor and helmets and such would be obvious. Sparta at this time had just begun to permit the minting of coins and had a reputation acquired with our starting king of allowing more luxuries than at any previous period. Plus, we felt like maybe taking things a little further (not much more for this point though) to get the point across that these are *not* Thermopylai Spartans, and that they have changed quite a bit in many respects. It's a fairly elite unit too, and although that didn't affect the way the unit was directly created, I'm personally glad I have a unit I can look forward to recruiting instead of feeling like it's a step down from my other units. Well, that's just a few general words to further prepare folks for the spartans when they are released. I'm sure there will be plenty more discussion. No problem talking about possibilities here though, as long as we realize what we know and what we don't.

[Fondor_Yards]

Yes he is talking about 5th century Spartans, however it doesn't make much sense that later they would suddenly decide to keep their cloaks in combat.

And I think your also correct, that there is very little anyone could say would be incorrect, and I did not say there is a "set" way a Spartan should look except for the fact they should not be wearing cloaks in combat. That is like saying Principes wore Lorica. It just didn't happen. It doesn't make any sense why they would do that.

My point Fondar is you want to have every advantage in combat possible. If you've ever seen the UFC fight between Royce Gracie and Kimo Leopold, where Royce essentially destroys Kimo by pulling his hair and thereby holding his head while he punches him in the face, you realize this. If Kimo hadn't had a pony-tail for looks, he may not have lost. It would be very easy to grab a part of the Spartan cloak and rip him to the ground (just like it was easy for Royce to grab Kimo's hair), especially if your weapons (such as some of the ones the Persians used) were unable to pierce his armor.


This thread is done, I can bring all the evidence in the world, I can have people agree or disagree, and I'll never change the minds of the people in EB, who consistently fall on ad-hoc arguments despite my challenges.

Oh well, I'll just have to mod the Spartan myself.

Your telling in the 230 years or so from 500 BC to 270 BC*game* the spartans didn't change their outfits or equipment at all? The EB team said they are not bringing the giant cloak blankets you were talking about. They said they were bringing smaller one.

And yes I have seen UCF, but that hardly applies here. Spartans did not fight 1v1 combat all over the battle field, they fought in a phalanx. I like to see some persian*why did you even say persian, the persian empire has been dead for over 100 years at this point* try to grab a spartan's cloak while he's being stabbed by 10 spears.

If you don't like the way EB shows their units, then don't play it. Did you ever stop for a second and think, maybe you were wrong. EB puts countless hours of work in each unit, I doubt they will have units wearing giant blanket cloaks. Other units in game have small cloaks on them as well, which is what they will have.

[fallen851]

Did you ever stop for a second and think, maybe you were wrong (sic).

This seems to be the center of the arguement against me.

Do I think I am wrong? No I don't because I base my opinion on trust sources and logic.

I haven't seen anyone bring up trusted sources that say they wore cloaks.

I haven't seen anyone refute my reasons why wearing a cloak in combat would be a burden.

Where are the sources?

If you guys have them, that is great, in that case I will be wrong, and I'll be the first one to say it. But why are you wasting your time attacking me, (or blindly supporting the EB team when you have no clue if they have the sources or not), why not just show me the evidence?

And if there are no sources, why not explain to me why cloaks are such a benefit, and why they would have become shorter.

I don't really ask for much, I just want evidence.

Almost every arguement you guys have used with me on this subject and others is ad-hoc, you don't give me the reason why you decided (the sources, the logic), you simply defend what you've decided by telling me ad-hoc arguements, for instance, other modders have done the same with the cloak on the Spartan. Well that is a logical fallacy, just because a lot of people believe in God, doesn't mean he exist. I'm so sick of crap arguements like that from the EB team. Tell me why you choose to put the cloak on the first place, why did you do it? And if it was just for show, then that's fine too, but don't claim the Spartan is realistic.

[Geoffrey S]

Ok, so it has a small cloak, which isn't traditional for a Spartan unit if I understand what you said correct, and you said it quite clearly, but I think you stated it incorrectly? And the cloak was used as blanket, is it big enough to be that?

Warry uses Thucycdides, Xenophon, and Plutarch as his main sources for that chapter.

I looked into Lykourgos, who Plutarch wrote a biography of, so I'm sure Warry is very familiar with him.

But enough with sources, would you wear your blanket in battle? Too often I think people read into sources as if they are end-all be-all arguements. We need to think "Does this make sense?"

But really, it seems you keep assuming that said cloak as it will be depicted in EB will be the huge, full cloak that the spartans slept in according to fifth century sources; the kind of cloaks as they were depicted in the original CA spartan hoplite.

But VandalCarthage has specifically stated that this is not the size of cloak that will be used in EB. Along with the fact that Spartans were not as spartan as may be assumed at the start of the EB game, it would be reasonable to assume they no longer slept in their cloaks but had other equipment for that (what a luxury!), that a cloak will be depicted more like on this unit than like the original unit in RTW. Certainly not a full-length body cloak.

[VandalCarthage]

Ok, so it has a small cloak, which isn't traditional for a Spartan unit if I understand what you said correct, and you said it quite clearly, but I think you stated it incorrectly? And the cloak was used as blanket, is it big enough to be that?

No, it's not, and I said nothing incorrectly - you've just been defining the word cloak for yourself in a very narrow fashion, this whole argument:

Cloak:
1. A loose outer garment, such as a cape.
2. Something that covers or conceals: a cloak of secrecy.

But VandalCarthage has specifically stated that this is not the size of cloak that will be used in EB. Along with the fact that Spartans were not as spartan as may be assumed at the start of the EB game, it would be reasonable to assume they no longer slept in their cloaks but had other equipment for that (what a luxury!), that a cloak will be depicted more like on this unit than like the original unit in RTW. Certainly not a full-length body cloak.

Thanks for listening

If you want pure realism, go play RTR. EB never said it was about 100% historical accuarcy.

That doesn't even really bear discussion...