EB news - Friday, April 8

[khelvan]

on the picture (big/first) i see two skirmishers, what's the differnce? one is holding two spears in one hand, how will the throwing animation be? btw will reload be fixed, will the grasp behind their shield instead of javs popping up? will the romans have two pila strapped on their shield?

They're different units...different names, different places of origin, and so on.

We currently have a choice for skirmishers - have them carry extra javelins in their off hand/shield hand, or not. We can't change it so they "use" the javelins. They're either there, or they are not. For many units they will remain there. For the Romans no, we decided not to because of the clipping issues this would cause with the Testudo, among other things.

[Divinus Arma]

Overall, I am delighted.

I'll throw in my two cents about the barbarian "hill": It just doesn't look right. The concept motivating the change is a step in the right direction though.

The new seige/blockade is AWESOME. Whoever is responsible for this work should be VERY proud of themselves.

The units look excellent of course.


I read some comments here about changing the army/spy/diplomat tokens.

Is this hard coded, or do you have something in mind? Quick thoughts: The army token could be changes to a formation, although I have no idea how challenging the animation changes would be. It would like nice though...
Diplomats could have a carriage or something similar, although I have no idea what was really used then.

Either way, whatever. Looks good so far. I look forward to the beta. I'll be happy to give you guys some professional beta testing reports.

[HolsteinCow]

About the barbarian watchtower...

Why not let it rest on a mound of dirt? That way, it would be appropriate for the all of seasons.

[Lief]

Really great guys. I'm really loving the German units. However, shouldn't their beard color match their hair color?

[Divinus Arma]

Hey me again.

I love the new seige art. A quick note on this:

I am currently reading "The making of the roman army: from republic to empire" (Keppie, 1998). Keppie's history is extremely detailed and he provides a mountain of sources for his work.

Here is my point: Many times he refers to seiges being conducted by the Roman army, with trenches and palisades, etc. Keppie (1998) details the Seige of Alesia:

"He [Caesar] dug out a 20 foot trench, with perpendicular sides at the bottom as at the top, and held back the other fortifications some 400 feet behind this trench... ...Behind the ditches he erected a rampart, strengthened by stakes, 12 feet in overall height. On top was a breastwork and battlement, with large forked branches projecting, where the breastwork and rampart met, to slow any Gauls who tried to climb over. There were towers put along the fortification, round the entire circuit, 800 feet apart" (p.89).

While this was in what, 53 or 52 BC... the specifics are important. If you are going to be so accurate as to change the seige art, you may as well do it in the spirit of your mod: accurately. So perhaps you may include this in addition to your tents? Just a thought.

I wish I had the artistic talent that you have, as I would do it myself and offer it to your labor.

reference:

Keppie, L. (1998). The Making of the Roman Army: From Republic to Empire. London: University of Oklahoma Press.

[khelvan]

So, we plan on addressing all of the campaign map models, including the soldier model. Unfortunately we have only so many people to work on these things, and only so much time. I don't think we can have the model change "formations," I believe it is a static model, but I'm not a modeller, so I can't really address that.

[eadingas]

About the siege model: we can't really add anything more to this, because it already reaches the limits of how complicated a model in RTW can be (there's a limit on number of polygons available, or sth like that), besides, not all armies have built complex fortifications when they were besieging cities, and this icon is supposed to be universal. So it's a compromise of sorts.

[Skilfingr]

the germanic warriors look awesome. I'm happy to see wooden shield bosses but the blue shield is a bit overdecorated (from the picture). simple, geometrical would be more appropriate, like the shield of the Sahsnotaz or Ridon-Harjan. another minor flaw: germanic people didn't used belt loops, but belt hooks in preroman iron time. the use of belt loops started around the beginning of the 1st century bc with roman forms.

I would be happy if some of your germanic researchers could tell me what the names of the units mean (my protogermanic is almost nonexisting). I guess Sahsnotaz means swordsbondsmen (ok that was not hard), Ridon-Harjan is army (german Heer, danish hær) horsemen (german Reiter, danish rytter), Bedilaz - absolutely no clue, Bugiz-Mannaz is bowmen (bow is in german Bogen, in danish bue or bov), Swainaz - this puzzles me most. I don't think it is something like swine (german Schwein, danish svin).

what happened to the suebian knot. is it dropped for good?

a last question about the unmounted Ridon-Harjan: is it possible to unmount a horsemen in battle (IIRC it is not possible) or is it just in this picture?

and the sahsnota should throw only one javelin at once - but I guess you already know

[jerby]

They're different units...different names, different places of origin, and so on.

We currently have a choice for skirmishers - have them carry extra javelins in their off hand/shield hand, or not. We can't change it so they "use" the javelins. They're either there, or they are not. For many units they will remain there. For the Romans no, we decided not to because of the clipping issues this would cause with the Testudo, among other things.

your animators can't change the reload animation? is already guessed you can't remove the jav form the shield, but let teh right arm go behind the shield to make it look like it 'grabs' s jav. look at the reload in rtw for javs. they pop up, can't the pop-up be fixed?

[Tux]

I read some comments here about changing the army/spy/diplomat tokens.

Is this hard coded, or do you have something in mind? Quick thoughts: The army token could be changes to a formation, although I have no idea how challenging the animation changes would be. It would like nice though...
Diplomats could have a carriage or something similar, although I have no idea what was really used then.

No it isn't hard-coded and this in our plan to change it and yes a little formation was our thought to do, with the other we haven't decided yet what to do.

[khelvan]

what happened to the suebian knot. is it dropped for good?

I can't speak for SaFe, but isn't this what you're talking about?



I also made a mistake on the unit name, it is Ridon-Harjaz, not Ridon-Harjan.

[Sarcasm]

Suebian Knot

[SaFe]

the germanic warriors look awesome. I'm happy to see wooden shield bosses but the blue shield is a bit overdecorated (from the picture). simple, geometrical would be more appropriate, like the shield of the Sahsnotaz or Ridon-Harjan. another minor flaw: germanic people didn't used belt loops, but belt hooks in preroman iron time. the use of belt loops started around the beginning of the 1st century bc with roman forms.

I would be happy if some of your germanic researchers could tell me what the names of the units mean (my protogermanic is almost nonexisting). I guess Sahsnotaz means swordsbondsmen (ok that was not hard), Ridon-Harjan is army (german Heer, danish hær) horsemen (german Reiter, danish rytter), Bedilaz - absolutely no clue, Bugiz-Mannaz is bowmen (bow is in german Bogen, in danish bue or bov), Swainaz - this puzzles me most. I don't think it is something like swine (german Schwein, danish svin).

what happened to the suebian knot. is it dropped for good?

a last question about the unmounted Ridon-Harjan: is it possible to unmount a horsemen in battle (IIRC it is not possible) or is it just in this picture?

and the sahsnota should throw only one javelin at once - but I guess you already know

A lot of questions, let me answer a few
- the suebian knot will appear also, but it was naturally not the only known hairstyle of the germanic people:-)

Bugiz-Mannaz are Bowmen and Sahsnotaz meaning Swordbondsmen - perfectly right.
Ridon-Harjaz means Rider-Warrior.
Bedilaz means Free Men
and
Swainaz means Youthling.

Enough for now...

[Colovion]

I know I shouldn't, but every update drops my jaw to the floor. Especially those rustic 'barbarian' units which honestly look simply fantastic. Out of all of the custom units I've seen, those are undoubtedly my favourite. Something about the shading and the lines on them make me get a feeling of the true essence that they exuded. Big props to Alin and Webbird. The Germans are going to look amazing, and already are.

Keep up the amazing work guys, I know I haven't been around recently, but you're blowing any competition out of the water time and again. I love the fleets and the blockades, excellent work.

[Skilfingr]

the head of the Osterby man

A lot of questions, let me answer a few
- the suebian knot will appear also, but it was naturally not the only known hairstyle of the germanic people:-)

of course not. many roman depictions of germanic people show the suebian knot. this doesn't necessarily means that most of the germanic peoples used it. in fact romans had a very strict image of barbarians (long blond or red hair and beard, tall, athletic, savage and so on) based on the (not always accurate) descriptions given by Caesar, Tacitus and others. once they got used to the peculiarity of "the" germanic peoples, it is very likely that they used the suebian knot in most depictions to characterize these barbarians as germanic people.

on the other hand Tacitus describes in detail which tribes used the suebian knot. the short version: the suebian people
the long version Semnonen, Langobarden, Hermunduren, Markomannen, Quaden and many more.

Do you mean by your statement, that suebian knot is used only for units exclusively to suebian areas?

the interesting thing in his Germania is: he claims that the suebian knot is mark of the suebians. a few lines later, he is contradicting himself by stating that men of other tribes used this hair style too.

[SaFe]

the head of the Osterby man



of course not. many roman depictions of germanic people show the suebian knot. this doesn't necessarily means that most of the germanic peoples used it. in fact romans had a very strict image of barbarians (long blond or red hair and beard, tall, athletic, savage and so on) based on the (not always accurate) descriptions given by Caesar, Tacitus and others. once they got used to the peculiarity of "the" germanic peoples, it is very likely that they used the suebian knot in most depictions to characterize these barbarians as germanic people.

on the other hand Tacitus describes in detail which tribes used the suebian knot. the short version: the suebian people
the long version Semnonen, Langobarden, Hermunduren, Markomannen, Quaden and many more.

Do you mean by your statement, that suebian knot is used only for units exclusively to suebian areas?

the interesting thing in his Germania is: he claims that the suebian knot is mark of the suebians. a few lines later, he is contradicting himself by stating that men of other tribes used this hair style too.

As the tribes of the suebian confederation had many contacts with other tribes this hairstyle was often adapted. It is not exclusivly for suebian people.

[Simetrical]

If an army is represented by a single person, why shouldn't a fleet be represented by a single ship?

-Simetrical

[khelvan]

The armies won't be represented by a single person for long :)

[jerby]

question: will teh reload-jav-animation be different
evver seen it from close up? the sword magically transforms into a jav. looks weird. and than they bend over with their head touchign teh ground to throw it 30 meters up into the air sometimes, something looks weird.

[khelvan]

If possible, then yes.