[kennydicke]

Gregstrom

A note on the recurve bows: I had assumed (given the history and geography of the Ashdod/Hinnom/Gath source material) that the greatbows they used would be recurves. Their piccy looks sort of recurved, for that matter. If that assumption is correct, Qayanate bows shouldn't be quite up to those stats (Ashdod giants would presumably treat a 166 pound pull as a child's toy).

I always thought of the Gath nations as being Semitic, as nametype, unit/commander titles/names, startsites, heroes, etc. are *all* Semitic in origin. While they are truly great peoples, (especially the hittites, gotta love those who wield iron in while everyone around them is just hitting the bronze age! mod material?), I never thought of them as having recurve bows. But I wouldn't doubt it if I was wrong. If so, you are correct; if not, you are still correct. I tried to use the greatbow (when I was thinking it was an English longbow) as a reference, while staying on par/slightly better than it, weaker than the Gileadite bow, and stronger than the longbow (which to me was a standard long bow ~4.5-5ft long, while an English longbow was at least 6' long). If vanilla longbows are meant to represent standard longbows, the Mongol-style recurve should far outstrip it; if vanilla longbows are meant to represent English longbows the Mongol-style recurve *should* be comparable and slightly stronger with roughly equal (slightly higher) range and precision for the user. I can understand balance concerns, and tend to agree. I just like historical accuracy for some reason. I will tone them down to be about equal to a longbow for the larger recurve on foot units and slightly better than a composite bow for the mounted recurve. Further playtesting at those levels should determine their overall gamebreaking power. You raise really good points!

As far as vanguards etc. go: Their attack values drop (obviously enough) because you're using two weapons with a combined length of 6. Making the light lance a #bonus or adding some ambidexterity would fix this, as others have noted.

Not giving everyone ambidexterity was one concession I made to balance before even starting the mod. I would gladly give them all ambidexterity 2 if it's not too unbalancing.

The mental image of a horseman using a sabre and light lance while simultaneously getting effective use out of a buckler seems a little odd, though.

It does to my western sensibilities as well, but that is how the Mongols and Huns fought (when not shooting a bow, while still effectively using their buckler). History does not always match with logic, but we can try to force it!

My initial idea had been the creation of a sort of 'medium lance', with the lance's function of breaking on the first hit and the #bonus tag. I don't know if that's possible, though.

That was my initial idea as well, and was a topic I had wanted to broach at a further point. I'm actually pleased you brought it up. I am also unsure, I pretty much *just* delved into modding. My other attempts were mostly edits to prior code and a mirror of Machaka with a few new units that were probably way too strong. I assumed that the #charge tag made it *break* like lances, I am probably in error. If there is a decent way to do it, that anyone knows of, I'll take my best crack at it!

Mages: You're right on the button when you refer to Pythium. They and Mictlan are existing models of pantheonic faiths within the game. Pythium handles worshippers of something other than the Pretender by giving them the heretic tag, while Mictlan gives different sects the task of worshipping different aspects of the Pretender. Either works nicely. They're also (I think) a good model of the sort of mage power a magically diverse nation should have.

I was initially going to make the servanta of erlik, the closest thing to a true outcast, a heretic (I really like these one cold-bloods called Priests[?] of Sotek) as they were the only true outcasts. I should have made a note that one of the strengths of Mongol rule was that they were open to all races, creeds, and religions; they gave equality (at least, relative for the times) to men, women and other races that were *Mongol* (they themselves referred to any conquered/allied people in this way, they saw no difference between where someone was from, who he was descended from, what his skin color was, what his occupation was, or how he worshiped his chosen god; they only looked at if the person was useful to their society, whether as a warrior or workforce. (No slaves! Freedom was as important to them as it is *supposed* to be to American citizens.) For primarily this reason I decided against heretics; I also liked the pantheonic element to the lizardmen of Itza, so I thought I could incorporate a similarity. The only peoples they truly looked down on were the Chinese (cowards who hide behind walls), the Japanese (inhabitants of cursed islands) and the Koreans (who were too deadly to be engaged). All this aside, if the consensus is to make some heretics, or to remove #holy from some of them, I'll cast historicity aside!

By the way, why does the Quyan light scale they use have 0 enc? It doesn't matter for the cavalry, and the infantry are definitely under-encumbered given their levels of protection.

The leather-scale armor used by the Altaic tribes was not only tougher (read: protection), but lighter (read: encumbrance), more flexible (read: defense) and more durable (not really translatable to dominions) than the chain mail hauberks that were the European standard of the time. They didn't actually have lighter or heavier armors (the closest thing was an even tougher variation known as Lamellar armor, a more deflective albeit more rigid version) I took license to create variation; but technically, there should just be "Qayan Leather Scale" and "Qayan Lamellar Armor." Lamellar armor is actually what is shown in most depictions of Mongol, Rus, Turkic and Byzantine (ooh, another phenomenal race for a mod, the vanilla Pythium, a decent nation, does no justice; Byzantium, the Varyags of Miklagaard! I've already got a number of ideas, from twenty seconds of thought) warriors. Anyway, to a people whom both sexes donned armor at a very young age, and wore it as everyday clothing, a *light* armor would have no encumbrance. Once again, though, balance trumps historicity! Suggestions?

PS: Don't worry about the colonel thing. It certainly doesn't mean I'm any kind of expert.

Don't worry about the private thing. It certainly doesn't mean my last name is Parts! um roll: Please!

That wasn't meant as an insult Gregstrom. So please don't take it as such. I appreciate your input (as I do everyone's) and will strive to make everybody's suggestions gel into a fun, playable, and balanced mod nation!