Nescio

https://code.wildfiregames.com/D2779

Thanks, that explains it. I suppose I simply have to get used to no longer typing "preview". Also, "only" saves three characters.

Today I updated arc; apparently the libphutil is deprecated and merged into the arcanist repository. To my surprise, however, `arc diff --preview` no longer works; I get: [0ad]$ arc diff --preview Usage Exception: Unknown argument 'preview'. Try 'arc help'. I don't understand why. After a quick search I found an alternative, `arc diff --only`. What's the difference?

Quoting a paragraph from Joyce Poole, Paula Kahumbu, Ian Whyte “Loxodonta africana Savanna Elephant (African Bush Elephant)” in Jonathan Kingdon, David C. D. Happold, Thomas M. Butynski, Michael Hoffmann, Meredith Happold, Jan Kalina (eds.) Mammals of Africa (London 2013) 181–194; 183: And the corresponding paragraph from Andrea Turkalo, Richard Barnes “Loxodonta cyclotis Forest Elephant” in Jonathan Kingdon, David C. D. Happold, Thomas M. Butynski, Michael Hoffmann, Meredith Happold, Jan Kalina (eds.) Mammals of Africa (London 2013) 195–200; 196:

True. My point is size alone is not a good criterion. The pygmy elephants of the Congo were long thought to be a separate species, but they turn out to be simply an isolated population of forest elephants; the same is true of pygmy peoples. No, actually not. During colonial times about a dozen subspecies were proposed for the African elephant, but none are recognized nowadays, nor is the L. a. pharaonensis. Practically all scholarly publications on hellenistic war elephants from, say, the last 50 years, typically state, or repeat, as a matter of fact, that North African elephants were forest elephants (Loxodonta cyclotis). Furthermore, they rarely highlight the fact that Carthage and the Ptolemies sourced them from two entirely separate populations. Historians and classicists are not biologists. Only the latest cyclus matters, what happened long before is not very relevant in this case (the spread of African elephants). Whether they are aware of it or not, those arguing that North African elephants were forest elephants implicitly assume an argument along the lines of: c. 15 000 years ago both bush and forest elephants roamed the entire continent. Due to increasing desertification, elephants disappeared from the Sahara. Bush elephants died out in Mediterranean North Africa and the broader Red Sea region, whereas forest elephants survived there, as in the equatorial rainforests. (Somehow the different climates and environments didn't matter.) Everywhere else bush elephants survived and forest elephants disappeared. (Somehow the different climates and environments did matter.) Despite the distance and isolation, the forest elephants of Mediterranean North Africa and those of the broader Red Sea region were rather similar to each other. Starting from about 2000 years ago, elephants died out in Mediterranean North Africa and the broader Red Sea region. Subsequently, bush elephants moved into the broader Red Sea region, from which the modern elephant populations there are derived. Compare this with: c. 15 000 years ago bush elephants roamed the entire continent. Forest elephants were limited to the equatorial rainforests, as they are now. Due to increasing desertification, elephants disappeared from the Sahara, isolating the bush elephants in Mediterranean North Africa from those elsewhere. Often simpler explanations tend to be more likely.

https://wildfiregames.com/forum/index.php?/topic/28114-removing-territorial-system/&tab=comments#comment-396101

Yes! 0 A.D.'s elephants are a bit ugly; e.g. their necks are too long: Also, if the feet are to be improved, Asian elephants have “usually five nail-like structures on each forefoot and four on each rear foot instead of [African elephants, which have] four and three” https://doi.org/10.2307/3504045 0 A.D. has separate lion and lioness actors, and also bulls and cows for cattle. Would it also be possible to have male and female elephants? For instance, male Indian elephants, 1.7× as tall as humans, can be used for war elephants, and female Indian elephants, 1.4× as tall as humans, and without tusks, could be used for worker elephants. It would also be nice to have elephant calves of a few sizes (e.g. 25%, 50%, 75%).

If and when units on walls no longer interfere with the opening and closing of gates (D1418), it would be possible to garrison units on gates (D2760) and also on wall towers (D2769), differentiating them further from free-standing defence towers and making them more similar to other wall segments. Most wall towers are already suitable for this, with a platform on top, but a few actors would need to be adjusted. From left to right, the kush, mace, and sele wall towers: The Kushite actor is fine and doesn't need changes. The one of the “Hellenes” (used by athen, mace, spart) needs its roof replaced with a platform, like those of other civs; it also has a tiny window halfway and is the only one with a door at ground level; could those be removed? Walls were typically solid up to the parapet level. The sele also needs a platform instead of the roof, or, if you want more variation, raise the roof and replace the chamber with a platform (cf. gaul); also remove those arrowslits in the middle. The brit wall tower does have a platform on top, but the roof is so low there is no room for placing units. At the very least its roof should be raised considerably (cf. gaul). However, the brit wall tower could actually use a redesign, since currently it's neither round, nor square, nor a regular octagon. The last civ with unsuitable wall towers is maur; here the situation is more complicated, because the short, medium, long segments have roofs too, which would should not end in empty space, and because the wall tower design is basically used in the gate as well:

Here are more pictures from Wikimedia Commons, to highlight the differences between elephant subspecies. First the African bush or savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana); note the pronounced curve of the back, the large, triangular ears, and the curved, forward-pointing tusks: Then there is the African forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis); notice the more level back, the rounder ears, and the straight, downward-pointing tusks: Next the Indian elephant (Elephas maximus indicus); you can see it has a round back, a more dome-like skull, much smaller ears, and a trunk with only one “finger”; also, females don't have tusks: The Sri Lanka elephant (Elephas maximus maximus) is largely similar, but darker of skin: Finally, the Sumatran elephant (Elephas maximus sumatranus):

For your information, D2503 has been committed as rP23703 and rP23704 (thank you, @Stan`), which means selection shapes are now named differently, so you'll probably have to update your mod, @wowgetoffyourcellphone. Other mods should be fine. I see only now I forgot to add the selection texture line thickness required for constant line thickness (units with smaller footprints need thicker lines), so here's the table again, @fatherbushido, with an additional column: 128x256 : width × depth ; proportional ; required for constant line thickness chicken : 0.9 × 1.8 ; 3 ; 33.333 fox, *piglet*, *rabbit* : 1 × 2 ; 3.333 ; 30 *peacock* : 1.1 × 2.2 ; 3.667 ; 27.273 goat : 1.3 × 2.6 ; 4.333 ; 23.077 dog, sheep, wolf : 1.4 × 2.8 ; 4.667 ; 21.429 gazelle : 1.5 × 3.0 ; 5 ; 20 deer, elephant infants : 1.7 × 3.4 ; 5.667 ; 17.647 cattle, giraffe infant, zebra : 1.9 × 3.8 ; 6.333 ; 15.789 bear, *boar*, lion : 2 × 4 ; 6.667 ; 15 donkey, horse, muskox, tiger, wildebeest : 2.1 × 4.2 ; 7 ; 14.286 dromedary camel : 2.5 × 5 ; 8.333 ; 12 white rhinoceros : 2.8 × 5.6 ; 9.333 ; 10.714 *hippopotamus* : 3 × 6 ; 10 ; 10 walrus : 3.2 × 6.4 ; 10.667 ; 9.375 giraffe : 3.3 × 6.6 ; 11 ; 9.091 African forest elephant : 3.5 × 7 ; 11.667 ; 8.571 Asian elephant : 4 × 8 ; 13.333 ; 7.5 African bush elephant : 4.6 × 9.2 ; 15.333 ; 6.522 128x512 : width × depth ; proportional ; required for constant line thickness great white shark : 2 × 8 ; 6.667 ; 15 *Nile crocodile* : 3 × 12 ; 10 ; 10 humpback whale : 4 × 16 ; 13.333 ; 7.5 fin whale : 5 × 20 ; 16.667 ; 6

https://code.wildfiregames.com/D2684

It depends on your operating system, see https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/GameDataPaths On my end (Fedora 32) it's under .config/0ad/logs/

Yes, this is something I have too, for years now, both when I open up atlas from inside the game and when I run it from the command line with: binaries/system/pyrogenesis -editor It probably has something to do with the fact I have a high resolution (3840×2160) and Atlas treats system settings differently than 0 A.D. @vladislavbelov taught me to use: GDK_SCALE=1 binaries/system/pyrogenesis -editor instead, and then Atlas does use the full space indeed.

Speaking of which, I recommend: Lionel Casson The Periplus Maris Erythraei : text with introduction, translation, and commentary (Princeton 1989) The Periplus is an unique text, written between AD 40 and 70 in a matter-of-fact style by an experienced Egyptian Greek merchant who evidently sailed himself to the East African coast, Arabia, and Western India. What I find particularly interesting are the points where his account, of the early Roman period, differs from the descriptions of the major geographers (Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, Pliny), which reflect the situation in Ptolemaic times. Casson's book contains a wealth of information, is reliable, and worth a read.

True, the Sahara is significantly larger today than it was in the 3rd C BC and the surrounding areas a lot more arid. However, what I meant was that the Sahara was a desert in Antiquity, i.e. hostile to elephants, and the situation during the African Humid Period (nice term!) is not relevant for the Hellenistic period. The Libyan (Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco) and Ethiopian (Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia) elephants were two completely separate populations. The Sudan and Sahel have probably moved a great deal to the south in the past millennia and Lake Chad and Lake Yoa used to be many times larger than they're now, so yes, it's certainly possible there were still elephants there in Hellenistic times. However, assuming there were elephants in the Tibesti mountains and the Ptolemies were aware of that, there is still the problem how they could have sent tame elephants there and brought back captured wild elephants to Egypt, given the desert in between. Exactly! When populations are isolated, they tend to diverge, there is nothing unusual about that. It's the simplest and least problematic explanation for the small African war elephants. Anyway, I believe we're basically in agreement, we just have different backgrounds and ways of expressing ourselves.

That could be the location of Herodotus Trogodites, yes. However, in later authors the term refers exclusively to the Red Sea coast. The difference could be in how or where they were obtained; see also the Casson (1993) article linked earlier. One explanation might be that Ethiopia here refers to the kingdom of Meroë (i.e. Kush). There is also evidence for elephant remains in Northern Tunisia during the 9th century BC: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352409X16302693 Yes, Northern Tunisia belongs to the same geographic area as Northern Algeria. It was also a lot more fertile than it is today. Elephants could have roamed throughout the Mediterranean coastal strip. The Sahara alternates between complete desert and green savanna every 10,000 years or so, thus there were probably some elephants when the area was green in the Neolithic, but in Hellenistic times the Sahara was a desert, like now.

Luckily the livius.org page linked earlier has an identifier of the inscription: OGIS 54. Found it: https://epigraphy.packhum.org/text/218979 [EDIT]: and: https://archive.org/details/orientisgraeciin01dittuoft/page/85/mode/2up : In ipso lapide sine dubio Τρωγοδυτικῶν scriptum fuit.

The classical sources could be explained either way, hence the debate in modern scholarship. What is needed is both critical thinking and common sense. Paraphrasing Fichte for the most plausible solution: thesis: African elephants had turrets. antithesis: African elephants could impossibly have had turrets. synthesis: African elephants may occassionally have had turrets. Herodotus' world view is fairly straightforward: to the East of the Nile is Asia, to the West Libya, to the South Aithiopia. This remained more or less accepted for about two millennia. Herodotus' entry on the Trogodytes is in IV.183: Given their position in the text, it's clear Herodotus locates them somewhere in the Sahara. This is not the case for later authors (Diodorus Siculus, Strabo, etc.), where Τρωγοδυτική means the lands on the Red Sea coast, opposite Arabia. From Pliny Naturalis Historia book VI: With “Troglodytic and Ethiopian elephants” the inscription means elephants from the coast (T) and interior (E). If Ptolemy III had any Libyan elephants, they would have been called as such; also note “the kingdom of Egypt and Libya [i.e. Cyrenaica]” etc. earlier in the inscription. Moreover, I doubt there were any elephants in the Northern Sahara steppe in Classical times; Carthage seems to have captured them in the woodlands surrounding the Atlas mountains (Morocco and Northern Algeria). What I want to know is whether that inscription really has a λ. Some manuscripts do, presumably because of association with τρώγλη (LSJ: an hole formed by gnawing, esp. a mouse's hole; plural: caves; holes in clothes; of canals in the flesh), but the correct form appears to be Τρωγοδύται, without the λ.

Why? I did a grep in the simulation folder, and neither 'actor_mask' nor 'actor.png' showed up. I don't know for sure. I assume those values were introduced for a reason. For me, though, multiples of 0.5 are good enough. What do you mean exactly? I understand, but you can browse the mod files on github. It's basically a regular dodecagram {12/5} in a circle, hence why I named it `circled_dodecagram`; you can find it, along with several other, similar shapes, under here. An octogonal shape is fairly easy to write, e.g. last_octagon.svg.

Though in the case of dogs, horses, cattle, etc. we can blame human breeding methods, which is not applicable to war elephants, which were captured from the wild. A better example is the difference between the now extinct Sicilian and Italian wolves; they were both about the same length, but the former had a shoulder height of c. 55 cm, the latter of c. 66 cm (F M Angelici & L Rossi (2018)). Numerous other examples exist of divergence and morphological differences (shape and size) when populations are chronically separated (for the Sicilian wolf, by the Strait of Messina; by the Sahara for the North African elephants). I know of it, though I haven't looked up the original publication. Ptolemy III did invade Babylonia, but whether he really conquered it, as well as the Upper Satrapies, is doubtful. In general Babylonian records tend to be more reliable than Egyptian propaganda. https://www.livius.org/sources/content/mesopotamian-chronicles-content/bchp-11-invasion-of-ptolemy-iii-chronicle/ L. Casson (1993) “Ptolemy II and the Hunting of African Elephants” (JSTOR, Sci-Hub) discusses the Ptolemaic elephant programme (infrastructure, locations, organization, etc.). Thanks again, that's an useful article, the images are nice and sharp, and the list of references long. This is yet another interesting debate. Many scholars hold the view Asian elephants did and African elephants did not have turrets; others argue both had turrets; some state Indian elephants didn't have turrets either. Proving the non-existence of something is always tricky, and often relies on an argumentum ex silentio. See M. B. Charles (2008) “African Forest Elephants and Turrets in the Ancient World” (JSTOR, Sci-Hub) for a recent overview. Let's split the question into three: Could North African elephants have supported a turret? Did Ptolemaic war elephants have turrets? Did Carthaginian war elephants have turrets? Given the loads donkeys, mules, and dromedary camels can carry on their backs, or humans carrying a lectica (litter), even small elephants shouldn't have trouble with the weight of a turret. Therefore I believe the answer to the first question is yes, though presumably their turrets would provide space for one or two men, rather than the three or four of an Indian elephant. As for the second question, Plb 5.84.2 is clear enough. Some people try to explain it away by stating these Ptolemaic elephants that engaged their Seleucid counterparts were Indian elephants, with turrets, whereas those Ptolemaic elephants that shied away and refused to fight were African elephants, without turrets. I don't see a compelling reason for this, though. Alexander had a quite large corps of Indian elephants, which was later split between various successors; Ptolemy I later seized some of those. Wild elephants can have a lifespan beyond 60 years, however, elephants in captivity don't breed and die younger; using them in forced marches and pitched battles is not helpful either. The Seleucids blocked access to India, which is why Ptolemy II went to such lengths to capture African elephants. If Ptolemy IV had some Indian elephants at the Battle of Raphia (217 BC), how did he get them? Finally, Carthage. On the one hand, it's notable neither Livy nor other hellenistic historians mention turrets in combination with Hannibal's elephants, nor are they displayed on Carthaginian coinage: On the other hand there is an entry in the Suda; P. Rance (2009) “Hannibal, Elephants and Turrets in Suda Θ 438 [Polybius Fr. 162⁻] — an Unidentified Fragment of Diodorus” (ResearchGate, JSTOR, Sci-Hub) discusses it in detail; and this terracotta from Pompeii (1st C AD?), now in the archaeological museum of Naples: (Which also seems to be the inspiration for the cart and ptol elephant actors in 0 A.D.) Taking everything together, I'm inclined to agree with Charles (2008), that Carthaginian elephants typically did not carry turrets, but might have on special occassions (e.g. parades), which is probably also true for the Roman elephants. (Yes, the Romans had African war elephants on multiple occassions, including the battles of Cynoscephalae (197 BC), Thermopylae (191 BC), Magnesia (190 BC), during the Second Celtiberian War (154–151 BC), and possibly during the invasions of Britain.)

Shouldn't fmt be added to the dependencies then?

Actually my point was descriptive, not prescriptive. Here is a table with animal footprints: 128x256 : width × depth ; proportional line thickness chicken : 0.9 × 1.8 ; 3 fox, *piglet*, *rabbit* : 1 × 2 ; 3.333 *peacock* : 1.1 × 2.2 ; 3.667 goat : 1.3 × 2.6 ; 4.333 dog, sheep, wolf : 1.4 × 2.8 ; 4.667 gazelle : 1.5 × 3.0 ; 5 deer, elephant infants : 1.7 × 3.4 ; 5.667 cattle, giraffe infant, zebra : 1.9 × 3.8 ; 6.333 bear, *boar*, lion : 2 × 4 ; 6.667 donkey, horse, muskox, tiger, wildebeest : 2.1 × 4.2 ; 7 dromedary camel : 2.5 × 5 ; 8.333 white rhinoceros : 2.8 × 5.6 ; 9.333 *hippopotamus* : 3 × 6 ; 10 walrus : 3.2 × 6.4 ; 10.667 giraffe : 3.3 × 6.6 ; 11 African forest elephant : 3.5 × 7 ; 11.667 Asian elephant : 4 × 8 ; 13.333 African bush elephant : 4.6 × 9.2 ; 15.333 128x512 : width × depth ; proportional line thickness great white shark : 2 × 8 ; 6.667 *Nile crocodile* : 3 × 12 ; 10 humpback whale : 4 × 16 ; 13.333 fin whale : 5 × 20 ; 16.667 ** means assuming D2721 is committed I count 20 different footprint sizes, which means at least that many selection textures versions need to be made if you want a constant line thickness in game. You present it as a fact; I'm unsure what you're exactly referring to. Could you clarify, especially what was done and when? What do you mean with “fancier texture”? Something like this: or this: Personally I like complex shapes and elaborate patterns. However, in my personal experience (I tend to play maximally zoomed out), simpler is clearer and better, because the purpose of selection shapes is to easily identify different entities. You can find my personal take in my 0abc mod, which is not exactly the same as my personal recommendation for 0 A.D., i.e. D2503.

Thanks, that's an interesting article. Elephant usage in antiquity is a subject that has fascinated me for years. I may be a bit of an heretic, but I happen to disagree here. First a bit of context: Modern taxonomy started with Linnaeus in the 18th C. The recognized extant elephant species and subspecies are (thank Wikipedia): Sri Lankan elephant: Elephas maximus (1758) → E. m. maximus (1940) African (bush or savanna(h)) elephant: Elephas africanus (1797) → Loxodonta africanus (1824/7) Indian elephant: Elephas indicus (1798) → E. m. indicus (1940) Sumatran elephant: Elephas sumatranus (1847) → E. m. sumatranus (1940) African forest elephant: Loxodonta cyclotis (1900/36) Unaware of the existence of forest elephants, early-20th C scholars critized Polybius, because they knew from zoos and safaris that African elephants are larger than Asian elephants. Now aware of their existence, mid-20th C scholars argued the North African elephants were actually forest elephants, because they knew those were the smallest species. DNA-sequencing emerged in the late 20th C, giving biologists a powerful tool to determine species. Hybrids (forest × bush) have been discovered. Most ancient historians focus primarily on the elephant size (height or weight); @Genava55's article is no exception. However, size is certainly not the only criterion; elephant species also differ in the shape of their back, ears, tusks, trunk lips, etc. Here is an article listing the differences between bush and forest elephants:Living African elephants belong to two species_ Loxodonta african.pdf All ancient depictions of African elephants I've seen resemble small African bush elephants (S-shaped back, curved, forward-pointing tusks), not really African forest elephants (straighter back, straight, downward-pointing tusks). Moreover, size is not everything. Pygmies (<150 cm) are not less human than Bosnians (>180 cm). And chihuahuas and St Bernhards belong to the same subspecies (Canis lupus familiaris, the domestic dog). Furthermore, forest elephants live in the equatorial forests of Africa, to the south of the Sudanian Savanna, where bush elephants are native; North Africa is much closer in distance, climate, and vegetation to the areas where bush elephants live; anyone arguing ancient war elephants were forest elephants ought to have an explanation how those ended up in North Africa. Therefore I'm of the opinion that both the “Libyan” elephants, used by the Carthaginians, Numidians, and Romans, and the “Ethiopian” elephants, used by the Kushites, Ptolemies, and Axumites, were simply small bush elephants, not forest elephants.

So the Indian war elephant is approximately 1.7 times as tall as men? That sounds about right, they shouldn't get higher. Where can I find that? Such a tool would be quite useful for determining appropiate footprint heights for the current animal templates.

https://code.wildfiregames.com/D2756