Sundiata

@causative, I agree that they're not glass cannons, and destroying it isn't done with a few stabs from a sword, true. I'm just saying that they had no business in an open battlefield. Also, when defenders try to brake out and rams are overrun/caught in the open, they would simply be abandoned by their crews because they offer very little intrinsic protection from units on the ground. That's what I want to see. Also, oil and fire will definitely stop a ram in it's tracks. Pouring oil on anything that's wet, and then setting it alight is a disaster for anyone nearby. Oily fire splatter is not a joke, and the the now burning ground around it is most unpleasant for anyone forced to push through it. The wet animal skins are mostly against flaming arrows, I believe. Also tanks (still don't agree with the analogy ) are often taken out by ground troop placing explosives on, or near them (IED's and sticky bombs for example).

But what is half an hour in an engagement that can last days or even longer? Battering rams were operated by soldiers... Not really though... That title would go to war-elephants. And battering rams have a much more limited use... Taking down gates, and sometimes city-walls, but not other structures or units. Yeah, but oil and fire does the trick very well. Also, this scenario depends on a ram being attacked from above from garrisoned walls. A ram in the middle of a battlefield would be abandoned by its crew faster than you could say "Ave Caesar".

Historically speaking, battering rams were used almost exclusively to bring down gates (sometimes walls). They are now used to bring down pretty much any structure in game which makes them very unrealistic. Yes, I get it, gameplay... I'm just clarifying something about how compromises in historicity for gameplay's sake can actually negatively affect gameplay in some respects (rampaging rams). Buildings were brought down by infantry units, not battering rams. Infantry units would set buildings on fire, or pull down supporting columns with ropes or hack through supporting walls, or even disassemble structures block by block, by hand, using only simple tools. Rams are actually very easy to destroy or capture outright... Any unaccompanied ram caught out in the open by enemy infantry should realistically be captured or destroyed with relative ease. Rams were never used in melee combat, and rams killing units or horses is super-awkward and annoying. Rams were not hermetically sealed from the outside world, making the people operating it invulnerable or something. Quite the opposite... You would NOT want to be one of the dudes they assign to the ram (on account of the high chance of death). Rams were normally built on the spot, and usually only 1, or just a few at the time, accompanied by a battalion, but not armies of battering rams going in solo. This is obviously not how ancient warfare worked. Ancient battles can easily last several hours or even days, and sieges can last weeks/months/years... If you translate those times to in-game time, where battles can last a few minutes, battering rams should go down in a matter of seconds if not properly protected. I'm not saying that everything about battering rams in game needs to change, I'm just saying that history can't be used as a justification for current battering ram-mechanics, because it's so far off from how they were actually used.

@mapkoc Yeah, borderline stone-age clubmen definitely don't need to be op... Thanks for reporting!

@TheFortold, right-click on the 0AD icon, and choose "show package content" contents → resources → data → mods (to place a mod) Most of the interesting stuff is in: mods → public → public There are a lot of hidden files on a macbook, and sometimes you'll have to use the ~/Library (which itself is also hidden...) to follow certain file-paths. MacBook makes finding specific files aggravatingly difficult/annoying if you're unfamiliar with this kind of stuff, like I am.. Finding save-games or user-created maps becomes a whole hullabaloo because of it.

@balduin, So there are two main types of cavalry depicted in those images. Javelin cavalry and lancers. The javelineers usually carry a few spears/javelins which would be thrown at the enemy from a short distance, after which the rider would pull back, and circle round to find another opening to throw another spear. Especially heavy cavalry is usually restricted to nobility and maintaining horses is expensive. Most individuals with horses also owned servants (also depicted in some of the images) who would carry much of the equipment, and when javelins are finished can provide "reloads" during battles. I don't know exactly what distance they were thrown from. Definitely varies in different places and depends on equipment, training and experience. I'm not familiar with textual references of African cavalry traditions detailing your questions. Not that they don't exist, I'm just not familiar with them, and I think a lot of the primary references would be in Arabic (the script that was used throughout much of the Sahel and beyond in the medieval period e.g. libraries of Timbuktu) and Ge'ez, ancient Ethiopic script, both of which I don't understand There are also descriptions by European travelers which mention some cavalry traditions, like the repetitive but fake massed cavalry charges against visitors to impress them, as an "official welcome" (can be seen in this image) I should share the following video of Queen Elizabeth's visit to Northern Nigeria in 1956, and the royal durbar in her name. Lots of cavalry (mostly Hausa and Fulani) including the fake massed cavalry charge on the Queen seen towards the end of the video. There are offensive colonial undertones in the narration of the video, but considering it's from 1956, it's not as terrible as one might expect.

@stanislas69 to me it looks perfect now... So this would be ideal for the Carthaginian war elephant, but I think it could also be used for the Ptolemies and even for that one Kushite hero-elephant, with their respective props, of course.

Ooooh, cool, I think that looks way better! I like the way the blanket makes the tower look less large, but maybe the blanket itself is a tad too large/wide? By the way, here's an idea for the Ptolemaic tower (wood frame), although this one seems to be used for parades. I can still imagine some leather spun over it for actual battle:

Amazing work as usual... @stanislas69 Just a quick question: where does the Kush_cavalry_archer come from?? It was removed from the 0ADMods Github like 2 months ago because there's no primary references of Kushite cav-archers... Just noticed now that it's in the main 0AD Github nonetheless...

@stanislas69 Very cool indeed! @wowgetoffyourcellphone I think it's important to emphasize the fact that these towers are very lightweight. Some of the artists' reference images of a Carthaginian war-elephant shows towers made of stitched leather, (probably hardened, and spun over a light wooden frame). I think that would do good to add to the authenticity of the look. Also, maybe the tower is still a little too tall? I made a stitched leather texture that I think would be more appropriate for the tower? Secondly, I think there needs to be a thick blanket (3D) underneath the tower, to cushion the tower for the elephant and evenly distribute the weight. This image shows very beautifully, how the tower is cushioned by a thick blanket: If you look at all the references, the towers are usually fastened to the elephant with three straps: one across it's chest, one across it's belly, and one across it's butt. Most appropriate IMO would be a thick leather strap in the middle across it's belly, and metal chains across it's chest and butt. The leather strap in the middle holds the tower down (anchors it) and the the two metal chains across it's front and back prevent it from moving back and forth. Maybe @Alexandermb could help us here?

@wowgetoffyourcellphone So I finally watched Black Panther... I enjoyed it though it's not really my genre... Totally worth the watch! "Don't scare me like that, colonizer!"... I died... I saw dem Azande shields! The pattern is almost the same as one of our own, lol! Of course, as an Africanist, I have my pet peeves. As a huge mashup of everything African, from North, South, East to West, they still managed to underrepresent African art and culture... lol. For example in the museum: The "Edo Mask" from Nigeria looks absolutely hideous compared to the real Edo Mask it was modeled after: There is no such thing as the "Bobo Ashanti tribe" from Ghana. "Bobo Ashanti" is an order, or mansion in the Rastafarian movement. The Ghanaian tribe is simply known as "Ashanti" or "Asante". They're not known for their mask-making either, but of course there are exceptions, and the golden mask of the Asantehene (King/Emperor of Ashanti) Kofi Karikari is the most well known metal mask from Ashanti. Note the striking difference between the rather hideous Ashanti metal mask in Black Panther: Many more examples like that, but what can you expect from Hollywood Anyway, good movie!

@Alexandermb Thank you so much for your rich contributions! This is way better than my 2 dimensional attempt

@Alexandermb Cool The horses from Ballana (post-Meroitic) are by far the most complete Kushite-style horse-accoutrements ever found/reassembled, with direct parallels to earlier Kushite horse-trappings and 100% perfect as reference. Note the the bells... These are the actual accoutrements! From the Nubian museum in Aswan: The only difference is that the older Kushite variants are more complicated, with the strings of circular silver discs often replaced with squarish or rectangular silver or bronze plaques with figures of gods or lions attached to leather bands (this obviously won't be visible in game), and extensive use of faience:

Indeed, the suggestion came up before. Wowgetoffyourcellphone also suggested it if I'm not wrong. I've flirted with the idea of a paired tech for the temples myself. I personally think it's really nice to have both structures be buildable, but perhaps it does brake too much with the other civs... It's not totally unhistorical because there were towns with both an Amun temple and an Apedemak temple, but there were also towns which only had one of the two temples. One issue is that the temples have different build-costs (which they should have), and should have different techs.. Amun temple should have an important civic tech. Lion-temple could have a modest military tech (Apedemak is a war-god, among other things). But that might actually make the choice more interesting. I leave it up to you guys..

On another note, it would actually be quite appropriate to have a build limit of max 1 Amun temple. They were built with the frequency of about 1 every 100 years or so... Am I the only one who thinks "upgrading" someone's grave/tomb is really weird?

@Hannibal_Barca & @Grugnas You don't really need my agreement on anything. I'm just here to provide the historically accurate information and references. That having said, indeed, Apedemak temples are not Amun-temples, not by a long shot, regardless of the very superficial similarity. It's super-awkward to "upgrade" from one god to another god... The way the game portrays them now is perfect. I'm not sure which phases they become buildable, but it makes sense to leave the Amun temple for the city phase, and add an important tech, like "overseer of works", to merit building it. Organizing labour, managing plantations, training artisans and even call the men of the land including the King himself to arms were some of the duties of the priests of Amun. This way you'd also get information on the state of an opponent: Amun temple = city phase. Kush was probably one of the most theocratic civilizations in the game, and "only" 2 temples is a good approximation of this. Apedemak is so quintessentially Meroitic that excluding him would be "wrong". He's second only to Amun, and personified the (military) power of the Meroitic King. The temples are way smaller, so it's perfect for town-phase. Also: Lion-God... a God... That's a lion... I mean, yo... How cool is that!?! As for the pyramids, I've said before I'm totally open to whichever way you want to feature them. 2 different types of pyramids was never a necessity or request from my side, but the variation is nice. Having one structure with 4 variants (like the houses), works just as fine for me...

@mimo, fair enough... Thanks again for taking the time to reply.

@mimo Thank you for the clarifications/explanation! Sorry about being such a spoiled brat about everything "I want" for 0AD. I always want more . I've just learned to speak my mind, so that my thoughts are out there, and they don't fester in my mind. Of course I'm not familiar with all the specifics that go in to implementing such a comprehensive change, but I can imagine it takes quite some time and effort, and if you say it's not feasible for this release, I can only thank you for taking the time to explain why Of course I have my own perfectly selfish reasons for wanting this in alpha 23 A bunch of jibber jabber, be warned:

Since it's mostly Ptolemaic Egypt here, how about the Greek term for Egypt: Aegyptos, or the Latin Aegyptus It kind of has that historically romantic flavour, and is still recognisable enough for all..

lol, I actually keep forgetting to mention it more in depth, but "scarification" was practiced by Kushites. Tribal markings, giving specific information about identity, or having spiritual/cultural significance.. The skin is literally cut open in a particular way, which heals in a particular way, and can be used to make markings or patterns in some cases. Extreme tattooing... Wasn't universal among Kushites, but was practiced extensively by some sub-groups, and can range from a simple, single cut, to full face and body patterns. It's a dying practice... --WARNING-- not for the fainthearted -- WARNING --

Ooooh, wow! Thanks for that one!

A crop of something I've been working for longer than I care to admit... It's like I'm scared to actually finish the piece... Kushite elite:

@Alexandermb, as usual, amazing work! I have to ask about the reference for the Iberian horse armour though... I've never seen such a thing so far West in our timeframe... Even the Eastern civs didn't use such extensive horse-armour until later...

@Lion.Kanzen So you still need references?

So, which one is it?? lol...