Genava55

Did the Mamluks really ride on camels, like we see in Age of Empires II? Did they fire arrows or throw scimitars? From the exhibition "Mamluks 1250-1517," curators Souraya Noujaim and Carine Juvin analyze this video game franchise and the representation of this warrior elite, described by Adam Isgreen, Creative Director of World's Edge, the studio behind the "Age of Empires" franchise. From June 10 to July 11, an exceptional program of content and events produced in partnership with World's Edge, Xbox and the Louvre Museum is available to the public!

A useful document: https://hal.science/hal-03117028v1/file/Proposition d'inscription Nisa TURKMENISTAN.pdf This is for adding the Fortress of Nisa to the UNESCO.

Implementing a feature based on slavery could make a lot of differences. Firstly, it would be much more realistic and historical. Secondly, it would bring more differences between civilisations because they didn't practice slavery in the same way. Thirdly, slaves could be much more efficient at harvesting resources. The citizen soldier would therefore be more versatile and more defensive.

Change is not inherently bad. It's just bad execution. There is clearly room for improvement in the implementation of territory and capture features. Changing the default is understandable.

Age of Empires has always had many excellent mods. The only constraint is that the definitive edition now receives numerous updates, which discourages modders.

Honestly, it was probably one of the clumsiest and most immature changes ever made. Currently it is a hidden feature most new players won't see and understand. The information is buried in the manual and the list of hotkeys. Clearly, it should have a button in the UI. Don't forget that you're in a bubble and that other people don't follow all your discussions all the time.

Not really. Most of the accounts are rebellions against Rome, like Spartacus and Sacrovir. I think there is an account when Otho and Vitellius fought against each other, they recruited gladiators. But I don't think they fought with their gladiatorial weapons. We know however that experts from the Gladiatorial schools participated to the training of legionaries in the army, to teach them the use of weapons.

It is based loosely from a Roman bronze figurine depicting a sort of gladiators, generally interpreted as Crupellarii: In 21 AD during the reign of Emperor Tiberius, two Gaulic nobles named Julius Florus and Julius Sacrovir revolted against the Roman Empire. The revolt was a result of the denial of frequent petition for tax relief and debt forgiveness among Gaulic debtors. Florus and Sacrovir managed to raise an army of 40,000 rebels, some of whom were professional gladiators. Among those gladiators was the Crupellarius, a class of gladiator that was particularly popular in Gaul. The Crupellarius was a heavily armed and armored gladiator who was typically a very tall, large, and muscular man. Florus and Sacrovir placed the Crupellarii as the front ranks of their army, where they were to act as human tanks, pummeling and bashing through the Roman ranks. Once in battle, the Romans found that their gladii and pilum (javelins) were practically useless against the Crupellarius’ heavy armor. Thus, Roman soldiers retrieved their engineering tools such as axes, adzes, and pickaxes. Using them as weapons the Romans were able to pierce the Crupellarius’ heavy armor and batter down the behemoths. Once the Crupellarii were defeated, the remaining Gaulic rebels were slaughtered.

Une vidéo en français sur le Cirque Maxime:

Gladiators have evolved considerably, and the ones we know best are from the imperial period. There are a few books on the subject: Plates and descriptions: Plates and descriptions: Plates and descriptions: Bonus: I hope you find it interesting

There is a dedicated thread for them:

@wowgetoffyourcellphone would be great for your Roman Principate civ in DE.

Here some schematic illustrations based on Celtic shields:

@Obskiuras has a point in the sense a shield generally requires some volume for the handle.

By the way the original: Edit: You can find more info there: https://gelmir.com/compendium_item/gold-bracteates/

I understand but the idea from EBII was to make a speculative simpler interpretation of a later design, trying to fit it into their timeframe. Since the golden bracteates are generally from the migration period. It is from the Dejbjerg wagon.

https://www.persee.fr/doc/paleo_0153-9345_1974_num_2_2_1057

The only way to test the GUI is to compile from a Git repo?

By the way, Rome 2 Total War also got its inspiration from EBII for the Suebi Edit: you can find more info and images there: https://gelmir.com/compendium_item/gold-bracteates/

https://www.labrujulaverde.com/en/2025/05/evidence-of-the-use-of-a-polybolos-the-mythical-greek-repeating-weapon-at-pompeii-in-89-bce-discovered/ Evidence of the Use of a Polybolos, the Mythical Greek Repeating Weapon, at Pompeii in 89 BCE Discovered A team of Italian researchers has discovered markings on the walls of Pompeii that could be the first known evidence of the use of an ancient and sophisticated weapon of war: the polybolos, a type of automatic crossbow capable of launching multiple arrows without needing to be reloaded, similar to modern machine guns. Its invention is attributed to Dionysius of Alexandria, a Greek engineer who worked in the arsenal of Rhodes in the 3rd century BCE. It wasn’t a crossbow in the traditional sense but used a torsion mechanism based on bundles of twisted sinew, and we only know about it from the description left by Philo of Byzantium, who wrote between 280 and 220 BCE. Philo recounts how one of these weapons was found and provided a detailed description of the gears that powered a chain drive to position bolt after bolt into its firing groove. This is the earliest known application of such a mechanism. The study published in the Nexus Network Journal focuses on a section of the northern wall of Pompeii near the gates of Vesuvius and Herculaneum, where the researchers, led by Adriana Rossi from the University of Campania, found and analyzed small holes in the stones. These marks are square or diamond-shaped and do not match the impact patterns of stones launched by conventional catapults. Instead, they appear to have been caused by arrows or metal projectiles. They appear in groups of four or five, as if the projectiles that caused them had been fired in bursts, something difficult to achieve with handheld weapons or traditional crossbows. The precision and frequency suggest the use of a repeating machine, the researchers assert, believing that they could be the work of a polybolos used during the siege of Pompeii in 89 BCE, when the troops of the Roman general Sulla conquered the city. Although no physical remains of the weapon have been found, the markings on the walls would match its historical description. To confirm their theory, the team used 3D scanning techniques and digital reconstructions. Through virtual models, they calculated the speed and force of the impacts, estimating that the arrows that could have made the marks reached a speed of around 109 meters per second, a rather surprising speed for the time. They also confirmed that the depth and shape of the holes matched models of Roman arrowheads kept in European museums. Why Shoot Arrows at the Walls? But why would the Roman army besieging the city have fired arrows at the stone walls instead of at the defenders? The researchers offer two fairly evident theories. The first is that they simply missed their shots—that is, they were aiming at soldiers on top of the wall but missed, perhaps because the weapon was hard to handle or simply wasn’t as effective as it should have been. And the second is that they were simply testing, practicing and calibrating the polybolos before using it against the enemy. In this regard, an episode of the popular show MythBusters aired in 2010 built and fine-tuned a replica of the polybolos based on Philo’s description, concluding that its existence as a historical weapon was plausible, despite being prone to constant mechanical failures. The team now plans to analyze more sections of the walls of Pompeii and collaborate with museums to cross-reference their findings. They also hope this discovery will attract interest to Pompeii not just as a city frozen in time, but also as a battlefield where Roman military engineering left its mark. SOURCES Rossi, A., Gonizzi Barsanti, S. & Bertacchi, S. Use of Polybolos on the City Walls of Ancient Pompeii: Assessment on the Anthropic Cavities. Nexus Netw J 27, 243–272 (2025). doi.org/10.1007/s00004-024-00803-x Reconstruction of a polybolos. Credit: Diels and Schramm 1919 / AR and archives of Archeotecnica / archeotecnica.com