Narrative Campaign General Discussion?

[Lion.Kanzen]

3 hours ago, Vantha said:

Not sure about what exactly? The tutorial's general structure?

We must ask what kind of tutorial campaign we want, whether a campaign with many scenarios to test or just a few.

In the case of few it would mean that we should leave the learning scenarios in some campaigns.

What would be the difference? 

The difference would be how intense we want the learning to be and how long the tutorial campaign would be.

A (Intense)

B (more free will) more relaxed learning and with greater freedom.

Note: you can make a mix and have a little of both techniques.

[Vantha]

Hmm. Ideally, players can decide that themselves and progress at their own pace, right? So, why don't we create a large number of optional practice scenarios between the tutorials and provide players with the option to skip forward to the next tutorial at any point?

[Lion.Kanzen]

1 hour ago, Vantha said:

Hmm. Ideally, players can decide that themselves and progress at their own pace, right? So, why don't we create a large number of optional practice scenarios between the tutorials and provide players with the option to skip forward to the next tutorial at any point?

Yes, I think so, that's why I say that the combat can be more free and with some interesting difficulty. 

You must think that it should be more entertaining than the current tutorial, in fact AoM does not have an intense tutorial and has a good story.

The first map is simple.

 

https://ageofempires.fandom.com/wiki/Omens

Here is a link with details of this map.

Edited Friday at 19:06 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

22 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Yes, I think so, that's why I say that the combat can be more free and with some interesting difficulty. 

You must think that it should be more entertaining than the current tutorial, in fact AoM does not have an intense tutorial and has a good story.

The first map is simple.

 

https://ageofempires.fandom.com/wiki/Omens

Here is a link with details of this map.

On the other hand you have something guided in AoE4.

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

I have the idea of starting missions in the eastern Mediterranean.

I would like to start with the Greek-Egyptian Neukratis.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_colonisation

But it could be any colony.

Edited Saturday at 21:59 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

9 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

I have the idea of starting missions in the eastern Mediterranean.

I would like to start with the Greek-Egyptian Neukratis.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_colonisation

But it could be any colony.

The oikistes (Greek: οἰκιστής), often anglicized as oekist or oecist, was the individual chosen by an ancient Greek polis as the leader of any new colonization effort. He was invested with the power of selecting a settling place, directing the initial labors of the colonists and guiding the fledgling colony through its hard early years.[1] The oracle is also consulted during deliberations for choosing an oikistes.[2] After he is appointed and directed to found a colony, he also consults the Delphic oracle.[2][3] Due to his authority, the oikistes was often accorded his own cult after his death, and his name was preserved even when all other details of the founding of a colony were forgotten.[4]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oikistes

Example 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battus_I_of_Cyrene

 

[Vantha]

Naukratis sounds interesting, combining ancient Greece with ancient Egypt. I think this concept can also appeal to people new to 0ad's time frame. Greeks and Egyptians are among the most famous ancient peoples, and it's good if new players can recognize something they're familiar with right at the beginning.

Is Naukratis' "oikistes" known? I couldn't find a name.

Also, we should think about the campaign's map(s). Is anyone interested in making some? If not, I suppose we could also reuse existing ones. For Naukratis, there would already be one map containing a Nile segment and another (huge) one featuring the entire Nile delta.

[Lion.Kanzen]

39 minutes ago, Vantha said:

Naukratis sounds interesting, combining ancient Greece with ancient Egypt. I think this concept can also appeal to people new to 0ad's time frame. Greeks and Egyptians are among the most famous ancient peoples, and it's good if new players can recognize something they're familiar with right at the beginning.

Is Naukratis' "oikistes" known? I couldn't find a name.

Also, we should think about the campaign's map(s). Is anyone interested in making some? If not, I suppose we could also reuse existing ones. For Naukratis, there would already be one map containing a Nile segment and another (huge) one featuring the entire Nile delta.

Leave examples and links above.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oikistes

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

1 hour ago, Vantha said:

Naukratis sounds interesting, combining ancient Greece with ancient Egypt. I think this concept can also appeal to people new to 0ad's time frame. Greeks and Egyptians are among the most famous ancient peoples, and it's good if new players can recognize something they're familiar with right at the beginning.

Is Naukratis' "oikistes" known? I couldn't find a name.

Also, we should think about the campaign's map(s). Is anyone interested in making some? If not, I suppose we could also reuse existing ones. For Naukratis, there would already be one map containing a Nile segment and another (huge) one featuring the entire Nile delta.

 

Me and wow would design the maps.

Some research is required.

Special factions will be used or created like AoE4.They put modified factions in their campaigns.

As the game is still in alpha, new mechanics will need to be tested to be included.

Special campaign units should be created.

It would be interesting to ask the community what they would add to the maps and the story. 

According to Wikipedia:

Greek culture had a long but minor presence in Egypt long before Alexander the Great founded the city of Alexandria. It began when Greek colonists, encouraged by many Pharaohs, set up the trading post of Naucratis. As Egypt came under foreign domination and decline, the Pharaohs depended on the Greeks as mercenaries and even advisors. When the Persians took over Egypt, Naucratis remained an important Greek port and the colonist population were used as mercenaries by both the rebel Egyptian princes and the Persian kings, who later gave them land grants, spreading Greek culture into the valley of the Nile.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ptolemaic_Kingdom#:~:text=Greek culture had a long,the trading post of Naucratis.

This will be the main story, that is, the plot with which it begins.

The Greeks settled in Cyrene and from Cyrene they began to arrive in Egypt.

Even from Crete. I don't know if I should create characters for this story based on our narrative novel model.

I need to study what Microsoft does with its narrative DLC.

[Lion.Kanzen]

12 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Special factions will be used or created like AoE4.They put modified factions in their campaigns.

https://ageofempires.fandom.com/wiki/Campaign-only_civilization_(Age_of_Empires_IV)#Ayyubids

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Design of first map.

Neukratis is around 3-7

Naucratis was the first commercial colony established in Egypt by the Greeks. It was granted to them, according to different versions, either by Pharaoh Psammetius I in the 7th century BC or by Amasis in the 6th century BC (according to Herodotus),[1] although it is believed that there was previously a factory occupied by colonists from Miletus on the same site. Many of the early inhabitants of the city were Greek mercenaries serving until then in the neighboring Egyptian fortress of Daphnae, at the eastern end of the Delta. However, the colony was handed over to a confederation of mainly Ionian cities, headed by Miletus, Corinth and Aegina. Therefore, Naucratis was a truly international city, and an attractive cultural center visited by figures such as Solon or Thales of Miletus.

[Lion.Kanzen]

Just now, Lion.Kanzen said:

Design of first map.

Neukratis is around 3-7

Naucratis was the first commercial colony established in Egypt by the Greeks. It was granted to them, according to different versions, either by Pharaoh Psammetius I in the 7th century BC or by Amasis in the 6th century BC (according to Herodotus),[1] although it is believed that there was previously a factory occupied by colonists from Miletus on the same site. Many of the early inhabitants of the city were Greek mercenaries serving until then in the neighboring Egyptian fortress of Daphnae, at the eastern end of the Delta. However, the colony was handed over to a confederation of mainly Ionian cities, headed by Miletus, Corinth and Aegina. Therefore, Naucratis was a truly international city, and an attractive cultural center visited by figures such as Solon or Thales of Miletus.

The mercenaries began with the colonists of Cyrene.

In Cyrenaica to the west, Battus II of Cyrene had encouraged further Greek settlement in his city, especially from the Peloponnese and Crete. This sparked conflict with the indigenous Libyans, whose king Adicran appealed to Apries for help around 570 BC. Apries launched a military expedition against Cyrene, but was decisively defeated at the Battle of Irasa.

----I don't know whether to start from here or before here.----

On the one hand we could start with a lot of action.

[Lion.Kanzen]

We have 2 possibilities.

Start peacefully with Battus II and his expansion. The scenario would be to build a CC on Libyan lands.

This would be tutorial scenario 1.

The mission would be to build a CC, create some things, collect X amount of resources, pass the phase and build a trade route.

By connecting the route, the Libyans would become aware of the Greek expansion into their lands.

That would lead to the next scenario: we will have to prepare to face two forces, the Egyptians and the Libyans.

We will command the main Greek army and receive supplies from the settlement we created in the previous scenario. 2 v 2 battle.

[Lion.Kanzen]

But the history of Neukratis is older.

At least we already have 2 maps thought out.

https://historia.nationalgeographic.com.es/a/naucratis-colonia-griega-antiguo-egipto_18517

The foundation of Naucratis dates back to the time of Pharaoh Psametic I (664-595 B.C.). It was the same monarch who, after employing Greek mercenaries from the Egyptian fortress of Daphnae to fight against the Ethiopians, decided to compensate them by allowing a group of them to settle in the eastern delta. The colony, which may have been established over an Egyptian settlement, Per-Meryt, of which little remains today, flourished rapidly.

Egypt's commercial port

According to the Greek historian Herodotus, it was Pharaoh Amosis II (570-526 BC), described as a "great friend of the Greeks," who really boosted the city and transformed it into an emporium. Amosis handed over the colony to a confederation of twelve Greek cities, including Corinth, Rhodes, Samos, Cnidus, Aegina and Miletus, and granted them a monopoly on maritime trade from Egypt.

 

The resulting commercial boom of Naucratis attracted a large number of new settlers with the most diverse professions (soldiers, merchants, administrators, craftsmen, sailors, writers, philosophers...) and from the rest of Egypt as well as from Greece, Cyprus, Persia or the Phoenician cities. Naucratis thus became one of the richest and most dynamic centers of Antiquity.

At the end of the Saite dynasty, the power of Naucratis was threatened by the instability of Egypt, which led to the Persian conquest in 525 BC. During the first Persian domination, until 404 BC, the city was favored by the policies of monarchs such as Cambyses and Darius I; the latter even had some of its temples rebuilt.

 

Naucratis continued to be a very active port in the later period, as manifested by the so-called Decree of Naucratis, promulgated by Pharaoh Nectanebo I during the first year of his reign (378 BC), which fixed the tribute that every foreign merchant in the Delta had to pay to the temple of Neith at Sais. The law was engraved on a stele found by archaeologist David G. Hogarth in 1899, now on display in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

 

The conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great and the foundation of Alexandria in 331 BC meant the end of the hegemony and many of the privileges of Naucratis, which became a secondary port. Despite this, the city did not decline completely. It is significant that Naucratis, which had been the only Egyptian city of the Pharaonic period that had minted its own coinage, continued to do so even in the Hellenistic period.

[Lion.Kanzen]

1 hour ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

We have 2 possibilities.

Start peacefully with Battus II and his expansion. The scenario would be to build a CC on Libyan lands.

This would be tutorial scenario 1.

The mission would be to build a CC, create some things, collect X amount of resources, pass the phase and build a trade route.

By connecting the route, the Libyans would become aware of the Greek expansion into their lands.

That would lead to the next scenario: we will have to prepare to face two forces, the Egyptians and the Libyans.

We will command the main Greek army and receive supplies from the settlement we created in the previous scenario. 2 v 2 battle.

The first map would therefore be the defense of Daphne's fortress.

[Lion.Kanzen]

27 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

The first map would therefore be the defense of Daphne's fortress.

Daphnae, ancient fortress town (Fortress of Penhase), situated near Qanṭarah in northeastern Egypt. Excavations by Sir Flinders Petrie in 1886 uncovered a massive fort and enclosure surrounded by a wall 40 feet (12 metres) thick, built by Psamtik I in the 7th century bce. A garrison of mercenaries, mostly Carians and Ionian Greeks, was established in the fort. After the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem (587 bce), many Jewish fugitives, including the prophet Jeremiah, fled to Tahpanhes. Its decline began in the 6th century bce when Amasis gave Naukratis the monopoly of Greek trade.

https://www.britannica.com/place/Daphnae

 

Edited yesterday at 00:41 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

18 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

Daphnae, ancient fortress town (Fortress of Penhase), situated near Qanṭarah in northeastern Egypt. Excavations by Sir Flinders Petrie in 1886 uncovered a massive fort and enclosure surrounded by a wall 40 feet (12 metres) thick, built by Psamtik I in the 7th century bce. A garrison of mercenaries, mostly Carians and Ionian Greeks, was established in the fort. After the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem (587 bce), many Jewish fugitives, including the prophet Jeremiah, fled to Tahpanhes. Its decline began in the 6th century bce when Amasis gave Naukratis the monopoly of Greek trade.

https://www.britannica.com/place/Daphnae

 

We will need Carian mercenaries for this mission.

[Lion.Kanzen]

 

The site was discovered by Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie in 1886; it was then known by natives as Qasr Bint al-Yahudi, the "Castle of the Jew's Daughter".[10] There is a massive fort and enclosure; the chief discovery was a large number of fragments of pottery, which are of great importance for the chronology of vase-painting, since they must belong to the time between Psammetichus and Amasis, i.e. the end of the 7th or the beginning of the 6th century BC. They show the characteristics of Ionian art, but their shapes and other details testify to their local manufacture.[11]

 

Egyptologist Noël Aimé-Giron proposed to identify Tahpanhes with the biblical location of Baal-zephon based on the Saqqara letter.

When Naucratis was given the monopoly of Greek traffic by Amasis II (570–526 BC), the Greeks were removed from Daphnae and its prosperity never returned; in Herodotus' time the deserted remains of the docks and buildings were visible.

In addition to his temple at Jebel Aqra and Ugarit, Baʿal Zaphon is known to have been worshipped at Tyre and Carthage and served as the chief god of the colony at Tahpanes.

According to the Phoenician papyrus letters, Phoenicians settled in the site.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tahpanhes

 

Edited yesterday at 01:44 by Lion.Kanzen

[Lion.Kanzen]

25 minutes ago, Lion.Kanzen said:

 

The site was discovered by Sir William Matthew Flinders Petrie in 1886; it was then known by natives as Qasr Bint al-Yahudi, the "Castle of the Jew's Daughter".[10] There is a massive fort and enclosure; the chief discovery was a large number of fragments of pottery, which are of great importance for the chronology of vase-painting, since they must belong to the time between Psammetichus and Amasis, i.e. the end of the 7th or the beginning of the 6th century BC. They show the characteristics of Ionian art, but their shapes and other details testify to their local manufacture.[11]

 

Egyptologist Noël Aimé-Giron proposed to identify Tahpanhes with the biblical location of Baal-zephon based on the Saqqara letter.

When Naucratis was given the monopoly of Greek traffic by Amasis II (570–526 BC), the Greeks were removed from Daphnae and its prosperity never returned; in Herodotus' time the deserted remains of the docks and buildings were visible.

In addition to his temple at Jebel Aqra and Ugarit, Baʿal Zaphon is known to have been worshipped at Tyre and Carthage and served as the chief god of the colony at Tahpanes.

According to the Phoenician papyrus letters, Phoenicians settled in the site.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tahpanhes

 

Tehaphnehes (Eze 30:18), while an Egyptian queen (XXIst Dynasty) is named Tahpenes (1Ki 11:19-20). Tahpanhes was a city on the eastern frontier of Lower Egypt, represented today by Tell Defenneh, a desert mound lying some 20 miles Southwest from Pelusium (Biblical "Sin") and a little North of the modern Al-Kantarah ("the bridge"), marking the old caravan route from Egypt to Palestine, Mesopotamia and Assyria. Its Egyptian name is unknown, but it was called Daphnai, by the Greeks, and by the modern Arabs Def'neh. The site is now desolate, but it was a fertile district when watered by the Pelusiac branch of the Nile.

[...]The pottery found at Tahpanhes "shows on the whole more evidence of Greeks than Egyptians in the place. .... Especially between 607-587 BC a constant intercourse with the Greek settlers must have been going on and a wider intercourse than even a Greek colony in Palestine would have produced. .... The whole circumstances were such as to give the best possible opportunity for the permeation of Greek words and Greek ideas among the upper classes of the Jewish exiles" (Petrie, Nebesheh and Defenneh, 1888, 50). This was, however, only one of many places where the Greeks and Hebrews met freely in this century (see e.g. Duruy, History of Greece, II, 126-80; Cobern, Daniel, 301-307). A large foreign traffic is shown at Tahpanhes in which no doubt the Jews took part. Discoveries from the 6th century BC included some very finely painted pottery, "full of archaic spirit and beauty," many amulets and much rich jewelry and bronze and iron weapons, a piece of scale armor, thousands of arrow heads, and three seals of a Syrian type. One of the few inscriptions prays the blessing of Neit upon "all beautiful souls." There was also dug up a vast number of minute weights evidently used for weighing precious metals, showing that the manufacture of jewelry was carried on here on a large scale. One of the most pathetic and suggestive "finds" from this century, which witnessed the Babylonian captivity, consisted of certain curious figures of captives, carved in limestone, with their legs bent backward from their knees and their ankles and elbows bound together (Petrie, op. cit., chapters ix-xii).

https://www.internationalstandardbible.com/T/tahpanhes.html

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

[...]After being chased from Memphis, Psamtik I received another similar prophecy from the goddess Wadjet of Buto, who promised him the rule over all Egypt should he employ bronze men from the sea. Beginning in 662 BCE, Psamtik I formed contacts with Gyges, the king of the Anatolian kingdom of Lydia, who sent to Egypt the Ionian Greek and Carian mercenaries that Psamtik I used to reconquer Memphis and defeat the other kinglets of the Dodecarchy, some of whom fled to Libya. Psamtik I might have been also aided in these military campaigns by Arabs from the Sinai Peninsula.

After having eliminated all his rivals, Psamtik I reorganized these mercenaries and placed them in key garrisons at Daphnae in the East and Elephantine in the South to prevent a possible Kushite attack and to control trade.[11] This military aid from Lydia lasted until 658 BCE, at which point Gyges faced an impending Cimmerian invasion.[14] By Psamtik I's 4th regnal year, he completed the forging of an alliance with the powerful family of the Masters of Shipping from Heracleopolis, and by his 8th regnal year in 657 BCE, he was in full control of the Delta.[11]

Psamtik II led a foray into Nubia in 592 BC, marching as far south as the Third or even the Fourth Cataract of the Nile, according to a contemporary stela from Thebes (Karnak), which dates to Year 3 of this king's name and refers to a heavy defeat that was inflicted upon the kingdom of Kush.[4] A well-known graffito inscribed in Greek on the left leg of the colossal seated statue of Ramesses II, on the south side of the entrance to the temple of Abu Simbel, records that:

 

"When King Psammetichus (i.e., Psamtik II) came to Elephantine, this was written by those who sailed with Psammetichus the son of Theocles, and they came beyond Kerkis as far as the river permits. Those who spoke foreign tongues (Greek and Carians who also scratched their names on the monument) were led by Potasimto, the Egyptians by Amasis".

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psamtik_II

 

Under Apries:

According to classical historians, Apries campaigned in the Levant, took Sidon and so terrified the other cities of Phoenicia that he secured their submission.[7][8] However, this supposed submission was likely short lived.[9] A recently uncovered stela from Tahpanhes records that Nebuchadnezzar II attempted to invade Egypt in 582 BC, but Apries' forces were capable to repel the invasion.[10]

 

In Cyrenaica to the west, Battus II of Cyrene had encouraged further Greek settlement in his city, especially from the Peloponnese and Crete. This sparked conflict with the indigenous Libyans, whose king Adicran appealed to Apries for help around 570 BC. Apries launched a military expedition against Cyrene, but was decisively defeated at the Battle of Irasa.

When the defeated army returned home, a civil war broke out in the Egyptian army between the indigenous troops and the foreign mercenaries. The Egyptians threw their support to Amasis II, a general who had led Egyptian forces in a highly successful invasion of Nubia in 592 BC under Pharaoh Psamtik II, Apries' father.[1] Amasis quickly declared himself pharaoh in 570 BC, and Apries fled Egypt and sought refuge in a foreign country. When Apries marched back to Egypt in 567 BC with the aid of a Babylonian army to reclaim the throne of Egypt, he was likely killed in battle with Amasis' forces.[13][4][14] Alternatively, Herodotus (Histories 2.169) holds that Apries survived the battle, and was captured and treated well by the victorious Amasis, until the Egyptian people demanded justice against him, whereby he was placed into their hands and strangled to death.[15] Amasis thus secured his kingship over Egypt and was then its unchallenged ruler.

 

Amasis, however, reportedly treated Apries' mortal remains with respect and observed the proper funerary rituals by having Apries' body carried to Sais and buried there with "full military honours."[4] Amasis, the former general who had declared himself pharaoh, also married Apries' daughter, Khedebneithirbinet II, to legitimise his accession to power. While Herodotus claimed that the wife of Apries was called Nitetis (Νιτῆτις) (in Greek), "there are no contemporary references naming her" in Egyptian records.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apries

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

Context of Egypt under the Saite dynasty.

 

[Lion.Kanzen]

The Carians.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carians

They are also named as mercenaries in inscriptions found in ancient Egypt and Nubia, dated to the reigns of Psammetichus I and II. They are sometimes referred to as the "Cari" or "Khari". Carian remnants have been found in the ancient city of Persepolis or modern Takht-e-Jamshid in Iran.

A meeting between the Psamtik II (595-589BCE), and an Ionian, or Carian, mercenary. These "Men of Bronze" were wooed by Psamtik with the promise of great rewards, and assisted in reconquering Egypt. There is still graffiti from these ancient Greeks at the Temple of Abul Simbel, where on famous inscription, on the leg of a statue of Ramses II, states, "Archon, son of Amoibichos, and Axe, son of nobody ('Pelechos son of Eudamos'), wrote this." Art by Johnny Shumate,

I'm going to need a Carians mercenary.

With Peltast shield

With spear and axe

[Grautvornix]

This is ultra-cool! Great storyline that should well motivate newcomers getting to know the game! 

[ShadowOfHassen]

I don't want to insult the intelligence of new users, but I strongly suggest that we don't bog them down with so much history for a tutorial. The Egypt stuff looks pretty cool and all, but it would require a LOT of set up with the history, and if somebody wants to sit down and learn the game for multiplayer there shouldn't be that much.

I want to stress that for the Age of Empires games, there was a difference between the tutorial level and the beginning parts of a campaign. The beginning parts of the campaign did have a lot of similar information, but the actual tutorial was something different.

This is the AOM tutorial

https://ageofempires.fandom.com/wiki/Tutorial_(Age_of_Mythology)

There is a difference between reminding the player what to do when he needs to do it in a medium stake environment then letting the player get the hang of it in a low stakes environment.

I think the Egypt idea is really cool for a campaign, but I think it's history is complex for a tutorial. The player should be focus on learning the mechanics.

(If you have a better idea for a tutorial than mine that's OK I don't care, but I do think the History should be at minimum and the campaign story should be REALLY simple.

 

 

[Vantha]

I'm also not convinced.

Firstly, from my research, the foundation of Naukratis is still debated, the date is not clear, there is no single founder, and there might even have been a settlement before there as well. I don't think it suits a beginner-friendly story.

Secondly, I think we lack the resources to afford creating entire civilizations from scratch for single time use in the campaign. Of course, there's nothing wrong with creating a few new units, but, ideally, we only rely on reusing what we already have. The game has enough content for that.
And we should worry about that rather sooner than later. For the story you proposed, we lack the Libyans, Carians, and Egyptians (Ptolemies are much later).

Thirdly, and most importantly, (I admit my experience with other RTS's is fairly limited) but the storyline in general seems too complex for a tutorial campaign. I think we should avoid time and place jumps entirely. And limit the number of characters as much as we can. Battus, Psamtek, Apries, Amasis, Cyrene, Naukratis, Daphnae... I did a decent bit of research on the topic and still don't understand all connections. If I as a new player encountered this campaign, I would feel helplessly overwhelmed by the story. I believe what we need is one city, one protagonist (the colony's "oikistes"/founder), one conflict, and one straightforward storyline.

I like the idea of combining ancient Greece and Egypt. But, all in all, I like @ShadowOfHassen's outline better. The parallel between setting up a colony the process of learning the game is a really interesting concept.