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[blablahead]

During the Middle Ages, the only Jewish state was the Khazars, a Turkic tribe on the Pontic Steppes of southern Russia/Ukraine. Maybe that can help...

[SMST]

Hmm, as far as I can see from Wikipedia, they seem to be pretty interesting. The question is: Did they "only" accept Judaism as their religion or did they adapt the whole Jewish culture?

[oshron]

well why not just have their medieval as just "european jews" as a whole? alternatively, you could go with "palestine", which even before modern israel DID have large jewish populations

[Jeru]

The Khazar story is pretty iffy and dubious. There are similar stories in Yemen btw.

[SMST]

well why not just have their medieval as just "european jews" as a whole? alternatively, you could go with "palestine", which even before modern israel DID have large jewish populations

Once again, the European Jews were simply no political power at that time.

I am still anxious to hear what you do think about my "Diaspora" idea. To make it more clear, here an example how it would work:

You control the ancient Jews up until the Hellenistic age. Then you choose another faction (German and Turkish seem to me the most obvoius choices) and get their units and their appearance, but the civilisation traits (civ bonusses, team bonusses, special technologies) stay the same, which means that the change is only somewhat cosmetical. Then, when you enter the modern age, you come back to the state of Israel again.

But if anything, this would be expansion stuff. I do not want to break the 10-faction-number right now.

Edited July 18, 2010 by SMST

[blablahead]

The Khazar story is pretty iffy and dubious. There are similar stories in Yemen btw.

How do you mean? The Khazar's conversion to Judaism is pretty well documented. What is dubious is to what extent the general population converted and if the Khazars were the ancestors of the Ashkenazi Jews. Most scholars seem to agree that the conversion to Judaism was mainly among the upper class. And the claim that the Ashkenazi are descended from the Khazars and not the Israelites is also not widely accepted.

As for pre-Islamic Arabia, many tribes did practice Judaism, as well as Christianity and traditional paganism.

[Jeru]

That is what I meant to say, blablahead, thank you for the correction.

[Gen.Kenobi]

Hey guys!

I just registred here to make a cumpliment to both SMST & oshron. I read the entire topic yesterday and i'm really impressed.

However there are 2 things that i would like to suggest, for both Atlas and Pyrogenesis: Empire.

Instead of obligation to chose a faction that will become something in the future - something very dificult to adress, historycally speaking, even more when we're talking about Pre-Historic ages - Why don't you guys make something like we have seen on Age of Empires III & Empire Total War?

Over Age you choose a politician, what about you choose a flag to defend, a flag to become a nation?

Over Empire Total War, we had the Revolutions. You had to choose to remain with the King or to be a revolutionary.

These metheods can be tweaked to acheive both fun gameplay and historical accuracy.

And...what about... you don't have to age up? You age up by the time of playing... so, the different factions would evolve at different times, grantting them game advantages or disavantages, making the game more historical accurate.

Edited July 30, 2010 by Gen.Kenobi

[WhiteTreePaladin]

There are no ages in our game. We have phases which are not researched like "ages." I believe our phases are: Village, Town, and City. They are not implemented though, so there is nothing to try out yet related to that.

[Gen.Kenobi]

But if you take a look at their planning...it's all about ages

I guess it's something that we may be abble to tweak...since we have the engine open.

[WhiteTreePaladin]

I suppose you could "modify their mod" if you liked their basic premise, but didn't want ages. I was just saying that there are no ages in the official game.

[oshron]

well for Pyrogenesis and for Atlas, its not really phases as i understand it (im not too sure about PG:E at the moment), and they instead cover periods of time. PG:E basically goes from the dawn of human history to the present day while Atlas covers the much narrower time period of 1350 - 3039. and its not so much that the civilization covers a specific nation, though that is certainly the case in most or all of them, and instead more focuses on the people of a given country and, by extension, peoples associated with them depending on source material (for example, some foreign soldiers are available to certain civilizations as unique units, like the Indian Scout available to the Yankees, and theres also more emphasis on alternative historical possibilities than anything else)

[WhiteTreePaladin]

Just some clarification

The game, 0 A.D., covers the time period from roughly 500 B.C to A.D. 500.

Pyrogenesis is just the game engine, not a game in itself.

Atlas is the scenario editor, so it doesn't have a time period.

[oshron]

Atlas is also what i decided to name my modern mod of 0ad. i came up with the name long before i heard of 0ad, when it was planned as a Nintendo DS version of Risk

[WhiteTreePaladin]

Ok, I just got it confused with our Atlas.

[Gen.Kenobi]

Lol! I found that quite strange...like WTF this guy is talking about

@oshron: If you are really going to do that, you must think in a way to Age Up.

[oshron]

it would probably just be like advancement in empire earth, though a bit more complicated. youd probably need to research some essential technologies or build some special building, maybe even a wonder, first.

[SMST]

In each age, there are four key technologies, so-called "innovations" that you have to research in order to advance. In addition to that, you have to research four other technologies of the current age which you can choose freely. After that, the advancement button in the Civ Centree becomes active and you have to pay the obligatory amount of ressources as in AoE or EE, but without building certain structures, but by researching. That's the way I imagine it.

Edit:

And just to make this clear: Pyrogenesis: Empire is a simple working title that I derived from the engine name. The final mod will have a different name. I am open for suggestions.

Edited August 1, 2010 by SMST

[Gen.Kenobi]

Do you guys have any work so far, besides the planning?

Models, codes, stuff?

[SMST]

Putting it simply? No. The planning isn't finished, either.

[Gen.Kenobi]

So...what is missing into your planning? I'm sure we would all be glady to help

[oshron]

whats missing is still a lot of planning and the game itself

[SMST]

So...what is missing into your planning? I'm sure we would all be glady to help

The most important thing missing is, as oshron said, the game itself. As long as the basic game mechanics are not laid down (which means an Alpha release at the most) there is not point in starting programming for the mod.

What can be done already is faction, unit, technology research. I am doing that by myself atm, but I would be glad if you or anyone else would contribute.

What can also be done is some artistic work, but not as long as the planning isn't finished.

[oshron]

hey SMST, im doing some research and work on ATLAS again, and ive gotten to nuclear bombing units. i decided to add prerequisites to a fair amount of my units for realism (ex: you can only build aircraft after you research Aeronautics, and you can only build tanks after researching Armored Fighting Vehicles) as well as some "strategic resources" to enable certain units. for instance, mechanical siege weapons like cannons require a "gunpowder" resource. in this way, i can also reimplement my old Khrusionite resource. among some of my other "strategic resources" are poison (for chemical soldiers) and, of course, nuclear. there would probably be strategic resources for other aspects of gameplay (one possibility is crashed alien spacecraft, which would speed up the production of aircraft and spaceships, kind of like how in 0ad you can garrison horses or camels to speed up the production of cavalry and camelry, etc) and for more basic resources that could perhaps provide resources indefinitely, like maybe beehives coiuld provide an infinite supply of food, though at a very slow rate, while diamonds could provide gold (because of their value)

anyway, im not sure if i overcomplicated things or not, but here's the prerequisites for nuclear weaponry:

hold a Nuclear resource (plutonium, uranium, etc)

research Nuclear Physics and Nuclear Chemistry (starting in the period of 1890 - 1914, or the Victorian Era: Imperial Age)

research Nuclear Fission (starting in the period 1918 - 1939, or the Interwar Era)

research Nuclear Weaponry (from 1939 onwards, or the World War II Era onwards)

all of those cost ALOT of resources in an attempt to limit the use of nuclear bombs, and nukes themselves would still cost alot just to be created and used. this wouldnt just include nuclear bombers but also such weapons as ICBMs. nuclear resources would also be required later on for vehicles or buildings that run on nuclear energy, like nuclear subs, spaceships, and possibly mecha

anyway, do you think ive overcomplicated the prerequisites for nuclear weaponry?

[chess007_phoenix_clan]

"...do you think ive overcomplicated the prerequisites for nuclear weaponry?"

That depends on how complicated you want to make it. The more techs that have to be researched for something to happen, the more your mod leads towards a simulation game (i.e. sim city) and away from an rts game. Some prefer quick and dirty RTS's -- not much of an econ, with it easy to rush - for example, red alert, red alert 2. Others prefer more of a simulation. For example, Empire Earth and Civilization. The more technical something is the more it annoys certain people, while others are happier.

AOKTC strikes the best balance between an econ sim and an RTS.