===[COMMITTED]=== Onager

[real_tabasco_sauce]

Yeah that’s the one I used too. It’s honestly pretty close.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

Are there any artists that know how to make a cargo for the packed onager? It might work to start with https://trac.wildfiregames.com/browser/ps/trunk/binaries/data/mods/public/art/actors/props/units/hele_rock_packed.xml and replace the two ballista arms with some thick beams or the onager arm and basket.

Then it could be called rome_rock_onager_packed.xml

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

2 hours ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

Are there any artists that know how to make a cargo for the packed onager? It might work to start with https://trac.wildfiregames.com/browser/ps/trunk/binaries/data/mods/public/art/actors/props/units/hele_rock_packed.xml and replace the two ballista arms with some thick beams or the onager arm and basket.

Then it could be called rome_rock_onager_packed.xml

My computer is breaking, unfortunately. Need a new motherboard or graphics card or battery or all of the above. Maybe @Stan` could whip it up.

[nifa]

like this? smaller packed?

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

Hmm, probably broken down even more. The Romans made their siege engines highly modular and (relatively) easy to pack away for transport. 

[real_tabasco_sauce]

I agree. Also, it looks a little precarious like that. If you are still working on it, could the crosspiece with the cushion be split from the two side supports, so all three of those parts can fit parallel to each other?

Thanks so much for working on this!

[nifa]

better? I would like to make it still recognizable what it is unpacked.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

I think this looks great!

[nifa]

for you to take a look for yourself

to-do's:

- I just saw at the backside there is still some overlapping with the wagon.

- I need to fix some textures at a few places where I had to add geometry

- the black parts of the textures are to strong imo

- there are a lot of unnecessary and hidden faces and to many tris in general (?)

onager.zip

[wowgetoffyourcellphone]

4 minutes ago, nifa said:

- there are a lot of unnecessary and hidden faces and to many tris in general (?)

 

Oh yeah, any chance to delete unseen triangles we should do it, for sure. 

Edited August 30, 2023 by wowgetoffyourcellphone

[nifa]

18 hours ago, wowgetoffyourcellphone said:

Oh yeah, any chance to delete unseen triangles we should do it, for sure. 

alright, I'll do my best. The unpacked onager has a lot of hidden triangles too, and way too much geometry for the small round parts:

[nifa]

rearranged one overlapping piece, texture fix, deleted faces and used the decimate modifier to cut down tris at the round parts (now 33k; unpacked 39k). Next question, is the player colour too strong or too one sided?

onager.zip

[nifa]

tidier and little player colour to both sides

onager.zip

[real_tabasco_sauce]

Alright, this looks awesome! I'll go ahead and add it to the onager patch and credit you.

https://code.wildfiregames.com/D5114

[real_tabasco_sauce]

@Genava55

Would it be reasonable for the romans to access Onagers after researching a military reform tech? One source says onagers came about much later like 300ad, but that source also says they were the same as a scorpion which is funny.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Onager_(weapon)

However some sources say they may have been used as early as 300 bc.

So the approach in my patch https://code.wildfiregames.com/D5114 was to lock them behind the marian reforms tech so that they emerge in the late game, just as they likely emerged later in ancient rome. It seems reasonable to me given the lack of specifics when it comes to their invention and use in war.

[Genava55]

1 hour ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

However some sources say they may have been used as early as 300 bc.

The earliest accounts are Ammianus Marcellinus (4th century AD) and Vegetius (end of 4th c. and beginning of the 5th c.).

According to E. W. Marsden: "To sum up the situation in the first three imperial centuries, the Roman army reached very high standards in artillery equipment and organization. In particular, after the introduction of the arrow-shooting ballista in its various forms at the beginning of the second century, and while the stone-throwing ballista remained in service, every Roman legion possessed substantial batteries o f the most powerful artillery produced in the ancient world. There is very little direct evidence for the third century. But the introduction of the onager into general service, which may have occurred in the second century, and of the non-torsion arcuballista, both machines being of relatively simple construction, suggests a shortage of good artificers."

The hypothesis is that Vegetius is using a lost text of Publius Tarrutienus (2nd century AD). There is also in a fragmentary text by Apollodorus of Damascus a mention of a one-armed machine and a variant of it incorporated to a battering ram. Furthermore, Apollodorus of Damascus was an engineer close to Trajan.

Previously, Philo of Byzantium, who lived most of his life in Egypt, under the Ptolemies around 220 BC, mentioned one-armed devices in the list of machines that could be used by the defenders against besieging platforms. No description survived.

1 hour ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

Would it be reasonable for the romans to access Onagers after researching a military reform tech?

I would say there is no evidence for its usage during the Roman republic and if we decide that Philo of Byzantium indeed mentioned onagers, then the Greeks were the first to use them.

Edited August 31, 2023 by Genava55

[nifa]

What would you think of adding this smaller onager?

[real_tabasco_sauce]

19 minutes ago, Genava55 said:

Ammianus Marcellinus (4th century AD)

This is the guy that thought it was the same as a scorpion, at least according to wikipedia.

So it seems they were commonplace during battles in the 4th century and may have been invented in 2nd century or possibly much earlier by greeks. Thanks @Genava55

Given that we already have content from the late 1st century, Is the early 2nd century really too late, even if its after a reform tech which would be accessed late in the game? I understand that the early roman empire was fairly peaceful, so maybe that could explain the lack of records of their use.

1 hour ago, Genava55 said:

I would say there is no evidence for its usage during the Roman republic and if we decide that Philo of Byzantium indeed mentioned onagers, then the Greeks were the first to use them.

I think it would be fair for the romans to begin the transition into the "imperial" timeframe. especially since this began before 0 a.d., and I wouldn't be against giving the athenians an onager in the future if we consider philon's machine an onager.

[Genava55]

18 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

Given that we already have content from the late 1st century, Is the early 2nd century really too late, even if its after a reform tech which would be accessed late in the game?

As far as I remember, people were still objecting the idea to go beyond the Punic Wars for the Romans, notably @Thorfinn the Shallow Minded

So I doubt they would like to mix the Principate period into the current Roman civ.

23 minutes ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I understand that the early roman empire was fairly peaceful, so maybe that could explain the lack of records of their use.

I suppose you are thinking of the Pax Romana concept. Be careful do not confuse this idea with peacefulness. Pax Romana means a period without civil wars and without invasions within the Roman Empire. During the Pax Romana, Rome had multiple wars and invaded multiple people. Including Britons, Germans, Dacians, Parthians, Jews etc.

The lack of records is simply due to the lack of surviving material. Most of the material from the classical period survived because medieval monks trained themselves with ancient authors, to learn Latin and Greek.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

2 hours ago, Genava55 said:

As far as I remember, people were still objecting the idea to go beyond the Punic Wars for the Romans, notably @Thorfinn the Shallow Minded

So I doubt they would like to mix the Principate period into the current Roman civ.

It would seem very strange to me to not allow content ~ 0 A.D. into 0ad's time frame. Also, I think it would be sad to disallow principate period content just because it's later on. The principates romans are still just romans.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

The point is that 0 AD does not represent factions over a broad period of time.  It is supposed to be a snapshot, and the Punic Wars represent a period where the Roman Republic was still fairly functional and the soldiers were still militias.  I would endorse representing a Roman civilisation from a later point to be able to show Caesar conquering  Gaul, but that would involve a functionally different Rome with a clear delineation between its civilian population and its military.  

The real question to ask is what can an onager do that other siege weapons in the game can't?  I'll admit that it's cool, but having a redundant unit added to a roster is unnecessary noise that a player would have to deal with.

[borg-]

I have two question pls. Did the Marian reforms extinguish veles, hastatus.. of Roman army suddenly or was it something progressive? Another question, did the first Marian legionnaires still work or were they full time soldiers?

[borg-]

20 hours ago, real_tabasco_sauce said:

I think it would be fair for the romans to begin the transition into the "imperial" timeframe. especially since this began before 0 a.d., and I wouldn't be against giving the athenians an onager in the future if we consider philon's machine an onager.

We can simply change the current path to athens. I wouldn't be bad about it.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

17 minutes ago, borg- said:

I have two question pls. Did the Marian reforms extinguish veles, hastatus.. of Roman army suddenly or was it something progressive? Another question, did the first Marian legionnaires still work or were they full time soldiers?

I did some researching before the marian reforms patch and it seems the reforms are rather contested in terms of their attribution to marius. My understanding is that there were reforms, but they were progressive, turning the army into more of a standardized professional force over time. Maybe it is fine to call it marian reforms since it is what people are familiar with. I think they existed but the regular legionaries were prioritized.

If you think it would be good for the reforms to emphasize the veles as an eco unit, I could add a modification for -25% damage for CS units.

[real_tabasco_sauce]

2 hours ago, Thorfinn the Shallow Minded said:

The point is that 0 AD does not represent factions over a broad period of time.  It is supposed to be a snapshot, and the Punic Wars represent a period where the Roman Republic was still fairly functional and the soldiers were still militias.

That seems like a massively limiting design constraint. just 100 years (punic wars) is the 'Snapshot' allowed? And well before 0 A.D. ? We already have a lot of content well outside of this. Why can't we have flexibility and the freedom for the civs to change over time? Its not like the cities in 0ad are built instantly.

I thought the approach was to look at a 300-500 year span and pick the important/impactful/interesting developments for content.

2 hours ago, Thorfinn the Shallow Minded said:

I would endorse representing a Roman civilisation from a later point to be able to show Caesar conquering  Gaul,

Wouldn't this be a bit outside of the 'snapshot' you suggest? Also, I would find it goofy for two civs to exist for rome, when they can fight each other. As if the two civs are different, when really they are both just 'rome'.

The idea of the reforms technology is to unlock the beginning of the transformation of the army. So sort of the end of republican rome.