Interesting article about ancient elephants that should be implemented in the game.

[jamreal18]

This article talks about the difference between indian and african elephants that were used in the battle Of raphia....

http://m.nbcnews.com/science/elephan...ved-2D11972907

Courtesy of nightingalehussar

Indian and african elephants should look different from each other....

[SirRobin]

Shall it be included in the game? Says who? I think you mean "should" be included in the game. I agree with that

But unfortunately, I think in CA's terms it will translate to "won't" be included...

[daelin4]

What is the issue here exactly? Size envy, only in this case it's pachyderms?

[Leftcoaster]

What are we asking to be included? That smaller elephants be afraid of larger elephants? The article potentially disproves the ancient report that Ptolemy's Elephants ran from the larger Asian Elephants, because it was genetically unlikely that the Asian Elephants were actually bigger, in fact it was the larger elephants that ran away.

So do we want the game to make the larger elephants afraid of smaller elephants? or was it something else that spooked them?

The game already has different units for African Elephants and Indian Elephants.

[DeliCiousTZM]

it bothers me that my african elephants are indian elephants.

[rob-a-dogg]

Smash 2 elephant units together, for me they both hit the roof pretty quick and go mad - which is fair when you make 20 tonne animals fight each other.

Plus there are many reasons why the elephants buggered off from that REAL LIFE battle, storywise it may have just been what the Greeks noticed (hey those look smaller!), hell greek art doesnt even always have good grasps on scale and depth or angles and take a very long time to develop them. This article merely notes that the elephants *may* have been of similar size based on the genetics of the the groups we *think* that those elephants came from. No mention of age of the elephant corps in the army? Different training? No? Other factors? Anything?

Also to clarify this appears to be "Interesting article about ancient elephants, that OP wants to be implemented in the game.

although the article doesnt really tell us anything we can implement. Oh well.

[jamreal18]

it bothers me that my african elephants are indian elephants.

Different elephants that look exactly the same...

[PhillySouljah]

The article mentions Age of Empires. I don't recall the Battle of Raphia depicted in AoE and I'm pretty sure the game didn't distinguish between elephants.

[DeliCiousTZM]

Different elephants that look exactly the same...

African Elephant

Indian elephant

Using the same skin for two different elephant species is annoying, they are not the same and shouldn't look the same. In fact i'd like the African war elephants to be bigger with some better stats. Balance can take a hike.

Thank you.

[WhooLong]

Yeah, african elephants have bigger tusks, bigger ears, bigger everything, except skull I think. African elephants look more badass. They should have made two models like OP said. But they probably won't, I mean people don't care about those details, they are more occupied with their Hoplite phalanx fantaisies.

[D E C]

One could say that there's no evidence at all where exactly did the Egyptians/Carthaginians get their African elephants from or how did they look. Also, the Seleucids used Syrian elephants too which could actually be much larger than the North African elephants.

[SD_Man]

The African Bush and the now extinct North African Forest Elephants are two different animals. The latter being the correct pachyderm used by the Carthaginians and Egyptians. Even though this variant was smaller it was also easier to maintain and train unlike their crazier Bush cousins which is why they were preferred. Of course, over-exploitation and lost of habitat is the main reason why they are extinct today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_African_elephant

[ptoss1]

What's so great about elephants?

You shoot a couple of volleys at them and they're dead.

Whoops, there goes years of training.

[jamreal18]

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

African Elephant

Indian elephant

Using the same skin for two different elephant species is annoying, they are not the same and shouldn't look the same. In fact i'd like the African war elephants to be bigger with some better stats. Balance can take a hike.

Thank you.

Nice pictures!

[jamreal18]

African elephants shall look like these:
















And this should be their animation when charging:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7Vej9AOKY0

[Toho]

woa woa woa...

these african elephants are found way...WAY south in the african continent (like a whole Sahara desert away).
the African elephant in the game is actually extinct and they were actually pretty small compared to the Indian elephant.

[HippieGunner34]

Am I missing something? I just played the battle of Raphia in historical battles and the advisor kept hammering on me that our elephants would not stand to be near selucid elephants.