Histography and Total War Attila

[Anna_Gein]

Great posts Rinan

Back on OP point I suspect the hidden incomes are a big part of this situation. As every 1/2 settlements factions beneficent from it as much as the two big roman factions. Since infrastructure are in bad shape the WRE can not compensate with its size. So the WRE must face dozens of hostile factions who are in great advantage thanks to it.

[veverčák]

Untrue. Paradox games like CK II are sophisticated state and dynasty building games, while its military campaigns are unrealistic and fairly simplistic. TW's military campaigns are more realistic and detailed, as are its real time battles (compared to CK II/EU IV etc.)

Well, that is exactly what I was trying to say. Only thing I would correct on your post Huberto is this: Paradox already made games focused on battles. Hearths of Iron and March of the Eagles (Napoleon adn his conquest) are already focusing on war. Not in TW style of RTS battles, but the mechanics and focus is on war, battles and being general/war leader.

[ray243]

I wish the game design team spend more time with Historians in regards to game design itself, letting history inform us what kind of game we can design as opposed to trying to fit a game into some simplistic and wrong model of history. If Total war can model more complex character interaction, perhaps more people be invested into it.

The game is most fun when there is elements of RPG mixed in with strategy. I just do not understand why the current game designer for CA removed features like family tree from Rome 2.

[Marvzilla]

Just to be clear: Paradox is also far from potraying the medieval period correctly in CK2.

[Huberto]

Just to be clear: Paradox is also far from potraying the medieval period correctly in CK2.

Closer than M2TW though I am sure of that.

[User29]

OP clearly just doesn't see the righteous truth of proud Germania! *Deutschland anthem softly plays*

I had actually totally forgot about some of the points OP rightfully made, I was truly greatly irked by the Alani thing but two things makes it okay for me,

1. The Alans were heavily influenced by the Germans and "hung out" with them throughout their stay in the Western Rome Empire, especially the Vandals.

2. The Alans are playable faction and they weren't in Rome 1, CA... did this? really? I can cut some slack that they re a lazy faction, cause they exist at all.

On the Saxons being invited to hold off the Celtic Hordes, This just does not and could not play well regarding Total War mechanics so to be fair to CA, it's an alright compromise, but the Saxons weren't imminently invading in 395, that should be changed.

[craziii]

For the love of the Heavens! Such is nature of any game!

In Europa Universalis IV (EU IV. for short) the whole power balance in Europe lies within borders of France (also known as:le Blob, BBB - Big Blue Blob, Final Boss, Blue Plague, "God hate you Joe" and many more). Under normal circumstances the BBB kick out English crown from continent within first 10 years (Grand Campaign starts in 1444) and then continue its Drang nach Osten by seizing Lois XIV. borders 200 years earlier. Then continue in Italy, Germany, Flanders, Netherlands, up to some point, where I, as the almighty entity called player, step in and try to reverse the BBB back to its more natural borders. Or BBB is disintegrate into small kingdoms by Alliance of Light - Poland - Lithuanian Commonwealth, Burgundy, Castile/Spain and Austria and Ille de France is last holding of french kings. it really depends on build and focus of last DLC.

Oh, and next time, when someone try to convince you that Hapsburg or Jagelonid dynasties found their empires by using strategic marriages he is lying! The Personal Unions were heavily abused by the monarchs and therefore nerf to oblivion! Only war is capable of bringing you new subjects!

Seriously, nobody is claiming that WRE and ERE fall in before 400 or that power balance in western Europe was that bad, neither CA, Paradox, Sega.....anybody. The main goal is to present player an interesting game based upon time frame of beginning of the Dark Ages or Age of Rise of the Europe. That is all.

excellent post

[Darios]

OP clearly just doesn't see the righteous truth of proud Germania! *Deutschland anthem softly plays*

I had actually totally forgot about some of the points OP rightfully made, I was truly greatly irked by the Alani thing but two things makes it okay for me,

1. The Alans were heavily influenced by the Germans and "hung out" with them throughout their stay in the Western Rome Empire, especially the Vandals.

2. The Alans are playable faction and they weren't in Rome 1, CA... did this? really? I can cut some slack that they re a lazy faction, cause they exist at all.

Not quite. The Alans that invaded Europe were quite independent and remained a distinct entity until at least AD 429 after which they (like the Germanic invaders) were absorbed into the fabric that would soon become medieval Europe.

The steppe Alans that we see in Attila remained even more independent/culturally distinctive. They ultimately settled in the Caucasus and were Christianized during the 10th century. Their medieval armor, language, and culture were direct continuations of Scytho-Sarmatian traditions and there is nothing to suggest that they were ever Germanized. If anything, the Antes were probably heavily influenced by Alans that hung around on the steppe because the Antes (unlike other early Slavic entities) were adept horsemen and had a strong cavalry arm.

[User29]

Not quite. The Alans that invaded Europe were quite independent and remained a distinct entity until at least AD 429 after which they (like the Germanic invaders) were absorbed into the fabric that would soon become medieval Europe.

The steppe Alans that we see in Rome 2 remained even more independent/culturally distinctive. They ultimately settled in the Caucasus and were Christianized during the 10th century. Their medieval armor, language, and culture were direct continuations of Scytho-Sarmatian traditions and there is nothing to suggest that they were ever Germanized. If anything, the Antes were probably heavily influenced by Alans that hung around on the steppe because the Antes (unlike other early Slavic entities) were adept horsemen and had a strong cavalry arm.

I'm talking about the Alans that did go with the Vandals, not as a whole. the ones who stuck behind in Alania(area north of the Caucasus) Were definitely not germanicized.

Where are you getting remained distinctly independent until 429? I can't imagine too many archaeological sites for the migratory hordes, I thought we had some faint settlements and many many words from the Romans.

I'm not saying the Alans should be seen as Germanic, I'm only trying to see the reasoning behind CA's decision. I don't think they should have any Germanics in their core roster and should only be recruiting Germans in the same way Romans or Huns do, that's to say, only if their next to a germanic horde, like say, a Buddy Vandal Horde?

Alans need more units, so do the Celts. Especially the Alans though as they are playable.

[Darios]

I'm talking about the Alans that did go with the Vandals, not as a whole. the ones who stuck behind in Alania(area north of the Caucasus) Were definitely not germanicized.

Where are you getting remained distinctly independent until 429? I can't imagine too many archaeological sites for the migratory hordes, I thought we had some faint settlements and many many words from the Romans.

I'm not saying the Alans should be seen as Germanic, I'm only trying to see the reasoning behind CA's decision. I don't think they should have any Germanics in their core roster and should only be recruiting Germans in the same way Romans or Huns do, that's to say, only if their next to a germanic horde, like say, a Buddy Vandal Horde?

Alans need more units, so do the Celts. Especially the Alans though as they are playable.

There are tons of place names in modern day Spain and Portugual that are derived from "Alan" - Alenquer, Catalonia, etc. that points towards their presence in the region. My point of view is simply that historians usually disregarded them au lieu of the more famous Germanic tribes until we are left with the impression that the Alans who went west must have been germanicized simply because we were taught to associate the fall of the Roman Empire with Germanic tribes. After the Romans defeated the Alan Kingdom in Iberia the remnants did join the Vandals and conquered Africa and this is accurately depicted in the Vandal roster.

The Alans seem to have been given the short end of the stick in ATW. They have a few cool units but as you stated, they should have no more than a handful of Germanic units at the most. CA took a very lazy path in attaching a few cavalry units to a core Germanic roster. Even their cities on the battle maps are Germanic with mead halls and statues of Wodan. Nomadic camps would be far more accurate and it would be really cool to see elements of "sword in the stone" worship in their settlements/camps. I assume that CA might be holding off on a specific Sarmatian culture/religion for DLC purposes but it's sad that a faction that is already playable in the game has to remain a joke until then.

[Cope]

Very nice post, I agree with it. I think CA decided to be lazy for a number of reasons with regards to the unit varieties and the over emphasis on the Germanic stuff:

1. As you already mentioned they want to milk the game for DLC later on down the line. I'm assuming that they will make the Caldenonians, Picts, and Irish playable at some point which will enable them to fill the not so mysteriously missing Celtic units.

2. Again, as you also already mentioned, CA probably associated the Germanic tribes with the fall of Rome as is consistent with the Hollywood perception. It is certainly true that the Anglo-American audience tends to be aware of the role of Germanic mercenaries in the Roman military as well as the Saxon, Frankish and obviously Angle involvement in the ending of the Empire. It is clear that from the Teutoburg disaster onward (which CA also played on massively in Rome II along with the Punic war) the Germans are seen as being the ultimate thorn in the side of Rome, and it is apparent that CA wanted to tap into this popular theme.

3. They know that the hardcore fans of the series won't kick up to much of a fuss about the lack of variety because they'll be expecting modders to "fix" it for them. To a certain extent, this is why I've not really made any noise about it, even though it is a little disappointing. It's almost irrelevant that CA were lazy with regards to some of the military cultures because, even if they'd been more expansive, the modding community would still end up out doing them anyway. Being a D et I player, I've been spoiled with the amount of unit diversity (the D et I Roman auxiliary system alone has more units that half the factions put together in ATW) so it is unsurprising that what CA have come up with is a little underwhelming. In any event, modded unit packs are only a matter of time, in fact some have already been released. The problem is getting them to be balanced for vanilla since a lot of modders construct new units with stats which are in keeping with whatever battle modification they are using.

All that being said, and whilst I strongly agree with your base premise that there are a lot of missing units and the German assets have been lazily reused far to often, at least I think the Romans have some nice units and variety - and let's face it, this game is only really enjoyable playing as the WRE or ERE because that is what the campaign map was designed around. Playing as anyone else is just too easy unless you crank the difficulty up to legendary.

[Butan]

Playing as anyone else is just too easy unless you crank the difficulty up to legendary.

Or use a lot of mods that gives ERE/WRE better chance, else you can rampage them with ease.

[craziii]

I knew the best post in this thread would be totally ignore. same pattern in every thread

[Fanest]

I knew the best post in this thread would be totally ignore. same pattern in every thread

it is a good post but that doent't justfies the laziness of CA to make factions a bit more distinct - damn even Slavs have germanic roster, then there are Celts and Sarmatians and others as well

[veverčák]

it is a good post but that doent't justfies the laziness of CA to make factions a bit more distinct - damn even Slavs have germanic roster, then there are Celts and Sarmatians and others as well

I do not know if its even possible. Those factions which were using truly distinguish tactics are rather hard to do right within TW rules. For example the Slavic people defeated Romans by using army compose only by archers. They just lurked heavy legionnaires into the pre-set traps by shooting then from far and provoking them. Just imagined the huge variety of slavic roster - two archer unit. One called "Slavic Raiders" with no armour and weapons besides bows and one called "Slavic Nobles" with bow, dagger/short sword and helmet!

And how do we ends up here, unit variety and rosters? I was almost adamant the original post was about Attila can not simulate some historical and social movements properly. Then I have discovered that German historians are underplaying important role of Iranian tribes in history and then we are talking about rosters and how lazy CA is.

Btw Darios are you sure with those geographical names? According to Wikipedia it starts to be used in 11th century. The origin is questionable at best:
One theory suggests that Catalunya (Latin Gathia Launia) derives from the name Gothia or Gauthia ("Land of the Goths"), since the origins of the Catalan counts, lords and people were found in the March of Gothia, known as Gothia, whence Gothland > Gothlandia > Gothalania > Catalonia theoretically derived. During the Middle Ages, Byzantine chroniclers claimed that Catalania derives from the local medley of Goths with Alans, initially constituting a Goth-Alania.

[Darios]

I do not know if its even possible. Those factions which were using truly distinguish tactics are rather hard to do right within TW rules. For example the Slavic people defeated Romans by using army compose only by archers. They just lurked heavy legionnaires into the pre-set traps by shooting then from far and provoking them. Just imagined the huge variety of slavic roster - two archer unit. One called "Slavic Raiders" with no armour and weapons besides bows and one called "Slavic Nobles" with bow, dagger/short sword and helmet!

Ironically, I had a lot of input for creating the faction rosters for the Sclavenii and Antes in the East of Rome mod (M2TW). Both peoples were essentially Slavic but the Antes migrated more towards the steppes of Southern Ukraine and Moldova and therefore came into contact with the Iranian Alanic people. The prototypical Slavic warrior during the 5th-7th centuries would have been an unarmored javelinman who wielded the Slavic axe (топоръ) as a melee weapon. The Slavic warrior was an ambusher who typically hid in forests and swamps (Emperor Maurikios in the Strategikon even mentions that the Slavs were capable of hiding for hours under water and breathing through reeds while waiting to ambush their enemies) and preferred to fight from a distance rather than in melee. As the Slavs lived upon the edge of the steppes, it is only obvious that they would have also employed spearmen that were capable of fending off nomadic cavalry based peoples. Archery was cherished among the early Slavs and while they were not up to par with their steppe neighbors, they made up for it in their ability to set ambushes/traps. The Sclavenii had almost no cavalry to speak of but a few among them did skirmish with javelins upon horseback. They even had a type of berserker, Volkolaki (almost every Eastern European language has a word similar to this - literally means 'werewolves') whom Herodotus described as entering into a rage, pretending to be wolves once a month, and going upon their enemies.

The Antes on the other hand were a largely Slavic people but were ruled by an Alanic/Iranian aristocracy. Therefore, they were more adept cavalrymen and while they were no match for nomadic peoples such as the Huns or Avari, they had their own horse archers and were capable of carving out an existence as an independent people upon the Budjak steppes. Emperor Justinian allied with the Antes and even gave them the abandoned Roman fortress of Turris to serve their needs. As a result, a degree of trade flourished between the Antes and Romans and while the Sclavenii were completely unarmored, Antean nobility had access to imported Roman armor and were therefore capable of arming themselves with heavier weapons. Their basic infantry would have been similar to that of the Sclavenii but they would have had more of a cavalry/horse archer/armor advantage. Nonetheless, while the Sclavenii were opportunistic and conquered Roman Thrace during the late 6th century, the Antes remained on the steppes and "disappeared" from history by the 7th century. More than likely, they evolved into more developed entities like the Tivertsi and Ulichs between the 8th-10th centuries.

Here is more than enough information to create interesting and unique rosters for the Sclavenians and Anteans in Attila. Since many factions already have rosters that stretch out to the 10th century I see no reason why "Druzhina" (heavily armored swordsmen) cannot be used for their general's unit.

Btw Darios are you sure with those geographical names? According to Wikipedia it starts to be used in 11th century. The origin is questionable at best:
One theory suggests that Catalunya (Latin Gathia Launia) derives from the name Gothia or Gauthia ("Land of the Goths"), since the origins of the Catalan counts, lords and people were found in the March of Gothia, known as Gothia, whence Gothland > Gothlandia > Gothalania > Catalonia theoretically derived. During the Middle Ages, Byzantine chroniclers claimed that Catalania derives from the local medley of Goths with Alans, initially constituting a Goth-Alania.

I find it a pretty big linguistic stretch to turn Catalonia into "Gothalania." It remains only a theory, and could just as easily be another whitewashing of history in order to glorify Germanic tribes. In any regard, it's not very important because the point is to show that the Alans were important enough as a people in order to have had various places named after them in Iberia and even in Gaul (Alainville, Les Allains, Allaines, etc)

[Cope]

I knew the best post in this thread would be totally ignore. same pattern in every thread

Assuming you're referring to the EU IV post, I don't think that you can make a fair comparison between EU IV and Attila Total War with regards to AI Empires. On the one hand, whilst it is true that the BBB can often take much more land than it did historically, it's nowhere near Total War levels of ridiculous. If the EU IV France was in Total War, it would take over the entire map every single game, a la the Suebi in Rome II.

In any event, the main complaint is that for people who want to play as a barbarian factions, the Roman Empires just get dog piled by the AI meaning that you, the player, are not able to have a mighty showdown with Rome because they've already been destroyed by the time you get there.

[Geronimo2006]

I have doubts about the "Gothic falxmen". I assume these are based on some idea that the Goths may have recruited ethnic Dacians. However I have some doubts about this. I saw a documentary on youtube recently which cited ancient historians as claiming about 40 Dacians were left alive after Trajan's campaign. Also DNA evidence in Romania points to big differences between ancient and modern Romanian DNA, which would seem to support the theory.

[Godless Crom]

They even had a type of berserker, Volkolaki (almost every Eastern European language has a word similar to this - literally means 'werewolves') whom Herodotus described as entering into a rage, pretending to be wolves once a month, and going upon their enemies.

Hm, quite interesting that! Seems that violent warrior cults based on some sort of wolf totem were common across Europe: the well-known Scandinavian berserkers and their supposed cognates among the other Germanic-speaking peoples, the fianna of early medieval Ireland (various associations with wolves and war-dogs, including a verb for their raiding activities in Old Irish often translated as "werewolfing," or simply, "wolfing") and apparently these fellows among the early Slavs. Perhaps a common origin? Or maybe humans just really think wolves are bad-ass.

[Darios]

I have doubts about the "Gothic falxmen". I assume these are based on some idea that the Goths may have recruited ethnic Dacians. However I have some doubts about this. I saw a documentary on youtube recently which cited ancient historians as claiming about 40 Dacians were left alive after Trajan's campaign. Also DNA evidence in Romania points to big differences between ancient and modern Romanian DNA, which would seem to support the theory.

It would make far more sense for the Gothic falxmen units to be renamed "Carpian falxmen" because

1) The Goths ruled 4th century Dacia as a military aristocracy that remained separate from other peoples (Carpians, Romanized Carpians, Tafali, Izyages, and Gepids). Peter Heather reckons that there might not have been no more than 3000 professional Gothic warriors and only became the big army that won at Adrianople once they implemented a levee-en-mass. The Carpians originally raided the Romans south of the Danube as the equal of the Goths but by the late 4th century they were clearly subservient to the Goths. Makes total sense for the Goths to have a Carpian/Dacian unit in their roster.
2) Falxmen for the Goths should remain an early tier 1 unit that should ultimately disappear once you upgrade them to Gothic warbands. I guess that the Thracian Oathsworn unit should remain optional but the fact remains that the Goths weren't recruiting falxmen after they migrated into Italy and Spain.

Concerning the DNA evidence - Romania was usually the first stop for any migrating tribe that made its way into Europe. A few years ago there was a Romanian historian who was somewhat ostracized by suggesting that modern Romania's origins has more to do with the Slavs, Tatars, and other migrators rather than the "accepted" 19th century theory of Roman legionnaires falling in love with Dacian women during the very short 150 year Roman occupation of Oltenia and Transylvania. While there are clearly defined links between ancient Dacian traditions and modern Romanian culture (ex: animal husbandry and its associated lexicon), I find that the Roman influence on the culture here to be almost non-existent (except for the language ironically). Different regions of Romania were influenced/occupied by different peoples throughout history and you can sometimes see it among the people in different regions. Ex: Studies have shown that people from Northeastern Romania, Moldova, and Southwestern Ukraine have remarkably similar DNA.

Hm, quite interesting that! Seems that violent warrior cults based on some sort of wolf totem were common across Europe: the well-known Scandinavian berserkers and their supposed cognates among the other Germanic-speaking peoples, the fianna of early medieval Ireland (various associations with wolves and war-dogs, including a verb for their raiding activities in Old Irish often translated as "werewolfing," or simply, "wolfing") and apparently these fellows among the early Slavs. Perhaps a common origin? Or maybe humans just really think wolves are bad-ass.

Despite what Hollywood (and Total War) would like for you to think, wolf worship was not the sole property of Germanic peoples. Almost every ancient culture that came into contact with wolves worshipped/cherished them in various ways. Wolves are simply badass in that respect and humans wished to emulate them. The Dacians referred to themselves as "Daoi" (The wolf people) and their draco standard had a wolf's head on it. The Mongols (I think) have stories that say that they're descended from wolves, and of course the stories about Native Americans and wolves are quite extensive. Don't forget that even the Roman orgin myth involves a she-wolf raising the children of Mars.