I'm very happy to finally be able to make this public. A few notes not in the main post:
These units were made before our DeI partnership, so at this point in time they do not include any of their components. Like with our early Romans, we will probably end up intermixing elements from both when we can find the time.
Hannibal remains a work in progress. Right now, that is how CA portrayed him with a few pieces added in (a brand new helmet, an armor thrown on top). We hope to redo the textures - particularly the ugly purple used by CA. The cloak is Tyrian purple, but for some reason the Attila faction selection screen displays the colors differently. We will see what we can do there.
Hannibal/Scipio are currently represented as units players can select in custom battles. They will be normal bodyguard units with the custom generals as officers.
Not all Carthaginian units are shown above. The roster is rather large with all of their AOR units thrown in and reforms included. A few were left out but will be shown later.
There is one issue in the preview - the Sicilian units have some missing armors. In game, this is fine, but when the picture was taken there were some missing files.
I'd like to thank Petellius once again for the awesome screenshots and wallpapers. He produces great previews that really showcase the units. This is particularly great because much of the work that constitutes the units isn't our own, but comes from outside mods/modders kind enough to let us use their work. It's awesome to be able to show it all in its glory.
Please, critique away. We are aiming for historical accuracy. With a roster this size, there are a number of things people can nitpick on, I'm sure. Some decisions we will defend/explain our reasoning, but there's things that may just be wrong.
Thanks for the kind words. They are always appreciated, but especially so coming from yourself. But it's really mostly the work of others. We can't thank the Legionaire mod team/Attila enough, and Germans are coming for his contributions.
The unit cards are all UMC. He is continuously tweaking and refining what he does on his own. And Petellius brings a lot of the units in and puts them together.
Down the road we can add in DeI's great work to the above, as well. We had these units done for quite a while, but were lagging on the preview with Petellius away. Need to find the time to go back and revise.
I must say Petllieus, you seriously are an amazing unit mod editor! I love this preview, and I am stunned - this looks like the Rome 2 in detail!!! I love the Sacred Bands(don't change them as they are fine), and the Hannibalic veterans - love that unit. Hopefully this will be awesome!!1
I cannot wait to see, can I download a WIP to test this out?????????????????????
I must say Petllieus, you seriously are an amazing unit mod editor! I love this preview, and I am stunned - this looks like the Rome 2 in detail!!! I love the Sacred Bands(don't change them as they are fine), and the Hannibalic veterans - love that unit. Hopefully this will be awesome!!1
I cannot wait to see, can I download a WIP to test this out?????????????????????
@Random
Truly well done cards - they seem more akin to that of Rome 1's carthage unit cards
In regards to the cards - thanks! that is what I was aiming for, with it's own uniqueness. Glad you noticed And promote away. Word of mouth is the best advertisement.
In regards to the cards - thanks! that is what I was aiming for, with it's own uniqueness. Glad you noticed And promote away. Word of mouth is the best advertisement.
Brilliant, I'm already noticing that this is no ordinary mod. I cannot wait for the Parthians@(you can take all the cataphracts from the Sassiands, put them in the Parthian roster, and please have face masked helmets, I admire cataphracts that have more face masks, its a gameplay sort of thing), no problem. Alright if I promote this on the Attila total war forums? I'd love Parthia to have some immortal units.
will there be veterans of Hannibal with roman equipment available? maybe only recruitable in Italy or sth.
Additionally, will there be a Nova Carthago faction? I know itīs arguably "inofficial", but the Barkas practicably ruled the lands in Iberia as independent state.
Furthermore the AI in Rome 2 was never able to decide where to send itīs armies, to the effect that in DeI Carthage had most of its armies in between Sicily and Iberia...
Edit: sorry, just looked at the preview pics
Last edited by Maetharin; June 25, 2015 at 01:57 PM.
I know the historical sources are vague at best but both Polybius and Livy have mentioned Carthage having somekind of pikemen (perhaps shorter than sarissas though) present at Cannae at flanks. I think Divide Et Impera did a great job adding a few pike-units (alas not as many as the greek/diadochi/macedonian factions) to spice up the flavor.
References to pikemen come from Polybius, but it's a mistranslation. The word used was actually longchephoroi which refers to throwing javelins in the time period Polybius is writing. The units in question are always performing light infantry tasks, and the reference is not used at Cannae. The only piece of evidence I've seen that directly supports the use of a Macedonian pike by the Carthaginians is by the EBII team, but I have never been able to find the source myself and they never provided it that I saw. it was apparently some French academic journal or something of that nature. It was an inventory list from Carthage that apparently included sarissa. I've never seen a reference to this evidence anywhere else.
The odds that Hannibal was using pikes are pretty slim given that he was fighting in Iberia which has some of the roughest terrain in Europe, using a mixture of native forces and Libyans, and the African infantry maneuvers quite well in all of Hannibal's battles. At Cannae they are able to swing around, we are told, to flank the Romans as they piled into the center. Not irrefutable that they weren't pikes because of that, but doubtful.
It's also likely that Hannibal had already switched to the oval shield in Iberia, if not his predecessors. And he re-equipped his Africans in Roman arms which would seem a bit odd to me if they had a Macedonian fighting style. By the Third Punic War, the inventories provided of what the Romans found included cuirasses, thureos shields, longche and xiphos. Livy also remarks how Carthaginians in Spain could not use their spears in close quarters during the siege of Nova Carthago. Which would seem to suggest that they did in fact fight with spears.
The only other evidence for any Macedonian arms are very indirected. Xanthippus introduced modern Hellenistic drill, but there is nothing on him reequipping the infantry to fight differently. Conversely, Polybius makes a point to tell us when the Achaeans switched over to the Macedonian style.
The other indirect piece of evidence - Polybius makes an odd reference to Hannibal when he is starting to discuss the Macedonian phalanx versus the Roman legion, but it's unclear whether he is talking in the general sense of a phalanx (Greek and Macedonian) or what. It's particularly odd because he is setting up the battle as the first real test between the phalanx and legion (he discounts Pyrrhus because he intermixed his forces - the Italians fought in their native style).
So, to me, the evidence stacks one way. There is nothing that actually indicates the use of a sarissa, and most points the other way. I know other mods add in African pike units, but we will not be doing so. Their will be opportunities for submods there, I would imagine, but not for the main mod. Not unless someone can present a smoking gun piece of evidence that I'm unaware of. We also have a pretty capable historical adviser who agrees with this assessment, so I intend to stick to it.
I see. How about mercs? I was mainly thinking about the 4000 troops that Philip V sent that were present at Zama fighting with pikes for the Carthaginians.
After a lot of research online it seems that the only reason Carthaginians didn't use pikes widely (one can assume with a probability) was due to it being impractical against most of their enemies/in the landscape they fought in at that current time (iberian hilly terrain, african vast plains fighting against skirmishers/cavalry or how it seems Romans have adapted to deal with enemy pikemen formations) - but this being a game and you being able to fight any one that Carthaginians didn't fight historically makes me believe that some latitude towards "what if"-units should be given.