Sumskilz's Unit Creation Blog

[Tureuki]

Great !! I can't wait new unit preview

[sumskilz]

I just posted an official preview of these peones which a collaborative effort between gustave, pacco, and me. The action shots might not be as good as usual, but I wouldn't be surprised if these guys show up as adversaries in an upcoming Almoravid preview.

[sumskilz]

[TuCoT]

Looks great. + rep!
It looks like these ghulams are light or medium melee cavalries? And will they fight for th Turkish factions? Because you used Turkoman faces on them.

[Tureuki]

I think they're using Turkic faces because most of ghulams were Turkic

[sumskilz]

It looks like these ghulams are light or medium melee cavalries?

They are a Fatimid unit called Hujariyya. The elite cavalry of the Fatimid army were ghulams who would be trained from childhood in their hujra schools. The Fatimids purchased both Central Asian and European slaves but the boys captured from nomadic Turkic tribes were considered the best horse archers (probably because they had already had been trained to some degree by their way of life). The problem for the Fatimids though was that it was very hard for them to get Turkic slaves because their enemies the Seljuks did their best to keep Turkic slaves from reaching Egypt. The solution they came up with was to enlist freeborn boys who were the sons of Turkic ghulams and local women which is what the hujariyya regiments were. Though they were never quite as effective as the slave recruited ghulams because the training of freeborn boys wasn't allowed to be as harsh.

I think they're using Turkic faces because most of ghulams were Turkic

Exactly

[RollingWave]

They are a Fatimid unit called Hujariyya. The elite cavalry of the Fatimid army were ghulams who would be trained from childhood in their hujra schools. The Fatimids purchased both Central Asian and European slaves but the boys captured from nomadic Turkic tribes were considered the best horse archers (probably because they had already had been trained to some degree by their way of life). The problem for the Fatimids though was that it was very hard for them to get Turkic slaves because their enemies the Seljuks did their best to keep Turkic slaves from reaching Egypt. The solution they came up with was to enlist freeborn boys who were the sons of Turkic ghulams and local women which is what the hujariyya regiments were. Though they were never quite as effective as the slave recruited ghulams because the training of freeborn boys wasn't allowed to be as harsh.

hmmm, but from what I've read the thing about the Fatimid by 1080 was that they had purged the Turkish elements from their army due a really ugly civil war in the 1060s-70s. essentially what happened was that the Fatimids divided their armies along ethnic lines (mostly Berber / Turks / Blacks / locals but they weren't really important players). But the different ethnics were usually at odds with each other, especially the Berbers who were the foundation of the dynasty were also trying to put down the other factions, while the Turks were fast rising in importances and thus always collided with the other factions.

Effectively civil war broke out between those factions and the Caliph lost pretty much all control of his army as different factions fought each other and the Turks ended up holding the Caliph and Cairo hostage for several years while the Berbers holed up in their strong hold along the coast and the Black roamed around the destroyed a lot of the Nile farmlands (what's worse is that this coincided with a massive draught)

In the end the Caliph had no option left but to recall all his troops in Syria / Levant, led by the Armenian Ghulam Al-Badr they succeeded in retaking Cario (and in the process basically killed all the Turks) and restored order, these series of events had some major consequences though.

A. Since the Fatimids recalled ALL their forces back to Egypt the Seljuqs obviously said "why thank you" and took all those areas. The Fatimids struggled for the next couple of decades to retake the area, they finally took advantage of the Seljuq's own collsaps in the 1090s and retook the Levant... only to have a bunch of Crusader Steamroll into the area and undo all their work.

B. Since the Turks were one of the biggest culprit of the civil war they were effectively purged and removed from the army after this point, which left the Fatimids with very little to no horse archer regiment until the intervention of the Zangis (which resulted in Saladin obviously).

C.Al-Badr was rewareded for his efforts in restoring the Caliphate by being made an all powerful vizier that effectively replaced the Caliph as the real ruler of Egypt. Later Caliphs however would try to restore power and the struggle between them and the later Viziers was one of the last straws on the Fatimid's demise.


BTW: those Murabitun Spearmens look EPIC. it makes the vanilla stuff look like amatures . but wouldn't their shields be more along the lines of the Adaraga heart shield?

[Morrowgan]

Can we see a new unit ?

[sumskilz]

Can we see a new unit ?

I've been busy with University studies so my production has been a little slow lately. I have some time off in December so hopefully I'll get a lot done then. In the mean time, here are some images I haven't posted yet (they're all WIPs):

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Most of the texturing on the Almoravid unit was done by Gustave.

I really like this image but I've never officially previewed this unit (You guys might have seen it in our youtube preview though):



Edit: Horse textures by Argent Usher of course.

Also, Dome from the Magyar Mod has recently made some Ottoman units that are awesome, but I don't want to preview them until he's ready to.

[Morrowgan]

Very nice

[Walkman810i]

Epic. Can't wait to slaughter those guys

[Morrowgan]

Can you show us any other units ?

[knight_12]

NICE ! One more great looking unit ! Awesome job Sumskilz.

[TuCoT]

Awesome! Can't wait to slaughter others with these guys!

[Walkman810i]

Avesome! Can't wait to slaughter others with these guys!

You do not stand a chance...

[tibu17]

This units are great.Some ghulams are muslim kipchak in Fatimids.The Fatimids are use kipchaks to their horse archers or ghulams.,but kipchaks isvery good unhorsed fighters and they are use fatimid shields and helmets,but swords are kipchak swords.

[sumskilz]

[Matthæus]

excellent

[Morrowgan]

awesome

[Sulfurion Blackfyre]

:O Anything new?