MA: Al-Murrah: Desert Dwellers

[Starshine_Monarch]

Note: This is not finished yet. For now this is just where I'm going to gather my ideas for this mod. I'm gonna need some help with this mod, so I encourage you to post your comments and ideas here as well.

Here's what I have to go on so far:

"Al-Murrah is a confederation of semi-nomadic human tribes united by their unshakable faith in their new god. Shieks, or wise-men are the tribal leaders of the Bedouin tribes of desert dwellers. The new government, the Caliphate, based on the teachings of the new god, rules over the various Bedouin tribes. Mamluks are slave-soldiers of conquered lands. While not always accustomed to desert climes, Mamluks are all very skilled warriors."

Race: Humans, Wasteland Survival, Prefers heat scale +2
Military: Versatile light infantry and cavalry. Medium camel cavalry. Medium Mamluk infantry and cavalry. Sacred versions of many units.
Magic: Fire, Air, Astral, some Water
Priests: Powerful

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Bedouins are humans with Wasteland Survival, high morale, average martial skill and light to medium-light armor. Ansar Warriors are Bedouins typically armed with scimitars, bucklers and bows or javelins.

Ansar Riders use light armor, light lances and javelins or scimitars and bows and are mounted on fast horses.

Camel Riders are mounted on slower camels and have medium armor, falchions and heavier shields. Despite their slow speed and heavier armor, all camels have a strategic move of 3. (I'd like them to have a reduced supply cost, but I was wondering if that was possible at all.).

Ansar Zealots are more expensive, sacred versions of the Ansar Warriors and Riders.

Bedouin Shieks are wise-men and leaders of the Bedouin tribes. They are mounted on camels and use weak water magic to seek out oases so their tribes can eat and drink when food and water become scarce. They have decent leadership capabilities as well, but are not good combatants.

Mamluk Warriors are tough, skilled and armed with mid-heavy armor and shields. However, they lack ranged weapons and Wasteland Survival of the Ansar Warriors and Riders. Mamluk Zealots are also sacred like the Ansar Zealots.

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So far this is all I have. I need more details on the Caliphate, more commanders and possibly some more units. Any ideas would be much appreciated. Strategies, national spells, more units/commanders, anything, put it here. I will attach the mod when it is done.

[DrPraetorious]

The sacred units should benefit from Sakina - religious fearlessness. Morale 30.

Here are some other units that we came up with in brainstorming for another arab mod. I was going to use this stuff for late era so you'd probably want to change the magic.

(sufis)
* Dervish. Capital only berserking sacred.
* Murshid. A priest/mage, H1. WSN plus 100% from WSN plus 10% from WSN. Capital only, berserker (like Dervishes.) You get a hero version who is bigger.

(assassins)
* Ainsarii. Capital only stealthy sacred. No poison!
* Hashshasin. A priest/assassin/mage, H1. Capital only, has D, is crazy bad-***. No poison!

(actual islamic clerical titles, mix of traditions though)
* Imam. A priest/general, mounted, H4, has a standard, large leadership. Is a hero.
* Ulema. A priest/philosopher, H2, makes research.
* Mufti. A priest/judge, H3, has a patrol bonus. Capital only, maybe has a chance of death magic?
* Qadi. A priest/judge, H1, has a patrol bonus.

And given that Alchemy is an arabic word, they should get an alchemist.
* Alchemist. A mage. FED, 100% FED, 10% FED. Forge bonus, alchemy bonus. You get a hero version who also has blood and astral - he's eeeeevil.

I'll gladly help you with mod-script if you don't know how to make any of these units (the Ulema needs to copystats on the EA Arco philosopher.)

Anyway, go ahead and take any of this that is helpful - I've got plenty of other mods I want to work on so I'm not keen on doing arabs myself if someone else wants to do it.

[llamabeast]

This sounds really interesting to me. Both the theme and the units. I was about to suggest Fire/Air as main magic paths, but re-reading the first post it looks like you had the same thought.

[Nix]

I've also given some thought to an Arab mod, kinda different from where this one is going though. IMO the magic could go any way you want it - even Nature is possible, consider a priest/mage Marabout unit with high leadership.

[Sombre]

Interesting stuff.

If I get around to making my MA turkish/askari influenced nation it could make for some good scraps.

[Starshine_Monarch]

Thanks for posting your ideas. I do like Dr.P's ideas for Sakina and the various clerics and I've decided I can use them.

And Dr.P, I would be so eternally grateful if you would help me with the coding. It's not really that I'm bad at it, it's just that it takes so long to do and I'd rather spend that time making the sprites. I'm actually very good at it too. Attached is the first sprite I made for this mod (in .png format), the Ansar Warrior, based off of the Marverni Scout sprite and edited pretty much pixel by pixel.

This particular one uses a bow and a leather cuirass, but I have a version that uses javelins and versions that use ring mail armor as well.

[DrPraetorious]

Yeah, it looks nice. What do you want coded?

Oh, I also did some Jinn and Ifrit national summons for Abyssia (they're in my Black Tome mod.) The Jinn needs new artwork (I shrunk down a picture of Genie from the TV show, on a lark) but you should be able to use the code.

Actually, the jinn should probably be cavalry, since the Qu'ran specifically mentions their mounts.

[Starshine_Monarch]

Pretty much everything really. I'll think up the stats for the units and send you the sprites and all you'd have to is plug them in. I can make new sprites for the Jinn and Ifrit you have as well. As I said before I really appreciate your help, Dr.

Also I've been wondering. Equipment for units has a set resource cost now, so does it automatically add the item's resource cost to a unit when it is coded in? (Ex. Say a weapon I make up costs 4 resources and I say the unit I put t on costs 1 resource. When I play the game, will the unit cost 5 resources or 1?)

[DrPraetorious]

The resource costs are figured automatically.

In general, all human units should have an intrinsic resource cost of 1, except for heavy cavalry, who pay something like 15-20 resource points for barding, which you have to input yourself.

[Wizzil]

Can i suggest some ideas, being an arab myself i find it weird the game is lacking a distinct arabic faction (its a great game nonetheless), and i find this mod really interesting.

I'll list 3 ages to reflect some history, Tribal (Early), Imperial/Caliphate (Middle), and Taifa (Late).

For the Early Age(Tribal Age) the Al Murrah are a tribal confederation, with units more or less exclusively arab (reflecting on actual history)

Tribal Warband:basic infantry unit armed with swords, leather armor, javelins and large wooden shields.

Shiekh: Though i like your description, i'd still say sheikhs vary, some of them are warlike and like to lead from the frontlines and some hang in the back preferring to not fight.

Ansari: Remain unchanged, good light cavalry.

Camel Riders: unchanged, your description fits.

For the Imperial/Caliphate age, the Al Murrah start augmenting their army with non-arab, and slave troops as mentioned above Dervish (mountain people, primarly kurds) and Mameluke (turkish slave troops), though if you wouldn't mind i have better sacred name versions:

Sacred version of the Dervish could be the Serwan Peshmerga (Death Soldier) they reach a point where they totally cast away any fears they have and are pretty much crazy naked berserkers.

Sacred version of Mamelukes can be Fursan Al Halqa (Knights of the Ring, literally), a better armored version of their predecessor and improved generally.

Jund: Better armed armored version of tribal warbands.

Cataphracts: Heavily armored riders, though not to be confused with byzantine or sassanid ones, the arabian ones had leather lamellar armor mostly and leather barding.

To reflect the Caliphates centralisation, units will be lead by Qaed(Captain) which is an upgraded sheikh.

For the last age the Taifa, the Al Murrah have degenerated and become squabbling kingdoms of princes (Amir) and governors (Wali) without a central leader, they rely mostly on mercenaries and primarily non-native troops. Mamelukes and Dervish units will be present, aswell as:

Askari: drilled and organised heavy infantry, they use spears, metallic shields and chainmail or iron lamellar.

Lancer: armored with chainmail, lance and adarga shield (heart shaped shield)

Thats about it for now, these are just some ideas i have gathered for this mod to be used or not at all, i'm pretty new at the game and i have no idea how i could balance this all, so i'll leave it for the mod author to assign whatever he sees fit. If you like this, i'll provide more information with mythological units such as Djinns, Selbouhs, Ghuls, Ifreet etcetera and some wacky stuff like flying carpets and dancing ropes in my next post i'm not sure if its possible to fit these in the game though.

Hope you like it