Inside Mac Games Volume 6 #1

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Text File | 1997-03-07 | 30KB | 528 lines

THE VIKING AGE SCENARIO by Harlan Thompson The year is 850. After a period a chaos surrounding the fall of Rome, Europe has settled down to a period of several hundred years of relative peace and stabillity. All that is about to drastically change. The Vikings have begun a two hundred year period of pillaging and conquering that will leave almost no part of the West untouched. Historically at one time or another they conquered most of the cities in England, Ireland, France, Germany, European Russia, Sicily and even looted as far as North Africa, Constantinople and the Caspian Sea. By the time they finally settled down after converting to Christianity they had profoundly changed history. While the Vikings were helping make the Dark Ages dark, the Byzantines and Abbasids were the keepers of the technological flame. Both of these powers were vibrant and militarily powerful during this era, but they were more or less in entrenched positions, prevented from growing. This game is particuarly designed for the human player to be the Vikings, but after you've done that you should try being either the Abbasids or the Byzantines for a different kind of game. I put a lot of effort into making all three civs playable, with many unique units and technologies for each. INSTALLATION This scenario is designed to be played either for those with or without the Scenarios CD (and thus the capabilities of the events.txt file). The events.txt file helps determine who is at war with who and gives money each time a King unit is killed. Useful things, but the game should work fine if you don't have it. If you have installed the Scenario CD, follow this simple procedure: Make a new folder under your Scenarios folder (which is inside your Civ2 folder). Call the folder "Vikings" or whatever you want. Put all the files you downloaded in your new folder, and play. For those without the Scenarios CD, here's what to do. Before starting to play this scenario, make or make sure you have backup copies of your Rules.txt, City.txt, Game.txt, Cities.gif, Icons.gif, Terrain1.gif and Units.gif in some folder other than Civ2. Then put all the new files you have here (including the viking.scn and viking.txt files) in the Civ2 folder. Then you'll be able to play. The Events.txt and Title.gif files won't work for you so it doesn't matter what you do with them. Once you're done, simply replace these versions of your files you moved with the originals. THE PLAYERS -in order of playability (starting government types in brackets; the Empire type is explained later. If I refer to a civ having more than one capital that means it has more than one palace) The Vikings (Despotism) This game is designed primarily for the human player to be the Vikings. The Vikings were incredibly good at navally attacking cities and could sail their boats far up most rivers (hence big rivers are made up of ocean squares). However they were just as bad in holding onto their conquests, either quickly leaving to loot the next city or getting quickly absorbed into the local population due to their small numbers. Really bad too at conquering inland towns unreachable by boat. So in this game the Vikings are all naval offense and no defense (their "strongest" defensive unit has a defensive value of 1!). Being essentially a barbarian group they are also very weak technologically (except navally), still a despotism and have a relatively small population in marginally fertile areas. So to succeed they not only must attack and expand, they also must cripple the more advanced civs to prevent being left behind. And get monarchy already before your cities starve to death! If you wish to raid like the Vikings, this is one unusual strategy I found successful. Attack first with boat and sometimes Hirdmenn (to keep the boats strong). Move in the conquered city with a unit, sell some city improvement from it, then put that unit on "sleep/ board next ship" mode. Then bring the boat in and take it away, which you can do even if the movement points are used up. Thus you get away before the Peasants units even get unfortified (read below about these) and when they do you'll be able to get them later from offshore, possibly even take the town again. Keep your treasury very low- spend your money when you get it. That way when the cities you raid are reconquered you don't lose as much as you gained. Try conquering an island as a base and then following this strategy in the Meditteranean. The British Isles and France especially are full of Cathedrals and Monasteries just begging to be conquered and sold for easy money. But don'[t forget to hurt the Byzantines and Abbasids too since they are the biggest and most advanced civs. Exclusive units: Stallari, Hirdmenn, Gestir, Bezerkr, Knarr, Karv, Longboat The Byzantines (Empire) The Roman legacy carries on the East through the Byzantines. During the Viking Age the Byzantines enjoyed a resurgance after the initial wave of Islamic expansion settled down. Their capital Constantinople was far and away the largest and most glorious city in the Western world, but technologically and militarily the Abbasids held the advantage. Can the Byzantines reestablish the mighty empire of the Romans? A few things are working in their favor. The Byzantines were the only ones to hold the secret of Greek Fire, a defensive weapon similar to napalm. They also have the best naval technology in the Mediterranean. Exclusive units: Greek Fire, Dromon, Galley, Knights, Crusaders The Abbasids (Empire) This civ represents all the various forces of Islam. In fact there was much infighting within the Islamic world (so much so that during this time their population actually went down), but for most of the Viking Age the Abbasids really were recognized (kind of like the Pope) as the supreme authority over most of their territory on the map (the major exception being Spain which was ruled by another Islamic faction). The exceptional infighting is represented by bunch of Independents in the Sahara at the beginning of the game (they represent barbarian attacks but I used Indepedents instead so the computer doesn't always show them). Compared to the Abbasids, Europe outside of the Byzantine Empire was considered an underdeveloped backwater. Can the Abbasids conquer the most prized city in the world, Constantinople, and beyond? Because their country is so big the Abbasids have two capitals, Cordoba and Samarra. Exclusive units: Lancers, Genitors, Moors, Assassins, Slaves, Devotees The Hungarians (also known as Magyars) (Despotism) The Hungarians are basically like the Vikings except on land. Christian prayers in this era would often end with the line: "And Lord, protect us from the Vikings and Magyars" because it seemed no town was safe from these two marauding groups. Their horse archers terrorized all of Central Europe until their conversion to Christianity around 1000. Hungarians also have little technology and poor defense. They loot and conquer. Because I was limited by only seven civs maximum, I lumped the Khazars of the Steppes of Russia together with the Hungarians. This all-Jewish (believe it or not) Turkish barbarian group was very similar in spirit to the Hungarians; once again horse archers were their chief weapon. The capital of the Khazars is in Itil. Exclusive units: Horse Archer, Huns The Franks (Empire) Shortly after the glory of Charlemagne the Franks have been severely weakened. They are totally unprepared for the Vikings and can't hold a candle to the more advanced civs of the Byzantines and Abbasids. In fact, for example, in reality Muslim Cordoba was at least twenty times the size of any city in France during this age. Being this civ would be quite a challenge. Exclusive units: Crusaders, Knights The Holy Roman Empire (Empire) Their situation is similar to the Franks. The northern cities are a bit more prepared against the Vikings, having already been raided frequently. But they are also a target of the Hungarians. In the south a few of the cities have naval power and trade connections in the Mediterranean. As with the Franks this is not the easiest civ to play. Technically the Holy Roman Empire didn't really get going until a bit later but I moved history up a bit so I could get by with 7 civs. This civ has two capitals, Rome and Aachen. Exclusive units: Crusaders, Knights The Independents (Empire) Limited by a maximum of 7 civs, I lumped all the remaining smaller countries into one civ. There would be no point in choosing this civ since it is so big and doesn't make any historical sense as a single entity. You can think of the Independents as the individual countries in it. There are the tiny Christian countries of Northern Spain holding out against the Abbasids. The capital here is Leon. There is Burgandy between Franks and the Holy Roman Empire represented by two towns. There are the many tiny governments of England and Ireland. The center of power here was in Wessex so the capital for the region is there (Winchester). Four cities represent the country of Bulgaria, eventually conquered by the Byzantines. Most of the Independent towns are located in Eastern Europe and the area soon to be known as Russia. At the beginning of the Viking Age no dominant power had emerged yet in this region of tiny regional powers, though this would soon change with Viking-led Kiev dominating the region and becoming the biggest city. Thus Kiev is the capital here. There are a number of other Independent towns here and there, such as Naples, Croatia, and Georgia. Exclusive units: Crusaders, Knights With the Scenarios CD, the Independents, Vikings, Abbasids and Byzantines are always at war with each other. Without it they still all begin the game that way. Also with the CD, the following countries are always at war with each other: the Franks and Holy Romans, the Holy Romans and Hungarians, and the Hungarians and Independents. Sometimes there may be messages such as "The Byzantines and Abbasids form an alliance against the Vikings" but don't believe them- if you have the CD that only represents what the computer would do if it could. Also, if you have embassies sometimes you may not see countries at war with each other under the Foreign Minister like they should be. Nevertheless they are when their part of the turn comes around. THE UNITS When I say exclusive units in the above paragraphs, I mean just that- only the civs that start the game with those units can possibly ever build those unit type; even stealing the prerequisite tech is impossible (a little trick I learned courtesy of Dirk Weber's FAQ on this subject in the FAQ section of the ModHeaven website, http://www.aim4game.com/modheavn/homepage.htm). The downside is that such units don't show up in the Civilopedia with the Scenarios CD, so check this chart if you don't see a unit there. There are many new units that more closely reflect the militaries of the time. The Vikings, Byzantines and Abbasids in particular have many unique new units. The names and roles are as accurate as I could get. Here's a rundown of what exists in the scenario: NAME COST ATT DEF MOVE HP FIRE SPECIAL PREREQ. TECH OBS. BY Archers 30 3 2 1 1 1 Warrior Code Musketeers Assassin 80 10 0 2 2 2 7 Islamic Tech -- Bannerets 90 6 1 2 3 2 4 Elite Nobility -- Battering Ram 60 6 1 2 1 2 3 Seige Engin. -- Bezerkr 80 10 0 2 2 2 7 Viking Tech -- Caravan 50 0 1 1 1 1 1 Trade Merchants Catapult 40 6 1 1 1 1 Mathematics Cannon Cannon 40 8 2 1 2 2 Metallurgy -- Chariot 30 4 1 2 1 1 The Wheel Crusaders Crossbowmen 30 4 2 1 2 2 Crossbow -- Crusaders 40 5 1 2 2 1 Europe Tech Bannerets Devotees 40 4 2 1 2 1 Islamic Tech -- Diplomat 50 0 0 2 1 1 1,4 Literacy Spy Dragoons 50 5 2 2 2 1 Leadership -- Explorers 30 0 1 1 1 1 1,2,4 Seafaring -- Freeholders 60 0 1 1 2 1 9 Free Peasantry -- Genitors 60 5 2 2 2 1 Islamic Tech -- Gestir 30 4 1 1 1 1 Viking Tech -- Greek Fire 50 3 3 1 2 1 Byz. Tech -- Hirdmenn 40 6 1 1 1 1 6 Viking Tech -- Horse Archers 50 7 2 2 2 1 2,4 Hungar. Tech -- Huns 20 1 2 2 1 1 5 Hungar. Tech Musketeers King 500 4 4 1 2 2 4,5 none -- Knights 40 4 2 2 1 1 Europe Tech Dragoons Lancers 20 1 2 1 2 1 5 Islamic Tech Musketeers Legion 40 4 2 1 1 1 Iron Working -- Merchants 40 0 2 2 2 1 1,4 Magnetism -- Moors 60 6 1 3 2 1 Islamic Tech -- Musketeers 30 3 3 1 2 1 The Gun -- Peasants 80 4 2 2 2 1 1,2 none -- Phalanx 20 1 2 1 1 1 Bronze Working Pikemen Pikemen 20 1 2 1 1 1 5 Feudalism Musketeers Serfs 60 0 1 1 2 1 9 Serf System Freeholders Siege Tower 60 6 1 1 1 1 3 Astronomy Battering Ram Slaves 60 0 1 1 2 1 9 Islamic Tech -- Spy 60 0 0 3 1 1 1,4 Espionage -- Stallari 60 6 1 2 1 1 4,5 Viking Tech -- NAVAL TROOP HOLD Caravel 3 40 2 2 4 2 1 Navigation Galleon Dromon 0 80 6 2 5 2 1 4 Byz. Tech -- Frigate 2 60 4 1 4 2 1 Magnetism -- Galleon 4 60 0 3 4 2 1 Magnetism -- Galley 4 40 2 1 4 2 1 8 Byz. Tech -- Karv 5 40 4 1 5 1 1 8 Viking Tech -- Knarr 3 70 6 1 8 2 1 Viking Tech -- Longship 2 100 8 1 10 2 1 4 Viking Tech -- Trireme 2 40 1 1 3 1 1 8 Map Making Caravel Special abilities: 1: ignores zone of control 2: moves as if all terrain were roads (i.e. alpine troops) 3: ignores city walls 4: can see up to two squares away 5: defense times 2 vs. units with a movement of 2. 6: can attack directly from boats 7: dies after attacking 8: ship must stay near land (like trireme) 9: performs functions of settlers A few things I feel I should point out in case you missed 'em. Assassins and Bezerkrs work like less powerful missles- you can attack with them once, but then they're destroyed. Freeholders perform settler functions twice as fast as Serfs or Slaves but they can't use the "transform" command. The Vikings have a special trade unit called Merchants that are more hardy and can travel quicker than Cavarans. They're even cheaper, packing all the punch of the usual 50 shield Caravan for the low low price of only 40! The Vikings were in fact probably even more successful in trade than conquest. Send them repreatedly into the certain big cities of other civs and you will be rewarded with a steady supply of gold. For instance, the right commodity from a far away Viking city put into Constantinople can instantly give up to 800 gold. THE PEASANT UNIT I did a very strange and complicated thing with the Peasants unit. This unit is an early version (in historical time) of the Partisan unit. The idea is that since the Vikings tended to attack a city and quickly move on, the Peasants unit represents the angry peasants who would quickly retake their city after being kicked out. Otherwise even with such poor defensive units I think the Vikings would have no problem keeping their conquests. I have arranged it so that no civs can actually build Peasants (it is too strong a unit) but for all civs except the Vikings and Hungarians, most anytime the civ has one of its cities conquered, Peasants will spontaneously appear. Unfortunately under Monarchy I couldn't get this effect to happen. So I had to change all the Monarchy governments to Communism which I then retitled Empire. Confusing, but it is the only way I found to get the Partisan effect so early in the technology tree. For the purposes of this game Communism is basically the same as old fashioned Monarchy except no corruption and its easier to keep cities happy. THE KING UNIT One other unit can never be built, only appears, and has no prerequisite tech- the King unit. This of course physically represents a country's leader and the leader's personal guard. For those with the Scenarios CD, the killing of a King always nets the killer two hundred fifty gold. Once a King is gone, that's it- there's no way to make more. All official capitals have Kings and some other cities do too, since these cities were capitals of smaller, independent territories. Just to make it absolutely clear, here is a list of all the cities that have Kings in them at the beginning of the game: Aachen, Budapest, Bulgar, Bulgaria, Burgandy, Castile, Constantinople, Cordoba, Georgia, Itil, Jelling, Kiev, Naples, Navarre, Paris, Rome, Samarra, and Winchester. CITY IMPROVEMENTS - Port Facility has become Shipyards, still available with Amphibious Warfare. It is both cheaper (100 shields) and less costly to maintain (1 per turn). - The Colosseum is now called the Mosque, and is available with the new Islam civ advance. The Abbasids can't build Cathredrals (they have the Al-Koran (i.e., Michelangelo's Chapel) wonder) and Christian countries can't build Mosques (unless they steal the Islam advance first). - The Stock Exchange becomes Monastery, available with Monotheism. Recall this boosts trade by 50% in the city. It is now available after a Marketplace is built and building it enables a Bank to be built (if one has the Banking tech). A Monastery is much cheaper to make than the Stock Exchange (only 100 shields) and requires no maintainence. This change comes since I was surprised to read Monasteries acted as the banks of the middle ages. - I was hoping to make a looting strategy more profitable, but most of the expensive city improvements that can be sold tend to disappear (i.e, the Cathedral). So I made a new city improvement, the Church, the does the usual work of the Cathedral. Then I made the Cathedral a totally useless improvement that does nothing but sit there waiting to be looted! Its shield cost (and thus the money you get for selling one) is 250, and has no upkeep. I'm pretty sure no civ would want to make any more but I put them in most towns of France, Germany and the British Isles. - Supermarket has been radically altered. It is now called Castle. Food production was able to increase slightly with the increased organization and security lords in their castles could provide. But since this improvement is now available with Chivalry, the farmland settler function doesn't come with it. So you only get one extra food in the city. Not much, but given how tough it is for a city to grow in this scenario, it can make a difference. Plus, the cost is cheap too- reduced to 60 shields and no upkeep. - The name and look of Courthouse has been changed to Prison since that seems a more "primative" form of justice appropriate for the age. - Coastal Fortress city improvement has been moved from Metallurgy to Engineering. Moved to give civs some chance of defending themselves from Viking ships. At the beginning of the game only the Abbasids have the tech, but I put Costal Fortresses in all the Independent and Holy Roman cities on the Baltic and North Seas, representing their greater vigilance after already being frequently attacked by the Vikings. - City Walls cost more to make, 100 instead of 80. TECH TREE The tech tree has been drastically pruned. More or less, all Industrial Revolution and Modern civ advances (the purple and pink ones on the civ chart) plus The Republic have been done away with. The advanced techs that remain are Amphibious Warfare, Explosives, Economics, Espionage and Sanitation (with their prerequisites generally changed). Meanwhile, there are a number of "new" techs. The new ones include: Crossbow, Elite Nobility, Empire, Exploration, Free Peasantry, Guilds, Islam, Seige Engineering, Serf System and The Gun. You may see a few other strange ones if you look under your Science Advisor, with names like Secret Tech and Byzantine Tech. All of those are only to help me make up the scenario and can't be researched, traded or anything else- ignore them. A few techs, Islamic Dress and Viking Dress 1 and 2, exist only to allow changes in the People.gif file. Ignore (and hopefully don't trade) these too. Many other techs have had their prerequisites changed, or the things you can make with them changed. You can look up these changes and the attributes of the new techs with the Civilopedia (for those with the Scenarios CD). WONDERS The wonders have been changed to reflect the real wonders of the time. NEW NAME OLD NAME CITY OBSOLETE WITH? Al-Koran Michelangelo's Chapel Samarra never Code of Justinian Colossus Constantinople never The Crusades King Richard's Crusades available never The Dome of the Rock Hanging Gardens Jerusalem never Great Library -- destroyed -- Great Mosque Copernicus' Observatory Cordoba never Hagia Sophia Shakespeare's Theatre Constantinople never Leif Erikkson's Voyage Magellan's Expedition available never Lighthouse -- Alexandria already obsolete Marco Polo's Embassy -- available never Mausoleum Oracle Smyrna Elite Nobility Mosque of al-Mutawakkil Cure for Cancer Samarra Economics Pyramids -- Cairo never The Roman Legacy Isaac Newton's College Constantinople never Theodesian Walls Great Wall Constantinople Seige Engineering Theme System Adam Smith's Trading Co. Ancyra The Gun The Vatican J. S. Bach's Cathedral Rome never Of the three wonders still available to build, all the prerequisites have been changed. Marco Polo's Embassy is available with Economics, Leif Erikkson's Voyage with Exploration and the Crusades with Leadership. I needed to make Marco Polo's harder since his journey didn't take place till the 1300's, and I wanted to give the Christian countries a logical head start on the Abbasids with the Crusades (although who knows, howabout a Muslim crusade on Europe?). You can read brief descriptions of each wonder (in addition to what it does in the game) in the Civilopedia for those with the Scenarios CD. OTHER CHANGES AND NOTES: - Twice as much food is required to increase population and settlers type units (slaves, serfs and freeholders) are a bit harder to make. Plus, most civs need to research the technology to build more settler type units. - Each "citizen" now eats three food instead of two, which slows down population growth even more. In partial compensation I improved the food production of some terrain squares, or else most cities would be starving. - The look of terrain has slightly changed too. The Buffalo special square has been changed to Game since there of course are no buffalo in Europe. The Silk square has been changed to Timber since silk was much more an import from the East and just starting to be grown well locally during this time. - Scientific advances are four times harder to accomplish. This is after all the Dark Ages. - A few of the trade goods were changed to fit the times (i.e., slaves instead of oil). - Pollution doesn't matter. - There are not many goody boxes left. These are located in the few places left in the world unexplored at that time. These are the far northern regions in the frozen top edge of Russia and the unexplored islands of Iceland and Greenland. - Tech from conquest is forbidden. - Changes in government are allowed. However, the government form of Empire is only available to those civs that have it at the beginning of the game. Other civs are unable to even steal the prerequisite tech. - At the beginning of the game no civs have embassies with any other civs. - Existing barracks are made obsolete with The Gun, not Gunpowder as usual. - I normally play Civ2 with the sound off, so the sound isn't going to match for the new and moved units. If anyone cares and wants to fix it, let me know. OBJECTIVES There are 94 total objectives in the game (cities plus wonders). To reach a decisive victory one needs a total of 40. For a marginal victory one needs 30 objectives. A marginal defeat is less than 20 objectives, and 15 or less objectives is a decisive defeat. The "protagonist" is supposed to be the Vikings, but in case you aren't playing the Vikings it shouldn't matter at all how many objectives the Vikings get (since they will be so ineptly played by the computer) but whether your civ can reach those numbers. For the Abbasids and Byzantines add ten to the above numbers (since those civs start out with about ten more each) and you should have a better estimate how well you did. Here are the cities that are considered objectives: VIKINGS Jelling Hedeby Kaupang Trondheim Birka Roskilde Gotland Westness Straja Lagoda Normandy INDEPENDENTS Winchester London York Dublin Navarre Leon Naples Moravia Cracow Riga Varna Bulgaria Minsk Kiev Odessa Tana (later called Azov) Novgorod Smolensk Bulgar Sudzal FRANKS Paris Tours Orleans Marseilles Rheims Bordeux Barcelona HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE Rome + wonder Verona Salzburg Prague Aachen Mainz Wollin (later Stettin) Dorestad HUNGARIANS Budapest Zagreb Pecs Esztergom Sarai Itil (later Astrakhan) Berezany ABBASIDS Samarra + 2 wonders Cordoba + wonder Alexandria + wonder Cairo + wonder Jerusalem + wonder Toledo Seville Fez Tabert Palma Tunis Palermo Messina Tripoli Damascus Antioch BYZANTINES Constantinople + 4 wonders Ancrya + wonder Smyrna + wonder Trebizond Tarsus Cyprus Athens Thessalonica Rhodes Venice Tarentum Salerno Adrianople Cherson BUGS On my computer at least, the first turn there is a problem with the display of units and the uncovering of unexplored squares, but it should go away by the second turn. Sometimes wonders are not given as a production option despite the civ having the proper prerequisite tech. This shouldn't be a big deal since most wonders are built already, but check twice before changing cities for the Leif Erikkson's Voyage wonder. FINAL NOTES Starting out I knew very little about The Viking Age, but I'd like to think this is pretty accurate. Making this civ was kind of my way of learning about this time period. It's amazing what you can learn off the internet, a couple of good historical atlases and a trip to the library. It's hard to know how big cities were, which ones to include and all that. A certain amount of fudging was needed. All the pictures of wonders were taken from real pictures of those things (even the Leif Erikkson dragon was taken from a close up view of a replica of his sailing craft, I'm happy to say). Some wonders have very little left in the way of photos or drawings to remember them by so I had to make do. Apologies for any inaccuracies- if you have any improvements or comments to make, please let me know. My name is Harlan at harlant@hawaii.edu. I think now it's done elements of this scenario would make a good starting point for other scenarios based in a similar time and place, such as the Crusades, the Mongol invasion of Europe, the rise of Charlemagne, the Hundred Years War and so on. If you're a scenario maker, feel free to use the units, wonders, map, whatever. Free distribution of this scenario is encouraged, but please do not attempt to sell or make money from this scenario in any way. THANK YOUS This map is based on the one named Europa.mp made by Pedro Lopez Rodriguez. Thank you, though I'm really perplexed why you made most of the Sahara mountain! I adapted it a little, for instance there was a lot more forest in Europe at that time than today. Most of my units were developed from pictures and ideas I saw in the books Medieval Warlords, Celtic Warriors and The Barbarians, all by Tim Newark. Lotsa good pictures in there. Some of the units were stolen outright or stolen and modified a bit from other scenarios. I also used many great web sites to download pictures to edit. A few web sites I'd recommend to get started in case you're making your own historical scenario or just want to know more: http://www.execpc.com/~dboals/hist-gen.html and http://kuhttp.cc.ukans.edu/history/index.html. Both are general history indexes with hundreds of links for just about anything you'd want. The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World has all kinds of good links (http://pharos.bu.edu/Egypt/Wonders/) and the Viking Home Page has everything there is about Vikings (http://control.chalmers.se/vikings/).