Slitherine

I'm trying out FoG II tonight, but there's one thing that concerns me when taking a first glance at the game's roster of playable civilizations. Namely, although North Africa is part of the ancient Mediterranean setting, the kingdom of Kush in northern Sudan (aka "Nubia") doesn't seem to be included or even mentioned. As someone with an interest in African history and culture, I find this a very bizarre omission considering they were an empire of considerable wealth, power, and significance in the Nile Valley region. They were longstanding rivals of the Egyptians---even conquering them at one point in history---and are also known for threatening Roman hegemony over the region after the Romans took Egypt. In the end they even outlasted Egypt itself (i.e. until 350 AD). They're at least as worthy of inclusion in a game like FoG II as any minor Celtic or Germanic tribe.

And I notice that this is a recurring trend in strategy games with an ancient Mediterranean focus. These games are willing to include Ptolemaic-controlled Egypt, Carthage, and Mediterranean Berber peoples like the Numidians, but Kush rarely gets any attention. At most, it's either a non-playable faction (as in the second Rome: Total War game) or represented as mercenaries for the Egyptians (as in the first one). It's a very suspicious omission if you ask me, especially considering the Kushites are generally accepted to have been a dark-skinned African people. Surely, a mighty empire of dark-skinned Africans would be something that games with FoG II's scope would like to represent, especially given how diversity in game characters is a hot topic these days.

TL;DR: I for one would really like Kush to be represented as a playable civilization in this game.

Interesting post. What kind of data do we have on how the Nubians organized and fought?

My impression is that there was not a lot of *large-scale* military interaction between Nubia/Kush and other major powers in the Rise of Rome time frame. There was plenty of military interaction prior to the fall of the 25th dynasty and also after the Islamic conquest of Egypt. Consequently, there was an early medieval Nubian list for Decline and Fall (the Field of Glory army list that encompassed the rise of Islam), and a pre-classical Nubian list for Swifter than Eagles (covering the Pharaonic period.) There is also a Beja list in Lost Scrolls, and a number of sub-Saharan African armies from the 16th/17th centuries in the FoG Renaissance lists.

I would love to see lots more lists for sub-Saharan African armies. But miniature-based games tend to focus on armies involved in pitched battles, symmetrical conflicts between relatively evenly matched states. Sub-Saharan Africa was both isolated from much of the rest of the Old World (because of the Sahara) and the states there, due to a number of factors, tended to have much lower population densities than the Mideast, Europe, Central Asia, India or China. You'd get a lot more asymmetrical warfare - regional states dominating a hinterland - than pitched battles.

MikeC_81 wrote:Interesting post. What kind of data do we have on how the Nubians organized and fought?

The stela of Piye, which is a primary source on the Kushite conquest of Egypt, has Piye ordering his troops to "announce battle from afar" and to fight only when the enemy agrees to fight. So I take it that they did fight pitched battles.
[quote="The Stela of Piye (quoted from the book "The Literature of Ancient Egypt")"]
Do not attack at night in the manner of a game. You should fight when there is sight. Announce battle to him from afar! If he should say, "Wait for the troops and cavalry of another city," then may you sit until his army comes. Fight when he says. If, further, his supporters are in another city, let one wait for them...let one announce battle to them in advance, saying, "O you whom we do not know how to address in mustering the troops! Yoke the best steeds of your stable! Line up in battle formation! Be informed that Amun is the god who sent us!"[/quote]
I am not sure about the details of their army organization, although I guess it was at least vaguely similar to that of the Egyptians (since Egyptian culture was a big influence on that of Kush). We do know that archers and cavalry were very important to the Kushite military. With regards to the latter, Kushite kings like Piye were known for their love of horses (they even had horses buried alongside them), and horses bred in Kush were sought after throughout the Middle East:

Piye's inscriptions were accompanied by images of horses and a team of horses was buried near his own tomb in a pyramid at el-Kurru near Napata, a practice adopted by several of his successors. The prominence accorded to horses seems to be closely linked to military developments in the 1st millennium BC: chariotry, which dominated armed warfare in the New Kingdom, gradually gave way to cavalry - a technique which necessitated a much closer physical relationship between the rider and his horse.

The Kushites' interest in horses was shared by the Assyrians. Technological innovation had turned their chariotry and cavalry into formidable weapons of war and greatly increased the Assyrians' need for horses, which was met through tribute and booty as well as trade. References to Egyptian and Kushite horses in official and administrative texts from Assyria highlight these regions' importance in the international horse trade. Kushite horses in particular were valued for their strength and size and sought after all over the Middle East, including by the charioteers of Israel and Assyria, as was the corresponding expert knowledge: the Nimrud Wine Lists, records of wine ration distributions at the royal court of Kalhu, attest to the presence of Kushites in Assyrian service as early as 732 BC.

---Kush, Assyria's rival in the Levant (I can't link to the article right now, but it is on the University College of London's website)

In addition, it's also possible that the Kushites even trained war elephants. The ruins of elephant enclosures have been found at the Kushite site of Musawwarat es-Sufra:

The major period for construction of the Musawwarat es-Sufra began after 300 BC with the erection of temples on artificial terraces within the Great Enclosure. This site is located in a natural basin five or six miles in width surrounded by hills in the Sudan. Musawwarat es-Sufra was an important center for pilgrims who came to celebrate the periodic festivals held there for the local gods. The numerous elephant representations may possibly suggest that elephants were trained here (for military and ceremonial purposes) and the large enclosures may have been designed to herd them in.

---Ancient Africa: Meroe (from the Purdue University website)

To clarify - Nubia fielded large armies, but it just didn't have a lot of well-documented wars in this period.

The conquest of Egypt would probably be covered by the Swifter than Eagles module.

The Field of Glory miniatures system gave the pre-classical Nubian armies and the Christian Meroitic armies lots of massed bowmen



Christian Nubian
http://www.madaxeman.com/FoGAM/tiki-ind ... ian+Nubian

Early Pharaonic Nubian
http://www.madaxeman.com/FoGAM/tiki-ind ... age=Nubian

Kushitic Egypt
http://www.madaxeman.com/FoGAM/tiki-ind ... e+Egyptian

Nijis wrote:To clarify - Nubia fielded large armies, but it just didn't have a lot of well-documented wars in this period.

The conquest of Egypt would probably be covered by the Swifter than Eagles module.

So maybe this is something that an expansion pack is going to add? Nice.

I must admit that I posted my OP as someone who was unfamiliar with the whole FoG brand. Most of my experience has been with other PC games in the strategy genre with an ancient Mediterranean setting.

Jabrosky wrote: I must admit that I posted my OP as someone who was unfamiliar with the whole FoG brand. Most of my experience has been with other PC games in the strategy genre with an ancient Mediterranean setting.

Yeah, not really fair to criticize FOG2 based on its coverage as an initial release--the DLCs will probably gradually cover pretty much every ancient/medieval army you can think of (and some you can't). Look at all of the DLCs for FOG1 to get some idea...

If there is something that FOG doesnt lack is armies

Expect we have 2-3 DLCs more.... Inmortal fire, a medieval army list and maybe Legions Triumphant.... and table game has more army list than first FOG had... even there are things like Conquistadores or Chinese armies

The table top game had 13 osprey sized books with army lists in them, and some were very thick Osprey books. And I still have some lists drafted that never made the cut, even into Lost Scrolls

About 300 lists in total I think, and Richard has split some of them for FoG II already so in theory if all were used it would be even more than that ...

Scutarii wrote:If there is something that FOG doesnt lack is armies

Expect we have 2-3 DLCs more.... Inmortal fire, a medieval army list and maybe Legions Triumphant.... and table game has more army list than first FOG had... even there are things like Conquistadores or Chinese armies

FOG1 had a number of medieval lists including "Wolves From the Sea", "Oath of Fealty", "Storm of Arrows", "Swords and Scimitars" and "Eternal Empire" so I am expecting all those armies to eventually appear for FOG2.

I'm modding in the Chinese so don't worry.

I refer that FOG when has 2-3 extra army list become a little monster, more armies than you can use, if you add more army lists...

I had all FOG I army list except the 2 released for the new engine because i find it very poor and inferior to original engine and i cant made run vikings over old version.... and well when you have 2-3 army list you are a little missing to decide what use... specially when you mix periods

The Meroitic kingdom was at least as powerful as any of the contemporary northern European tribal confederations. I'm not sure if it counts as the "Rise of Rome" era, but in the early Imperial era (25 BC) a Roman force equivalent to two full legions was sent into the territory of Meroe to retaliate for a raid on upper Egypt by 30,000 Meroitic warriors. They fought a substantial pitched battle outside the walls of Pselchis, in which the Meroitic forces are described as being poorly led, but armed with large rawhide shields (thureoi), axes, swords, and pikes (kontos).

After the Roman victory, they sacked Pselchis, and took two more Meroitic cities by storm (Premnis and Nabata) before overextension forced them to return to Egypt. Meroe was not yet beaten, and returned with an army of several thousand to besiege the Roman garrison left behind. The conflict ended with a negotiated solution that delimited the Roman and Meroitic spheres of influence on the upper Nile, and in which Augustus waived the previous tribute requirement.

The conflict is briefly described in Strabo: (http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:c ... g2:17.1.54)

Maybe a way to represent the Nubians at the moment coul be that of using the Indian army without heavy chariots, nomad horse archers and all kind of artillery (plus the irregular, if this army contains them, I don't remember now).
Nubians in fact were reknowned for their archers and 1 or 2 elephants, as well as light chariots, could be compatible with their african background.

jomni wrote:I'm modding in the Chinese so don't worry.

Have you seen this?

https://youtu.be/u50qDyU4khI

Was on the cable last night. Any ideas how to make the chariots work better in FOG2?

Henry

Thanks. I’ll watch that one if these days. My problem is I can’t do new 3D models. Just repaints. So I painted the Indian Chariot just because the crew have firing animation.