Danes
Poland
Persians
Moroccans
Brazil
Maori
Siam
Kongo
I’d be happy with any of these civs though I’m gonna be greedy out of love for the game and the devs work and hope they all make it in. I can dream can’t I?
Danes
Poland
Persians
Moroccans
Brazil
Maori
Siam
Kongo
I’d be happy with any of these civs though I’m gonna be greedy out of love for the game and the devs work and hope they all make it in. I can dream can’t I?
They are a West Asian/Middle Eastern/Eastern European civ, not just “A Middle Eastern Civ” and definitely can’t be based off of present-day Turkey, which btw still has decent chunk of land in Europe today.
Russia is situated almost entirely in Asia but I don’t see you calling that an Asian civ.
That chunk of land that Turkey has in Europe is rather small compared with the rest of Turkey, which is in Asia and today’s capital in Turkey, Ankara happens to be completely in Asia. Of course Istanbul, which is located in Europe, was the capital of the Ottoman Empire but I just need to point that out. Even though a large chunk of Russia is in Asia and does have more land mass in Asia than in Europe, the reason I never refer to the Russians as an Asian civ is because the Russians originated completely in Europe as their origins traces back within Eastern Europe.
Russians originated in Europe and expanded to Asia. Turks originated in Asia and expanded to Europe
This is the best idea in this whole thread (except adding Poland) and I hope the devs read it. I wish I could press the heart on it more than once.
History really focuses on the famous pirates and not on the vast expanse of land which was effectively owned/occupied/supportive of them.
I don’t like this idea as a standalone civ, but it could definitely work as a revolution. Haiti is already essentially a pirate themed revolution. Ideally, Haiti would be based more on the slave revolt and have units such as Maroons, but apparently it’s too racist to actually depict the history of oppressed black people so they get to be pirates.
Haiti already has Buccaneers as a variant of the Pirate. However, it should be its own class of outlaw, especially after Pirates have been changed into shock infantry.
More units like the Freebooter you mentioned could take it to the next level. There could be even more revolution options like Jamacia, the Republic of Pirates, or Libertatia. These could even be secret revolutions only available to players who age up with the Gentleman Pirate.
Which is even worst.
‘We don’t like talking about black slavery, so instead of being the first Latinoamerican nation to be independent and funding Bolívar and San Martín, you get to be raiders, murderers and thieves’
I’d rather Haiti rev was given it’s own black militia/soldiers/guerilla fighters as in real-life. As I’ve said before in another post, it’s really odd to have an 18/19th century revolution just boil down to having 17th century Buccaneers considering they were their own thing.
Buccaneers were split into two broad groups: the mainly French ones called Flibustiers who had a Buccaneer stronghold in Tortuga, off Hispaniola and the English ones just called Buccaneers (or Freebooters) who favored Port Royal. Most Buccaneers were part of a loose coalition called Brethren of the Coast, and would often muster together in thousands strong freebooter armies and attack towns via land. Buccaneers were in the grey area of piracy - they took commissions like mercenaries but they also freely attacked the Spanish. Their Buccaneer bases had proper economies - taverns, merchants, bawdy houses, markets and various plantations along with settlers. Generally buccaneers brought in the money which was happily spent into the local economies. That’s just the 17th century!
When Buccaneering was made very much illegal, that era of Caribbean sea roving ended and then the ‘proper’ pirates appeared, either Buccaneers turning pirate or those hearing the old buccaneering tales and joining a pirate crew. The earthquakes and the destruction of Port Royal was also fairly persuasive for Sea Rovers to move on to the Bahamas where the next pirate stronghold would pop up.
The Pirates didn’t field the armies of the Buccaneers however they had fairly good organisation with crews (up to 400 each for the biggest of piratical vessels) led by the captain, who could be with a Pirate Company made of many ships led by essentially a pirate commodore. The main pirate base in the 18th century was the Pirate Commonwealth (which it was called as such in that time, rather than Pirate Rebublic) in Nassau, New Providence (Bahamas), though French pirates/privateers still operated from Petit Goave (Hispaniola). Inbetween the Buccaneering and Golden Age Pirate eras, pirates would sail from the Caribbean and make Madagascar home (Ranter Bay, St Mary and Saint Augustin were pirate bases - not the fictious Libertalia).
Again these pirate bases had plenty of wealth gained from wreck-raids and prize ships to keep an economy running (often smuggling goods into the Carolinas and beyond). Interestingly the Pirate Commonwealth and it’s small part on the bigger Caribbean pirate timeline lasted around 12 years, entire length that Gran Colombia lasted for.
I champion Sea Rovers as it covers two influencial groups which are very much linked - the Buccaneers and the Pirates with their consortiums, as well as the mercenary pirates inbetween (your privateers), which had ‘home cities’, have distinctive unit rosters, have plenty of native allies who wanted to work with pirates (native american Moskito Striker warriors from Panama, for example) and Consulate allies (Buccaneers acquired commissions/letters of marque to effectively ally and legitimately target the enemy). Also, it would make a refreshing change to play as a ‘rebel’ state.
At the Sack of Campeche there were 1,400 pirates. All in one place at one time and there to do violence individually. In a military force, there’s usually about 7 people in support roles for each person who’s actively doing the violence. Plus the civilian infrastructure. Obviously this has variation from the place in history and the region. But think of the amount of people producing cloth, hemp, powder and shot. The people cutting lumber, the people growing food. Not to mention, there were plenty of active pirates in that region who were elsewhere at the time due to a lack of centralised command. We’re talking tens of thousands of people all directly interconnected and operating loosely as a force which could engage the most powerful empire on earth at the time and cause it significant damage.
The Republic of Pirates is listed as a ############# on Wikipedia, rightfully so.
Thala $
ssoc $
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Is an offensive word apparently.
most “pirates” in reality where privateers, essentially private people attacking an enemy of their countries shipping during war.
i really, really think making a pirate faction would be a massive mistake, they where never a serious threat to the countries operating in the new world or elsewhere.
Maybe a good option would be add to AoE 3 DE pirates Minor Civilizations: Barbary Pirates (Mediterranean maps), Caribbean Pirates (Caribbean maps) and Wakō (Japanese Pirates for Asian island maps).
If you were fairly-well inland then yeah Sea Rovers wouldn’t be too much of a threat (which would probably apply to many civs ), though anywhere coastal or somewhere they can moor up and trek, or trading across the seas, then you would be fearful.
The British pretty much restructured their colonial efforts to deal with Pirates (though they were happy to use their predecessor Buccaneers to muscles their way around the Caribbean) and later on, along with the US, would put a lot of effort to stamp out piracy (roughly around 1830.
The French continously used Flibustiers on commision to bolster their weaker navy throughout the age of sail, so were rather pirate-friendly.
The Spanish treated Buccaneers as a serious threat - they had the Costa Guarda who’s sole purpose was to deal with pirates, privateers and interlopers (whilst being pretty much pirates themselves). Buccaneers raided and sacked many Spanish towns, cities and fortresses (interestingly the song ‘La Bamba’ actually derives as a folk song about the sacking of Veracruz). They also crossed the jungles from the Caribbean to the South Seas and then sacked the Spanish towns along the Pacific coast.
The successors to the Buccaneers, your Caribbean Pirates, attacked anyone generally, and certainly were not privateers when the many Wars stopped (pirates would often be ex-privateers). In fact many pirate companies sailed to Madagascar (which I’d say would make a good ‘Revolt’ civ for them) to use it and its surrounding islands as pirate strongholds and as a staging point to raid the Indian Ocean. Pirate Henry Every joined forces with other pirate companies and plunder Mughal ships making the equivalent of $190 million in modern terms and then sailed halfway across the world back to Nassau
Whilst, I think a piratical ‘minor civ’ would be apt (though if you are using their services, surely they would be Privateers), there’s enough justifcation for a Caribbean Sea Rovers civ.
A rough-around the edges civ that can switch between being complete outlaws (Unaligned) to working with a nation (Buccaneering/Privateering for Dutch/English/French) in a mercenary fashion (all in a Consulate-style of national support in the form of a Governor’s House), an additional resource of Plunder (we talking plundered valuable cargo/treasure - not coin) which can modify shipments to your piratical settlement as well as purchase higher tier units, and bring something new to the table (a mostly infantry-based non-native American civ which relies on plundering and smuggling).
A proto-state civ with a Plunder resource model would also work hand-in-hand with a proper Barbary State/Corsair civ and even the Cossack Hetmanate/Zaporozhian Sich civ (these guys, despite being mostly land-based, use small boats for raids and warfare and even sacked Istanbul).
You know, you have made some good points. It’s not something I would buy, and I would prefer other civs before something like this, but it wouldn’t be out of place in the game.
Unlike Romans in Age 2
Edit: the comment about Romans is not about the new DLC, but about the people who want to add Romans in Age 2.
i think if one wants a naval civ there are much more interesting choices like Denmark, Korea or one of the Indonesian countries.
pirates are built up a lot in popular culture but in reality they werent that important, larger more important cargo was transported in fleets and therefor entirely outside the capability of pirates to attack, the biggest “pirate” operations therefor where in fact nations navies conducting raids.
the biggest most dangerous “pirates” where not found in the new world but in north africa and sometimes south east asia, those pirates actually often did operate as states and would often raid coasts, as oppose to new world pirates who almost exclusively kept to the seas and again where in reality often privateers not pirates.
the period in general had much more crime than we are used to in our modern day, it was a violent time with even small cities of 5000 people having half a dozen murders a year.
We kind of already have 1 1/2 pirate states. The Maltese were pirates with a thin veneer of religiousness and the Haitian revolution is styled entirely with a pirate theme.
The Safavid Empire would be an interesting addition to a lack of middle east civ aside from the Ottomans.
With Arabians civ in one Middle Eastern DLC of course
Honestly, I predict that the next DLC civ order will go something like this:
I would like to finish expanding Africa with 2 more civilizations, including Zulues. I would like more about southern Africa such as more native and the Madagascar map.
Canada seems very possible. You get to play Canadians in a historical battle, and they would mesh well with the USA/Mexico themes and blend more European style (especially British/french).
Brazil is the other successor nation that could be added and is likely. I’m not sure how it would work with the federal state age up system though.