Civ Concept: Persia (Yes another one)

Age of Empires III: DE III - Discussion
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I’ve been sitting on this for about a month and I realized that I’d rather just post it and finish it with feedback than just sit on it forever and just being beaten to the punch by someone actually making the civ whole cloth.

Anyways, what took me the longest is realizing that I’d probably need to design an entire culture alongside Persia. If I get to finish the idea, I might as well get to designing Uzbeks, Afghans and Kazakhs while I’m at it.

Features

  • Starts with 6 Villagers, 300 food, 200 wood, 100 Coin and 1 Pishva.
  • Choose three different lines of technology to advance in age through the Madrasah.
  • Homecity shipments send more units the latter in the game you are.

TECHNOLOGY TREE

Town Center – Trains

  • Villager

Can be temporarily transformed into a Citadel, increasing damage, rate of fire and hit points.

Automatically revives your Pishva over time, although at a very slow pace. This rate can be increased, at a cost.

  • Pishva - Persian Hero. Explores, gets treasure, builds Town Centers and Trading Posts. Can summon retainers, who are very good at fighting treasure guardians, serviceable against enemy units, very, very bad against buildings and economic units.

Madrasah –

Has three branches of technology, military - economic - civilian. After enough research in the branches has been carried out, you will automatically advance in age.

House –

Market –

Ksar -

Defensive building where you can task Herdable units to fatten. Trains Goats.

Crop & Cash Crop

Infinite sources of food and coin (in the cash crop’s case). They hold a single villager, build relatively fast, and have faster gather rates than other similar buildings. However they can be depleted, and will need time before they can be harvested again.

Noria

Support building for crops. Makes them regenerate faster, holds their upgrades and can even build crops itself!

Hammam

Building where you recruit outlaws and mercenaries. Unlike European Taverns and American Saloons, the Hammam doesn’t trickle resources, instead healing nearby units.

Royal Palace

Building unique to the Middle East civilizations. It can toggle between 6 different focuses, powering your units attack, hit points, speed, train rate, experience production or gather rates. It also holds arsenal technologies that are comparable to the european ones.

  • Mail Armor: Hand Infantry and archers get +10% hit points.
  • Damascus Steel: Heavy Infantry gets +20% Hand attack.
  • Long Rifles: Rifle Infantry gets +1 multiplier against heavy infantry, counter skirmisher +1 multiplier against light infantry, both get +2 range.
  • Parthian Tactics: Ranged cavalry gets +2 range and line of sight.
  • Arabian Horses: Cavalry gets +10% attack and hit points.
  • Rum Dasturi: Artillery gets +10% attack, +10% hit points and +5 line of sight.

Barracks - Trains

  • Piyadegan (II): Much like the Azap, the Piyadegan are primarily heavy melee infantry, but they possess a ranged bow attack to beat Light Cavalry and ranged shock infantry.
  • Tofangchi (II):Similarly to the Carolean, Tofangchi have their multiplier against cavalry in range, rather than in melee range, although they can still hold their own in melee combat. They have slightly more range than a musketeer, much like the United State’s Regular.
  • Jazayerchi (III)T: Exceptionally well drilled Skirmishers. Jazayerchi have more armor than a regular skirmisher, like Cassadores, and slightly more range than a regular skirmisher.

Stable - Trains

  • Gholam (II): Persian Cavalry armed with a mace. Deals less damage than an equivalent Hussar, but they ignore armor.
  • Qoorchi (II): Persian Cavalry armed with bow and arrow. They have moderate range and modest damage, but fire multiple arrows in rapid succession. Good against other cavalry.
  • Savaran (III): Persian heavy ranged cavalry armed with a musket. Heavily armored, they have the Charkhchian Charge active ability where they do a melee area damage attack with an axe that momentarily stuns unit. Good against other cavalry and artillery.

Artillery Foundry - Trains

  • Firangi (II): Persian artilleryman carrying a small cannon, similar to an Abus, good against Light Infantry and other siege units, not as much against heavy infantry.

  • Qapu (III): Cannon with two different fire mods, Exploding shot where it’s good against other artillery, and Incendiary shot where it’s good against buildings.

  • Camel Gun (III): Relatively mobile artillery unit good against infantry.

Docks - Trains

  • Fishing Boat
  • Galwet (II): Early Persian battleship. It’s slower and tougher than the Caravel.
  • Tranki (III) : Medium Persian Warship, swift and not very durable, but good at sneaking units onto land. Can train units.
  • Terrada (IV): Heavy Persian Ship. More expensive than a Frigate, but also more durable.
  • Bomb Ketch (IV): Dedicated siege ship. Doesn’t hit as hard, but fires faster than a Monitor.
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Design Notes:

Most of the military units were taken from Iran at War: 1500-1988, although someone wrote a book of the Persian army of the Napoleonic era and it was so, so useful.

The navy was a royal pain to research, long story short there was nothing during the Safavid Era, apparently literally nothing, not just “I didn’t find anything” nothing. Nader Shah did go out of his way to establish a navy both in the Caspian and the, let’s call it Persian Gulf for now.

Googling anything has become almost impossible through the last two months, but there’s a freaking military wiki that kept most of the relevant information, I know there’s an article in JStor that actually contains this info, but damn it’s difficult to track back.

Similar story with the artillery. I know, I know, in an ideal world the Camel Gun should be called Zamburak (maybe give India ranged Cavalry with a gun for once, or maybe just keep that unit and rename it Shaturnal, whatever works) but while India has already that unit name, I went with second best.

The only source I could find on Persian Artillery unit names was a book called Persian Fire and Steel: Historical Firearms of Iran. Which was difficult as hell to track down. There’s a freely accesibly powerpoint presentation that gives you the cliffnotes fortunately, that’s where the Qapu came from. The Firangi came from a very useful article called Firangi, Zarbzan and Rum Dasturi which gives a very, very good perspective on the use of cannons during this period. Spoiler alert: It wasn’t very practical to keep and use artillery in an european army style, which is why they relied so much on Zamburaks and light cannons in general, it simply wasn’t much worth the effort unless they were fighting against armies in the west like, well, ottomans. Unwalled Cities and Restless Nomads digs into similar themes.

Cultural design wise, people may realize I cannibalized many elements from several Wars of Liberty civs and cultures. Well, why break why ain’t broken right?

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Some of the units sound op. A Carolean, an Azap, an ~Abus counter skirm and a longer than normal range skirm. Not to mention the plus two range from the Arsenal.

The age of method seems interesting. I’d imagine they’d need some expensive techs or a lot of small ones.

The cash crop running out of res should probably be removed. I understand it’s unique, but having to micro vills once you’re on crops would be annoying

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You mentioned hammam ( Place of public bathing )
Its an interesting idea
You can find old hammams in almost all persian old cities
I went to Shiraz city & I visited Vakil hammam
It was interesting & I also took some pictures :

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But i don’t know how it will work in AOE III DE
You can also give them Toopkhaneh ( Its a Persian artillery foundry)
Citadel is also essential for them that you mentioned

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The OP looking army is intended, they are meant to mirror the Ottomans.

I gave them subtle weaknesses though, unlike the Carolean the Tofangchi don’t have the active ability nor the extra speed, so they will need Azap support if they get engaged in melee and they are much more easier to just hit and run.

In the same vein, the Firangi is a much, much more specialized unit than the Leather Gun or the Abus, making the civ having a more fragile unit comp than the Ottomans or Swedish.

It’s a paper tiger, it looks super strong until you start realizing the holes, that’s on purpose.

If anything I’d worry more about the cav that ignores armor, I think it could have 15 attack and it still outperform hussars simply due to how important armor is in this game.

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Okay. I guess the follow up question would be what would Persia’s eco look like? Otto works because they have a bad economy

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That’s what I still need to figure out. As I’ve written them right now they only have a late game bonus, the bonus where shipments escalate depending on how long the game has gone has a lot of nooks and crannies you could adjust.

For example a Commerce Age shipment that sends 500 wood + 100 per every 5 minutes of game (up to 30, as all these techs do) would give you 1100 at the end of the game, which is better than if you got the regular 700 wood card, but early game it’s atrocious because it basically means be forced to use 600 wood in a rush.

You could get a flat crate of wood every 2 minutes of game, like that one native site tech, which would also be an atrocious 400 wood early game, but escalates much better into the late game.

The formula to calculate the shipments per minute is really funky so there’s many, many ways to approach it and I still need to figure out the best way to do it, either a flat shipment + extra on top or just go all or nothing. Homecity probably has space for both.

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This looks like a solid proposal to me, and I’d like to play it. The Madrasah is a very interesting system and seems reminiscent of AoE4 Abbasids.

Would these techs provide meaningful boosts in and of themselves? And would the techs equate with the cost of typical Age-ups? (So Age I techs equal 800 food, Age II 1200f and 1000c, etc.)?

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Nah, the system works like the African Age ups of Wars of Liberty (or the Rise of Nations Age up system which is the actual, original inspiration.)

Ideally, they should grant a small unit shipment (a crate or two, a few units, whichever) a more permanent bonus (+10% hit points for some unit for example, better bounty values, etc) and maybe even a temporary bonus (gather rate boost for a minute for example). You should research multiple of these techs to age up, so each individual piece is cheap, but as a whole you end up paying roughly the same to age up. Kind of like with asian market upgrades where they are cheap but half effect and you need to research the big tech to get the full effect.

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I was going to do an Uzbek concept so I better get working on that before you beat me to it.

The units look mostly okay, but I see a few issues.

Gholams - They are slave soldiers that were generally the makeup of infantry masses. It doesn’t seem right to make them cavalry.

Firangi - From what I can tell prangi were Ottoman weapons that spread to India because of their use on ships. It didn’t look like they were used as extensively by Persia. Ideally they could serve as a Mughal skirm equivalent of India ever got split. Your suggested function also seems a little weird. Are you intending them to be counter-skirms?

Camel Gun - Rather than making a new unit to properly represent Zamburaks they really ought to just fix Zamburaks. India already has Howdahs so their light cavalry role is covered. I think something like a beefed up Rifle Rider that does siege damage would make most sense.

Darbzen/Zarbzan - I’d really like to see a generic Turkish style cannon that could be shared among most Muslim civs. This would be a good option for a Falconet equivalent for Ottomans, Persians, Mughals, Uzbeks, etc.

I know this is a work in progress, but in my opinion, all these building options kinda suck. Most of these are not even Persian.

Crops/Cash Crops is really lame and Noria is just a generic watermill so I don’t see the Persian connection.

Paradise Garden would be my pick for their agricultural building. They are very Persian and while their main purpose was aesthetic, they were also so full of fruit trees that they were practically orchards.

Ksar look to be Berber, not Persian.

Hammam isn’t a bad idea, but filling this role with a Caravanserai would be much better since it could be shared with every other Islamic civ.

Royal Palaces seems a bit conflicting with the African Palace. It also seems very arbitrary to make it a uniquely Middle Eastern building.

If you want shared Middle Eastern buildings you could maybe do a unique Bazaar market equivalent.

Is the Madrasah the main age up method or just a bonus way? Seems like most of the palace stuff could go there. Even so, I was thinking a Madrasah could instead be a good way to split up the Sufi Mosque holy site. You could split it as follows:

Sufi Mosque
Unit: Moro Swordsman
Location: Southeast Asian maps
Shia Madrasah
Unit: Qizilbash
Location: Central Asian maps, India, Yemen, Sumatra, etc
Sunni Ribat
Unit: Ghazi Raider
Location: Most Muslim areas with emphasis on Africa and Western Asia

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About Persian explorer/hero i think Dervish will be good choice
What do you think ?

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And why not making them Asian civ ?
I know making 5 unique wonders is not a easy work for devs but I think its time for Asia

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Bazar/Grand bazar can be their unique market
And they can add some cards or something related to the Persian carpets because they are very popular in the world

Zamburak is a unit that really needs rework
It should be mobile siege weapon / mobile artillery unit not something like weaker dragoon with only 1 pop cap
It definitely needs rework
Even it’s firing sound
They can rework it and make some unique cards for them and make them accessible for both Persian & Indian armies
I think in this quite big update they will mention about possible upcoming civilizations
Lets wait and see
I’m so excited :hugs:

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A unique market called bazar would be a great idea! Maybe a “Persian carpets” card could give a small gold trickle? Of course, it would require a build limit.

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I propose Khan, as it could be shared with a Tatar/Uzbek civilization, and the term Khan was an honorific title used in Persia after the Mongol conquests.

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Gholams - They are slave soldiers that were generally the makeup of infantry masses. It doesn’t seem right to make them cavalry.

Gholam 3
Gholam 2
Gholam 1

Dunno where you got that info from because Gholams not only were cavalry units, but as the centuries passed they became the most prestigious of the military units of Persia.

They also were explicitly created to replace the Qizilbash, which is very convenient to, well, not have the Qizilbash as a unit here so we can keep the native site unit.

Firangi - From what I can tell prangi were Ottoman weapons that spread to India because of their use on ships. It didn’t look like they were used as extensively by Persia. Ideally they could serve as a Mughal skirm equivalent of India ever got split. Your suggested function also seems a little weird. Are you intending them to be counter-skirms?

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They were common enough. The Firangi is indeed meant to be a Counter-Skirm, mostly because the civ has no Crossbowman in the Barracks, but they have an unit that counters ranged cav on Age II already, so they just need an unit that supplies the other role (+ countering artillery), maybe it’s too minmaxed and just a literal Abus Gun would be better, I dunno.

The Iran at War book actually described several interesting weapons that I mostly didn’t include because it doesn’t elaborate much upon them, which is a shame because they sound like the most unique:
Siege

Camel Gun - Rather than making a new unit to properly represent Zamburaks they really ought to just fix Zamburaks.

It is what it is. I just worked around what we have already. For what is worth, the Persian army of the Napoleonic era does actually have a name for heavier Camel Guns compared to Zamburaks.

Shaheenchee

These are Afghan though.

I know this is a work in progress, but in my opinion, all these building options kinda suck. Most of these are not even Persian.

These are meant to be shared buildings.

Crops/Cash Crops is really lame and Noria is just a generic watermill so I don’t see the Persian connection.

Noria is very much an arab word and it represents a very regional way of growing crops. I don’t see why I should give Persia an unique resource mechanic. Like Paradise Gardens works fine as a card or a tech, but why an unique building?

Ksar look to be Berber, not Persian.

Livestock Pens are always a pain to design, piling the two useless buildings each culture has (Livestock Pen + Outpost) with a name that’s appropiate is a very good move imo.

Hammam isn’t a bad idea, but filling this role with a Caravanserai would be much better since it could be shared with every other Islamic civ.

What makes Hammams less Pan-Islamic than Caravansarys?

Royal Palaces seems a bit conflicting with the African Palace. It also seems very arbitrary to make it a uniquely Middle Eastern building.

Point taken. I needed some unique building to not make the culture so plain and this is the best thing I could come up with. Ideally they should get some unique resource they gather somehow. But ain’t got no idea atm.

Is the Madrasah the main age up method or just a bonus way? Seems like most of the palace stuff could go there.

The only age up method. I mostly don’t think you can move the Palace stuff here because there’s no space in the UI. Although with the new technology provided by those semi-big-buttons africans have maybe something could be worked out. Definitely an interesting venue to explore.

About Persian explorer/here i think Dervish will be good choice

If we made Persia as an “asian” civ, Dervish would ironically fit the warrior monk template well.

And why not making them Asian civ ?
I know making 5 unique wonders is not a easy work for devs but I think its time for Asia

They just look odd having most of the Asian features, although no less than the Asian civs already ingame I guess. I had made a wonder shortlist way back when, no idea where I left it though. Doable for sure.

A unique market called bazar would be a great idea!

Is there any reason to have an unique market other than just because we can?

Like I guess that’s literally the logic behind the Africans having Ports rather than Docks, but dunno, I don’t see the justification here.

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I think the Ghulam/Gholam could be a general purpose heavy hand infantry like a Slamurye or Halberdier for all the civs in the Middle Eastern culture. Does Persia have any other good ideas for a hand cavalry unit?

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About half a dozen or so. I’m not sure Ghulam is the best option for that role though, Tabardariya could be a more generic unit name, or, if you want to make absolutely sure one size fits all, Ghazi.

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They could recycle the Tribal Horseman from the historical battle Moroccans and Barbary States and give it a new skin. Much of the Persian cavalry came from Turkmen and Afghan tribes living within or on the fringes of the Empire.

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I have no doubt that they were prestigious cavalry units, I’m just questioning whether or not that was how they commonly fought. Guhlams in AoE2 and AoE4 are both infantry units. It seems the cavalry role might be more common though so your approach is probably fine.

What other role? Your cavalry will counter light infantry, and if Firangi are counter-skirm then you have nothing to counter heavy infantry until you get Jazayerchi. You could maybe do a swordsman unit similar to a Shamsherbaz that has a bonus versus other heavy infantry.

Your description sounds a lot like African Fields, and if that is the case, then I hate it. Noria also seems like a bit of a stretch for Persia. Even windmills have a stronger connection.

Why have any unique features? They’re quite iconic and would add some flavour to Persia. If you wanted them to be generic, you could maybe do an Orchard building shared with other Central Asian civs. After all, fruits like apples are originally from Kazakhstan.

Fair enough, they are quite pan-Islamic. But I don’t see why they would be a place to recruit mercenaries an outlaws. A Caravanserai is an inn along a trade route, which is exactly the place you’d expect to find bandits and soldiers of fortune.

A Bazaar is literally the most stereotypical Middle Eastern thing ever, of course it would be something to work into those civs. To differentiate it from a Market, it could have a mechanic that hints at the image that happened across the Islamic world. That could be a major component of a civ like Morocco or Oman.

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