Community made fan expansion

We keep talking about it but it feels like nobody is pulling themselves up by the boot straps and rallying everyone together. So I’m gonna do that. I will helm the game design aspect and maybe share with a few chefs.

Let’s make a fan based expansion so good the devs and big names cannot help but notice it!

First let’s decide where the expansion takes place: this should be based on a few parameters: how hard it would be to get new voice lines or architecture sets made, excitement for said civs and just how fundamental it might change other civs already in play

so to start post your resumes and lets build our team and be democratic

And I’m gonna keep bringing this up because o believe in us and won’t let us rest until we win together

If other civ crafters and modders like TriRem Cysion etc can make it even Chrinicles was a mod… it’s my turn! OUR turn!

Spread the word far and wide my friends. Especially to Reddit

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If Mandate of Heaven or Hegemony or Rome at War can be a big hit surely we can do Riders of the Steppes, Secrets of Mesoamerica, or Riches of the Sahel can go far. I’m not gonna give up until I get our future codified so help out!

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Let’s talk possible paths:

Barbarian: Civs like the Alans, Tuyuhan, Vandals and Saka mean a world wide reach. You could even have the Chichemeca as new world Barbarians and get Eagles more love!!

Issues: you need a likely Shareable barbarian Type of raider or regional unit and boy deciding the hard line of raiding/barbarian civ is hard. Are Franks, Teutons and Burgundians when they spent their first few centuries doing just that to Rome or attacking Arabic caravans in the Crusades? Are Turks for Seljuk? Are the Jurchens whom eventually settled? Are Saracens who help rapid spread a religion with razing?

What would this unit be? If it’s infantry then sure it could be slapped into any raiding civ including American and southern African, but what would it do?

Is it cavalry? Perhaps it’s a scout type of plunder unit who at the stable you can toggle between food, wood and captive where after killing or assisting enough kills with the unit your next villager queued is free and instant. This is probably a bit easier to implement if the stats don’t deviate too much from the scoutline except maybe building killing power, and might help the Mapuche have a real excuse to even have a stable and some horse techs for the one unit that makes sense there!

Is it nothing? This sort of expansion could easily fall into the old Conqs style more easily than any other expansion to date! Chich can be your new Eagle civ. Alans are your new Caucuses civ with Steppe Lancer and Camel and Dromon. Vandals are a strange breed with likely MXbow to remind you they are European to go with their camels and strong Dromon infused navy.

Tuyuhan revisit some of the 3k as Hei Guang and Xianbe riders fit in pretty well!

Saka are interesting because their reach is from steppes and down into parts of Northern India so inject those non horse mounted units directly into my tech tree!!!

So this seems like a safe one since it doesn’t really need any new buildings or regionals unless you want to show off.

Next is West Africa . I mean the northern part. Salt and gold aplenty. Civs with a focus on camels. This expansion almost begs for a Berber rework since many of these civs had something akin to a javelin horseman and rode plenty of camels enough that they might have archers. Speaking of archers most of theirs used venom from the rare desert flowers instead of crossbows and quilted Lifidi armor wasn’t uncommon on certain horsemen.

As you can see this area looks like fun but I don’t drink enough alcohol to figure how to make it all work so well especially not by my lonesome.

Also probably a regional Mining Camp. Auto gathering from nodes seems impossible but the very tiniest trickle? For 150w 3g/1.5s per minute means you get all of 150g after 50 minutes if your game lasts that long.

Steppes: Steppes are easy enough and more of that Central Asian stuff for Persians to not have. Lancers and some of the more southern towards India would have elephants and those towards China would have rocket things! I’m all in on it! Probably don’t need a new region unit.

Mexico! Eagles are a classic and ignored step child that’s better than your actual child and you know it but you can’t admit it. To compare to southern America some new regional likely a skirm replacement might be needed. This area can bleed into some Center more and Spurherj civs with some having both regional scouts and us as a team will go into political levels of violence deciding which civ gets which of Eagle or Champi as the scout and I don’t know the correct answer

Anyway this is where we stand. Let’s make a choice!

I’m leaning towards the Barbarians with no shared raider or plunderer but that seems cowardly for a big crafter like us to do

If we have the talent to show off we go all ham with a big African packet

There’s also the harrowing fear of what civs do we replace

I can understand if the Activision news has halted people’s desires but… certainly we can still gather a little server and start planning over discord or teams or something?

I don’t want to seem like I’m spamming or talking to myself but what could be done to generate interest in this product that a reasonable human being like myself can do

So I realize I may somehow come across as a little egotistical and I apologize for that. I want all of you who want to make civs to know that I cherish you and would love to build meaningful connections. Please by all means let’s become friends and make civs together

Parthians:
in AoE Forums or Google Drive (Google Drive has the fully updated version; the post may not be).
Or were you going for just AoE2 civs, not Chronicles?

If this were a chronicles project sure I’d be down for it alas it isn’t and I beat the community who become team members to vote on what expansion we make… cmon everyone what’s keeping you so afraid of interacting?!

What would you be doing in this project exactly?

So far Im working on fitting the civs and thier bonuses into a mod file. Im using NapKingCole’s civ maker to help if that isnt considered lazy akin to using AI slop?

So I guess Id be game designer, although I fear much like how in fraud finding work in businesses, segregation of duties is tantamount to keeping everything in order. You dont have the head chef do your taxes for instance

I worry this may take time and if I want everyone’s okay/approval just tell me what you all need so I can get “headpats”

One thing i could use is an artist or modeller for UUs, civ specific structures or flag/shield/emblems

Anyway I know some people like to make fun of the fact I wasnt a natural modder and I will apologize until it earns respect

There are no active modders doing this now,you best bet is to use hero skins and other ingame assets.

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nobody is a “natural modder”. people become modders by practicing and working hard.

I don’t think anyone wants to work in a strict hierarchy when working on a hobby. You claiming the role of “game designer” and “civ crafter” for yourself and insisting on “segregation of duties”, sounds like you won’t let anyone else design their own civs, when that is what most people in this forum seem to be doing. So you will struggle to find a lot of people.

I personally don’t want more civs, i think there are too many already, so consider my reply here the view of an outsider.

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People don’t make fun of you for not being “a natural modder”. It’s the “ideas guy” thing that nobody likes.

Take it from me, an actual game designer, you still need to at least know how to script your civs.

That said, game producer is very much a real job but you also need to demonstrate you know what you’re doing, hope you like spreadsheets, trellos and writing down documentation.

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And then I… I mean… WE shall rule the world muahahah

Sensing hostility. I just want to build some community

Remember I am a human and im valid too

To me, AoE2 feels – to phrase this in the most neutral way I can – very very full, in every possible way, to the point that expanding it further doesn’t feel necessary. If I was making my own “expansion”, I would probably start from The Conquerors and take things in a different direction from FE, rather than add more of anything to DE.

That said, I don’t actually have the inclination to do it, especially since probably no one else would want to play what I would come up with!

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@Apocalypso4826 would like to be the boss in your organization

“Would like to” and “should be” are two very different things. I should not be a boss. I lack patience.

if i were the boss i would fire anyone who says “meta”, “OG” or “FU”.

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Then you would have either no employees or a workforce terrified of you.

“a workforce terrified of you” sounds good to me. no candy or hugs for anybody.