Fan Design of a Potential New Italian civ

Economic Bonuses and Unique Buildings of the Italians:

Starting Resources:

  • 200 food
  • 200 wood
  • 100 gold
  • 6 vills

Market and Dock:
Italians have special markets and docks, with a unique appearance. They both cost 50% less, along with their economic upgrades. The market also have a 20% better buying/selling rate.

Università:
It works differently from the hausa university. It costs 300 wood, and have a build limit of 1, but it can be shipped a wagon in the I Age.
Is needed to research the unique age up techs.

Basilica:

So the Italians get 4 unique upgrades at the church (which is called basilica) without needing a HC shipment. Similarly to the swedes with the arsenal. The Italian church is called Basilica, it cost 200 wood and 150 gold.

AGE II

  • Professional Crossbowmen:
    Cost: free
    It replace the wood cost of the xbow with a gold cost. In exchange, the xbow trade the x2 multiplier against light cav with a x2 against heavy cav (against light cav, xbows get a x1 multiplier).

  • Swiss Papal Guard:
    Cost: 500 gold
    It ships 5 papal guards (renamed swiss pikemen). It also enables the training of papal guards from the church, at 120 gold each.

Age III

  • Golden Bill:
    Cost: free
    Markets have a +10% better buying/selling rate, but gold is gathered 15% slower from all mines.

Age IV:

  • Modernization:
    Cost: 1500 food
    Transform all MC into special guard mounted carabiners. The unit gain more attack when mounted, but lose the ability to dismount.

The appearance of the university, church, dock and market should be unique:

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I don’t quite understand what’s the appeal you see on just giving the civ random percentage discounts on techs, it still feels like you’re trying to design an Age of Empires 2 civilization.

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Dude, they are just numbers…

It’s a way to write something. You can write them down in percentages like on aoe2, or in multiplier like aoe3, but the thing is the same.

When you get a card that reduce the cost of a building is it too much aoe2? Sweden literally as a bonus just have a free HC shipment (advanced arsenal). France have vills that gather fast, you can either write it with a percentage or a multiplier, it it would be the same.

I did a really similar thing to the swedes with the church and the market.

Don’t get me wrong, I would love to give them a super unique bonus, but I suggest that their houses gather resources, they call me crazy and label the civ OP.

But if you have better idea fell free to suggest them.

New Revolution for the Italian civ

This revolutions are made in case the Italians would get a standard revolution, like the other european powers. I also hypothesized an Alliance sistem. I’ll post further ahead if this won’t work.

Greece:

The venetians and genoans had colonies in the Mediterranean, Aegean and Black Sea for centuries. In the the more modern years, the kingdom of Italy had control over the Dodecanese, so Greece is the revolution that made more sense, and it could be given to the ottomans too.

Home City:
Athens

Effects:

  • All vills are transformed into klefties (revolutionary) soldiers that gain gold instead of XP when they kill a unit or destroy a building. They can still gather from crates.
    Cost: 100 food and 1 pop
  • Churches allow you buy mercantilism as many times as you want, which also cost less (500 gold).
  • Ship 7 stradiots and 1 ironclad.

HC Shipments:

  • 9 stradiots
  • 11 klefties and a church wagon
  • 1000 gold
  • 2 li’l bombard
  • 10 cretan archers (reskinned desert archers)

Eritrea:

The kingdom of Italy had the colony of Eritrea, which was basically the etiopian region on the red sea, named Eritrea by the Italians.

Home City:
Asmara

Effects:

  • TCs periodically spawn cattle.
  • All vills are transformed into levied gunners, which don’t lose HP over time.
  • Ships a cattle market and 2 cattle. Cattle can be sold for XP other than wood and gold.

HC Shipments:

  • Somali 11 darood militia + 9 issa warriors
  • 4 sebastopol mortars
  • 6 cattle
  • 4 gatling camels
  • 1 ras

Another Italian revolution could be the Barbary State. Italians had Libia as a colony, so it make sense to be it’s revolutionary state.

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Greece definitely needs ironclads, 1 of the things the greeks did well was naval stuff once they got free from the ottomans.

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I gave them a frigate because I felt that alongside the stradiots, an ironclad might be too much.

But if you think that it’s not too strong, I can change it.

hmm, it seems kinda underwhelming not gonna lie, at the very least they need to be able to ship ironclads from the homecity because otherwise their navy is the same other than you spent 3000 resources for a single ship.

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Well, I took it for granted that you can ship ironclads, like you can ship forts or similar things. All the most common HC revolution cards can be added.

I indicated only 4 unique shipments for each revolution, but they can have more standard ones too.

Anyway, I changed it. The rest is ok?

It could be an improvement for all civilizations with crossbowmen. To convert this infantry unit into a cavalry / infantry unit at the same time.

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Other civs may get a HC card that transform all present xbows into MC, but not being able to train them.

The MC is a unique unit, much like the ruyter, or the hakkapelit, so it should be trainable only by the Italians.

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I think the third option for a revolution could be Yugoslavia. Venice had its estates in the territory of later Yugoslavia.

I know it could be a controversial choice but it would include Croats, Slovenes, Serbs and more nations that have formed a common state. The truth of Yugoslavia did not exist within the AoE 3 timeframe (which is not fully established when it ends), but the idea of ​​its creation already existed. Besides, Serbia (which united the Southern Serbs into Yugoslavia) and Montenegro existed within the AoE 3 timeframe. I think such an option of revolution could appear in AoE 3.

Additionally, Italians could have the possibility of the US, Brazil and Argentina for a revolution - looking at the very large number of Italians who lived there under the AoE 3 timekeeping and were influential there. Of course, that would be too many revolutions, but it could arise if the revolutions were limited to the appropriate continents - e.g. European revolutions only on European maps, African revolutions only on African maps, etc.

It is true that Istria and Dalmatia were venetians territories, and I wouldn’t mind them but I find it a bit more complicated to add.

The territories itself didn’t gain independence directly revolting against Venice or Italy. Those territories were conquered, and then they gained independence from the Austria-Hungarian empire.

Greece instead revolted against Venice on the territories of Candia and other islands (even if they didn’t succeeded), and Venice was involved in several revolutions of the Greeks mainland with against the ottomans.

Still, I might think of something for them, to see if it’s doable. It’s just that without much wars to work with, but I’ll see if I can come up with something.

Those I don’t like much… Italians there were immigrants, not colonist.

But the US could have Italians immigrant cards, that are based on the Italians civ unique abilities and soldiers.

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I reckon the abandoned Swedish Immigrant card shipped a torp or two. Hopefully it gets added.

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Those, if the Italians and the european theater is added, could also be the local tribes, in the form of small cities.

I think that Croats and Serbs would be enough from the Western Balkans.

Yugoslavia as an option Revolution would be interesting. And so Serbia should be a revolution, but as Yugoslavia it would have even wider range of possibilities and content.

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The problem is that Yugoslavia wasn’t a country that formed itself from a revolution. It was a country that was formed by other powers after WW1.

Those are 2 big requirements that it doesn’t fill:

  • being in the pre-ww1 time frame
  • being a revolution
    Greece instead had its revolution, and it fits into the aoe3 timeframe.

Eritrea too it’s a big stretch (got indipendent after ww2) but at least there are wars to work with. It may be enough to change the name into abissinia, and that was the “try to conquer” the inner etiopia may become a revolution.

I would start with serbs, and then see. If an european context is added, you may need a lot of different smaller tribes from a lot of europen regions.

I’m trying to prepare something for them too. But for the macro region of the balkans, I was thinking that serbs, albanians and romanians might work.

All three have the possibility to be added in their context, since all three cultural groups had its moments into the aoe3 timeframe.

Greeks too might be an idea, but since they have its revolution, I would add them only if there are some maps located into aegean islands, though, since the venetians often brought albanians communities into their colonies, they could work too.

Potentially Minor Tribes for European Maps:

  • Serbs
  • Bavarians
  • Swiss
  • Romanians
  • Wallachians
  • Catalans
  • Lithuanians
  • Albanians
  • Scots
  • Bohemians

Maybe:

  • Tiroleans
  • Greeks
  • Croats
  • Sicilians
  • Bulgarians
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keep in mind that natives need to be available on MULTIPLE maps, according to FE at minimum 3 maps is seen as acceptable, so you need to find bigger groups (like ideologies or pan nationalities) to add to the game.

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Well, tribes like swiss and albanians were also mercenaries, so it’s easy to justify their presence in map geographically different than the ones that they inhabit. Other too, like the catalans or scots might be justified this way.

Slavs, bohemians and bavarians too may be stretched a bit, since even if they aren’t on their native land, they could be present on adiacente ones. Greeks too can be stretched a bit, since greek communities could be found from sicily to the anatolia.

In the end, it all depends what approach is followed. Native tribes might be based on mercenary groups, or regional identities, both are practical. It’s enaugh to decide which add like the former and which add like the latter.

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Things of the Italians civ that I would bring into the game, from the mods

As you may know, there are 2 unofficial mods that introduce the Italians into the game. Those are the Napoleonic Era mod and the War of Liberty mod.

Here I’ll list what ideas it may be worth to bring into the game. Some should be changed, and I’ll write how, but anyway those are just more ideas, and not necessarily all should be brought into an eventual official civ, or along with the features that I suggested in my design.

  • The architect:
    The architect is a special hero, that can build faster, allowing to not idle your vills for building. It doesn’t have to be available from the the start, but I can be shipped, maybe with a vill shipment, that then enable their training at the university.

  • The merchant:
    It’s a special villager for Italians that cannot build. I personally wouldn’t give them such a vill. Even with the architect, you never know when you need to fast build SOMETHING with a ton of vills, maybe because your architect/s are dead or busy.
    Though a merchant could be a special vills, that other than gather resources, they can work at the docks (to boost the gold or food collected) at markets (to get better exchange rates) and TPs (to get more resources or XP). All proportionate to the number of merchants. Still, they shouldn’t replace the standard vill trained at the TC, but it should be a special vill, sended from the HC, that replace the standard vills shipments, or they could be trained at the market.

  • The statues:
    In the WL mod, statues can be built to reveal enemy units and prevent them from building near them. I personally don’t find it that useful, yeah it they could be us3as outposts and to make enemy rushes more difficult. But I also don’t see the historical reason behind the mechanic.
    Instead, I would suggest that the explorer (or vills) can build statues (maybe after the explorer shipment) for a cost that increases with each statue built (starting with 100g, then 200g, then 400g and so on…). The statue have radius of effect. Inside such radius, all buildings and units created gives back 0.5 more XP. Another effect could be that all techs are researched faster, age ups included.
    In the NE instead, the statues boost the combat ability and heal, if I’m not mistaken. For the first, the american already have something similar, but for the second, it might be a good idea. A passive healing factor inside a certain radius (that can be stacked above the other abilities, with a HC shipment) might be a good idea.

  • The mafia mechanic:
    Now, I won’t hide it, I’m not a fan of it… at all. I know that the mod that introduce it goes for historical accuracy over everything, and they added other controversial mechanics. But still, having the Italians culture based only around such theme, for which even nowday a lot of people suffer and dies in Italy… when I simply don’t like it.
    Still, it shouldn’t be hided, it’s shouldn’t just be the main flag bearer, and if it wouldn’t make into the game at all, well it would be better in my opinion.

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