Jawhar, the fella who conquered Egypt, founded Cairo, and fought a variety of foes befitting a splendid campaign.
Made a very basic sketch how it could look like:
JAWHAR
Colour: either grey (the dynastic colour of the Fatimids was white but it’s taken by Gaia ) or yellow (the Caliph’s banner were white and yellow according to some sources)
1. The Slave General
Jawhar’s rise to fame by reconquering Maghreb. The only scenario where we don’t play as Egyptians.
Player:
Jawhar (Berbers): has a camp west of al-Muʿizz’s capital of Al-Mansuriya. Can’t train vills or build town centers, has to rely on the allies for economic support and obtaining vills. Castle Age.
Allies:
Caliph al-Muʿizz (Berbers): rules from the Fatimid capital of Al-Mansuriya and provides Jawhar with villagers and tributes.
Ibn Ammar (Berbers or modified Sicilians?): a Kalbid and the commander of Fatimid forces in Sicily. Following victory over the Byzantines will help the player with naval support; player 2 in the co-op campaign.
Sub-Saharan tribes (Malians or another Sahelian civ): passive AI in the southernmost part of the map allied to everyone, has a market to trade and perhaps could provide bonus soldiers in return for mini quests.
Enemies → Allies:
Zenata tribesmen (Berbers): the closest but weakly defended enemy. After their hero Ya’la ibn Muhammad al-Yafrani is killed, they switch to Allies and start providing the player with vills and military support.
Enemies:
Midrarids (Berbers or Moors): they rule the city of Sijilmasa in the southwest of the map and a castle (Tasagdalt) just to the west of it. Destroying the town center in Sijilmasa switches the control over the city and forces within it to the player, but the castle doesn’t surrender until the hero unit Muhammad ibn Wasul is killed (if not killed in the city, he’ll garrison the castle).
Umayyads (Moors): the most formidable opponent holding the heavily fortified city of Fez. To force surrender the player needs to destroy castles and town centers, after which the city and units within switch to the player.
Byzantines (Byzantines): hold parts of Sicily. In case they defeat Ibn Ammar, they will harass Jawhar from the sea.
After the three enemies in Maghreb are subdued (plus Byzantines if playing co-op), we get a cutscene showing how Jawhar and al-Muʿizz are visited by disgruntled Egyptian nobles asking for military intervention.
Caliph al-Muʿizz (Berbers): holds a port in Tunisia and supplies Jawhar with tributes from time to time.
Ja’far ibn Fallah: Jawhar’s subordinate who establishes small camp outside Alexandria following the successful landing and can attack in flared directions. Player 2 in the co-op.
Enemies:
Ikhshidid navy (Egyptians): most dangerous early on as they can sink Jawhar’s transport ships if the player is not careful. They hold the Nile Delta and initially Alexandria, but the latter immediately switches to the player’s control after a successful landing. Destroying their docks and military buildings scattered in camps across the delta forces them to surrender and awards the player with extra transport ships.
Ikhshidid army (Egyptians or Turks without guns): holds the heavily fortified Rawdah Island and other camps scattered across the map.
Hasan ibn Ubayd (Mashriqi): based in Palestine in the northeastern corner of the map, the most powerful opponent if unchecked for too long.
Neutral:
Locals (Egyptians): they hold a number of towns across the map, each with a tower at the center; converting each tower grants the player control over its town. The biggest, Fustat, doesn’t have towers, it switches to the player’s control after the conquest of Rawdah Island.
3. Viceroy of Egypt
The goal is to thwart the Ikhshidid remnants across Middle and Upper Egypt, subdue Nubia and Hejaz through military or diplomatic means, and build a Wonder (al-Azhar Mosque) in Cairo.
Player:
Jawhar (Egyptians): controls the northernmost corner of the map (Cairo). There’s not much resources in the vicinity and a huge part of Cairo is not available to be built on (it’s reserved for the Wonder) so staying there too long is not recommended. Starts with a hero monk al-Aswani whose death ends with the mission’s failure (in the co-op version al-Aswani would belong to a separate player alongside a couple vills and a packed Town Center).
Allies:
Ibn Hinzaba (Egyptians): former Ikhshidid vizier who switched allegiance to the Fatimids. Holds Fustat directly south of Cairo but initially lacks resources and needs to be defended from Ikhshidid remnants (his defeat equals the player’s defeat). Gives out side quests that can be completed for extra technologies and troops.
Enemies:
Ikhshidid remnants (Egyptians): various bandit camps across the map.
Beja tribes (Egyptians? Nubians? Arabs? Berbers? Somali?): their camps block access to the Red Sea and the Musawids across it.
Neutral → Allies or Enemies:
Makuria (ideally Nubians, but if for some dumb reason Saracens are split before adding more African civs then Ethiopians would suffice I guess): has a very strong base in the middle portion of the map.
Alodia (Nubians or Ethiopians): southern portion of the map.
(Both Nubian factions need to be either significantly weakened militarly or visited by al-Aswani and bribed with food, after which they’ll supply the player with gold and Archers of the Eyes)
Musawids (Arabs): controls Hejaz in the southeastern part of the map across the Red Sea. Needs to be conquered or bribed with gold.
4. The Qarmatian Invasion
Jawhar’s subordinate Ja’far ibn Fallah pushed into Levant with initial success but suffered catastrophic defeats at the hands of Byzantines and Qarmatians. He died in battle against the latter, the Fatimid possessions in Syria were reduced to Jaffa, and Jawhar was forced to defend against the Qarmatian onslaught.
Player:
Jawhar (Egyptians): controls the city of Cairo at the bottom of the map and needs to defend its Wonder (Al-Azhar Mosque).
Allies:
Jaffa (Berbers): remnants of Ja’far ibn Fallah’s Kutama army and Jawhar’s relief force barricaded in Jaffa in northern half of the map. They might slow down the Qarmatian onslaught and Byzantine raids for awhile but they’ll almost definitely fall without the player’s support. Player 2 in the co-op.
Enemies:
Qarmatians (Arabs): holds the heavily walled city of Ramla east of Jaffa and a number of strong palisaded camps across Lower Egypt. Will send wave after wave to besiege Cairo, but each destroyed camp lowers their numbers. Destroying either all their camps or recapturing Ramla wins the scenario.
Egyptian rebels (Egyptians): bandit camps scattered throughout the map
Byzantines (Byzantines): docks and fire towers in the northernmost part of the map, uninvolved on land but undisputed naval dominance in the Mediterranean. If unchecked will send dromons down the Nile to annoy the player.
5. Dunno, I’m too bored to finish this post
Jawhar’s final campaign in Syria with Arabs, Turks, Mashriqis and Persians (Buyids) as enemies.
6. Byzantine Empire Strikes Back
Elderly Jawhar doesn’t partake in warfare anymore but narrates the events of the Fatimid war with John Tzimiskes.
You’re right, the thing is that this game was made in a very ethnocentric way that is kinda outdated now (maybe for reasons that have to do more with politics than truth but there’s some merit regardless I think), in fact aoe4 and chronicles use polities rather than ethnicities for civs. Also empires are multiethnic by definition (the Persian empire was not just Persian in a national sense) and I mean isn’t everyone always saying that nationalism is a modern construct? And at the same time some people want an ancient/medieval game representing… nations and ethnicities? Make peace with your mind
You have plenty of examples, basically all original civs are not ethnicities or nations. Byzantines are not an ethnic group. Vikings meh. Celts super meh. Franks, Goths and Teutons were Germanic confederations, made of many ancient ethnicities who unified to fight the Romans (the pre 200 AD ones). Franks were not a single group of people and they were defined so by Romans to simplify. Saracens? Persians? It’s more complicated than that. The more you get closer to modernity with civs like Turks and Spanish the more they can make sense as exclusive homogenous national ethnic identities (Turks not really before late modernity but anyway).
That said more or less you get the idea of what these civs are representing so what am I trying to say? That people shouldn’t take everything so strictly and literally. This game doesn’t have some super consistent method to do anything and it’s just a game anyway. Adding the 3k is not wrong because of breaking some “divine” rule set in stone, it’s wrong because it feels pointless compared to the richness of the area they wanted to represent. It’s like I wanted to show you the Alps and I take a picture of three rocks in Austria idk
Splitting Saracens wouldn’t be the same thing unless you go split… idk, the almohad and almoravid lol. The fact the split is ethnical or not is pointless since ethnicity is a debated subject anyway (and I thought was very out of fashion honestly) and all books I read about history tell me how fluid identities are. Not that I necessarily agree but when I look at the migration era for example the argument definitely has some merit. It becomes very muddled very quickly what makes you a Frank, a Goth, a Celtic native, a Roman or what. That said, contrary to what most academics think, I don’t think there is no discernable and exclusive ethnicity at all in that mess but that’s another topic…
In any case as many pointed out you can keep up the fiction of the golden rule for example by simply calling the Umayyads Syrians or whatever. Again to me the point is the substance, not the form, so the civ will be judged for what it is and how it portrays it.
I can understand 3’s inclusion given the Italian Unification happened at the end of 3, but 2’s inclusion makes no sense to me. They were too different from each other, even with their common cultural ties. And as far as Venetian inclusion into the civ… Florence and Savoy had better light Cav than Venice ever did, Venetian Cavalry sucked due to a lack of available land for them to develop more than rudimentary forces.
And I hear a great many complaints that want the civ changed to a more historical framework due to that. That doesn’t disprove my point, that only reinforced the rationale for my decision.
Bulgarians don’t really focus on Ivaylo, though; they draw inspiration in a more broader sense from the civ’s history, from the Bulgarian empire era as a whole.
Never heard of her, I’ll have to look her up.
…is it bad that I was genuinely disappointed when the summary stopped?
People seem to say this a lot, and I’m curious because I don’t see it personally. What aspect of them do you think is based on Braveheart? (Apart from the campaign?)
I came up with the easiest parts, the final two are trickier to design and would require more thought than a quick train of thought. The fifth scenario, Jawhar’s last campaign in Syria, consists of initial victories and then defeats, so probably a lot of scripting and then playtesting if scripted defeats are fun (the one Jadwiga scenario where we control Vytautas does include a scripted defeat but at the very end when the player is already satisfied with beating the scenario). And finally while the sixth scenario as Caliph al-Aziz should be really fun (three side war between Fatimids, Byzantines, and Buyids, with the need to retake Muslim holy cities that renounced Fatimid authority after Qarmatian invasions, and to subdue Alptakin for good).
On the other hand, I like the idea of basing the Egyptian campaign on Shajar al-Durr too.
I don’t understand the question. Of course Saracens covers them. The thread is about renaming and splitting Saracens. They can’t be splitted from Saracens if Saracens doesn’t cover them. I explained my idea how can Saracens be splitted.
I disagree. Woad Raiders are based on Pictish warriors, with some elements of Iron Age Celts (the La Tène shield and stripey Asterix-style trousers). If they were based on Braveheart, they’d at least have kilts and brighter blue warpaint, and probably would have more medieval-style weapons and wouldn’t be topless.
Well, firstly, the Picts were medieval – their kingdoms lasted into the 9th century at least – so no. But even in popular culture this isn’t true, e.g. the Celts in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (released several years before Braveheart) wear woad.
They already have a bonus on camels.Also if arabs and saracens are the same people why do we need a second civi for them? That would be the same as the 3k factions.
Hindustani are afgans plus other islamic people in aisa,afgans are not middle eastern.Kurds are problematic as they never had a kingdom of their own.
I think the idea is to restrict Saracens (or a rename thereof) to be the umbrella just for the states formed on the conquered non-Arab territories that incorporated a huge deal of local cultural and warfare traditions, where peoples such as Kurds, Syrians, Egyptians etc. were a significant portion of the state apparatus and eventually rulers in their own right. Arabs would cover the native Arabian lands.
I feel like the Hindustanis are not Afghans. They are based on the Muslim polities of India. Afghans had their own polities like the Ghurid dynasty. Kurds formed the Ayyubid empire.
AOE2 is about civilizations i.e. the Saracens which represent the Arabs. Similarly, I would like to see Kurds and Afghans added. It’s not a hill I am going to die on though. But splitting the Saracens is a no from me.
To be fair I would be alright with a Kurd civ but Saladin should stay with whichever civ represents Levant as there’s nothing Kurdish about his campaign. If Kurds are added, the campaign should take place closer to Kurdistan (western Iran, parts of Mesopotamia, etc.). Perhaps the devs could re-record Saladin unit voicelines to be Kurdish though.
Edit: or maybe just keep the current Arabic voicelines with Arabs, and for the hypothetical Egyptians and Mashriqi use mixes of dialectal Arabic and non-Arabic (Copt, Kurd, etc.)
3K factions are 50-100 years survived Chinese dynasties that is found by warlords. However Egyptians (that be represented by Saracens) and Yemenis (that can be respresent by Arabs) are two different culture that have different history. Adding a camel bonus isn’t enough for representing Arabians. Let’s add some CA bonus to Turks and they can represent Tatars. Oh wait a minute! They already have.
There you go another ppl here giving absolutely wrong narrative about history. It’d be extremely odd region dominated by Arabic speaking Egyptian ppl at its time but for whatever reason speaking Kurdish just because leader was even then leader was a fluent Arabic speaker. Even Kurdistan region today is predominately of mixed ethnicities. Armenians, Iranians, Anatolian Turks/Greeks, Azeris and even Arabs themselves. You simply cant just design civ that way.
Even then all those said leader never did anything such as ruling as part of Kurdish group. They interacted with broader groups I said before. Either Caliphate-Dynasties like every other game/entertainment or just do Andalusians. Atleast Andalusians were separate enough from the rest of the MENA region.
) or yellow (the Caliph’s banner were white and yellow according to some sources)