[Suggestion] The Portuguese

[VicKestrel]

The Portuguese
EXPANSION, TRADE, GUNPOWDER

868-1580

“Let us hear no more…of Ulysses and Aeneas and their long journeyings, no more of Alexander and Trajan and their famous victories. My theme is the daring and renown of the Portuguese, to whom Neptune and Mars alike give homage.”
Luis de Camoes - Lusiads

Portugal is the oldest nation state on the Iberian Peninsula and one of the oldest in Europe, its territory having been continuously settled, invaded and fought over since prehistoric times. It was inhabited by pre-celts and Celtic peoples, visited by
Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Ancient Greeks and ruled by the Romans, who were followed by the invasions of the Suebi and Visigothic Germanic peoples.
After the invasion of the Iberian Peninsula by the Moors, most of its territory was part of Al-Andalus. Portugal as a country was established during the early Christian Reconquista.
Founded in 868, the County of Portugal gained prominence after the Battle of São Mamede.(1128). The Kingdom of Portugal was later proclaimed following the Battle of Ourique (1139), and independence from León was recognized by the Treaty of Zamora. (1143).

In the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal established the first global maritime and commercial empire, becoming one of the world’s major economic, political and military powers.
During this period, today referred to as the Age of Discovery, Portuguese explorers pioneered maritime exploration.
During this time Portugal monopolized the spice trade, divided the world into hemispheres of dominion with Castile, and the empire expanded with military campaigns in Asia.

Disclaimer: balanced bonus and percentages are not my area of expertise, suggestions welcome

Portugal:

Civs Bonus

Fortified Town Center: Town centre has higher HP and a defensive fortification.

Portolan Charts: Ships and Scouts have 30% line of sight increased.
Fishing Boats have 10% gathering rate increased.

Feitoria: Can build a feitoria add on to neutral trade posts from the castle age (powerfull defensive building with weapons emplacement) denying acess to enemy faction traders until the building is destroyed.

Maritime Insurance: Receives 25% back of resources spent per sunk ship.

Matchlock Arquebus: Gunpowder units have +x% of range.

Influence system:
First Global Empire
Increased gold generated from trade posts by 50%.

Unique units:

Espingardeiros
These handgunners were a portuguese military squad whose emergence is noted during the second quarter of the fifteenth century. They obtained a considerable representation in the king’s army becoming one of the military corps that composed it.

Caravel
The caravel is a small highly-maneuverable sailing ship developed in the 15th century by the Portuguese to explore along the West African coast and into the Atlantic Ocean. The lateen sails gave it speed and the capacity for sailing windward beating.
Caravels were used by the Portuguese for the oceanic exploration voyages during the 15th and the 16th centuries, during the Age of Discovery.

Grand Carrack
Precursor to the great galleon of later centuries, the Grande Carrack is a superior version of the Carrack, used in the late 15th century and early 16th century.
The Portuguese carracks were usually very large ships for their time, often over 1000 tons.
(The Grand Carrack should double as transport ship, allowing the Portuguese player to mimic the combined arms amphibian assaults used on the conquest of fortresses at Morocco and East Asia.)

Adventurers
From the mid-15th century onwards, the lower and middle-ranking leadership of Portuguese expeditions and of the resulting overseas outposts were the fidalgos – gentlemen descended from the old knightly class.
Fidalgos, who were nobles, clad head to toe in an expensive full set of armour, always at the top commanding positions, and also formed the veritable “spearhead” of assaults. Most notably, they wielded some scary two-handed swords the Portuguese called montante.

Fortified Town Center Trains Leader Unit (Fidalgo: Infantry Greatsword unit, offensive aura ability.
(“Hero” unit)

Unique Techs:

Foral:
Increases farm yield in the TC area of Influence (Feudal)

Conto Crossbowmen:
Increases Crossbowmen damage (castle age)

Lateen Sails (Castle age)
Increased 20% ship speed.

Reinforced Decks (Imperial age)
Unlocks cannons on Caravels
Increases cannon damage by 10%

Ordenancas
Unlocks Halberd weapon for Elite Spearman (Imperial Age) bonus vs infantry.

Unique Building: Feitoria
Strong defensive building with cannons that can be built on neutral markets. Can be Garrisoned.
Increases gold received from trade route by 50%.
Blocks enemy faction traders.

Dark Age:

Starts with Fortified Town Center.
Instead of building further town centers TC, further expansion is done with building called called Colonial Fort. (Can only be built from castle age).

Colonial Fort (Castle Age)
Strong defensive building that can train Villagers albeit at a slower rate.
Can be upgraded with springalds and cannons.
Can Garrison units.

Starts with a Fidalgo as a Hero that buffs units.

Landmark Castle of Guimaraes.

Area of effect that inspires land units.
Can Train Cavaleiros Viloes (Light Melee Cavalry bonus damage vs other Light Cavalry)

Landmark Convent of Christ
Can store relics in the building giving increasing tech research speed.
Can train Order of Christ early Heavy Knights.
Knight of the Order of Christ Fidalgo upgrade allowing him to capture relics.

Feudal:

Can train Crossbowmen at Archery Range.
Can Train Almogávares (Javelin Light Infantry) on Archery Range.
Stables Can Train Cavaleiros Viloes Light Cavalry, and Cavaleiros Fidalgos Heavy Cavalry.

Castle of St.George Landmark (Defensive Building)

Castle Age:

Can now build Barracks
Barracks Train Guisarme Infantry /Men at Arms with Sword and Shield
Archery Range unlocks Conto Crossbowmen upgrade
Caravel unique unit (can trade)

Landmark Monastery of Battle (army based bonus)

Tower of Belem landmark ( navy based bonus)

Imperial Age
Grand Carrack unique unit
(Can transport up to 15 units) São João Baptista (galleon) - Wikipedia
Espingardeiros do Conto (handgunners)
Adventurers (heavy elite infantry with Montantes) good vs mass melee units
Ordenancas upgrade for Guisarme infantry, equips Halberdier bonus attack vs Infantry
Montante Upgrade for Fidalgo
Unlocks Captain Major Upgrade allowing him to board Grand Carrack ship turning into a flagship, improving its stats.

Wonder
Jeronimos Monastery

In short first 2 ages focus on the Reconquista and wars against neighbouring Castille.

In these times frontier townspeople had a high degree of preparation and often formed the bulk of the armies during summer months. The military orders provided much needed Lances for campaigns, as well the rich towns people that could afford horses, weapons and armour.
Military Orders also contributed for the conquest and defence of the land and large swaths of land were granted to them to help repopulate during the Reconquista.

From castle age Portugal focus on trade bonuses and professional men at arms representing the start of the Portuguese Expansion into North Africa and the rest of the world. Militar orders role eventually diminished as Portugal tactics shifted from Cavalry to Infantry at the turn of the 15th to 16th century.
Due to limited human resources Portugal adopted a restricted model of occupation, where forts would be used to defend surrounding lands, and hold out for reinforcements.

Portugal should focus on Naval and Gunpowder tech, with elite Ordenancas (Halberdiers) and Aventureiros (Greatswords) and Espingardeiros (Arquebus).
Colonial Forts, smaller and cheaper, provide the much needed map control for the player, that can produce villagers albeit at a slower pace.
Garrisoning ranged units on it improves their defensive capabilities.
Portugal was never a populous country so defend your villagers.

With the change of infantry tactics (from the swiss and italian wars) and campaigns overseas that often included disembarking from boats where horses weren’t used, having the option to embark/ disembark carracks a port player can mimic the shock and awe amphibian warfare style, where they would disembark under the cover of ship cannon fire to storm enemy positions, that the Portuguese historically did across at Morocco and Asia.

Fall of the Malacca Sultanate | How 1000 Portuguese Soldiers Toppled an Empire

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329096636_The_Portuguese_Art_of_War_in_Northern_Morocco_during_the_15th_Century

de Brito, P. (2008). Knights, Squires and Foot Soldiers in Portugal during the Sixteenth-Century Military Revolution. Mediterranean Studies, 17, 118–147. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41167395
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Some eye candy in no particular order:

[DoctBaghi]

The first 2 things fhat came to my mind reading your design are:

• there isn’t an influence sistem, where some buildings have an area that give some sort of effect.

• it lack an early naval bonus. Early carrack is good, but they are weak until castle age.

I mean, don’t worry, those are actually pretty difficult to design, and lot of people forgot the influence sistem since is something new that only aoe4 have.

For the rest, I like the idea of fortified TCs, but maybe as an individual upgrade for each TC (the one that you start with already have it) that way, if you need a TC for just economic purposes, you don’t need to pay for an expensive defensive building.

[VicKestrel]

Great idea on the TC.

The buildings influence might be easier to work with.

Will rework the main post a bit (taking inspiration on your awesome Venice post.)

[VicKestrel]

Taking a page from @DoctBaghi I reworked a bit of my Portugal suggestion.
Will keep working on it and adding more items and info as necessary.

[VicKestrel]

OP updated with further landmarks and ideas improving the faction assymetry (hopefully)

[DoctBaghi]

@TalVheet

Cannot Build Barracks and Archery Range untill Castle Age.
Fortified Town Center Trains Crossbow and Spear Militia and a Leader Unit (Fidalgo: Infantry with Greatsword)

Ok, I see a bit of a problem with this one, which is the fact that you need TCs for vill production. If in feudal you are hit by horsemen, you need to stop vill production to train spears.

The way I see it, this has to be counterbalanced by some kind of advantage, like:

• spears trained at the TC cost less.
• spears trained at the TC are trained almost instantly.

Also, consider that you lack archers in feudal, which might put you in a difficult position against enemy spears. So maybe rearrange your xbows so that they are a more versitile unit, less specialized against heavy units (since you have good HC) but better against light infantry.

@TalVheet

Dark Age:
Starts with Fortified Town Center (Option to upgrade fortification on further town centers) that can train Town Militia, Militia debuffs outside of Town Center influence range.
Starts with a Fidalgo as a leader that buffs Militia units within his area of influence.

I just saw that. Maybe you can have TC train just the militia (a special spear) super fast, that doesn’t lose health inside the influence of you city.

Then have the fidalgo that buff the production speed of nearby barracks and ranges.

Those are just random ideas, you need to tell if they can work and are historically accurate.

In general, the civ can work, but overall it lack some sort of eco boost of some kind, to help it going through the ages and get to their powerful late game units.

I get the idea of helping them to defend better, but still, if longbows and horses harass your vills you’ll most likely be behind.

[VicKestrel]

Cheers for the feedback, you raise valid points.

The town centre having slighty stronger attack could help the early milita units, quick and cheap training could be a solution, with Conto Crossbowmen in feudal upgrading the archers.

Another solution would be upon purchasing a Milicia Concelhina (Militia) upgrade on a fortified town center, it would automatically build a “mini barracks” adjacent to the TC where the player can train the milita. Obviously the militia would still be a weaker counterpart, and if the building is destroyed, it would have to bought again.
Having archers and spears as militia in the dark age then Conto Crossbowmen upgrade in feudal with Cavaleiro Vilao upgrade for the scout aswell.
Historically this would be moving from the border peasant milita recruitment, to a semi professional body of Crossbowmen and Medium Cav as it happened.

Fidalgo AoE then could be used to give the units some mobility outside the TC influence area.
The Militia Spears and archers would be weaker outside the range of the TC, losing health is a good idea and the fidalgo would have an aura albeit smaller to allow some early movement like a mobile TC aura.

What kind of economic buff would you recommend? And I can work out an historical background.

[DoctBaghi]

@TalVheet

What kind of economic buff would you recommend? And I can work out an historical background.

Mmm it’s difficult to find one right away…

Usually I start the other way around, finding some kind of peculiar historical aspect that could be transformed into a bonus.

The other way is to find a bonus that naturally complement the other bonuses or UU.

Like, I don’t know, a market that can be built in the age 1 at a cheaper cost with cheaper merchants, so to trade earlier and compensate the lost TC time training military units… that’s what came up on top of my mind, but you need to see if it can work…

[VicKestrel]

@DoctBaghi

Usually I start the other way around, finding some kind of peculiar historical aspect that could be transformed into a bonus.

Good advice. Gonna do a bit of reading.

[DoctBaghi]

You can also look at games like aoe3 or aom to find some inspiration for ideas.

[VicKestrel]

Yeah, I did that aswell.
One thing that came to mind was:
Monastery, can be built in age 1, Heals units in its area of influence buffs gathering rates of Food and Wood of nearby villagers. Farm can be built around it.

Historical reasons:
Christianity provided the cultural and religious cement that helped hold Portugal together as a distinctive entity, at least since the reconquest of Porto in 868 by Vímara Peres, the founder of the First County of Portugal. By the same token, Christianity was the rallying cry of those who rose up against the Moors and sought to drive them out. Hence, Christianity and the Catholic Church pre-dated the establishment of the Portuguese nation, a point that shaped relations between the two.

Under Afonso Henriques (r. 1139–1185), the first king of Portugal and the founder of the Portuguese Kingdom, church and state were unified into a lasting and mutually beneficial partnership. To secure papal recognition of his country, Afonso declared Portugal a vassal state of the Pope, and was as such recognized in 1179 through the papal bull Manifestis Probatum. The King found the Church to be a useful ally as he drove the Moors towards the South. For its support of his policies, Afonso richly rewarded the Church by granting it vast lands and privileges in the conquered territories. The Church became the country’s largest landowner, and its power came to be equal to that of the nobility, the military orders, and even, for a time, the Crown. But Afonso also asserted his supremacy over the Church, a supremacy that — with various ups and downs — was maintained.

[BrunoMagno]

I really like the Portuguese in AoE 2, so i would love it in AoE 4.

The Bizantines, The Turks, The Portuguese, The Spanish, The Moors, and The Japonese are all civilizations i would gladly buy as an DLC.

[DoctBaghi]

@TalVheet

Yeah, I did that aswell.
One thing that came to mind was:
Monastery, can be built in age 1, Heals units in its area of influence buffs gathering rates of Food and Wood of nearby villagers. Farm can be built around it.

It can be done, but you need to lock monks until age 3, since that’s already the HRE thing (the prelate is basically an early buffed monk).

[VicKestrel]

Well that should not be an issue, as the monks would usually just live in isolation, looking at the Cisternians and Benedict rule.
So it’s more of a support building for a town.

[DoctBaghi]

It can work.

Maybe like, a bonus that gives you an early unique monastery (you need to find a name for it…) that is cheaper and have access to unique techs that boost the economy.

Like, one effect can be there by default, and the others needs UTs, so at the same time you boost your UT numbers.

[VicKestrel]

Ah that can be easily done, can repurpose the Monastery of Alcobaca for that.

Alcobaça Monastery

"The monastery owned and developed extensive agriculture areas, and the abbot exerted influence over a large area. "

And can use Braga Cathedral as a wonder along with Guimaraes Castle.

Braga Cathedral

[DoctBaghi]

Good, maybe you can also use the word “monastery” in portoghese to name the building.

[VicKestrel]

Yeah need to edit this stuff in the OP post.
I’m just leaving in english for the ease of reading.
It’s just Mosteiro de Alcobaça in PT.

[KettleBunny]

Look at all those pretty kettle helmets! Portugal is quite pleasing to the eye, bwee bwee

[VicKestrel]

The War Hat in Portugal

War hats are, along with sallets, the most popular type of helmet worn in 15th century Portugal. Municipal and royal ordinances are filled with ‘gibanetes com (…) capacetes com suas babeiras’ [10] required of those deemed wealthy enough to serve with them. It’s easy to understand why, given their low cost but also, and more importantly, their suitability to war in Northern Africa, the largest and most frequent theatre of war the Portuguese found themselves in.

For our period, there were two main types or styles of war hat worn in Portugal. The most common of these can be seen in the Pastrana Tapestries, in the Santa Clara Tryptich, and in many other late 15th and early 16th century Portuguese works of art: it consists of a plain skull, drawn to a point (a central apex), with either a very subtle medial ridge or no ridge at all , and a medium-to-shortish brim angled rather close to the head – what I shall refer to as a barreta. The brims are either softly keeled or often straight all along the circumference of the helmet, with no ridge even if the skull has one.

The second type of war hat commonly found in Portugal was the capacete (strictu sensu , i.e. the Iberian capacete ), which the Portuguese were almost as fond of as the other Iberian kingdoms. Some of the only surviving late 15th century Portuguese helmets are capacetes , including Duarte de Almeida’s, [11] and a capacete and bevor in Lisbon’s Military Museum (stamped with the crow’s foot mark of Calatayud armourers) [12]. Unlike war hats, capacetes weren’t normally covered with fabric (if ever). Decoratively, they were often limited to a metal band around the base of the skull (usually brass, plain or gilded) or, in some more extravagant examples, appliqués to the brim [13]. Capacete crests tended towards the small side, in keeping with their subtle stalks [14]. Additionaly, I could find no examples of capacetes fitted with ‘pangolin tails’, which their longer brims with pronounced rear keel might have precluded.

Source:

15th Century Portuguese Armour III – The War Hat