Comments - ForGondor[FR]

It is true that women very rarely participated in actual fighting (though a few of them did in both Frankish and Islamic societies during the 12th century). However, they had a direct role in siege logistics for instance. This would be very hard to portray in the game anyway. There is also a certain number of women that actually led besieged operations. the most famous in our timeframe being Eschiva of Bures in Tiberias in 1187.

Well, technically you are not seeing great helmet before the first quarter of the 13th century so it would not be accurate to have it in a mod about the Third Crusade (late 12th century). "Maciejowski" one only appear later (probably second half of the 13th century). You can see some enclosed helmet from the last quarter of the 12th century though.

I don't know at all because we still don't know if emerging factions are possible to make (either in the game, or for our dev team).
If it is possible it will probably not come in the first version of the mod though I'm not a dev. I'm only giving historical advice.

The principality was created in 1190. Technically vassalized to the Byzantines from 1190 to 1204 (with a large autonomy yes but still vassalized to Byzantines), then independent for a bit more than a decade (1204 to 1215 or 1216) and then vassal to Epirus.
As Lucazinho said, the question about gaingin independence is quite a tricky one and that would not come before 1204 at least.

I worked about cities unprotected by nature like Aleppo too that did not use ditches either in most cases. But yes at least having some places with ditches and some without would be better. The book is planned but not before my PhD will be over. I still want to expand the number of sieges as much as I can. And the main focus will not be fortifications or sieges engines as it have been done and done again at the expense of all the other aspect of siege warfare like logistics, sallies, fighting inside the place once outter fortifications are taken, diplomacy, contact between ennemies, etc.

There were a good number of sieges in which there is no evidence of ditches. On my MA study I would say at least 60% or 70% out of 221 sieges. Then were they used but the author did not talk about them, or were they not used in that siege?
There is a huge gap between the theory of siege warfare and the real practice of siege warfare. For instance, sieges are portrayed as long operations, with an assault that ends it or a lack of food after long months of sieges. Well 80% of the cases I worked about lasted less than 3 months, most for less than a week (and only 9% of food shortages). Only 10 to 15% ended in an assault when the other were mainly ended by a surrender or the failure of the siege.
There is a lot of misconception about siege warfare due to the use of the more exceptional ones like Acre in 1291 or Antioch in 1097-1098.

History is even my work in a way haha^^. I'm a PhD student working about medieval siege warfare in Syria (Bilad al-Sham) and Jazira.
And yes I absolutely agree with Zouache about the wood issue. I frequently find it mentioned by chronicles about sieges.

Ettenrocal What you try to describe as local people/militia in large number or levies are maybe one of the two main kind of volunteers:
-al-mutaṭawwi'a (volunteers)
-ghāzī (volunteer of the faith), less used before Saladin than after him.

They were also using other kind of troops but mainly when invaded or more likely during sieges and not for offensive campaign like:
-ahl al-balad (sort of urban levies, what we would call arrière-ban in French. I'm French by the way). They are different to the semi-professional urban "militia" generally named as aḥdāṯ.
-fallāḥūn (peasant levies).

For offensive campaigns they used temporary troops (more than levies that have another meaning for medieval historians) like Turkomen cavalry comming from the East and recruited for one campaign. But then Nūr al-Dīn developped the Iqtā' system that tends to reduce the number of Turkomen in Muslim armies with more semi-professionnal and professional cavalry coming from the Iqtā' (like Ghulām or Mamlūk and others).

If you are interested in these stuff, I could suggest you Abbès Zouache, "Armées et Combats en Syrie de 491/1098 à 569/1174" which is probably the major work on the subject.

I have no longer access to my old TWC account because of e-mail issues but I'm trying to get it back to be able to contact him again.

Last time I spoke to him may have been when he decided to stop the project (heis profile was named Neadal at that time). I do not know if he is still active on TWC. Sadly I never had his e-mail, we only used TWC at that time.
Well let's say that I never make much on mods except for historical adivce. But yes MTW2 is still one of my favourite game.
On the other hand the map of IND was very good, it needs some improvments but it is one of the best I've ever seen. The only issue is that it does not include Mosul, which could be nice to add as the eastern province of the map at least to include Mosul principality (zankid).

Yes of course no problem with that. I'm not an expert on equipment though but for map/map design/events/characters/troops name or basic use there is a lot I can do. I'll send you a PM.

I took part in IND but only on the historical part. If you want to contact me feel free to do it. The map has some issues that will need to be modified thus.
ps: I'm a PhD student on crusading and islamic warfare during the 12th century.

@Thedragonknight1, sorry to say that but you are clearly lacking knowledge about armour used at that time.

I am a historian working about both crusading and Islamic warfare in both medieval Syria and Jazīra from 1097 to 1193. You talked about David Nicolle but you seem to ignore that Nicolle himself portrayed heavy armoured Turkish troops in many of his work including the famous “Arms & Armour of the Crusading Era 1050-1350” in 2 volumes, but also more recently an article in a French collective book “La guerre dans le Proche-Orient medieval. État de la question, lieux communs, nouvelles approches”.
If you look for a clear contemporary description of Turkish and Arabic warriors wearing full mail in the 12th century you could also read Usāma ibn Munqidh “kitāb al-I‘tibār” that have been translated into English as well as French, German and Russian. There is no doubt about the use of full mail by Muslim armies. Not for all troops of course, but for a part of their armies. If you don’t know who was Usāma, he served and fought under the Būrid, the Fatimid, the Zankid and finally Saladin.
Other medieval authors, both Latin and Arabic clearly talked about the use of full mail, and even sometimes double-mailed by Muslim fighter. And of course, furūsiyya books are also showing that with no possible doubt.
Muslim armies were not only using the hit-and-run tactic. We can even say that 90% of medieval warfare was not about major engagement but raid, pillage and sieges in which this tactic was clearly not the most employed by Muslim troops.

Another mistake you make is to talk about crusaders as very well armoured. Knights and some sergeants were heavy armoured. The rest of the troops use by the Crusader States were generally lightly armoured depending on several factors including (but not only) wealth, status and regional origin.

Finally, I also wanted to praise the Dev team because they gathered a very strong team of historians and history students to make their mod as historically as accurate which is very rare.

Ps: I suppose that you read Nicolle’s book published by Osprey. These are very wide audience book, not scholarly or academic research. Many of Osprey’s book are not really good, but they can be an interesting first reading.

I was participating in the project which as been "abandonned" due to everyone lack of time to continue in 2016 or 2017.
It was only a beta lacking a lot of what we wanted to add. I didn't recall that we had time to add events in this version.

Thanks!

Mainly you can try to go for an academic career (lecturer or an equivalent) or secondary teaching.

Hello, first I wanted to thank you for undertaking this project and to consider the historical part seriously.
I do not know if you need any help on the historical part but if needs be just send me a message or a link to your discord.
ps: I'm a PhD student working about siege warfare from 1097 to 1192 in the Levant on both Franks/cursaders and Muslims perspective. This might be helpful to you.