The Ancients rule-set is designed to provide Freeciv with a flavour of the pre-gunpowder era. The current version focuses on the nations of Mesopotamia, the Mediterranean, and surrounding regions. --- Using the rule-set: For network play, be sure the rule-set is available both on the server and on all the clients' systems. Start the server normally, and issue the following commands: rulesetdir ancients These server commands can be used in conjunction with most other server commands that you want to use. Start the clients with the command: freeciv-gtk2 -t ancients If you do not specify -t, then you will get the default tile-set, which will not make any sense as a representation for your units. --- Playing under the rule-set: It is VERY IMPORTANT to remember that you are not playing the standard game. The technology tree is different, and units, technologies, buildings, and governments all have new characteristics. Do not assume that things work as before! Information is available under the Help menu of the game client. Certain aspects of maintaining your civilization will be difficult to manage, and this is deliberate in the Ancients rule-set. You should often face tough decisions between progress and survival, and you may find your research forced to directions you did not want to take. Learn to enjoy the challenge! If you continually feel that your civilization is teetering on the edge of chaos, then the rule-set is well designed. If you feel frustrated after playing under the rule-set, start again and pursue a different tech strategy. This will often result in a completely different style of game. Units that seem worthless in one game will prove to be quite valuable in the next. Miscellaneous warnings: o The Ancient Democracy represents the government of Athens and its small empire during the Peloponnesian War. This government type is unsuitable when you have more than a handful of cities; changing to it after your nation has grown large will have disastrous results. o The Petty Kingdom and Republic are suitable for medium-sized empires; you will need to change to Imperial Monarchy or the Principate to manage the largest empires. o All naval units in the game risk sinking if they do not end a turn adjacent to a shoreline. o The percent chance for diplomatic sabotage differs from the standard game as follows: - Military installations suffer only a 10% chance, since they will usually be guarded. - The palace and all wonders suffer a 1% chance, just to keep things interesting. - All others suffer a 50% chance. o Settlers can not build roads or irrigate land; you must use Workers to do so. --- ChangeLog Ancients 2.4-0 * Updated format to be compatible with freeciv 2.4 Ancients 2.3-1 * Increased hitpoints to 15 for all military units that used to have 10 hitpoints Ancients for Freeciv 2.3 * Updated format to be compatible with freeciv 2.3 Ancients for Freeciv r15801 Updated for Freeciv development version (what will be 2.2) revision 15801 * Some ships can leave shoreline * Calendar speed about halved Ancients 2.1.0-2 (preview) Updated for Freeciv 2.1 branch. Major changes from 2.0.x: * Updated all rules, governments etc to effects.ruleset * Now has more nations An amplio-based tileset for Ancients called ampcients compiled by Daniel Markstedt is available but not (yet) under a bundleable license. See the wiki page[1] for more information. Report any bugs and/or suggestions to me or Daniel Markstedt See also the original webpage[2] of Ancients for Freeciv 1.x [1]: http://freeciv.wikia.com/wiki/Ancients [2]: http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/bdbryant/freeciv/ancients.html Updated by Ulrik Sverdrup Daniel Markstedt --- The current maintainer of the rule-set: Benedict Adamson The original maintainers of the rule-set: Bobby Bryant Moses Lei Additional contributers (alphabetical): Armen Carapetian Aho Esen Miguel Farah Daniel Markstedt William Allen Simpson The rule-set has a Web site at: http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/bdbryant/freeciv/ancients.html Feel free to send feedback to the maintainer, or to discuss the rule-set on the Freeciv mailing list.