Warning!: You need to have installed the CivII: Fantastic Worlds 
disk for this scenario to work! 



THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO (version 1.1)


by Jess Balsinde (jbalsinde@ucsd.edu).


February 10, 1998




PURPOSE AND OBJECTIVES

Contrary to what the title and that quote at the begining of the 
introductory text file might suggest, this scenario does not deal with
the conquest of Mexico by a bunch of rude Spanish conquistadors. It 
deals with the conquest of Mexico by the Aztecs! Of course the 
conquistadors have quite a few words to say in this scenario, but that
is not the main point of it. Thus my fourth scenario separates a bit 
from the concept around which all my scenarios revolve, i.e. the 
history of Spain.

This scenario was initially designed as an alternative to the one 
appearing in Fantastic Worlds entitled "New World". To me, this is one
of the most enjoyable scenarios ever created by the guys at Microprose.
Aside from some minor inconsistencies (horses, wheels, bronze & iron 
working, that unbelievable story of mammooth domestication), the
scenario captures very well at the start the mystic of the early
American tribes (this is again my very own personal opinion, of
course). However, the thing that bugged me a bit was that customary
tendency of the Americans to focus only on what concerns them directly
and to ignore everything else. If the scenario is called "New World",
I think the right thing to do would have been to include the entire
American continent, not only the North! The election of the tribes was
really not a very good one either, although the inclusion of two non
U.S.-civs deserves praise.

Well, the modificatins I have introduced make "The Conquest of Mexico"
quite a radically different scenario from "New World", as you will soon
notice. My scenario takes place in what we call today Mesoamerica, the
indians called Anhuac, and the conquistadors named New Spain. It spans
from 1325 (the foundation of Tenochtitln) to 1547 (Mayas finally 
conquered), and goes for a maximum of 444 turns, as each turn is six
months.

This is not an objectives scenario. Spaceship building is obviously out
of scope. You can only win before time runs out if you conquer all of
the other civs in the game, but this is virtually impossible (without 
cheating).

It is recommended that you play only with the Aztecs. The rest of
Amerindian tribes are severely handicapped by their starting location
and/or form of government, which cannot be changed. The Spaniards are
way ahead in technology and their units are much, much better than 
those of the Amerindians si it would no be fun to play with them. 



BACKGROUND
  
The Aztecs entered Anhuac (the Valley of Mexico) in the mid-thirteenth
century, but it was not until 1325 when they founded their capital
city, Tenochtitln, in the place where an eagle was sighted killing a
snake on a cactus. Gradually the Aztecs transformed their capital from
a miserable village of thatched huts to a grand city with adobe houses
and stone temples. Paralleling the sophistication of their city, the
Aztecs put themselves on the road to empire. Aggressive expansionism
and wise alliances allowed the Aztecs to establish an empire that
encompassed most of Anhuac, and a population that numbered in
millions. But the Aztec empire, cemented on hatred and tyranny, was
soon destined to meet its doomsday. Bearded white men from across the
seas terminated with the Aztec imperial illusions in only two years.
Would you be able to create an empire in Anhuac strong enough to hold
off the devilish Spaniards? 




INSTALLATION

This scenario is meant to be used with the upgraded version and
capabilities provided by the Fantastic Worlds scenario disk. Make a new
folder under the Scenarios folder. Call it "Mexico" and put all the
files in it except those files with extension .wav. Inside the "Mexico"
folder make a sub-folder called "Sound" and place all the .wav files
in it. Now just play. 




ADVANCES

The tech tree has been taken directly from the "New World" scenario
that comes with the Fantastic Worlds CD. I made several changes whose
consequences are however dramatic. The science tree is chopped off for
the indians just before the acquisition of gunpowder. It means that if
your research progresses fast you may run out of techs to discover! I
find it difficult however, given the fairly high tech paradigm of this
scenario (70/10). No tech can be acquired by conquest and there are no
goody huts. You can steal techs from rival civs, but you will never be
able to build conquistadors.

Other changes I made to the tech tree were in order to eliminate
anachronistic advances such as Horseback Riding, the Wheel, Bronze
Working, and Iron Working. Some of these have been eliminated, others
have been renamed.




UNITS

In order to prevent the Amerindian tribes from building cannons or 
conquistadores, I had to take these units off the tech tree. Thus they
do not show up in the Civilopedia. For your information, these are the
statistics of the conquistadors. Get to know the people who are going
to overrun your lands!

----Attack/Defense/Movement (Hit Points/Firepower)----

Cannon,           33a,  4d,  2m    (2h, 5f) 
Infantry,          8a,  6d,  2m    (2h, 2f)
Halberdmen,        1a,  4d,  1m    (2h, 1f) 
Harquebusier,     12a,  6d,  2m    (2h, 3f) 
Crossbowmen,      10a,  6d,  2m    (2h, 3f) 
Sword Horse,      14a,  7d,  3m    (3h, 4f) 
Pikemen,          16a,  8d,  3m    (3h, 4f)  
Reinforcements    18a,  8d,  3m    (3h, 4f) 


Impressive, uh? Unless you send hundreds of warriors to battle, your
chances of winning against the Spaniards are close to zero. However,
there exist ways for you to defeat the Spaniards. Sorry, I am not
going to tell. 

For comparison, take a look at the stats of your troops:

Warriors,         1a,   1d,  1m    (1h, 1f)  
Eagle Knights,    1a,   2d,  1m    (1h, 1f)  
Pipiltin,         6a,   2d,  2m    (1h, 1f)  
Slingers,         7a,   2d,  1m    (1h, 2f) 
Clubs,            4a,   1d,  1m    (1h, 1f)  
Jaguar Knights,   5a,   3d,  1m    (1h, 1f)  
Arrow Knights,    3a,   2d,  1m    (1h, 1f) 

I told you, it's gonna be tough...


Some useful information to finish this section: the settler-type units
are the "mayeques", the diplomats are "High Priest", the spies (Spanish
-only) are "Friars", and engineers (Spanish-only) are colonists. The
trade units are "Pochteca".




IMPROVEMENTS AND WONDERS

Some new city improvement names come directly from the "New World"
scenario. Other improvements have been renamed by me.

Not all WoWs are available in this scenario. There are only 17 WoWs.
Only one is already built from the beginning: the Cross and the Sword 
(Mike's).

Important note: City Walls cannot be built! There are city walls in
the two or three most important cities of each tribe, that is it.




MISCELLANEA

The Mixtec-Zapotecs begin with two palaces, Mitla and Monte Albn.
The Mayans begin with three, Chichn Itz, Uxmal and Mayapn.
In both cases this was done to highlight the importance of these
five cities in pre-Columbian times. So many palaces is good for
two things: no corruption in these cities, and no possibility
of bribery by enemy diplomats.

Ruler names-- Those of the Aztecs, Tarascans and Tlaxcalans existed in
real life. I chose "Gernimo" for the Northern tribes' leader as the
Apaches were the most representative of these nomadic tribes ("the
tigers of human race"). Hernn Corts was an obvious choice for the
Spaniards. I did not know the name of any Mixtec-Zapotec or Mayan
ruler. So I picked up "Sayacu" for the former and "Popol Vuh" for the
latter. Sayacu was another name used by the Mixtecs to refer to their
political center, Cuilapn. Popol Vuh is the sacred book of the Quich
Mayas. 



A SHORT NAHUATL-ENGLISH GLOSSARY

Well, I have used quite a few words in Nahuatl in this scenario. Here
is what they mean:

Clmecac = School for the sons of the noblemen (replaces University)
Calpulli = a clan which owned land and paid tribute or taxes as a
      unit (replaces Stock Exchange)
Chichimec = Barbarian
Chinampa = "Floating Gardens" (replaces Supermaket. See Civilopedia
      entry for an explanation)
Huitzilipochtli = Blue Hummingbird on the Left (Aztec god of war)
Mayeques = Serfs (Settlers unit)
Nezahualcyotl = Hungry Coyote (Texcocan king and poet, and the one
      who tells you epic stories)
Pipiltin = Aztec Noblemen
Pochteca = Merchant (Trade unit)
Quetzalcatl = Feathered Serpent (Aztec god king) 
Sacbeob = Causeways
Telpchcali = School (replaces Library)



THANKYOUS

I am sorry to say that I do not know who created the beautiful map used
in this scenario. Nor I remember where I took the map from. It has been
sitting under my main Civ2 directory for so much time now that I forgot
this information. I would like very much to know who was the artist,
so if it is you, please drop me a line.

The people.gif file is from John Ellis' "Colonies" scenario. I changed
the "elvises" a little bit as well as the color of the feathers. From
John Ellis' scenario I also "borrowed" some ideas for making my flags.

The Chichimec unit and the Friar unit were taken from Frdric Meuni's
Stonehenge modpack. The Pikemen unit is from Michael Nielsen.

The rest of new units and new graphics were either created by me or 
adapted from other Microprose scenarios, particularly "New World". If
you want to use any of the units I've created/modified, please go
ahead, but give written credit, (that is, acknowledge their origin
somewhere in a text file just like this one), and do not remove my
initials (JBR) from the graphics!

Historical accuracy of this scenario owes a lot to the following book
whose reading I strongly recommend to anyone interested in Anhuac:
Miller, Robert R. (1985) "Mexico: a History". Univ. Oklahoma Press,
Norman.

And of course, to the hundreds of sites of Mexican history scattered
thru the net.

Finally I would like to thank Chris Pannell for advice and suggestions,
and for making some room in his homepage for my scenarios. This 
scenario, along with the other three I have designed to date are 
available for download at Chris' site:
(http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Realm/9476/civilization.html).

That's all folks.
