The MIXTECS -- A History-First AoE2 Civ Proposal (LAVAnilla Episode 9)

[@ahmicqui9396]

It was a pleasure working with you Robby! Also credits to my wonderful wife for my profile pic art included here! If anyone has any questions/criticisms (history-wise), feel free to ask away here!

[@robbylava]

Wow, please give her my compliments, it looks fantastic. Could not have done this without you man, thanks again.

[@GodFlesh572]

I have a question. What are the sources or authors you consulted in your research? It would be eye-opening to me at least, and if you don't mind, do you know how the mixtecs were organized during spanish rule? Are there "pueblos de indios" with a high mixtec population? Good job on the video, pretty fascinanting mechanics overall.

[@ahmicqui9396]

@@GodFlesh572 The Realm of Eight Deer by Byland and Pohl and The Cloud People by Kent Flannery are probably the best books on the Mixtec. Stuff by John Pohl is ESPECIALLY amazing, be it books or articles.

[@ahmicqui9396]

@@GodFlesh572 There are some Mixtec towns and cities even today. I'm not sure if they are majority there, but Tōtōtepēc for example is still standing and has a notable Mixtec population. As Robby mentioned, they largely had to abandon farming and become goat herders. Not all of them obviously, there's still farming done in La Mixteca even today, but it's not anywhere as prominent. Speaking of La Mixteca, it is divided into three parts: Low, High and Coastal. AFAIK it has been this way for most of the colonial period too?

[@GodFlesh572]

@@ahmicqui9396 Thanks for your replies. I forgot about La Mixteca to be honest.Tototepec is in Guerrero right?

[@slkdfjklasasdfasdf]

Wow, this was an incredibly creative, captivating, and unique civ overview. I absolutely love the atypical tech tree alongside unconventionally powerful tools necessitating creative problem solving rather than standard strategies. I'm always impressed with how well you tie together game-play and interesting game mechanics with the actual history. I'm not much of a meso-civ player, but I would absolutely play the hell out of this civ if it was in the game.

[@robbylava]

What a compliment! Thank you so much for saying so my friend, I was really hoping that you guys would enjoy how this one came together!

[@KarlKapo]

7:10 that castle looks insanely good.

[@nicolaaffatati5355]

"Cavalry... Uh" 😂😂😂 i died laughing! Good job Amico, love the meso civs, absolutely like the way you build this civ!

[@robbylava]

Hehehe thanks bud!

[@Grevnor]

A really fun build. All for implementing more Mesoamerican civs, and a full Mesoamerican DLC wirh reworked Aztecs and Mayans is long overdue!

[@unseparator]

So bold! What a fantastic build. I hope the devs are brave enough to push boundaries in this way. Stone farms/vills AND the no treb in one build is a masterstroke of theming and design

[@robbylava]

Hehehe thanks a lot my friend! This design definitely pushes the boundaries of what could be defined as LAVAnilla, but it just felt so perfectly themed that I just had to do it

[@richardchen7062]

I don’t think it would be broken. Trebuchets are a thing but they’re not infallible and can be taken out, so there is a way to deal with it

[@KarlKapo]

Yes! Finally Mixtecs!!! Would love to see Inkas split into several civs :)

[@ahmicqui9396]

@@KarlKapo I guess we plan to deal with the Andes... eventually!

[@richardchen7062]

The way you could release more than 5 civs a year if they allowed your ideas to flourish ❤

[@acarrot589]

That Zapotec emblem looks great too. Hinting an expansion pack?❤

[@robbylava]

I just might be!

[@Kaliayep]

What a treat

[@thire7432]

Stone vills sounding fun. I imagine their drush would be stronger than average because they can create 8 vills with their starting resources. So I bet the build would have the first few vills go to wood instead of sheep so that they can get the barracks up earlier and get the militia out fast.

[@EL-os6yg]

I really hope that we get two official Mesoamerica dlcs, Purépecha & Tlaxcalan (with a Otomi unique unit) and the Zapotec & Mixtec, the 8 Deer campaign would be so cool.

[@robbylava]

I would very much hope to see at least two DLCs as well, particularly if we go back to the old three new civilizations model!

[@matthewjohnson3656]

In a video a while back you talked about ways to redesign infantry as a group to allow them to force engagements more and be stronger as a core army. An idea I had was to change how their production worked. Instead of an infantry taking up population while they are training, they only take it up after they are done. So the train progress goes all the way up to 100% and then if there is no pop available, it will just hold there until it does. This would allow them to be more population efficient without actually being able to field more total units, which is kinda intrinsic to how the game is overall designed. Now instead of having 50% of your units fighting, 25% walking to the battle and 25% in training, you could theoretically have 75% in battle, 25% walking and 0 population being taken up by training units. Flavorwise, it also represents how the easiest troops to arms and throw into a fight are the infantry. they don't need long term training like an archer, or to have extensive horse and rider armor suited up. If you have 15 barracks and you just had a group wiped out, they will all pop out the next wave right away.

[@robbylava]

That is an exceptionally creative proposal. I've never heard anything like it before. Might not be the way I end up approaching it, plus I'm not even sure it's actually technically possible to mod into the game as of now, but I really like the way you think.

[@gytux0258]

Finally, a civ that makes it viable to turn my base spiky with towers

[@Rob_Fordd]

awesome work on this video!

[@robbylava]

Thanks bud!

[@Rob_Fordd]

@@robbylava sent $5 on kofi too :)

[@robbylava]

@Rob_Fordd EYYY, thank you SO much for supporting my work my friend! That genuinely means a lot.

[@rupertBluza]

When it comes to new Mesoamerican civs in AoE2 personal I would like to see Tlaxcallans. Not only they already take a huge part in the Aztec campaign, but their alliance with the Spanish could be an excuse to make them the first AoE2 meso civ with access to stables and gunpowder and I think that potentially could be interesting.

[@robbylava]

Definitely a strong consideration for me, you will almost certainly see them in the future!

[@divicospower9112]

Interesting. I don't know this people so I am always glad to learn new stuff. The stone aspect of their faction is quite unique and I think that it's well put together. Some points to mention - I really like the yaha yahui. Great effect and very unique. - The castle age unique technology makes a lot of sense. More towers that cost less to protect farmers to make them build stone farms generating stone. Well thought. - They don't have trebuchets. Ok. But do they have petards?

[@robbylava]

Thanks so much for saying so man! They do, unfortunately, have petards. I was already taking a big step in removing trebuchet, so I felt like getting rid of the other standard castle unit probably wasn't a great idea!

[@Oscarandu]

The atlatl was used in southamerica too, but mostly for sport and hunting

[@robbylava]

Interesting! I had no idea. Will try to do some research and see if it was literally ever used in warfare, and if so I can broaden this regional to then as well Thanks for sharing!

[@stfnknbb]

Buckle up boys! It's gonna be a good one!

[@Edelweiss1102]

31:35 Robby finally unleashing his master plan and the reason this channel was created all along. I've been so busy and currently sick that it has become hard to write long intrusive comments, but your videos have become pretty much a Friday evening ritual to me and I always enjoy watching them. A very interesting and thought out build to say the very least, with some brave choices, but hey that's why we are all here for in the end. I do wonder if the reliance on stone is a bit overtuned. Stone is the scarcest of all resources, and a lot of potential interests are fighting for it. Sacrificing a potential castle for farms sounds pretty whack, but you do get the stone generation and cheap structures in return, which can potentially snowball. But it's also very vulnerable to raid. If you lose most of your economy after stone has run out, and you have to buy it at the market just to get food, yikes. Turning off defensive structures and spawning in units sounds very broken, but I do think it's somewhat balanced by completely lacking any good ranged siege, or siege in general. Archers with bonus damage against buildings are great, but they can't replace trebs obviously, so you really have to get in close to destroy buildings and are vulnerable to counterattacks. The Yaha Yahunis willl be swarmed like light by flies. Generally, the quality over the past few months has been absolutely insane, both with AoE2 and AoMR, so thanks for all the hard work from you and all the people behind the scenes, it's amazing to see how far the channel has comes since it's infant days. Hope the lil villagers have wheelbarrow by now and are doing great haha, stay awesome buddy!

[@robbylava]

Wow, thank you so much for the awesome review man! I tremendously appreciate the kind words, and I hope that your IRL stuff sorts itself out soon. Always great to see you in the comments, and I'm thrilled to hear you've been liking the recent stuff so much.

[@richardchen7062]

Also you should have SOTL react to this!

[@mohamadekonurcahyono2529]

Malay can also be split: -malay represent mallacca sutanate -sumatran represent srivijaya empire -java represent majapahit empire -philipinian -bornean -balinese -molluccas -celebes Please discuss that.

[@robbylava]

Completely agree, this is absolutely a reason I would like to tackle someday. It's a little far down my list, but only because there are so many other requests that I want to cover first, so I promise I will get around to it eventually even if that is not necessarily soon.

[@daniloalves1139]

Dude, seriously, whoever is responsible for AOE2 DE just hire this guy already and give him total powers

[@DreameverCompany]

I have been thinking about the ball game court since i saw your vieo on the zapotects. I came upon a weird idea. You see mesoamericans (and andeans) didn't have blacksmithing, but they still get a blacksmith in the game, no one seems to notice. So why not replace the Blacksmith with a "regional" building for mesos (and there would be also another one for the andeans): The Ballgame Court with special technologies for their infantry/archers that compensate the playstile of lacking cavalry/gundpowder. Here you could get creative with the technologies, beyond the generic +1 pierce armor for infantry (but keeping the generic bonus). There are 5 rows of techs, but the mesos don't have cavarly so it is 4 rows for them: Infantry/Cavalry atttack (Cavalry doesn't apply) Infantry pierce defense Archer attack Archer pierce defense You could create 4 flavour appropiate alternative rows of techs for the Ballcourt game. For example: Dodge Training: +1 pierce defence and +2 catapult/balista defense for archers. This would be tier 1 Archer pierce defense (Padded Armor). Hit and Run: +1 attack and +4% speed for infantry. This would be tier 1 Infantry attack (Forging). And so on with each tech row.

[@robbylava]

That's an exceptionally creative idea. Not sure if it's the way I would personally approach it, but It would definitely be a damn sight better than what we have now.

[@robbylava]

I should note though that while they did not have blacksmiths per se they did have metalworking and craftsman. While we often think of mesoamerica as being a stone age region pre Columbus, many mesoamerican peoples used bronze weapons (including, coincidentally, the Mixtecs!).

[@DreameverCompany]

Yes, with blacksmithing I mean iron working.

[@s.w.4409]

More AoM Builds please!

[@AussieMulletboi]

Did u not c the poll?

[@s.w.4409]

@@AussieMulletboi just saw it as voted, thanks

[@robbylava]

Working on multiple right now, they just take a lot of time!

[@Giagrus]

glad u added the atlatl. I think the jaguar warrior should stay uu for aztecs and make eagle warrior uu for them as well. Instead of eagle warrior give the mayans and inca another regional units. Something fast that serves similar role to eagle warriors. But adding atlatl is great.

[@robbylava]

I see what you mean, but as of now I have not been able to find sufficient grounding for a regional unit that could serve the niches I'm trying to fill. The majority of mesoamerican peoples fielded some form of animal-inspired elite infantry, and both eagles and jaguars were extremely common recurrent themes among them, though of course the Jaguar and eagle warriors as we know them now are pretty much 100% modeled after the Aztec iterations. So I personally think that having eagles and jaguars for mesoamerican powers is probably fine. That said, I do not want to have these units for Mayan civilizations, and I definitely don't want them for South American civilizations. Unless I find evidence that they fielded soldiers of a similar nature, which is possible that seems unlikely to me.

[@acarrot589]

Maybe tower farms should look different, maybe potato or corn fields to help identify them

[@robbylava]

That's a very interesting idea, though it would get complicated if, for example, the tower was destroyed, or the farm was placed equidistant between a tower and a mill. But I like the idea!

[@edgarnany]

Sei que você já fez um vídeo sobre os mississippians. Tente fazer um sobre outra civilização norte-americana

[@daniloalves1139]

mandou em PT BR mesmo? ahuahuauhahu

[@edgarnany]

@@daniloalves1139 ele já me respondeu outras vezes em PT-BR

[@robbylava]

@@edgarnany (Obrigado, Google Translate!) Definitivamente planejo visitar outra civilização norte-americana em algum momento, embora provavelmente demore muito até que minha agenda me permita retornar para lá.

[@Crossil]

Wtf, I was literally thinking about Mesoamerica this past week. This and Celtic Crumble (probs Irish, Scots, Welsh and Bretons) would've been my guesses for your next DLC speculation. Well, I know you have Zapotecs and Purepecha/Tarascans already, this is three with Mixtecs, so who will be the last one for your 4-a-piece DLC set? Based on previous interactions, I'll hazard a guess it'll be Tlaxcalans due to their prominence in the Montezuma campaign? Technically you could do Otomi. Campaign appearances? None, I think. In theory the first Montezuma scenario could have them if redesigned, but all the other scenarios with Mesoamerica are quite firmly Aztec (read Nahua) and Mayans. If memory serves, that is. Well, aside from a single Zapotec appearance in Dos Pilas, but that's as far as it goes.

[@AlvinMLozada]

Agree Tlaxcala will make a sweet variant to current Aztec faction, I am thinking something similar to what AoE4 did on the last DLC. And if I may add something else, since Zapotec and Mixtec were living so close each other in Oaxaca I feel they influences mutually. What if they were portraited on the speculative DLC as counterparts, maybe they share architecture and castle, but not the wonder nor language.

[@ahmicqui9396]

​@@AlvinMLozadaThat is the general idea!

[@robbylava]

"Celtic Crumble" is an ingenious name, I love it

[@richardchen7062]

Um actually…Xolotl Warriors so you can convert Stables with Monks

[@KarlKapo]

Instead of archers, maybe another regional unit? Mixtecs were known for their javelins.

[@richardchen7062]

Change “Archery Range” to “Range” to account for lack of archery?

[@robbylava]

A cute idea for sure! Probably not something I would do outside of like an Easter egg, but I like the way you think.

[@richardchen7062]

@@robbylavaThanks. It’s just that if there is no evidence of archery in some civs, they should eventually be removed, no?

[@robbylava]

Maybe as an Easter egg, though I should note that we DON'T have evidence of ZERO archery among the Mixtecs. In fact they certainly had it, given that several of their neighbors were famous for it. It just seems to have not been very important to them, hence why I have chosen to deemphasize the Archer line rather than remove it entirely.

[@Sandman10032]

I know you have a lot of videos going on and a lot of people always asking but are you planning on a “How much can we split the Chinese”?

[@robbylava]

100% planning on it! Currently working with people who know the history much better than me to make sure I get it right

[@danielalejandrobarramartin5193]

Don't really a fan of the Yaha Yahui 😅, but the Yuchi Yutun blast attack is quite the Unique in his way 💪🗿

[@robbylava]

Heheheh thanks my friend! Totally understand if that design was just too much for your tastes, but I'm glad you liked the Yuchi Yutun

[@PekkaEräreikä51]

Age2 is so historically accurate. No hope for any theorycrafting

[@robbylava]

I gotta hear your reasoning for this.

[@PekkaEräreikä51]

@@robbylava Think about any non European or non near Eastern civ and the basic military units. Also the villagers.

[@PekkaEräreikä51]

@@robbylava I also hate how they had to have Sámi tribesmen as Slavs, which is just atrocious. That could give wrong information to someone less fortunate when it comes to knowledge of history.

[@robbylava]

So do you mean that it is historically INaccurate? Because your original comment says accurate. If you are saying that it's inaccurate, I couldn't agree more with you. All the more reason for my particular niche of trying to make it more authentic and faithful to the facts!

[@PekkaEräreikä51]

@@robbylava That's why we need at least some Finnic representation, and everytime I bring that up some very smart people will either at worst attack my culture personally and say we weren't white or at best use some stupid logic like a.) we somehow didn't have any significance when it comes to history even though we were along the costs of the route to rus and byzantine which made those costs very rich (a whole song in Livonia about that) or b.) we didn't have any significant leaders in the historical records, as if would be of any importance to have it in the game other than in campaigns.

[@danielalejandrobarramartin5193]

The Naimans are on mind?

[@robbylava]

Could be really cool at some point!

[@richardchen7062]

“The Naiman are our enemy. If you drive them from the steppes, then and only then will we join your horde.”

[@alejandrocanelo3058]

seems like yuchi yutun would be brokem anyways. If you take chakram throwers, for example, with very low attack they destroy everything when in moderate mass (except for the highest melee armor units)

[@robbylava]

I see where you're coming from but seriously doubt it. The chakram is ranged and substantially faster, allowing it to better capitalize on clumped up enemies. If the unit ends up being overpowered I would happily change it, but the nature of its blast damage is so different and its speed is so much worse that I am not at all concerned it will be anywhere near as strong as the chakram was on release.

[@erikdw8379]

First!

[@TuTosRARE]

THE REGION OF O A S H A C A

[@AussieMulletboi]

Good vid but i feel like we have the three messo civs that we need. I am obviously still gonna watch but i was wondering why messo so hype and not europe

[@ahmicqui9396]

@@AussieMulletboi Europe is extremely overcrowded already and definitely overrepresented. Have you played the Bohemian campaign? The American ones are trainwrecks compared to that (especially 'Montezuma') If not Mesoamerica then Asia, but definitely not Europe IMO

[@AlvinMLozada]

If I am not wrong, we only have two Mesoamericans civs in the game. Cause Incas were located in the Andean region, that btw I bet some would say it is also under represented.

[@AussieMulletboi]

@@AlvinMLozada i felt that they were all represented enough cos the three empires the Spanish had to deal with are in the game

[@TwistedGalaxy]

It's pronounced Wua-ha-kah

[@ahmicqui9396]

@@TwistedGalaxy In Spanish it's Wa-ha-kah, in classical Nāhuatl it's Wash-ya-cack (I know, it sounds like you think it does), but modern natives sometimes still do pronounce the x as "sh" even when not speaking their native language. The spaniards would also pronounce it as "washaka" for years, it just changed later... but not in all cases anyway (Don Quixote being an example, I've only ever heard it as "kishot" and never "kihot")