I'm actually thinking about adapting the Civilization game to the Mesoamerican culture.
I'm no artist though, especially the map-artwork exceds my capacities, so I'd like to ask if anyone would be interested in helping on the project. I'm currently deep into work, but I should be able to spend some time on the project to get it going.

Until now, I've roughly gathered some ideas on commodities, calamities and advances:

Commodities:
1 Clay
1 Stone
2 Agave
2 Flintstone
3 Salt
3 Textiles
4 Fur
4 Chili
5 Dyes
5 Tobacco
6 Copper
6 Jade
7 Spices
7 Obsidian
8 Copal
8 Gold
9 Quetzal Feathers
9 Cocoa

Calamities:
1 Insubordination (reduces taxes)
2 Treachery T
2 Banditry
3 Civil Disorder T
3 Volcano/Earthquake
4 Epidemic T
4 Famine
5 Civil War T
5 Hurricane/Tidal Wave/Flood
6 Chichimec Hordes T
7 Rebellion T (like Slave Revolt, but 20 token)
8 Superstition T (like I&H, worse than originally)
9 Succession Turmoils T (no purchase of advance that turn)

Advances:
Pottery - no change
Sculptures - bonus Pyramids, Architecture
Boat Building - allows ships
Masonry - red. Hurricane; req. for Engineering, Pyramids
Chinampas - increas pop. limit in the highlands; aggr. Famine
Milpas - increases pop limit in the lowlands; aggr. Famine
Pyramids - red. Rebellion; bonus for Theocracy, City Planning, etc.
Engineering - like Original
Trade Routes - acquire commodities by paying tokens; aggr. Epidemics
City Planning - requires Engin.; only 8 tokens/city in no city area; red. Flood;
Astronomy -red. Superstition; bonus Pyramids, Calendar
Calendar - nullifies negative effects of Milpa and Chinampa
Map Drawing - nullifies Banditry
Medicine - like Original
Symbols - bonus for Mythology, Calendar, Theocracy, Administration; req. for Writing System
Writing System - req. Symbols
Mythology - red. Superstition; bonus Poetry
Ritual Sacrifice - use beaten enemy tokens for CC purchase; aggr. Rebellion; req. for Flowery Wars
Ritual Ball Game - red. Superstition
Theocracy - alters Civil War; nullifies Civil Disorder
Flowery Wars - destroy enemy tokens in 1 adj. area/turn (and use them for CC purchase); others who hold Flowery Wars are NOT immune
Henotheism - red. Superstition by 2; immunity vs. Flowery Wars
Music - like Original
Mural Painting - red. Civil Disorder
Poetry - red. Civil War; red. Civil Disorder
Architecture - like Original
Administration - red. Succession Turmoils (1 Advance may be bought, but without counting any credits) and Rebellion
Military Orders - holder moves last; aggr. Civil War
Tribute System - Allows to increase value of one set of commodities by one card once/turn; allows to adjust taxes; aggr. Rebellion
Diplomacy - allows to bribe Chichimec Hordes; cities immune to pillage; aggr. Treachery

Playable Civs:
Huaxtecs
Totonacs
Otomí
Toltecs
Aztecs
Mixtecs
Zapotecs
Olmecs
Maya
Quiché

What do you think?

I'll look around for what I can dig up.

My primary question is what exact area are you thinking of including?

You say Mesoamerica, which usually means southern half of Mexico to norhtern half of Honduras.

From your country list, I think you want
Mexico/Guatemala obviously, but what about

Heading south,
El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua (you would be able to use the Mosquito tribes if you included that), Costa Rica (Chiriquiri, Chorotega's), Panama, Colombia

Heading north
Coast of Texas -> Las Floridas

Into the Ocean
Cuba, etc

It seems a shame to not include the Nahuatl. Mostly living in Mexico, I know they made it at least as far south as Costa Rica.

If you are looking for other trade items, the "bolas" (I know, Spanish for balls) were traded fairly extensively. These were granite balls from size of an orange up to 15 tons or so.

Well, one can't divide the Nahua from the Aztecs (or Mexica, useing the more exact expression) and Toltecs. Both groups were Nahua speaking people. Nahua is a term like "Germanics" but did never develop a feeling of belonging together until the Spanish came. I was thinking roughly about Mexico ~south of Monterrey to the southern border of Honduras, but without the Mosquito coast.

Glad to see your interest!

Maybe I'm confused, but I thought the Nahuatl/Mexica were conquered by the Aztecs and a distinct civilization.

I'll see what I can find for decent maps for you.

Jeff

http://broggs.org/~mcbeth/meso/map.jpg
http://broggs.org/~mcbeth/meso/mesoamerica.gif
http://broggs.org/~mcbeth/meso/MesoJade.500.jpg

Are several maps giving the basic idea of possible locations of city sites, physical borders, and geographical features. It at least is something to work from...

I am certainly not an expert on Central America civilizations, but if I can do something to help, I'd be glad to.

Raffaele

P.S.: I'd keep a door open to possibilities to play a scenario between this and the Western Extension map.

The first map seems to be great, although it would be good to extend it to the north. Furthermore, I don't have any idea how to eliminate the borders and names on the map properly, as I've said, I'm not really an artist, which is my biggest problem...

And I can assure you that I'm right about the Aztecs/Mexica, nicniuhtli ("my friend" in Nahuatl, which I tried to learn for a while, but it's damn hard!!!).

Oh I definitely belive you are right on the Nahuatl. I've just got to figure out where my crazy ideas came from now. Maybe remembering some false history from "Song of a Hummingbird" (ick).

I didn't mean to suggest that you work on the map right now. I will get around to it sooner or later (although I also am no artist)

I actually think that the second map is a better starting place using 1 and 3 for terrain reference

Jeff

Oh sorry, I misunderstood. Anyways, one thing which is important at any rate is to include Lake Texcoco in its historical dimensions and not in nowadays, which basically means that there would be none. In Mesoamerican history, however, Lake Texcoco was much bigger and several very different and important areas bordered it.

I friend of mine had an idea of a fantasy Atlantis scenario. I could think of an enormous continent based on perhaps the maps from the role-playing modules Gurps Atlantis or Rifts Atlantis, with the Lyonesse island just west of Ireland...

Has there ever been some development on this variant?

I was thinking about this myself once.

Using a map-area like this:



Not that I'm ready to work on this, Just was wondering where this idea stopped?

McBeth did some extensive work on a Mesoamerican map over at the Redscape forums, but as far as I know he never finished it, and I can't find the thread again...

Yup. I still talk about it once a month. About a year and a half ago I got hit with 100 hour weeks and CivProject was the first to go. I wanted a smaller game (similar to the 6-player East map), and so was heading toward this

http://broggs.org/~mcbeth/closer.png

The original larger area was looking like this

http://broggs.org/~mcbeth/meso-allfilled.png

I and Tomahaha (Hatti in Celtic Fury) still have all the city site, civilization, trade card decisions floating around and we do chat about getting it going again sometime. I'm certainly better with my graphics tools now than I was then.

interesting.

Well, maybe somewhere in the future...

I've liked the idea anyway, couse I thought of it myself too.