Messages

I am back from a speaking trip to New Zealand and Australia.  As I don't know the game you are working on, I am unsure what information you are looking for.  The Nabataean uniqueness was what helped them against the established powers of their day.  Their empire was different. Check out nabataea.net for some ideas of city names etc.  They also had a presence on the seas, but I don't know if your game includes sea units.  One of my sons who has had some experience with balancing games mentioned to me that it was purely a military game.

As for the comment about pursuit, think of them like the N.A. Indians who simply disappeared after a battle and assembled somewhere else.  Camels can go where horses cannot, and with their hidden water cisterns, the Nabataeans could just ride into the desert where others would die. The desert was their protection, where armies could not penetrate. This is why they were successful at being smugglers and merchants. It was only they who could cross the desert, to bring goods and information from one side to the other. The Roman army took very long to go around the edges. They moved quickly across the desert. they didn't have to defend borders. And as far as the local families in each of the cities, they became wealthy merchants, and usually had the protection of the local rulers. So it is a complex set up and I think not really good for a military game made up of slow moving units intent on taking territory and holding it.

Thank you for clarifying that you are interested in the Hellenistic era. I know nothing about the game you are working on. It sounds like you are an adept historian. I have only studied the Nabataeans and the bedouin of today. The Bedouin are small people, lightly built. Riding two people to a camel is not uncommon. If you have two thousand camels you can have four thousand mounted archers. They also used horses. For instance, there is a relief of a Nabataean cavalryman at the castle in Kerak.
    Remember that they usually chose NOT to fight. Outside of their burial cities, national borders meant little to them. They acted more like smugglers in the early days, and later like a secret society in Rome, than a foreign nation. By 120 AD they dissipated their kingdom as most of it was annexed into the Roman Empire. The Roman coins issued in commemoration were different from others that commemorated similar events. Rather than saying Conquered Arabia, the coin said Acquired Arabia.  The hint is that the wealthy merchants purchased their way into Roman citizenship while the low-class continued on in Petra. So perhaps you should not include the Nabataeans in the game, as it sounds like it is a military game, and the Nabataeans didn't figure very much in the military history of Rome. If you want other types of units, you could include any mercinaries you wanted, as they had money to purchase whatever they desired.

Anyway, I am heading out for a month long trip, and will be off the radar (ie no emails, phone, fax, etc).  Wishing you all the best.

Tactic: Some Quotes:

Obodas I (96 - 86 BC) became ruler of the Nabataeans, and he continued his father's expansion by moving on northward into Syria as Seleucid rule disintegrated. Obodas managed to ambush Alexander Jannaeus near Gadara, just east of the Sea of Galilee. Using a mass of camel riders, he forced Jannaeus into a deep valley where the Nabataeans completed the ambush and gained their revenge over loosing Gaza.

Another facet of the Nabataean defense was their use of cavalry. They had both camel and horse cavalries, but in the end, horse cavalries were by far more common.

It seems that the Nabataeans had a poor reputation as warriors among both ancient and modern historians. However, the Nabataeans did win their fair share of battles.
In 87 BC the Nabataeans fielded 10,000 cavalry and defeated the Seleucid ruler, Antiochus XII. The Nabataean king, Aretas II, then took control of Damascus and Syria.
Twenty two years later, in 65 BC, Aretas III sent 50,000 horsemen as well as infantry units to support the Jewish prince Hyranus II who was contesting his brother for the throne of the royal house of Judea. The Nabataean army pressed the siege of Jerusalem so vigorously that the Roman envoy Scaurus intervened in the dispute and ordered the Nabataeans to withdraw or be declared an enemy of Rome. The Nabataeans withdrew, as Rome was their principle trading partner. Isolating themselves from Rome would have caused the end of their lucrative trading business.


For historic reference to the two camel riders, check Orientalia Vol 78, No. 3 Page 409 and the reliefs on page 410 and s on.  Many of the reliefs show the rear rider facing back and armed with an bow. 

Since they bred both horses and camels, they had litterally thousands of these. They were not expensive, and could move through the desert where horses could not. They were unarmoured because they came out of the desert and disapeared again back into the desert much like the North American Indians. They were light cavelry units, and very hard to pursue. Sometimes came around the back of a marching army to harrass it.

the Nabataeans were in Arabia since very early times. They moved into the Edomite Empire after Nebedcenezer took the Israelites captive, and later they moved into Damascus after the disintegration of the Greek generals. During the time of Christ, there was a Nabataean governor in damascus and Knig Herod married a nabataean princess.

This is your chance to make a civilization that is very different from all of the others. They are wallowing in money, and knowledge, but because they are so focused on money, their military is weak.

Economy
In ancient Nabataea economy was everything!  The Nabataeans were a merchant nation, that relied not so much on their military as on the vast amounts of money they made. Incense was the backbone of their economy, although they traded in many items. Rome was addicted to incense. they burned it in thousands of temples, and in every home before their gods. One Roman General almost bankrupted the empire by burning huge amounts of it before a battle. Nero almost bankrupted the empire by burning so much of it at his wife's funeral pyre. It was also used in medicine. It was the equivalent of oil power today. And only the Nabataeans supplied it to Rome, and only twice a year.  So whenever a Roman General attacked the Nabataeans, they paid him off. Soon it became very popular in Rome that generals wanted to be posted to the borders of Nabataea so they could "attack them" and get their share of the wealth. Nabataeans traded in EVERYTHING that could make money, including drugs, prostitutes, gems, and selling knowledge. As a people they kept to themselves and did not intermarry, and were very secritive.

Military
General called a Strategos. Main military unit was two archers on a camel. They supplied 2000 of these at the sack of Jerusalem in 70 AD., but they were reluctant to partake in the battle and just watched.  They favorite tactic was to ambush people by using their masses of camels to force their opponents towards their hidden foot soldiers and hidden archers. 

Temples
(Gods were regional, they accepted the gods of other regions)
El-Uzza: the god of power
El-Dushares: the god of Rocks and Mountains (God of Petra)
El-Kutbe: the god of Writing (Merchants were very clever at writing contracts)
El-Manaat: the goddess of Fate.
El-Qaum: the god of War
El-Lat: the goddess of Fertility (they took multiple wives, women had equal status)

Names
I haved attached a book I have written on the nabataeans.

Character Traits/Ancilaries
Quick to withdraw from battle.
Camels hit hard and leave
Had lots of money, I mean lots and lots of money
Had an excellent spy system, since their merchants lived in all the main cities of Rome, and they had an excellent supply route. They did not visit a city and set up a market, rather, when they came to a city, they went to their Nabataean relatives who lived at that city and dropped of foreign goods, and picked up local goods. They were not above pirating or organized crime as long as they profited. Imagine crossing oil sheiks with Russian mobsters, with Jesuit Priests (who were advisers to kings). Because they traveled and were respected, they knew what was happening everwhere. So they would not have a fog-of-war.

Diplomacy
They were a real democracy, the king (sheik) was elected and was evaluated each year. The usual evaluation was on how much money was being made. In effect, each of the tribes would have an elected leader, then all of these tribal leaders would meet twice a year at the festival in Petra which would be the royal court. They would elect a high king or high shiek. That ruler would lead them for many years, often 40 years or more. Coins (with mroe silver or gold than Roman coins) had the image of the king and his wife on it. The term "King" was used by the Romans to describe the man, but it was not necessarily the term they used for their own elected ruler. What is title was is not cleaer. I would call him the sheik.

Cultural Buildings
Royal Courts in Petra,
Warehouse - for storing all the goods
Treasury - for storing all the money
Tomb with dining hall - Because they were so spread out, they buried all their dead in a burial city (Petra was the main one). they would bring all the bones of the dead and put into a family tomb.  They would return twice a year if possible (or every couple of years if far abroad) to visit the dead and eat a meal in the dining hall with all their family and then break the dishes.
Pottery Kiln - for making pottery for smashing at the tombs
Market Place - for selling goods, could be set up anywhere
Caravansaries - stopping  places for caravans were put up all over the place, and could be used as mobile HQs where they could fight from, and resupply from. Since they had these and attached families in every major city in the Roman world, they could spawn soldiers from them as well. 

If you want to make this game interesting, let the Nabataeans own all the Marketplaces in all of the cities... and they sell to other nations from these, and earn money from other treasuries.
Just an idea.