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ahowl11
01-16-2012, 08:41
Title says it all folks, this is a vanilla mod. We will not be getting super complicated or fancy with anything. Except improving upon vanilla with historical accuracy.

First the exe
BI, forget about ALX. BI has been proven to work the best

Map
Mundus Magnus 4.0, we will be stripping all the cities however and making our own city list, being historically accurate with each faction. The regions of India and Arabia will still be present but only as terra incognita. The start date will be at 280 BC and the end date will be 30 BC

Unique add ons and features so far:
Makanyanes Neutralised Senate Mod: makes the Senate facion playable, but disables all of the senate features. Senate has been internally renamed to "slavs"

My synopsis for the features we should include:
We will feature different add-ons and other things of the matter, to improve upon the original vanilla game. Here are the top 10

1. RS2 environments. Makes the campaign map look nice, and adds a very different feeling to each battlefield. The topography is stunning and the difficulties it creates adds a challenge to the player.

2. Free People Faction. Here is what dvk901 the leader of Roma Surrectum had to say about it:

I'm going to start this thread to explain the Free People concept in Roma Surrectum, the implementation and the theory behind the concept.

1. First of all, it's pretty well known that in RTW, the 'Slave' faction is basically a randomized nuisance that can build no logical units, has no workable economy, diplomacy or government, and is basically a faction intended to roll over and die before the forces of the other factions in RTW. The result is fast expansion by most factions (on a random basis), and little challenge from the so-called Rebels, except to pop up in your territory in a senseless fashion to disrupt your economy.

2. In an attempt to change this detrimental behavior, Roma Surrectum includes several 'innovations' that create a much harder and challenging Strat campaign, as well as a real battle for regions that belong to its Free People.

First, the 'Slave' faction in RS has been given a good face-lifting...with better unit selection, better starting armies, and better more challenging armies are spawned.

Secondly, the old 'briton' faction, which was of no real value historically for the time period, has been converted to a Free People faction. Many changes have been made to their banners, the Slave banners, battle banners, unit composition, and the regional layout. The result has been a much livelier Free Peoples 'experience' during a player's efforts to expand his/her faction's holdings.

This is accomplished by giving the briton/Free People faction various regions on the map that are strategically placed to block expansion and/or make it more difficult to just run over regions until you've built a super power for yourself.

This faction now recruits many different types of units, all controlled by an Area of Recruitment scheme that restricts them and other factions to a cultural sphere of influence. So if they own a region in the Mideast, they can only recruit eastern or greek cultural units. If the region is in Italy, they'll have Italian or Greek cultural units. If the region is in Africa, Numidan/Carthaginian units, and so on. They can even have specifically named units that would represent a specific Kingdom or Tribe, restricted by an AOR to a certain region or regions.....thereby creating dozens of little 'pseudo-factions' to fight and deal with. This is a work in progress, and hopefully will get better and better.

The key to making this work properly, without creating a monster than wipes out all the other factions on the map, is distance. This pseudo-faction has power, tons of units, a huge economic base and more regions in its control than any faction on the map. But it does not have a unified purpose because of the distance between the regions it controls. Thus, the AI's 'line of sight' is somewhat stumped by what to do with holdings that are all over and distant from each other, and it's forced to make decisions it wouldn't normally make as an RTW faction.

If all these regions were together, or even several grouped together, the AI could choose to expand into a more promising area, and focus it's military building on a particular region or faction it doesn't like. But with dozens of lonely regions that may not even 'see' each other (as far as the AI is concerned) the AI is forced to perhaps randomly or haphazardly try to expand blindly against a neighboring region in dozens of places....or try to make peace with you because it doesn't yet know what to do or where to focus. So I believe the only way to make this work well is to make sure the regions are spread out so they can't work together.

The overall result and 'feel' of this new combination 'real faction/dumb faction Free People' has been quite impressive. Slave armies build up, and more effectively guard, the territories they own. The Free People send diplomats to negotiate...make peace, demands, plead with you not to attack. They spy on you all over the map and even seemingly attack each other! So now RTW is really 'Total War'.

An added benefit to this, as I mentioned above, is to literally create dozens of little 'pseudo-kingdoms' with specific kinds of units in certain areas. You could name cities a faction name and fill it with units specific to that historical tribe or kingdom. You can have a variety of skins available in the game that probably has never been possible before....since you can give the 'britons' literally every single unit in the game if you want to....and then limit where they can build them.

The in-battle look and feel is also much different than fighting 'the rebels'. You'll find greek units, banners, and officers in Greek cultural areas. Barbarian in barbarian, etc. In fact, the more varied the banners of the culture are, and the skins, the more varied you can make this 'Free People' be. The only limitation is how many different kinds of banners you can get. Unfortunately, the 'Main' faction banner and the strat banners and symbols are limited to just the one. But with several different rebel cultural symbols being different on the strat map, the effect is still pretty good.

So Roma Surrectum will have 43 Factions, and you could play 23 of them all at once......how's that? Just kidding....but almost.

Basically, all we would need to do is limit the recruitment of the Free People faction so that they could not expand at all, having this revamped system for the rebels adds exciting game play. I did not like the fact that rebels did nothing in vanilla, with the free people faction, it makes it much more flexible.

3. Features from Diadochi Total War. I like the fact that their wooden walls allow for the placement of troops, it makes wodden walled sieges much more meaningful and interesting. Also the two-handed phalangites.. they do work, I have tested with them. No man could have held a pike with one hand. I like the way it looks and should not be too much of a hassle to implement.

4. Signifierones' Unit Animations. This makes everything look better in my mind, especially the hoplite units and legionary units.

5. Culture. From BI yes, when your a Roman or Greek dominated culture and capture a province dominated with Barbaric culture, there will be issues and possibly revolts.

6. Hording. Gauls, Parthians, Sarmatians, Germans. All get this feature as it will enhance the game play and accurately simulate historic movements.

7. Loyalty. Especially for Romans, but for all factions, if your generals have low loyalty they might revolt against you.

8. Better AI formations. Whether it be Darth's or something else, we need to enhance the AI.

9. AOR. It's a must, especially for a historical mod. It limits things, and makes things more accurate. We will need to have multiple AOR's.

10. Reforms for all factions. From 280 BC to 30 BC all factions included in our mod went through changes throughout history, we need to implement reforms for each faction, making it a challenge for the player.

Current Faction List (#19 subject to change)

1. The Roman Republic - replacing The House of Julii.
2. The Republic of Carthage
3. The Seleucid Empire
4. The Ptolemaic Empire - replacing Egypt
5. The Antigonid Kingdom - replacing Macedon
6. The Odrysian Kingdom - replacing Thrace
7. The Kingdom of Pontus
8. The Kingdom of Armenia
9. Parthia
10. The Kingdom of Epirus - replacing The House of Brutii
11. The Bosporan Kingdom - replacing The Senate
12. Numidia
13. Gauls
14. Germans
15. Britons
16. Iberians - replacing Spain
17. Sarmatians
18. Illyrians - replacing The House of Scipii
19. Greek Faction (Yet to be determined, could be Aetolian League or Sparta) - replacing The Greek Cities
20. Free People - non-playable faction, will look like rebels, but be able to attack more often, and conduct diplomacy - replaces Dacia
21. Rebels - we will try to make them more active

My synopsis of each faction:

The Roman Republic
Okay so in vanilla we had four roman factions. One being the senate, which gave the three families (Julii, Scipii, and Brutii) missions to go and add to the republic. As a player, once the Senate gave an outrageous mission i.e. "Kill Your Faction Leader" it was the signal to revolt and start the roman civil wars.
Alright, that's fun and everything but totally outrageous. I understand where CA is coming from by using the senate and civil wars, but to use four Roman factions? I don't think so. So, for HRTW we will in a sense "combine" each roman faction into one Roman Republic. One faction will be Roman, that faction being the old Julii faction. The main reason is simply their color, red. To me, when I hear Rome, I think of the color red. In my own opinion, I would love to see the senate "feature" still exist by assigning missions and promoting offices, but it simply will not work with one Roman faction due to hard coding limitations. So I have used Makanyanes "Neutralised Senate" mod to fix that. It essentially goes in and internally renames the Senate faction from "romans_senate" to "slavs". The effects of this are the deletion of the "Senate Tab" and "Senate Offices Scroll", meaning no bugs when trying to edit the Senate faction.
For the Romans there are many things we can do to enhance them, but we will stay to the basics. First, the family tree. The Maxentii, Julii, and Scipii families existed, and I want to portray that. So we make three family trees. The Maxentii being the main family, with the Julii and Scipii on the side. It is a very simple task that involves adding "sub_faction" in the character entry. The result is that you get three families, capable of marrying, having children, and adopting. However, only the faction leader's family will be present in the family tree, another thing that we cannot help.
Second, the unit roster. I will not go into full details, but simply point out some things. A "Town Watch" unit or levy troops such as Rorarii or Vigiles, more than likely did not wear a cape. The cape has been removed. Units such as pigs, and wardogs may have been used throughout the history of the Roman Republic, but how often? Often enough to recruit them everywhere you go? If not simply deleting these units, we should at least limit where they are recruited.
Praetorians and Urbans, the most powerful units in vanilla. Historically, were mere entities. Praetorians were personal bodyguards, elite marshals and officers whose duty was to protect important figures and emperors, not a fully capable cohort that fought in the front lines. Urbans were more like a veteran core of Town Watch for the city of Rome alone. They will not be a part of this mod.
Legionary Cavalry and Praetorian Cavalry also did not exist, after Marius' reforms the Romans had a cavalry unit but most of their heavy cavalry was made up of native and auxiliary troops. These units will also not be included in the mod.
Arcani, special battlefield assassin troops known for their stealth. I believe this unit belongs in a fantasy mod, even if "agents" were used by the Romans, they were surely not used in battle. Arcani will not be a part of this mod.
Artillery units such as Onagers, Scorpions and Heavy Onagers were not widely used, at least until the Empire. However, this mod focuses on the Republic instead, only Ballistas and Repeating Ballistas shall stay.
Third, Rebellions. There were many rebellions in the later period of the Republic. As it became larger and gained more territory, the more unstable it became. There were the Social Wars and the great civil wars waged between the popular generals. These can easily be simulated with some work. Since we are using BI exe the loyalty feature is available, meaning certain general's or family members can revolt becoming part of the Free People faction. Also to simulate revolts we can shadow the Gauls and others on the Romans, making it possible to revolt after the taking of certain settlements.
Fourth, traits and ancillaries. In BI certain generals had the title of the general of a legion or something to that effect, we should include something similar to that when a general has a certain command rating. I would still like to assign the traits of Consul and other offices to certain family members as well. This is something we need to look into.
Last, unique Roman AOR. We all know that most armies of the Roman Republic consisted of many allied troops and auxiliaries, we need to set up a special system for the Romans where they can have this ability.
For the faction symbol, we can simply use the one from Diadochi Total War. It is nice, and fits vanilla perfectly.

The Republic of Carthage

The Seleucid Empire

The Ptolemaic Empire

The Antigonid Kingdom

The Kingdom of Pontus

The Kingdom of Armenia

Parthia

Numidia

The Kingdom of Epirus

The Bosporan Kingdom

The Odrysian Kingdom

Gauls

Britons

Germans

Iberians

Sarmatians

Illyrians

Greek Faction

Free People

Rebels

Xpartacus
01-16-2012, 16:20
For loyalty 1 faction can shadow up to 3, so with 1 free people faction slot only 3 factions should get the loyalty feature. And to make sure the free people faction doesn't steamroll someone we should make at least 1 AoR per region.

ahowl11
01-16-2012, 17:43
Hmm good to know, we will have to choose wisely.

Yes exactly. Here is an example. Bithynians. They could recruit any of the units that they could have access to in their region, but lets say they tried to conquer Byzantium, if they succeeded we would make it so they could not recruit any unit whatsoever, or at least maybe a few militia units. That's how we restrict the free people, and thats how they will not become too powerful

Skull
01-16-2012, 20:29
" Senate has been internally renamed to "slavs" "
...

Is that a seacret "thank you" for all the slavs working on this?:)


(Na,just kidding,I know that is in the "Neutralised Senate" mod :) )

Asgaroth
01-16-2012, 21:16
I like the whole upper post we all decided on first post...Just the greek faction is left to do and we can then start.Well I will not say anything as I already pointed out why is it better to use Aetolian legue(or Achean league)instead of just Spartans...

But could somebody please explain me what means terra incognita as I didn't heared this before ?

Skull
01-16-2012, 21:57
But could somebody please explain me what means terra incognita as I didn't heared this before ?

Ummm...

It coud be a provinical camping...

Edit:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_incognita

Xpartacus
01-16-2012, 22:54
Terra Incognita is a latin word (i hope i'm not wrong about this) wich means "unknown land". In antiquity maps it used to be all lands beyond the previous knowledge of cartographers (likke when Europeans realized that the Americas weren't India the "default" name for most of the continent was "terra incognita").

In RTW mods that name is usually applied to lands where historically the "developed" nations (or the ones present in a mod) never went (the Sahara desert, as an example in MM map), thus, using that "region" for lands either unknown or historically not important you can save region slots and prevent the AI and the player from expanding all over the map (it has no actual consequences, but to me it looks really bad). Also, some mods use that land (it has to be unconquerable) to "place" scripts and stuff like that.

Asgaroth
01-16-2012, 23:27
Now I get it...Thank you guys.

hameleona
01-17-2012, 23:04
Am, ahowl, you know, that you can not have loyalty, right?
You need a faction for every rebel faction, that you want to have. And you have maxed out the faction limit.
And one faction can not be the rebel faction for more than three others. As far as i know, atleast.

Cute Wolf
01-18-2012, 08:00
" Senate has been internally renamed to "slavs" "
...

Is that a seacret "thank you" for all the slavs working on this?:)


(Na,just kidding,I know that is in the "Neutralised Senate" mod :) )

I think ahowl will rename "slavs" to "america" for this :lol:

ahowl11
01-18-2012, 16:48
Well if I'm limited to three factions essentially i have six factions, Free People and Rebels will each have 3 factions for revolts/loyalty.. I can only think of Rome right now for that...
Did any other factions have major civil wars?

And America? Na, Im good ahaha

hameleona
01-18-2012, 16:56
Every possible hellenic Kingdom? They rebeled so often that we don't know every one. And Rome had their civil wars around the end of the 1st century BC. Why bother. Before that, rome didn't really had loyalty problems - just normal rebellions. Better kill the Free People and make Celt-Iberians. You can make the GCS a shadowing faction of Macedon, Epyros and Thrace, but in the late-game there will be some strange things (it will be strange for Babylon to become "Free Greek" city.)

ahowl11
01-18-2012, 17:02
Well we will have to see, to me the free people are important, and I will get into contact with the RS team, because they found ways for the free people to emulate different cultures. yes the rebellions were later in the republic, which makes me wonder if maybe the game should be shorter? Maybe to 107 BC when Marius reformed the Army? Then we would have another mod covering the time of the late republic and the rebellions? that could be easier than what we are doing now, especially if we have a 4 turn per year script

hameleona
01-18-2012, 17:20
Don't go there, cuz you'll end up with HRTW 1248132597249587.0 - in the medieval time-frame.

I still don't really get your fanaticism on those free people. They have so much ways to screw every thing in the mod, that i don't really know when to start. An in the end (with the "great" rtw AI), they'll end up beaten anyway. Or will end up beating everyone.

Asgaroth
01-18-2012, 19:11
Maybe to 107 BC when Marius reformed the Army? Then we would have another mod covering the time of the late republic and the rebellions?

No,no and no...That is bad.The one mod idea is far better then this one.



They have so much ways to screw every thing in the mod

Then all the hard work we have done would be in vain.I do not no the "core" of the game so go,because I am not that good at scripting.In this case I would rather listen to a person who has some,hameleona,or I would go and ask the other mod leaders how did they do it and what are the effects.

However,I am rather for Celt-Iberians then free people,but do as you think it should be best.

ahowl11
01-19-2012, 15:34
I will get the information when I can, I need to know everything about them and how they were created

hameleona
01-22-2012, 21:58
I'm concerned about the battles and unit stats.
I disagree with the dude in TWC that weeps that the battles are too long. The truth is that the battles are too fast. It takes a LOT of time to kill someone with armor and shield. A LOT. So, please tell me, that you won't make them faster than vanilla.

Asgaroth
01-22-2012, 22:16
So, please tell me, that you won't make them faster than vanilla.

They will be slower.That is the point.

Ahowl11 wanted for this mod that the battles are longer.

Skull
01-23-2012, 14:48
But not too slow.:)