The March Monthly Modification Report - Saint Joseph's Day
On this day in history…….
A Mongolian victory in the Battle of Yamen in 1279 ends the Song Dynasty in China.
Welcome to the first Modification report by myself, NagatsukaShumi, the Mod Castellan at the Guild. After several months of delay I am pleased to give you the first of our monthly reports into the goings on in the world of modding Medieval II : Total War. A bonus that has come with the delay is the progression of many projects since the games release in the Fall 2006, as a result several promising projects have risen from a mere drawing board to exciting prospects. The following reports will come at different times of the month, they will not follow a strict schedule just be pleased to hear that there will be, at the very least, one every month.
For those of you interested in your project having some space in these reports, please drop me a line by sending me a private message on the Guild with, if possible, some information about your project, how far along you are and what your future goals are, anything else is a bonus. I am happy to hear from any group and I hope I do hear from some of you soon.
That’s right, the second patch for Medieval II : Total War is incoming and it opens up some interesting area’s for us modders.
Quote:
We are releasing a few more tools for modding. The big one is the cinematic editor (which is stand-alone program that runs off M2 replays) which lets you create cinematic renders from your replays. You can set camera paths and animations and render them out to .avis. Very usefull for making cutscenes, event movies or promo trailers for your mods.
We also uncommented a few utilities from our debug code which will now be available in the exe once the patch is released:
(these are all run via command lines which I'll write a few tuts for)
- Ability to build add and convert new vegetation models (.cas) and re-build the descr_vegetation.txt
- Ability to re-build descr_geography.txt (this may still cause problems because of the time stamp issue, may need some tinkering to get working)
- Ability to build collision mesh's for Siege engines from .cas files (not all the usefull at the moment, but it might be handy later on)
- Ability to build sound packs
- Caliban
This certainly makes for interesting reading, not only will it cater for those of you who are a bit more advanced in your knowledge of the files of Medieval II : Total War but for those of you who just want to have a play around the cinematic editor sounds like it will be right up the street of any budding modder or director in the making. The ability to make AVI’s from battles will undoubtedly come in handy for projects who wish to totally revamp everything from the engine to the graphics and now the introduction movie. The ability to edit existing models and mesh’s will allow battlefield visuals to be enhanced and it certainly seems that this patch will be another step forward in the modding community. Keep your eyes peeled for news of its release on the official Total War site here.
Mod Aims
Quote:
Lands to Conquer is a mod aimed at improving the gameplay and balance of Medieval II Total War. It does this through extensively rebalanced unit stats; changed unit costs; longer, slower paced campaign; more difficult to maintain larger empires; improved campaign ai thanks to the Ultimate AI mod; and various other things. It also features an easy to use installer that does everything for you.
-Lusted
For those of you unfamiliar with Lusted’s modification, Lands to Conquer is a project that aims to improve the game play from Medieval II : Total War and has made good progress since its first release and is now onto version 2.1. Its scope ranges from making changes to the AI on the battle map and campaign map to the odd graphical tweak. Lands to Conquer includes projects such as the UltimateAI mod by GrandViz, Darth Vader’s improvements to formations and battle AI and the_foz_4’s fix for a shield bug to name but a few, all of these projects help lend to a nicely polished modification by Lusted, something that has not failed to impress me considering it is still in its infancy and has so much time to be improved upon.
For those of you who are looking for something that helps improve the Medieval II : Total War experience without offering a total change to the setting, Lands to Conquer is a project you should seriously consider giving a go.
Find it here.
Mod Aims
Quote:
Timeframe
1080-1580 with 2 turns for year. The growth of the settlements is already been worked out in the settlement xml file. The movement of land military units has been halved and together with the bigger map will avoid blitzkriegs (no Guderian and Rommel in middle-age... you know ). Movement of most agents and ships have been increased. Cost and construction time of all buildings have been multiplied by 4. Starting development of cities will be historically correct (so yes Constantinople will have Saint Sofia from the start).
Regions and Map
I'm near to complete the complete rewriting of all regions. They'll be about the max of 200, historically correct for the date of campaign start (1080) and with their names in the language of the owners (possibly). The map will be a reworking of Spurius' one (big thanks to him). Rebel regions will be noticeably stronger, if the Byzs want to conquer Bulgaria back they have to sweat like Basil II did (it's hard to be the Basileus).
Factions
There will be no countries (no sense in middle age, there was no concept of country in modern sense) but instead dinasties that will battle over the map, acquiring regions and titles linked with them.
Basically if the Plantagenets will kick the Capetians' ass they will become kings of England AND France, as they became kings of Scotland, Eire and Waled in reality... you see historically correct and gameplay solid.
So no more silly Denmark become the ruler of the world, it will be the dinasty who ruled Denmark which will get the titles he will conquer grabbing regions from others. Another example, the HRE will have the Welfs and Waiblings battle over the emperor crown.
Titles
There will be kingdom titles, which could be acquired just by the faction leader, and regional titles (count, duke, sheik, etc) which will be given to generals once they'll garrison a settlement for some minimum turns. They will be transmitted to the son (maybe giving the son a trait... title_heir if the father has the ancillary title, removing the trait if the father would not have the ancillary title anymore). Have to test how could the AI behave, but I think I will sort it out.
Titles will be removed once the faction won't possess the region at the end of the turn.
All in all it will be a shitload of scripting and triggering as for every turn it will have to test the property of every region for every faction.
Victory Conditions
This is the hardest of all to work out as the AI is not very reliable about it and don't know exactly how to link the it to the titles but probably I will give as victory conditions the possess of some capital regions (which grant the royal titles). Anyway I will think about it a bit better.
AI
AI will be improved but is still in a testing phase until I could mod all the new factions into as it's extremely reactive to who the neighbours are and which victory conditions they share with us.
New Units and Buildings
Without the unpacker no work done here but units will be recruited possibily on a regional basis more than on a faction basis (so if Egypt will conquer Welsh it could recruit welsh longbows).
Generals could be recruited by all the faction who will still possess one capitol region so to avoid (hopefully) the unhistorical adoptions as there no way to mod it out completely, but you will have presented 99 years generals who'll die the year later, so it's better for your factions to have fertile sons.
I'm also curios if you can inherit other factions by one of your princesses marriage (as it did happen historically).
The most prominent buildings will be included into the hard coded limits (so if Capetians will posses Paris region they could build Notre Dame for example).
- Re Berengario I
Much like Lusted’s Lands to Conquer, Re Berengario I’s Anno Domini aims to use the Medieval timeframe and build on the engine provided by Creative Assembly. Re Berengario I has moved on from modifying the campaign map to now editing the soldiers skins for the battlefield, going as far as to updating the skins for each level of development provided by armour upgrades. The inclusion of historical events adds a nice flavour to Anno Domini which reminded me alot of Europa Universalis II, although more limited the events in Anno Dimini look to provide not only a good read but will help those will less knowledge of the timeframe learn about the vents that moulded medieval history.
Anno Domini also offers up an entertaining game, and although it is not as far on as established mods like Lands to Conquer it still has bags of potential and if it keeps going at the pace it has been it will be well worth checking out, for those of you who are interested in Anno Domini make sure you read Re Berengario I’s topic here.
Quote:
GENERAL INFORMATION
The mod is not based on any film, book or period in our history. The setting, factions and religions are entirely original. All designs, though influenced by real life equivalents are also original. The concept for this mod came to me after years of toying with a fantasy concept, originally I was planning on writing three novels, but that did not eventuate. I have developed religions, cultures and even the beginnings of two languages relating to this concept and I suddenly realised that a mod was the way to make it public.
BACKGROUND
The world of Cleru Denaurath is generally peaceful, but for the occasional raid on the Ilsamiri by their neighbours of the Northern Kingdom and the Seaborne. These raids have of late become increasingly regular and organised, a poor omen. The Ocean Tribes conduct their civilisation quietly among the Islands of the Dividing Sea and the Southern and Western Kingdoms carry out their trade and agriculture under stable rules, but they too are increasingly threatened, largely because of their close relationship with the Ilsamiri. In the far south, in the great Forest of Light, Clauthnor, the warlords stir.
On the Eastern Continent, the Mekathenain civilisation is preparing a mass exodus. They have been driven to abandon their once fertile land by the encroachment of the desert from the centre of the continent. Rain has not fallen on their farms for almost 100 years, and so they have constructed a mighty fleet of ships and assembled a vast force for the colonisation of as yet undiscovered lands.
Note: Some of the terms e,g. the Malice, are the closest possible translations from the Ilsamiren terms. For example, the people of the Northern Kingdom do not worship what the Ilsamiri call the Malice, they worship the Lechan, the True God.
- Islamir Lord
The Islamiren Wars first came to my attention when reading up on the project running for Rome : Total War and has attracted my constant viewing ever since. I am a fan of fantasy literature and this project has, in my view, plenty of potential as long as it keeps going. Islamir Lord has showcased just some of his world to the public and from what he has released he seems to be on his way to creating a in depth living breathing world which will, I’m sure, be a nice change to the many historical projects we see. What is so charming about The Islamiren Wars is its originality, it is not based upon J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-Earth or famous fantasy games such as Warhammer and Warcraft and that is refreshing in the sense that you just do not know what to expect, the story is not all there already and it adds a nice bit of mysticism to the project.
For those of you who are, like me, big fans of fantasy novels, games and other media I highly recommend that you give The Islamiren Wars a read, catch up on the going’s on in the Northern Kingdom and the other realms it chares the world with here.
In other news……
Mediæval Auctoriso is on the look out for new members of staff, if your interested in lending a hand visit the recruitment thread here.
Medieval Total Realism goes from strength to strength after releasing a faction list earlier this year, join in the ongoing discussions here.
Videogame Total War has been recently announced, for those of you who are looking for something completely novel and quirky pop down to the new forum right here on the Guild.
The New World 1500 to 1800 is also looking for new staff, if you are interested in helping out with the colonial project then make sure to look at the recruitment thread here.
