Starting a modification

Starting a modification:
Below are some steps that you might want to follow when starting a mod. Of course I am no modding god, but I've made quite few mods and have explored all areas of moddings. Over time I have developed an approach to modding to avoid wasting time and loss of info.

Step 0: Are you motivated?
Modding requires quite alot of time, and conversion projects like H:TW or N:TW takes a year for an entire team! Don't overreach yourself, find out what can be modded and wether you are capable of doing it. Starting a fantasy mod with 30 new factions, hundreds of supernatural monsters while you are still drawing stick-figures doesn't get you far. But if your idea is so great then you might still be able to form a modding team and bring your concept to life. But present it well and show that you are serious.

Step 1: Set up a design document
A design document will help you and others to get a clear view about what you are intending to do. You can make it as detailed as you want, but you might want to include:

• Time period. Do you want to cover the entire Dark Ages or do you remain in ancient times?

• Place. Does the campaign map cover all of Europe or just Minor Asia?

• Summary of conflicts. Most likely your time period covers some conflicts which are the focus of your mod. For example the Hundred Years War or the invasion of the Vikings.

This should give you a good base to build upon.

Step 2: Announce your mod
You probably can't wait to announce your mod on the boards and see what the reactions are from other patrons. And perhaps they will even help you. But remember that the first impression is the most important one. If your first post is an uninspired lazy one then there is a big chance that you have lost quite a few fans. To get the maximum potential out of it prepare your first post!

• Introduction
  The reader should know within a few sentences what your mod is about. Note that non-modders will also visit your thread so make it as appealing and inviting as possible.

• Features
  Of course you have intentions of what you want to include in your mod; x number of new factions, new units, or even a complete new campaign map. This will give the reader a quick summary wether your mod is one worth to watch.

• News
  If you are dedicated to your mod then your thread will slowly grow in size and then the danger of confusing readers comes along. To avoid redirecting your fans to page 7, post 6 include a News section in your first post. When you have made a breakthrough or when the mod is released then the readers only need to go to page 1. The mod development forum will soon be crowded with mod threads, don't give normal patrons an even harder time to find a mod.

• Make a banner.
  Not entirely necessary, but a banner will connect the reader not only via text but also visually. Plus you can also use the banner as a signature to promote your mod automatically all over the Org. If you do so take notice of the guidelines for signatures.

• Post in the Mod list thread
  To make it easier for our regular patrons to find your mod, make a post in the List of modifications thread. Make short general description, 1 to 3 sentences. Do not include features as the patrons will find that out in your mod thread.

Step 3: Develop your mod
And now it's up to you to decide how to continue. Some want to start with the tactical part so that they can quickly play a battle, others favor the strategic part so they start with working out the campaign.
If you have made a breakthrough then remember to update your news section in the first post. It will be then very easy for normal patrons who infrequently visit the Dungeon to see how you are progressing.


And that is all I have to say at this moment. R:TW has only just been released and we have yet to begin researching its modding capabilities. Let's hope that CA hold his promise about R:TW being "very moddable".

Cheers,
Duke John

Good Advice Duke.

Let us not forget that not all mods need to be big mods. A person may want to simply change a minor aspect of the game. In my case I seriously thinking of tracking down the Public order routines used in the campaign and fixing them so the player him self causes a revolt by not doing something rather than the revolt happening when a city reaches a certain size.

What ever people intend to do there are other considerations.

1) How big will your final mod be ?
2) Who will be hosting it for you and will the size of the mod cause the site to run out of bandwidth before the end of the month.
3) Are there are ways you can reduce the size of mod, eg by using Nvidas DDS tools perhaps on your TGA's etc.
4) Packaging and installation, how can you make it fool proof so even a noob can play your mod. Tracking down some of many freebee installers like the click teams install cuts down a lot of problems in this area.
5) Promoting you mod, you have to be a wiz are promoting stuff and making it sound cool without actually lying about it.

When the time comes for beta testing and feedback I have this advice for you.

1) Good testers dont grow on trees, be nice to them.
2) Take everything they say seriously no matter how outragious it sounds. I have found they are often right.
3) As you develope a list of does and dont's based on their feedback, post them as a list so your beta testers can learn them too. An informed beta tester is a better beta tester.
4) Name your generals after your beta testers, give them something to talk about and have a laugh over when the mods done :)
5) Remember beta testers have lifes too, so dont bombard them with new betas every few days, give them a chance to gather info on several bugs before releasing an update. Releasing an update to fix 1 bug at any stage of develope is often more annoying for players than not fixing a bug at all. Wait until your sure you have all the known issues fixed before releasing an update. Unless one bug is paticularly serious.

Giskard

DJ, your link 'list of mods' doesn't work.

Just an observation. Is the list being made? Will it be a post in the forum? Or is it already somewhere on the ORG but the link is just wrong?

Just expanding slightly on Step 0: there is no point starting a mod if you have no idea about modding and have no motivation to learn along the way.

Thats very negative, when I started, I knew nothing, as I'm sure you did tombom...

Hello to you all.

I'm pretty new to this site and the whole community in all, so please forgive me if this is the wrong place to post this.

I've read the introduction guide and thought about this little project I have (a parallel project I work on when I'm not modding Europa Universalis)

For about 6 years I've been creating a fantasy world of my own for roleplaying purposes. With time I've created a full 6000 year history, a mythology, a geographical world etc. I've included (stolen some would say) elements from everywhere from Tolkien to real history to Warhammer to all sorts of religions. I've included just about every stereotype of fantasy to including new stuff, like an proto-industrial revolution, etc. I want to make a full mod for RTW out of this, but I'm not in a hurry. If it takes a year or more, so be it.

What I have for a starter is plenty of maps of the world, enough to make a working map for the mod. Factions, units and so on are also done, that is, I have it on paper idea-wise. I figure that if I do the map first, make the factions work and so on, that would be a good start. I don't know how to do units, but from what I've seen so far, there are plenty of units in the communities to "steal". ~;)

So, if I leave the unit graphics alone for the moment, and concentrate on building the world itself, what elements should I be aware of? The map itself I know I can do. Question is, once I finish the map, what then?

Well I guess the obvious thing would be factions then units. At the end of the day, you want a mod with good gameplay. My personal oppinion is get a 'skeleton' of the mod working. Basically a map and factions, and some units. They don't have to be balanced. Then once you've done that, you can play around to your hearts content with stats and stuff to make the game fun.

PS, not really the right place, but I suppose if you can't make your own thread...

Hmmm. The advice in this topic is great. I probably should have read it before posting my mod. I guess that's what the edit button is for though.

Very good advice indeed. However, if I knew this two years ago I never would have started Fourth Age: Total War. :laugh4: I got lucky and found the right people to run the project...