How to mod desc_strat ( for those who don't no )

[Ossie The Great]

From the file desc_strat you can mod start and end date of a campain, the population of a settlement, the buildings in a selltement, the denari a fraction starts of with and make all fractions playble

allways make a back up file of Desc_strat when u change it



First you have to go in desc_stat, located in c:/programfiles/activison/rometotalwar/data/world/maps/campain/imperialcampain and there is desc_start text file ( c: stand for hard drive )

now open the text file and it should look like this


Make all fractions playble

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii

end
unlockable
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities

end
nonplayable
romans_senate
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
slave
end


start_date -270 summer
end_date 14 summer

just cut and paste the factions you want into playble but do not make slave playble, the reason for this is that slaves are really buggie .

Changing the campain end and start date

you should see this

start_date -270 summer
end_date 14 summer

simply change the numbers ( note - stands for bc )

changin the population of a settlement

now scroll down till where u meet

faction romans_scipii, bureaucrat napoleon
superfaction romans_senate
denari 5000
settlement
{
level large_town
region Campania

year_founded 0
population 4800
plan_set default_set
faction_creator romans_julii
building
{
type barracks militia_barracks
}
building
{
type core_building governors_villa
}
building
{
type defenses wooden_pallisade
}
building
{
type hinterland_roads roads
}
building
{
type hinterland_farms farms+1
}
}

all u have to do is change the population to the one u want it to be ( note it make take a while to find the right region )

Adding a building


Just add the building name u want like this

building
{
type barracks milta_barracks
}
}
to the end of the list ( note if you want a imperial_palace just type imperial_palace where governors_villa is etc.... )
Changing the denari of a fraction

faction romans_scipii, bureaucrat napoleon
superfaction romans_senate
denari 5000
settlement

just find the fraction you want to change the denari with. and change the number of denari

p.s my spelling is really bad . but make saw u have the right spelling when you edit this file

[Roman_Man#3]

Good tutorial for beginners, but one thing. I would check your spelling. It is has to be spelled perfect because RTW is so sensitive.

Good job though
RM3

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

Thankyou for providing this oscarreeve! I, and many other, will find it very useful.

[Ossie The Great]

Good tutorial for beginners, but one thing. I would check your spelling. It is has to be spelled perfect because RTW is so sensitive.

Good job though
RM3

I know my spelling is really bad And I made this tutorial for beginers because so many new people are always asking how to unlock all fractions

[Caius]

Deleting the senate as giver of missions

Delete the Superfacion line

[Aemilianus the Younger]

Does anyone know the exact coordinates for the cities: Croton, Tarentum, Messana, Capua, Rome, Arretium, Ariminum?

i was editing the descr_strat by moving some of the character's starting places around and i somehow lost track of the starting coordinates.

[Roman_Man#3]

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=50921

Check there.




I am the king of the links

[Aemilianus the Younger]

Alright, if you change the starting date for the imperial campiagn, do the events and disasters move along in the same order or does the time cut some of them off?

for example: if i make my imperial campaign start in 280, will the Eruption at Etna still happen in 261 or so or will it happen in 271?

for example: if i make my imperial campaign start in 260 instead of 270, will the eruption happen in 251? or will it never happen at all?

[Roman_Man#3]

It depends. If the trigger is set by turns after the beginning of the game, it will be in 271(?). If it is set by actual year, which i think it is, it would still happen in 261(?).

[Caius]

Diseasters are not related at descr_strat.They will ocurr if the time is the correct

[Caius]

This guide should be usefull for new members, sadly there are a few points to remark and some grammar errors to correct.Not to say Oscar Reeve made everything wrong, I apreciate his effort.

Is there a way those errors are corrected?

Caius

[hangerhead]

strange thing for me is, after i made all the factions like seleucids playable, i ran the game (whether pacthed to 1.3 or 1.5, results the same) and when I click to new game, i can select each of the now unlockede factions (seleucids e.g.) BUT when I click on the next button, the game just returns to the main screen (continue campaign, new game, custom battle).
i tried by removing the unlockable section completely, putting it back in, leaving it with a blank line only and in the end, just leaving the gauls in. same thing happens though - any ideas?


; Custom campaign script generated by Romans Campaign Map Editor

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
germans
britons
greek_cities
end
unlockable
gauls
end
nonplayable
romans_senate
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
slave
end

[Ibn-Khaldun]

You should have this when you want all factions to be playable:

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
romans_senate
end
unlockable
end
nonplayable
slave
end

[Finch]

yep but there is still lots of things needs doing like the faction leaders icons and some ui cards

[hangerhead]

i had tried that also, but am wondering now if my mistake was in adding extra funds to the seleucids.

i hadn't added any new characters, but had increased the stats of the main legions and characters. i gues you'd not be wanting me to post the actual changes though...?

[Red Spot]

Go back to the original or at least a working version of the DS-file.
Than do you edits step by step, cut the seleucids from non-playable to playable and load the game, if it works go to step 2 ... if it doesnt, post the exact changes here, perhaps you could even .zip the file and attach it to your reply.

; Custom campaign script generated by Red Spot

campaign		imperial_campaign
options bi ;;(only if you have BI)
playable
	romans_julii
	romans_brutii
	romans_scipii
	seleucid
end
unlockable
	egypt
	carthage
	parthia
	gauls
	germans
	britons
	greek_cities
end
nonplayable
	romans_senate
	macedon
	pontus
	armenia
	dacia
	numidia
	scythia
	spain
	thrace
	slave
end


start_date	-600 summer
end_date		600 summer

gladiator_uprising_disabled ;;(only if you have BI)
brigand_spawn_value 96
pirate_spawn_value 32


;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
; >>>> start of landmarks section <<<<

If you no longer have the original use my DS-file above, copy and paste it over the top of your own. I already edited the Seleucid to be playable for you and placed a comment behind the BI-only options. (though for the money I would really look into getting BI and run Rome under BI, its a bit beter game if run under BI)

*disclaimer, I havent modded Rome for quite some time now, so I could very well be missing something here ....*

[hangerhead]

hi there - not had a chance to do anything - moved home (now working in spain) and my mrs is out here with me now too, so got my own total war to play :D

[HKagemusha]

okay I've been pulling out my hair for hours now trying to get some simple modding done. I'm a fresh-faced, raw recruit with no prior experience modding, but I do understand alot of the basics and have had success doing all the things above. Unfortunately, thats not what I'm looking for.

What I want to do is edit the starting units, family members, and relationships for the various factions. I see all of this listed in the descr_strat file, but editing it causes immediate crashes when I start a camp. I think its pretty obvious that descr_strat isn't the only file I need to edit to create family members/garrisons that don't already exist. I'd imagine someone somewhere has already written a tutorial on this and have been searching through sevearl different forum's archives for hours now but can't find what I want. Please, if anyone could point me in the right direction, I'd be immensly grateful

Okay so after several more hours, I've figured out how to create characters, add names, place garrisons, and even give my generals wives. However, I am still completely stumped about childrens and relationships other than wives. Any attempt to add children, or set the relationship between my faction leader and another general, has failed horribly. So my family tree only consists of the faction leader and his wife, all the rest of my characters, including my heir, despite being married, are not part of the family tree. I must be missing a file for relationships or family or something, please help!

[Makanyane]

there isn't another file dealing with the family relationships (M2 has one that sets some stuff about ages, but the relative ages are hardcoded in RTW)

Things to remember when setting up a family;
Every person is listed at least twice - if they are over 16 and male they need to have a

character Vibius Julius, named character, age 28, , x 88, y 81
army
unit roman generals guard cavalry early

type entry and that is where his age is set...
if they are under 16 or female they need a

character_record Amulius Julius, male, command 0, influence 0, management 0, subterfuge 0, age 13, alive, never_a_leader

type entry

you can then include them in the 'relative' section below.

When you set up the family you need to keep track of everyone's ages - I can't remember if it's 14 or 16, but you need a minimum age gap between the father/mother's age and the eldest child. When you list the children, you can only have four per couple and they must be listed with the eldest first, then in descending order acording to age.

If you want the family tree to link together (which is advisable - otherwise you can get 'cloned character' CTD later in game) you need to have the son from one relative line used again as the father in his own relative line.

If you use surnames you have to use the same one for every male in the linked family.


See if that helps - if not please post the section of the descr_strat file you're working on, and let us know what -show_err error message, if any, you're getting.

[HKagemusha]

ah the last thing you said finally answered it. Surname has to be the same for all characters. That's too bad, I had read you could change surnames with the hidden trait trick.

I had the rest right though, I copied and pasted the format from vanilla rome and used that as a guide, keeping the order of ages and whatnot straight. Here is a different question, I uploaded a lot of names to the 3 name files, following proper format. The first batch I added worked fine, second batch may have caused a CTD. Will it have problems if a name is repeated in the list? Also, I haven't looked into this yet but which file holds scripts for characters spawning? I need to change any names listed in those scripts as well to reflect the characters.

Thanks much though, I'll give it another shot tonight

[Makanyane]

OK, previous was the basic answer (as you sounded like you were having problems getting anything in) there are other things you can do about the surname thing....

See this research by DVK
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...92#post5165892
(I'm not sure anyone else has tried it yet, but DVK is a very good tester so that looks like promising solution if you need different surnames and don't need them appearing in same family tree - has some disadvantages as you can't actually see who's got children due to come of age or set heir in game to branch you can't view)

To use the 'hidden trait trick' on a linked family you'd still need to either not give them surnames or give them all the same one in descr_strat, but then also give them a trait with an Epithet that overwrites the surname in game - like where existing characters become '..... the Great'
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=62388
is tutorial about that ( if they get another trait with Epithet later I'm not sure which one overwrites )

[HKagemusha]

thanks, I'm a fast learner ^^ I was completely new to this when I set out, I already feel like a veteran marine now, having waded through all sorts of CTDs lol. Surprisingly, it has all come out alright so far, I've managed to work through everything through sheer persistence.

The sub_faction idea is good... of course its sorta a shame that their children wont carry on their name. The epithet idea is also good, but I'm concerned about the override. If the name gets overridden but the trait still carries on to their children, then I'll be okay with it. But if the name is overridden and the children no longer receive the family name, then that solution wont work.

*edit* oh yeah that and the hardcap on hidden traits. I might have to use all 50 or 60 of them.

As for what I'm working on? I grabbed the campaign submod for Battles of Asia and am trying to build on it, more for the experience than anything else. The camp map is decent, the units and buildings work well, its just the factions are bare to start; only a faction leader for each. If you know about samurai families then you probably know that the vast majority of their retainers carried different names, and entire generations would serve the same lord. Thus it would be nice to get these varying surnames to work ^^;

Thanks again