*Beta 2 Released* MIITW: Pro Deo Et Rege

[socal_infidel]

MEDIEVAL II TOTAL WAR:
PRO DEO ET REGE
“For God and King”
*v0.4 Beta*
Compatible with Official Patch 1.2

To install this mod, simply follow the steps outlined in the Installer Program, which by default installs Pro Deo et Rege to the following folder:

C:\Program Files\SEGA\Medieval II Total War

You must have the Official Update 2 patch for Medieval II Total War in order to install Pro Deo et Rege v0.4 Beta.

Once installed you should use use the PDER_v.0.4_Beta.bat file found in your SEGA\Medieval II Total War folder to run the game.

If you have a previous version of Pro Deo et Rege already installed, it is recommended that you uninstall that version and do a fresh installation of this
latest version.

Overview: This mod will be aimed at improved historical accuracy and realism. At two turns per year, this mod hopes to provide for a slower and more challenging campaign. Forging and maintaining an empire will not be an easy task as the player will face many obstacles in his quest for medieval dominance. From noble rebellions to increased upkeep costs for standing armies to a regional area of recruitment system that limits and restricts the amount and types of troops available to a faction in newly conquered foreign province, establishing a medieval empire will be a challenge.

Note: This is the initial beta version of this planned mod so if you have any comments or suggestions, please feel free to post them. The mod is fully playable but does need some balancing tweaks, as well as minor graphical clean-up, in addition to additional planned changes (e.g. retextures). Any feedback would be appreciated.

Main Features:

I. Regional Area of Recruitment System:
Upon conquering a foreign province, a faction will find itself as strangers in a strange land. Looked upon with suspicion and faced with hostility, much work will need to be done to bring a new province into the fold. To this end, this mod implements a fully-realized Regional Area of Recruitment System that limits and restricts the amount and types of troops available to a faction in a newly conquered foreign province.

Step 1: Auxiliary Hall

Unless the newly conquered region is closely-aligned in culture (e.g. Spain and Portugal), a faction will find the existing military structures in this region useless and unable to provide for the recruitment of troops. The first step in the system that will allow for the eventual limited recruitment of a faction’s own roster of troops is an Auxiliary Hall. This building serves as a governour's residence, town hall and public meeting place. Consider it a place to show the locals that life under a new regime won't be so bad...or at least no worse than life under the old one…

This building does not allow for the recruitment of any troops but does provide a boost in public happiness and public order.

Step 2: Auxiliary Levy Barracks
After the locals have grown accustomed to life under a new regime, a faction may build an Auxiliary Levy Barracks that allows for the recruitment of regional levy infantry units. Provinces can now be entrusted with their own local levies as garrisons. A faction’s main troops can be moved back to the front-lines from the rather mundane task of garrison-duty.

Alternatively, in a castle settlement a faction may begin building Auxiliary Bowyers (which allow for the recruitment of regional archers and missile units) or Auxiliary Stables (which allow for the recruitment of regional cavalry units), if they prefers arrows and ponies over swords and shields!

Images:

English Levy Barracks
Andalusian Levy Javelinmen
Byzantine Slav Levies

Step 3: Regular Line of Military Buildings and Limited Recruitment of Faction’s Own Roster

As more and more of a faction’s population move into these new regions, a faction becomes capable of constructing its regular line of military building complexes that will allow for the limited recruitment of a faction’s own roster of units.

Regional Recruitment System: Not only will a faction face the challenge of defending a far-flung province with only regional levy troops initially, but certain units from a faction’s regular roster will only be available to recruit in specific provinces.

For example, should the Almoravids gain a foothold in France they cannot expect to recruit Tuareg Camel Spearmens there even after bringing their French region firmly under their control.

II. Revised Faction Names & Starting Positions & Armies
Factions Names: Revised all faction names for more historical feel:

Kingdom of England
Royaume de France
Heiliges Römisches Reich
Reino de Castilla
Serenissima Repubblica di Venezia
Regno di Sicilia
Repubblica di Genova [replaces Milan]
Rìoghachd na h-Alba
Kievan Rus'
Basileia ton Rhomaiôn
al-Murabitun Imarat
al-Fatimiyyun Khilafah
Selçuk Saltanat
Condado Portucalense
Kongeriget Danmark
Królestwo Polski
Magyar Királyság

Republic of Genoa: Thanks to Sicilian Vespers’ allowance of the use of his Coat of Arms and Banners, Milan has been changed to Genoa.

Repubblica di Genova: This fledgling maritime republic, in alliance with Pisa, has recently ended a campaign against Saracen corsairs in Italian waters. This campaign eventually saw the Saracens driven from their settlements on the islands of Corsica and Sardinia. However, control of these prized island possessions is still very much in dispute, as Pisa hotly contests Genova's claim to these islands. It looks increasingly likely that this situation will break out in armed conflict between these two Italian city-states.

Should conflict come, Genova is well prepared for it. Boasting a port second only to Venice in all of Italy, Genova has established itself as the one of the world's leading naval powers. Despite its supremacy at sea and despite boasting fine militia in the time-honored Italian tradition, Genova cannot hope to compete with the larger medieval powers on land...yet. A likely first step will be to move quickly into Corsica and Sardinia to consolidate its status as the coastal gateway to the Mediterranean...and beyond.

Revised Starting Positions & Armies: All factions starting positions have been revised to reflect the regions they historically held at the time. In addition, all faction’s initial armies have been revised.

III. Historical Personages, Generals & More Realistic Aging:
Most faction’s leaders and family trees have been revised for a more correct depiction of the movers and shakers on the medieval scene at the time.

Robert Guiscard and Bohemond preparing to lay siege to Dyrrachium!

The de Hautevilles are at it again! These Slav Levies in the service of those Italian Norman free-booters prepare to enter battle against a coalition Papal Army led by Swabian Swordsmen!

Revised Titles for Faction Leaders and Heirs: thanks to deRougemont and finney13’s work in the Character Names Project, all faction leader and heir titles have been revised! Why does my Spanish king always change his name to “Rey” upon ascension to the throne?

All settlements now start out with named characters or family members governing them. However, don’t expect to blitz rebels early with your uber-generals of Vanilla! General’s bodyguard units have been decreased in size to 15 (on huge settings). Effective and loyal fighting machines? Yes. Uber-panzers able to single-handedly take out a unit of spear militia? Not likely!

Characters Live Longer! In addition, thanks to ZaPPPa’s work on character aging, characters now live longer than ever! Coupled with a lowering of the age of manhood to 14-years of age, expect to better maintain your royal bloodlines!

This Venetian Doge is 86-years young and as wrathful as ever! Will he live long enough to see Venice topple Constantinople?

Roi Reinald of France is a youthful 70-years of age! An heirless widower, however, his royal line dies with him...

IV. Stronger Rebels! Blitzing Won't Be Easy!
Rebels recruit and retrain troops and construct buildings!

Old Ziggy here is doing his best to make sure taking Vilnius isn't easy!

V. All New Units!

Varjazi Axemen: comprised of Scandinavian adventurers, these fearsome warriors serve as the personal troops of the wealthiest Kievan noblemen.

Dismounted Mailed Knights: well trained, clad in mail armour, and armed with sword, these troops fight as well as their mounted counterparts.

Feudal Sergeants: these veteran warriors wear heavy mail armour, are armed with a spear and can be counted on to hold a line in battle.

Armenian Foot Knights: these noble knights fights in the style of dismounted Western Knights and are willing to serve fellow Christians in their campaigns against the Moslems.

Cuman Foot Archers: these Turkish warriors found in regions north of the Black Sea are accustomed to life in the saddle, but will dismount and fight on foot when the need arises.

VI. More Challenging Holy Land!
Crusades: Taking the Holy Land was the easy part! Thanks to the new Regional AoR System and increased religious unrest, holding on to it is now even harder than ever! But there’s hope! If a faction is able to survive the first few years here, the odds are a Hospitaller or Templar Order will ask to establish a Chapter House. Also, you can count on a limited number of Outremer Knights and Sergeants to help defend your possessions in the Holy land, as well.

Images:

Knights of the Outremer
Foot Knights and Sergeants of the Outremer

Holy Orders:
Dismounted Order Knights: included Dismounted Order Knights for all 4 Orders thanks to zhumin1978’s fantastic mod!

Brother Sergeants: Brother-Sergeants are the lesser infantry that fight in support of their Orders. They comprise squires, rich commoners, or lesser nobility that have given up all their earthly possessions in the name of their Order. Protected by mail armour and wielding maces, these soldiers serve their Orders faithfully, but cannot be counted on in protracted melee.

Images:

Hospitaller Brother-Sergeants
Santiago Brother-Sergeants

These Templar Foot Knights and Brother-Sergeants with the support of Armenian Foot Knights and Turcopoles prepare to face a full onslaught of Turkish Horse Archers led by the personal bodyguard of the Turkish Amirs, the Askaris!

VII. Revised Buildings and Construction Times
City Stables and Merchant Cavalry Stables: All factions are now able to recruit their light cavalry units from city settlements. In addition, recruitment of cavalry militia has been moved to the new Merchant Cavalry Militia building.

City Stables are also included in the Regional AoR System and allow a faction to recruit
regional light cavalry units in their new foreign lands.

Town Stables

Revised Build-Times, Bonuses and Guilds
• Increased trade bonuses for market, port and wharf line of buildings leads to greater emphasis on trade buildings leads to greater emphasis on trade.
• Revised build bonuses for an Explorer’s Guild. Now it may actually be worth acquiring.
• Revised triggers for Thieves Guild, now expect to see a wider-variety of guilds in a newly conquered region
• Increased building costs and construction time balanced to the 6 months per turn time-scale.
• Generals are now recruitable from city/castle walls.
• Revised number of recruitment slots for city and castles.
• Castles given free upkeep slots

VIII. Trade Capitals, Centers and Hubs:

Not all medieval cities were equal! Due to location and resources, some cities naturally had more of an economic advantage than others. To this end, there are four levels of trade spots:

1) Commercial Capitals: these are the jewels of the medieval world! London, Venice, Constantinople…all cities that became major economic powerhouses. Should you be fortunate enough to hold one, expect greatly increased trade and wealth! Should you not, well then…get campaigning!

2) Trade Centers: these cities serve as the trade centers of a particular region and offer increased trade bonuses as well.

3) Trade Hubs: these cities serve as waypoints and stops on the main trade routes of the time and receive a slight increase in trade.

4) Minor Cities: a city that can be developed economically if the effort is put in, but one that does not boast the advantages that others naturally possess.

IX. Increased Campaigning and Army Upkeep Costs:
Don’t expect to maintain stack after stack of large standing armies. Expanding your fledgling empire won’t be easy and it will cost you. Recruitment and upkeep costs for all units have been increased by 50%. Expecting to undertake a long campaign using primarily militia units? Expect it to really cost you. Militia upkeep costs have been increased even more to reflect the blow to a medieval empire’s economy campaigning for an extended length of time with an army comprised of commoners would be.

To counteract this, however, more free upkeep slots have been added to cities. So as long as you keep your militia units garrisoned in their home settlements, you should be fine. Also you should take advantage of your noble knights and their armed retinues (sergeant spearmen, armoured sergeants and feudal sergeants)! Not only do they have free upkeep while stationed inside castles, they have lower upkeep costs in relation to mere commoners.

X: Battle Mechanics and Unit Balancing

Greatly improved and enhanced battle mechanics and unit balancing thanks to the hard work done by Lusted and Palamedes.

XI. The Long Road’s Developer Tornnight’s Era System

Thanks to The Long Road’s developer extraordinaire, tornnight, this mod makes use of his era-based building and unit recruitment system! Don’t expect to field an army of Chivalric Knights in 1150 A.D. anymore!

XII. Bloods…Broads…and Bastards! v.2.00

Need I say more? The mini-mod that leads to major depth and medieval atmosphere!

And Much More! And More to Come!

Credits:

Lusted and Palamedes - for their great work on unit balancing and battle mechanics.
Tornnight – for permitting me to implement his Era-Based recruitment and construction system.
dearmad and Pnutmaster – for allowing me to use Blood, Broads and Bastards v2.00.
SicilianVespers – for being so kind as to let me use his lovely Genoese Coat of Arms and Banners.
burrek – for use of some textures and units from Knights and Knaves 0.95
WhiteWolf - for his remarkable new Byzantine textures
DisgruntledGoat - for use of his amazing new Byzantine textures
joedreck - for allowing me to use his Kings Banners
Salty - for his great Italian faction shields
matko - from the Magyar Mod Team for use of his Hungarian Banners
deRougemont and finneys13 – for their hard work on shepherding the Character Names Project
zhumin1978 – for his fantastic Dismounted Orders Mod
Ralendil - for his wonderful Order mounts and banners
selenius4tsd - for use of his Highways Mod
zaPPPa – for his invaluable findings on variable & realistic aging and death

MORE CHANGES PLANNED! COMING SOON!

[socal_infidel]

UPDATE!

NEW PROPOSED AoR UNITS WORKS IN PROGRESS!

'ello all! So I've finally plunged myself headfirst into the world of unit model editing. Last night and this morning were my first attempts at it, so go easy on me.

Basically, as I've mentioned in the past, I'd like to diversify the Regional Area of Recruitment System Unit Rosters (and maybe sprinkle a few units into the regular faction rosters where needed). So here are three units, I've come up with so far.

PROPOSED CUMAN UNITS: AOR_CUMANS REGION

Cuman Foot Archers: The Cumans are a nomadic Turkish people occupying the area north of the Black sea, who have made a name for themselves as brave warriors. Accustomed to a life in the saddle, they will dismount when needed and fight on foot. Equipped with powerful composite bows, they prefer to leave heavy hand-to-hand combat to others.
Images:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Cuman Spearmen: Not all Cumans can afford a horse! Representing the poorest members of the tribe, these men must fight on foot as light infantry. Armed with little more than a spear and a small shield, these warriors make up for their lack of equipment with bravery and enthusiasm. However, they cannot be counted on to hold a line.

Images:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

LEVY SERGEANT: AOR_FRANCE, AOR_GERMANY, AOR_ITALY, AOR_ENGLAND, AOR_SCANDINAVIA, AOR_NETHERLANDS

Levy Sergeants: Comprised of freemen who cannot yet afford a mount, these men fulfill their compulsory civic duty on foot. Better trained, disciplined and equipped than levy spearmen, these local troops are armed with spears and protected by light armour and a large shield. Useful in support roles for heavier and better units, these men should not be counted on in extended combat.
Images:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

If you have any suggestions and/or feedback, feel free to post them here! I'd appreciate any/all comments!

Also, if you'd like to help out with any reskinning, please let me know! I could use any help I can get! Thanks!

Cheers!

[Rhyfelwyr]

Looks like a great mod with plenty of all-round improvements. Can't believe this hasn't got more comments. Still, keep up the great work.

[Frederick_I_Barbarossa]

This looks AWESOME...is there a screenie or a map somewhere showing what you've revised the starting positions to?

[Frederick_I_Barbarossa]

OK so I downloaded this, and I have a few comments:
+AWESOME map...love the layout of the provinces
+the new ancillaries are awesome
+GREAT skins
+love the native names for the factions

-IMHO building costs are too high...I spend most of the game hitting "next turn" trying to build up the florins to, well, build (this is the only major flaw that I feel warrants complaint)

Overall: AWESOME work...I love it...this has the potential to be to M2TW was RTR was to RTW!

[LorDBulA]

Coupled with a lowering of the age of manhood to 14-years of age,

Could You share how You mod this?

[socal_infidel]

OK so I downloaded this, and I have a few comments:
+AWESOME map...love the layout of the provinces
+the new ancillaries are awesome
+GREAT skins
+love the native names for the factions

-IMHO building costs are too high...I spend most of the game hitting "next turn" trying to build up the florins to, well, build (this is the only major flaw that I feel warrants complaint)

Overall: AWESOME work...I love it...this has the potential to be to M2TW was RTR was to RTW!

Thanks for the comments. Appreciate them.

I'm definitely focusing on balancing/tweaking the economy because I want the game to be a challenge. But I don't want it to be tedious or boring while you build it up.

What I'm trying to avoid is a player being able to field large standing armies and in the rare event a player does lose to the AI, it's not as simple as sending your next full stack over to wipe out the remaining AI rabble. It should hurt. Same with the added upkeep costs. Should a player decide to campaign with militia expect a hit to the economy as these are, after all, your able-bodied taxpayers and commoners who are now off campaigning in the field.

What I can say is that early game a player should definitely focus on the trade and roads and farms.

Trade Buildings - an even greater emphasis has been placed on trade. So a player is getting even larger bonuses from building these buildings.

Roads - also increases trade and paved roads increase population, as well as people are now able to safely travel to developing cities

Farms - these give additional population bonuses in addition to their usual bonuses, so more taxpayers are able to be supported.

Thanks for the kind words. Sincerely appreciate them.

Expect an update soon! With some minor tweaks/bug fixes. Hopefully for the next release, I'll be able to add some of the new AoR units I'm working on.

Cheers!

[socal_infidel]

Could You share how You mod this?

Assuming you've unpacked the game, find this file - descr_campaign_db.xml.

Open it and find this section:

<family_tree>
      <max_age uint="100"/>
      <max_age_for_marriage_for_male uint="75"/>
      <max_age_for_marriage_for_female uint="40"/>
      <max_age_before_death uint="101"/>
      <max_age_of_child uint="10"/>
      <old_age uint="60"/>
      <age_of_manhood uint="14"/>      
      <daughters_age_of_consent uint="16"/>
      <daughters_retirement_age uint="40"/>
      <age_difference_min int="-10"/>
      <age_difference_max int="30"/>
      <parent_to_child_min_age_diff uint="12"/>
      <min_adoption_age uint="14"/>
      <max_adoption_age uint="30"/>
      <max_age_for_conception uint="50"/>
      <age_of_manhood_close uint="14"/>     
      <max_number_of_children uint="4"/>
   </family_tree>

The lines in bold are the ones I've changed.

Also if you're going to do this yourself, be advised that there are two or so children in the descr_strat file that are 14 and that will now need to be changed to named characters in that file.

I want to say the Moorish leader's youngest son and one other one...

Cheers!

[Frederick_I_Barbarossa]

Having played a couple of more factions this morning, I would like to expound on my previous post:

+The more I play this map, the more I love it
+The more I see what goes on with my characters, the more I love it

- The economy is completely screwed. No matter what I try, I can't get enough economic buildings put up before I run out of cash. I end up basically broke and being invaded by huge stacks of Lesser Faction troops , which I cannot counter because I cannot build or train anything . This is the only weakness I can find in the whole set up.

I hate to end on a negative note like that, so I'll repeat: This is an amazing job. I would seriously put this on the same level as RTR if it weren't for the nasty economic issues. I'm quite impressed with every other aspect of the game, and can't wait to see what the finished product looks like! On behalf of the M2TW community at large, I thank you !

[LorDBulA]

Assuming you've unpacked the game, find this file - descr_campaign_db.xml.

Thanks man.

Quite interesting mod You have there.
Vanilla M2TW was unbearable, hopefully I will be able to play more with this mod to learn about M2TW new features.

[socal_infidel]

Having played a couple of more factions this morning, I would like to expound on my previous post:

+The more I play this map, the more I love it
+The more I see what goes on with my characters, the more I love it

- The economy is completely screwed. No matter what I try, I can't get enough economic buildings put up before I run out of cash. I end up basically broke and being invaded by huge stacks of Lesser Faction troops , which I cannot counter because I cannot build or train anything . This is the only weakness I can find in the whole set up.

I hate to end on a negative note like that, so I'll repeat: This is an amazing job. I would seriously put this on the same level as RTR if it weren't for the nasty economic issues. I'm quite impressed with every other aspect of the game, and can't wait to see what the finished product looks like! On behalf of the M2TW community at large, I thank you !

Thanks a bunch for the feedback. Not offended at all. In fact, I'm glad for the constructive feedback. As I don't get much time to actually play extended campaigns with each faction and have to rely on auto-run campaigns for the most part, any feedback is put to good use!

So thanks. I'll definitely look into balancing the economy for my next update. Hopefully, you'll give it another shot, mate!

Cheers!

[socal_infidel]

UPDATE!

NEW UNITS: ARAB SWORDSMEN [EGYPT & MOORS]

ARAB SWORDSMEN: Recruited from the many Arabs settled across North Africa and the Middle East, these men are fierce warriors sworn to uphold the tenets of Islam. Wielding razor-sharp scimitars, these men make a formidable foe on the battlefield.

IMAGES:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

ADDITIONAL UPDATES COMING SOON!

Cheers!

[socal_infidel]

UPDATE! v0.2A RELEASED!

Just a slight update here. Due to problems Oldgamer was having with his installation, I took the liberty to release a new full installer version of Pro Deo et Rege. Please note, this version is essentially the same as PDER v0.2 but includes several bug fixes and other tweaks.

Download the full self-installer PDER v0.2A here!

Full Installation Instructions:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

To install this mod, simply follow the steps outlined in the Installer Program, which by default installs Pro Deo et Rege to the following folder:

C:\Program Files\SEGA\Medieval II Total War

You must have the Official Update 2 patch for Medieval II Total War in order to install Pro Deo et Rege v0.2A Beta.

Once installed you should use use the PDER_v.0.2A_Beta.bat file found in your SEGA\Medieval II Total War folder to run the game.

If you have a previous version of Pro Deo et Rege already installed, it is recommended that you uninstall that version and do a fresh installation of this latest version.

IMPORTANT!

If you have been experiencing no problems with the text displaying incorrectly or otherwise wonky and simply want the latest bug fixes/tweaks and balancing, then you can also dowload stand-alone versions of the updated files.

Download these v0.2A Update Files Only Here!

Updated Files Installation Instructions:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

To update your version of PDER to v0.2A, simply extract the .rar file to
C:\Program Files\SEGA\Medieval II Total War\PDER_v.0.2_Beta (or to whatever directory your game is installed)

The files in this update maintain the following folder structure:

data\descr_names.txt
data\descr_rebel_factions.txt
data\settlement_mechanics.xml
data\export_descr_buildings.txt
data\descr_unit.txt
data\text\export_vnvs.txt
data\text\names.txt
data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\campaig n_script.txt
data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\descr_s trat.txt
data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\win_con ditions.txt
data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\map_*fa ction*.tgas\

Changelog v0.2A:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

---------------------
v0.2A BETA[06.27.2007]
---------------------

Bug Fixes
---------

-Corrected event counter recruitment requirements for Levy Swordsmen
 [export_descr_building.txt]
-Slightly revised starting armies for all factions. Settlements should
 now be garrisoned with militia units that correspond to the level
 of barracks in each settlement [descr_strat.txt]
-Minor graphical enhancements [splash screen, map_faction.tgas]
-Slightly toned down economic assistance rebels receive [campaign_script.
 txt]
-Slightly increased income from farms, taxes and trade [descr_settlement_
 mechanics.xml]
-Added Swabian Swordsmen to HRE recruitment pool [export_descr_
 buildings.txt]
-Fixed Denmark's inability to recruit Scandinavian AoR units from
 Levy Barracks [export_descr_buildings.txt]
-Increased the number of settlements needed for victory to 60 [descr_win_
 conditions.txt]
-Cleaned up Moors names list and removed "bad names" [descr_names.txt
 descr_strat.txt, names.txt]
-Removed Mounted Sergeants from Italian rebel city-state factions
 beginning armies. Replaced with Levy Light Cavalry. [descr_strat.txt]
-Corrected auxiliary bowyer construction requirements. Now able to 
 build after construction of an Auxiliary Hall NOT Auxiliary Levy 
 Barracks
-Removed "Milanese" references from export_vnvs.txt - replaced with 
 "Genovese"
-Corrected Merchant Bank construction requirements - now requires Great
 Market

Rebels
------

-Lowered the rebel and brigand spawn rates.[descr_strat.txt]
-Removed late-era units from rebel spawn pools.[descr_rebel_factions.txt]

PRO DEO ET REGE v0.3 BETA COMING SOON!
ADDITIONAL PREVIEWS TO COME!

[socal_infidel]

UPDATE!
NEW UNITS

NEW KIEVAN UNITS: REVISED VARJAZI AXEMEN & DRUZHINA SWORDSMEN

VARJAZI AXEMEN: Comprised of of Scandinavian adventurers, these fearsome warriors serve as the personal troops of the wealthiest Kievan noblemen. Protected by light mail armour and wielding a huge two-handed axe, with which he is all too eager to take off a few heads, the mere sight of this warrior incites terror on the battlefield.

Images:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

DRUZHINA SWORDSMEN:

Images:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

PRO DEO ET REGE v0.3 BETA COMING SOON!

[Wakizashi]

I had lost faith in MIITW before you released this mod, this is really fantastic work and makes me like the game a whole lot more. Can't wait for more updates.

[Frederick_I_Barbarossa]

socal: your PM box is apparently full, as it will not let me send you one!

[socal_infidel]

I had lost faith in MIITW before you released this mod, this is really fantastic work and makes me like the game a whole lot more. Can't wait for more updates.

Thanks for the kind words! Really appreciate them!

@Frederick_I_Barbarossa
Didn't realize the inbox limit was so small! Try now!

[Ninefingers]

Hi there. Just finished a 4 or 5 hour romp of your mod, and first of all let me say that it has enormous potential. Like someone said, with some balancing and polish, this could be the R:TR of M:TW2.

Let me also begin by saying that I am personally not a big fan of 2 turns / year mods as the game progresses too slowly for my liking. Adjusting build times in particular seems counter-productive to the aimed realism (at least I assume that's the purpose, since characters age at the same rate and nobody needs that many turns to complete any objective). It seems curious to me that building a simple stables takes 3 or 4 years, for example.

Pros, Cons and In-Betweens

+ Great campaign map. Lots of new provinces in sensible locations, including many historical ones that I'm sure many folks missed.
+ Great selection of mods. If I had to pick and choose mods to add to vanilla M:TW2, then the ones included here would probably be it.
+ Great new units, banners, etc.
+ AOR system

- Build times, build times, build times. I can live with stables taking 3 or 4 years to produce, but why do I have to wait 5 years between recruiting basic militia units? Basic troop types should have their availability rates seriously looked at, as currently the AI factions are skipping infantry barracks in favor of spamming auxiliary cavalry buildings, which for some reason seem to refresh faster. Venice has three stacks running around Italy with over 15 cavalry units in each of them in my current game.
- Diplomacy's too simple. Everyone I allied to, I had outstanding relations with in record time. I didn't even do anything other than extort money out of them for the alliance.
- Some of the mods are redundant with 1.2 - for instance the princess traits from BBB really shouldn't have to be there as princesses are fine in vanilla now.
- The economy needs a lot of work. I have 5 or 6 skill merchants pulling nearly 2k a piece in the Levant, which seems like way too much. My economy is completely dependent on them. Building costs are too high - I understand they're high to match the build times, but the economy seems slowed down anyway. I don't understand why it's necessary to place this many financial challenges in the player's way, when most people just find juggling coins tedious.

+/- Original settlement and faction names. On the one hand it's more immersive, on the other hand I have to double-check the factions list just to know who the hell my events list is talking about. And I speak five languages fluently, so it's not because I'm linguistically challenged. I can appreciate the historical accuracy, but I also like being able to pronounce the names of my settlements...not that I speak out loud during my campaigns, mind you!

Notes:

The "Hates Muslims" trait offers +1 command against muslims, but the trait description talks about how much the general hates slaves and rebels.

The Genoese family still has "of Milanese Blood" traits and their descriptions still talk about Milan.

Tunis shows up as "Tnis" in event notes (such as when a Crusade is called on it) and presumably in the actual settlement sheet as well since the u on the campaign map uses an unknown character. I'd assume this is true of many other factions as well.

Playing as the English, my Prince in Nottingam was constantly shown as greyed out in the retraining list. I'm not sure why he was in the retraining list, but even more annoying was that I couldn't retrain him! Gnah!

Questions:

I took Jerusalem in a Crusade and was quickly offered the Knights Templar chapterhouse there, which was shortly upgraded all the way to an HQ. My governor received the Grandmaster ancillary fine but I cannot build any Templar units. Is this intended, do I have to reach a certain date or another precondition? The building browser offered no help, and aside from the public health bonuses conferred by the Hospitaller chapterhouses, showed no units under the guild houses.

The swordsmith guilds show the bonus as increasing from +1 to +2 and up to +3 at the HQ level. Has any progress been made on determining whether or not the original +1 conferred actually increases the attack value by +6 as I believe Lusted suggested? If so, then +3 would be one heck of an increase....

Well, I guess that's it for now. I'm only up to year 1117 so far, and hold rather few provinces as Genoa (Genova, Pisa, Ajaccio, Cagliari, Jerusalem, Acre and Tunis) and seem to be significantly weaker than the AI factions, who are running around with many many full stacks. I'll keep playing this campaign in the hopes of seeing how the mod ends up in the high / late periods. Fortunately I have tomorrow and Tuesday off, whoohoo!

Great work so far, and I hope you keep working on this potential-laden mod

[socal_infidel]

Build times, build times, build times. I can live with stables taking 3 or 4 years to produce, but why do I have to wait 5 years between recruiting basic militia units? Basic troop types should have their availability rates seriously looked at, as currently the AI factions are skipping infantry barracks in favor of spamming auxiliary cavalry buildings, which for some reason seem to refresh faster. Venice has three stacks running around Italy with over 15 cavalry units in each of them in my current game.

Agree unit recruitment times need to be revised. Hopefully, I'll get to it for the next version. If not, I'll at least seriously decrease the replenishment rates for the Levy Light Cavalry and city cavalry units as you're right, the AI seems to favor them.

At the same time, I limited replenishment rates for basic militia units as I don't want to see stacks of Town Militia units running around either! There's a balance in between and in-depth posts like yours will hopefully help me find it.

Diplomacy's too simple. Everyone I allied to, I had outstanding relations with in record time. I didn't even do anything other than extort money out of them for the alliance.

Diplomacy right now is strictly vanilla 1.2. Haven't changed anything yet. For the next version, I am considering adding GrandViZ' Ultimate AI as an optional add-on. Maybe this will help.

Some of the mods are redundant with 1.2 - for instance the princess traits from BBB really shouldn't have to be there as princesses are fine in vanilla now.

Dunno, I feel like all of BBB adds to the immersive experience I'm shooting for. And it is helpful to know when a princess comes of age as you can send diplomats to arrange marriage alliances.

The economy needs a lot of work. I have 5 or 6 skill merchants pulling nearly 2k a piece in the Levant, which seems like way too much. My economy is completely dependent on them. Building costs are too high - I understand they're high to match the build times, but the economy seems slowed down anyway. I don't understand why it's necessary to place this many financial challenges in the player's way, when most people just find juggling coins tedious.

I guess what I'm trying to do with the increased build-times and the AoR system is to create a more challenging game for the human player. As it is, an experience player will rarely lose a battle to the AI all things being pretty much equal. And it is far to easy to simply blitz the AI right off the bat. It shouldn't be an easy task to establish and maintain an empire IMO.

But that said, it shouldn't be impossible either (even for a smaller faction like Genoa). Just need to find the right economic balance. Which I admit does need work.

+/- Original settlement and faction names. On the one hand it's more immersive, on the other hand I have to double-check the factions list just to know who the hell my events list is talking about. And I speak five languages fluently, so it's not because I'm linguistically challenged. I can appreciate the historical accuracy, but I also like being able to pronounce the names of my settlements...not that I speak out loud during my campaigns, mind you! .

I hear ya...but at the same time I bet a lot of people who played Rome weren't really all that familiar with the cities of the Roman world. If you keep playing you'll get used to them. Plus, it helps with the immersion like you mentioned.

+/The "Hates Muslims" trait offers +1 command against muslims, but the trait description talks about how much the general hates slaves and rebels.

The Genoese family still has "of Milanese Blood" traits and their descriptions still talk about Milan.

Just fixed the first one. The second one has been fixed with version 0.2A Beta.

Tunis shows up as "Tnis" in event notes (such as when a Crusade is called on it) and presumably in the actual settlement sheet as well since the u on the campaign map uses an unknown character. I'd assume this is true of many other factions as well.

Just fixed this one.

I took Jerusalem in a Crusade and was quickly offered the Knights Templar chapterhouse there, which was shortly upgraded all the way to an HQ. My governor received the Grandmaster ancillary fine but I cannot build any Templar units. Is this intended, do I have to reach a certain date or another precondition? The building browser offered no help, and aside from the public health bonuses conferred by the Hospitaller chapterhouses, showed no units under the guild houses.

This has been pointed out over at TWC. Yeah, it's rather silly to be offered a guild and not be able to recruit any units. Because right now, the Templars and Brother-Sergeants are available to recruit upon the Heavy Mail Armour event around 1140. I'll look into it.

The swordsmith guilds show the bonus as increasing from +1 to +2 and up to +3 at the HQ level. Has any progress been made on determining whether or not the original +1 conferred actually increases the attack value by +6 as I believe Lusted suggested? If so, then +3 would be one heck of an increase....

Good question...I'll look into it.

Thanks again for your detailed feedback. Really appreciate it. It's comments like these that will really help me out. So I appreciate your taking the time to make them. Can only help me make my mod even better!

Cheers!

[Ninefingers]

Well, it's back to work tomorrow so here's some more thoughts - I upgraded to 0.2A for these comments, sorry about missing that earlier. Before I begin, I have to say again: great job. I'm really warming up to the slower pace of the campaign and even the build times are growing on me (though not the recruitement times, as mentioned earlier).

- Many of the de Hauteville family do not receive the "of Sicilian blood" trait when born. I only noticed this because those buggers breed like rabbits, not sure if it happens with other houses as well.

- Oporto, the Portugese starting city, has two grain exchanges. Only one of these can be upgraded, the other's upgrade (market) is grayed out.

- The large rebel stack near Oporto, led by Sebastian Villalobos I think, tends to kill the faction off quite frequently. I'd really recommend taking it out entirely so that Portugal can at least start to build itself up before it has to take on those vicious rebel stacks.

- The HRE was wiped out in five turns in one campaign. No idea why. Couldn't reproduce it, just thought I'd mention it. Possibly the Kaiser and Prince were killed in the same battle?

- I don't understand the ratio of churches to priests. Sometimes all I have to build is a small church in order to have a priest available for training, sometimes building one does nothing. Is there a logic behind this that I'm missing?

- The rebel general in Palma has no name.

- Explorers' guild offers are too frequent. They've become the new Thieves' guilds, which ironically have disappeared off the face of the earth. I haven't been able to get a Thieves' guild to save my life.

- Coimbra cannot be upgraded to a Castle after reaching 5000 population despite the upgrade message showing up. The building browser didn't even show a normal castle as an option. Is this related to the "stone castles" event? The year is 1109.

Thoughts on combat balance:

- Peasant crossbows seem a bit too strong and/or prolific. Every rebel stack seems to have 4-6 of them and they decimate any army before it even has a chance of reaching them.

- Spear units have a charge of 5, which is the same that mounted knights have, whereas dismounted knights have a charge of 3. I fail to see the logic.

- Eastern rebel levy spearmen and spear militia have the exact same stats, but the militia is considerably more expensive. Is there a reason for this, does it translate to eastern factions (haven't tried one yet)?

- Redundant units: andalusian cavalry have the exact same stats as jinetes. In my opinion jinetes should have an edge over the andalusian cavalry, not for historical reasons but simply because one is a faction-specific unit and the other is an AOR unit.

- Dismounted Norman knights seem to be available very early, is this intended?

- Byzantine steamroll in every game. I'd suggest cutting out a few of their provinces. Otherwise I've seen a nice variation in which factions rise to the top.

- 95% of Princesses have the suffix "the Affectionate", even if their traits suggest they're anything but.

- Other factions' auxiliary halls / levy barracks aren't destroyed when you move in or build your own. The public order bonuses remain. I held Antioch after a Crusade and it had my levy barracks, Byzantine levy barracks and a Turkish auxiliary hall. Intended?

- The "Superstitious" line of traits seems to pop up every 5 seconds, to the point of being a nuisance. When my provinces are 95%+ Catholic, I'd expect my governors to be a bit more serious about their beliefs!

Well, that's it for now. Some of these observations may have been one-time things, but I'm writing down everything I spot that strikes me as odd or potentially unintended. Hopefully you don't mind. Keep up the great work, I'm looking forward to 0.3!

Now to get some sleep so I can wake up in time for work...

[socal_infidel]

v0.3A Beta has been released!

Download link in here

Oh, and Ninefingers, sorry haven't responded in-depth yet. Busy getting this latest version ready and getting ready for a four-day weekend in Nantucket!

I'll respond when I get back! But I appreciate your taking the time to post your feedback! Much help mate!

Cheers!

[socal_infidel]

PRO DEO ET REGE v0.4 HAS BEEN RELEASED!

DOWNLOAD LINK IN HERE

[Vanguard XIII]

Firstly, this is the best mod for players who enjoyed XGM. I'm loving this and am playing it everyday now.

GREAT WORK! I'm surprised this isn't far more featured than others. Lots of love and labor put into this, and it shows!

So I started the Danmark campaign, and I had a question.

It appears that there are settlements which can't be upgraded at all, is this correct? I have a village which says it has a wall, but doesn't. I now have over 3000 people in there and I can't upgrade it at all - a shame since its a large territory with lots of promise. Is there a certain year when the town gets officially 'founded' (its now 1125), after which the village can be upgraded to a small town?

Is this a feature of the modded game?

I appreciate all responses.

[socal_infidel]

Firstly, this is the best mod for players who enjoyed XGM. I'm loving this and am playing it everyday now.

GREAT WORK! I'm surprised this isn't far more featured than others. Lots of love and labor put into this, and it shows!

So I started the Danmark campaign, and I had a question.

It appears that there are settlements which can't be upgraded at all, is this correct? I have a village which says it has a wall, but doesn't. I now have over 3000 people in there and I can't upgrade it at all - a shame since its a large territory with lots of promise. Is there a certain year when the town gets officially 'founded' (its now 1125), after which the village can be upgraded to a small town?

Is this a feature of the modded game?

I appreciate all responses.

Hey there! Thanks for the feedback! Really appreciate it! A lot of love and labour was definitely put into it (mostly by me)!

My mod has its own hosted forum over at twcenter.net. It gets a lot more action over there! Check it out, we're going to be adding two new factions for the next release!

As far as not being able to upgrade. There's a stone wall event that appears around 1150-1170 or so that should allow you to upgrade. Let me know if you're still unable to do so!


Thanks again for posting! Cheers!