WesW
10-02-2003, 17:01
The Public Release of the Medmod IV v3 is now posted at my website.
My computer has been getting progressively more unstable the last couple of weeks, so I will try and get caught up on the forums later. Right now, I am just posting the Main Readme.
I had just been making the readmes and documentations good enough to get by as the beta progressed, so it took longer than I had anticipated to get everything in shape for the public release, plus put in a few new finishing touches.
If you use skipcredits.txt, please disable it the first time you run the game after installation. One of the new tidbits that took longer than it should have....
There are three Word documents for the mod, including the Main Readme, which covers my goals for the mod, and lays out the general features, concepts and changes to the game, as well as how to use the various docs and spreadsheets which come with the mod.
The faction descriptions doc is the expanded, updated and polished version of the v3 mod descriptions text.
The Units Notes is just that; covering new unit abilities and characteristics, and those things that deserve repeating from the Main Readme and faction descriptions texts. It also contains the Projectile stats chart, which details my changes to that file, plus the list of which units have the regular and compound bows.
Finally, the v3 stats spreadsheet contains a wealth of necessary info for players, and some additional sheets which other mod-makers may be interested in.
I just realized that I forgot to paste in the units text with the latest changes, but those only involved some changes to region bonuses.
I added a buildings page to the file, and expanded the unit names page to include all the unit descriptions composed and/or altered for the mod.
BTW, if any mod-makers out there are using EditPlus2, and you should be, I have a great stx file that colorizes most all of the text patterns and functions that you run across in the files.
Everything mentioned in my latest posts in the 3.09 thread have been implemented, as well as a few other tweaks, of course. This includes the Swedish faction in all three eras, with Nordic units. I think everything but the name of the faction in the faction selection screen has been switched to Swede as well.
The last time I read the forums, about Tuesday I think, I could read everything but I could not submit replies for some reason, so I have been keeping up fairly well with the latest posts.
Try and note whether or not Muslim factions are still producing princesses. I "think" I found that bug, but I can't confirm it.
There are probably one or two bugs or inconsistencies left buried in the mod, but I finally got all the campaigns to load, and I don't "think" there are any textures conflicts left.
One thing I noticed when setting up Custom Battles- the units displayed their original names in the review panel, but then they showed up correctly on the battlefield.
Also, for the last week or two the game has been hanging up on exit, requiring me to do a hard reboot, I think it's called. I minimized the game once, and under the Task Manager Processes it listed the game as using all of the CPU. The first thing I remember with the game was it CTD'ing when I pushed Esc to save a game. I have not saved any games since to see if that is still occurring. The game seems to run fine until you try and exit it. Let me know if any of you experience this.
The next thing I am going to post is a list of my computer problems in the Apothecary, if any of you want to see if you know what's going on, as these are not the only problems I have been having lately.
So, here is the readme:
Main Readme for the Medieval Mod IV for Total War: Viking Expansion
V 3.10: Total Immersion
By Wes Whitaker (email address, webpage) Note: Please place the words “Medmod” or “Medieval” in the subject line of emails to insure arrival.
My aim with this mod, as it has been with my other Medieval mods for Call-to-Power I and II and Civilization III (which I never released), is to correct any errors which may have slipped by the designers, even out those settings and stats which seem unbalanced, and to add the things which I believe will increase players’ enjoyment of the game.
These modifications are the results of over a year spent playing the game, listening to player posts in the mod threads, and scanning the forums to see what people were saying about the game, both good and bad. When I started the Proposed Unit Lineup thread back in June, I said that this version of the mod would be the major overhaul that characterized the previous Medieval Modification Packs. I privately wondered if that could really be true, since I didn't have access to the types of AI and other files that were open in the Call-to-Power games. Well, I think that this current version of the mod comes very close, and that the next version, which will have the new factions, will be the icing on the cake. I have been quite pleased and impressed with how the basic faction priority settings have so solidly altered AI performance in terms of what it builds. I guess this is a testament to the core code that CA put together.
I thought, way back last year, that here in MTW was finally a game that could challenge even a veteran player for a very long time. All it needed was, essentially, more play-testing and experimentation. This mod goes way beyond that in some areas, but at its core it is a comprehensive fine-tuning of the basic game, with both minor and major concept expansions and developments where necessary to help with the game's relatively few short-comings and provide a much greater variety of playing styles.
My first goal with this version of the mod is to make the game more challenging once you enter the conquest phase. This is done by restricting the provinces where factions can produce units. The areas where factions can recruit their units are called Homelands, and reflect the theory that empires are built upon the native soldiers from where the faction originated, rather than draftees from newly conquered areas. Practically all units, with the exception of Peasants, artillery and some missile units, are restricted to certain provinces, and even these units are restricted to certain factions.
In order to restrict the units to certain provinces, I have added almost seventy new units to the game, and drafted more than thirty additional units from the Viking Campaign for use in the standard campaigns. These additional units allowed the implementation of my second goal, which was to expand upon the original CA design of giving each religion unique characteristics and unit traits. Thus I have worked to give each Christian faction unique characteristics and unit traits.
A secondary aim in the goal of faction uniqueness was to add much more historical realism to the game, and I am very proud with what has been accomplished, thanks mainly to the members and visitors of the TotalWar.org forums. Many of them have contributed their knowledge to the development of the unit lineup, and some like Dan and Mael have spent considerable time and effort researching and passing on to me their information on this era in history. I am continually astounded by the depth of knowledge held by many of the members of the forums, and this added realism is why I entitled this version of the mod Total Immersion, because I believe that you can now become engrossed in the feel and atmosphere of the Medieval period to a level I have never felt outside of role-playing games.
In addition, work continued on the basic task of improving AI performance and enhancing gameplay. Several new concepts were developed to facilitate this, and these are covered below.
Acknowledgements:
Mael Knapp, a.k.a. Yelping Godzilla, was an invaluable source of both ideas and historical information, and he wrote most all of the unit descriptions created for the mod. I encourage you to take note of these if you have any interest what-so-ever in history, as they are as good or better than any ever written for the Medieval series, and those of you familiar with previous Medmods know how high a praise this is. I have included these descriptions in the mod’s spreadsheet alongside the new and altered unit names for the mod.
First of all, thanks go out to Lord Crazy, Barocca and the other guys who offered help on the .org forums, and to forum members such as Gaelstrum, Red Harvest, Pablo Sanchez and especially A_B, who offered key suggestions to solving certain problems, and provided extensive feedback in the development of the mod.
Installation:
For those of you downloading the mod from my site, it is contained in a self-extraction utility, so all you need do is save it, click on it, and follow the instructions. And please take the few seconds required to read them, as they may save both of us considerable time later.
If you downloaded the mod through the Org, or 3-D, then the self-extraction utility will be contained in a Winzip file. Simply unzip the mod into a temporary folder, and follow the instructions above. That’s it.
Expressions of appreciation:
The posts and emails I receive lauding the quality of the mod, and expressing gratitude for all the work which goes into both making it and presenting it to the public mean a great deal to me, and are one of the things that I remember most fondly from my experiences these last four-plus years. Several players like yourself have expressed a desire to go even further, and accompany their words with monetary gifts of appreciation. If you agree with them that my work is worthy of such praise, and would like to contribute yourself, please know that it will be both graciously and humbly received. Humbly, because there is no greater praise than that which comes from those with the greatest knowledge and experience, and that is you, the players.
Funds may be sent to my PayPal account online, or to my home address:
Wes Whitaker
983 Co. Rd. 415
Killen, Al. 35645
Color Scheme:
General changes, text references and acknowledgements, file references, Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Christian, buildings, ships, spearmen, infantry, cavalry, missiles, agents.
Charts and Readmes:
This file, along with the spreadsheet and some other interesting texts, is placed in your Charts and Readmes folder, which is located in your Medieval – Total War folder.
Presenting the enormous additions and alterations made over the course of the development of the mod, in a way that is convenient, intuitive and sufficiently detailed, has been one of the hardest tasks which I have faced with this version. What I decided upon was a two-pronged approach, which would allow you to view unit information in either a relative or an absolute method.
The absolute method was accomplished by the inclusion of an exact copy of the units text file, which was pasted into the Units text page of the v3 stats spreadsheet. This file contains all relevant, and some non-relevant, information about every unit in the game. This page should be used as the primary source of information on the exact costs and building requirements for all units. This page is meant to be used in conjunction with the Unit names sheet, which lists the File name, Game or Screen name, and description of all new or re-named units in the game. Units not listed here are assumed to use their original Screen name, and have an identical File name.
What I do when starting a game is to order the units by faction, using the methods described in the Working with the Units text section below, and use a notepad and pencil to construct a list of the primary units for my faction, noting building requirements, region bonuses, where present, and any additional data that I find relevant such as excellent speed or armour-piercing ability. This additional data may also be obtained from the relative method described next.
The faction descriptions text contains a description of the general characteristics of every faction in the game, and a detailed list of all unique units available to each faction, along with any additional notes of interest. You will probably want to view this text next, after finishing this readme, followed by the Homelands and Mercs sheet, which lists the Homelands for every faction and notes those provinces where Inns may be constructed.
The Unit stats sheet of the spreadsheet contains the standard, or known, units that are referred to in the faction descriptions text when describing all of the new or altered units in the mod, and is meant to be used in conjunction with that text. And as there are over one-hundred such units, you can see how important this page can be to understanding unit capabilities. Note that the referrals are based upon the Medmod statistics of these known units, which may be substantially different from those found in the original game. I would recommend that you do as I have done and print out the first two pages of the Unit stats sheet, as shown in the Excel Print Preview option. I refer to these pages as needed when evaluating how my faction’s units compare relative to those of the AI. In addition, I highly recommend that you take time to read the red-tabbed comments that I have sprinkled throughout the page for your benefit, especially the ones near the top of the first column, which explain the color schemes used in that column. They often go into detail explaining individual changes that I made, and with the greatly expanded use of era restrictions for this version of the mod, are almost essential to avoiding confusion.
Note: At the time of the initial public release, this page of the spreadsheet had been generally, but not meticulously, updated and thus should not be seen as an exact guide to unit abilities. In particular, building requirements may frequently be out-of-date. Also the cost formula crafted for the spreadsheet was inexact in some circumstances, and I varied from it as I saw fit when setting unit costs. Thus it too should only be used as a guide. Remember to refer to the Units text sheet when you need exact info.
The building spreadsheet is by AFlorin, which I also obtained from the .org site, and is modified in a similar manner to the unit stats sheet, with the yellow background signifying values which have been changed.
Working with the Units text sheet:
The Units Text page, which is a direct paste of the game's units text, can be used for many things. The column headers for this page explain what info each column contains.
You may want to order the units by faction, column AC for example, to see a list of a faction's unique units, or you can look up any of the other info contained in the game's units text. This includes price ( C), upkeep (D), turns to build (E), number of men per unit (H), region bonuses (M), general stats, including movement Speed, Charge, Attack, Defense and Morale (W), era and provincial restrictions (T & AD), special abilities such as armour-piercing, supporting ranks and bonuses versus cavalry units (AI to AQ), and dismounting info (AU & AV).
New concept: Homelands. A dozen or so provinces that share the same ethnicity as a given faction, usually encompassing the faction's territory and some surrounding provinces. Note that two or more factions may claim the same province, where their peoples intermingle. This can often lead to conflict between the factions. A list of the Homelands for each faction is available in the Homelands and Mercs page of the v3 stats spreadsheet.
For non-Homeland provinces, you may be able to build basic units like spearmen and archers, generic bolt or gunpowder units, artillery, ships, or any special attack unit such as spies and assassins. Specifics may be found in the Unit notes text.
New concepts: Restricted Inns and Buildable Mercenary units.
Inns can now be built only in provinces where the Mercenary "good" is found. These provinces will generally be in areas where ethnic Homelands overlap, and thus conflict is more likely, or in areas where special mercenary troops are available, such as in Ireland.
Each faction will generally have an Inn available at the start of the game. Thus, as your empire expands, you may be able to capture other designated provinces, build them up, and use them as further recruitment centers. However, this will take time and money.
Buildable mercenary units require all of the buildings that they would were they normal troops, in addition to the Inn.
Generic buildable mercenaries may be built by any faction, but take three turns to build.
Faction-specific buildable mercenaries are restricted just like native troops, and cost 25% more than normal. These troops are generally native to minor provinces or factions, and are hiring themselves out to the nearest, ethnically-compatible major faction.
Buildable mercenaries are a way of:
1)filling in the gaps certain factions have in their native troops, including Muslim factions
2)fielding balanced armies, or
3)just bulking up your forces; but all at a premium.
Note that Inns cost more to construct than before, since their potential effect is greater, especially for factions such as the Byzantines.
Generic buildable mercenary units: (faction-specific units are specified in the faction unit lists below):
Alan Merc Cav- All eras
Germanic Knights- Feudal Kns; High and Late eras
Swiss Mercenary Pikemen- Late era only; Catholic factions only
Expanded concept: Unique Bodyguards
The discovery that the game ignores any era restrictions on bodyguard units allowed the designation of faction-specific units for each faction. Bodyguards can be any regular troop, and now reflect the character of their faction just as the regular units. Bodyguard units are denoted in the faction descriptions text by the initials “BG”.
New concept: Standard and Compound bows. Many units from non-Catholic regions, primarily the open Steppes and the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa, used bows superior to those of Feudal Europe, and now this is properly reflected in the game.
Units possessing compound bows have more arrows, so that they are easy to spot in the unit lists, and a list of all individual units is listed in the Unit notes file, which also contains a detailed chart listing the exact differences between the bow types, as well as my other changes to the various projectile stats used in the game.
Starting positions:
Faction availability:
All factions are available for play, except the Papacy. In addition, a new faction, the Swedes, has been added to all three eras of the game, using the Novgorod text entries. At this time, not all text entries had been converted, so you may receive messages referring to the Novgorods instead of the Swedes. The Russians have been added to the Early era, and occupy Kiev, Crimea and Khazar for this first release of the mod. Also, I restored the Sicilians to the late era, since they still held Naples and Provence, so I felt that the change was warranted. In addition, I brought back the Burgundians in the late era, and gave them Flanders as well. This reflects the historical situation in the early part of the Hundred Years’ War, when France was weak and Burgundy had allied with England after failing to usurp the French throne. Numerous other changes to provincial ownership have been over the course of the mod’s development as well.
I have posted the maps I based my changes on at my webpage, which were obtained from the Euratlas.com website. I also studied maps from other sites, and found that oftentimes they did not agree when it came to issues such as independence versus a vassal state. Plus, the game does not, and really could not, show all of the historical provinces that existed at the various times covered by the game, so sometimes I had to decide what the most important part of the province seemed to be, and award ownership thusly. In addition, in some cases like Norway, I gave weak factions the benefit of the doubt in order to strengthen them and facilitate better gameplay.
Trade and provincial relationships:
I severed the link between Constantinople and Nicaea, to try and protect the Byzantines from the Turks, and also the link between Flanders and Wessex, since invading England from mainland Europe has always hinged upon control of the English Channel.
In addition, four seas have been eliminated from the game. Two of them, the Ionian and Marmara seas, were removed to help the AI keep trade connections to Venice and Constantinople, which are crucial to the survival of their owner’s factions. The other two, the Gulf of Cadiz and the Atlantic Ocean, were removed to split the map into northern and southern halves. This was done to keep factions from establishing over-sized trade networks that would skew the game's economic model.
I have made numerous changes and additions to starting infrastructure, trade goods, land values and mines in an effort to balance out the incomes of the various factions.
I gave every province a unit bonus, since I and many of you enjoy the strategic aspect that this brings to the game.
For provinces whose governorship bequeathed a general’s star, the AI would always grant them to its highest-ranking available general. This could, and often did, produce disastrous results in cases like Constantinople and Denmark, whose incomes were vital to the survivability of the faction. Thus, I have allotted general’s stars only to poor provinces. I think this has the added effect of making those provinces more valuable to control.
Building and General changes:
I added the Viking Campaign’s Muster Field to the standard campaigns, with the requirement of a Keep, and made it the requirement for Peasants. I then set both the Muster Field and Peasant’s priority levels close to zero. I think this will go far in making Peasants relatively scarce in the game, at least for the AI factions.
I added Pagan Shrines and Sacrificial Altars to the game, the same as the ones in the Viking Campaign. I hope that these will help the Mongols hold down provincial rebellions.
Happiness buildings: Watch Towers and Border Forts cost more, as do Churches and Monasteries. Border Forts take two turns to build, but Churches and Monasteries take less time.
Some Tavern and Brothel upgrades take less time to build, though they may cost more. I also lowered the castle requirements for Brothels.
Merchants now require a Port, Merchant Guilds now require a Shipwright, and Master Merchants require a Dockyard. This was done to keep the AIs from building higher-level merchants in provinces where they were probably not equitable.
The requirement of a Cannon Foundry for building a Shipbuilders Guild has been removed. I don’t know who stuck that in there at the last moment, but it sure caused plenty of confusion. Anyway, its deletion squares it with the building chart and gets rid of the War Galley incompatibility.
Palaces: The Marshals Palace requires a Fortress to build. I think the current setting is another error (Castle12 instead of Castle13). Also, since palaces are now unique, I have removed all but the castle type from the requirements list. This way, you may have more than one city eligible to build these improvements.
The Military Academy has different requirements, since the Turks would seem to need more than one of them, and the previous requirements were unique. Therefore, the requirements have been changed to a Royal Palace and Citadel for the Christians, and a Royal Palace, Castle and Ribat for the Muslims. Academies now instill discipline as well as valour for Janissary units. Note that Academies only benefit units that require them for construction.
Master-level buildings now give various bonuses rather than the standard valour increase. I tried to match the bonuses to the general deficiencies present in the troop classes produced by each structure. Please see the spreadsheet for specifics. I decided to make this change when I realized that many units would always get one, and sometimes more than one, valour increase due to their building requirements. This is perhaps why the defensive stats of the spear class, which would not automatically get such a bonus, rose at a faster rate than the offensive stats of the sword and mounted units.
Militia Barracks: County Militias require a Citadel, in addition to a Town Militia, instead of a Fortress.
In addition, Orthodox and Muslim factions now need Militia buildings for their units, just as the Catholics do.
Also, the Russians need Royal Courts for their heavy cavalry units, just like Catholic factions, since their society was at least as feudal as any in Europe.
Time and cost reductions: The time to build the troop producers, from Forts to Fortresses, has been reduced by 25%, and the costs and/or time of many other structures have been reduced as well. Please refer to the Building page of the Med mod spreadsheet for details.
Finally, the cost of improving Farmland by 80% has been reduced to 2,000. I use a 20 yr ROI (return on investment) as a guide, and it seems that the designers did too from the mine costs, and I never encountered a province while playing the game that met this criterion for the 80% improvement under normal circumstances.
Strategic Agents:
I only corrected a few errors with faction bonuses in this section, other than the change to the building requirements for Spies, which was explained in the Building’s section. The Poles were given a bonus for producing Orthodox Priests and Bishops; I felt that the Russians could make better use of it. I also switched the bonus for Inquisitors and Grand Inquisitors from the Aragonese to the Spanish. I am not sure if this was a bug, but it seemed to fit better.
Crusades and Jihads:
I have totally re-worked almost everything about Crusades, based upon the opinions of myself and others on the forums, and using the knowledge given by Eat Cold Steel in the 1.6 thread. Note that the Aragonese can no longer launch Crusades, nor can the other factions that I enabled for v1.85 of the mod (the Poles, Hungarians and Sicilians).
Gothic and Teutonic units are used by the HRE and the to-be-added Teutonic Order factions.
Gendarmes and Hospitaller units are used by the English, French, Italians and Spanish. Other units are used by all factions.
Chapter Houses are now unique. The pre-requisite for them, a Church, has been placed in provinces where I hope the AI builds its Houses, namely provinces other than their capitals. Since Crusades now take so much longer to build, it is not a good idea to create them in your capital. Some Houses have been placed on the map in certain historical provinces, mainly in the Late era.
Crusades themselves now cost 4000 florins, which is compensated for by the fact that fives times as many units are created by them. This means that a dozen or more units should be created by the Crusade for the human, and who knows how many for the AI.
A Crusade now takes ten years to build, both to spread out the high cost, and to insure that they will be few and far between.
Jihads now take five years and 2000 florins to build, and produce four times as many units as before.
Seven special Crusade versions of existing troops have been created, along with seven unique Jihad units, which are no longer available as regular units. I think that the best way to show the new units’ layout is through the charts below, which I hope are self-explanatory. One important thing to note, however, is that early units are not available in later eras, unless specified in the chart.
Note that Crusades and Jihads can have many more than sixteen units. If you notice an arrow on the left side of the review panel, then this is the case.
Unit type / Era Early High Late
Spearmen Feudal Sergeants Chivalric Sergeants Order Foot Soldiers
Swordsmen Feudal Foot Knights Chivalric Foot Knights Hospitaller/Gothic Ft. Kn.
Light Cavalry Mounted Sergeants Gendarmes/Teutonic Sgts. Gendarmes/Teutonic Sgts.
Heavy Cavalry Knights Templar Knights Templar Kn. Hospitaller/Teutonic Kn.
Unit type / Era Early High Late
Spearmen Muwahid Foot Muwahid Foot Muwahid Foot
Swordsmen Ghazi Infantry Ghazi/Dismounted Faris Dismounted Faris
Light Cavalry Faris Faris Faris
Heavy Cavalry Early Ghulam Guards High Ghulam Guards Late Ghulam Guards
Note that crusading factions have access to all the Crusader Kingdoms units. These units are available in Palestine, Tripoli, Antioch, Cyprus, Edessa, Syria and Lesser Armenia. The Crusader Kingdoms faction is not added yet, but the units are.
My computer has been getting progressively more unstable the last couple of weeks, so I will try and get caught up on the forums later. Right now, I am just posting the Main Readme.
I had just been making the readmes and documentations good enough to get by as the beta progressed, so it took longer than I had anticipated to get everything in shape for the public release, plus put in a few new finishing touches.
If you use skipcredits.txt, please disable it the first time you run the game after installation. One of the new tidbits that took longer than it should have....
There are three Word documents for the mod, including the Main Readme, which covers my goals for the mod, and lays out the general features, concepts and changes to the game, as well as how to use the various docs and spreadsheets which come with the mod.
The faction descriptions doc is the expanded, updated and polished version of the v3 mod descriptions text.
The Units Notes is just that; covering new unit abilities and characteristics, and those things that deserve repeating from the Main Readme and faction descriptions texts. It also contains the Projectile stats chart, which details my changes to that file, plus the list of which units have the regular and compound bows.
Finally, the v3 stats spreadsheet contains a wealth of necessary info for players, and some additional sheets which other mod-makers may be interested in.
I just realized that I forgot to paste in the units text with the latest changes, but those only involved some changes to region bonuses.
I added a buildings page to the file, and expanded the unit names page to include all the unit descriptions composed and/or altered for the mod.
BTW, if any mod-makers out there are using EditPlus2, and you should be, I have a great stx file that colorizes most all of the text patterns and functions that you run across in the files.
Everything mentioned in my latest posts in the 3.09 thread have been implemented, as well as a few other tweaks, of course. This includes the Swedish faction in all three eras, with Nordic units. I think everything but the name of the faction in the faction selection screen has been switched to Swede as well.
The last time I read the forums, about Tuesday I think, I could read everything but I could not submit replies for some reason, so I have been keeping up fairly well with the latest posts.
Try and note whether or not Muslim factions are still producing princesses. I "think" I found that bug, but I can't confirm it.
There are probably one or two bugs or inconsistencies left buried in the mod, but I finally got all the campaigns to load, and I don't "think" there are any textures conflicts left.
One thing I noticed when setting up Custom Battles- the units displayed their original names in the review panel, but then they showed up correctly on the battlefield.
Also, for the last week or two the game has been hanging up on exit, requiring me to do a hard reboot, I think it's called. I minimized the game once, and under the Task Manager Processes it listed the game as using all of the CPU. The first thing I remember with the game was it CTD'ing when I pushed Esc to save a game. I have not saved any games since to see if that is still occurring. The game seems to run fine until you try and exit it. Let me know if any of you experience this.
The next thing I am going to post is a list of my computer problems in the Apothecary, if any of you want to see if you know what's going on, as these are not the only problems I have been having lately.
So, here is the readme:
Main Readme for the Medieval Mod IV for Total War: Viking Expansion
V 3.10: Total Immersion
By Wes Whitaker (email address, webpage) Note: Please place the words “Medmod” or “Medieval” in the subject line of emails to insure arrival.
My aim with this mod, as it has been with my other Medieval mods for Call-to-Power I and II and Civilization III (which I never released), is to correct any errors which may have slipped by the designers, even out those settings and stats which seem unbalanced, and to add the things which I believe will increase players’ enjoyment of the game.
These modifications are the results of over a year spent playing the game, listening to player posts in the mod threads, and scanning the forums to see what people were saying about the game, both good and bad. When I started the Proposed Unit Lineup thread back in June, I said that this version of the mod would be the major overhaul that characterized the previous Medieval Modification Packs. I privately wondered if that could really be true, since I didn't have access to the types of AI and other files that were open in the Call-to-Power games. Well, I think that this current version of the mod comes very close, and that the next version, which will have the new factions, will be the icing on the cake. I have been quite pleased and impressed with how the basic faction priority settings have so solidly altered AI performance in terms of what it builds. I guess this is a testament to the core code that CA put together.
I thought, way back last year, that here in MTW was finally a game that could challenge even a veteran player for a very long time. All it needed was, essentially, more play-testing and experimentation. This mod goes way beyond that in some areas, but at its core it is a comprehensive fine-tuning of the basic game, with both minor and major concept expansions and developments where necessary to help with the game's relatively few short-comings and provide a much greater variety of playing styles.
My first goal with this version of the mod is to make the game more challenging once you enter the conquest phase. This is done by restricting the provinces where factions can produce units. The areas where factions can recruit their units are called Homelands, and reflect the theory that empires are built upon the native soldiers from where the faction originated, rather than draftees from newly conquered areas. Practically all units, with the exception of Peasants, artillery and some missile units, are restricted to certain provinces, and even these units are restricted to certain factions.
In order to restrict the units to certain provinces, I have added almost seventy new units to the game, and drafted more than thirty additional units from the Viking Campaign for use in the standard campaigns. These additional units allowed the implementation of my second goal, which was to expand upon the original CA design of giving each religion unique characteristics and unit traits. Thus I have worked to give each Christian faction unique characteristics and unit traits.
A secondary aim in the goal of faction uniqueness was to add much more historical realism to the game, and I am very proud with what has been accomplished, thanks mainly to the members and visitors of the TotalWar.org forums. Many of them have contributed their knowledge to the development of the unit lineup, and some like Dan and Mael have spent considerable time and effort researching and passing on to me their information on this era in history. I am continually astounded by the depth of knowledge held by many of the members of the forums, and this added realism is why I entitled this version of the mod Total Immersion, because I believe that you can now become engrossed in the feel and atmosphere of the Medieval period to a level I have never felt outside of role-playing games.
In addition, work continued on the basic task of improving AI performance and enhancing gameplay. Several new concepts were developed to facilitate this, and these are covered below.
Acknowledgements:
Mael Knapp, a.k.a. Yelping Godzilla, was an invaluable source of both ideas and historical information, and he wrote most all of the unit descriptions created for the mod. I encourage you to take note of these if you have any interest what-so-ever in history, as they are as good or better than any ever written for the Medieval series, and those of you familiar with previous Medmods know how high a praise this is. I have included these descriptions in the mod’s spreadsheet alongside the new and altered unit names for the mod.
First of all, thanks go out to Lord Crazy, Barocca and the other guys who offered help on the .org forums, and to forum members such as Gaelstrum, Red Harvest, Pablo Sanchez and especially A_B, who offered key suggestions to solving certain problems, and provided extensive feedback in the development of the mod.
Installation:
For those of you downloading the mod from my site, it is contained in a self-extraction utility, so all you need do is save it, click on it, and follow the instructions. And please take the few seconds required to read them, as they may save both of us considerable time later.
If you downloaded the mod through the Org, or 3-D, then the self-extraction utility will be contained in a Winzip file. Simply unzip the mod into a temporary folder, and follow the instructions above. That’s it.
Expressions of appreciation:
The posts and emails I receive lauding the quality of the mod, and expressing gratitude for all the work which goes into both making it and presenting it to the public mean a great deal to me, and are one of the things that I remember most fondly from my experiences these last four-plus years. Several players like yourself have expressed a desire to go even further, and accompany their words with monetary gifts of appreciation. If you agree with them that my work is worthy of such praise, and would like to contribute yourself, please know that it will be both graciously and humbly received. Humbly, because there is no greater praise than that which comes from those with the greatest knowledge and experience, and that is you, the players.
Funds may be sent to my PayPal account online, or to my home address:
Wes Whitaker
983 Co. Rd. 415
Killen, Al. 35645
Color Scheme:
General changes, text references and acknowledgements, file references, Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Christian, buildings, ships, spearmen, infantry, cavalry, missiles, agents.
Charts and Readmes:
This file, along with the spreadsheet and some other interesting texts, is placed in your Charts and Readmes folder, which is located in your Medieval – Total War folder.
Presenting the enormous additions and alterations made over the course of the development of the mod, in a way that is convenient, intuitive and sufficiently detailed, has been one of the hardest tasks which I have faced with this version. What I decided upon was a two-pronged approach, which would allow you to view unit information in either a relative or an absolute method.
The absolute method was accomplished by the inclusion of an exact copy of the units text file, which was pasted into the Units text page of the v3 stats spreadsheet. This file contains all relevant, and some non-relevant, information about every unit in the game. This page should be used as the primary source of information on the exact costs and building requirements for all units. This page is meant to be used in conjunction with the Unit names sheet, which lists the File name, Game or Screen name, and description of all new or re-named units in the game. Units not listed here are assumed to use their original Screen name, and have an identical File name.
What I do when starting a game is to order the units by faction, using the methods described in the Working with the Units text section below, and use a notepad and pencil to construct a list of the primary units for my faction, noting building requirements, region bonuses, where present, and any additional data that I find relevant such as excellent speed or armour-piercing ability. This additional data may also be obtained from the relative method described next.
The faction descriptions text contains a description of the general characteristics of every faction in the game, and a detailed list of all unique units available to each faction, along with any additional notes of interest. You will probably want to view this text next, after finishing this readme, followed by the Homelands and Mercs sheet, which lists the Homelands for every faction and notes those provinces where Inns may be constructed.
The Unit stats sheet of the spreadsheet contains the standard, or known, units that are referred to in the faction descriptions text when describing all of the new or altered units in the mod, and is meant to be used in conjunction with that text. And as there are over one-hundred such units, you can see how important this page can be to understanding unit capabilities. Note that the referrals are based upon the Medmod statistics of these known units, which may be substantially different from those found in the original game. I would recommend that you do as I have done and print out the first two pages of the Unit stats sheet, as shown in the Excel Print Preview option. I refer to these pages as needed when evaluating how my faction’s units compare relative to those of the AI. In addition, I highly recommend that you take time to read the red-tabbed comments that I have sprinkled throughout the page for your benefit, especially the ones near the top of the first column, which explain the color schemes used in that column. They often go into detail explaining individual changes that I made, and with the greatly expanded use of era restrictions for this version of the mod, are almost essential to avoiding confusion.
Note: At the time of the initial public release, this page of the spreadsheet had been generally, but not meticulously, updated and thus should not be seen as an exact guide to unit abilities. In particular, building requirements may frequently be out-of-date. Also the cost formula crafted for the spreadsheet was inexact in some circumstances, and I varied from it as I saw fit when setting unit costs. Thus it too should only be used as a guide. Remember to refer to the Units text sheet when you need exact info.
The building spreadsheet is by AFlorin, which I also obtained from the .org site, and is modified in a similar manner to the unit stats sheet, with the yellow background signifying values which have been changed.
Working with the Units text sheet:
The Units Text page, which is a direct paste of the game's units text, can be used for many things. The column headers for this page explain what info each column contains.
You may want to order the units by faction, column AC for example, to see a list of a faction's unique units, or you can look up any of the other info contained in the game's units text. This includes price ( C), upkeep (D), turns to build (E), number of men per unit (H), region bonuses (M), general stats, including movement Speed, Charge, Attack, Defense and Morale (W), era and provincial restrictions (T & AD), special abilities such as armour-piercing, supporting ranks and bonuses versus cavalry units (AI to AQ), and dismounting info (AU & AV).
New concept: Homelands. A dozen or so provinces that share the same ethnicity as a given faction, usually encompassing the faction's territory and some surrounding provinces. Note that two or more factions may claim the same province, where their peoples intermingle. This can often lead to conflict between the factions. A list of the Homelands for each faction is available in the Homelands and Mercs page of the v3 stats spreadsheet.
For non-Homeland provinces, you may be able to build basic units like spearmen and archers, generic bolt or gunpowder units, artillery, ships, or any special attack unit such as spies and assassins. Specifics may be found in the Unit notes text.
New concepts: Restricted Inns and Buildable Mercenary units.
Inns can now be built only in provinces where the Mercenary "good" is found. These provinces will generally be in areas where ethnic Homelands overlap, and thus conflict is more likely, or in areas where special mercenary troops are available, such as in Ireland.
Each faction will generally have an Inn available at the start of the game. Thus, as your empire expands, you may be able to capture other designated provinces, build them up, and use them as further recruitment centers. However, this will take time and money.
Buildable mercenary units require all of the buildings that they would were they normal troops, in addition to the Inn.
Generic buildable mercenaries may be built by any faction, but take three turns to build.
Faction-specific buildable mercenaries are restricted just like native troops, and cost 25% more than normal. These troops are generally native to minor provinces or factions, and are hiring themselves out to the nearest, ethnically-compatible major faction.
Buildable mercenaries are a way of:
1)filling in the gaps certain factions have in their native troops, including Muslim factions
2)fielding balanced armies, or
3)just bulking up your forces; but all at a premium.
Note that Inns cost more to construct than before, since their potential effect is greater, especially for factions such as the Byzantines.
Generic buildable mercenary units: (faction-specific units are specified in the faction unit lists below):
Alan Merc Cav- All eras
Germanic Knights- Feudal Kns; High and Late eras
Swiss Mercenary Pikemen- Late era only; Catholic factions only
Expanded concept: Unique Bodyguards
The discovery that the game ignores any era restrictions on bodyguard units allowed the designation of faction-specific units for each faction. Bodyguards can be any regular troop, and now reflect the character of their faction just as the regular units. Bodyguard units are denoted in the faction descriptions text by the initials “BG”.
New concept: Standard and Compound bows. Many units from non-Catholic regions, primarily the open Steppes and the deserts of the Middle East and North Africa, used bows superior to those of Feudal Europe, and now this is properly reflected in the game.
Units possessing compound bows have more arrows, so that they are easy to spot in the unit lists, and a list of all individual units is listed in the Unit notes file, which also contains a detailed chart listing the exact differences between the bow types, as well as my other changes to the various projectile stats used in the game.
Starting positions:
Faction availability:
All factions are available for play, except the Papacy. In addition, a new faction, the Swedes, has been added to all three eras of the game, using the Novgorod text entries. At this time, not all text entries had been converted, so you may receive messages referring to the Novgorods instead of the Swedes. The Russians have been added to the Early era, and occupy Kiev, Crimea and Khazar for this first release of the mod. Also, I restored the Sicilians to the late era, since they still held Naples and Provence, so I felt that the change was warranted. In addition, I brought back the Burgundians in the late era, and gave them Flanders as well. This reflects the historical situation in the early part of the Hundred Years’ War, when France was weak and Burgundy had allied with England after failing to usurp the French throne. Numerous other changes to provincial ownership have been over the course of the mod’s development as well.
I have posted the maps I based my changes on at my webpage, which were obtained from the Euratlas.com website. I also studied maps from other sites, and found that oftentimes they did not agree when it came to issues such as independence versus a vassal state. Plus, the game does not, and really could not, show all of the historical provinces that existed at the various times covered by the game, so sometimes I had to decide what the most important part of the province seemed to be, and award ownership thusly. In addition, in some cases like Norway, I gave weak factions the benefit of the doubt in order to strengthen them and facilitate better gameplay.
Trade and provincial relationships:
I severed the link between Constantinople and Nicaea, to try and protect the Byzantines from the Turks, and also the link between Flanders and Wessex, since invading England from mainland Europe has always hinged upon control of the English Channel.
In addition, four seas have been eliminated from the game. Two of them, the Ionian and Marmara seas, were removed to help the AI keep trade connections to Venice and Constantinople, which are crucial to the survival of their owner’s factions. The other two, the Gulf of Cadiz and the Atlantic Ocean, were removed to split the map into northern and southern halves. This was done to keep factions from establishing over-sized trade networks that would skew the game's economic model.
I have made numerous changes and additions to starting infrastructure, trade goods, land values and mines in an effort to balance out the incomes of the various factions.
I gave every province a unit bonus, since I and many of you enjoy the strategic aspect that this brings to the game.
For provinces whose governorship bequeathed a general’s star, the AI would always grant them to its highest-ranking available general. This could, and often did, produce disastrous results in cases like Constantinople and Denmark, whose incomes were vital to the survivability of the faction. Thus, I have allotted general’s stars only to poor provinces. I think this has the added effect of making those provinces more valuable to control.
Building and General changes:
I added the Viking Campaign’s Muster Field to the standard campaigns, with the requirement of a Keep, and made it the requirement for Peasants. I then set both the Muster Field and Peasant’s priority levels close to zero. I think this will go far in making Peasants relatively scarce in the game, at least for the AI factions.
I added Pagan Shrines and Sacrificial Altars to the game, the same as the ones in the Viking Campaign. I hope that these will help the Mongols hold down provincial rebellions.
Happiness buildings: Watch Towers and Border Forts cost more, as do Churches and Monasteries. Border Forts take two turns to build, but Churches and Monasteries take less time.
Some Tavern and Brothel upgrades take less time to build, though they may cost more. I also lowered the castle requirements for Brothels.
Merchants now require a Port, Merchant Guilds now require a Shipwright, and Master Merchants require a Dockyard. This was done to keep the AIs from building higher-level merchants in provinces where they were probably not equitable.
The requirement of a Cannon Foundry for building a Shipbuilders Guild has been removed. I don’t know who stuck that in there at the last moment, but it sure caused plenty of confusion. Anyway, its deletion squares it with the building chart and gets rid of the War Galley incompatibility.
Palaces: The Marshals Palace requires a Fortress to build. I think the current setting is another error (Castle12 instead of Castle13). Also, since palaces are now unique, I have removed all but the castle type from the requirements list. This way, you may have more than one city eligible to build these improvements.
The Military Academy has different requirements, since the Turks would seem to need more than one of them, and the previous requirements were unique. Therefore, the requirements have been changed to a Royal Palace and Citadel for the Christians, and a Royal Palace, Castle and Ribat for the Muslims. Academies now instill discipline as well as valour for Janissary units. Note that Academies only benefit units that require them for construction.
Master-level buildings now give various bonuses rather than the standard valour increase. I tried to match the bonuses to the general deficiencies present in the troop classes produced by each structure. Please see the spreadsheet for specifics. I decided to make this change when I realized that many units would always get one, and sometimes more than one, valour increase due to their building requirements. This is perhaps why the defensive stats of the spear class, which would not automatically get such a bonus, rose at a faster rate than the offensive stats of the sword and mounted units.
Militia Barracks: County Militias require a Citadel, in addition to a Town Militia, instead of a Fortress.
In addition, Orthodox and Muslim factions now need Militia buildings for their units, just as the Catholics do.
Also, the Russians need Royal Courts for their heavy cavalry units, just like Catholic factions, since their society was at least as feudal as any in Europe.
Time and cost reductions: The time to build the troop producers, from Forts to Fortresses, has been reduced by 25%, and the costs and/or time of many other structures have been reduced as well. Please refer to the Building page of the Med mod spreadsheet for details.
Finally, the cost of improving Farmland by 80% has been reduced to 2,000. I use a 20 yr ROI (return on investment) as a guide, and it seems that the designers did too from the mine costs, and I never encountered a province while playing the game that met this criterion for the 80% improvement under normal circumstances.
Strategic Agents:
I only corrected a few errors with faction bonuses in this section, other than the change to the building requirements for Spies, which was explained in the Building’s section. The Poles were given a bonus for producing Orthodox Priests and Bishops; I felt that the Russians could make better use of it. I also switched the bonus for Inquisitors and Grand Inquisitors from the Aragonese to the Spanish. I am not sure if this was a bug, but it seemed to fit better.
Crusades and Jihads:
I have totally re-worked almost everything about Crusades, based upon the opinions of myself and others on the forums, and using the knowledge given by Eat Cold Steel in the 1.6 thread. Note that the Aragonese can no longer launch Crusades, nor can the other factions that I enabled for v1.85 of the mod (the Poles, Hungarians and Sicilians).
Gothic and Teutonic units are used by the HRE and the to-be-added Teutonic Order factions.
Gendarmes and Hospitaller units are used by the English, French, Italians and Spanish. Other units are used by all factions.
Chapter Houses are now unique. The pre-requisite for them, a Church, has been placed in provinces where I hope the AI builds its Houses, namely provinces other than their capitals. Since Crusades now take so much longer to build, it is not a good idea to create them in your capital. Some Houses have been placed on the map in certain historical provinces, mainly in the Late era.
Crusades themselves now cost 4000 florins, which is compensated for by the fact that fives times as many units are created by them. This means that a dozen or more units should be created by the Crusade for the human, and who knows how many for the AI.
A Crusade now takes ten years to build, both to spread out the high cost, and to insure that they will be few and far between.
Jihads now take five years and 2000 florins to build, and produce four times as many units as before.
Seven special Crusade versions of existing troops have been created, along with seven unique Jihad units, which are no longer available as regular units. I think that the best way to show the new units’ layout is through the charts below, which I hope are self-explanatory. One important thing to note, however, is that early units are not available in later eras, unless specified in the chart.
Note that Crusades and Jihads can have many more than sixteen units. If you notice an arrow on the left side of the review panel, then this is the case.
Unit type / Era Early High Late
Spearmen Feudal Sergeants Chivalric Sergeants Order Foot Soldiers
Swordsmen Feudal Foot Knights Chivalric Foot Knights Hospitaller/Gothic Ft. Kn.
Light Cavalry Mounted Sergeants Gendarmes/Teutonic Sgts. Gendarmes/Teutonic Sgts.
Heavy Cavalry Knights Templar Knights Templar Kn. Hospitaller/Teutonic Kn.
Unit type / Era Early High Late
Spearmen Muwahid Foot Muwahid Foot Muwahid Foot
Swordsmen Ghazi Infantry Ghazi/Dismounted Faris Dismounted Faris
Light Cavalry Faris Faris Faris
Heavy Cavalry Early Ghulam Guards High Ghulam Guards Late Ghulam Guards
Note that crusading factions have access to all the Crusader Kingdoms units. These units are available in Palestine, Tripoli, Antioch, Cyprus, Edessa, Syria and Lesser Armenia. The Crusader Kingdoms faction is not added yet, but the units are.