Guide To Adding New Cultures - Discussion

[Dol Guldur]

I have uploaded the first draft of my Complete Guide To Adding New Cultures in BI...

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?p=945668#post945668

This is the thread for discussing it and getting it perfect! ;)

[Sahran]

So we dont have any hardcoded limit on cultures, or as I understand it, religions? That's pretty cool, and at least one limitation off the modders backs.

[Dol Guldur]

I'm going to need to research the sound files for a new culture; unit models in the battlemap seem to work, but strat_map voices are currently missing as are the battle events and music. Battle speech has defaulted to Roman.

This is an area in which help would be appreciated as I know little of the sound text files.


Sahran,

7 seems to be the hardcoded limit. Attempts to add an 8th culture fail even after swapping. But even 1 extra culture opens up quite a bit more for us modders!

[alpaca]

No problemo:
You'll have to go through each sound description file, every one of it has "culture" lines. Just search the culture you want (e.g. barbarian) in the text file and append your culture to it.
You can also add new culture blocks copying the old ones if you want to use custom sounds.
I guessed this would happen as I know some about sound files from my work on Chivalry...

[Dol Guldur]

Thx. Alpaca.

Adding my new culture to the culture lines in the export_descr_soudns_stratmap_voice.txt file produced no results.

I will look into it more.

[alpaca]

Oh, I forgot.
You have to delete or rename data\sounds\events.dat
But leave the .idx intact or the game will crash.
I hope that still works as it did in 1.2...

[Dol Guldur]

That did the trick! Thx - getting nearer to adding to the tutorial now. I see the folder you point out now contains a bi dat file too.

One question, a new dat file did not seem to generate...

[alpaca]

No it doesn't.
The sound files of the game are stored in the .dats or in a subfolder of data/sounds
You can unpack the dats with a tool of Vercingetorix', or at least you could in 1.2 to get all the sound files out but you shouldn't do that as it seriously slows down loading the game (in vanilla there are some ten thousands of sound files).
The idx files contain a list of the sound files used.
events.dat now is different insofar as it links the sounds to game events, but if you delete or rename this file, the "prerogative" goes back to the text files, i.e. the game reads them out instead of the events.dat file.
You still need the idx because it probably holds a list of game events or something to be linked to the sound files, but I'm not sure about that.

[Dol Guldur]

Thx. Alpaca, now I understand (I think). Are there any tutorials on modding sound anywhere?

[Dol Guldur]

The Guide to Adding a New Culture in BI has been updated to incorporate sound, music and vocal slots for your new culture...

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=55112

Comments welcomed.

[Lonely Soldier]

Dol Guldur - Shame its only one, but this is still a great discovery ~:cheers: ! Every little bit helps!

[Dol Guldur]

Lonely soldier:

Dol Guldur - Shame its only one, but this is still a great discovery ! Every little bit helps!


Thx. I still awaiting feedback on those who have tried it out - and the way battle-map models tie in to culture needs to be addressed (I am woefully ignorant on the matter).

[hoggy]

I've got it working as per your tutorial, I used a copy of an Eastern culture to create the new one. Might be worth mentioning when you auto rename files in export_descr_buildings to watchout for unit types named the same as the culture ie 'eastern archers'. The new Lombardi faction ends up with mostly eastern buildings but some roman and barbarian too (I think it's hardcoded religion based buildings?) I've been trying to get my new eastern culture to use egyptian ITEM files but am at a bit of a loss. My modding skills in that department are a bit lacking. It's abit of a dissapointment that BI uses only 3 unique cultures as far as ITEM files go. Top tutorial though, cheers.

[Dol Guldur]

Excellent, not just me that has it working then ;)

Thx for the tip. Wish I could help on ITEM files, but I know nothing of that area. :(

(but keep us updated!)

[Ciaran]

Does the guide apply only to BI or does it work in Rome 1.3 as well?

[hoggy]

Ok, I think I've mostly cracked it... mostly. I followed your guide and created a new eastern based culture instead of barbarian. I then when through each step changing this new culture to egyptian and copied the egyptian UI from RTW 1.3 over the newly created eastern based culture UI files. Then in descr_settlement_plan.txt as well as the section around line 8576 you mentioned I editted the two sections above that (plans and plans by level) using text from RTW 1.3 settlement files to ad the egyptian paragraphs. This basically resulted in my new culture using mostly egyptian ITEM files in battle mode. I think the remaining buildings are the remnants of the Lombardii tech tree where it can't find egyptian equivalents... I've not tested heavily yet but I think it's close. Hopefully with a new tech tree we will have another set of ITEM files to edit unique to the new culture.

[blindfaithnogod]

thats good news hoggy. good goin, i was kinda headed in that dirrection aswell....

[Dol Guldur]

Ciaran, it's just for BI. Although you can of course use RTW resources (as hoggy is doing with Egyptian).

Hoggy, Great going. You will of course provide the step-by-step tutorial for this so that I can link to it from the New Culture Guide when you are finished? ;)

[Burns]

Having an extra culture is better than nothing.

[Dol Guldur]

Having 7 rather than 6 cultural groupings for the portraits, buildings, audio etc. of your factions will open up a whole new dimension for most mods I think, especially those based in fiction or those wishing to create subcultures (or new cultures) in historical mods.


And please post in the discussion thread - this is for the tutorial! :)

[hoggy]

Ok DG here it is, this is possibly more long-winded than it needs to be but this is how how I did it:

Part 1: New Eastern Culture

Follow Dol Guldur’s tutorial but with these variations:

Step 1

part.2: ‘Eastnew’ instead of Chinese.

Step 2 and 3

Copy the content of the eastern folder not the barbarian and call your folders ‘EASTNEW’

Step 4

Copy eastern section and replace Chinese with eastnew

Step 5

Change from barbarian to eastnew

Step 6

Follow instruction but replace ‘eastern’ with ‘eastern, eastnew’ instead of ‘barbarian’ with ‘barbarian, chinese’ (go back afterward to alter where your eastern archers have been renamed too)

Step 7

Instead of chinese Barbarian_plan_levels put eastnew Eastern_plan_levels

Step 8

{UI_EASTNEW} EASTNEW instead of {UI_CHINESE} CHINESE

and {EASTNEW} Eastnew instead of {CHINESE} Chinese

Step 9

Copy Eastern section instead and put eastnew on banner line

Step 10 and 11

Rename files with prefix eastnew instead of Chinese

I’ve not gone into sound and music here
Test this to check it’s working and that the Lombardi use eastern portraits etc.

Part 2: Changing NewEast into Egyptian culture that uses Egypt’s ITEM files:

Step 1
open campaign_descriptions.txt in the bi data\text folder

change eastnew to Egyptian

Step 2
Rename your BI EASTNEW UI folder to EGYPTIAN and copy the contents of your Rome Egypt UI files into this folder

Step 3
Open up BI data\descr_cultures.txt and rename eastnew to egyptian including the building tga paths.

Step 4
Open up BI data\descr_sm_factions.txt change Lombardi to Egyptian culture

Step 5
Open up BI data\export_descr_buildings.txt

Replace all ‘eastnew’ with ‘egyptian’

Step 6
Open up the BI data\descr_settlement_plans.txt

Go to around line 8438

In the ‘plans’ section add:

plan Egyptian_Fort egyptian_fort.txt
plan Egyptian_Village egyptian_village.txt
plan Egyptian_Town egyptian_town.txt
plan Egyptian_Large_Town egyptian_large_town.txt
plan Egyptian_City egyptian_city.txt
plan Egyptian_Large_City egyptian_large_city.txt
plan Egyptian_Huge_City egyptian_huge_city.txt

in ‘PLANS BY LEVEL’ add:


plan_levels Egyptian_plan_levels
{
village Egyptian_Village
town Egyptian_Town
large_town Egyptian_Large_Town
city Egyptian_City
large_city Egyptian_Large_City
huge_city Egyptian_Huge_City
}

and in PLAN SETS

replace: eastnew Eastern_plan_levels
with: egyptian Egyptian_plan_levels

Step 7
Edit tags and text as in step 8 of DG’s tutorial (I think there are already Egyptian entries but best to check)

Step 8
Open up BI data\descr_banners.txt

Change eastnew to Egyptian

Step 9
I think that’s it. You’ll see that the Lombardi are using Egyptian buildings in battles. You need to adjust their export_descr_buildings to match Egyptian building production closer to make sure the last few are replaced (for example Christian churches etc). You can then edit portraits, ITEMS etc of the egyptians to any culture. I’m hoping I haven’t missed anything. If anyone finds anything post here. Cheers to Dol Guldur for sorting the process.

[Dol Guldur]

Hoggy,

Thx. Much appreciated. I've added in the link.

I've changed step 6 of my Guide to read:

Simply replace "barbarian," with "barbarian, chinese,"... which will avoid replacing any units (I thought I had it that way anyway - strange).

Thx. again.

[alpaca]

Has anyone tried how (and if) the Combat_V_Culture modifiers used in the traits file and with ancillaries work with new cultures?
Hope this is not hardcoded, maybe anyone can test it, I don't really have the time right now...

[Dol Guldur]

That's a great question, but I'm not going to have time to check it this week :(

Anyone?

[Rodion Romanovich]

Great guide, made adding a slavic culture easy!

[Rodion Romanovich]

Some things I've noticed:

- not editing diplomacy will result in messages like DRT_MESSAGE_BLA_ (looking like the tags for diplomatic messages) appearing instead of the real messages ingame. No crash. But editing them doesn't seem to fix the situation either! Has anyone successfully fixed a new culture with correct diplomatic messages? I tried to copy the roman section of the diplomacy file in Data/text, then editing the part "roman" to "slavic" (the name of my added culture), but to no avail. The diplomacy scroll still shows messages like DRT_MESSAGE_WELCOME_NEUTRAL etc. instead of the actual messages it should show. Screenshot:

https://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y191/LegioXXXUlpiaVictrix/diplomacy.jpg

- in order for building descriptions etc. to work in-game, you need to edit export_buildings.txt in Bi/data/text/.
1. Copy all entries of the form:
{proconsuls_palace_barbarian} Great Hall

{proconsuls_palace_barbarian_desc}
The Great Hall is an unmissable statement of might. The building's size and grandeur are intended to impress all who walk through its doors. The servants based here collect taxes, manage improvements to the settlement and carry out the 'business of empire'. The Great Hall allows for sophisticated development in the city outside its walls, as costly building works can now be undertaken. All aspects of government - civic, military and religious - can be improved as a result.

{proconsuls_palace_barbarian_desc_short}
The Great Hall is an unmissable symbol of the tribe's might. Those who live in its shadow can have no doubts as to who is in charge.

2. In the pasted copy, edit the tag from barbarian to your new culture. In this guide, it would be "chinese". For me, it was "slavic".

3. Edit the texts if desired

[Dol Guldur]

Legio,

Thanks for your post. I will have to look into the diplomatic element when I get time.

I usually think of the buildings on a factional basis - and mod faction-specific descriptions - which is why it probably never occurred to me to address this matter. Thx.

[Dol Guldur]

I have added Step 15 to the Guide which now allows you to set up all the diplomacy messages for your new culture.

Thanks to Legio for pointing out this omission. Legio, let me know if you can't get it to work - but I have tested it and it works for me.

IMPORTANT EDIT: Legio, it looks like you were right - though it is the bottom-most culture that gets displaced, not necessarily the new one. I have subsequently discovered the error your reported now exists for the Nomad culture after adding my new culture. It is strange that it should not allow another when everything else does - I won't have any time to revisit this for a few days :( Any help is appreciated.

Can a mod please sticky the tutorial? I think it's quite important.

[Dol Guldur]

Problem solved - full diplomacy messages now available for all cultures...

Note that the game rejects the last-occurring culture entry, so place Greek (or Egypt) entries at the bottom of the file for all BI culture diplomacy messages to work - this will not cause Greek diplomacy messages not to display correctly in R:TW as it is read from its own file in the R:TW data folder.

[Rodion Romanovich]

Wow, this is interesting. Shouldn't this mean it's possible to add some more cultures by removing for instance Egyptian too like greek was removed above? Then we could get 8 cultures ~:)

[Dol Guldur]

I already had this thought but the problem with adding the file - if you read back - was not with a file containing old references to R:TW slots :(

Again, I'm willing to be proved wrong ;)

[nikolai1962]

Great guide, very clear.

I followed it to add a 7th culture to 1.5. No problems so far.

[Dol Guldur]

Thank you.

Glad to be of help.

[nikolai1962]

Odd problem adding a 7th culture in 1.5

Normally, when you double-click on an ai faction city you get the scroll with a lot of question-marks. It always displays defenses and ports though, if they are present.

If i start a campaign as one of the factions that i assigned to my new "steppe" culture and look in a city with a wall or port then it is fine, the building graphic and text open no problem. However if i double-click on a steppe-culture city that belongs to the ai, and that city has either a wall or a port, then the game crashs. If i remove the wall/port from the descr_strat and start up again i can double-click the city no problem.

Just wondering if anyone had come across and soved this problem?

[alpaca]

Sounds as if the game can't find a tooltip, a file or something to me...
Might be something completely different, though ;)

[Dol Guldur]

Might need to see some screenshots of the former display problem - no, I've not come across it. You get display problems when something has not been coded in for a new culture - like the diplomacy messages etc.

As for the CTD, sounds like the culture change has caused some problems with the old culture-faction assignments as build requirements in EDB. Remember that although the cultural terms may still make sense culturally the factions may not if they have been specified as a faction rather than the culture.

If you post which faction has been reassigned the new culture and post the edb section showing the problem building tree I might be able to see the problem.

[nikolai1962]

The display bit is fine, just the normal thing of getting question-marks instead of the buildings when you double-click an ai city when you don't have a spy close.

The code is below. As you can see i am using all cultures.


wooden_pallisade requires factions { barbarian, steppe, carthaginian, eastern, egyptian, greek, roman, } and building_present_min_level government_types govtype4 or building_present_min_level barbgovs barbgov4 or building_present_min_level nomadsett smallstlmnt
{
capability
{
wall_level 0
tower_level 1
}
construction 2
cost 800
settlement_min town
upgrades
{
wooden_wall
}
}

I'd normally expect an instant ctd when the game tries to display an info scroll to be related to a text error somewhere but doesn't seem to be. Plus that would normally (i think) show up the same way when you right-clicked a building in one of your own cities. If I start as one of the steppe culture factions and look at a port/wall in one of my starting cities it is fine but not if i start as another faction and then double-click the same city. Strange.

Just wondered if anyone had seen it. I'll try making copies of the port/wall graphics and renaming them steppe instead of the barb ones the culture file is pointing at.

Ty both for comments.

[Dol Guldur]

I've not seen a distinction between the AI and Local faction during play; what can the AI do that the player cannot in this regard?

Have you tried using the faction name(s) instead of the new culture?

[nikolai1962]

I've not seen a distinction between the AI and Local faction during play; what can the AI do that the player cannot in this regard?

Have you tried using the faction name(s) instead of the new culture?

The only distinction is the AI doesn't randomly double-click on enemy cities whereas I do sometimes when i'm thinking (thereby discovering the ctd) :)

I'll try that idea. Ty again

[PROMETHEUS]

is possible to add completely new walls to this culture that do not use any model by the others and is not a retexture ?

[cyaneopubescens]

That's a great guide, however I still bump into problems...

For a long time I've wanted to make a LOTR mod but knowing that that would be total suicide I've come to the conclusion that simply adding an Orcish culture to BI would already be fun enough.

I have two choices for doing that, modingfying an old culture, or doing what you did so nicely - adding a new one and then modding it.

My first try at following your guide ended in failure however. After step 11 the game wouldn't start anymore, it crashed after the first copyright screen. So obviously something is wrong and I have to spend time figuring that out.

However, I have a few questions if you don't mind me asking:

- When following step 6 in your guide one will end up with "barbarian, chinese, chinese, ..." in three places in the BI data\export_descr_buildings.txt. is that intentional or accident? I figured only one mention would be nessessary and removed the extras. I don't know if that possibly was a mistake.

- In step 11 you say "We need to change *all* of these in the same manner as with the cities", does that mean editing them in export_descr_buildings.txt too, because I don't see where the buildings are mentioned bound to culture in that file. Or do you mean that if one changes the name from for example cesspit to goopit that one has to edit THAT in the txt?

- Are steps 12 through 15 "Must do's" or just guidelines for further modding that don't nessessarily have to be implemented?

- One of the most important questions: Should the game be able to run between each of the steps in your guide? Because that would be a great debugging tool if I knew that, or after what steps the game can be started or not.

Thanks!

[Dol Guldur]

Thanks for the post - I will address your questions as soon as I can, but the next few days are very hectic and critical here at the Fourth Age.

Suffice to say for now, a number of people have it working without any problems so please check that you have followed the instructions correctly. Some of your comments suggest you have not. I'll make a proper post as soon as I can.

[cyaneopubescens]

Yeah I'm sure I missed something since several people, including you have it all working. I've made a clean install now (though 1.6!) and backup and will have another go at it from scratch.

BTW, there is another question I wanted to adress:
You state the following: "This Guide requires that you have unpacked the PAK files in the manner prescribed in the readme for that software."
I did not find the readme very helpful in regard to telling me what paks to unpack, so I only used xpak on "ui_1.pak" as suggested here:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=49498
I got the feeling that was all I needed, correct?

Thanks for your support! :)

[cyaneopubescens]

Ok, I've done it this time and I've done it right. It must have been the step 6 problem, there was no double mention of the cultures this time.

Now I wonder about two more things:
- In the settlement details the religious symbols for the breakdown of religious belief are missing. Any idea about that problem? (Remember, I modded 1.6, maybe that's the problem)
- The culture still stands as the Lombardi in most instances: in the chose culture screen, in-game on the map... can that be changed?

Sorry about the load of questions. I'll be trying to get at those issues myself, so I'm only asking to cut time in case you or someone else already knows the answers.

[reahad]

You didn't mention anything about the generals, lesser_generals. Do they appear as the Barbarian generals or do you have to model new ones?

[Dol Guldur]

Reahad,

That question is not relevant to culture but to faction, generals are assigned to the faction or factions you are using in the new culture in exactly the same way regardless of whether or not you have an extra culture.

See descr_character.txt

[reahad]

Reahad,

That question is not relevant to culture but to faction, generals are assigned to the faction or factions you are using in the new culture in exactly the same way regardless of whether or not you have an extra culture.

See descr_character.txt


Thats not what I meant. I was talking about the generals on the campaign map, NOT on the battle map. I guess my question wasn't that clear.:oops:

[Lusted]

Same thing. It's assinged in descr_characters.txt.

[reahad]

Dol Guldur: Can you please post samples of the files that you edited (especially the ones dealing with the music,voices,sounds)?
I tried adding an Indian culture as a copy of the Eastern one and it didn't work. When I tested it in a custom battle, I had the captain saying the correct lines, but in the Roman voice.

[Dol Guldur]

Have you added the "Indian" entry (a copy of the Eastern one I presume) in export_descr_sounds_prebattle.txt?

Roman is what the game will default to if you've not coded such things in. See Step 13 in the Guide.

[Neon twilight]

I'm trying to give egyptian culture eastern buildings so It's just a matter of using the same building models for both culture

I've red the tutorial and only made changes regarding settlement plans in descr_settlement_plan and I still got egyptian buildings on the battle map, what's wrong ? did I missed something ?


plans
{
plan Egyptian_Fort eastern_fort.txt
plan Egyptian_Village eastern_village.txt
plan Egyptian_Town eastern_town.txt
plan Egyptian_Large_Town eastern_large_town.txt
plan Egyptian_City eastern_city.txt
plan Egyptian_Large_City eastern_large_city.txt
plan Egyptian_Huge_City eastern_huge_city.txt


plans_by_level
{

plan_levels Egyptian_plan_levels
{
village Eastern_Village
town Eastern_Town
large_town Eastern_Large_Town
city Eastern_City
large_city Eastern_Large_City
huge_city Eastern_Huge_City


plan_set default_set
{
locale any
;default test_levels

roman Roman_plan_levels
greek Greek_plan_levels
carthaginian Carthaginian_plan_levels
egyptian Eastern_plan_levels
eastern Eastern_plan_levels
barbarian Barbarian_plan_levels

[Dol Guldur]

Neon,

I've added a link to Step 14 that is related. I wanted to have it for reference anyway. I think it may help you:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=55841

[Neon twilight]

Thanks It has solved my problem.

[Squid]

I know this is an old thread, but I found something that is missing from the guide (or at least I didn't spot after reading it through a couple of times):

In step 6, you add the new culture to EDB, but no note is given that you also have to edit export_buildings.txt because there are no entries there for your new culture, so any buildings that is culturally (and not factionally) specified in export_buildings will not have an ingame description.

[Dol Guldur]

Thx Squid - I've added in a bit of text to highlight this. All text files that reference culture may of course ge affected.

[Squid]

Interesting bug I've come across. I had completed all steps except for step 14 and changing all the text entries in the data/text folder that aren't listed in the guide. The game loaded and everything seemed to be working correctly, except I noticed I was missing building descriptions. I added in all the missing building descriptions, changed the rest of files in data/text that needed changing, and did step 14 by adding nomad to all culture blocks that had barbarian listed as a culture.



cultures
{
barbarian
nomad <--- this was added to all barbarian culture blocks
}


The problem is that now when I load RTW, the game loads, but there is no menu options on the main screen. If I click on the single player option (by choosing the top option where the mouse cursor changes) then choose any option on the next menu (again no text), the game instantly CTDs.

Any ideas of what is causing the problem?

[Dol Guldur]

None at all. As other mods have a seventh culture working (in BI and RTW) I can only suggest you backtrack and see if you can narrow down the cause.

[Monkwarrior]

I can only say that I added the nomad culture to ITW mod for RTW following the tutorial without problems. And the file descr_settlement_plans was modified in the same way, including the nomad culture in all the barbarian slots.

My advice is the same as Dol Guldur.:yes:

[Squid]

That's what I ended up having to do, I undid all the work and redid it and had no problem the second time. I figure I messed up something in one of the files in data/text. An interesting thing I did note, I tried to add an entry {SMT_CULTURE_NOMAD} to strat.txt, right after the barbarian entry at the top, and all the in game entries from below that were off by one. It appears that the order of the entries in strat.txt matters.

[Monkwarrior]

That's what I ended up having to do, I undid all the work and redid it and had no problem the second time. I figure I messed up something in one of the files in data/text. An interesting thing I did note, I tried to add an entry {SMT_CULTURE_NOMAD} to strat.txt, right after the barbarian entry at the top, and all the in game entries from below that were off by one. It appears that the order of the entries in strat.txt matters.
Yes, not only in that file. I found a similar result, but I cannot remember in which file. It was something related to a victory text for a non-playable faction, and everything below this new line was moved.

[Dol Guldur]

Yup, some files are like that - basically I think it is the ones where the text has a specific placement rather than solely in a scroll body of text.

[Sandrokottos]

Hey guys,
i followed Dol Guldur's and Hoggy's instructions step by step and its working all in all.
But when i want to battle in a city of this brand new egyptian BI culture I get no egyptian buildings like palace, temple barracks etc.
Instead of this I get roman replacements, 'normal' city buildings not even their palace or temple.
I made a modfolder for this, but nevertheless it schould have worked.
Did i do something wrong?

[Squid]

You've obviously skipped or done incorrectly the step where it mentions you have to edit descr_settlement_plan.txt in order to get battle buildings into the game. Its a lot of tedious work to do that one step, I found it took about as much time as the rest of the guide put together.