MTW Viking Expansion Revisited - Help With Belated Mod?

[drone]

I only get 71 columns in Gnome. The last 3 columns in the text file are actually combined in Gnome, deals with how the unit is available as mercenaries. You can't see all 3 usually unless you select a unit box for that column, then you see YES/NO, an era distinction, and a faction distinction. You might want to check that box for all units to verify that you aren't missing a column for a unit.

[OldMan]

Ah-ha! So after the "yes/no", it indicates which factions are eligible to hire such as mercenaries, and early/high/late for doing so! Is that it?

Also, after doing quite a few modifications in the unit file, the game is now not showing up. That last box; Does that have anything to do with it? Or do I have a problem somewhere else that I need to look?

(Cripes, I'm getting closer than I have in 3 years of working on this silly thing!)

[OldMan]

Nevermind. I got it. A Couple missing lines from the startpos file and some junk from the Viking Expansion in the UnitProd file. Got the Danes, Scots, Welsh, Mercians, English, Sicilians, italians, Papacy (non-playable), (with as many factions that are bunched up, he's gonna be on excommunicating *** ), Germans, Hungarians, Polish, French, Aragonese, Spanish, Almohad, Turks, Irish, Egyptians, Byzantines, Golden Horde, Novgorod, Russians (which I may take out, haven't decided yet), Swiss and Burgundians -- and I think that's all. Going to ignore the Saxons (assumed they became or were obsorbed by the English) and the Picts (assuming they became or were absorbed by the Scots). Gonna throw in the Northumbrians, though, and then work from there and see if i can't get all 30+ factions vying for control.

[drone]

If I remember correctly, there is a hard limit of 31 factions (+ rebels), so you will need to fit under that. Are you going to have both Novgorod and the Russians? In vanilla they are essentially the same faction, just named differently based on era.

[OldMan]

Haven't decided yet on the Russian thing. Maybe so, being as I do not want to mess around with flags/directories etc. that will mess up the Vanilla game. I like to play it sometimes.

You've been a lot of help and I really appreciate it, but I do have yet another question ....

I tried following the directions precisely of John Duke's guide for not CTD during battles. So, I copied/renamed Peasants folder, called it Custom0, renamed all files within with Peasant in the name replacing with Custom0 then tried to play.

"Description label is unknown. Clumn 27 row 1. Custom0".

What did I do wrong? Any ideas? I've reviewed my work and the directions, and don't see anything different than what is described.

Also, there is a file there called "Peasants"; Should that be renamed as well to "Custom0s"?

[OldMan]

Nevermind. Got it. Found it in another thread. Must be all caps.

CUSTOM0 not Custom0.

Not crashing in battles. And those Joms Vikings are pretty tuff.

Problems with labels. Guess I will have to play around in names.txt and changes.txt. Don't want to. They have been touchy with me in the past. Of course, I have been doing ok with the FactionSpecific file, and that one gave me fits in the past too.

[drone]

The labels are tough, if I remember correctly everything has to be in the order the factions are declared. Very easy to mess things up.

Haven't decided yet on the Russian thing. Maybe so, being as I do not want to mess around with flags/directories etc. that will mess up the Vanilla game. I like to play it sometimes.

One thing you might want to try is to work in a directory copy. The standard way of playing multiple mods of MTW is to do a fresh install/VI/patch, and then copy the entire directory to another pathname. All you need to do then is create a desktop shortcut to the new directory's Medieval .exe to play the mod, while the vanilla game is untouched. It also leaves you an unmodified set of files for reference when playing around with your changes.