Back on the grid (somewhat?)

[Tristrem]

Hello everyone, it seems like it has been years since I have posted anything on the forums. I just drifted away after MTW2 was a disappointment, and never came back after I heard ETW was such a debacle. However, since I heard the there will be a Shogun 2, it sparked my interest to come back and see if anyone still plays MTW?

I have just reloaded MTW back on my computer, and what can I say except that this game is such a wonderful gem to still own. However, finding mods and the patch for VI has been quite the chore.

The reason I am posting is that I am somewhat interested in making my own mod to suite my own playing tastes, and I am wondering if anyone would be interested if I shared it, and or wanted to help in making it.

My idea would be to make the game more like STW in that everything was simple. The player never outclassed the opponents troops because it was easy to build up the infrastructure to make the best troops. This is the main area I feel the vanilla game fails at. The ai still builds peasants in the 1350's.

So here is my idea:

1) No more peasants period.

2) Eras for units, so that the ai has to build better units in later eras.

3) More realistic build times. A advanced spearmaker should not take 8 years to build.

4) Homelands for units, not building longbowmen in egypt, or camels in russia.

5) Adjust the troops available to each faction, in a medmod like way, i.e. italy has great spears, france has great knights, english archers are a force to be reckoned with.

6) I really don't have any experience making new units, or factions, so I won't make this a priority, but if I have time, I may dabble into that.

any feedback on these ideas would be greatly appreciated!

Merry Christmas

[drone]

Welcome back, Tristrem.

1) No more peasants period.

I leave them in for the revolts, but make them untrainable. Ballistas as well.

2) Eras for units, so that the ai has to build better units in later eras.

I like this idea. The problem I see is the build requirements from Feudal X to Chivalric X might leave poorer factions in the lurch. This would need to be looked into, it might also get solved with 3).

3) More realistic build times. A advanced spearmaker should not take 8 years to build.

Probably a good idea. You would need to balance fort upgrade times with this, and I'm not sure if the AI will be able to budget for it, you can go through a lot of cash with shorter build times.

4) Homelands for units, not building longbowmen in egypt, or camels in russia.

Definitely. Not only is it more realistic, but this will give you a very rudimentary supply chain mechanic.

5) Adjust the troops available to each faction, in a medmod like way, i.e. italy has great spears, france has great knights, english archers are a force to be reckoned with.

To some extent this is already in place. If you want to nudge a faction one way, maybe use the unit discount feature? I'd be careful using the province valour bonus feature, the AI can cripple itself economically in the single-minded attempt to get the build reqs for the unit.

6) I really don't have any experience making new units, or factions, so I won't make this a priority, but if I have time, I may dabble into that.

Never tried new units. Factions aren't too difficult, unless you get super crazy making them unique.

[PershsNhpios]

Welcome again Tristrem and Merry Christmas to both of you!

I have found all mods again except MedMod v4 which seems to have sunk with wes.apolyton.net

I am sure you realise that you will have a very small audience for the approval and testing of such a mod, but you should also know that this very small audience will likely be most zealous of all to help you, and I think there may be an advantage there in that you can cater to a smaller field of suggestions and make a very specialised (special) mod.

I agree with drone's comments, but have no experience in modding myself.

My own suggestion is that if you have the time and will, experiment and make a start, and if anyone is in the Hall here, I think you will find support and feedback.

Thank you for the post!

[drone]

I'll add this: For some good ideas about improving the game mechanics/AI through modding, you could read through the PocketMod/Britannia Divided sub-forum. Martok, Caravel, Psychonaut, and several others did quite a bit of work trying to improve the gameplay through unit and building tweaks. They never did finish it, but there are a lot of good ideas and conversations in the mod forum.

[gollum]

Not sure about the homelands: the AI is not aware of the provinces that are "home" to the factions he is controlling. The most effective for the sake of teh game is units that are nation/faction/kingdom oriented rather than region oriented. Too specific homelands will inevitably make the Ai factions fight with generic units only. I've actually tried that, as did others, and its not a very good idea, despite how promising it sounds.

Not sure about the medmod adjustement; its true that the battles are more balanced that way but a lot of the diversity or faction fighting styles determined by the rosters of vanilla are lost. It is however a valid option.

Also the more "realistic" build times will take out a strategic management layer from the game. The idea behind progressively increasing build times and cost for more advanced buildings in the same thread (swordsmith, spearmaker etc) is that the player has to choose which direction of recruitment he will take (at least within that province). Otherwise it will result in being able to eventually build everything everywhere, something that will take out that strategic element, as well as the associated risk, ie that a rival faction can put an end to the progression towards cetrain advanced units by occupying the province(s).

[Gaiseric]

I recommend giving the Samurai Warlords Mod a try. It is a mod for MTW:VI and very well done. It is basically Shogun Total War with a bunch of improvements. I think that there are around 25 playable factions on a map of Japan with 60 provinces. The units have been modded so that they are the same as in STW too. Its one of the best MTW mods that I have played so far.