Adding in a general

[Amon_Zeth]

How do I add in a general? I've given him traits and only 8 ancilliaries and I coped the other general formats perfectly. Does he have to have a Latin name (since I put him in for the Julii family)? Is there something else I have to do?

[alpaca]

Short answer: Yes.
Long answer:
We...ell naming conventions seem a bit... strict in R:TW.
Your new Character will need a name consisting of a first name (you find those in /data/descr_names.txt under your faction, in this case "faction: Romans Julii" after "character") and/or a surname which you find after surnames. You can also add names here, but if you do, make sure to also edit /data/text/names.txt by adding: {Name} Display Name

[Amon_Zeth]

What do I do after I get a working name? And there's another file called descr_name_lookup, should I put the new name in there too?

[alpaca]

You can put the name in descr_name_lookup.txt if you want. However it seems to me that it is only there for determining which names are in the game, and it is not, I am rather sure, necessary for a name to work. But maybe you are right to put it in there, it could be that it is used for something ^^
What do you mean with your first question, though?
It would help if you posted the lines you are adding, just make sure you add some relatives, too (I'm not sure which ones are required but I think he has to be someones son at the least).

[Amon_Zeth]

My question is how do I add a general into the strategic game, specifically for the Julii family.

I'm adding the following into the game-

character Lycaios Nairas, named character, heir, command 0,
influence 0, management 0, subterfuge 1, age 18, , x 90, y 86 traits Brave 3,
NaturalMilitarySkill 5, GoodCommander 5, GoodAttacker 5, Intelligent 3,
StrategicSkill 4, RhetoricSkill 2, PoliticsSkill 3, Austere 3,
GoodAdministrator 4, GoodDefender 5, MathematicsSkill 3, GoodDiplomat 5,
AuthoritarianRomanVirtue 3,
GoodCavalryGeneral 3, GoodRiskyAttacker 3, GoodInfantryGeneral 3, PublicFaith
3, GoodTrader 3, GoodAmbusher 3, Rabblerouser 3 ancillaries aged_retainer,
freeman_clerk, treasurer, tutor, quartermaster, bodyguard, heroic_saviour,
drillmaster, beastmaster army
unit roman generals guard cavalry
exp 0 armour 0 weapon_lvl 0

inserted the names in the Julii faction, and put in this for the relatives

relative Flavius Julius, Faustina, Lucius Julius, Quintus Julius, Vibius Julius, Lycaios Nairas end
and
relative Lycaios Nairas end

but I still can't get it to work. What else should I do/change?

[fenir]

Amon seth,


To add a general is alot of work, i did part one last weekend. (carpe diem)

You need to add an entire history et... for them. I have written alittle in a howto, but i haven't posted it yet because i haven't finished, also i found a few bugs.
So i suspect that there are some things I have missed.

But it is one hell of alot of work.

I had a look at adding a faction too, but that is even worse. And I am not even sure adding a faction would work at this stage.
(Aut viam inveniam aut faciam.............I will either find a way or make one.)



But the general does need lots of work.

fenir

[TNZ]

I had the same problem when I tried to add a new general to the scipii faction.

So I had a look at all the other factions to see what I had done wrong. All the other generals seemed to have wives, so I gave my new general a wife and he appeared on the map.

[Szun]

well i only wanted to add some children to flash out the famaly..
I looked over the format and added the "children" as alive, non leader as stated with the others and into the relative section.
I made sure i only used the propper julii names under name.txt julii section.
I even copied the spaces in the format...all in all it looked perfect but it didnt work.
I went back and sorted the children by age from the top...same with females..
still didnt work..then i gave up and and added to priest of jupiter fertality 9 :P

[Sinner]

Amon Zeth:
First off, you've declared the character as heir, but have you removed that entry from Lucius Julius' stats?

The 'relative' entry for your general - the one that reads "relative Lycaios Nairas end" - isn't required since you've not given him a wife, you'll need to comment that out or create him a wife.

The starting coordinates you've chosen will put your general in the Gaul's territory, change to x 90, y 85 instead... that'll put you at the northernmost extent of the Julii territory.

As a note changing the command, influence, management & subterfuge values to anything other than zero seems to have no effect.

Since there's a maximum command of 10, adding GoodAttacker, GoodCavalryGeneral, etc is somewhat pointless since you already have NaturalMilitarySkill 5 and GoodCommander 5.

Lastly since you've gone to the effort of making a super general, I'd really suggest adding the trait of Sane 1... it's a hidden trait that avoids any chance of picking up the lunacy type traits.

EDIT: As a note, reading one of the earlier replies, you don't have to make your general related to anybody... I have a few unrelated extra generals in various factions in my modded campaign. If you do add relatives, make sure you get the ages correct... don't have a 18yo general with a 6yo son, since the game requires the males to be 16yo IIRC before they can start fathering children.

Basic rules seem to be:
- Don't have more than one leader or heir
- Don't try to place more than one general or admiral in the same army/location, although you can have multiple assassins, diplomats & spies start at the same location (the game quibbles but doesn't CTD).
- Generals must have an army with at least a general's bodyguard, admirals must have a fleet with at least one ship.
- Be careful not to have naval units start on land and land units at sea! Similarly, avoid placing land units in the middle of unpassable terrain.
- Make sure ages are sensible, especially regarding children. It appears that men can start fathering at 16 - I've read that wives can be as young as 12! - and only one child per year - I vaguely recall trying twins, but it didn't work.
- Only chose names from your faction's list, although you can add new ones as noted earlier in the thread.
- Copy & paste a similar characater type to make sure you get the basic format right, it can save a lot of heartache when you have an otherwise correct entry, but have got spacing wrong or a missing comma.
- You can have as many traits as you like, but only 8 ancilliaries.


EDIT 2:
Amon Zeth, just noticed in your 'relative' entry where you make your new general the youngest son of Flavius Julius that you're missing the comma after your character's name, which will cause the campaign to fail.
Plus I just tested whether a general without a wife needs a relative entry and he doesn't... having one will stop the campaign from loading - I amended my note above.

[Sinner]

Thought I'd better start a new post rather than just keep editting the one above...

Further rules/comments regarding starting characters' ancilliaries...
- There's no point adding an ancilliary if your culture is is excluded from having that particular one, eg. Romans can't have Actors as ancilliaries, since he/she simply won't appear among the general's retinue.
- You can have more than one priest - I've seen this question somewhere - and you can even add foreign priests, even though you won't pick them up in-game.
- Some ancilliaries exclude others, eg. you can't have an exotic slave if you already have a barbarian slave (although oddly enough the reverse isn't true). Whichever one you put first in the list of ancilliaries will be the one you get. (so considering the oddity of the two slaves, place the exotic slave before the barbarian slave and you'll have both; place the barbarian one first and you'll only get her)
- Some ancilliaries can only be gained by certain characters, eg. only assassins can have poisoners. You can add these ancilliaries to your general, but they may not have an effect.

[alpaca]

Ok, as I found out, yesterday's post of mine was partly incorrect.
It seems that male members of the Roman families have to have the surname of their family (in this case you must style your general Lycaios Julius) or the game will change their surname to Julius automatically. Strangely enough this doesn't apply to any adopted characters during the game...
Anyways, as already pointed out by Sinner, you may have two heirs in your Julii faction.
But more importantly, be EXTREMELY cautious with your formatting! It is a real pain in the ass editing the descr_strat.txt
I will post you the formatting (even omitting a space can screw you, so again, beware):
character(TAB)name,(space)command(space)0,... ...,(space)age(space)#,(space),(space)x(space)#,(space)y(space)#(space)(linebreak) {The last space is optional}
traits(space)trait1(space)#,(space)trait2 #,...
ancillaries(space)ancillary1,(space)ancillary2,... ...,(space)ancillary8 (space)(linebreak) {again the last space is optional}
(linebreak) {optional}
army(linebreak)
unit(TAB)(TAB){unit id}(TAB)(TAB)(TAB)(TAB){stats}(linebreak)
...
(linebreak) {optional}
(linebreak) {optional}
character_record(TAB)(TAB)name,(space)(TAB)gender,(space){stats}(linebreak)
...
(linebreak) {optional}
relative(space)(TAB)name,(space)(TAB)wife,(TAB)(TAB)child1,(TAB)child2,... ...,(TAB)end(linebreak)

Again, keep the formatting under all circumstances where I didn't write optional.

@Szun: Another thing about children: Children of one father must have different ages (you can't have, for example, two children who are 13 years old) and must be listed in the relatives list from old to young (child1 above is the oldest and the last child the youngest)

[Amon_Zeth]

Alright, it's all ready. The problem was that, for some strange reason, every 4th trait can't be directly before the next trait on the list, you have to swap them. But now I have my super general, my thanks. :D

[Szun]

alpaca every child had a other age so that wasnt the problem..i bet i had some "tabs" wrong since i only work with wordpad in strat_desc ... fertiliy adds on priests work fine
(in 1 game i added 90 on a selecuid and had 28 memebers befor i quit)

edit: i cant type :D

[dj jones]

Alright, it's all ready. The problem was that, for some strange reason, every 4th trait can't be directly before the next trait on the list, you have to swap them. But now I have my super general, my thanks. :D

Hi Amon -I want to add a bunch of generals, but I am not sure what you mean by the above -

can you elaborate?

thanks