MTW Pocket Mod: General

[The Unknown Guy]

Well I'm not sure I agree with that at all. The Byzantine units were not only renamed in a greek fashion, they were redesigned, resized, many stats were changed and a new unit was added. I feel now, that they are better than they were. Many will no doubt disagree, but that's personal choice. I haven't personalised them in any way. Instead I've filled in the gaps and tried to give them more historically accurate names.

As a grain of support, I like the stuff you do with Byzantium (althrough I don´t agree with all changes, and I add some of my own -such as lowering the Toxatoi, or however they are called now, support to 37, and removing the province restriction-). I think they were supposed to be a singular faction, different from all others, to begin with, and your modifications further enhace this feeling.


Oh, and, as for adding new factions: I was going to suggest making kingdoms that weren´t too big yet were historically important (Portugal, Navarre, for instance) unplayable factions, with standard catholic units (or standard Iberian units in the case of these two). It can´t be utterly impossible, if only because BKB and XL did it, and thus it can be looked up...

[The Unknown Guy]

Well I'm not sure I agree with that at all. The Byzantine units were not only renamed in a greek fashion, they were redesigned, resized, many stats were changed and a new unit was added. I feel now, that they are better than they were. Many will no doubt disagree, but that's personal choice. I haven't personalised them in any way. Instead I've filled in the gaps and tried to give them more historically accurate names.

As a grain of support, I like the stuff you do with Byzantium (althrough I don´t agree with all changes, and I add some of my own -such as lowering the Toxatoi, or however they are called now, support to 37, and removing the province restriction-). I think they were supposed to be a singular faction, different from all others, to begin with, and your modifications further enhace this feeling.


Oh, and, as for adding new factions: I was going to suggest making kingdoms that weren´t too big yet were historically important (Portugal, Navarre, for instance) unplayable factions, with standard catholic units (or standard Iberian units in the case of these two). It can´t be utterly impossible, if only because BKB and XL did it, and thus it can be looked up...

[EatYerGreens]

Well I'm not sure I agree with that at all.

That was meant to be tongue-in-cheek but the wink smiley didn't come out right. I also entirely glossed over the changed unit sizes and stats, didn't I?

Anyway, I was basically saying that it was an entirely laudible effort, just that I wouldn't have gone to the same lengths...

The faction mix ups in the marriage proposal parchments I've never seen referred to anywhere else, but I've no doubt they've also been fixed before.

This one rang a bell with me because I've certainly seen it go wrong in the game. You won't find any threads mentioning it in the topic title but I think I've seen it mentioned, in passing, a few times. That makes it virtually untraceable though.

The golden Horde Faction leader's campaign map piece is messed up

This one I haven't seen, myself, so I was curious about it. They're alive and thriving in my current English campaign and the leader's piece appears normal, whenever I bother to look (though they've had two or three succession events so far - I started in Early and am up to the 1290s).

Have you searched through the alchemists lab and repositary?

Not for a long while. The 'nuggets' are widely scattered though, hence the usefulness of a condensed "fix these before you start modding in earnest" post.

If you find nothing in there I can probably knock you up a guide as to how to fix a few of those other things.

Only if you have the time and the inclination. And for the community's benefit rather than mine, specifically.

I'm more of a 'meddler' than a modder, so I'd probably never progress beyond the 'home-brew' stage. As you said yourself, M2TW is out and there's enough interest in the various existing mods for any new releases to have a hard time catching on.

[caravel]

As a grain of support, I like the stuff you do with Byzantium (althrough I don´t agree with all changes, and I add some of my own -such as lowering the Toxatoi, or however they are called now, support to 37, and removing the province restriction-). I think they were supposed to be a singular faction, different from all others, to begin with, and your modifications further enhace this feeling.

The Psiloi are restricted to the Byzantine homelands by design. Having the Byzantine Standing Armies being churned out, outside their homelands feels wrong. Before I abandoned the mod, I was planning to add an "eastern archers" unit that would have been available across the board to all factions in the eastern provinces, a "western archers" unit for all catholic and orthodox factions in the west. This would have resolved some of the issues that one would have when conquering outside their homelands. Personally I didn't see the need for lowering the support for Psiloi, the professional armies of the Byzantine would not have come cheaply, and it's not as if the faction is exactly underpowered.

Another important point is that while you may not agree with certain changes, I have yet to see a mod where I myself agreed with even 50% of the changes made. The difference with those other mods is that they are mostly closed projects, and you pretty much get what you are given.

Oh, and, as for adding new factions: I was going to suggest making kingdoms that weren´t too big yet were historically important (Portugal, Navarre, for instance) unplayable factions, with standard catholic units (or standard Iberian units in the case of these two). It can´t be utterly impossible, if only because BKB and XL did it, and thus it can be looked up...

Adding new factions, as I've said time and time again, is a) a lot of work, b) not what this mod is about, c) involves a lot of extra files being bundled with the mod pushing up the download size probably into the 10MB+ region.

That was meant to be tongue-in-cheek but the wink smiley didn't come out right. I also entirely glossed over the changed unit sizes and stats, didn't I?

It depends on how you look at it I suppose, certain parts of the mod appeal to some players more than others. The Byzantine and Turks simply went through their optimizations (additional units, unit rebalancing, major name changes, info pic changes, battlefield sprite changes) first, other factions would have followed but this mod was never finished. Both the Byzantine and Turks were pretty much done with, and I was planning to move onto the Almohads and Egyptians next. After which the Poles and Hungarians would have followed, then the rest of the Catholic factions. People were contributing valuable info pertaining to the latter as this thread was progressing, so I was doing that as I went along, though concentrating on the Byzantine and Turks as they were first on my list (they had been dealt the worst hand).

This one I haven't seen, myself, so I was curious about it. They're alive and thriving in my current English campaign and the leader's piece appears normal, whenever I bother to look (though they've had two or three succession events so far - I started in Early and am up to the 1290s).

Zoom in and check the Khan's inactive piece on the campaign map. His piece looks like a catholic or orthodox culture piece. When it's picked up or attacking it's normal pagan again. If this doesn't appear in your game, then I can only assume it's localised. I've always had this problem. It originates from the VI disc I think.

[Dutch_guy]

Hey, good to have you here again EYG

[The Unknown Guy]

Another important point is that while you may not agree with certain changes, I have yet to see a mod where I myself agreed with even 50% of the changes made. The difference with those other mods is that they are mostly closed projects, and you pretty much get what you are given.

That´s my point. I agree with most of the stuff and that I dont çuite agree I push up and down.

For the moment my only tweakings have been moving the Psiloi support from 52 to 37 and back to 45 (Now they have long range, they deserve it :p), removing Novgorod as playable, and toying around with the Varangian Guard (Following my idea of small groups of strong units)


By the way, you have abandoned it for good? :(

[The Unknown Guy]

Can some moderator make this sticky? I think this mod´s worth it

[caravel]

That´s my point. I agree with most of the stuff and that I dont çuite agree I push up and down.

Well that was the whole point: Players giving feedback and that feedback being analysed and replied to here by those involved and any others that feel like participating.

For the moment my only tweakings have been moving the Psiloi support from 52 to 37 and back to 45 (Now they have long range, they deserve it :p), removing Novgorod as playable, and toying around with the Varangian Guard (Following my idea of small groups of strong units)

Support costs do need tweaking for a lot of units, but there's only so much that could be done at once. THe Varangian Guard idea you have is much the same as an idea that I had came up with for Huscarles earlier in this thread; so we are thinking along the same lines.

By the way, you have abandoned it for good? :(

Who knows? I may get back to it one day. Interest in it just died off, and without that there wasn't much point going on with it.

Can some moderator make this sticky? I think this mod´s worth it

Thanks for the vote of confidence, and it's nice to see someone still playing this mod, though it's not really necessary to sticky it. I was thinking of asking a mod to close it in fact.

[The Unknown Guy]

Some input:
- Kontarakoi: they lack an in-battle icon. They also lack an (artistic) info picture. (in this last issue I suggest using the ChivSergs pic. It fits the description and general looks. It could potentially be tweaked so that instead of the three lions it displays the Greek cross, too.)

- I´ve tried to tune down steamrolling Castile by raising the requirements of Jinettes. But now it seems to die pretty much every single time. On the other hand, Aragon now seems to fare decently.

- Rebellions: I don´t know if this can be tweaked, but I´m getting an awful lot of "Siegers Trade Unionist strikes". AKA: Most of my rebellions are mainly artillery, or only artillery. It becomes rather surrealist that "peasant rebellions" turn out to be some guys moving around a trebuchet.

- Bringing back the issue of repairing the broken economy: will it perform still as "rebel" or will it become a juggernaut?
Also, on the same subject: On a Byzantium High game I took Trebizond and left Constantinople alone for a few turns, and they indeed built a ship.

[caravel]

Some input:
- Kontarakoi: they lack an in-battle icon. They also lack an (artistic) info picture. (in this last issue I suggest using the ChivSergs pic. It fits the description and general looks. It could potentially be tweaked so that instead of the three lions it displays the Greek cross, too.)

I was sure they had an in battle icon? I will have to check that again. Also I have a info pic for them but haven't used it as yet. so that isn't a problem.

- I´ve tried to tune down steamrolling Castile by raising the requirements of Jinettes. But now it seems to die pretty much every single time. On the other hand, Aragon now seems to fare decently.

This is the issue you will always face where uber units exist. Jinetes are somewhat overpowered and Aragon are economically crippled due to their supporting of the numerous heirs that come of age. This is something else I'm working on.

- Rebellions: I don´t know if this can be tweaked, but I´m getting an awful lot of "Siegers Trade Unionist strikes". AKA: Most of my rebellions are mainly artillery, or only artillery. It becomes rather surrealist that "peasant rebellions" turn out to be some guys moving around a trebuchet.

I've done that already. Despite my changes to the rebelling troops mixes the number of ballistas, trebuchets and catapults is still an issue. On the whole I've yet to see the real usefulness of siege equipment in a rebellion so I've removed it from rebellions altogether.

- Bringing back the issue of repairing the broken economy: will it perform still as "rebel" or will it become a juggernaut?

It won't get any any more aggressive but it will be better able to defend it's provinces. It should also develop it's provinces saving the player/AI factions from doing this. The main issue is actually achieving this. There are several methods none of which have really worked so far. Instead of a huge bloated starting income, the rebel AI needs to receive a huge cash bonus every year. Turning a closed off province into a cash cow for the rebels is one idea (EatYerGreens), another would be to create unique and very cheap and fast to build rebel only buildings (I'm thinking the rebel tavern or brothel, but I need to test this and ensure they actually build the thing and also edit the building influences to force the rebels to build them) that will give a large income to the rebels annually.

Also, on the same subject: On a Byzantium High game I took Trebizond and left Constantinople alone for a few turns, and they indeed built a ship.

The ship may have been in the startpos file, because the rebel factions cannot build ships. There is nothing to stop the rebel faction from building a shipyard but when it comes to actually building ships the following dilemna, column 5 in the unit prod files, appears. This column restricts certain ships to certain factions for example on row 121, the Dhow, we have this:

"FN_ALMOHAD, FN_EGYPTIAN, FN_TURKISH, FN_GOLDEN_HORDE"

That restricts the building of Dhows to those factions only. That is to say, the rebels (FN_REBEL) cannot build Dhows.

[The Unknown Guy]

(from the other thread)

The fort I would have as a simple garrison building, costing 100 and taking 1 year to build, as a temporary outpost to hold down a province - not a town/settlement. The only buildings that could be constructed at fort level would be the farmland, port and mines. The horse breeders I would change to depend on the later castle levels instead of being fully upgradeable,

Sounds well, and if the AI can handle it properly, it might make the campaign more dynamic. Also, it would make the "surrounded factions" (like Poland, or the HRE) more playable, by keeping smaller garrisons on the borders, backed by neighbouring armies able to retake the province if attacked. In fact, some game files suggest that it was in the original plans to make "Border forts" garrisonable
In fact, it sounds like it would make the game more realistic. After all, one of the first things a conçuering army would do would be establishing a fort, even if it was just a temporary one (suggestion: could it be made so that assaults and sieges invariably destroyed the defender´s fort, so that the would-be conçueror had to rebuild it?), lacking fortified cities to camp. Romans certainly did it, but I´m not certain about the middle ages, as mainly cavalry armies would reçuire larger forts, perhaps larger than it was practical. , althrough some browsing I just did of the Alexiad (which, for the record, is a free pdf download from some site, but I can´t remember the address. If someone is curious -as I was- I suggest googling it. It was on the fifth page of the search, or so) seems to point out they did

after attacking several places repeatedly without success, he reached Moglena via Bodina and there rebuilt a small fort which had long lain in ruins. There he left a Count, nicknamed the Saracen, with an ample garrison and betook himself to a spot on the river Bardares called the Asprae Ecclesiae.

It would also be more realistic on the "homeland" frame. It just doesn´t sound right that someone is the overlord of a province and doesn´t keep even a token fort as protection. Borders would be more stable, too, as long as the opposing army had enough troops nearby, for a retreat could be followed by a counterattack the following year. Whereas abandoning besieged forts for a time would be suicidal, as they can be torn down by any kind of troops, and would be unable to hold large garrisons (which would fall çuickly anyway).




One concern: as I mentioned, during my messing up with the spanish jinetes reçuirements, I failed to achieve a balance whereby they weren´t either churned out in dozens, or too scarce to hold back the almohads (I left it at horse breeder 3, and almost invariably Castile gets crushed. However, Aragon seems to hold, maybe because Castile gets crushed), so it seems it needs a deeper tweak than my attempt.

Also: shouldn´t the sicilians get some personal unit? (Or gothic knights and sergeants, at least?)

Also: my old suggestion concerning certain borders:
-Making the Spain-Morocco landbridge a coast battle
-Making the Constantinople-Asia Minor border a coast battle (after all, Constantinople is in Europe)
-Making the Egyptian-East of Egypt border a bridge battle (Somewhat flimsy, I know, but I was thinking that the Nyle should be a natural defense)

[caravel]

(from the other thread)


Sounds well, and if the AI can handle it properly, it might make the campaign more dynamic. Also, it would make the "surrounded factions" (like Poland, or the HRE) more playable, by keeping smaller garrisons on the borders, backed by neighbouring armies able to retake the province if attacked. In fact, some game files suggest that it was in the original plans to make "Border forts" garrisonable
In fact, it sounds like it would make the game more realistic. After all, one of the first things a conçuering army would do would be establishing a fort, even if it was just a temporary one

I am speaking of the existing fort, not an extra fort or forts. When it upgraded to a keep it would still disappear and be replaced by that structure as ever. The fort would function the same way, but would be cheaper, faster to build but support few units. The rest of the tech tree would then be realigned with cheaper and faster castle upgrades, as follows e.g. (draft) :

Fort - Improved Farmland+, Mines, Port, Shipwright (?), Watch Towers/Border Forts.

Keep - Spearmaker, Swordsmith, Bowyer, Armourer, Horse Farmer, Siege Engineer, Town watch, Trading Post, etc, etc ,etc

Castle - Spearmakers' Workshop, Bowyers' Workshop, Armourers' Workshop, Horse Breeder, Siege Engineers' Workshop, Town Guard, Merchant, etc, etc ,etc

Citadel - Spearmakers' Guild, Bowyers' Guild, Armourers' Guild, Horse Breeders' Guild, Siege Engineers' Guild, Town Militia, Merchants' Guild, etc, etc ,etc

Fortress - Master Spearmaker, Master Bowyer, Master Armourer, Master Horse Breeder, Master Siege Engineer, County Militia, Master Merchant, etc, etc ,etc

This gives 4 solid levels, not 5 overlapping and interdependent ones that cause a lot of unnecessary building. All costs and build times would need to be tweaked. Also many units that depend on, a for example, a swordsmith, would have to be changed to depend on a swordsmiths' workshop to prevent them being available too early. The lower level swordsmith could then be used as a dependency for other units (this is better than the current situation where you can build several upgrades and still be able to train nothing new).

(suggestion: could it be made so that assaults and sieges invariably destroyed the defender´s fort, so that the would-be conçueror had to rebuild it?), lacking fortified cities to camp. Romans certainly did it, but I´m not certain about the middle ages, as mainly cavalry armies would reçuire larger forts, perhaps larger than it was practical. , althrough some browsing I just did of the Alexiad (which, for the record, is a free pdf download from some site, but I can´t remember the address. If someone is curious -as I was- I suggest googling it. It was on the fifth page of the search, or so) seems to point out they did

Can't be done, the fort may be destroyed in an invasion as it is now, but this cannot be coded to occur always.

One concern: as I mentioned, during my messing up with the spanish jinetes reçuirements, I failed to achieve a balance whereby they weren´t either churned out in dozens, or too scarce to hold back the almohads (I left it at horse breeder 3, and almost invariably Castile gets crushed. However, Aragon seems to hold, maybe because Castile gets crushed), so it seems it needs a deeper tweak than my attempt.

jinetes are probably slightly overpowered in the melee department (currently 2) lowering this to about 0 should make them do less well once they get into a fight, forcing them to charge, throw and skirmish. This needs to be looked at in more detail though, as do the Andalusian Infantry (AUM) which are still a little too overpowered and ruin the flavour of the Moorish factions.

Also: shouldn´t the sicilians get some personal unit? (Or gothic knights and sergeants, at least?)

The Sicilians were Normans, Gothic armoured Knights are typically (very) late era and should be HRE only. The Italians need a variant - Milanese Knights perhaps. Both of these would need to be later era only, and have very steep dependencies.

Also: my old suggestion concerning certain borders:
-Making the Spain-Morocco landbridge a coast battle
-Making the Constantinople-Asia Minor border a coast battle (after all, Constantinople is in Europe)
-Making the Egyptian-East of Egypt border a bridge battle (Somewhat flimsy, I know, but I was thinking that the Nyle should be a natural defense)

-It is a coastal battle
-This cannot be coast battle due to the province layout. I have looked at editing the map to extend Nicaea right up to the west coast and placing the border of constantinople on the coast line of the bosphorous. Messing about with this time consuming however, and will probably result in a hugely increased download size, it is also not a priority at the moment.
-Armies crossing from the Sinai into Egypt should face a bridge battle perhaps? Though not in the other direction.

[Innocentius]

The Sicilians were Normans, Gothic armoured Knights are typically (very) late era and should be HRE only. The Italians need a variant - Milanese Knights perhaps. Both of these would need to be later era only, and have very steep dependencies.

I think that Gothic Knights should be available to England, France, Spain, Aragon, Poland and Denmark (and Portugal in XL) as well, not just the HRE and the Italians. It wasn't like Gothic armour didn't reach outside Germany. Look at Graham Turner's pictures in the Osprey book about Towton (1461, slightly out of the MTW timeframe) and you see the better part of the Englishmen running around i full-plate Gothic armour.
Also, Gothic Sergeants I think should be re-designed to something better. They are nigh impossible to reach and once you get them they do about they perform just like Chivalric Sergeants since there are less men in a unit. Making them a better version of Chivalric Foot Knights (i.e. certain bonuses while attacking cavalry) and such would be good. Giving them the same stats as JHI just with more armour and a lot slower would be interesting.

[Innocentius]

Why not increase their number from 60 to l00?

Of course, that would be the obvious solution, but I'm not really a great fan of spears anyway so I'm thinking about re-modding them in my game as soon as I'm through with my Polish campaign.

These are some of my unit modifications (if it's of any interest...):

Gothic Knights dramatically improved (8, 6, 7, 9, 10) and are now worth the buck. I'll make them available to all catholics after my Polish campaign.

Gothic Sergeants, Latin Auxillaries and Janissary Heavy Infantry stats slightly improved. I'll change the Gothic Sergeants into a polearm unit later on (i.e. a unit with a bonus of 3 attacking cavalry and only 1 while defending against cavalry), changing their build requirements to something like; Military Academy, Master Armourer and Master Spearmaker while removing royal_court4 (don't remember its true name). The high requirements will be pretty necessary as they will be better than JHI!

Handgunners improved (3, 3, 4, 4, 4) but only available in Late and now require Gunsmith's Guild and Swordsmith's Workshop. I increased the recruiting cost as well. They now make CMAA superflous in Late as they can fulfill their role while at the same time act as missile troops with demoralising ammo!
They are still slightly worse in melee than CMAA though, and will only beat them roughly 1 of 10 times (Normal, both units charging head-on, handgunners don't fire), but if recruited with a single armour or morale upgrade they can beat them even in head on combat, without using their guns.

[caravel]

An idea for Sicily: apparently Frederick II allowed muslims to settle there as his personal guard (mainly because he had good relations with muslim princes, and they didn´t mind when he got excommed, apparently).
So, maybe the King of Sicily could have access to some muslim units? Perhaps Faris, or maybe Desert Archers?

Interesting idea, and one I'll be interested in implementing.

Then again, this does not necessarily mean over-complication, as an already working muslim unit (maybe the Futuwwas, or Janissary bowmen?) could be copied, and used with a different description along the lines of "Territorial disputes with the Papacy have forced the Crown of Sicily resort to recruiting muslim settlers in their lands as soldiers. These men are both indifferent to excommunication threats and loyal to the King of Sicily beyond any kinship with fellow muslim rulers, making them a fierce fighting force in Sicilian armies - as long as they are paid"

They could be called... Mercenary Sarracen Militia, or something?

I would avoid the word "Saracen" and also I think I would base the troops on Moorish units rather than Turkish ones. Also having specific units for such a role, when the Muslim factions themselves lack many specific units would be overdoing it a bit perhaps? Perhaps Al-Murabitun Infantry and desert archers available to the Sicilians in the Maghreb, Malta, Sicily and Naples?

On the Gothic Knights. That type of armour came about in the mid to late 1400's in Germany, adding Gothic Knights to all factions would be a bad idea, I have considered removing them altogether and am certainly considering removing them from the Italians. The Gothic Sergeants are another issue that I haven't looked into yet.

[The Unknown Guy]

Another thing, which occured to me while putting down another rebellion of the infamous Siege Engineers Union: Ballistas are useless because of their short range, not-bouncingness, slowness to build, and horrible accuracy (related to them not bouncing)

So perhaps they could either be improved in accuracy (hence making them the very first antipersonnel arty you get), or reduce the building time to one turn, so that you can churn them çuickly when (if) you need to assault a castle, or would like some artillery firecover fast, even if it´s a bit piss-poor?

[caravel]

Another thing, which occured to me while putting down another rebellion of the infamous Siege Engineers Union: Ballistas are useless because of their short range, not-bouncingness, slowness to build, and horrible accuracy (related to them not bouncing)

Well, I have been negotiating with the SEU and we have reached an agreement to the effect that they will no longer be participating in strike action.

So perhaps they could either be improved in accuracy (hence making them the very first antipersonnel arty you get), or reduce the building time to one turn, so that you can churn them çuickly when (if) you need to assault a castle, or would like some artillery firecover fast, even if it´s a bit piss-poor?

I'm not sure about improving them, as that may turn them into anti-general sharp shooters. I have experimented with removing them in the past and that is possibly the best course of action, though I do think they could be retained as lower cost, quick to build siege equipment for breaking gates. Trying to find which stats to improve is the main issue. I like the idea of reducing the build time, and perhaps improving the projectile damage and range slightly.

[Innocentius]

On the Gothic Knights. That type of armour came about in the mid to late 1400's in Germany, adding Gothic Knights to all factions would be a bad idea, I have considered removing them altogether and am certainly considering removing them from the Italians. The Gothic Sergeants are another issue that I haven't looked into yet.

Gothic styled armour was rather popular already during the 1420-ies. Jeanne d'Arcs gothic armour is one of the more famous examples.
I don't see why adding Gothic knights to all catholics woul be such a bad idea? It's both historically accurate and hardly affects the game since I've actually never seen the AI field a Gothic unit (or Janissar Heavy Infantry for that part).

[caravel]

Gothic styled armour was rather popular already during the 1420-ies. Jeanne d'Arcs gothic armour is one of the more famous examples.
I don't see why adding Gothic knights to all catholics woul be such a bad idea? It's both historically accurate and hardly affects the game since I've actually never seen the AI field a Gothic unit (or Janissar Heavy Infantry for that part).

Well because this type of armour wasn't as widespread at that time. To be honest I see your point in that it wouldn't be such a big deal to make Gothic Knights available to all factions as they take so much teching up you're unlikely to see many of them.

I've been working on the Rebel income Tavern/Brothel buildings. I have successfully implemented them but have hit a stumbling block. No matter how much income I assign to them the rebels still go negative. Is this hardcoded I wonder or am I missing something obvious. I had checked the income/expenses parchment and it shows that every province is making more than it expends. I then increased the incomes drastically and was getting around 73,000 florins per turn. Still the rebel economy went into the red.

I've completed the simplification of the tech tree. I will still have to fine tune costs and build times of course. At present I'm going for the 2,4,6,8 build times for all weaponsmiths, horsebreeders, and town watches. I would like to hear arguments for the 4,6,8,10 build times. I'm also using the 200,400,600,800 costs any suggested adjustments to those would be welcome. All of the first level buildings depend on the Keep, not the Fort.

The Metalsmith is still available and so is the Armourer, though I have been considering Noir's advice on the removal of armour and weapons upgrades. The Armourer could instead be used as a regular dependency building and to give valour to some units that depend on it, at the master level only. The metalsmith would probably need to be removed altogether. I have Iron as a mining resource now anyway so Iron in the provinces would not be redundant. This is only something I'm considering.

The castle structure has been altered in that the Fort costs 100 and takes a year to build. It is not necessary to build the Fort or it's upgrades in order to build the Keep. So the Keep can be built from an empty province for 800 florins and takes 6 years. The hope here is that the AI will get going from the early period faster, and not hang about training Spearmen and UM from it's forts for the next few decades. The issue is how this will effect poorer factions, though this has pros and cons. It will force the AI up to the level of a Keep before it starts spamming hundreds of troops. Unless it upgrades to a keep it will only be able to build income generating buildings such as farmland, and foresters. This will need some testing to see how it functions.

@Martok: Is it possible we could have this thread merged to the original Pocket Mod thread?

[Noir]

May i suggest that the Aragonese and the Sicilians could do with more starting provinces in the PM than they currently have. The Byzantines in any case did not held Apulia nor Naples at the time the game starts -1087 AD- (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:B...%2BAntioch.png) and the Castilians were in fact two kingdoms the Castilians - Leonese and thus unlikely to be yielding the territorial robustness that seem to be enjoying.

The Aragonese could start with Navarre or even Toulouse (as it is not much use to the French being isolated anyway), and the Sicilians with Naples.

If the Turks get wiped out they may be strengthened with Anatolia and perhaps even Nicaea as they were also holding them briefly after Mazinkert and in fact took the Byzantines to arrange for the Crusaders to get them back.

The Danes may enjoy a landbridge to Sweaden and so solve their chronic economic anemia and also perhaps expand towards Livonia, Lithuania, Prussia rather than going for Freisland or Saxony, as they usually do at least in vanilla.

Certain key historical provinces are located at crossroads and thus are vulnerable, however they were founded in those locations due to the natural protection the particular location would provide.

Such places include Venice and Constantinople that are both in crossroads and as such very susceptible in falling to one conqueror or the other way too easily. Venice was a remnant of the Roman empire and was officially reckognised as such by Byzantine Imperial documents; it developed into a community of "floating houses" as protection from the various barbarian hordes that were roaming the italian North in the period 400 to 600 AD.

Constantinople, is known to all a very secure place that was facing land only on one side and was protected there with the best walls of the whole medieval period.

I suggest that these places be less of a "passage" than they currently are.

[Noir]

Another idea for when the time comes to consider this, would be to differentiate the rosters by re-arranging units and essentially contstraining them to 1 missile/1 spear/1 light cavalry/1 heavy-medium cavalry/1 melee(sword)unit per faction/per era. These can be additive, that is the ones for a faction from the early era may complement the ones on the high.

The rosters as they stand give 2 spears, 2 missiles, 2 swords etc per faction per era. This is somehow problematic as they create a tactical abundace for the player with any faction that essentially helps him to get by with the situation he's facing on the battlefield.

It would be nice to play with rosters that make for particular advantages over certain factions and in certain terrains and also to simplify the things for the AI as he spams low tech units early in that he cannot get rid off if not attacked. On top of that he continues to prefer low tech units as they cost less for the factions with feeble income. The present units (as a number at least) are more than enough for doing this, they need only to be reaasigned to factions for that purpose i would have thought.

The overall level of warmaking is also low due to the small number of factions in the game and since the PM is not adding any this needs to be addressed in another way; in my opinion by sharing more evenly the large number of non-faction occupied provinces as stated in the above post in order to make up for more equal wars and thus a more healthy AI economy overall. In that respect the whole eastern steps being rebel is somewhat of a problem.

Noir

[The Unknown Guy]

May i suggest that the Aragonese and the Sicilians could do with more starting provinces in the PM than they currently have. The Byzantines in any case did not held Apulia nor Naples at the time the game starts -1087 AD- (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:B...%2BAntioch.png) and the Castilians were in fact two kingdoms the Castilians - Leonese and thus unlikely to be yielding the territorial robustness that seem to be enjoying.

In fact, the problem with the northern Iberian kingdoms is the land sharing, and size of the provinces. Castile would not become that large until much later on. In fact, Navarre, which is not even an in-game faction, was the dominant Christian kingdom at the time. Serious rehasal of the Iberian çuestion would reçuire adding Aragon and Navarre as unplayable factions (not unfeasible, but hard. I downloaded the manual. Would reçuire a lot of coding. Shields are no problem as there are plenty of them freesource. Spanish Jurisprudence recognizes free lawful use of national symbols, I seem to recall,so getting the shield of Navarra is not a problem. I don´t know about Portugal, through), and add some more provinces in the north (VERY HARD)



Anyways, I´ve managed to increase the survival rate of Aragon (and the Almohads) by limiting the number of Jinetes avaiable at any given time, increasing the support cost to 90 per unit. It works... after a fashion. I cant really tell, as they managed to kick the almohads nonetheles (althrough around year ll20, later than usual), but they didn´t have that many Jinetes, and had several costly battles. I think it was mainly due to having many heirs.

Such places include Venice and Constantinople that are both in crossroads and as such very susceptible in falling to one conqueror or the other way too easily. Venice was a remnant of the Roman empire and was officially reckognised as such by Byzantine Imperial documents; it developed into a community of "floating houses" as protection from the various barbarian hordes that were roaming the italian North in the period 400 to 600 AD

Indeed, the first Italian Doge was appointed by the Byzantines. They were given autonomy for lack of ability to defend them at the time.

Concerning Constantinople: The thing is that I think that it should not be a normal map. Not even a coastal battle. Ancient maps of the city show it to be on the golden horn, surrounded by a huge wall on both land and sea, plus the Theodosian wall after it. What I would like is that the battle took place there, at the foot of the Theodosian walls, through I don´t know how. Would it be viable to add a map cut down by a wall? Furthermore:would the AI know how to deal with it, and bring either siege eçuipment or cheap infantry to storm the walls? And, third: would it make Byzantium too easy to play? Trebizond/Nicaea/Bulgaria/Greece are all at hand, and present a four-border, easy to defend yet wealthy core. That without adding the trade. Plus the pocket mod addresses many of the problems that the Byzantines have in game, such as the problems with Byz Cavalry, and the like

If the Turks get wiped out they may be strengthened with Anatolia and perhaps even Nicaea as they were also holding them briefly after Mazinkert and in fact took the Byzantines to arrange for the Crusaders to get them back.

True: and it might help to delay the Byzantine Juggernaut that happens countless of times in Early (along with the Spanish Juggernaut, and the Russian VP Juggernaut, it´s one of the three monsters in the game)

[Martok]

I've completed the simplification of the tech tree. I will still have to fine tune costs and build times of course. At present I'm going for the 2,4,6,8 build times for all weaponsmiths, horsebreeders, and town watches. I would like to hear arguments for the 4,6,8,10 build times. I'm also using the 200,400,600,800 costs any suggested adjustments to those would be welcome. All of the first level buildings depend on the Keep, not the Fort.

I have a possibly stupid question (I ask out of genuine curiosity, and not to be adversarial): Why the increase in build time & expense for every building level? Why not just make it an even 4 years & 400 florins for each one? Is there something inherently unbalanced about having equal costs and build times for each level?

The Metalsmith is still available and so is the Armourer, though I have been considering Noir's advice on the removal of armour and weapons upgrades. The Armourer could instead be used as a regular dependency building and to give valour to some units that depend on it, at the master level only. The metalsmith would probably need to be removed altogether. I have Iron as a mining resource now anyway so Iron in the provinces would not be redundant. This is only something I'm considering.

Given that the Spanish were reknowned for their steel weapons (their swords in particular), I don't know that removing the Metalsmiths is such a great idea. I can understand removing their dependence on the presence of iron, however. Would there be any way to make the Metalsmith dependent on specific provinces instead? That way, Castille and Syria (Damascus was famous for its steel weapons as well) could still produce troops with an attack bonus. I don't know if this is feasible, but it might be an alternative solution.

As for the Armourer(s), I think Noir may have a point. I'm not sure if they should be removed entirely, but it might not be a bad idea to at least dramatically raise their building requirements. Perhaps restrict them to Citadels and Fortresses only? That way one couldn't build more than an Armourers Workshop, and troops therefore couldn't be trained with more than 2 extra levels of armour.

The castle structure has been altered in that the Fort costs 100 and takes a year to build. It is not necessary to build the Fort or it's upgrades in order to build the Keep. So the Keep can be built from an empty province for 800 florins and takes 6 years. The hope here is that the AI will get going from the early period faster, and not hang about training Spearmen and UM from it's forts for the next few decades. The issue is how this will effect poorer factions, though this has pros and cons. It will force the AI up to the level of a Keep before it starts spamming hundreds of troops. Unless it upgrades to a keep it will only be able to build income generating buildings such as farmland, and foresters. This will need some testing to see how it functions.

Sounds good, Cambyses. If you need someone to help test that out, I should have some free time this weekend.

@Martok: Is it possible we could have this thread merged to the original Pocket Mod thread?

I was wondering about that. I'll do so once I'm done posting this.

If the Turks get wiped out they may be strengthened with Anatolia and perhaps even Nicaea as they were also holding them briefly after Mazinkert and in fact took the Byzantines to arrange for the Crusaders to get them back.

I agree that giving Anatolia to the Turks would help. I disagree with giving them Nicaea as well, however -- while I believe you're right about the Byzantines not getting it back until the First Crusade, I think that would still unbalance things too far in the Turks' favor. I *do* propose making Lesser Armenia a rebel province, as it was (IIRC) a semi-autonomous principality largely independent of Constantinople's authority.

The Danes may enjoy a landbridge to Sweaden and so solve their chronic economic anemia and also perhaps expand towards Livonia, Lithuania, Prussia rather than going for Freisland or Saxony, as they usually do at least in vanilla.

Unless I'm mistaken, I believe the Danes have a landbridge to Sweden already. (If not, however, then you're right that they should.)

Certain key historical provinces are located at crossroads and thus are vulnerable, however they were founded in those locations due to the natural protection the particular location would provide.

Such places include Venice and Constantinople that are both in crossroads and as such very susceptible in falling to one conqueror or the other way too easily. Venice was a remnant of the Roman empire and was officially reckognised as such by Byzantine Imperial documents; it developed into a community of "floating houses" as protection from the various barbarian hordes that were roaming the italian North in the period 400 to 600 AD.

Constantinople, is known to all a very secure place that was facing land only on one side and was protected there with the best walls of the whole medieval period.

I suggest that these places be less of a "passage" than they currently are.

If you're saying that those provinces should have different battle maps that favor the defender more, then I think you might have a point.

The overall level of warmaking is also low due to the small number of factions in the game and since the PM is not adding any this needs to be addressed in another way; in my opinion by sharing more evenly the large number of non-faction occupied provinces as stated in the above post in order to make up for more equal wars and thus a more healthy AI economy overall. In that respect the whole eastern steps being rebel is somewhat of a problem.

A couple of points here:

1.) Personally, I feel there's already enough war going on. While I realize the name of the game isn't Medieval: Total Peace, I don't think we need to try and force the factions into attacking each more often. I know that's only my own opinion, but I would wager a good number of florins that I'm not the only one who feels that way.

2.) While historical accuracy isn't always the most important aspect of this game, I do believe it's something that Cambyses (and for that matter, myself) wanted to try and improve with the Pocket Mod. With that in mind, arbitrarily adding a lot of the "rebel" provinces to the lands of existing factions just wouldn't be realistic at all.

Of course, it would be more realistic to make most rebel provinces their own playable faction, but that's obviously not a possibility with the hard-coded faction limit. (That, and I know Cambyses never intended to add more factions anyway -- doing so would be far beyond the scope envisioned for the Pocket Mod.)

[Martok]

(Threads merged.)

[The Unknown Guy]

I think that would still unbalance things too far in the Turks' favor.

In High or Late I would agree, but in Early I witness the Byzantine Juggernaut rule from Lithuania to Syria. They should be a superpower on Early, allright, but they seem to eat EVERYTHING. In my current HRE game, I´m pondering abandoning my provinces and letting them loose at the French and Italians that have been pestering me, while I stay in the relative safety of Saxony and Scandinavia (Under Imperial control)

Unless I'm mistaken, I believe the Danes have a landbridge to Sweden already. (If not, however, then you're right that they should.)

They do, and there´s a landbridge from Sweden to Finland too, btw.

Would there be any way to make the Metalsmith dependent on specific provinces instead? That way, Castille and Syria (Damascus was famous for its steel weapons as well) could still produce troops with an attack bonus. I don't know if this is feasible, but it might be an alternative solution.

I think that the easy way to do this would be restricting Iron again to a few provinces.

This makes more sense than it might seem. While all nations found iron reserves, not all iron was of the same çuality. Spanish iron mineral, for instance, is of great purity. Hence smiths had an easier time putting together good steel weapons than smiths in places with poor iron mineral (such as England). (For the record, I read somewhere that in Japan they bypassed the problem of having horrid iron mineral by hammering it over and over until they drove out most of the impurities, hence Japanese swords being of high çuality too)

In fact, the high çuality of the steel later played a role in the Industrial Revolution both in England and in Spain (which, besides being wrecked by civil wars at the time, has sucky coal, and english mineral coal had to be imported, whereas the Bessemer Steel Convertor reçuired high ammounts of high çuality iron, which was not found in many places-but luckily for Bessemer, it was just across the sea)

[Noir]

Hi Martok,

i misread your post, apologies. My post now edited.

I think that the PM needs extra factions then - however i know that's out of the scope of the mod and i leave it at that.

Many Thanks

Noir

[Martok]

No apology necessary, mate.

For what it's worth, I actually agree that adding more factions would be grand, all other things being equal. Doing so would require a great deal of effort, however -- far more so that the considerable amount Cambyses has already expended. Would that I possessed modding skills myself, I might be able to help him out; but (unfortunately) I don't, so I can't. That guys like VikingHorde and BKB managed to find the time and energy to create a mod all by themselves continues to simultaneously stagger and impress me!

[caravel]

May i suggest that the Aragonese and the Sicilians could do with more starting provinces in the PM than they currently have. The Byzantines in any case did not held Apulia nor Naples at the time the game starts -1087 AD- (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:B...%2BAntioch.png)

It is probably best to give the Sicilians Naples. I have done this in the past. The game seems to make efforts to represent the very short Byzantine reconquest of parts of Naples and Apulia. I can't remember the exact details of this but I don't believe it is worthwhile representing. This will be changed to a Sicilian province and the Sicilians renamed Siculo-Norman.

and the Castilians were in fact two kingdoms the Castilians - Leonese and thus unlikely to be yielding the territorial robustness that seem to be enjoying.

The Aragonese could start with Navarre or even Toulouse (as it is not much use to the French being isolated anyway), and the Sicilians with Naples.

I'm not sure about Toulouse as it was never fully under Aragonese control. It should possibly be an independant province, but that simply gives us more rebels. Navarre could be Aragonese in the high era but not in early or late, as it would have been mostly independent in those times. It's borders, and the borders of the other Spanish kingdoms would have been very dynamic, which we can't really represent in this game. (this is why I'm largely opposed to changing the map, as you can never get it right anyway, and not enough extra provinces can be added to make enough of a difference)

If the Turks get wiped out they may be strengthened with Anatolia and perhaps even Nicaea as they were also holding them briefly after Mazinkert and in fact took the Byzantines to arrange for the Crusaders to get them back.

I'm strongly in favour of giving the Seljuks both Nicaea and Anatolia in the early period to try and rebalance the game in this area. The Byzantine would not have held either of those provinces in 1087, they would have only held the part of Nicaea that is represented as part of constantinople in the north west and would have only reconquered parts of western Nicaea some years later. Both provinces I would start in the early period as Orthodox religion with Seljuk forces occupying them.

The Danes may enjoy a landbridge to Sweaden and so solve their chronic economic anemia and also perhaps expand towards Livonia, Lithuania, Prussia rather than going for Freisland or Saxony, as they usually do at least in vanilla.

The landbridge already exists, as does the one from Sweden to Finland.

Certain key historical provinces are located at crossroads and thus are vulnerable, however they were founded in those locations due to the natural protection the particular location would provide.

Such places include Venice and Constantinople that are both in crossroads and as such very susceptible in falling to one conqueror or the other way too easily. Venice was a remnant of the Roman empire and was officially reckognised as such by Byzantine Imperial documents; it developed into a community of "floating houses" as protection from the various barbarian hordes that were roaming the italian North in the period 400 to 600 AD.

Constantinople, is known to all a very secure place that was facing land only on one side and was protected there with the best walls of the whole medieval period.

I suggest that these places be less of a "passage" than they currently are.

Constantinople needs to be a small separate province on the coast with it's own specific castle map. That is pretty much beyond the scope of this mod at the moment... never say never though. Venice needs to a small landbridged island, again this involves a lot more work and deviates from the main objectives here.

Another idea for when the time comes to consider this, would be to differentiate the rosters by re-arranging units and essentially contstraining them to 1 missile/1 spear/1 light cavalry/1 heavy-medium cavalry/1 melee(sword)unit per faction/per era. These can be additive, that is the ones for a faction from the early era may complement the ones on the high.

The rosters as they stand give 2 spears, 2 missiles, 2 swords etc per faction per era. This is somehow problematic as they create a tactical abundace for the player with any faction that essentially helps him to get by with the situation he's facing on the battlefield.

It would be nice to play with rosters that make for particular advantages over certain factions and in certain terrains and also to simplify the things for the AI as he spams low tech units early in that he cannot get rid off if not attacked. On top of that he continues to prefer low tech units as they cost less for the factions with feeble income. The present units (as a number at least) are more than enough for doing this, they need only to be reaasigned to factions for that purpose i would have thought.

I'm not sure about this, examples needed.

The overall level of warmaking is also low due to the small number of factions in the game and since the PM is not adding any this needs to be addressed in another way; in my opinion by sharing more evenly the large number of non-faction occupied provinces as stated in the above post in order to make up for more equal wars and thus a more healthy AI economy overall. In that respect the whole eastern steps being rebel is somewhat of a problem.

The biggest problem, as regards rebel provinces, is in the east. This is only a problem in the early era as in high and late, the GH and Russians fill the void somewhat. In the early era the region is ripe for Byzantine over expansion. The remedy would be to add extra factions in that area such as Pechenegs, Cumans and others. This is a lot of work and, etc etc etc. For now I would prefer another solution, if the mod evolves into something better in the future and involves a lot of new units, factions and provinces then so be it. But for now I prefer to concentrate on refining what we have, before adding more bulk.

[caravel]

Anyways, I´ve managed to increase the survival rate of Aragon (and the Almohads) by limiting the number of Jinetes avaiable at any given time, increasing the support cost to 90 per unit. It works... after a fashion. I cant really tell, as they managed to kick the almohads nonetheles (althrough around year ll20, later than usual), but they didn´t have that many Jinetes, and had several costly battles. I think it was mainly due to having many heirs.

I think that the easy way to do this would be restricting Iron again to a few provinces.

This makes more sense than it might seem. While all nations found iron reserves, not all iron was of the same çuality. Spanish iron mineral, for instance, is of great purity. Hence smiths had an easier time putting together good steel weapons than smiths in places with poor iron mineral (such as England). (For the record, I read somewhere that in Japan they bypassed the problem of having horrid iron mineral by hammering it over and over until they drove out most of the impurities, hence Japanese swords being of high çuality too)

The problem is one of game balance as well as one of historical accuracy. By adding Iron to more provinces, and the addition of the Iron Mines I have given more non trade income to the AI factions. Also this enables most factions to have at least one province with a metalsmith. Restricting Iron again to the vanilla provinces would yet again imbalance the game in favour of those factions with the upgraded weapons, and remove that income. Personally I see it as either:

1) Metalsmiths, available sparsely to all factions in a larger number of provinces.

2) Removal of all metalsmiths from the game altogether.

The metalsmiths after all increase attack, which is technically improving a units ability to fight, not it's actual weapons, whereas historically it would have been longevity, sturdiness and durability that would have set these weapons above the rest. The metalsmith would also no doubt improve the quality of armour though armour is dealt with via the armourer. The metalsmith also gives an attack bonus to an urban militia man probably armed with the cheapest of weapons. The effect is far to "global" in that it improves a factions attack bonus across the board. It also places emphasis of the equipment over the men wielding it. A better system would be to have certain Spanish units that reflect the greater quality of the steel. Knights of Santiago, Jinetes and Spanish Javelinmen already represent this. Other units could be added if necessary.

Another aspect is armour upgrades. These are both ahistorical and poorly implemented. Sending your archers back to the province with the Master Armourer to be retrained with what? What do they get equipped with? Why would Gothic Knights be trained with anything less than the best armour anyway. Armour was hard to come by in those days, most was scavenged or looted and only the nobility wore full suits of it. Personally I believe the armourer upgrades need to go. This is not a Mechwarrior game where you add more armour to your chassis. Instead a valour bonus could be added to the Armourer at master level. The swordsmith doesn't upgrade swords, the bowyer doesn't upgrade bows, so why should the armourer add an extremely false defense bonus?

[The Unknown Guy]

Sending your archers back to the province with the Master Armourer to be retrained with what? What do they get equipped with? Why would Gothic Knights be trained with anything less than the best armour anyway. Armour was hard to come by in those days, most was scavenged or looted and only the nobility wore full suits of it. Personally I believe the armourer upgrades need to go.

You have a point there, specially bearing in mind how the effects of armor affect the units. How are units with no armor, or very light armor, such as Psiloi, going to get "better" armor? Perhaps with better çuality leather, granted, but it should not give a "plus one" bonus, as a knight "improving" his armor gets that very same "plus one". And I don´t think that the improvement in defensive properties would be the same for a knight than a guy in a leather armor, or that the guy in leather should roast in the desert for carrying a BETTER armor than an unupgraded eçuivalent.
In fact, I don´t think the improvement would be noticeable at all, unless the armor in çuestion was falling to pieces.

Knights of Santiago, Jinetes and Spanish Javelinmen already represen

t this.
Concerning Javelinmen, I think they mostly represent the "historical" almugharavs, which did use hit and run tactics, (the actual in-game almugharavs are a bit puzzling, as they have an odd "defends well vs cavalry", which is unrealistic in warriors which would deal as much damage as possible, and then retreat to the hills). In fact, the muslims called "almugharavs" (bandits, or somesuch, when translated) everyone which used these tactics, which were popular in every region of Spain with mountains to do it. (Roland, the French hero, did not fall in battle with muslims, contrary to popular belief. Actually, he annoyed the Duke of Navarra -not a kingdom yet back then-, and got ambushed by his minions on a mountain pass). The term nowadays applies mostly to the Aragonese ones because it was them who started sending them around as mercs.
They´re a bit lacking in HtH skills, however, specially considering they´re more expensive than other javelinmen and that they´re described as being able to skirmish.
Another potential unit (For High or Late only) would be the Knights of Calatrava, which was a secular, non-crusading, knights order, loyal directly to the crown.

BTW: a bit off this particular subject: Arab Infantry (the "backbone of the armies of Islam" one) seem balanced to me after all (I had doubts formerly). While it´s a dangerous thing to get thrown at you, for their high attack and high numbers, their poor defense and armor makes them easy prey to projectiles, and repeated cavalry charges. Plus, while playing other factions, I´ve never really seen Egypt as able to flood the Almohads or the Turks by sheer numbers, unless they were already weakened by Byzantine or Spanish expansion.


Edit: Something I just forgot: Byzantines. As I usually played them on High, I rarely saw the "Byzantine Juggernaut". But I´ve seen it now, and indeed, is absurd. I think the problem doesn´t come from the command stats of heirs per se, but by the fact that, FOR SOME REASON, the Byzantine Emperors ALWAYS start with a very high influence (Even in High, where they are technically Emperors-in-exile), which, furthermore, doesn´t drop when a succession takes place (In my HRE and Almohad games, "succesion" is almost synonimous of "lossing one or more points of influence. Which is realistic, because a succession is the ideal moment for rebellious nobles to stage a coup or a secession movement), and which, furthermore, does not fall despite horrid defeats and losses (Come on, I lose l96 Psiloi because I mess up troop deployment, and my generals will just shrug and say "oh well, it happens"?). If their influence worked the same as with other factions, they wouldn´t be able to steamroll the steppes, because they´d suffer civil wars and/or rebellions for bloat effect. Right now in my HRE game they own ALL Eastern Europe, and all their provinces are cheerful and happy)