Unpacking kingdoms files...

[Radioman]

I started with unpacking the americas folder...Now if someone can tell me how to or if you can start a modified kingdoms game using a .bat executable???

The updated text file in the tools folder doesn't seem to say what to do after you unpack the kingdoms folders...

[edders]

I assume it's the same as the Mediveal 2 method (i.o. file_first or whatever it's called) except that you replace the medieval2.exe line with whatever the name of the Kingdoms .exe is.

[Halie Satanus]

Moved to the workshop.

[defc0n5]

What you could do is create a .bat file using the kingdoms .exe file (not sure if there is one or not, as I'm at work right now), but make a major change to the unit file. Perhaps change one of the units in the Teutonic campaign to have 1 for all it's attack stats, then boot up the teutonic campaign using your bat file, start a custom battle, and see if that unit you edited has the attack stats you set it to have.

But make sure you back up your original file.

[Chevalier IX]

I was able to run the game with a batch file with the io.file_first,but oddly everything was fine save for the fact that the battle field user interface was blank and the text was distorted...I have not modified anything that should cause this issue,for i have not changed anything but the effects(smoke,dust,weather)any ideas???

[defc0n5]

perhaps your graphics settings might be off??

I had messed with my Med 2 installation extensively so I had to un-install and re-install before I could play kingdoms, and when I first ran it after re-nstall, i changed the graphics setting to be maxed on everything. there were moments, during battles, when the UI went blank and units disappeared. I solved that by reducing the graphics settings.

As for the distorted text, do you mean slightly blurred?? I found that when I reduced the resolution from the default, everything became clear again.

[Kiki52]

I hope that person who made that program that automatically gives you a mod folder by just clicking on it and you can specify which files you want extracted (I think it is called medmanager?) will do one for Kingdoms. That'd be nice.

[Chevalier IX]

hmmm....I did not consider that.most of my settings are on the highest levels.I will give that a shot.as for the text,by distorted I mean the letters are actually jumbled up or non existant.I havent a clue what could cause that,for it is the first I have heard of it.anotrher oddity for me is that this seems to only happen with kingdoms,so I was thinking that perhaps the io ias having a hard time reading a file or another,for when I run it normally(erase the io)everything is back to normal.

[Americanus Supremus]

I ran into problems after unpacking the files. The game would run fine. But when I would go to fight a battle it would load up and then crash. Everytime. So I saved all the files I wanted to mod and the uninstalled and reinstalled, didnt unpack files, places the files I wanted to mod into there proper spots and started again. That seems to have worked. That unpacking always screws up my game. Just as it says it might in the readme.

HC

[Chevalier IX]

@americanu supremus
after unpacking you have to make sure to erase the following files from your data....
descr_geography_new.txt
descr_geography_new.db
these two files have time stamp issues and they will cause your battles to crash every time,after you erase them everything should be fine from there on out.

[tonedog]

ok ive unpacked the files and made a couple of small changes but there's 600mb of memory bein used but all those files and thats just 1 campaign.

how does this unpacking work, is there a way to repack the files after u have modded them to save on hard drive space?

[Chevalier IX]

@tonedog
I suppose you could very well delete them for the easiest route,the ones you do not need anyway,for this will not negate them from the game,they will just launch at their default settings providing you did no change them upon starting up the game.so just get rid of the files you are not changing.

[Tominokar]

hmmm....I did not consider that.most of my settings are on the highest levels.I will give that a shot.as for the text,by distorted I mean the letters are actually jumbled up or non existant.I havent a clue what could cause that,for it is the first I have heard of it.anotrher oddity for me is that this seems to only happen with kingdoms,so I was thinking that perhaps the io ias having a hard time reading a file or another,for when I run it normally(erase the io)everything is back to normal.

Yeh I have the same problem, when running a batch file directed to the kingdoms exe. I'm assuming there's some extra files needing for a mod folder with Kingdoms.

Didn't CA say Kingdoms would be the most mod-friendly TW yet? I've not seen anything but more complications so far

[pansarskott]

Tried making my own mod for the britannic campaign. Extracted all files then made a new folder in the "mods" folder, changed some stats for some units, made a shortcut called: "C:\Program Files\SEGA\Medieval II Total War\kingdoms.exe" --features.mod=mods/Mymod.
The game starts up with the britannic screen but then CTD. whats wrong here?

[Spurius]

I suggest changing the default 'Mymod' to the actual mod name, like teutonic...

[pansarskott]

Got it to work... Thanks!

[SigniferOne]

Did your text start out as distorted in campaign map? For some reason, if I use file_first, my campaign becomes all distorted.

[Juggernaut]

I unpacked the files for teutonic campaign, changed export_descr_units.text and I launched the game through the .bat file with io_file first command.
The game launched fine, but when I enter a battle every text in the game just disappears.
When I change
[io]
file_first
to false the text appears, but the changes I made to the untis aren't there.
Does anyone else have this problem?
Edit:I deleted unnecessary files and it now works.

[lordgeordie]

hello

could i be a bit picky! could someone create a guide to unpacking (which i have done fine) and creating/running a modded version of the main game.........all i wanted to do was increase troop numbers in a mod! when i add the io--first it just loads med 2 instead of kingdoms americas errrgh!

please please a dumb guide covering all eventualities would be ace!

[nerazzurri]

This is the way I use to mod Kingdoms

1. Go to the unpacker folder right click on the bat file that unpacks the campaign you're modding and change the destination from ..\..\ to another folder on you system, e.g. C:\Crusades\ (I suspect this has to exists to begin with so if you set this to something that doesn't exist you'll need to create it before running the batch file). The reason for doing things like this is that you don't then have to go through and delete everything that causes Kingdoms problems afterwards.
2. Run the batch file.
3. Copy across the files you want to edit from the folder of unpacked files to the mod folder making sure that it gets put in the right place, i.e. if it's in the data\text folder in the unpacked folder put it in the data\text folder in the mod folder.
4. Edit the files as required.
5. Right click on the shortcut for the campaign you've modded and add a space and then --io.file_first to the target. The final result should look like this:-

"C:\Program Files\Sega\Medieval II Total War\kingdoms.exe" --features.mod=mod/crusaders --io.file_first