Rome Total War Vanilla Mod

**Roy974** · July 10, 2010, 04:44 PM

Back when this mod first start it was all about staying loyal to the vanilla feel, well I think this mod has come a long way and is not as close to the vanilla feel as I originally had wished to keep. But as with all projects, they start small and grow and grow on till you end up with something you never pictured would be the end result. So we look at the changes over the years, we all know about the new imperial campaign map, night battles, 4 turns per year etc. You ask what is new, what could be done to add more to this mod. We a lot could be done, but as said before trying to stick as close to vanilla feel as possible (not as easy as it sounds).

First off the campaign map will seem so different, it will feel like its a new campaign map and some of you might swear blind till your blue in the face its a new map (before anyone does turn blue though) no this is the exact same campaign map as in earlier versions and has not been changed in any way. The only changes are texture changes (its amazing how textures can fool you into thinking its all new) nothing added or removed from the map, all purely down to textures (I know i'm still as shocked as you guy's).

So the imperial campaign maps had a texture upgrade, what else could warrant an new release. Well textures play a bulk of the work in this new version so i'm afraid you'll have to see the changes for your selves. But many, many units have had their textures changed and some of these units will be seen in pictures posted around this topic and maybe even in this very post. But for the best part you'll just have to look for yourself i'm afraid.

We don't end this there though, no, no, no. We have to think, the campaign map is better looking, units are better looking. May as well have better looking battle fields as well then right? Well to be honest we figured why make everything look better, something has to look poorly done and sadly it was thins area. (Ok, ok calm down, man anyone would think we did it to annoy you all) yes of course we couldn't leave out the most logic place to improve, after all you'll be spending most of your game time there so leaving it wasn't an option.

Its not all about textures though, no I wanted to give you something new, something unscripted, something that would leave you crying or wanting more (be warned, if you have no patents then stick to version 8.0). To really get things going rebalancing of units was in order, every unit was looked at (it took me bloody ages) but the end result is a campaign mode that will test your skills, push your patents and test your equipment strength as you bang the keyboard through the mouse (remember its attached via a wire and might swing back to hit you) case and monitor (just break the disc in half, its cheaper to replace). Anyway the factions will be tougher, if playing as the Julii, you'll be spending more of your resources defending and loosing towns as the Senate aids in your defence. Scipii don't have it any easier either, no, no, no, they have it just as hard. The Greek's are no push over, the Carthaginians are stronger and more capable of defending their towns and taking what they want. The Bruitii think them selves lucky then (they shouldn't) the Greeks maybe hard, but the Macedonians aren't no walk in the park either and even if the Brutii could crash the Macedonians the Thracians can be just as bad if not worse, and the Dacians will toy with you (they must like annoying their enemies, they annoyed me a lot sending half stacks to attack a town that has a full stack inside and full stack outside, they need to stick their stacks up their ***).

This isn't the only other change and just because I used the Romans (after all tis is Rome TW is it not) doesn't mean that the other factions aren't just as challenging to play as. Its true the Barbarians will be easier as they make vast amounts of money per turn and can field larger armies, but are those armies capable of taking on the mighty Romans and defeating all the houses and then taking on the likes of the Macedonians, Greeks etc (I doubt it). Anyway moving on, balancing the units out (even though was the longest part of my work load) wasn't the only change to take place in the rebalancing. No I went further and made reductions in the trade value's for all tradable goods (sounds so much like real life doesn't it? how depressing). Now its harder to make money early on, it gets easier and mines will give you the biggest return, so taking towns that can build mines is more important than taking any old town. The next changes was what I just hit on, mines. Gold mines have a very high trade value, this was done because it made sense and because the trade bonus that had been added to many buildings in previous versions has been removed. Overall the game is now much harder, some factions will be harder to play as than other, this wasn't done intentionally but in less each faction has the exact units and exact same stats for those units you will never have a truly balanced mod. This version is much more balanced than previous versions though, and its much more fun to play.

Main Features:

New Faction Symbols: