Official CA comment - Total War: The modding situation

[Ziame]

for us normal folks can anyone tell us what this all mean? are total conversion mods possible now?(like a medieval mod,etc)

Just read the damn topic, everything is explained. Those are tables with data that modders have decoded but furthermore with data they haven't decoded; apparently map is still unmoddable (in a quick way), Zone of Control is moddable now and a lot of stuff everyone/noone will care about.

[LEGIO_Desaix]

all the fuming. you should get over it. you are the exact personification of this chinese proverb "得寸进尺" get an inch, want a foot. I hope ca don't stop because of you from what I have read in this thread, formations are hardcoded, so you best bet is to ask for a patch. you can always take your money else where if you are fed up. I doubt they will miss you, especially with how you reacted to their good will gesture. good luck and go grab a beer from the freezer.

This is what we've been doing for the last year. Politely asking for a patch, offering cooperation to point out and suggest solution for problems or bugs we thought needed to be fixed. It can look pestering at time, but first square bug (remember you could form square while engaged before patch 3) was addressed because of player's complain. It is quite legitimate that we keep on asking for new fix that could offer a longer longevity to the MP of NTW.
What did you do for giving a better NTW or Empire? Can you point us to your mods before critizing those who spent countless hours trying to enhace this game. Fullin is one of them and I believe this is a thread about modders for modders. If you cannot understand Fullin's sarcasm is because you DO NOT LOVE this game as much as we do, otherwise you would not write those lines.

We love to play NTW, we've been played NTW2 for Rome for a couple of years and we would like to do the same for NTW. It's quite obvious that either a patch to the game could be worked in some months or CA will abandone NTW moving on the new titles. ANd we never propose dramatic changes to the engine, just slight fixes we believe can be introduced with limited effort. This is not asking for a foot, but basically start a cooperation which can only increase CA sells in the end.

CA policy for the last 3 years has been that to increase the frequency of released games and implement new solutions on new titles instead of taking back to the already published games. Some patches in the first 6 months of life and then moving on to the new title. Until MED2 that did not reduce the chance to have tons of fantastic mods because the engine was quite open and one could mod almost 100% of the game. Now starting from Empire lots of things are hard coded and only CA can change things. Hence some people's repetitive request that sometimes can sound annoying or offensive, but it's instead a show of GREAT DEDICATION TO TW GAMES.

[♔hammeredalways♔]

I think you are missing the point, yes we get the sarcasm but once is enough, repeated posts of the same type are not about love for the game - if people wish to blow off steam, or criticise there are threads for that.

We all want to improve the things in game that frustrate us but some things take time, we have no idea what issues are facing the CA team and irrespective of the time lapsed between release and the new spirit of dialogue we should seek to grasp it and move forward at whatever pace.

Repeatedly spitting out our collective dummies could well lead to the new spirit evaporating quickly and having the proverbial door slammed in our faces, one thing that I'm sure would annoy people far more than the current situation

quite frankly if it happens again I will likely report it something I would rather not do

[alhoon]

quite frankly if it happens again I will likely report it something I would rather not do

A lot of people seem to consider that reporting a post to a moderator to check it equals a big hostile move like sending someone on trial with a 10 year imprisoment penalty. All you do with report is to call the attention of the moderators to a post.

[♔hammeredalways♔]

- I have no issue reporting people, but I see some of the better moderators on the site tend to fire a warning shot across the bows first, on the hope that the poster can be drawn to sense

[♔DARTH LEGO♔]

i agree with hammered on this one, there should be no comeback for reporting bad behaviour, disruptive posting etc... the offenders should rather look at themselves for putting the mod in that position in the first place.....


BOT:

Im also guilty of throwing down allot in these threads but sooner or later enough is enough, lets rather use these opportunities to forge a new future with CA, who knows it might open up more doors than we could ever imagine, and if it doesn't.... well, i prefer being on the moral high ground regardless of the outcome.

[d0nutz]

I have been introduced to mods recently and I reckon (from posting about mods on the "once alive Shogun2 forum") 80% of the players have no idea they exist. I have posted on these forums a FEW times with mod links and people are simply amazed by them once they try them.
Once the modding community makes these 80% of the players aware, I reckon CA´s attitude will change. As long as a couple of people high above (for whatever reason) have modding as a very low priority thing on their "this makes money for us to survive and pay the bills" list or very low on the "this may help others steal our work" list, things wont change. Modding is far more addictive than the game itself by far. After reading this thread, I cant help having the feeling some quite low on the CA chain loves modding and somehow made the mistake of endorsing it without permission and now has been put in charge of sorting out the mess.

[alhoon]

I think it's the low priority of the top heads. In a passing they may have said "Modding? Yes, you two when you have the time see what you can do about helping modders. However, I still want those bugs fixed for S2TW multiplayer by next Wednesday! No, I won't give you more time to work on modding! Multiplayer is more important!" etc.

[Birdofilo]

Stop whinning please. These files are not useless. TC has worked a lot to add the new definition to PFM.
For the ship stats alone, we now have 117 new columns properly identified.

As I said, the most important thing in a TW game is the campaign map. Those 117 new columns will not allow relevant changes in the game. Who cares about changing the ship stats when you can't even add a new region?

[T.C.]

As I said, the most important thing in a TW game is the campaign map. Those 117 new columns will not allow relevant changes in the game. Who cares about changing the ship stats when you can't even add a new region?

Yes they will. Come back and make statements like that when if you manage to make a mod of your own.

[Steph]

As I said, the most important thing in a TW game is the campaign map.

In your eyes perhaps, but others may want to mod only battles for instance.

Who cares about changing the ship stats when you can't even add a new region?

Some who likes the map as it is but want to mod the ship stats perhaps? It was a hard question. I needed to think at least 1/10 secondes before I could imagine an answer.

[d0nutz]

I think it's the low priority of the top heads. In a passing they may have said "Modding? Yes, you two when you have the time see what you can do about helping modders. However, I still want those bugs fixed for S2TW multiplayer by next Wednesday! No, I won't give you more time to work on modding! Multiplayer is more important!" etc.

I dont see CA as a top tycoon in the game industry, so what you say is so very feasable its just not funny. Increasing people´s perception of modding is essential in my opinion. Its funny as I NEVER saw a single thread pointing to this forum on their main forums (I browsed them quite a bit with the Shogun2 release), and while I know other forums and a quick search on google will show TWC straight away, I think more should be hammered there as a solution to some of the issues normal players bring to the table (I know I did quite a few posts once I found out about the modding possibilities and how they resolved some of the players expectations).
All I see from this thread is an oversight from CA about the possibilities of their own game, and if it is so obvious that everyone can see it, then something else is at play here for sure...
Also, something I don´t get is.... people who have cracked their skulls for months discovering new stuff to mod (which could have surely been given away and make their lifes easier) not taking pride in the credit given to them for their work, in equal measure. I sure give them that credit when playing an amazingly modded campaign.

[xxon]

CA: Here, we can't give you full mod tools yet, so here we go. Some raw data, sorry for this taking so long.

TWC: CONSPIRACY THEORY!!!!!!1!!!ONE!!11!EXCLAMATIONMARK!1!1

lol this

These DB files are at least something, stop whining, CA isn't obligated to give us anything.

Warscape uses a damn lot of weird files to create the map, including height maps (easy to mod) and pathfinding (impossible to mod). CA confirmed they use internal tools to make it, therefore unless we've got access to them someday we won't do anything to the campaign map that isn't adding new town/resources (with retarded pathfinding) or maybe, in a future, spliting a region (using the original pathfinding with new divisions). And I consider the campaign map to be the most important part of a TW game, but these are the facts, we aren't modding the campaign map of a Warscape game in the next years.

[Birdofilo]

Yes they will. Come back and make statements like that when if you manage to make a mod of your own.

Since RTW, I made several mod for personal use. I have some basic knowledge about modding.
I still believe that the most important thing is the campaign map. For example, do you think that great mod such as Europa Barbarorum or Third Age: Total War would be the same if the creators of these mods were unable to make a new campaign map?

[Bolkonsky]

Easy gentleman. Let's try and stay on topic please.

[alhoon]

we aren't modding the campaign map of a Warscape game in the next years.

I'm not so sure and I'm very thankful that others are not so sure either so they keep trying. Yes pathfinding is hard to mod, but what it takes is work to find out what does what. And again, I'm thankful people are doing all that work. So, unlike you, I'm positive we will be modding the campaign map (or at least some people would) within a year.

[xxon]

taw, uaime5, HusserITW, PietroMicca and others are doing some colossal work regarding the campaign map, however I think they've actually reaching the limit of what we're be able to mod with no tools or further information from CA about several very complex issues about the map.

[Von_Clausewitz]

I will chime in even if late in this debate.

I am part of the Lordz Modding Collective that worked on NTW3 as well as lord Desaix and lord Fullin.

Those files would have been helpful 18 months ago. Now that modders have almost discovered everything that is meaningful what help are these files? No help at all.

Waiting 2 years to release them after interest in the game has faded except from the hard core napoleonic fans and other modders is a slap in the face and more like an after thought to excuse the layziness of CA not giving us the modding tools they promised and a PR stunt before their next title.

To hear some modders say that empire and NTW are the most moddable titles makes me chuckle. How many new maps have been made by modders? Close to none outside of our maps that took forever to make. Any changes to the campaign map? No.
What has been moded? How ridiculously high a canon ball bounces, speeds and textures. Compare RTW mods and NTW and ETW mods and you will see which one was more moddable.

Now the way I understand things is the following:

Lord Desaix can make a map editor in his spare time by himself allowing us to make countless maps but CA cannot, it is too complicated. If you know how you can make new units when you unpack the game, you would know that a unit editor would take very little time to make by an experienced GUI programer and I find it very hard to believe that CA was not using a unit editor to make all these units. Any amateur programer would have made himself a unit editor to avoid hours of repetitive work. I do not care how crude their tools are, they could release them and we could improve on them.
Since the CA team involves numerous people I am sure the tools made should be easy enough to be handled by different people and not just their author. If the geniuses at CA that cannot make a map editor can use these tools then we can.
This whole mea culpa and lame excuses provided (tools to hard and too vague to publish) is so disingenuous, I am never buying a total war title again. Having bought every TW title since STW to NTW, I did not buy shogun2 nor will I ever buy another title again.


As for the accusations that my team is the only team that cares about the line/square/column mechanics of napoleonic warfare here is what I have to say about that.
Would you care if I soled you a car without wheels? Or with square wheels? How can someone claim that their work is historically accurate when they do not understand or care about the fundamentals of napoleonic warfare?
How can CA claim to make a napoleonic game and at the same time not get the fundamentals of napoleonic warfare correct?

All we asked about was a quick fix that is as easy to make as scrambled eggs. When you press the square button delay the bonus and the formation by a few seconds. Give me access to the exe file and I will do it for them pro bono.

I cannot believe anyone still believes those excuses of too much work too little man power from a company that produces a new game every year.

Their strategy is we sold you that lemon (NTW), let's move on to the next lemon (S2TW), we will promise to fix this lemon until we have the next lemon ready then we give you some water and ask you to make lemonade.

Lord VC

[[N]Fullin]

This is all very interesting.

while some of you people think that you love the game more because you make us to shut up because we complain, you are wrong.

I show the love for the game by spending countless hours and days in front of that loading screen modding and playing .

My love is in my 50 MP maps and the 45 new units and uniforms I made for my mod and soon to be released for the whole community.

That doesnt mean I have to be a yes man, and jump in rejoice every time Craig dignify us with a post.

Telling them thank you ,fantastic and great work , will not improve their company.

They already know everything is fine when they look at their sales gentlemen.

They dont need your compliments every time ,they dont need you to tell us to shut up and certantly, Im sure ,they dont want our adoration.
We aint grouppies and they are not rock stars you know.

They need your 50 bucks and to tell them how to get things better.

Do you think CA cares about my complaining?
Of course not.

But, if they can see some of their flaws , the work is done for us to see better games in the future.

Do you think the games will improve by jumping of exitment for every thing they do or post?

What do you achieve by shuting up complains?

Seriously?

They are big guys gentlemen, they run a big succesful company, Iam sure they can take critisism as anyone else, and probably they laugh about our petty complains and underelaborate sarcasm .

if its not like this , hey can post or pm as whinners with the following.

Dear Guys , we will not fix the square and we will not give you editors , so shut the hell up, move on and live with what we gave you.

Period , problem solved.

Do you think I willl feel bad about that, insulted?

Cmon gentlemen.

Lets try not to be this sensitive and understand that we all here starting from a well solid premise.

We bought the game , and we still here playing it and moding it.

And thats the most sincere show of love and respect anybody can ask for.

Yours Lord Fullin

[T.C.]

Lord Desaix can make a map editor in his spare time by himself allowing us to make countless maps but CA cannot, it is too complicated.

The argument that they won't because of laziness holds no water. They've already mentioned certain things can't be release due to third party software useage which they can't release publicly due to how they've licensed it.

Now that modders have almost discovered everything that is meaningful what help are these files To the Lordz? No help at all.

Fixed that for you. There's others out there who'll use them, don't speak for everyone just cause you think you already know how to do everything.

Apologies if I'm being blunt.