HURB (Historical Units Region Building) is a fairly large mod that changed a very large portion of the game, which is why I decided to start writing a guide to the mod so folks get a better view of what was changed.
INDEX
1.Intro
2.Factions
3.Region and Settlement changes
4.Buildings and Economy (under construction)
5.Units (under construction)
6.Recruitment system (under construction)
7.Other changes (Scripts mostly) (under construction)
1.Intro
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:HURB stands for Historical Units Region Buildings, it is an attempt to try and improve the historical accuracy of almost every aspect of the game while adding the fun element and avoid making excessive use of scripts that would slow down the game. It's most notable change is that it tries to maximize the potential of divsersity in units and buildings, giving you an extremely wide array of option to choose to build from, and also a very wide array of units as well. If you've played other RTW/M2TW mods, then the closest approximation of what this mod is trying to aim for is a M2TW version of Roma Surrectum.
In terms of major changes in detail
1.New Factions : currently the Abbasid Caliph is in game, next planned faction is the Kingdom of Serbia
2.Reworked Map : based strongly on historical population distribution of the early era and also relative political representation. and of course said settlement have to really exist at that time.
3. Completely reworked recruitment system, you should now be able to build almost everything with one building, but difference in cost / replenishment / balance of arm would still force you to not just always go with a relatively balanced setup.
4. Many new units or reworked units, utilized several other mods' great models, Ruschi and Madtao's were already in SS but I utilized them further, also added BC's and Wrath of the Northmen amongst other.
5. Very dramatically different EDB, if you use winmerge or something to compare it with the original SS one, it's almost completely different.
2.Factions
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:As of Version 3.3, the Current factions in game are
Playable
Islamic
1.Abbasid Caliph (new faction)
2.Almoravids (Moors)
3.The Great Seljuqs
4.The Fatimid Caliph
5.Khwarezmian Shahdom
Catholic
1.The Most Serene Republic of Venice
2.The Republic of Genoa
3.The Holy Roman Empire
4.The Kingdom of Sicily
5.The Kingdom of England
6.The Kingdom of France
7.The Kingdom of Scotland
8.The Kingdom of Leon-Castille
9.The Kingdom of Aragon
10.The Kingdom of Portugal
11.The Kingdom of Poland
12.The Kingdom of Denmark
13.The Kingdom of Norway
14.The Kingdom of Hungary
15.Crusader States
Orthodox
1.The Eastern Roman Emire
2.The Grand Principality of Kiev
3.The Republic of Novogod
Pagan
1.The Grand Duchy of Lithuania
2.The Cuman-Kipchak Confederation.
Emergents and non-playbles
1.The Golden Horde
2.The Timurids
3.The Papal-States
4.The Teutonic Knights
5.Independent Forces
Future planned Changes (current avalible faction slot = 1)
1.Add Serbia
2.Remove Timurids and possible TO to add in Armenia Cicilia and Kingdom of Georgia. (Early era only.)
3.Region and Settlement changes
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Current Map and notable settlement changes
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Specific Relgional Changes rational explained here.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:(British Isles)
Cut:
Galway
Aberdeen
Exeter
Winchester
In general, the British Isle's population during the middle ages was small, and even smaller outside of England, the population of Ireland might have realistically been lower than that of the Balearic isles for example. as such, and given the rather clear overpowerness of whoever wins in the isles in most game out come, a very big axe was given to the region.
(Scandinavia and Germany)
Cut:
Eikundsund
Skara
Nyköping
Arhus
Add:
Ribe
Lubeck
Erfurt
Aachen
See British isles, the population density of the region was very low during this period especially outside of the Danish regions. Arhus was not particularly important in the sense that it was the main port but it wasn't the main capital. Ribe was the main political seat in Jutland.
Lubeck not being in was obviously a farce, while Erfurt and Aachen gives Germany area a bit more reasonable represntation . Aachen was espeically important politically for the HRE as most of it's Emperor were crowned there.
Rus / Steppe region:
Cut:
Embi
Kholyv
Serbinoka
Moscow
Zholotymyr
Turku
Kazan
Bulgar
Astraskhan
Jailsk
Added:
Chernigov
Turov
Suzdal
Volodymyr
Novhorod-Siverskyi
Bolghar
Aktobe
Saqsin
Embi and Kholyv region were very sparesly populated during this period. and there was no proof that either settlement actually existed at that point. (actually there is quite a bit of proof that they DIDN't Exist until much later) for the other 3 it's mainly because they were either small or relatively unimportant to the other cities I added to the Rus region. Moscow was not meantioned in any text until the late 1100s for example, and was not a particularly prominent town until the 1300-1400s. Turku was not founded until around the turn of the 13th C, while Finland in general was too sparesly populated to seriously warrant a settlement. Kazan also didn't appear to exist at 1100, Bulgar I think was confused with Bolghar which was in a different spot.
The settlements I added in their stead should be instantly recognizable by anyone with even a passing interest in Russian Medieval history as some of the most important centers of Russian Principality during this period. in fact they're almost all more important than any other Rus Settlements outside of Kiev and Novogorod, the Steppe region's settlement is aligned or renamed to align more realistically with existing onces in 1100.
the overall # of Rus region actually went down by 2 but the distribution becomes much more focused on the Ukrain / Belarus region. which is inline with the historical reality of the region.
(Balkan / Byzantium Region)
Cut:
Targoviste
Rhodes
Added:
Ras
Tarnovo
Wallachia as a concept did not truely form until the late 13th C at the earliest and more likely the 14th C. Rhodes is the most logical one of the remaining settlements to cut due to population and relative importance issue. Ras was the real capital of the Serbian Principality that eventually became the Kingdom of Serbia, while Tarnovo was the capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire, these two settlement had massive political importance from the 12th-15th century, they abosalutely had to be in.
(Greater Persian Region)
Cut:
Khiva
Mashhud
Konjikala
Added:
Merv
Herat
Nishapur
This is basically just a regional center move (though combined with a bit of border redraw as well, the 3 city that I added in there stead were almost all surely amongst teh top 20 greatest city IN THE WORLD during the 12-13th C. Merv was repeated attested as being just as populated as Baghdad during this period. meanwhile, Khiva was not really prominent until after the Mongols literally wiped Persia off the face of the earth, while Mashhud and Konjikala was clearly not as prominent as those other two.
(Arabian Region)
Cut:
Sharjah (the UAE/Oman region)
Qarisiya
Al-Aqba
Tayma
Added:
Al-Kharj (modern day Riyadh)
Najaf
Samarra
Essentially shifting the Population towards Mesopotamia, which was easily several times the population of the rest of the Penisula combined. Al-Kharj represents the Arabian desert trade rout, which was not really impassable. This balance out the power of Egypt greatly as well. as they start with 2 less settlement and much harder access to Medina / Mecca .
(Western North Africa, aka the Maghreb region and Iberia)
Cut:
Melilla
Baleb Al Anab
Oporto
Add:
Badajoz
Sijilmasa
Santiago de Compostela
Coimbra
Melilla was barely a village at that time, it's only real significance came at the very tail end of the medieval period due to Spanish occupation, Baleb Al Anab is ok but having 3 region for Algeria is really too much. Sijilmasa was very crucial to the Moorish dynasties in controlling the Saharan trade routs, and as such it is represented as having a very good land trade access and very good resources. Seperated Badajoz from Sevilla again. Both were important and Andalusia really could use more representation anyway.
Santiago was a very much seperated region (hell it was even a nominal kingdom) during that span, so it must be in. Coimbra was more representative than Oporto at that point.
(France)
Cut
Clermont
Marseille
Added
Troyes
Orleans
Nice
Arles
Poitiers
The # of settlement France had in 6.3 (and MTW as a whole) is generally a travesty, based much more on 1800s population than 1100s. the medieval era French region was easily at least 4 times the population as the British Isles.
Orleans and Poitiers were probably as big as London during that period. or at least bigger than any British settlement not named London by a good margin. Nice was the border zone between Italy and France and frequently switched between Genoa and French hands. while I moved Marseilli to Arles partly due to political importance (the Kingdom of Arles was the bases of later era Bungundy) and partly due to map balance (to put a little more distance between them and Nice )
(Italian and Swiss Region)
Cut:
Bern
Ajacco
Added:
Florence
Verona
Trieste
Zurich
Northern Italy was by far the most densely populated region in Catholic Europe during the entire medieval era, there isn't much more needed to be said about why these were added. Moved Bern to Zurich as Bern wasn't founded until later on. and Zurich geographically and historically all make more sense than Bern anyway. Vernoa is a very interesting position as it's literally right in the middle of everything, while Florence's importance is too obvious to overlook, Trieste was quite important to Venice's empire as it's second port and gateway into the Balkans. Corsica was not that unimportant but something had to give .
(Anatolia)
Cut:
Adana
Added:
Sis
Tarsus
Essentially spliting the Cilician Armenian region into it's 2 Capital region, to give more complextion to the Anatolian war and possibly to lay the ground for a future Armenian faction.
4.Buildings and Economy
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
HURB changes buildings (and thus also economy) greatly by introducing many many more buildings, and also making the effects of buildings much more complicated in general, most buildings will have several effects (usually some positive and some negative, but usually the positive outweighs the negatives). and building chain restristriction and relavance become much more interwinned. (for example, most larger stone buildings will require a quarry to build.)
A simple example of the the multi effect building would be brothels, in addition to inreasing happiness it will now add considerable income as well (since it increase commerce and tax collected), while decreases law (for obvious reasons as well).
I have incorperated some previously little used building effects more widely, such as a fix income effect to give a further dimension to income. a lot of buildings will either decrease trade or fix income to simulate upkeep cost of buildings as well.
5.Units
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:Under Construction
6.Recruitment system
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
The Recruitment system in HURB do away with the rather ridiculas Vanilla version of Barrack / Stable / Range recruitment, medieval armies were very rarely trained by the state, so the idea that your training knights in a barrack is about as laughable as Knights in plate armour running around in 1100.
In general, most recruitment now only center around one building, which represent feudalism (or comparable) system in the Medieval world, the building will give you access to most of your avalible units almost immediately (though again, this may depend on factions) . it is completely unhistorical and illogical that you could say.. only summon Sergeants but not Knights (who were usually their masters) or vice versa, the truth is almost all medieval army came together, when the King called a knight he'll bring his sergants and levies and what not all at the same time.
Units are of course, still seperated by relative avalibility and cost, replenish pool is generally very low due to the fact that you can now build almost everything with just one building.
However not all units are limited by that one building, for example militias are still upgraded via the city barrack line, and some buildings will give you bigger pools to certain units.
There is considerable difference in effect and recruitment of various faction now, some faction have much stronger recruitment pools (such as Western European Feudal states) but the feudal system will take a significant toll on your economy, while others (such as the Italians) will give a relatively weaker pool but will have little to no harm to the economy at all.
AOR units are also now much more obvious, including even basic levy units, for example if your France and you conquered say.. Alexandria, you levy spearmen from Alexandria will be the Middle Eastern oncs.
7.Other changes (Scripts mostly)
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:I have added a Almohad rebellion script mostly to keep the Moors in check, since the Moors start as one of the largest faction in game in a very safe corner spot, combined with the now more reasonable unit and recruitments in previous games several players have reported the Moors simply overrunning Iberia easily most of the time, the Almohad script is a two step script that'll fire in 1120 and 1130, the more serious second event will spawn two major army to attack Moorish settlements back in North Africa, the event will only fire if the Moors are strong at that point though, if they're already losing then only the first event will fire