Preview: Arabia

[Dago Red]

@Dago RedMost modern widescreen monitors have a setting to change the aspect ratio from always wide to auto.

Thank you but that looks worse imo than the stretching. It's an option for some I guess, not for me.

Do you want the team to just go all "Golly guys, we've been doin' it wrong the whole goggly down time!

You're funny!

All I'm saying is, there are reasons to get the mod out as fast as possible before it becomes far too difficult for the average person to even be able to play it. And after 6 years since this was announced (I think), no one can claim getting it out now is rushing it. There is no rushing anything anymore. Geriatrics in a testudo formation would have moved faster.

I don't begrudge anyone on the team for wanting to get things right, or taking extra care in the details. But they NEED to hear another viewpoint... which many of us are harping at: they don't need to write a treatise every time a proposal is made to make a great game. They don't need pages that take 60 minutes to scroll down of information on every single faction to make a historically accurate portrayal. They don't need to spend 6 years developing a game to be the greatest historical depiction of the classical period.

I guarantee you, just 25% of the research and work they have already done would have resulted in that already. So, going forward, just concentrate on putting it out and stop the endless scholasticism. That, is my viewpoint, and what I am "driving at" is putting it out there (with these technical/compatibility issue concerns) so that this viewpoint is heard. Just saying "omg, i can't wait, googly goo lol!" for 6 years is rather useless input. You may not agree with my assessments, but they are real, and useful concerns to address.

[Lуra]

Thank you but that looks worse imo than the stretching. It's an option for some I guess, not for me.



You're funny!

All I'm saying is, there are reasons to get the mod out as fast as possible before it becomes far too difficult for the average person to even be able to play it. And after 6 years since this was announced (I think), no one can claim getting it out now is rushing it. There is no rushing anything anymore. Geriatrics in a testudo formation would have moved faster.

I don't begrudge anyone on the team for wanting to get things right, or taking extra care in the details. But they NEED to hear another viewpoint... which many of us are harping at: they don't need to write a treatise every time a proposal is made to make a great game. They don't need pages that take 60 minutes to scroll down of information on every single faction to make a historically accurate portrayal. They don't need to spend 6 years developing a game to be the greatest historical depiction of the classical period.

I guarantee you, just 25% of the research and work they have already done would have resulted in that already. So, going forward, just concentrate on putting it out and stop the endless scholasticism. That, is my viewpoint, and what I am "driving at" is putting it out there (with these technical/compatibility issue concerns) so that this viewpoint is heard. Just saying "omg, i can't wait, googly goo lol!" for 6 years is rather useless input. You may not agree with my assessments, but they are real, and useful concerns to address.

Thing is, this scholasticism is what makes EB so goddam good. Yes, if they released it now, without all the research it would be th best classical time-period mod for TW, you are right. And it will be awesome to play, but it wouldn't have the scope of immersion and depth the fully complete product will have. I wait with patience knowing that what these guys will finish is going to be that good...

Also, most forumites around here know how to fiddle with their comp to get something installed, and if you do have troubles the forum is there to help you. We're a community not a bunch of whiny teenagers that drop something at the mere sight of an error box.

Another reason we shouldn't disturb the team too much is because Foot may descend from the heavens and stomp on us, repeatedly with the sole of his sole being: a foot.

~Lyra

[Tellos Athenaios]

Take one look at the installation instructions, and then all the help and technical issues problems from people on say, Broken Crescent, and you'll see what I mean. You or I may not have had too many problems, or been able to figure it out easily, but others have been thwarted. There are also all the well documented UAC hurdles one must leap over in Vista and 7 which make some installations as complicated as passing a bill in the US House of Representatives.

(...)

but the average person is totally lost when it comes to the complexities of installing a mod that takes more effort than simply clicking "install."

We had EB1 to learn that lesson. It basically stems from doing your installer more as an afterthought than as a "feature" on its own. So for EB2 we decided to do things quite differently, mainly because we wanted to make the installer automatically avoid many of the pitfalls that one might otherwise stumble into.

In fact we might be the first and only mod to have a working installer before a working mod.

As a general guideline: if a mod asks you to disable UAC it is "doing it wrong". There is absolutely zero need for elevated permissions or mucking about with system settings when installing a mod as the game supports loading mods from arbitrary path names and for the purpose of Steam/Launcher integration one can register mods inside the "current user" section of the registry which is also picked up by the M2TW launcher.

So because our installer specifies that it wants "normal permissions" this means that on Vista/Windows 7 it will default to an unprivileged installation method. The installer checks whether or not it is running as administrator and whether or it is running on a 64bit system. Additionally the installer refuses to install to a directory which already exists, except if that directory corresponds to an EB2 installation (for the purpose of patches/reinstalls) and the default installation location is inside the current user's home directory. It also makes sure to integrate the uninstaller for EB2 with the Windows Control Panel.

[bobbin]

Thank you but that looks worse imo than the stretching. It's an option for some I guess, not for me.



You're funny!

All I'm saying is, there are reasons to get the mod out as fast as possible before it becomes far too difficult for the average person to even be able to play it. And after 6 years since this was announced (I think), no one can claim getting it out now is rushing it. There is no rushing anything anymore. Geriatrics in a testudo formation would have moved faster.

I don't begrudge anyone on the team for wanting to get things right, or taking extra care in the details. But they NEED to hear another viewpoint... which many of us are harping at: they don't need to write a treatise every time a proposal is made to make a great game. They don't need pages that take 60 minutes to scroll down of information on every single faction to make a historically accurate portrayal. They don't need to spend 6 years developing a game to be the greatest historical depiction of the classical period.

I guarantee you, just 25% of the research and work they have already done would have resulted in that already. So, going forward, just concentrate on putting it out and stop the endless scholasticism. That, is my viewpoint, and what I am "driving at" is putting it out there (with these technical/compatibility issue concerns) so that this viewpoint is heard. Just saying "omg, i can't wait, googly goo lol!" for 6 years is rather useless input. You may not agree with my assessments, but they are real, and useful concerns to address.

Why do keep on acting like you know anything about how EBII is being made? You somehow feel able to cast judgement on the team about making a mod when you freely admit you know nothing about making a mod.

So let me tell you from someone who actually works on the mod that scholasticism is not the reason it is taking so long, too ambitious plans, free time and above all manpower is what has held us back. We addressed the first one, can't do anything about the second and we are constantly trying to improve the third.

Criticism is welcome when the person has something useful to say and actually knows what they are talking about.

[Xerrop]

I don't begrudge anyone on the team for wanting to get things right, or taking extra care in the details. But they NEED to hear another viewpoint... which many of us are harping at: they don't need to write a treatise every time a proposal is made to make a great game. They don't need pages that take 60 minutes to scroll down of information on every single faction to make a historically accurate portrayal. They don't need to spend 6 years developing a game to be the greatest historical depiction of the classical period.

I guarantee you, just 25% of the research and work they have already done would have resulted in that already. So, going forward, just concentrate on putting it out and stop the endless scholasticism. That, is my viewpoint, and what I am "driving at" is putting it out there (with these technical/compatibility issue concerns) so that this viewpoint is heard. ...

Donīt think that all those scholasticism is hindering the mod development to such an extent you might think of. Just look on the other Roman mod for Medieval2:TW "De Bello Mundi".
There you have no large essays about all the factions and it looks like they will have more simple gameplay-mechanics. But still they are working since atleast 2008 and are also not finished yet:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=143858

I donīt know anything about modding but I guess porting a game to another timeframe is the main reason why it take so long to get things done. Most finished and polished mods for both RTW and M2:TW are dealing with the exact same timeframe as the vanilla game. Doing any other timeframe results in much more work I think.
E.g. you can not adjust simply the vanilla units, traits and ancillaries and so on. You have to create most things completely new. Different buildings (various temples instead of only churches and mosques), using the religious system for other things, making new agent models, portraits and donīt know how many other things.
Then there are other units and tactics on the battlefield. You probably have to create a new AI to deal with the new units and balance things out. Might also be a huge task compared to a Medieval mod where you "only" need to adjust some setting values here and there.

[Tellos Athenaios]

Quite. It starts with something as simple as fonts...

And before you know it you find yourself working on a tool to generate the events.dat/events.idx pack, so sound code actually works properly.

M2TW has bugs. Stray outside of M2TW Vanilla, you tend to find out.

[PunitorMaximus]

saugeil, oida! keep this going

[Casual Tactician]

saugeil, oida! keep this going

"Sow-wicked", "Oii-there"?!? What!?

[athanaric]

"Sow-wicked", "Oii-there"?!? What!?

More like "ing cool".

[Casual Tactician]

More like "ing cool".

Yup!

[The Crooked Philosopher]

This is my first gaze upon the upcoming EB II faction and i could only say: "Awesome". For the first time there's someone who are willing to contribute a huge amount of information about Ancient Arabia civilization, anyway i hope EB II could release sooner.

Good luck, EB II team.

[yuezhi]

there already was an ancient arabic civilization

the Nabatu faction symbol hasn't been explained in detail yet.

[Moros]

The lion was a popular symbol and can be seen depicted in many forms of Nabataean art, for example there are two rather large lions facing eachother carved out in the rocks at Petra. It was a symbol of power and some people claim it was also connected to the royal house. Not to sure about the last part though. Other possibilities were either to abstract or generic, or only applicable for a certain period.

[Casual Tactician]

Weren't lions or at least mountain/cave "lions" (similar to American pumas) fairly common in the ancient world (EB area; not Britain and sorts though)?

Any knowledge on lions or large "wildcats" in ancient times / or the EB area is welcome...

[yuezhi]

emblem of baktria. not a lion but it is a wild cat that was clearly prominent in ancient times

[Casual Tactician]

emblem of baktria. not a lion but it is a wild cat that was clearly prominent in ancient times

I was asking for knowledge...

[bojieh]

Lions were common in today's European Turkey, during our timeframe.

[martin-bs]

Donīt think that all those scholasticism is hindering the mod development to such an extent you might think of. Just look on the other Roman mod for Medieval2:TW "De Bello Mundi".
There you have no large essays about all the factions and it looks like they will have more simple gameplay-mechanics. But still they are working since atleast 2008 and are also not finished yet:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=143858

I donīt know anything about modding but I guess porting a game to another timeframe is the main reason why it take so long to get things done. Most finished and polished mods for both RTW and M2:TW are dealing with the exact same timeframe as the vanilla game. Doing any other timeframe results in much more work I think.
E.g. you can not adjust simply the vanilla units, traits and ancillaries and so on. You have to create most things completely new. Different buildings (various temples instead of only churches and mosques), using the religious system for other things, making new agent models, portraits and donīt know how many other things.
Then there are other units and tactics on the battlefield. You probably have to create a new AI to deal with the new units and balance things out. Might also be a huge task compared to a Medieval mod where you "only" need to adjust some setting values here and there.

Besides, the MTW 2's battle mechanics is amazingly bad, and there are way to many ways to exploit it. I am sure the EB team will fix that! I hope this time the EBII horse archer nobility (Sarmatian for example) would not be as strong as before, or as cheap, or as common. That was the one imbalance that I have found as a shortfall of EBI. The ease with which you could defeat anyone just using horse-archers felt almost vanilla-like.

[bobbin]

As we can control how often a unit is available to recruit in M2TW that will no longer be a problem.

[martin-bs]

As we can control how often a unit is available to recruit in M2TW that will no longer be a problem.

I am looking forward to seeing the result of your work, not only because I am a die-hard EB fan, but also because I would like to experience the total war games the way, in my opinion, they should have been!