Yeah, I'm kinda sad that the first release does not include a muslim faction, but I'm sure the team will give them all the atention they disearve
Yeah, I'm kinda sad that the first release does not include a muslim faction, but I'm sure the team will give them all the atention they disearve
Yes, turks and arabs will get the same care and attention other factions did, however they can't make it into the first custom battle release.
Once the first release goes live, I can divert my attention to the middle east in general, also the bulgarians, the prussians etc. well, still lots to do ....
Those Teutonic knights look wonderful for their beginning stage, Ltd.! There's just one more problem that I have in making them a faction: they did not actually begin conquering Prussian lands until a few decades after the campaign begins, and therefore I'm not entirely comfortable making them their own faction at this point.
On the other hand, if the Latin Empire can't make it into the first release, that's fine. Here's a repost of my ideas for their forces lifted from a few months ago:
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No, I wasn´t considering making them a separate faction , but merely AOR units for some factions, like HRE and Hungary, maybe other as well. So making those factions have like 1 Teutonic Knight unit per army, like 1-2 mounted and dismounted teutonic sergeant units per army ( I am ready with them as well) , also some (hopefully in the future ) teutonic crossbow units to bolster the mentioned factions armies, that would be available only in certain regions and to certain factions only. That was my idea.
Also, I forgot about your proposal for the latins, sorry about that. This list should be enough, now I just have to find a means to accomplish them
So let me get this straight, the TO isn't going to be a separate faction but just AOR units for HRE and Hungary? But we can put in the Latin Empire again because of the roster suggestions from Giovanni? I need to clarify that because I accidently said on the Moddb page that the TO was separate and the Latin Empire was cut. I need to fix that ASAP so yeah. I'm also going to put together some order units for some of the other factions because now HRE's roster would be much larger other wise.
Well, yes, as Lord Giovanni suggested , there was no TO faction until a few decades later, but these units are indeed needed, from the start, as they had an impact on mentioned factions ( and I´m also sure everyone liked to play with the TO in M2TW). I am ready with them anyway (except for a possible xbow unit, once you and / or Grudge succeed in making the proper animations).
The Latins must stay, what I meant, is that I dont´have much to import on them, for now, and making everything from scratch would take a lot more time, than doing the TO and Poland, for which I have plenty stuff. I have already done some polish armour so should be fine.
For the TO I have a Knight unit, a mounted and a dismounted sergeant. I think more is not needed, since they are not a proper faction.
So the Latins won´t make it into the first custom battle release, but everything else stays as is.
I think that building the Latin roster will be easier than it looks. It will take some importing of Warman's Venetian units for the Italian communal troops (the Italians in the Latin Empire were almost all Venetians anyway), his knights models, some utilizing of the Greek archers and infantry from Nicaea, and having the Nicaean Cataphracts use Latin-style full helms, shields and lances for the Greco-Latin Cataphract Knights. I think that the Greek Guard archers and elite Trebizond Archers could use the same unit models. That leaves just the pilgrims (who would be in traveling robes and wielding staves [i.e.- walking sticks]), and the Templars and Hospitallers.
Still, if there's no time to get the roster in for the first release, that's fine.
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Allright, I don´t want to stay in the way of progress. There is one latin - norman knight unit, that I assembled some weeks ago, that has like 3-4 surcoat variations, but it lacks shields so for now it is just lying around aimless. So I guess it could work for the latin - imperial knight unit. However, if you don´t mind Lord Giovanni, I think a greco - latin cataphract unit is somewhat redundant (gameplay-wise, I mean), since the latins already have good knights, like templar, hospitalers and the latins themselves. The cataphract unit would make the Nicaeans somewhat unique in this regard. What do you think?
Also, I have , to some extent, assembled parts of a polish knight, polish heavy cavalry / sergeant and a polish spearmen, though all of them lack assets here and there.
You bring up a good point with redundant knights. It's very important to avoid redundancy in our rosters. The way I see it is this: I think that if it were to come down to redundancy for knights, then the Templars and Hospitallers should be dropped from the Latin Empire general roster- the knightly orders were still mainly employed in fighting Muslims, not Orthodox Christians. I had thought that since the Latin Empire was the only "Crusader State" playable at the moment, that they should be included. Perhaps the Templars and Hospitallers should be AOR units in Syria and Palestine for the Latin Empire, like the Teutonic Knights will be for Hungary and the HRE.
I think that the cataphract knights would actually be pretty important for the Latin Empire; they would only be available only after a lv. 3 stable is researched, and by the time that they could field the cataphract knights, they would have defeated the Byzantine successor states and established a power base in Asia Minor. It would show that not only would the Latins have adopted useful Byzantine influences, but also the (arguably foreseeable) addition of the native Greek nobility (the pronoiatoi) to the knighthood of the Latin Empire, especially after they had converted to Catholicism and shown their valor on the battlefield.
That would mean, then, that we would have the more well-rounded Latin Imperial Knights, and the slower-but-more-powerful Cataphract Knights. I don't think that there's much of an overlap between them, like how the Seleucid Companion Cavalry and Cataphracts could fill different roles in the army.
As for your concerns about keeping Nicaea's cataphracts relatively unique, they still would be- especially in the pivotal first decades of the campaign. The cataphract knights would be comparable to the cataphracts of Nicaea, but available much later. The Latin Empire will have to make do with mainly Franks and Italians for the first few decades (which historically was the case) before they could really begin to enlist quality Greek-influenced forces (which they didn't have time to do, historically). Weren't we also planning on making Nicaean cataphracts an AOR unit for a Trebizondian-restored Byzantine Empire? So, the bottom line for their exclusivity would be with Nicaea, the Byzantine Empire, and the Latin Empire would have a cataphract-influenced unit that still wouldn't have the "style" of a full cataphract. That means that only the Greek heirs of Byzantium will have full cataphracts.
Last edited by Lord Giovanni; September 03, 2014 at 12:53 AM.
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So here comes a new update on my roster. The TO and the Polish Duchies this time, and the hungarian King unit
Teutonic Order: Knights (with Hochmeister and banner carrier), mounted sergeants, dismounted sergeants
Hungarian King:
I changed the horse barding, so only the King unit will have horse barding, the normal knights´s horses won´t get barding. The king unit has also some bavarian surcoats with hungarian shields, showing there were foreign knights employed by the king.
to be continued...
Last edited by Ltd.; September 06, 2014 at 05:02 AM.
Polish duchies:
Knights:
There are four variants in the polish officer unit, signifying the four duchies in that time, so it´s one knight unit but with varying chances who the officer will represent, like Silesian or Masovian province, Greater Poland etc
Polish Cavalry , archers and spearmen:
Also, Lord Giovanni, I guess there is time to assemble some Latin units, also the cataphracts, though not as heavily armoured maybe as the real deal, Nicaeans.
Jesus Christ , Ltd ! That crowned helmet, those polish officers and that teutonic dismounted units are simply outstanding !!!
Ok, so I got some news: I am mostly done with the Latins as well, so as it seems we will include them in our first release. Their roster, following Lord Giovanni´s ideas, includes for now:
- latin knights (lance and sword, shock cav)
- latin cataphract unit ( mace, lance, eastern roman armour, mainly western european / norman helmets)
- auxiliary spearmen (light / medium spearmen, padded armour)
- latin guard sergeants ( heavy multi purpose unit, spear-shield and 1h axe, though not switchable, but the unit will use both in melee)
- militia archers (light archers)
- turcopoles (spear, sword, bow light cavalry- spear to charge, sword in melee)
I will not include any more pictures now as we come closer to the first release date, and people don´t seem to be that much interested in these previews, anyway.
I have also extended the cuman roster with 2 more units and the hungarians with one more unit.
Once templars and hospitalers are done, they will complement the Latins´roster as well, and so are the crossbowmen, once work with the proper animations has finished. On your end, warman, you can assemble some italian units for them, as Lord Giovanni suggested and they should be good to go.
That´s all for now.
That roster sounds great, Ltd.! I'm looking forward to seeing it in battle! Congrats, and thank you!
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Good luck on your next work Ltd !
Also, little question : The last time you showed us your work on the mongols, there was like 4-5 units. Have you updated the mongol rooster, like banner carier and all ?
Thank you.
@ BalroghOfMorgoth: Well, there is an officer already for the mongols, though no banner carrier, yet. I plan to include banner carriers for all factions, revisit all my units and iron out bugs. I haven´t added any more units though to the mongols since their last preview. I´m a little bit torn between adding these "mainly cavalry" factions, like mongols, cumans, to some extent hungary, foot soldiers only for the sake of extending their roster, on the one hand, and leaving their core units as they are and making them use AOR and merc units to complement their armies, on the other.
I can add a generic mongol spear unit and a dismounted archer unit from the assets I have got if you guys see it fit. Let me know.
Sounds good Ltd. I'm glad you're expanding the cumans as well btw. I would add just maybe those two units to the mongols to make things a little easier. Also I have a good mini roster of mercenary units that I can give to complement where needed.
Ok, let´s see some facts and numbers: so I have assembled most / all units I wanted for the first release, I tested every unit in a huge custom battle (7 factions and if I´m not mistaken 47 units in total) to avoid crashes. All units were working as intended (except for one cavalry animation, a little bug actually, which I will try to amend soon), so I am content with the result. By this I mean that all of the units function.
After having seen in warman´s preview that he has got around 200 COA, I was amazed at how much COA there were already and how much work he has put into this mod. It never occured to me before to actually count all the pieces I have imported / made, so I began counting
As it looks there are 221 pieces of armour, 156 helmets and 196 shields/weapons lying around on my HDD. These are the ones that have been used to assemble units. Now if you would count to it warman´s work, now that is quite a number.
And now that we are getting very close to our first release I am happy to see this mod truly take shape as we wanted and glad I could contribute to this mod.
I also checked the R2 workshop and found out that there are so many little new modifications around that I have never seen, since I stopped playing R2, or in fact any game a few months ago, so I can say that this mod has taken some months of my life and free time, and which made my long-time girlfriend, to whom I am now engaged, "especially happy"
And again, thank you to the nice folks who have given us permission to use their work and thank you to everyone who has contributed to this mod.
Congratulation Ltd for all the hard work ! I can't wait to see how far this mod will go.