Vil's Game Improvements [0.1]

**Vil-hatarn** · April 22, 2015, 09:42 PM

Vil's Game Improvements is a modular total overhaul mod for the Sengoku Jidai campaign that aims to improve on all aspects of the vanilla game. The current release is limited to the campaign mode, and comprises changes to technologies, character skills and retainers, unit production, garrison sizes, and more. Future expansion is planned to incorporate changes to the campaign AI, rebalanced battle mechanics, and further refinement of existing campaign changes, especially diplomacy and finances.

While intended for use as a single unit, several portions of the mod are usable on their own, and so the mod is split into a number of independent files. These presently include:

Ancillaries: Total redesign of the ancillaries/retainers available to characters, with more balanced effects.

Base: Contains shared assets for other modules as well as a number of vanilla bugfixes. Can be used alone to patch the vanilla game.

Campaign: Interlinked changes to unit recruitment, buildings, and technologies. Introduces several new technologies, makes gunpowder units slightly easier to access, starting experience is leveled across unit types, replaces several nonfunctional technology effects, and revamps Encampment chain buildings.

Difficulty: Slight tweaks to difficulty settings, including applying success modifiers to all agents (only applied to ministers in vanilla).

Garrison: Significantly increases garrison sizes, mostly with the intent of helping the AI hold its castles. Also adds dojo samurai to master-level dojos.

General Experience: All generals that participate in a battle receive at least 3 experience, even if they weren't in command.

Ministers: Tweaks the bonuses offered by ministers in line with other changes.

Skills: Redesigns and rebalances the skill trees for all characters, and provides a few extra skill points. Bonus star skills are distributed across multiple ranks to reduce cases of a character gaining +5 effective levels at once.

Sounds: A sound patch for the Campaign module generated with Sinfonia Semplice. Replace with your own sound patch if using in combination with other unit mods (not something I would particularly recommend, especially once I make further unit adjustments).

Starter Armies: Changes starting units for several factions to reflect their faction specialties (e.g. Chosokabe start with a bow samurai and three yari ashigaru).

Additional information on each mod is available in the included readme and changelogs. Note that most of the modules are not save-game compatible.

**Vil-hatarn** · April 22, 2015, 10:07 PM

Here are a few preview pictures, of the General skill tree and the tech tree, respectively.

**Collateral_dmg** · April 24, 2015, 08:04 AM

I see you changed the required tech for matchloks, right? I tried to make matchlocks require no techs but it didn't work. When I go to units_tech_required (I think that's what it's called) and remove the matchlock entry it still says that I need Gunpowder Mastery for them in game. Do you know how you would do that? I would appreciate your help. Btw your mod looks interesting.

**Vil-hatarn** · April 24, 2015, 12:31 PM

Yes, I found early on while working on this project that there are several non-indexed tables that make modding technologies, tech requirements, and such problematic, because mod-type files can only add or overwrite, not remove, existing table entries (and overwrite is inconsistent, depends on the table). There are only two ways I know of to address this. First, it may be possible (I honestly haven't considered it at length) to essentially duplicate and rename every building, technology, and unit key in the game; you could then assign new dependencies. However, there may very well be secondary tables that reference the original names that suffer the same issue from lack of indexing. Also, it would simply be a ton of work.

The second option, and the approach I took, was to utilize a patch-type file. Patch files replace the original table in its entirety, and therefore can be used to delete entries. As this is still a work in progress, I've split the patch and the mod to make my work easier; the patch replaces the original tables (such as building_tech_required, technology_effects_junctions, and units_tech_required) with versions containing only RotS and FotS data, while the table in the mod contains all of the Sengoku Jidai data including any changes I've made (such as replacing the Gunpowder Mastery requirement for Matchlocks with the new Gunpowder Expertise, or replacing the non-functional running speed bonus from Form). It's kinda the nuclear option, and I spent months trying to work around it, but without indexing on the tables there's not really an alternative.

Anyway, thanks for looking! I'd certainly appreciate any feedback if you get a chance to try it out.

**Collateral_dmg** · April 24, 2015, 12:49 PM

So how do you do it exactly? Sorry for my ignorance, I'm new to this. Do you use PFM, MMS, or is there another way? You dont have to waste time here on explaining everything to me, only if it's easy to explain for you.

**Collateral_dmg** · April 24, 2015, 01:12 PM

I put the mods in data, and my game chrashes when I dont select any of your mods, or I select only a couple. It only works when I select all of them. So is that supposed to happen?

**Vil-hatarn** · April 24, 2015, 02:42 PM

In PFM, you need to uncheck "CA Files are Read Only" under Options; then, under File, go to Change Pack Type.

There are some inter-dependencies, explained in the readme file. Base is required for several of the others to work (Ancillaries, Campaigns, and Skills definitely, don't remember for the others). It's harmless on its own however--it'll change a few names and patch some vanilla effects but should be stable and have no significant game impact. The problem I would guess you're having is related to the patch file I was talking about; patches don't show up in the mod manager, they load automatically, so if you're not using VGI_campaign you need to manually remove the file VGI_campaign_patch from the data folder. Those should be the only dependencies--not much point in making it modular if the components don't work on their own!

**Collateral_dmg** · April 25, 2015, 06:15 AM

Ok I understand now, thanks for the info!

**Vil-hatarn** · May 04, 2015, 12:53 PM

Just realized I misplaced some text while editing the various readme docs together; wanted to note that the General Experience mod is adapted from Vragos' version, with much-appreciated permission. Will add proper attribution to the docs on the next update.

**ForVictory** · February 09, 2017, 05:23 AM

I really like what you did with this mod. Any change making it for ROTS too or seeing updates soon?

**Vil-hatarn** · February 14, 2017, 01:48 AM

I'm glad you liked it! I stepped away for a while to work on other projects and start grad school, but I definitely still intend to expand the scope and revise the existing portions as originally outlined. I'm aiming to carve out the time for that in the next couple of months, hopefully have something to show before summer.

While I won't rule it out, I have to say a RotS version is unlikely; I don't have the same familiarity with it as the core game so proper balancing would be a struggle. I'll revisit the thought once the core version is complete.

**WhiskeySykes** · February 14, 2017, 06:17 AM

Thank you for making this modular, instead of a giant overhaul. I can choose which changes take place, and its so much easier to spot your changes in pfm, which is awesome!

**Vil-hatarn** · February 16, 2017, 12:08 AM

It only seemed logical, especially for the less intrusive changes like general experience or starting armies. I hope you enjoy it!

If you don't mind me asking, which parts are you using?

**WhiskeySykes** · February 16, 2017, 06:07 AM

I use slightly modified base, campaign, difficulty, garrison, sounds, and starter armies. For example, in difficulty I gave the ai a chance for revolting against ai occupiers, and in general I increased the zone of control slightly for castles, so there are more bottlenecks.

**Vil-hatarn** · February 16, 2017, 07:45 PM

Cool, is there anything in particular you dislike about the character overhauls, or are you just happy with the base versions?

The tweaks you made are areas I'll definitely be looking at in the full version, particularly the zone of control sizes.

**WhiskeySykes** · February 16, 2017, 11:59 PM

I just don't agree the generals are broken. I don't think they should be as strong as adv cavalry, nor too "free" with the buffs. I guess I'm ok with vanilla, although Gempei's General skill trees were perfect, imo. If for a final you could even replace the Geisha with the Shirabyoshi ability to seduce and her skill tree, as well as ditch the monk's for the sou's skill tree, then that'd be great.

**Vil-hatarn** · February 23, 2017, 10:35 AM

I wouldn't describe vanilla generals as broken; I just felt there was some room to make their skill tree more diverse. I may consider scaling back some of the warrior-line bonuses, but not by much; the base general unit is inferior to any real cavalry unit so I feel if you're going to sink all of your skill points into it (a significant opportunity cost compared to the benefits offered by the other lines) you should get an above-average unit (which remains undersized).

Unfortunately, I don't believe your suggestion re: changing agent abilities is possible with the available editing tools. I'll be sure to take a look at the Sou's skills for ideas.