MOS 1.7 Gondor "Marka" Barded Horses Submod

[Roma_Victrix]

The MOS Submod for Gondor "Marka" barded horses

Hi everyone! This is my first attempt at modding, so be gentle. What we have here is a simple miniature submod for TATW MOS v. 1.7. In addition to very aesthetically pleasing barded "marka" horses for several cavalry units belonging to the faction of Gondor, a few units have new textures, models, and/or attachments. You will be happy to learn that it is also save-game compatible (at least from my own experience). MOS is very cranky when you edit the "export_descr_unit" file and crashes if you make certain changes and don't start an entirely new campaign. However, lucky for us, changing the mounts seems to cause no problems! If you encounter one, let me know.

None of the textures are of my own creation, although I have received permission from the Divide and Conquer team (Arachir Galudirithon) to use a handful of units from their submod. The new mounts come from the marka barded horse project submod. They basically allow any other mod to use their models and textures so long as the following members are credited for their original work: the Rusichi Team, Paradamed, KingKong, and AnthoniusII. Cheers to them for their brilliant works of art!

Before we get down to business with downloading instructions, let's give you an idea as to why you should have this submod. Here's some eye candy pics of what your MOS cavalry will look like, should you choose wisely and download it as you are told (and you will do as you are told, because Roma_Victrix has ordered it):



Did you like those? ...I knew you would.

Download instructions:

1) Back up your MOS files first if you haven't done so on your hard drive or external drive! If you don't want to waste a decent amount of time backing up everything, at the very least back up the files "export descr unit" and "descr mount" in the "data" folder, and "battle models" in the "unit models" folder. In fact, simply back up the entire "unit models" folder while you're at it, as well as "unit sprites" (also found in the main "data" folder).

2) Whew! Now that that's done, visit the download page over at ModDB and click the "download now" button (or, alternatively if you are a member of TWC you can simply download it here from TWC instead by just clicking the download button). You don't need both of these downloads, they are identical .rar files, so either one will work! When the "opening data.rar" window pops up, choose "open with" and "WinRAR archiver (default)" unless you have a preference for 7-Zip or some other program.

EDIT, March 31, 2016: I have created another Moddb download option on a more relevant page (for Medieval II: Total War Kingdoms), which you can visit here to download.

3) Once the new "data.rar" WinRAR window pops up, select the "extract to" option from the list of tabs above. Direct your download DIRECTLY TO THE THIRD AGE TOTAL WAR FOLDER (or whatever name you've given to your mod folder containing MOS), do NOT place it directly in the main Medieval II folder, the mods folder, or the data folder within MOS, etc.

4) After selecting the Third Age Total War folder for extracting these files, a message should pop up asking if you want to replace some files. Just say yes to all! If you did not receive this message then you've done something wrong (i.e. directed your download to a folder other than your Third Age Total War folder, or whatever folder you've named for MOS).

5) Boot up the game and enjoy!

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I'd suggest playing a custom battle first to get a good look at the beautiful new horses in your army (and also to test and see if everything's working correctly). Your bodyguards will have these barded horses right away, including Boromir and Denethor, Imrahil's Swan Knight bodyguard detail and now Forlong's bodyguards too, but it will obviously be a while before you'll be able to recruit regular swan knights and knights of Minas Tirith. Don't despair! Dol Amroth squires can be recruited very early in the game. I've also given the regular "Gondor Cavalry" the regular heavy horse instead of the light horse, to make up for the fact that the former model is no longer used by the "Gondor Bodyguard" and "Knights Minas Tirith" units.

Please, give me feedback! And of course rep the marka barded horse project team members who deserve the recognition.

UPDATE: I have just updated the download links to include some missing textures that were causing CTD problems with the Gondor bodyguard unit. The game should work just fine now with the new download! Please continue giving me feedback.

UPDATE: If the links above do not suit you, there is an alternative link I have made at MEGA. See post #16 below for a link to the .rar download there. I've also made a fourth download link option via Google drive, which you can view and download here.

UPDATE (19 October 2015): I now have a brand new, similar submod for the "Divide and Conquer" submod. It replaces the Gondor bodyguard's mount to a barded one! If anyone is a fan of DAC, this is an aesthetically-pleasing submod that you will surely enjoy.

[Ngugi]

Nifty, and nice to see a new modder out here

Tip out of experience: add and underline what version of MOS this submod is for; or people will try to add it to old versions (and later versions, before you got time to update it, when that time comes), with a lot of needless head scratching and annoyance for all involved hehe

[Roma_Victrix]

Nifty, and nice to see a new modder out here

Tip out of experience: add and underline what version of MOS this submod is for; or people will try to add it to old versions (and later versions, before you got time to update it, when that time comes), with a lot of needless head scratching and annoyance for all involved hehe

Wow! How the hell did I forget that? Thanks. That's a pretty big thing to miss, actually. It will certainly save me a lot of headache.

[Roma_Victrix]

UPDATE: I have added another download option of this submod by uploading a copy of it to the host site called MEGA. Now everyone, including guests and not just TWC members, can enjoy this submod! Cheers everyone and play hard.

[Bercor]

Looks pretty good.

[Roma_Victrix]

Looks pretty good.

Thanks! I'm thinking about uploading one more picture, to make it clear that the "Gondor Bodyguard" and "Knights Minas Tirith" units do in fact look quite different despite having the same black-and-white barded horse now. The Knights of Minas Tirith keep the original look found in MOS, but the bodyguard unit is now the one taken from DAC, where they have slightly different helmets and shields. I thought a little variation would be nice, hence that decision. The Swan Knights are also the same texture and color as those in DAC, along with mercenary DI "Elf Spear" and "Elf Archer" units from the High Elves. The banner carriers and officers of Gondor also have the original blue banners instead of black ones, to jive more with the new blue barded mounts (the High Elves highel_captain_unit_flag banner carrier is also taken from DAC). I didn't include it in this submod, but for aesthetic purposes, my own version on my computer, and my own tastes I also restored the original colors to Gondor's unit banners found in vanilla TATW and DAC by editing the banners file in the "data" folder.

These were basically the only cosmetic changes I made outside of giving the cavalry units shown above those new impressive barded mounts. If anyone wants the new mounts but would like regular old MOS textures back for one or more units that I mentioned above, I would be happy to assist. However, I kept such changes to a minimum, as I expect many people who play MOS prefer the look and feel of most units over DAC. Personally I think DAC has equally if not superior looking rosters and unit models, in some cases aesthetically more vibrant and less drab too, but MOS is the better scripted mod. I'll end such talk there, as I have no dog in a hypothetical fight between MOS and DAC fans.

[Roma_Victrix]

I've gotten some rep for this (thanks to everyone for that), but so far no feedback! I'm assuming that means everything is working smoothly? Did I make any perceivable mistakes? No one's game is crashing, right? I just want to make sure, seeing how this is the first submod I've ever created.

[LazyOne]

Hey there.

It seems I've encountered a small problem. I tried some custom battles to test this out, but every time i include the general's bodyguard in the mix, my game crashes because of an unspecified error. Also tested it out in the campaign and got the same result.

Other than that it works like a charm, looks awesome as well. I always thought that some of Gondor's cavalry looked a little underwhelming. So thank you to both you and the original team.

[Roma_Victrix]

Hey there.

It seems I've encountered a small problem. I tried some custom battles to test this out, but every time i include the general's bodyguard in the mix, my game crashes because of an unspecified error. Also tested it out in the campaign and got the same result.

Other than that it works like a charm, looks awesome as well. I always thought that some of Gondor's cavalry looked a little underwhelming. So thank you to both you and the original team.

Ah, crap! You serious? Thanks for letting me know. I'll look into it immediately!

[Roma_Victrix]

UPDATE: I have since figured out the problem and updated both the download links! Please download it again! Please! Forgive me! I placed the "soldiers attachments diff" and "norm" texture files in the right location for another unit (unit_models / _units / NGU / attachments), but I failed to also place those files in the regular "attachmentsets" subfolder in the unit_models folder as well. That's where they are needed for the Gondor bodyguard unit, as stipulated by the battle_models file. Dammit! I knew I did something wrong!

I humbly ask that you try the download again. Please give me feedback on the updated download, and sorry for the mess that I've caused! Also, sorry to anyone else who has downloaded this and been disappointed. You can download it again and everything should be fine.

[LazyOne]

Re-downloaded and tried out a custom battle with all Gondorian cavalry units, just to be safe. Works perfectly now and looks awesome. This has me really pumped for my new Gondor campaign. Didn't want to start it without this mod.

So thank you again for making this compatible with MOS. Keep up the good work.

[Roma_Victrix]

Re-downloaded and tried out a custom battle with all Gondorian cavalry units, just to be safe. Works perfectly now and looks awesome. This has me really pumped for my new Gondor campaign. Didn't want to start it without this mod.

So thank you again for making this compatible with MOS. Keep up the good work.

Awesome! Thank you very much for letting me know! It's a huge relief to know everything's working correctly now.

[Roma_Victrix]

UPDATE: That stupid apparently worthless BS site MEGA doesn't work (or rather, the link to my file no longer works for some inane reason). I'm ripping my hair out trying to figure it out, but in the meantime I've created a ModDB account and uploaded the mod there. Aside from TWC, you can now download it from ModDB, although that link is currently pending approval from their site administrators. I hope that doesn't take long, but in the meantime you can still download it from there or, as mentioned above, members of TWC can easily download the game directly from TWC.

EDIT: Could someone please try using the new ModDB link to confirm that it is okay? That everything works?

[ElvenKind]

UPDATE: That stupid apparently worthless BS site MEGA doesn't work (or rather, the link to my file no longer works for some inane reason). I'm ripping my hair out trying to figure it out, but in the meantime I've created a ModDB account and uploaded the mod there. Aside from TWC, you can now download it from ModDB, although that link is currently pending approval from their site administrators. I hope that doesn't take long, but in the meantime you can still download it from there or, as mentioned above, members of TWC can easily download the game directly from TWC.

EDIT: Could someone please try using the new ModDB link to confirm that it is okay? That everything works?

You can also upload it to Google Drive.. 15 GB of free space..

[Araval]

In MEGA, when you got the link to your file, was the Include key button green?

[Roma_Victrix]

In MEGA, when you got the link to your file, was the Include key button green?

I certainly did have the green "include key" button turned on.

https://mega.nz/#!Dlk20YiC!hymU_RaMR...S1E8qU0CcmPV60

It seems to be working now.

You can also upload it to Google Drive.. 15 GB of free space..

Good idea! I'll give it a try.

EDIT: wow! That was easy! No headache at all! Once again, thanks for that idea. I provided a new Google Drive link above in the OP.

[Roma_Victrix]

To those who've recently downloaded the submod: any more issues like the one discussed above about the missing texture for Gondor bodyguards? I really want to make sure everything is working smoothly.

[Davek]

I will try your mod tomorrow, and report back to you.

[Roma_Victrix]

I will try your mod tomorrow, and report back to you.

Cool! I hope everything works out and that it's to your liking. Fingers crossed! After my recent fix, it has worked fine for LazyOne. Let's hope that's the case for everyone.

[Roma_Victrix]

I will try your mod tomorrow, and report back to you.

Hi again, did you get a chance to try it out?