RS 1.5 -- Release Thread
dvk, here's a first draft of the text for the 1.5 release thread. Can you read through this and make sure I'm not including anything that's not in 1.5? (For example the Roman reforms and the 'homeland' economic bonuses, are they in 1.5?)
Squid, if you can give me a bit more about the temples, I'd like to expand that a bit.
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INTRODUCING ROMA SURRECTUM 1.5
Some months ago the first full version of Roma Surrectum was released, and thousands of fans have downloaded and enjoyed it. Since then, the RS team has been busy on a new version of Roma Surrectum –- RS2.0 –- which is being completely redone from top to bottom. Hopefully you’ve had a chance to look at some of our faction previews and see the amazing work our team is doing.
However, there were a few things about the original RS that we felt could be improved, so we’ve taken some time to ‘revamp’ the original Roma Surrectum and slap a shiny new coat of paint on it. The result is a ‘director’s cut’ of Roma Surrectum 1.0 –- new, improved, with twice (possibly three times!) the fun. We call it Roma Surrectum 1.5.
If you’re familiar with RS and want to get right to the downloading, you can get it here:
[DOWNLOAD LINK]
If you want to know more about this new version of the mod, read on...
ROMA SURRECTUM 1.5 -- CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS
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New Map and Textures
The campaign map for RS1.5 has significantly improved, and team member Baxon7 has created a new set of textures that dramatically increase the visual appeal of the map. The result is a map that is fun to play on, that recreates actual geography, and that looks great. See the bottom of this post for screenshots of the new map and textures.
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New Calendar
RS1.5 no longer records the date in years B.C. or A.D. but rather A.U.C. -- Ab Urbe Condita -- “...from the founding of the city.” Roma Surrectum now begins in 473 A.U.C. -- the same year as 280 B.C.
Technically, Ab Urbe Condita means from the founding of the city of Rome, but one can imagine it to mean from the founding of whatever city you like. The Romans kept track of the passing years in this way until some 500 years after the birth of Christ.
There are two reasons for this change. First, to correct a known CTD problem around 66-67 B.C., related to the Roman Civil War. By changing the way the years are counted, no civil war CTD’s occur, so you can play any campaign as long as you like.
The second reason is that it disconnects the game campaign from the historical timeline. You won’t be tempted to think “Hmmm, it’s only 260B.C. and I already control Cisalpine Gaul, that’s not historical!” The result is more immersion in the alternate history of your campaign.
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Roman Military Reforms
Roma Surrectum has totally revamped the way the Roman recruitment/AOR system works in RS1.5, and the way in which we implement the reforms of the Roman army. Rather than one Empire-wide reform, your regions will update and reform separately, as you build up your military recruiting infrastructure. So the Reforms that are such a key part of the Roman campaign are now a more gradual, ‘organic’ process.
The object of this change is to show a gradual change, over many years, in the Roman Army, and better reflects the way things really happened. Over a century passed after Marius before the first named and numbered Legions were ever recorded, so it stands to reason that the Marian Reforms involved a long slow process of converting the huge Roman military into professional armies.
Here’s how it works in RS1.5:
1. You can recruit Republican Legion units (Hastati, Principes, and Triarii) at the start of the campaign. As you expand into areas of Gaul and Greece, you'll see that Hastati become available (Republican Legion II & III respectively)... but they will cost more. As the barracks level goes up, the Principes and Triarii will be available as well outside Italy (again, costing more), while the same units will be available in Italy in lower level barracks and cost less.
2. When you build an 'Army Barracks', you will initiate the first of RS's building-induced reforms. This building represents a '2nd Punic War' reform, where the use of the Roman cohort formation began. This reform combines the Roman Hastati and Principes into one unit, the VE Legions – I and II. VE Legion I will appear first in Italy, and be available only in Italy. VE Legion II will be recruitable in certain military AOR's all over, and in Gaul and Greece. If you never built a 'Royal Barracks', these units would eventually replace all the Hastati and Principe units, but the Triarii would still be available.
3. Building the 'Royal Barracks' effectively brings about the first step of the reforms of Giaus Marius. Only in Italy, the first of the named and numbered Legions will begin to appear in each city... except Rome. There are 12 of these Legions in all. You may still have other units available in other areas of the map... even the very first of Rome's units. But as you build up they will all gradually change.
4. Building the Imperial Palace in certain cities will no longer trigger the 'Marian Reforms'... instead, the event has been renamed 'The Imperial Reforms'. All of the old units will disappear from recruitment, and the Imperial Legions will then become available to recruit. Depending on what barracks you have built, the first 12 Legions may appear in other Legion recruitment areas around the map.
Now, where can you recruit these Legions? We’ve made it easy. Every region that can recruit a Legion at some point has an (L) after its city name. If you right click the region that city is located in, you will see the name of the Legion or Legions that are available there.
In your RTW\data directory, in the _Important_Stuff folder, you will see a new folder called 'New_Legion_Recruitment'. There are two maps in there and a text file that explain where all the Legions can be recruited.
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Improved Battle System
All unit stats have been re-balanced, and a number of mistakes and imbalances corrected, as well as missing\wrong weapons values. RS has always had a fun battle system, but this newest version is better than ever.
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New Mercenaries
The roster of mercenaries has been expanded across the map for increased unit variety. Some of our most popular units, the City Hoplites (Athenian Hoplites, Byzantine Hoplites, etc.) are now recruitable as mercenaries.
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Unit Cards
Unit cards that were missing in RS1.0 have been fixed, and Roman unit cards now all match the textures on the battlefield.
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The 'Monument' Building Tree
Several new buildings have been added in the 'monument' building tree, representing special buildings available to specific cultures. 'Monument' buildings include:
- Barbarian Weapons Dealer (improved weapons and armor)
- Eastern Gardens (increased trade)
- Military Monuments and Shrines for all factions (happiness bonus)
- The Great Temple of Ba'al for Carthage (happiness bonus due to increase in baby sacrifices)
- The Temple of Jerusalem (happiness bonus and trade increase)
- Legion Monuments (happiness bonus)
- Arches and Columns (happiness bonus)
- Colonnaded Streets (happiness and trade bonuses)
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New Sprites
All units now have working sprites, so RS1.5 will run faster than ever in battle.
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Economic Balancing
RS1.5 has a number of modifications to the economy to correct some things we didn't like. Carthage has been made stronger. Syracuse and the Bosporans are weaker. We did a great deal of testing to improve the balance between the Seleucid Empire and its neighbors in an attempt to prevent the Seleucids from quickly dominating, or quickly being wiped out.
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Naval Invasions
Some factions have been set to “Prefer naval invasions” – resulting in some very interesting conflicts across the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Rome now sets its eyes on Corsica and Sardinia, often battling Carthage for supremacy of the islands of the Western Mediterranean, while the Bosporans and Pontus frequently wage war with each other, launching naval invasions across the Black Sea.
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Roman AI Expansion
By making some changes to the terrain on the campaign map we’ve been able to ‘nudge’ the Roman AI to expand east and west rather than heading north towards the Baltic. In some campaigns the AI Romans will still insist on a skiing vacation, but more often they will expand historically, into Transalpine Gaul and the Balkans.
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Victory Conditions
Every faction now has a set of victory conditions tailored to their location and their historical situation.
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Rebellious Regions
Some areas on the map that were historically difficult to conquer have had specific penalties added, to make any potential ruler in for an unpleasant surprise. For example, any faction going north into the steppes will need strong garrisons for the settlements they capture. Syracuse and Jerusalem will be trouble spots. Carthage will have more trouble holding Syracuse.
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Faction Homelands
In many mods, you may have a hard time in the beginning, but you reach a point where you become so powerful that no other factions can stand up to you. You reach a ‘tipping point’... where you know you're going to win because you've got so much money and so many armies that nothing can stop you.
RS1.5 reduces the impact of this ‘tipping point’ by putting emphasis on your economy in your own 'home' territories. This restrains you, because your finances are based in the areas where you started. But it also gives you an advantage for the same reason. As an AI faction expands, it loses money... or more correctly must spend a lot to maintain the expansion. It has a ton of armies because it can support them....but not a lot of money because it's trying to maintain its empire. Now you come along and attack this faction. You take its territories away. You relieve it of its expensive armies. You pound it back towards it's 'homeland’. In the typical RTW mod, what happens is that you handcuff the AI faction because you are taking huge chucks out of its economy. But in RS, as you pound an AI faction back towards it's home, you are actually INCREASING it's income. Army maintenance drops. Costly and often unproductive regions are removed from it. You are actually making them stronger economically. So it gives them a better chance, and delays the ‘tipping point’, because if you're not careful, that faction can recover and come at you again!
So, the further you get from home...the less money you make. This represents the cost of sending armies to distant places, and the costs of controlling a vast area of people who are going to want something from you in return for their cooperation. So for example, if Armenia conquers a region in Gaul, they suffer an instant 35% penalty in the form of lost taxable income. 45% in Britain. The penalties expand according to the distance from where you start. So while it may seems as if you have a ton of money in the beginning of the campaign... wait until you start trying to conquer areas that are far away from your homeland.
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Population Control Buildings
You ever have a huge city that keeps growing, and getting harder and harder to control? You ever wish you could do something to slow down that population growth? Well, now you can – dvk has created two new building trees, one to increase population growth, and one to reduce population growth. Just as real city managers can build new housing to attract people to a city, or build neighboring settlements to siphon off excess population, now your governors can do the same. It sure beats waiting for them to rebel, and then exterminating your own citizens!
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New Temple Structure
RS1.5 replaces the old RS temple structure with a totally new temple structure that drastically expands which temples all factions are able to build; it also replaces the existing priest ancillaries with a new set matching the new temples. Two notes about temples: Naval temples can only be built in a region that can build a port, and forge temples (i.e. weapon upgrades, etc) can only be built in a region that has at least one of gold, silver or iron AND some of its benefits are only available if a specific resource is also available in the region. Silver or gold are required for the mine improvements, and iron is required for weapon/armor upgrades.
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New Campaign Map and Textures
Last but not least, the huge, spacious Roma Surrectum map has been radically overhauled -- every region of the map has been redesigned with an eye towards realism, gameplay, and a special emphasis on looking really friggin' cool -- which was accomplished in no small part with a set of beautiful new textures created by legendary RTW mapper Baxon7.
The world which once looked like this...
...now looks like this:
For more screenshots of the new map, look here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=133792
Now isn't it time to start downloading?
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CREDITS
dvk901
Roman AOR system, faction balancing, improved battle stats, new victory conditions, Monument building tree concept and development, Population Control building tree concept and development, 'faction homelands' concept and development, not to mention many other things (such as tasering tone when he starts to slack off).
Baxon7
New campaign map textures, mapping advice and guidance.
cherryfunk
Map terrain revisions.
SquidSK
New temple system and new ancillaries.
tone
The beautiful Unique City Hoplites units, Roma Surrectum's most popular batch of units (so far...).
Drtad
Leadership of the Armenia and the Caucasus Mapping Project.
swhunter
Enthusiasm, diligent playtesting, and pictures of obscure Greek helmets.
The Roma Surrectum Team
Playtesting, refinement, moral support, griping about SPQR Praetorian.
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Originally Posted by cherryfunk
..BUT that was cherryfunk that creat nice ground and coastline on map
