DLV6.2: i love it and i hate it

[cedric37]

Hello all,

First of all a big hurraa for this mod which i find very addictive, and very well thought out.
As i really like it i also am very frustrated by some aspects of the game... the more intense the love the more intense the hatred ^^

Here are some points i would like to discuss:

1) Capital moving: in fact it is better not to try to move it at all because at the end you will finish with a civil war. I found that it was hard-coded the name of the capital for the coronation and even with the crown, your leader is expected to be located in the original capitat not the one you decided. That removes some freedom for the player and is a real pain if your orignal capital have failed in the hands of your opponents...

2) Economy: the random events have too many chance to trigger (10%) so your economy is like a yo-yo and generally very poor due to more than frequent "disasters on your roads" event which will kill completly your income.
When your income is normal though, some cities can reach crazy levels, like Venice who sometimes gave me 30K/turn! Maybe something smoother would help.

3) Unit rosters: there are some very unbalanced rosters in the game. The moors have one good example, "Andalusian Infantry". Those monsters are recruitable in castles (tier 2), does not cost that much and their stats are superior to most of the knights the western catholic nations can build for much more expensive prices and only in fortress or better.
I play now as milan and my foot / mounted feudal knights (tier 3) have no chance beating andalusian infantry (tier 2) on a 1 to 1 basis. This is very annoying.
Plus the AI only recruit endless stacks of this unit, so you have to fight the same stacks again and again with heavy loss. It kills the diversity as well as the fun.
Even my templars had bad time fighting those andalusian cyborgs (DEFENSE 40!!!! my famiglia ducale, which is the top elite of milan have defense 40 too but they cost 3x the cost of andalusian infantry and are tier 5.)
I don't know if other rosters have such unbalancing units; but it gives the game a sad turn (castille and portugal have been exterminated by the andalusian cyborgs and france was about to fall when i fortunately called a holy war against cordoba and catholics start to retaliate...)

4) Dark Ages: this event is more of an annoyance for me. I mean you took lots of time to build / consolidate alliances sometimes it had cost you a lot of money and concessions. Everything is lost during those years as your most fidel allies will fight you, sometimes just by blocakding ports that are even not strategical points at all.
This is particularly annoying when the betrayer is one of your vassals because your count of regions held diminish; and you will never be able to have this faction as a vassal again (or the odds are so poor).
Could it be that this event only throw neutral nations to fight you ? At least vassals should remain vassals...

5) Admirals: once you have separated a fleet in 2 parts you will never be able to have it whole again. It is very annoying that everytime you build a ship you have to get a new fleet with its proper admiral; especially when he gets no stars...
The only way to get a big fleet is to let your fleet in the port when the new ship is build. It is not very logical when you compare to earth units. You can merge 2 generals in one stack but you cannot merge 2 admirals in 1 stack. This restriction should only apply to "starred" admirals IMO.

6) Assassination chances: once the AI gets an assassin, even a 0-starred one can kill a governor in a city. And i already seen some of my 10-stars generals assassinated by incompetent assassins. Is it normal ? It is a real pain to see your champion murdered by a newbie assassin.

7) Factions behaving like hordes + winning conditions: a bad combanation. Try to achieve the victory when your victory is linked to the elimination of 2 other factions. It is nearly impossible; as Sicilians will flee away as far as Georgia to avoid Milan's wrath... Plus the realism of this is very poor.
Imagine that all venetians armies / fleets have been crushed by successfull milanese campaigns. They are now besieging the last venetian survivors in Venice. No way out: the only access to the city other than the port is by a tiny land occupied by hordes of milanese soldiers. Guess what ? when you finally crush the defense of the walls, the venetians have mysteriously fleed, flying over your armies and by some more kind of magic they now have condottieri and elite units at their disposal.
Not really logical and not very funny.

I have seen that there is a submod by Grimblade which seemingly fixes some of the issues i describe, but it also seems to apply for DLV6.1 and i definitively prefer DLV6.2 as i can choose the scripts i want to apply in my games.

Is there some way of fixing some of those points ? Will they be adressed in a later patch ?
I have already changed some files to fix points 2 (decreased % for events in campaign_script) and 7 (removed the horde settings in descr_sm_factions but i need to test this one though), and maybe i will take some time to fix point 3 (EDB / EDU, will take me lots of time) and 4 (remove the event in descr_events maybe ?).
For point 1, 5 and 6 i have no idea what to do.

Sorry for the long complaint, but i really like the mod and if i could fix those points this mod would be nearly the perfect mod for M2TW.

Cedric37.

[Myshkin]

I agree on almost everything you said.

On three, did you try BB45? It's really nice!

[cedric37]

Thanks!
I will try it out asap

[ShockBlast]

Wait a moment,DLV 6.2 has horde feature for all factions?In this feature part of the yes and no scripts that kick in at the start?

[cedric37]

In fact this feature cannot be disabled at start, no check box will remove the horde-like factions. But modifying the descr_sm_factions.txt like i did will normally work; i did not test it out yet; the game does not crash but i don't know if it will make the trick or not.

I have also taken EDU / EDB from BB2.45 and adjusted them to fit my views of the game (no special recruitments for AI in cities and castles) and it seems to be more balanced (thanks to the "sub-" modders).

I have also removed all the black_death_hits events in the descr_events.txt (for Historical campaign) and i hope it will remove the annoying "totally crazy AI attacking everything".

[Myshkin]

Hope some DLV developer can offer some suggestion.

[Kjertesvein]

1) Capital moving: in fact it is better not to try to move it at all because at the end you will finish with a civil war. I found that it was hard-coded the name of the capital for the coronation and even with the crown, your leader is expected to be located in the original capitat not the one you decided. That removes some freedom for the player and is a real pain if your orignal capital have failed in the hands of your opponents...

Is your complaint that it's not historically correct to move ones coronation city to another location far away?
As a side note, you are not de facto addicted to the crown. It really depends on you skill of aquiring and maintaining authority. One time, I moved my whole flemish sovreign to the Americas from turn 1, hell of a fun battling huge stacks of aztecs. You can also capture others crown, which is cool as hell.

2) Economy: the random events have too many chance to trigger (10%) so your economy is like a yo-yo and generally very poor due to more than frequent "disasters on your roads" event which will kill completly your income.
When your income is normal though, some cities can reach crazy levels, like Venice who sometimes gave me 30K/turn! Maybe something smoother would help.

To my knowledge, the random event's are very stable. There is as much chance of a negative event, as a positive one. However my static response, I belive repman is fond of people who give detailed and ballanced opinions his new scripts.

3) Unit rosters: there are some very unbalanced rosters in the game. The moors have one good example, "Andalusian Infantry". Those monsters are recruitable in castles (tier 2), does not cost that much and their stats are superior to most of the knights the western catholic nations can build for much more expensive prices and only in fortress or better.
I play now as milan and my foot / mounted feudal knights (tier 3) have no chance beating andalusian infantry (tier 2) on a 1 to 1 basis. This is very annoying.
Plus the AI only recruit endless stacks of this unit, so you have to fight the same stacks again and again with heavy loss. It kills the diversity as well as the fun.
Even my templars had bad time fighting those andalusian cyborgs (DEFENSE 40!!!! my famiglia ducale, which is the top elite of milan have defense 40 too but they cost 3x the cost of andalusian infantry and are tier 5.)
I don't know if other rosters have such unbalancing units; but it gives the game a sad turn (castille and portugal have been exterminated by the andalusian cyborgs and france was about to fall when i fortunately called a holy war against cordoba and catholics start to retaliate...)

You seem quite right. This kind of feedback is best served to the battle ballance workshop.

4) Dark Ages: this event is more of an annoyance for me. I mean you took lots of time to build / consolidate alliances sometimes it had cost you a lot of money and concessions. Everything is lost during those years as your most fidel allies will fight you, sometimes just by blocakding ports that are even not strategical points at all.
This is particularly annoying when the betrayer is one of your vassals because your count of regions held diminish; and you will never be able to have this faction as a vassal again (or the odds are so poor).
Could it be that this event only throw neutral nations to fight you ? At least vassals should remain vassals...

IIRC, every thing goes back to normal after the dark ages. Tho I can see the vassal thing. You should find a sollution here.

5) Admirals: once you have separated a fleet in 2 parts you will never be able to have it whole again. It is very annoying that everytime you build a ship you have to get a new fleet with its proper admiral; especially when he gets no stars...
The only way to get a big fleet is to let your fleet in the port when the new ship is build. It is not very logical when you compare to earth units. You can merge 2 generals in one stack but you cannot merge 2 admirals in 1 stack. This restriction should only apply to "starred" admirals IMO.

I allways got a small boat, maybe a damaged one, which stand at the docks, and escorts the new fleet into the main fleet.

6) Assassination chances: once the AI gets an assassin, even a 0-starred one can kill a governor in a city. And i already seen some of my 10-stars generals assassinated by incompetent assassins. Is it normal ? It is a real pain to see your champion murdered by a newbie assassin.

I allways carry with me a retinue of agents:
-Spy's keep my eye open when I travel the thick rebel forests and to guard against enemy assassins. However, using them to open the gate for me is beneeth me. ...And to some extent, to risky.
-I also carry with me an assassin, to fend of annoying priests and merchants, aswell other amature assassins.
-A diplomat is also a good chioce to include in my retinue, as (s)he can bring my message across the table when it comes to selling conquered land.

Any noble general is expected to be followed by the most seasoned of departments. While governors can install watch towers along the borders, and use national departments (1 assassins and 1 spys) to hold the political peace of several regions.

7) Factions behaving like hordes + winning conditions: a bad combanation. Try to achieve the victory when your victory is linked to the elimination of 2 other factions. It is nearly impossible; as Sicilians will flee away as far as Georgia to avoid Milan's wrath... Plus the realism of this is very poor.

The realism of winning conditions is very poor in the first place.

Sovreigns and factions exiling, and coming back, is nothing new at all. It is actually very commen that groups cannot be eradicated by military force or eliminated by decree.

Imagine that all venetians armies / fleets have been crushed by successfull milanese campaigns. They are now besieging the last venetian survivors in Venice. No way out: the only access to the city other than the port is by a tiny land occupied by hordes of milanese soldiers. Guess what ? when you finally crush the defense of the walls, the venetians have mysteriously fleed, flying over your armies and by some more kind of magic they now have condottieri and elite units at their disposal.
Not really logical and not very funny.

Again, it's very logical and historical that a group of people, a movement, does not give up with one battle. Nor is it un-historical that others who belive, will take up arms and armour for the same couse.

BL-W

EDIT: I see several people consistenly feeling resenment about minor issue, which can be fixed with some simple added historical text:

Horde - I can name a dozen historical characters, groups, etc. who exiled (a continent away), and came back with a huge force to challenge the current regime.

Disasters on your roads - Events like this in paticular seems abit strange. "You say what? A storm which last for 3 consistent years?". Better historical examples like: notable increase in criminality (pirates & robbers), floods, (tax) corruption, etc. are much more credible then bad weather.

Dark ages - "Back in 13** AD, the dark ages (...). Sovreigns like A attacked B and lost land and trade, and C lost 3/4 of their population, bla bla bla".

[Myshkin]

To my knowledge, the random event's are very stable. There is as much chance of a negative event, as a positive one. However my static response, I belive repman is fond of people who give detailed and ballanced opinions his new scripts.

Definitely yes. After 100 turns I am about -5 at economy. Annoying I think. Once I find the time, I need to make it affect up to 20-40% of your income (i.e. 40% of road income etc.).

I allways got a small boat, maybe a damaged one, which stand at the docks, and escorts the new fleet into the main fleet.

I hate this solution! I would prefer if a general had to board on a ship and stay there to become an admiral.

---

I would have implemented the use of militrary/goverment points in a different way; like a secondary income. At the moment once you get 120 on each, you don't need to worry about them ever again... Even if they get 0, who cares, if you have unlocked everything?

Constructing new city buildings, and recruiting new agents (diplomats, priests, spies and asssasins) would all cost goverment points.

Constructing castle buildings and recruiting military units and ships would all cost military points. To counter the costs specialized buildings could constantly generate points.

For example a scholarium, and a town hall could give +1 goverment point per turn. Governor's chambers could give +2 governor points per turn. A drill square could generate +2 military points. A wonder could offer a massive boost up to +20 gov/military points, or maybe 10 for both.

---

I would also like to see an easier way to check on gov/mil. points. Something like a menu.

The financial report should incorporate field and city expenses as well.

---

Just me dreaming?

[cedric37]

Is your complaint that it's not historically correct to move ones coronation city to another location far away?

Yes, and remember that if your "original" city was captured you just cannot crown your king anymore.

As a side note, you are not de facto addicted to the crown. It really depends on you skill of aquiring and maintaining authority. One time, I moved my whole flemish sovreign to the Americas from turn 1, hell of a fun battling huge stacks of aztecs. You can also capture others crown, which is cool as hell.

I did this with a very good king IMO (chivalry 10 authority 10, good traits and ancillaries overhall) and he got the offends nobles trait; so my own experience is that you better take the crown and stay in the original capital.
This said, how do you capture crowns ?

To my knowledge, the random event's are very stable. There is as much chance of a negative event, as a positive one. However my static response, I belive repman is fond of people who give detailed and ballanced opinions his new scripts.

Yes but the odds are too high, 10% multiplied by the number of events = you never have a turn where everything is still (or this is very rare). Like Myshkin said, at the end you will always finish by economy -5 or so. I have subsequently changed the odds to 2% and they trigger regularly enough.

IIRC, every thing goes back to normal after the dark ages. Tho I can see the vassal thing. You should find a sollution here.

I tried to change the event itself but i cannot find in which file it is scripted; so i removed it from descr_events.txt.

I allways got a small boat, maybe a damaged one, which stand at the docks, and escorts the new fleet into the main fleet.

Thanks for the tip, this is not a big issue anyway.

I allways carry with me a retinue of agents:
-Spy's keep my eye open when I travel the thick rebel forests and to guard against enemy assassins. However, using them to open the gate for me is beneeth me. ...And to some extent, to risky.
-I also carry with me an assassin, to fend of annoying priests and merchants, aswell other amature assassins.
-A diplomat is also a good chioce to include in my retinue, as (s)he can bring my message across the table when it comes to selling conquered land.
Any noble general is expected to be followed by the most seasoned of departments. While governors can install watch towers along the borders, and use national departments (1 assassins and 1 spys) to hold the political peace of several regions.

I will try to recruit more spies, but i don't really like assassins as when you use them your king's dread will go up and your global rep will go down...
Also i think i can change the settings in the descr_campaign_db.xml file:
<assassinate_base_chance float="33"/>
<assassinate_attack_modifier float="0.8"/>
<assassinate_defence_modifier float="0.8"/>
<assassinate_public_modifier float="0.25"/>
<assassinate_personal_modifier float="0.25"/>
<assassinate_counter_spy_modifier float="1.0"/>
<assassinate_agent_modifier float="1.25"/>
<assassinate_own_region_modifier float="0.75"/>
<assassinate_assassinate_attr_modifier float="0.18"/>
<assassinate_chance_min int="10"/>
<assassinate_chance_max int="95"/>
Maybe if i lower base chance and agent modifier. I have to test it.

The realism of winning conditions is very poor in the first place.

Yes, in fact i just changed the conditions to remove the "eliminate factions" thing and increased the number or regions to control instead...

Sovreigns and factions exiling, and coming back, is nothing new at all. It is actually very commen that groups cannot be eradicated by military force or eliminated by decree.

I don't want to discuss the "history accuracy", it could be a long debate and we should keep focusing on the gameplay. The thing is that gameplay-wise, i find this more annoying than funny; and the fact that some elite units that maybe are not available to any faction at that moment, will mysteriously pop up in the ranks of your foes is not very logical. Plus the sovereign could exile (i am not against this idea), but not necessarily with 3 full stacks. He would rather go "alone" (mean with no armies) in a country which is an ennemy of the new power, and then get a military assistance from this ally and attract partisans once ready to fight this new power. But it is just impossible to script this in game i think... And the fact that they flee as far as georgia for italian nations is a bit too far away IMHO.

Again, it's very logical and historical that a group of people, a movement, does not give up with one battle. Nor is it un-historical that others who belive, will take up arms and armour for the same couse.

We are not speaking of one battle but of a long and hard campaign finishing with the ennemy's abdication. And IMO just speaking of the gameplay, when a faction has lost its military power, it should be considered destroyed but maybe if you want to add some realism, you can pop up stacks of rebels from time to time to simulate some insurection; which will be better in terms of gameplay.
Although some nations did really quit their land (like the kwarezmian who tried to establish themselves around jerusalem after their crushing defeat in the mongols hands), most will not leave their lands for nothing on earth but instead will try to revolt from the inside (examples are too numerous to be quoted but most european nations never quited their lands and they were occupied many many times by all sorts of invaders).
But as i said this subject alone could end in a long debate and i am sure you will find pertaining arguments to sustain your cause and i can also find pertaining arguments to sustain mine; and we will finish in a draw ^^ This is not the subject of my thread. I am just speaking for the gameplay.

You may have feeled attacked by my complaints but this was not the purpose to "attack" anything, i instead want to defend this great mod and if i can give a list of 8 points that i don't like; i can give you a list of 80 that i like
I was just trying to get some tips or advices and this worked well as now i have nearly fixed all my issues. Plus if a lot of people side me, maybe we can just do a mini-mod (one more ^^).

If some of my complaints can be adressed in a later patch this is even better but as long as i can fix some of them with your help, i am happy.

Thanks anyway for your answers.
Cedric37.

EDIT: Myshkin, your ideas are not that bad, maybe it would give the governance/military points a real interest past the caps you mentioned. I personally don't play with them as they limitate my freedom too much and thanks to DLV6.2, i can play the vanilla m2tw concerning this part. But your ideas of spending military points to recruit and the same for buildings is good. BTW, i think giving the player let say 30pts in governance / military at the start of the game would really help players; and this seems logical that you start with a given amount. But that's just my 2 cents as i don't plan to use the governance points.

[Kjertesvein]

Yes, and remember that if your "original" city was captured you just cannot crown your king anymore.


I did this with a very good king IMO (chivalry 10 authority 10, good traits and ancillaries overhall) and he got the offends nobles trait; so my own experience is that you better take the crown and stay in the original capital.

The crown is one of the oldest and deepest systems in DLV, which deserves a thread on it's own. If you feel like changing the file's, then the campaign folders are the places to visit.

This said, how do you capture crowns ?

Every faction except muslim/greek can steal eachothers crown. Mulim factions can steal eachothers, and the greeks can not steal any of the other factions crown.
1. Kill their faction leader.
2. place your king in it's capital with appropiat buildings and less then 8 retinue
3. The turn after got their crown, and it will holdt any rebelion. This may make the other king very weak, and can spark rebels.

Yes but the odds are too high, 10% multiplied by the number of events = you never have a turn where everything is still (or this is very rare). Like Myshkin said, at the end you will always finish by economy -5 or so. I have subsequently changed the odds to 2% and they trigger regularly enough.

PM Repman, the Creator, about this. Do a real detailed report and I'm sure he will take much notice. He does not bit.

I tried to change the event itself but i cannot find in which file it is scripted; so i removed it from descr_events.txt.

Try to find a sollution here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=276
Be detailed, informative and specific. Remember to pitch back if there are some local hard-nut questions.

I will try to recruit more spies, but i don't really like assassins as when you use them your king's dread will go up and your global rep will go down...
Also i think i can change the settings in the descr_campaign_db.xml file:
<assassinate_base_chance float="33"/>
<assassinate_attack_modifier float="0.8"/>
<assassinate_defence_modifier float="0.8"/>
<assassinate_public_modifier float="0.25"/>
<assassinate_personal_modifier float="0.25"/>
<assassinate_counter_spy_modifier float="1.0"/>
<assassinate_agent_modifier float="1.25"/>
<assassinate_own_region_modifier float="0.75"/>
<assassinate_assassinate_attr_modifier float="0.18"/>
<assassinate_chance_min int="10"/>
<assassinate_chance_max int="95"/>
Maybe if i lower base chance and agent modifier. I have to test it.

Again, try asking here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=276

Yes, in fact i just changed the conditions to remove the "eliminate factions" thing and increased the number or regions to control instead...

Nice! In the future, you might even try to create a mini mod with moderate goals, including this.

I don't want to discuss the "history accuracy", it could be a long debate and we should keep focusing on the gameplay. The thing is that gameplay-wise, i find this more annoying than funny; and the fact that some elite units that maybe are not available to any faction at that moment, will mysteriously pop up in the ranks of your foes is not very logical. Plus the sovereign could exile (i am not against this idea), but not necessarily with 3 full stacks. He would rather go "alone" (mean with no armies) in a country which is an ennemy of the new power, and then get a military assistance from this ally and attract partisans once ready to fight this new power. But it is just impossible to script this in game i think... And the fact that they flee as far as georgia for italian nations is a bit too far away IMHO.

I can say that all the possibilitys which you deny, have been proven by history. You talk about logical fallacy of an historical event, jet you don't want to discuss history. Therfor I will (again) refer to the mod forum: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=276

We are not speaking of one battle but of a long and hard campaign finishing with the ennemy's abdication. And IMO just speaking of the gameplay, when a faction has lost its military power, it should be considered destroyed but maybe if you want to add some realism, you can pop up stacks of rebels from time to time to simulate some insurection; which will be better in terms of gameplay.
Although some nations did really quit their land (like the kwarezmian who tried to establish themselves around jerusalem after their crushing defeat in the mongols hands), most will not leave their lands for nothing on earth but instead will try to revolt from the inside (examples are too numerous to be quoted but most european nations never quited their lands and they were occupied many many times by all sorts of invaders).
But as i said this subject alone could end in a long debate and i am sure you will find pertaining arguments to sustain your cause and i can also find pertaining arguments to sustain mine; and we will finish in a draw.

It's a trail and error in the historical debate + some easy modding, which create an exellent mod.
I can give you facts of one faction doing every thing you deny of what is possible. Will you belive it or not. Offcourse you have no choice but to beliving it.
Visa versa. Therefor, kwarezmian if it was in DLV, can be modified to not do an uprising, however Norway will.

You may have feeled attacked by my complaints but this was not the purpose to "attack" anything, i instead want to defend this great mod and if i can give a list of 8 points that i don't like; i can give you a list of 80 that i like
I was just trying to get some tips or advices and this worked well as now i have nearly fixed all my issues. Plus if a lot of people side me, maybe we can just do a mini-mod (one more ^^).

Trust me, you have jet to see a % of what I would consider "attacked". What I see is a person which do-, instead of dictate his goals.

If some of my complaints can be adressed in a later patch this is even better, but as long as i can fix some of them with your help, i am happy.

What if I say "yes" to both. DLV is a community mod. If your mini-mod follows a few simple rules(no SS materials), specific and clear OP and practical substance (no radical/personal tweaking of allready fully working products), then it's a very good chance it's in the next patch.

BL-W

[Myshkin]

Wow! Tripple 10 King means all the nobles should bow on everything he demands!

Pretty much agree on everything you said mate. Can you please tell me how to decrease the frequency of the economy events? Is there a way to make them more balanced mylself?

I would love to test your version of DLV. Could you please give me your files? Is it only for the historical campaign?

We really need to make a sub-mod together with BL-W.

[cedric37]

Hi Myshkin,

I am happy that someone at least share my views on the game.

I have changed the following files (i suggest you do a backup of each file before taking mine):

- EDB from BB2.45 but removed the recruitment boosts for the AI (which will ends up with more andalusian cyborgs to fight so i don't want this). (EDB = export_descr_buildings.txt).
The units seems to follow a more balanced development (the greater the tier, the greater the power, roughly, but with some exeptions and in this case the cost justify it). Note: i don't have the file on this computer right now but i will attach it later.

- EDU from BB2.45 (cool adjustments as far as i have seen in terms of units stats). Notes: idem.

- descr_sm_factions.txt (you can find it a couple of posts before this one):
The horde-like factions only apply to mongols now as in original vanilla m2tw.

- descr_events.txt (idem):
The black death hits events have been removed (dark ages chaos).

- campaign_script.txt (i will attach it in this post): changed the trigger for economical events to 2% each. You can also remove the "civil war" part of the script if you don't like it.

- descr_strat.txt (i have not my current version right now on this computer, i can attach it later): i removed the forts rebel garrisons as well as the rebel armies that popped up automatically on turn 1.
But if you wanna play with military points it can be handy to let them as it will bring you military points when fighting them... That 's the only usefull purpose i can find for them (that is my opinion and this is highly arguable).

- desc_campaign_db.xml (i have to test / adjust it): i plan to lower slightly the chances for assassinations.

Thanks for your support,
Cedric37.

EDIT: changed also the descr_winning file to remove "eliminate faction" conditions and increased the regions to control but i don't have it here.

[cedric37]

Dear BL-W,

Thanks again for your detailed answer.

The crown is one of the oldest and deepest systems in DLV, which deserves a thread on it's own. If you feel like changing the file's, then the campaign folders are the places to visit.
Every faction except muslim/greek can steal eachothers crown. Mulim factions can steal eachothers, and the greeks can not steal any of the other factions crown.
1. Kill their faction leader.
2. place your king in it's capital with appropiat buildings and less then 8 retinue
3. The turn after got their crown, and it will holdt any rebelion. This may make the other king very weak, and can spark rebels.

I don't plan to change anything about the crown and thanks for the info about how it works. BTW, can you steal the crown of a destroyed faction ?

PM Repman, the Creator, about this. Do a real detailed report and I'm sure he will take much notice. He does not bit.

I hope and would prefer that Repman can read this whole topic and give us his thoughts on this.

Try to find a sollution here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=276
Be detailed, informative and specific. Remember to pitch back if there are some local hard-nut questions.

Thanks, i will do this; right now i have changed many parameters myself (which do work) without consulting this dB. I should be ashamed, but one of my biggest defaults is that i like to discover things myself (i know this is completly stupid... and guess what ? my job in true life is... developper ^^).
But let see what the community can do to help me.

Nice! In the future, you might even try to create a mini mod with moderate goals, including this
It's a trail and error in the historical debate + some easy modding, which create an exellent mod.

Thanks for your positive thinking and encouragements. I did not plan to make any mini-mod at the beginning and still i am not sure i want to officially start a mini-mod; because i am a bit lazy and my life already is well filled ^^ and if i start a mini-mod that means i will have to keep it alive and make regular updates of it.
But if i am backed by other motivated people (Myshkin ?) then why not. In this case i want to be the man behind the curtains

What if I say "yes" to both. DLV is a community mod. If your mini-mod follows a few simple rules(no SS materials), specific and clear OP and practical substance (no radical/personal tweaking of allready fully working products), then it's a very good chance it's in the next patch.

I don't want to change too much the way DLV works because it won't be DLV anymore; i think most of my points are really detail points and don't affect the mod overhall.
Most of this could be addressed like the other yes/no features of DLV6.2, at the beginning of turn 1.
E.g. "Would you like factions to behave as hordes ? yes/no".
If i could get some support from a talented DLVer which will take care of this in DLV6.3 then i would be the happiest man in the M2TW world ^^

Again, thanks for your support.
Cedric37.

[Ahlerich]

1) Capital moving: in fact it is better not to try to move it at all because at the end you will finish with a civil war. I found that it was hard-coded the name of the capital for the coronation and even with the crown, your leader is expected to be located in the original capitat not the one you decided. That removes some freedom for the player and is a real pain if your orignal capital have failed in the hands of your opponents...

2) Economy: the random events have too many chance to trigger (10%) so your economy is like a yo-yo and generally very poor due to more than frequent "disasters on your roads" event which will kill completly your income.
When your income is normal though, some cities can reach crazy levels, like Venice who sometimes gave me 30K/turn! Maybe something smoother would help.

3) Unit rosters: there are some very unbalanced rosters in the game. The moors have one good example, "Andalusian Infantry". Those monsters are recruitable in castles (tier 2), does not cost that much and their stats are superior to most of the knights the western catholic nations can build for much more expensive prices and only in fortress or better.
I play now as milan and my foot / mounted feudal knights (tier 3) have no chance beating andalusian infantry (tier 2) on a 1 to 1 basis. This is very annoying.
Plus the AI only recruit endless stacks of this unit, so you have to fight the same stacks again and again with heavy loss. It kills the diversity as well as the fun.
Even my templars had bad time fighting those andalusian cyborgs (DEFENSE 40!!!! my famiglia ducale, which is the top elite of milan have defense 40 too but they cost 3x the cost of andalusian infantry and are tier 5.)
I don't know if other rosters have such unbalancing units; but it gives the game a sad turn (castille and portugal have been exterminated by the andalusian cyborgs and france was about to fall when i fortunately called a holy war against cordoba and catholics start to retaliate...)

4) Dark Ages: this event is more of an annoyance for me. I mean you took lots of time to build / consolidate alliances sometimes it had cost you a lot of money and concessions. Everything is lost during those years as your most fidel allies will fight you, sometimes just by blocakding ports that are even not strategical points at all.
This is particularly annoying when the betrayer is one of your vassals because your count of regions held diminish; and you will never be able to have this faction as a vassal again (or the odds are so poor).
Could it be that this event only throw neutral nations to fight you ? At least vassals should remain vassals...

5) Admirals: once you have separated a fleet in 2 parts you will never be able to have it whole again. It is very annoying that everytime you build a ship you have to get a new fleet with its proper admiral; especially when he gets no stars...
The only way to get a big fleet is to let your fleet in the port when the new ship is build. It is not very logical when you compare to earth units. You can merge 2 generals in one stack but you cannot merge 2 admirals in 1 stack. This restriction should only apply to "starred" admirals IMO.

6) Assassination chances: once the AI gets an assassin, even a 0-starred one can kill a governor in a city. And i already seen some of my 10-stars generals assassinated by incompetent assassins. Is it normal ? It is a real pain to see your champion murdered by a newbie assassin.

7) Factions behaving like hordes + winning conditions: a bad combanation. Try to achieve the victory when your victory is linked to the elimination of 2 other factions. It is nearly impossible; as Sicilians will flee away as far as Georgia to avoid Milan's wrath... Plus the realism of this is very poor.
Imagine that all venetians armies / fleets have been crushed by successfull milanese campaigns. They are now besieging the last venetian survivors in Venice. No way out: the only access to the city other than the port is by a tiny land occupied by hordes of milanese soldiers. Guess what ? when you finally crush the defense of the walls, the venetians have mysteriously fleed, flying over your armies and by some more kind of magic they now have condottieri and elite units at their disposal.
Not really logical and not very funny.

I have seen that there is a submod by Grimblade which seemingly fixes some of the issues i describe, but it also seems to apply for DLV6.1 and i definitively prefer DLV6.2 as i can choose the scripts i want to apply in my games.

Is there some way of fixing some of those points ? Will they be adressed in a later patch ?
I have already changed some files to fix points 2 (decreased % for events in campaign_script) and 7 (removed the horde settings in descr_sm_factions but i need to test this one though), and maybe i will take some time to fix point 3 (EDB / EDU, will take me lots of time) and 4 (remove the event in descr_events maybe ?).
For point 1, 5 and 6 i have no idea what to do.

Sorry for the long complaint, but i really like the mod and if i could fix those points this mod would be nearly the perfect mod for M2TW.

Cedric37.

1) i agree, always have.. also when your empire grows it just is inconvinient
2)do not care
3)never noticed, you make a good example though
4)agree/ plague is alright, that all attack you just doesnt make sense. i dedicated a whole game as hre to keep the teutonic order alive and at dark age they attack me.. thats not really fun or immersive.
5)agreed
6)never faced that so i have no opinion
7)somewhat agree

[Baron Vlad Felix]

i agree completely whit cedric37.

[Ahlerich]

would be sweet if the script related points would be made optional. at least the move capital and the dark age impact. also a new or more events that improve loyalty would be nice as this always becomes an issue and its just impossible to keep all generals busy and develop them so they become loyal.

[cedric37]

Thanks Myshkin, Ahlerich and Baron Vlad Felix for your support and thanks Ahlerich & Myshkin for adding your own suggestions.

My 1st purpose was not to change many things in DLV6.2 but as we are speaking, maybe there is enough material to make a patch, maybe not a mini-mod because they are already numerous ones and one more would just add confusion (but don't look at me; because i quite suck at modding). But this must be a decision from Repman, else it is pure blasphemy.

The idea to get additional check boxes "yes/no" for some fixes is simply great because this way you can continue to play this great mod as ever or just prepare for a new experience. I don't know how to do it and i don't really intend to make such complex modding.

But at least, some unit rosters should be a bit more balanced (there are not so many unbalanced units but in BB2.45 there are good changes for EDB/EDU ... yet some other are less neutral like the AI getting now access to many units very soon and everywhere which we cannot accept as a general fix). Again it is up to Repman to decide whether or not he can accept such changes in a future patch or if one has to make a mini-mod for this.

Maybe a compilation of the best mods + some other fixes like some described in this post (with a yes/no choice) could ends in the (nearly) "Perfect DLV" version.
As some players agreed that some aspects of the game need to be improved, maybe something like the Stainless Steel RR/RC compilation can be done. It is not for me to say anything about this. Originally i just wanted to find some help to change some aspects of the game for myself.

Cedric37.

[Taiji]

It's great to see someone taking the time to give good criticism of DLV. If you want to give me feedback on BB, Cedric37, please do - I seriously do not get enough.

I'm happy to hear about misbalanced units (obviously) but since I've put a load of work into getting recruitment balanced also, I'd really like to hear about that too

"...yet some other are less neutral like the AI getting now access to many units very soon and everywhere which we cannot accept as a general fix."

About this above, I wonder what you are talking about... It sounds like perhaps you misunderstand my recruitment idea. The AI does not get access to units 'very soon' they just get to produce some relevant tier units from the walls. I suppose it may appear to be very soon if you are very slow at producing the correct buildings... BTW what were you thinking that it was fixing? And why do you think the attempt was a failure? Cryptic and interesting

Oh and the contentious point ( joking), what is RRRC doing better than me? This is a great question to hear answers to, I really like PB's work.

Like I say, feedback is sincerely appreciated

[cedric37]

It's great to see someone taking the time to give good criticism of DLV. If you want to give me feedback on BB, Cedric37, please do - I seriously do not get enough.

I wish i could give you more but right now i just get your EDU / EDB file (the latest i modified) because i could not load the BB2.41 file (takes hours from filefront so i gave up).

"...yet some other are less neutral like the AI getting now access to many units very soon and everywhere which we cannot accept as a general fix."

About this above, I wonder what you are talking about... It sounds like perhaps you misunderstand my recruitment idea. The AI does not get access to units 'very soon' they just get to produce some relevant tier units from the walls.

Sorry but what is the difference that they are capable of recruit them from walls or from barracks ?
I mean if i take the very good example of the annoying andalusian cyborgs (mean andalusian infantry from the moors), it used to be recruitable from castles, fortress and citadels in standard DLV6.2. Which was VERY unbalanced IMO.
Now the AI not only can recruit them from castles but also from towns (city tier 2) which is even worst than before! The player though can now recruit those monsters from castles tier 3 and more which is fair. Or maybe i misunderstood your lines of code ? In this case, my most sincere apologies.

BTW what were you thinking that it was fixing?

AI having stacks of andalusian infantry early in the game when you can recruit mailed knights and even after your feudal knights are no match against them. This is an example of what i think would have been fixed. Maybe i am not correct ?

And why do you think the attempt was a failure? Cryptic and interesting

I never said so my friend, i really appreciate that people like you try to improve a such great mod.
Really i would like to test your mod in its integrality. I was just speaking of the EDB file, nothing else and i never said it was a failure or something, just that the AI get unbalanced units so for me it is half corrected as my concern was balancing for both player and AI

what is RRRC doing better than me? This is a great question to hear answers to, I really like PB's work.
Like I say, feedback is sincerely appreciated

Nothing better, in fact i don't like RR/RC compilation (again my opinion, not saying the contents are bad or something)
Just that it is now recognized as a standard through all the SS players community; nothing more.

Really i wish we could work together to improve the "rolls royce" that is DLV and make me forget about SS. You are already very experienced as a modder and me i am just a newbie and the word is kind enough... lol. So maybe you wish to join the adventure ?


EDIT: well i am trying to load BB2.41 again (nearly 4 hours scheduled at 13,5 KBytes/sec... brrrr ^^... i think it is not for tonight...)
EDIT2: i have found in the campaign script the reason why hre which was my vassal (playing as milan) did betray me during the dark ages. In fact either sicily either hre would declare war on milan (it is scripted) then all AI factions get the "kill_human" command so their priority become to kill the human player above any other priority.... This explain why everybody declared war on me except the pope (he is not concerned by the script). The miracle is that byzantium which was my other vassal stayed fidel to me (at least).
EDIT3: oops in fact it did load integrally yesterday, so maybe i can try and start a new game...

[Taiji]

I wish i could give you more but right now i just get your EDU / EDB file (the latest i modified) because i could not load the BB2.41 file (takes hours from filefront so i gave up).

Ah, fair enough. Perhaps I should make a torrent.

Sorry but what is the difference that they are capable of recruit them from walls or from barracks ?
I mean if i take the very good example of the annoying andalusian cyborgs (mean andalusian infantry from the moors), it used to be recruitable from castles, fortress and citadels in standard DLV6.2. Which was VERY unbalanced IMO.
Now the AI not only can recruit them from castles but also from towns (city tier 2) which is even worst than before! The player though can now recruit those monsters from castles tier 3 and more which is fair. Or maybe i misunderstood your lines of code ? In this case, my most sincere apologies.

AI having stacks of andalusian infantry early in the game when you can recruit mailed knights and even after your feudal knights are no match against them. This is an example of what i think would have been fixed. Maybe i am not correct ?

They shouldn't be available so soon, really good point. I'll try to sort that for next BB version. It's great to get feedback like this, thankyou very much

I never said so my friend, i really appreciate that people like you try to improve a such great mod.
Really i would like to test your mod in its integrality. I was just speaking of the EDB file, nothing else and i never said it was a failure or something, just that the AI get unbalanced units so for me it is half corrected as my concern was balancing for both player and AI

Oh, OK. It's just that a fix I cannot accept is a failed fix to me... And I agree totally with your point about the cyborgs. I can see now how my efforts have simply exacerbated that problem.

Nothing better, in fact i don't like RR/RC compilation (again my opinion, not saying the contents are bad or something)
Just that it is now recognized as a standard through all the SS players community; nothing more.

This is pretty much the case with BB, not very modest am I?....

Seriously though, my remit and PB's differ in some areas but I think that we cover most just as thoroughly as each other. I consider much of BB to be to be a DLV patch, the battles, the AI messing... the recruitment stuff is a new concept. I haven't had enough feedback about it and I didn't want it including in 6.2. It's much improved from where it was around 6.2 release right now, I just need to iron out bugs like the one you mentioned.

Really i wish we could work together to improve the "rolls royce" that is DLV and make me forget about SS. You are already very experienced as a modder and me i am just a newbie and the word is kind enough... lol. So maybe you wish to join the adventure ?

I've been working on improving DLV for ~1 year. I've had a lot of spare time this last year and spent most of it modding. I didn't mean to put in so much effort in the first place but the more I did the more I wanted to do.

There's been a great many people who have given me a great deal of feedback and help, without this I could not have moved from one issue to another so quickly. I might not even have noticed some issues, but I had them pointed out. Sometimes I didn't agree at first, but then eventually I saw the sense of the criticism. Efforts to convince me often don't work but I usually take onboard suggestions and try things out. Without all of this help and feedback there is no way I could have done what I have managed to do this last year.

DLV's community is a very supportive and helpful lot, this is a nice place to mod