Great Job Guys

[HLandin]

Salvete fellow Romans.

I'm a new member on this forum, but I've been playing Extended Realism for a while. First off, hats off to all those who labored to give us this mod. I'm sure we all know (especially those of us who study Roman/ancient history) that while fun, Rome Total War in its original form was not completely realistic or historically correct. After I discovered this mod a few months ago, I've become attached to it. It breathed new life into a game I was starting to lose interest in. Being a fellow student in ancient military history, I love the level of historical detail that has been added and continues to be added to this mod: the expansion of the troop types available for recruitment and the adjustment of their stats to better reflect actual combat performance, the added provinces, the cursus honorum (political ladder for roman family members), added mercenaries, the 4 turns per year, the addition of auxillary buildings simulating cultural assimilation, improved AI, and eliminating my personal pet peeve, the lack of centurions and signifers in the origional version, just to name some.

I have thoroughly enjoyed this mod and will continue to do so as updates continue to better reflect this exciting time in history. My continued appreciation to those who developed this mod and continue to support its development (especially the timely updates as technical issues are discovered). You have created something very satisfying for the community.

I would like to take on the name Gnaeus Publius Scipio (the uncle of Scipio Africanius). Please let me know if that name is taken or is inappropriate.

HLandin

[Antiochos VII Sidetes]

If you wanna change the name, you're gonna want to head to the Questions & Suggestions forum.

[Carados]

Heehee, I think it's fair to say the best is yet to come. FOE has given us a couple of neat ideas, you can find a couple of them in a variety of recent threads. I suppose I could try and list all the changes we are thinking and put them into one gigantic post, but then that would ruin the suprise?

[Quinn Inuit]

I'm glad you're enjoying this so much, HLandin!

Carados: let's wait on announcing the changes for awhile and then roll them out in style.

[Carados]

Well, Santa has been and gone I guess......

[HLandin]

While Fate of Empires had some interesting features (such as the highly detailed terrain, trees, grasses, etc., it felt like too much new stuff at once for me. While the non-Roman units were highly detailed and had massive descriptions, the Roman units still looked a lot like the previous versions. I like the details from Extended Realism better (the open hand at the top of signum signifying the oath of allegence to the SPQR, the shields for the triarii were duller instead of the bright colors, etc.).

I do have a couple of questions. While the manipules of hastati, principes, and triarii have centurions and signifers as expected, the equites only have a hornblower. I was wondering if they might get a decurion (commander of the calvary unit similar to a centurion), and even a signifer as well. The other question is, since most units have an officer or commander of the unit itself including a centurion for manipules, the commander for the Greek phalanx units, and the commander for the German units, would it be possible to have the morale of just that unit affected by the death of its commanding officer. Again, would it be possible to affect just that unit, symbolizing the loss of local command structure that might occur if he were to die in battle, especially if that unit was green or inexperienced.

[Carados]

More officers would certainly be nice to implement. The local morale loss due to losing one of it's officers is something that is impossible to do though, I think.

[Quinn Inuit]

Yeah, that wouldn't be possible, sorry. It's a great idea, though, and I hope CA implements it at some point.

I like the additional officer idea. Not sure I'll be able to get you a decurion (it'll be hard to justify an additional DMB slot just for another Roman officer), but a mounted signifier should be do-able.

btw, I'm going to use the RTR velite, but I'm planning on leaving our Romans as-is. I like Prometheus's models, and the RTR ones are so detailed they slow down my computer.

[HLandin]

I like the additional officer idea. Not sure I'll be able to get you a decurion (it'll be hard to justify an additional DMB slot just for another Roman officer), but a mounted signifier should be do-able.

Since I don't deal in modifying, just in playing, let me ask: does it require an additional character/model slot to create the decurion, and if so, wouldn't creating a mounted signifer also require an additional slot? I'm just asking since I don't know.

Thanks guys

[Quinn Inuit]

Not exactly. This is a common misconception. There are two files governing units, export_descr_units.txt (in which we have lots of space) and descr_model_battle.txt (in which we have very little space). Multiple units in the former may link to the same entry in the latter, but not vice versa. The new signifier will just be a new EDU entry, whereas a new decurion would require a new DMB entry, as well.


Three thousandth post!

[HLandin]

Not exactly. This is a common misconception. There are two files governing units, export_descr_units.txt (in which we have lots of space) and descr_model_battle.txt (in which we have very little space). Multiple units in the former may link to the same entry in the latter, but not vice versa. The new signifier will just be a new EDU entry, whereas a new decurion would require a new DMB entry, as well.


Three thousandth post!

For the decurion, couldn't you just use a modified centurion just like using a modified signifer?

[Quinn Inuit]

Well, the signifier won't be modified, just given the appropriate mounted skeleton (if one isn't already defined). Wouldn't a decurion have looked different than a centurion, though? I'd rather not add one in than add in something blatantly incorrect.

[HLandin]

Wouldn't a decurion have looked different than a centurion, though? I'd rather not add one in than add in something blatantly incorrect.

I agree, historical accuracy is the goal. I'm not sure what a decurion would have looked like (not much of a description in Polybius compared to the hastati, principes, and triarii), so what you say is true.

[Quinn Inuit]

I'm tempted to just throw a centurion on a horse, but a decurion would of necessity have been of a different social class and I'd imagine they'd be equipped differently. A signifier at least looks different enough in his entirety that he's not recognizably plebeian or patrician.

[Carados]

The post-marian generals have fancy bodyguards don't they? Maybe just use one of those for the decurion instead, or from the alares? There won't be a difference for the post-marian generals, though.

[Quinn Inuit]

Hmmm...we might have a spare early Imperial mounted unit lying around that we could use. If we have a spare DMB slot when the dust settles, that would be a nice option.