Overhaul mods - too early?

[Ecka65]

Discussion topic as per the title.

Important: I have nothing but respect and admiration for modders, help them where I can, and dabble in it myself from time to time. This is NOT an anti mod thread!

My question: If a player / modder has limited experience with the vanilla game, wouldn't that make an overhaul mod premature?

My experience: I've logged over 250 hours on S2TW (how do I block my wife from seeing this?) I've been able to play it pretty solid every day since release. The first week was learning and winning on N/N after my first few attempts at my regular TW setting of H/VH ended in debacle. Week 2 I started to get the game a little better and spent most of the week trying to beat the game on H/H with Uesigi. Week 3 and I finally started to get a bit of "rythm" going thanks to a better understanding of the game. H/H changed to VH/VH.

Finally, nearing the end of week 4 I'm able to appreciate a lot of things in S2TW and how they interrelate. I can now have a challenging game at VH/VH and avoid compleet fiasco!

My opinion and point (at last): As a regular TW fan and a pretty consistent TW player (I have 4 TW's always loaded) this one had the steepest learning curve for me. I still learn or appreciate something in the game a little more each day - after 4 weeks. So how can the game be properly overhauled from week 1? Once the overhaul starts and by itself requires tweaking, is it possible for the modder(s) to even know if they are making "improvements" or simply just "changes"?

I think there's a lot more than initially meets the eye in this game. I think it needs to be experienced for some time before - even for individual tastes - balanced improvements can be made.

Your thoughts welcome.

[Urobulos]

Well, my opinion of the game has been steadily improving. When I first played it I went: this looks nice, but will probably get old quickly; the diplomacy is random, enemy behaviour makes no sense etc. Finished a couple short campaign on hard and another two domination ones on legendary and I have to say I look at the game in a completely different; much, much more positive way, than I did 2-3 days after release. Steam shows 187 hours right now so I think I got my moneys worth. Probably going to finish a campaign on legendary as every clan since a)it's exciting b) I just want to know that I can By then hopefully the online side will look a bit better, had way way too many people disconnecting on me just before defeat. Since I never dc'd from any game my loss/win ratio looks like . I can live with that, but since I got no exp for those battles then my progress in the game is just too slow for my taste.

I think it does take some time to spend with vanilla. Any time I hear someone talking about broken diplomacy it makes me smile.

[Aeon221]

Not everyone took 250 hours to learn the game? I started a VH campaign as Date, won, a H campaign as Oda, won, and a VH campaign as Oda and won. I'm now approaching 30 hours, and am plotting the opening moves of a Legendary campaign.

Meanwhile, I've been pretty cautious. There are plenty of people who went to Legendary for their first campaign, and won.


Some of the modders no doubt play mostly on normal. Others are on VH. So long as they can justify their changes, or implement the stuff other players talk about, it's not a big deal.

And if it doesn't work, it becomes obvious quite quickly.

So that's how.

edit:

Oh now I get it: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...30#post9373130

If you have a problem with a specific modder's work, do it in their thread imo.

[Ecka65]

Not everyone took 250 hours to learn the game? I started a VH campaign as Date, won, a H campaign as Oda, won, and a VH campaign as Oda and won. I'm now approaching 30 hours, and am plotting the opening moves of a Legendary campaign.

Wow. Well done indeed - three full campaigns in less than 30 hours.

[St. Cyr]

The basic total war formulas and concepts are the same in this game as the others. So even with all the cool new features, it still feels very old hat for me.

And I knew right away that TW veterans would feel that the combat and movement speed of units was far, far too fast. I felt that way in my first ten minutes of playing a battle. So I think those types of changes hardly require a hundred hours of playtesting before deciding they need to go.

[rob-a-dogg]

And I knew right away that TW veterans would feel that the combat and movement speed of units was far, far too fast. I felt that way in my first ten minutes of playing a battle. So I think those types of changes hardly require a hundred hours of playtesting before deciding they need to go.

My first battle in shogun 2 my mate was watching me play, we have both been playing TW games for 7+ years, and we were very excited to see the new game. Before id even finished that fight he had rung the game store to cancel his order for S2 he was about to leave and go pick up.

The problems we have are glaring and instantly recongisable, I had 3 a4 pages covered in scrawls on both sides after 2 hours of things i liked and things that i wanted changed (for a review on my regular gaming forum). Many of these bad things have already been changed by modders

[♔DARTH LEGO♔]

My question: If a player / modder has limited experience with the vanilla game, wouldn't that make an overhaul mod premature?

luckily for us though its not like learning a new subject, it all boils down to coding, stats, balance tables and scripting and once you've done one (still busy getting that right first...) its pretty much the same for the others... and when you break it down further its just numbers and lines of code...computer language... it never changes just the format.
In the STW2 case we have pretty much the same engine that was prevalent for NTW and for which the whole TW community beta'd in ETW *coughcough*
so the modders know already what needs to be done.

when you couple this with the huge community support on forums like these, quick voluminuos report backs from everyone who is literally play/run testing all the time, things develop pretty quickly.

I think there's a lot more than initially meets the eye in this game. I think it needs to be experienced for some time before - even for individual tastes - balanced improvements can be made.

You are very right but here again the modders are way ahead of the pack, they know it cant be done overnight and especially with the restrictions in play regarding copyrighted files must also be strictly adhered to. So they target very specific areas...

Brig. Graham- Always cracks on with an awesome music score.
Darth- looks at balancing and getting mechanics fixed as to how we want them done.
Toon- always gets nice compilations going and his sexy unit packs are always well received
Swiss halbedier- gets the flavour in there with more units
hip63- makes modding for noobs look easy with all his cool and automated launchers etc

and there are so many others doing so much more awesome work at an accelerated pace becuase of the level of commitment from the community, if you look at other mods on MODDB etc there are so many unfinsihed/WIP prohjects becasue interest dies out RL intervenes too much etc etc etc.

But with such an active community here gives the modders a very large pool for beta testing so the mods can forge ahead and they never stop...just look at the overhaul threads at the sheer amount of feedback and reports relating to gameplay, tweaked mechanics, graphics etc and you will see for yourself.

DMUC is on 6.9 for ETW and you can be certain it will be rounded off sooner or later but that 2 years in already and the mod is still going.

SO to answer your concerns yes you have individuals giving their own thoughts, ideas and flavours to the game but you must realise the base for their expertise and for their reasoning is alot wider and in depth than you might suspect....

In short give them all the support and feedback you can...net result:

"a more pleasing and enjoyable experience for us all..."

[Ecka65]

I am talking specifically of full overhauls. Speed reduction mod was out very quickly - and I use it.

Despite the insinuation of Aeon above, I don't have an issue with overhaul mods or the modders that make them. Hell? Why would I? My reasons for querying the time factor is that already some threads get confused because of them. One player says "sheesh, I'm having some problems dealing with X,Y and Z on hard difficulty" and gets replies from players using overhaul mods saying "Oh I've found that no problem on VH - just do A, B and keep and eye on C." It's the mod that has made X,Y and Z less of a problem and may be the only reason B is even possible.

It has taken me (at least) quite some time to settle into this new TW. After my first 10 or so hours I was left thinking:

1. Geez the economy is tight
2. Hell, no chance of holding a castle without regular troops stationed there
3. My God but enemy archers can chew you up if you're not careful
4. I've got Ai clans crawling all over me with DOW's, some of them were my friends 5 turns ago?
5. Realm Divide!!!! Hand me a pistol and leave the room!

But after plenty of play all of the above make sense and can be overcome with good play.

Look at what some of the overhauls immediately set about changing and I think you'll see my point. Economy buffed, costs reduced, bows nerfed, auto garrisons enhanced, diplomacy hits reduced, RD virtually eliminated. Result? After years begging for a challenging TW game, we finally get one and it is being made easier.....

[Black-]

The AI cheats on harder difficulties, that's why modders play on normal.
Normal ist mostly untouched by modifiers like -50% +50% etc.

Unit speed is ok, when they rush pre battle. But it's completly broken when in mid/after fight.
Try to run with 30kg on your back.

[ManSh00ter]

I am talking specifically of full overhauls. Speed reduction mod was out very quickly - and I use it.
Look at what some of the overhauls immediately set about changing and I think you'll see my point. Economy buffed, costs reduced, bows nerfed, auto garrisons enhanced, diplomacy hits reduced, RD virtually eliminated. Result? After years begging for a challenging TW game, we finally get one and it is being made easier.....

Did you play with those mods? Because I have and (talking about DarthMod here specifically) I do not find my game "easier". Perhaps its easier not to get horribly steamrolled within first five turns by the AI cheating left and right, but gameplay is definitely way more demanding than previous titles.

The issue is, its one thing playing against a smart AI that exploits your every weakness - its totally another to play against a cheating AI which only seems strong because it gets free armies, extra slots, free money etc.

Mods primarily deal with horrible inconsistencies and backstage trickery that's going on in the game. And I can tell you that those changes make for a much, much better game, which is still challenging (currently hanging by my fingernails playing Uesugi holed up on Sado) but doesn't destroy the game by having the AI cheat all over the place.

[Xelathur]

My opinion is that Shogun II has problems with minor clans losing their land really fast - there is nothing to stop a clan ( be it AI or human ) to blitz and stomp everything early-game with the starting army. Get that first heroic victory, the second, and third. Voila, you now have 4 provinces! ( Easy-mode on? )

DarthMod ( haven't tried any other full mods for S2 ) actually makes it harder to blitz. And that's not easier than vanilla? Or did I miss something? Having garrisons in castles makes Oda survive the first turn. It makes all those small clans have a fighting chance, and it makes that province next to your starting one a bit harder to take.. not just autocalc against a unit of retainers to win!

However, your point is valid. Since these "full mods" often are complete overhauls, you have to playtest the mod and give feedback in the mod threads on this forum. Without this feedback, alot of things can go wrong. Some mods actually broke the game pretty hard when they were released, but that's fixed now because of the community feedback ( spamming retainers etc when they were unlocked ).

Ofcourse I recommend everyone to log a considerable amount of hours on vanilla shogun 2 before trying a mod.

[Abe86]

I am talking specifically of full overhauls. Speed reduction mod was out very quickly - and I use it.

Despite the insinuation of Aeon above, I don't have an issue with overhaul mods or the modders that make them. Hell? Why would I? My reasons for querying the time factor is that already some threads get confused because of them. One player says "sheesh, I'm having some problems dealing with X,Y and Z on hard difficulty" and gets replies from players using overhaul mods saying "Oh I've found that no problem on VH - just do A, B and keep and eye on C." It's the mod that has made X,Y and Z less of a problem and may be the only reason B is even possible.

It has taken me (at least) quite some time to settle into this new TW. After my first 10 or so hours I was left thinking:

1. Geez the economy is tight
2. Hell, no chance of holding a castle without regular troops stationed there
3. My God but enemy archers can chew you up if you're not careful
4. I've got Ai clans crawling all over me with DOW's, some of them were my friends 5 turns ago?
5. Realm Divide!!!! Hand me a pistol and leave the room!

But after plenty of play all of the above make sense and can be overcome with good play.

Look at what some of the overhauls immediately set about changing and I think you'll see my point. Economy buffed, costs reduced, bows nerfed, auto garrisons enhanced, diplomacy hits reduced, RD virtually eliminated. Result? After years begging for a challenging TW game, we finally get one and it is being made easier.....

I fully agree with this, great post !

[rob-a-dogg]

One player says "sheesh, I'm having some problems dealing with X,Y and Z on hard difficulty" and gets replies from players using overhaul mods saying "Oh I've found that no problem on VH - just do A, B and keep and eye on C." It's the mod that has made X,Y and Z less of a problem and may be the only reason B is even possible.

This is similar to saying "you are wrong for playing Starcraft, you should be playing Supreme Commander".

It comes down to game play. Its not that we want to cheat. We want a challenging game. But we want it to be more challenging than just keeping up with crack-cocaine unit speeds or arbitrary "everyone hates you and will all join together into a super faction to destroy you after you capture x number of provinces", or that archers are really powerful so i have to adapt to them....

How about we slow those units down? Lets allow more tactics than mobbing and lightning speed cavalry flanking (that might not even get there in time).

How about we change the way realm divide works? Lets make this logical, no one is going to hate you for eterenity, and your allies and vassals for the most part shouldnt hate you for climbing to the top. You are friends. This can have great benefits them. Why force the AI factions in to hating you 99% of the time?

How about we turn archers into a support unit instead of a power house? Now they have to be used effectively to be worth while.

It comes down to game play. People like different things. If you like Vanilla Arcade action, more power to you but that doesn't mean any one else is less qualified to decide how much they enjoy the game because they haven't slugged out 250 hours of (*what would be for me*) incredibly painful and upsetting game play.

[Aeon221]

I am talking specifically of full overhauls. Speed reduction mod was out very quickly - and I use it.

Despite the insinuation of Aeon above, I don't have an issue with overhaul mods or the modders that make them. Hell? Why would I? My reasons for querying the time factor is that already some threads get confused because of them. One player says "sheesh, I'm having some problems dealing with X,Y and Z on hard difficulty" and gets replies from players using overhaul mods saying "Oh I've found that no problem on VH - just do A, B and keep and eye on C." It's the mod that has made X,Y and Z less of a problem and may be the only reason B is even possible.

It has taken me (at least) quite some time to settle into this new TW. After my first 10 or so hours I was left thinking:

1. Geez the economy is tight
2. Hell, no chance of holding a castle without regular troops stationed there
3. My God but enemy archers can chew you up if you're not careful
4. I've got Ai clans crawling all over me with DOW's, some of them were my friends 5 turns ago?
5. Realm Divide!!!! Hand me a pistol and leave the room!

But after plenty of play all of the above make sense and can be overcome with good play.

Look at what some of the overhauls immediately set about changing and I think you'll see my point. Economy buffed, costs reduced, bows nerfed, auto garrisons enhanced, diplomacy hits reduced, RD virtually eliminated. Result? After years begging for a challenging TW game, we finally get one and it is being made easier.....

Dude, it's not an insinuation. I opened a thread, saw your post with very critical language on this very subject about a specific modder, and remembered this thread. Putting two and two together this isn't, because that would actually be harder.

If you think his work sucks, cool, I do too. That doesn't mean I'd bother telling him because, uh, other people think its awesome stuff and that's great and they'll play it and I won't.


And it's pretty easy to complete three short campaigns in about ten hours each if you're quick with stuff and focus on overwhelming single stacks with multiple stacks like I do. Ashigaru bonused Oda makes that real easy. Compared to something like Vicky 2, strategic planning in Shogun 2 is trivial.

I _have_ spent a lot more time on multiplayer (which is indeed pretty buggy, and I hate the lack of time limits, ing hill campers and dropouts), and on multiple Legendary starts (doing first ten turns as Oda, checking AI responses, restarting, repeating) for research purposes, but my core campaign times are pretty limited. I gotta say, that first battle as Oda against the rebel army on Legendary can make or break your campaign start. It's pretty unreal how critical a battle that would be minor in ten turns is at that moment. Kinda reminds me of the first time I needed to implement error handling in a Java program: trivial if you're experienced enough to know the many potential outcomes, "impossibly" complex if you aren't.

[Little Legionaire]

I'm just looking forward for the visual and sound mods. Despite my deep respect towards the overhaul moddders i think i won't use any of them at least until the patch 2.0 is out.

[Captain Arrrgh!]

With the exception of Medieval 2 I may be one of the only members who actually have little to no gameplay mods for ANY of my TW games. Most of the mods I have are purely esthetic. Though I highly respect modders, and acknowledge their value within the community, I don't think CA has done that bad a job regards core gameplay concepts and trying to appeal to a broad audience.

[Gralachthule]

I think the OP has a good point; because I got the same impression when browsing the mods itself. Most of them make the Game easier or nerf core components (like Real Divide) that make the game challenging - but that is absolutely okay for me, because I don't paly any mods. (And never did in MTW2, EMpire or Napoleon). I usually played a lot of classical RTS Games besides TW (like SC, SC2 and DoW) and so I'm coming from the gameplay side of stuff - i.e. I want an exciting game with good and varied gameplay and some elements of history.

The only thing one should be viewed critical is balance changes in mods : competitive play is only a month old and no one has any idea what good balance looks like, we can maybe talk about it in six months or something like that; once the dust has settled and obvious strategies can be singled out. Right now it's just "Oh, I think this unit is too strong" (= i.e. I have no Idea how to counter it or find a good way to balance my army) and then someone nerfs it in a mod . Right now, nobody has any Idea how well the majority of the units work in MP. Another Problem is that you need to make up for the AI in some way (Archers are especially good against AI armies, that's probably why many people think they should be nerfed, because the AI has problems making coherent charges and never scares or pushes your line with probing attacks from cavalary). Then generally the mods are designes with SP in mind, so to each their own I guess .

But yes, when someone claims in his mod that he fixed the obvious imbalances from vanilla in his mods, I can only smile!

[rob-a-dogg]

I think the OP has a good point; because I got the same impression when browsing the mods itself.

Most of them make the Game easier or nerf core components (like Real Divide) that make the game challenging -

I usually played a lot of classical RTS Games besides TW (like SC, SC2 and DoW) and so I'm coming from the gameplay side of stuff - i.e. I want an exciting game with good and varied gameplay and some elements of history.

As an example, and to show our reasoning:

A DoW equivelant of Realm Divide would be that after you capture 10 points all of the other players are instantly allied onto one team, and you alone are put on the other team.

Is it challenging? Yes.
Can you possibly prepare for it and defeat it? Yes
Does it add to the game, i.e. varied game play? No, at X point in every game 90% of the AI factions on the map will form a super bloc, put aside all differnces and try stomp you for the rest of eternity. Diplomacy is effectively disabled after this point as every existing faction will have a -200 diplomatic penalty towards you. Only way around this is to cruch each faction and librerate home provinces so you can create vassals.

So we change the realm divide event to be less severe and to have a time limit. AI clans are still very likely to start attacking you, but will noew remember their old girevances against eachother and some times back stab eachother because of this, your allies will now be much more likely to stick with you (before they had to really really like you and possibly you would have to bribe them constantly. I know i had to more than once), and of course after a few years things settle down a bit.

Some factions will tire of you constantly punching their eyes in every time they try to step to your fantastic peasant armies and sue for peace, some will hate you and stay in the power bloc.

Vanilla Realm Divide to me is not a challenging gameplay mechanic. It is a lazy way of forcing a very difficult and effetively scripted event/situation on you.

[King Gambrinus]

I'd wait for the last patch, then do all you want with modding, 'cause patches just up the good work.


I wouldn't take the risk...



Otherwise, overhaul mods generally make the AI more intelligent and less reliant on the "handicap" resources they get. So there's no endless fullstacks and blitzing but more consolidation , etc... So it is worth it.

[Xelathur]

I can add one thing to this thread, that is: If you do not like mods, don't use them or dont read what people say about them.

And to the people that say "Oh it's gonna get patched and broken haha!" -what? I didn't know! Holy moly! Call the modgods!