The Caravel Mod for MTW

[tashtego]

Greetings fellow Medieval Total War fans and TWC members

The Caravel mod is a modification for Medieval Total War VI v2.1 i've made with the help of friends and fellow orgahs that works in both domination and GA for the early period only of the main Medieval campaign, and is hosted with the kind permission of the late TosaInu (previous org admin now deceased) at www.totalwar.org (the org), that thankfully provide the space for it.

You can download the mod here:http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showth...he-Caravel-Mod
either by the link provided in post#1 in the org thread of the mod or follow the Download link in my org signature.
Note: the latest version is version 3.3; for your enjoyment be sure to have this, as its better than the previous ones in every way.

Please also check out further down the thread:
-Caravel Mod game settings, how the mod is reccomended for play
-Information about the mod, its key concept(s) and gameplay
-Installing the mod, with detailed instructions how to
-Suggested iron-man rules and play modes; ways to spice up the game
and
-Credits, a whole hearted and well deserved thanks to all having contributed and kindly interested



Caravel Mod Game Settings

The mod was made and playtested with the following in mind, and it is strongly suggested/reccomended, for your own enjoyment, that anyone who'd be kindly interested to try it, to play thus:

1. Add the -ian and then the -loyalty:130 and the -green_generals lines to your MTW shortcut
(for instructions how to do this see here:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

1. Make a shortcut of you MTW exe (if you don't use one)
2. Then right click the short cut and select "Properties". This will show you among other things the target box of the exe shortcut. Put then your cursor to the target box. Leave the text there as is, and also leave one space.
3. Then type: -ian

The -ian command line allows you to change factions mid game. It also allows you to add further commands, and zoom in and out of the battle field without limits on the camera angle, which is good for having a "close to teh action" feel as well as screenshots. Every faction is represented by a number of your keyboard.

Factions are:
1. Rebels
2. Almohads
3. Byzantines
4. Danes
5. Egyptians
6. English
7. French
8. Germans
9. Italians
0. Polish
Shift+1. Russians
Shift+2. Spanish
Shift+3. Turks
Shift+4. Aragonese
Shift+6. Golden Horde (after they appear)
Shift+7. Hungarians
Shift+9. Pope
Shift+0. Sicilians

Furthermore, and after leaving again a space after -ian and each, you add the following two command lines:
-loyalty:130
-green_generals

The loyalty bit makes the AI keep 130 loyalty in all his provinces at all times, This practically means that he is keeping small garrisons in them, and hence his long terms devlopment is much safer from rebellions civil wars and his attacks more prudent rather than recklessly opportunistic.

The green_generals makes dead generals being replaced by the game engine by new statistically inferior versions; hence you cannot cultivate super generals over a long campaign. It also downgardes and changes their traits.

or here: http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showth...eval-Total-War
Chapter: 5.5 Cheat codes and command lines).

2. Choose either huge or default unit setting, hard (or expert) difficulty
(unit settings can be chosen from: Main Game Menu\Options\Performance and sroll the unit size bar to huge or leave it to default).
NOTE: While the choice is yours, my personal reccomendation is huge; the mod was conceived and received most of the playtesting with huge. Default was also playtested however and works just as well.

3. In the campaign/era menu, choose either "CRVL (huge)" campaign if you have set unit size to huge, or "CRVL (default)" campaign if you have set unit size to default.
NOTE: It is important to choose the right campaign as economics have been customised for unit size. If your unit size choice and Caravel campaign do not match, you'll get either too much or too little money available in the campaign.

4. Turn the battle clock off
(Clock can be closed from: Main Game Menu\Options\Game Options and tick the battle clock box off - found at the bottom).

All these settings make considerable difference and so please, for your enjoyment, remember to implement them. You can read about the significance of each in the spoiler below:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

-The huge unit settings are calibrated with the "CRVL (huge)" campaign income provinces' for good short and long term campaign pace and AI behaviour. They give more spectacular and tactically edgy battles that require foresight, as there are less blocks available for the most part. Battles also tend to be less tedius (because of the lower amount of reinforcements due to the lower amount of stacks - as every stack has more troops in it in huge). Generally huge slows the battle pace allowing better control, puts a greater strain on resources in the campaign map, requiring more planning. Its downsize is that in the battle units may seem - at first at least - unwieldy and there there is less room to maneuver and hence less flank attacks etc. Essentially battlefield gameplay becomes a bit more strategic in huge.

-The default unit settings are calibrated with the "CRVL (default)" campaign income provinces' for good short and long term campaign pace and AI behaviour. They give a more action oriented campaign game, as armies replenish faster, but also more tedious battles as there are many stacks floating and battles become too long with many reinforcements. In the field, default means more room to maneuver, however this is more taxing on micromanagement skill, especially since match ups resolve quickly and there are lots of flanking moves from the enemy to counter as well as to do. Essentially battlefield gameplay becomes a bit more tactical in default.

-The loyalty:130 addition in the MTW exe shortcut is particularly crucial; without it, the (many) factions that are set to be expansionist AI personalities burn themselves out by rebellions as they don't pay attention to loyalty of their provinces, no matter how newly conquered(!), when they invade.

-The clock off makes the AI use sensible tactics rather than trying to beat you by the clock, which inconveniences him as he turns his back to the player to use the clock and that can turn to a rout.

-The green-generals makes the engine replace your generals with statistically inferior men, so you cannot cultivate them, that results in huge command stars generals that makes morale redundant as a gameplay element (also known as jedis = unroutable).

Mod Information (a short description of the mod's concept and gameplay)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Mod Concept

In a way you can think of The Caravel Mod as MTW's version of Jack Lusted's "Lands to Conquer" series of mods for RTW and M2TW. It is based on essentially the same concept ie maintain the vanilla feel and flavor and improve on it.

So the mod is not:
-a mod providing more factions, units or provinces than the vanilla game
-a mod featuring new graphics, icons, models, portraits, unit cards etc in other words it does not have any new aesthetic touches.
-a mod geared for impossible difficulty, although it is by far more challenging than the vanilla game
-a mod that is geared to make the game strictly historically accurate, although it improves on the historical plausibility of teh vanilla game in a number of ways

The mod is a comprehensive and complete (but by no means exhaustive) take in bringing out the potential of the vanilla game and make it shine. All gameplay concepts, art, features and attributes of the vanilla game have been maintained; the existing core game has been improved/optimised for SP (single player).

What the mod achieves in the campaign and the battlefield

Improvement and optimisation consisted of small but numerous (too many to meaningfully list) alterations and in the (heavily playtested and proven) combination thereof.

The results are more meaningful faction choices and so behaviour without losing in diversity, flavor or complexity. By improving stack composition, AI unit choices and choice priorities and helping the AI factions to regenerate more easily and quickly decent stacks (through meaningful building choices and dependencies), the battlefield experience is also (considerably at times) improved over vanilla.

Overpowered or underpowered vanilla units/weapons were tweaked (mildly to retain familiarity) accordingly in order for them to become units/weapons with clear battlefield roles ie having clear plusses and minuses, which the AI can recognise and use as such, and so put them to good use on the battlefield.

Battlefield gameplay was then enhanced on the basis of combined arms.

Combined arms basically means that you need to coordinate your units and your unit types (missiles/heavy-light-missile-cavs/melee infantry/light infantry/artillery) in order to win on the field of battle, rather than having units that can do everything themselves (can fulfil multiple roles too well) and singlehandendly (ie so strong that they make other units redundant, hence overpowered) carry the day. I drew on this account from my own TW singleplayer and multiplayer experiences as well as of other players'.

In order to make navigation of units and buildings that have been tweaked easy and the game intuitive to play, the text descriptions of units and buildings were changed where appropriate to reflect their intended uses. Hence what you read in the description is what you get.

AI battlefield use of certain units was also tweaked (through the available parameters in the files), like for example BG units, xbows/arbalesters and guns, to improve their performance at the hands of teh AI, with good results.

Basically, if you enjoy the vanilla game, but are tired of slaughtering armies of peasants and ballistas (or other low end units) with your lancers, or of the AI wasting good florins in buildings that cost much, take forever and train no units or have no other benefit for that faction or in that region (say master merchant in a landlocked province), or of Lithuanian cavalry having building requirements that rival those of Gothic Knights, or sick of winning the early game with mercenary dismounted Druzhinas then this is a mod you might want to try.

NOTE: all levels of difficulty start with 2000 flrs treasury. This is because 2000 flrs is the default treasury, and all AI factions, that is the factions that the player does not choose, revert back to it. This is pretty easy to assert, just start a campaign in vanilla and after the first turn switch to another faction (note: by use of -ian every faction is represented by a number in your keyboard - press the numbers to change factions; also use switch+number). What you'll see is that (any of) the AI faction is down to 2000 flrns as starting treasury. Hence, its only fair for the player to start at the same money level - if the AI can do it, we can(?) too

Installation (instructions on how to install the mod - installation made easier since v2.9 as now mod comes with a self extracting .rar)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The mod comes with an easy to use .rar self exctracting archive. You need to target it for exctraction in the main game folder ie wherever you have a clean (unmoded) install of MTW/VI v2.1. It also includes a read me file that provides installation instructions. These are reproduced here for your convenience:

In order to play the mod, you'll need to target the .rar archive that contains the Mod, to extract itself to wherever your Main MTW game folder is.

The location of the main MTW game folder varies according to edition.

If you have the original game and the VI expansion patched to v2.1,
then your game will be in: C\Program Files\Total War\Medieval Total War

If you have the Gold edition, that includes combined the main game and the VI expansion and installs through DVD rom, then make sure the game version is patched to v2.1 (for some gold editions you need to download and install the v2.1 exe patch); for them the game will be in:C\Program Files\The Creative Assembly\Medieval Total War

If you have installed the game in a custom location, then target The Caravel Mod.rar to extract itself there.

You will be prompted if you want the files replaced (with those of the Mod), choose "Yes to all"

NOTE: the Loc folder that contains game text (for unit descriptions etc) has been modified for the english language only. If you are playing in another language edition you can re-install the game in English before you install the mod or if you are playing in an edition that uses another language only, you can try installing the mod save for the loc folder; although you will be missing any changed text - and there is lots of changed text that helps navigate the role of units - but if you can live with this ommission, that should work.

Suggested iron man rules/modes of play (iron man rules/modes of play you could try that may perhaps enhance your gaming experience; also applicable to other mods and the vanilla version)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

There are also a number of iron man rules/play modes that you could try, that certainly make the game more interesting and challenging imo:

1. You can prohibit yourself from manually razing buildings and disbanding units - the AI cannot do the same; instead he has to raid enemy cities by the autopillage automatic engine function and rid of overbudget troops by making war.

2. You can grant land titles only to those generals that are either of royal blood or are married to the royal family (via a princess) or are given office. Once a general has assumed a title (after being eligible) he cannot leave the province he governs unless his title is revoked or the province lost. This has benefits as, if you keep governors in their respective provinces they get traits from what you biuld in those provinces (builder, stweard etc), traits that can keep the population happy and also increase your output

3. You can play a single ruler and once he is dead, switch (note: by use of -ian every faction is represented by a number in your keyboard - press the numbers to change factions; also use switch+number) to the youngest ruler of any other faction on the map. If more than one are the youngest you can choose. This allows for:
a) much better roleplaying
b) many challenging new starting positions for all factions as history is rewritten
c) constant challenge as you never have time enough to make a faction so large that the game becomes a chore, and you would have to fight the factions you helped to make very strong with other, weaker, factions.

Credits (a thanksgiving to all interested and also kind enough to contribute and help in any way)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Full credits go to:
1. Anyone at CA involved in making MTW(1)
2. To Caravel, as co-maker, constant inspiration and raison-d'etre for this mod - you're the greatest mate
3. To Raz, for his suggestion about BG behaviour and for making himself available for technical issues.
4. To victorgb, Glenn, Belisario, Stazi, Raz, Durango, Tristrem, Cyprian2, huth, armoros, virus found, faremisch, vanitas, RRMike, Togakure and drone for their feedback interest and encouragement
5. To Stazi for discussing issues related to loyalty settings effect in gameplay
6. To Axalon, Stazi Durango and Ra's al Ghul for making me aware that the weather modification was not working due to engine limitations
7. To Stazi for suggesting an increase in campaign funds or decrease in unit settings in order to make the camp game more dynamic by allowing to the AI factions the funds they need to be competitive and aggressive
8. To Stazi for suggesting increasing the priests' conversion rate to compensate for decreasing the same from religious buildings, that helped teh AI converting newly conquered lands, without sidetracking from the intended religious gameplay
9. To Stazi for detailed feedback that spotted lots o minor glitches and omissions in v2.3 and others
10. To the late TosaInu and totalwar.org for kindly hosting and the TW community - thank you for all these years
11. To TinCow and the new org admins for heping me out with tech issues and putting up with my ineptitude.
12. To Caravel, Belisario and Stazi for giving me courage to stick with the concepts and ideas i set the mod on.
13. To Stazi for pushing me to make the mod more user friendly by including a self extracting file.
14. To Stazi for cleaning and ordering the unit and build_prod files from the tail leftover by the gnome editor
15. To Belisario for notifying me for a mistake in the read me of v2.8
16. To Stazi and Caravel for providing advice how to clean up tails in txt files produced by editors
17. To Sazi for providing advice and aid on how to add famous rulers and heroes to the GHorde
18. To drone and the org for stickying the Caravel Mod thread at the org's Engineer's Guild (the org MTW modding section).
19. To Ishan and the TWC for stickying the Caravel Mod thread in the MTW section of the TWC.
20. To Stazi for testing and advice he did and gave me on how to add the historical G. Horde characters.
21. To Stazi for spotting a mistake in the vanilla files that is resopnsible for the "Mongol Leader turns catholic" glitch on the campaign map while the Mongol leader piece moves.
22. To Stazi for spotting a syntax mistake in the txt file of version 3.0 and notifying me very early for it
23. To Stazi for suggesting to fix a glitch in the names of the new Horde Heroes - fixed in v3.3.
24. To Stazi for suggesting that the Byzantine unit builds is problematic for their AI personality which prompted me to change it in v3.3.
25. To Stazi for kindly thinking to write a review of the Caravel Mod in a polish site - i am most honoured and thank him kindly.

I would be happy and grateful if anyone finds something that is awkward or downright wrong or simply has a suggestion or a question and wishes to post it - you are very welcome to do so in this thread, and i'll reply as soon as i can.

note: Dear all, the chances are that i will be more available to reply in totalwar.org as due to RL i do not unfortunately have the time to check thoroughly both there and here, in your fine forums. However, i will try to respond as best i can as time allows.

Last but not least, this mod is named after and dedicated to fellow TW community member Caravel Hopefully he, and others, from now on can play MTW SP without having to worry too much about the dillema of giving in or not to the modding urge... Unless of course its all about the modding urge

I would also like to thank Stazi for his feedback and keen sense of observation that unearthed many issues that could be improved as well as for his skillful, kind and timely help. I am most indebted for your significant contribution to this mod

Finally let me say a big thank you to Ishan and the TWC center staff for welcoming me and for stickying this to your fine forums. I am greatly indebted, thank you very much

I hope you all enjoy the mod as much as i do

Yours truly, tashtego aka gollum

[tashtego]

Dear all, while the mod is still evolving in versions these are save game compatible as the main frame work for rosters and tech trees has been laid down some time ago and will not (easily) change.

Things however, like prices and minor stat adjustments are continuously being tweaked and improved as feedback comes in and playtesting proceeds.

The mod is also now, since v2.9(current) being made more user friendly than before, as the deleterious extentions created by editing using the gnome editor are cleaned in the files and so you can make your own mod of the mod easier and safer, as well as the mod coming now in a self extracting rar that makes it far more straightforward to install.

The mod has been released for 5 months now and been in development much longer than that. If you like the vanilla game but dislike AI incompetence and imbalances that make it too easy for the player on the campaign and the battlefield, this is a mod you may want to try.

It retains all vanilla familiarity you may have and flavor you may like, but improves the core game very much both on the strategic and tactical side by improving Ai behaviour, choices, unit use in battle and longterm campaign stability.

You may think of it as MTW's version of Jack Lusted's "Lands to Conquer" series of mods for RTW and M2TW. Like them it aims to retain all vanilla feel and flavor but improve the gameplay in terms of balance and AI performance.

I hope it adds to your enjoyment of the game

Thank you tashtego aka gollum

[tashtego]

Dear all,
the next version of The Caravel Mod, will contain a few minor price and AI preferences tweaks relative to high end religious orthodox and muslim agents to make the AI use them more, as well as some small reduction to high end catholic cavalry, again to help the AI field more of them - currently they are slightly overpriced.

The main new feature of the next version though will be the introduction of historical Kings (khans) and heroes (generals) for the Golden Horde that are missing from vanilla. This will make the Horde having a more historically plausible feel as well as providing it with a few competent commanders like Khan Batu and genghis Khan general Subutai, that will turn the Mongols into a tougher (still) proposition than they already are in the mod.

The next version will be out within the next week or so if all goes well, and will be fully save game compatible.

Take care and i hope you enjoy

[tashtego]

Dear all,
version 3.0 is now out. It contains the religious agents fixes and price changes, as well as slight price reductions to high end catholic cavalry and 3 Golden Horde historical characters that are pretty good generals too. They thus beef up the Horde and also give it a more historically plausible feel.

I hope you enjoy

Yours truly, gollum

[tashtego]

Dear all, version 3.1 is now up and available for download. It contains a few minor price adjustments for low end cavalry and a couple of other very minro tweaks taht will be unoticeable, and yet they exert a positive influence in playbalance and in the AI factions' development.

I hope you enjoy, yours truly

gollum

[tashtego]

Dear all, version 3.2 is now up and available for download. As all versions for ages now it is save game compatible. However you will feel the full benefit of the latest tweaks in a new campaign.

It contains:
-Withdrew the jedai Byzantine Royals. Byzzie Emperors still have the hardcoded extra influence that makes for generaly good stats including command, but their command stats are now in par with other factions'. It makes for a much more fun game with them. They are still tough opponents to beat due to their superior tech and too good units for early and their generals still have command stars, but not 8-9 as a rule.
-Tweaked all missile cavalry AI use parameters including fast and weak as well as slower and stronger. Did quite some playtesting in custom and tweaked then re-tested etc and final values make for better use of these units by the AI.
-Did one each minor tweaks in the Byzantine and Russian rosters;
-Slightly increased the buying price of mercs to reflect the increase of incomes by 1/3 around the map since version 2.8.
-Incorporated a fix for the Mongol Faction Leader piece while awaiting. As Stazi found out there was an error in the vanilla game in the naming of the paganpiece while awaiting which made the engine to show the default catholic one. The mod now includes a fix for this.

So this is it, i hope you enjoy

[Cyprian2]

Hi, tashtego (gollum). I will be coming back to MTW within a couple weeks and plan to start with your latest (and final?) instalment of Caravel. Just wanted you to know that your hard work does not go unappreciated around here. (And thanks for the little-deserved nod in the credits!)

[tashtego]

Thank you for the encouragement Cyprian2. I hope you enjoy the mod.

[tashtego]

Dear All,
v3.3 of the Caravel Mod is now up and available for download. It incorporates a laborious finetuning of a number of aspects which i list below:

*The most novel thing introduced in this version is the inclusion of a custom made version of the Caravel Mod for default (60mansword,100manspear, 40manhorse) unit sizes as well as another for huge. This has been made and playtested as it is clear that many people are either unwilling to move to huge or simply prefer default.

Now the Caravel Mod caters for these people.

In order to play on the unit sizes you wish, first select the unit size of your choice (from Options\Performance) and then, in the campaign/era menu, choose either "CRVL (huge)" campaign if you have set unit size to huge, or "CRVL (default)" campaign if you have set unit size to default.
NOTE: It is important to choose the right campaign as economics have been customised for unit size. Please make sure you choose the campaign that corresponds to the settings you have chosen as otherwise the campaign may either have too much or too little money.
NOTE: While the choice is yours, i still personally reccomend huge unit size.

*Other than that, v3.3 does a major retouch on parts of teh English, Italian, Byzantine, Turkish and general Catholic rosters. This includes:
-Minor stat adjustements for units - in order for them to function more effectively within the roles they fulfill in their rosters, while as always being recognisably vanilla
-Streamlining of rosters - a few simplifications in order not to have quasi duplicate units that have little purpose.
-Retouching of certain units' texts - to give them a more historical feel
-A few skin switchings for certain units - in order to make them aesthetically blend in with the rest of teh factions they belong to.
-Slight unit costs adjustments for some missiles units - some were slightly overpriced.
-Slight change of AI use parameters - to improve AI use in battle after quite some playtesting.
*Did a streamlining for Muslim and Orthodox religious agents, as the major ones from Cathedral/G.Mosque were never used by the AI even when he was building those.

*Fixed a glitch as per Stazi'ssuggestion in the new Horde Hero names that would make them be called "Lord Khan" upon receiving a title - now they are called "Lord Batu" etc

*Fixed the Byzantine AI personality unit build preferance numbers in order to allow them to have more well balanced stacks, as per Stazi's suggestion.

As always, the new version is save game compatible, but you'll get the most out of the new tweaks if you start a new campaign.

So, this is it. There will be a while now for a new version of the Caravel Mod. If any of you Caravel Mod enthusiasts - old and new - have not given the mod a try since v2.8, please do, as its now really really better than prior to that.

Thank you all, i hope you enjoy :medievalcheers:
yours truly, tashtego aka gollum

[Cyprian2]

Dear All,
v3.3 of the Caravel Mod is now up and available for download.

You are a busy man, Sir gollum. I know what I'll be doing in the next few days.

[Kitbuqa]

The mod is only 5 MB? Would you please make it so low to medium end spear units take heavy casualties from heavily armored cavalry? And Please make Gendarmes charging cavalry and the the heaviest HC unit in the game.

[Sarissofoi]

Interesting.
I will check this.
BTW It looks like MTW work(with new drivers) properly on my graphic card. No need to switch cards only to play MTW.

[macmini706]

Thanks very much

[HUtH]

epic dig out with kataphraktageddon - coming back of Byzantium

[Cyprian2]

epic dig out with kataphraktageddon - coming back of Byzantium

Niiiice! I've put quite a few hours into an Aragonese campaign lately, and it's reminded me of all the hidden gems in this mod. And, uh, surprises like "kataphrankenstein" monster armies.

EDIT: Also, I have to add, using the -ian switch with this mod is just so much fun.

[HUtH]

Well I play with -ian, loyalty130 and green generals.
It's tempting to switch to Byzantines now, get at least one ship and begin a little campaign in Levant. My goal with Danes was to remake norman expansion with taking Constantinopole, though I couldn't stop myself from bribing all those superb rebel steppe armies, also had to deal with big Byz and Turk stacks, so everything was slowed. And boring.

I never played with switching nations but I'm going to rush for Constantinopole, than switch to Byz, conquer some inland territory and hopefully I won't get destroyed by my carefully bribed elite armies of Danes...

BTW can rebels built up provinces? Or recruit? I can't notice if they can... I think it'd be better for gameplay. And such a shame that Ireland has no port so I can't bribe these Gallowglasses, aaahh