Faerûn[Forgotten Realms]TW - v0.2 released, check the first post

[Vladyvid]

I posted a link in our group, to files for some 13 strat models. The textures are all sorted. What remains to be done is to give them proper skeletons and probably re-assign the bones as necessary, and then all that proper comment and stuff like that.

[Mr_Nygren]

I posted a link in our group, to files for some 13 strat models. The textures are all sorted. What remains to be done is to give them proper skeletons and probably re-assign the bones as necessary, and then all that proper comment and stuff like that.

Cool, I'll look into that. I believe I could do those in 1-2 days whenever I have time.

[Vladyvid]

Great, looking forward to it!

[Mr_Nygren]

I started doing some modding at my new place. Im still busy after work most of the time, but tried to find some time and i managed to finish the Spellguard for Luruar.

Here a bit of lore on that unit if you like to check it: https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Spellguard

I know that someone criticized this models arms and forehead, and I don't think it was included sadly as a result.. Despite the picture being dated September, 2020- and the 0.2 update being dated October 22 or so..

I think he convinced you to not include it which is a shame. Compared to Assurbanippals models the unit looks dated of course, but compared to your other older "Apprentice Wizards" this model looked a lot better. Yes, it's a clear improvement over your older wizards- even if it's outdated when next to Assurbanippals models.

I still think it should have been included as it does show improvement over your older wizards..

[Mr_Nygren]

some revamped models

Driders

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Minotaurs

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Mind flayers

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So I'm reading through this thread to get a better understanding of the mods development history, as I didn't pay attention to Faerun: Total War back in 2011-2017 despite being an active Medieval 2 mod player since 2008.

These models look awesome, especially that spider girl goddess creature of the Drow.

What happened to the Kobolds and that monster spider? You really should send these guys. I was thinking that we could have another faction made up of monsters next to Damara in the region of Vaasa?

Orcs, Gnolls, Kobolds and giants? We already have the units from Thay's roster but we lack the Kobolds.

So then I see this post that you have like made even more interesting units as early as 2014.. That's really impressive and there are Warhammer/Hyrule animations for that type of spider unit. The question would be what faction to add it to? I realize that Cormanthyr had some Drows.

Yeah, all those monsters really need to be added man, if you still have the models. They're more interesting than the humans.

[Mr_Nygren]

Here they go some of new stuff pics, bear in mind that all of them are in WIP stage. They are even not texturized so, far from being finished

Beholder:

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Kobold heads

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Wemic

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Lizardman heads

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Driders, warrior and priestess

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Minotaur

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those are a few samples of what im making, any suggestion or feedback is welcome

Beholders - We have a beholder in Warcraft: Total War so we could just use the same animations and you could easily use that model as a base for your if you wish to re-rig it. Not even certain if that's necessary - I also made a strat-model out of the Beholder for the Burning legion used as their spy.

Kobolds - We really could use them for a standalone faction of monsters (Witch King's Remnants) or in Thay?

Lizardmen - We do have a few Lizardmen in Thay's roster but in the early stages of this mod Vladyvid had an option to include a Lizardmen faction (Nargash?) - it would be a cool addition I think. We have 8 slots for more factions - so Lizardmen, Monsters next to Damara that Damara is actually on the watch for, Drow - maybe half-drow like the earlier faction suggested Dambarth? Or we could place a Drow faction next to Cormanthyr in one of the empty ruins? I mean, I wouldn't be against having them playable- there were a few surface-Drows too. In Warcraft we do have the Naga starting in their old areas where they lived as Highborne, because we couldn't have them in underwater cities. With the Drow it depends on if you want a fun faction or if it's more important that they are all underground. I think surface-drows would be a fun faction.

Driders - Yeah, I'm willing to include those if they're sent - they look great even if they're old.

[Mr_Nygren]

thx both guys, and yes green orcs look like each other, maybe this one looks a bit different
greyskin orc

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texture is temporary, and no, hes not ballotelli pissed off

Some units completely done
Beholders

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Mind flayers

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and finally a couple WIP yuan-ti

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We literally have all the animations you'd need for these units in Warcraft: Total War. The naga-faction would fit the last unit perfectly and I don't believe they used any new animations neither. Bantu/Tartor made them work on the original human models animation even.

Those first monsters looked scary.. Which I like.

[Mr_Nygren]

Sadly I cannot, because of 2 reasons, my main Pc got crashed and iI have to deal with a crappy one now that is not able to run Mtw2, and the other is because of I have no clue about to do that

Here some new models:
Calimshan minotaurs, the Calimshan top elite units, i did 3 different models

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A couple driders, priestess and warrior

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and finally some kobolds, shaman and elite cavalry and its ¨horse¨(its a waesel)

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I was thinking about adding all the rebels to the map, but before that is possible all the models is better added first. These models do look a bit dated seeing them with textures, as your Calimshan Minotaur looks much better in the release than on the picture.

Hopefully you still have the models, and I'm sure they're gonna be improved over time. If they won't be their own factions they would certainly fit as mercenaries and rebels. But by honest opinion after we had 50+ units unique to the rebels in Warcraft: Total War is that the more of them are mercenaries the better. It's more fun if the player can use them.

That first Kobold looked great in my opinion.

[Mr_Nygren]

some undeads

basic skeleton

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armoured skeleton

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eskeleton necromancer

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ghoul

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human necromancer

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Man, you have like literally every single monster made already - there were others prior to this post as well.

The Armoured Skeleton and the Skeleton necromancer looked awesome.

I'm not sure if you included them for Thay or if Thay only got boring normal skeletons. All of these ones would definitely fit in a mod with too many humans.

[assurbanippal]

these all models are very old and hurt my eyes XDD. some of them have been remade and they look now much better, for instance, minos; calimshan unit, skeletons; thay units ( should be like 3-4 skeletons unit into thay roster including skeleton horses), lizards; thay unit ( like 3 models or so), same for orcs... the others gotta be remade and ill do ofc for rebels or merc

[Mr_Nygren]

these all models are very old and hurt my eyes XDD. some of them have been remade and they look now much better, for instance, minos; calimshan unit, skeletons; thay units ( should be like 3-4 skeletons unit into thay roster including skeleton horses), lizards; thay unit ( like 3 models or so), same for orcs... the others gotta be remade and ill do ofc for rebels or merc

Yeah, I saw a clear difference in quality between the Minotaur and the older iteration. Your old models aren't bad though, I mean they still look decent compared to other models. But you have certainly improved a lot over the years.

Yeah, Thay is lacking the Kobolds but have everything else. I'm interested in finishing coding the rest of their units soon.

[Mr_Nygren]

Back in June 2020 I did implement/code 15 units for the Thayan nation into the mod, which was less than I had intended to do at first - thankfully WarcraftHero implemented four factions back then as I were more tired than I had expected to be when I said I would do it (I had implemented 10 rosters back in 2016 for WotN Grand Campaign for two weeks straight, I had also implemented one faction to TLK: WotN in 2017, many units for GoT Enhanced in 2017 and finally all the new models of Warcraft: Total War non-stop between May 2017 and early 2019) - so I could certainly get it done but didn't count on being tired of the same boring procedure.

In March 2021 I learnt how to convert battle-models into strat-map models and so I implemented 86 strat-models to Hyrule, and 54 for Warcraft - I also tried one orc-general for Faerun but didn't actually do any more like I said I could do- I were pretty tired of modding after May 2021 and hardly did any modding the rest of the year, as I mostly played that year - I did finish a submod for TW: 1942 for Rome Alexander but that's it.

In 2023 I did implement 76 additional strat-models to Hyrule, and I also did one model for Faerun as a test - the Baldur's Gate general - but while the model worked it lacked an arm, and so will need to be redone.

Vladyvid had sent me all the generals/captains for the 10 factions of his making in 2021, together with textures that had been made into single-textures which makes the process easier for me, as otherwise a battle-model usually has one texture for the body, and one for attachmentsets (shields, helmets & weapons) and this would force me to combine both textures into one texture as the strat-models only use one. Some battle-models use one which is easier - like the majority of Hyrule: Total war's models - while others like the Warcraft-models use two which means texture-work to combine them into one single texture.

While I had the texture-work done by Vlad already for10 factions, the models unfortunately didn't work with my method of converting- so it's actually easier for me to take a battle-model from the game and use that over using the models Vladyvid prepared - because they have been altered in a way that causes trouble for my method, as I'm not really rigging the model, but I'm using the method of converting them instead which means I prefer them as they are in battle. But his textures will come in handy whenever I decide to do the strat-models. When I used his model for Baldur's Gate the arm was missing so I'll have to pick an original model from the game after first deleting the variations.

In October last year I implemented 8 new units to Calimshan - the Cataphract Bodyguard, the Farisha Horse Archers (heavy mounted archers), Sidimmin Skirmishers throwing Javelins and three militia units with unique models including females - one of these units were one of a kind and is a slinger using a slingshot.

A week ago or so I remade Valdyvid's unit/unit_info cards for the Elves of Cormanthyr and the Kingdom of Aglarond, as these cards had been lost but thanks to a picture posted by him over at moddb I could remake them in Gimp with some tinkering.

I've also replaced all the generals and captains that were vanilla Medieval 2 models with custom ones in battle - and all the vanilla medieval 2 horses/mounts have also been replaced.

I did implement 4 new Calimshan mounts back in October 2023, and a few days ago I implemented two more - including the light horse of Shadovar.

I've updated the campaign a little bit and added the Cormanthyr garrisons, as back in 2020 I had added their recruitment but only added their Coronal Guard unit (bodyguard) for the leader and the heir - now instead they have some troops as well like the other factions.

I'm posting 10 pics of these updates, but I will be posting more updates as I can only have 10 pics in each post.

I've also added all of Vlad's unit_info-cards for Damara - but only 5 unit cards because they weren't made. And my method of making cards takes 30 minutes per card needing to erase the background by hand for each card- the same procedure takes 2 min in MS3D but then I'll need to learn how to animate the model there.

Something I'm gonna try.. Then I can make cards much faster. The reason they need animating is because you need the units to pose on the picture rather than standing like a cross.

My next goal will be to add the factions already implemented to the campaigns recruitment - the Kingdom of Aglarond implemented by WarcraftHero in 2020, the Kingdom of Damara implemented by him as well and the Rashemen implemented by him - and the Damara-roster is huge - Vladyvid had planned to cut it in two and make the 2nd half Impiltur or mercs - now it's uncertain because even though I can make another faction I am not skilled in 2d-art even if I did do the prcedure a few years ago for Hyrule and Warcraft (Zant's faction lacked symbols, as did the Oocca - I had to get pics into the game - I also did a Blood Elven symbol that got replaced later) - so while I can probably do the symbols I don't really feel like doing it. It would be easier for me to just give Damara their roster and make the Nobles regionals from different areas - for example the blue "France"-looking nobles for one area, the red "England"-looking nobles for a 2nd area and the black/yellow Holy Roman Empire (Austrian)-looking models from a third one. Yes, Damara is a faction with the look of crusader knights. Different noble houses could work like in Game of Thrones with certain nobles recruitable from only one place, and the others from different settlements. I had also implemented the human half of the Thayan Nation in 2020 and they will be added to the campaign, the Goblin merc is also implemented. I will need to add the Red Wizards for their general in the campaign.

So this is my current goal, after which I plan to add the rest of Calimshan & Unther, the rest of Thay & the new faction of the Shadovar - both Shadovar and Thay were supposed to be added by me in 2020/2021. I also plan to add the strat-model generals and captains.

I think that version 0.3 will include everything planned in 2020 which means more content than in the article by Wizard of Turnish/Vladyvid - I'll include Thay, Shadovar and the strat-models. However, the custom music will be cut - I'll include vanilla music. I'll leave the proper music for someone else to implement.

In a later version I'll include Chondath, Delzoun, Mulhorand, Sembia and possibly the new Amn units by Assurbanippal.

So two big releases, starting with the 2020 release - it will probably be more of a 0.5 than a 0.3.