DCI: Tôl Acharn 1.2.4 released 12th Aug 2013 - unleash the mighty Dúnedain Counter-Invasions for TATW 3.2

[Ngugi]

second place in TWC's "Favorite Classical mod/submod" 2018

third place in TWC's "Most Popular Mod and Sub-Mod 2013"


winner of TWC's "Music & SFX Award 2012"
[for SFX, DCI:TA don't change music]

Version 1.2.4 for Third Age: Total War 3.2 is avilable as complete game and trough an attached patch at the end of this post

Hello friends! Longed to counter Invasions or get countered?
Unleash the mighty Tôl Acharn oath (the Jihad from M2:TW) as either Gondor or Arnor upon the enemies of the Dúnedain.
Use diplomacy to allow the Northmen factions to also participate in them when the tide is turning and since v1.2, by time, be able to call them as Northmen yourself.

What is a M2:TW Jihad?

If TATW is the only Medieval 2 Total War game that you ever played then you might have no idea that this feature even exists. It is similar to a Crusade (named "Invasion" in TATW) whereby a settlement becomes the target of a joint attack. It can be called by a 'priest' (Imam) of any Muslim faction and all other Muslim factions can join it. But unlike Crusades there is no Pope to make the decision on whether it will be called; when an Imam calls one it begins immediately. Armies that join one have the same movement bonus that Crusading ones have, plus the option to recruit mercenaries that are only available to Jihading generals. It is an interesting and powerful feature, adding an extra dynamic to the campaign. If one of the joining AI factions captures the target then they own it, which can affect how they behave from that point on as they move to add further units/armies there to defend it and possibly take other settlements in between to 'unite' their realm. i.e. Influencing another faction to do something that they would not normally do which could take the campaign down an interesting path. Plus, of course, it means a good chance of fighting alongside your allies in an attack on a settlement. One reason that TATW does not have this feature is that the Jihading factions must be of the same "islam" religion (culture). In vanilla TATW the Dwarves have this religion ("Dwarves") and the others have, rightly so, their own religions (Elves, Dunedain, Northmen, Melkor). This submod makes the "Dunedain" religion the "islam" one instead - so they may call and join Jihads - and uses some slight of hand to temporarily make the Northmen factions "islam" as well - so they may join Jihads.

Preview of the game

Arnor example campaign: Invoke a Tôl Acharn

Start the game Let us start a campaign as Eriador under the firm rule of Aragorn. First we make 3 important choises (which you do when you start as any faction): to use Acharn?, speed up Invasions? and start as Arnor (to get the Acharn available early)? At this time we say Yes to the first and decline the two second alternatives. Call and join Tôl Acharn After a long hard struggle Eriador has been reforged into Arnor! Good work lads. Now we get our Loremaster (Picture #1. Picture #2 is a sneak peak on Gondor's) and because there has been already Invasions we may make use of the Tôl Acharn. Pay back time! Now we have invoked it. We shall of course send the best to fulfill it, we send Gandalf and can se Him and his men now marked with the white star of the Oath of Vengeance. Acharn in progress We are not alone. Gondor is Dúnedain so they may join freely. Rohan and Dale is both allied with Arnor so they are free to join if they want to. And they want to. Men of the West on the move! Guess we are a bit slow, ran around gathering merc's... (Note that some of these event-images are Northmen-UI specific) Hang on Gamling and Angbor! We're coming! The result We missed the party! But now we are far from the boring North (OotMM and OoG is dead) but at the real east front and can help out Gondor and Dale The war continued with many Tôl Acharns and a really thrilling, unusual development.

***

Dale example campaign: Join a Tôl Acharn

Messages Far into the campaign as Dale we are allied to both Gondor and Arnor to enable participation if a Tôl Acharn is summoned. And then it comes: Picture 1) Do we want to be able to take the Oath? Yes of course! Picture 2) Welcome to the party Practical aspects King Bard has now taken the oath. Since it was Arnor who called it, and they are not allied with Rohan, Rohan is not requested to join and therefore we're three factions in this Acharn. Dale's Northmen-culture is during the Acharn switched to Dúnedain to enable us to join in. As you can see there is no negative effect on public order because of this (picture 1). [Units can be recruted as normal as well]. Soon Isengard was in Dale hands and celebration was in order. Cheers! As can be seen in picture 2 above Dale then returned to Northmen culture.

***

Acharn merc's v1.2

Eriador regions Gondor regions New units in action #1 Northern Line Volunteers #2 Elven Rangers (and Ranger Volunteers) # 3 Southern Line Volunteers

***

Acharn traits

Traits

Tòl Acharn appointed targets

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Gondor
Minas Tirith
Arnach (Lossarnach)
Dol Amroth
Pelargir
Linhir
West-Osgiliath

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Close to Gondor
Emyn Arnen (Ithilien )
Tir Ethraid (South-Ithilien)
Henneth Annun (North-Ithilien)
Cair Andros
Woldberg (East-Emnet)

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Arnor
Bree
Fornost
Annúminas
Amon Sûl

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Close to Arnor
Lond Daer
Tharbad [both]

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; Mordor, Harad, Isengard
Minas Morgul
Black Gates
Malgalad (Dagorlad; Dead Marshes)

Barad-Harn

Isengard

Tirith-Thoron

;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
- no more than 10 options will be possible at a time. Not only of us chosen targets will be possible but just more likely.

DCI version 1.2.4

Released: 12th August 2013
Size: 181 MB
Site: Download v1.2.4 here. v1.2.4 is a stand alone and do not require any previous version of DCI: Tôl Acharn

For those who have v1.2.3 currently a patch to upgrade to v1.2.4 has been attached. This is of no interest unless you have v1.2.3
Open Third_Age_3/data/world/maps/base and delete the file map.rwm, after extracting the patch to your Third_Age_3-folder. Saved game compatible.


Submods containing DCI
Withwnar's Submod Collection
MOS

Changelogs

v1.2.4 Changelog * Upgrade a condition making Dwarves and Dúnedain faction decline in diplomatic relationship over time (unless countered by other factors like trade and alliances), so it again applies to Elves and Dwarves. * Title upgrades for northmen Loremasters so that all scripts apply properly. * Previous versions compiled. v1.2.3 Changelog * Tweaked a flaw that good factions that can not join a Tôl Acharn got the messeage they should + a mission scroll giving the impression they could join the Acharn; it is now rewritten to notet hat those who can should join. Due to scripts that secure that no good faction become target for a Tôl Acharn the message and visible mission is unavoidable. v1.2.2 Changelog * Corrected a flaw that might cause a bug in the religion switch when Rohan dies. * Put 1.2 and 1.2.1 together as site for downloading was moved from GameFront to SpeedyShare due to GF's limitations v1.2 + 1.2.1 Changelog * From the end of the first Acharn + 25 turns (but not before turn 50), if the player is a Northmen faction [Rohan, Dale, Eriador] and is allied with either Gondor or Arnor, he/she might be offered to invoke the Tôl Acharn. The offer occurance is based upon frequency of Acharns in the campaign but the longer the campaign proceedes, the more frequent the chance of offer. See Acharn Mechanics (extensive info) for more details. We thank Withwnar's skill once more. * The Northern Line Volunteers are no longer Battle Ready Dúnedain but Dúnedain Swordsmen, a beautiful unit by smoesville. The Lossarnach and Blackvale volunteers are replaced by additional Southern Line Volunteers. All merc's has been given uniqe battle map-voices. Unit stats has been tweaked. * The two Tharbad-settlements are now added as targets; one faulty target removed. * New voice set for the loremasters. * Many smaller corrections and tweaks in texts and adjustments on the map to work with the 3.2-updates, etc. v 1.2.1 * A few edits; removal of work notes and typos. v1.0 Released 2 April 2012 * When starting a campaign three Yes/No events are given; Play with Acharns, Play with early Invasions and Begin with Arnor reforged? * Gondor gets a Journeyman if a certain condition is fulfilled. The Journeyman's quest then make's him a Loremaster. When reforged and after the first Invasion Arnor get a Loremaster. No other faction can get one of their own. [see also "Acharn Mechanics"] Only a Loremaster can call Acharns (jihads) and they can not do this before the first invasion has occured. If allied to the Dúnedains then the Northmen factions may join the Tôl Acharn if they want to. This include Eriador and works for both AI and player. * Players may call Acharns at non-evil factions but will not get any help from other factions doing that. * Tôl Acharn merc's; In the area of/by Gondor: Ithilian Rangers, Blackvale Archers, Lossarnach Axemen, Southern Line Volunteers [Spearmen of Pinnath Gelin] In the area of/by Eriador/Arnor: Dúnedain Rangers, Battle Ready Dúnedains and one additional feat... * New icons, flagmarker and event pictures. * Religion swapped (see "Jihad Mechanics"). Dwarves culture now renamed Khazâd. * New loremaster voice, event sounds and additional war horns for Northmen and Rhûn/Harad.

Reviews

I love this mod Oh, I love it! Was great to be able to strike back against Isengard during my Eriador campaign. The even better part was seeing the other factions take part. Seeing Gondor's full stack besieging Orthanc was great! I just came by to tell you this... ING AMAZING!!! I am just loving to play TA with this incredible mod!! Congrats!! Dang, DCI is so much fun! (...) The first campaign i played was with gondor but there the first invasion was called at turn 74 so i couldn´t test DCI that much, though the missions were very nice to unleash the Tôl Acharn. Back to the map above. It was an invasion and counterinvasion madness! Invasions: 33 Edoras, 59 E.Osgiliath, 83 Moria, 116 Bree / Edit: Turn 144 Black Gate..the madness continues Tôl Acharn: 46 Tirith Toron, 67 Tir Ethraid, 90 Isengard, 128 Tirith Toron The first Tôl Acharn gave dale a huge advantage against rhûn (dale wasn´t allied yet so it was taken by rohan and then conquered by mordor, thanks to total diplamcy so that dale didn´t miss the next counter invasions). The second one helped gondor a lot and so on. The targets that are included are very good strategic points and i had to think a lot what could be the best next target. Especially because i could also make dale attack harad because of that (...) (...) Love the traits that are given to your own generals if they succeed in their Tôl Acharn. (Khales and BBThrash used Withwnars Submod Collection)

Acharn Mechanics (extensive info)

How It Works This explains how the Jihad feature works. For simplicity I'll refer to them simply as "Acharns". In TATW "religion" is named "culture". But there are two kinds of "culture" in TATW: religion and building. To avoid confusion (I hope) I will avoid the word "culture" here and just use "religion". Eriador/Arnor is a special case given that Eriador = Northmen and Arnor = Dunedain. In this text "Eriador" = "Eriador only, not Arnor" and likewise for "Arnor". If something applies to either/both factions then I will use "Eriador/Arnor". Activation Three activation events at campaign start: Tol Acharns - activate Acharns - declining will prevent Loremasters from spawning and deactivate all of the Acharn-associated script. Earlier Invasions - spawns the Sauron priest at turn 30, bypassing vanilla's "not until turn 40 + 10% random" condition. Reforge Arnor - reforges Arnor immediately, for both player and AI Eriador. These are all independent: any combination can be activated and they do not affect each other in any way, other than Earlier Invasions will affect the Journeyman spawn turn. Religion Gondor and Arnor are now islam instead of numenorian; still displayed in game as Dunedain. The Dwarves are now khazad instead of islam; displayed in game as Khazâd. Loremasters There are three kinds of Loremaster: Journeyman Loremaster Loremaster (with Sceptre) - Acharn caller Spawning Arnor, player/AI: a Loremaster is spawned 1 turn after both of these are true: 1) Arnor reunited, 2) first invasion has been called. Gondor, AI: a Loremaster is spawned in turn 2. Gondor, player: a Journeyman is spawned after capturing either East Osgiliath or Cair Andros. An event message appears at turn 2 telling the player to do this. It needs to be held for at least one turn end. The Journeyman will then spawn but not before: Turn 15 - if Earlier Invasions is NOT activated Turn 3 - if Earlier Invasions IS activated If a Journeyman dies then he will respawn 2 turns later. If a Loremaster dies then he will respawn 10 turns later. The spawning location is always the same: Gondor = outside of Erech Arnor = outside of Annuminas Journeyman Quest A Journeyman becomes a Loremaster after completing his quest. This is the only way for player Gondor to get a Loremaster. The Journeyman must visit these sites, in this order: Minas Morgul The Argonath Isengard Annuminas He must be at the site during an end of turn for it to count as "seen". i.e. He cannot walk to a site and then immediately move on to the next. After that turn end a message will say that he has seen the site. His Journal ancillary updates with instructions on what to see next. By selecting the Journeyman and hitting F1 a scroll will display Quest Help, explaining how to complete the Quest. At any time the destination can be displayed to the player. Select the Journeyman and hit F3. An arrow points to the spot that he should stand near. He must be within one tile of that spot to guarantee success, though some sites are less fussy. The "location discovered" video events are completely independent of quest locations. Seeing a video does NOT mean that this part of the quest is done, NOR that he is standing on the right spot (though he might be). When the last site is reached (Annuminas) he will - during the end of turn - disappear and reappear at Erech as a Loremaster. The quest is now over and that's the last you'll see of the Journeyman in this campaign. If a Journeyman dies then the next Journeyman must start the quest from the beginning. Acharn Enabled Acharns can only be called after Invasions begin. 5 turns after the first Invasion is called Gondor and Arnor Loremasters are given the Sceptre that gives them piety. Their Acharn buttons will become active as a result. A message appears to the Gondor/Arnor player when this happens, telling them that they may now call Acharns. If the Loremaster was dead during this time then the message will instead appear when he respawns. Acharns As just explained ("Acharn Enabled") Acharns can not be called until 5 turns after Invasions first appear. And as only Loremasters have the ability - not Journeymen - they are not available to the Gondor player until the quest is finished. Gondor and Arnor - player and AI - may call Acharns. Northmen Involvement If Rohan, Eriador or Dale is allied with the Acharn caller then they can join the Acharn. In order for this to happen they must be allied with the caller at the time of the calling. If they ally at a later time during the Acharn then they will not be able to join that Acharn. Breaking the alliance during the Acharn will not make them leave the Acharn. If you are playing one of these factions - and you are allied with the caller - then you will receive a message asking if you wish for the ability to join. There is no penalty for declining the offer. If you accept then your faction will switch over to the Dunedain religion for the duration of the Acharn. AI Northmen factions will switch automatically (if they are allied to the caller). Once the Acharn is over they will return to their correct religion: Northmen. If Arnor was reunited during the Acharn then they will remain as Dunedain after the Acharn, being the correct religion for Arnor. This religion switch does not affect recruitment, cultural (religious) growth or construction options. But it would result in cultural (religious) unrest in their settlements due to the region's religion now being at odds with the faction's. To compensate for this all of their settlements are given a 35% Law bonus for the duration of the Acharn. Northmen Calling If the player Rohan, Eriador or Dale is allied with Gondor and/or Arnor then they may recieve offers to call an Acharn. This lets you - a Northmen player - call an Acharn and select the target. However, unlike Gondor/Arnor who can call one at any time, Northmen can only do it when given the opportunity... A Gondor/Arnor Loremaster appears and a message offers you to decide on the next Acharn target. If you accept this offer then your faction will switch to Dunedain and the Loremaster switches to your faction. You may then use him call an Acharn in the usual way. If you do so then you will receive the "join Acharn?" message immediately, letting you join the Acharn this turn. If you do not call an Acharn or if you do but decline the offer to join it then your religion switches back to Northmen at the end of the turn. The Loremaster always disappears at the end of the turn. Possible Targets Acharns can not be called on Dunedain-owned settlements (vanilla M2TW behaviour: islam-owned settlements are off limits). The AI can only call Acharns on Melkor factions and the Rebels (a custom feature). The AI will not call Acharns on settlements owned by the Dwarves, Elves or Northmen. This is achieved by setting these factions to Dunedain during AI Gondor and AI Arnor turns. They are switched back again at the end of those turns, meaning that e.g. the Dwarves will not be Dunedain during their own turn (player or AI); there is no risk of them joining Acharns. It also means that the player (of any faction) will never be aware of this religion switch because it has switched back again before their turn starts. The player does not have this restiction: you may call an Acharn on any settlement of any faction, other than Dunedain ones. If a "good" faction (Dwarves, Elves, Northmen) captures an Acharn target then the Acharn will end (a custom feature). This avoids that faction becoming the new target which would result in either war or a never-ending Acharn. For a list of the targets we have appointed, see the spoilerbox in the preview section. /by Withwnar

Artistic concept and why only Men

Mod concept: Tôl Acharn - ’Vengeance comes’ - is a mighty creed, first declared upon the followers of Melkor by Húrin of the Edain in the First Age. At the end of the Second Age when Elendil came from Númenor to Middle-earth he said ’In this place will I abide, and my heirs, unto the ending of the world’. But strife and loss has been his peoples late fate, with hope lost in darkness. Still, in the South stewards as Túrin II or Denethor II and commanders as Thorongil or Boromir have proven that strenght remains to recapture lands Gondor have not relinguished its claim upon. In Eriador the people once were friends and brothers in arms while the Northern Dúnedain rangers heed their linage, leaving the shadows; long have Rohirrim hold the Oath of Eorl true while the northmen of Dale could be reminded of the past alliances. Perhaps, if Gondor calls for their aid once more, they will come? The Dúnedain now rise to claim Elendils heritage, awaking the hearth of all good Men to retribution, a reminder to all of the West - that Vengeance comes. First the matter of the White Council - I answer as I am main responsible for the background story and therefore concept of the Dúnedain Counter-Invasions - as W.C very natural comes to most peoples mind and been the most expected base for a jihad feat. The White Council consisted of Elves and Istari and nobody else, even if it is quite populair to make it an 'all races'-council in fan fiction that was not the case, and it was argued to keep it so. While there might be a contradiction in developing Tôl Acharn into a fan fic' jihad feature while not wanting to change another part of the lore I just happends to like the council the way it was hehe. Our intention was, to begin with, a pure Dúnedain retaliation against the threat of Sauron. Later on, thanks to TNZ's input and Withwnars skill, we became able to let allied Northmen to join the Acharn. As they can't call it [edit: before v1.2] they are still considered a 'boon of help' - but this is not the Northmens cause. It is the cause of Dúnedain still and it is those men who volunteer, leaving home to reclaim Elendils heritage. Northmen will follow their leaders to aid their kin and fulfill oaths of alliance, as in history they have done before, but its not a public rising for such a cause. An important factor is further that the Invasions are supposed to be the dread of Middle-earth. If all 'good' factions may join then the total sum of potential Invasion faction participants is counted 6 while the potential Tôl Acharn faction participants is counted 7, turning the table in an unintended way. Our hope is that it will not be dicourageing for the players but that those playing Elves or Dwarves will be glad each time they are alerted that Men is mustering their defence against the Dark Lord, maintaining differences between the good factions and be great fun for those who use or have to face (ye evil rascal) the Coming Vengeance /Ngugi

Crew

Ngugi - Project leader, editing, sound, units, minor graphics

Withwnar - scripts, editing, minor graphics and units

smoesville - graphics, units and editing

And then we all do a little of everything anyway

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Thanks to

We credit the TATW crew for their wonderfull work and we want to express our thanks to TNZ for all help and good suggestions; who inspired the scriptwork behind an all-Men-jihad. Gratitude to Curufin that allowed us to use his Spearmen of Pinnath Gelin, and thus also credits to Rusichi tw whom helped him making them. To Emperor of Hell who made the new Spearmen of Pinnath Gelin-unit card and Maltacus who given permission to use his unit cards for Ithilian and Dúnedain rangers. We bow to the crew of The Last Kingom for the permission to one of their merchant strat map models with dual skin - here the Journeyman and mighty Loremasters. Thanks last to Baron Samedi for a good pointer.

Permission

The DCI team keep an open attitude concerning sharing content to fellow modders, so it's just to ask Exceptions are ofc content we ourselves got permission to use (see "Thanks to") and if you want to use the Dúnedain Swordsmen then first ask smoesville.

Installation

1) Create a fresh copy of the folder Third_Age_3 [make sure you are patched up to 3.2 and that it contains no other submods (or ask before, some few might be compatible).
Rename your backup so that only the folder to install into is named Third_Age_3].


2a) Download v1.2.4 here. v1.2.4 is a stand alone and do not require any previous version of DCI: Tôl Acharn
Extract the .rar into Medieval II Total War/mods/Third_Age_3. Accept to overwrite all.

2b) If you already have v1.2.3 installed, then use the attached Patch at the end of this post instead.
Extract the .rar into Medieval II Total War/mods/Third_Age_3. Accept to overwrite all. Saved game compatible.


2c) You can get DCI: Tôl Acharn and more trough following submods:
Withwnar's Submod Collection
MOS


3) OBS: Open Third_Age_3/data/world/maps/base and delete the file map.rwm (it will recreate itself when the game starts)


4) You can now run the game We are most interested in getting to know your experiences!


Submods for [clean] DCI:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

All submods are compatible with each other

* For those who want to use the Additional Mercenary Minimod one adapted version named AMM v1.3.1 for DCI v1.2.1.rar with all trees has been created for DCI v1.2 and later versions and is found here.

** The Remade Event Pictures-submod is compatible with DCI v1.2 and later versions, altering over 100 event images. Available here.


** The Archer Accuracy Submod 3.2-submod is compatible with DCI v1.2 and later versions, after some editing from the player.
Mod info: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...9#post10747839
Download here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...1#post11602761
Installation + editing instructions here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...0#post11803760

News;
DCI currently work on DCI: Last Alliance