A fast guide to make a -rough- hybrid startpos with Taw's tools. No victory conditions at the time

[alhoon]

What is this about: This is a fast and quick guide to make Hybrid Startpos.esf for R2TW main campaign. Be warned! It's rough around the edges!

What is a Hybrid startpos: It is a startpos.esf made from a saved game. That means that you can use a Hybrid startpos to change faction midgame. Your game with Carthage has been kinda dull lately, with you at imperium 6, holding all of Africa, Italy and good chanks of Greece and practically nobody to oppose you? How about you change your faction and played with Sparta instead having to fight the huge Carthage you have created? Can you win when fighting those 2 gold Chevron armies you left at the Balkans when playing as Carthage?
That can be done with a Hybrid startpos.

What it needs: Taw's tools. Specifically his esf-to-xml and xml-to-esf converters.
It also needs courage for you to fight those 2 gold chevron armies.

known problems:
- Aside from the faction you just left (and picking that from the startpos defeats the whole purpose of the Hybrid), no faction has victory conditions. Why? Because they're saved at a different part that's a bit harder to change.
- The starting screen where you pick your faction will show the original starting factions and info. Why? Because that's what the text files refer to. They need to be edited accordingly to show different info
- If you pick a faction that has been wiped out, you go to an endless "Turn end" mode. So, if you pick Suebi and the Suebi have been wiped out in your save, they won't appear just because you chose them.


The guide:
Assume that the save you want to turn to a startpos.esf is called "HYB". It would work with any name.

1. download the Hybridization file from this post
2. Copy HYB.save from your save folder to the folder with Taw's esf2xml converter
3. Rename HYB.save to HYB.esf and ignore windows warnings
4. convert the HYB.esf to xml
jruby esf2xml HYB.esf HYB_dir
5. Now a HYB_dir should be in the folder with Taw's converter
6. Go to HYB_dir, and replace: save_game_header, preopen_map_info, esf.xml with the contents of the Hybridization file you downloaded at step 1
7. convert the HYB directory back to esf, naming it as you want. Let's assume HYBRID.esf
jruby xml2esf HYB_dir HYBRID.esf
8. go to your R2TW data folder > campaigns > main_rome
9. backup the original startpos there! ! ! !
10. Paste HYBRID.esf in the main_rome campaign folder
11. delete the original startpos after you have backed it up in step 9!
12. rename HYBRID.esf to startpos.esf

You're ready to go.