My Grand Plan - Playable faction & Full roster

[Ironborn_81]

Well first off I'll say hello to all on my first post and get right too it.

I have recently become quite interested in modding R2TW despite my complete lack of knowledge of such things, I have tampered with several Arma games in the past, building mission/campaign packs and editing things like custom load outs etc but other than that I have little experience in this type of thing and hence I have a shed load of questions.

Inspired by some of the unit expansion mods seen and used from steam workshop, I set about looking into how it might be possible for myself to create a custom roster and certain faction playable. Google and youtube were my primary sources for info, I found a couple of videos which showed exactly how to create new units however they were quite lengthy with a fair bit of back tracking and mistakes being made I was more confused than enlightened.

I downloaded the Assembly Kit Beta though found it to be unhelpful, I have had more luck with PFM while watching how too videos but thus far I have only managed to familiarise myself with the program, yet haven't been able to create any new units. They seem to appear with components missing or the game itself fails to start. I know from my limited experience that I simply need to stick at it to learn to process and am determined to do so. (hopefully with your help)

To outline the project I have in mind -

1.) To make the Caladones (British Tribe) faction fully playable - Campaign & custom battle. Hopefully including functional political systems and the like.

2.) To create an interesting, fun and balanced faction roster.

3.) Alternate faction emblem. (The only external element I wish to add)

To be clear, I don't want to add anything new to the game, models an the like. Just move stuff around.

My main reason for posting up here to find good resources and perhaps some guidance, a good video on how to create custom units with the PFM would be a good start if anyone knows of such a resource. My first attempt at creating a new unit has not went well - My Great Spear (celtic pike unit) are a shambles at the moment...

An indication by experienced modders on how difficult this might be would be appreciated also.
This sees like a daunting challenge to a mere beginner, regardless feel it is achievable. (with some help)

Cheers
IB

[crawe1]

Ironborn_81, welcome.

Creating new unit rosters in R2 is pretty simple, particularly compared to R1. Two months ago I was in the same position as you currently are - but since then I have been able to revamp most of the factions. When I play the Odrysians, for instance, I now have thirty or so units to choose from, not counting artillery. I would advise that you stick with PFM - it is simple and user friendly. I think the Assembly Kit is still in beta and I haven't tried it out myself.

If you haven't already done so, the two key threads to check out are http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...-unit-with-PFM and http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...initions-files. The first one may be a little dated by now, but I still found it extremely useful and it should tell you most of what you need to know about filling in the database tables. What is doesn't tell you, you can easily work out through trial and error. Another really useful thing is to download and explore some of the other unit pack mods out there to see how they did it (I'd recommend Agent 2P's Thracian & Dacian mod - it's simple and only adds a few units, so studying how he did it will be quite relevant).

Regarding Variant definitions, if weapons and equipment are not showing up in-game, 99% of the time is is because you have made some tiny error in syntax, i.e. you've missed out a "/" or a ">" or something similar. In PFM, the only way to get around this is to just double and triple check everything. This appears to be a recurring issue in Jack Lusted's thread listed above.

Unit icons and masks are also pretty simple. The easiest thing is to cannabalize and merge existing icons using Gimp or Photoshop. This should be particularly easy for the barbarian cultures, who already have a large number of icons with which to experiment with. The masks are a little more fiddly, but still not too hard.

I'm not sure about making non-playable factions playable. Personally, I just use the very popular ALL FACTIONS PLAYABLE mod (http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...2013)-Patch-8). However, although I haven't tried unlocking a faction myself, my impression is that it isn't too hard. The best thing would be to study what Izanagi did in his mod listed above.

Can't help you with the emblem thing, but again, that is something Izanagi does in his mod.

Hope some of this helps, good luck, and happy modding!

[Ironborn_81]

Thanks for the info, I have been looking over a lot the threads that are around and other material. I'm keen to get started.

Will post any progress I make.

Cheers.