The startpos can be found under campaigns/main_rome/startpos.esf (for the main campaign). This file determines many aspects of the starting situation for any new campaign. It is basically like a save game file that is loaded (save games do not use the startpos, they are their own startpos - that is why startpos changes are not save compatible).
If you want to create a sub-mod that changes any of the starting aspects of a campaign, you will need to edit the DeI startpos or create your own. These changes include starting army units/sizes, starting region ownerships, starting diplomacy, starting buildings, turns per year, faction cultures, region resource tags for AoR, faction-specific military recruitment priorities, starting money, starting characters, the start date, etc. As you can see, many things are decided in the startpos, and DeI does some very heavy startpos editing. You have two basic options - edit the DeI startpos or create a new one.
*These directions assume a knowledge of startpos editing and modding in general. If you need help on those issues, check out the Rome Workshop.
Editing the DeI Startpos
- This method is recommended because it is the easier of the two. However, some changes are much more difficult. Specifically, changing region ownerships is an unbelievable mess if you directly edit the startpos.
- However, if you are doing almost anything other than region ownerships, I
highly recommend simply using PFM or EditSF to manually edit your changes into the existing DeI startpos. You will find tutorials in the
Rome 2 Workshop area on how to do many of these things, from starting unit sizes to editing faction characteristics. If you have a specific question on how to make a certain change, post here and I will try to answer it.
Creating a Startpos From Scratch - This is very, very time consuming
- If you choose to create a startpos from scratch, then head on over to my basic tutorial on
how to use the Assembly Kit to make a startpos. That tutorial includes region changes and new armies.
- Some things that aren't included in that tutorial but you may want to do for region changes are:
- If you remove a faction, you will want to remove their diplomacy entries. You can do this either in the starting positions Form or in the start_pos_diplomacy table editor.
- You will want to change post-reform units to pre-reform, specifically Cel_Heavy_Horse to Cel_Light_Horse. This can be done in the start_pos_land_units table editor.
- You may want to change the starting cultures of some of the regions you altered. Other changes I make include Cimmeria and Mesopotamia being more Hellenic. You can make these changes in the start_pos_region_religions table editor. Note: Provincial culture is determined by the numbers in the capital region. Changing numbers in any of the minor regions will cause a crash.
- Although it isn't in the startpos, changing the start_pos_past_events table to remove any factions you deleted may be a good idea. This will have to be included as a db table in the pack.
- You will want to make DeI's minor factions playable (and any other factions you want to make playable). Simply go to start_pos_factions and change their "playable" column to "True". If you add any new minor factions that DeI doesn't have, make sure to include political parties for them in your db files.
- In the starting_positions form under the main_rome campaign area, you can change the turns per year. You can also change what season the campaign begins on here.
- Once you have made your changes, you need to follow the tutorial I linked and export your startpos.esf file using BOB. You will find your new startpos under the assembly kit/working data/campaigns folder.
- Take that startpos and either put it in a pack and edit it with PFM or use EditSF to directly edit the file. We are going to make more changes that the kit can't do very well.
- There are 3 main changes that take awhile to do - unit sizes, Meaningful resources, and the region unit resource tags for area of recruitment.
- Unit sizes - You can choose to not make this change. If you don't all the starting units and garrisons will be smaller than the proper DeI unit size. If you choose to make this change, it is very time consuming. You will need to go into the FACTION ARRAY - ARMY ARRAY - UNIT CONTAINER areas and look at each force. I recommend doing this only for the playable factions, otherwise it would take forever. Under each UNIT entry, change the 2nd and 3rd numbers to match the DeI unit sizes from our main_units table. You have to do this for every land army and garrison. Note: Do not change garrison unit types or it will cause a crash.
- Region Resource Tags - These tags are for our custom area of recruitment. In order to know which areas need which tags, open up our normal DeI startpos. Go into REGION MANAGER/REGION ARRAY and look at each Region's entry. On Row 18 you will see a few different entries like Auxilia_Roman, etc. The one that says DEI_X (e.g. DEI_Provence for Provincia regions) is our custom tag. You need to go into every region and add that tag.
- Meaningful Resources - We have changed various building entries. Use the Meaningful Resources main thread to know which buildings to change. The changes are listed under the Spoiler tag beneath "startpos changes for modders." In order to edit the buildings, you will want to go into the REGION SLOT MANAGER for the various listed regions and change the BUILDING MANAGER's first entry. For example, to add the horses resource you would change rom_EASTERN_city_minor_township_1 to rom_EASTERN_city_minor_horse_1. To know the proper building names, look in the DeI main pack under building cultural variants.
Victory Conditions
- The major problem currently with using the Kit is that it is missing victory conditions in a created startpos. The only way to currently add them in is to use a 3rd party program. You unpack the vanilla startpos, take the victory conditions from that, and insert them into an unpacked version of your startpos. Then, you repack it. The process for setting up this third party program is somewhat complicated.
Here is a tutorial for ESF to XML.
- Once you have unpacked the vanilla startpos, you will find a file called info-main_rome under compressed_data/preopen_map_info. You want to copy that file over into your unpacked startpos in the same location, then repack your startpos.
- Once you have the vanilla Victory Conditions in your startpos, you will want to add ones for the minor playable factions as well. The easiest way to do this is to identify a faction that is near and similar to that faction. Simply right click on that faction's Victory Conditions entry (under Compressed data - Preopen Map info) and hit Duplicate. Then change the faction name to the new faction.
Comes Rei Militaris
[Tutorial] How to Make Startpos Sub-mods for DeI
Roma Surrectum II
Re: [Tutorial] How to Make Startpos Sub-mods for DeI
Senator
Ducenarius
Originally Posted by Dresden
Laetus
. I've been trying to make late roman empire starting positions (from 161 A.D and so on) like a Pax romana made by Ragnar Lodbrok but for DeI.
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