(Small SubMod) The Notitia

[maximus decimus meridius]

First of all , i want to congratulate with DResden and others who are building this fantastic work, i'm playing with the mod for some days, it has the potential to become one of the best mod for Attila - TW.

BTW i'm very displeased with the bad conformity with the hystorical relity of the vanilla game. So i've made a little mod that change the names of the units with the real ones. I made the mod for my personal use but now i've decided to make him usable for who loves more hystorical feel of the game.

for example In this mod there are now:

legio palatinae seniores and iuniores
legio comitatenses seniores and iuniores
lanciarii seniores
lanciarii pseudocomitatenses
cohors riparienses
legio pseudocomitatenses
auxilia palatinae seniores and iuniores
auxilia palatinae gallicana
etc.

hope the mod will be useful for you

bye


This is the 3rd edition of the mod. Every comment and advice will be welcome.

hope you will enjoy it
thanks

Attachment 323125

[GERMANICUS]

Nice! I was hoping that this feature would be added FotE. My thanks in sharing with the community and those who enjoy more historical immersion to their Total games.

+REP

[Autaritus]

Great idea! Thanks!

[Majorien]

i was dreaming of it, thank you !

[Dresden]

Thanks for posting this

[Antiokhos Euergetes]

Thank you for sharing

[Augustusng]

Couldn't help but noticing there are a few Latin errors in those names (most of your adjectives are plural, but are next to singular nouns). Did you actually find those in the Notitia Dignitatum, or what (could be it's written like that, this post-classical Latin is messy)?

Also unrelated, I'd recommend renaming the "Legio" units to something like "cohors," or maybe "legionarii" since "Legio" refers to a whole legion, not a single unit (then again, Roman units were a bit mixed up in the Notitia, with some units much smaller than their theoretical strength).

[Cope]

Yes, I'm a little confused at some of the Latin as well.

A minor suggestion would be to change "lanciarii pseudocomitatenses" to Pseudocomitatensis Lanciariorum. I think that the word comistatensis is used as a noun in a late Roman military context - so it looks, I believe, as if you've written Lancers (not possessive ie Lancer's) pseudo-Regiments. I think my version says part-time regiment of lancers (spearmen).

[maximus decimus meridius]

@Augustusng
thanks for your suggestions , yes there are some mistakes with adjectives and nouns , i'll try to correct in the next version.

@Leving
the Pseudocomitatenses were "limitanei/riparienses" regiments promoted to comitatenses level, they are not part-time regiments. BTW i'll check the correct definition.

@Dresden

thanks, glad to see you've appreciated this little mod.
I've renamed (and i will rename in the next version possibly) some byzantine units with roman ones, (it seems to me that it was the correct thing to do) for example the tagmata guards would become Equites Buccellarii, Hetaereia - PEdites Buccellarii and the Numeroi would become a palatine legion .
i don't know how to classify the MEnaulatoi, there aren't roman counterparts for these pikemen..

i don't know if you've planned to substitute these byzantine units with roman ones....

[Cope]

@Leving
the Pseudocomitatenses were "limitanei/riparienses" regiments promoted to comitatenses level, they are not part-time regiments. BTW i'll check the correct definition.

I know, but I was trying to come up with a meaningful translation for it. Of course you could just stick with "pseudo" since we use that word in English also, but I don't think that it is fair to categorize the the pseudocomitateses literally as "false" companies/regiments since as you've pointed out they weren't really false or "pseudo" soldiers. So I was just broadly translating it into English in terms of what I think the wider feel of the word is - perhaps "junior" would be more accurate.

Edit: done some research, it actually looks fine actually assuming that pseudocomitatenses can be used as an adjective, which I guess it can.

[Bashar]

AFA pseudo-comitatenses, do your research. It's in the ND, it's in pretty much every historical book on the army of the late empire. They were limitanei legions drafted into the mobile forces, the regional or palatinae comitatenses exercitus. You guys need to step it up - SAI style, that is the closest mod historically to this time frame, albeit for the original RTW. Stop asking for 200 man units, it's ridiculous. A Roman army century at this time was 80 men. In SAI they've got the huge units at 160 = 2 centuries. Infantry wise Legios were about 1000 men give or take, Auxilia Palatinae 500-750. Cavalry units are vexillationes. They were about 300-500 men. Expect significantly under-strength units, from losses due to disease, battle, leave, etc. plus the well documented fact that many commanders cooked up the numbers to draw the rations and pay from these non-existent soldiers. Elite units were especially hard to replace. Most of the army guarded the frontiers.

Approximately 70% of the army were limitanei, the static units guarding the frontiers, garrisoning frontier cities, towns, and forts along the limes (frontier roads), river crossings, etc. They were all full time soldiers, not a "militia" of part time soldiers/farmers. Units of infantry were legios (500-1000), maybe some limitanei legions were larger but many were spread across different forts or towns, some even in different regions altogether, numeri - 200-300, alae et cohortae - 300-500. Cavalry were much more predominant in the limitanei units, around 40% of them.

They were highly trained and well armed, maybe not to the standard of the comitatenses but they were certainly battle worthy (and usually had more combat experience than milites in the comitatenses. That's why they were perfectly combat ready to be promoted into the comitatenses them if need be (pseudo-comitatenses). Especially after the battle of the Frigidus at the end of the civil war between Theodosius and the puppet Eugenius controlled by the Frank magister militum Arbogast.

Armies were much much smaller than in the Republic or the early empire. Field armies were around 10,000-30,000 give or take, and often emperors resorted to the expedient of hiring barbarian mercenaries to bolster their forces, a practice which increased greatly from the mid 4th century onwards.

By the time of Attila's rise, yes many limitanei were given plots of land to cultivate in lieu of rations and pay, but that didn't necessarily mean that they were the ones actually growing crops or raising livestock. Often they were rented out or worked with hired laborers, so to say they were a militia is a big misrepresentation.

By the mid 5th century foederati were a MAJOR component in both the Eastern and Western empires. So many "real" Roman soldiers in the comitatenses had been lost in civil wars, battles versus barbarians, and so many provinces were overrun by barbarians (allied like foederati or hostile) which sapped the emperors of taxes and manpower. Especially in the West, where the cycle became fatal.

Most of the warfare in the late empire was in the form of skirmishes and ambushes. Risking a major battle could mean significant losses even with a victory, and endanger a general's position, or life for that matter especially if he lost. There was a lot of political infighting and backbiting, besides the usurpers. Read Ammianus Marcellinus, he was a candidatus, a personal bodyguard (and equivalent to a modern day NCO) to Emperors Constantius II, Julian (the Apostate), and Caesar Gallus (Julian's unfortunate older brother.

I realize that RTW 2's engine is certainly not mod friendly at all, which is unfortunate since there are some absurd historical inaccuracies and anachronisms in it. CA really screws it up again.

I know, but I was trying to come up with a meaningful translation for it. Of course you could just stick with "pseudo" since we use that word in English also, but I don't think that it is fair to categorize the the pseudocomitateses literally as "false" companies/regiments since as you've pointed out they weren't really false or "pseudo" soldiers. So I was just broadly translating it into English in terms of what I think the wider feel of the word is - perhaps "junior" would be more accurate.

Edit: done some research, it actually looks fine actually assuming that pseudocomitatenses can be used as an adjective, which I guess it can.

[Chris P. Bacon]

So does this mod add units or just rename them? Regardless, thank you for making it!

[maximus decimus meridius]

Added the second edition of the mod.

bye

[The Iron Chancellor]

Thank you for this, Maxiumus. Is the second edition of your mod compatible with patch 2?

[Grizwald714]

It worked for me only problem was all new units didn't have names. So just add a prefix to the text db file like A_ land_units.loc so that way the games text file still loads for the new units while all the Roman units keep their new names.

[Chris P. Bacon]

Yes if it hasn't already an update would be greatly appreciated


EDIT: Doesn't make the game crash but makes the names of all the new units invisible.

[maximus decimus meridius]

Sorry mate, i'm very busy with my personal affairs, so i have little time to check the forum.

anyway, please can you explain me what new unit hasn't proper name?

maybe the problem is that i haven't upgraded my game installation with the longbeards DLC. i have some problem with my steam account...

thanks in advance

[Chris P. Bacon]

Its easy to see in custom battle, if you select one of the Celt factions and click on any of their units, where the name of the unit usually is is blank and when you mouse over the cards on the left you have a weird black square. This is true with the new generals bodyguard units added to the Longbeards factions so it definitely has something to do with the most recent patch.

[maximus decimus meridius]

In the first post i've attached the 3rd version.

This version should be compatible with longbeards and celtic DLC.

any comments would be very appreciated.