Ladders and siege towers too small

[Gigantus]

Hmmmh, I corrected that issue twice in BG, (I actually thought you were talking about some other mod) here is the summary of the present BG version:

wooden_pallisade     level 0 == siege_tower_size too_small
wooden_wall         level 1 == siege_tower_size small
stone_wall             level 2 == siege_tower_size small
large_stone_wall     level 3 == siege_tower_size medium
huge_stone_wall     level 4 == siege_tower_size large

You then have two ladder sizes: small (level 1 and 2) and medium (level 3)

[K'Sharra the Conqueror]

Why does the siege-tower size for large city change (and only for large cities, not castle/fortress/citadel that is also level 3 size on the battlemap) when I change the level 2 entry in descr_walls then? And boiling oil and targetable gatehouses don't exist on minor cities despite it should be level 2, but it isn't in mods, only in Kingdoms?
Can you explain this? Is there something else that effect walls?

[Gigantus]

I did a compare of BG's descr_walls with the game's files:

the kingdoms versions all use the setting I listed in post #21
the basic version uses 'medium' at level 2 already (stonewall)

I did a custom battle in BG with the city level settlement (level 2) and the ladders were fine (medium size), there was however no oil discharge even though the gate house was manned when the ram operated.

The battle with the next level (large city) revealed that the ladders as well as the tower were too short - oil discharge however was prompt.

The huge city (level 4, no ladders) went fine with towers the right height and oil being discharged.

I will have a look at the oil at level 2 and correct the ladder\tower size in level 3.

Edit:

- changing the size at level 3 to large had the desired outcome
- copying the level 3 oil entry into level 2 had no effect and I am suspecting a problem with the discharge points of the gatehouse model.

[Gigantus]

I have been suspecting that the descr_campaign_db file might have some influence here and added a kingdoms one to the BG set up and tested again with the level settings below

wooden_pallisade, motte      level 0 == siege_tower_size too_small
wooden_wall, wooden_castle   level 1 == siege_tower_size small
stone_wall, castle           level 2 == siege_tower_size medium
large_stone_wall, fortress   level 3 == siege_tower_size medium
huge_stone_wall, citadel     level 4 == siege_tower_size large

The settlement test is as follows:
L1 = wooden_wall - correct height of tower and ladders
L2 = stone_wall - correct height of tower and ladders, oil does not work (model issue?)
L3 = large_stone_wall - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works
L4 = huge_stone_wall - no ladders, correct height of tower, oil works

The castle test is as follows:
L1 = wooden_castle - correct height of tower and ladders
L2 = castle - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works (must be a model issue then)
L3 = fortress - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works
L4 = citadel - ladders, medium tower (despite large setting) is right height, oil works

Bare Geomod has been updated with these changes

[K'Sharra the Conqueror]

I don't think there's a models issue, as it works in the Kingdoms expansion, and Bare Goemod doesn't change the battlemaps/settlement models. I think the problem lies in that somehow City level use wodden_wall (level 1) entry in descr_walls somehow in Bare Geomod, as why would changing the Siege-tower level on the level 2 entry (stone walls) to medium fix the problem with Large City siege-towers/ladders and not change siege-tower height on City level?
There must be something we are missing here.

[Gigantus]

Well, levels 2-4 have working oil in the castle line. So it's not the descr_walls entry.
The levels have been assigned consecutively in the EDB.

Let me play a city custom battle with the teutonic and crusades campaign.

Yup, NE culture, city has the oil working in crusades

Edit: copying descr_walls and descr_campaign_db from crusades into BG didn't help, still no oil. Can't see any building files in the blockset directory that might relate to the settlement level. Wall level assignments in the EDB are the same in crusades as in BG.
I am going to stop here - if you ever find out what the reason might be that there is no oil in stone_wall\level 2 let me know.

[makanyane]

I have been suspecting that the descr_campaign_db file might have some influence here and added a kingdoms one to the BG set up and tested again with the level settings below

wooden_pallisade, motte      level 0 == siege_tower_size too_small
wooden_wall, wooden_castle   level 1 == siege_tower_size small
stone_wall, castle           level 2 == siege_tower_size medium
large_stone_wall, fortress   level 3 == siege_tower_size medium
huge_stone_wall, citadel     level 4 == siege_tower_size large

The settlement test is as follows:
L1 = wooden_wall - correct height of tower and ladders
L2 = stone_wall - correct height of tower and ladders, oil does not work (model issue?)
L3 = large_stone_wall - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works
L4 = huge_stone_wall - no ladders, correct height of tower, oil works

The castle test is as follows:
L1 = wooden_castle - correct height of tower and ladders
L2 = castle - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works (must be a model issue then)
L3 = fortress - correct height of tower and ladders, oil works
L4 = citadel - ladders, medium tower (despite large setting) is right height, oil works

Bare Geomod has been updated with these changes

Are you sure that works?

I'd be interested to see how the alteration to the db file works - I thought the wall assignments (which settlement used which level) were hard coded... be interesting if it was moveable!


also you're showing stone_wall, castle using the same level - the 3d model for the stone_wall (city) is physically shorter at 8m equivalent, than the one for castles which has 12m walls the same as fortresses and large cities.

[D@gget]

There also seems to be something wrong with towers for Large Stone Walls in Bare Geomod. No tower upgrades seem to come into effect for them.

In campaign, Ballista Tower upgrades don't come into effect apart from a cosmetic change in the battle map. In custom battle, defense level for Large Stone Walls stays locked at level 1, while in Kingdoms custom battles it can go as high as 3 (Cannon Towers for large cities, which isn't even possible in campaign).

I've tried looking at descr_walls, but was unable to find what's wrong in it.

[Gigantus]

descr_walls is slightly modified, comparing it with one from the campaigns will show what has been changed. Not sure what the issue is with the tower upgrading because I can't recall having changed anything other then the 'siege tower size' value and the EDB file is the default file without changes.

[D@gget]

Correct. I compared both files and nothing seems off. It seems to be a slippery one.

[Evil Eyes]

So I am playing Stainless Steel and having the same problem with siege towers. I have a city with large stone walls and it is being attack with small towers and ladders. Can anyone explain in layman's terms how to fix the problem. I know what files you all are talking about editing.

[Gigantus]

Large stone walls is the second last level (level 3 in a list of zero to four) in data\descr_walls.txt. That should require medium size siege towers\ladders (ladders take their size from the siege tower value):

wall
{
    level 3
    siege_tower_size medium

    wall

../..

[Evil Eyes]

Ok I checked the file descr_walls.txt and it all looks good. Any other things I could try?

[Gigantus]

Not really - if you used 'large' at level 3 you won't get any ladders and the largest size siege towers. You can try that, but I think it must be somewhere else.

There also seems to be something wrong with towers for Large Stone Walls in Bare Geomod. No tower upgrades seem to come into effect for them.

In campaign, Ballista Tower upgrades don't come into effect apart from a cosmetic change in the battle map. In custom battle, defense level for Large Stone Walls stays locked at level 1, while in Kingdoms custom battles it can go as high as 3 (Cannon Towers for large cities, which isn't even possible in campaign).

I've tried looking at descr_walls, but was unable to find what's wrong in it.

I had a look at it again via custom battles - at present (several remakes of the file in BG since your post) the tower levels are working fine:
city - level 1
large city - level 2 (the default kingdoms file has level 1, an issue with descr_walls, not EDB)
huge city - level 3

castle onward is level 3

also you're showing stone_wall, castle using the same level - the 3d model for the stone_wall (city) is physically shorter at 8m equivalent, than the one for castles which has 12m walls the same as fortresses and large cities.

Ran the test once more for city and castle with medium siege tower size at level two and both times the size was fine
Oil didn't work for city but for castle (NE culture) suggesting an issue with the oil points in the city model. Same result for ME and SE culture.

[Evil Eyes]

What file should I look at next?

[Evil Eyes]

I have also noticed that I have the same problem in Third age Total War if that helps narrow down the problem.

[Evil Eyes]

I found a fix for the ladders/towers. I can't explain why it worked but I will explain what I did. I was running the game on Steam and have been using a kingdoms.exe to run mods using desktop shortcuts. The mods I am running are "Third Age Total War - Divide and Conquer v4.5" and "Stainless Steel 6.4 - Bugfix Compilation v1.27."

When you launch any of the Kingdoms expansions (Americas, Teutonic, Crusades, Britannia) I noticed the game launches using medieval2.exe and not the kingdoms.exe. In fact I don't think the Medieval 2 Definitive Edition on Steam comes with a kingdoms.exe. I think I got a exe online to run mods but it was so long ago I don't remember.

I read another post about how to launch Stainless Steel if you don't have a kingdoms.exe. What you would do is rename the Stainless Steel folder in "Medieval II Total War\mods" after one of the kingdoms expansions. (Example. Name Stainless Steel, "Americas" and name Americas "Americas Original" or whatever you like.) When you launch the game through Steam and select "Americas" it will launch your mod using the medieval2.exe instead of the kingdoms.exe.

This fixed the ladder problem for me with both Stainless Steel and Third Age - Divide and Conquer. (Though Third Age has a lot of custom maps and still has some ladder/tower problems but I hear that in normal.) Any way I can't explain why it works and I can't figure out how to launch the games from desktop shortcuts without using the kingdomes.exe. However it works and that is good enough for now.

[Gigantus]

I always cringe when I see the totally outdated way of starting mods on Steam. Simply copy and then rename the medieval2.exe file as described here (or let the installer do it for you).

Did you actually use a disk's kingdoms.exe with the Steam version?

[Evil Eyes]

I used a kindoms.exe with the Steam Version. It might have been from one of my old disks or I might have got the exe online. Don't remember. Must have been what was causing the errors with the ladders.

Sorry to make you cringe but the mods just keeps asking for the Kingdoms.exe (witch is why I got an old one in the first place) and this is the simplest solution. Renaming the medieval2.exe dose not seem to work. Can't explain why. Like I said I don't know how any of it works. Programming is a great and mysterious mystery to me.

I don't understand any of what was in that link you posted other than what I am doing now. Some other way to get shortcuts to work? Experience has taught me to leave well enough alone and I have not had any trouble with the games using this method so far. Is there any thing wrong with this method I should know about?

[Gigantus]

I guess using an executable from a disk for Steam will be the underlying issue. Not sure what might be going wrong with renaming the Steam executable file - the installer in the link actually does it for you, provided you have the original medieval2.exe file present.