Should I redo my "late legionaries" submod with lorica segmentata legions? The official petition thread.

[Roma_Victrix]

In addition to one guy requesting it in my submod's thread, I just recently received a PM requesting that I renew my late Roman legionaries submod for EB II v. 2.2b. Yet how much of a demand exists for this at all? I'd like to find out at least, before I bother giving it another go.

For those of you who haven't seen it, you'll notice right away in the description that I was not savvy enough to create my own Imperial reforms in the campaign script file, so unfortunately these units would appear as early as the Marian reforms, along with the introduction of the Marian units c. 107 BC. Obviously it is stilly and grossly ahistorical to have lorica segmentata legions running around roughly a century-and-a-half before they even existed. However, I created the mod in the first place because I admired DBM's models for these particular units and thought they would look great in EB II. If anything my submod for v. 2.1b was a "canary in the coal mine" to test if others would be interested as well. It didn't generate much inerest the first time around, but I'm wondering if anyone cares to see it now.

More importantly, I'd only want to continue with the submod if someone here is willing to write in some Imperial reforms for it, by editing the campaign script. That means the legionaries won't appear on the battlefield for a very long time, not until at least the age of Augustus in the late 1st century BC. Any volunteers for that? I was also never able to fix the shield-holding issue entirely, since I lack the editing skills using milkshape to rotate it as necessary (the legionaries often hold their shields sideways, especially if not ordered into shield wall formation, which looks odd).

[Cohors_Evocata]

I personally don't care for these units, but if you want a simple reform event, this should work...

    monitor_event PreFactionTurnStart FactionType f_rome        
        if I_TurnNumber > 980                                ;;; 27 B.C.
        and I_EventCounter ecMarianEra > 0                     ;;; ...and Marian Era is there
            set_event_counter ecMarianEra 0                ;;; ...trigger the reforms.
            set_event_counter ecAugustanEra 1
            terminate_monitor
        end_if
    end_monitor

Note that there will be no popup and that you have to edit the government buildings in order to enable the new units. The above is basically a copy-paste of the Marian fallback event, with the amount of turns and event counters changed.

[Roma_Victrix]

I personally don't care for these units, but if you want a simple reform event, this should work...

    monitor_event PreFactionTurnStart FactionType f_rome        
        if I_TurnNumber > 980                                ;;; 27 B.C.
        and I_EventCounter ecMarianEra > 0                     ;;; ...and Marian Era is there
            set_event_counter ecMarianEra 0                ;;; ...trigger the reforms.
            set_event_counter ecAugustanEra 1
            terminate_monitor
        end_if
    end_monitor

Note that there will be no popup and that you have to edit the government buildings in order to enable the new units. The above is basically a copy-paste of the Marian fallback event, with the amount of turns and event counters changed.

Oh. It's that easy? Fair enough. Editing the EDB file will be a bit more difficult, though, but nothing I can't handle. I certainly don't know how to create a pop-up message. That would make it much more complete and official-looking! I'll still wait for feedback, though, and if there's isn't enough positive feedback then I'm not going to bother repeating this submod.

Im rather interested in augusteian legions, would this be possible?

If you had played my submod for v. 2.1b, then you would have seen Imperial-era legions. Mind you, legionaries during the age of Augustus were still only wearing lorica hamata (chainmail) and lorica squamata (scale mail, or even lighter non-metal armor like leather padding). Lorica segmentata did not yet exist, although the legions from DBM that I've added are named and numbered legions, some of which existed during the reign of Augustus. I've maintained their text descriptions from the De Bello Mundi mod, explaining the history and origins of each legion.

[Cohors_Evocata]

Oh. It's that easy? Fair enough. Editing the EDB file will be a bit more difficult, though, but nothing I can't handle. I certainly don't know how to create a pop-up message. That would make it much more complete and official-looking! I'll still wait for feedback, though, and if there's isn't enough positive feedback then I'm not going to bother repeating this submod.

Jup, just slot this in the campaign_script (beneath the Marian Reforms, if you want to keep things nice and tidy), delete map.rwm and start a new campaign. Keep in mind that if it doesn't work, you're not going to notice until you're almost a thousand turns into the campaign.

Having a pop-up is quite easy, but requires creating a Historic Event entry (plus editing the script to make it appear) and I'm not sure whether the public release uses .txt files or binary strings generated through .xml files for those.

[Roma_Victrix]

Jup, just slot this in the campaign_script (beneath the Marian Reforms, if you want to keep things nice and tidy), delete map.rwm and start a new campaign. Keep in mind that if it doesn't work, you're not going to notice until you're almost a thousand turns into the campaign.

Having a pop-up is quite easy, but requires creating a Historic Event entry (plus editing the script to make it appear) and I'm not sure whether the public release uses .txt files or binary strings generated through .xml files for those.

Thank you for explaining this. Now all that remains to be seen is if people will be interested enough in this submod to convince me to edit and release it for v. 2.2b. If not, then say bon voyage to the segmentata legions, unless of course Midnite wants to release his own submod. He toyed with the idea a while ago but got bogged down with other projects.

[Bernardius]

Im rather interested in augusteian legions, would this be possible?

[juanplay]

i would say im interested about playing with the augustan legions, could you also add the auxiliries of DBM?

question: how would you manage the stats vs the marian legions? how different should they be?

[Roma_Victrix]

i would say im interested about playing with the augustan legions, could you also add the auxiliries of DBM?

question: how would you manage the stats vs the marian legions? how different should they be?

They wouldn't be different at all from the Marian legions in terms of stats (as strongly advised by Quintus Sertorius). At best I would give the lorica segmentata legions a +1 armor advantage over their Marian precedents wearing lorica hamata. Chainmail armor still provided excellent defense and ferrous metallurgy wasn't advanced enough at this stage where plate armor offered an incredibly higher defensibility (unlike late medieval plate armor forged from cast iron and high carbon steel). I would consider adding the auxiliary units from DBM, although that's more of a hassle. Also, with all the new units in v. 2.2b, I'm not even sure how many free unit slots are available anymore!

[Stannis Baratheon]

Count me interested as well, i'm itching to play a full historical roman campaign over holidays and it wouldn't feel right conquering Dacia, Britannia, manning the Danube-Rhine limes, etc. with only marian legions. Even though these units will stand out a bit in EB as they're bit too shiny and "clone-y", for it's more rough and individualistic style. That's obviously not a complaint!

As for available unit slots, pretty sure there's enough, team has 487 units in total planned for now iirc, still well below the limit.

I've started doing it myself (and i see that it's a good chunk of work ) but 2.2 version is quite different... already i've ran into a potential problem of every unit in 2.2 having 3 models, while in 2.1 there was only one. I'm not sure what purpose of each of these models is and whether just having one will work or interfere with something i copied from a 2.2 unit entry, etc. In DBM there are different models for with and without javelin, i'm not sure whether do i need them and so on. Pretty tough

[Aquila SPQR]

I'd love to see such submod. EB seems to "stop" after reign of Augustus but Roman history and expansion does not. I'd love to play with imperial units with segmentata just because they look incredibly cool.

[Roma_Victrix]

I'd love to see such submod. EB seems to "stop" after reign of Augustus but Roman history and expansion does not. I'd love to play with imperial units with segmentata just because they look incredibly cool.

I'm actually thinking about letting someone who's more competent take over this project, like midnite, since I don't know how to edit units using programs like milkshape. The Roman shields were always a problem in my submod. I tried in vain to fix them using the skeletons available and listed in the battle_models file, but they almost never held their shields correctly (usually only when you put them into shield wall formation and force them to hold their shields up properly, not sideways like a bunch of idiots). I even tried editing the skeleton files themselves to include DBM ones but all I got was miserable CTDs for all my effort. If midnite or someone else wants to use my material and create a new submod for 2.2b, have at it. I just don't think it's worth it if I release a new submod, though, not until those units get fixed.

[toolazytopost]

i'd love for you to remake the mod again, if not, i can try to do it, lol (with the worst possible way done)

[midnite]

I'm actually thinking about letting someone who's more competent take over this project, like midnite, since I don't know how to edit units using programs like milkshape. The Roman shields were always a problem in my submod. I tried in vain to fix them using the skeletons available and listed in the battle_models file, but they almost never held their shields correctly (usually only when you put them into shield wall formation and force them to hold their shields up properly, not sideways like a bunch of idiots). I even tried editing the skeleton files themselves to include DBM ones but all I got was miserable CTDs for all my effort. If midnite or someone else wants to use my material and create a new submod for 2.2b, have at it. I just don't think it's worth it if I release a new submod, though, not until those units get fixed.

I could take a look and play around with your mod.

[Roma_Victrix]

I could take a look and play around with your mod.

Cool! Thanks.

Have a look at the files and see the changes I made, but they're outdated and they ARE NOT compatible with v. 2.2b. Unless you're using the old v. 2.1b you'll get a CTD.

The Roman units I added to the export_descr_unit and battle_models files are easy enough to find. I think they all start with "legionary_" or "legion_" or "legio_" or something like that. You don't have to add the Chinese heavy cavalry mercenaries if you don't want to, not a necessary unit considering how they never traveled that far west historically in antiquity (if you discount their wars with the Xiongnu spanning as far as Kazakhstan, and their brief war against the invading Kushan Empire in the Tarim Basin of Xinjiang).

Also, if you're planning on releasing this as a submod, take Cohors_Evocata's advice and edit the campaign_script to add an Imperial reforms event after the Marian military reforms:

    monitor_event PreFactionTurnStart FactionType f_rome        
        if I_TurnNumber > 980                                ;;; 27 B.C.
        and I_EventCounter ecMarianEra > 0                     ;;; ...and Marian Era is there
            set_event_counter ecMarianEra 0                ;;; ...trigger the reforms.
            set_event_counter ecAugustanEra 1
            terminate_monitor
        end_if
    end_monitor

[Coldfire88]

It depends if this is only for 1 unit or more comprehensive roster of imperial era legions? if so Im all for it, although It would be so far into the game that I think Il never reach it .

[midnite]

Cool! Thanks.

Have a look at the files and see the changes I made, but they're outdated and they ARE NOT compatible with v. 2.2b. Unless you're using the old v. 2.1b you'll get a CTD.

The Roman units I added to the export_descr_unit and battle_models files are easy enough to find. I think they all start with "legionary_" or "legion_" or "legio_" or something like that. You don't have to add the Chinese heavy cavalry mercenaries if you don't want to, not a necessary unit considering how they never traveled that far west historically in antiquity (if you discount their wars with the Xiongnu spanning as far as Kazakhstan, and their brief war against the invading Kushan Empire in the Tarim Basin of Xinjiang).

Also, if you're planning on releasing this as a submod, take Cohors_Evocata's advice and edit the campaign_script to add an Imperial reforms event after the Marian military reforms:

    monitor_event PreFactionTurnStart FactionType f_rome        
        if I_TurnNumber > 980                                ;;; 27 B.C.
        and I_EventCounter ecMarianEra > 0                     ;;; ...and Marian Era is there
            set_event_counter ecMarianEra 0                ;;; ...trigger the reforms.
            set_event_counter ecAugustanEra 1
            terminate_monitor
        end_if
    end_monitor

I have 2.2b working in campaign but not custom battles. Is this a known issue? Do you have a list of units that you added to the edu?

[Pherion]

YES! Please do so. It would make Rome far more interesting! Atleast for me.

[Roma_Victrix]

i'd love for you to remake the mod again, if not, i can try to do it, lol (with the worst possible way done)

Do you know what you're doing, though? How to edit text files correctly? Which folders to place your new texture files from DBM? Etc.

YES! Please do so. It would make Rome far more interesting! Atleast for me.

Duly noted. I'll direct midnite to this thread. Hopefully he'll have a look and consider picking up where I left off. I've already done much of the work for him! He would simply need to update it for v. 2.2b (inserting the entries for DBM units into the EDU, EDB, battle_models, and export_units files) and of course fix the way they hold their shields using a program like Milkshape 3D, as I mentioned earlier.

[Primative1]

Yes please, esp the auxiliaries.

[IGdood]

Someday when EB 2 and IB 2 are finished I'll throw in the Late Roman/Constantinian reforms like I did with EB 1