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Thread: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

  1. #1

    Default The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Hello everyone!

    It is my pleasure to announce that we are releasing our second beta this weekend, to be followed by a LIVE STREAM of the mod by our very own Jackasaurus, so keep your eyes on this thread for when he posts his link.

    Now, onto the mod!

    Our last release thread contained no screens, and basically a list of changes. We have made up for that by taking a good amount of screenshots for everyone to gaze at.
    In BETA 2 we really focused on our in-game mechanics regarding trade, farming, economy, population growth, battle mechanics and overall ai gameplay. Graphics are roughly the same, though the environments are an upgrade due to EmoDude's constant work. Units are the same, and factions got some tweaking in regards to symbols and colors. However, the gameplay (which is what we've been focusing on first from day one) is superbly better. I have done a few tests myself and it is a very fun mod to play as regardless of the faction!

    Here is the entire feature list dating back to our first release.

    1) The map is based off Philadelphos' Rome Total History map. This map in turn is based off the combination of the RTRPE map and the Mundus Magnus map that we have come very accustomed to. This means the map will encompass the areas that were most important to Rome and Greece. Certain areas will not get as many settlements due to the fact that they bordered the Greek and Roman lands, and they were considered more of trade partners than enemies. Such areas include India, Arabia, Africa, and North East Europe. Two major rivers are navigable, the Nile and Danube. We have also recently expanded the map more into India and have made a new radar map as well as all of the faction maps.
    EmoDude has also polished the campaign map. He fixed the jagged coastlines, improved the textures, made new eye candy water, added 3D sand dunes to deserts, added new settlements from RTRVII and RSII, e.t.c.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 


























    Besides a beautiful map we decided that for phase 1 we needed a solid base in which we can develop a great mod. So we are running RTW on the Alexander engine, which is the best engine of the three as it has multiple AI improvements and it can handle most of the features from Barbarian Invasion.

    Here are the features in Detail:
    2) Every city that historically had either stone or earth walls have stone walls, even if they are not at city level yet. Some colonies and most barbarian settlements have wooden walls.
    3) Most regions have roads, blacksmiths and ports as its realistic.
    4) Most cities have the closest temple associated with it historically in place.
    5) If cities specialized in ships, academics, mining, farming, games, theater, cavalry, archers, or infantry they have been given the specific buildings to represent this.
    6) Religion: which is now termed culture. There will be Western Civilized, Eastern Civilized and Barbarian cultures. They each get a building tree to help spread their culture and public unrest will be the result if you conquer a city of different culture. Each region has an indestructible native culture building, but factions can build colonies of their culture to help convert the populace. Carthage and the Seleucids will have the toughest time. Also traits were added to characters to reflect their culture. Thanks to the XGM and XC teams for helping us with this feature.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 








    7) Seventh Culture: Nomad. This has been given to two factions. They now have different portraits, and sound eastern. They also have eastern music and the nomad building tree from BI. Xeofox has done great work to make them look unique compared to other cultures.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    8) Loyalty: This feature has been given to a few greek and celtic factions and your generals all have the loyalty feature attached to them. A disloyal general will defect to the shadowing faction upon revolt instead of being kicked out of a settlement.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    9) Night Battles: Your best generals will now have the ability to fight night battles.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    10) BI Buildings for Barbarians: the 4th and 5th tier buildings have been added to the strat map and battle map. No bugs either.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    11) Naval Invasions: A few factions will have the tendency to make naval invasions.
    12) BI Barbarian Interface
    13) Advisor portraits for Barbarian, Nomad, Carthaginian, Greek and Eastern Cultures.
    14) Faction Specific Mercenaries. With ALX, factions can have mercenaries available only to them. I added a few vanilla units that made sense to some factions (we are tinkering with this, once we add more units it will become more unique and diverse)
    15) Immortal trait added (this will be important for future development)
    16) ai_do_not_attack_faction - this feature makes it so factions don't attack a faction. It can only be used once per faction. I'll let you guess who we gave this to!
    17) New factions: Sarmatia, Nabataea, Hellenic Kingdoms, Saka, Illyria, and Celtic Tribes
    18) One Roman Faction
    19) A new recruitment system: When you take over a settlement you can build a normal barracks but it will only allow you to recruit the most basic troop types, native to that region. However, depending on which settlement you take you will be able to have two options to choose from. First is the annexation route where you slowly integrate the city and its people into your culture. This will lead to unrest and it takes a long time, but in the end you acquire access to most of your factional units. The second route is an allied client state where it takes a quick amount of time and gives you local troops, this also keeps the population happy but you cannot train factional units.
    20) Built off of this system is an Area of Recruitment and Zone of Recruitment system. Certain troops will only be able to be built in certain regions, and factions won't be able to build factional troops on the other side of the map.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 





    21. Also, for special cities such as Carthage or Alexandria, a certain building can be built to acquire mercenary units. This is based off of the fact that many greek factions and Carthage used mercenaries from distant lands to do their fighting for them.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 





    22. A lot of new units are included. These units are all either from BI, ALX, or reskins of vanilla. They also have more historically accurate and culturally specific names to distinguish themselves from similar unit types. Here are some of the new units showcased by Lanjane and his beautiful unit cards.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    24) Here starts the main features that were not included in BETA 1. Quinn_Inuit of ExRM has been extremely gracious to RTR in letting us use his economic system. Here is the description of our economic system from Quinn himself from the ExRM Documentation page.
    Quote Originally Posted by Quinn_Inuit
    Farming and Growth:
    Income from farms was historically the major source of income for most states, yet the RTW engine heavily privileges trade (especially sea trade). As a result of this, in a well-balanced mod, you won't be able to recruit and sustain a major army from inland regions. If you could, then you'd have to be able to recruit huge armies from the coastal regions.

    We've fixed this by leveraging the game's "tax income" feature into a farm-based income system. Regions are given tax income multipliers based on both their base fertility and the level of farming improvements there. Many improvements also give minor income tax penalties to represent maintenance and/or pollution costs, but they always make up for it in other ways. This forces players to be careful to build infrastructure only where they actually need it. This ensures that farming (in most regions) is a more important source of wealth than trade, but that trade remains important to your overall income stream. This system allows inland regions to support troops just as well as coastal ones, or at least nearly as well.
    Trade:

    You'll see a few new trade resources in the game, such as salt and fish. We thought these were more important than some of the existing ones, and allowed us to more accurately portray the strategic significance of some cities.

    Much more has changed "under the hood" with the trading system. Fewer buildings provide trade bonuses now, and many of those that do provide such bonuses only boost land trade. This allows us to keep trade income from become the main source of income for almost all factions, like it is in the unmodified game, and it also prevents the income from sea trade from completely overshadowing land trade income. Trade is still very important, of course, but it's now just one part of a balanced budget.

    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 





    25) We've also changed population into Man Power based off a concept created by RedFox and his Diadochi TW mod. It's impossible to simulate realistc population numbers in RTW as the squalor gets way too high and cities are constantly in the red. So instead we changed population to Man Power. Also Man Power doesn't generate as quickly as Population did, once again, Quinn with the reasoning behind it.

    Quote Originally Posted by Quinn_Inuit
    As you can imagine, this system required us to tackle growth, as well. Astute players will have noticed that growth in most RTW mods (to say nothing of the unmodded game) is heavily weighted toward the early game, since a base fertility level of 6 is equivalent to L2 farms + L2 sewers + L2 trader. We thought this made games too quick while simultaneously deprecating the importance of proper region management. So we set up a system of slow, balanced growth that relies more on buildings and less on base fertility.
    This allows for the measured growth of regions, and rewards careful management by players. It should also reduce the occurrence of population-growth-induced rioting, since such growth cannot get out of control now. Your people may still have reasons to riot, but displeasure at ahistoric population growth rates will no longer be one of them.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    26) New Environments: Since the previous release, EmoDude has done a lot of work to enhance the environments even more. He also enhanced a lot of tree models from RSII.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 








    27) New Cliffs and Routing Banners




    Emodude added new cliffs to the battle map, some are ported from a mod called 300 Warlords of Sparta, some are from RTW Alexander, but most ones are enhanced cliffs and rocks from vanilla. On the second screenshot you can also see the new banners for routing units.

    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 





    28) New Faction Icons and maps with new names for difficulty levels

    All factions have new faction icons and banners made by ngr, who made the original Mundus Magnus Mod, and new faction maps made by EmoDude. Furthermore the difficulty levels have been renamed, stars have been added and there is also a warning message on the bottom of the screen that warns for possible bugs on hardcore (very hard) campaign difficulty.
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 




    29)
    6tpy, climate change, realistic movement and supply system


    EmoDude has also been busy working on realistic movement rates that depend on circumstances such as supply rates, climate, season and there’s also huge penalty in enemy territory. An army needs to be commanded by a family member in order to have full movement enabled and for admirals you just have to wait a few turns. Agents have full movement enabled by default. Furthermore he increased the number of turns per year to 6 and the number of winter turns varies between 2 and 4. Early in the game you’ll have 3 winter turns on average to simulate the cooler Subatlantic period, later in the game short winters of 2 turns will become much more common to reflect the beginning of the roman warm period. Also, the climate in a region is represented as a building and affects population growth, supplies and movement rates in certain seasons depending on the climate (not fully implemented yet).

    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 







    Those are all of are features for BETA 2. Here is a list of contributors and credits, a big thank you to all of you!
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

    New features
    BETA1
    Alexander Engine
    Barbarian Invasion features such as: Loyalty, Night Battles, Religion, Barbarian Tech Tree, Barbarian Interface
    Map from Philadelphos and the Rome: Total History Mod
    New Culture: Nomad
    New Factions: Rome, Celtic Tribes, Hellenic Kingdoms, Saka, Sarmatia, Nabataea, Illyria
    Accurate Building levels in Cities
    Naval Invasions
    New Advisor UI
    AI_Do_Not_Attack_Faction
    New Recruitment System: Factional, Allied, Levy
    Mercenary Centers and Ports
    New Units from BI and ALX
    Many Unit Name Changes
    Many new Unit skins and Unit Cards
    BETA2
    better animations for most units
    merged Sinuhet and Darth formations
    Battle AI script made by germanicu5
    6tpy script
    more realistic environments
    added some greek buildings in ptolemaic settlements
    enhanced height map with various features like eye-candy sand dunes
    eye candy water on the campaign map
    new faction maps
    renamed difficulty levels
    new strat map pines from AEE
    faction specific wall textures for both wooden and stone walls
    new road textures for both mud tracks and paved roads
    new nomad settlements
    autumn trees
    new faction icons and banners
    new banners for routing units
    more realistic cliffs on the battle map
    new movement and supply system
    smart AI bonuses
    hellenic generals for the Ptolemaic kingdom
    new UI cards for the Ptolemaic faction, made by TuCoT
    tweaked projectiles
    rebalanced ships
    climate “buildings” that affect population growth, movement, supplies and the acquisition of ancillaries, e.t.c.
    strat map settlements from RTRVII and RSII
    protective formations system for darthmod
    economic system (farm & trade) from ExRM
    population growth system from ExRM
    man power instead of population from DTW
    Money Script for AI
    Peace with the Dead Script
    New Nomad Portraits
    New Yuezhi Horse Archer model and Texture with Unit Card
    Bug fixes
    the foot missile bug is fixed
    fixed the height of Chigu, the capital city of the saka
    fixed the jagged coastlines
    fixed the cliffs on the strat map
    the fatigue system is completely fixed
    nerfed tower arrows
    the desert scout ancillary can now only be acquired in desert regions
    Credits
    Philadelphos and RTH for the Map
    limes and AEE - Campaign Pine Trees
    DimeBagHo and XGM - Unit textures, UI's, Culture System
    RedFox and DTW - ManPower mechanic, Roman Symbol
    ngr - Original Mundus Magnus map and many faction symbols
    Rise of Empire - Many unit textures and Unit Cards
    comrade_general and THS - Unit textures and Unit Cards
    Prometheus - Animations
    Signifierone - Animations
    Pat89 - Peace with the Dead Script
    Makanyane & 300WOS team – battlemap Cliffs
    Europa Barbarorum - Animations, Stratmap Vegetation & Inspiration
    davide.cool - wall textures
    Germanicu5 - RealyBadAI Script for RTW Alexander
    0 A.D. - road- & ground textures
    http://mapdb.obsidianconflict.net/te...snow-materials - Alpine winter cliff texture
    http://www.mb3d.co.uk/mb3d/maxTextur..._Textures.html - Ground- wall- & Bridge textures
    http://mayang.com/ - Ground textures
    RTRPE: strat map textures, bamboo javelin
    RTRVII: strat map settlements, animations
    Darthmod - AI formations, base for fatigue system, foot missile bug fix, protective formation system
    Sinuhet - AI formations
    Roma Surrectum: nomadic campaign map settlement models, roman, greek and carthaginian ports, some settlement textures, some campaign map textures, missile models and used as base for our environments which also include a tree model made by Éorl for FATW
    TuCoT - Ptolemaic General Portraits
    Contributors (only listed if contributed)
    ahowl11 - Project Leader, Coding
    EmoDude - Coding, Mapping, Bug Fixing, Graphics
    XeoFox - Nomad Specialist, Nomad Portraits, Yuezhi Horse Archer, Menu Video, Pulchura Mors Mod
    Quinn_Inuit - Helped with porting ExRM features and Scripts
    Alavaria - Devised Recruitment System and set it up
    uanime5 - Finished Recruitment system as well as various coding
    Anarchon - Initial Map editor, helped with factions and settlements
    comrade_general - Unit reskins and Unit Card recolors
    Michael333 - Unit reskins and Unit Card recolors
    Lanjane - Many new Unit Cards
    Pat89 - Advise on Economy
    Aarronbarron - Coding
    Mandoni - Siege of Numantia Historical Battle
    CanOmer - Starting Positions Preview Map
    Mausolos of Caria - Historical Advise
    Phillip - Testing
    Vincent Butler - Testing
    Gen.james.wolfe - Testing
    Vrosivs Avgvstvs Ravkvs - Testing
    Jackasaurus - Live Stream Testing
    Jubal - Forum Hosting on Exilian
    Infiernus - GitProject Hosting and Management
    If we forgot any Contributors let me know! There are many RTRProject members, but I will only list them when they contribute, or else the list would be huge.


    DOWNLOAD

    https://mega.nz/#!559RXSqI!kJQHd1shE...am9HPsMuk_7eUc
    http://www.mediafire.com/download/ap...1tnay3/MM3.rar

    Will post more download links as they are presented. Soon we will post a link to an installer as well.

    To install
    1. Extract the MM folder to your RTW directory or if you are using steam, your RTW - Alexander directory
    2. Right Click on the Alx.exe and create a shortcut
    3. Then right click the shortcut and select properties and put this in the target line after all quotations: -show_err -mod:MM
    4. If you are using steam,
    Go to your RTW - Alexander folder and make a shortcut of the exe file, and then follow step 3.
    5. If you are using the non steam version but want to run it through steam, go to 'Add a game' then select the Shortcut you made in step two and name it RTR BETA 2
    6. Play!

    This patch of the mod has very important texture files that enhance the looks of the mod. It cannot be modfoldered sadly so it must overwrite your vanilla data folder to be used. It's an optional download but if used it wont effect any of your other games or mods, but simply add some enhancements.
    https://mega.nz/#!Y89wnZ6R!segfiivTU...3gaZOrTy_1cnOw

  2. #2

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    SO AWESOME!!!! Can't wait to try it out!

    Everything looks great but the next focus should be more unique units both per facton and mercenary restyled. Like the mod you borrowed those things from.
    Last edited by webMaster412160; July 18, 2016 at 07:33 PM.
    One of the few to still have his first avatar in place here on TWC.
    I sometimes miss this place you know. This is where my journey began.


  3. #3

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Redoing the models and skins of the existing units is definitely next on our list

  4. #4

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Also found a bug, the fleed of ships assigned to the greeks at Rhodes contains a unit of phalax.

    Also the faction symbol for the greek kingdoms is so out of place... Why use the frankish one lol?


    Also what makes this mod diff in current or future stages and offer a more rich game exp then the exiting mods out there including those you borrowed some stuff from?

    Some new buildings would be cool to like wineyard.


    Also what triggers the roman reforms that you can build legions?
    Last edited by webMaster412160; July 19, 2016 at 07:37 AM.
    One of the few to still have his first avatar in place here on TWC.
    I sometimes miss this place you know. This is where my journey began.


  5. #5

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    -Will look into the bug, you're the second one to mention that.
    -thats not the symbol you are thinking of haha but I see the similarity.
    -This mod is basically trying to combine everything from the RTW modding world that it can so that it can have the last laugh before the RTW modding world finally dies. It won't be perfect and it might not be someone's favorite but we hope to make the mod that completes RTR for good.
    -You'll probably see a building like that down the road
    -I believe you'll need a huge city in Italy for the Marian reforms to take effect

    Why not post some screens of your current experiences?

  6. #6

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Another bug was playing as Macedon and a region near the pharta start regions revolted from greek kingdoms and joined my side... Or is this not a bug?

    Also the new buildings you added don't show up in the building list.


    Also rebel stacks in city are to weak. No exp no elite unites. The playable AI factions and me can conquer any city with ease.

    I will share some exp when I done more testing and playing. XD
    One of the few to still have his first avatar in place here on TWC.
    I sometimes miss this place you know. This is where my journey began.


  7. #7

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    -Not a bug
    -Will look into Buildings
    -Rebels Will be upgraded at some point

  8. #8
    demagogos nicator's Avatar Domesticus
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    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    New beta looks really good. Both battle maps and campaig maps looks really beautiful now. I just do not understand why you decided to use the vanila style units instead of those used in the former releases of RTR.

  9. #9

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Unit detail is next on the list my friend, we wanted to focus on mechanics first.

  10. #10

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    congrats @ahow11 for beta release , i am usually played Europa Barbarorum and Invasio Barbarorum mod,but your new battlemap convince me to try RTR Public Beta 2 too, and i love team idea to focus at mechanics first, then unit, here Rep+
    My name is John, Tribune of Legio Ripenses IX Tertiae Italica and loyal servant to the computer generated Emperor, Julianus Flavius Augustus "The Apostles". And I will have my vengeance again The Quadi tribes, barbarian scums who decimated half of my legio in Mediolanum City Siege almost a year ago and Gratianus Flavius "The Traitor", the former Caesar who convince a half of precious my legio to his petty scheme rebellion just 3 months ago in this save game or the next
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    IB:Restitutor Orbis Signature courtesy of Joar

  11. #11

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Thank you so much! Emodude really put in a lot of time and effort into the environments and it's still not complete thanks I know we are lacking interest because we aren't showing off pretty units but in the end they will also be added and I'm hoping for a very fun and complete historical experience.

  12. #12

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    You should also advertise more and contact the members on the steam group of this game to try out the beta. Get the participation going.
    One of the few to still have his first avatar in place here on TWC.
    I sometimes miss this place you know. This is where my journey began.


  13. #13

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    ah send my regards to @Emodude..what a wonderful job, hopefully you and your team will achieve the goal: a very fun and complete historical experience
    My name is John, Tribune of Legio Ripenses IX Tertiae Italica and loyal servant to the computer generated Emperor, Julianus Flavius Augustus "The Apostles". And I will have my vengeance again The Quadi tribes, barbarian scums who decimated half of my legio in Mediolanum City Siege almost a year ago and Gratianus Flavius "The Traitor", the former Caesar who convince a half of precious my legio to his petty scheme rebellion just 3 months ago in this save game or the next
    -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    IB:Restitutor Orbis Signature courtesy of Joar

  14. #14

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Webmaster, believe me I'm trying to get people to play but it's such an old game that many take the newer games over it. Thanks for the kind words John, we appreciate those who take the time to play our mod

  15. #15
    crazyroman's Avatar Artifex
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    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Congratulations about the mod !! Really really good ! I want to ask something about the units.They include officers,musicians and standard bearers for all factions or not ?

  16. #16

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    No not all factions, not yet

  17. #17
    _Tartaros_'s Avatar "Harzschütze"
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    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Many Congrets! The Mods looks beautifull put in place

  18. #18

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Congrats I am so excited to try this mod. Looking forward for more news about it!!

  19. #19

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Excellent work! Total realism in its purest form. The mod looks great and the new environments are awesome.

  20. #20

    Default Re: The RTR Public BETA 2 Release Thread

    Thank you everyone for the feedback, we are working hard on a 3rd Beta now

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