[Overhaul Submod] "Data Venia" (for DeI 1.2.5 - Updated 2020-01-20)

[Jake Armitage]

Well done

[Chicano]

Splendid, now i can play dei. Thank you !

P.S. 4tpy mod appears to be working well, i'll post any bugs

[Ygraine]

Thanks guys!

@Chicano don't use the old pack, it's missing out on several things (like for example some of the new unique capitals). I removed it now since it was for 1.2 and earlier versions. I just uploaded a new 4TPY submod for whoever prefers that in Grand Campaign. It also includes reforms from base DeI scaled for 4TPY and 4TPY historical events. Use that one instead!

Unfortunately I don't have time to scale movement, research rate etc to 4TPY. But with a little modding knowledge it's easily done if someone really wants that. I recommend the modding tutorials by Magnar.





I also want to clarify to everyone that Empire Divided is not supported by DV currently (only DLC I didn't bother to get). RoR isn't supported either, but I have special plans for that campaign which I will reveal at a later date. Imperator Augustus is supported but unpolished. Will give it a look-over at some point soon (need to start playtesting it to find stuff out of place). All other campaigns are 100% supported.
I've updated the first post in the thread with campaign info.



Edit:

Another hotfix released!

Summary: Patrol stance reworked to have two uses, more expensive to besiege enemy cities (just like it was in real life!), higher impact due to foreign cultures, occupations have harsher penalties and various misc fixes. See changelog for specific details.

[Chicano]

Unfortunately I don't have time to scale movement, research rate etc to 4TPY. But with a little modding knowledge it's easily done if someone really wants that. I recommend the modding tutorials by Magnar.

I plat with the default DV movement, it's harder. Thanks again

[valerius karamanus]

Hellenic liturgies edict gives a staggering 10 squalor minus. Is this intended?

[Ygraine]

I designed those edicts several versions before I started moving city/town maluses to core chains, so it's good that you brought it to my attention (and honestly squalor made no sense for this edict). It definitely needs to be remade if it still gives 10 squalor. Will be hotfixed soon, thanks!


Edit:

Hotfix out!

Fixed the above edict, lowered pleb size a bit as promised and some other things.

[Ygraine]

~Summary~

Patch 4 is a milestone for Data Venia brings with it some major changes to both combat mechanics and campaign interaction. These will have a major impact on how the mod will be played.


The two major highlights of Patch 4: A recruitment overhaul and a combat overhaul.

1. Recruitment: Recruitment times are now based on unit quality, weight-class and population type (with some exceptions). The current template looks like this:

Elites/Nobles/Heavies require 3 turns to train.
Medium tier requires 2 turns to train.
Light tier/militia/levies require 1 turn to train.

The tiers above are the core concept.

Navies have a similar concept with Quinqiremes taking 4 turns to build and lighter ships below are constructed faster based on mass and quality, down to 1 turn for Raiding Hemiolas and basic Dieres.

Exceptions:
Elephants require 4 turns to train, dogs require 3 turns to train, all pike types require 3 turns and all siege weapons require 5 turns.

Mercenaries are unaffected.

What does this system mean for the player? You now need pre-plan your recruitment more in advance. If the enemy is 1-2 turns away from your settlement then it's a better idea to muster levies quickly than risk going for better quality and getting attacked before they've been mustered.

I will most likely be tweaking unit recruitment times as I play-test and players report odd balances where units have either too many or too few recruitment-turns.



2. Combat overhaul: Every single old entity has been removed and a completely new template has been created. This means that all units are properly tiered now in different classes. To better explain what I mean, take a look at the screenshot below:

As you can see each unit category has several tiers. Cavalry has four types (five with the addition of camels), three chariot types, three elephant types and thirteen infantry types.
If you look at the various columns you can see that each unit type has different stats, and there are differences in stats between various tiers of one unit type as well. What I've been trying to achieve here is bigger difference between different weight-classes among the units. A player should be able to discern between for example their super heavy infantry and medium infantry by just looking at their run-speed.

Mass plays another major role in the engine of Rome 2 as it directly impacts how effective a charge is (adding to the charge stat itself) and how much you're affected by the impact of an enemy charge. If the AI charges your light troops with super heavy cav, then it will hurt more than just due to the charge-value of the cavalry, because there's a big difference in mass between the attacker and the target. Same goes for infantry on infantry combat. (some units have bonuses to bracing from formations with help them withstand charges, like for example hoplites in formation, pikewall formation and certain roman formations).
I've also tried to make sure that there are no more situations where average infantry can catch up to running heavy cav by charging them (something that would occasionally happen in older DV versions).

You might have noticed "inf_naked_fighters" which stands out a bit among the infantry tiers, this entity is used by all naked fanatics/2h berserkers/naked 2h units (like falxmen/indian 2h axemen etcetera). What this entity does is it gives these units speed on par with light infantry, but the mass of heavy infantry, making them a hard hitting and flexible troop type on the battlefield.

So all in short there's now a more noticeable difference between unit tiers now, both speed-wise and mass-wise, having a major effect on the battle.

This system isn't necessarily complete and will be tweaked. Kam suggested that one can differentiate charge values among infantry so that super heavy/heavy infantry will never be able to catch light infantry. This is something that I will look in to in the future, as in theory it brings a nice dynamic to combat where you're best off to have a well-rounded army rather than spamming just heavies, and it will allow you to outmanoeuvre heavy AI contingents readily if your own forces are lighter.

3. Other Miscellaneous noteworthy changes:

Settlers:Starting with Patch 4 DV now contains a modified version of Dresden's settler pack. This version only contains a warrior class and a lower class version since a noble class would break immersion and be quite overpowered. They should be recruitable for all factions from all core settlements. Warrior class settlers contain 600 men and pleb/mob/citizen class settlers contain 800 men.

Merc tweak:
Merc recruitment cost has been increased by an additional 15% (upkeep unchanged), which will synergy well with the recruitment overhaul.

Navy:
Beside the increase in build time for ships, all ships (except transports) have also received 25% more hullpoints. This was done to try to make boarding more attractive between proper navy ships. Before this ramming was pretty much the meta, but now hopefully both options will be viable. Transports can and should still be easily sunk by proper ships.

Other:
All successor states have received levy pikes recruitable from Hellenic core settlements. Levy pikes are a cheap version with barely any armour, but readily available. Due to the intensive training required to train soldiers in pike warfare they require 3 turns to recruit just like all other types of pikemen.
Carthage has received two of their old pike-units again (previously removed in DeI, many versions ago), recruitable from the Carthaginian barrack chains. The first one is a medium/light pike variant, and the other one is a medium/heavy. This change will fill the pike-void for Carthage until they get access to their late-version pikes.
All dog units have been increased in size from 150 to 225, while also increasing their cost and upkeep by 25%. They're been thoroughly tested in custom battle and are effective vs stationary light/medium troops, while losing majorly against heavy infantry. To compensate for this buff they require 3 turns to recruit (which is somewhat authentic since it did take a long time to train them).
Arche Bosphorus has received a new emblem and a new faction colour. 8~ more emblems are on their way for various factions that still use old boring ones, but I didn't have time to add them to this update. They'll be released in an upcoming hotfix.

See changelog if you want to see the other misc fixes.

Feel free to report any bugs/mistakes or just general feedback. Stay tuned for more hotfixes in the upcoming days (including AFP making a return, since Dresden is currently working on it), and the next major update will finally bring the long awaited new custom general trees to Data Venia!

[leonardusius]

Entities change are almost without any point. DeI is way better. What's the point of reducing the categories of man entities from 40+ to 13 ??? Also I don't see any reason to upscale so much the mass. Ex. DV inf_very_heavy = 1250 and in DeI rome_infantry_very_heavy = 200; DV cav_heavy = 1500 and in DeI rome_horse_heavy = 600. A quick calculus show your ration is 1.2 vs. 3 (cavalry vs. infantry) which give an unexpected very BIGGGG advantage to infantry in impact charges (not to mention the bracing factor). I will stick on previous version.

[KAM 2150]

We only have 40+ entities in base DeI as they are leftovers for stability purpose but they are not used. Actual entitites are less than 20.

[Ygraine]

Entities change are almost without any point. DeI is way better. What's the point of reducing the categories of man entities from 40+ to 13 ??? Also I don't see any reason to upscale so much the mass. Ex. DV inf_very_heavy = 1250 and in DeI rome_infantry_very_heavy = 200; DV cav_heavy = 1500 and in DeI rome_horse_heavy = 600. A quick calculus show your ration is 1.2 vs. 3 (cavalry vs. infantry) which give an unexpected very BIGGGG advantage to infantry in impact charges (not to mention the bracing factor). I will stick on previous version.

1. You wrote that changing entities "are almost without any point", then contradict yourself later that the changes give a "very BIGGGG advantage to infantry"
2. Kam has stated several times that values here have a high impact on battles, which is correct.
3. Another point is that you're forgetting the "Cavalry Advantage"-ability which makes cavalry quite strong against infantry in this mod.
4. I've done a decent amount of play-testing before releasing this update, and it's been working fine so far in my initial tests. But of course I can be mistaken!
5. These values are not set in stone and I was expecting to have to tweak them, which was the reason I was asking for feedback from other players. But I would prefer feedback from someone who actually tried playing it, not just looked at the numbers and went "meh".
6. This my first attempt at trying to make somewhat balanced combat changes, since I've been using old and outdated values in this mod for quite some time. That means that this is in no way perfect (I never claimed it was), but in my opinion it works a lot better than the old version. I strongly suggest that you try it before arbitrarily dismissing it.
7. This version isn't supposed to be like older DV versions nor like standard DeI is. If I was aiming for the same experience, then I wouldn't be making this mod to begin with. What I'm aiming for is balance that fits the current state of this mod which has moved to the point where old entities and their values were no longer fitting.

Thanks!

[leonardusius]

We only have 40+ entities in base DeI as they are leftovers for stability purpose but they are not used. Actual entitites are less than 20.

Too bad. In fact DeI usually give up on good ideas and ends in something depleted from all 'flavor'. Can you point me an older version which is using all entities as shown there ?

[leonardusius]

1. You wrote that changing entities "are almost without any point", then contradict yourself later that the changes give a "very BIGGGG advantage to infantry"
2. Kam has stated several times that values here have a high impact on battles, which is correct.
3. Another point is that you're forgetting the "Cavalry Advantage"-ability which makes cavalry quite strong against infantry in this mod.
4. I've done a decent amount of play-testing before releasing this update, and it's been working fine so far in my initial tests. But of course I can be mistaken!
5. These values are not set in stone and I was expecting to have to tweak them, which was the reason I was asking for feedback from other players. But I would prefer feedback from someone who actually tried playing it, not just looked at the numbers and went "meh".
6. This my first attempt at trying to make somewhat balanced combat changes, since I've been using old and outdated values in this mod for quite some time. That means that this is in no way perfect (I never claimed it was), but in my opinion it works a lot better than the old version. I strongly suggest that you try it before arbitrarily dismissing it.
7. This version isn't supposed to be like older DV versions nor like standard DeI is. If I was aiming for the same experience, then I wouldn't be making this mod to begin with. What I'm aiming for is balance that fits the current state of this mod which has moved to the point where old entities and their values were no longer fitting.

Thanks!

This is an old smoked subject for me....those values coupled with bracing almost kill all sorts of cavalry on the battlefield. I want more diversity, because historically was ....a lot of it ! DeI exaggerate in one way, you in the opposite.

[Jake Armitage]

Man, you have the tendency to exagerrate, sometimes with your comments.
I get that from your pov you simply want to put your thoughts down bluntly but they just sound nasty and quite useless, sometimes.
Just to let you know and keep behaving as you prefer, this is a free world.

[leonardusius]

Man, you have the tendency to exagerrate, sometimes with your comments.
I get that from your pov you simply want to put your thoughts down bluntly but they just sound nasty and quite useless, sometimes.
Just to let you know and keep behaving as you prefer, this is a free world.

You think so.
Man, this is my opinion, and ....this is a free world ? isn't it ? Besides that, I don't won't relaunch a 'century old debate' about a question which seems to be very personal for almost everyone. Nobody is going to let down a of 'preconceptions' (and misconceptions also) for the sake of realism. I'm just using a personal heavy modified tables when playing this game.

[Jake Armitage]

Yeah, yeah, I get it, sorry for having put it that way, wanted to do just a friendly reminder.

[Ygraine]

I don't think Data Venia is the opposite of DeI, just another flavour of it since it's based on DeI after all. An opposite to DeI would perhaps be vanilla or some other balance that is more radically different.



In any case I noticed that due to increased foreign culture penalty, you're currently getting extremely high negative public order when occupying a settlement where another culture is dominant. This will be hotfixed shortly as it's quite a big deal. And after doing three more custom battle tests specifically with heavy cav and various tiers of infantry, I'll nerf the heavy cav mass down a tad


Edit: Hotfix out and changelog updated!

[KAM 2150]

Too bad. In fact DeI usually give up on good ideas and ends in something depleted from all 'flavor'. Can you point me an older version which is using all entities as shown there ?

This has been like this for nearly 3-4 years...I had no use and it was pointless. You wont be able to provide a single good game play/historical argument why 40 plus unit speeds for infantry is required to have flavour because there is no difference if one unit walks at 1.1 and other at 1.15 speed.

[Ygraine]

Another hotfix is out!

Revamped infantry speeds for various reasons, another quick fix to occupation -po impact and a few other changes. See changelog for a full list of details.



Grab todays new update (21/8):

Includes a critical balance fix which made cav super tanky due to almost doubled HP-values, an unintended side-effect in Patch 4.

[Jean-Louis Le Gueux]

Oh man, what a shameful display I display...Download your mod and don't even say thanks...Thanks Ygraine!

[Jean-Louis Le Gueux]

So, Ygraine, some few things I felt I had to report (about that version I downloaded last weekend – 18/19 Aug – non-steam vers.)



_First, I’m seeing no attrition for my troops when besieging settlements.

_Did you do away with the unit_to_building thing table? I had to tweak the one within the DeI to allow the Britons to recruit Indian Eleph…err…I mean, to fix a couple of wrong stuff…

_I found the Ai behavior when it comes to rebuilding lost armies pretty nice, actually better that what it used to be before: when you had to face the enemy along with all their armies, and that you won the encounter, you pretty much had no time to get to their settlements to profit from the battle due to the fact that the opponent would have immediately raised new osts in no time. Now, even if the Ai seems to be kind of acting weirdly at times –like just staying put with generally 4 half emptied armies and not raising anything at all before a long time, say 10-15 turns, and that even if at wars/threatened – you don’t feel the big battles to be in vain, as you are no more overwhelmed by the rapidity of the opponent to “come back”. I personally very much like it.

_Diplomacy: Ai more prone to accept defensive alliances than non-aggression pacts (but that’s an old one .

_No Pantodapoi Phalangitai for Bactria or other Hellenic kingdoms? Just saw you did add them in your major update – that I’m eager to test! Thanks for the nice work – so this one I let go, for now…


Now, I’m a very lenient guy, and I as long as I can walk peacefully my elephants throughout Sussex, I’m happy with whatever you give us and I just felt like I should report these things to you, at least, help a bit with feedbacks. So, excuse me if these things you already fixed in newest updates or if it is just my install that is corrupt.



Talking of feedbacks, as I said, I’m really eager to try out the Major update: having different masses for the different types of units I always felt was lacking and is a nice thing I welcome. It sucks to see your cav, when you play factions that heavily really on light one, be in no time caught up by those charging dudes that shouldn’t even be able to move (lol). Also, archers should be more useful, for I always felt them not to be so due to the very reason that from the moment their release their first arrows till they are being caught up with, too little time elapses, especially if facing heavy units. Now, playing those factions like the Scyths or other nomads should be pretty nice.

By the way, I know it’s one of the regular features of your mod, but I’m thinking about those hoplites formations: could you not allow us to switch from active or inactive, like I remember is possible in DeI? Having them always on makes for the whole army to walk at a very very slow pace, bound as they are to move as one, and the slowest is so slow, namely the hoplites in fixed formations, that you cannot reach any battle spot before a long time or before your enemies. I think it would be noice



Thanks Ygraine, and now, if you allow my double posting, I have an important question that I would kindly ask the community, down below…Hope you’ll bear with me…