An overhaul of the Roman rosters and campaign which expands the roles of limitanei, pseudocomitatenses, foederati and auxilia that increasingly filled the ranks of the 5th Century Roman armies. There are three main ideas behind this mod:
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1. The Roman Army of the 5th Century became more and more an ad hoc blend of merged units, mercenaries, and foederati due to accumulating casualties, and diminishing money and manpower. The army of the 4th Century, of the Notitia Dignitatum, had probably been destroyed by the time of Attila and Aetius.
2. Despite the accumulating losses and reliance on non-Roman forces, the Late Roman Army was still a formidable, tactically flexible and, usually, victorious organisation. In this mod the Roman Empires' rosters, both in appearance and combat abilities, are at times very different from the vanilla rosters in order to reflect this.
3. Internal threats such as civil wars and revolts greatly weakened the empires' ability to resist raiders and hostile mass migrations and perhaps were as great a factor in the West's destruction
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Some changes include:
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Units: -over 150 units reskinned or added. -Expanded Roman rosters with more limitanei, pseudocomitatenses, auxilia and foederati. -AOR for some unique Roman units, foederati and auxilia. -Shield wall and mobile testudo for most Roman infantry. -Plumbata or javelins for most Roman infantry. -Units sizes, formation depths, ammunition added or increased, and other minor changes. -Other minor changes to several vanilla units, Roman and non-Roman. -Roman commanders now start as cavalry, not infantry. -various unit caps.
Battles and campaign: Recommended LARGE unit sizes and NORMAL to HARD difficulty.
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-Slower movement and reduced hit chance to slow combat down. -Armour resistance to missiles increased, more ammo to compensate. Some missiles have reduced damage. -Archers can shoot both the vanilla flat trajectory and modded high trajectory for normal shot. Whistling shot was removed to allow this change. -artillery greatly nerfed and reduced to a single piece (chiroballistas unchanged). -Towers nerfed. -Ship artillery ranges and accuracy nerfed. They can no longer snipe land units. -Charge bonuses for cavalry reduced. -Formations more untidy. -Greater morale impacts from casualties, flanking and rear attacks. -Roman garrisons strengthened slightly with limitanei. -80% chance of AI sallying out from small settlements.
Economy, Agents, Politics and Other Matters:
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-Latin and Orthodox church upkeep massively reduced and sanitation added to Latin churches. -Minimum reduced to 25% for state religion change. -Base income reduced. -Reduced army caps at low imperium, but greater at higher imperium to help reduce stack spam from minor factions. -Only one Spy/Assassin, one Priest and zero Champions to reduce turn times, shenanigans and magic army bonuses. -More governors. -Very high upkeep for core Roman units to reflect the costs of training and equipment. -Loyalty more affected by politics, more chance of civil wars. -A few faction colour changes, e.g. Franks are primarily blue, WRE, ERE and Sassanids are less saturated, etc.
Reasoning and future development (This is a Work in Progress)
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I don't make any claims to historical accuracy. This is just my take on the military problems faced by the Romans, especially in the West.
I decided to push ahead with this mod after the Three Kingdoms announcement. While I hope 3Ks is a successful and popular game, its setting doesn't particularly appeal to me. As a result, Total War Attila is now my main choice for playing Grand Campaigns for the foreseeable future and I'll keep working on this for quite a while yet. Attila is by far my favourite game in my Steam library.
Apart from shields and quivers, almost all the reskins have been with vanilla materials. I will seek permission to use better stuff to improve a lot of the units' appearances. Magister Militium Castellanus has kindly offered to help with the Roman rosters going forward. Any mistakes and problems are mine alone.
If you'd like to get involved with this mod, especially with startpos creation (I'd like to include playable Britain and Armenia), and anything else, please let me know. I'm happy to teach and support newbie modders if you're keen.
NOT COMPATIBLE WITH MOST OTHER OVERHAUL/CAMPAIGN/CUSTOM UNIT PACKS. May be compatible with reskins provided they are only variant meshes.
Credits and thanks:
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Help, Advice and Tutorials: Sebidee (unit creation/unit card tutorials, Total War Center) Augustusng (ui editing and many informative posts in TWC) Magnar (series of video tutorials on yuutuuube, and countless mods) Dresden (various tutorials, mods and posts in TWC) Caligula (series of unit creation/varient mesh tutorials in TWC and yuuutuuube) Kam 2150 (many informative posts about battle balance in DEI forum, TWC)
Shields and Textures: Stealth4health Celticus Magnus Kraut and Tea The Germans are Coming Avetis
Inspiration and mod influences: Magister Militum Flavius Aetius (many informative posts throughout TWC). Pompeius Magnus “the Late Roman Army” document and discussion in the Invasio Barbarorum1(RTW) forum, TWC. Seniorbatavianhorse, as above Riothamus and IB2, “Conquestus Brittanniae III”, a MTW2 mod. Notitia Dignitatum (h ttp://lukeuedasarson.com/NotitiaPatterns.html) Kermit The Frog, “Realistic Battles” packs (Steam Workshop) Black Stabbath, “Ultra Compatible Realistic battle mod” (Steam Ws) Fall of the Eagles (overhaul mod)
Main reading: Heather, Peter: The Fall of the Roman Empire [2005]. Goldsworthy, Adrian: The Fall of the West (The Death of the Roman Superpower)[2009].
limes imperii 1.1 is now under construction. It will include improvements to the Roman rosters, more barbarian reskins, and other exciting changes. Released soon. However, after that...
limes imperii 2.0, which is now in serious planning stage, will include a new start date in the 5th century, and hopefully playable Britain and Armenia.
Limes Imperii 1.0
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