Adding New Faction from Nothing – Step by Step

[soccernut]

I followed the tutorial, and I thought I was successful, until I tried to fight a battle in campaign mode. Auto resolve works fine, but when I try to actually fight a battle, the battle loads, the field is shown (but the textures aren't loaded), and then MTWII just exits afterward...

My log just shows this:

20:05:05.269 [system.rpt] [always] CPU: SSE2
20:05:05.269 [system.rpt] [always] ==== system log start, build date: Dec  5 2006 version development ===
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_0.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_1.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_2.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_3.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_4.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/localized.pack
20:09:24.761 [system.rpt] [error] Medieval 2: Total War encountered an unspecified error and will now exit.

Does anyone know what the problem might be?

[Lord Condormanius]

I followed the tutorial, and I thought I was successful, until I tried to fight a battle in campaign mode. Auto resolve works fine, but when I try to actually fight a battle, the battle loads, the field is shown (but the textures aren't loaded), and then MTWII just exits afterward...

My log just shows this:

20:05:05.269 [system.rpt] [always] CPU: SSE2
20:05:05.269 [system.rpt] [always] ==== system log start, build date: Dec  5 2006 version development ===
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_0.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_1.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_2.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_3.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/data_4.pack
20:05:05.269 [system.io] [always] mounted pack packs/localized.pack
20:09:24.761 [system.rpt] [error] Medieval 2: Total War encountered an unspecified error and will now exit.

Does anyone know what the problem might be?

If I had to guess, I would say there is a problem with your textures. Check to see that they are located in the proper places.

[soccernut]

Ahh, I figured it out!

After using the unpacker, I hadn't deleted data\descr_geography_new.txt and data\descr_geography_new.db . My battles don't crash mysteriously anymore.

thanks!

[Lesten]

Great tutorial!

I have a question (not sure if it has been asked before, but this thread is sooo long).

Is it possible to add even more factions and simply choose not to use the old ones? If I add 30 factions, can use them all instead of the old ones?

The reason I'm asking is when you're working with a total conversion mod such as The Gathering Storm it would be far easier to be able to use the tag name "huns" for the Huns, instead of "mongols", for instance. Otherwise you'd have to learn which faction is which, so to speak.

Or is it possible to actually change the tag name, without adding a new faction?

Thanks

[Methoz]

Hi..

i have problem with descr_model_strat.txt and symbol at banner in game... my models (strat) dont work - game jist crash and symbol at banner in campaign have english - its bad.. how to change it?

thanks

[God-Emperor of Mankind]

I added a faction using this nice tutorial and with the help of lionskin's nice template
However my game crashes before it even reaches the intro video.
I just see the Medieval 2 total war opening screen and then it dies on me.
There is nothing in the system.log either.

[Lord Condormanius]

I may be wrong, but that sounds like a modelsdb file error. Have you made any changes to that file?

[God-Emperor of Mankind]

I may be wrong, but that sounds like a modelsdb file error. Have you made any changes to that file?

Me or Methoz ??
If me then no, I haven't touched that file(yet )

[Methoz]

me? no... i want to some "graphic" changes...

[God-Emperor of Mankind]

well I tried putting Lionskin's template and my faction in 2 different folders.
Using his template, the game starts however can't play the campaign(says something about unspecific error bla bla bla) and system log shows nothing either.
However using my folder, the game crashes right when the opening screen pops up(no error message or anything).
Now the strange part is that my folder isn't that much different from his.
All I did was change the name inside the files from "factiona" to the name I want my faction to have.
Also incluedes the files that the tutorial used but wasn't in his template.
So I have no idea what is causing my game to crash.
As I said, I followed the tutorial, it should work.

[Sisu2820]

hi this is my first post but ive been trying to use a tutorial at this forum for a while now. the tutorial ive been trying to use is DukeofSerbia's Adding New Faction from Nothing – Step by Step at

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=79274

ive tried about ten times over. i go through the fourteen steps and then every time i try to play a campaign either the game crashes or my new faction doesnt appear on the faction select screen and if i try to play another faction it just goes back to the menu. once this happens i reinstall medieval II and try the tutorial from the beginning again but every time i end up with the same results. i think ive done everything thing right so i have no idea where i went wrong. if somebody could help me it would be a big help. i have the files that the tutorial says to alter in a .zip file. if somebody could take a look at them to help me get it right would be cool. if you can help post it here or you can email me at
karbumky@msu.edu

also in the folder i added system.log and a file "read_this_first" that explains what how i changed the files

thanks

[Lord Condormanius]

Try moving finland from playable to unlockable in the descr_strat.

[Gundug]

I haven't had time to go that deeply into your files, but I think you are having a problem with your relatives. The game seems to have problems with an unmarried faction leader in the descr_strat. Try adding that code and see if you have better luck. It would look something like this:

character_record Adela, female, age 17, alive, never_a_leader

relative Kyle Karbum, Adela, end

(Copy and paste from one of the other faction entries, not from here, since the formatting will be wrong)

[Sisu2820]

thanks for the help guys but i tried it and it still didnt work so i changed all the files back to how they are after the original installation and installation of patch 1.2. I also used the unpacker. im guessing that it would be easier to alter another faction than to add a new one. i still have the files i altered in my first post so i can change it back to that if anyone has been looking at the files and knows how to fix them. if not i was wondering if it is possible to alter denmark so i dont have to make a new faction just change an existing faction. if you can i want to change the name from Denmark to Finland, i want to change the main color red to blue, and i want to change the names of the characters in the faction. since there are only a few things i want to change im guessing that this would be a much easier way to get the faction that i want to play. If anyone can give me directions on what files i need to alter to do this and how i need to alter the files that would be great.

thanks

[The Border Reiver]

Hi Guys

Great I have added Ireland, and this is working on about my 10th go!

Has anyone worked out why when a character is adopted they die straight away?

thanks
BR

[Ralendil]

Notice:

Update I

RTR Fan wrote this:
Quote:
About banners, to see them, just place descr_banners_new.XML in your main MTWII folder. It will not work from a mod folder.
NOTICE AGAIN:
Put descr_banners_new.XML in your main MTWII folder!

This is no longer true with the patch 1.2

EDIT:
Something I have discovered :p
If you want to add a strat model, you can use the old ones of BI and RTW
As I don't have a CAS editor, this is really helpfull at least for me.
I really hate when things look like half done.

For the ones that don't understand what I speak about, it is this line in descr_sm_factions.txt

symbol						models_strat/symbol_portugal.CAS

This line commands the game the picture that will be displayed when there's no unit in a town, or when you are far away of the town to see if there's an army in it.

[Differently Sane]

I've been trying to add a new faction based on this tutorial, and unsurprisingly run into a few problems. I'm trying to add a Bohemian faction from scratch. Currently, when I start up the game, I can select them on the Grand Campaign menu (I've even got campaign maps for them), I then get the video of the monk chappie, and then the loading screen. However, when the loading bar fills, the game pauses for half a minute and then crashes without a word.

As for the mod itself, I started with DeZzErX's Lion of Flanders mod (which works fine by itself), and then added factions for Burgundy and Aragon based on the Normans and Saxons slots. I have a working mod including all three of these. I have then tried to add Bohemia to the mix, following the steps in this thread and a few others for adding units, and it doesn't work.

I'd post an error log but for some reason, it's not creating one. I've added

[log]
to = logs/system.log.txt level = * error

to the .cfg i'm using to run to the mod, but my medievalII\logs folder is empty. There is a system.log.txt file in the medeivelII folder itself, but that hasn't been updated for nearly a month, so it claims. I even added a system.log.txt file in the empty folder, but it mysteriously disappeared. Once I can fix that, I can get a proper error log, and see if that helps.

I've tried everything I can think of and I'm stumped. Has anyone had similar problems, or have any suggestions for things to try?
I've gone through the .txt files repeatedly for typos and the like, so I'm fairly confident it's not that (although I can't rule it out).

[Differently Sane]

Ok, I've not been able to figure out what the problem I'm having with textures is; is there some way I could upload all the files I'm using for someone more experienced than me to have a look at?
I've done enough computer programming to know how hard it can be to find errors in your own code, but for someone else to spot them straight away.

[Lusted]

Sounds like you've specified a incorrect path for a texture.

[Differently Sane]

Ok, I'll have a look into that. Am I looking for game textures or unit ones? I've not done much with unit textures for the new faction yet, so I'm inclined to the former. I've left unit textures until later for the other factions I've added and other than being invisible, they've worked okay.

EDIT: since I have a working mod, and a non-working mod, both of which use the same base game folder, logically, all the files in there should be working correctly, right? Presumably, then, it's only the files in the mod folder that are actually wrong in some way


Update:
I've got error logging working now (yay), and the main error it's giving me for this is 15:12:26.031 [data.invalid] [error] Insufficient video memory to load requested texture set.

Looks like you were right, though I've yet to work out which textures and where they are.