Proposed Visual update

[UrienRheged]

First off I want to stress that I am in no way criticizing the original creators and designers of this mod. But I had a lot of fun creating my own update to it.
If there's more work to be done on it I'm always happy to help. I absolutely live for the Late Antique-Early Medieval era and especially in North-Western Europe.

This is the (recently updated) faction heraldry:



From left to right:
Line 1: Imperium Romanum (Roman Empire), Uí Néill (both northern and southern dynasties so Ailech ánd Mide), Uib (Fife, Southern Picts), Guined (Gwynedd), Rheged (Cumbrians), Suþ Ængle (East Anglians & Mercia), Ebrauc (Eboracum), Friise (Frisians), Dál Riada (Scotti), Seaxan (Settler Saxons)
Line 2: Ulaid (Ulster), Alt Clut (Strathclyde), Sahsan (Continental Saxons), Connachta, Mumu (Munster), Duringos (Thuringians), Letau (Brittany), Consilium Britanniæ (Council of Britain/Romano-Britons), Uerteru (Fortriu, Northern Picts), Gutans (Visigoths)
Line 3: Svvabos (Alemanni/Suebi/Swabians), Guotodin (Gododdin), Danir (Danes), Ēotas (Jutes), Laigin (Leinster), Sala-Frankan (Salian Franks), Dyfneint (Dumnonii/Devon), Borgendos (Burgundians), Norþ Ængle (Bernicia & Deira/Northumbrians), Ribwara-Frankan (Ripuarian Franks)
Line 4: Libera Civitates (Rebels).

See my posts below for the skins of the strat characters. I've also redone all of those, making them match up with their faction colors. I'm acutely aware of the fact that in the 5th century CE people did not have national flags or color schemes, let alone dressed in them, BUT I wanted to make the strat map a bit neater and more easily understandable. There's already so many things to figure out when first playing this mod and it's nice just to have intuitive clothing to tell you what faction this or that character belongs to. I'm halfway through the merchants and diplomats, I've done all ships, generals, captains. I'm thinking of maybe adding seperate Kings and Princes like in certain Kingdoms mods, but I'm gonna need some help with that.

This is the faction selection screen, based off a great design by 'nearlyded'.


And this is a screenshot of the strat radar map. The Visigoths temporarily have a settlement but they won't be there anymore in the 'finished' proposal.

[demagogos nicator]

This looks really nice and promissing. I have always hated how many good early medieval mods uses very anachronistic late medieval heraldy based faction symbols for early medieval factions.

[UrienRheged]

The Southern Brythonic Factions
Dyfneint (originally the Regnum Brittonum)
I went with a less romanized name for this faction, also because Dyfneint is such a cool sounding kingdom.
This flag design is one of my favourites, mainly cause it incorporates three colors that work well together: the white, the purple-greyish blue and the dark red.
This faction is the ultimate dragon-themed culture, with its leader bearing the title Penn Dreic ('Pendragon') instead of 'Rex' or 'Brientin'.
They have a bit of a noble look, which might have to be countered by inflicting some hard core atrocities on the Saxon invaders or your Brythonic rivals to the North-East.


Consilium Britanniæ:
For the name I used the Late Latin vibe of 's' in Consilium and used the æ instead of ae, but that's minor.
I kept the very pure and heroic white and pistachio color scheme of the original mod but opted to put more emphasis on the Brythonic part of their culture. They used to have a Chi Rho symbol and mostly Latin-named units, but I made about half Brythonic in title. I also renamed most towns to their counterparts in Nennius's 28 Cities of Britain, as you can see for yourself in the screenshot.




The Bretons of Letau (the Old Welsh/Old Breton spelling of Llydaw).
I've made some minor changes to this faction: the family tree now includes Budic's aging father Aldrien (which was a nice positively Tolkienesque name I couldn't leave out of this mod) and I changed Budic's sons from Hywel and Salomon to Meliau and the very very evil and disloyal Riwal.
I've also turned the large town of Condate Redonum (Rennes) in Benoic to a wooden castle, just to add some variety to what's being conquered in the early Letau campaign.
The names of the towns and units have also been altered to an Old Breton vibe (by which I mean: very close to Old Welsh, but sliiiightly different). Their starting towns are called Kair Ys, Kair Ahes and Gwened.
I'm slightly chuffed with the fact that the symbol almost fades into the black flag of a full army stack, but not completely, thus emphasizing the round shield-shape.

[UrienRheged]

The Goidelic and Pictish factions:

-The Ui Neill: very similar to the original design but with a slightly less flashy color scheme in the outfits.

-The Connachta: I gave them an alternative captain design, coupled with the Dal Riada captains.

-Alba (who, when I finally figure out how to make new factions from scratch, I will split up into Uerteru and Circinn):
I just gave them some navy blue and brown accents.

-Mumu: For some reason I thought it would be cool to give the Munster captain a bronze helmet.
The Deisi Mumu were an important sub-faction, a sept of which (the Ui Liathain) settled South-West Wales and Cornwall heavily in this timeframe. So I put two Mumu raiding parties (lead by Meic Brocc and his son Meic Caille, respectively) in range of raidable Brythonic settlements.

- The Laigen: as I said, I declined to give them the Irish harp symbol because I saw potential in the crossed spears (similar to the original Ebrauc crossed swords!). They're the greenest of the Goidelic factions, with gold and blue-grey elements. They're a pretty standard Goidelic faction, with the addition of Loingsaig (the former Scotti Campwyr) due to their connection and alliance with Dal Riada. They're in for a very challenging campaign as they're at war with the powerful Ui Neill and bordered by Mumu on the other side who can't be trusted, and they're severely strapped for cash. There's a potential solution for this as Prince Nath Í is out on a raid in Wales, with a juicy, poorly defended village in sight.

-Dál Riata: a fun faction to play as, I've found. I took the Isle of Arran from them and instead gave them Dun Sobargi on the Northern Irish coast. They're allied to the Laigen and at war with the Picts and the Ui Neill.
-

[_TotalWar_]

Very, very nice!

[UrienRheged]

A little addition to the Pictish factions. I've now successfully renamed & relocated the Alba faction to Uerteru: Fortriu, in the North, centered on Apur Nisa (Inverness) and created a new faction from scratch called Uib (Fib). They are the southern picts, centered on Apur Nethige (Abernethy). They're at war with the Guotodin and allied to Uerteru.
I've given them a slightly flamboyant color scheme (I hadn't used orange as a primary faction color yet, so here we go) with a green carved horseman figure from a Pictish stone.
Here's a little pic:


Now for the Northern Brythonic or Cumbric factions:
Guined:
I've changed next to nothing: these guys look great. I might've added to the black elements and toned down the red. New symbol, though.
Their starting situation is almost the same, except for the elite Laigin army led by Tanaiste Nath Í rampaging through the Llyn peninsula.

Guotodin: Instead of the dark red of the original mod I decided to go with the Joker-y blueish green of the ATW faction. Love this combination of colors so I kept it and made the strat models keep to it.
Alt Clut: I like how the slightly muted river-blue and the orange goose/swan work together. Updated the strat models to match the color scheme.

Now to the two northern superpowers: Ebrauc and Rheged.
Ebrauc I gave a softer purple, also to emphasize the romanization of Eboracum (though that's slight blasphemy, because no one would in their right mind wear imperial purple in vain). Their faction logo, the Dragonesque brooch, gives them prestige and a historic relevance.
The last king of the united north, Ceneu, has died and left his two sons Maur and Guirgast two halves of his vast kingdom. Rich and romanized Ebrauc to the east, which we've just discussed, and mountainous and remote Rheged to the west, plagued by Ui Neill (soon to be Ulaid) raiders. Rheged faces a rebellious populace, multiple threats from its neighbours and a shaky alliance with its sister-kingdom across the Pennines. Its unique unit is the Marchaucion Cichfran (Raven Cavalry), my version of ATW's Marca Bran.
I'm especially proud of Rheged's Dark Red-Dark Blue-Dark Black color scheme, which I've even put into their Burgh Castle/Deurne style Late Roman helmets, with black accents.

Straddling the end of the Pennines and wedged between the two kingdoms is the province (and minor kingdom) of Elmet, although by rights this should belong to Rheged as Guirgast's son Mascuid would inherit this kingdom from his father within the timespan of the mod. But I'm afraid that would make Rheged too powerful, with six settlments including two cities, a large town and two castles. Maybe I'll take Cair Guenddolau away from them to even things out a bit... We'll see! Suggestions are always welcome.

[UrienRheged]

This makes 24 factions in total, which means I can make six more. Suggestions are always welcome as to which factions I could add.
I've made a list of primary candidates in order of necessity:
- Ulaid (Ulster) on the east coast of Ireland, and then I'll give the Ui Neill Tara to make it historically accurate (though it's almost certain that most of the early Gaelic history is forged =))
- Ribwara-Frankan (Ripuarian Franks) , the allies/rivals of the Salija-Frankan (Salians), centered around the Northern Rhine region. This would weaken the Franks and possibly make the Imperium too powerful on the continent. Just in time for the huge invasion force of the...
- Vesi-Gutans (the Visigoths), with a large invading army marching in from Aquitania around 470, threating both Letau and the Imperium. Historically the Visigoths were a constant presence in Gaul until Clovis broke them at the Battle of Vouillé. They would really make sense in this mod. The main problem is that I've no other faction to base them on, and I can't make new units =) I'm just not good enough at the 3D stuff =P
- An Alemanni/Suebian sub-faction like the Lentienses or the Brisigavi, because the Alemanni were historically not as united as they appear on the campaign map.

[_TotalWar_]

Great work and very nice additions/changes. As for the factions, the geographical scope is very specific, so in my opinion it's not a big deal of no other factions are added. Your ideas above are nice, though, and I agree with the Ulaid and perhaps the Visigoths. The new Frankish and Alemanni factions could, as you say, have the effect of making the Roman Empire in Gaul too powerful and I don't know how would they "play differently" from their respective brethren. Concerning the Visigoths, yes, their realm stretched up to the Loire river (their main center was at the time in Toulouse, this period in their history until 507 (battle of Vouillé) is indeed known as "kingdom of Toulouse"), so it's not a bad idea having them disturbing northwestern Gaul. As for units, they could eventually be borrowed from IB2 Africa Vandalorum (just a thought).

[UrienRheged]

Thanks for the input!
I've gone ahead with Ulaid (Ulster) and Uib (Fife) so now my primary goal is to get the Visigoths on here, the only real 'power player' that's missing, imho. Good suggestion of using IB2:AV units. The only problem is that I have no inkling of how to go about that. My modding prowess is severely limited, if i'm honest.


As for the new factions. I've just performed a bit of a switcheroo: the Ui Neill faction (with the distinctive yellow color scheme and the red hand of ulster) has been moved and renamed to the Ulaid. Their capital is Rath Celtchair (Downpatrick) and they've got a small seaborne raiding party on the coast of Rheged.

And in their place I've created a new faction now called the Uí Neill, and instead of just the Northern ones, they now represent both Ui Neill divisions, those in Ailech and in Mide. For their color scheme I used a primary hue I missed on the strat map: light blue. But no worries, they've got a pretty bad ass looking dark red lion as their symbol.
I'm thinking of giving them Temair (Tara), thereby handing them a huge advantage, but their problem will be a huge family tree with many ambitious members, extremely stretched out domains and five other Goidelic factions out for their Royal blood.
Ireland is turning into a real fighting pit =)

[UrienRheged]

An update of what the campaign radar map looks like, with names of the factions in a vaguely medieval font =P
The newly added factions (which are all fully functional except for in-battle unit textures) are Rheged, the Laigin, the Ulaid, Uib and the Danir.

[UrienRheged]

Another update!
I'm at 28 factions now, so only a couple more to go! I've now completed Rheged, added Laigen, Ulaid, Uib (Fife), the Danir (Danes) and the Gutans (the Visigoths). Have a look at the faction symbols.



Here's the continental Germanic factions with the Goths in the bottom right corner. They will be an Arian (newly added religion) horde faction moving in from Aquitania in the south. Their faction leader will be a Magister Militum, not a king or prince, and their capital will be called a 'Provisional Capital' as the Visigoths did not hold cities in this geographical setting, but they DID send several invasion forces. So it's basically just gonna be an event where a large amount of stacks will appear around 465-70ad once or twice and they might (hopefully) capture a settlement and convert a part of the populace to arianism, but they won't reform into a horde again if you capture their last settlement.

And here, below, are the North-Sea-Germanic factions with the Danes at the end. The Danes are based on the Jutes but will use less cavalry. Their king is Grámr, son of Skjöldr, two semi-legendary figures from the Vendel Age, who I figured could have existed in the fifth century. There's archaeological evidence the Danevirke was already present in some form around 500AD, so the Danes were certainly active.

Please notice the ship models with shield-arrays in the color scheme of the faction, thaaaaanks

[_TotalWar_]

Beautiful! It's a breath of new life into Conquestus Britanniae which in my opinion deserves more attention than it has (same thing concerning every mod or game set in this crucial period, and unfortunately there aren't many of them). I gather that the Visigoths won't be playable? But amazing work anyways

[UrienRheged]

Thanks!
It is indeed a very good mod of my favourite era/area in history.
Well, as I'm a bit of a Goth-fanatic, I'd like to make them playable but that can't happen if they're a horde, obviously. I might try and make a 'Provincial Campaign' where they're also available immediately, or maybe I'll give them one settlement (Aurelianum) and then we'd see the horde as a retaliatory expedition when that settlement is taken. That's another option.

[_TotalWar_]

Yes, when a faction emerges during a campaign it's not possible to play as them. They can be played as a horde at start, there was an explanation on how to do it for Medieval II somewhere in the forum, to make a horde faction playable at start just like there were playable hordes at the beginning of the campaign in RTW:BI. Or else, as you said, the option of giving them a settlement (not totally historical in that part of the map, of course, but everything is a compromise in game terms).
Beautiful symbols, btw!

[UrienRheged]

I've just split the Ængle faction up into the Suþ Ængle (taking up most of the settlements the base faction now owns, sowing the seeds for East Anglia and Mercia) and the Norþ Ængle (settling more to the north, infringing on Ebrauc and the Gododdin, something they rarely do when I play the campaign now), in order to make their expansion a bit more inevitable.
Two (competing) Anglian factions also doesn't seem overkill as the Anglian kingdom of Northumbria was one of the most powerful Anglo-Saxon factions in the Heptarchy, always rivalling the sovereignty of of Mercia. And the fact that in my campaigns the AI Angles never really established any serious footholds in the North, and the Gododdin were always steamrolling everyone due to their very strong starting position. The fact that this Brythonic faction is now at war with Uib, directly to their north AND the Norþ Ængle, directly to their south, might make sure that doesn't keep happening.

This is the Norþ Ænglisce faction. In designing their symbol I took my inspiration from the Northumberland county flag, based on an approximation of the original Northumbrian flag, nicknamed Oswald's Stripes (which were originally purple, but people used red later on as it was much cheaper).

[redin5ide.82]

Stunning job here, congrats mate.

[UrienRheged]

Thanks! I've updated the first post to show the two new factions I'm putting in: the Ribwara-Frankan (Ripuarian Franks) about which I'm not yet sure if I'll use them as a shadow faction for the Salian Franks, or as a starting, playable faction. And secondly a Burgundian invasion in 462, after the death of Majorian.

I'm actually stuck with an immediate CTD that I can't get a hold on, at the moment. I don't seem to be able to add a 30th faction (including the rebels, I'm aware of the hard-coded limits). And I'm doing this on a MacBook Air so I don't get error logs. If anyone here wants to try and figure out what I'm doing wrong I could upload it for you. Thanks in advance!

[_TotalWar_]

Good job there, as always. About the CTD, I'm quite weak with the "engineering" of the files to look out for the possible reason of the problem, I'm afraid. Perhaps try and contact Gigantus, he's a real wizard and has helped a lot of modders during all these years. He might not see this thread, so contact him directly or post your question on the mod workshop. Cheers and keep it going!

[Kilij of the East]

I'm willing to help. I like IB2CB very much too but there are a lot of CTD, just had to fix a battlemap CTD myself recently due to a river placement.

[Gaelstrix]

So weird, I was looking through old bookmarks on my computer, and this was my favourite mod years ago. Then I found this.

Just wanted to commend you on your work! I'll certainly play this when it's done