Medieval Paganism - Alternate History Mod

[VltimaRatio]

I've wanted to make a mod like this for years and now have gotten a mod folder started for it using bare geomod as a blank slate. Ideally a better map would be used than the vanilla one, so I'm looking for someone who knows geomod tools. The aim is to acheive a similar gameplay depth to SSHIP although obviously without the historical accuracy part.

The concept is an alternate version of the middle ages where the ancient religions survived late antiquity and the collapse of the western Roman empire and all factions maintain their pre-Christian/pre-Islamic ones. This will be reflected in campaign mechanics and the aesthetics of the units/factions.

Some units/assets/buildings/early versions of faction icons:

[Vortigern]

Fun. Me likes.

[VltimaRatio]

Some more units/banners

[Werety]

I really like your idea!

An alternative timeframe without christianism and islam religions? can be interesting to do a nice research how the world is before these religions.

I can help you with this idea If you want.

[VltimaRatio]

I'd appreciate help if you're interested, I know more about some pre-monotheistic religions than others, but moving the timeline forward centuries from the point of departure in late antiquity means a lot happened in the world in the meantime that might have been the same as in real life, sort of similar or completely different. It's not too hard to imagine the more northern factions that were still becoming Christian at the time the campaign starts, the Middle East is trickier though.

[Werety]

Well, Islam religion expand for the 600, you can create some different pagan religions for the middle eastern zone and Arabia, if you plan to start the mod in a X date, need to see what religions and faction can be added or more appropiate.

I can help you to research, its my favorite thing to do and personal hobby, I know the code of the game very well, and understand about units, buildings, mapping, scripts and different stuff. If you have discord contact me to try to organize the help

[VltimaRatio]

I think Mesopotamian/Arabic paganism and Zoroastrianism with some Hellenic influence from the successor kingdom days would take up much of the region, and the Turks would still be some kind of Tengrist (as are the Mongols in SSHIP). Some syncretism and mixing between factions could make them more unique. Manicheanism could still exist and be a significant religion - I'm not sure how the butterfly effect would affect this cause Manicheanism did draw on Christianity to some extent.

If you know mapping that would be very valuable, I mainly know unit stuff and some building/faction/ui stuff (don't really know how to fill in the remaining faction slots with working faction symbols and the like though. A better map than vanilla is definitely needed, I've looked at Gigantus' resource maps and while they're great an ideal one would be something between the Europe and Alexandros maps- basically not too different from the Stainless Steel map in extent. I do have a discord connected to this account, I'll get in touch on that for sure.

[Werety]

I have some little info about pre islamic religion: https://www.cerasa.es/media/areces/f...hment-2844.pdf is in spanish but I translate a part for you

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Before the arrival of Islam, there existed in the Arabian Peninsula a plurality of religious options, old beliefs and paganism were maintained. The Most Arabs were polytheists. Although their religious beliefs and practices are not well known, it seems that they did not consider their gods to be something more than beings that could get angry and cause misfortune, and to whom they could placate with offerings and sacrifices.

Along with the multiple divinities, a triad of main gods stood out: Al-La¯t, goddess of the sun or sky, Al-'Uzza, morning star, and Al-Mana¯t, goddess of luck or happiness, that they were subject to a higher divinity, Alla¯h (God), who would soon have to eliminate all the divinities to become the only god.

The cult of betyls, formless stones in which the divinity was supposed to dwell, was widespread. There were places of worship where, in certain months of the year, festivals and fairs were held. The most famous of these santuay was that of the Ka‘ba, in Mecca, where the Black Stone was venerated, around which ambulatory rites were practiced, which will be preserved with the arrival of Islam. The guard and custody of these places were entrusted to certain priestly families such as the Banu¯ Qurayš of Mecca.

It must be borne in mind that, in Arabia at the end of the sixth century, there were fairly well-organized groups of Jews, who settled in the south and along length of Hiyaz, in the trajectories ofthe trade routes. And also, numerous Christian colonies of a certain importance, who lived as refugees in the desert, or in areas south of the Hiyaz, around the Nayram region, where the Monophysites, victims of Justinian's persecutions. there is constancy of the existence of some Arabs who, without being Christians or Jews, professed the monotheism and indulged in ascetic practices.

About the map, you can use a map of other mod, that can be easy to to, with credits obviously, and some changes can do the job easily. Only need to explore a little the maps of the mods.

And about the slots of factions, you can use 20+ slots of vanilla factions, thats enough job to do for me XD, look my mod now:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
aztecs
england
mayans
normans
tlaxcalans
tarascans
chichimeca
france
portugal
milan
hre
venice
sicily
scotland
byzantium
hungary
russia
moors
timurids
poland
papal_states
saxons
turks
egypt
denmark
mongols
apachean
spain
end
unlockable
end
nonplayable
slave
end...

[VltimaRatio]

That's good info, useful for the Arab religious building chain. I sent Stainless Steel a pm on mod db to see if they'd be OK with the map being used, not sure if that's the best way to reach whoever is current leader of the mod though.

I think the 29 slots are enough, it's just the work of adding in the ones not in vanilla. I got Gigantus' tutorial for it though.

[Werety]

Stainless steel mod had a lot of people in the dev team, some of them are being inactive for years, maybe if they don't answer you can use the map and add credits, actually the TW modding fanbase are basically missing or inactive, sometimes its difficult theiy answer you quickly. Patience or Initiative is what do you choose to do your mod, waiting sometimes can be frustrating.

With the vanilla factions you can do a lot honestly, adding new factions from 0 can be difficult and little buggy, is better recycle the existent factions.

If I can help you with something, send me a MP via discord in my signature

[VltimaRatio]

If Stainless Steel was the base a lot of faction slots would be unlocked in additon to the map itself which would be great. But I'm reluctant to start without permission cause otherwise a lot of work could be redundant and would have to be done again if the team object. I think one of the new mods on mod db uses the same map though, at least at a glance it looks the same.

I'll try and make some more units and buildings for a preview by the end of the week, could set up a mod db/discord for it when there's more to show. Mod db is pretty active, might be able to recruit more people there.

[Werety]

If you wait for permision you die of old bro, how I say few posts before the major part of devs of the mods are inactive or missing for years, you dont create your mod if you wait permission, btw I never knew people who have a bad answer for ask permission, go forward dude, make your mod, and add in credits of the map, and its done.


I dont know moddb but discord for work is more easy and useful, you can open a discord server for the mod to work and a modb to show the progress.

[VltimaRatio]

You're probably right, I just like to ask just in case. But I did go ahead and port my changes into SS, and made some variant temple building chains. Is there a way to add a experience modifier to infantry from a building? Like what the jousting list does for heavy cav, I'd like to add it to the war god chains to give the different types of gods/temples a unique but small bonus. Mercury has a trade bonus copied from the market building, planning to add a law bonus to zeus/head deities, and so on. Also, you know how to add the yearly/monthly/whatever sacrifice cycle to a building? It would be nice to add that to the temples. How many of those can you have? Would adding that to temples overwrite the race track feature?

[Werety]

You can solve your questions in this post: https://www.twcenter.net/forums/show..._Buildings-txt

The link have a list of bonus and effects of the buildings, with a little description, about the race track you need to choose what you want, or "race tracks" or "sacrifices" the mechanic is the same, the only thing who changes is the name, is in strat.txt or expanded.txt file.

The bonus of XP for the recruited troops is in the link too

[VltimaRatio]

Great, thanks. I changed races to sacrifices and it works nicely.

Wonder if the number levels can be played with, there's only 1 and 2 in the vanilla game.

The stage_game thing can be used too apparently, maybe for festivals, or to have both races and sacrifices.

[Werety]

You mean about the number of levels of "stage_games 1"? You can try to add a 5 and initiate the game and experiment by yourself what effect do in the settlement

About the stage races, you need to choose, horse races, sacrifices or festivals, you cant do 2 at the same time (well I never see) is repetitive mechanic in the settlement, can cause some problems, you have photos about that?

[VltimaRatio]

I'll experiment with it tomorrow. The fact that there's two entries in the strat text file (stage_races and stage_games) could mean you can have two but it could get glitchy.

[KerryG]

I'll experiment with it tomorrow. The fact that there's two entries in the strat text file (stage_races and stage_games) could mean you can have two but it could get glitchy.

How can this be the cause of a problem?

[VltimaRatio]

I thought maybe the UI only had space for one at first. But both are used by the Mesoamericans in Kingdoms and when I tried adding a games building too you can actually cycle between daily/monthly/yearly either or both. Which is cool, will definitely be using that for sacrifices and festivals both then.

[Werety]

Yeah, I think the UI only accept 1 of them entries and put both in the same space of the interface, btw I dont think this is a huge problem for the mod, can make a "standard" entrie, like "rituals", "ceremony" or similar, more generalistic you know