(Update Aug. 28: Incorporating some changes to make things a bit clearer, and some screenshots. )
I've been playing around with modding off and on for a couple years, and decided to test some ideas. It's a great bloody wall of text, and not really necessary to enjoy the narrative of the story -- but some people are interested in that sort of thing, so I've hidden it in the spoiler tag. Long and short of it is that several companions are changed; some entirely, some merely tweaked. The Vaegir are more competent on the battlefield. Vaegir, Nords, and Swadians look a little better due to armour changes.
I'll be using italicized text to visually separate my own responses from the actual narrative. Finally, "Jeremus" is now "Brother Jerome", a Franciscan monk with an over-inflated ego that makes him an ill fit for the order.
And so we begin.
The Chronicle of Brother Jerome remains one of the key historical texts illuminating life in mid-late 13th century Calradia. Though some scholars have questioned the accuracy of his depictions, they are widely regarded as an unusually clear source of the considerable shift in both politics and culture that reshaped the north in the closing decades of that century.
In an era when literacy itself was rare, and written accounts infrequent, the culture of the Nordlanders (referred to as simply "the Nords" by outsiders) proved even more elusive in this regard. Literacy was an exceptional thing, relying instead upon oral traditions maintained by highly-trained Skalds. So it is that Brother Jerome's exceptional circumstances grant us valuable insight into a culture that has been typically (and perhaps unfairly) presented as one of mindless brutishness. In particular, it gives us some insight regarding contemporary figures whose names have become legendary in the passing centuries: King Harlaus IV of Swadia and his dutiful knight, Sir Grainwad; King Graveth I of Rhodokia; Yargolek, whom some still refer to as the last true king of the Vaegir; and of course King Ragnar I of Nordland, and his champion, Aedvord, more commonly known as Norvordr (trans: north guard, or guardian of the north), and the storied band that he lead.
I've been playing around with modding off and on for a couple years, and decided to test some ideas. It's a great bloody wall of text, and not really necessary to enjoy the narrative of the story -- but some people are interested in that sort of thing, so I've hidden it in the spoiler tag. Long and short of it is that several companions are changed; some entirely, some merely tweaked. The Vaegir are more competent on the battlefield. Vaegir, Nords, and Swadians look a little better due to armour changes.
I've been experimenting with modding off and on for awhile; nothing fancy, just little tweaks. No re-writing of code, but playing around with Companions, fooling around with character generation options, re-texturing items, and even designing something new (with a lot of help). So I took Diplomacy's source code, and ran with it. As an aside, I consider the items in question works in progress. I'm not yet happy with how they appear in game.
I was also toying with the idea of tweaking game play to allow more variety in beginning stats, but restricting long-term advancement and weapon skill development -- I wanted to see if it were possible to create the feel of someone who is a prodigy in one field (physical might, in this case) without destroying game balance. To this end, I started a character with elevated Strength and Power Strike, but with XP accrual slowed (player XP multiplier of 0.1 instead of 2.0 -- and occasionally using character import 'cheat' to reset his XP when advancing too fast). The goal is to keep him within a level or two of his companions. Weapon Master has been kept down to level 2 to keep his weapon skills from growing too fast (in hindsight, I perhaps should have set it at level 1). NPCs were also tweaked here and there; from common soldiers to kings.
The overall effect has been a character who is a prodigy of brute force, but whose skill and agility is comparable to -- and often outstripped by -- NPCs. He doesn't hit as often, but when he does hit it's a brutal thing.
My playtest has been a lot of fun, and my imagination's run overtime with it, so I figured I'd put it up as a very story-driven AAR and see if it amuses anybody else. It's written from the point of view of Brother Jerome -- formerly Jeremus, of vanilla Warband. The narrative blurs the line between real history and Calradia, and this is something I've purposely left vague. Calradia's a wonderful sandbox, but lacks a sense of culture for the individual nations... something beyond the initial game's scope, but not something that should ever be lacking in a story. And this is a story, first and foremost.
Lastly, I originally mentioned some of the changes I've made to the vanilla game, but it was a clusterf**k of a paragraph, so I'm throwing it up in point form.
I was also toying with the idea of tweaking game play to allow more variety in beginning stats, but restricting long-term advancement and weapon skill development -- I wanted to see if it were possible to create the feel of someone who is a prodigy in one field (physical might, in this case) without destroying game balance. To this end, I started a character with elevated Strength and Power Strike, but with XP accrual slowed (player XP multiplier of 0.1 instead of 2.0 -- and occasionally using character import 'cheat' to reset his XP when advancing too fast). The goal is to keep him within a level or two of his companions. Weapon Master has been kept down to level 2 to keep his weapon skills from growing too fast (in hindsight, I perhaps should have set it at level 1). NPCs were also tweaked here and there; from common soldiers to kings.
The overall effect has been a character who is a prodigy of brute force, but whose skill and agility is comparable to -- and often outstripped by -- NPCs. He doesn't hit as often, but when he does hit it's a brutal thing.
My playtest has been a lot of fun, and my imagination's run overtime with it, so I figured I'd put it up as a very story-driven AAR and see if it amuses anybody else. It's written from the point of view of Brother Jerome -- formerly Jeremus, of vanilla Warband. The narrative blurs the line between real history and Calradia, and this is something I've purposely left vague. Calradia's a wonderful sandbox, but lacks a sense of culture for the individual nations... something beyond the initial game's scope, but not something that should ever be lacking in a story. And this is a story, first and foremost.
Lastly, I originally mentioned some of the changes I've made to the vanilla game, but it was a clusterf**k of a paragraph, so I'm throwing it up in point form.
- The Player Character has been altered to change game play
- Certain Kings & Lords were given more individuality. Example: Ragnar has reduced ranged skills, but is a melee devil who hits like a huscarl. Some lords were given armour more fitting to their culture or station.
- Several companions were either tweaked or changed from the ground up, dialogue and all. i.e.: Matheld is now "Brunhild", and started with a slightly different skill set and gear befitting her station, but is otherwise unchanged. While Rolf and Baheshtur are now Gunnar Grimspear and Ivarr Greyshaft -- Nordlander brothers who were separated due to ill fortune.
- Bows were made a little quicker. The longbow had its damage increased so that it's second only to a warbow, balancing the disadvantage of its speed somewhat.
- Vaegir Marksmen were made a little more effective
- Crossbows were made slower, with reduced damage. The end effect seems to have been negligible; Rhodoks are still monsters, and even the Swadians still make huscarl shields explode rather swiftly
- Military cleavers were removed from the game, and replaced with a variety of swords. If anything, this has made the bloody Rhodoks a little more dangerous, while making them look a little more properly "medieval". It's also had the unintentional yet amusing effect of making the PC look like a freak for carrying one.
- Fighting Axes were added to the weapons of several Nord troops, increasing the effectiveness of the shields they carry around by allowing them to use them a little more often.
- Several new armours added to the game, including some from Narf's Rus and Transitional Armour packs, along with some of my own experiments. A copy of the pilgrim disguise was renamed and re-statted as "priest's armour", for Brother Jerome.
- Vaegir troops had more fighting axes and heavy sabres added, while reducing the number of two handed weapons. The Vaegir were previously just moving targets who tended to fall far too easily. They're more of a threat, now. Vaegir Knights also had a stat tweak that make them better at melee; almost as good as the Swadian or Sarranid cavalry. Almost.
- Changed some of the Kings' banners
I'll be using italicized text to visually separate my own responses from the actual narrative. Finally, "Jeremus" is now "Brother Jerome", a Franciscan monk with an over-inflated ego that makes him an ill fit for the order.
And so we begin.
The Chronicle of Brother Jerome remains one of the key historical texts illuminating life in mid-late 13th century Calradia. Though some scholars have questioned the accuracy of his depictions, they are widely regarded as an unusually clear source of the considerable shift in both politics and culture that reshaped the north in the closing decades of that century.
In an era when literacy itself was rare, and written accounts infrequent, the culture of the Nordlanders (referred to as simply "the Nords" by outsiders) proved even more elusive in this regard. Literacy was an exceptional thing, relying instead upon oral traditions maintained by highly-trained Skalds. So it is that Brother Jerome's exceptional circumstances grant us valuable insight into a culture that has been typically (and perhaps unfairly) presented as one of mindless brutishness. In particular, it gives us some insight regarding contemporary figures whose names have become legendary in the passing centuries: King Harlaus IV of Swadia and his dutiful knight, Sir Grainwad; King Graveth I of Rhodokia; Yargolek, whom some still refer to as the last true king of the Vaegir; and of course King Ragnar I of Nordland, and his champion, Aedvord, more commonly known as Norvordr (trans: north guard, or guardian of the north), and the storied band that he lead.
