Developer's Diary

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Dec. 5 progress report:
I am down to the final odds and ends before release.  I have completed and tested all of the new coding and the mod is running stable.  Yay!

My final task is to clean up the module itself.  I am going through the resources (BRFs) to remove most of the unused or redundant meshes/materials/textures in order to further optimize the mod.  I am also improving a few armor textures from my previous modded versions.  Once that is all completed I will finish the change list and features description, and post the mod to ModDB. 

Not much left to do really, just need time to get it done.  I am now in the busiest time of my work year and so have just bits of time here and there to work on the mod.  Will complete as soon as possible.  Keep the faith!  I think you will enjoy the changes I have made.
 
Hazzardevil said:
Can we ask what the Geroians are going to be like?
And I just reinstalled the mod to give it another play. Good to see it's still being worked on.

The Geroians are based on images of Ottonian era German troops of the Holy Roman Empire.  The professional troops have mainly mail armor.  They have good infantry and cavalry and crossbowmen.  Their elite troop is called "elite ritter."  I also gave their skirmishers pretty good stats just to round them out since they are a smaller faction.  They are equipped similarly to the Swadians in my mod except without the surcoats or jupons over their armor like many of my Swadian troops have.  The Geroians use heater shields and the mounted troops have pot helms while the professional foot soldiers use bascinets.  The common troops use kettle helmets at the higher levels, simpler helms and hats at lower levels.  I tried to give the Geroians (and all factions) a distinctive look that is somewhat consistent with the team period. 

I am preparing to release this version in the very near future- after Dec. 17 but before Christmas.  I just have to get through the piles of work I have at my job!
 
Well, version 3.0 is now released, so where do I go now?
1. My first priority is to fix any bugs, glitches, weirdness that appear in version 3.0. This would include improving some of the armor textures and other things that are fairly easy.
2. After that, I don't know. I am taking a short hiatus from modding (excepting attending to item 1 above). I am considering creating an "invasion" feature for the mod and have actually created some of the code. The invading force would actually be an uprising of Calradia's masterless men who unite under a powerful leader and his 10 lords. This will fulfill the mod's subtitle ("mercenary uprising"), along with having the 3 new factions of former mercenaries (Keltons, Khergiz, Geroians). I need to flesh out the full masterless men troop tree and create the new lords and ladies, and worst of all, new banners (unless I assign them all the same faction banner to carry.
3. After Bannerlord releases I will take the temperature to see how much demand there will be for additional updates to version 3.0.

It has been fun to create and sustain this mod. If new modding ideas strike me, and I have the ability to implement them, I will try to do so. I am particularly interested in creating some simple wooden forts for the Khergiz castles. For now though I am going to enjoy the fruits of my labor and see if I can actually finish a game as King.
 
Dev Diary May 4 2020

I discovered a mistake I made in version 3 when I re-added the village of Uzgha to mod- I did everything but forgot to create the village elder! I discovered this quite by accident- I was granted Uzgha by the Sultan and couldn't find the village elder anywhere. Adding the village elder to the troops will mess up the save-game therefore v. 3.1 will require a new game. I have made a few other changes since then, and might release a patch with just the save-game compatible changes prior to releasing v 3.1.

Such as patch would include all of the following items except items 8-9.
1. Prison scene bugs for Starfall Castle and Jamiche Castle are fixed.
2. Siege scene problem for Curaw is fixed- new scene.
3. The native kite shields that some players have found to be too shiny are fixed by changing materials settings.
4. Slightly modified the Khergiz party templates to make them a little less powerful since they are mostly mounted.
5. Switched Vaegir elite from a mounted archer to heavy cavalry. (This troop already existed in troop file but was not linked to upgrade- this is save-game compatible because of this fact, although it will take a bit of time to see the changes in lord's armies.
6. Added an elite infantry troop to Gerioan troops (they now have elite cavalry and elite infantry). (Since this troop already existed it will be save-game compatible).
7. A few equipment changes for some of the faction troops and the custom troops (a new game will be needed to see changed equip for custom troops).
8. Uzgha village not having a village elder.
9. Switched the Sarranid mounted skirmisher into a mounted archer.

If I release the patch (call it patch #2), it will be save-game compatible and Uzgha still won't have a village elder. This will only be a problem if you need to speak to the elder in Uzgha, otherwise, it won't affect gameplay.

Version 3.1 will include all the fixes and a few more modifications and additions to the code, including an invasion option. I will post other aspects in the next development diary.
 
Just wanted to drop by to let you know I am still working on the next update to version 3. I explained a good deal of it in the post above (May 4). The thing is that I am overwhelmed right now at my job and just have not had much time to complete the update. I have made most of the changes discussed above plus a few more. I have not added the invasion feature yet and anticipate that it will be quite time-consuming. I might go ahead and release what I have completed up to this point since it contains a few bug fixes and plenty of improvements. I won't decide until I have more time to think about it.
 
Patch 2 for Version 3 was released July 2021 and dates to July 2020. It does not include changes made since July 2020.
These are the fixes and changes made for Patch 2:
1. Fixed the missing village elder for Uzgha village.
2. Fixed prison scene bugs for Starfall Castle and Jamiche Castle.
3. Fixed siege scene problem for Curaw by changing to native scene.
4. Fixed the native kite shields that some players have found to be too shiny.
5. Fixed problem with a Sarranid shield texture.
6. Added an elite infantry troop to Gerioan troops (they now have elite cavalry and elite infantry) and modified some of the Geroian troops equipment.
7. Slightly modified the Khergiz party templates to make them a little less powerful since they are cavalry heavy.
8. Changed the Khergiz trained skirmisher from level 20 to 15 as intended.
9. Fixed the animations on some of the newer map flags that weren't waving.

There are other small changes that I cannot remember. I will list any other changes that I can remember below this:

As stated above, this patch was made in July 2020 and released July 2021. It does not include the many changes I have made to the mod since July 2020. I decided to release the patch due to requests posted on the ModDB page for the mod. I am making good progress toward the next version and will soon post a partial list of changes below this post.
 
Hi Redleg, i really enjoy your mod. In this 2022, still you develop this mod ? I'm still waiting for your fix to the bug when my Patrol Outpost's killed, i can't train my Patrol, and the Patrol can't respawn again.
 
Hi Redleg, i really enjoy your mod. In this 2022, still you develop this mod ? I'm still waiting for your fix to the bug when my Patrol Outpost's killed, i can't train my Patrol, and the Patrol can't respawn again.
I am still working on the mod. I have fixed the crashing problem when demolishing the outpost but not any other bugs with it. I will add it to my list of things to look into. No guarantee that I will be able to fix it though.

I have made quite a few changes to the mod since the last patch, including adding nobility titles and some other nice features. I will release the new version sometime in early summer.
 
I am still working on the mod. I have fixed the crashing problem when demolishing the outpost but not any other bugs with it. I will add it to my list of things to look into. No guarantee that I will be able to fix it though.

I have made quite a few changes to the mod since the last patch, including adding nobility titles and some other nice features. I will release the new version sometime in early summer.
Looking forward to any future update! Such a stupendous mod, can never get enough of it :grin:
 
Looking forward to any future update! Such a stupendous mod, can never get enough of it :grin:
I am glad you are enjoying it. I will have some time this summer to complete and release this version. I should have mentioned in my previous post that the fix for the fort demolition was coded by Tocan, the creator of the Tocan's Calradia mod.
 
August 2 2022 update: you may be pleased to know that I am still working on the major update. I had to take some time off modding to move to a new place and have since gotten a newer, better PC thanks to my dad, who gave me his "old" pc due to just getting a new one. Anyway, I hope to complete the next version soon and will post it on ModDB as usual.

I have found that my new pc doesn't seem to like enabling "textures on demand" and crashes on menus but not in battles or on the world map. The error is "rgl error on creating shaders: out of video memory." It's kind of weird, I know, since it is usually recommended to enable textures on demand. I have battles set to 270 and they run quite well with no lag and little impact on frame-rate. Unticking load on demand textures seems to stop the error without any noticeable change in performance.

I expect that there are still some Warband players out there and some who follow this mod. This next release will likely be the last major update I make, excepting any fixes that might be needed.
 
Looking forward as ever!
I am glad there are still a few Warband players out there. I am getting closer to release and have worked out some of the issues with my new PC. It still doesn't like loading textures on demand so I don't use that option. The mod runs smoothly at a battle size of 250. I have made the main changes and only a few other things remain:
1. In version 3, I allowed the player to choose his starting culture and this would determine which troops the player got when becoming a king. In this update I will create an additional culture choice at start ("foreigner to Calradia") that when selected, will give the player custom troop trees when they become king. These troops are already in the game as custom troops that you can get when you build a barracks in your castle or town. The new option will give them to you when you become king.
2. I am considering increasing the number of lords/ladies for the 3 smaller factions from 10 lords to 20 lords. I have two reasons for this. One, this will prevent these factions from getting wiped out early in the game. Two, this will permit me to initialize their aristocracy without having to use the additional code that I used before. The downside to adding another 10 lords to those factions is that some of them will be landless lords unless I were to add another 10 settlements, which I am not planning to do since I would like to release this before the year's end. I will want to play test this to make sure it doesn't cause any issues, like a large number of lord defections, which would defeat my purpose and also strengthen the already normal sized factions.
3. I haven't decided on whether to complete the invasion script. It depends on how much time I have to work on it. I am heading into the busiest time of the season for my job and don't know how much time I will have to add this.
4. I have made a number of improvements to troop trees and equipment, especially for the Khergiz and Geroians. I will post some screenshots over at the ModDB site and perhaps here too.
 
Update: Jan. 26, 2023
I had planned to complete the new version by the end of 2022 and here we are in the last days of January. I have finished the majority of changes and have mainly been working on optimization of the mod to make it run a bit better. I seem to have resolved the crashing problem with my newish PC. I think it was caused by too many meshes/materials/textures in the BRF files. I deleted all the unused ones and that seems to have done the trick. I don't forsee being able to complete it today but the good news is that I have some free time the next few weeks to complete the mod and put together my list of changes and new credits. Some of the changes I listed in my posts above this. It seems that a few of us are still playing Warband so it seems worthwhile to complete this version and release it as soon as I can.

I should note that the last big change I still want to make is to improve the behavior of horse archers so they don't just charge into the melee. I had hoped that the PBOD skirmish mode would solve this issue but it doesn't appear to do so. It works for foot archers and others flagged as guarantee_ranged but doesn't seem to work for horse archers. If anyone knows of some newish code that will fix this issue, let me know. I have been searching the forums here but haven't had much luck. There is some coding used in Prophecy of Pendor that might work. The behavior of all mounted troops could use some work, in my opinion. Sometimes they seem to work properly in terms of riding past the infantry and attacking the archers and some times they just charge headlong into the infantry formation. Anyway, I am still working on the mod and making progress.
 
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Update: Jan. 26, 2023
I had planned to complete the new version by the end of 2022 and here we are in the last days of January. I have finished the majority of changes and have mainly been working on optimization of the mod to make it run a bit better. I seem to have resolved the crashing problem with my newish PC. I think it was caused by too many meshes/materials/textures in the BRF files. I deleted all the unused ones and that seems to have done the trick. I don't forsee being able to complete it today but the good news is that I have some free time the next few weeks to complete the mod and put together my list of changes and new credits. Some of the changes I listed in my posts above this. It seems that a few of us are still playing Warband so it seems worthwhile to complete this version and release it as soon as I can.

I should note that the last big change I still want to make is to improve the behavior of horse archers so they don't just charge into the melee. I had hoped that the PBOD skirmish mode would solve this issue but it doesn't appear to do so. It works for foot archers and others flagged as guarantee_ranged but doesn't seem to work for horse archers. If anyone knows of some newish code that will fix this issue, let me know. I have been searching the forums here but haven't had much luck. There is some coding used in Prophecy of Pendor that might work. The behavior of all mounted troops could use some work, in my opinion. Sometimes they seem to work properly in terms of riding past the infantry and attacking the archers and some times they just charge headlong into the infantry formation. Anyway, I am still working on the mod and making progress.
About the horse archery thing from Pendor, I think I know,which one it is. I've tested it and it works very well (raising horse archery skill on troops never hurts either), but it requires some fine tuning of the values that control speed and distance to work properly
When I implemented it in my homemade module, the horse archers would just trot instead of actually galloping or at least riding fast, and they would both circle too close to my troops, and take too long to evade them if they approached. I can't remember now as it has been a couple years, but after working on some values used on the calculations, it worked very well, and suddenly Khergits were very deadly. Something about a wheel of archers surrounding you while a wave of armored lancers crashed into your army was just terrifying to watch
 
About the horse archery thing from Pendor, I think I know,which one it is. I've tested it and it works very well (raising horse archery skill on troops never hurts either), but it requires some fine tuning of the values that control speed and distance to work properly
When I implemented it in my homemade module, the horse archers would just trot instead of actually galloping or at least riding fast, and they would both circle too close to my troops, and take too long to evade them if they approached. I can't remember now as it has been a couple years, but after working on some values used on the calculations, it worked very well, and suddenly Khergits were very deadly. Something about a wheel of archers surrounding you while a wave of armored lancers crashed into your army was just terrifying to watch
I will have to take another look at the code. I assume this is part of formations AI rather than PBOD. Thanks for the info.
 
I think it was caused by too many meshes/materials/textures in the BRF files. I deleted all the unused ones and that seems to have done the trick.
Creating texture atlases also helps at that.

I should note that the last big change I still want to make is to improve the behavior of horse archers so they don't just charge into the melee. I had hoped that the PBOD skirmish mode would solve this issue but it doesn't appear to do so. It works for foot archers and others flagged as guarantee_ranged but doesn't seem to work for horse archers. If anyone knows of some newish code that will fix this issue, let me know. I have been searching the forums here but haven't had much luck. There is some coding used in Prophecy of Pendor that might work. The behavior of all mounted troops could use some work, in my opinion. Sometimes they seem to work properly in terms of riding past the infantry and attacking the archers and some times they just charge headlong into the infantry formation. Anyway, I am still working on the mod and making progress.
I recall some work there at TLD but can't really tell what they did. Their work is OSP though (in case you didn't knew this already).
 
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