Hmm, the reason why I think you are taking this seriously is: Your below answer explains what is dishonorable and what is not.
Hanakoganei said:
Because you're causing problems for the villagers. Think about it, somebody with an army comes to your village, destroys your homes and livelyhood, probably steals what food and cattle you had left. There's nothing honorable about it. Anyway if you have high honor from doing other things like helping other villages and rescuing lords, it shouldn't matter too much.
Once again, I know that robbing poor people is an evil thing, no problem with that. I do not do bad things in real life, that's for sure.
Just the below answer:
Hanakoganei said:
While I see your point of view, that's not really necessary for this submod and would be additional work on my part. Not only are there ways around it, like sending your companions away on a mission while you raid, but you can get other submods in the form of .txt tweaks that can edit this stuff for you.
was enough to explain why you do not think of applying my suggestion. I admit it was an irrelevant suggestion from the beginning, but none can blame me for trying.
But, anyway, let's not go over this on and on.
So, I am waiting your submod and but I want to ask just one final question: Will you modify the levels of troops? Sometimes it may be bothersome to train high level troops. But again, I remember a post Leifdin wrote that he mentions he can train high levels troops easily. If you think this way, I will assume the levels of troops will not be modified.
Actually yes all of the troops will be new. I didn't just change the existing troops. I deleted all of them and replaced them with new ones. That's also what I did with the items. I deleted them all and re-added the ones I wanted one-by-one after checking the models in OpenBRF.
And you won't need to "train" or upgrade troops in this submod at all. When you recruit new troops, you receive them as-is, meaning you won't get recruits that you have to level up to turn into swordsmen, who you need to level up into veteran swordsmen, etc. You get "Swordsmen", and there won't be "Novice Swordsmen", "Veteran Swordsmen" or "Elite Swordsmen". It's just "Swordsmen." Emphasis on the role in combat, not the level.
To quote the first post on the front page:
There will be no more "filler" troops (recruit -> veteran -> elite). All troops are recruited as-is [...] and can be freely changed into other roles as necessary...
I used the Upgrade function (for now, I could refine this into a more professional menu later on) to allow units to switch roles when outside of combat. In the dialog menu when you talk to them there will be an option that gives them a huge amount of experience, allowing the Upgrade button to be active just in case you make a mistake and want to re-organize your troops. They'll also still earn experience normally. But the idea is that you should be able to tailor your army as necessary. If you think you need more of one troop that other units can change into, just tell them to change into that. If you don't need them anymore, you can tell them to change back.
For example, a Swadian Crossbowman can "upgrade" into a Swadian Spearman and vice versa. They have the same level, skills and proficiency. The logic is that both crossbow and spear weapons are easy to teach even to peasant fighters and militia, as long as they can follow some basic principles of discipline. So when the Crossbowman changes roles, he drops his crossbow and bolts in exchange for a spear, which is great if you need more people to help stop a cavalry charge. If you get tired of that, you can switch them all back to the Crossbowman role outside of battle.
Another example is the Nord Axeman, who uses an axe and shield (often with throwing axes too), can switch roles to a Nord Spearman, who uses a throwable spear, a shield and a sword instead. Both the Nord Axeman and Nord Spearman can also switch to a Nord Archer, dropping their throwable weapons in exchange for a bow and some arrows. Their stats are all the same because it's the same guys, just using different equipment. That's why I'm confident that Leifdin will not be disappointed in the Archers, and he can have as many archers as he wants in his Nord army. If too many of the Axemen and Spearmen have died and you need to get more, you can tell some of the Archers to switch back into either role.
As a bonus, you can stick all three types into a shield wall and it'll be spewing all kinds of missiles out from it, being both an aggressive and defensive formation at once.
As a disclaimer, not all roles can be switched into. Specialist roles, like the Swadian Longbowman, can't be switched into or out of.
There are also a lot of "irregular" troops. Irregular means they're kinda like mercenaries, except that they have a loyalty to your faction, unlike mercenaries, who you will find fighting for any side. Irregulars are not part of the professional army, though you still pay them while they're in your party. They are more likely to be found in villages, while the "regulars" are more likely to be found in castles. The irregular troops can't switch into regular roles, and regulars can't switch into irregular roles. Irregulars, however, tend to perform special functions. For example:
The Swadian Ranger is an irregular troop who is good at both archery and hand-to-hand combat, unlike the normal swadian archers (Longbowman). They're faster and have better equipment than the Longbowmen, but are not quite as well-trained in archery, so Longbowmen will still be more effective at a range. The role that Rangers play on the battlefield is up to the player, but you can besiege a castle with purely Rangers if you want, since they'll do okay even if you charge up the ladders right away. You can also set them up as ambush or flanker units, since they're fast.
The Rhodok Mountain Halberdier is a heavy infantry unit with a large "mountain halberd" (think of the Landsknechte in Floris Expanded). They're excellent frontline troops, and can stop cavalry and infantry charges alike if you need to defend your soft and squishy Rhodok Crossbowmen, who are regular units. If you want to be a bit more aggressive, you can have the Mountain Halberdiers switch into Mountain Vanguard units, who drop the halberd for a lighter pike, allowing them to move forward faster to charge the enemy lines.
The Sarranid scout is an ultra-light cavalry unit. They are the fastest riders in the game, and carry a very light crossbow that can be used on horseback, though they're terrible at shooting while riding. They have two possible uses in combat. You can use them in a group to taunt the enemy cavalry positions so they break formation, then ride back to the safety of your main force. Or you can use their speed to set them up at the enemy's flank, optionally order them to dismount, get them in formation and start shooting volleys into the enemy position.
If the recruitment system isn't clear yet, here's how it works:
When you go to a village to recruit volunteers, you'll get a bunch of troops in a number and balance based on that village's faction. This mod will be very difficult so I think it's okay to have "fully upgraded" troops come out of villages and castles.
An example setting might be the ability to recruit from one village:
0-3 Swadian Rangers
1-8 Swadian Longbowmen
2-10 Swadian Spearmen
0-2 Swadian Man-at-Arms
Or from one castle:
0-1 Swadian Rangers
3-8 Swadian Longbowmen
4-12 Swadian Spearmen
2-5 Swadian Man-at-Arms
0-1 Swadian Knights
These numbers and troop types are not yet final, as I'm still studying the balance and feel, and of course the fun factor for each faction. Again, you can switch some of those units into other roles.
I'm working on getting rid of the recruitment fees (should be easy but I haven't touched that part of the scripts yet), so that you won't feel bad about letting troops that don't fit your army go. That is, if a bunch of Rangers show up at a village for you to recruit, but you don't use Rangers since they don't fit into your tactics, you can just fire them so you have space to hire more of the other units.
This submod will be unlike any mod you've ever played for Warband. It'll be much more like a RTS game. You can get troops quickly but if you make a mistake in your tactics, you'll lose them quickly too. I highly encourage the player not to participate in combat in fact, so he can pay attention to his lines and formations, to see whether he should retreat, reform, or whatever. Some people might find this boring lol. But yeah, that's what I find interesting so that's what I'm doing.
Oh, I love that Nord switching! Currently, it takes quite lot of effort to balance out my troops! However, with that, it's gone! Also I think that gives a lot of advantage- if you make a mistake and let your archers to get wiped out, you can just rearrange your army!
Yes exactly! In real life, a lot of these warriors knew how to do more than one thing. It isn't too hard to learn how to hold a shield up and stay in formation, and some of them were probably hunters or did archery for fun when they weren't at out at war so they knew how to throw spears or shoot a bow. It makes sense that if you take a look at your army before a battle and you realize you need more archers, you can tell a bunch of them to bring out their bows for the next fight instead of lining up in front with the spearmen.
All of the switchable classes have logical possible alternate roles.
There is actually already an option for this somewhere in floris, it's a box that you can check mark that disables all companion complaints.
coolchucky said:
One suggestion for your submod Hanakoganei: Why don't you omit companion reactions and honor loss for raiding a village.
why is raiding the village without physically harming the villagers dishonorable?
WAKE UP!!
We are not in the game anymore..
Ok, now I guess you are awake so you will definitely understand we are talking about some kind of computer game, named Mount & Blade: Warband where you ride a horse and swing some kind of deadly weapon to kill your enemies.
Aaaahh, what am I talking about.. You probably play this game for trading. I guess you have never played GTA or Total War or Call of Duty etc.
In a game where people are sold to slavery, we can assume raiding people costs no honour loss. Both are as same dishonorable actions as to me..
I obviously cannot argue with that sort of logic. I tip my fedora to you, sir.
Back on topic, while you've been going through the items, have you considered fixing the scabbard problem?
http://floris.wikia.com/wiki/Issue_item_drawn_still_in_scabbard
picture example - warning, it's wide.
Pretty much all one handed swords do this. I think the easiest way to fix it would to just remove them all and replace them with the vanilla ones. (Which, I personally think were higher quality anyway). There's also just fixing the scabbards themselves.http://forums.taleworlds.com/Themes/TWcurve/images/bbc/spoiler.gif
I guess I could do it myself... But I don't really want to
I need to kill my mount and blade addiction anyway
so I don't really blame you if you don't want to do it either.
Well alright. I'm going to make a comprehensive list of all the weapons with non working sword scabbards, since it's a pretty easy task. And here that is.
That's it. I'm not sure if it's all of them, actually. But I did go through each of these and they all did the same thing
Well, there's a few different ways to fix this.
1) Remove Show Holster When Drawn for the following items
RESULT: Item still has a scabbard, the scabbard disappears after you pull the weapon out.
2)Remove the scabbard completely by using the weapon's mesh for it's scabbard mesh, don't show holster when drawn.
RESULT: Weapon has no scabbard at all.
4) Fix the model/mesh so that there is an empty scabbard when it is drawn.
RESULT: Clear skies and happy days.
Okay, I'll see what I can do about that. I have not played the game yet with the edited items so I dunno yet which ones are affected, though I did use a lot of the Native skins. I'll go through each of them to see which ones have the issue. I don't need to remove the ones that aren't broken, and like I said I culled the list of items down, especially the swords, quite a bit. There's a lot of spears (most of the spears were left in) but not a lot of swords because frankly most of them looked alike, and I didn't feel the need to have 5 different versions of a sword that had similar dimensions and appearance. The spears, axes and blunt weapons all had sufficiently different appearances that merited having most of them stay, because a longer spear = better reach but likely to be slower and heavier, or an axe with a bigger blade might do more cutting damage. Luckily these weapons don't have holsters.
I'll work on that after I finish working on the scripts and whatnot. It's much easier to fix cosmetic stuff than buggy scripts that are supposed to be core features or otherwise break the game lol.
Now, on troop balance:
I'm trying to make the Nord Spearmen balance out and be particularly useful for certain roles. This question is mostly for Leifdin, who I consider the foremost Nord fanboy here, but anybody with an opinion is welcome to answer too.
For the Nord Spearmen, which of the following equipment choices would you prefer?
A. Very long spear, sword, shield, chance of javelins
B. Very long spear, sword, shield, no javelins
C. Guaranteed javelins, sword, shield
D. A single throwable short spear, sword, shield
Here are the implications and why it's an issue of balance:
The really long spears (194-210 weapon length) are obviously the best choice against cavalry charges, which are the only real weakness of the Nords right now since they seem to be able to resist archers and skirmishers. Giving them some javelins in addition seems unnecessary as they're likely to be surrounded by other units with missile weapons like the Axemen and Archers, so they should instead focus on their role of holding the spears up to stop cavalry or infantry charges.
Option C gives them javelins instead of a long spear, making them particularly effective against infantry and somewhat effective against cavalry if you time the throws, as the game will consider them to be archer type units, you'll therefore be able to issue volley firing orders.
Option D is my favorite however. The throwable spear is 121 length and a good melee weapon, being decent against both infantry and cavalry, with good speed as a melee weapon (109 speed) and decent damage (25 pierce on thrusts), and of course usable with a shield. You can issue orders for them to hold their fire to force them to use it as a melee weapon, and issue the order to use ranged to make your troops use them as throwing weapons. Even though it's only one shot, a well-timed throw can cripple or even wipe out a cavalry force. This makes them very versatile.
Frankly I'm leaning towards either options B or D. There is an irregular troop for the Nords called the Nord Raider, who I want to specialize as an aggressive infantry unit with javelins. You can deploy these guys outside of the shield wall to attack the enemy from the flank. They'll come in charging with spears flying in first to wreak havoc similar to what the Berserkers can do (though the Berserkers are much more vicious).
For reference, the standard Nord formation right now is an even mix of Nord Spearmen, Nord Axemen (with throwable and melee axes + shield) and Nord Archers (they also have swords and shields aside from their bows), comprising the majority of their army as light infantry/archer units. These guys will likely be used in a moving shield wall formation by the AI, and I recommend the same thing for the player. There are Huskarls (heavy armor, sword, shield) as officers who will also be in the shield wall, and Berserkers (heavy armor, two-hander weapons, one-hand/bastard weapon, shield) as elite troops that can join the shield wall or be deployed just behind it to charge the enemy when the shield wall closes with the enemy.
All factions have at least one officer unit, who I intend to script to help prevent units from leaving your army. A larger army needs more officers, or else people might get unruly and random events on the world map that I'll implement later on will start happening more often. These random events could include fights breaking out amongst your troops, or people complaining about various things like sleeping conditions or food, sometimes causing some of them to leave or even die. RP-wise, the officers could be dealing with these issues for you.
Smaller armies like 20 troops will not need officer units as you will be their officer. My intention is to make it so that every 30 or so troops, depending on the faction, will require 1 officer with them, or else they start messing up. Swadians require 1 officer per 30 troops. Khergits require 1 officer per 100. Typical army sizes are pretty big in this submod, with the player easily able to acquire 500 troops, with more based on Renown and other factors (NPC lords also get around this number, again depending on their faction and personality).
Leadership and maybe Charisma will play a role in how many officers you need, though I haven't started calculating how much this should affect it. I'm also considering adding an option for gender bias, for people that like that kind of challenge, so that male troops might get even more unruly if you're a female commander, requiring even more officers or higher Leadership and Charisma.
Mercenaries do not require officers, as they will follow orders and stay disciplined as long as you pay for their very expensive wages, which is why even some NPC lords will prefer mercs over their own faction's troops.
These guys are designed for slaughter, and will slay dozens of men before they die, if they even die. In the typical Nord army right now, these guys are who you're trying to protect with your shield wall, so that you can unleash them right into the enemy line. They are the best melee fighters in the game.
That isn't to say that the other Nord troops are not good at melee combat. But as pretty much legendary troops, the Berserkers really earned their status.
Thinking about this, which of the Spearman options would complement the Nord playstyle the most?
Hm, in my submod I made two types of spearmen, one with long spear and one with short one.(That's probably bit excessive use of the word "one" in one sentence). I think that short spears are bit better, because they can be used with shield which makes spearmen more tanky. However, I wouldn't resort to giving them one throwing spear and sword.(won't they switch to sword if you command them to use melee?). I would give them a throwing spear with melee item of that spear so they would actually carry one throwable, one for melee, shield and no sword(sometimes spearmen chaotically switch between spear and sword). I think that spear is quite good enough for general melee combat so they wouldn't need a sword.
Anyway, it's up to you. To answer the question, I like short spear and shield more than long spear(it also fits Warband style better; in real life, spears would be used offensively from behind a shieldwall, which is not something implemented in Warband)
So far if you tell them to switch to melee they seem to switch the spear into its melee form as long as you have a hold fire order in place, but you're right it's inconsistent. It doesn't guarantee that they'll switch to the spear, but I think there's some scripting from FormAI that makes them reconsider using the longest weapons in their inventory if the enemy is far away. From some behavior tests I did before, what seems to happen is they switch to swords when they get in sword range. Kinda like what the Landsknechte do.
I'm glad to hear you are considering the sword/scabbard issue. I actually thought this might be something that would interest you since a lot of the swords were duplicates to fit in the expanded troop tree tiers.
I'm quite excited either way, as you've re-done all the equipment by scratch.
I did a bunch of reshaping for some of the factions, especially the Rhodoks and Sarranids. I wanted the Rhodoks to feel a bit more different from the Swadians, and the Sarranids to feel different from the Khergits.
Right now the Rhodoks have a lot of spears (just like their supposed power in Native), with 3 different kinds of spearmen, and they also have a lot of crossbowmen. They also have good shields, with deployable pavise shields for the crossbowmen. Aside from having no cavalry, the main difference between them and the Swadians is the ability to use the spearmen for both aggressive offense and protection for your crossbowmen, while the Swadian spearmen are only for defense or follow-up offense when your cavalry and heavy infantry have already closed with the enemy.
Sarranids have their own knights now, who are up to par with Swadian Knights (historically there is a martial practice called furusiyya, which is similar to knightly training, with large emphasis on horsemanship and weapons). Aside from the existence of the Sarranid Knight, Sarranids also field heavy skirmishers, though they're not as well-armored as the Khergit heavy cavalry. This is in addition to the light skirmishers, which allows for more variety of formations and tactics because you can bring your heavy skirmishers much closer to the enemy lines than the lighter skirmishers of the Khergits. In practice, you can move 2 (or 4 with split troops) skirmish lines at different distances and angles from each other to make the enemy turn their shields one way while your lancers drive their wedge from the other side.
Right now all the 6 main factions seem to feel pretty good. I'm just gonna work on the Player Faction troops, mercs and bandits now before I continue working on the scripting parts.
What about insanely strong Varangian Guard for insane price?
Seriously, I suggest "specialist" mercenaries for each faction, or even better, combining influence of two factions into one unit; for example, Varangian Guard would be influenced by Nords and Vaegirs.
Way ahead of you lol. Varangians have indeed been included, and are some of the toughest mercs in the game and most expensive. In fact, each faction has at least 1 male and 1 female contribution to the mercenary pool.
Below is a teaser featuring some of the mercenaries and sword sisters I have planned. There's actually a fairly large number planned (at the moment, there are 16 male mercenaries excluding the Farmer, and 9 female mercenaries excluding the Peasant Woman, which is a lot considering the factions have an average of 5 troop types each), and more may be added later as I think of some other roles not currently covered.
Champions are junkies of the Swadian tournament circuit, skilled in all weapons but particularly fond of jousting. That said, they're very heavy cavalry units that crash through enemy lines and feel most at home when they're surrounded by the enemy.
Rogues are ultralight female knife fighters that use speed and agility to their advantage. They expertly throw knives and stab with them, and although they lack armor and would probably do terribly if you mix them in with your main force, you can use them as tactical troops, coming in from the enemy's flank to raid their archer lines.
Macemen are heavy infantry that wield heavy hammers. Really heavy hammers. They're the best purely blunt damage units in the game, so you might want to hire a lot of these if you want to get into the prisoner ransom business.
Amazons, based on the legendary Amazons who were traditionally placed around the border of the Scythian area of the Caucasus in the Eurasian steppes, are light cavalry female units that throw javelins. They ride very quickly, and are very useful as shock troops to lead the charge. Pull them back after they unload their javelins so your heavier cavalry can finish the job.
These Skirmishers are based on the skirmishers you'll find in the Khergit Horde, but with slightly better proficiencies (think of them as veterans that are looking for more lucrative work). They are the most effective horse archers in the game, so a faction that needs horse archers will do well to hire these guys.
Camp Defenders are a special female Khergit light cavalry unit. These are ideal rearguard units, with speed and both the ability to shoot a bow from horse and armed with slashing polearms, making them good for protecting other units from practically anything.
Ah, the Varangian Guard. Just imagine the ferocity of the Nord infantry. Now make them more elite, as a race of men bred for combat rather than vocational soldiers. That's what they are.
Shield Maidens are female troops, pretty much the female counterparts of the Varangian Guard.
Both these units are commonly found in large numbers together with some lords that really like elite heavy infantry. Kings will often hire them as personal guards and castle defenders.
Crossbowmen are based on the various Italian crossbowmen that sold their services to various kings and warlords in medieval times. They perform like the Rhodok Crossbowmen, complete with deployable pavise shields.
Sword Sisters are special female light infantry units armed with estocs and bucklers. The ideal duelist. The estoc is a powerful thrusting sword that's great against heavy armor, with good speed to match up against other fast duelist types like the Rogue or even Nord Raiders.
The real life Assassins were actually an army, although they did perform what we now call "assassinations", but to them was simply selective public killing of key figures. These Assassins are loosely based on that army. They're light cavalry with crossbows that can be reloaded on horse, armed also with slashing weapons or thrusting swords. The ideal way to use them is to use the horses to get them in position somewhere, then order a dismount so they can use the crossbows and fight on foot. They're very good at that.
Blade Dancers are female heavy infantry that use various scimitars, dressed in mail armor. While they are not based on any real world units, there are many historical warrior queens, princesses and even commoners known to have led armies and fought in Arabic, Persian and North African history.
Naturally it's up to the player to figure out how to deploy the various merc troops. I'm trying to make sure every conceivable role has a mercenary that can fill it, so if you want to have something that your faction currently lacks, mercs will fill that role for you.
Mercenaries can't switch roles to anything else, but many of them have various roles built-in, with role-switching simply being a matter of simply ordering them to do one thing or another while in battle or pre-battle orders. Good examples of this are the Ranger units, who can be told to put away their bows for a melee charge.
Yeah me too lol. I'm not even sure what my favorite faction is right now because they all seem so fun. A tactician's dream, etc.
- edit: Edited the front page with new information, and to clean it up using spoiler tags because there's much more walls of text now, and it looked very scary to read in just one go. @_@
Love the new variety of mercenaries you're adding to your troop trees. You're using pre-existing weapons and armors in the game for them, right? Or will you be adding in a few more OSP resources to give them even more customization?
I'm open to recommendations for new OSP stuff that would fit the theme, so no fantastic swords like Soul Edge or gunblades lol. Right now because I'm lazy I'm using only the stuff that exists in Floris. I don't really want to have to require additional files for download unless they're really really good or improvements to the existing stuff (bug fixes, retextures, feminized meshes, etc.), like Leifdin's stuff maybe.
Right now all the files are .txt files after compilation, and you simply need to back up the existing Floris files and copy paste the .txt files into the mod folder, or make a copy of the entire module folder so you can play normal Floris 2.54 and this mod as a new mod, because this will definitely not be save compatible with Floris 2.54.
The armors are pretty good in that. I might use some.
Btw I forgot to mention, the mercenaries in this submod are from the factions. They aren't wearing a mercenary uniform or anything. They're wearing the armors that belong to their faction of origin that the regular troops aren't wearing. Usually a neutral or different color, since the faction regulars tend to wear their faction colors or related. So a mercenary Skirmisher looks just like a Khergit Horde Skirmisher, except he isn't wearing purple, since purple/pink are the Khergit colors.
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