SP Medieval [WB] 1257AD Heart of Europe - Historical mod from 13th Century NEW RELEASE!

[Raudentius]

1257AD Heart of Europe (for Mount&Blade known as 1257AD Middle Europe)

[size=24pt][size=24pt]7. 2. 2014 - New full release for WB 1154+!!![/size]

Download new full release 1.0 for WB 1.154+ here:

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http://www.nexusmods.com/mbwarband/mods/3766/?tab=2&navtag=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nexusmods.com%2Fmbwarband%2Fajax%2Fmodfiles%2F%3Fid%3D3766&pUp=1

My music colection for better historical feeling! New release! - download here:

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http://mountandblade.nexusmods.com/mods/3765

Mod description:
1257AD Heart of Europe is a mod set in the proper historical setting (as opposed to the Native's alternative fantasy setting) in the year 1257. It is the independent sequel from the original 1257 AD Middle Europe for original Mount & Blade. Year is the same, but we will separate from big 1257ad "family" and create our  independent mod. The ultimate goal of the mod is to provide absolute historical accuracy within the gameplay framework similar to the Native with many improvements and tweaks, new units and textures and many more. We currently preparing to release full version.

Features:

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New map
New 6. factions
New troop tree
Historicaly corect lords
Every lord have unique equipment
New Ladies and NPC
New mercenaries
New bandits with Bosses
New companions
New items
New banners
New tournaments
Books are renamed into realistic Latin form
Economy improvements
Better recruiting system
New troop tree for player faction
Changing of equipment for player faction troops
Court Chancellor, Chamberlein.... (If you play as ruler or lord)
Some new texts
Productive enterprizes in towns
Diplomacy
Pre Battle Orders
Battlefields tactics
Bank of Caladria
Deployable Pavise
etc.

Credits:

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Gameplay:
Native Mod Compilation - Full 1.0 BETA 2 by Bismarck
"Battlefield Tactics Kit" by motomataru
"Bridge Battle" by Arch3r
"Custom Commander" by rubik
"Deployable, destructible pavise" by Cartread
"Diplomacy" by Waihti
"Duel Kit v0.5" by MartinF
"Garnier's Bank of Calradia"
"Module System" by Taleworlds
"Pre-Battle Orders and Deployment Kit" by Caba`Drin
"Training Fields" by lucky lancer
"Warband Entrenched" by Tempered
"Historic castle project" by Adorno
Models and textures:
Faradon
Pino
Thick1988
Silverwolf
Wanderer949
Narf
Talak
Dejawolf
Maw
Iboltax
Mackie
"topfhelm itempack" by tf
BossBob88
Lord Szentgyorgyi
Martiin
Resurr3ction
Dia151
Sorry if I forgot somebody!

Historical description:

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The year is 1257 and the realm forged by Přemysl Otakar II. of Bohemia is ever more powerful. Southwards the lands of Ostarrichi, Steiermark and Adriatic Coast were gained by Přemysl due to skillful diplomatic efforts and marital union and just two years ago Přemysl led the Crusade against Lithuanian and Prussian pagans in hope to create lands stretching from Baltics to Adriatic sea which gained Přemysl allies among the Teutonic knights who founded the Königsberg castle in his name. Přemysl is now in a position when he hopes for being elected the Emperor himself!

The feat which might not be easy to pull off due to the numerous enemies both within and outside of the Reich. For one Béla IV. of Hungary raised claims for the Ostarrichi and Steiermark and tried to take the land by force. The stalemate eventually led to Béla renouncing the claims of Ostarrichi and keeping part of Steiermark for himself. That was 4 years ago however and it is likely that the Hungarian king won't settle for just a piece of what he believes is righfully his! Hungary might have been recently devastated by the Tatar invasion but it is already recovering and stands strong - a mighty opponent for the Czech king indeed in the struggle of Middle European hegemony.

To the west the rest of the Holy Roman Empire in which the Bohemian king acted as one of the Kurfirsts - the electors of the German kings. The turomil within the Empire is great indeed and it could not yet prove its true power. The German Emperor Frederick II. died in 1250 thus deciding the civil war in favour of the Wilhelm von Holland who was elected anti-king in 1247 after the Frederick's excommunication. Wilhelm himself however died just previous year and yet two other kings were elected starting another round of civil war - Richard of Cronwall and Alfonso el Sabio, the king of Castille. Neither however is present in person in the Empire and they tend to their own matters in their respective homelands. The Reich thus experiences kind of power vacuum and is not yet in position to endanger its neighbours. The situation which might change rapidly however!

Polish principalities, once united as a kingdom, are now engaged in petty wars with the Henryk II Pobożny was killed during the disastrous battle of Legnica during the last Tatar invasion (1241) and ever since the Poland is in disarray with neighbouring kingdoms biting pieces of the land for themselves with little opposition. Bolesław Wstydliwy did little to improve the situation and even his alliance with Halych and Hungarian Béla IV. against Přemysl Otakar II. of Bohemia did not gained him any good. It was him who invited the German settlers to Silesia and Teutonic knights to the northern lands to protect againsst Lithuaniana and Prussian pagans. The Polish High Duke would need to strenghten his domestic position first if he is to hope for playing any role in upcoming power struggle.

Lithuanian Grand Duchy is officially catholic country for 4 years now with the Mindaugas being crowned king in 1253. The people however are largely pagan and the Teutonic knights remain sworn enemies ever growing in power. The Kingdom of Galicia being vassal of the Tatar horde engages seldomly in the matters of the Middle European realms but its dynastic ties with Poland and ambitions for power of their king Daniel might play significant role in the future. The safe haven cannot be found even in Northern Italy which might soon see yet another attempt of the Imperial forces to retake the cities and sieze the iron crown of Itlay along with the riches of the city of channels - Venexia!

Factions:
Kingdom of Bohemia
Kingdom of Poland
Kingdom of Hungary
Lithuania
Teutonic and Danish Crusaders
Holy Roman Empire


Map:

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Ingame pictures:

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Troop trees (Units pictures)

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Team:
Raudentius - creator, troop editing, texturing, research...
Resurr3ction - coding, map creator, research...
BossBobb88
dia151 - texturing, banners
Vankod - coding, bug fixing

 

[joseph590]

best of luck 

 

[Temuzu]

Looking good.

 

[Jock]

Good luck, looking neat so far!

 

[SMST]

Great campaign map. Not so crowded like the ones you usually see in such mods.

Some suggestions:
"Munchen","Wurzburg" and "Nurnberg" would be actually "München", "Würzburg" and "Nürnberg". If you can't create "ü"s, you can transcript it to "Muenchen" etc. Also, "Venexia" would be "Venezia"/"Venecia" in Italian.

Other than that, it looks great! Good luck to you!

 

[Raudentius]

Great campaign map. Not so crowded like the ones you usually see in such mods.

Some suggestions:
"Munchen","Wurzburg" and "Nurnberg" would be actually "München", "Würzburg" and "Nürnberg". If you can't create "ü"s, you can transcript it to "Muenchen" etc. Also, "Venexia" would be "Venezia"/"Venecia" in Italian.

Other than that, it looks great! Good luck to you!

Thanks! Of course, this is only first version of our map, we fix this small bugs.

 

[Resurr3ction]

Great campaign map. Not so crowded like the ones you usually see in such mods.

Some suggestions:
"Munchen","Wurzburg" and "Nurnberg" would be actually "München", "Würzburg" and "Nürnberg". If you can't create "ü"s, you can transcript it to "Muenchen" etc. Also, "Venexia" would be "Venezia"/"Venecia" in Italian.

Other than that, it looks great! Good luck to you!

Thanks for suggestions, but...

Diacritics is not possible and I am unaware of the 'ü' being transcripted as 'ue'. It does not sound right either...

Venexia is correct for Venice in Middle Ages (13th century). Venezia and Venecia are later alternatives although the sound of the name is more or less the same, it's just the orthography what differs.

 

[SMST]

Thanks for suggestions, but...

Diacritics is not possible and I am unaware of the 'ü' being transcripted as 'ue'. It does not sound right either...

Well, it is a common transcription. It sounds right to me (though I have no idea how you would pronounce "ue") and it is considered standard in Germany and internationally, as far as I am concerned. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_alphabet#Umlauts)

I'm sorry, but this is kinda important to me. I am from München.

Venexia is correct for Venice in Middle Ages (13th century). Venezia and Venecia are later alternatives although the sound of the name is more or less the same, it's just the orthography what differs.

Well, I've found that on the Wikipedia Page. Proves you right, in fact, the name seems still to be in use in Venetian dialect.

 

[kuauik]

všechno nejlepší ! at se daří

 

[dia151]

nice you got new map , units, items, ehat about features ?

 

[Jock]

The ultimate goal of the mod is to provide absolute historical accuracy within the gameplay framework similar to the Native with many improvements and tweaks, new units and textures and many more.

I think that means a rather large change in gameplay like arrow damage, horses (weaker?), spears stronger(?) etc. Least I hope so.

 

[eliasW]

hey this looks good! good luck!

 

[dia151]

is this mod going to couse major lags liek ad 1257 , do you take care for that?
i see that map is pretty detailed, and there are descent amount of factions

 

[Resurr3ction]

2SMST: Interesting. My only concern is that it would be inconsistent with our naming policy because we don't use diacritics (is it's not possible) and substitute the special letters with regular ones. I might consider changing the German names in this way though since we used the Medieval digraph orthography for Czech already. Hungarian did not evolve that much afaik in this respect and Polish uses digraphs till today although we again could not use many of its special letters... but Raudentius know Polish a bit and we're both history geeks so I believe we got those names right.

As for the München according to wiki the name is derivative of "Munichen" which might be a good name provided it's just few decades from the alleged founding?

2dia151: Many are under development but I cannot properly engage in the mod due to RL issues. We also discuss a lot of them still so giving you detailed list would make no sense as it will yet change significantly.

As for the lag unless you lag in the Native you won't have a problem. Number of factions is native +1. Number of lords is the same. The map is of Native size with slightly more villages than in Natives and one extra city (Zendar = Venice ). Maybe a bit more forest which is btw historically placed* (yes, we are that geeky about historical accuracy). Even troop trees are kept relatively simple and in line with what was proved concept in vanilla. The aim was to make the learning curve as smooth as possible and use the proved concept rather than venturing into unknown finding ourselves with ****load of bugs and imbalances humanly impossible to fix. So that's our design perspective.

King of Scotland Native framework means that we know that how are things balanced in Native they work pretty well. Combat tweaks etc. will come later after the initial (at least Beta) release. The 13th century is the century of heavy cav domination - the knights. In fact the biggest knight battles were fought by Přemysl Otakar II. (Kressenbrun, Dürknut) in this exact time and place. Overally we'll have to testit extensively first and make balances based on that. I used to be quite fond of the Realism Combat sub-mod for 1257 AD for original MB with armour really matter etc. Unfortunately the way the weapons were used back then is VERY different to the way they are portrayed (romantically I'd say) in the game and most movies. That makes making combat realistic quite tough.


*The forests should be almost double their current size but the map would lag like hell even when being vanilla size.

 

[Tapase]

Yay looking great. [; But... >: what about theutonic order? Cant u put them here? ; P also google "warmia and mazury castles". (:

 

[Raudentius]

Of course, teutons are allready done! As minor faction.

To our tweaks:
1)More recruits in every village (better playability for minor factions - Venice, Teutons and Lithuania)
2)More money from tournaments
3)More money from owning vilages, castles and cities
4)Starting animation will be removed
5)More money from lords ransom

This tweaks are already done. We plane much more changes, for example tournaments will be only jousting, no this native nonsense with bows, crossbows etc.

 

[Jock]

Suggestion : Scottish Mercenaries perhaps...?

 

[Raudentius]

He He, nice try King of Scotland!!! Actual situation in mercenaries: Crusader Sergeant (inf. base unit) upgrade into Hospitaler or Templar Knights (Both orders have comends in Bohemia, Hungary and Poland). Merchant Cavalryman (base unit) upgrade into Mercenary crossbowman (Final elite ranged unit) or Mercenary Squire (cav.). From Squire into Mercenary Knights(Heavy cav.) or Mercenary Noble Retainers(Heavy cav.). Every units have new equipment and new stats. I plane upgrade of this system and create much more local mercenary units. But Scottish mercenaries...... Maybe in western part of HRE?

 

[Jock]

But Scottish mercenaries...... Maybe in western part of HRE?

They could be found in few spots, HRE would do, just add them.

 

[Cruger]

Merchant Cavalryman (base unit) upgrade into Mercenary crossbowman (Final elite ranged unit) or Mercenary Squire (cav.). From Squire into Mercenary Knights(Heavy cav.) or Mercenary Noble Retainers(Heavy cav.)

What? Just what? A mercenary horseman upgrades into a mercenary crossbowman and a mercenary squire, and furthermore becomes a mercenary knight?

First of all, horses were not excatly cheap. If a mercenary had a horse he would never in a million years choose a crossbow over that. Crossbows were a common weapon that most lowclass peasants had, while a horse were something that you would only get if you had money to throw around, or stole it. It should be the other way around: Crossbowman -> Horseman

Second of all. Squires, Knights etc. are feudal ranks. Making such thing as a mercenary squire/knight is a paradox. First of all because a knight was a landover (which a mercenary was not), and a squire was a knights backup, shield bearer, apprentice or whatever you want to call it. Secondly because a mercenary that could afford such equipment that what a knight would wear, wouldn't bother to be a mercenary.

But Scottish mercenaries...... Maybe in western part of HRE?

They could be found in few spots, HRE would do, just add them.

I'm pretty sure the use of Scottish mercenaries hadn't reached it's zenith yet.