Post by Marlin on Oct 4, 2015 16:48:10 GMT -5
Original Rohan thread on Desura
(auto-locked due to the bizarre ways of the Desura forum, but you are of course very welcome to post comments here)
After his own links had stopped working, I previously reposted this and other mods by TBShunter on Desura (who, by the way, I think may be identical to the one just called Hunter on this forum; and should he let it be known that he disapproves, I will take all links down, obviously). I did it the way I had them in my own mods folder, though, which included a few fixes of obvious errors – except that I don't think I had made any changes at all to the Rohan mod.
However, when, only a few weeks ago, I took a closer look at the Rohan mod, I first realized that the annoying reference to "Dragon Terror" for what was supposedly the Horn of Helm Hammerhand could be fixed. So I decided to do that. Then, just when I was about to post that little update, I discovered a number of pretty serious other problems – with the Rohan weaponry and with other things – so I felt they too had to be fixed. Which turned out not to be so easy, even require "fixes to fixes". Eventually, I somehow got so caught up in fixing things that I even started messing with the graphics – adding new sprites and touching up existing ones.
I am really not sure that I should at all be some maintainer of these mods that aren't mine to begin with, but since I now made the fixes and additions that I did, I felt I may as well post them.
Before you unpack this zip file:
- I suggest you delete any older rohan folder you have in your mods folder (with old sprites for the mod), before unpacking the new version.
Or, if, for archiving purposes, you want to keep the original sprites, just rename that folder. Since the changes I made this time are so extensive, I've in any case decided to keep a link to the old version of the Rohan mod. (The link above is to the new version.) - The new zip file actually contains two variations of the mod – the one called simply rohan.c3m is meant to be just a corrected version of the original by TBShunter. The one called rohan_variant.c3m contains some further changes of mine, beyond what I could really claim to be mere corrections.
Both use the same images, including the banner by TBShunter, and to avoid confusion you'll probably want only one in your mods folder, ultimately. After testing them, perhaps, you could move or rename (change the c3m file name ending) one of them so that it no longer appears in the mods menu.
Corrections to the base version (rohan.c3m)
- The fear attack of the King of Rohan was annoyingly referred to as "Dragon Terror" before. Now corrected to Horn of Helm Hammerhand.* (See further note below.)
Plus, the sound of this attack has been changed to a horn sound (that of the Heavenly Horn, of harbingers). Note that the game effect is still the same as before, though (= the Dragon Terror of Elder Dragons), and if you prefer the standard fear sound, you can always change the wsound number for it back from 102 to 22. - The name type that TBShunter had given the few female characters in this mod was 38, Celtic Female. Unfortunately, that name type is empty, at least in v3.23. (The only "name" you'll get is "end".) So, I have changed the name type to 3, Anglo-Saxon Female, which works.
For consistency, I eventually decided to change the male name type to Anglo-Saxon as well. (From what I understand, Tolkien was in any case using old English for his Rohan names, so Anglo-Saxon would to me seem closer at hand than Celtic.)
Adapting or creating a specifically Rohan name type is unfortunately not possible, as name types are among the many things that aren't at all moddable. Of course, you can always manually enter the name Theoden for your king (instead of leaving it empty and let the game choose), and if you also play with the --rename switch, you can manually rename any princess you get to Eowyn, etc. - Units with lance charges will no longer simultaneously strike with their swords. Swords are used only in subsequent battle rounds. (On the other hand, the ability that TBShunter gave Rohirrim lancers to charge through friendly lines has, after some consideration, been kept in the base version – despite that it makes no sense to me either. See further the variant, below.)
Unfortunately, due to an apparent bug, this fix means Rohirrim lancers will no longer be able to replace their swords with magic weapons. (They can carry magic weapons, but they won't be used.) - As a workaround for the just mentioned problem, I have added "rituals" to allow commanders with a lance to shed the lance (and to later take it up again). Without the lance, a magic weapon will again work.
(On the plus side, if the magic weapon is really good, you may prefer it over the lance anyway.) - Units that made a lance charge and then got unhorsed would keep "reloading" their pike or sword, instead of fighting. (And, boy, did I bang my head against the wall before I figured that one out.) This is fixed through the workaround of adding a dummy attack, No Lance Charge, to the unhorsed units. It will look a bit odd, but will work as I think you'd expect it to.** (See further note below.)
- Unhorsed units with battle afflictions (chest wounds or never-healing wounds) could be prevented from ever getting back in the saddle. While there might be some realism to this, perhaps, it didn't at all feel satisfactory to me.
In order to get mounted again, they need to restore a certain amount of hit points, which was set equal to what previously was their full amount of hp's (as unhorsed). Unfortunately, hp-reducing battle afflictions will reduce also this hp amount (something I regard as a bug). My workaround here is to simply add a couple of extra hp's to the full amount of unhorsed units (above what will again make them mounted). Which will fix things in most cases. (Some few cases of very badly afflicted units being unable to get back in the saddle might still occur.)
Specifically, princesses, riders and banner bearers got +2 hp (from 6 to 8), captains and guardsmen got +3 hp (from 8 to 11), and king and queen got +4 (from 10 to 14) to their unhorsed versions. - The knightly hoof attack that TBShunter has given most of the mounted units of Rohan was never ever actually used in combat. This is fixed, and I eventually decided to have it strike every battle round (like with knights), since I am assuming that was the intention of TBShunter – even if, with lance & sword, the way the game's modding commands work, it requires a second hoof attack (it will again look a bit odd in the unit info box).*** (See further note below.)
- Purely for consistency between sprites and unit properties, I made the shields of the banner bearer and the princess large. They weren't before. (It shouldn't really matter much as these are rare units.)
As for unhorsed Rohan Riders, on the other hand, I changed the sprites rather than the unit properties. (I.e. the sprites now show the smaller shields of the riders.) - The 128×128 pixel sprite of the (mounted) banner bearer caused it to count as "huge" in battles (take up two positions in the battle line). Although I can't say with certainty that this wasn't intended by TBShunter, I am guessing not. To me, in any case, it seemed odd and unnecessary. So I cut the size of that sprite down somewhat (reduced its empty margins).
- Tidying and reworking of most other sprites as well. Some of the major changes include:
- All sprites for unhorsed units extensively reworked to make them look a bit more similar to their mounted counterparts, and also make their attack versions look a bit better.
- The Helminga lacked a separate attack sprite. Fixed.
- New, more distinct, attack versions also of Riddermark Militia and Shieldmaidens.
- The Riddermark Archer sprites both reworked.
- The Royal Guard also got extra editing.
- The Queen of Rohan has been given entirely her own sprites. (She previously was using the sprites of the king, which looked a bit odd.)
- The unhorsed Banner Bearer has also been given his own sprites.
- TBShunter had given his Rohan characters an extraordinary range of strength values – from the hobbit strength of 2 for his Wise Woman to the ogre strength of 7 for the King of Rohan. At the same time, oddly, there were no weapon bonuses given to any of them.
Although I should perhaps have refrained from messing with this in the base version (saving it for my variant) that's what I ended up doing anyway. So the Wise Woman has had her strength upped to 3, but she also got a −1 to her dagger attack (making her exactly the equal of the Old Wizard as far as close combat goes). The king of Rohan was weakened to a strength of 5, but he also got a +1 to his broadsword attacks. The characters with strength 5 or 6 were just weakened to a strength of 4 (which is what knights in the standard game have) with no change to weapon bonuses (still zero everywhere). They were as follows. Previous strength 6: Queen of Rohan, Rohan Captain, Royal Guard. Previous strength 5: Rider, Banner Bearer, Outrider. - Reduced the number of hit points of the Riddermark Archer from 6 to 5. The standard archer in the game has no more than 5 hp, and is otherwise tougher than what TBShunter made the Riddermark archer, so this has got to be a pure mistake. (Although I am suspicious of the 6 hp also of the militia, I left those alone.)
On the other hand, the Wise Woman got her hobbit amount of hit points (2 only) raised to 3. I also gave the Skirmisher one extra hit point (upped to 7 hp). The number of hp's given the weakest of the Rohan cavalry units seem overall a bit low to me, but I hesitate to mess with such a central part of the mod, except for this very small adjustment. The mere 6 hp that the skirmisher previously had seemed, to me, more fitting a hobbit on a pig. - The luck that the Princess can bestow on one ally each battle round was previously effected through the spell-casting of Fortune Magic at level 1. Now it's changed to a specific luck attack (counted as a "ranged attack" that can be freely used also in melee).
It still works exactly the same. (Except that the – highly hypothetical – possibility of upgrading the spell-casting of the princess, with a magic booster + library visit or spell scroll, no longer exists.) It just looks neater and more direct in the princess's info box.
It also will make things look much better in the queen's info box. The way it previously worked – since TBShunter has the princess lose her luck-bestowing ability upon being crowned queen – was the queen would in her info box retain a now irrelevant spell list. The change means there won't be any spell list in the info box of either princess or queen.
Entirely another question is how much sense it makes to have the queen lose so many abilities that she had as a princess – not only the luck-bestowing ability, but berserker trait and acute senses too – but I didn't mess with that in the base version – only in the variant. (As queen, she does gain a lot of abilities too, of course.) - Although, in his last note on his Rohan mod, TBShunter mentions having "updated the naming of rituals", he never seems to have gotten around to actually posting that update. There were no ritual names at all in his mod as posted. So I have now added some: "Coronation to King" is what the mastery of the Rohan Captain is now called. "Coronation to Queen" is the name I've given the mastery of the Rohan Princess.
Additional changes in the variant (rohan_variant.c3m) - Enforced uniqueness of the king – and also of any queen, if there is one.
This means that only one player can play Rohan. (Or, to be exact, only the last Rohan player will get a king. So if you play first, and you get a king, you instantly know that nobody else is Rohan.)
In case of more than one Rohan player in the game, all players will get a warning message in turn two (recommending a restart). - King and queen made immune to charm and enslavement. This is really just an ugly hack, and it's the reason I didn't include royal uniqueness already in the base version.
I would have very much preferred a way to instead remove the uniqueness of a charmed or enslaved unit (by having the charm/enslavement change it into a different type, a "Former King of Rohan"), but there is none provided in the modding interface. So, without this ugly hack, a Rohan player would be prevented from crowning a new, if losing his king/queen this way instead of by death. Which wouldn't seem right to me.
**** (More on royal uniqueness in note below.) - Coronation costs dramatically lowered. The cost for crowning a new king was 1000 gold, for crowning a queen, 500 gold. Now it's 300 gold for either.
I have really no firm idea what a fair and reasonable coronation cost should be. It's just that the costs set by TBShunter seemed too high to me.
If the coronation cost is what a player has to pay merely to recover from an early stroke of bad luck, then 300 gold is still a lot, I believe. If, on the other hand, it turns out that it's a feasible tactic to have kings deliberately suicide attack and replace them with new ones, then I obviously made coronations too cheap. - Also, the queen now keeps the luck bestowing ability and the acute senses that she had as a princess. She still loses the berserker ability when crowned.
- Lance charges through friendly lines disabled. Whereas I could dismiss sword strikes simultaneous with the lance charge as just a bug (fixed in the base version), it seems pretty clear, from comments in the mod if nothing else, that TBShunter really did intend for Rohirrim lancers to be able to charge from the second row (through the first one). So, I let that ability alone in the base version.
To me, however, lance charges through friendly lines just don't make any sense. Thus, in the variant, they are disabled (the long trait of the lances removed). I feel I have strengthened the Rohirrim in several other ways, so I don't feel at all bad about this decision. - The Outrider is now in the front rank, though behind any other front rank units. I couldn't quite make heads or tails of the outriders, the way TBShunter designed them. On the one hand, they're very tough melee fighters, not quite as tough as the near-knight class Riders, but tough. On the other hand, he made them mid-rank, meaning they would in most cases be little more than glorified horse archers.
Placing the outriders instead in the front rank, as flank troops, while allowing them to still fall back and use archery from behind other front rank troops whenever there is a full line of 20 of those, seems very natural to me. (It will, I'm sure, make them a more useful addition to the Rohirrim cavalry.) - The Rohan Princess and Riddermark Archers also leave melee to others in their rank when there is a full line of 20 of those. (The princess is still front rank, and the archers still mid rank.) These changes go further than what I did in my general Nimble Front mod (of units in the standard game), but they nevertheless felt reasonable to me.
Although the princess lacks the bow of the outriders, and although she is very good in melee (stronger than the outrider), she is more fragile than the ordinary Rider of the Mark and her value obviously extends beyond that of a mere melee fighter. Theme-wise, furthermore, she is (before being crowned queen) a royalty not leading any troops to whom she would have anything to prove. (And, of course, Eowyn, in the books, weren't supposed to fight at all.)
The ordinary foot archers are simply the worst of all the Rohan mid rank units in melee, by far, and this change will ensure that in particular any helmingas (which, in this mod, are just tougher archers) are always placed in front of them. - The Rohan Princess removed from recruitments. Random events will now have princesses emerge in Rohan towns, rather than have you recruit them for gold. (The recruitment of girls for the posts of princesses of Rohan just didn't seem entirely right to me.) The chance per turn is still only 1% – except if the Rohirrim have managed to get a second town, in which case the chance will be doubled. (With a third town it will be tripled, and so on. I also added a 1% chance of a princess in the King's Castle in the Monarchy era.)
- Other units will also spontaneously join the Rohirrim in Rohan settlements through random events. Outriders may come to any human settlement of up to village size – except cannibal villages, where Shieldmaidens can instead appear. In towns, militia, or even the odd banner bearer, may once in a while freely join, while in cities, advisers might occasionally side with the Rohirrim. (All of these units can be recruited too, though some only rarely.)
Primarily, I wanted Rohan to have access to a bit more outriders, now that they have become front rank troops, and rather than messing with recruitment frequencies and amounts, I thought it might be fun to have the outriders come from outlying parts of Rohan.
The amounts of extra free troops should be marginal, particularly in the early game (and in the later game, Rohan might possibly need a boost), and may furthermore be offset by the increases I made to costs of some key unit types. See next item. - Recruitment costs and frequencies revised. The frequencies of several recruitment offers were increased. So were the costs of some key unit types, however, although I lowered the costs of some more peripheral types.
- Rohan Captain: Frequency upped from 15% to 20% (making him as frequent as standard captains of other classes). Average gold price stays at 51 gold but resolved as 45+D10 instead of 40+D20. Iron price raised by 8, from only 2 to 10. (In all, price and frequency now very similar to that of the Baron's High Lord, just 5 gold less.)
- Rohan Priestess: Frequency upped from only 1% to 2%. Price raised from a mere 51 gold on average to 101 gold on average. (Though also see next item.)
- 5 helmingas: Iron price lowered by 10 to 15.
- 3 Riders: Gold price raised by 10 to 60. Iron price lowered by 5 to 20.
- 3 Royal Guardsmen: Gold price raised by 10 to 60. Iron price lowered by 15 to 60.
- 3 Outriders: Gold price raised by 10 to 50. Iron price stays at 5.
- Banner Bearer: Frequency upped from only 2% to 5%. Average gold price lowered from 31 to 21 (resolved as 15+D10, like a scout, instead of 20+D20). Iron price raised from 0 to 5.
- Wise Woman: Frequency upped from 3% to 5%. Average gold price lowered from 21 to 16.
- Adviser: Frequency upped from 1% to 2%. Average gold price lowered from 51 to 46 (resolved as 40+D10 instead of 40+D20).
- Magic items may now be brought by arriving Rohirrim spell casters. Priestesses will come with items about as often as the standard wizards do (except that the priestess cannot wear boots, so any boots will be lost). The wise woman has a 10% chance to come with a magic item.
The adviser has a 25% chance to come with a random magic item, plus he always comes with two level 1 spell scrolls (except when the random item replaces one of them).***** (See note below.)
It seemed to me that the Rohan class had more difficulties getting access to magic than perhaps even the standard baron class (not counting the Horn of Helm Hammerhand, of course). Recruitment offers from standard wizards (which come with magic items) were made more rare (if not abolished entirely), so the spell casters of the class will be mainly the Rohan priestesses – which didn't come with any magic items, and also were extremely rare. On top of that, of course, the way that the Rohan class is heavily cavalry based, almost entirely lacking footed leaders, means they tend to miss any magic boots.
The adviser(s) and wise women can do some minor spell casting too, but their usability is limited by their slowness and inability to lead troops (the wise woman can't even move on her own).
Hopefully, I didn't overdo this. TBShunter clearly meant for this class to be mostly non-magic, and I hope they remain so even after these changes. - The Skirmisher abolished – or rather split into two new unit types: The Riddermark Horse Archer and the Scout of the Mark. (The latter is identical to the previous skirmisher; the former is too except that he lacks acute senses.)
I couldn't understand why Rohan would get such a ridiculous abundance of scouts – which is what the "skirmishers" really were – and so ridiculously cheaply. But then, from the comments by TBShunter, it seems the scouting ability (acute senses) of his skirmishers may have just been thrown in as an afterthought, to give Rohan any scouting ability at all.
The new Scout of the Mark will be on the recruitment list as often as the skirmishers previously were (10% of the turns), but only one can be recruited each time, not three. In other words, Rohan will now have exactly the same access to scouts as most other classes, no more, no less. The Scout of the Mark is obviously better than the standard scout, though, being mounted, and yet I made him cost exactly the same. (This is still a raise from the way too low price of the skirmishers.)
The Riddermark Horse Archers will be as common as the skirmishers previously were, though instead of three offered 10% of the turns, two will now be offered 15% of the turns. They will be as dirt cheap as before, or even slightly cheaper: 25 gold for two, instead of 40 for three. - All "dismounted" units are in the variant called unhorsed instead, as this seems rather more more descriptive and to the point to me.
Balancing
Balancing isn't something I have concerned myself with. I have tried not mess with what balancing was there in the Rohan faction – that is, where some of my changes have strengthened them, I have tried to balance them against others that weakened them. Whether the faction was balanced to begin with is another matter. Balancing in particular a "rusher" class, like this one, is in any case hard, of course.
The Rohirrim do seem very strong at game start, possibly too strong, with their Horn of Helm Hammerhand and their force of almost knight-class riders – which furthermore are fast. Almost any other class starting near them will be very unlucky indeed. On the other hand, of course, they have pretty limited access to magic and they can't summon any big monsters. (The biggest, most terrifying "monster" they'll ever get may well be the king himself.) They also lack the siege engines of the baron, for instance.
Notes
* Regarding the Horn of Helm Hammerhand, the reason for the "Dragon Terror" text, the way TBShunter published the Rohan mod, was, I think, at the time there was no way to define your own attack type. (The CoE3 progress page has an entry for 24th June 2012, which is after the Rohan mod was released, that says "Weapon modding implemented.") Thus he had to stick with the ones already defined in the standard game, and so he went with the Dragon Terror attack of the Elder Dragon to represent the Horn of Helm Hammerhand.
Now that there is a way to fix this (has been for three years), I think it was about time it was finally done.
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** Units making lance charges and then becoming unhorsed previously lost any and all ability to fight on. Instead they would keep "reloading" their pike or sword, round after round after round. (The battle text would literally say that X "reloads Pike" or Y "reloads Broadsword".)
What happens, apparently, is the state of the first weapon (the lance charge) being used up for the battle is inherited by the unhorsed unit, even though the first (and only) weapon is now an ordinary pike or sword that can't be "used up". Instead of correcting this, the game keeps showing messages about the indefinite "reloading" of pikes and swords.
What I eventually did was to insert a dummy attack, No Lance Charge, before the regular one of each unhorsed unit, the mounted counterpart of which has a lance charge. This dummy attack will now be the one to inherit the state of the lance charge, allowing unimpeded functionality of the regular attack.
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*** Hoof attacks were by TBShunter, quite reasonably to me, defined last of the attacks of each unit, and as "meleeweaponbonus" attacks, which, according to the modding manual, supposedly should ensure that they "will be used in addition to any other attacks". Unfortunately, that's not the way it works, at least not in v3.23.
On the contrary, if there is a preceding melee attack defined that's not "bonus", the bonus on a following attack will ensure that this attack will not be used. As it turns out, this can actually be a useful feature, to prevent a unit from simultaneously attacking with both lance and sword. If the lance attack is one-shot, the sword can then be used in following rounds.
So how can the hoof attacks be made to work? Well, for mounted units without a lance charge, all that was needed was to simply remove the "bonus" from the hoof attack, and it will strike together with the preceding sword attack.
Although the same could have been done where there is an initial lance charge – making attacks with lance, sword and hoof all go simultaneously – much more reasonable in that case seemed to leave the "bonus" on the hoof but also add it to the preceding sword attack. Now there will be no sword strike together with the lance charge anymore, but, in the following rounds, there will be attacks by both sword and hoof.
But what if the hoof attack is to work like that of standard knights? Those will attack with hoof together with lance charge as well as together with subsequent sword strikes. Well, if a second hoof attack is added without the "bonus", it will go with the bonus-less initial lance charge. It will look odd in the unit property box, where two hoof attacks will be listed (unlike the property box of standard knights), but it will work the same as for knights.
And that's ultimately what I decided to do.
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**** Royal uniqueness: One major reason I eventually decided to now post the mod in two variations was that, on the one hand, I really wanted to include royal uniqueness. On the other hand, the immunity to charm and enslavement that seemed a necessary complement was hard for me to explain or defend, in particular as a correction to the mod. In a variant, I felt I could take further liberties, and that's where royal uniqueness is now implemented.
Again, it would have been great if there had been a way to remove the uniqueness of a charmed or enslaved unit (by having the charm/enslavement change it into a different type, a "Former King of Rohan"). A unique-within-faction property (rather than just the global uniqueness there is now in the game) would also have been highly useful, of course. But there is nothing of that, so instead, as a last resort (/ugly hack) the king and queen were just inexplicably made immune to charm and enslavement.
Note that there is a bug that – despite the uniqueness of the king – allows you to crown a second one while the first one is unhorsed. To counter this, however, I have defined events that check for dual kings and, if there are, automatically (and harshly) correct the situation. This correction is a bit harsher (or more crude) than I would have liked it (everybody in the square of one king will die, and if both kings are in the same square, both will die), but it works.
In theory, those events would be enough on their own to enforce the uniqueness of king (and queen), without the use of the unique command – as long as Rohan is played by a human player who is aware of the dire consequences of crowning two kings. However, it felt neater and more sane to use the unique command anyway – and not just for the sake of any AI Rohan player.
Another somewhat unfortunate side effect of the royal uniqueness is, of course, that only one player can now play Rohan (since, again, there is no unique-within-faction property, only the global unique). Or rather, only the last of multiple Rohan players will get a king; any Rohan players before him will be king-less. This should be a minor problem though:
- In single-player, you can always check "unique random players".
- If you play with score graphs enabled, you can at any time with F5 check data for all players, including what classes they are playing.
- If a human taking Rohan plays first (or before any AI players), and gets a king, this should ensure there aren't any AI Rohan players.
- Finally, I have included a check in the Rohan mod itself for multiple Rohan players. If there are, then all players will get a warning message on turn two, recommending a restart.
***** Extra starting spells are, by TBShunter, given the adviser using the more1spells command. Specifically, the adviser should get three extra spells, or five spells total – except that it turns out he often starts with only four, occasionally just three spells total. (Apparently, the game has the more1spells command just add three random spells without first checking whether he already knows them.)
For this reason, and because the adviser has seemed a bit weak and hard to use to me, I decided to also give him some level 1 spell scrolls. Of the eight level 1 witchery spells in the game, some are good, others much less so. (In particular, the charm spell could potentially be very good.) The spell scrolls will merely reduce the risk of an adviser starting without useful spells. If he already knows the useful spells (including charm), the scrolls will hardly make a difference to this class with so few magic users.