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Inspired in part by Baalz's thread in the main forum gathering links to his various (and excellent) guides, I've made this thread to collect together my moddy offerings and post about general ideas and general progress. Specific updates will go in the respective mod threads as usual.
This is going to take a little tinkering before it's of much use, so bear with me. Skavenblight, Rise of the Under Empire http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...1&d=1236117574 Era: Middle Current Version: 1.1 Finished: 99% Heroes: Yes Spells: Yes This is my pride and joy. It recreates the Skaven from Warhammer Fantasy Battles and is largely faithful to the army book, though I have changed some things to better fit Dom3. It has a variety of national spells and summons to go along with its many units, commanders and heroes. I really think I captured the feel of the Skaven in the mod, their unpredictability, variety, sneakiness and attitude to friendly fire (they're all for it!). Future updates will be the usual tweaking but essentially they're a finished product. As of the 1.1 update they're probably the deepest mod nation out there in terms of spells, units, heroes, summons etc Tharoon, Decadent Overlords http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...2&d=1236117581 Era: Middle Current Version: 0.2 Finished: 45% Heroes: No Spells: No This unfinished nation is based on a nation from the old PC RTS Warwind, the Tharoon. It's far from a straight adaptation and less faithful than my Warhammer nations, I just felt that the race was interesting and stylish and would make a nice fit for Dominions. I plan to continue work on them at some point but they are playable as they stand (if a bit limited) - if you have any suggestions or want to encourage me to do some more for them, please post in their thread. They will definitely get an update in the coming months, if only to make sure they are compatible with the latest patch and to add things I've already added to them in my version of the mod. Arga Dis, Blood of Warriors http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...0&d=1236117563 Era: Middle Current Version: 1.35 Finished: 95% Heroes: Yes Spells: Yes This nation is loosely inspired by the film 300. I think the mod suffers a little from a samey colour scheme, graphically speaking, but it does play very well and some of the graphical work I did is pretty cool. There's an excellent guide to Arga Dis by Amhazai in the main forum. I think the nation is quite well balanced and sufficiently interesting that there's little I'd like to add to it in terms of content, so much like the Skaven all it's likely to get is tweaks in the future. I do intend on releasing an update to it quite soon though. Ogre Kingdom, Gathering of Might http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...4&d=1236117633 Era: Middle Current Version: 0.9 Finished: 85% Heroes: 2 with 4 more planned Spells: Yes This is a recreation of the Ogre Kingdoms army from Warhammer Fantasy Battles. It diverges more from the straight army list than the Skaven mod does, but it still captures the raw brutish power of the Ogres and has the distinction of being perhaps the most disgusting nation in dom3. Playing as the Ogres is interesting as they have by far the worst research of any nation but for the most part can concentrate solely on the Blood path, possibly with Construction thrown in too. You should also find yourself challenged to keep your armies of gluttonous monsters fed, though there are various solutions to that problem. I intend the next update to the Ogres to be major, changing their mid and late game significantly and taking them even further from the original Warhammer army list by adding a variety of demonic blood summons, one of which will allow them to shoot for mediocre research. They are completely playable as they stand though and a lot of fun. Not for squeamish types though. Itza, Servants of the Old Ones http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...3&d=1236117594 Era: Middle Current Version: 0.75 Finished: 80% Heroes: 1 hero, 1 multihero - 5 or so more planned Spells: Yes This is another Warhammer Nation like Skaven and Ogre Kingdoms. I think this mod represents some of my best graphical work which is partly because the lizardmen use bright colours and each have a very distinctive look. Like the Ogres, the Lizardmen are something of a nation of extremes, with perhaps the best mages in all of dom3 (though also the most expensive) but with no midrange mages between their level 1 magic priests and their crazy rainbow magepriest Slann. They also have the fairly major handicap of extremely expensive forts in all kinds of terrain and 600 gold temples too. The recent update brought new spells and summons as well as the recruitable Stegadon, one of the largest units in the game. I still have a variety of heroes and a few extra summons planned for the Lizardmen and they still need balance fine tuning, so any feedback is welcome. If you like a powerful alien feeling race with interesting drawbacks though, they are a great choice as they stand. Altdorf, Pride of the Empire Era: Middle Current Version: Yet to be released. Finished: 10% Heroes: No Spells: No I've been working on the Warhammer Empire nation for ages now, but getting very little done. I am absolutely certain I will have them up to the standard of the other Warhammer nations at some point in the future, but it really could be a while yet, especially as they are such a broad nation - even the Skaven and Lizardmen are dwarfed by comparison. I'm going to aim to release a very early beta of them to start balance testing as early as possible though, before doing the huge numbers of summons, heroes and spells they'll get in the final version. I hope they'll be popular (the Warhammer race certainly is) and they'll perhaps feel a bit less alien than the Ogres, Skaven or Lizardmen - to an extent they are much like a combination of MA Ulm and Marignon. Jomon Broken http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...4&d=1236370165 Era: Late Current Version: 0.8 Finished: 90% Heroes: Yes Spells: Yes Jomon Broken was inspired by watching Japanese horror films and considering their messages about gender. They're a rich topic for Feminists and they also make a pretty fun base for a nation. Here we have a male dominated Samurai culture essentially enslaved by mysterious demon women. If Ulm Reborn is a 'good' LA Ulm then this is an 'evil' LA Jomon. You get plenty of undead and demons to play with and in the future I intend to add more powerful fox demons as summons. I'd also like to add some spells and the nation could use more than 2 national heroes, so I'll do some of those two. For whatever reason this is probably my least popular mod - personally I think it's a blast to play. Ulm Reborn http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...3&d=1236370155 Era: Late Current Version: 1.5 Finished: 95% Heroes: Yes Spells: Yes This was the second mod nation I made and it originally replaced Ulm, Black Forest in the Late Era. Now it can be used alongside that nation, for people wanting to play a civil war between the two Ulmish factions. It's a mix of Germanic enlightenment and overzealous religion. Almost like a reformation version of MA Marignon in a way. It boasts some of the heaviest armour in the game and was quite popular amongst people who wanted a 'good' version of LA Ulm, or felt Ulm was a bit weak overall. In the future I may add extra content like more heroes or spells, but the nation is essentially finished. Avernum, Crystal Souls http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...5&d=1236370172 Era: Middle Current Version: 1.5 Finished: 95% Heroes: Yes Spells: Yes This was the first mod nation I made and as I didn't feel confident I'd be able to do graphics at that point, I chose to base it on the Exile series of games by Spiderweb Software. I got permission to use their sprites which fit rather well into the Dom3 world and evoked a great deal of nostalgia for Exile players like me. I've continued to update Avernum since that first release and it's come a long way - it's not so complete as Skaven, but it does feature national summons, a wide variety of units and a full set of interesting heroes. It's a lot of fun to play and is definitely a strong nation have very powerful and diverse magic along with recruitables that fill a number of roles. I have no plans to add content like extra units or spells, but I could certainly see myself tweaking the balance in the future. |
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Thanks! I've learned more about modding looking at your mods than anywhere else.
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Gosh but that's a cute little piglet. I'm glad my mods were helpful to you. They aren't very heavily commented or structured, but they do tend to use a lot of different commands.
I'll slowly update the first page over the next couple of days. I'm adding graphical teasers for each mod, because often they give a better idea of what the nation's about than the descriptions. |
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I really wish you´d finish the Lizardmen, it´s absolutely beautiful!
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I did a little work on the Lizardmen yesterday, just fiddling around with 3rd generation Slann. I think they'll get an update relatively soon with 3rd gens and many changes to sacred spawnings.
They are quite playable as they stand though, having almost all of their recruits (missing only stegadons iirc) and all of their fort buildable commanders. |
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Fantomen, I always tell him that, but he never listens...
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Sombre your mods are great, I've had alot of fun with all of them. When are you gonna try to finish the Empire one by, I'm really interested in seeing how it comes out.
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I just have to echo XLegend here and tell you again how much I love your mods. Especiallly the Skaven. And also ask when we can see a rough Beta of the Empire mod. From what you have said about it I might grow to love it as much as your Skaven mod if not more!
Keep up your excellent work Mr. Sombre!! |
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Great stuff! I can really see the joy you have derived from bringing these nations to life. Now what would be cool would be a MP game based solely on modded nations - see who comes out on top.
One thing I wouldn't mind doing when i get some time is trying to devise a points method of creating new nations. Say give a base line of various atributes per unit, points for choosing archers over slingers maybe - points per school of magic for a nations mages, points for national summons etc.. that way a competitive basis could be established upon which to experiment with different flavours of strenght and weakness. Man i would love a couple of weeks to do bugger all! |
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I can see how the points thing would be darn difficult - the variables are enourmous... Wouldn't have a link to the good Dr's work handy? Going to start myself a Skaven game. |
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I actually edited my above post to say more about the mod nation game I played in, while you were posting I think. No fights and name calling! (why should there be?)
No, I don't have a link to Dr. P's thing. Do a search for threads started by him in this subforum and it should be findable. |
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Well, the mods that were used were accepted as being reasonably balanced by the players beforehand. I tend to think that sombre's mod nations are just a little more powerful than the average nation, but the tomb kings are by no means weak. I did have the suspicion that the lizardmen might be a bit stronger than the others, but it didn't bother me. Honestly, the main reason me and sombre lost is we were trying to roleplay our nations a bit, and I didn't see any good way to back out of the war that made sense :). So sombre and I battled it out while llama grew immensely powerful, and in the end we just didn't have the resources to defeat him.
Speaking of which, wasn't there supposed to be a sequel? |
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Also I'm awesome. :)
I actually made quite a few changes to the Tomb Kings following your comments rdonj, most notably giving the Tomb Kings themselves a consistent E1 so that they're reasonably likely to get E2, and making them correspondingly more expensive. I never quite released it though. I will do soon, hopefully. |
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I made a few changes to lizards and have fairly drastic changes to Ogres planned (and in production) to make them less one dimensional. I had literally nothing I could do once llama was spamming stellar cascades at me in that game. I think Ogres will always lose to Lizards in the mid/late game but I want them to at least have some goals they move towards. Hence they get a whole new family of blood summons which keep them frightening in the next version.
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I'm really looking forward to seeing the new version of your tomb kings :). And the ogres should be excitingly fearsome once they're finished. |
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Your sprites look great Sombre.
Jazzepi |
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Just putting up the Ulm Reborn teaser.
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I just had a crazy idea regarding the Warhammer nations. Modders often start with the idea that they will create a nation in all 3 ages - a version for EA, a version for MA and a version for LA, each with major differences, units, spells etc. This is a great way to tell a story and it's worked really well for many vanilla nations like Agartha, Abysia, Ermor and even 2 era ones like Pythium. But it's very rare for a modder to go through with this grand plan, because of the work involved and the fact that after you complete one era you're much more likely to be attracted to a different concept entirely for your next project.
So my thought is to package EA and LA versions of my 3 warhammer nations in with the main MA version, but to make the differences between them, in terms of work, extremely minor. In terms of gameplay though,... well there can be a much much bigger impact. For example a summon might become a recruitable unit, a spell might change research levels entirely, the costs and stats of certain units might change. This doesn't equate to a lot of work but you get to tell a story (changes to description), people get to use them in different ages and you can represent different facets of the nation that might be lost in the sheer variety of the MA version. An example would probably be useful here. Let's take the Skaven. In their history Clan Pestilens was removed from Skavenblight for a looong time, only returning relatively recently. So an EA version might lack all Pestilens spells and recruits, with the other clans (particularly Skryre) holding more power and their units thus having altered stats/costs. Meanwhile in LA the opposite could be true, with Pestilens eclipsing the other clans, leading to cheaper, more numerous pestilens troops, grey seers replaced by Plague Priests as the religious power, eshin assassins switching their warpstone poisons for weapons using the disease magic of Pestilens, moulder rats and rat ogres becoming disease carriers... you get the idea. Once again the work I'd have to do would be far less than you might expect, but the gameplay impact would be pretty huge. The bottom line is the MA version would remain the 'main' one and contain pretty much everything, while EA and LA would be different primarily through omission of content and quite heavy handed tweaking. They would also conform to the idea that magic is stronger in EA and weaker in LA. |
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I must say, Sombre, while I'm not perfectly satisfied with the balance of your nations, there are all very different and very evocative. I have played the Skaven nation, as well as Ulm Reborn, and since I don't like the micromanagement of gemming battle commanders, it seemed a bit hard to use a few of the Skaven battle spells, but I completely recognize their utility.
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Well they would be presented as variant nations as much as earlier or later versions of the nations.
For Lizardmen it could work this way: EA - You are clearly going to have more Slann - 5th, 4th and 3rd gen all buildable, but no Skink cavalry, shamans, priests of sotek, sotek summons, red crested skinks, skink archers. Spawning summons all cheaper/more numerous. Skink Priests cost more and don't auto communion - are far less needed with Slann being a lot more common. Salamanders haven't been tamed yet - big dinosaurs are cheaper though, as are kroxigor. It's incredibly powerful magically. LA - Sotek stuff and skinks rise more into power and sotek saurus and priests are now sacred - far less saurus, only 5th gen slann available at great expense, no more oldblood saurus and saurus scar veterans are expensive. Sacred spawnings cost more as do temple guard etc. Basically everything is more centered on skink and Sotek, with the crazy power of the slann being far harder to get to and more costly. You don't get 2nd gen at all any more and 3rd gen are extremely expensive summons. The nation is actually almost a blood one at this point. |
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I'd play them :) I was really thinking of the empire when I said that, I'm not sure how easy it would be to make an EA and LA empire. Although I do seem to recall you having said something about them before, now that I think about it.
EA lizardmen sound a lot stronger than la lizardmen though, even without the skinks. It might be hard to balance them for something like an all ages game, not that it's really that likely you'd see one with multiple ages of the saem mod nation.... If you do it like that, there should be some anti-skaven flavoured spells for the priests of sotek, or maybe some kind of disease immune creatures. Hmm, I don't think there's a tag to be just immune to disease though without being a demon/undead. I guess relying on poison resistance to show their anti-skaven bent isn't so bad, but if you're changing the la skavens to be more disease-inducing it won't quite be as helpful for that. |
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Recuperation is an effective anti-disease flag, if you can come up with a thematic justification for it.
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Good point....
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Ooh ooh, you could build LA Skaven on top of MA C'tis, so as to give them the Miasma. No-one escapes disease in the lands of Clan Pestilens!
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I just summoned a Vermin Lord. It says "but their chisel-teeth, sharp claws and powerful hooves are almost as dangerous". However, they have no claw or tooth attacks.
Also it says they are surrounded by an aura of creeping decay. I wonder if it might be cool to give them disease cloud? |
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Actually I guess they're not quite finished, since they have no attack animation. Also their attack causes the communion animation on the target, oddly.
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If you don't mind me asking, how are you playing the skaven? I'm having a little difficulty with them now against the computer. I usually play medium to large maps, 11 mighty AI nations. The big problem seems to me that skaven want to fight a war of attrition, which the computer does better (having hordes more chaff, and generally better morale). Also, I tried a S9/W9 bless (was gonna play them like Mictlan, with censors taking the role of jags) but my guys die way too fast. I really like the nation, and I think they would perform better in a game against humans, but dealing with the vast numbers of chaff without anything to absorb it is difficult.
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The Verminlord is finished and does have an attack animation. Maybe not in the last public version though. The reason for the communion animation when you hit something is the doom glaive is a vanilla weapon and that's the animation from its secondary effect I guess. Nothing to do with me.
They have a bonus hoof attack which is more than most SCs get. If they had a bonus hoof, bite and claw attack as well as two hand slots, it would be pretty ridiculous. So the answer is Verminlords /could/ rip you apart without any weapon at all, but they don't, because they have weapons. You shouldn't be using them without any kit when they have full slots other than head :P I'm not going to give them disease cloud because it would primarily be irritating and doesn't fit their description - it's more of a flavour description than one to point out a gameplay ability. They are the right hand of the god of decay after all. Skaven aren't a dual bless nation, ideally. You can play them that way but the censers are more of a support troop than anything that wins battles on its own, which is what you need to justify a dual bless. It sounds like your best bet is to go down construction early and use the warpfire throwers behind a wall of skaveslaves etc to cause casualties. If you're worrying about your own losses and trying to come up with elites than win battles without taking any, you aren't playing the skaven right. I will update Skaven fairly soon with a bunch of little tweaks and probably a first go at the EA version of them, which will require more tweaks and balance based on feedback. |
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Thanks for the advice. I didn't think they were a dual-bless nation ideally, either.
I've been rushing construction, then blood. The thought being that I could use cheap rats for the chaff to launch warpfire/lightning over. When I first played them, I was able to do it with slaves, and I ignored the blood aspect. But I was using normal AI. The problem I'm having on mighty, is I'm facing multiple armies of 100+ guys, many of them archers, in year 1. So I can't really attrition them, because even if I'm throwing out 30 slaves a turn (which is still 300 gold and 150 resourses) I'm not able to keep up. It might just be a play style that doesn't work against higher computer AI. And I'd like to say I've really enjoyed all of your warhammer nations. The models are all great and very detailed, and I think you've done a great job with balance (although the Ogres could use some boosting, don't see how they're viable after year 2 or 3). |
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Perhaps you could try to make crushers or lumber constructs as more durable blockers? I don't really know, I haven't played the Skaven much at all.
I just noticed by the way that Vaettiheim and Avernum are missing from the list in the first post Sombre. I guess it's still a work in progress? Or are they deprecated? |
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k, I can confirm that crushers work very nicely indeed in combination with poison wind globadiers and warpfire throwers. Definitely worth trying. You need to put the crushers right at the front and the war machines right at the back though, otherwise they'll overtake the crushers.
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That crusher idea does indeed work rather well. I also found that summoning living statues with my pretender worked great with massed poison (the skaven have no shortage of these attacks with pestilent breath, censers, globadiers and gutter runners).
I'm sort of posting here to announce I'm getting back into dom3 and will be updating mods shortly (I promise this time). I want to get EA Skaven up first, then I'll do a lizards update, then either ogres or getting all my mods fully up to date with the latests versions of dom3 and cbm. |
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I usually like to play mod nations on a no independants map, such as sombre's version of Shahrivar. On a map with no independant recruitable commanders I don't feel too bad about spending some time recruiting normal commanders instead of mages and you can produce enough slaves and rats with commanders that it's not too hard to find a decent supply of them for every battle. I haven't tried crushers/living statues but I can certainly see how that would work.
Welcome back Sombre, I'm eager to see how all your different projects turn out. |
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Ok, with the Ogre update on the horizon, I need to know what you fine people would like me to work on next.
Here are your options: 1. Get to work on a beta of Warhammer MA: The Empire 2. Make a small scenario map featuring a mod nation of your choice 3. Update and upgrade the neglected Tharoon nation mod 4. Make a llamaserver MP game featuring several of my mod nations and update based on feedback from that Quite limited I admit, but if you have a better suggestion I will listen. Keep in mind I won't start work on this next project until the Ogres are updated, which will take maybe a couple weeks. |
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Well I think we should do 4 anyway, when I've slain my thesis (three days...).
Apart from that, 1. |
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I'm with the llama.
There are a lot of mod games going on recently. If it kept up that would be a nice trend. |
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Well, I was already planning to start a mod-nations only game, as soon as one of the 3 games I'm in is finished, and I already prepared a mod with 8 nations in (the 4 warhammer ones, + Arga Dis, Avernum, Jomon Broken, and New Ulm), with the CMB and llamabanners incorporated. I also played with it a little and found no problems so far.
I'm attaching it here if anyone wants to have a look...regarding the game, if you have other suggestions for more mod nations, or want to start the game yourself, I'm ok with that. As long as i get a slot in it:p |
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I think you should start that game yourself because it sounds different from the smaller game I was planning on starting (with about 5 nations, a couple of them vanilla).
If you want to add another mod nation then you might consider Shangrila or Alchera. |
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I think I'd rather see Bretonians instead of Empire. But my choice is 4, MOD nations are more fun then vanilla, atleast for me.
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Besides, I have already done Pilgrim units so some of the work is already done :) . But anyways, I promised Sombre to do some units to Empire. I'm currently working on a Bright Wizard sprite. Once it's done, I'll send it to Sombre and ask if it's good enough and does he want more. |
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Thanks for all of your mods and for placing all of them on this one thread for easy access. Skaven and Arga Dis are among my favorites.
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Yay! I've officially resumed modding. I've been working on some fun code for skaven, tweaking some stuff and giving them packmasters who bring free rat packs to battle along with an awesome new hero (one added by GW to the skaven lineup recently) and probably the prettiest spell I've ever coded - Warp Static. I'll be releasing a new version over christmas.
Yay! |
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I suppose we couldn't have a little sneak preview on the spell and the hero? ;)
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Hard to preview the spell and the hero hasn't got a graphic yet. Here's the description though.
Feeding a chunk of raw warpstone into a whirring brass device, the Warlock is moments later engulfed in a blinding cascade of warplightning. Gesturing across the squeaking horde in front of him, he directs a roil of barely suppressed energy over them. The chittering of the Skaven builds to a terrible pitch as their fur stands on end and green arcs of energy play across their ranks. The stench of burning fur fills the air as some skaven simply burst into flames. When struck the warp power crackling around the ratmen will discharge in a violent blast, hopefully as lethal for their foe as it is for the unfortunate Skaven. While this Skryre magic is powerful it is extremely tiring and should only be used on expendable troops or those adequately protected from shock and fire. The graphical side of it is a load of green lightning streaking down and hitting the caster, then a wave of green energy rolling over the target aoe. |
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Sounds promising. Can't wait :)
Merry Christmas by the way ;) |
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Hey sombre, nice to hear you're back into modding:D
If you feel like continuing it, I'm sure that a lot of people would happily welcome an update for the Empire mod. |
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Empire work will continue in the new year.
For now, here's a new skaven pretender. He's sassy! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attac...&d=1262137216p |
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