political mod

[smegmus magnus]

Howdy,

I have flirted with this game several times over the years, without ever exploring it even moderately deeply. This is something that I personally think of as being fairly lame, though I don't feel particularly apologetic, either (which is probably good, as you guys can't really possibly care, and I already understand why I haven't). Nevertheless, I continue to come back because I love Roman history and I thirst for a quality Roman political simulation; this ain't it. But I do wonder if it offers the possibility.

...there is a post by someone on one of the Rome 2 threads on this forum that invokes the hope that a Rome 2 might include a political facet similar to that featured in a game from Dreamcatcher in 2002 called Pax Romana. This games box says that is was designed by the designers of Europa Universalis II (I think it's 2; I'm not looking at it currently). The crux of what makes this (Pax Romana) flawed and failed game so alluring is the combination of the ability to suborn Senators and Equites, and being able to form, each year, a unique political agenda.

I want these abilities!

I have searched the 'net over and over again, over many years; while I have found the occasional defunct Roman Senate simulator (breaks my heart every time too, as I never seem to find them in time), I have only once in the last 2 years successfully found an online, current community that is playing out a virtual Roman life, which (unfortunately) I am still trying to find again since I have lost the address due to computer death.

...anyway: The purpose of this post is this; You, who have experience modding EU: Rome, is it feasible/possible to mod in a portion of gameplay which would bring the player into a series of screens aimed at bribery/persuasion towards strengthening a political faction, and design political agendas utilizing the EU: Rome law system, augmented by international diplomatic factors? I wonder if this would be problematic due to the character restrictions, or if this is a reconcilable variable; I also wonder what difficulties my ignorance does not apprehend. On that note, I wonder what solutions to such considerations may be available?

Help? Thoughts?

Thank you,

Iullus Cornelius Smegmus Magnus Pantocrator

 

[smegmus magnus]

Please note; the reason I keep coming back to this game, even while never delving deeply into it, until now - I have played it more (modded w/ Cursus Honorum, mind) in the last 2 weeks than ever before - is because of its obvious value.

I just want more, specifically, political play.

My initial question comes from the fact that I would be willing to try my hand at creating a political mod, provided the learned opinion(s) of the informed folk here tell me that it is even feasible, in the way that my original question indicated.

Thank you,

Iullus Cornelius Smegmus Magnus Pantocrator

 

[Wave]

It would require some heavy-duty modding and I wouldn't dare to promise anything too good if someone tries to add whole new GUIs to the game to tweak the senate. (though I once made a brainstorm thread about it.. I'll find it and link here as it exactly had this same idea)

One way to do this would be adding a great amount of event chains that affect the senate and politics. Some events affect the senate and the parties and some affect the characters.
That would be good way to add depth to characters' relations between eachother but the problem is that this only works when you have only a handful of "primary characters" that get the events so you don't get lost in the huge character base. This can be done with title system though so that's not a problem.

The events are quite a pain to learn at first to make so that's not the easiest way to begin your modding career but once you get the grasp how the EU and Clausewitz (did I even typo it?) engines work you have quite unlimited possibilities to make the game have anything you want so I suggest to take a little time with the game files and tweak things to see how they work.

Descartes' mod guide is very good even if it isn't perfectly accurate but there you can see all triggers and effects to use. Also the modding forum section is there exactly for asking help for your mods so don't hesitate to do it as the community has a lot of people who can and will help you.


I think this is an interesting idea and I'll maybe try to do something for it.

 

[smegmus magnus]

@Wave,

Thanks for the reply. I had a feeling that I might be wanting something larger than my ability to provide. It excites me that you have a liking for the general idea; even more so that you have already thought of it, as it seems like that could tip the odds in a favorable direction. I notice that there are some other threads that occasionally have the game Pax Romana mentioned, which at the least illustrates that the basic idea is feasible, even if the template was a bit flawed.

Pax Romana has proven to be a major pain in the tookus, though largely as a result of my own making. This $4.00 game has taken a terrible toll on my soul and sanity because I had this crazy idea that I would like to play it on my laptop. I have tried partitioning/dual boot, virtual machines, compatibility mode(s), XP mode, downgrading a Vista machine to XP, and installing XP to a machine that originally ran it (!!!why would this not @?!&*#! work?!). The fact that I got it to run properly using a virtual machine on my desktop became beside the point, as it became a mission to make it work on one of my laptops. I have not succeeded at this mission.

Anyway; I would be happy to float you the files for this old Dreamcatcher game; it might prove to be a nice inspiration for brainstorming.

 

[Wave]

I have a little idea what Pax Romana looks like and I'm pretty sure that adding new GUIs (windows) to the game and making use of them requires hard coded changes (= changes to the .exe file, which is illegal as far as I know) so distributing the mod would be troublesome and Paradox would not give any more tech support.

However there is MARE NOSTRVM mod that promises quite a new look but I haven't heard about in ages so I don't know will it ever be published. Whenever it comes out it'll help modders a lot as we could learn how things are done in it so it might open up a lot of possibilities..

Here is my old brainstorm about senate factions' internal diplomacy.

For now I'd go on with the "focus on a handful of characters who will get in trouble and affect your senate" approach. If you manage to wake up anyone who has more modding skill than I do then I'd be more hopeful about the GUIs and other weird stuff

 

[SAS]

I always mod the Imperial government type to Republic making the Emperor rule for life but the other positions selectable by me as the player. When the Emperor dies the senate vote selects the new Emperor, its great fun!

 

[unmerged(94161)]

Could you build an agenda system into the existing National Idea system?

 

[Wave]

Could you build an agenda system into the existing National Idea system?

Would you mind giving any more accurate idea?

But I think that's actually a.... darn good idea (especially if you're thinking the same as I am)! The NI system is pretty versatile "as is" so the ideas can be changed to policies that the senate is trying to drive trough.

And using 4 idea slots would mean one slot for every faction..
Worth thinking really


EDIT: Now that I started to think of it more I got even more overkill idea to try..
I would use a map similar to Imperium mod (too bad that Descartes has been away for long time and thus probably can't help) and simply steal an idea or two from RTW and CK so the Rome is divided into pieces that are ruled by independent families and the game is fully focused on Roman internal politics. Then the family prestige of one family would mean the prestige of the "country" and it could be used for something useful.

Stay tuned, I just got a real kickstart to this project! Perhaps I will eventually get something done..

 

[smegmus magnus]

@Wave,

You got yourself some exciting brainstorming going on. Were you to embark on trying this sort of project, I would want to help. There is a caveat regarding that, though-I have zero experience modding. What I do have, however, is a fairly in-depth, though lay-man, understanding of Roman political shenanigans from many different eras of their history; certainly enough to realize when I need to research a question towards a better understanding.

Mayhap I could help?


Iullus Cornelius Smegmus Magnus Pantocrator