Toto Improvement Project [TIP]

[Pied-Noir]

I've been meaning to post this for a long time but just never got round to it, and then I got locked out of the forum for about six months. Also, I realize the mod has a silly name but it was originally only ever meant to be a private collaborative effort for a few friends on Steam.

To be clear, this mod is not a total conversion of any kind and doesn't attempt to be ambitious in any meaningful sense. I've never believed in trying to reinvent the wheel when it comes to video game mods, and I don't like vast, sweeping mods that are riddled with bugs, half-finished work and horrible placeholder GFX. None of that here.

TIP is a longstanding - it's been through several versions, some with map edits - project to improve the basic vanilla CK II experience with new content, new GFX, bug fixes, and improved historicity. My aim has only ever been to improve on what Paradox have already done, and so although this mod plays like an improved and far more polished version of the base game, it doesn't add any new mechanics or fundamentally change the way anything works. This mod is likely to appeal to dynastic history buffs or people with mild OCD, but probably not to casual gamers (Achievement hunting, map-painting etc.) or anyone looking for anything overly ambitious or radically different. My ideal audience is someone who prefers to spend the first 45 minutes of every game just looking through family trees.

So, what is TIP and what does it offer?

• two new bookmarks: The Anarchy (1144) and Fall of Acre (1291)
• major improvements to all existing bookmarks, including a heavily revamped 936
• around a hundred new historical bloodlines
• revised de jure setup
• new de jure duchies: Strathclyde and Narbonne
• new de jure kingdom: The Isles
• hundreds of new historical title and dynasty coats of arms (and all DLC ones improved)
• heavily revised culture file (names, links, etc.)
• 1000+ new historical characters and dynasties, including dozens of important cadet branches
• countless database fixes and revisions (years' worth of work)
• new government flavor names
• Cognatic succession for Pictish culture characters (as well as Basque)
• new mercenary companies
• new minor titles: Mayor of the Palace, King of the Romans, Junior King and Symbasileus
• new cultures: Scots and Berber
• 100+ new historical nicknames
• new decisions to form Cumbria, Great Moravia and the Serbian Empire
• legitimizing bastards is now limited to certain cultures (or pagans)
• new/improved cultural conversion events and decisions
• an event to rename Neustria to Normandy if ruled by Normans or Vikings
• an event to form the Capetian dynasty
• two new starting wars: Fatimid Invasion of Egypt (936) and Invasion of Northumbria (936)
• decisions to embrace Scots and Bulgarian cultures
• localization improvements and new ruler titles
• new geographical regions for events and decisions
• dozens of broken family trees fixed
• map fixes
• bug fixes!

Note: Due to the improvements and changes made to the DLC coats of arms packs, if you own them I'd advise disabling them whilst using the mod just so there are no overlap issues.

If you've bothered to read this far then I'll reward you with a download link here.

A few screenshots to cynically convince you:

The legendary Wægmunding dynasty of the Beowulf saga, playable in 769 and 867 (as the man himself)

Prince Eustace, Stephen's son and heir in the new 1144 bookmark; can you lead him to greatness over his Angevin rivals? (note the 'classic' traits)

Hugh the Abbot, Marshal of West Francia in 867 - an impressive Martial score, but good luck starting a family

The Umayyad bloodline of Abd-al-Rahman III, a man with excellent traits but a tendency to die rather quickly

House Megas Komnenos, one of the many new cadet branches in TIP (with unique coat of arms, naturally)

Western Europe's direct vassal holdings in 936, and the Robertian dynasty of Hugh the Great - if you want to see Capetians then you'll need to reclaim your father's throne

Arnulf the Bad, one of many interesting (if deeply unpleasant) characters playable in 936 - his youngest son Leopold is progenitor of the Babenberg dynasty

Thanks for reading - I hope you'll take the time to try the mod and provide some feedback. Have fun murdering inbred kids! (in-game)

 

[ZeRedleg]

Looks very interesting!

 

[Pied-Noir]

Looks very interesting!

Thanks. I hope you enjoy playing it.

I've released a small update which adds a scripted war to somewhat simulate the Battle of Brunanburh in the 936 scenario, as well as fix a couple of vanilla issues from the bug forum.

v4.20b

- (936) added the Invasion of Northumbria as a scripted war
- added the missing children of Constantine II of Scotland
- added the marriage between Olafr Guðrøðsson and Gruoch nic Causantín
- the Slavic Union may now also be formed by Slovien culture characters
- removed the titular duchy of Salamanca in 1337
- fixed a bug with the timer for forging a peaceful bloodline incorrectly being reset
- fixed the Isle of Wight (1950) incorrectly having ocean terrain
- fixed the barony of Vrhbosna being misspelled
- fixed a couple of scripted_effects bugs
- updated the title history of The Isles

 

[Aerotinge]

..., and improved historicity
...

• two new starting wars: Fatimid Invasion of Egypt (936) and Invasion of Northumbria (936)

Fatimid did not invade Ikhshidid Egypt under Abbasid around year 936.

My ideal audience is someone who prefers to spend the first 45 minutes of every game just looking through family trees.

Here!
But I'd like see a mod which port SWMH database back to the vanilla map.
Vanilla history is beyond repaired.
BTW is the bug fixes original or cheerypicking from CleanSlate?
No offense, I'm working something like this mod and have to choose fully adoption of CleanSlate or staying Vanilla a while.
Guess I could get some advices from this mod.

 

[Pied-Noir]

@Aerotinge

The bug fixes are hundreds taken from the bug and suggestions forums over many years.

The Fatimid invasion is intended to represent the various incursions into Egypt through the 10th century, and to give the Fatimids some starting troops and a potential way to take Egypt earlier (or it's very unlikely to happen at all). I realise it's not strictly historical for a 936 start.

You can try the mod and see what you think. If you don't like it or don't think it's good enough then fair enough, but good luck starting a mod from scratch now that does as many database fixes as I have with this one since ~2012.

 

[Pied-Noir]

A small update:

v4.20c

- added custom CoAs for the following dynasties: Harclay, of Salisbury, de Roumare, Giffard, de Hereford, de Tosny
-> de Brionne, de Tracy, Scrope and de Neufmarché
- inbred and imbecile rulers now require a regent; updated regency events accordingly
- added historical nicknames to a few more characters
- added causes of death to a few more characters
- split William de Tracy off into his own cadet branch
- fixed Andrew Harclay having the wrong dynasty name (must have been overwritten in vanilla years ago...)

Further progress largely depends on how well I can run CK III (if at all), and how easy it is to mod the kinds of things I want to. My modding ambitions there will likely be far more modest anyway, as it looks to be a much better starting point than CK II (in terms of database and map), although I do have a to-do list ongoing.

 

[appsith]

May I also suggest you into having a look at ck2+ devs "cleanslate" effort? It would be great if many talented modders could work together to fix all the issues in one single, great resource. Thank you.

 

[Voy]

May I also suggest you into having a look at ck2+ devs "cleanslate" effort? It would be great if many talented modders could work together to fix all the issues in one single, great resource. Thank you.

The thing about history base "corrections" is that they sometimes are very subjective. TIP is no different from that in some areas. Historical interpretation + how to represent something in-game is tricky. What is legend/exaggeration and what is a historical fact? Who held what land and who held the most power in an area in-game? What trait is more accurate to represent a historical character? Is a man a genius/administrator/strong just because the victors decided to write about him as a competent ruler or was he just lucky?

Also, TIP already is a "collaborative" effort. He got to look at my own private changelog with over 1000's of entries and copied what he wanted, but has not given any credit for it. No, I'm not bitter.

 

[Pied-Noir]

I have released an update.

v4.21

- added a better quality CoA for Albany
- added custom CoAs for the following dynasties: de Medici, Leslie, de Lindsay, Trinci, d'Enghien, Sinclair
-> de Sanseverino, Polentano, de la Haya, de Bourbon-La Marche and de Beaumont
- changed the existing custom CoAs for the following dynasties: Gonzaga, Malatesta
- split a junior line of the de Bourbon dynasty into a cadet branch: de Bourbon-La Marche
- added some missing members of the Despencer, de Lindsay and de la Haya dynasties
- added Stefan the First-Crowned's nickname
- added Alp Arslan's nickname
- added William Sinclair
- added Walter Leslie
- added the de Beaumont dynasty (Beaumont-sur-Oise)
- added the Trinci dynasty
- added the de Medici dynasty
- added a few missing Italian characters
- added the barony of Beaumont-sur-Oise in Senlis from 1050.1.1
- tweaked some Arabic and Turkish names
- corrected a Basque name variant
- corrected Vladimir Rasate's name
- corrected the Magyar naming suffix
- updated the title history of Blekinge
- updated the title history of La Marche
- updated the title history of Spoleto
- fixed a broken dynasty in Sicily

I am still pondering whether it's worth attempting to port this over to CK III. It would be a herculean task, and I'm not convinced it's worth it considering I haven't been tempted to play since a couple of days after release. I might wait for a patch or two and then reconsider.

 

[Arko]

- added the barony of Beaumont-sur-Oise in Senlis from 1050.1.1

Hope you named it "Beaumont" and not "Beaumont-sur-Oise"

 

[Pied-Noir]

Hope you named it "Beaumont" and not "Beaumont-sur-Oise"

I named it Beaumont-sur-Oise and renamed the other one to Beaumont-au-Maine, so they don't have the same name.

http://fmg.ac/Projects/MedLands/PARIS%20REGION%20NOBILITY.htm#_Toc40424595

 

[Arko]

Beaumont is indeed a quite common name, but "-sur-oise" addition is quite recent iirc (at best later CK era)

edit:

Le nom de la localité est attesté sous les formes latinisées Bellimontis en 11105, Bellus mons en 1170, Bellus super Ysaram en 12616.

Not that recent in fact (if "ysaram" means "Oise" by the way)

 

[schwarherz]

The thing about history base "corrections" is that they sometimes are very subjective. TIP is no different from that in some areas. Historical interpretation + how to represent something in-game is tricky. What is legend/exaggeration and what is a historical fact? Who held what land and who held the most power in an area in-game? What trait is more accurate to represent a historical character? Is a man a genius/administrator/strong just because the victors decided to write about him as a competent ruler or was he just lucky?

Also, TIP already is a "collaborative" effort. He got to look at my own private changelog with over 1000's of entries and copied what he wanted, but has not given any credit for it. No, I'm not bitter.

FYI CleanSlate isn't a history fixing mod. I think we've only even really touched two history files because they were needed for a bug fix. We took/are taking the vanilla scripting files and completely rewriting them with the most recent available functions, thus "CleanSlate". That being said, I definitely understand if you don't want to use it since you've already got so much stuff here. Compatching to something like that can be a huge pain.

 

[Voy]

FYI CleanSlate isn't a history fixing mod. I think we've only even really touched two history files because they were needed for a bug fix. We took/are taking the vanilla scripting files and completely rewriting them with the most recent available functions, thus "CleanSlate". That being said, I definitely understand if you don't want to use it since you've already got so much stuff here. Compatching to something like that can be a huge pain.

Never said it was. You're clearly supposed to respond to someone else. I support your project and will use it for my own mods when it is done, though. Keep up the good work!

 

[CFH1985]

Never said it was. You're clearly supposed to respond to someone else. I support your project and will use it for my own mods when it is done, though. Keep up the good work!

Same. CleanSlate is probably going to be the new vanilla game for a lot of serious modders. Only makes the game run as intended and more efficiently... no brainer really