posted 19 April 2013 05:48 AM EDT (US)
For quite some time I've known that there are quite few mods for Age of Mythology that actually help Scenario designers or just Age of Mythology gamers in general. Recently I discovered, however, that a there are a few gamers that don't have or know about some of these mods. So this thread's intention is to bring forward such mods in the hopes to better all of AoM's gamers.
As a foreword I will state that
Please note that this is just my opinion, if yours differs, great! Let me know below
The AoM Unit Modder allows scenario designers to edit a units position and appearance external to the AoM editor. Before this tool was created independantly scaling axes was an incredibly advanced procedure. This utility simplified this procedure so that some impressive eyecandy could be created by all scenario designers. As an added bonus it allows units to have their X and Y coordinates to be alters and allows units to be unselectable. |  |
 | In any list regarding scenario design nottud is bound to show up somewhere, and in classic nottud style he has named this file blatantly. Only when a building has been clicked and is in the process of being placed (but not yet confirmed placement) is this mod enabled. This mod doesn't make significant changes to the scenario designer and again is actually more useful to supremacy players than designers. However it does have it's uses, mainly to do with the fact that placing buildings in the editor changes the terrain. If a designer wants to ensure that a building can or cannot be built in a specific place then playtesting with this mod installed is perfect. If the scenario designer doesn't have this mod installed when playtesting then they may think that a building can't be placed in a specific spot when in reality it can be if it's rotated correctly. The same is true reversed. The enhancement is subtle, but once it's been taken away you'll wonder how you use to manage. |
This is one of the additions that I think everyone left here has and uses in just about all of the scenarios released these days, and for good reason too. I'll let Mythic_Freak tell you what it does if you don't know: "Basically all the useful functions we have made through the ages have been gathered in this single file. The basic idea was to provide an easier to use environment for trigger scripters, where they had new functions and variables This mod significantly improved the quality of triggers being made and allowed for a range of new, exciting triggers to be created. As another significant boon, the Trigger Loader also increased the speed of trigger creation and decreased the size of the triggers being created. A lot of triggers created these days require the Trigger Loader to be created in order for them to work. The Trigger Loader itself is just an amalgamation of a lot of code scripting from various artists, but it helps scenario designers by allowing us to use all of these cool and complex triggers (like the one shown to the right). |  |
 | I think this is possibly the most overlooked, underrated and unknown modification to ever hit Age of Mythology. This is the holy grail for both Scenario Designers and Supremacy Players. This rose amoungst the thorns brings the most concise tooltips you will ever see. It has all of the most relevant and coolest information on it. Once you have it you will never, NEVER be able to go without it. Although bundled with a lot of other helpful utilities, Enhanced Tooltips is the most useful thing I have ever installed and I still use it everytime I play, create or use Age of Mythology. It shows you all of the things that are normally not viewable to the user, like exactly how much multiplier a Throwing Axeman gets verse a hoplite or a spearman, and how long it takes to build a villager, or how many build points a temple has. It tells you cool things that you most likely forgot about or didn't know, like that rapid-right clicking an enemy whilst having a mirror tower selected will make it deal twice as much damage; or that Hippolyta can be turned into a minion by a mummy; or a bunch of other cool stuff that you'll never be able to remember. Which leads me to why it is so good, it has all of this information available to you whenever you mouseover an object. You don't need to memorise all of these numbers or situations because mousing over the object in question informs you of all you need to remember. And it's not just for units, this also updates the tooltips of technologies and relics so you know exactly what is happening once completed/garrisoned. As a further advantage, when you have the New X Editor installed you get the tech tree available in the editor. This means that whenever you need to find out a specific value (like bonuses to cavalry or infantry) for a specific unit all you have to do is go into the tech tree and click on the unit's icon. You never even have to leave the editor! Compare this to having to extract the protox.xml and then searching for the unit. I believe every AoM gamer NEEDS this installed. |
Again I believe this mod is at least known by all of the current designers of the day, if not used. Having a whopping 28,000 downloads the New X Editor is one of the popular files on AoMH. The New X Editor brings a variety of enhancements to the stock editor including: saving and copying triggers and camera tracks, loading a saved game into the editor, copy&pasting terrains, editor timer, a list of all portraits and icons, the ability to change graphics in the editor, a techtree to view and a huge bunch of other stuff. The New X Editor paved the way for a ridiculous amount of additions to be added to Age of Mythology as well letting the Scenario Designer create so seriously awesome scenarios. The Superpack by nottud is based on this, and many may think that the Superpack is superior - which it aims to be but I definitely prefer the New X Editor over the Superpack by nottud. The reason why is simply this: Everything added by the New X Editor I use often, while half of the features added by the Superpack I either dislike or don't use or both. Regardless of which you choose, the New X Editor is the forefather of editor additions and is not be overlooked by any scenario designer. |  |
 | "The 3D Farm allows the existing farm to become an actual crop farm (3D) when upgraded with "Irrigation". For AoM and AoM:TT." - The Modsmith. Basically this mod spices up the otherwise dull looking farm object. The addition made is texture based so it works online. This is the reason it is at position #5, it really doesn't help the designer much and in fact it is more useful to supremacy players than designers. The reason for this is that once any player researches the "irrigation" upgrade all of their farms have the new texture, thus you can tell when someone upgrades their farms. I personally love this mod, and it's my list so it's going in |
This is a simple background created by one of the coolest Moderators ever. It's not really, and that's why it didn't get a place in this list; but it is cool and you should definitely check it out  |  |
What are your thoughts? Do you think I missed any? What are your favourite utilities for Age of Mythology? ~ Milkman Matty
Proud Member of Forgotten Empires
96Reviews KaS Dota2 Halo 5 Reach
{ "Work until your idols become your rivals" }
༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ trGetUnitScenarioName(); ༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ
[This message has been edited by Milkman Matty (edited 12-01-2014 @ 01:50 AM).]
