Total War: Rome 2 Heaven

I've almost exclusively played Rome 2 modded in some way since launch week. I'll give a quick rundown of the one's I'm using or have used.

Major Mods - These mods are the ones that alter almost everything in the game from unit skins to the starting positions and political relationships of factions with one another.

Divide et Impera is the main mod I use. Originally started by Epaminondas the "Oblique", it is a major overhaul mod that aims to make Rome 2 as historically accurate as possible and still being fun to play. The main highlights to me are the tweaked research trees, historical unit names (with English translations and a much more enhanced battle experience (I've actually had major battles last 40-50 minutes instead of Vanilla's 5 minute skirmishes). Hellbent's/Dresden's Traits, Talents & Toadies character trait overhaul mod is included as well which breathes much needed life into generals and agents.

Magnar Mod is the major overhaul mod that I used to play before DEI started up. Magnar improves the Rome 2 campaign greatly by improving the fatigue & morale system in battles and by tweaking naval transports so that they can't handle true warships in battle and adding an Area Of Recruitment system for the Romans.

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Minor Mods - Smaller mods that can have a major effect on the parts of the game they're focused on.

GEM Graphics Enhancement Mod makes the Rome campaign map, battle maps and units look like works of art. By altering Sweet FX settings, you can make Rome 2 look however you like or if you'd use someone elses settings (like me) the mod comes with a few preset setting files for you to choose and use.

BareBones Superior Campaign AI tweaks the AI's task management and priorities so that it will coordinate invasions better and defend its settlements better, instead of risking its armies in an all out attack you.

Melius Imperi: A Better Empire is one of my favorite mods. The main highlight of the mod is the new Garrison building chain, which allows you to convert minor settlements into military outposts that spawn real troops when attacked instead of mobs or militia units.

Replenishment Rebalance nerfs the replenishment rates of armies so that when an army is defeated in battle, it takes a lot longer for it to replenish its ranks and get back to full strength instead of only 1 or 2 turns like in vanilla. Really makes you reconsider risking troops in battles where you're either outnumbered or badly outmatched in troops types or quality.

Dresden's 2TPY & 4TPY Build, Research, Recruitment, Cost, Growth and Movement Mods v1.8 is one that used to use quite a bit, until I started using Magnar and DEI. Gives you more turns per year so that your generals and agents don't drop like flies and a lot of campaign features that makes you think further ahead when it comes to researching and building things.

City Recruitment Mod makes it so that the AI always recruits its best units and build armies with balanced unit compositions. No more armies made up solely of slingers, archers or skirmishers!

Bloody UI is a cosmetic mod that does what it says: makes the UI tabs look bloody

Better Water III HD is a cosmetic mod that makes the Mediterranean and other bodies of water on the campaign map look absolutely amazing.

[This message has been edited by DominicusUltimus (edited 12-17-2013 @ 10:16 PM).]

Yeah, Dom pretty much nailed em. He's been real active in Rome 2. As for extra recommendations...

For major mods:

SSO mod -- Tweaked unit spacing, speed and damage so they will move and fight at more realistic speed. Fire-at-will for Roman units. Unit size are now more unique. (pikes and horse archers have more units) This mod basically makes the battles more balanced and realistic than vanilla. http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=195812291&searchtext=sso

For minor mods:

1. Improved Mercenary camp 2.7 -- Gives every faction Roman style auxiliary system. Now you can recruit more variety of mercenaries. The cost is insane though. http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=187022656

2. Splenyi's better campaign camera -- You can zoom out with your camera in campaign much further and have really nice bird's eye view. http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=187013080


PS: if Silven manages to update his Silven Total Improvement mod, I'll grab that ASAP.

[This message has been edited by el_bandito (edited 12-17-2013 @ 10:51 PM).]

To a new player would you recommend jumping straight into mods to get the best experience or starting un-modded to get a feel for the raw game?

For M2TW etc I'd have said the latter but R2 has been somewhat more criticised as far as I see

Melius Imperi's garrison building chain looks great- precisely what an empire needs with the limit on armies nowadays. Thanks!

EDIT: Apparently DeI has some unit cap issues (Legionary garrisons counting towards the unit cap)- is there a quick fix for it, such as removing the cap altogether?

Also, some people are saying Radious mod's battles seem to make you invincible or are at least incredibly easy. Hm...

[This message has been edited by EnemyofJupitor (edited 12-18-2013 @ 05:04 AM).]

Radious' mods are bit extreme to my tastes. His new units are pretty powerful and can make the game easy. People do praise his AI mod for making the AI more aggressive. I never touched it so I do not know. I like to play it safe by using lesser mods until patch 8.1 hits. Otherwise, starting a campaign over due to incompatibility issue is gonna hurt.

Almost died when my Rome 2 failed to start after 8.0. The thought of restarting my Seleucid Migration Campaign was too much to bear. Luckily, by removing one mod, I was able to continue it.

[This message has been edited by el_bandito (edited 12-18-2013 @ 08:50 AM).]

Quoted from EoJ:

Apparently DeI has some unit cap issues (Legionary garrisons counting towards the unit cap)- is there a quick fix for it, such as removing the cap altogether?

I think they've fixed the problem with the legionary cap issues in the latest build of DeI, but I haven't played it with the Romans yet so I can't confirm.

They also added seasonal effects (but not graphics) in the latest build and updated it with Dresden's new version of TTT. I'd love to spend the day playing through it and adapting to the new season mechanics, but I'll have to wait till after work

Season mechanics? Such as the dreaded attrition in winter? Hope the AI can cope with that.

I think the season mechanics cover more things like farming income shifting from season to season (depending on region). I'm completely torn between a vanilla campaign following the prologue and something on DeI. Having almost started the DeI one I think I'll go vanilla after all, just for one campaign.

Too much choice already...

Good choice. Play a vanilla game, get a feel about it.

There is already a mod that includes 4 seasons' effects in main game--such as attrition and harvest etc...best used with 4 turns per year mod for realism.

Apparently there's one where the diplomatic standing increases as you progress in a war with a faction so to make peace treaties an actual thing. Which one is that? I can't remember it, but I swear I saw it...

Quoted from EoJ:

Apparently there's one where the diplomatic standing increases as you progress in a war with a faction so to make peace treaties an actual thing. Which one is that? I can't remember it, but I swear I saw it...

I believe that would be yukishiro's Historically Plausible Development Minimod unless I'm mistaken. Not only does it tweak the way positive relations work with enemy factions, it also gives a negative boost to allied factions as you successfully war and expand to simulate the suspicion and jealousy they'd feel towards an overly successful ally and potential enemy.

Ah, I haven't noticed the changes yet! Let me see if it's enabled on my mod manager...

Anyone know of any good faction symbol mods? There are some like Epirus and Athens that are good factions, but I find their faction symbols are wanting.

Quoted from Punic:

Anyone know of any good faction symbol mods? There are some like Epirus and Athens that are good factions, but I find their faction symbols are wanting.

Noif de Bodemloze's Faction Emblems Mod is the only one I can think of off the top of my head. He's only made new ones for the playable factions, but they're all very well done

I like Athens', but Epirus' is a bit rubbish. The one in the mod is rather better.