Total War - Various modding technique

[Leonardo]

 I know a little about different modding techniques in every Total War games, so I would like to share of what I know and perhaps there is other people here who have played a Total War games before.

 

There is a least two major techniques, but before you begin I'm not responsible of what might happen if your game stop working as a result of editing text files.  So always backup any files you want to edit first.

 

• Directly editing vanilla text files (mostly older games such as Medieval TW, RomeTW, Medieval2TW) and read the next post about vanilla text files.
• Using tools for different game (RTW, M2TW), because you can't use RomeTW or Medieval 2TW modding tool to create a mod for later games (EmpireTW, NapoleonTW, Shogun2TW) or vice versa.

 

However I know you can use some ETW tools for different games (only later games) or vice versa, but never for an older games than Empire TW.  EasyEsf is one tool that I've tried before.

 

I've been working with an idea I had to changing the starting positions in Barbarian Invasion for a couple of factions and I call it "Unique Factions", because when I read the description of each faction in the game menu were you select a faction for a new game.  Some of these factions actually had unique stories that I wanted to bring more focus on in-game.

 

I admit there was a few things I didn't like so I change it to the better in-game I hope.

[Leonardo]

This is about the mining facilities for the Sassanids Empire plus other factions too such as the Alemanni, because if you edit the vanilla <path>\The Creative Assembly\Rome - Total War\BI\data\export_descr_buildings.txt (always backup the original files first before editing them) file shown like this...
 

building hinterland_mines
{
    levels mines mines+1
    {
        mines requires factions { barbarian, carthaginian, eastern, hun, nomad, roman, }  and resource silver or resource gold
        {
            capability
            {
                mine_resource 4
            }
            construction  2
            cost  2000
            settlement_min town
            upgrades
            {
                mines+1
            }
        }
        mines+1 requires factions { barbarian, eastern, roman, }  and resource silver or resource gold
        {
            capability
            {
                mine_resource 7
            }
            construction  3
            cost  3500
            settlement_min large_town
            upgrades
            {
            }
        }
    }
    plugins
    {
    }
}

...and change a few lines shown below you'll be able to construct mine buildings in three regions (Babylonia, Media, Assyria).  I did that but I'm not sure why Media already has constructed a mine since I haven't
touch it plus I can't see the building on the campaign map and I wonder why Media already have a mine constructed.
 

building hinterland_mines
{
    levels mines mines+1
    {
        mines
requires factions { barbarian, carthaginian, eastern, hun, nomad, roman, }  and resource silver or resource gold or resource iron
        {
            capability
            {
                mine_resource 4
            }
            construction  2
            cost  2000
            settlement_min town
            upgrades
            {
                mines+1
            }
        }
        mines+1
requires factions { barbarian, carthaginian, eastern, roman, }  and resource silver or resource gold or resource iron
        {
            capability
            {
                mine_resource 7
            }
            construction  3
            cost  3500
            settlement_min large_town
            upgrades
            {
            }
        }
    }
    plugins
    {
    }
}

All you need to do is to add the iron resource after were you find what factions that's require to build mines and viola you have an extra income.