Lets get the basics out of the way, mods, or modifications are something that changes the games look and feel as well as play through. Case in point, the following are NOT mods, they are user created content.

• Scenarios
  
• Maps

This is important as we just cleared out 90% of the workshop content.

As we dig deeper we hit a middle layer. What the developers intended to be modified and expected to be so. These include the following:

• Music
  
• Sound
  
• Textures
  
• AI

These really do change the look and feel. However there is one group of mods that is so close to bedrock that the developers often overlook. The one fact keeping it within the workshop realm because it was the basis for the Forgotten Expansion to exist in the first place...

Ah yes, the glorious files that CANNOT be stacked with other monolithic mods, but the very fluid blood of the game. The following are the files in question and are all found in the '\Data\' folder:

• blendomatic.dat
  
• blendomatic_x1.dat
  
• BlkEdge.dat
  
• empires2_x1_p1.dat
  
• empires2_x2_p1.dat
  
• FilterMaps.dat
  
• lightMaps.dat
  
• LoQMaps.dat
  
• PatternMasks.dat
  
• TileEdge.dat
  
• view_icm.dat

Modifying any one of them renders your game unique to you alone and any others with the exact match. Once modified, any normal multiplayer is now a minefield of out-of-sync errors. Special editors are required to modify these files and attempting to combine different mods that use the same file WILL NEVER WORK due to the simple 'last-to-install-last-over-written' method that Steam Workshop uses.