family relations:
- improved Roman family relations by adding ancestors (i.e. dead parents for sisters and brothers) this are 'virtual troops' meaning they wont exist (which is not necessary as they are dead anyways)
- introduced Vitellius, Galba's and Otho's family
- standardized code of relation change for players political actions:
as usual: largest relation drop for closest relatives, but you will now lose (or gain!) much more relationship, but must of the time its only a +1 or -1; for a close relative, like father or son it can be up to -20, I recommend to check the message log carefully after you supported (or opposed) Nero for the first time in an event to get a feeling how it works now.
- lowered relation change from replacing governors
- stopped inbreeding of Roman families (now really)
scenes:
- generic Roman fort siege scene now has closed doors, attackers must now destroy the gates before they can enter the fort
- improvements for Britannic castle and town scenes
- improvements for Germanic castle and town scenes
- added interior scene for domus mare, with working passages
- added scene for academy in Athen
- added scene for Petra
- added scene for Jotapata
- added scene for Palma
- added scene for Athen
- added Germanic town scene
- added two Germanic castle scenes
- added a Germanic village scene
- added a Roman village scene
- added a Judean village scene
- added new scene for Colonia Aggrippina
- added new scene for Mogontiacum
- improved tavern scene of Phrasis
magnification of Rome:
- made imperial palace a place worth for a God-Emperor
- made the town hall of Rome more beautiful
- some changes to Roman town center:
* added Curia Julia: you can now visit senate via passage
* added Domus Augusti on the Palatin: you can now visit the palace via passage
- made a separate scene for the Imperial gardens, large and magnificent (accessible via passage)
- added a separate scene for the 'dinning room' of the imperial palace (accessible via passage)
- gave Rome unique town picture
- Caesar and Augusta have now special spawn point in town hall of Rome
- added a secret location: catacombs: it is only accessible from the town center via a passage. There is also a hidden 'Easter egg' in the catacombs (only available as long as Nero is emperor)
- changed Roman prison scene
- added generic courtiers to townhall and palace
- added supplicants to townhall with small funny requests
quests:
- added three new quests relating to Nero: will be given once you are tribunus militaris or higher and have relation 10 or 20 or 30 respectively with Nero. The following themes are covered:
* abduction
* forced suicide
* Troyad
- added gardens of pleasure quest (hanging gardens related)
- added elephant hunt quest for minor faction kings in Africa
- added village quest: Villagers need tools.
- fixed capture and bring women quest for villages: it can now be given properly and the dialogue is improved
- fixed an issue with certain lady quests
- improved dry wells quest description
performance:
- using shift-short cut dialogues and dialogues with magister civium will now load small scenes (which load faster)
- improved some meshes (reduced vertices)
- removed unnecessary or duplicated textures
- unified some textures
- removed unnecessary meshes
- decreased resolution of some textures which were ridiculous high
- improved world map performance a bit
- heads of decapitation will fade out after some time
- changes to lods
- removed unnecessary sound files
- changed sound file format to ogg from wav (though I hear it is better to use wav I had better results with ogg in recent tests)

campaign map and parties:
- seasonal effects for the map
- improved mountains
- changed trees
- added Palma (village)
- changed icon of Sleza to a forest
- new icon for pyramids
- new icon for Delphi
- new icon for Parthian/Armenian villages
- changed lord icons
other changes:
- leaving an encounter while freelancing now has a chance that the enlisted party will reconsider its action (its worth trying this if your commander is attacking a superior enemy)
- activated death cam for freelancer praetorian mission to storm the villa
- slightly increased progress gain from battle during freelancing
- participating in freelancer training will now always give 1 progress point and some xp (no matter of outcome)
- winning a patrol fight during freelancing now gives 7 progress points per default instead of 5 and some xp
- sleeping with women will gain xp
- sleeping with follower woman while freelancing will now increase health
- you will now gain small xp on promotion
- family relations are now considered when determining relationship change with liege when liege grants a fief to someone
- its now possible to change the god you currently worship
- some taverngoers in minor faction towns will now spawn with a cup
- increased money from looting minor faction towns (now depends mainly of wealth of the town)
- added new minor faction in Nubia: Kush
- disabled hair and beards weaving in wind
- a philosopher school can now be build in Athen (you need either to be Emperor or to own Athen)
- exams mini game at philosopher school
- second outfit available in Alexandrian library now
- special arms merchant in Rome now also sells Greek fire
- added script which let nearby parties join battle for battles where player helps other parties: this means larger battles especially for freelancer
- changed siege picture
- added new town picture for Athens
- added cutscene after event when you become Pharaoh of Egypt (only available if you make a small or large ceremony, not available if you screw the ceremony)
- changed 'Fire of Rome' event text
- changed code which refreshed village inventories: now goods, which aren't produced in village or town cannot appear in village inventory, towns still can have goods they don't produce, due to trade with other towns
- removed the term 'Emperor' and replaced it with either Princeps, Caesar or Caesar Augustus
- added praefectus urbi: in mod, this official is responsible for the Praetorian activities in Rome, Player can order to kill or terrorize senators via this official or distribute large amounts of grain under the plebs. Any companion can be appointed
- introduced Tigellinus: historically, he was the Praetorian prefect during the last six years of Neros reign. In mod, he will serve as Praefectus urbi of Nero, and is responsible for the crimes
- added additional expedition to the Southern lands (Australia :) ), there are now 12 expeditions to the South
- added custom auxilia cohort, can be founded once you own a town/castle with a barrack (like legion), works similar to legion, with the difference, that you can recruit it in every barrack
- added custom auxilia ala, (works like custom auxilia cohort)
- added secret bonus chest to Londinium out-door scene
- sailors can now be given to follower party where they apply the speed bonus too
- working for villages has now more rewards: you will now gain more exp and always 1 relation with village
- Jotapata will now join the Jewish revolt
- added events for governors seeking advice from player emperor
- more options for daily training sessions
- added a surprise for the 'rags are enough' start option
- some changes to beards
- in Palma Balearic slingers can be recruited as volunteers
- in Rhodos slingers of Rhodos can be recruited as volunteers
- in Kidonia Cretan archers can be recruited as volunteers
- changes to Paulus dialogue
- changed/updated dialogue with tavernkeepers about secret treasuries: it should list now all available secret weapons/armors
- overhauled the whole dialogue during the 'power transition' events, with new decisions and many explanations about crimes Nero committed (unfortunately for you, it is now very long xD)
- added hostile dialogue for Nabatean raiders
- added a dialogue with Kaeso about his faith, available once the 'bribe' quest started under 'I wish to ask you something.'
- changed dialogue with Kaeso when player is a Christ
- added dialogues about Christianity to Roman and Greek scholars in palace
- added dialogues where Nero talks about generic nonsense
- added dialogue with a slave about the fire of Rome, can only trigger for 'rags' start option, if you have made all this Muscullus stuff, triggers once entering Rome as tribune or higher rank.
- added dialogue option under 'talk about military affairs' which allows you to dismiss also governors from service, i.e. this allows you to make governors normal 'Lords' in the native sense, which means, they will follow marshal orders, but wont recruit special Roman troops.
- increased maintenance costs of Domus Augusti
- decreased number of looters, added new (stronger) bandit party type instead
- looting temple in Jerusalem now also gives you 150,000 denars
- added event about financial affairs of lords: triggers only for lords in the same faction as player, player has various options, some also depend on players trade skill. Lords can also comment on this (like comments on village raids or capture of centers etc)
- showing world map in reports will now also display minor factions
- replaced medieval looking symbols for custom banner creator
- can now set any troop in party as guards for castles per talking with them via the party screen
- updated info pages

Nice! This must be the largest update, at least when measured by items in the changelist. Looking forward to trying it out tomorrow.

There were a few things I was awaiting, of course, but when I read the changelist, this has to be my new favorite:

"- special arms merchant in Rome now also sells Greek fire"

I wanted to propose this a long time ago, but thought you wouldn't want it after realizing the "Greeks" in question were Byzantines from many centuries after the mod setting. So, I'm definitely glad to see it. :D There are times when historical accuracy should take a back seat to fun.

Originally posted by BanDHMO:

Nice! This must be the largest update, at least when measured by items in the changelist. Looking forward to trying it out tomorrow.

There were a few things I was awaiting, of course, but when I read the changelist, this has to be my new favorite:

"- special arms merchant in Rome now also sells Greek fire"

I wanted to propose this a long time ago, but thought you wouldn't want it after realizing the "Greeks" in question were Byzantines from many centuries after the mod setting. So, I'm definitely glad to see it. :D There are times when historical accuracy should take a back seat to fun.

I just called it greek fire. If someone has a better name for this ancient granate I would change it.

Originally posted by BGMaxi:

I just called it greek fire. If someone has a better name for this ancient granate I would change it.

There really isn't anything comparable to an incendiary hand grenade I could find in this period, and I really tried at the time to come up with something that would be a half-decent excuse to propose this mechanic to you. :) In a siege situation, you have stationary fires over which oil is kept hot and then poured on attackers or launched at a settlement, similar to what you had for a while now in sieges. Oil has to be heated a lot for this to work, making mobile applications impractical.

As far as something incendiary that an individual warrior carried, it's basically a torch, which is not very impressive. But so what? Just because we don't have records showing that it existed doesn't mean they couldn't have a version of it, especially since this is an exotic weapons merchant. Possibly, their recipe required rare materials making it cost-prohibitive for widespread use, and the rare uses by the few who were rich enough to afford it AND crazy enough to use it simply didn't leave a written trail in history. :)

I personally don't particularly care about the name, but if you want to change it so nobody comes whining about how real Greek fire wasn't actually invented until 7th century or something like that, you could always call it something else. I like the sound of "Vulcan's Fire", myself.

Originally posted by BanDHMO:

Originally posted by BGMaxi:

I just called it greek fire. If someone has a better name for this ancient granate I would change it.

There really isn't anything comparable to an incendiary hand grenade I could find in this period, and I really tried at the time to come up with something that would be a half-decent excuse to propose this mechanic to you. :) In a siege situation, you have stationary fires over which oil is kept hot and then poured on attackers or launched at a settlement, similar to what you had for a while now in sieges. Oil has to be heated a lot for this to work, making mobile applications impractical.

As far as something incendiary that an individual warrior carried, it's basically a torch, which is not very impressive. But so what? Just because we don't have records showing that it existed doesn't mean they couldn't have a version of it, especially since this is an exotic weapons merchant. Possibly, their recipe required rare materials making it cost-prohibitive for widespread use, and the rare uses by the few who were rich enough to afford it AND crazy enough to use it simply didn't leave a written trail in history. :)

I personally don't particularly care about the name, but if you want to change it so nobody comes whining about how real Greek fire wasn't actually invented until 7th century or something like that, you could always call it something else. I like the sound of "Vulcan's Fire", myself.

that are god points. Vulcan's fire sounds funny, though I will think about it. Maybe I use Latin translation of it.

The work that you do with this mod, its incredible, i look for a god mod of rome in warband, your mod its the best, and with the will will be one of the best mods for warband. I really enojoy your work, greatings from México. IMPERATOR

thank you very much! Multas gratias!

What great news to come out of early 2021. I haven't played the recent update yet, but it sounds excellent. I am also very happy to see one of my suggestions added to the game (I'm Aurelius).

Originally posted by An Karow Gwynn:

What great news to come out of early 2021. I haven't played the recent update yet, but it sounds excellent. I am also very happy to see one of my suggestions added to the game (I'm Aurelius).

Nice to hear!

sorry, that I forgot, but what was it you suggested?

Originally posted by BGMaxi:

Originally posted by An Karow Gwynn:

What great news to come out of early 2021. I haven't played the recent update yet, but it sounds excellent. I am also very happy to see one of my suggestions added to the game (I'm Aurelius).

Nice to hear!

sorry, that I forgot, but what was it you suggested?

The rebuilt Academy of Athens.

ah ok cool

Maxi you are a damn Hero