Which Mods would you recommend?

[eternalnoob]

I'm new to Gladius on Steam and am completely overwhelmed by the number of mods in the workshop. Could you please give me some recommendations.

[Grotzel]

I'll mostly copy something from another reply I made a while ago to a similar question. Of course it all depends on what you are looking for - if you just want to go by popularity ... use the sort function of the workshop page. In my very personal opinion I have to say:

The absolutely undeniably best mod ever (well ... some tasteless barbarians disagree ;) ) is clearly 'Too Many Voices'.
Extremely well made, adds tremendously to the game's atmosphere ... at least for the factions that are supported at this point (check the list the mod page provides) - but all the core game factions have at least some support - Necrons and Orks enjoy glorious, full voices.

... maybe not AS spectacular as TMV ... but a number of mods I really enjoy / find interesting:
Personally I love 'Unique Artefact Skins'. A beautiful, uncomplicated little mod that just makes the game a bit better.

Doc's Interface Updates is another tiny mod that might also just be essential as it gives trait icons enough space in the unit window (in the standard game the game simply stops showing new ones in some cases because no more can fit into the window)

Then there is Timmeh's City Textures ... which makes cities prettier. ... and gives outposts neat little faction flags - which are great (the emphasis on showing more of the player's colours is great, too ... although the Necron's buildings might be just slightly too shiny).

I am currently combining it with Timmeh's City Rescale:

Makes cities bit bigger (with the little downside that it may slightly overlap hexes).
I previously used Cities+ from Dexgattaca which makes cities impressively huge ... (but maybe a little too big - and it sadly has no outpost faction flags).

Never tried 'Golden Tooltips' but it looks extremely useful - particularly for beginners.

There are certainly many others - Timmeh has some great textured environment mods, Kurziel's Evolving Battlefields mod series is immensely cool ... but both of these tend to lead to crashes in the later game on my poor pc.

There are many mods that add additional player colours - e.g. Kurziel's Full Citadel Color Set. 

Devian has some extremely cool mods that add new heroes as some sort of mercenaries (Heroes of Legend series) with several new models. Been itching to try those, but they'll probably really mess with the balance ... and I want to try some other stuff first.
I think Dok has some reeeally impressive new models for several new units ... mainly for the imperial factions (again, want to try them ... but they will change the balance).
Gladius really has a workshop full of interesting mods. :)

Problem is, of course, that especially some of the larger mods might conflict with each other ... and you'll probably want to experience the regular game more before trying out some of those that affect the actual gameplay.

[Verkava]

There is one bad side with mods. The more mods you use, the longer it takes to game start. At worst it could take 5 minutes to start, because game re-checks ALL the stuff you downloaded. I only use 8 mods.

Locknots Set-up' is must, it adds more map-generation, difficulties and colors options.
Too Many Voices' as well.

Difficulty steam achievements dont work with mods, they disables them.

[Devian]

Originally posted by Grotzel:

Devian has some extremely cool mods that add new heroes as some sort of mercenaries (Heroes of Legend series) with several new models. Been itching to try those, but they'll probably really mess with the balance ... and I want to try some other stuff first.

I take feedback into consideration, only the old stuff need some polish and balancing but for now my Aeldari and Space Marines stuff are up to date. I not limited my work to hero anymore, i've created such a buch of new units models for new units as the Mastodon, Stormbird, Sicaran, Strategic buildings, Turrets... well, it will be long to list them all.

[Grotzel]

Originally posted by Devian:

I take feedback into consideration, only the old stuff need some polish and balancing but for now my Aeldari and Space Marines stuff are up to date. I not limited my work to hero anymore, i've created such a buch of new units models for new units as the Mastodon, Stormbird, Sicaran, Strategic buildings, Turrets... well, it will be long to list them all.

Good to know ... although I wasn't really criticizing the mods. :) Balance is always tricky and perfect balance is seldom achieved - be it in mods or unmodified games. As attempts at creating the optimal balance might lead to boring, safe choices, this is complicated. You have to balance balance with fun ... and I could absolutely understand if mods choose to go more into the direction of fun (as long as it doesn't get horribly unbalanced, but you seem to work hard on preventing that).

While I'm usually a bit reluctant to try mods that change game balance I still definitely want to try yours. :)

One tiny thing that sort of held me back was the question if it wouldn't be better to use the hero mods for every faction simultaneously ... so that every player could benefit. However, that might turn out to be a little problematic. As I wrote before, my poor old PC has a little bit of trouble handling too many mods at once.

This is just a little explanation why I haven't tried Heroes of Legend stuff yet. ;)

[Devian]

Oh don't worry ! I didn't take it as a criticism :D
I just tried to reassured you (and other if needed) with some explanations and flavors.

My main goal is to maximise fun and diversity among each games, the new stuff benefits to the player but the AI too. I try to get the dlc feeling for each new units.

Since my modding skills increase with each editions, i must update older editions with better models and balance.

And you're right, it's better to use all the mods together. For now only Orks (sadly for you :/) didn't have many heroes/new units. But this will change ASAP (i'm eager to work with them). I didn't forget that i promised to you custom little grots tank :)

And you're right again, the addon edition that contains a lot of new stuff can increase the loading time. But for a hundred new custom units, that's pretty normal.

Did you have a SSD ? If so, try to put Gladius in it, it will greatly shorter the loading time (a lot).

[Grotzel]

Originally posted by Devian:

Oh don't worry ! I didn't take it as a criticism :D
I just tried to reassured you (and other if needed) with some explanations and flavors.

My main goal is to maximise fun and diversity among each games, the new stuff benefits to the player but the AI too. I try to get the dlc feeling for each new units.

Since my modding skills increase with each editions, i must update older editions with better models and balance.

And you're right, it's better to use all the mods together. For now only Orks (sadly for you :/) didn't have many heroes/new units. But this will change ASAP (i'm eager to work with them). I didn't forget that i promised to you custom little grots tank :)

And you're right again, the addon edition that contains a lot of new stuff can increase the loading time. But for a hundred new custom units, that's pretty normal.

Did you have a SSD ? If so, try to put Gladius in it, it will greatly shorter the loading time (a lot).

Commendable goals - especially grot tanks (another mod added them with a scaled down tank model ... but an original model would certainly be great). ;) Grots certainly don't enjoy enough protection in their daily life. Actually ... really big boxes with lots of thick plates would probably be safer ... like Gargants. Then again ... if you are bigger, folks can see you more easily and shoot at you. Sooo .... probably sticking to little tanks is better.

Thanks for the tips. Unfortunately my SSD is sadly pretty cramped and small - no room even for Gladius. It's not really the added loading time that is bothering me in any case. I think my problem is more likely RAM related. On my system too many bigger mods seem to lead to crashes later in the game - so I have to be careful with how much stuff I'm experimenting with. While you can safely deactivate purely aesthetic mods, mods that actually change gameplay can't be deactivated in an ongoing game because those mods are then needed for the savegames.

Oh well, I'll probably limit myself to choosing just a few of the mods and limit the number of factions. :)

[Devian]

Originally posted by Grotzel:

Thanks for the tips. Unfortunately my SSD is sadly pretty cramped and small - no room even for Gladius. It's not really the added loading time that is bothering me in any case. I think my problem is more likely RAM related. On my system too many bigger mods seem to lead to crashes later in the game - so I have to be careful with how much stuff I'm experimenting with. While you can safely deactivate purely aesthetic mods, mods that actually change gameplay can't be deactivated in an ongoing game because those mods are then needed for the savegames.

I'm sorry to hear that :/ let's hope you'll get a better setup soon to enjoy Gladius more !

[Grotzel]

Originally posted by Devian:

I'm sorry to hear that :/ let's hope you'll get a better setup soon to enjoy Gladius more !

Thanks, but it's not that bad. Usually Gladius runs just fine. :) No idea how taxing heroes of legends mods even are ... but I doubt that at least a few of them will have too much of a problematic impact. I'm just a bit wary since I had a little trouble with other mods recently and plan to play my next session with fewer mods before testing other stuff again.

[Devian]

As far as i know, no one complaint until now (since i've lightier a lot some heavier meshes).

But pick what you want and if you have feedbacks, i'm all ears.