HEARTS AND MINDS (Part 2)

Hearts and Minds comes in two complementary parts and both are stand-alone. (ie they do not require the other part to work)

Hearts and Minds (Part 2): Focuses on Battle related enhancements such as balanced unit stats, unit diversity and immersion (Inspired by Rome 1).

Refining the Rome 2 Vanilla experience – But without altering its core features, base mechanics and signature gameplay while keeping the same or even better levels of performance (FPS), loading times, turn times and stability.

• Most factions’ theme colors now match their emblem’s colors (Factions are now more recognizable and unique on the battlefield like in Rome 1).
• Restored hidden campaign units that can now be used in Multiplayer. (Hellenic Marines, Steppe Infantry, Iberian Spears, Mounted Nobles, Female units etc.)
• Sparta: Reskinned several Spartan units with the "Heroes of Sparta" look (Unique Spartan Helm etc).
• Athens: Reskinned several Athenian units with the "Classical" look (Corinthian Helm, Blue Plumes etc).
• Suebi: Reskinned most Suebi units with a more unique "Germanic" look (Less "Celtic").
• Getae: Reskinned most Getae units with a more unique "Gothic" look (To differentiate them from other "Dacian" Factions).
• Ardiaei: Reskinned some Ardiaei units with a more unique look (More Female Units).
• Iceni: Reskinned some Iceni units with a more unique look (More Female Units).
• Carthage: Reskinned most Carthage units with a more unique "Seafarers" look (Less "Generic").
• Egypt: Reskinned most native Egyptian units with a more unique "Pharaonic" look (Less "Hellenic").
• Seulucid: Reskinned some Seulucid units with a more unique "Silver" look (Less "Macedonian Gold/Purple").
• Parthia: Restored units only found in Wrath of Sparta that are key to its core gameplay.
• Aegean Influenced Factions: Restored Marine units found in Wrath of Sparta that represent Greek sailors and pirates for hire for many factions that could have access to them via ports.
• More unique looking and balanced Iberian Factions.
• More unique looking and balanced Nomadic Factions.
• More unique looking and balanced Eastern Factions.
• More unique looking and balanced African Factions.
• More unique looking and balanced Desert Factions.
• 99% of the units keep their vanilla stats intact. Only the unbalanced or senseless stats were modified.

Note: By making most of the playable factions for every culture more unique we basically and indirectly managed to make every faction in the whole game unique since the untouched factions now look and feel different compared to the playable ones. Enjoy not having to fight clones of your faction anymore.

Immersion vs. Realism: Since we took inspiration from Rome 1 units we could said that the mod leans more into the immersive and "movie like" looks rather than historically accurate depictions.

• Adjusted model and texture LODs for better performance.

Recommend Battle difficulty: Hard or Very Hard.

Included extras and credits:
• Ancient Music by Daker.

Compatibility:
• English is currently the only language fully supported. While you will get 80% of the text in other languages you will still be missing some untranslated texts.
• Part 2 will probably conflict with with many reskins mods but not with mods that add new units exclusively.
• Part 2 should be compatible with any mod that alters the Ai and the mechanics of the Grand Campaign as long as part 1 isn’t loaded.
• Saved games created when Part 2 was enabled will no longer work for Vanilla and vice versa.
• The performance and balance focused attributes of H&M cannot be guaranteed when combined with other mods.

Don’t forget to like & comment for more content like this in the future.

To Improve your Loading Times by 200% with any mod:

Move (cut and paste) the hearts_minds_1.pack and hearts_minds_2.pack files found at:
C:Program Files (x86)Steamsteamappsworkshopcontent214950
To
C:Program Files (x86)SteamsteamappscommonTotal War Rome IIdata

IMPORTANT: You need to do this everytime there is an update to the mod.

If you want to play Multiplayer (COOP or Battles) and one of the players has followed the Tip above then all the players participating must also move their .PACK files to the Data folder and run the mod via the launcher from there (Local Folder) to prevent potential desync issues. (Either all play from the workshop folder or all play from the data folder)