Modding tech teams
Introduction
One of the most interesting new features in HoI2 is the new research system and one integral part of this are the tech teams. They outline the historical strengths and weaknesses of a country and add a lot of flavour. In best Paradox tradition they are totally modable.
You can find the tech team files in the /db/tech/teams/ subfolder. They are saved in Paradox' usual csv format and can be easily edited with a text editor or Excel.
Basic Structure
The first line in each file isn't of much interest, only the country tag needs to be adapted to the country you are currently working on. The following lines list the tech teams.
Example:
314;Supermarine;T314;9;1930;1970;aeronautics;technical_efficiency;artillery;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;x ID
Each tech team needs to have a unique ID which is a unsigned integer. The files that come with the game have their IDs structed following a simple principle: At first there is a number for each country (e.g. 3 for the UK or 76 for Afghanistan). This is followed by a two-digit number counting the tech teams.
Name
The names of the tech teams have to be written directly into the csv file as they aren't language specific.
Picture
The next column is the name of the picture for the tech team without the ".bmp" extension. These pictures are stored in the gfx/interface/pics/ subfolder. They use a quasi-greyscale (just copy the palette of a tech team picture coming with the game) palette and are 96x96 pixels in size. All the pictures that come with the game have a white margin of one pixel around them, but his margin isn't necessary. (the picture doesn´t have to be exactly 96x96 pixels, a small deviation is allowed)
Skill level
The skill level is used to specify the overall quality of your research team. The research teams in the game range from skill 1 to 9, but it is possible to assign higher skills. Note that the skill determines the cost of the research team. Though you could change the skill to higher than 10 in the files, in-game it seems 10 is the highest you can go.
Start and Endyear
The start- and endyears are pretty straightforward. The team will become available on January 1st of the start year and will stop to be available on January 1st of the endyear.
Specialities
The next columns are filled with the component types that the team is specialized in. Only the first five are actually used by the game. These specializations half the time need for developping a component of this type.
When you are making new research teams for an unmodded tech tree you should notice a few things:
- Technical_efficiency is a very potent specialization as it is used for ships, tanks and aircraft and is almost always of a relatively high difficulty and double time so that it counts as much for this tech as two normal matching specializations.
- Electronics is used for a lot of stuff, including almost every single vehicle, ship and aircraft. Giving a team electronics and technical_efficiency should be well considered as it will often make the team the best one for all three of these vital parts of the tech tree.
As a final point, be sure to add an blank new line by pressing enter if you are using a text editor. Otherwise the game will not recognize your new tech team.