[Tutorial] [v2] Replacing Vanilla Audio

First things first. I’m just a monkey pressing buttons. I don’t have a clue what I’m actually doing. If you want to do fancy stuff, I’d highly suggest reading:

the rome2_music_mod_tutorial.rtf document that was written by CA, and is included in the Wwise installation (see step 3); and
this tutorial: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?685984

When you select a unit in Total War: Attila, the unit will say specific lines such as "Palatina guards!" or "Horse Lords!". I will be referring to these as battle VO (voiceover) orders. I have isolated 280 unique battle VO orders.
You can assign up to 3 options for a unit to say. You can decide how to do this, but my suggestion would be:
Line 1 - A line unique to that unit.
Line 2 - A line unique to that subrace and class, eg all Uruk-Hai melee units (Uruk-Hai Infantry, Berserker, White Hand Stormer, and Raider).
Line 3 - A line unique to that faction.

This is a tutorial on how you can override those audio files.

Firstly, you have to plan out how many battle VO orders you want to replace, and what units you want to assign them to.
It is worth noting that battle VO orders are also organised by subcultures, as displayed in the table below.

Subculture No. of Battle VO Orders
barbarian 110
eastern 64
nomad 59
roman 47
Each battle VO order also has 15 .wem files assigned to it, on average. This is likely to increase variety as you will be clicking on units a lot.

The tools you will need:

Rome 2 2014 Wwise.
Battle VO Orders spreadsheet - 95% of the work done by Ole, 5% done by myself just organising his raw data.
FrogSucker's Audio Transcription (optional) - This is fairly accurate AI transcription of all the audio lines in Attila, so you've got a rough idea what each one relates to.
Isolated Historical Battle Audio (optional) - If you want to create your own historical battle, this spreadsheet contains all the audio files that play during historical battle cutscenes, and that are said by the advisor at certain points during a battle.

Part 1: Preparing Your Audio
Step 1: The very first thing you need to do is identify the specific audio track/s you want to override. Refer to the 3x spreadsheets above.
For the purposes of this tutorial I have identified that I want to replace the selected_palatina_guards battle VO order. Referring to the Battle VO Orders spreadsheet I can see that this involves the following audio tracks:
1072607642.wem
134618308.wem
146290875.wem
19833585.wem
233848878.wem
268452779.wem
280963842.wem
310638346.wem
544967355.wem
60302077.wem
662385529.wem
804726061.wem
806451676.wem
917904039.wem
968606310.wem
FYI 78634587.wem is the audio file for the main menu music.

Step 2: Now you need to prepare the custom audio you are going to import into the game.
First you have to balance your audio so that it roughly sounds the same as all the other audio in Attila. Here are a few Attila audio files I have extracted and converted so you can compare your audio levels to them.

I am very bad at this step, and would greatly appreciate any help in writing a better tutorial on how to do this.
I have been told to use Audacity (free software), and adjust the gain levels. Apparently this can be done by normalizing the effect at -3db, whatever that means.

If you want to extract more CA files to listen to, see the following sub-tutorial:
Total War Attila's audio files can be found in the following packs:

local_en_shared_rome2.pack
music.pack
music_en_shared_rome2.pack
sound.pack

They are all in WEM format. In order to listen to them, you will need to convert them. The tutorial I've found online recommends converting them to OGG format with the Divinity Sound Converter.

Step 2a: The first step is to extract the audio files from the packs listed above. Extract them to a folder somewhere.

Step 2b: Then you need to download the Divinity Sound Converter to your computer. I will admit that the link looks a little dodgy, but its seemingly legit and works fine for me.

Step 2c: Now extract the .zip package to the local hard disk. Then it will generate a divinity_sound_converter_v1 folder.

Step 2d: The next step is to copy all WEM files from the folder in Step 2a to the divinity_sound_converter_v1 folder. You may want to keep a copy of the .wem files, as the conversion process seems to break the copies you use.

Step 2e. Now double click on the red divinity_converter.exe. This will cause a CMD window to pop up which will show the progress on converting the files and will close automatically after the process is finished.

Step 2f: Now delete the "_wem" files that are left over. I'm not quite sure what they are, but you can't convert them again and they're rubbish.

Step 2g: The final step is to open the NUMBERED or NON-NUMBERED folders and you will see all the converted OGG files.

All credit to this tutorial: https://www.videoconverterfactory.co.../wem-file.html

Step 3: Now you must convert your audio to wav format.
You can convert files to wav format using a variety of online converters (try to choose a legit one). Eg https://audio.online-convert.com/convert/ogg-to-wav
For the purposes of this tutorial, I'm getting a few audio files from Battle For Middle Earth 2 in game.

Part 2: Getting Your Audio Into The Game
Step 4: Now you need to download and install Rome 2 2014 Wwise. https://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Wwise_-_...Modding_(TWR2)
once it is downloaded, extract Rome_2_Music_Modding_Kit.zip somewhere;
open the folder that comes out;
create a new folder inside this called “Wwise Project”;
put rome2_music_wwise_project.zip in the "Wwise Project" folder; AND THEN
extract rome2_music_wwise_project.zip as well

Step 5: Open the Wwise_v2014.1.3 folder and install Wwise_v2014.1.3_Setup.exe. Make sure you only install Authoring Data, Authoring Binaries 64-bit and SDK(Common)

Step 6: Go to the Wwise Project folder and use Wwise to open rome2_music_wwise_project.wproj

Step 7: On the left, in the Project Explorer panel, expand the various folders under Interactive Music Hierarchy. music – front_end – historical_battle_sequence – silence (I initially wrote this tutorial for how to import audio into historical battles. All the folder hierarchy is for Rome 2 anyway, so I don't think the hierarchy you use matters)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

https://i.imgur.com/dbIYzw0.png

Step 8: Right click on historical_battle_sequence and click Import Audio Files – Add Files – find the .wav file/s you want to add to the game – Import.
If you get an error message saying: "Error: Unsupported Resolution. The file must be in 16 or 24 bit per sample" then follow this guide to change the bit per sample: https://www.3cx.com/docs/converting-...h.a3mrwq9f9qkn

Step 9: Expand the file/s, you’ll see that its now blue. Click on the blue file/s and then in the Music Track Property Editor box tick the “Stream” box. You can also boost the volume up or down if you want to, via the sliding bar, and press play in the Transport Control box in the bottom.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

https://i.imgur.com/SFYqivQ.png

Step 10: Click on the historical_battle_sequence button, and then click F10. Drag the audio file you’ve imported under where it says “Random Continuous” in the middle bottom section.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

https://i.imgur.com/wHz4BhE.png

Step 11: Delete the “silence” file from historical_battle_sequence.

Step 12: Click F7 and you’ll see the Soundbank Manager box. Expand “Default Work Unit” and tick the following 4 boxes: Global_Music; Music_Data; Windows; English (UK)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

https://i.imgur.com/VOAtNWe.png

Step 13: Click “Generate”.

Step 14: Go to the “Wwise Project” folder and open “GeneratedSoundBanks”. You'll see it has created .wem file/s with random names. If you don't know what .wem file is what, you may need to convert them to ogg format to listen to them (see Step 2 - make sure you keep a copy of the wem files)
Make however many copies of the .wem file that you need (the selected_palatina_guards battle VO order involves 15 different files, thus I'll make 15 copies). Now rename each copy to the specific .wem file you're overriding. As detailed above, for me this is:
1072607642.wem
134618308.wem
146290875.wem
19833585.wem
233848878.wem
268452779.wem
280963842.wem
310638346.wem
544967355.wem
60302077.wem
662385529.wem
804726061.wem
806451676.wem
917904039.wem
968606310.wem

Now create a new folder called “audio”, and put the .wem file/s in it (the CA tutorial suggests also putting the Global_Music.bnk; and Music_Data.bnk in it but I haven't run into any issues from just ignoring them)

Step 15: Now you need to open your mod.pack; click Add - Directory; and copy+paste the directory of your audio folder (from step 14) into it. Your .wem file/s will be added to your mod.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read:

https://i.imgur.com/6pbM28X.png

Step 16: The final step is to add land_units_tables and main_units_tables to your mod.pack.
In land units table scroll to the far right and add the Battle VO Order you've edited, eg "selected_palatina_guards" to the selection_vo; selected_vo_secondary; and selected_vo_tertiary.
In main units table, scroll to the far right and ensure the voiceover entry is the same as that in the Battle VO Orders spreadsheet, eg roman if you've edited "selected_palatina_guards". Now it is finally time to test it in game!

An example pack can be found here. It gives all Roman units in base game Attila Orc voices.
However, as you will be able to tell, there will still be quite a few generic audio lines when you select units. These are likely tied to the unit's class in land_units_table. I will attempt to track them down at some stage.

Subculture	No. of Battle VO Orders
barbarian	110
eastern	64
nomad	59
roman	47