First off, this guide is a Work in Progress. I wanted to get it out there to help people understand and use the moreRealistic mod to increase their enjoyment of Farming Simulator 2013. If you don't understand the MR mod, it can be frustrating at times, so hopefully this is helpful. As Dural continues to update the MR engine, changes will occur in how the MR mod works. I will try to keep this guide as up to date as possible.

So, what is the moreRealistic mod?

Basically, the moreRealistic engine adds a physics engine to the game that better simulates real life. This has a number of affects on the game. One of the most notable effects is the reduced ability of tractors to pull heavy trailers or implements. With this mod, you will not be able to hook up the Amazone Condor behind a 100 HP tractor and expect to get anywhere. You will actually have to use tractors that have the proper horsepower requirements to pull various implements. The same is true for pulling trailers. A trailer full of grain is a very heavy attachment, and will require substantial power to pull. This will be most noticeable when pulling a trailer uphill, in which case the tractor will slow down considerably. If the tractor if greatly under-powered, you will not make it up the hill. In general, tractors will slow down when going uphill, speed up when going downhill, and take longer to accelerate when they are pulling a load. This is by design as it is more realistic. There have been a number of complaints about "Why does my tractor go so slow when I'm pulling a trailer of grain?" Understand, your tractor should go slower with a heavy load of grain than it would with no load.

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Another effect is seen in the harvesters. The speed at which a combine will be able to harvest is dependent upon the power of the combine, the size of the header, and how much grain is actually being harvested. For example, the Fahr M66 that you start the game with will only harvest a full header's width of wheat at about 2 mph. If you try to hook a larger grain header to the M66, it will slow down even more during the harvest.

These two factors mean that upgrading equipment in the game is very beneficial. The Case Steiger and Quadtrac actually become very useful and necessary to pull the largest implements. Larger Harvesters become necessary because you can't work very much ground with a 3 meter header at 2 mph.

Dural, the mod author, recommends that you start of playing with only the four parts of the MR mod in your mod folder. This includes the MR engine, MR Hagenstedt map, MR vehicles and MR Alternative Tipping. By doing this, you will get a good feel for how the MR mod actually works. Then, if you so desire you can start to slowly add in MR mods. Just be aware that some mods, especially maps, may affect how the MR engine runs. If you start to notice some weird effects, you may have a mod conflict. Start with no mods besides the four things listed above. I think you will enjoy it even though you may not have your favorite mod.

Also, at no point should you use an MR piece of equipment with a non-MR piece. This will cause very weird behavior. You can still use non-MR equipment when using the MR mod, but you need to use it with other non-MR equipment. For example, if you buy an MR trailer, it should be pulled behind an MR tractor. If you decide you want a non-MR trailer, you should get a non-MR tractor to pull it. You can still have all this on your farm at the same time, just don’t try to pull the MR trailer with the non-MR tractor, or the non-MR trailer with and MR tractor.

Some basics about driving the equipment:
Cruise control still works and is very similar to using the ESLimiter mod. Once you have a cruise control set, you can use the NUMPAD "+" and "-" to adjust the speed to what you want. Additionally, if you are just driving along and decide you want to set a cruise control setting at your current speed, you may hit Left Ctrl+the number of the cruise control you want to set. For example, if I am driving alongside a harvester unloading it and I get my speed perfectly set, I can hit Left Ctrl+4 to set cruise control 4 to that speed. This is a very nice function.
If a peice of equipment is equipped with AWD (All Wheel Drive), use NUMPAD * to turn it on or off. AWD is helpful when your slip values start to get too high.

I have put this section at the beginning because on many maps, harvesting is the first thing you will do. Therefore, it is the first time you will really notice the changes from the MR engine. In the Basics section, I already talked about the most noticeable change. The speed at which you can harvest is a function of the power of the harvester, the size of the header and how much power it requires to run, and the amount of crop passing through the header into the harvester. More powerful harvesters will be able to run bigger headers at higher speeds. As previously mentioned, the Fahr M66 that you start with on Hagenstedt will only run about 2 to 3 mph when harvesting the field of wheat that you start with. The 56 kW (75 HP) engine is barely enough to run a 3.2 m header when harvesting a fully fertilized field of wheat. Dural even put in the bigger 56 kW engine. The real engine in the M66 only has 38 kW, but with that little power the harvester won't be able to harvest wheat.

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This means upgrading to a more powerful harvester will be a early priority. By comparison, the Duetz-Fahr 7545 RTS will harvest wheat with its 8 m header at around 5 mph. This is still not fast, but that is by design. Real life harvesting is not done at 15 mph. At 5 mph with a 8 m header, you are still harvesting 6.4 Ha per hour. With the M66 at 2 mph and its 3.2 m header, you will be harvesting 1 Ha per hour. The benefit of better harvesters should be fairly obvious.

The other side of harvesters is their efficiency. In the MR engine, there are two factors that affect a harvesters efficiency. The first is known as realThreshingScale and represents minimum loss of grain during the harvesting process. Whatever this number is set at represents the highest percent of yield you will be able to obtain. In older versions of the MR mod for the M66, this number is set at .75 which means 25% of the possible yield is lost in the harvesting process. Dural notes that this number is unrealistic, but it is set that way to enhance gameplay. Again, this is encouraging you to buy a better harvester. If you step up to the Deutz 5465 H, your loss will drop to 17%. The best base MR harvester, the Deutz 7545 RTS, has a loss of 3%, so you can clearly see the benefit of upgrading. Note: In newer versions of the MR mod this number has been changed so that it is not such a huge factor.

The second factor is known as realCombineLosses. In the newer releases of the MR mod, the <realThreshingScale> has been changed and <realCombineLosses> becomes the main motivation for you to upgrade harvesters. (The M66 now has its <realThreshingScale> set to 0.96). This sets a maximum amount of material that the combine can handle per unit time before starting to experience more losses. These losses will increase even more as speed increases. Better harvesters are able to handle higher volumes of grain per unit time, further increasing your incentive to buy better equipment.

Plowing and cultivating are two of the areas I think were best served by the MR mod. In the un-modded (henceforth referred to as "vanilla") version of the game, basically any tractor could pull any implement no matter the size or weight. It should be fairly obvious that this is very unrealistic. Small 100 HP tractors should not be able to pull an 8-furrow plough through the ground. The MR mod corrected this.

Now, the more powerful tractors are actually necessary in the game to pull the larger implements. For example, the Pottinger Servo 6.50 (the 8-furrow plough) now requires a tractor of 200+ horsepower to pull. And that is on the light side. If you are trying to plow a field that has some hills in it, you will want a tractor closer to 300 HP. The Vogel & Noot TerraTop S 800 requires 350-600 HP to pull. So, with the MR mod you will no longer be able to buy big equipment early in the game without the proper tractor to put in front of it. This makes you actually work up to the bigger equipment because the more powerful tractors are quite expensive.

Some pieces of equipment (cultivators and seeders) receive a bonus when they are working on ground that has already been tilled. Dural gives an example of a tractor that is not quite strong enough to pull a cultivator over a field with stubble still in it. If you plow the field first, you may be able to pull the cultivator over the plowed ground because of the decrease in resistance. No-till seeders should have this function in them, as well, as it requires much more force to pull the seeder through the roots of a previous crop. Overall, cultivating and plowing still basically work the same way as the vanilla game, but you will require properly matched tractors to pull big equipment.

Seeding is the second area where people tend to notice the changes with the MR engine. Usually they first notice it when they go to plant canola in one of their fields. There are a number of changes to the way seeding happens, which I will outline one by one.

The first one I want to cover is important to understand because if you continuously change seed types, you are going to lose a lot of money. With the MR mod, anytime you change seed types with your seeder, it will empty the seeder out and refund you 85% of the value of any seed that was left in it. Even though this is covered in the manual that comes the the moreRealistic download, I have read numerous posts where people ask, "Why did I lose all my seed when changing seed types?" This is the MORE REALISTIC mod, and in real life you cannot morph wheat seeds into canola seeds. You have to empty your seeder of wheat seeds before adding canola seeds to it. This is what the MR mod is trying to replicate. The other reason, which I will cover in more depth later, is that different seed types cost different amounts per liter. If you could just change seed types (as you can in the vanilla game) people would just fill up with the cheapest seed, then switch to whichever seed they wanted. Again, the goal is realism.

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The second point I want to cover is that different seed types cost different amounts. I have seen numerous posts bashing the MR mod because someone went to fill their seeder with canola and it cost them $200,000. The manual does state that you shouldn't put any more seed in your seeder than you will need to plant your field, and explicitly states that you don't need much canola to plant a field so you should't fill your seeder all the way. The seed types which require more seed per hectare cost less per liter. Wheat and barley are relatively similar, but canola is very expensive per liter. This is realistic. As you will find out, while canola seed is very expensive, it takes very little to plant a field. So you don't need to buy much. Just be aware that certain seed types you will not want to put large amounts of seed in your seeder.

This brings me to the next point: Seed usage in liters per hectare also varies based on seed type. Now, as I use some numbers to illustrate here, note that seed prices and usage vary based on difficulty level. I play on hard, and that is where most of my numbers come from. Wheat and barley use around 200 L/Ha when planting. In comparison, canola only uses 4 L/Ha. So, if we take the starting field on Hagenstedt (Field 16) which is 0.45 hectares, you will need 90 L of wheat, 101.25 L for barley, and only 1.8 L for canola. You will need to keep this in mind when filling your seeder. You only want to put in as much seed as you will need to seed your field. The seed cost for wheat is $2.625/L, so it will cost around $240 for the seed we need to plant Field 16. If we change to barley, seeds cost $2.475/L, so the cost will be around $250. Canola seeds cost $70/L, so it will cost $126 to plant FIeld 16. So we can see that, while canola seeds are very expensive, in terms of cost per hectare to plant, canola is actually cheaper than wheat or barley.

Fertilizing is one section of the MR mod where you may not notice much difference. The MR mod does make some changes to the use of fertilizer in game, but they are just less noticeable than other changes. Solid and liquid fertilizer both cost the same, so it will not matter whether you use a fertilizer spreader or sprayer. You will pay the same amount per liter to fill it. However, the usages for solid and liquid fertilizer are slightly different. You will use slightly more solid fertilizer than liquid fertilizer to do the same sized field.

As in the base game, fertilizer spreaders and sprayers have a speed limit. If you drive faster than that the implement will not put fertilizer on the ground. However, with the MR mod you can drive any speed you like under that speed limit and not have to worry about wasting fertilizer. In the base game, a spreader or sprayer outputs fertilizer at the same rate no matter what your speed is. Therefore, to avoid wasting fertilizer you would have to drive as fast as possible under the speed limit. With the MR mod, the rate at which these implements spread fertilizer scales with the speed. So you will use the same amount of fertilizer driving 3 mph as 10 mph. Now you don't have to fertilize at break-neck speeds and can take things at your own pace.

Fertilizer prices are also subject to the global price multiplier, so it will be more expensive as you increase difficulty levels.

One note about slurry and manure: If you read the data documentation that comes with the MR mod, it will say that slurry usage is 30 m3 per hectare (30,000 L/Ha) and that solid manure usage is 25 T/Ha (which works out to 38,000 L/Ha). This has been changed in newer versions so that slurry usage is 20 m3/Ha and manure usage is 20 T/Ha (which works out to around 30,000 L/Ha).

Baling may be (is, in my opinion) the most exciting change that occurs with the MR mod. Cheifly, this is because you can now handle bales without them flying all over the place. They seem to have wieight. Amazing! So, if you are using MR equipment, you should be able to cruise along and pick up your bales with a frontloader with little trouble. Also, since the bales have weight, you are able to use the bale trailers to transport them without worrying about a locking script. You can now just place them on the trailer and drive off. Assuming you do not drive like a crazy person and take turns at a reasonable speed, the bales will sit soundly on the trailer without falling off. In fact, while driving like a real farmer would, the bales hardly even move around on the trailer. Again, this is without a locking script. This is a huge change from the vanilla game. Baling is actually enjoyable now instead of an exercise in extreme frustration.

One very, very important note about baling: you must be using an MR converted baler. Obviously, the MR mod comes with the Krone round and square balers converted to MR. So, if you use these you will notice these differences. If you use a non-MR baler, your bales will not be MR, so they will behave as they do in the vanilla game. ***VERY IMPORTANT***

One of the biggest changes when selling crop is that the best price for a certain crop will change stations every day. In the vanilla game, prices would fluctuate, but a certain station would still always have the best price compared to the other stations. This is no longer the case. You need to check your PDA every day to see which stations are offering the best prices for certain crops.

You will also notice that carting grain around has become much different. Trailers full of grain actually act like they have weight now. While a tractor may be able to pull a trailer empty, it may struggle to pull it full of grain. This becomes most noticable when trying to cart grain up a hill. If you play on Hagenstedt or Westbridge Hills, the hills are quite steep (unrealistically so in many cases). Even with a powerful tractor, you will notice a considerable decrease in speed when trying to cart grain up these hills. With less powerful tractors you may not be able to make it up these hills with a full trailer. You may have to take a different route or take the trailer to the sell point half full. While this may seem crazy and annoying, it is realistic with the insane grades on Hagenstedt and Westbridge Hills. So be prepared and plan on this aspect of the game, especially if you play on a hilly map.

When playing with the MR mod, especially if you are new, you need to forget alot of what you learned from the "vanilla" game. Start playing with the MR mod and relearn how it works. One good example: in the base game, adding a front weight to a tractor would make it go faster. In the MR mod, it will actually slow you down and decrease acceleration because you are now carrying more weight. Front weights really should be used only to keep the front wheels in good contact with the ground so you can steer. If you can steer fine without a front weight, don't use one as it will only slow you down. If your steering starts to feel a little loose or hard to control, try a front weight. And don't use the larger front weights unless you need them. Remember, more weight = slower speed, slower acceleration.

Above all else, enjoy the MR mod and all the work that Dural has put into it. Try not to get too frustrated, but remember parts of the game are supposed to be somewhat challenging. If you have questions, feel free to ask. Post a question in the Steam forum for Farming Simulator 2013 or as a comment here on my guide. Or check out the forums at www.fs-uk.com. There is a section for the moreRealistic mod which can answer a lot of questions. Have fun!

This section will outline the data I have collected so far from playing in game. There are different numbers for Easy, Normal, and Hard settings. These numbers are current as of the V1.2 patch. I will update them as I am able.