CK3 Dev Diary #60 - The Cost of Warfare

[Tiax]

Using a war as a pretense to weaken large blob monsters so they can get eaten by others (or from within) was a common strategy for me in CK2. I can't say I'm upset to see it come back.

Sure, but the way the AI conducts war currently is that the two armies march past each other and race to siege down each others' capitals and see who gets lucky with captives. It's one thing to weaken to a large state with a prolonged, devastating war. It's another to just sail around to their capital, siege it down, and make them easy pickings for the vultures.

Countries should be weakened because their armies have been cut down, not because they can't re-garrison their capital.

 

[Sledjer]

I am a fan of most of the changes, but

When it comes to Mercenaries, we adjusted how their cost is calculated. The price of a company is now affected by a few parameters:

• The primary title
• The size of the Realm
• The current Innovation Era

The dynamic price will make it easier for lower tier realms to rely on Mercenaries and fight back their bigger neighbours. And it will be harder for extremely rich emperors to deny access to mercenaries by hiring all of them for a small sum. After all, why would the Count of Ulster be expected to pay the same price as the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire - if you're a mercenary captain and you see that your client clearly is rich, you might just increase your prices...

I strongly disagree with this one. If you need to buy mercenaries as a larger realm, chances are you are fighting someone else who also has a large army. Given that you would already need to buy more mercenaries in a large war with mercenaries than in a small one (larger wars mean the armies are already larger, and thus one mercenary company is proportionately less given the higher scale), this means that mercenaries are now only useful for small countries. I agree that buying all mercenaries to deny access is kind of cheesy, but at least conceptually it sounds like a valid strategy if you have the means to do it. I don't think it really counts as a game exploit, and it seems to me like this would have been even doable in real life. The only reason we didn't really see it in history is that, both in reality and the game, you're only wasting money if you buy more mercenaries than you need. If you can afford to buy the mercenaries to cause a mercenary shortage for the enemy, you could have just as well just bought enough mercenaries to comfortably win in battle and not have to waste all that money. If its really becoming a problem then that is more the fault of inflation, and this would be nothing but a bandaid solution. I'm also skeptical about the reasoning that you would charge different prices. While a rich lord could certainly pay more, he would also be expecting a company with higher quality or numbers to justify the cost. It's not as of there is only one mercenary company with a monopoly on the market. Even if that was valid though, it should clearly be a function of income rather than realm size.

 

[Cassilda]

I'm happy to see that vassals outside the de jure territory of a ruler will be more likely to seek independence, expanding an empire and keeping it stable should be more difficult than it is in the game most of the times.

 

[Tiax]

Sure, there definitely should be a bias towards powerful vassals wanting independence instead of weaker ones but ambitious also doesn't mean smart so I don't have a problem with a count joining an independence faction only to reabsorbed a few years later.

We can certainly justify poor AI behavior this way, but I don't think it makes for a good gameplay experience if the AI is incompetent at pursuing its goals. If random counts declare independence before they can fend for themselves on the basis of being ambitious, that means their story is cut short. If they instead pursued power in a somewhat more sensible way, by growing internally and then declaring independence, we'll get much more compelling narratives. The AI doing foolish things is likely to simply appear random and uninteresting to a player, even if there is some justification we can concoct on the basis of the AI's traits (and a healthy dose of assuming the AI to not be smart ).

 

[Herennius]

It's an inelegant fix but hard capping the number of mercenaries certain rulers can recruit is probably going to be the only realistic fix. There could then dynastic or possible government bonuses that allow you to recruit more mercenaries.

Imperator Rome went this path recently - the base number of merc armies you can recuit is tied to the country rank and certain inventions allow additional ones.

 

[Cymsdale]

I think some of you are getting the impression it's going to be like "Oh, you're a king/empire? Then hiring us will be one billion ducats!" when it's more like a moderate increase so that hiring out every merc indefinitely doesn't just cost a tiny percent of your massive yearly budget.

 

[Morrowind3]

Dynamic Garrison​

Your upcoming war will have a quite different pace. From now on, the garrison will be depleted at the end of a successful siege. It means that a freshly captured territory will be defenseless for a while, making recapturing it faster. After a siege, the garrison will recover over months or years, and the speed can be increased by improving the Holdings.

It will thus be easier to counter-attack and recover territories you lost recently, or to continue a war which was invalidated if you have another valid casus belli. This change will encourage you to defend your wargoals and the strategic territory with your armies.

Nice, one of the features I missed from ck2

 

[Cymsdale]

The AI doing foolish things is likely to simply appear random and uninteresting to a player, even if there is some justification we can concoct on the basis of the AI's traits (and a healthy dose of assuming the AI to not be smart ).

Well the AI's traits DO drive a lot of the decisions they make. Brave/Wrathful/Arbitrary/Dull for example can lower the rationality of the character, and this drives how "smart" they are when they declare wars based on relative army strength.

The nice thing is the AI characters do attempt to act on personality and don't act like a bunch of grognards who know they are playing a 4X strategy computer game.

 

[InsidiousMage]

We can certainly justify poor AI behavior this way, but I don't think it makes for a good gameplay experience if the AI is incompetent at pursuing its goals. If random counts declare independence before they can fend for themselves on the basis of being ambitious, that means their story is cut short. If they instead pursued power in a somewhat more sensible way, by growing internally and then declaring independence, we'll get much more compelling narratives.

I was actually talking about real people. Incompetent rulers exist and I thinks its fine for that to be represented in-game outside of whatever issues the players think the AI is bad at. There are plenty of people in history whose ambitions far exceeded their ability. Not saying every AI count with the Ambitious trait should push to go independent but if they are also, say, Greedy or Arrogant then yeah, they could join the independence faction and lose everything a couple of years later.

 

[bsmithers333]

I made have made a mistake in an earlier post... can anyone confirm how faction strength is calculated? I assumed it was based on total troop numbers (not quality), but I suppose it's equally possible that it accounts for quality by summing total damage or toughness of units? So that Men-at-Arms are "weighted" in the calculation?

Genuinely interested, and sorry for any misinformation. Anecdotally it just seems like an 80-100% faction is bad news if they merge their stacks as they have tons of MAA, and I always buy mercs if I can't pick off enough stacks right away.

 

[JackTheHat]

War declaration screen- Very nice improvement to make things easier
Mercenaries- Not a fan of the 'flexible' prices. It doesn't make any sense. The count of Ulster would absolutely be expected to pay roughly the same as the Holy Roman emperor for a similar sized mercenary band. The obvious handicap seems kind of immersion breaking and punishes a player for having a rich and prosperous realm. In future I'd love to see characters with prestige and gold create their own mercenary band. Playing as a mercenary captain turned adventurer would be a cool way to start a dynasty and would be a perfect chance to give unlanded, ambitious, non-Norse characters an opportunity to carve out their own realm.
Garrison- Very happy with this update. I preferred the old CK2 style of conquered territories being weaker
Factions- Another nice improvement. Anything that makes the game more challenging is good news for veteran CK players. An option to pay off members of a faction would be a good idea for future updates.

 

[Tiax]

Well the AI's traits DO drive a lot of the decisions they make. Brave/Wrathful/Arbitrary/Dull for example can lower the rationality of the character, and this drives how "smart" they are when they declare wars based on relative army strength.

The nice thing is the AI characters do attempt to act on personality and don't act like a bunch of grognards who know they are playing a 4X strategy computer game.

I would rather see the AI's personality influence its goals, not prevent it from pursuing them. An ambitious character should seek to be powerful, not throw away their chance to be powerful at the first opportunity. I understand there's a balance to be struck between having the AI behave as though they were real people driven by personality and having the AI behave as a meta-gaming computer, but I don't think that conflict exists in this case. The count of Kent declaring independence and trying to go it alone is not something a real person in history would have tried.

In the case that small AI vassals do want to become independent, I'd much rather see them try to band together behind a leader than try to all go it alone. Consider for example the Bulgarians in the 1066 start. If a handful of Bulgarian counts or dukes acquired some land within the Byzantine Empire (I think at game start it's almost all Greek governors), and wanted to be free of the Byzantine yoke, should they just try to be come a bunch of independent OPMs, ready to be gobbled up by Hungary, the Pechenegs, or Byzantines within a few years? No, they should do what historical figures did - band together behind a leader and try to make him an independent King of Bulgaria.

Having just a bunch of random counts that become independent and are gobbled back up every few years isn't interesting, isn't realistic, and isn't a threat to the stability of large powers.

 

[Tuo]

I would think that for a mercenary company, a job from Emperor Maximilian Chadinson of Megarome would likely involve higher stakes and more travel than one with Count Pete Pettymore of Littlenowhere - an easy headcanon justifying the scaling mercenary cost.

 

[JackTheHat]

I would rather see the AI's personality influence its goals, not prevent it from pursuing them. An ambitious character should seek to be powerful, not throw away their chance to be powerful at the first opportunity. I understand there's a balance to be struck between having the AI behave as though they were real people driven by personality and having the AI behave as a meta-gaming computer, but I don't think that conflict exists in this case. The count of Kent declaring independence and trying to go it alone is not something a real person in history would have tried.

In the case that small AI vassals do want to become independent, I'd much rather see them try to band together behind a leader than try to all go it alone. Consider for example the Bulgarians in the 1066 start. If a handful of Bulgarian counts or dukes acquired some land within the Byzantine Empire (I think at game start it's almost all Greek governors), and wanted to be free of the Byzantine yoke, should they just try to be come a bunch of independent OPMs, ready to be gobbled up by Hungary, the Pechenegs, or Byzantines within a few years? No, they should do what historical figures did - band together behind a leader and try to make him an independent King of Bulgaria.

Having just a bunch of random counts that become independent and are gobbled back up every few years isn't interesting, isn't realistic, and isn't a threat to the stability of large powers.

You both make good points but I think I agree more with you. There's a difference between ambition and stupidity. I'd have thought an ambitious ruler would build their own power and wait for the right opportunity before striking against their lord if they were to rebel against their lord at all. Ambition doesn't necessarily mean treachery. Maybe an ambitious character would be a brown-noser...
I also agree about the independence comment. In my last Viking campaign France absolutely splintered and mopping up all of the independent counties was no problem at all. 2000 levies would get the job done. It didn't make sense. The Empire of Odin was on their doorstep and they didn't seem to show any signs of self preservation.

 

[Dan the cynical barbarian]

Hello everyone!

I’m back with more info about what’s coming in the 1.4 Azure patch! Today we are going to cover improvements around Warfare. We prepared a few more things in addition to the starting Men-at-Arms. I hope you will find them interesting!

Declare War Window 1.4​

In addition to the Quality of Life improvements we presented last week, we also revisited the war declaration interface.

[Image of the new Declare War window]​

As you can see, the information has been restructured and it should be easier now to:

• Compare your strength with your target
• Estimate if your opponents will have the funds to hire mercenaries
• Select an available objective

Dynamic Mercenary Cost​

When it comes to Mercenaries, we adjusted how their cost is calculated. The price of a company is now affected by a few parameters:

• The primary title
• The size of the Realm
• The current Innovation Era

The dynamic price will make it easier for lower tier realms to rely on Mercenaries and fight back their bigger neighbours. And it will be harder for extremely rich emperors to deny access to mercenaries by hiring all of them for a small sum. After all, why would the Count of Ulster be expected to pay the same price as the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire - if you're a mercenary captain and you see that your client clearly is rich, you might just increase your prices...

Dynamic Garrison​

Your upcoming war will have a quite different pace. From now on, the garrison will be depleted at the end of a successful siege. It means that a freshly captured territory will be defenseless for a while, making recapturing it faster. After a siege, the garrison will recover over months or years, and the speed can be increased by improving the Holdings.

It will thus be easier to counter-attack and recover territories you lost recently, or to continue a war which was invalidated if you have another valid casus belli. This change will encourage you to defend your wargoals and the strategic territory with your armies.

Factions update​

In order to make your life harder when you start conquering the world, we tweaked the logic behind the creation of factions, and they should be more threatening now.

One of the big changes is their ability to synchronise their declaration. The power they need before pushing their demand is now dynamic and reacts to the state of the other factions. If a faction is threatening you, or is already at war with a ruler, it will be easier for another faction to push their demands. It should create more challenging situations, and you might want to concede to some factions to avoid struggling with too many opponents.

[Image: The faction is not strong enough to push their demands despite a lowered threshold due to existing factions]

[Image: After one of the other factions declared war, the faction is now strong enough and will push their demand while their ruler is fighting the others.]​

In addition to that, characters will be more inclined to join an Independence Faction if they own enough territories outside of the de jure area of the primary title of their Liege. Again, fast conquest will be more challenging, and consolidating your Realm will be more important.

And that’s it for today’s Dev Diary! But, before leaving you, a quick reminder: The PDX Con will be held this week-end! You can join us on our dedicated Discord Server! There will be a lot of nice streams and announcements; stay tuned for some news about Crusader Kings III !

Have a nice week, and see you soon!

Congratulations on taking a year to catch up to CK2. Only Paradox to need to add stuff that was in their previous game in patches

 

[InsidiousMage]

There's a difference between ambition and stupidity.

But they are also not mutually exclusive either. People can be both ambitious and stupid and that should be reflected in the game.

 

[Tiax]

But they are also not mutually exclusive either. People can be both ambitious and stupid and that should be reflected in the game.

If we want the AI to push for suicidal independence on the basis of stupidity, let it be controlled by the Imbecile, Stupid and Slow traits, not by Ambitious.

 

[Liquid Ghost]

'oh, now I make 3x more money, awesome! nevermind, now almost everything costs 3x more too...'

They just told you the scaling is not linear....so no.

 

[sante10]

All of these changes are welcome and are really important things. But I really hope that at some point the system of the Crusades will be improved.

 

[JackTheHat]

But they are also not mutually exclusive either. People can be both ambitious and stupid and that should be reflected in the game.

Sure but like Tiax said, ambition alone shouldn't cause hopeless rebellions. If it's combined with arrogant, stupid, vengeful or wrathful it might make more sense. If it was happening all the time though it would be stupid. Even rulers with all of those traits would be unlikely to fight a war they can't win.