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Winter is here and the ice-fear is very cold (now there's an obscure reference for you). For today's diary, I thought that we might immerse ourselves in medieval jurisprudence. In practice, the laws function in much the same way as in Rome: Vae Victis, but in Crusader Kings II there are two different types of law; one that applies to a character's actual demesne (de facto, or demesne laws) and one that applies to everyone within an ancient traditional kingdom (de jure, or kingdom laws.) Demesne laws cover things like succession, tax levels and how the council operates. Any playable character can fiddle around with his own demesne laws. Kingdom laws cover the freedoms, rights and obligations of burghers, nobles, clergy and peasants. Only the holder of a Kingdom title is allowed to change these laws, and they will affect the whole geographical kingdom, regardless of whether a province is actually under its de facto control. (Like in Crusader Kings, de jure duchies and kingdoms are static, geographical entities that never change.)

Therefore, a player who is, for example, king of Norway and Denmark must change de jure laws separately per kingdom. To make things even more interesting, succession at the kingdom level (and only at the kingdom level) is also handled per kingdom, so Norway might be an elective monarchy while Denmark has primogeniture. Thus, the Norwegian dukes might elect another successor to the throne of Norway than the oldest son of the current king, which would split the kingdoms apart...
Speaking of succession laws, they are slightly different from the ones in Crusader Kings. In Crusader Kings II, most succession laws can be either cognatic or agnatic (that choice is a separate law.) These are the succession laws of CKII:

  • Seniority (oldest man in the dynasty succeeds)
  • Primogeniture (oldest son succeeds)
  • Elective (the current king and the dukes each nominate a successor)
  • Gavelkind (all titles are divided among the sons of the ruler)
  • Turkish (a succession crisis is almost guaranteed, but the vassals are content)
  • Republican (a random vassal or courtier succeeds; used for republics, etc)
  • Catholic Bishopric (the liege lord can override the Pope's choice by nominating his own successor)

That's all for now. The game is still a very long way from being finished, but I can at least offer you this screenshot of the current Law interface (though bear in mind that it is still very much subject to change.) In the screenshot, the king stands to inherit the duchy, because the young duke has no legal heir. "Pretenders" are the second and third characters in the line of succession.


Diary003_01.jpg


Until next time, I bid you a very merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Henrik Fåhraeus, Associate Producer and CKII Project Lead
 
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Nope, 2nd and 4th respectively. Schedule is first Thursday of the month, but the holiday ballsed that one up. I'm sure we'll get something once he's back in the office :)

(get back to work, Doomdark!)
 
I’m curious, how random is succession in republican form?

Doomdark said that it is random, but in CK1 it was affected by a character's stats, probably military most of all, like all states with elective succession. There is room for some interesting things in CK2. In the thread on republics, I suggested how being the feudal count of a republic might be interesting, and historical. In EU Rome, elections varied, from once a year to every ten years IIRC, so we may be able to get out of republican leaders ruling until death.
 
I hope republics, will have their superior features)))

There should be a way for small states to declare themselves from monarchy to republic and back again. The devs said something about baronies not being able to change what they are, which I find limiting (but it probably makes sense from a programming point of view). But northern Italy should have its communes, same for the Flanders: expanding cities means more trade, more taxation, bigger armies, all the benefits of bigger, concentrated populations; it also means for royalty the ability to squelch your nobility a bit, by granting the bourgeoisie privileges (e.g., imperial free cities).
 
Don't push them. We know it will come today, just be patient, or they might punish us and only publish it at 23:59h...
 
Will the modding in an additional succession law be easy? a task of simply adding in one with notepad?
with scroll bars in place to cope with the extra additions and all?
or will there be a fixed maximum number of potential succession laws or have them hidden away out of being meddled with? as with laws in Victoria II being trapped in unexpandable boxes
As in will the Female Succession Mod or Saxon Law Mod or what have you, be completely complicated with either removing a current law and whole sets of interface replacements, or a simple two second to make entry adjustment, no more than say adding in a new culture or the like?
 
Will the modding in an additional succession law be easy? a task of simply adding in one with notepad?
with scroll bars in place to cope with the extra additions and all?
or will there be a fixed maximum number of potential succession laws or have them hidden away out of being meddled with? as with laws in Victoria II being trapped in unexpandable boxes
As in will the Female Succession Mod or Saxon Law Mod or what have you, be completely complicated with either removing a current law and whole sets of interface replacements, or a simple two second to make entry adjustment, no more than say adding in a new culture or the like?

Doomdark said on December 2, 2010 [post #7 of this thread]: "The succession laws are only partially moddable. You can change the requirements, but not how they actually work." If it is like in EU Rome, this means that you can change the requirements for changing the law, but the effect is the same. If you have Rome, see yours /decisions/monarchy.txt to see what I mean.
 
Well thats a shame but atleast the starting options are great.

I like the senior male family member option myself, and that you will have a different law for each title. That way, electoral or primogeniture kingship, and then divvying up the inheritance by gavelkind will finally work for my Iberian Christians. And a mix of laws for other cultural groups like separate electoral kingdom titles for Scandinavians and Central Europeans as it should be.
 
aye it does all sound like its going to be Brilliant!
And i like the sound of that one too! and the seperation is truely the best thing for sure.
But i was hoping for open possibilities for the like of succession along the maturnal line only or dynasty elective or female succession and all those sort of potentials but no worries and neverminds.
 
aye it does all sound like its going to be Brilliant!
And i like the sound of that one too! and the seperation is truely the best thing for sure.
But i was hoping for open possibilities for the like of succession along the maturnal line only or dynasty elective or female succession and all those sort of potentials but no worries and neverminds.

Doomdark has said that they may add more succession laws, since they're still about a year away from release..
 
Crusading Orders, Bishoprics, and Republics

What succession laws will crusading orders like the Knights Templar have? In CK1, the ruling law was elective by default, but I was thinking that the Catholic bishopric law might apply: some orders like the Spanish Order of Santiago were under the clear aegis of the state, as the Templars were under the Kingdom of Jerusalem, so secular leaders should have some say on who is elected Grandmaster (or the master of a local priory for that matter), or at least be able to sway votes towards their favorites.