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Dev Diary 11: Stopping The Snowball

Hey! So today we will talk about some mechanics we’ve added to make other rulers react to what happens in the world. We want to slow down the snowball and prolong the time it takes to conquer the world, so it shouldn’t be as easy to do. Snowballs are pretty evil, just like medieval rulers.

Just as with the shattered retreat mechanic we took inspiration from Europa Universalis 4 in our decision to add Coalitions. Our coalitions however are based on an Infamy value instead of Aggressive Expansion. You might recognize the name Infamy from our old games, but even though it shares the name it will work quite differently.

Infamy is limited to be within the range of 0 to 100% and will slowly decay over time based on how strong your max military potential is. When you hit 25% infamy, coalitions will be unlocked and AIs will start joining them based on how threatened they feel.Your infamy will serve as a hint on how aggressive and dangerous other rulers think your realm is. You gain infamy primarily by conquering land through war or by inheriting a fair maidens huge tracts of land.

The amount of Infamy you gain is based on the action you do, how much land you take and how large your realm already is. So for instance the Kaiser of the HRE declaring a war for Flanders and taking it is going to make the neighbours more worried than if Pomerania manages to take Mecklenburg.
capture(56).png


Coalitions themselves are mostly defensive in Crusader Kings, if any member gets attacked by the target of the coalition they will automatically be called into the war. If a member starts a war against the target they only get a normal call to arms which they can choose to decline.

For an AI to join a coalition they will consider the relative strength between the target and themselves, how threatened they think they are and how much infamy the target has accrued. You can view the current coalition someone has against them by the diplomacy field on the character screen.

capture(54).png


But it might not be the easiest way to view it so we also added a mapmode to more easily visualize Coalitions. A nation which turns up white is the nation you have currently selected, blue will be targetable for coalitions, yellow means they have a coalition against them and Red means they are members of the coalition against the currently selected one.

capture(55).jpg
 
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Oh I just love this dynastic game and how it isn't about world conquest for the glory of the state. BRB about to world conquest for the glory of my state with no reaction from the AI.

  • AI now reacts accordingly to states bent on world conquest.
WTF? If I wanted the AI rulers to actually be wary of my Sassanid empire mk 1000, I would have played EU4!

This game is now just EU4! How unrealistic! For rulers to try to stop my snowballing. God, what a horrid and ahistorical idea! If I wanted ahistorical coalitions against my rule, I would've played EU4. Not like any of those ever happened during the middle ages.
 
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I can't wait to get more information on the patch and dlc to make an informed decision but I am optimistic that if they are introducing this as a free patch feature then there will be more anti-snowball mechanics in the actual dlc.
 
I forgot to put this on Dev diary 10 so I'll put it in this one:
I think it is time you guys look into updating the province screen to show all the info on one screen like how many troops to siege it what buildings are there how much loot and a spot for trade posts and forts all without having to toggle between two or three screen would be swell
 
Oh I just love this dynastic game and how it isn't about world conquest for the glory of the state. BRB about to world conquest for the glory of my state with no reaction from the AI.

  • AI now reacts accordingly to states bent on world conquest.
WTF? If I wanted the AI rulers to actually be wary of my Sassanid empire mk 1000, I would have played EU4!

This game is now just EU4! How unrealistic! For rulers to try to stop my snowballing. God, what a horrid and ahistorical idea! If I wanted ahistorical coalitions against my rule, I would've played EU4. Not like any of those ever happened during the middle ages.
All your listed examples are regular alliances, not coalitions.
 
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I forgot to put this on Dev diary 10 so I'll put it in this one:
I think it is time you guys look into updating the province screen to show all the info on one screen like how many troops to siege it what buildings are there how much loot and a spot for trade posts and forts all without having to toggle between two or three screen would be swell

You can already see how many troops it takes to siege it down by clicking on it and mousing over the levy/garrison in the castle. Levy + garrison + 1 = troops needed unless levy is empty, then it's just garrison + 1.
 
You mean, those alliances were established by marriage?
What's the difference between a non-marriage alliance and a coalition?
A coalition is a reaction by several countries to an immediate threat, and targeted specifically at it. An alliance is bounding two or more countries in friendship, usually with the goal of long-term cooperation.
 
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Coalitions work great against France blobbing in EU4.

Oh wait, they dont.....


You set up the event chain for charlemagne to get his brother killed: bang!! lots of coalition for following the game!
 
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Asking my earlier question again @Groogy how moddable will this be? Will we be able to mod targeted decisions into the infamy system ?
@Groogy
+1, this would be really good to know if its moddable so modders can start drafting some plans.
 
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I forgot to put this on Dev diary 10 so I'll put it in this one:
I think it is time you guys look into updating the province screen to show all the info on one screen like how many troops to siege it what buildings are there how much loot and a spot for trade posts and forts all without having to toggle between two or three screen would be swell
But...we do have all this information on display. Well, except for buildings.

Troops to siege = 1+Garrison (hover over green bar of holding)+Levy (hover over red bar of holding).

Buildings, click on holding picture. It is a different screen, but still there.

Loot, gold/yellow/orange bar in the middle of the province info. If you hover over it it'll tell you all about loot for the province.

Fort/Trade Posts: Click the arrow next to the province info and fort/trade info will 'slide out' so you can see that too.

Wait. Some of this might only be true for CK2+ . Vanilla may gave different fort/trade display methods
 
Fort/Trade Posts: Click the arrow next to the province info and fort/trade info will 'slide out' so you can see that too.

Wait. Some of this might only be true for CK2+ . Vanilla may gave different fort/trade display methods

No, you're correct. Vanilla CK2 puts trade/forts in the arrow thing similar to buildings in EU4.
 
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Does it apply to dependent rulers and vassals as well?

Please please make it so. Don't make it just a top liege content. EU4 coalition already has that much content (and more). You need to differentiate CK2. I want other counts and dukes to form coalition against their peers.

The concept of 'this guy has more pointy sticks than me, so I will get everyone who hates him to poke him with their pointy stick's was invented about roughly the same time as the pointy stick.

No coalitions are not something humans invented because we created nation states.

You said it so your self. Dependent count and duke peers should do that to each other. Don't restrict it to dependent realms. Make it moddable for extended modding options, please!
 
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Does it apply to dependent rulers and vassals as well?

Please please make it so. Don't make it just a top liege content. EU4 coalition already has that much content (and more). You need to differentiate CK2. I want other counts and dukes to form coalition against their peers.

Excuse me, this is an anti-blobbing measure, and you're asking for it to happen to *EVERYONE*, regardless of realm size?
 
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The concept of 'this guy has more pointy sticks than me, so I will get everyone who hates him to poke him with their pointy stick's was invented about roughly the same time as the pointy stick.

No coalitions are not something humans invented because we created nation states.

Yes, because my peers should logically try to prevent me from conquering their peers and rising through the ranks as much as other countries try to stop the blobbing. Ti's the same logic.
 
I have seriously mixed feelings about this new system. It might sound somewhat nice on paper right now but it will be horrible in practice. This game is not EU4 and doesn't even share similar mechanics.

It will kill chances of expansion for smaller nations, while the snowballing big blobs will still roll on unstoppably, because only some other snowballing blob can match the size of their levies, money and power. :(

If Paradox is going to import EU4 stuff in CK2, they might as well focus on extending the end date to 1492 and make it scalable to at least 1453.
 
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Wait, does legitimately (through normal inheritance or undetected assassination) gaining land through peaceful means produce Infamy?
 
Hmm... Maybe we could have the infamy limit before getting a coalition be dependent on your dip score?
 
"You gain infamy primarily by conquering land through war or by inheriting a fair maidens huge tracts of land."

Probably.

That's just ridiculous, this will only stop medium size realms from rising. The existing blobs like the Caliphates, ERE and HRE will not be seriously impacted by this, the only thing that can stop a blob reliably is another blob.
 
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