• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.

Dev Diary #113 - Community Choice Event Pack

Greetings!

We’re all back, gathered from the holidays, and ready to set sail for 2023! Actually, most of us have been back for a few weeks by this point, working away on this year's big release, but we're not going to be talking about that just yet. That's not to say we're not going to in the future, but until we are ready to, we want to give you something to dig your teeth into as a community. This is the first of a small series of Dev Diaries about some more minor things, teasers, and today, about a brand-new community initiative!
But first, here’s a small teaser of something coming in the expansion:
teaser1.png

[Image - Teaser]

Later this year, after we’ve released the next big expansion and before we start working on the next large project, we’ll have a period where we have the time and opportunity to work on an event pack. For the last event pack we chose ‘friends and foes’ as the core theme, as it was something practically everyone in the team felt strongly about, and something that needed more content in the game. Since then, we’ve had so many ideas for future event packs, both from within the team and outside, and this time it’s harder to choose…

Therefore we’d like to invite all of you to help us decide which theme to pick! We have three themes that we’ve curated, which means a few things; each theme has designers on the team that are passionate about them, and we know roughly what free feature we’d like to add to the update that will accompany the event pack: generally we'll be aiming for something with a similar size and impact as Friends & Foes' Memories system, which heavily ties into the events we're making but is relevant across the game as a whole.

We don’t have final names for the event packs yet, but as we enjoy alliteration here’s what we’re calling them and a very brief description of each:

Wards & Wardens - Anything childhood-related, with themes such as: playing as a child, being a guardian, handling children in court, and so on. A deep dive into what being a child in the Middle Ages was actually like, and what guardianship meant in practical terms.

Love & Lust - An exploration of more intimate relationships, with themes such as: expanded seduction, romance, married life, and so on. This would be a great time to allow lovers and spouses to take on a larger role in the game.

Villains & Vagabonds - Events and content around Dread and Tyranny, exploring what it means to be dreaded, leveraging your fearsome reputation, making dread more visible, and the consequences and opportunities of being a tyrant. It’d also be interesting to explore the other side of the coin from Dread - fairness, and honor.

Even though this event pack is something we’ll work on later this year, it’s good to get your input now - this way we can start working on it without delay as soon as the next big expansion is out! As we have a lot of talented event-crafters on the design team, we feel quite confident that we can adapt to whatever theme you, as a community, choose.

If this turns out to be a popular activity, it is possible that we will do it again in the future! The themes that do not get chosen this time will likely make a comeback, alongside some new challengers.

The poll to vote is located in a separate forum thread here. Voting will begin today and you will have until January 27, 8am CET to discuss the different themes and cast your vote. We’re looking forward to seeing which theme you like the most!


EventPackThemeVote.png
 
  • 106Like
  • 27
  • 25Love
  • 2
  • 2
Reactions:
Finally something nice to expect.

The teaser pic, why i have the feeling that bridgers and rivers will finally play important role in game?
Either it's gonna be used for "map gameplay" rivers increasing trade, functioning as natural barrier, building bridges etc.
OR it's background art for event when your character travels andis either ambushed on bridge or has an event with guards on bridge.
Both of those two options, would be good.
 
  • 1Like
Reactions:
Hello Paradox. I share the same general opinion, it's an excellent initiative (I'm interested in the 3, for now the Villains and Lust are what captivate me).

I would like to propose that you consider the following:

- After the death of the main character, when the heir is under 16 years old, have the regency controlling the kingdom/duchy/county. And to take advantage of the dynamics of the relationship between the people, the heir and the regency. Intrigues, usurpation (or attempt) of power, or murder in serious cases, among others, but without exaggeration in terms of the frequency with which it happens.
The factor could be the widowed mother/father trying to gain power, it could be cultural or ethnic differences, totally different points of view, or the issue of loyalty to a figure whether national or foreign. Among other cases. It could very well be a new event pack.

- Ports and ships, please put the disembarkation restriction without a port. It's a real "festival" chasing enemies over land towards the sea and vice versa. Remove any immersion. If an enemy (or national) army without controlling a port has to embark, let there be severe limitations, either leaving part of the army on land, either by attrition or desertion (due to flight), or both.

- Is a new concept plausible in Crusader Kings, which is to control a Military Order, and expand it? And protect against kings and sultans who want to exterminate them or withdraw power and accumulated wealth? And act on behalf of the Head of Religion (eg the Pope). And who knows, create a new state (kingdom) if a crusade or jihad is successful.

Thanks and best regards.
 
  • 3Like
  • 1
Reactions:
actual want a monthly sit in court and judge dispute event pack

is it a thing already or not
I think Royal Court was kind of supposed to be that, but didn't work as well in that respect as everyone had hoped.
 
  • 6
Reactions:
If Villains and Vagabonds means there will be other ways of playing besides being a monster, I'll take it. Right now, kindness is a weakness.
 
  • 7Like
Reactions:
All 3 are very good ideas to explore and drastically needed. How about all three spread out though the year.

Especially considering how starved the community are for content and the excessively slow releases and updates. It's been almost 3 years.

With the current release model, does this mean we are only getting one of these per year? If so it is going to be a very long wait for the other two.

If this is the case, it would have been better to just pick one internally and not mention the other two. Now we know the options. The community has to vote. Expectations have been created which will inevitably not be met.

If I understand the scope of these content event packs, is that they do not require a lot of resources to make. I think it would be nice to have Flavour Pack, Event Pack, Major Expansion, Event Pack, Flavour Pack, Event Pack. Per year.
 
  • 4
  • 2Like
Reactions:
If I understand the scope of these content event packs, is that they do not require a lot of resources to make. I think it would be nice to have Flavour Pack, Event Pack, Major Expansion, Event Pack, Flavour Pack, Event Pack. Per year.
That is not a Paradox-compatible release schedule; a two-month interval between releases is really not sensible when it collides with the annual leave scheduling concerns for a large team in a country with generous labour laws (and a climate that encourages the practice of taking a big chunk of your generous annual leave allotment in July or August).
 
  • 5
Reactions:
Voting for L&L because it feels the most suited for an *Event Pack*, i.e. a system that mostly works but could use more variety. I'm actually mostly content with the content for Dread/Justice events, and W&W feels like it needs more than just events to bring it where I'd like that system to be.
 
  • 2Like
Reactions:
Been wanting prisoner wards (like Theon in GoT) since CK2.

 
  • 2Like
Reactions:
I worry that Love & Lust will make cheating and bastard childs even more prevalent than it already is. Woman seem to cheat constantly in this game and it's immersive breaking.
 
  • 8
  • 3
Reactions:
Villains & Vagabonds is most necessary! Because there is basically nothing, that rewards honorable actions, besides these useless prestige points. Also something that would punish evil actions, because them -10 in opinion isn't a game changer either.
 
  • 4Like
  • 1
Reactions:
Regencies were the absolute worst part of CK2's gameplay experience.

(Remember, regencies aren't just for early childhood. They're for when your young, healthy ruler with congenital +Health traits gets his skull pushed into his brain and spends two decades as a drooling Incapable vegetable.)
I don't think this mechanic was "the worst", but it wasn't implemented in an interesting manner, that's right. This is why I suggest what kind of gameplay could be built around regencies. Not just "you can't do this and that" but actually some stuff you won't experience in other situations.
 
  • 3
  • 1Like
Reactions:
On one hand I'd love to have a pelt, on the other hand I want to remove all wolves from the game. But on the other hand I don't think the eunuch trait will help me with plotting. These choices are but an illusion with no warden to guide me! When in really it comes to whoever can bribe or blackmail us first!
 
  • 4Haha
  • 2
Reactions:
Regencies were the absolute worst part of CK2's gameplay experience.

(Remember, regencies aren't just for early childhood. They're for when your young, healthy ruler with congenital +Health traits gets his skull pushed into his brain and spends two decades as a drooling Incapable vegetable.)

That's my recollection too. Just being completely locked out of half (more?) of the game systems - sometimes for a decade-and-a-half until your child character becomes an adult - and knowing that, at any point, you might just get a pop-up that's like "you've been stabbed to death by your uncle/regent/pissy councillor" with no ability to interact with the systems to even try to manage/prevent that.

It seems a lot of people around here have a completely different take though - and remember CK2 regencies fondly. I'd love to know what they were doing that made them fun (that's a genuine question for anyone reading this).
 
  • 3
  • 1Like
Reactions:
In my opinion the best part about this dev diary is the very high amount of dev responses.
It feels like we got as many in just this (and the voting thread) as we had over the last year.

It's great to see and a very promising start into the new year. :)
 
  • 9
  • 1Like
  • 1
Reactions:
For @monkey1998 who "respecfully disagrees" with this (???), don't hesitate to check on WP : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_regents
(I first checked french version : https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Régence )
And maybe clarifying what exactly you disagree about?:confused:
Not them, but while I hate using Wikipedia "list of X" articles to prove anything (as they tend to be eclectic mixes of things with poorly defined criteria and more focused on "this is somebody I've heard of" rather than any attempt at being systematic), that list actually includes a bunch of regencies well before the 11th century.

More broadly, the Romans and Byzantines regularly employed regents (who might or might not usurp the crown); indeed, part of Charlemagne's claim to the imperial title was that the Byzantines were ruled by a woman, Empress Irene, who had originally been a regent for her son. It's notable that your linked list doesn't include the Romans or Byzantines at all, when they famously used regents extensively.

It was less common among early western kingdoms, who tended not to follow as clear rules of succession, but even then you have some examples.
 
  • 5
  • 1
Reactions:
I'll admit, it was really hard to pick from those three - i see why you guys had a hard time choosing.

I voted for villains because I think everything surrounding dread is a bit underutilized in this game. Love and lust was a clise 2nd because, besides rampant seduction, it often doesn't feel like your spouse, soulmate, etc., is a real person. There are events with them in it but usually just making a choice between making them happy at a gold cost or the cost of another person's opinion.
The children... it's an important aspect of the game, and could always use more... but I feel like it does well enough for now.
 
  • 3Like
Reactions: