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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:
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[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
 
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That teaser bridge looks like Pont Valentré, but nothing else.

But it's Wards & Wardens for me!
 
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To be honest, Villains and Vagabonds has the worst Pack Name of all three as both are more negative attributes and it should theoretically tackle both villanous and heroic actions. If it would be Villainy and Virtue both the positive and negative aspects would be in it. It just undersells itself in that poll. And that I say as someone who voted for the Guardian-choice.
 
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Hard to decide without a little more info.

If the wardens pack involves me playing as a guardian where I control/influence the little brat seducing them to the dark side or guiding them to the light then I'm in. Or grooming them for later marriage to my crusty old PC to take the kingdom. Or I play as a kid and do everything I can to undermine my guardian scheming to get them sent to the dungeons because they took my favourite toy or won't jump in bed with me when I get to the curious age then I'm in.

OTOH if the vagabonds option greatly expands on intrigue play style allowing me to influence from the shadows to destabilise realms, etc then I'm definitely in.

As for lovers, I would say hell yes because there's very little interesting and meaningful interaction/involvement with spouses and lovers, but somehow I feel that would just involve more bland let's go for a picnic or lemme buy two necklaces instead of just buying for one spouse single page events.

But regardless of which happens please please address the current event system bugs that don't use triggers properly, don't use checks properly, and the many trivial bugs like the education invalidation bugs or simple syntax errors that are documented in the error/debug logs, like read your game's log file while developing. There's glaring syntax bugs in the error/debug log files that have been there since day one, which aren't that hard to to solve as I spent < 20 minutes eradicating them with a personal mod. Read your own log files!

Having my PC petition my PC on their empty throne to stop my PC seducing my PC's spouse, or my spymaster declare my spymaster is plotting against me, has passed beyond amusing to boring.

This is not a good look!

[03:40:39][pdx_data_statementparser.cpp:237]: Unexpected characters found at end of Statement 'Select_float(GreaterThan_CFixedPoint(CombatMaaItem.GetStat( 'pursuit' ),'(CFixedPoint)0'), '(float)1.0','(float)0.4'))': ')'

There's only around 40 of them in the debug log but how am I expected to have confidence in your development if your developers never read their error/debug logs and fix the bugs listed there?
 
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Friends & Foes wasn't just a whole load of events, remember. Yes there were events and yes they took time, but it also included an entire code system (memories, programmer time), a script system (House Feuds, designer time), multiple new event backgrounds (2D artist time), multiple new animations (3D art time), music (audio time) and a whole host of other bits and pieces. We call them Event Packs and that puts a natural emphasis on the time spent making events (which is admittedly considerable) but these are not small endeavours we chuck together in a week and a half on a whim, they're concerted multi-discipline efforts.

As such, I can guarantee you there's an opportunity cost to doing any one of those. So choose wisely!
Friends & Foes has horrible reviews. Memories are basically useless, have little effect on a gameplay, and who even checks that tab regularly? House Feuds are unbalanced as hell, AI goes nuts with murdering your whole family, and it's better to play with House Feuds disabled (if you know how to mod, since it's not an in-game rule). All that's left is a couple of dozen of events, and even one event mod on Steam has way more than that (while being free, and you can get a couple of in-depth relationships mods while you at it). Not to mention bugs nobody is in a hurry to patch. I'm sorry, but if the last event pack's quality is anything to go by, you might as well make all three of your new event packs for the price of one. :rolleyes:
 
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Voted for "Love and Lust".
As an idea for something to add, maybe have the possibility of a child or courtier refusing to marry someone you betrothed them to if they have an extremely low opinion of that person or if they would lose too much prestige as a result of the marriage. You could then try to force them into it, or break the betrothal at the cost of seriously angering the other family involved.
 
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Having some wild guesses:
Love & Lust: More than just saving another character every time in a romance soulmate scheme?
Wards & Wardens: More interactable events and maybe more reasonable terms to the education tier trait.
Villains & Vagabonds: More diverse way to gain dread. Lovely.

I picked love as I think there are too less variants in the romance scheme.
 
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If there's any chance that Wards & Wardens can bring back regencies, I'd vote for that in a heartbeat over the other two. But if not, I'd prefer Villains & Vagabonds. So it's a bit difficult for me to vote when I don't know what I'm voting for...
 
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Sounds like a classic case of domestic abuse relationship.

I know it is ridiculus but that is what it is. The whole system should get a hard look at in my opinion. Even from a roleplay standpoint it is tiresome because the traits just do not matter in the relationship. Like I said my wife should hate my PC and ask for a divorce but she she does not and turns a blind eye towards the fact he killed two of her children. I thought she was Just?

The whole Sedcution tree should get a look at from the developers in my opinion. It is so weak. Why would anyone want to waste 6(!) perk points just to make Seduction shemes easier?! They are already easy enough. It is the most narrow tree in the game. The whole Seduction tree should be more about being more likeable and getting bonuses from that. Systemic bonuses thhat make a difference to how you play the game. The only bonus that is meaningful in the tree is the one where your lovers can stop a succesful murder plot against you and that is rare case. The rest are essentially worthless. The tree in my opinion should have flavourful, systemic bonuses such as:

1) If councilours or court officials like you or are your lovers, they are more skilled on your council, similar to the "Up To The Task" skill in the Gallant tree

2) Vassals give more money or levies if they are your lovers or friends.

3) Didn't medieval rulers have mistresses? Make a new court position open to an official lover that can act like Lady in Waiting or something, similar to a concubine but children are not legitimate.

These are some I have just thought of right now, I am just spitballing. Proper systemic perk points in the tree that make a difference when your pick them. Just my opinion.
 
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Having some wild guesses:
Love & Lust: More than just saving another character every time in a romance soulmate scheme?
Wards & Wardens: More interactable events and maybe more reasonable terms to the education tier trait.
Villains & Vagabonds: More diverse way to gain dread. Lovely.

I picked love as I think there are too less variants in the romance scheme.

I voted for Wards and Wardens, but I really hope they sort out the "just saving another character every time in a romance soulmate scheme" thing whichever ends up winning. Even just adding two or three different possible event endpoints for that would make such a difference.
 
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If there's any chance that Wards & Wardens can bring back regencies, I'd vote for that in a heartbeat over the other two. But if not, I'd prefer Villains & Vagabonds. So it's a bit difficult for me to vote when I don't know what I'm voting for...
I think the devs said regencies are coming back in a free patch at some point anyway, so I wouldn't worry about it too much.
 
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Also, speculation for the next major DLC. Something that focuses on infrastructure/trade/stewardship.
That's a major component of the roadmap/floorplan they showed late last year, and would make tall play more viable.
 
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I know it is ridiculus but that is what it is. The whole system should get a hard look at in my opinion. Even from a roleplay standpoint it is tiresome because the traits just do not matter in the relationship. Like I said my wife should hate my PC and ask for a divorce but she she does not and turns a blind eye towards the fact he killed two of her children. I thought she was Just?

The opinion modifiers from a character knowing someone killed two of their children, being a known murderer and having opposite traits are pretty hefty. What modifiers are balancing those out to give a positive opinion in this situation?
 
Also, speculation for the next major DLC. Something that focuses on infrastructure/trade/stewardship.
That's a major component of the roadmap/floorplan they showed late last year, and would make tall play more viable.

They've said it's definitely not trade. It's an expansion that leans towards roleplaying - rather than mechanics - apparently.
 
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I think the devs said regencies are coming back in a free patch at some point anyway, so I wouldn't worry about it too much.

I'm really hoping the centrepiece of the free patch that comes with the next expansion pack is some good mechanical stuff like that.

I'm pretty disappointed that we're getting another roleplay expansion pack, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the free patch will make up for it.
 
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I am definitely a huge fan of the ideas behind villains & vagabonds. Especially because I myself would never have considered something such as that! Its by far the coolest idea.
 
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