Hi folks!

It's been a while, and I bet you're all wondering what we've been up to... Now, I can't reveal anything about the upcoming expansion quite yet, but, to tide you over, I thought I'd talk a bit about our other efforts. As you know, with every expansion comes a slew of free improvements and fixes. This time the focus has been on the latter; clearing up old bugs and issues (the change log is currently 620 lines long). Sometimes, that has required us to do some fairly major code rewrites. For example, we got rid of the rule that your 'government type' was determined by the type of your Capital Holding. (You know how it was game over when you got a Temple Holding as a capital, even for a tiny period? Well, now that kind of thing cannot happen anymore.) The government form is now something more persistent, and can have various rules that override those of your religion (whether you can raid, take concubines, etc.) To go along with this change, we also reworked the portrait frames to clearly distinguish between the various government forms.

In a similar vein, almost since release we've been plagued by bugs with characters leading multiple regiments and/or flanks, which could even cause crashes. Part of the problem was that the whole system was rather strange, so we decided to consolidate it in the following way: only the ruler, the Marshal and characters you have appointed Commander (a new title) can lead flanks or your own demesne and retinue regiments. Vassal levy regiments can still be led by your loyal vassals, but a character can never both lead a flank and a regiment. Mercenaries become more useful because they come with their own, good, leaders. Flank leaders apply their martial bonus to all regiments in the flank. Oh, and the combat system has been updated under the hood to correct various quirks that few people ever noticed, but which could sometimes cause never-ending battles and such.

In the process of implementing the new Commander title, we decided we might as well throw in a more convenient Honorary Title view. This is a perfect example of how what starts as a simple bug fix can turn into a whole new little quality-of-life feature. In this whole house cleaning process, we've also made some serious optimizations to the speed and memory usage of the game.

To finish off, here are some random snippets from the change log:

Spoiler

- Revised the pagan Subjugation CB so that it completely subjugates the target but no Holdings ever change hands
- Added "Stop Seduction" and "Stop Spying" decisions
- Failing to imprison vassals of vassals now correctly forces them to abdicate and flee the realm
- AI will not join wars against spouse
- When your heir has an equal tier title to yours, _your_ laws are now copied to his primary title on succession
- Character Finder: The 'Married' filter now excludes concubines too
- Character Finder: Councillors now correctly show up too!
- Fixed a problem with allies of vassals staying in the war when the vassals's liege joins the other side
- Fixed some cases of ANY_ALL in location tooltips
- Duels now potentially give the Kinslayer trait
- The Yazidi Sheikh and Hurufi Caliph now have access to the Muslim subjugation CB and the Jihad CB
- The Paulician faith can now properly mend the schism
- The Hashshashins can now resurface after being scattered
- Fixed some issues with 'excommunication' for Yazidis
- Sons with traits blocking them from inheritance no longer count as "unlanded sons", causing prestige loss
- AI: Toned down seduction by characters with many children
- AI: Toned down impregnation chances for seduction affairs with characters with many children
- Handsome and lustful men now also populate the cabins in the wild for the pleasures of people who find them attractive

That's all for now, but from now on, we plan to post a dev diary every Tuesday, even if it's a short one!

 

[Karolus Magnus]

The commander title creates more micro. So how about a quick way to enable command for characters? Like a small checkbox next to their names or something like that.

You'll also be able to right click the character and use the Appoint Commander interaction.

 

[Guthuk Gaming]

Commanders will default lead your armies, correct?

As in, there will be less micro due to when you raise and combine armies the commanders will be the ones leading it?

 

[Jia Xu]

Does everyone get the same number of commanders or is that altered by something like title rank (king, emperor, etc)?

 

[fanoI]

You are right in expecting so.

Excellent!

 

[Karolus Magnus]

Commanders will default lead your armies, correct?

As in, there will be less micro due to when you raise and combine armies the commanders will be the ones leading it?

Yep.

Does everyone get the same number of commanders or is that altered by something like title rank (king, emperor, etc)?

No, the number of commanders will differ depending on tiers.

 

[SehnVretor]

The merchant republic will however not become a republic when it lose its port capital (it will however become a normal republic again if it for some reason lose its duchy title and ends up as a count).

But this would still mean you'd get a game over, when, as a patrician, your Republican liege loses his main Duchy title, right? E.g. if your liege revolted against his liege and he loses, and his liege subsequently decides to revoke your liege's main title. I have been in this situation before and I became a feudal ruler, but since governments now won't change, I would become a republican count or baron, which would result in game over.

 

[Allastair]

I have question, which may be dumb, but here it goes:

As the government form will be separated from capital holding, would it also mean, that it is not necessary to have any holding in the province to have title? I mean if, for example, I am a count Dublin and Leinster, I must have poth their capitals in my personal demesne, or rather, I could give barony of Dublin to someone, but keep the count title?

 

[omega20056]

You'll also be able to right click the character and use the Appoint Commander interaction.

Will we be able to localise the Commander title based on culture, or create a cultural equivalent?

 

[Drake_Hound]

This sounds really good, so can try to mod a cognatic feudal republic, like the Netherlands become after the 100 year wars.

Well bugs and problems to be expected, with succession issues.
But atleast the stuff is dehard coded

 

[thesolaris]

- When your heir has an equal tier title to yours, _your_ laws are now copied to his primary title on succession

Well, I suppose I can say my farewell to my indian republics :'(

 

[ColZimin]

Man, they really need to rebalance the MTTH for dev diaries. At this rate it's gonna be days before it triggers again.

 

[wolfing]

Man, they really need to rebalance the MTTH for dev diaries. At this rate it's gonna be days before it triggers again.

you'd have to change define.lua otherwise we'd see dev diaries every 3 weeks instead of 1.

 

[Es57]

you'd have to change define.lua otherwise we'd see dev diaries every 3 weeks instead of 1.

Could someone mod the Paradox dev team so the dev diary event fires every day ?
And maybe reduce the next dlc build time ?

 

[SBolshevik]

Could someone mod the Paradox dev team so the dev diary event fires every day ?
And maybe reduce the next dlc build time ?

Unfortunately those systems are hardcoded, you can't use modifiers on them either. :/

 

[ngppgn]

@Karolus Magnus : Sorry if I'm being retarded here, but do you imply in my comment that we can't mod in new playable governments in the thocracy and coty groups? But only in the feudal and tribal groups?

Also, is government tied to character or to title? Can a characterter hold at once several titles with different governments?

 

[Zarathustra_the]

Are we able to change the rules of different governments within a government group, ie would it be possible to recreate entirely the republic government with patriarch succession within the feudal group>

 

[DevilSauron]

@Karolus Magnus Will it be HARDCODED that only merchant_republic_government in republican and nothing in theocracy will be playable? I too suggest playable=yes because there are mods with can include theocracies with primogeniture dynastic sucession etc. Without this, it would be possible to emulate this effect but with too much "hacks".

 

[Maglock]

@Doomdark Any chance that we can see an overhaul to rebels so that they become like EUIVs? ie Instead of annoying RNG - actual rebel system with ability to suppress, put troops in county to lower revolt risk, revolt timer etc.

 

[sermaciej]

Handsome and lustful men now also populate the cabins in the wild for the pleasures of people who find them attractive

what

 

[Slavicist]

- AI will not join wars against spouse

NEVER ever???