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Dev Diary #93 - Venetian Guile

Dev Diary #93 - Venetian Guile


Hello there!

We’re closing in on the end of July, and we are on to the fourth of the five Dev Diaries we are doing over summer. For this week, we are going to take a look at three of the five Special Crusades we are doing for Holy Fury. First of we are going to take a look at the reworked Shepherds’ Crusade, then on to the Children’s Crusade some of you might have seen in the PDXCon stream, and then finally to the Fourth Crusade events.

As always, keep in mind that things might be changed before the release of Holy Fury. For the Shepherds’ Crusade to be enabled you will have to own Sons of Abraham, and for the two other you will need the Holy Fury DLC.

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The Shepherds’ Crusade has been broken for quite a while, so we have ripped out the old events entirely, and rewritten the whole chain. With Holy Fury, a Shepherds’ Crusade has a chance to start a couple of years after a failed normal Crusade. It will start somewhere in Catholic Europe, and will usually target either a Kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula, or Jerusalem.

As the Shepherds’ Crusade army moves across the map towards its location, it will start picking up soldiers along the way, potentially getting into conflict with the local lords, trying to kick out the Jews, or ask local Lords for aid in their Crusade.

Who knows, once in a blue moon they might actually manage to win!

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The Children’s Crusade is a special one-time event chain that can happen at any point after the Pope has announced the need to reclaim the Holy Land.

If Jerusalem is held by infidels, a landless child in Europe might decide to pick up arms and start his own little Crusade, gathering fellow Catholics and traveling all the way to the Holy Land.

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The Children’s Crusade will move from court to court, demanding troops and resources from local rulers, and gathering zealous commanders and disgruntled underage courtiers along the way.

As a ruler hosting the Children’s Crusade, you will be able to support or hinder their efforts, increasing the amount of troops and morale that they will receive once they reach Jerusalem, forcing their travel to a premature end, or, if you are feeling particularly virtuous, deciding to become their sponsor.

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Becoming a sponsor allows a ruler to follow this special Crusade more closely, to invest in it on multiple occasions during its travel, and actively join the Children as allies in the war against the infidels if they manage to reach the Holy Land.

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Once the Children reach their target, they will spawn an army whose strength, size and composition will change depending on how their travel went and declare war to the current holder of Jerusalem. In the unlikely chance that they succeed, the leader of the Crusade will take over, and convert and vassalize all the rulers in the area.

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As some of you saw, one of our pictures for the Steam page for Holy Fury, was the Crusade for Orthodox Thrace. In other words, a set of Fourth Crusade events. These events have a chance to happen at every Crusade, if the Byzantine Empire is alive and doing well, holding the core lands of Constantinople.

A set of narrative events will happen, where a claimant for the Byzantine Throne will leave the court of the Emperor, and find a Catholic Merchant Lord to support their claims. With enough gold and the potential for plunder ahead, the Catholics will be swayed to change the course for Constantinople.

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If the Catholics could come around, and actually win the Crusade against the Byzantines, there will not be a normal distribution of titles, but rather a special Fourth Crusade one.

First of, the Byzantine Empire will be no more. The old Emperor will relocate to any land outside of Thrace, if they had any, and get a temporary titular Empire title. The winner of the Crusade will receive the Latin Empire, taking the lands of Thrace, and a special bloodline.

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The old direct vassals of the Byzantine Empire will be freed. Any ruler of Trebizond might be given the Kingdom of Trebizond title, and there might also be another ruler taking up the King tier title, to simulate the Despotate of Epirus.

After the fall of the old Empire, a new decision will open up for Christians of the Byzantine Culture group, to restore the old Byzantine Empire. If you hold all of the core lands around Constantinople, and have a lot of prestige, you can restore the Empire and start recreating the Byzantium of old. Well… At least if you can remove those pesky Latins from the rightful Greek lands of Thrace.

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And of course, rules has been added for all the different kind of Crusades, so people are free to enable or disable them as they want.

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That was all for this week! I hope you enjoyed reading about the rise and fall of- Wait… That’s wrong. The fall and rise of Byzantium, there we go!

Next week we will be talking about the Northern Crusade, and the Reconquista of Iberia. So I hope I’ll see of you for the final rogue Dev Diary of the summer!
 
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They'll die as part of the event chain. It is more of a narrative reason for the Crusaders to take the throne, than an actual claimant.
That's fine, I was just wondering if there was a chance of a potential final part of the event chain in which the claimant usurps the throne but is overthrown, imprisoned and strangled a few months later which causes the Crusaders take over.

What about the Pope and excommunication? does he even care if the target is changed? I feel there should be a chance of an event firing in which he threatens the leaders with excommunication, especially for the Doge, if the Crusade is diverted. Participants could choose to back out for a large amount of piety and a big opinion boost or choose excommunication, which would be lifted if the alternative Crusade succeeded, it would be a nice way to differentiate Popes between the zealous and righteous or greedy and wicked.
 
I feared that the Children's Crusade would be annoying, but I actually like what we have here: merge both theories on what Crusade meant so that you have a child leading a bunch of peasants. I can buy that!

The Fourth Crusade though... it should not be triggered by some strange claimant, but by the "Massacre of the Latins" event chain, with possibility of it being triggered by some other major event that makes Byzantine and Catholic relationship strained.
In other words, it would go like this:
1. A Catholic Merchant Republic established a major Trade Port in Constantinople. Since it is the City of World's Desire, it is especially strong. The Republic has options to spread corruption, which increases the chance of the following even to trigger
2. During a turbulent period in Byzantine Empire (during a Civil War that the Emperor does not fight well in) or if the corruption got too high, an event chain occurs where a Byzantine mob wants to attack the rich Catholic merchants. The Emperor can either ignore them (historical choice), support them (you get a lot of money and the happy populace), or stop them. First two strain the relationship with the Merchants and Catholics (one more than the other), and the later can improve them but brings a short era of internal conflicts in Constantinople
3. If relations are strained and the Emperor ignored the massacre, zealous Catholics get Punitive CB that allows them to pillage any region in the Byzantine Empire for a while. If the Emperor supported the Massacre, Catholic rulers get Holy War CB against the Orthodox for a while
4. If the Emperor ignored the Massacre, the Fourth Crusade can occur as a punitive action by the Merchant Republic. If he supported them, it will definitely occur, maybe without need for the Merchants

Additionally, if the Emperor supported the lynching, he can support the mobs in other cities under influence of the Catholic MR's, gaining a lot of money. In the end of the chain, it could result in formation of a buffed vassal republic.
Though to make it not that blatantly beneficial, there should be a chance that this instead results in mobs getting over themselves and attacking the Emperor for "not being good enough". Maye the burghers could event entertain the idea of return to the good old days before Ceasar.

In any case, I'm very hyped about this! Crusades were all I wanted for so long!
 
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With the addition of new smaller kingdoms in the byzantine empire, isn't it a problem that all kinds of small kingdoms pop up in the empire?
An easy way of preventing this might be the restriction for rulers to create a kingdom title when under imperial rule.
 

It seems that such special title (Children's Crusade) does not need regencies?
And how about if they do manage to success and found the Kingdom of Jerusalem?
 
With the addition of new smaller kingdoms in the byzantine empire, isn't it a problem that all kinds of small kingdoms pop up in the empire?
An easy way of preventing this might be the restriction for rulers to create a kingdom title when under imperial rule.

This should definitely be a passable law.
 
It seems that such special title (Children's Crusade) does not need regencies?
And how about if they do manage to success and found the Kingdom of Jerusalem?

I'd imagine it would be a special character flag that ensures that given ruler doesn't require a regent. That or the screencap was taken directly after the event fires so the game hasn't assigned a regent yet.
 
I notice that the father of the Children's Crusade leader has no option to forbid his son from going? Wouldn't it make sense to also have an option where the boy goes against his father's will, not just with begrudging acceptance? Or even for the father to put his son under house arrest.

Alternatively wouldn't it make more sense for the Holy Child to be a peasant boy with no relation to any noble house as the two historical Children's Crusade leaders were?
 
Let's say a Muslim ruler owned Sicily and Anatolia and a Shepards crusade or Children's crusade heading to Jerusalem reaches there land. Will there be any options? Maybe the sultan can help them or allow them safe passage to weaken a rival and it will cost him piety. Maybe the Muslim ruler can attack them and be praised??
 
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Given the role Venice will play in the 4th Crusade, is there any chance Venice becomes de jure part of the Byzantine Empire, instead of the Italia Empire, like they are today?

I have been having playing Venice in 769 a lot lately, and a tough part of the initial start is to acquire lands adjacent to the Byzantine Empire, so I can swear fealty to the Emperor and expand my fledgling trade empire under his protection. The 4 times I have tried to expand as an independent Venice, I keep getting my trade posts embargoed and destroyed by Lombardy or Byzantium, who have 10x the troops I do in the early game.

It make sense that Venice would be affiliated de jure with Constantinople, given the shared history between the two cultures in real history. If Venice was under the Byz Empire de jure, I could swear fealty without even un-pausing the game, and it would make MR gameplay a lot more fun in the early going. :)
 
IIRC Venice was specifically removed from de jure Byzantium because otherwise they where conquered in short order because the Byzantine emperor desired his de jure lands. Venice will more reliably stay independent if it is de jure in the Italia empire, which is more historical.
 
Given the role Venice will play in the 4th Crusade, is there any chance Venice becomes de jure part of the Byzantine Empire, instead of the Italia Empire, like they are today?

I have been having playing Venice in 769 a lot lately, and a tough part of the initial start is to acquire lands adjacent to the Byzantine Empire, so I can swear fealty to the Emperor and expand my fledgling trade empire under his protection. The 4 times I have tried to expand as an independent Venice, I keep getting my trade posts embargoed and destroyed by Lombardy or Byzantium, who have 10x the troops I do in the early game.

It make sense that Venice would be affiliated de jure with Constantinople, given the shared history between the two cultures in real history. If Venice was under the Byz Empire de jure, I could swear fealty without even un-pausing the game, and it would make MR gameplay a lot more fun in the early going. :)
@eastcoastceojam
Initially Venice was de-jure under Byzantine Empire, but then the Byzantine always conquered Venice and made it feudal. So, in a patch, I don't remember which one, they moved it into Italy. It's improbable that they change it back.
 
As the Shepherds’ Crusade army moves across the map towards its location, it will start picking up soldiers along the way, potentially getting into conflict with the local lords, trying to kick out the Jews, or ask local Lords for aid in their Crusade.

Does it reduce the Prosperity of the provinces it march through? Because if so then hopefully I can, I don't know, initiate a happy tiny accident to the crusade leader?
 
Good changes. I love it.
But also I'm afraid. No more byzantine province, no buff orthodox religion. Seljuk is still a big blob, Sunni and Shia caliph declare jihad for anatolia, and now 4th crusade.
AI byzantine could endure?