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Tinto Talks #15 - June 5th 2024

Welcome to the 15th Tinto Talks, where we ask for feedback on our extremely crazily top secret game which has the codename Project Caesar.

One thing that many have asked for has been a more in-depth dynastical gameplay, so here it is.

Characters
Before we delve into the dynamics of dynastic gameplay, we must first talk about their building blocks, the characters.

european (1).jpg


Here is a European King with an early 18th century background.

While not copying the Crusader Kings mechanics, a Character in Project Caesar is a bit more alive than in let's say EU4. A character is born, lives, and eventually dies.

Every character has Administrative, Diplomatic and Military Attributes ranging from 0-100. Of course, these attributes will not add any sort of mana, but they will impact how well the character will perform certain roles. One example is that the diplomatic ability of an admiral impacts the morale of the navy he leads.

Newborn characters start with 0, but that grows until they are adults depending on what childhood trait they have. You can also assign your rulers’ children and grandchildren a specific education during their childhood

gifted.png

This is a trait that when on the heir of the player it increases the chance of hunting accidents by 200%.

Characters ruling a country will gain up to 3 traits, depending on how long they have ruled.
They are gained while ruling a country. Characters that are generals or admirals will also get traits after combat. There are also unique traits for characters that are REDACTED or OTHER_SECRET_THING.

Characters also have a culture they come from, a religion they follow, they keep track of where they were born, and where they currently are living. They belong to an estate, which for most characters tends to be the nobles estate.

Many characters will have a father and/or a mother as well. For some historical characters at the start of the game that will not necessarily be true.

The number of spouse(s) a character can have depends on religions and laws, but the number of children they get depends more on the fertility of the parents.

So what can you do with characters? Well, this is not Crusader Kings, so the characters themselves are not as important, and there are no character specific events like in Imperator either. In this game, characters are tools to be used for the greater good. If that means marrying off your daughter to secure an alliance with France, then that's what you have to do. You can arrange marriages in your country, send less useful characters into convents, ennoble great people, and much more.
ashanti (1).jpg


This is an African ruler, in his throne room, which while beautiful, is just a background image…


Speaking of marriages, royal marriages in Project Caesar are not just sending a diplomat, here it is far more limited, as you have to actually marry real characters, and often this is a vital action. If you can’t arrange a royal marriage with a country of enough prestige, that has a young consort, you may be forced to marry a local noble from your country, or worse, even a lowborn.

A Royal Marriage between two rulers will immediately form a union between those two countries. Every country has its own inheritance laws, which if they differ, may cause a Union to break, as the rulers would be different. This is probably not the audience where I need to explain the difference between Salic Law and Semi-Salic Law right?


bjälbo.png

And who was the founder of this dynasty?

Dynasties are important, as they impact diplomacy in direct and indirect ways. As some inheritance laws prefer their own dynasty, and having the same dynasty can improve opinions between countries.


As in almost all previous GSG, the game will keep track of who has ruled that country before, just so you can go back and admire them. We have tried to get in as much history as possible here, even if my heathen content designers refuse to have Odin as the original King of Sweden!

ruler_history.png

Of course regnal numbering and actual names depend on many different things..


Stay tuned, next week we’ll be back and we will then talk about how the cabinet will work.
 

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Please tell me they don't move awkwardly like in ck3...
 
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That's definitely something I'm happy to hear about. While I enjoy CK licence and I know that those games are different from Other PDX GSG, but having at least some characters to love or hate definitely is a big improvement in my book.

As an example in EU4 I always loved the "talented and ambitious daughter" event, not only because it was a pretty much guaranteed godlike ruler, but also because it served as a small narrative giving me incentives to make this talentend and ambitious daugther rule the best as I can.

So I'm hyped to see how PC will manage its character system but for now I like what I see. I'd like to see some cabinet dynamics with each minister pushing their own agenda depending on their office and/or estate which could make me love one guy while hating the other depending on what is my own agenda as a player.

Also I see character traits are a thing and I welcome it. But I was wondering if some stuff such as a retinue was planned.

I imagine it as unimportant characters (which don't need to be represented by the character system) who are actually just stat buffs for the important ones. As an example, admitting I don't have a gifted child but still want hi mto become a good ruler, could I assign him a preceptor who would speed up his skill acquisition ?

Or what about an adult character who, following an event or some in game actions would get a foreign friend, buffing his diplomatic skills with other culture. Or a hunting enthusiast relative boosting his military skills ?
 
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Does this mean that there are many different succession laws in Project Caesar, also, can we entice union members to change their succession laws, so the union doesn't break?
 
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Will there be cadet houses? The map already shows a massive fracturing of France into different dynasties, but a lot of them are offshoots of the Capetians.
 
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It's actually very nice to have more flavor for characters! That's something that was sorely lacking in EU4. This is definitely a step-up, while also not overcomplicating it, CK-style, as it isn't really necessary for a game like this.

I will say, though, that I'm slightly saddened by the fact that they're 3D. Not because I think they look bad - I actually think they look nice - but because this is somewhat limiting for modding: I have a fantasy world (without humans) that I've been meaning to convert into a mod, and creating 2D images is much easier than 3D modeling. If anything, will there be any option for modders to use 2D portraits? (I know this is just wishful thinking, but a man can dream...)

Also, I wanted to comment on the dynasty names for Iberia. They're... weird. Why is it “da Burgundy” for Portugal, mixing the Portuguese da with the English Burgundy? If you wanted for it to be Portuguese, it should've been “da Borgonha” instead. Similar for Castile, which should be “de Ivrea”. As for Aragon... well, I'm probably going to create some controversy here, but imo, it should be “de Barcelona”, and not “d'Aragó” (“di Aragó”, though, is just a monstrosity).
 
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Are "de" "di" "z" "von" and "van" still hard parts of dynasty name, or there're dynamic?

I'm wondering if de Burgundy and da Burgundy would be considered as the same dynasty or not.

Btw, does the same_dynasty check still work when two houses share one name but techically have nothing to do with each other? It's a question related to localisation. You see, Li (Shun) and Yi (Korea) in EUIV are different houses, but in chinese localisation they use same spelling, which makes same_dynasty returning yes. I'm wondering if this is avioidable or not.

Same for Bragrationi and its russian spelling in an opposite sense. They should be one while kinda different in spelling.
 
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I have a question regarding last week's DD. Can a country join a Situation camp that is not its own by default? For example France which joins the Italian camp, or Aragon which joins the French camp?
 
I have two question.
1.what happens if my country changes dynasty?
2. If I am in a lesser personal union of a country what happens if I break free? Will a random dynasty be assigned to me or something else?
 
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Very nice additions! :D
Could You please answer some question regarding Dynasties?

1. Since rulers must belong to an estate, Peasant Republics will have rulers from commoners and trade republics from burghers, right?
2. There is a possibility of rulers leading armies, right? But if the ruler is shared between two countries in a PU (and there is no senior/junior partner), can just one of them assign it as theirs general and kill him in battle without consent?
3. Do rulers "die" instantly when for example government type changes like in EU4, or can they just continue living as background character, unless you decide to pull a guillotine? It was always weird to me that when you change government in EU4, the previous ruler automatically dies the same day.
4. Could you tell us how diarchies might function?
5. Will historical characters that appear by event be modeled after their real-life counterparts for some extra flavor? :p
 
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Will there be a “dynasty” and “house” system? I am thinking of the case of the Capetians, with the Valois in France, and the “Capets” in Navarre.
 
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How does this work for republics? Does the country have an existing set of character milling about that can be electoral candidates, or is a new character with their own dynasty generated whenever an election replaces the ruler? I see the Teutonic Order has a dynasty, though I can't fully make out the letters.

Why is Denmark without a dynasty? Are they in rebellion like Scotland is?
There was an interregnum from 1332 to 1340. Thus no dynasty to show on the map at game start.
 
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