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Sorry I was using winzip 12.0 but it wanted to make it into a zipx and ths forum din't like the filetype .zipx
I'm surprised this hasn't gotten more attention. I find the premise fascinating.
On the one hand, having an immortal ruler does seem to downplay the whole dynasty angle - which is really the point of CK - but it's not like your vampire king will live forever. Even if he can't die by old age or disease, there are lots of other ways his reign can come to an end. And there can be lots of drama in the meantime.
One thing I'm mulling over is whether vampires should like other vampires. I'm thinking they should be loners, and so take a relationship penalty towards other vampires, not a bonus.
I also think it would be cool if there were events that made them lean towards the dark side: have them gain traits like selfish, deceitful and suspicious. Maybe model them on the events for raising your own child- the ones with the questions you have to answer. I'm thinking this would also be a good way to replace traits like 'zealous" and 'modest' with their opposites.
e.g., if the vampire is honest, it could provoke an event like
"Your honesty is at odds with your need to conceal your dark gift."
A) "I'll manage somehow" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'stressed'
B) "I must not be discovered!" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'deceitful'
The events that lead to discovery could function the same way.
"Nobles begin to question where all the maids have gone!"
A) "There is a reasonable explanation" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'stressed'
B) "How dare you question me!" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'arbitrary'
Traits like 'cruel' and 'vengeful' could be added in a similar way. Some events could involve paying money, of course.
Where all this is going, of course, is to load your vampire character with the risk factors for madness: stress and the traits of arbitrary, deceitful, selfish, suspicious and vengeful all add to the risk of developing schizofrenia. It would happen slowly, of course, but after a few centuries most vampires should be quite evil and quite insane. Although I imagine that a vampire king will be assassinated by his heir long before these events all play out. The MTTH of that event might need to be modified for vampires. Or the odds of dying reduced.
The vampire might also run afoul of the church. Maybe modify that event where one of your courtiers is accused of black magic. It more or less forces you to be on the outs with the church. It is also a good way to retire a vampire that has become inconvenient- just surrender to the inquisition.
I also think it would be nice if vampires increased their powers over time. An event like the one for fosterlings that raises one attribute by one point- maybe have it hit every 20 years or so after the age of 80? If you are going to be stressed or insane, you deserve a few perks.
I'll have to think about this a lot more. It shouldn't be too much of an advantage to be a vampire, but not too much of a disadvantage either. Hard to balance.
But thanks for raising a really interesting idea!
On the one hand, having an immortal ruler does seem to downplay the whole dynasty angle - which is really the point of CK - but it's not like your vampire king will live forever. Even if he can't die by old age or disease, there are lots of other ways his reign can come to an end. And there can be lots of drama in the meantime.
One thing I'm mulling over is whether vampires should like other vampires. I'm thinking they should be loners, and so take a relationship penalty towards other vampires, not a bonus.
I also think it would be cool if there were events that made them lean towards the dark side: have them gain traits like selfish, deceitful and suspicious. Maybe model them on the events for raising your own child- the ones with the questions you have to answer. I'm thinking this would also be a good way to replace traits like 'zealous" and 'modest' with their opposites.
e.g., if the vampire is honest, it could provoke an event like
"Your honesty is at odds with your need to conceal your dark gift."
A) "I'll manage somehow" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'stressed'
B) "I must not be discovered!" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'deceitful'
The events that lead to discovery could function the same way.
"Nobles begin to question where all the maids have gone!"
A) "There is a reasonable explanation" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'stressed'
B) "How dare you question me!" - 50% chance to gain the trait 'arbitrary'
Traits like 'cruel' and 'vengeful' could be added in a similar way. Some events could involve paying money, of course.
Where all this is going, of course, is to load your vampire character with the risk factors for madness: stress and the traits of arbitrary, deceitful, selfish, suspicious and vengeful all add to the risk of developing schizofrenia. It would happen slowly, of course, but after a few centuries most vampires should be quite evil and quite insane. Although I imagine that a vampire king will be assassinated by his heir long before these events all play out. The MTTH of that event might need to be modified for vampires. Or the odds of dying reduced.
The vampire might also run afoul of the church. Maybe modify that event where one of your courtiers is accused of black magic. It more or less forces you to be on the outs with the church. It is also a good way to retire a vampire that has become inconvenient- just surrender to the inquisition.
I also think it would be nice if vampires increased their powers over time. An event like the one for fosterlings that raises one attribute by one point- maybe have it hit every 20 years or so after the age of 80? If you are going to be stressed or insane, you deserve a few perks.
I'll have to think about this a lot more. It shouldn't be too much of an advantage to be a vampire, but not too much of a disadvantage either. Hard to balance.
But thanks for raising a really interesting idea!
Thanks for your ideas I have added an event which takes account of one of them I am considering adding more of them in the future as well
Have you found that your court tends to get awfully small as your ruler ages? Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but all my good courtiers die off over time, and I'm left with folks whose attributes are in the single digits. The problem is that I can't match up unmarried courtiers, and so there's no new babies. I can match my own sons and daughters (not with each other, of course!), but I generally give my sons lands of their own, and eventually I run out of daughters. That's with even a normally fertile ruler. If your ruler is infertile (like a vampire is), it makes it worse.
My idea to make the vampire ruler evil and/or insane will tend to drive courtiers away, I think. That makes the shrinking of the court accelerate. I'm not sure how much fun this would be.
My idea to make the vampire ruler evil and/or insane will tend to drive courtiers away, I think. That makes the shrinking of the court accelerate. I'm not sure how much fun this would be.
Interesting.
Interesting, I might make an event to make discovered vampires gain random vampire courtiers to make up for it and so that beeing discovered isn't 100% negative just mostly. (Edit: of course thats not easy to script in Ck)
BTW have you had any vampire rulers die? If so from what? and at what age?
I am VERY interested in further reports on my vampire mod so that I can have an idea how realistic and involving a world it's creating.
Interesting, I might make an event to make discovered vampires gain random vampire courtiers to make up for it and so that beeing discovered isn't 100% negative just mostly. (Edit: of course thats not easy to script in Ck)
BTW have you had any vampire rulers die? If so from what? and at what age?
I am VERY interested in further reports on my vampire mod so that I can have an idea how realistic and involving a world it's creating.
Hmmm. I managed somehow to screw up the "character_health" file, so no characters anywhere in the world died of natural causes. I thought my king was just unusually long-lived (he was 69) but then I noticed a courtier in another court who was 115... 
I fixed it by over-writing the file with a clean copy, and my king died shortly thereafter. My heir (who had his own county) had died somehow- I imagine in battle- so his son took over. He was 8 years old.
He was later assassinated (one of those "your bedroom door opens suddenly" events) by, I assume, a rebellious vassal. I am going to have to see how that happened- it had never happened before to me before, so either the fact that the ruler was a child or that he had fairly low prestige must have increased the odds.
All of which is a long way of saying that I suppose a vampire king could be assassinated or else die in battle.
I was pondering how one could use existing traits and attributes to model the effects of vampirism. For instance, a discovered vampire might gain the kinslayer trait to reflect his horrible unpopularity. A vampire might default to getting the severely wounded trait so as to explain why he does not lead the troops (he has to stay out of the sunlight). Perhaps one with really high intrigue might be able to "recover". Or if he ceases to be a ruler (by having his lands conquered or something). This would be an AI character, but these former kings might go on to other courts. It would be best that they lose kinslayer and severely wounded traits if they cease to be rulers.
I was thinking of modifying the various illness and death events so as to create a huge modifier for high health. Give a MTTH for death by old age a factor of 10000 or so for a health of 20 or higher. A vampire, of course, could be given a +20 or so to health when it is created (and a penalty to fertility).
The idea is that instead of having to modify scores of events to incorporate vampires (chances of realm duress, courtier disloyalty, etc., etc.) you could use existing traits to do most of the work for you.
It would introduce a few quirks, of course. If, somehow, a regular character got a health of 20 he or she would not die of natural causes. But that is a feature, not a bug. I think it would be neat if a few folks were naturally immortal. Kind of like the legend of the wandering Jew.
And if we used kinslayer + severely wounded to represent a known vampire, then some characters would acquire these traits naturally. I'm inclined to include an event that gives these guys a boost to their health so they actually do become vampires. Other events would enable them to pass the trait on to their relatives and/or courtiers.
So, in summary, I was toying with the idea of using the following instead of the user defined traits:
high health (20+) = vampire
severely wounded = ruler vampire
kinslayer = known vampire
Modify the factors for high health to give a truly ridiculous bonus to the MTTH for the health events. Enough that instead of dying in a few days after reaching age 80, you will last for hundreds of years. And ensure that you recover in a day or two after getting illness, plague or pneumonia. But you never recover from being severely wounded.
The severely wounded is to explain why the vampire king is rarely seen, and never leads his troops. I am assuming that vulnerability to sunlight and being unable to cross running water is incompatible with leading troops. Besides, there's the risk of dying in battle which is best avoided.
Kinslayer both represents a way of becoming a vampire (if there's an event that gives high health to a bedridden kinslayer) and shows the social stigma of being a known monster. Heretic might work too/instead. Especially if a heretic king has a chance of passing his heresy on to others. Dunno.
p.s.
Maybe turn fosterlings into vampires? And find a way of making them stay (the DVIP has an event that makes fosterlings return home). Or else add bastards periodically. The text for the event can be that they are babies stolen from their mothers, or something.
The event to make courtiers into vampires should be triggered by their high ability scores. Maybe it already is- I should look at the event again.
I fixed it by over-writing the file with a clean copy, and my king died shortly thereafter. My heir (who had his own county) had died somehow- I imagine in battle- so his son took over. He was 8 years old.
He was later assassinated (one of those "your bedroom door opens suddenly" events) by, I assume, a rebellious vassal. I am going to have to see how that happened- it had never happened before to me before, so either the fact that the ruler was a child or that he had fairly low prestige must have increased the odds.
All of which is a long way of saying that I suppose a vampire king could be assassinated or else die in battle.
I was pondering how one could use existing traits and attributes to model the effects of vampirism. For instance, a discovered vampire might gain the kinslayer trait to reflect his horrible unpopularity. A vampire might default to getting the severely wounded trait so as to explain why he does not lead the troops (he has to stay out of the sunlight). Perhaps one with really high intrigue might be able to "recover". Or if he ceases to be a ruler (by having his lands conquered or something). This would be an AI character, but these former kings might go on to other courts. It would be best that they lose kinslayer and severely wounded traits if they cease to be rulers.
I was thinking of modifying the various illness and death events so as to create a huge modifier for high health. Give a MTTH for death by old age a factor of 10000 or so for a health of 20 or higher. A vampire, of course, could be given a +20 or so to health when it is created (and a penalty to fertility).
The idea is that instead of having to modify scores of events to incorporate vampires (chances of realm duress, courtier disloyalty, etc., etc.) you could use existing traits to do most of the work for you.
It would introduce a few quirks, of course. If, somehow, a regular character got a health of 20 he or she would not die of natural causes. But that is a feature, not a bug. I think it would be neat if a few folks were naturally immortal. Kind of like the legend of the wandering Jew.
And if we used kinslayer + severely wounded to represent a known vampire, then some characters would acquire these traits naturally. I'm inclined to include an event that gives these guys a boost to their health so they actually do become vampires. Other events would enable them to pass the trait on to their relatives and/or courtiers.
So, in summary, I was toying with the idea of using the following instead of the user defined traits:
high health (20+) = vampire
severely wounded = ruler vampire
kinslayer = known vampire
Modify the factors for high health to give a truly ridiculous bonus to the MTTH for the health events. Enough that instead of dying in a few days after reaching age 80, you will last for hundreds of years. And ensure that you recover in a day or two after getting illness, plague or pneumonia. But you never recover from being severely wounded.
The severely wounded is to explain why the vampire king is rarely seen, and never leads his troops. I am assuming that vulnerability to sunlight and being unable to cross running water is incompatible with leading troops. Besides, there's the risk of dying in battle which is best avoided.
Kinslayer both represents a way of becoming a vampire (if there's an event that gives high health to a bedridden kinslayer) and shows the social stigma of being a known monster. Heretic might work too/instead. Especially if a heretic king has a chance of passing his heresy on to others. Dunno.
p.s.
Maybe turn fosterlings into vampires? And find a way of making them stay (the DVIP has an event that makes fosterlings return home). Or else add bastards periodically. The text for the event can be that they are babies stolen from their mothers, or something.
The event to make courtiers into vampires should be triggered by their high ability scores. Maybe it already is- I should look at the event again.
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Well three things and I am sorry about not writing in quite as much detail as you because I don't have all that much time right now.
However:
1. It should be impossible for a vampire to die of natural causes so if they are dying of natural causes theirs something wrong with the way I have edited the file. I havn't played that many long games with the mod so I'll test it when I get the chance. If your sure it's happening I'll look at fixing it now.
2. Actually using current traits with the mod is not something I want to do because I want the mod to work as an addition to not a total focus to the main game. However I may give discovered vampires herect/excomm traits to make them more disliked. Don't worry about how much I need to write I'll make it into a great mod eventually.
3. Turning fostlerlings is a really great idea if I can get it to work. And I could also add other bastards to represent unkowns turned by the ruler as well. However my only fear about that is what if the ruler had bastards before becoming a vampire.
However:
1. It should be impossible for a vampire to die of natural causes so if they are dying of natural causes theirs something wrong with the way I have edited the file. I havn't played that many long games with the mod so I'll test it when I get the chance. If your sure it's happening I'll look at fixing it now.
2. Actually using current traits with the mod is not something I want to do because I want the mod to work as an addition to not a total focus to the main game. However I may give discovered vampires herect/excomm traits to make them more disliked. Don't worry about how much I need to write I'll make it into a great mod eventually.
3. Turning fostlerlings is a really great idea if I can get it to work. And I could also add other bastards to represent unkowns turned by the ruler as well. However my only fear about that is what if the ruler had bastards before becoming a vampire.
You could set up an age requirement. Bastards older than a year old wouldn't be turned.
Although why wouldn't a vampire turn his illegitimate sons as well?
Although why wouldn't a vampire turn his illegitimate sons as well?