CK 1.05 RELEASE CANDIDATE H - general feedback (IAC only!)

[MrT]

1.05 RELEASE CANDIDATE H


Change Log

• Removed restrictions on only christians creating vassals. All rulers should now do so. (exe change)
• Lustful/chaste traits are no longer removed for teenagers at loadtime. (exe change)
• Fixed a problem with randomness not being reset between effects in events. (exe change)
• Reduced range of age on random male courtiers to maximum of 55 instead of 65 years. (exe change)
• Fixed a major crashbug which corrupted savegames. (exe change)
• Fixed another random crashbug. (exe change)
• Found and purged what I hope are the last few lingering formatting errors in the extra_text.csv
• Fixed a missing marriage end date in 1187 scenario (ID #6500)
• Fixed name of SAND in world_names.csv
• Fixed Spanish names in province_names.csv
• Made a ton of corrections to the Spanish text in the extra_text.csv
• Made some Spanish corrections to world_names.csv
• Made bunch of fixes to 1187 and 1337 marriages involving randomly-generated characters of the same dynasty being married to one another (thanks to Fat's hard work of preparing those files for me -- also Fat now creditted in 1.05 change log)
• Fixed a large number of ghost marriages, etc. in the 1187 and 1337 scenarios (thanks to NexusRTI for these -- credit added to the 1.05 change log)
• Changed Elvira, countess of Zamorra (C191) to 'Urraca'; changed Urraca, courtier in Kingdom of Castile (CAST) to 'Elvira'; and made new Elvira's location to be in county of Zamorra (C191). (Thanks binTravkin!)
• Reworked bastard stats-boost event effects to take fixed RND seed issue into account
• Reworked a couple court events to take RND seed fix into account.
• Tweaked mortality rates a tiny bit more
• Tweaked down likelihood of getting a "free" claims event.
• AI will no longer appoint non=coreligionist officers to his court via event
• Court officers will spam you a bit less with their "flavour" messages.
• Wandering courtiers of various ilks will cost a bit less
• The "I could be a better..." event series will now not have a courtier ask for a court position if not same religion as ruler
• Courtiers should be a fair bit faster at adopting the religion of their ruler.
• The pope and patriarch will now only spam you about using heathens or schismatics in court offices if there is at least one unemployed courtier who is the correct religion and *could* be assigned to the office (regardless of that courtier's stats, though). Exception: see next item.
• The pope *will* complain about heathens that hold an office in a Catholic court during the crusades. (i.e. when crusades aren't active, you could let a non-christian hold office, but during a crusade you will need to demote them and have either no officer or a Christian one).
• In theory, the above changes should make it possible to play some of the realms (like Serbia, Vidin, etc.) without being spammed like made before your court has attracted/produced enough correct-religion courtiers. Just don't leave a heathen court officer in his post during a crusade if you're Catholic.
• Tweaked Catholic AI rulers' interest in going off on a crusade to be slightly more likely again.
• Made one last attempt to tweak the "Masque of the Red Death" series. MTTH for the bad events has been greatly increased -- and even more so for ruler, ruler child and court officers. The good events (healing) should happen more rapicly for ruler, ruler child and court officers but mtth for those is otherwise unchanged. The courtsize limits on the events have also been adjusted, so bad illness/pneumonia ones will only happen if court has more than Count20/Duke25/King30 courtiers; and the plague-related ones will cut off at courtsize count15/duke20/king25. So if you have a very large court you'll still get them (mostly for courtiers) but they should stop once court is somewhat culled.
• Reworked some Horde events to take into account the fixed RND seed bug.
• The "Manzikert event"(6157) is now quite a bit more likely to trgger for a rebellious vassal and/or if liege has the realm duress trait.
• Vassals of a liege who already has the realm duress trait will not become rebellious unless they have less then 100% loyalty.
• High intrigue vassals won't consider becoming rebellious if they are 100% loyal.
• Vassals of a low intrigue liege won't consider becoming rebllious if they are 100% loyal.
• Vassals are generally slightly less likely to become rebellious on tyheir own.
• Far away vassals are far less likely to spark a civil war than before, but are more likely to break away somewhat sooner than they used to.
• Rebellious vassals are less likely to start a civil war now.
• Vassals who are 100% loyal are quite a bit less willing to becoming rebellious than they were before.
• Vassals who are 100% loyal are quite a bit less receptive to joing a civil war.
• Loyal vassals are a little less likely to change their minds and become disloyal later.
• Byzantine Emperors will have less trouble than before to clear a civil war.
• Generally, a civil war is likely to be ended a little sooner than before.
• A civil war will clear much more rapidly if there is no remaining vassal who have less than 100% loyalty.
• Very poor stats have less of an impact on slowing down the end of a civil war than before.
• Assassinations are generally a little less likely to happen.
• In the balkan region, a vassal will not try to assassinate his liege (who is probably BYZA) unless he is at least a bit disloyal (<90%). (Historical "frequency" of Eastern Roman Empire court intrigues)
• In the italy region, a vassal will not try to assassinate his liege unless he is somewhat disloyal (<75%). (Historically, many city-states did employ assassination as a political tool)
• In all other regions, a vassal will not try to assassinate his liege unless he is fairly disloyal (<50%).
• Tweaked the minimum values for assassinations to be possible.
• Poor liege stats in martial, stewardship, and diplomacy have less impact on the likelihood that an assassination will be attempted than before; however very low intruge lieges are now more likely to be assassinated than before.
• Vassals with high loyalty are somewhat more likely to change their minds and cease to be rebellious.
• Reduced (a bit) the frequency that rebellious AI vassals are likely to get the "free" loyalty hits, and made the degree of the hit randomly variable between 10-50% (instead of a flat 25%). Very loyal vassals will get few "hits" and very disloyal vassals will tend to get more hits.

IMPORTANT REMINDERS:
If you gain a new title that is a higher rank than any title you own then you must pause the game, save, and then reload in order for it to take effect. So if you're a count and become a duke or king, or if you're a duke and become a king, then you should save and reload. Failure to do so will cause all sorts of possible bugs or crashes.

This patch should be applied over a clean 1.04a installation or on top of the previous release candidate patch.[/b] It will crash on a new installation that hasn't been patched to 1.04a since the official patch contains necessary files that are not included in this public beta patch (to help keep file size down).

If you’ve edited any of your own files or are using any mods, please remove them and revert to a vanilla copy if you want to give feedback (else your feedback will be either worthless or potentially detrimental to the process).




SUPER-IMPORTANT!
If you haven't done so already, please make sure that you read THIS POST which contains vital information about using and reporting about this beta patch. If you followed the instructions for Candidate A, you may simply install this on top of your existing installation. If you haven't followed the instructions, please do so but install this patch instead of the Candidate A patch.

THIS CANDIDATE IS PROBABLY NOT COMPATIBLE WITH ANY SAVE GAMES MADE PRIOR TO THIS PATCH!!!
Any save games you have made with Release Candidate C-G might work, but earlier saves ARE NOT compatible with this release candidate.

AND AN EXTRA SPECIAL REQUEST...
We have until Tuesday to balance everything, and since there were some exe changes in this patch that will affect a number of situations, we REALLY, REALLY BEG you to PLEASE START A NEW GAME USING NORMAL/NORMAL GAME SETTINGS.
This is probably the last chance (unless I make another patch on the weekend at some point) that you'll have to give us feedback before we have to submit the files. Yeah...it's a bit scary that the (probably) final release candidate has two *major* exe changes. Our choices were "do it now, and balance as best we can" or "make no exe change and who knows when the next chance will come to change it". We chose to take the chance and get it done now -- mostly because one of the changes is the single most requested exe change you've asked for. Please try to test this as much as you can, and give us (constructive) feedback so we can make some last tweaks before the files go to localization.

Thanks folks


Get it here

[Duuk]

Happiness is an exe change.

[MrT]

A couple comments to go with this patch...


It wasn't until this morning that Johan was able to find any time at all to do anything with the exe, so I haven't done anything more than about an hour's quick testing with it. I had not expected the RND seed bug to be fixed, so I didn't have all of the event files ready for it...so that means I had to quickly revise the *major* events that had been redone to accomodate the bug, and try to estimate how best to change them to reflect the fix. With no testing time, you're getting my "best guess" in this patch.

I had known that he would change the religion restriction on granting titles (if he found time) so I *did* have the other files relating to that prepared. Because I had to tdo the other stuff (and also keep up my EU3 duties) the changes relating to this is also simply my best guess.

I made no changes based on the "fix" to allow chaste/lustful to be loaded for teenagers, but I don't really think any were needed (iirc we already addressed that with event fixes in a previous patch).

Johan has given me until Tuesday morning to have the final files in his in box. Now I know what you're all going to say...that it's insane to make a pair of major exe changes (grant title and RND seed fix) with only 3 days of testing left before the final files have to be submitted; but I only had two options from Johan:

1. Take the new exe with these requested changes/fixes (plus the crash-bug fixes) and do the best that we can, or
   
   
2. Abort the new exe...in which case it could easily be a month or two (or more!) before any exe time would be available.

Given the choice, I felt that you folks would probably prefer the new exe changes and I think that we can find a moderately good balance if everyone can play as much as possible and give us feedback.

No...delaying the patch wasn't a choice. I will have no more real tweak/balancing time after next week because I will be full time on EU3. I'll still do a bit here and there in my spare time, but that's likely to be very limited. Same is largely true for Byakhiam who I've recruited to help me with one of my projects in EU3.

With enough feedback, I might be able to do some tweaks and post up another RC (or maybe even two?) on the weekend...but that's more dependent on what volume and quality of feedback I get in the next 48 hours. If I get enough, then it's possible. Else this will likely be the final releae candidate.

In the end, my opinion is that we can probably get a pretty good final release ready, and that any further tweaks and such can be done via this public beta forum and "early" 1.06 beta patches. I hope that you all agree -- or are at least sympathetic to my dilema.

Chris

[The Phoenix]

Originally Posted by MrT

Change Log

• Removed restrictions on only christians creating vassals. All rulers should now do so. (exe change)

WHOOOO!
(I suppose title-creation wasn't included though?)

[Byakhiam]

Whehey, I didn't even check the changelist before doing a test run. Johan rocks.

[Aardavark]

Originally Posted by The Phoenix

WHOOOO!
(I suppose title-creation wasn't included though?)

I would probably be happier if it weren't included. As it is, you have to erradicate a pagan/muslim power in order to get a title they hold. It would be pretty bad if, for example, they Fatimids created most of the KoJ duchies...

[MrT]

Originally Posted by Aardavark

I would probably be happier if it weren't included. As it is, you have to erradicate a pagan/muslim power in order to get a title they hold. It would be pretty bad if, for example, they Fatimids created most of the KoJ duchies...

You'd have to do it one way or another. If is was all one great seething mass of realm X, or a variety of vassals to realkm X, the net result 's the same. The big differences are that:

1. Those vassals have to be paid attention to or they can get feisty. Civial wars...assassionations...etc are all now far more a part of EVERYONE's life...not just Christians' life.

2. MOST IMPORTANTLY, if those vassals are far away (like the sheik of Praha) they will break away as independents properly, so their Christian neighbours will be far more inclined to attack them since they aren't afraid of a 200k Fatimid retribution.

[Duuk]

Originally Posted by MrT

You'd have to do it one way or another. If is was all one great seething mass of realm X, or a variety of vassals to realkm X, the net result 's the same. The big differences are that:

1. Those vassals have to be paid attention to or they can get feisty. Civial wars...assassionations...etc are all now far more a part of EVERYONE's life...not just Christians' life.

2. MOST IMPORTANTLY, if those vassals are far away (like the sheik of Praha) they will break away as independents properly, so their Christian neighbours will be far more inclined to attack them since they aren't afraid of a 200k Fatimid retribution.

AND THERE WAS MUCH REJOICING!

[CSK]

Really great changes!

However, I would like to know if saves from the current version will be compatible with the coming 1.05.

[The Phoenix]

Will the Mongols hand out vassal titles, or will that be delayed until they are Mongols no more (the rulers, that is)?

[Veldmaarschalk]

Removed restrictions on only christians creating vassals. All rulers should now do so. (exe change)

I should read the changelog better, . That is why I am currently seeing one province sheiks/emirs all over Asia Minor popping up and not going independent.

I will have to check if it also goes for Republics and Archbishops.

[The Phoenix]

Originally Posted by Veldmaarschalk

I should read the changelog better, . That is why I am currently seeing one province sheiks/emirs all over Asia Minor popping up and not going independent.

I will have to check if it also goes for Republics and Archbishops.

Yes, please do so (although I suspect that they either don't release vassals or at least don't release vassals of their own type).

[Byakhiam]

Originally Posted by CSK

However, I would like to know if saves from the current version will be compatible with the coming 1.05.

Should be. Most often saves are compatible, the trait changes during earlier RC:s and then resultant uncompatibility is an exception, not a rule.

[CSK]

Originally Posted by Byakhiam

Should be. Most often saves are compatible, the trait changes during earlier RC:s and then resultant uncompatibility is an exception, not a rule.

Woot. I have one week holiday and nothing to do. Thus I thought I would start an AAR. But of course only if I can play on.

[MrT]

Originally Posted by The Phoenix

Will the Mongols hand out vassal titles, or will that be delayed until they are Mongols no more (the rulers, that is)?

Not 100% sure since I haven't tested. My understanding is that there are now no religious restrictions on it so I suspect that they will. This might mean that we need to increase the Horde army sizes back to where they were in earlier patches, or make some other tweaks/exclusions in some of the events to avoid pulling their teeth too badly.

[MrT]

Originally Posted by CSK

Really great changes!

However, I would like to know if saves from the current version will be compatible with the coming 1.05.

Should be. In fact I think earlier saves would be okay with today's patch too; but I very desperately need feedback on what's happening in new games so I know what the effect is on the initial years. If you've got a save that you'd like to continue, please just hang on to it and then resume playing it as of Tuesday. You'll probably see a ton of vassals created in the first few days though.

Most of all, I urgently need feedback on new games if possible. It's our last chance to tweak before this goes official.

[Fawr]

I see there are lots of changes to make 100% loyal vassals more loyal. With the changes to assassinations another game as Byzantium beckons Hopefully this time I can avoid having my first 9 rulers assinated in the course of 40 years. Although I must admit I'm a little disappointed that I can't continue and set an unbeatable record for the most consecutive rules killed by their vassals.

[CSK]

Originally Posted by MrT

Most of all, I urgently need feedback on new games if possible. It's our last chance to tweak before this goes official.

I guess you missunderstood me. I do not want to play a save of an older version on but play a save of this version with 1.05. As long as this works I'm happy.

[Justinian_A]

Wow, these are some excellent changes. It's like getting everything you wanted for Christmas, but weren't expecting. Time to fire up a new game...

[MrT]

Originally Posted by CSK

I guess you missunderstood me. I do not want to play a save of an older version on but play a save of this version with 1.05. As long as this works I'm happy.

Oh. Well yeah then. I am hoping that my gut instinct tweaks are pretty close, so with any lcuk there will be only slight tweaks to a few mtth values or modifiers. I certainly don't expect anything at all to change that would affect a save game started with this patch.