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CK3 Dev Diary #81 - A tour of your Royal Court (Interface)

Hello there, and welcome to the eighty-first CK3 Dev Diary!

Today we are going to look at the experience of admiring your Royal Court, one of the paid features of the Expansion with the same name.

Most of the actual mechanics of the expansion should already be familiar to you if you have read previous Dev Diaries. I will refer back to these Dev Diaries where appropriate, so you can see this as a bit of a summary of what it means to preside over your own Royal Court.

That being said, we are going to talk a bit about Court Types, a minor feature for your Royal Court

Visiting your Royal Court​

When you reach the rank of King or Emperor as a Feudal or Clan Ruler, you have laid the foundation for your Royal Court. You can now go to it via a button in the main interface.

This button highlights if there is something interesting to do in your Royal Court at this moment, such as if you have new Court Artifacts.

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You can also view anyone else’s Royal Court via a button next to their Character.

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The Throne Room​

Your Royal Court is split into three segments: Throne Room, Court Grandeur, and Court Artifacts

When you enter your Royal Court, you end up in your Throne Room.

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Here you can see various petitioners or other goings-on in your Court, and you can choose to interact with them. These types of events are described in Dev Diary 75. If any Inspired Characters are present or have projects in progress, they are also shown here, on the left side of the screen.

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If there is not enough going on here, you can also choose to Hold Court, inviting Courtiers and Vassals across the Realm to grovel before you (which was shown in Dev Diary 72).

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If this is your Liege’s Court, you can even approach them to hear your reasonable requests, as seen in Dev Diary 74.

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Grandeur and Amenities​

Moving on to the second part of your Royal Court, which is an overview of your Court Grandeur. How much you have, various factors affecting it, and so on.

Grandeur was explained a while ago, in Dev Diary 61. Basically, it is a measure of how well known your Court is, and each Level gives you further benefits.

Your current Grandeur, Grandeur Baseline, and unlocked Grandeur Levels are shown on the large bar in the center.

In the image below, we can see we are gaining Grandeur every month due to being below our Baseline.

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Our current Level is 4: while we do not have enough Grandeur to maintain this Level, we had unlocked it before, and it will thus stay unlocked for 6 months, regardless how much Grandeur we have.

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We can also see that our expected Grandeur Level is 7, which we are nowhere near fulfilling.

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Grandeur is also reflected in other ways. If you have high Grandeur, the UI looks more luxurious, and new (non-Artifact) furniture appears in your court.

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A large source of Grandeur is which Amenities are available to your Courtiers and visitors to your court. Providing excellent Amenities is sure to make your name well known across the world.

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There are two other factors affecting Grandeur, Court Language and Court Types. Court Language was already explained in Dev Diary 78, so let’s talk about Court Types.

Court Types​

With Court Types, you can choose which kind of Royal Court you want to foster. Perhaps one where martial prowess is admired, or where there is a whisper around every corner and a lover behind every curtain.

You always have the choice between two Court Types, based on the Ethos of your Culture, and changing it costs Prestige. If your Culture changes, you can still keep your old Court Type.

The type of Royal Court affects two things: what you get from your Grandeur Level, and what your Courtiers get from being part of the Court.

While some Grandeur Levels you reach are always the same regardless of your Court Type, some change somewhat. So, in a Diplomatic Court, Grandeur Level 4 may see you gaining less Tyranny, while in a Warlike Court, you may gain more Levies.

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As for Courtiers, each Courtier who stays at an especially Grand Royal Court for a certain period of time (5 years) will gain a special Courtier Trait based on the Court Type

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Each Trait of this type has two different levels. If your Court is at Grandeur Level 5, Courtiers get the first level, while the second level will appear at Grandeur Level 8. The second level comes with extra bonuses and can be especially useful for those you plan to be your Vassals.

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Court Artifacts​

Last but certainly not least, are the Court Artifacts. We showed a few of them off in Dev Diary 69.

In short, Court Artifacts are a special type of Artifacts. These are large furniture and other decorative items you display inside your Royal Court. This makes them distinct from your Inventory Artifacts described in last week's Dev Diary as you are not hauling them around everywhere.

When entering this part of the Royal Court, you can see all spots where you can place Court Artifacts

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Just like Inventory Artifacts, they give you a bonus if they are actively on display in your Royal Court. The primary purpose of Court Artifacts is to increase your Court Grandeur, but some have additional effects.

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For most Court Artifacts, there is more than one slot to place them. Perhaps that tapestry would look better on that other wall?

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End of the Tour​


That is all for this week, thank you for reading!
 

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Some of these are tied to the court type, others are just tied to grandeur.
 
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Hello, thanks for your interest! It is moving day today for most of Paradox in Stockholm (down to a new floor!) so it has been a somewhat chaotic day! So I will reply to as much as I know here, and hopefully I can come back with some more answers later.

Cool! I really like the diplo court, and the benefits seem strong and worthwhile.

Could we see some of the benefits of going over court grandeur expectations?

When you die, is your current court grandeur preserved? Or does your heir have to build it up again?

Here is an example of when going above expectations:
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Mind you, I got this with debug commands so the values are probably unrealistic. But the types of bonuses are true.

On succession, you will lose some Grandeur, but you will not lose everything.

Would it be possible to place the same object on multiple locations?
Many Court Artifacts have multiple slots of their type. For example, there are 4 Pedestals, and you can choose where to place your Pedestal Item. Of course, the same Artifact cannot be in multiple slots at the same time, unless you hired Schrödinger in your Court. :)

Looks good. Some questions:

-> Will the renown penalty from not fulfilling grandeur expectations also be relevant for characters other than the dynasty head?
-> There seem to be 7 slots for court artifacts. Is this a flat limit, or can that be increased somehow?
- No, it only affects you if you are the Dynasty Head
- There are a few more than 7 Slots (around 15), the 7 you can see are only those you have Artifacts for (you can see more slots in the image, but these are not shown as prominently since you don't have anything that fits in that slot)

I see "inherited along with the kingdom of Pomerania" on that goblet, does that mean that artifact inheritance can be tied to inheritance of a specific title? or is it strictly related to being put on display in the court?
Yes, some Artifacts can be inherited along with a Title.

Can your unlanded hair get a courtier trait if he stays unladed in your court for 5 years? And if you place an unlanded courtier as Marshal or Steward he can still get the courtier trait right?
Yes to both.

2)Are Courtier Traits mutually exclusive?
2) No, you can have multiple types of Court Traits.


My question would be how many diffrent visual styles there are. I mean not martial, diplomatic but rather cultural. In the images are two. A more european and a more african, arabian one. Do we get something special for the vikings?
There are 4 main styles: Western, Mediterranean, Middle East, and Indian.

Although the features are really cool (even if they can become quite repetitive, especially Holding Court, but okay, modders will easily fix that eventually), I think the Royal Court is not that impressive. Especially the change from CG level 0 to 10, it adds a few bits (as somebody else already pointed out), and this is actually disappointing: it doesn't feel a Royal Court, but more a storage closet in some details (this wants to be a constructive criticism, not a provocation).
However, looking forward to release, artifacts and court grandeur seem to be very gamechanging!
It is worth noting that if you have Grandeur Level 10, you probably have lots of Court Artifacts as well. Comparing 0 and 10 without also adding the extra Artifacts is actually a bit misleading, sorry about that.

A practical question - if all these 3D courts destroy performance on older PCs, can we disable them without disabling the DLC itself? Are they a fundamental aspect of the game or just visual fluff? Will the artefact system work without everything having to be shown in 3D in every court? (Realistically, I'm assuming some of these questions relate to the performance issues that have caused the delay).
For the older computer, you can disable the animation of the Court Scene. This means that the game only renders one picture for a certain camera angle, which is then basically a still image. So you are really only sacrificing the animation of the character and props and the movement of the camera.

When I click the button to go to my royal court, how long is the loading delay?
It is instant (or near instant)
 
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The difference between a Level 0 Grandeur Court, and a Level 10 Grandeur Court (if that's indeed what we're being shown) is... pretty minor. A rug and a couple of wall lamps? Is this an accurate depiction of the differences between the minimum and maximum levels of Grandeur visually?

Also two things that stand out to me: the characters don't have shadows, which looks odd. Also, the King sat on the throne is so high up that his legs are kinda dangling like a little boy. Is it supposed to look like that?

Conceptually: this stuff is all fantastic, and I'm looking forward to playing with it. Visually, it's looking a little lacklustre if I'm honest.
 
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When in the court screen dealing with court events, I assume the game is paused (it looks like it in the screenshots) but how would it work in a multiplayer ? Would we have to pause for everybody or do we deal with he court events while the rest of the players do their thing ?
The game will pause in single player when you open the royal court view, but continue while in MP.

Court mechanics will not be available for tribal kingdoms?
The Royal Court is only available for clan and feudal kingdoms and empires.
Can the court types be added by mods? Also, how customizable is it?
Court types are moddable, and they have their own script files for you to peruse and change.
 
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I... don't think it looks that great yet and I can pinpoint it to a few things. I hope that things will improve over the coming months.

- I wish the walls were different in the Pomeranian court. It's too noisy for a cosy feeling if that's the intent, and yet it's not flamboyant enough to be authentically medieval.
- The courtiers wear clothing that looks out of place for the court if you ask me. In truth, the awkward stilted poses of the characters look very unnatural.
- Missing shadows and too bright lighting, I'm sure this is getting tweaked.
- Clipping on the clothing in the new animations, especially sitting ones.
- Those children animations must change because it looks creepy and out of character for very young children. Better to have them sit or play with something.
 
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The difference between a Level 0 Grandeur Court, and a Level 10 Grandeur Court (if that's indeed what we're being shown) is... pretty minor. A rug and a couple of wall lamps? Is this an accurate depiction of the differences between the minimum and maximum levels of Grandeur visually?
There's also a bench!
 
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It looks like the vision set out in the original Royal Court dev diary has been implemented really well, both in terms of the features and the UI. I'm looking forward to playing this; it's exactly the kind of thing I like.

One thing I would change though. While the feature looks good, the term"Court Type" seems a bit antiseptic and more suitable for a script keyword than a flavourful UI. Could it perhaps be referred to in a more immersive way? "Court Atmosphere", maybe?

I'm thinking of something that would look appropriate in event text.

A medieval courtier wouldn't say: "My lord, would you consider changing the type of this splendid court to something more warlike?"

But she might be more likely to say: "My lord, would you consider changing the atmosphere of this splendid court to something more warlike?"

Other people might come up with something even better than "Atmosphere"; it's just a first thought.
 
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Why still not all character in courtroom have shadows?

This feature feels like such a waste of dev time for such results...

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Throne itself has the shadow but no one else in the room does?

Also, it's not as noticeable in character screens, but if you're putting toddlers in the room (for some reason) here, why are they barefoot??
 
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When in the court screen dealing with court events, I assume the game is paused (it looks like it in the screenshots) but how would it work in a multiplayer ? Would we have to pause for everybody or do we deal with he court events while the rest of the players do their thing ?

Looks great anyway.
 
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I see a lot of value in all of the mechanics, but I am having a hard time suspending my disbelief with those graphics.

I know they are not final, and shadows are painfully still missing, but there is something fundamentally tough to look at here.

Chiefest among my gripes is the throne room size itself. It feels so small. This will be specially painful if the room size does not change as you increase Grandeur. If I am the HRE, King of France or, specially, the Byzantine Emperor, that room is laughably small!

What I keep seeing, visually (mechanics look great), is something that is far more fitting for Count and Duke courts...
 
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So what exactly decides the expected court level?
It is based on your Realm Size and if you are an Emperor or a King.

Thanks for this. Would you consider subsequently adding new visual styles with future flavour packs and expansions (e.g. a Moorish court visual style for Andalusian culture rulers included with any Andalusian flavour pack, or a special unique Byzantine imperial court room tied solely to the Byzantine Emperor title included with any Byzantine DLC)?
We spent a fair bit of time on showing Characters in 3D scenes, so I would expect we would try to come up with even more ways in the future. Not sure about adding it to a Byzantine DLC since then you need 2 DLCs to access the feature and I don't know how we want to handle that.

It's a really minor thing, but gathering from the pictures, it seems like you need to confirm you didn't accidentally click the hold court button which seems like unnecessary work to me.
I'm sure most people have good enough aim to klick the button intentionally more often than not - and you could always have an escape option as a cop-out if you wanted. :D
Backing out here actually means you have called everyone to Hold Court, and then choose to ignore all your petitioners because you "don't feel like it" that day.

Another question, but I think I’m too late: does the cost of court amenities scale with the number of courtiers (and maybe other factors)? This should prevent partially the end-game easiness.
It scales with Realm Size and if you are a King or Emperor, and also what Era you have reached.

Will Ai rulers summon players to their royal court?
No, if you want to interact with your Liege you do it yourself via Petition Liege.
 
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So...I don't want to be this guy, I really don't. But I gotta ask the question...

What exactly is the point of all these features? How does this make Crusader Kings a better Strategy Game? This isn't The Sims, or Barbie and Ken Dress Up hour. I'm not trying to mock here, but to understand the point of all this. This just seems like a giant DLC of ultimately pointless time padding busy work, just to give the player anything at all to do. How do these features improve my strategic standing with my rivals in a way the vanilla game is not currently capable? How do these features improve my ability to defend my realm, or expand it outside of some extra levies? How is diplomacy improved and made more in depth than vanilla currently does? Because every screenshot I see, is basically the same vanilla events as before, just with a 3D room window dressing instead. How are languages and cultures going to enhance my strategic thought process? Don't misunderstand, I appreciate adding more immersion to the game. I 100% support that idea, but at the end of the day, as I said, this isn't The Sims. How does this actually enhance strategy in this (what I thought was) a strategy game?
 
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So...I don't want to be this guy, I really don't. But I gotta ask the question...

What exactly is the point of all these features? How does this make Crusader Kings a better Strategy Game? This isn't The Sims, or Barbie and Ken Dress Up hour. I'm not trying to mock here, but to understand the point of all this. This just seems like a giant DLC of ultimately pointless time padding busy work, just to give the player anything at all to do. How do these features improve my strategic standing with my rivals in a way the vanilla game is not currently capable? How do these features improve my ability to defend my realm, or expand it outside of some extra levies? How is diplomacy improved and made more in depth than vanilla currently does? Because every screenshot I see, is basically the same vanilla events as before, just with a 3D room window dressing instead. How are languages and cultures going to enhance my strategic thought process? Don't misunderstand, I appreciate adding more immersion to the game. I 100% support that idea, but at the end of the day, as I said, this isn't The Sims. How does this actually enhance strategy in this (what I thought was) a strategy game?
That's the magic of it. The barrenness of the court room represents the hollowness of the game, thus maximizing immersion.
 
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Although the features are really cool (even if they can become quite repetitive, especially Holding Court, but okay, modders will easily fix that eventually), I think the Royal Court is not that impressive. Especially the change from CG level 0 to 10, it adds a few bits (as somebody else already pointed out), and this is actually disappointing: it doesn't feel a Royal Court, but more a storage closet in some details (this wants to be a constructive criticism, not a provocation).
However, looking forward to release, artifacts and court grandeur seem to be very gamechanging!
 
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All the bonuses are going to be pointless if the rest of the game isn't fixed. Most every attribute in the game is already super easy to stack, and most of them don't even matter anyway. I'm definitely not going to care about 0.16 prestige a month if my character has like 20,000 prestige that doesn't do anything.
 
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