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CK2 Dev Diary #36: The Witching Hour

Hi everyone!

I hope you all had a good time during the Holidays. I know I did, but now it’s time to don the crown, strap on the sword and get back to work on Crusader Kings II (and my other game, of course...) Now, what better way to start off the new year than with a bit of harmless witchery? In the terribly long eras before the great thinkers of the Age of Reason would have us replace magic with science, the “occult” was of course seen as a normal part of life, and society lived in fear of curses and evil spells. But… just because you’re superstitious does not mean the witches aren’t out to get you! Just like today, the desperate and the unscrupulous would seek power by any means necessary, including the worship of demons and evil spirits...

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This brings us to my favorite Society in the upcoming expansion Monks and Mystics; the Demon Worshippers. These brothers and sisters of the left-hand path come in several varieties: Abrahamics get “Lucifer’s Own”, Tengri pagans get the “Plaguebringers”, the Indian faiths are afflicted with a particularly nasty type of Kali worship, Baltic, Slavic and Finnic pagans get “The Cold Ones” (evil shamans) and Germanic Pagans have those who curry the favor of Hel and of powerful jotuns. Regardless of religious context, they are all united in their self-serving, utterly ruthless quest for power in the world of the living, and care little for their fate in the afterlife. As they advance through the ranks, Demon Worshippers get powers like “Dark Divorce”, “Summon Familiar” and “Tainted Touch” (a health curse.) Through their network of agents, they can also attempt to abduct relatively low ranking characters. Now, a lot of the content for the Demon Worshippers is hard to explain in terms of placebo effects and natural phenomena, so if you don’t care for the supernatural I suggest simply not joining those Societies (because rooting out their covens and persecuting them through your Court Chaplain is reasonably historical and adds flavor to the game.) However, if you really don’t want them around, you can turn them off through a Game Rule.

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Next up are the infamous Assassins, a Shiite Muslim Society that - unsurprisingly - specializes in murder. The elusive Assassins consider themselves the true followers of Allah, and will do anything to further the advances of Shia Islam and protect their fellow believers. Consisting of loyal warriors as well as competent spies, wielding manipulation and social skills as expertly as a dagger, they specialize in asymmetrical warfare, striking hard at the heart of their enemies. Their special powers include intimidation and murder. For example, they can get a Favor with someone (if you have the Conclave expansion) by leaving a dagger on their pillow. At higher ranks, they can also mark someone for death, so that lower ranked members will get that murder as a mission. Since this Society is also a political entity and a Holy Order of sorts, the Grandmaster gets the power to raise special troops.

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There is more to say about these Societies; their other powers, missions and semi-random events, but I don’t want to spoil it all. Oh, and if you have the Way of Life expansion, you can use “Spy On” to find out if a character is a member of a secret Society like the above...

There won’t be a CK2 stream today, but stay tuned for something next week (and a new dev diary, of course)!
 
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If I recall the Are's Own trait is just in there as flavor for the immortal character who has a chance to pop up in that quest chain and is an ancient Greek.
OK, point conceded. I haven't met that guy yet.
 
Any societies for the Aztecs? Just wondering if their AI will have more to do.

An Aztec secret society in a culture that practices ritual torture and blood sacrifice - they knit tea cozies, practice basket weaving and exchange recipes for homemade jams.

But no one must ever find out . . . !
 
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So the whole deal with the Aztec religion is that blood and flesh sacrifice postpones the universe's destruction, something to do with the gods' having created the universe through sacrificing of themselves, yes?

Well then perhaps the Aztec wicked society is about accelerating the destruction of all things through, to them, profaning sacrifices? If sacred sacrifice is medicine for the universe, profane sacrifice would be poison disguised as medicine.
 
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So the whole deal with the Aztec religion is that blood and flesh sacrifice postpones the universe's destruction, something to do with the gods' having created the universe through sacrificing of themselves, yes?

Well then perhaps the Aztec wicked society is about accelerating the destruction of all things through, to them, profaning sacrifices? If sacred sacrifice is medicine for the universe, profane sacrifice would be poison disguised as medicine.
The wicked one shall be somehow against the mainstream. Thus, I guess they delivers love and flowers instead of destruction which is totally HERETIC!:eek:
 
The wicked one shall be somehow against the mainstream. Thus, I guess they delivers love and flowers instead of destruction which is totally HERETIC!:eek:
Well depends on which cult of aztecs although all were blood thirsty there were some that really loved flowers (the ones who worship the Flower goddess(or was it flower god)). Their sacrifice was quite gruesome though flaying the victims skin and making it into a skin suit to be worn by priests for a slightly more than a week. Damn Aztecs they even ruin flowers...
 
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So there's gonna be a way to make Lucifer's Own overtake Christianity and have a Europe of Devil Worshippers right? Oh man I want this DLC so badly...
Sadly, it doesnt seem like it. They said that some of the cult-groups (The assassins maybe?) can 'reveal' their true religion to spread it, but that Lucifer's own wasn't one of them. I mean, I guess you still could in a sense, by having all the powerful leaders in the cult, but otherwise I don't think so.
 
So there's gonna be a way to make Lucifer's Own overtake Christianity and have a Europe of Devil Worshippers right? Oh man I want this DLC so badly...

That would require a new heresy for Catholics/whoever else has the cult. Since I haven't seen any mention of things like that...
 
Slightly skeptical about all this. I also keep reading "If you don't like it, turn it off in the game rules.". But if I think I'll just turn it off, then why would I buy it in the first place? : /
 
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Slightly skeptical about all this. I also keep reading "If you don't like it, turn it off in the game rules.". But if I think I'll just turn it off, then why would I buy it in the first place? : /

Because of the other features? You buy it for the features you want and you turn the features off you don't want.
 
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Slightly skeptical about all this. I also keep reading "If you don't like it, turn it off in the game rules.". But if I think I'll just turn it off, then why would I buy it in the first place? : /

Disabling supernatural events/societies would (presumably) have little to no effect on the Assassins, the Monastic Orders, and possibly some other societies that aren't based around the supernatural stuff (though there might be some events for them that are supernatural and thus would be disabled).
 
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A Policy question for the future of Crusader kings DLC. For the past few expansions their release has occurred about a month after their official announcement. Yet for this latest installment there has been no set release date given even though its been over a month. Can we expect this trend to continue of early teasers for new content or has the holidays pushed back the launch for Monks and Mystics?
 
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Am I the only one who spotted the green "B" character on the 3rd picture's tooltip? Over the "nomadic agitation" icon.
Since he is playing as Fatimid in 1066 at game start, might it mean "bug"?? :eek:
 
Am I the only one who spotted the green "B" character on the 3rd picture's tooltip? Over the "nomadic agitation" icon.
Since he is playing as Fatimid in 1066 at game start, might it mean "bug"?? :eek:
Here are pics taken from the dev Twitch stream:

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