Western Europe 410-962 - The Winter King

[Ols]

One thing I noticed- when you have the Saxon invasion trigger which gives Cantia a bunch of guys and causes them to have a war with Dumnonia, the AI tends to fail spectacularly at handling its new stacks, sending their old levies first against the Dumnonians. This result almost immediately in them getting wrecked and despite still having an additional 6,000+ troops, the 100% warscore auto-ends the war with nothing taken, which is a bit disappointing.

That'll probably be resolved by changing the way Cantia expands. Most likely an event will trigger to give Lancelot the Belgae, who will then usually swear fealty to Cerdic. This will trigger the Meonware Jutes moving in to settle the land. Once Lancelot is dead, the land will be ruled by a Saxon (a Jute) too. The rest of the expansion will be triggered by an invasion of event troops, which would carve out an independent West Seaxe from any land still owned by Britons in Dumnonia, preferring land closest to Cantia.

 

[agarber12]

I was wondering if there were plans to have start points later in the books. I was really hoping to try to claim the throne of Dumnonia as Gwydre. During the final start (Excalibur)you could have Arthur as governor of Siluria (duke level title) at war with Mordred as King of Dumnonia. On Arthur's side would be Sagramor as the rebelling Lord of the Stones. Mordred could also be undergoing an invasion by Gwent to simulate Meruig's coup at the end of the book. Just suggestions. Hope work on the mod is going well, can't wait to see the new features from Charlemagne implemented.

 

[Ols]

I was wondering if there were plans to have start points later in the books. I was really hoping to try to claim the throne of Dumnonia as Gwydre. During the final start (Excalibur)you could have Arthur as governor of Siluria (duke level title) at war with Mordred as King of Dumnonia. On Arthur's side would be Sagramor as the rebelling Lord of the Stones. Mordred could also be undergoing an invasion by Gwent to simulate Meruig's coup at the end of the book. Just suggestions. Hope work on the mod is going well, can't wait to see the new features from Charlemagne implemented.

There are plans, I'll begin implementing them relatively soon. We already have some Charlemagne features (such as tribals) implemented.

 

[Immortal Impi]

That'll probably be resolved by changing the way Cantia expands. Most likely an event will trigger to give Lancelot the Belgae, who will then usually swear fealty to Cerdic. This will trigger the Meonware Jutes moving in to settle the land. Once Lancelot is dead, the land will be ruled by a Saxon (a Jute) too. The rest of the expansion will be triggered by an invasion of event troops, which would carve out an independent West Seaxe from any land still owned by Britons in Dumnonia, preferring land closest to Cantia.

That sounds fucking awesome and a much better system than what we have now. It's pretty disappointing to watch the Anglians wreck the goddamn shit out of the central and northern kingdoms (in my current game it conquered all of Elmet too) and then Cantia fails every time.

 

[Ols]

That sounds fucking awesome and a much better system than what we have now. It's pretty disappointing to watch the Anglians wreck the goddamn shit out of the central and northern kingdoms (in my current game it conquered all of Elmet too) and then Cantia fails every time.

The Northern Kingdoms are a lot stronger in our working version. Quite a few provinces were added, and there are plenty of allied kingdoms. If you start in 410, you'll find the North governed as a single Empire title with immense power.

Also, here's the a newly implemented character who will play an important part in the rule of ancient Ireland even after his death. That's not a new CoA - the flags are broken in our working version.

 

[VandrosRW]

Is that Imperial Rome that it's still unified under, or Coel Hen at the start?

 

[DC123456789]

That sounds fucking awesome and a much better system than what we have now. It's pretty disappointing to watch the Anglians wreck the goddamn shit out of the central and northern kingdoms (in my current game it conquered all of Elmet too) and then Cantia fails every time.

We're planning to have an event chain to collapse Anglia most of the time after Aelle dies, so you won't be seeing the ahistorical super-Anglia so often anymore. Instead, we'll have a number of new tribes invading into the mess to create new independent kingdoms.

Is that Imperial Rome that it's still unified under, or Coel Hen at the start?

Coel Hen. Rome had abandoned Britannia a few years before, IIRC.

 

[Ols]

Is that Imperial Rome that it's still unified under, or Coel Hen at the start?

The 410 date was chosen because that's the first year that none of Britain was subject to Rome in any way. Coel Hen started out as the ruler of a Roman vassal, and ended up truly independent.

 

[das]

Glad to hear that there are new provinces in the north. Right now it seems like it would be nigh-impossible to found Hen Ogledd without conquering most of it. I'm still not sure if it's right that it is harder to found than Britannia (needs bigger realm size), considering it is a smaller area.

Also, the chronicle problem seems to only happen sometimes. I'm not sure why.

 

[Ols]

Glad to hear that there are new provinces in the north. Right now it seems like it would be nigh-impossible to found Hen Ogledd without conquering most of it. I'm still not sure if it's right that it is harder to found than Britannia (needs bigger realm size), considering it is a smaller area.

Also, the chronicle problem seems to only happen sometimes. I'm not sure why.

Hen Ogledd has been enlarged to cover Elmet, so it wont really be easier. It'll be easier to form since everyone there is related and you can take it by simply inheriting land.

 

[DC123456789]

Glad to hear that there are new provinces in the north. Right now it seems like it would be nigh-impossible to found Hen Ogledd without conquering most of it. I'm still not sure if it's right that it is harder to found than Britannia (needs bigger realm size), considering it is a smaller area.

Also, the chronicle problem seems to only happen sometimes. I'm not sure why.

The large realm size was actually from before we made everything tribal, which meant that you needed far less territory to cover it. It should probably be reduced for tribal realms. I changed it for Britannia and Aenglaland in 0.99.4, but forgot about Hen Ogledd.

 

[das]

Hen Ogledd requires 25 realm size when tribal, 35 when not. Britannia requires 20 when tribal, 30 when not. It seemed odd.

 

[DC123456789]

Oh, so it was changed. I probably forgot about it.

The reasoning there would be that for claiming Britannia you only need to be a powerful king who will then proceed to get the submission of all the other Anglo-Saxon kings, whereas for Hen Ogledd you are large and powerful enough to declare yourself High King over all the Cumbrians, without the need for anyone to swear fealty to you.

 

[Ols]

We now have basic history in place for every province in the 410 start, which frees me up to work on balancing it all and making things run more smoothly.

Also, people wanted to see what the de jure titles for the Saxons (at their maximum extent were), so here's what they will be in the next version (and for the most part, what they are now). Once the next version is out, I'll write a short manual explaining de jure duchy changes.

Empire:

Spoiler

Kingdoms:

Spoiler

Duchies:

Spoiler

Kingdom Variant form:

Spoiler

 

[loup99]

Have you shown the setup for France in 410? If not, what are you exactly going with religiously, politically and culturally?

 

[Ols]

Have you shown the setup for France in 410? If not, what are you exactly going with religiously, politically and culturally?

For the time being there will be Roman governorships as kingdom level titles independent of Rome. The justification for this will likely be that the Sack of Rome in 410 has weakened the hold of the Empire. The provinces will lack most cbs against each other, but will be able to plot to form Soissons and the Gallic Empire. The Franks will be designed to invade into Belgica over time, the Visigoths will sweep upward, and the Burgundians will be sequentially granted land until they hunger for more. Armorica will be a vassal of the Romans, and will eventually break free. Benoic will be Romano-Gallic and will be settled by Armoricans in an event. Frisia will be mostly the same. If Roman authority collapses enough then the ruler of the Governorship centered around Soissons will get an event to form Soissons, which will demote the other governors and make Soissons a de jure Kingdom - eliminating the other ones.

With regards to culture - we're keeping "Gallic" out for now. Romano-Gallic will completely dominate, though we may have events for Gallic culture and religion to emerge. One possible trigger may be an Armorican Empire (Breizh) pushing inland. Frisian is totally monolithic and doesn't change. Frankish creeps inland and is spread by the tribal settlement action. Romano-Gallic may transform into some kind of Old French over time - but wont for now. Visigothic tends not to spread much, nor does Burgundian. Gaul is pretty simple culturally at the moment as it's pretty difficult to remove cultures if it turns out that they don't work well ingame (breaks save game compatibility). I'm open to ideas, but I still want to keep the mod fairly simple which somewhat rules out lots of melting pots and minor cultures. The biggest cultural overhaul we need to work on beforehand is breaking up Anglo-Saxon into Saxon, Angle and Jute.

 

[Immortal Impi]

This all sounds really awesome. I am very excited- when can we expect the release?

 

[Ols]

This all sounds really awesome. I am very excited- when can we expect the release?

Not sure. It all depends on how balance turns out. It's horrific at the moment - we end up with Supergwent in 410. You are welcome to preview the current pre-release version and offer feedback if you're willing, though. It's definitely well over a month until we can release anything, as so much needs to be done to make 410 lead into a vaguely plausible future.

If someone likes making videos then I can give them the entire 410-479 map when it's done (there are a few gaps around 450) and let them scroll through it all with commentary to introduce what we've put in.

 

[Immortal Impi]

Not sure. It all depends on how balance turns out. It's horrific at the moment - we end up with Supergwent in 410. You are welcome to preview the current pre-release version and offer feedback if you're willing, though. It's definitely well over a month until we can release anything, as so much needs to be done to make 410 lead into a vaguely plausible future.

If someone likes making videos then I can give them the entire 410-479 map when it's done (there are a few gaps around 450) and let them scroll through it all with commentary to introduce what we've put in.

Sure, I'll run a few games in different regions and observer if you give me the pre-release.

 

[Ols]

Sure, I'll run a few games in different regions and observer if you give me the pre-release.

It'll be utterly insane in this release, but balancing starts next. I'll PM you.