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CK3 Dev Diary #34 - It’s all about appearances

Hello, I’m Nils and I’m the lead character artist on Crusader Kings III. We’ve already touched briefly on a lot of the features of the portrait system but in this Dev Diary I’m going to dive deeper into the intricacies of the system. It might get a bit technical at points - so bear with me. I personally think all this stuff is very cool but I'm also a gigantic nerd when it comes to these things.

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There’s going to be a lot of text in this Dev Diary, but really, when it comes down to it, it’s mostly there as an excuse to show off the art!

Characters are generated dynamically in the game using a DNA system that defines their looks - everything from mouth shape to body height is stored in this DNA. A DNA is made up of a number of genes. Each gene defines a certain feature. Crusader Kings II already does something similar, but in CKIII we have more than 10 times the amount of genes for every character and a lot of added complexity. The system itself is very flexible and it was up to me how to set it up to get as much visual variation out of it as possible.

Our predecessor, CK2, by necessity builds up characters from a limited number of facial features. There are x amount of noses combined with x amount of mouths and x amount of eyes and so on to make up a face. While this works well and gives a good amount of variation it still has some inherent limitations. What we’ve done in CKIII is to have a much more granular approach where we use many parameters to control each feature. So, for example, instead of just picking a nose (you shouldn’t pick your nose kids) out of a selection of pre-defined noses we store values for nose protrusion, nose height, nose length, nose nostril height, nose nostril width, nose ridge profile, nose ridge angle, nose ridge width, nose size, nose tip angle, nose tip protrusion, nose tip width, nose ridge definition and nose tip definition. In other words; if you’re into noses, or any other facial feature, this is the game for you.

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Some of the many faces (and noses!) of Crusader Kings III
As you can imagine, this gives us quite detailed control over the facial features of characters. And they can vary greatly depending on many factors, which I will try to cover here. Let’s start with ethnicity.

Like we’ve shown in other Dev Diaries already, the CKIII map covers a vast area of the world from Ireland in the west to modern day Mongolia in the east and from Arctic Norway in the north to Sub-Saharan Africa in the south. This big area is populated by groups of different ethnicities which we represent in the game. Due to the way that the character generating system is set up, we can use the same base assets for all different ethnicities and just script in different average values for the facial feature parameters. As an example, west african characters have, on average, darker skin, fuller lips and differently shaped noses than their european or asian counterparts, but they still use the exact same base model. This is good news for inheritance, which is the next subject I will discuss.

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A selection of characters of different ethnicities
Due to the fact that all characters use the same base model, we can easily create blends between multiple DNAs. Each character stores two sets of genes that we call dominant and recessive, respectively. (Disclaimer: Please note that the dominant and recessive genes in our system do not work exactly like in real life. We’re still dealing with an approximation of genetics. We haven’t fully replicated real world genetics. Yet.) When a baby is born it will inherit two versions of each gene - both of which will come randomly from either parent. As mentioned one of these genes will end up being dominant and the other one recessive based on a chance value (dominant genes from the parents have a higher chance of being inherited as dominant genes for the baby). The appearance of the newborn character is decided entirely by its dominant gene set. But the recessive genes are still there as a representation of genes carried down the generations. So when this new character gets to make its own babies they will have a chance of inheriting a gene from their grandparents, even though that gene might not have been visible on their parent.

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Inheritance in action. Top row parents and bottom row their children. If you look closely you should be able to spot the inherited features.
I hope you guys are still awake for the continuation of this Dev Diary. What does all this genetics mumbo-jumbo mean for you as a player? It means that inheritance has a much bigger impact on the appearance of a character in CKIII than than it does in CK2. Characters of different ethnicities that get down for the hanky panky will make babies that look like a blend between both parents, with some genes from further back in the family tree thrown into the mix. Of course, there’s still a fair amount of randomness in the system so we won’t get identical siblings unless they are, you know, identical twins.

Now, while we’re on the subject, let’s talk briefly about children and aging. This is the other huge factor in defining the appearance of a character: his or her age. The 3D system that we use gives us the possibility to have seamless aging and there’s a ton of things that are set up to take advantage of this. A newborn child will obviously be very tiny compared to when it’s all grown up. It’s adult facial features will be there already from birth but they are very toned down during early childhood to get gradually more pronounced as the character ages. When a character approaches their 30’s and 40’s their skin will get more rugged, age lines and wrinkles will start appearing in the face, and their hair turns grey. Once they enter old age their body will start sagging, posture will deteriorate, their ears and nose will get bigger and the jaw protrudes as they lose their teeth.

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Chieftain Somatu of Kevrola, from age 0 to 99

In addition to genetics and age, lifestyle choices and changes also impact a character’s appearance. Body types vary greatly from alarmingly thin victims of starvation to truly impressive bulks of some high nobility gluttons. Different levels of muscularity and fitness are also represented and tied to the “prowess” value in the game.

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Examples of different body types


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Like, every Christmas Holiday, ever


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I got ripped in five seconds!

There are a number of traits and conditions, genetic or otherwise, that have visual impact on the character portrait. Some examples of non-genetic ones are pregnancy, wounds, scars, lost arms, blindness and disfigurement. And some notable examples of genetic conditions are dwarfism, gigantism, albinism and hunchback.

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Genetic traits

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Dragoman

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You know how some people have names that just feel “right” for them?



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“You should see the other guy”

We have already discussed clothes in previous Dev Diaries so I won’t go into great detail about them. But I would like to show something I don’t think we’ve shown before. That is the barbershop feature which allows you to change clothes, head wear and hairstyle for your character:

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Barbershop
Even though the vast majority of characters have randomly generated appearances, there are some notable exceptions. The detailed setup of the DNA system allows us to design quite specific appearances where we want to. There are some historical starting characters in the game whose looks were based on how they are described in historical sources. For example William the Conqueror and Harold Godwineson of England. Of course, medieval sources are not always... perfectly reliable and the portraiture from the time not the most accurate (to put it mildly!) so we did have to do some guesswork and use a lot of artistic license. There are also a whole bunch of developer characters with appearances that match their real life counterparts. They’re lurking around various courts in the game. If you want to find some, a pro tip is to browse through the characters in modern day Sweden…

It is perfectly possible to mod DNAs as well as adding new ones, so if you feel like adding your own likeness or a medieval Abraham Lincoln to the game it is fairly easy to do so.

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Historical characters from the “Fate of England” in the 1066 start date. Guess who is who!
And finally, to end this on a more gruesome note, the last thing I’d like to show you is some diseases. As you all know, the middle ages were a time of ravaging epidemics and quick unexpected death from disease. And the game reflects that in quite a graphical way.

And if you don’t enjoy being disgusted - don’t worry - we have an option to turn off the worst looking diseases and replace them with something less nightmare-inducing.

WARNING: The following spoiler tags contain images that some viewers might find disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised.

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Don’t say I didn’t warn you
 
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I'm glad PDX decided to make human models aside from white people this time.
 
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Please, make correct inheriatance of dominant and recesive traits. From what I read, in CK3 recesive traits like light hair are inheirted randomly when mixed with dominant traits like dark hair. Its shouldnt have place in historical game. There is nothing hard with making everyone have two genes (one from each parents) but only dominant showing. Whats point of inheritance form grandparents if we dont have it? Even in as old games like Sims 2 it was almost comleptly correct (darker colors were dominant but for some reason red was random when paired with blonde and brown with black). I think later Sims games make all colors random (each color have 50% chance). Also I hope dark colors will not be inherited from parents with light hair (only light hair should be recessive and as such inheritable form parents who have dark hair but light hair in ancestry). I made example from hair but its the same for eyes and of course skin should be codominant (color form betwen both parents colors). Even some other traits like some facial features and hair type are inherited recesive or doninant and not codominant. Its very important for me as I always was interested in genetic and inheritance and I dont want to see blondes and redhads everywhere they should be rare as in real world especaily for mixed race people. For example Mongol without known ancestry shouldn't have redhaired child with some Irish. Seriously what is reason with this fake inheritance when you can make it correct easily? Please, dont teach people incorrect inheritance.
 
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True DNA would be entirely out of possibility in their engine as they have stated. What we have is something that provides a good variety, including sometimes getting traits from grandparents, and I think it will work fine. No one ever said it was entirely realistic. Without using the entire DNA strand (correctly), it would be difficult to make any system you design work well because one way or another you have to make sacrifices and do things differently to get your results. In this case, they chose the dominant and recessive option. I'm sure this will be far more "realistic" than The Sims as there are probably a greater number of "DNA" that are being used in this game. The results may not be the same and in certain cases may be less realistic, but I don't have a problem with that.
 
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From what I read the problem is that they don't use recesive and dominant traits at all. All traits are radom and have the same 50% chance. I quoted the Sims 2 because there were recesive and dominant traits in comparision to later sims where everything was random. So we would get half children from pure Mongol and Irish as redheads when there should be only children with black hair. Its little better than CK2 random portrait as some facial features will be randomized, but still it would make game extremaly unrealisitic as we would get unusualy high number of recesisvie features especialy for mixed race children.
 
From what I read the problem is that they don't use recesive and dominant traits at all. All traits are radom and have the same 50% chance. I quoted the Sims 2 because there were recesive and dominant traits in comparision to later sims where everything was random. So we would get half children from pure Mongol and Irish as redheads when there should be only children with black hair. Its little better than CK2 random portrait as some facial features will be randomized, but still it would make game extremaly unrealisitic as we would get unusualy high number of recesisvie features especialy for mixed race children.
That is sacrificing variety for realism and I respectfully disagree. Your system will be complicated since they will need to know which gene to be dominant and which to be recessive, for all of them, some of which are just a value like nose width. If you're saying just some traits should be set up like that, then we run into a slippery slope of which one should we apply this special rulen for.
Under your system, after a couple of generations every character will look the same. Only 25% of the first generation will have the recessive phenotype and that's only if they marry into the same ethnicity. It's not good for variety. Realistic, yes, but unfun, and that's more important in a game. Maybe EA saw that and that's why they changed it.
 
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Thats pretty easy, recesive and dominant traits are well known so they can check what to make dominant and recesive and what to make codominant with sliders. Also variety will not dissapear. We still have variety in real world so dont worry about variety we would only lost all recesive traits if everyone who carry them (even hidden) would die. So even when Mongols conqer all world and random courtiers from other ethincies stop showing there would still be recesive traits from characters married into Mongol dynasties. It will be extremaly satisfying and more fun than some randomnes for artifical variety. Historically Nogai Khan married Byzantine princess and his daughter married Rus prince. It will be nice to see how they children would really look like. And it would not make everyone look the same after couple of generations at last no more than it historically did.
 
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Since cells do recombination, swapping things back and forth between the two DNA strands when making gametes, there's no need to simulate full DNA strands. They've mostly got a working system for tracking traits and DNA, it's more a matter of working out what the rules should be and letting characteristics of traits be passed down. Like rather than one trait being selected as 'dominant' the trait itself has some dominance ranking. If a trait has a higher dominance ranking than the other, it appears. If both traits have the same dominance ranking, they both appear as a mix.

Some traits should also have multiple DNA trait entries, like skin tone.
 
From what I read the problem is that they don't use recesive and dominant traits at all. All traits are radom and have the same 50% chance. I quoted the Sims 2 because there were recesive and dominant traits in comparision to later sims where everything was random. So we would get half children from pure Mongol and Irish as redheads when there should be only children with black hair. Its little better than CK2 random portrait as some facial features will be randomized, but still it would make game extremaly unrealisitic as we would get unusualy high number of recesisvie features especialy for mixed race children.

But Mongols do have red hair and sometimes bluish grey eyes.

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Rare cases exist but have reason for it. If some Mongol parents both have ancestors from for example Tocharians its possible but extremaly rare and not common at all.
 
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Rare cases exist but have reason for it. If some Mongol parents both have ancestors from for example Tocharians its possible but extremaly rare and not common at all.

The point is that recessive genes do display themselves sometimes.
 
There is an example of a "beautiful" person here, a 30 year old barmaid. The red rose is the beautiful trait:


I have to say, the characters have been looking better and better, and this stream is no exception. I even really liked the small bits of animation, which looked particularly good in a few instances.
The “T-Pose” was also pretty funny.
 
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Thats pretty easy, recesive and dominant traits are well known so they can check what to make dominant and recesive and what to make codominant with sliders. Also variety will not dissapear. We still have variety in real world so dont worry about variety we would only lost all recesive traits if everyone who carry them (even hidden) would die. So even when Mongols conqer all world and random courtiers from other ethincies stop showing there would still be recesive traits from characters married into Mongol dynasties. It will be extremaly satisfying and more fun than some randomnes for artifical variety. Historically Nogai Khan married Byzantine princess and his daughter married Rus prince. It will be nice to see how they children would really look like. And it would not make everyone look the same after couple of generations at last no more than it historically did.
I tried to search for dominant and recessive physical traits and didn't see anything. :(

I don't think you can find such a list online? If you can show me one I'll be very grateful.

Aside from the research needed, I think having co-dominant is too complex and the devs would want to lower the calculations needed for each baby born. Instead of "one gene-one characteristics" which you only need something like a simple table for, now you gotta worry about all these different special rules that will really complicate the coding, which introduce bugs and affect performance. Most importantly, their current system works, may not be entirely accurate, but it's a step up from the past, and easier to maintain, and cost less computations. That's probably why they choose it.
 
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Due to the fact that all characters use the same base model, we can easily create blends between multiple DNAs. Each character stores two sets of genes that we call dominant and recessive, respectively. (Disclaimer: Please note that the dominant and recessive genes in our system do not work exactly like in real life. We’re still dealing with an approximation of genetics. We haven’t fully replicated real world genetics. Yet.) When a baby is born it will inherit two versions of each gene - both of which will come randomly from either parent. As mentioned one of these genes will end up being dominant and the other one recessive based on a chance value (dominant genes from the parents have a higher chance of being inherited as dominant genes for the baby). The appearance of the newborn character is decided entirely by its dominant gene set. But the recessive genes are still there as a representation of genes carried down the generations. So when this new character gets to make its own babies they will have a chance of inheriting a gene from their grandparents, even though that gene might not have been visible on their parent.

It says here that there will be dominant and recessive genes!
 
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Due to the fact that all characters use the same base model, we can easily create blends between multiple DNAs. Each character stores two sets of genes that we call dominant and recessive, respectively. (Disclaimer: Please note that the dominant and recessive genes in our system do not work exactly like in real life. We’re still dealing with an approximation of genetics. We haven’t fully replicated real world genetics. Yet.) When a baby is born it will inherit two versions of each gene - both of which will come randomly from either parent. As mentioned one of these genes will end up being dominant and the other one recessive based on a chance value (dominant genes from the parents have a higher chance of being inherited as dominant genes for the baby). The appearance of the newborn character is decided entirely by its dominant gene set. But the recessive genes are still there as a representation of genes carried down the generations. So when this new character gets to make its own babies they will have a chance of inheriting a gene from their grandparents, even though that gene might not have been visible on their parent.

It says here that there will be dominant and recessive genes!
We all know that. His problem is that the recessive/dominant gene is chosen at random instead of remain consistently dominant or recessive between parents and child.