[MOD] Dark Ages - Immersion & Role Play in CK2

[ibrahim100]

Nice! What are the next steps for the mod? Any plans yet?

 

[Cardolam]

Next week the players can expect to be able to request gold from the treasury of the Mercenary Captains they originally funded. There's going to be events and a targeted decision involved. The player will be able to ask for money from the Mercenary Captain by selecting the relevant option from the RMB character menu.

You can read the rules of this system HERE in the chapter XXIV.

 

[Cardolam]

Nice! What are the next steps for the mod? Any plans yet?

What I said in the post above and after that I'll delve into a dedicated set of events for the Paranoid trait.

 

[Cardolam]

Another feature added for next week concerns Merchant Republics. Given the fact that Merchant Republic gameplay soon turns all the other Patricians except the player irrelevant in terms of land grab and income and "for the good of a virtuous Republic", from now on, all the titles of all conquests made by a Patrician will be subject to a lottery between the merchant families to see which one will gain the said title.
This will prevent the player to accumulate a huge demesne while the fellow Patricians only have their puny family palace...
Notice that if an AI Patrician (independently of being the Doge) conquer some title, the player gets the chance of getting the new title too.

Along the week I'll release screenshots both of this feature as well as the one related with the treasury of the Mercenary Captains.

 

[Keizer Harm]

Another feature added for next week concerns Merchant Republics. Given the fact that Merchant Republic gameplay soon turns all the other Patricians except the player irrelevant in terms of land grab and income and "for the good of a virtuous Republic", from now on, all the titles of all conquests made by a Patrician will be subject to a lottery between the merchant families to see which one will gain the said title.
This will prevent the player to accumulate a huge demesne while the fellow Patricians only have their puny family palace...
Notice that if an AI Patrician (independently of being the Doge) conquer some title, the player gets the chance of getting the new title too.

Along the week I'll release screenshots both of this feature as well as the one related with the treasury of the Mercenary Captains.

Hmmm... at least make the house who made the conquest get something in return if they don't get the land, like cash? Otherwise all wars are useless.

 

[Cardolam]

Hmmm... at least make the house who made the conquest get something in return if they don't get the land, like cash? Otherwise all wars are useless.

Definitely, the family who made the conquest will receive a significant reward in more than a single aspect.
But wars are not useless. The Republic will grow and with luck your family power can grow too (if you win the title in question).

Also, there is a game rule to opt out of this feature.

 

[Cardolam]

Ooops! It came to my attention two nefarious bugs that are included in latest version of the mod. First, after the event where you meet with your religious head, you can ask him to excommunicate himself. That won't do.
Second, if you are part of a religion that allows excommunication, at this time you can simply right click on the portrait of a character following the same religion and excommunicate him/her at will and do it as many times as you wish. That won't do also. It is only supposed to be working after the above mentioned event has a very, very successful outcoming, used only once, not on the religious head and usable for a very short period of time (30 days).

Sorry to all. Will be fixed next Friday.

 

[Cardolam]

After the posts describing what I am working on for this week, here goes the first new feature, asking gold from a Mercenary commander.

Everything starts with a new targeted decision:

It will lead to a new event where the player can ask for the amount of gold he/she decides having various options depending on the size of the mercenary treasury:

Finally, an answer will be given but I can assure the results can be better than the one depicted below...

This new interaction will be available on next Friday release.

Enjoy!

 

[Cardolam]

Now on to write about something completely different...

It is a great pleasure developing the mod but I don't mind if there is recognition from the player base beyond the simple act of subscribing. As such, I am setting up a Patreon page for the souls who would be so kind as offering me a coffee! Check it HERE and a big thank you.

Notice the number of patrons will not influence my commitment to Dark Ages - which is full support with weekly updates over the long term - and that after the debacle of Imperator, I am still waiting for Paradox to release another great game in order for me to develop weekly for two titles simultaneously.

 

[Cardolam]

Concerning what I developed this week, lets address the changes to Merchant Republics (and Merchant Republics only!). So, to live by the "Republican Virtue" and after a Patrician conquers a new province, a lottery is organized to distribute said asset to a random influential family of the Republic (can be the same family headed by the Patrician that originally conquered the province). The event in question will present at most three options, as you can see below:

The first option gives a very nice Prestige bonus and gold to the original conqueror as a prize for upholding the Republican Virtues, goes directly to the lottery and attributes the province to the new owner. This Prestige bonus (and the gold if the player decides to invest it in the campaign) will help this character win over the next election.
The second option, available only for Doges that have an adult, non prisoner, capable heir, bestows the prestige gain for the conquest and the standing of the Republican Virtues on his heir, thus also improving the chances to win the next election.
Finally, picking the third option allows the original conqueror to keep the province for himself but will give a very significant Prestige hit on him, on every member of his family and a stackable "Powermonger" penalty that gives bad general opinion.

All this was done to distribute better the power acquired by the families, cutting the usual skewed result after some decades of playing where one family has a huge advantage over the others thanks to conquests.

Finally, there is a Game Rule where every player can opt out of this new system.

Will be available in tomorrow update. Enjoy!

 

[Cardolam]

Version v.1.1.78 - Download HERE

Fixes & Tweaks:

- Fixed an opinion modifier that was not being checked in the event pool to organize a Diplomatic Meeting
- Streamlined the code to apply the Game Rule about Infamy
- Standardized the names of the Dark Ages opinion modifiers (capitals only on first letter of first word)
- Fixed a bug where the player character, if belonging to a religion that allows excommunications, could excommunicate at will the members of that religion
- Fixed a bug where the player character could ask the head of the religion to excommunicate himself/herself
- Fixed a condition misplaced inside the murder decision
- In one of the conditions, an AI character can now only attempt to murder someone if the opinion of the target are less than -24. It was less than 0, so less murders overall.

New Content:

- Implemented the option to ask for gold from Mercenary band that was organized by the player
- Implemented a lottery system in Merchant Republics for titles recently conquered
- Implemented a Game Rule to activate the previous point about Merchant Republics and conquered titles


Observations:

- There were changes made to the mod manual in the chapter XVIII - Merchant Republics. Available HERE

 

[Cardolam]

So, what's up on my plate for next week? Basically two different things:

- First, the ability to ask another character that owes you a favor and that is landed to pay the favour increasing either your prestige, your piety or your treasury.
- Second, start the event pool for Paranoid characters. Paranoid, being so marked a trait, deserves its own event pool, much like the Possessed and Lunatic traits. I already have a good unique implementation designed for it, now its the time to start coding the events & modifiers. It will take some weeks to finish.

Hope you enjoy.

 

[Cardolam]

I have been working on the new options to profit from a favour owned.

As it is, the new interacting starts in the character menu, once a character owes the player a favour:

This leads to a menu where the player can ask for what he/she wants. Depending on certain variables characters may be more suited to some requests than others...

In total, this may lead to 20 different outcomes, depending on a host of factors.

Ready for next Friday update. Hope you enjoy!

 

[LordDamien]

sounds good to me!. Looking forward to finally being able to use favors that people owe me in a better way. Quick question though, For the lord Spiritual events, Will that fire regardless if an MA of a religion is 0 ?.

 

[Cardolam]

sounds good to me!. Looking forward to finally being able to use favors that people owe me in a better way. Quick question though, For the lord Spiritual events, Will that fire regardless if an MA of a religion is 0 ?.

Good to read you are having (and plan to continue having) fun with Dark Ages! The events for the favours give 20 different results, scaling Prestige and Piety partly depending on the Prestige and Piety of the other character - 9 values each - enabling an alliance and failing to convince the other character of the merits of your request.

I confess it never crossed my mind the subject of MA for Lord Spiritual events. I'll include it as a modifier that influences the frequency of the events for this Friday release.

Thanks for the heads up.

 

[LordDamien]

Good to read you are having (and plan to continue having) fun with Dark Ages! The events for the favours give 20 different results, scaling Prestige and Piety partly depending on the Prestige and Piety of the other character - 9 values each - enabling an alliance and failing to convince the other character of the merits of your request.

I confess it never crossed my mind the subject of MA for Lord Spiritual events. I'll include it as a modifier that influences the frequency of the events for this Friday release.

Thanks for the heads up.

Of course, Dark ages is one of my favorite mods to play!.

Well, I was mostly thinking about in terms of saying the event where you meet the religious head of a religion that MA should matter for that at least. Since if the MA of the Catholics is 0 than meeting with the pope won't do much because he does not have any moral authority. But the other events should not be effected like learning classical stuff etc.

Although i do wish there were other ways to raise the moral authority of religion. Since in my current game Catholics have 0 and have been for a long time now. and they can't seem to do anything to raise it. and even fighting holy wars do not seem to raise it much

Wonder if its hardcoded that some religions don't have a religious head. I would think if a Hersey got to a high degree of MA they would be able to get a religious head etc.

 

[Cardolam]

Well, I was mostly thinking about in terms of saying the event where you meet the religious head of a religion that MA should matter for that at least. Since if the MA of the Catholics is 0 than meeting with the pope won't do much because he does not have any moral authority. But the other events should not be effected like learning classical stuff etc.

I see your point, yes. I'll do something to that effect on that specific event.

Wonder if its hardcoded that some religions don't have a religious head. I would think if a Hersey got to a high degree of MA they would be able to get a religious head etc.

It's defined in the religions. A religion cannot gain a religious head midway in the game.

 

[Delnar_Ersike]

Wonder if its hardcoded that some religions don't have a religious head. I would think if a Hersey got to a high degree of MA they would be able to get a religious head etc.

It's defined in the religions. A religion cannot gain a religious head midway in the game.

They can. A religious head title for a given religion can be defined in the mod's files and then set to be inactive in the title's history files. Then, when you want the given religion to gain a religious head title, you activate it via event and give it to a character you want. It's how religious head titles for reformed pagan religions work in the base game, and how HIP implements religious head titles for heresies that have grown powerful.

 

[Cardolam]

They can. A religious head title for a given religion can be defined in the mod's files and then set to be inactive in the title's history files. Then, when you want the given religion to gain a religious head title, you activate it via event and give it to a character you want. It's how religious head titles for reformed pagan religions work in the base game, and how HIP implements religious head titles for heresies that have grown powerful.

Thanks for the clarification.

 

[Cardolam]

Version v.1.1.79 - Download HERE

Fixes & Tweaks:

- Fixed the border of 18 events that was being wrongly assigned (minimal cosmetic issue)
- Turned a host of internal modifiers for councillor events inheritable, meaning new rulers will continue to be affected. This have little impact on gameplay other than turning the Councillor events a tad more rarer.


New Content:

- Implemented requesting favours to be paid for gold, prestige, piety or alliance through a character menu option
- Implemented the basic structure of the new event pool for Paranoid characters.