[MOD] EMF: Extended Mechanics & Flavor

[AnaxXiphos]

Good God! What's his operating system? Windows 95?!

Fortunately my other computing technology is considerably more modern, so I'm running a reasonably powerful Windows 7 box. (I could never go back to 95... NEVER. 98 maybe, but not 95.) I'm simply unwilling to spend money to replace what is, aside from the low resolution and awkward form factor, otherwise a perfectly good monitor. (And these old CRTs also have some nice technical advantages which don't come cheap in LCDs.)

Any chance this GUI adjustment might be made into a standalone mod?

Possibly, yes. But for at least a little while I'd like it to be a HIP exclusive feature. After we've released it as part of EMF, I'll consider packaging it up as a standalone.

 

[IoannesBarbarus]

Any chance this GUI adjustment might be made into a standalone mod?

+1, if it can be made checksum‑invariant (otherwise I’d just use EMF).

 

[zijistark]

+1, if it can be made checksum‑invariant (otherwise I’d just use EMF).

I thought you didn't play multiplayer?

 

[IoannesBarbarus]

I thought you didn't play multiplayer?

I don’t, but I will one day. (Coming soon to a server near you.) What I directly have in mind is playing for achievements. And I just like to see more ironman mods, I like to encourage that category.

 

[zijistark]

I don’t, but I will one day. (Coming soon to a server near you.) What I directly have in mind is playing for achievements. And I just like to see more ironman mods, I like to encourage that category.

Fair enough.

Ironman and achievements are at least certainly good ideas, but Paradox has seriously failed to deliver with either of them IMHO.

Also, I'm surely biased, but I can't imagine playing vanilla multiplayer with all of the exploits and cheesiness that have and always will be rampant in vanilla. I'm not just talking about the explicit cheese one sees on reddit but also just the premature pacing and somewhat random cheesiness through, e.g., horribly, horribly unbalanced / blatantly erroneous combat tactics and such other details.

That said, I've created and maintain a mod that intentionally recognizes the better parts of vanilla and has a rather minimalist philosophy, so I can surely understand and appreciate a checksum-invariant modification that still manages to help improve the gameplay experience. It would just mean so much more for a game that had a higher-quality vanilla.

 

[pyrusmole]

So I'm looking to get back into the HIP after playing vanilla for about a year. Imagine how surprised I was when I saw a brand new mod entry getting top billing along with SWMH, VIET, and the rest of the pack. But after reading the about post, might I make a suggestion?

Please add a feature list. Even if its just a link to a text file in the github repo. It would really clear up what exactly your mod does for somebody who hasn't played it. I know way more about your projects goals, and what you consider a good mod than having any clue what your mod does beyond "changes things and shouldn't crash my game too bad." It would be helpful if you detailed what kind of changes EMF makes to vanilla game play.

That being said, looking forward to installing and finding out whatever it does.

 

[Remke]

So I'm looking to get back into the HIP after playing vanilla for about a year. Imagine how surprised I was when I saw a brand new mod entry getting top billing along with SWMH, VIET, and the rest of the pack. But after reading the about post, might I make a suggestion?

Please add a feature list. Even if its just a link to a text file in the github repo. It would really clear up what exactly your mod does for somebody who hasn't played it. I know way more about your projects goals, and what you consider a good mod than having any clue what your mod does beyond "changes things and shouldn't crash my game too bad." It would be helpful if you detailed what kind of changes EMF makes to vanilla game play.

That being said, looking forward to installing and finding out whatever it does.

pyrusmole, here you go. The wiki page does a good job of describing the actual conceptual changes/adjustments. (IIRC it has largely been written by zijistark et al) http://www.ckiiwiki.com/Extended_Mechanics_&_Flavor_(EMF)

 

[pyrusmole]

pyrusmole, here you go. The wiki page does a good job of describing the actual conceptual changes/adjustments. (IIRC it has largely been written by zijistark et al) http://www.ckiiwiki.com/Extended_Mechanics_&_Flavor_(EMF)

Thanks, mate. I'll give it a read. Still wouldn't be a bad idea to give the link a byline on the first or second post. Would save new users some confusion. Just a suggestion.

 

[zijistark]

Thanks, mate. I'll give it a read. Still wouldn't be a bad idea to give the link a byline on the first or second post. Would save new users some confusion. Just a suggestion.

Yeah, the wiki content is really new, and we haven't yet really finished the wiki / gotten it into a state where it includes more than half of what EMF provides, nor into a state where it more concisely breaks those features down while still providing specific detail (a lot of the text is just adapted a bit from changelogs currently, and we could use a few screenshots). Hence, we haven't yet decided to officially link to it / announce it. We plan to do so soon. You'll note that the 'Release Changelog Archives' post (3rd) does already directly link to it, since all of our changelogs are on the wiki now due to forum limitations.

 

[baconohbacon]

Could you explain what is different about EMF's crusades? I haven't been able to find any info about it anywhere.

 

[zijistark]

Could you explain what is different about EMF's crusades? I haven't been able to find any info about it anywhere.

They are inherited from Project Balance and haven't received any EMF-grade love since then. That said, they are, to most folks, an improvement over vanilla crusades.

• Upon winning the Crusade, the victor is given a choice of whether to keep the land, grant it to an unlanded relative, or grant it to a random character of their culture. The AI almost always chooses the random character (leads to fewer weird inheritance messes between the Crusader territories and the Continent than granting to relatives). This means that Crusades are not simple territory-grabs like in vanilla (though they still can be for the player, which I'd like to hinder altogether whenever I get around to writing EMF Crusades).
• A randomized time-offset timer gates the actual calling of a Crusade after Crusades are unlocked. This has the advantage of preventing simultaneous and immediate three-way Jihad/Crusade in starts after 1097. Downside is that the random nature of the timer makes it even more difficult to use the SoA 'Ask for Crusade' functionality.
• Special handling of cases such as the Pope himself or a holy order winning the Crusade to make sure it's granted to somebody else and that succession laws are properly fixed-up for a feudal realm and such.
• A lot of specialized details regarding creation of crusader states for random AI characters (set the right capital, spawn a small retinue, convert the capital to the victor's religion, etc.)
• Other details such as freeing any holy orders that may have been vassalized by the wrong religion (which would otherwise effectively nullifying them) when usurping the target title (common with Knights Hospitaler and Templar, common vassals of Jerusalem) and automatically refilling all the levies in the target kingdom (to emulate pilgrimage) so that it's not so prone to being immediately reconquered in its early years.
• Unlike vanilla crusades, it doesn't take into account claim strength (e.g., reconquest of Jerusalem or Byzantium or Sicily or one of the Spanish kingdoms) of Crusade participants when determining who will get the land. It only uses the participant with the strictly highest war contribution, as used to be the case for Crusades pre-2.0 and still is the case when there are no participating claimants to the target title.

I have plans for some neat and more polished mechanics & flavor for this in EMF, but it hasn't been a priority. The 'Use Vanilla Crusades' option is there for those that don't like the extra difficulty of using 'Ask for Crusade' or that simply prefer vanilla (it does have the best-crusade-claimant thing going for it, depending upon your perspective upon that).

 

[AnaxXiphos]

Another minor feature tease:



Characters who are banished from court will move to another court in your realm if they're the same religion as you, preferring their own dynasty members if available. If they're a different religion from you, they'll try to flee to another realm of their own religion. Because they'll be upset with you over the banishment, and because of the hardcoded Invite to Court mechanics, they'll be unlikely to accept return invitations, so use it cautiously!

 

[zijistark]

> A pleasant way of saying [court] "Population Control."

 

[IoannesBarbarus]

Characters who are banished from court will move to another court in your realm if they're the same religion as you, preferring their own dynasty members if available. If they're a different religion from you, they'll try to flee to another realm of their own religion. Because they'll be upset with you over the banishment, and because of the hardcoded Invite to Court mechanics, they'll be unlikely to accept return invitations, so use it cautiously!

I'll be tempted to flood my rival patricians with holy men, depriving them of fertility... muahaha

 

[AnaxXiphos]

I'll be tempted to flood my rival patricians with holy men, depriving them of fertility... muahaha

I assume there might be a few possible abuses of the functionality. If any of them turn out to be too terrible I'll definitely adjust the logic to prevent them. Otherwise, let it rain (holy) men (on your vassals)!

 

[zijistark]

I assume there might be a few possible abuses of the functionality. If any of them turn out to be too terrible I'll definitely adjust the logic to prevent them. Otherwise, let it rain (holy) men (on your vassals)!

I honestly think @IoannesBarbarus thought of the only way this could ever be "abused." Now, if only the AI ever actually pushed unlanded courtier's claims, you'd have to be a little more careful about who you were telling to find a new home.

 

[Hector of Troy]

I've been greatly enjoying this mod in combination with viet. The pace of the game has been very smooth, starting at the 769 bookmark. EMF does exactly what it says it does. It's in fact a minimalist mod that balances very well game-play in general, from either the player as well as the the AI's perspective. I've been really glad to notice that empires such as the ERE are no longer overpowered.

I have a quick question: How is it that a character that has been marked as "lucky" is affected?

Great mod.

 

[Palfouri]

Is it possible to block characters from attempting to rescind excommunication while at war with the pope? I noticed that a character at war with the pope kept lifting their excommunication, only to be immediately excommunicated again.

 

[zijistark]

I've been greatly enjoying this mod in combination with viet. The pace of the game has been very smooth, starting at the 769 bookmark. EMF does exactly what it says it does. It's in fact a minimalist mod that balances very well game-play in general, from either the player as well as the the AI's perspective. I've been really glad to notice that empires such as the ERE are no longer overpowered.

I have a quick question: How is it that a character that has been marked as "lucky" is affected?

Great mod.

Thanks for the praise. I'm glad you like EMF. Much work goes into every detail behind that minimalist aesthetic.

Lucky rulers are treated differently in the code in a number of ways, including but not limited to:

• Better character stats
• Tend to be very ambitious
• Effectively can field more troops
• Are liked by their vassals more
• Tend to be more likely to create/join independence factions or wage personal wars of independence
• Will more commonly than otherwise be supported in a claimant faction or as a feudal elective nominee (due to the liked-by-vassals-more part)
• Can fabricate claims via their chancellor a bit faster
• Are more healthy and thus likely to live longer with longer reigns and all that implies

Hope that helps.

Is it possible to block characters from attempting to rescind excommunication while at war with the pope? I noticed that a character at war with the pope kept lifting their excommunication, only to be immediately excommunicated again.

Possibly. It depends upon how the excommunication is getting lifted. I must admit that I'm not personally familiar with the event/decision-based ways to do this, so I'd have to take a look. If it is indeed an event/decision/CB lifting the excommunication, then it can be done, but if it's simply the diplo-action, then it cannot.

 

[Woody Man]

They are inherited from Project Balance and haven't received any EMF-grade love since then. That said, they are, to most folks, an improvement over vanilla crusades.

• A randomized time-offset timer gates the actual calling of a Crusade after Crusades are unlocked. This has the advantage of preventing simultaneous and immediate three-way Jihad/Crusade in starts after 1097. Downside is that the random nature of the timer makes it even more difficult to use the SoA 'Ask for Crusade' functionality.

Is it possible to have a look at the Jihad timers? Currently as soon as Jerusalem is captured after the first crusade, a Jihad is declared and all Muslim Holy orders unlock. I don't mind Jihads, but it'd be good to give the Crusader kingdom some breathing time to actually get established.