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Development Diary 0: From Ireland to Cathay
  • Development Diary 0: From Ireland to Cathay

    You are William II, the natural son of Robert the Magnificent.

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    As you await for the right tide to sail to England, you hear words that one of the contestants, Harald III Hadrada of Norway has been killed during the Battle of Stamford Bridge by an arrow to the neck. You also hear that a Viking Berserker, trying to defend the corpse of his King, was killed by getting his scrotum pierced with a sword. Disturbed at the barbaric ways these Saxons fight, you compose a letter to the dastardly Harold II of Godwin:

    "To the wretched Harold,

    Tales of your misdeeds are told from Ireland to Cathay, give up your claim to the English throne and I shalt reserve a place for you on the King's Council.

    From,

    William II, Duke of Normandy"

    You think about that phrase, "Ireland to Cathay". Ireland, which is known for its green pasture, hence the term "The Emerald Island", is not too far from England itself. Once the business with England is dealt with, perhaps you should force these people to recognise you as their overlord?

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    Then you think about the second part of the phrase, Cathay. An intriguing place even further East from the mystical realms of Hindustan, Cathay, has always been known for its civilised culture since the times of the Romans, having established the lucrative Silk Trade Route. You dismiss such foolish thoughts as your men prepare to embark on your ships for Hastings, but you think to yourself, "Ireland to Cathay; different worlds which is under one Heaven".

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    Hello everyone and welcome to the first general development diary for Tianxia: Silk Road Expansion.

    For those who do not know, this is the so-called "China Expansion" for this awesome game, Crusader Kings II. Of course, saying that it's just a "China Expansion" does injustice to what this modification aims to do.

    Now, it was my intention to do a series of general development diaries myself and leave it to the project leads of each of the individual projects to do theirs concurrently, but due to the fact that there's essentially no staff I have decided against doing a general development diary and instead opt for development diaries for each of the projects.

    Since this is Diary 0, this is just an announcement Diary in that there will be diaries in the future :p. As such, unfortunately, I won't be able to give much in terms of features and what not. However I can say that there will be lots of exciting stuff coming sometime in the near future. In terms of release, here is the current plan:
    - There will be four Open Alpha releases for the general public
    - There may be additional patches for these individual updates should it be necessary, but probably no hotfixes
    - The first release will be available once all the top-tier titles are playable for the Vanilla bookmarks
    - The second release will be available once all the top-tier titles are playable for The Old Gods bookmark
    - The third release will be available once all the top-tier titles are playable for the Charlemagne bookmark
    - The fourth release will be available once all the top-tier titles are playable for in-between dates for the Vanilla bookmarks
    - Alpha being Alpha, these versions will be quite barebone in that there will be nothing balanced, limited special features for the new religions, limited amount of new decisions and events, and missing fluffs

    Since I got the official announcement for the project out of the way, I have something more important:

    Recruitment

    At the moment it is just myself working on this, as well as .Me for minor graphical stuff. I am need of modders who are capable of filling up the historical titles as well as setting up the characters themselves. With the change in leadership, there has been a huge change in terms of the fundamentals such as the changing of ID tags (which has caused a huge mess). Also, anyone with a good historical knowledge (especially in areas of vassals) of both the Far Eastern and South Eastern Areas would be greatly appreciated.

    One more thing, provinces. Although .Me and co did a good job of expanding the map, I am somewhat unsatisfied with the amount of provinces. Am I being greedy? Hell yes! However, I do think that for the sake of accuracy, it would be best to have at least 1.5 times more provinces than Europa Universalis IV has for equivalent areas. In other words, I need someone who can do provinces too.

    In all seriousness, due to the sheer scale (also my lack of knowledge in the area), this mod is in serious danger of not getting a single release, so I definitely need more people!



    Well folks, that's it for today. Unless I change my mind, the next diary will also be the first development diary for our flagship project: Sons of Heaven.
     
    Sons of Heaven Development Diary 1: Overview
  • Great! And you can run it without any big hits?

    Note: I still think the map projection could be changed a bit to encompass more of Asia and Africa.
     
    Khans of Mongolia Development Diary 1: Overview
  • Khans of Mongolia Development Diary 1: Overview

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    Well, it's that time of the year again. So to give everyone a teasing present as well as keeping interest for this afloat, I decided to write up the first development diary for Khans of Mongolia, the accompanying project for this mod (ie the Steppe component), Tianxia: Silk Road Expansion. Like the previous two diaries, this will not cover all that much nor give out any details, but once again give an overview on what to expect.

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    Like the China component, this area has also been high up on the wishlists of Paradox fanatics. However, unlike China, the Asian Steppe has never had much in terms of contentions and as such did not usually meet with hostile oppositions like those seen in the suggestion thread in regards to China. The only objection to this of course being the necessity of adding China.

    As it has been mentioned before, this will simply continue on with the map projection invented by Paradox. With most of the Steppe already being drawn in vanilla, it was just a matter of adding playable provinces, removing wastelands, and simply extending the map Eastwards. Unfortunately however, the number of provinces are still not quite adequate which hopefully will be rectified by the time of either the Open Alpha or the Open Beta. As it was mentioned before also, the intent for the amount of provinces is that for every two provinces in the equivalent areas in Europa Universalis IV, so a ratio of 2:3 of course don't expect anything like HIP SWMH or CK2+.

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    Map extension is the primary focus for this project, but with it will also come with new cultures, events, titles, and some kind of refinement of the Horde mechanics, if possible.

    That's it folks and it won't be for some time until development diaries for Khans of Mongolia come again. Next time, we'll look into the development process for the Sons of Heaven and what's new.

    I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! (Well, at least for those who follow the Gregorian Calendar ;) )
     
    Sons of Heaven Development Diary 2: Cultures & Religions
  • Sons of Heaven Development Diary 2: Cultures & Religions

    I hope everyone has had an awesome Christmas and New Years holidays. It's been about twenty days since the developers of Paradox have gotten back to work even announcing a new expansion pack for Europa Universalis IV, entitled "El Dorado". To show that this mod is anything but dead (as Forkis enthusiastically showed us with his working in progress screenshots), it is time for a second development diary for the flagship project of this mod, Sons of Heaven. Today we shall be talking about two important topics of this mod: cultures and religions.

    Cultures

    Cultures is a bit of a hot topic for Crusader Kings II in the forums with arguments ranging from "why are x, y, z not in" or "why are x y instead of z" to "what is the point of cultures", et cetera. Since this mod is adding the other half of the mega-continent, it will only serve to fuel the fire and as such we shall only talk about what this mod does.

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    The Chinese portraits were done by rein005 who made the mod Chinese Portraits, while the rest were done by the founder of this mod, .Me, using the Chinese Portrait Mod as its base. Doing the portraits are quite tricky in that not only does it involve technical skills, but also requires extreme caution unless one is doing it from scratch since otherwise one may run into legal troubles (read the Terms & Conditions for mod distribution).

    Similar to India, though to a lesser extent, China itself has at least a dozens of cultures having a rich history of people migrating from different areas, only coming together with the shared interest in the so-called "Middle Kingdom". This mod only adds about half of that under the cultural group designated as "Chinese". Outside of China, we have the Koreans in the Eastern peninsula beneath Manchuria and the Japanese with their group of islands off the coast. West, we have the Tibeto-Burmans inhabiting the mountainous area while in the South we have the Tai-Kadais, Mon-Khmers, and the Malayo-Polynesians.

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    Religions

    Religions in Crusader Kings II has always been (and always will be) the hot contention in the forums with newcomers accusing the developers of locking contents like those big evil companies do (I'm guilty of this at first as well) along the lines of "day one DLC" while veterans criticize its inaccuracy (again, I do this as well). Once again, this mod will be throwing a gallon of gasoline on the open flame for the sake of it because why not.

    The Rajas of India DLC introduced an interest mechanic when it came to religions where instead of strife in Europe and the Levant, there could be harmony thus came about the Dharmic religion. In the Sons of Heaven, the main religions will follow this to an extent with the new Daoic religions, introducing three new religions in this new religion group: Amidism, Confucianism, and Taoism. Daoic religions borrows several features from the Dharmic religions, such as the subjugation CBs and being able to convert within their religion groups with the Amidism being able to convert to or from Mahayana Buddhism. In game, Amidism represents the Chinese influenced Buddhism with two schools of thoughts to choose from: Pure Land, and Dhyana (Chinese Chan, Japanese Zen, Korean Seon, or Viet Thien). Confucianism and Taoism represents the organised forms of folk religions which has spread and influenced much of the Far East with dozens of schools of thoughts to choose from such as agriculturalism, legalism, naturalism, et cetera (working in progress). Like the Dharmic religions, Daoic religions are not able to use the Holy War CB as the concept of a religious war was somewhat foreign as religious beliefs could be picked and chosen at whim (besides, who needs religion to declare war), instead relying on subjugations and County conquests. If possible, mechanics such as Ducal revocations and Decadence will be added to the Daoic religions, but that is up to Paradox to allow whether such mechanics should be available to modders.

    The Daoic religions are not the only new religions introduced with the Sons of Heaven. With the expansion of new indigenous cultures, the Pagan religion group has been expanded nearly twice its size with indigenous religions of the bear worshipping Ainu, secluded Melanesian, and the feministic Ryukyuan. Also included within the Pagan group are the folk religions which adopted some of the concepts of the Dharmic and/or Daoic religions: Chinese Shenist, Japanese Shinto, Korean Muist, Tibetan Bon, and the Viet Thanist. Amongst these, the one given special attention are the Japanese Shinto which unlike the others starts pre-reformed having the Tenno of the Chrysanthemum Throne being both the head of the religion and the ruling Emperor of Japan, having characteristics of the Islamic Caliphs and the Norse Fylkirs.

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    Well, that is it for now folks. I will think of a good topic to talk about for the next development diary as well as a further announcement on the upcoming Open Alpha. Until then!
     
    Khans of Mongolia Development Diary 2: Cultures & Religions
  • Khans of Mongolia Development Diary 2: Cultures & Religions

    I hope everyone has had a great Easter. It has been a long time since the last dev diary, and I apologise for it and the lack of communications. Apart from real life getting in the way, the mod got really difficult with hordes of patches breaking the game. Since the last time I wrote a dev diary, Paradox has released two DLCs for Crusader Kings II and three DLCs for Europa Universalis IV. Many of you probably thought due to the sheer amount of time the mod would be dead despite Deathlinger's lone attempt at keeping the thread alive with his work. If you thought so, you would be forgiven as even the developers themselves thought that was what had happened. Today I will do a second development diary for the supporting project of this mod, Khans of Mongolia. Now, you might think that the Horse Lords DLC made that project rather redundant, and you would be right. However, despite being a massive expansion pack, half of the Steppes are missing in terms of map space, that of which connects Europe and the so-called Middle Kingdom! This aspect made the Mongols terrifying in terms of gaining manpower, but also unstable due to over-extension. So taking advantage of the Horse Lords DLC, the Khans of Mongolia Project will aim to extend and expand beyond the current scope of what Paradox has done thus far. The topic of this diary like that of the flagship project, would be: cultures and religions.

    Cultures

    The Horse Lords DLC added quite a few cultures such as the Tocharians and the Khitans (about time). All of the Altaic cultures such as the Jurchens. I have also decided to shift the Tibeto-Burman group from the Sons of Heaven project to the Khans of Mongolia. The rationale for this was after further research and discussions with people more knowledgeable than myself, it was decided that the Tibetans were more closer to the Mongols than they were to the Chinese.

    Religions

    Since the Tibetan cultural group have been moved from the Sons of Heaven, so has its religion, Bon. In game, it is a reformable pagan religion with similarities with both Tengri and the Asian Folk religions. Once reformed, it becomes more like Buddhism, adopting many of its practices (like the pagans do in Europe with Christianity). However, it is still not Tibetan Buddhism we know today. Instead, followers of the Bon religion can convert to Buddhism of the Vajrayana branch. I intend on implementing more features, but that is all the idea I have for now. At the moment, Bon is the one new religion in this project. However in the future, if warranted, I intend to add more such as Dongba and Root West. Unfortunately, information about these are quite rare, so it may be difficult to see...

    As you would have noticed, there are no images and the other images have been taken down. At the moment, I am not confident to release any more screen shots of the game due to current problems (as well as lack of progress). In terms of the older images, I have no idea why this has happened. It may be due to the hosting site cocking up, but it is still disappointing. Regardless, I do apologise for the boring diary. Anyways, I hope to be able to release this mod soon, but I cannot make any promises.
     
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    Development Diary 3: Maps
  • Deathlingers Dev Diary.
    Hello all, as you may know I have taken over as the main map modder of the Tianxia project. I originally started out solely in improving Japan but I decided that I was up for the challenge of improving the already superb .Me map in that area, and so I produced what would be very similar to the historical provinces of the time.
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    I added in this area more islands as well as you can see, such as Goto, Iki and Tsushima. But I also added more political instead of regional areas such as Tane south of Satsuma, and Awaji East of Kaido.

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    Here you can see the current capital of Japan in 1066. I added various landmarks such as lake Bima and completed the San circuits.
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    Here you can see the very populous Kyoto Region with some very powerful and influential provinces.
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    Mount Fuji in all its glory.
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    The less populated Ainu lands to the north(east).
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    As you can see the Ainu lands are currently split, and could potentially provide a powerful early rival for Japan if they manage to unite.
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    The Frozen wastes north of the Ainu provide an easy target to expand for an Ambitious Ainu warlord, or perhaps could even prove worthy of invading the South. (Props to anyone who conquers from the tip of Kamchatka.)
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    As you can see with Japan there are plenty of new opportunities for fun and exciting gameplay, with characters to test players of all skill.

    Next I worked on improving the area south of Japan up into Taiwan.
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    I split the island into it's respective "mountains" but also added the Kerema Islands as a naval stronghold.
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    The Islands south of Ryukyu are a prime enemy for a strong Ryukyuan Kingdom. Originally these islands weren't on the map.
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    Taiwan starts off split into various tribes and chiefdoms. With the islands of Penghu being the only Confucian province.

    Next I upped the ante on Korea giving it many more provinces and improving the landscape.
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    Korea starts of unified in the South apart from the Island of Jeju. The many coasts and islands of Korea have been added in as well for flavour.
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    In the North a Korean player has to be very wary of a strong Liao in order to reclaim it's northern border. As well as having Ulleungdo for a stepping stone to attack Japan.(Or a really ambitious player to play as.)

    My next step was expanding the map further south so this led to me needing to add areas to Africa.
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    As you can see it's only small amounts here.
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    As you can see there are more areas to the south, however they are owned by their respective "power player" in the area. In the future this area may be expanded flavourwise.

    Next is Indonesia.
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    Here you can see some good opportunities for each kingdom. So far Bali, despite being small in size, starts off in a strong position.
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    A tribal island next to a Sinicised one leads to some interesting outcomes.
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    As you can see this area is strong island based and will rely on troop transports to seize control.

    I also worked on the frozen North.
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    And finally the latest update in Tibet.
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    I also did a little bit of Graphic design for the mod, as I did the images for the Japanese castles, cities and temples.
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    As well as working on updating a lot of the Religious icons
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    The Future?
    Alpha is being aimed for the 14th of this month. However at the moment it is just that an Alpha. We are planning and working on many more events, decisions, flavour and historical characters in order to create a Paradox feeling experience. With this I also announce that I will be doing a map update to China following release in order to get a more accurate feeling and stronger China. We also have many ideas for mechanics, events and decisions along the line available to each area. Furthermore as someone who can use Maya, I am looking at possibly creating unit models.
    We hope you all enjoy our mod that we have poured a lot of work into getting it working (with an incredibly small team.)

    Thank you,
    Deathlinger.
     
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    Development Diary 4: Mechanics Part I
  • Development Diary 4: Mechanics Part I

    Happy Fódàn everyone!

    Today we will be covering a bit of game mechanics implemented thus far with this mod. Although this will be an overall diary, the mechanics part will be mostly on the Sons of Heaven Project as that is the area which we have been working the most on. To start things off, here is a screenshot:

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    The new Chinese Daoic religion group behaves much like the Indian Dharmic religion group in that they have tolerance towards each other, can convert between each other, and they all have religious branches. Not only that, the Daoic Amidist religion can also convert to the Dharmic Buddhist religion and vice versa (if the latter is also of the Mayahana branch) to establish the closeness and similarities between the two religious groups.

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    The mechanics for changing religious branches is exactly the same as the Indian religions, if you have enough prestige, then through the intrigue tab, you can change your branch. Currently, Confucians have four Ethics to choose from while Amidists and Taoists only have two. There are plans to add more for Taoism later in the future. Unlike the Indian religions however, the Chinese Confucian and Taoist religions have heresies in the form of Neo-Confucianism and Neo-Taoism. Though nothing substantial has been added yet, there are plans to add some kind of flavour to give incentive to convert to those religions. Another difference added, was tolerance. Daoic religions have tolerance towards Dharmic and Pagan religions. This was done to not only portray the similarities and the influences the two groups had on each other, but also to emphasise that these group did not consider religion to be an exclusive practice, but more of a philosophical guideline thus we saw a lot of syncretism between local traditions and what not.

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    Now on to Japan...

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    Japan is somewhat unique compared to the other areas added. Contrary to popular belief, Japan was not fully feudalistic like that of Europe, that would come over a century later with the Kamakura Shogunate. Instead, for the earlier start dates, Japan is in an awkward situation of having Chinese Imperial System, while trying to have its unique form which would later devolve into feudalism not too dissimilar to medieval Europe. Depending on the start date, Japan starts under Imperial Adminstration, but the power lies within the hands of the regents. In-game, this is represented as a king-tier viceroyalty who has direct control over the whole realm except for the Imperial capital. There are plans to add much more, but this is what I have for now.

    That essentially completes the diary in regards to what we have done so far, but some of you might be wondering what "Fódàn" is. Well boys and girls, Fódàn (佛誕) is Chinese for what we call Buddha's Birthday to commemorate the birth of Siddhartha Guatama, the founder of the Buddhist religion. So in an essence, it is a Buddhist Christmas, Buddhamas perhaps? Well, regardless we the development team have a gift in the form of an important announcement: the Open Alpha will be available to the forum as of this diary being published:

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    Do note that the mod is very much in Alpha and as such quite bare bones. Most of the regions save for Siberia will be playable including some vassals for the Stamford Bridge Bookmark. There are known issues such as Tartaria displaying it's name across India, completely out of its actual realm. Also, some pagan religions will not be reformable due to certain provinces only having one holdings. Currently, the things we are looking for are game crashes, missing localisation, and border inaccuracies. If you encounter these, please report them in the new
    Bug Report thread. Things such as features should go in the Suggestions thread.

    For instructions and other information, go to the front page. Other than that, thank you for your support and patience, I hope you enjoy!

    Download:

    First Open Alpha
    Content Pack
     
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    Development Diary 5: Mechanics Part II
  • Development Diary 5: Mechanics Part II

    Hello everyone and welcome to the second part on the game mechanics diary for Tianxia.

    As promised, for today's development diary, I shall talk a bit about the Khans of Mongolia Project, though it won't be all that much.

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    Yes, for those who remember these event chains, the old broken Horde mechanics are back! Why would I eschew the much better system implemented by Horse Lords and go back to the old system? Well... With the expanded region, an interesting dynasty becomes playable way earlier than the vanilla version, they Borjigins. The ancestors of Genghis Khan are now playable, as such having Temujin spawn really does cock up the family tree. To reduce the amount of family trees getting messed up, the unified Mongol Horde system has been temporarily disabled and instead the divided Khanates are back to really mess your days up before fighting each other into oblivion.

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    As you can see, with the expanded region (including India), there is a large area which are not terribly affected by these vengeful Hordes. To rectify this so that everyone don't miss out on the Horde fun, I have added a third wave, the Chagatai Khanate. This means that no one will miss out on getting raped and pillaged by the Mongol Hordes.

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    This may seem like going backwards, but the point of doing this was to prepare for some new mechanics I intend on introducing with further development of the Khans of Mongolia Project. Though not set on stone, one thing I intend on doing is a decision ability for the Great Khan, should he need to delegate some areas, is to split up the empire by establishing independent Khanates, who gives tributes to the one who granted them the title, kind of like the old Roman Tetrarchy system. Although I have disabled the main horde from forming, they will make a come back in the future once I figure something out.

    Also to give some insight into what I intend to do with the Sons of Heaven Project, I intend on giving more decision based mechanics for China and Japan. For both empires, I intend on giving regents abilities to usurp throne of those who they were supposed to rule for. Also, for flavour, a lot of events from the Sword of Islam and the Legacy of Rome will be tailored for the Chinese. Even though the event chains may be similar, having different texts really do make a difference in making things feel unique. The other regions won't be completely left out, but priorities have to be set to get the mod progressing forward, so if your favourite region does not get any love it deserves, then I apologise in advance.

    From today onwards, I will try to do a weekly dev diary where with each diary there will be a new update. Bugs and other problems will be given priority, then playable regions. Then, I am hoping to make the expanded areas playable with different vanilla and DLC bookmarks with each update I release. Once all the bookmarks and areas become playable, then I will move on to refining the mechanics. However, at this stage, the mod will move on to the Closed Alpha stage as that is when I will be doing very experimental things which will probably break stuff. I will try to keep the stages which are closed to the public short, but seeing this is a hobby, I cannot guarantee anything.

    As usual, I hope you enjoy and if you find any bugs, do report it in the Bug Report Thread. If you have good ideas, then feel free to share them in the Suggestion Thread. To finish, here are some more screenshots for you to enjoy:

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    Download:
    Version 2.0.0
    Updated Content Pack
    (Now with Khitan Portrait and music for Korea and Indo-China)
     
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    Development Diary 6: Mechanics Part III
  • Development Diary 6: Mechancis Part III

    Hello everyone and sorry for the late update!

    This will be the last mechanic dev diary for the whole mod, so next time it'll be more specific to a single project.

    For those who have played this mod, you probably would have felt that the Daoic religions are essential clones to the Dharmic religions. Though they are supposed to have similarities, making them the same is not the intention. From Part I, I mentioned that the Daoic rulers get everything a Dharmic rulers get, such as having branches, converting between religions, and even designating your heir (the latter also applies to the Folk Pagan religions). Well, with the completion of porting over and tailoring vanilla events, I present to you: decadence.

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    Though the concept was not exclusive to Muslims and Chinese, the way the game utilises and portrays decadence fits quite perfectly with the Chinese concept of the Mandate of Heaven. Unlike the similar sounding Divine Right of Kings, the Mandate of Heaven was more or less of a retrospective justification to one's success and failure in governing the realm. So a ruler who is just and loved by his people were said to be favoured by the Heavens. On the other hand, cruel rulers who become overthrown by a new dynasty is said to have been abandoned by the Heavens. Of course, that is a rather over-simplification and there are more to it, but that is the gist of it. Currently, the decadence events seems to be working fine, however I was unable to get the decisions part working which is essential to straighten up decadent relatives. This is a known bug and I will try to fix it quickly, but in the mean time, I recommend throwing distant relatives in prison and go full Byzantine on them. Do note however, that only Confucian and Taoist rulers use decadence. Amidists still play like the Indian Buddhists.

    In terms of mechanics, that's pretty much it. For the Steppes, another vassal khan has been added to the Liao Empire while the Northern borders has been re-adjusted. The last thing I added was a small addition, but important as it is the namesake of this mod: the Silk Road.

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    The current trade route has been expanded all the way to Luoyang through Chang'an. The Eastern routes has not yet been added, but it will come. So instead of having the trade routes starting at two different points, it now has a single origin. Unfortunately, I do not own Horse Lords so I have not been able to test it out properly, so if you encounter any bugs; sorry!

    There won't be a dev diary next week as I will be taking a short break, meaning no new updates. Bugs will be fixed however, so please do report any bugs on the Bug Report Thread. Though I a not sure when, but the next diary and update will be a major overhaul of the
    de jure system and finally the support of other playable bookmarks, starting with The Old Gods in 867AD.

    Last thing before I finish, as mentioned before, Deathlinger has added some stuff like decisions and events. I believe it has something to do with alchemy or head-hunting....

    Download:
    Version 3.0.0
    Updated Content Pack (Now with Khitan Unit Pack and Tocharian Portraits, alongside some other fixes)
     
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    Development Diary 7: Viking Age (The Old Gods)
  • Development Diary 7: Viking Age (The Old Gods)

    Hello everyone, it has been a while since the last dev diary and update.

    This will be the first out of many dev diaries about bookmarks and how we are expanding the support from the vanilla 1066 start date to other interesting ones. As you may have guessed it from the title, this will be a short entry about the Viking Age, previously known as The Old Gods.

    ZxNhSJG.jpg


    While the Vikings wrecked havoc and the Karlings fought against each other in the Occident; in the Orient, things were a bit more settled down though not much better. In China, the Tang who had brought about the Golden Age was now in major decline after suffering incompetent rulers and the embarrassing Ganlu incident for the Emperor. In the Korean peninsular, the Kingdoms of Balhae and Silla are still at a stalemate, neither making any gains against each other. In Tibet, the mighty Tibetan Empire has collapsed with the last Emperor assassinated bringing in the Era of Fragmentation. In the Steppes, the powerful Uygher Empire of Mongolia has fallen, paving way to other Horse Lords including the Khitans.

    Though it is not much in terms of mechanics, I hope you enjoyed this. So as of this dev diary, the Viking Age (The Old Gods) will be fully supported alongside Stamford Bridge bookmark. Although it should be obvious, you do require The Old God DLC to play this start date.


    Download:
    Version 4.0.0
    Updated Content Pack
     
    Development Diary 8: Early Middle Ages (Charlemagne)
  • Development Diary 8: Early Middle Ages (Charlemagne)

    Hello everyone and welcome to the final dev diary for this stage (Open Alpha) of the mod development.

    Like with the previous dev diary, this will be about the bookmark which is now compatible; Early Middle Ages (previously known as Charlemagne).

    Ru2Ay8d.jpg

    As the two Karling brothers attempt to establish a foothold for their dynasty in Europe, the Tang has been defeated by the Abbasid at the Battle of Talas River four decades prior. Though it did not leave an immediate impact, the Chinese did lose influence in the region and would mark the end of the golden age for China. To their west, the mighty Tibetan Empire stands strong, eyeing their neighbours for further expansion. To their north, the Uygher Empire of Mongolia rules as suzerain overlords in the Steppe.

    As you can see from the screenshot, very little has changed since the previous update. The reason for this is because I really do not know how the borders should look. There are some parts which are clearly wrong, but there are others where the borders were just not clearly drawn out (whether it be on real maps or the game map). The same problem exist from the previous update, but not as bad. I would like to have gotten the borders more accurate, but I really do need help for this.


    Anyways, since only having another playable star date is boring to read about on a dev diary, I have one more addition. This however, may split opinions and as such be quite controversial.

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    I always felt that merely expanding the Silk Road to Luoyang (it should have been Chang'an) and going across Tibet was inadequate for a mod which aimed to expand the mechanics of the Silk Road. So, this time I went to the other end of the spectrum and added a whole lot more. Though not part of the main Route, the Eastern Route and the routes around Indo-China shaped the way these countries developed by sharing ideas on culture and religion.

    TSxYgyx.jpg

    Understandably, Paradox limited the extension of the Silk Road for the sake of game balance. Since the mod now adds a gigantic super power (both militarily and economically), the logical thing to do was break such a balance. As such, the Western Route was expanded to include Constantinople and Rome. These regions did have such routes historically, hence why silk existed during the times of the Romans.

    Now, this will most definitely break the balance of the game. If the Byzantines weren't overpowered enough, they are now. So for those who do not wish to compromise on game balance to such extreme, I recommend that you delete the file "00_silk_route.txt" found in your mod folder ("mod folder"/Tianxia/common/trade_routes)


    With this, I will conclude the final chapter for the Open Alpha as we now enter the experimental stage of the Closed Alpha. There will be applications for testers around about next month. In terms of support, there will be patches for borders and possibly new realms until the 20th and until the Open Beta comes out, the Open Alpha will be made compatible with the latest version unless the Paradox goes ahead and breaks too many things.

    As for the next stage (Closed Alpha), we really need some map modders to assist Deathlinger, otherwise expect some serious delays in progress (the map has been a one man job for some time now). For historical inaccuracies (like borders) and duplicate characters (I removed most, but I'm still unsure), please report it in the Bugs Report Thread for this mod. Until then, thank you for supporting this mod by enjoy playing it as we enjoyed making it.


    Download:
    Version 5.0.0
    Updated Content Pack
     
    Development Diary 9: From Here On Out
  • Development Diary 9: From Here On Out

    Merry Gregorian Christmas everyone!

    Though it ought to be a jolly time and be festive, I bring bad news: the mod is still utterly broken!
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    On the flip side, the map changes Jade Dragon brings us an opportunity to redo a lot of the things, especially the province count for China!


    Now, there have been a lot of questions regarding what will be included and what will be excluded from the new expansion which focuses on China without China. So this mod will be about what will be in and what will be out, though things can and may change.

    Most of the discussions between the developers regarding Jade Dragon have been about decisions so we will start with that: anything which isn’t about an off-map China will be in and even for things that are, if it makes sense it will be in with some re-work. As for an off-map China, we obviously don’t need it since Tianxia has an on-map China. We’re not entirely decided on the Western Protectorate, but it probably won’t be implemented again for the same reason as China.

    As you all now, the policy for this mod is to prioritise vanilla then add new things (if possible, don’t touch vanilla files). The idea for this expansion is to make it feel like an expansion rather than an overhaul though sometimes a few things had to change. One of the big things to throw a wrench into this was the inclusion of Bon and Taoists. The former is more of a meh and something annoying than game breaking. The latter on the other hand fundamentally broke how the Chinese Daoic religions were supposed to work. Both being DLC religions (it’s behind a paywall), just using our own system is not an option as it may circumvent that system which is against the terms and conditions which we modders agreed to. At the moment, we did not come to a final decision on how it ought to look so I decided to go with the vanilla setup and remove our versions as well as the Chinese (Daoic) religion group for the time being.

    In terms of cosmetics, since they were not made by Paradox, but rather a fellow modder, we will leave the Chinese Portraits and the Tibetan Portraits as an alternative for those who do not own the expansion pack which brings those packs, at least for now. From what some have said, I have heard that the garb worn by the Chinese were more of the earlier 7th century so I am considering making them an early version like the portrait packs released alongside Charlemagne Expansion packs for the Western and Eastern Europeans. Of course, if Paradox asks we will remove them from the mod.

    Of course, not all changes are associated with Jade Dragon. Initially, Tianxia was split into two major projects to ease the workload as well as better manage the resources. These were Sons of Heaven and Khans of Mongolia. Though this did help compartmentalise the project and steer focus as time went on, it was split rather unevenly, where the release of Horse Lords eased (as well as complicated) the focus for the Khans of Mongolia. Now with the release of Jade Dragon doing the same for the Sons of Heaven, I see that there should have been another split. So with this, I am announcing a third project: Mekong Rajas, a project focused on Indo-China. The first major change this project will bring will be the announcement of a new Empire region, Burma. Historically, the regions only ever had kingdoms ruled by the Pagan dynasty (later replaced by the Taungoo dynasty). However, the influence it had during the High Middle Ages shows that the realm had a major influence in the region, deserving a potential to be an empire equal to that of the Khmer. Prior to this change, Burma was part of Tibet which I was really confused and uncomfortable leaving it as.
    qanEyV6.jpg

    Due to the current state of the mod, I was not able to get a lot of screenshots and instead am relying on my personal thoughts and conjectures for the future in this development diary. It is Christmas so I will at least announce one somewhat positive thing: sign-up for the Closed Alpha Testing will be up now!


    We will be starting this with the current state of things as a means of fixing the utter mess as quickly as possible. This means that the testers will be “working” more than playing. First, we will accept only a handful of testers to look for major game-breaking bugs as well as root issues of crashes. Then we will expand to the more rudimentary things such as stupid mistakes which we missed. Once we start moving closer to the Closed Beta, things like AARs will be encouraged as well though don’t expect those to live nor last long due to the nature of unfinished products.

    Anyways, that’s it for today. Again, Merry Christmas and have a Happy Gregorian New Year!

    Link:
    Sign-Up for Closed Alpha Testers
     
    Development Diary 10: A First Look at the Tianxia Grace Rework
  • Development Diary 10 - A first look at the Tianxia Grace rework

    As you probably know, Jade Dragon added some more involvement with China in the form of the “China Screen” and the interactions you can find there, and despite the fact that Tianxia’s China is, you know, on the map it felt like a waste to not try to incorporate the Jade Dragon China mechanics that made sense to have with China on the map. However, since it is impossible to make an off-map title be held by an on-map ruler, the “China Screen” is not something we could use directly, and the Grace-related decisions that we ended up keeping have thus been moved to targeted decisions you can target the Emperor of China with (or his female relatives, in case of Imperial Marriages; see below for more info).

    ck2_76.png

    Most of the Grace decisions (and two non-Grace ones, of course).

    The new system

    First off, the Grace interactions can still only be used to target the Emperor of China, and only if he is Taoist (Note: Tianxia’s Chinese religion group has been removed because PDS’s decision to put Taoism in the same group as the Dharmic religions means we cannot have it elsewhere (because of DLC-locking) and too many things would get messed up if we kept the other religions in a separate group), meaning that any secret cult shenanigans resulting in e.g. a Catholic China or the Emperor of Japan (who, as you might expect, is Shinto) somehow invading China will disable the Grace interactions. Some other religions might get access to this in the future, but most likely not all (because if the religion of the Emperor of China is different enough things would probably work differently), and there are no guarantees that any non-Taoist emperors will have the Grace interactions enabled.

    Secondly, to be able to use the Grace decisions you must be at peace with China, not part of China, within the Emperor of China’s diplo range (or own at least one Silk Road province), not be a prisoner, not be incapable, not be inaccessible (in hiding, in seclusion, etc.), and not have a regent. The AI also must be either independent or king-tier, for performance reasons and to lower the amount of events the Emperor of China gets as he might be a player and thus might not appreciate being spammed.

    Thirdly, the likes and dislikes of the Emperor of China have been removed as permanent stances as other diplomacy is completely unaffected by such things and it would be strange for the Grace interactions to operate under their own rules. However, some traits can now impact how the Emperor of China reacts to certain Tributes; a Charitable Emperor of China is less likely to like gold or artefacts, for example, and a Lustful emperor will appreciate concubines more.

    Fourthly, some Tributes and Boons have been reworked to some extent, and some have been cut entirely. The cut ones are “Stop Supplying Horses” (due to “Supply Horses” being reworked; see below) and “Request Invasion” (because it would be fairly messy to check so that China only declares wars that it can win and that a player on the Dragon Throne doesn’t intentionally sabotage the war, to name a few reasons).

    Fifthly it is not possible to force China to open at the moment (because Chinese isolationism isn’t something we have implemented at this time), tributaries attempting to break free will have to do it the same way as tributaries to other powers, raiding China is done with actual raiders instead of a decision, and there is no special option to invade China to put a relative on the Dragon Throne just because you feel like it (Read: You have to get a claimant the old-fashioned way, or have to use other CBs, but you also aren’t forced to give someone else China if you manage to conquer it).

    Finally, Jade Dragon is still required to use the Grace system, and the AI will not be using it without Jade Dragon either.


    Below you find a description of how each of the Tributes and Boons work, as well as a general overview of both categories. Note that the localization is far from final, and that it will be considerably better in the future. Some other things might also change between now and when the compatibility patch is released (and beyond that) , but this is how things look at the moment, and I suspect we will not be removing things.

    Tributes:
    First, and most importantly, any character sent to China will be permanently disinherited, so don’t send people you might have a need of in the future.

    Unlike in vanilla, there is no cooldown on the player sending Tributes of a given kind, but the opinion gain from sending a particular kind of Tribute does not stack, and the AI needs to wait at least five years before sending the same Tribute again, though different AI characters can still send tributes during this time.

    If the Emperor of China dislikes you (or a person you seek to send to China as a Tribute), he can refuse the offer without a penalty (aside from negative opinion), and the player can also refuse at a cost if they are the Emperor of China. There will be a way to check for this dislike in the release version, but I haven’t coded it yet (because it is trivial to do and I have focused on more complicated stuff).


    Tribute – Send Gift

    The Emperor of China’s greed, as well as how much money he currently has, affects the amount of Grace you gain from sending gold, with a wealthier or less greedy Emperor being less likely to award a large amount of Grace.

    ck2_77.png


    Could have been better, could have been worse.



    Tribute – Become Tributary

    If you are within two sea zones of China or its tributaries and either aren’t an emperor or are a nomad, you can offer to become a permanent tributary of China in exchange for some Grace upfront and some monthly Grace. However, if you hold land that the Emperor of China wants, he will refuse your offer to become a tributary (though this might change in the future). Also, be aware that Chinese tributaries can fight one another without the Emperor of China getting involved, so don’t count on him protecting you against other tributaries.


    Tribute – Supply Horses


    This Tribute has been changed a bit from vanilla, and instead of having a lowered manpower regain you pay 300 manpower to give the Emperor of China a stack of non-reinforcing event troops (150 HA, 100 LC, 50 HC).


    Tribute – Offer Eunuch for Grace

    The most important bit first: The character being offered as a eunuch will be castrated when the decision is taken, as opposed to only if the offer is accepted, which is likely to make him a tad unhappy with you regardless of whether the offer is turned down or not, and his close relatives (unless they also are your close relatives) and dynasty members will be upset as well, so be certain that you can stand that penalty.

    Secondly, the Emperor of China can decide to pass the eunuch on to a vassal instead of keeping him at court, which is more likely to happen if the eunuch is less good. This gives you a smaller amount of Grace and makes your character upset with the Emperor of China, though to a lesser extent than outright refusal.


    Tribute – Offer Concubine

    To be able to send a concubine, the ruler of China must either be an adult male who isn’t homosexual, incapable, a eunuch, celibate, imprisoned, or inaccessible, or the heir to China must live up to those conditions and be unlanded and at court.

    Aside from refusing the concubine (which only is done if the ruler of China hates the sender or the concubine), the concubine can be kept (if the ruler of China lives up to the conditions above), given to the heir (again if the conditions are fulfilled), or given to a random adult male non-baron vassal vassal that the receiver doesn’t hate, and low quality concubines are more likely to be passed on to vassals. The Grace reward for a concubine given to the heir to the Dragon Throne is the same as for a concubine that the Emperor of China keeps for himself.

    ck2_78.png


    I intended for my daughter to be an Imperial consort, not the consort of some random guy!

    In addition to your own female relatives, you can also send unmarried female relatives of emperors and kings that have ended up in your court, and we might also add the ability to send prisoners as concubines, though this might upset their relatives.


    Tribute – Offer Commander


    China must be a primary participant in a war that is more serious than a peasant revolt for you to send commanders, and you can only send female commanders if the Emperor of China has increased SoW to max (which the AI doesn’t do). The Emperor of China can pass the commander on to a vassal, which gives the sender less Grace, and this is more likely to happen if you send a poor commander.


    Tribute – Offer Physician

    This Tribute now requires Reaper’s Due. Approximately 20 % of China’s provinces must have a disease present to be able to send a physician, or a flat 30 provinces if the realm size of China is greater than 400. The Emperor of China can pass the physician on to a vassal, which gives the sender less Grace, and this is more likely to happen if you send a poor physician.


    Tribute – Send Relief

    This tribute now requires Reaper’s Due. Approximately 10 % of China’s provinces must be depopulated to be able to send relief, or a flat 15 provinces if the realm size of China is greater than 400. The Emperor of China has a greater chance of lowering the depopulation of his provinces while the relief is being sent, which is increased by the realm size of the sender.


    Tribute – Offer Artefact

    The Emperor of China can decide to give the artefact being sent to a vassal instead of keeping it, which gives you less Grace. Other than that, it works mostly as in vanilla, though Tier 2 and 3 artefacts are appreciated a bit more and the Emperor of China doesn’t mind getting Hermetic artefacts if he is a member of the Hermetic Society.


    Perform Kowtow

    This event chain is being expanded slightly at the moment to involve the Emperor of China a bit more, and in the future other characters in China might also occasionally get involved. However, be aware that going to China if someone there dislikes you, particularly the Emperor, is not necessarily going to be a good idea…

    Boons:
    Unlike in vanilla, the player can request as many Boons as they have the Grace for without waiting for a cooldown, though make sure that you close the response event when you get it to avoid issues arising from event targets and flags not being removed. The AI still has a cooldown, as in vanilla.

    When the Emperor of China gets the offer, he has two options: Accept the request, and refuse the request. Acceptance sometimes is subdivided into several options; for example, if you request an artefact, the Emperor of China gets to pick which artefact to send, with his traits influencing just how good the artefact will be (though he may not pick an artefact you already have). In the case of Imperial Marriages there is another option as well that sometimes comes up; see that section for more details.

    Unless the refusal is perceived as justified by the world at large, the Emperor of China will lose a fair amount of prestige, and the AI will never outright refuse Boons without a reason. Regardless of whether there is justification, the person asking for the Boon will be upset, however, and the Grace spent on the request will not be refunded, with one exception (again, see Imperial Marriages).

    At the moment, only the female relatives of the Emperor of China that you marry are pre-existing characters, but we might add the ability for the Emperor of China to send an existing character to some other events. However, these characters would then be disinherited when sent from China, much like the Chinese princesses already are.


    Boon – Request Peace Deal

    If you border China or a Chinese tributary, or are within two sea zones of either, you can request a Peace Deal with China, which will be granted unless the Emperor of China wants your land or otherwise hates you. Neither party is allowed to declare war on the other if a Peace Deal is in effect, nor is a realm that isn’t a tributary of China allowed to attack China’s tributaries (the opposite is, however, allowed, and tributaries can also infight). As in vanilla, the Peace Deal lasts for fifty years or until the dynasty that rules China changes.

    If the player wishes to get out of a Peace Deal ahead of time without resorting to murdering enough people to change the dynasty that sits on the Dragon Throne, that certainly is an option, though it is probably not something you want to do unless you really want to go to war with China or a Chinese tributary…

    ck2_80.png


    Look; I'm sure this was just a misunderstanding of some kind. Can't we just let this slide?


    Boon – Request Physician

    This Boon works basically as in vanilla. The main thing to note here is that this Boon will be unavailable if there are enough diseased provinces in China for the Emperor of China to be willing to accept physicians as tribute.


    Boon – Request Artefact

    The traits of the Emperor of China matter quite a bit here, as a Greedy Emperor of China is less likely to be willing to pay to send you an expensive artefact (he pays 50/100/250/500/1000 gold respectively for Tier 1/2/3/4/5 artefacts being sent). Additionally, in certain circumstances you are likely to get a painting of Shanguang Tí regardless of how generous the Emperor of China is (unless you already have one)…

    As mentioned above, duplicates cannot be sent, so you will not risk wasting Grace on artefacts that get destroyed at once due to being duplicates.

    Currently, it is impossible to get figurines of previous emperors due to some issues with how that is scripted, but hopefully they will be added back.

    We will also add ways for vassals of the Emperor of China (and the Emperor himself, if he needs to) to get Chinese artefacts, but that hasn’t been added yet.


    Boon – Request Strategist/Siege Engineer

    These Boons can only be asked for if China is at peace or not in a war more serious than a peasant revolt.

    We are planning to add ways to get the Chinese commander traits if you are playing in China (or nearby), but again this isn’t something we have done yet.


    Boon – Request Scholar-Bureaucrat/Master Engineer

    These Boons work basically as they do in vanilla. Again, there will probably be ways to get similar benefits if you play in China.


    Boon – Request Trade Contract

    This Boon works essentially as it does in vanilla. Ending up at war with the Emperor of China will terminate the trade contract prematurely, as will a dynasty change in China, but otherwise it lasts for twenty-five years.

    Boon – Request Imperial Marriage
    Because we can’t mod the actual marriage interaction, we have been forced to use a workaround to ensure that there likely are unmarried relatives of the Emperor of China around to be married off. All dynastic female relatives of the Emperor of China within his realm (or the realm of someone revolting against his rule) will be blocked from marrying (unless they end up being landed). Furthermore, because we want male relatives of the Emperor of China to be able to get married for alliances, it is not possible to request an Imperial Marriage for a woman.

    There are two different ways to request an Imperial Marriage. The first, which the AI uses, is a targeted decision taken on the Emperor of China that has you select an unmarried male relative (or yourself) and then gives the Emperor of China up to three different adult female dynasty members under 35 to choose from, with a few additional conditions similar to those imposed on women that can be offered as concubines to China. If the only valid candidates happen to be lovers of the Emperor of China or someone he is actively seducing, he will refuse the request but refund the Grace you spent. This the only case in which you get a refund if the Emperor of China refuses your request. He also has the option to refuse the request with or without a good reason, as with all other Boons.

    The second way to request an Imperial Marriage is by targeting the female relative of the Emperor of China that you want to marry someone to and then selecting your male relative (or yourself) as above. In this case, the Emperor of China gets the option to accept the request, refuse it because of the chosen relative being his lover (or someone he is seducing), and refusing outright with or without a good reason.

    ck2_82.png


    Let's hope for future dynastic claimants. And that they fall in love, I suppose...

    Regardless of which option you use, the Emperor of China will, in AI hands, only refuse the request if he hates you, hates the person you are asking on behalf of, or if he is seducing/a lover of the target (in which case the refusal will come with a refund unless he hates either you or the person you’re asking on behalf of).

    As in vanilla, you get a Peace Deal for 50 years if an Imperial Marriage is granted (with the duration of any existing Peace Deal being refreshed), which only can be lost earlier if the dynasty on the Dragon Throne changes or you choose to break it (or if the Emperor of China is a player and breaks it).

    Since vassals of the Emperor of China might also want to marry Chinese princesses despite not having access to the Grace mechanics, they have near-identical decisions to the ones used by foreign rulers, though they have to pay 1000 gold if the offer is accepted and don’t get a Peace Deal (though, if the target is a close relative of the Emperor, they still get an NAP). Again, the AI only uses the decision that selects a random female relative of the Emperor of China for the same reasons as above.

    If you feel like things would be more to your liking with China using regular marriages for female members of the Imperial Family, there is a game rule for that, but using that game rule will make it impossible to use the Request Imperial Marriage interactions. Without Jade Dragon, there are no marriage blockers in place.

    Disabling Tributes and Boons

    Additionally, a player that sits on the Dragon Throne and feels that, say, eunuchs are overrated or, you know, that their sisters are to be seduced rather than wedded off, can opt to disable portions of the Grace system, though this comes with a fairly steep prestige cost and a stacking monthly prestige penalty, so you should only be doing it if you really want something to be disabled. Furthermore, if you block every Boon, the AI will stop sending Tributes, so you can’t ignore the Boons and still get Tributes. There will, however, be a game rule to disable the entire system that isn't penalized, but hopefully you'll keep it enabled.

    ck2_83.png


    You mean I can't just ask people to send me stuff without being prepared to give anything back?


    Attacks on the Emperor

    As in vanilla, declaring war on China costs a large amount of Grace, and getting caught trying to assassinate (with plots, the “Assassinate” button, the Intrigue focus, or when some event fires) the Emperor of China or his close relatives will also be penalized to a similar extent, so make sure your assassins are discreet if you want to engage in such actions. Some other hostile actions might also be penalized (for example, if you are a cannibal and target the Emperor of China’s relatives, he might get a tad upset).


    Other stuff

    Various events that are tied to the Grace system are also in the process of being made compatible with Tianxia, though there might be those that don’t make it in the end (the goal is to make as many as possible compatible, but there might be those that just don’t work well with China on the map). However, there might also be events that end up being expanded a bit so that characters in China get involved in various ways, so there will probably be a net gain when it comes to flavour events tied to the Grace system (even if some of them might be postponed to after the compatibility update.

    There are also some (rather vague, I’m afraid) plans to perhaps add more Tributes and Boons in the future, as well as possibly making it possible for the Emperor of China to proactively ask people for certain Tributes (and perhaps to grant them Boons without them asking for Boons), though that’s something that has a lower priority than general compatibility and that thus likely will come later.


    If you have any questions, feel free to ask them, and if you have any suggestions for improvements form the existing Grace stuff or for new Grace stuff, feel free to share them (though be aware that new stuff is probably not coming soon due to compatibility for existing stuff coming first).
     
    Development Diary 11: Outside China
  • Development Diary 11- Outside China


    Hi I'm Okawoa involved with Korea in the Tianxia: Silk Road Expansion. As the Winter Olympics wind down in Pyeongchang, we will look at the world around China as opposed to last weeks diary that focused on rebuilding the Grace system.

    To the East and North we have Korea and Liao who face new realities versus a more powerful China. The Liao will need to occupy Manchuria before having enough grassland to take over China. Korea, too, may need to develop before facing a more unstable but stronger China. Another reason Korea should pipe down is the Kingdom is now split into the minor-league version of the Three Kingdoms: Silla, Baekje and Gogureyo.

    Given that Korea has allot of peace-time integration ahead of it, its possible to play a decent amount without invading other places. Dano and especially Chuseok have been expanded since last patch. Female succession is now possible in early bookmarks under the Gim Dynasty but, as historically, a last resort if you have no male heirs. Female rulers being last of their kin need to be cautious to not die out!

    upload_2018-2-22_22-31-57.png

    Female ruler celebrating Dano (The Fifth) on the swing

    New also to Korea is the Hwarang (花郞) society, home of the flower knights. This society differs from regular societies in a bunch of ways. Youths 12-20 years of age can join to learn about military deeds, naturalism and unlock rewards. While only men can join (unplayable) female priests are welcome as supervisors of Hwarang. Common missions will be protecting monks, learning the secrets of make-up and participating in martial events. For most this is like the scouts, but there are chances if you don't keep up with your studies you might get hurt! This and future societies will be parcelled in modules so to not cluster the base mod. The Mu-Dang path, for females, is now less rare but more likely to end in possession.

    upload_2018-2-22_22-35-34.png

    Polynesians sending a delegation. Note he has been visited by Muslim sailors.

    In the spirit of mods like WTWSMS, event pictures of six East Asian cultures have been changed to show the diversity of the region. As Korea is practically done, eyes are south at Indonesia for the next target and then China to add event-chains based on Way Of Life choices. Japan remains untouched until we find an expert on the subject. India likewise has precious little improved minus a Naga event.

    The mod has come slow, mainly because Paradox keeps adding provinces that - well - we reserved. But now the team is more experienced at handling unexpected hurdles to progress and steadily improve the gameplay.
     
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    Development Diary 12: The Shinto Religion
  • Development Diary 12 - The Shinto religion (+ bonus Liao breakup)

    After some internal discussion and various comments in this thread, we have decided to move away from having Unreformed and Reformed Shinto to having just Shinto. For now, the Tenno (the Emperor of Japan, though not necessarily the holder of e_japan) still is the religion head and they have some reformed features (the ability to call GHWs, for one thing), but that might change (though since their MA will suffer a lot if they aren't an organized religion and lack a religion head it might be best for balance to keep that bit around; we'll see). They will, however, definitely work like the Bön when it comes to stuff like being able to have better succession laws and being able to feudalize if tribal, so you won't need to convert to get that stuff.

    ck2_69.png

    The religion map in 1066 (the white provinces in Japan are Shinto holy sites). At the bottom, you can see a Ryukyuan province following the Ryukyuan religion.

    The lack of an unreformed branch of the religion means there is no heresy for the Shinto faith. However, if the MA of the Shinto faith drops low enough, there can still be trouble, since Shinto provinces have a chance of turning Buddhists all of a sudden, and, if there are other non-pagan faiths within two sea zones of a Shinto province there is a chance that it will flip to that religion instead.

    ck2_77.png

    Look, I know we are supposed to be somewhat tolerant, but I'm not so sure that means you should actually convert to other religions! Silly peasants!

    We have also added a straightforward way to get the Sympathy for Eastern religions trait for Shinto rulers, and the Imperial Family (and, down the line, some others) have a special Sayyid-style trait, Amaterasu Descendant, that automatically gives the same benefit. Buddhist and Shinto characters can also intermarry freely.

    ck2_70.png

    Can't we all just get along?

    As you might have noticed in the screenshot above, there's also a Hold a Hanami decision for Shinto rulers. This is the Shinto equivalent to the Hold a Great Feast decision, though it has a bit over twice as many possible events. Some of them are very rare, though, and might not be something you manage to see in every campaign even with a hanami every year.

    Some of the events during the hanami are rather good (and this isn't the best possible event)...

    ck2_79.png

    Women dressed in male clothes and carrying swords are always good to hire to entertain you and your guests. Surely nothing could go wrong!

    ...and some of the events aren't particularly good (and this isn't the worst possible event).

    ck2_78.png

    Perhaps I should have listened to my mother when she said I shouldn't play with fire(works)...

    There is also some more flavour being worked on for the Shinto faith and Japan as a whole, but it isn't in a state where I can show you anything. However, the Shinto faith will probably end up beating the Norse faith in flavour when all is said and done, so they shouldn't be boring to play as.

    Also, all of the new pagan religions in Tianxia have been given Demon Worshipper cults (and the Taoists have also been given access to one of the new ones). These operate as the vanilla ones (though with a couple of small events possibly popping up for Shinto DWs during the hanami...) and can be disabled with the standard game rule (and the work that went into them was insignificant as they mainly use the existing events, so we've not been working on them at the expense of more historical flavour).

    ck2_80.png

    Sure sound like a friendly bunch...


    On an unrelated note, we have also broken up the Liao Khaganate a bit.

    ck2_74.png

    Tributaries are loyal... right?

    For those of you that find that interesting, that means that there now are two independent Nestorian nomadic realms in the east. Of course, being nomads, they're not guaranteed to stick with that religion, but I'm sure the player could create a large Nestorian (or, knowing the CK2 forums, Messalian) realm somewhere near China.

    ck2_75.png

    I'm sure the Tengri, Buddhist, and Taoist neighbours will be friendly towards you!


    Edit: Ignore the attachments; they're just the same screenshots as some of the others. Also, sorry about the weird formatting.
     

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    Development Diary 13: New Artefacts
  • I assume nobody really minds getting an early dev diary?

    Development Diary 13 - New artefacts

    Summer has been rather slow, with the Tianxia team being fairly inactive as a whole, but some stuff has been done.

    There will be plenty of new artefacts to discover in Tianxia. Currently, there are more than 30 new high-quality artefacts that have been added. These are historical, mythological, or possibly fictional, like the standard CK2 artefacts are (though none are entirely made up for the mod, like vanilla's +2 Axe is). A few -- such as the Heirloom Seal of the Realm -- will be in the possession of someone when the game starts, while others -- such the Tenka-Goken -- will need to be discovered during the game.

    Most of the new artefacts can be discovered regardless of DLCs owned since the artefact system is free, but some are only active for DLC-locked religions for one reason or another. Also, they are rather more strongly associated with the proper geographical region than in vanilla; you will not find Japanese swords in Iceland or the like.

    Unlike the vanilla artefact discovery events, the new artefacts require your character to get involved in some fashion. Some of these event chains just require you to pay someone to go off to find them, while others require your direct involvement. A few chains are wholly unique, while others are shared by two or more artefacts.

    ck2_70.png


    Saddle my horse!

    ck2_71.png


    A hilt? I need a blade for it!

    Your hunt for an artefact might go fairly well, and some rather powerful artefacts can be discovered...

    ck2_72.png


    I have a new sword!

    ck2_73.png


    Numbers (and possibly art) not final.

    At other times, your quest for an artefact might not go so well...

    ck2_74.png

    That's not how this whole things was supposed to go!

    For anyone curious, these are the artefacts that have been added so far:
    - The Imperial Regalia of Japan (Kusanagi, Yata no Kagami and Yasakani no Magatama; all are owned by the Tenno)
    - Totsuka no Tsurugi (non-unique)
    - Thuan Thien (both the blade and the hilt need to be discovered to get the sword)
    - The swords Ganjiang and Moye
    - Cura Si Manjakini (owned by the ruler of Malaya from 1299; can be discovered before)
    - Vijaya
    - The Heirloom Seal of the Realm (owned by the Emperor of China)
    - The Seven-Branched Sword (owned by the Tenno)
    - Sugari no Ontachi (owned by the Tenno)
    - The Sword of Goujian
    - The Spear of Fuchai
    - The Kojiki (non-unique)
    - The Nihon Shoki (non-unique)
    - The Green Dragon Crescent Blade
    - Kogarasu Maru
    - The Tenka-Goken (Dojigiri, Onimaru, Mikazuki, Odenta, and Juzumaru)
    - The Dragon-Phoenix Sword
    - The swords forged by Ou Yezi (Zhanlu, Juque, Shengxie, Yuchang, Chunjun, Longyuan, Tai'e, and Gongbu)
    - The Epic of Darkness (non-unique)
     
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    Development Diary 14: Amending Africa Again
  • Dev Diary 14 - Amending Africa Again

    This will be fairly short, but hopefully still informative.

    Work on compatibility and the map update is progressing fairly nicely. Africa has been updated as far as the province and de jure structure goes (province and title history still needs to be done), though there might still be some polishing done.

    If there are any mistakes, feel free to point them out. All title colours will be updated down the line to (hopefully; with a few thousand titles, it is hard to be sure...) be unique.


    West/Central Africa:
    Provinces:

    ck2_16.png


    De jure duchies:

    ck2_8.png


    De jure kingdoms:

    ck2_10.png


    De jure empires:

    ck2_11.png


    Culture:

    ck2_5.png


    Everything is African pagan right now, so I'll not post a screenshot of that.

    In total, there are nineteen new provinces (and a wasteland), five new duchies, two new kingdoms, and one new culture added beyond what vanilla has.


    East Africa:
    Provinces:

    ck2_17.png

    De jure duchies:

    ck2_13.png


    De jure kingdoms:

    ck2_12.png


    Everything is in e_abyssinia, so I'm not posting a screenshot of that.

    Culture:

    ck2_14.png


    Religion:

    ck2_18.png


    In total, there are thirteen new provinces, five new duchies, and two new kingdoms in the area.
     
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    Development Diary 15: Splitting Up Sumatra
  • Dev Diary 15 - Splitting up Sumatra (+ minor changes to Java)

    This will be another short dev diary. Again, stuff is still somewhat WIP, and you should feel free to point out any mistakes (particularly since the projection is rather weird here and that might cause some mistakes). Also, the title history files haven't been transferred yet, so everything is independent instead of where it should be.

    Sumatra:
    Sumatra has been significantly expanded from 2.8; including the miscellaneous islands that are part of the kingdoms on Sumatra, it has gone from 36 provinces to 55 provinces.

    Provinces:
    ck2_19.png


    The county of Nicobar is possibly a bit hard to make out, but it can be found where you'd expect it to be.

    ck2_24.png


    De jure duchies:
    ck2_20.png


    ck2_25.png


    De jure kingdoms:
    ck2_21.png


    ck2_26.png


    Culture:
    ck2_22.png


    ck2_27.png


    Religion:
    ck2_23.png


    ck2_28.png


    Since there might be some performance concerns arising when you hear that there's been plenty of provinces added, you should be aware that the relative percentage of provinces added with 3.0 Tianxia compared to 3.0 vanilla is projected to be similar to that of 2.8 Tianxia compared to 2.8 vanilla, and that there currently has been fewer provinces added than what was projected for the areas that have been covered so far.

    Java:
    The provinces are largely unchanged, but one has been split (Kedri into Kedri + Malang) and three tiny ones have been merged (into Lombok), resulting in a net loss of one province.

    Provinces:
    ck2_34.png


    De jure duchies:
    ck2_30.png


    Everything not shown as part of k_palembang earlier is in k_java, so I'll not post a screenshot of that.

    Culture:
    ck2_32.png


    Ignore the random Malay provinces; they were changed to Javanese after the screenshot was taken.

    Religion:
    ck2_33.png


    All of the areas covered today are still part of e_nusantara, so I'll not post a map of de jure empires.




    Also, this is probably not the only dev diary that's coming this week, so you might want to check back here in a few days...
     
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    Development Diary 16: Beautifying Borneo and Polishing the Philippines
  • Dev Diary 16 - Beautifying Borneo and Polishing the Philippines (+ small tweaks to Sulawesi)

    This will again be short-ish, since it's just map stuff. Again, things are WIP, and feedback is welcome.

    Borneo and Sulawesi:
    Sulawesi has been expanded from 9 provinces to 12, and one new duchy has been added.

    Borneo has been increased from 10 provinces to 28, and the duchy count has gone from 3 to 8. The island has also been split between two kingdoms; Kalimantan and Sarawak.

    Provinces:
    ck2_36.png


    De jure duchies:
    ck2_39.png


    De jure kingdoms:
    ck2_40.png


    All of these kingdoms are in e_nusantara, so I'll not bother with an empire de jure map.

    Culture:
    ck2_38.png


    Religion:
    ck2_37.png

    The Philippines:
    The Philippines have gotten a few more provinces; the total is 44, rather than 38. The duchy count has also been increased, from 8 to 12. There's also two kingdoms in the area now, as opposed to just one. Finally, these two kingdoms have been moved into a new empire (the Empire of the Pacific Rim; the name isn't final) since e_nusantara already has over 100 provinces (and Malacca is to be added there in the future) and the relevant realms didn't really hold sway up towards the Philippines.

    Provinces:
    ck2_46.png


    De jure duchies:
    ck2_43.png


    De jure kingdoms:
    ck2_42.png


    As mentioned, these kingdoms are in e_pacific_rim.

    Culture:
    ck2_44.png


    Religion:
    ck2_45.png

    That is probably everything for this week, but hopefully there will be another couple of dev diaries next week (probably towards the end). You should not expect the pace of two dev diaries per week to be maintained for long, though.

    The likely content of the next few dev diaries are Taiwan-Ryukyu-Japan-Ainu, Indichina, China (might be split into several dev diaries), Korea, Mongolia-Manchuria, and finally Siberia, in that order. Taiwan-Ryukyu-Japan-Ainu and Korea are areas I don't really need sources for the province layout for since the planned changes are minor, but the rest are areas where relevant maps would be quite helpful.[/Spoiler][/spoiler]
     
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    Development Diary 17: Improving Indochina
  • Dev Diary 17 - Improving Indochina (+ smaller changes to Taiwan, Ryukyu, Japan, and Ainu)

    This will be rather long, even if it is just map stuff. There will be some missing localization here and there, as I didn't have time to go through that and figured that you'd rather have a dev diary today than have it delayed due to localization issues. Also, ignore the blank province in Annam; that got fixed after I took the screenshots, and I didn't feel like redoing them.

    ck2_1.png


    The map rework has gotten decently far along, all told. There's still several hundred provinces to be added, but the Far East is starting to look as something other than just wasteland.

    ck2_2.png


    The de jure empire map mode. Everything that has been added north of the area shown is in e_japan, and everything to the south is in e_nusantara.

    Taiwan and Ryukyu:
    These areas have lost a few provinces since we had been rather generous and there were areas where we wanted to be able to add more. Taiwan is down to seven provinces (was nine), and Ryukyu now has six provinces (down from eight).

    De jure duchies:
    ck2_3.png


    You can presumably guess what is in which kingdom.

    Religion:
    ck2_4.png


    Culture:
    ck2_5.png

    Japan and Ainu:
    Japan proper has gained ten provinces, bringing it up to 85 provinces. Yes, that's an insanely big kingdom at the moment; we've been discussing that matter internally a bit, but we've not yet arrived at a point where we've decided how we should model the historical situation, which could affect how/if the kingdom is split.

    The areas of k_ainu that currently have been added have gotten one extra province.

    De jure duchies:
    ck2_6.png


    Everything execpt the small bit of Hokkaido (k_ainu) that you can see is in k_japan. Aside from Tsushima, everything is possible to reach without boats; I can also inform you that you can reach all parts of the Philippines except Sulu and Palawan from other parts of the Philippines without boats, which should help the AI a lot in that region.

    ck2_9.png

    The Kurils + Kamchatka should be another duchy, but that is currently being... uncooperative... and I've postponed fixing that due to having other things planned. Sakhalin may or may not end up in k_ainu down the line, and will presumably be at leas the three provinces it was in 2.8.


    Religion:
    ck2_8.png

    The orange provinces are Buddhist.


    Culture:
    ck2_7.png

    Malaya:
    Malaya has grown from nine provinces to twelve provinces.

    De jure duchies:
    ck2_10.png


    Kelantan, Langkasuka, Kuantan, and Melaka are part of Malaya. The rest are part of other kingdoms.

    Everything inside the kingdom's borders is currently Hindu and Malay, so I'll not post screenshots of that.


    De jure kingdom, culture, and religion maps for Indochina:

    ck2_13.png

    The main difference from 2.8 is that the Kingdom of Burma has been split into Ava and Pegu for now (since it was getting rather large after more provinces were added). More details below.

    ck2_12.png


    ck2_11.png


    The pale blue is Shenist (Chinese Folk Paganism).

    Culture and religion will probably be tweaked a bit down the line.

    Lavo and Pegu:

    Lavo had some very larger provinces before, and it has therefore grown from seven provinces to fourteen.

    The area covered by the Kingdom of Pegu used to have four provinces, and now has eight.

    ck2_15.png

    c_myeik is part of d_myeik; the screenshot was taken before that was properly fixed.


    Haripunjaya, Cambodia, Lan Xang, Champa, and Annam:

    Haripujaya still has eight provinces, as before, but they've been slightly redrawn and renamed due to the rest of the region being restructured a bit and some provinces not being located where they should have been located.

    Cambodia has grown to 26 provinces, from 14, since a lot of the provinces in the area were very large.

    Lan Xang has grown from nine provinces to sixteen, again due to the provinces previously being rather too large.

    Champa has grown from six provinces to eight, since the area already was relatively generous with provinces.

    Annam has grown from fourteen to seventeen provinces. Again, the area was fairly generous with provinces.


    ck2_16.png


    Ava, Shan, and Dali:

    The area that now is part of Ava has grown from nine/ten (depending on how you count) provinces to twenty provinces since they were quite large.

    Shan has grown from six/seven (depending on how you count) provinces to nine.

    Dali has grown from eleven provinces to fifteen, if you count Gyaltang for both versions (which may or may not end up as part of Kham down the line, as it was in 2.8).

    Also, the province of Batang is once more added as part of d_sutiya, since that's the best way to add that.

    ck2_18.png

    This will be the last dev diary for this year, and you shouldn't expect a dev diary next week. China is next, and China is going to be quite a bit larger than it was in the 2.8 version, so it isn't going to allow for as much copy-paste work as some things that have been added in the past.