Those darned Teutons!

[Quarto]

So, I've been playing with the duchy of Masovia today (well, kingdom of Lithuania now ).

There I am, minding my own business, conquering the Prussians, the Lithuanians, and anybody else that happens to be around, and along come the Teutons. They want to seize my land. No, says I, I'm doing fine, I've already conquered and converted the Prussians so I don't need you buggers here. Bah, your province is full of heretics, says they. Fine, whatever. Took a few years, but eventually the heresy went away.

A few years later, same thing happens.

...And again.

...And again.

...And again.

...And again, except this time one of my vassals gets it, and stupidly says yes. So I clean up the mess, wiping the Teutons off the map, and praying that, since I removed them by force, they won't be coming back.

...But they do come back, and they still want to seize my land. The answer is still no, says I. Bah, says they, your provinces are all full of heretics.

...And then they come back again.

...And again.

...And again.

...And again.

I hope you're getting the picture here . This event is surely right up there amongst the most bizarre, and evil of the events in the game. I realise that it's better now than it was before, that now at least you have a choice... but that choice involves making one of your provinces heretical. That's pretty darned bizarre, if you ask me - I can't see any connection between me refusing the Teutons and one of my provinces becoming heretical. But to make things worse, this event just keeps on recurring... and that goes beyond the bizarre, and into the realm of Just Plain Evil (tm).

All this is also weird for another reason, that reason being history. The Teutons were invited into Poland, by (oh, the irony) the duke of Masovia. They did not seize their land, they were given it. I mean, yes, later on there was that whole thing where they stole Danzig from Poland, but that was two hundred years later.

In any case, it would really be good if you could make this event a little bit less toxic, and a hell of a lot less recurring.

Also, before coming to Poland, they had tried to settle in Siebenburgen, but the king of Hungary decided he didn't want them there... and before that, they, like all the other knightly orders, stationed in the Holy Land. They only came to Poland after losing their place in the Holy Land. It would be pretty neat if some of this could be simulated through events somehow.

 

[unmerged(48100)]

The event fires until they have land. The AI always excepts

 

[Veldmaarschalk]

Just give them the land, it is just 1 province.

 

[Quarto]

I don't want to give them land, though... it's mine, all mine!

(and really, I don't see why I should have to give up a province to prevent an event as ridiculous as this)

 

[Rotten]

I edited the save file and made them my vassal. That made them, and me, happy.

 

[unmerged(48100)]

I edited the save file and made them my vassal. That made them, and me, happy.

Thats cheating, if you want them to be your vassal edit the event to be vassal of any country having the land before

 

[Olaus Petrus]

Maybe the event trigger could be changed, so that it doesn't fire that often.

 

[unmerged(2456)]

Maybe the event trigger could be changed, so that it doesn't fire that often.

The idea was to have it fire often. The heretic province was used to make it not fire as long as you have heretic province there.

 

[Olaus Petrus]

The idea was to have it fire often. The heretic province was used to make it not fire as long as you have heretic province there.

Yes I know this, but it's really irritating when you are playing as a minor duchy in the area and your heir gives his province to Order. You conquest it back, give some other province to heir and Order is created again. And when you keep all your five provinces yourself you get spammed to give land to Order. I don't think that the point of the event is made playing in this area harder. If I don't conquer order either Polish king or some pagans will conquer it within few years.

 

[Gebhard Blucher]

Can you take his title in one war, and then the land in another? I've always wondered if the various order titles can be grabbed by a human player. I know I've seen the ai do it before.

 

[unmerged(48100)]

No, human players can't take teuton order title

 

[unmerged(2456)]

Yes I know this, but it's really irritating when you are playing as a minor duchy in the area and your heir gives his province to Order. You conquest it back, give some other province to heir and Order is created again. And when you keep all your five provinces yourself you get spammed to give land to Order. I don't think that the point of the event is made playing in this area harder. If I don't conquer order either Polish king or some pagans will conquer it within few years.

I don't know if making it 'harder' is really the key word here. Its to make sure the Teutons exist as often as possible during the historic period in their historic area. The fact it gets overrun is not the fault of the event, but of the engine and the fact they should pester you does not mean you should be using OOC knowledge of how the engine works really for what to decide.

 

[unmerged(21937)]

The Heretic part is to ensure that it doesn't fire immidiately again. [1.04a] You might remember what it was like before, when it just kept spamming you whole time and as Crusades lasted for ever, they just kept spamming until end of game. [/1.04a] Now they will fire once, you refuse and get Heretical province, which prevents it from firing and it only fires when Crusades are on. I'd say it's pretty nice as it is and it's mere one province really.

 

[Olaus Petrus]

Yes, the situation is much better now. It was even more pain in the ass before. And when I'm playing as bigger kings, and not as Duke of Prussia, I almost always sponsor the Knight Orders by helping them against heathens and other christians.

 

[Quarto]

Now they will fire once, you refuse and get Heretical province, which prevents it from firing and it only fires when Crusades are on. I'd say it's pretty nice as it is and it's mere one province really.

Doesn't work that way. There's five provinces in there - if you have them all, you're stuck in a perpetual loop, where the order heresies-up five of your provinces, and just when the heresy has gone away in the first of these provinces, it all starts over again.

I really don't get the "it's a mere one province really" argument, either. What it comes down to is that you're telling me I should give up one of my provinces because of an event that desperately needs to be put out of its misery. Consider also that this event has a potentially huge effect if you're playing a dutchy (as I did in this case). I had two provinces, I conquered two more. I managed to convert them, which of course spawned all sorts of rebellions (as it should), which I finally managed to subdue... and then this event fires. I have the choice of either giving up 25% of my territory, or face the wrath of heretics starting up fresh rebellions.

I know you guys are busy fixing all sorts of stuff with this beta... but fixing one event doesn't involve more than five minutes of work, and it's not the kind of earth-shaking change that would require days and days of testing, either.

A few suggestions:
- The Teutonic order did not arrive in this area until about 1230, so having this event firing up right from 1066 is wrong. There should instead be an alternate Teutonic event for the time from 1066 to 1230 that places them in the Holy Land (like the other orders).

- The Teutonic order (actually, all the order events, I suppose) event should only trigger for independent countries. A vassal duke wouldn't have been able to make a decision like this without his lord intervening, and in any case this guarantees that the countries that cannot easily afford to give up a province (duchies and oversized counties) won't be affected by it.

- The event should only fire if there's a reason for the Teutons to drop by for a crusade. Of course, checking the entire Baltic area for pagans would make for an overly complex event, but at the very least the event should check for the existence of kingdom of Lithuania. Because this is a title that cannot be created without pacifying the majority of the pagans in the Baltic area, the existence of Lithuania should automatically kill any chances of the Teutons visiting.

 

[Yakman]

Just let them have one province--it's not too much to ask. Besides, that area is so damned poor, its not like losing one province is going to hurt you much--they all suck!

 

[unmerged(2456)]

D- The event should only fire if there's a reason for the Teutons to drop by for a crusade. Of course, checking the entire Baltic area for pagans would make for an overly complex event, but at the very least the event should check for the existence of kingdom of Lithuania. Because this is a title that cannot be created without pacifying the majority of the pagans in the Baltic area, the existence of Lithuania should automatically kill any chances of the Teutons visiting.

The problem with that is if they manage to passify them, smeone claimes king status, they gets beaten back by those same infedels (well actually different ones technically) and is left with one province in the middle of nowehere. And before you say otherwise, its actually its quite likely to happen.

 

[Quarto]

The problem with that is if they manage to passify them, smeone claimes king status, they gets beaten back by those same infedels (well actually different ones technically) and is left with one province in the middle of nowehere. And before you say otherwise, its actually its quite likely to happen.

Sure, it is - heck, I've seen Poland swallowed up by rampaging Prussians . And I realise that of the three suggestions I posted, this would be the most problematic - but if at least those other two were implemented, that would already be a step in the right direction, and neither of them requires changing more than two or three lines in the event script.


...And to those of you who keep on saying that I should just give up the one province and live with this event - for God's sake, keep such comments to the general discussion forum. This is the beta forum, it's not supposed to be a place where you advise users on how to live with the game's flaws. We're here to point out these flaws to Paradox and to offer suggestions on how to fix them. The amount of "it's not a problem if you just do this or that" posts in the beta forum is simply ridiculous - do you want to see this game get better, or not?

 

[unmerged(21937)]

Hardcoded dates in appearance don't seem like to be in line with non-determinism we have in CK, but that's minor.

Bigger issue is that for part of the players, knight orders are pleasant historical flavour and to other part of the players, which I suppose you Quarto belong to, they are pain in the bottom, that shouldn't be in the game in the first place. As it's obviously impossible to please both factions perfectly, we have chosen the middle way on it, with having them in, but trying to make them less of a pain, if you don't like them around. But if you are hell-bent on never seeing them in the first place, you are free to delete the event for your own playing pleasure, just remember that not everyone sees it in the same way as you do.

 

[Quarto]

I think it's the "less of a pain" thing that we don't see eye-to-eye on... I don't mind the knightly orders in general, but I think in spite of your efforts, the events are still a major pain, and definitely too much of a pain to leave in there in their current form.

And yeah, as a matter of fact I did eventually delete this event... but that's really not a solution. If I'm posting about a problem to the beta forum, I would much rather hear that you are going to do something about it, than merely get advice on how I can fix it myself. Especially since in this case, I really didn't fix it - I don't want to cut the Teutons out completely, I just want them to make more sense, and to be a bit less harmful.

As for the historical flavour, I think what you need to appreciate is that historical flavour in this game frequently clashes - and loses - against historical non-determinism. This is one example of this. After all, the Teutonic knights in this part of europe were a historical result of the crusades coming to an end. In a greater context, the story of the Teutonic knights is not a story of a crusading order - it's the story of a bunch of out-of-work soldiers trying to make something of themselves after the war is done. So, having them appearing in the Baltic area starting from 1066 is definitely not historical flavour, it's historical anti-flavour. Historical flavour would be to have the Teutons appear in the Baltic area after the crusades. And then, of course, you could do the same with the other orders - the Templars in France or England, etc..