Grand Strategy Crusader Kings III

[Theodora]

So ruler editor is coming back
https://www.crusaderkings.com/en/news/dev-diary-43-a-ruler-of-your-own
https://www.crusaderkings.com/en/news/dev-diary-44-1-2-bits-bobs

It's good to see them adding lots of features, both pragmatic and aesthetic/flavourful, for free as just a matter of course. (Of course, that shouldn't be something that stands out, but it does.)

New battle interface is nice.

I guess it's just kinda rare to see a UI get so much love immediately after release (given the previous patch too). Not sure what the trigger was, maybe they've hired some new people, given Imperator's massive UI rework on the way with 2.0 as well.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Heroic Liberator]

Rolling for aesthetic house and realm coat of arms over and over again reminds me of the time spent rolling for stat points and exceptional strength percentages in Baldur's Gate.

 

[Catacombs]

This is... free? I thought this would be a paid DLC.

 

[Xamenos]

Rolling for aesthetic house and realm coat of arms over and over again reminds me of the time spent rolling for stat points and exceptional strength percentages in Baldur's Gate.

I am not surprised a commie would waste his time cheating in a single-player video game.

 

[Theodora]

This is... free? I thought this would be a paid DLC.

For whatever reason Paradox has been learning from the failures of EU4 and CK2's DLC policies, and this is already pretty evident when you look at Stellaris and especially Imperator. That is to say, they seem to have learned that gating too much behind paywalls, especially mechanics, takes a huge toll on available design space over time; i.e. it becomes extremely self-sabotaging of what late development DLC can add or be, unless you're okay with features being independent silos that don't interact directly.

(I think that, arguably very tied to mana-style gameplay where you're simply shuffling around abstract e-points, is pretty blatant in its unpopularity.)

 

[Zero Credibility]

Been playing this again a bit, before the new patch hit and forced me to wait for mods to catch up. And I noticed something weird. I crushed a large rebellion where I jailed a bunch of landed relatives and forced them to renounce claims on my stuff. It appeared to work fine, when a couple of years later, one of them has all of those claims back, and then another one as well.

Is this a bug? Or is there some kind of a decision that they took to get them back? But if that's the case, shouldn't I get the imprisonment reason for them going against their word? Otherwise, what's the point of demanding anyone to renounce claims if they can just get them back?

 

[Xamenos]

Been playing this again a bit, before the new patch hit and forced me to wait for mods to catch up. And I noticed something weird. I crushed a large rebellion where I jailed a bunch of landed relatives and forced them to renounce claims on my stuff. It appeared to work fine, when a couple of years later, one of them has all of those claims back, and then another one as well.

Is this a bug? Or is there some kind of a decision that they took to get them back? But if that's the case, shouldn't I get the imprisonment reason for them going against their word? Otherwise, what's the point of demanding anyone to renounce claims if they can just get them back?

They probably just fabricated those claims again. It is extremely easy in ck3, after all.

 

[Zero Credibility]

I agree that it is waaay too easy to fabricate claims, resulting in never ending inter-vassal wars. But in these cases we are talking about some 10-15 claims, including whole kingdoms. Somehow the fuckers got them all back.

 

[luj1]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

 

[fantadomat]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

2
3 if you are simple.

 

[luj1]

Tnx I heard good things about 2 and 4

 

[GrainWetski]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

2 until there's either a bunch of DLC or some good mods for 3. Preferably both.

 

[Fedora Master]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

2
3 if you are simple.

To be fair, 2 is only complex because it has a mountain of obtuse mechanics by now.

 

[Xamenos]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

Ignore everyone else. 4 is BY FAR the best CK game. It's just a bit hard to find these days.

 

[fantadomat]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

2
3 if you are simple.

To be fair, 2 is only complex because it has a mountain of obtuse mechanics by now.

It is a better game all around. Maybe III will be ok in a decade of dlcs,but now it is simple and boring. Also 2 has a lot more mods and shit .

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Which Crusader Kings for first time? 2, 3 or 4?

3's your best bet for starting the series off if money's not a question. 2's got more content after a fuckton of DLC, but the performance is ass in comparison to 3 and there's less bloat in 3 so it should be a much easier starting point. Plus if you learn on 3 then you get new toys as DLC rolls out so presumably by the time you've chewed through a good part of the vanilla game and understand how to play there'll be new shit to fuck around with.

If money is a question, try out 2 since the base game for 2 is free now. It'll still be a bit bloated even if you don't buy DLC and there are differences between 2 and 3, but that works as a free way to see if you like the series at all and really want to dive in.

 

[thesecret1]

Eh... CK3's UI was really cancer last time I checked, and was really difficult to navigate even for a CK2 veteran. CK2 had it much better designed, and it's not really too complicated even with all the DLCs.

 

[Average Manatee]

CK2 performs just fine, don't know what you are talking about. If anything CK3 has more issues there.

 

[Smoker]

Needs more schemes, CBs, duels, ways to develop vassals / courtiers. Dynasty rivalry

 

[Catacombs]

Needs more schemes, CBs, duels, ways to develop vassals / courtiers. Dynasty rivalry

All that is incoming DLC

 

[Thorgeim]

Eh... CK3's UI was really cancer last time I checked, and was really difficult to navigate even for a CK2 veteran. CK2 had it much better designed, and it's not really too complicated even with all the DLCs.

Strange, are you playing on a 4:3 screen? I find the UI much better than CK2 overall. Yes some things are a bit weird like not being able to get rid of the suggestion icon, otherwise I like everything else more than CK2 UI.

 

[IDtenT]

The first major patch significantly improved the UI, in my opinion.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

CK2 performs just fine, don't know what you are talking about. If anything CK3 has more issues there.

u wot? Unless they pulled a great patch out of their asses since last time I played CK2, (It's possible I guess) the performance absolutely tanks after 100+ years played. You don't lose framerate, but the rate the game advances even on maximum speed slows dramatically.

The first major patch significantly improved the UI, in my opinion.

Agreed, the only area where I'd complain about CK3's UI now that I've learned it is it can be chunky and take up arguably too much space. Everything's fine in a vacuum but on occasions when an event pops and then you decide you want to look up a title or a character sheet or whatever for more information it can get a little packed. Well, I guess I have a second complaint. I'd still like the realm coloration that CK2 had. Still not as easy to see the land owned by dukes in my kingdom at a glance. I think there's a mod for it but I haven't nabbed it yet, and I know you can ctrl-click your realm to SORT OF bring up that overlay but the coloration is kinda fucked. Currently on a newbie-island Ireland game and the bites I own of England and Scotland have red and yellow coloration with that overlay so it's not particularly good.

 

[Norfleet]

u wot? Unless they pulled a great patch out of their asses since last time I played CK2, (It's possible I guess) the performance absolutely tanks after 100+ years played. You don't lose framerate, but the rate the game advances even on maximum speed slows dramatically.

I find that after that 100 years have passed, I'm not normally running maximum speed anyway because there's always something I need to do. Speeding along when you have only one stack out in the field is one thing, but when you have 50 stacks combing the map, you no longer get to slap maximum speed because someone always needs new orders.