Community Demo updated!

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Dear Ladies and Lords,

This update follows the schedule outlined in the 2025 recap, and finally delivers exciting parts of the Major Milestone you voted for.

Its main focus is the long-awaited Claim System overhaul and the foundations of Occupation mechanics, alongside several war-related improvements (focusing on Companies, "swarming" and pathfinding), plus a wide range of fixes and tweaks across other systems.

Please don't forget that since quite a few core systems changed under the hood, bugs are very much possible. Please don’t hesitate to report anything odd you run into. You can do this directly in-game: click the small yellow cloud icon in the bottom right, then hit the Bug Report button in the panel that pops up.

Thanks again, and happy skirmishes!

[Note: This post was originally published on February 7. While preparing the February 14 patch notes, I accidentally overwrote it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t revert the changes — so the original date is no longer accurate, and one paragraph has been lost.]

Changelog

Gameplay & Vibe

• Async bidding for claims The old, simple command-based claiming is gone. Claims are now handled through a more flexible, semi-hidden bidding system where only the top contender's identity and progress is known. Tiles are contested over time: once a claim starts, bids are evaluated at the end of each tick, and the highest bid pushes the claim forward. Physical presence or adjacency is required to initiate a bid, but any house can join the contest. Active claims are now visible both on the map (as a token) and on the tile card (with a dedicated indicator). Bid strength depends on many factors (including adjacency bonuses for your already owned tiles) — don’t skip the tooltips and hover new layout elements for info!

• Occupation. Lost a claim contest? No worries, you still have options! Occupation is a new command that lets Companies exert continuous pressure through military presence. In Cold War, it allows you to seize tiles in another house’s Wasteground (note: normal claims now also allow that!). In War, it also enables occupation of Feudum tiles. Both use the same bidding logic and indicators, but here your Company generates ongoing bids, based on its Tile Blocking value as long as it maintains control.

• Liberation If a tile that belongs to you or an ally is getting contested, other than indirectly helping by attacking the invaders, you can use the full scale of the bidding system to reclaim it — by mixing military presence or standard claiming. General tile blocking rules apply though: if an opponent maintains presence on the tile, it'll prevent you to execute commands on it. Successful liberation returns the tile to its original owner. Reclaim partially occupied tiles for their original owner — or, if you’re neither the original owner or an ally, exploit the chaos and take the tile for yourself.

• Disconnected tiles now matter Tiles cut off from their Manor fall out of the Feudum (into Wasteground if there’s room, otherwise becoming abandoned). Strategic layout isn't just about garrisons and economy anymore.

• Smarter labour policies Rulebooks now ship with several moddable default seasonal labour policies, just like in a classic 4X, each focusing on different production goals. You can switch built-in policies per Feudum