Patch #52 (BETA). Intimidation, Notification Reform, and Balance

Hello everyone!

This is the last patch in BETA chanell before the main branch update, which we are planning for Friday.

It includes the system of intimidating lords through terror, farming adjustments (thanks to our Discord community for pointing out the issue), changes to AI behavior on the global map, and much more.

Farming

The growth cycle of Rye and Hops has been reduced to 4 days, and vegetables to 2 days. This allows you to harvest up to 3 times per season, providing more balanced gameplay and reducing the risk of losing crops unfairly.

Intimidation system

Now punishing a lord instills fear thoughts in all others. This greatly increases their relations with your ruler but lowers their mood. You can try playing as a tyrant.

Notification system rework

We have reworked the notification system, removing many unnecessary and distracting ones. In particular, the top notifications about deep communication have been removed (you can still see what is happening in the status under the lord’s name).

New character traits

Seven new character traits have been added. More are coming soon.

• Honest Trader

• Iron Fist

• Benefactor

• Combat Teacher

• Intimidating

• Bookworm

• Friend of the Scriptonics

Global map

Hostile and strong neighbors will now demand vassalage from you more aggressively.

Other changes based on your feedback

• Clay pottery no longer requires technology and is available immediately after building the Clay Workshop

• Seduction system nerf - consequences for the initiator have been increased, preventing it from being used too frequently

• At least one faction on the world map will sell Rye

• The Scriptonic will bring books of the ruler’s culture instead of the culture dominant among adult lords. It will also always bring language dictionaries

Once again, thank you very much for your feedback and participation. We continue working - the most interesting things are just beginning!

Full list of changes

Characters and social mechanics

• Added character trait “Honest Trader”

• Added character trait “Iron Fist”

• Added character trait “Benefactor”

• Added character trait “Combat Teacher”

• Added character trait Intimidating

• Added character trait Bookworm

• Added character trait Friend of the Scriptonics

Intimidation

• Added loss of half of a lord’s direct followers when punished on the scaffold

• Added display of all consequences of punishing a lord on the scaffold — changes in relations with the player ruler, changes in lords’ mood, and more

• Added accusations against a lord by fanatics, which are applied when a fanatic religious uprising is declared (not the bishop)

• Added restriction on possible punishments when accusation traits are present

• Added traits Accused of Crime and Accused by Bishop for lords. These traits allow punishing a lord on the scaffold without mood penalties for other lords. Traits are applied when committing crimes (murders, attempted murders, poisonings, attempted coup) and when accused by the bishop before a religious uprising

• Player lords and junior player lords (excluding hired free lords) will receive the fear thought “Intimidated” toward the ruler and the mood thought “Terror” from punishments on the scaffold. Thought strength depends on the type of punishment

Balance

• The inventory of a free lord will be destroyed when the body is burned instead of being transferred to the player; the thought about the death of a faction member has been removed

• The player ruler will no longer receive sin for ordering seduction

• Punishing a lord on the scaffold will give a 3x stronger and longer-lasting thought to execution witnesses - commoners

• The negative thought from seduction will last 10 days instead of 3

• The seducer will not receive the thought “Good sex”

• The social thought that a lord played dice with someone increased to +14, the mood thought from winning dice increased to +16

• Farm growth settings updated - growth duration reduced

• “Soft” vassalage removed (where a neighbor offers vassalage without threat), but the chance of “hard” vassalage increased

• The heavy tribute demand variant (where a neighbor threatens attack) removed - but the light tribute variant now has higher amounts, higher chance, adjusted relation thresholds, and stronger relation penalties when refusing to pay

• Clay pottery can now be produced without researching technology

• At least one neighbor will sell Wheat

• The Scriptonic will bring books of the ruler’s culture instead of the culture dominant among adult lords

• The trait from the death of a close one (like grey hair) is now given to only one random character

• The Depression trait now applies a -5 penalty to skills

Interface, notifications and UX

• Added ability to specify hint context for reasons of skill level changes in the character menu

• Notifications about results of unique guests are now normal, not important / they are removed after reading letters

• Added a single notification for political changes (X is no longer an ally of the politician) instead of separate ones

• Reinforcement transfer notifications are grouped into one

• If a faction is destroyed by a horde, only one destruction notification is shown instead of two

• The hint reset option is now unavailable during gameplay

• When a soldier uses painkillers, it does not create a notification; instead, at 20:00 a summary notification appears with total usage

• The dice game notification moved to the top

• Removed knowledge study status from bottom right / it is now shown in lord hints in the top panel

• The game no longer pauses due to mountain marauder attack notification

• Conspiracy threat notification now has a 24-hour cooldown

• Buildings constructed after 15:00 will not appear as uninspected in the evening notification

• The game no longer pauses when hunters fight a flatwolf

• Removed deep communication notifications (top)

• Removed “child is not studying” notification

• Removed war consequences notification

• New energetic residents notification moved to the top

• Added display under the lord’s name showing what they are saying (joking, insulting, etc.) during communication activity

• Added name separation when characters stand close to each other

Fixes and stability

• Fixed character trait “Duelist”

• Fixed a bug where prisoners got pneumonia while sleeping in the barracks during winter

• Fixed game freeze when saving if a character had a seduction task

• Fixed a crash that could occur when destroying the alliance leader’s city

• Fixed a bug where seduction on the global map could fail if the seducer was acting under another lord’s order

• Fixed a bug where seduction could end without starting

• Fixed a bug where ending one trade agreement removed another one in the same city

• Fixed infinite loading for some old saves

• Fixed a possible crash when moving a building

• Fixed a bug where any resident becoming loyal to a lord was counted as loyal to the ruler in statistics

• Fixed talent assignment without required level

• Fixed a possible crash when closing menus

• Fixed a crash when starting a new game with a family with children

• Fixed a bug where the tutorial froze when exiting to the main menu

Graphics

• Fixed shadow rendering when zooming camera over water

• Added lakes and rivers to some maps

• Flower and mushroom decals will no longer appear on clay and mud

• Added new ground decals. Decals will no longer render on sand (except stones). Forests will have mushrooms and sticks