Here’s hoping the mod is more interesting than the snooze-worthy narration.
The GOT mod is out and the little I’ve played of it was gorgeous. However I haven’t played in at least 6 months and am stumbling around again. And the GOT mod seems even more complex in terms of family lineage and stuff. So here’s to stumble-bumbling my way to the Iron Throne.
Just wanted to jump in and say despite being incredibly excited about the original release of CK3, the game just never quite grabbed me on release. I drifted away quite quickly.
However, I started playing again last week and have been having a blast. I’ve no idea why yet, to be honest, but it feels like it’s got that magic something again that just keeps me going.
Anyone else coming back to the game and liking it more now?
I’m glad you posted this. It’s been a while since I played and got totally burned out with how mechanical the game felt. It felt less like the story generator of CK2 and more like an arithmetic problem. Do you feel it’s gotten better in this respect?
I’m not sure I’ve played far enough yet to draw conclusions, I’m about 100 years into, yes… and Ireland save (because I forgot so much).
But I definitely feel like the came has more life. I’m more connected to the characters, The game just feels fuller, snappier, and tighter.
At release, there was something about the game that left me feeling like it was empty and clunky. I don’t know it was just a matter of cleaning up some of the mechanics, like combat, or the addition of more DLC, but the game just feels like it’s more alive now. I feel its systems, too, things like culture and religion, are more present. Just thinking through this now, but it just feels like there is more to do, and more happening on the whole, as well.
I saw above that someone doesn’t like the Royal Court addition. I’m largely enjoying it. I like how you can divert funds to making it more ostentatious, and that gives your kingdom other benefits. I like the way items work in the game now, too, and being able to display them in your court is, well, fun. The only thing that feels a little bit like a waste of time is “holding court”. The decisions don’t really seem that meaningful most of the time. You can only do that every five years, I think, but I largely find myself just not doing it.
You both gave a good description of what has always made me put CK3 down really quickly after I try it yet again. This includes my last attempt recently. Even tried out both the Elder Kings and GoT mods that are both really cool but ultimately still CK3. Oh well.
Reading the latest developer diaries provoked me to preorder the tours and tournaments expansion which releases tomorrow. I think its great how instead of introducing buttons to press and so on (looking at you many eu4 dlcs), the new features have direct interaction with the map and actually takes existing button presses (hunts feasts etc.) and turns them into map interaction.
Developer diaries are such a great marketing concept. I want to say paradox were really the first company that did weekly diaries with alot of content in each?
Holy cow, it comes out tomorrow? Age of Wonders 4, Stellaris expansion yesterday, and CK3’s tomorrow? What is Paradox trying to do to my wallet?
If not the first, one of the first. The regular weekly discussions of the game design is great, I agree.
First decent-sized company to really embrace them, at least. I think there were smaller devs doing a similar thing well before Paradox started.
Indeed, the more stuff map games do with their map the better. It’s kind of why I mostly avoid things like the macro builder in EU4, I don’t play these games to just ignore the map! CK3 felt especially egregious since it’s very character focused and all of that took place in menus and had really no relation to the map.
I know OPB is super enthusiastic about this DLC but since he gets early keys for this stuff I don’t know how much he’s allowed to be critical before it drops. But I doubt he’d fake being positive about it. His video about the last Vicky 3 dev diary about the French exclusive journals and events was pretty negative all around.
Let me roll up my sleeve, here ya go, Paradox. Just shoot me up with your latest DLC.
I noticed they were selling a pack of the new DLC and two future smaller packs for $35 and got it. Seems like a good deal and I saved 12 or 13 bucks. Just a heads up for my fellow junkies.
It isnt every day you see a paradox dlc launch with very positive reviews on steam! Havent had a chance to play with it yet, but glad to see my preorder (probably) wasnt a mistake this time.
I forgot this was coming out now and had it pre-ordered. But yeah, I was expecting to see the usual barrage of negative reviews. They are downright glowing on this one.
I’m not sure, but it sounds like the free update portion of things improves the game as well?
I have been playing in Italy with the new expansion and having a great time. I really liked CK3 at launch but felt it lacked the variety or depth to be a game to spend multiple hundreds of hours within. I think it is now finally starting to find its potential as one of Paradox’s greats.
The last time I seriously played was before the Royal Court expansion, so some of this stuff was introduced awhile ago:
-
The normal/grand activities really work. It integrates you more closely to the map, results in interesting interactions with vassals / lieges / court, and also ties into existing systems really well like artifacts and schemes. Probably one of the best mechanic introductions from an expansion in a Paradox game that I can recall (other contenders are e.g. Colonial nations in EU4).
-
Mechanically the game makes more sense now. Vassal stances seems like a fairly significant change that was brought into the patch, and give your decisions more meaning as all your vassals have personalities that react to how you rule your realm.
-
Roleplay / immersion potential has now exceeded CK2 for me. The portrait system continues to be amazing and draw you into what’s going on. Emerging narratives are there more and more, but CK2 was in rare occasions so bonkers I don’t think that’s ever going to be replicated by another game again.
-
The artifact and royal court systems introduced in the first big expansion are great too, really helps with roleplay and immersion as the new expansion’s stuff does.
Going forward, if the CK3 team could say make wars / crusades more interesting and continue pumping out flavour and variety across the gameworld, we’ll have a true gem here.
Really? Wow, maybe it is time for me to get back in. CK3 felt so mechanical last time I played (a year ago maybe?)
Totally agree with this, although you’ve articulated a lot of the whys better than I’m able to. It’s hard for me to put a finger on one thing, or even specifically why, but the game flows better now and I constantly feel like I have interesting things to do.
I’m convinced. Buying today.
Really? The Royal Court expansion definitely helped, but even with that, I felt the game fell into obviously repeating patterns after a couple of generations to not play every character exactly the same way. There was also still way too much pointless events of the form “Your great rival <character you’ve never noticed before> has suddenly died.”
YMMV, but CK2 in its final version did not feel quite this repetitive to me.
I feel part of the problem is the skill tree, because there is very little incentive (other than boredom) not to build every character in a similar way. Does the new DLC add significantly more content to the RPG aspect?
I’m with you there and it’s why I haven’t gotten this next expansion bundle yet. It does sound like the travel and events lead to much more interaction with other characters, which is certainly good, but I don’t know that it fixes the issue of your rulers basically all playing the same.
I started a game the other night as Ireland in 1066. Found a wife, and got one for my son as well. Both spouses had good stats and one even had a nice inheritable trait. I was informed that I could vassalize a state, and could declare war on another. Cool. Standard stuff. After a short amount of time, I was in a war with the land to the NW of me. Can’t remember the name. We were evenly matched, so I called in an ally. Wow! I was going to quickly control the entire lower half of Ireland.
My ally shows, we put the hurt on the larger county. BUT - the guy’s army marches down and sieges me while I’m trying to take his land. Crap. Well, it was going to be over for his city soon, except… my ally marches away because my son (and heir) were just killed. Suddenly, I’m called in to help England because I’m allied with them. Wait. I’m also called with someone up north to help INVADE England by another ally. Meanwhile, Mr. Fancypants is still seiging my land. Go to call in another ally. Sorry, already at war. I go to hire mercenaries. Aha! Finally seiged him down so his army departs my land. His heir swears to kill me and take my land. The same guy who killed my son. Son of a …!
This all happened in the first 30 to 40 minutes of play. Yeah. CK3 has come a long way.
Is the similarity of character development coming from the idea that there is one best route to develop a ruler? Not arguing against your point here. I haven’t played enough yet to make the distinctions, but to me it seems like you could have fun going down any of the skill trees.
I’ve been mainly exploring the martial route with my first few rulers because of their traits and where Ireland is geopolitically, but I could see the other four trees matching up well with other rulers and goals and nation states.