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 What is this game? Crusader Kings 3 is a grand strategy game set in Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and South Asia from 867 or 1066 to 1453. You take the role of a noble dynasty and lead them through plagues, war, and intrigue to power and fortune. So what does that mean exactly? You're playing as a medieval ruler. You can pick the lowly count of Cambridge, vassal of the English king, or play as the mighty Byzantine Emperor. You then try to advance your family's fortune, for example by fabricating claims on neighboring counties that you can then try to press in a war. Or by scheming to kill a vassal and his family so that you can inherit his holding. Or you can try to kidnap a wealthy noble so you can get a big ransom. Or you can marry your heir to a woman in the line of succession to some lands so that your grandchild(ren) inherit those provinces. And if the wife-to-be is low in the line of succession, a few strategic assassinations can work wonders. And you can also try to schmooze up to your liege, so that they may appoint you to their council, or even grant you some titles. Or your character is already a powerful ruler. In that case, you might still try to expand, waging holy wars against heathen neighbors, or perhaps pressing your claim to the neighboring kingdom you inherited from your mother. But you will also be busy with realm management, like placating your powerful vassals so that they don't start factions to overthrow you, crushing peasant revolts, or dealing with heresies popping up in parts of your kingdom. A powerful duke who absolutely won't be mollified by anything you do might also meet a tragic end in an "accident". And perhaps you need to bribe the most outraged vassals after your part in that "accident" comes out. And when you're not scheming or waging war, you need to build up your personal holdings, pass laws giving you more troops or taxes from your vassals, and maybe swat down some vikings raiding your coasts. I'm new to grand strategy games, should I try Crusader Kings 3? Why should I play it over the much cheaper CK2? CK3 looks like the most newbie friendly Paradox game ever. The game has extensive tooltips, including tooltips in tooltips! A lot of terms that might or might not be obvious work like hyperlinks, opening a pop-up that explain what those are about. They range from the basics like "what is a duchy?" to the far less obvious "what does de jure mean?". There's also an improved tutorial, as opposed to the outdated and partly broken CK2 tutorial. If you're intimidated by a nearly decade old game with a ton of DLCs adding features, this will be the chance to play it from the start. The game also looks like it will be a big improvement over it's predecessor. There's obviously the big graphics update, with 3D models replacing CK2's 2D models. And many core systems already look like they received big overhauls, with the religion system for example already promises more depth with less yank than CK2's counterpart. If you're interested in learning more, you can read the developer diaries (https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...mation.1289830/), or watch this series of short CK3 videos, each focusing on one aspect of the game (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26vR8IdZmGQ). I'm a CK2 veteran, what are the biggest changes? First big change is the new world map:  This is the 867 map. There are big additions in Africa, as well as small expansions in East Asia. There's also more impassable terrain. One important change is that now each holding is present on the map. You can siege a county's cities before you attack it's barony(s). You can only take control of a county when you control all it's fortified holdings, which means you don't need to bother sieging every church or city holding in a county. Baronies are also now integral parts of their counties, meaning you never have to deal with border gore like the king of England holding some barony in France that one of his vassals inherited. You can now only play tribal and feudal rulers, but it looks like merchant republics and hordes have been removed from the game entirely. Meaning you should be able to play every ruler but landed clergy and the odd republican ruler. You can play as any religion from the start. As I alluded above, there are only two start dates: 867 and 1066. You can no longer advance the start date by single days from 1066 on, so your choice of different starts is more limited than in CK2. The technology system has been totally overhauled, techs are now tied to cultures instead of provinces, and are named innovations now, as they are no longer pure technologies. There are military and civic innovations (like horseshoes increasing your armies' movement speed, or Royal Prerogative enabling you to enact high crown authority law), as well as regional innovations (like Reconquista, making holy warring easier, but this innovations is only available to cultures in Iberia, of course). The innovations are also tied to the passage of time, Late Medieval Era innovations cannot be discovered before 1200 for example. Dynasties have been greatly improved. Cadet branches are now in the game, the head of a dynasty has special powers to disinherit a dynasty member, force peace between relatives, or invest in the new dynasty legacies. These are like mini tech trees affecting all family members, like improving the odds of dynasty members inheriting good congenital traits, increasing each family member's prestige gain by 10%, or making them more desirable in marriages. Dynasty legacies kind of replace the bloodline system of CK2. Lifestyles are now part of the base game, and are greatly expanded. Each of the 5 lifestyles now boast three skill trees. Your character will earn lifestyle experience passively (modified by traits), and they will be able to invest the experience in those trees. You can still change your lifestyle, and keep your unlocked skills. All in all, CK3 is even more of an RPG than CK2. Imperator: Rome was touted as a mix of EU4 and CK2, but it turned out that it was more like 80% EU4 and 20% CK2 (or "EU4 with some CK2 elements"), which pleased some people and disappointed other players. So if you don't care too much about the RPG aspects, Imperator: Rome might be better for you. If the RPG aspect was why you enjoyed CK2 over EU4, then CK3 is almost certainly the game for you. There are a ton of other changes, far too many for me to list them all. Like the big religion overhaul, reformation is now in the base game, and not limited to pagans only! I've linked the dev diaries and video guides, you should read/watch them to learn more. The game will be released September 1st, 2020. Crusader Kings 3 looks like it will be a very worthy successor to Crusader Kings 2. But remember to be cautious before buying or pre-ordering games. CK2 had a very good release, other Paradox games were often enough much worse on launch. And there's always SotS2 to keep in mind. So decide for yourself whether you are interested enough to pay money before extensive reviews have come out. I've already pre-ordered, and I will keep this thread updated when the game is released, so keep an eye on this thread if you're unsure whether to buy or not. If you're interested, the Crusader Kings 2 thread is here. Torrannor fucked around with this message at 13:20 on Aug 23, 2020 |
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Aug 23, 2020 00:53
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| # ? Apr 25, 2024 03:03 |
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Guides, info posts and more: Big post explaining roughly what we know about the new religious system here: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?noseen=1&threadid=3937583&pagenumber=3&perpage=40#post507510882 Post about what different mechanics of CK2 DLC seem to have made the jump to CK3: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3937583&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=5#post507537250 Torrannor fucked around with this message at 09:46 on Aug 25, 2020 |
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Aug 23, 2020 00:54
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Reserved also.
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Aug 23, 2020 00:54
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This looks like it going to be so good. Doesn't look like they have the warrior lodges anymore, going to miss those from ck2.
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Aug 23, 2020 00:56
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Excited for this guy. I like the increased granularity in the secrets/hooks and religious systems, and how they interact. The "legal" system in CK2 always left something to be desired imo, not least of which would be some way to track crimes and such.
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Aug 23, 2020 01:18
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I skimmed the OP, so sorry if I missed it, but how are the prospects for mods looking? I don't know much about how easy they were in CK2 but I do know I got a lot of extra play out of them. Hoping we can expect to see more!
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Aug 23, 2020 01:26
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this will be my first CK game
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Aug 23, 2020 01:33
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aparmenideanmonad posted:I skimmed the OP, so sorry if I missed it, but how are the prospects for mods looking? I don't know much about how easy they were in CK2 but I do know I got a lot of extra play out of them. Hoping we can expect to see more! Prospects are looking very good I think. Here's a recent DD if you want to read some more.
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Aug 23, 2020 01:38
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eonwe posted:this will be my first CK game We have such sights to show you.
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Aug 23, 2020 02:55
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Not buying it until I can go insane and place my favorite horse on my council and commit suicide because I'm depressed.
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Aug 23, 2020 03:05
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Despite the lack of societies and artifacts, I look forward to once more making the world pagan and woman lead, this time with the added bonuses of gay.
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Aug 23, 2020 03:21
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Eimi posted:Despite the lack of societies and artifacts, I look forward to once more making the world pagan and woman lead, this time with the added bonuses of gay. IIRC devs said something about game options allowing for tolerance in gender roles as well as sexuality. Imperator Rome had similar rule. So it might be easier than you think.
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Aug 23, 2020 06:11
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Can I still create a harem of genius women to give me genius heirs? Can I still imprison or execute undesirable heirs?
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Aug 23, 2020 06:44
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CK2 is a game I had a lot of fun playing despite being kind of bad at. Really looking forward to this one!
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Aug 23, 2020 06:47
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My body is ready but my wallet is not.
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Aug 23, 2020 07:09
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BluesShaman posted:Can I still create a harem of genius women to give me genius heirs? Yes to the harem, no to the execution; but if you have the sadist trait you can use hostile scheme against your kids and assassinate them. AtomikKrab posted:My body is ready but my wallet is not. CK3 is launching on PC Game Pass which can still be had for the $1 trial period!
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Aug 23, 2020 07:12
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Anyone know if ck3 will have dowries? I always thought it was weird not having them in a medieval marriage arranging stimulator
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Aug 23, 2020 07:35
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Eimi posted:Despite the lack of societies and artifacts, I look forward to once more making the world pagan and woman lead, this time with the added bonuses of gay. Are artifacts and societies within the realm of early modding possibility?
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Aug 23, 2020 07:47
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CommunityEdition posted:Are artifacts and societies within the realm of early modding possibility? The game is not out yet, we have no idea. That said, both artifacts and societies were popular enough that I wouldn't be surprised to see their return in a future DLC. Especially societies, but hopefully much bigger in scope.
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Aug 23, 2020 08:05
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As a fool who got burned by Imperator, I know I should be more wary about this game, but darn it CK2 is my favorite PDX game and I've played it since launch. It better be good!
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Aug 23, 2020 08:07
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I played like a million hours of EU4 and a million hours of Stellaris. I never gave CK2 a shot, but intended to eventually. If feedback is good I might just grab CK3 instead
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Aug 23, 2020 08:09
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There's simply no rush to get the game. It will be this newbie friendly for months after release. If you're on the fence, bookmark the thread, and wait for us to report how good the game holds up 
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Aug 23, 2020 08:17
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As a long-time CK2 player I'm happy I'll be able to play this on an "extended trial" on game pass cheap as chips, and then buy it on Steam when the DLC start rolling in.
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Aug 23, 2020 08:36
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I am so incredibly excited for this.
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Aug 23, 2020 08:46
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CK2 is my favorite paradox game and pretty much everything I saw about CK3 looks good. I can't wait to backstab and kinslay.
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Aug 23, 2020 09:00
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So we know what time zone they’re using for launch date? I’m hoping to be able to play next Monday night (PST) since it’s only 8GB.
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Aug 23, 2020 10:05
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The North Tower posted:So we know what time zone they’re using for launch date? I’m hoping to be able to play next Monday night (PST) since it’s only 8GB. We usually hit the big release button in the afternoon Central European Time, but I don't know if we've announced any exact timing for CK3 yet.
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Aug 23, 2020 10:11
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LordMune posted:We usually hit the big release button in the afternoon Central European Time, but I don't know if we've announced any exact timing for CK3 yet. Tell me there’s a giant novelty button.
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Aug 23, 2020 10:22
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LordMune posted:We usually hit the big release button in the afternoon Central European Time, but I don't know if we've announced any exact timing for CK3 yet.
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Aug 23, 2020 10:30
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QuarkJets posted:I played like a million hours of EU4 and a million hours of Stellaris. I never gave CK2 a shot, but intended to eventually. If feedback is good I might just grab CK3 instead Well I got onto Stellaris from CK2. Stellaris plays like a civ game in comparison, though its v much my bag. Imagine Stellaris, but every single portrait in the game had the same tools and rules and aim of winning as you. Every one of the bastards can do what you do, even the guys on your team. Especially those guys. DS9 but everyone is garak. CK2 can be minmaxed and cheesed but to little point, its much more fun play it organically and accidentally fail upwards and lock yourself in with a nemesis or two of your own creation, sometimes your own blood. I never found it a power fantasy game, its much more about scrambling to salvage a position at the top of the pile and laughing at how the hell you managed to pull that off. CK3 might be even more like that. I'd play CK2 pen and paper beside me taking note of my council member's money to spot if anyone was on the take, but its even more blackmail focused which isn't going to be something I can probably keep note of. I'll just be paying attention to who could gain from each mysterious action until I start blaming my computer for being in on it.
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Aug 23, 2020 11:28
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I'd also want to remind you all that CK2 is free. You'll be missing a lot of DLC features and especially DLC portraits but it's still an amazing experience on its own. So go try it while you wait for CK3.
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Aug 23, 2020 11:38
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I'm finally completing a playthrough of CK2 thanks to the release of this, and the work I've put into growing and maintaining my Satanic Empire is the funniest poo poo I've ever done in a videogame. Also apparently this is on Xbox Game Pass so I don't have to pay full price for this new one, lucky me.
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Aug 23, 2020 11:48
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I am always going to call them tootlips from now on.
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Aug 23, 2020 13:09
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The thing I look most forward to is not understanding how things work and bumbling around. It's impossible to recapture that early game enjoyment in CK2, where discovering the game was half the fun, after you figure it all out. I hope the new game can give me some of that, at least for a little while.
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Aug 23, 2020 13:23
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Mmmm I might have to get this. An improved tutorial system sounds nice. Also what is SotS 2? Googling brings up an old 4X called Sword of the Stars 2 but there’s no indication that a remake is being made?
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Aug 23, 2020 13:39
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Jakabite posted:Mmmm I might have to get this. An improved tutorial system sounds nice. Naw you've got it, it's an infamous case of why you never pre-order. SOTS1 is a beloved classic, 2 was an unbelievable shitshow (or so I hear.)
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Aug 23, 2020 14:18
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Is there a reason we can't preorder this on steam?
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Aug 23, 2020 14:20
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Raged posted:Is there a reason we can't preorder this on steam? There are problems with age restrictions / ratings if you're in Australia that caused it to be pulled. They're trying to resolve them and recently fixed it for New Zealand.
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Aug 23, 2020 14:39
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How likely is this to be easier to grasp as a newbie vs CK2? CK2 confused me to no end and this is as someone who figured out the inscrutable ways of EU4 and HOI4.
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Aug 23, 2020 15:51
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Peachy Poo posted:Naw you've got it, it's an infamous case of why you never pre-order. SOTS1 is a beloved classic, 2 was an unbelievable shitshow (or so I hear.) Yep, and more so than you’d expect. If I remember correctly, it was so broken at launch that the devs tried to save face by lying about having accidentally uploaded an old build. Even after a series of hilarious patches, it was still a profoundly unpleasant game on account of the lead dev being unable to take “your ideas are bad” as an answer. And it STILL got an expansion before they gave up!
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Aug 23, 2020 15:55
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