The grand strategy series Crusader Kings is expecting a new entry in 2020. Crusader Kings 3 is currently under development by Paradox Interactive after being announced back in October for PC. Since then, information has been slowly flowing from the Crusader Kings forum and new information has been released via developer diary entry Tuesday. The entry displayed all new features and a few changes from Crusader Kings 2. A video entry for the diary was also released Friday of this week.
The forum entry detailed the changes coming to the player’s court. Crusader Kings 3 is retaining the five core councilors: Chancellors, Spymasters, Stewards, Marshals, and Chaplains as well as a possible vassal as a councilor. While similar to the previous games in structure, the court in Crusader Kings 3 will be smaller on average and court members will leave your service to pursue other ambitions if they are not being utilized.
Additionally, guests will be visiting your court and interacting with other court members. These guests will stay for a few years but can be recruited if they are to your liking. However, you will have to either offer them a title or a bribe—or seduce them to stay. Certain guests are more likely to visit if they carry a high opinion of you, or you have a goal that aligns with their goals. The more in common you and the guest share the more often they will visit and try to be recruited.
As well, members of your court that leave after attaining family member status too far down the line to inherit property become stateless and will be classified as “Wanderers.” These characters travel around and begin developing on their own; Wanderers pick up skills, secrets and can possibly obtain a prestigious profession.
The video entry details upcoming tweaks, such as assassinations becoming much easier to plan and predict. Players can take more actions to bolster the percentile chance of a successful assassination; as well, the target character will take actions to protect himself if the scheme is found out. The attempted assassination is no longer capable of being foiled prematurely and can only fail during the act. Other methods of spoiling assassinations can be used, such as blackmailing characters with secrets you have come across, or even using the art of seduction to get what you want.
The core council members received some tweaks in an attempt to make them more impactful. For example, Stewards have a new task called “development” that helps structure your economy, and Spymasters can attempt to uncover secrets to exploit. A new drastic change is that Chaplains can now fabricate claims on land and titles, an aspect of the game that used to be random. A new addition is a Bishop, a special Court Chaplin for large religions. Bishops can lease your holdings for a temple upwards to a third, and they collect the taxes for the land. Depending on how much the Bishop favors you determines the amount of the taxes he gives back to you, a bad relationship rewards less gold or even no gold. Vassals will be playing a larger role, and can cause rebellions or even veto your actions if they dislike your character.
The final update is portraits. Characters will now have more facial traits to make then visually distinct, and children will be inheriting features from their parents to make a visually clear lineage. Character portraits now show the torso instead of the head and neck, with wealthy characters wearing fancier clothing. Finally, characters will visually display their age (and their appearance will become older as time passes) and characters that fall ill will reflect that with pale skin and sunken eyes.
Crusader Kings 3 will be coming to Steam and Windows, as well as being available with the Xbox Game Pass.