DevDiary 33 - Patch 1.3 Updates

[THQN Brad]

Hello friends and welcome to the third post-release DevDiary for “Knights of Honor II: Sovereign”! We know that it’s been some time since our last update and you’re probably hungry for news about what’s to come. So, let’s dive right in and discuss what you can expect in the latest upcoming patch.

With the upcoming update you can expect a few major quality of life additions, with perhaps the most requested by fans of the game being the zoom-out level of the game’s camera. It has been increased both in world view and during tactical battles, when the “Extra zoom out” setting is enabled. This allows players to see significantly bigger portion of the world. Preserving the older zoom-out restrictions may still be a better choice for players with low-end hardware, as observing such a large area with numerous objects in it has its toll on the performance and requires more powerful system to ensure high frame rate.

When you need to transition to political view, you can now do it seamlessly by simply scrolling the middle mouse button. In the same manner, zooming in while on political view leads to a seamless world view transition, enabling much smoother navigation between the two modes.



While we’re on the topic of navigation, the option to set waypoints to army movement in world view has also been introduced. You should now be able to do that by holding down SHIFT while ordering an army to move, similar to how you can set waypoints to units in tactical battles. This can be key when you want to navigate past certain kingdoms’ territories, for example to avoid relationship drops or potentially threatening armies in the area. It is really useful to avoid other inconvenient maneuvers of your armies, like crossing rivers while being chased or passing in the vicinity of castles and towns, that deal attrition damage.

Waypoint can either be set to an empty spot on the map or to any specific object (e.g., town, settlement, mercenary camp). Armies will interact with said object if it’s the last in the movement queue, with the caveat that entering battle cancels all subsequent waypoints.

We’ve also vastly improved the AI in tactical battles. A big part of our efforts was focused on making sure that noblemen cavalry squads act more careful and avoid ending up in dangerous situations; and when that happens – to try and run before it’s too late. These features were already present, but we made a major overhaul of the system and fixed some unwanted behavior that we encountered along the way.

Extensive work was done on fleshing out the threat assessment by all units. Areas where archers are shooting or can shoot at are now also properly recognized as higher-threat zones and entered with more caution – a behavior that didn’t work as we expected it to and is now debugged and rebalanced. AI squads also try to protect their archers more often.

On players’ side, keeping your archers more spread-out should now be of a bigger importance, as disorganized state has more severe penalties and properly triggers when ranged squads are trying to shoot while their lines are overlapping. Finally, increasing the friendly fire significantly should make strategic players think twice before sending deadly volleys where their own troops are fighting.



There are also some vital tactical battle improvements on a more micro-level. For example, squads should now position themselves a bit better on the battlefield and chase enemies more efficiently. Enemies are now more reluctant to split their forces and rush for your capture points, which sometimes allowed for easy victories by the players when forces were otherwise equally matched.

As a combination with all these changes, and many others, we hope that playing tactical battles will feel more fluid, challenging and interesting as an overall experience.

A few new exciting rules have also been added to campaigns, hopefully allowing for more varied starts and interesting challenges. First off, you can now “shatter” the world by forcing all kingdoms on the map (not only player, but also AI-controlled ones) to start with 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5-province territories. This option can be set via the “Kingdom size” option in both singleplayer and multiplayer lobbies. While playing with these rules, all kingdoms start off on an equal footing, with no trade centers, caliphates and autocephalous states (with the exception of the orthodox owner of Constantinople).



Speaking of fair starts, the “Religious Standing” campaign rule has been reworded and expanded to include more options in multiplayer. Now called “Kingdom standing”, it offers separate settings which offer more starting limitations for all players in a campaign. Namely, starting with no trade centers, not having an autocephalous/caliphates state, or having no vassals/sovereigns. The two other options in this ruleset allow you to either start a campaign fully historical regarding these aspects, or fully balanced (taking all of the criteria above into account).

Last but not least, we’ve been working hard on narrowing down the potential causes for some unfortunate game crashes and disconnects in multiplayer. This update includes some vital backend tweaks that will hopefully eliminate as much of these issues as possible.

As we wrap this diary, we’d like to thank every person who has commented on the forums and our discord channel, sharing what they’d want from the game. This feedback is invaluable to us and it would be an understatement to say that all of it helps us immensely. Thanks to all of you who also responded to our enquiries, when nasty bugs and issues were reported and we needed additional information. You rock!

If you have any further questions, or simply wish to chat about all things related to Knights of Honor II, feel free to join us in our DevStream on Wednesday the 19^th of April on the THQ Nordic channel: http://twitch.tv/thqnordic. Until then – go forth and conquer!
 

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[Yavor]

Thank you so much, guys! I absolutely love the tactical battle changes! Hope you all had a wonderful weekend! 🙂 

[Milliarde]

Excellent stuff in this patch.

- multiplayer bugfix will be huge, as disconnects are a big problem
- QOL stuff like higher zoom and army waypoints on world map will be super nice
- "shattered" kingdom mechanic is great, should add some interesting variety for campaigns
- kingdom standing feature is much needed as well, very good inclusion

Thanks for the update, looking forward to when it's released

[Lisotte]

Awesome news, we've been waiting for this!!!!  Can't wait to try out multiplayer after the fixes!!!

PS I think there was a bit of a formatting break after the final screenshot, the font is in a smaller size after the final screenshot which makes it harder to read.

[Hubris423]

I made a post on your forums to no regard, you need to add unit cards and descriptions to the country selection screen.

[Labmug_0]

Absolutely awsome, just one further sujestion is to please fix up the borders in iberia, portugal looks squished and maybe add a reconquista feature.

 

[Honululu]

The multiplayer still does not work. Please rent a server if peer-to-peer is too demanding for you. 

 

[Timerlane]

Hi team,
awesome changes and thank you for listening to the community. I am posting a couple of suggestions perhaps for future reference. It will be great if we can get a discussion going between the community and you guys on these:

- Historical Engagement -> the weight of the historical facts from my point are not enough. The pyramids and Mt Etna are a pretty nice touch, but I personally want to see a bit more. For instance, Rome with a non-touchable building (the Colosseum), Constantinople with Hague Sophia, Paris with Notre Dame... That will make those symbolic cities different from the rest. It‘s quite sad to start with Constantinople, which is completely empty in terms of building slots and they are no different than the rest.
- The Capital -> The capital is the center of your empire, the cradle of culture and civilization. Yet again, the importance of your capital is somehow missing because you are not getting it noted or shown in any way. You don’t get benefits such as additional building or army slots. The only sign will be your king if you assign it to it, but this somehow remains unnoticed or without any value at all.
- Cultural Buildings -> those are actually missing as a whole, and I am not referring to the Cathedral and the University. What I am talking about are other buildings like Libraries, Arena, Podium, Actors’ Guild, etc. There are no parks, gardens or fountains, which were also part of the cultural society and development of a city.
- Speaking about Building Districts -> Selez has created an extremely interesting mod where Farming District is changed. He had added a totally new building called Watermill – simply genius, as this was highly used building in the Medieval Ages. What I would like to see is even further improvement. Maybe something like Cultivation, Water Lifting cranes, maybe Wells or perhaps shadoofs or qanats.
- Military Building Districts -> I miss the fortifications from KoH1 :( It will be spectacular if we have Fortifications as an additional separate Building District as well. Towers, Gates, Moat, Drawbridge, Murder-Holes (if I am correct with the naming), Catapults on Towers, Balistas… a Citadel… all those that were available in KoH1. It was nice seeing them changing your entire castle’s look.
- Family Utilisation -> all the princesses have skills (stars), but those are not usable. There should be a better application for them, not marriages only. For example, within your court an option to appoint your daughter as a queen? It may result in revolt or discontent, but there are exceptions like Elisabeth I or Catherine the Great. What about using them in the other’s court as well? Like promoting our religion or when a son is born from your princess to be educated in your culture/religion. For Muslim religion perhaps multiple marriages?...
- Crusades, Jihad and Mercenaries -> I believe it will be more historically accurate if multiple factions and marshals join a crusade. Same for a Jihad. For mercenaries, it will be beneficial to have an additional option to support a revolt. Additionally, this can be a beneficial point for rebels as well, because I had a situation in which I am going into war towards a besieged castle from my supporters. When I attack, I am attacking the rebels instead of supporting them to conquer the castle…
- Peace offerings -> it will be nice if it is given an option to make certain negotiations or demands when the opponent is asking for peace. Not just from my side, when I am asking for peace and demanding from the other side (i.e.) vassalage.
- Summarised news -> worsen or improved relationship as an effect from a certain action… Wow, if you try to win the game through diplomacy manoeuvres, the amount of coming separate messages for positive/negative relations, is simply too much. It will be far much better, if they are all summed up in 1 single message as a list.
- Formable nations -> this is the last one, I promise. Those special quests, for forming/uniting a nation, are piece of art. We are all trying them and it is (maybe) one of the most beloved actions from KoH1. I am delighted to have them in KoH2, but I would suggest a tiny change: adding the entire title, like “Empire” or “Union”, or “Commonwealth”, or “Khaganate”, etc. at the end. Not just Spain, Ireland, Armenia, Bulgaria or Serbia. It looks different, especially on the map, when you have fulfilled this sort of special quest and see the entire name written😊 It brings this small measure of satisfaction and also acknowledgement.
p.s. Please add more! 😊 We miss Unite Germany, Scotland, France, etc. 😉

[Sh0ppo from 9ers_Gaming]

really nice addings! Highly appreciate the camera settings - was hoping for them since day one of the beta.

 

The additional game settings are also really nice. The shattered provinces for players and also the AI was desperately needed 😄edit: not to mention waypoints for army movement 

Edited April 20, 2023 by Sh0ppo from 9ers_Gaming

[cc93dcx]

Let’s talk about the points that still need to be improved in the 2nd generation.
1. Although it is not entirely advisable for the lord to die of old age, it can be made into an independent option for the start of the game. You can activate it yourself if you need it. In order not to make people collapse, you should let the lord age at the same rate as important relatives, or a little slower.
2. Just like the first generation, let the unit's basic morale and physical strength bar be visualized. Now I don't know how long it will be before the cavalry charges twice before they can charge again. Also, I hope that the basic morale of the city defense army without a general leader can also be seen on the big map.
3. The building needs to be simplified. For example, the items in the Royal Armory can be placed in the building upgrade of the palace or castle.
4. Increase the building column, the existing 8 building columns are too few.
5. The unlocking of arms should be linked to military buildings. For example, barracks can train militia series arms. Castle - Armory trains heavy units. The palace unlocks elite units. And the building should bring bonuses to the number of units, etc.
6. Some famous urban areas should have fixed resource output and special landmark buildings, which can bring great bonuses. Like the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople.

[mehmet harun]

Hello.  The game is very nice, but it could be more fun if a few additions were made.  First of all, the number of knights is insufficient.  1 additional knight should be granted for every 5 provinces.  Secondly, we must be able to protect our vassals.  We must be able to conclude an end-of-war agreement with their enemies for them.  Finally, we must be able to negotiate in diplomacy.  We must be able to offer money or land when asking for something.  Thank you