Peace making?

[FutureAndAHope]

I have to say I am really interested in this game, it appears to have al the elements of a great game.

Not sure how close you are to finalising the game, so my comment may not get any traction. But I have a suggestion.

I play Crusader Kings III, and overall it is not a bad game, but there is one weakness, you can not do anything if you seek a peaceful pathway.

My play style is often to try to make peace with neighbours, and build up my economy. But I find most games are so geared towards war, that developers forget to make tasks available for those who maybe seeking peace. It would be good to include some benefits for peace in the game. Like a feeling of safety/contentment for the population, and create additional tasks around economy, entertainment, and trade, so there is actually something to do if you want peace with neighbours.  

[FutureAndAHope]

Tournaments and jousts could be a good feature as well, knights can gain honor, experience, and prestige, during times of peace as well as war.  

[William Blake]

There are multiple winning conditions depending on a game mode and options and some of them are pure economy/diplomacy oriented. Although I doubt you can possibly win without any war at all because you can't get any new provinces without a conquest and other religions will be hostile to you at one point or another. But overall you don't have to go into war with everyone on the map. In fact it appears that probably you will be friendly with most other countries and still win.

[William Blake]

Just to put it in perspective. From dev stream:

 

This is royal court in  a middle of a game. 2 red ones are marshals - military commanders. Other 6 are NOT marshals. So from resource allocation point of view, military is only 25% of the kingdom.  The rest are - 1 spy, 1 diplomat, 2 merchants and 2 clerics. 

Edited January 17, 2022 by William Blake

[FutureAndAHope]

Thanks for the info. I am not trying to be fussy, but I guess the question has to be asked: What can you actually do with the merchants, diplomats etc. With the Crusader Kings III game, you can build towns etc, but that becomes quite boring after a while. I guess what I am looking for is some (optional) micromanagement of economic development.

As an example, maybe researching civil technologies, that can be used to give you benefits, or be used to produce luxury items that can be traded. Am example of a luxury item may be especially converted jewellery, longed for by kings, or clothing of a special kind that empires desire, and are willing to trade with you. Arab nations may have dried figs, or other delicacies that are required by kings courts. Some thing like that.

Maybe trade routes could be protected by armed escorts, and escorts gain experience much like in battle. Mini mission could be to successfully deliver a wedding ring to a kingdom having a wedding. Or to provide the item as a wedding gift to gain diplomatic favour.

If you had a flourishing clothing industry as an example you may receive visits from kingdoms wanting to try your wares, improving diplomatic relations. 

I am really thinking on the fly, so there are probably many more ideas that could benefit the game play.

[FutureAndAHope]

I n line with the whole research and trade things. Maybe religious orders, could produce decorated religious texts (after skill development/research), that are converted by religious nations, and give ongoing religious benefits to the holders. The items could have bents, i.e. A religious text may encourage the population to be a) more warlike, b) more peaceful. They could give other benefits like higher moral, based upon the selected trait.  These items would grant the nations ongoing benefits around what the king requires. A lot of the middle ages was bending religion to suit the desire of nations and kingdoms.

[William Blake]

Game already has a lot of things you imply with a different names. There are "books", which is global kingdom resource, knowledge power so to speak. There are "believes" which are buffs to population made by religious actions. There are "kingdom advantages" which are buffs to kingdom based on trade goods you can secure. There are "traditions" which are modifiers based on your royal court skills.

The information about all of this is scattered through the dev blogs, but it is in fact most of the things you want more or less in the game already.