Torture useless?

[MasterKroket]

Supposedly you can get secrets from torturing people. Really???
What are the odds of this? 0,1%? i have tortured quite a few people over my 150 hour + gametime and have yet to find a single secret...

Even worse some idiots are scheming to murder my little daughter for whatever absurd reason and my spymaster finds one of my dukes part of the scheme. So i imprison and torture the monster. But he doesnt give away the name of the ringleader ?!?!! Like how? that makes no sense. Well he can spend the rest of his days behind bars since executing him would lead to tyranny lol.... what?

[ManDudely]

Torture does yield secrets. I can say that in confidence because it has happened several times for a recent character I was playing.

She was the Sadistic Queen of Jerusalem, so she lost stress for torturing. So anyone I captured, I tortured first before ransoming. She had Dark Insights, so she got random stats increases out of torture. So there's two reasons to do it, for the right character.

There are torture based path features you can take to negate the piety hit. But I'm not sure if I was even getting one before it considering Muslims are considered Evil to Catholics.

[Makeithappen]

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

Torture IRL does rarely bring actual insights. Why would it do that in the game?

The "guilty" ones most likely keep quiet, while the innocent ones make up some stories, which in turn brings more pain to more innocent people.

thats very situational. even for IRL.

[peequi]

Originally posted by K0NFL1QT:

Torture does yield secrets. I can say that in confidence because it has happened several times for a recent character I was playing.

She was the Sadistic Queen of Jerusalem, so she lost stress for torturing. So anyone I captured, I tortured first before ransoming. She had Dark Insights, so she got random stats increases out of torture. So there's two reasons to do it, for the right character.

There are torture based path features you can take to negate the piety hit. But I'm not sure if I was even getting one before it considering Muslims are considered Evil to Catholics.

Good point on torturing hostile religious groups. Can anyone confirm if piety takes it hit or not when torturing hostile religions?

[Сааребас]

Originally posted by K0NFL1QT:

Torture does yield secrets. I can say that in confidence.

Blink twice for help

[ACS36]

Torture isn't useless. It's one of the most broken mechanics in the game alongside how the prison system works. In fact it's so effective that it makes alternative routes of playing very unappealing.

[ManDudely]

Originally posted by ACS36:

Torture isn't useless. It's one of the most broken mechanics in the game alongside how the prison system works. In fact it's so effective that it makes alternative routes of playing very unappealing.

I don't see it as being that broken, even for a character who specced into it. Everyone still hates you for it. Although I don't fully understand Dread yet.

Using abduction to insta-win wars is the most broken mechanic, in my opinion.

[La Comte de Frou Frou]

Originally posted by RodHull:

Originally posted by La Comte de Frou Frou:

I want paradox to add agonised screaming audio...

My personal caged dwarf is getting fed up of me wrenching his nipples to simulate it.

How quaint, I have a man servant to do the nipple wrenching for me, while I sit being fed grapes.

I had one but I refused to pay him minimum wage. I think he’s working in primary school as a teachers assistant now...

[CrUsHeR]

Originally posted by JohnWick:

Originally posted by CrUsHeR:

Torture IRL does rarely bring actual insights. Why would it do that in the game?

The "guilty" ones most likely keep quiet, while the innocent ones make up some stories, which in turn brings more pain to more innocent people.

thats very situational. even for IRL.

That is exactly how it works IRL.

Example the real al-qaeda terrorists were prepared to get tortured, and they believed in a higher purpose of what they did. So they very rarely gave away real information.
Meanwhile the innocent civilian suspects (the vast majority of torture victims) have no idea what's going on, so they just make up some information to make the torture stop.

On that topic - the movie "Zero Dark Thirty" was heavily criticized from the congressional inquiry commission and even the CIA Director himself, because the person who gave away the location of Bin Laden was evidently never tortured (while the movie wrongly suggests that).

Heck, even the ancient and medieval philosophers and intellectuals knew that torture is a useless tool in finding facts. They just weren't heard until the ideas of human rights started blossoming into the enlightenment era.

[NorPhi]

Originally posted by K0NFL1QT:

Using abduction to insta-win wars is the most broken mechanic, in my opinion.

That's an exploit, not a mechanic. It only works if you time it right.

[Archer the Bowless]

Sorry, I didn't read the thread, I just want to say I noticed Tyranny seems to be different in CK3.
The tyranny hit you get from executing someone is often very small. You can see it when looking at someones relation score, it'll say Tyranny -5. Like that's it, and it decreases like 1.2 a year so it's gone in no time. If you really don't like someone, -5 shouldn't be much. Plus the the dread you gain can be nice.

[MasterKroket]

Hmm well its good to know you can get secrets but it seems very rare. i d guesstimate i have tortured around 30 people over my 160 hours and havent seen a single one!
Its just weird this duke wouldnt give up information... I mean i would have banished him if he had now he can go die in a dungeon...
Stopping plots seems to be very random... like i know someone is trying to kill my daughter why cant i install a bunch of extra guards for a bit of gold or something? I suppose thats reflected in 'succes chance -75%' still agents joining seems way overpowered.

I have yet to play an intrigue / sadistic character but clearly that doesnt matter.
I did get the dark insights perk once when i got a free perk for the intrigue tree and i got a couple points of prowess out of the few people i tortured during the guy's long reign.

Tyranny can suck for sure. I conquered some belgian lands from the byzantine empire, some of the last dots that werent me in western europe. The duke of flanders got the lands but somehow the vassals stayed and promptly overthrew the idiot without me being able to help against their 1000 guys lol. So next his newborn son takes over and i get the 'when *** dies you ll lose land > back to byzantines' So retracting the vassal, imprisoning, taking back the lands and executing the greek gives me 51 (!) tyranny (with aachen as a holding) like all my vassals should be happy i got rid of some orthodox infidels?! That will take 204 (?) months to go away completely.
Luckily almost all my vassals were at or near +100 before this so i felt i could take the hit.

As for dread with the previous 2 guys i went 0 dread with this guy i try to keep it at 100 again...

[titanopteryx]

In the intrigue lifestyle there's a perk that gives a 50% chance to gain a stat point when torturing someone. So there's that.

[NorPhi]

I think the main Faith of a group all have a modifier that makes them count as astray rather than as infidel or heresy, hence the high tyranny value.

I don't think the AI ever stops schemes if the schemer hasn't been exposed or just died.

The perk that gives stats has a limit. I think you can get a max of 3 prowess and 3 intrigue.

For the duke that didn't squinch, well, as I said, he probably didn't have a secret to start with. Agents don't get secrets as far as I can tell. It's odd, but probably such that they cannot instantly blackmail the schemer or expose the scheme.

[titanopteryx]

Originally posted by NorPhi:

I think the main Faith of a group all have a modifier that makes them count as astray rather than as infidel or heresy, hence the high tyranny value.

I don't think the AI ever stops schemes if the schemer hasn't been exposed or just died.

The perk that gives stats has a limit. I think you can get a max of 3 prowess and 3 intrigue.

For the duke that didn't squinch, well, as I said, he probably didn't have a secret to start with. Agents don't get secrets as far as I can tell. It's odd, but probably such that they cannot instantly blackmail the schemer or expose the scheme.

It's 5 of each of those stats. Just a bit of a bonus if torture is something one does a lot in game.

[Admod, the Equivocal]

Torture is mainly used for dread gain. Dread is the useful aspect of torture and anything else you get from torture is just a bonus.