There IS NO emergent story without challenging situations and conflict

[Dizzy Ioeuy]

And RANDOM events popping up instead of emergent situations due to gameplay is starting to SUCK.

[Greenzebra]

If you played CK2, CK3 is way to easy and get's boring fast.

[nikdonikde]

I'm interested if making the game this way was developers choice or choice of their management and other upper echelons.

I understand that they wanted to make this game approachable to broader audience, but this was already done. Even the current audience would grow bored with vanilla.

[The Former]

𝕿𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖂𝖊𝖑𝖑-𝖎𝖓𝖙𝖊𝖓𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓𝖊𝖉 𝕯𝖎𝖟𝖟𝖞 𝕴𝖔𝖊𝖚𝖞,

May your horse ride swift, and with courage.

I can recount for you no less than six compelling and memorable stories from my CK3 runs right now. If you want evidence, here it is.

Now I'm not calling you a liar. I'm only supposing that you're lacking a key element of the sandbox experience.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2975967952

Alas, we're not yet in an era when an AI gamemaster can tailor storytelling to our game's exact circumstances. There are thus two broad options for a game: 1) Have a small amount of hand-written content and keep things mostly on rails, or 2) Have a big open sandbox with random content, and let the stories be written by imagination.

Kenshi. Mount and Blade. Even Skyrim to a point. Every sandbox in gaming will expect us as players to connect the dots. The challenging situations and conflict are all around you; you're just not always going to be delivered the details through an event quest.

Here's hoping you find that spark that's made me love this game for three years.

---

Originally posted by Greenzebra:

If you played CK2, CK3 is way to easy and get's boring fast.

𝕿𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝕴𝖑𝖑𝖚𝖘𝖙𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖚𝖘 𝕲𝖊𝖊𝖓𝖟𝖊𝖇𝖗𝖆

May your scribe's penmanship rival the finest calligraphers of the East.

CK3 is a calm ocean that some take five steps into, turn around to face the beach, and remain there.

CK2 is a backyard pool with an industrial fan pointed at it, that some snorkel to the bottom of before hand-walking across its entire measure in search of pennies.

What do I mean by this? I mean that there's no shortage of features in CK3. (In fact, there are as many and then some, even in the base game.) The primary difference between these games is accessibility.

Most of CK2's difficulty comes in having to dig through game files and parse code language (or, mercifully for us today, dig through the wiki) to fully learn the depth of its mechanics. I was literally yesterday years old when I learned I could influence the random tactics my flank commanders chose in CK2. And I've logged hundreds of hours in that game!

Moreover, most of this doesn't really need to be known. I had plenty of success in CK2, built multiple empires, without ever knowing I could influence tactics. It's a conscious choice one makes, to dig into those mechanics to such a degree.

So also, if you make a conscious choice to play CK3 like an actual feudal lord rather than a land-grabbing video game conqueror, it becomes far more interesting. The latter method of play is much easier in CK3 because all its mechanics are laid bare ingame. The former method, however, requires plenty of thought and nuance.

---

Originally posted by nikdonikde:

I'm interested if making the game this way was developers choice or choice of their management and other upper echelons.

I understand that they wanted to make this game approachable to broader audience, but this was already done. Even the current audience would grow bored with vanilla.

𝕿𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝕽𝖊𝖘𝖕𝖊𝖈𝖙𝖆𝖇𝖑𝖊 𝖓𝖎𝖐𝖉𝖔𝖓𝖎𝖐𝖉𝖊,

May a veritable army of servants massage the thighs of your steed, and daily.

Define "this way". Are there no random events in CK2? Certainly less. Perhaps that's why this erroneous belief exists. Because CK2 has less character-driven events going on, the perception is that it's somehow "less random". The reality is that CK2 and CK3 are the same amount of random, and then CK3 added plenty of flavor in the form of random (and semi-random) events.

Truthfully, many events people think are random in CK3 aren't even random, they fire when certain conditions are met. If people would pay more attention to what's happening in the world rather than slapping it on 5x and waiting for the next war, they just might enjoy themselves.

Here's hoping you enjoy yourself regardless of which method you choose.

𝔚𝔦𝔱𝔥 ℭ𝔬𝔪𝔭𝔞𝔰𝔰𝔦𝔬𝔫𝔞𝔱𝔢 𝔈𝔣𝔣𝔬𝔯𝔱,
𝔗𝔥𝔢 𝔓𝔞𝔯𝔞𝔡𝔬𝔵 𝔎𝔫𝔦𝔤𝔥𝔱

[KaykaysNL]

if you want a challenge try behaving like the traits your current character has.

[Dizzy Ioeuy]

Originally posted by KaykaysNL:

if you want a challenge try behaving like the traits your current character has.

Oh I do. But it's not jsut the challenge that is missing. It's that the game systems don't create situations one has to actually handle in ways that ever even very interesting. They are utterly predictable.

Something like Rimworld leads to all sorts of unpredictable but at least internally logical situations that really creates a sense of "omfg, that just happened?" and wow, and play on... without reloading because the systems were in place and I knew about them, so fair play.

But the random situations which pop up (the literally random ones) are usually only the finger flick or matchstrike that causes all the other stuff to happen that is my OWN fault, or was easily predictable and makes sense.

that's what makes a story, not just random event after random event after random mother f'king event.

[The Former]

Originally posted by Dizzy Ioeuy:

Originally posted by KaykaysNL:

if you want a challenge try behaving like the traits your current character has.

Oh I do. But it's not jsut the challenge that is missing. It's that the game systems don't create situations one has to actually handle in ways that ever even very interesting. They are utterly predictable.

Something like Rimworld leads to all sorts of unpredictable but at least internally logical situations that really creates a sense of "omfg, that just happened?" and wow, and play on... without reloading because the systems were in place and I knew about them, so fair play.

But the random situations which pop up (the literally random ones) are usually only the finger flick or matchstrike that causes all the other stuff to happen that is my OWN fault, or was easily predictable and makes sense.

that's what makes a story, not just random event after random event after random mother f'king event.

𝕿𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝕯𝖎𝖘𝖈𝖊𝖗𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌 𝕯𝖎𝖟𝖟𝖞 𝕴𝖔𝖚𝖊𝖞,

May your house be graced by perpetual summer.

I get your meaning, but really it's no different in Rimworld. Rimworld's events are also fairly predictable, right down to the way they're solved. Once you've experienced all the options a couple times, the main concern is only if a difficult event hits while you're already on the heel.

The same can be true here. Example, my earl's attempted rescue of his beloved sister. The matchstrike was the viking raid. Viking raids happen all the time, right? It's a fact of life. But then in my desperation for an army, I reached out to a powerful Scottish mormaer, ignoring his personality.

Then he captured my sister from her viking concubinage during the ensuing siege of the viking homeland. Then he tortured her to death because Sadistic characters will do that sometimes. From that point on, I became his bitter enemy.

Then suddenly I had to deal with another angle: "I've turned a powerful ally into a powerful enemy, and now I need help to fight him again." I could find none at first, so I had to do it by intrigue. Assassination was off the table, he was too well protected, but the stealing of his daughter... That would sate my character for a time.

And it all played out from there, leading to a pretty epic war and a generational feud between two former allies. All because of the one little matchstrike that was a viking raid.

[nikdonikde]

You decided to interact with the Scottish ruler, currently in the game you can just ignore he
horribly killed your sister and bye.

It's not mechanical, good mechanic would be if you would lost prestige for not revenging it, especially in case of tribal Vikings.

This would create that story on it's own without me catering it in my head.

I mean, I'm glad you are having fun with RP but I want from game to force me in those situations when it doesn't suite me > making me involved on gameplay level > sabotaging my original plans = having more fun.

[The Former]

Originally posted by nikdonikde:

You decided to interact with the Scottish ruler, currently in the game you can just ignore he horribly killed your sister and bye.

It's not mechanical, good mechanic would be if you would lost prestige for not revenging it, especially in case of tribal Vikings.

This would create that story on it's own without me catering it in my head.

I mean, I'm glad you are having fun with RP but I want from game to force me in those situations when it doesn't suite me > making me involved on gameplay level > sabotaging my original plans = having more fun.

𝕿𝖔 𝖙𝖍𝖊 𝖂𝖊𝖑𝖑-𝕾𝖕𝖔𝖐𝖊𝖓 𝖓𝖎𝖐𝖉𝖔𝖓𝖎𝖐𝖉𝖊,

May a thousand pumpkins fill your garden with their harvest bounty.

If this is so, then Crusader Kings may not be your game. It's always been meant to be a sandbox game, and by definition,

A sandbox game is a video game with a gameplay element that provides players a great degree of creativity to interact with, usually without any predetermined goal, or alternatively with a goal that the players set for themselves. Such games may lack any objective, and are sometimes referred to as non-games or software toys. More often, sandbox games result from these creative elements being incorporated into other genres and allowing for emergent gameplay.

We're fully expected to create our own fun. That's why Paradox's history sandboxes exist. The stories wait to be told, but we must tell them. From Dev Diary #0,

All events and scripted content should feel relevant, impactful and immersive in relation to the underlying simulation. That way, players will perceive and remember stories - their own stories, not the developers’ stories.

Even events are meant to draw from the underlying simulation. The simulation is at the heart of everything, not simply modifiers and costs.

It's regrettable that not having mechanical impetus to go do a thing means you won't do it. That's not to bash you in any way; our brains all work differently. You're a goals-oriented player, and there's nothing wrong with that.

However, a goals-oriented player will generally have a rough time having fun in a sandbox. CK2, which is comparatively devoid of these emergent storytelling moments (they exist, but their more inscrutable and thus require a more vivid imagination to storytell with), might be more your speed... but even then, it's a sandbox at the end of the day.

If goals are what push you, I would suggest perhaps something like Great Houses of Calderia, which released somewhat recently here on Steam. It's a promising little game somewhat akin to Crusader Kings in its play style, but it roots things a lot more in mechanics than Crusader Kings does.

[Abacus]

Sorry you feel this way. Ck 2 does indeed feel exactly as you described.

[freezray]

Originally posted by Greenzebra:

If you played CK2, CK3 is way to easy and get's boring fast.

Almost like CK3 is the next generation in the Crusader Kings franchise and the game play loop is largely unchanged. CK2 is also super easy and in fact snowballing in CK2 can be even more ridiculous than CK3.

[Chuckawookie]

The problem with CK3 for me is the constant spawning of random unknown characters. I've been begging for more events with people I know, especially my children, but I'd settle for everyone in court. That was the thing that made Tours and Tournaments so magical. You would travel, have events with court members, meet distant kings in someone else's town and befriend them. Then they'd invite you to their feast or wedding etc etc. That's what emergent gameplay is. It should be that my choice influenced the world, and AI responds accordingly which forces me to respond and so on.