Spotlight of Development: About Kingdom mechanics.

[Mortheim]

Greetings, Pathfinders!

This is the first "Spotlight of Development" post from the series and there will be more (name isn't set in stone though). In those posts we will tell you about the future of the project, upcoming changes, patches, DLCs etc.

We have received a lot of feedback on the strategic part of our game – development of the Barony. So, this time, we decided to highlight most obscure parts of Kingdom mechanics in the "Spotlight of Development" and try to address some of the questions and clarify various aspects of Kingdom Management.

Spoiler alert! There will be info about certain events, buildings or projects; some of them reference certain decisions or story elements!

Barony Status

Barony status - is one the most important parameters and it shows how peaceful the citizens are and how strong is their loyalty towards you as a ruler. Disregarding that parameter may lead to the barony collapse as well as the end of the game. Barony status can be lowered due to the following reasons:

1. At the start of the event, if it is about riots and uprisings. If the event is successfully resolved, the status will be restored.
   
2. At the end of some problems, if they fail.
   
3. If you have a negative amount of BP.
   
4. When one of the stats of a barony was reduced below zero.
   
5. As a result of decisions made during the barony ranking up process (for example, if you decided to increase taxes significantly)

Several events can help when barony status fell too low:

• When the status of your barony becomes "Troubled," at the start of the next month, you will get special event "Feast for the Afflicted," which restores one status level for 1000 BP and takes 5 days.
  
• If your barony status reaches "Riots," you will get another event - "Address the Barony," which allows Regent, Curator or Grand Diplomat to restore one status level for 25 BP, it takes 28 days and has difficulty check (DC) of 25 (if you fail this project, there won't be any bad consequences).
  
• And if your barony status becomes "Crumbling," the third event appears - "The Last Resort," which allows your General, Warden or Minister to restore one status level for 50 BP, it takes 14 days and has difficulty check (DC) of 21 (fail in this event will decrease respective kingdom stat by 6).

We are planning to add some additional events to help you recover the barony status.
There are also several buildings, projects, and decisions, which allow you to increase barony status during ranking up. Sometimes events and triumphs can lead to positive change in barony status and lead to "Serene." To give several examples:

• Assassin’s Guild (that could be unlocked from kingdom quest for CN kingdoms) can prevent going into Crumbling state, but at the cost of 10 Community, and only if you have allowed bandits ran rampant in your kingdom.
  
• If you have decided to help Linxia and despite all odds secured an alliance with her, you will be granted a project that occasionally makes status better (up until Worried). This project also makes Last Resort better.
  
• The decision to reduce taxes while increasing the rank of Economy to 3, will make status better (can even make it Serene); increasing taxes will make status worse.
  
• Troublemakers Kingdom Problem can make status worse on Disaster.
  
• Arrears Kingdom Problem can make status better on Triumph while solving with Councilor.

"Invincible Kingdom" setting prevents your barony from being ruined when it reaches barony status "Destroyed." However, some story events (like Massive Troll Attack or The Barony Was Consumed By The Bloom) can still lead to the destruction of Barony. You will be warned about such events in advance (2 months, a month, 3 weeks, 2 weeks and a week before). Such events are prevented by completing the main story mission of the chapter.

In the upcoming 1.1 patch, when BP drop below 0, barony status will change at the end of the day and will not when you hit negative BP. This will give you an opportunity to visit merchant Hassuf and buy additional BP.

We are working on other improvements for barony status system, and primarily on providing clear information about status changes (which, in most cases, are enigmatic).

Events

There are all kinds of events in your barony and a lot of them might affect stats or status of the barony. For most events, you need to assign advisors to solve them. Success or failure of the event is determined as follows:

1. D20 is rolled.
   
2. Advisor's ability score bonus is added (Str for General, Con for Warden, Dex for Minister, Int for Treasurer and Magister, Wis for Councilor and High Priest, Cha for Regent, Grand Diplomat and Treasurer).
   
3. Then “+2” bonus for every rank of the kingdom stat is added.
   
4. After that, another modifier, based on barony status, is added (from +1 if it is Serene, 0 if it is Stable and -1 for each step below Stable up to -4 if Crumbling).
   
5. The resulting number is compared to the difficulty of the event and if they are at least equal - the event is resolved successfully. If the resulting number is higher than the difficulty event by 5 - you get Triumph. If the resulting number is lower by 6 - you get Disaster.

If you want to increase the ability score bonus, you can equip your companion advisors with magic items increasing respective abilities. For NPC-advisors special projects like "Strengthen Jhod's Skills as an Advisor" appear when the corresponding barony stat rank increase; these projects increase bonus that NPC advisors provide.

There are two types of events: Opportunities and Problems. Failing an Opportunity won't lead to severe consequences, but ignoring the Problem might. When possible, you should assign an advisor with the highest bonus for resolving Problems. You can risk appointing advisor with a smaller bonus to the Opportunity and have a chance to grow barony stat, rank it up and eventually make a bonus for this advisor better. You can ignore the event (there is a special button at the bottom of a card), and it will be resolved as Failure on the next day.

If an event requires an advisor, you need to appoint him before the 1st day of the following month. In case you didn't assign the advisor for an event, one will be assigned automatically on the first day of the next month. And any events left without an advisor are automatically resolved as Failures. In the upcoming 1.1 patch, you will be able to resolve all the events that appeared after 20th of the current month, until the end of the next month.

You can assign advisors while you are inside the borders of the barony - there is no need to be in your capital. So you should plan your adventures accordingly and come back once in a month to assign orders. If something important happens (or you were away for too long) - you will receive a messenger raven. So, it is essential to claim regions and expand your barony.

And if the event requires baron's personal attention - you need to visit the throne room. Some of those events are related to the problems and can lower stat of your barony once in 14 days until you visit the throne room. Examples of such events from the beginning of the Barony would be: Troll Invasion, Visitor Waits in the Castle, New Troll Sightings, Problem with Taxes…

Some events, like those related to Bald Hilltop (Ancient Curse quests), are especially dangerous for your barony. First events of this kind called Eight-Legged Plague and Rotten Beasts. While these events are quite rare, they can significantly lower the stats of the barony. You can find the timer for the Bald Hilltop in Linzi's Journal, it shows the time left for the whole quest. The corresponding problem will appear in the barony and enemies will spawn on the Bald Hilltop 14 days before the end of the quest. Problems such as Eight-Legged Plague and Rotten Beasts lower barony stats once in 2 days, while an advisor can solve it in 1 day and even adverse outcomes (Failure and Disaster) will stop Problem from recurringly lowering stats. To complete the quest and receive rewards you must defeat enemies and successfully complete the problem in the barony. At the moment, you can easily miss the start of this event, and it will lead to harsh consequences. We have plans to add notification 2 weeks before the beginning of the Bald Hilltop problem to remind about its arrival and give you some time to prepare for it.

Difficulty level affects events directly. On Easy levels the difficulty of the event is lowered by 2, Hard level increases it by 2. We have plans to add additional difficulty level - "Effortless Kingdom." On this level any event is resolved successfully with the roll of at least 8 and, if the advisor can achieve success with lower roll, the game will use advisor's stat. It will allow developing your barony much easier.

Barony Development

To develop your barony, you should claim regions, improve them, construct buildings and complete projects. All those actions require BP. Barony receives 30 BP/week from Brevoy. For every rank of the stat, income increases by 1 BP (but it can't be bigger than Economy, for example, if you have 4 ranks in Economy and 6 in Loyalty, Loyalty will provide just 4 BP). Trade agreements and economy related decisions will also increase your BP income. Half of this additional income will be sent back to Brevoy. When your barony becomes a kingdom, it stops paying half of the income to Brevoy, at the same time it loses 30 BP/week.

You can purchase additional BP from merchant Hassuf in your capital (80 gold = 1 BP). The merchant with his stand could be found on the central square of your capital, he has many goods to sell so to find BP easily it is advisable to use filter “Other” and Sort by Name (From A to Z).

Special projects appear when you can claim a region, and they require Baron to spend 14 days to complete it (later you will be able to half the time needed for a project). That means 14 days will be skipped. You shouldn't start such projects if you have less than 14 days until the end of the month - it might lead to failing events which appeared at the end of the month (before patch 1.1). Every new claimed region increases barony stats, and you can build a settlement there. Some regions have prerequisites that should be fulfilled before you will be able to claim them. For example, North Narlmarches require Community rank 3, and Kamelands requires Loyalty rank 3. You will be able to found one settlement in each region.

Settlements can be upgraded. To upgrade your Capital from Village to Town you should fill 8 building slots and have at least 2 other Villages. The second town requires 6 settlements in the barony and 8 filled building slots in the Village you are going to upgrade. Capital can be upgraded to City if 16 building slots are filled, and there are three Towns in your barony.

Regions can be upgraded after Capital becomes a City. Those upgrades improve region stats and provide barony with additional effects. Every upgrade has its own conditions to appear, some of them are connected to story and side quests, others - to barony stats.

Artisans

Artisans are craftsmen, who create various items which are useful in travels across the Stolen Lands. You can meet an artisan after you have claimed the region where he lives. Some artisans will come to your throne room and ask for help, others can be visited after you have built a settlement in the region (you should enter this settlement from the global map). It is strongly recommended to visit North Narlmarches and Kamelands to talk to different characters. Artisan quest starts after you have spoken with him. To receive gifts from artisan you should construct a particular building, Artisan’s Shop, in the same settlement you have met the artisan. To give a couple of examples: Bokken's Alchemical Shop or Dragn's Armor Shop. After this you will receive gifts every 2-3 months - artisan will bring them when he visits baron in the throne room. If you have artisans - don't forget to visit your throne room, even if you don't have events.

With time, artisans will create more powerful items. To enhance items, created by the artisan, you can: complete artisan's quest, reform barony into the kingdom, increase specific barony stats and improve artisan's shop (after 1.0.16 patch). If you fulfill all the requirements mentioned above, the artisan will start working on masterpiece - especially powerful item, that can come in handy later in the game. The artisan will notify you before he starts working on such item. Masterpieces are one of the best items you can acquire in the game!

We have plans to add Kingdom events that will provide information about what’s happening in the regions you control and advise to visit the local settlement when artisan appears.

Barony Alignment

Initially, alignment of the barony corresponds to the alignment of the baron, but baron's alignment might change with time. When you receive an informational event that your barony becomes known across Golarion, barony alignment synchronizes with the alignment of its ruler. At the same time, a quest for cooperation with other countries appears.



That is all for this post! Feel free to ask questions - we will answer them if we can :)

[Tomice]

This is very helpful! Thank you!

IMPORTANT NOTE:
There still seems to be a "bad" window to start projects: Between 10 and 14 days before the month ends!!! Example: If I rank up my advisor on the 18th and it takes 14 days, events that pop up on the 19th will still autofail!
PLEASE RECONSIDER!

[Kerrovitarr]

To enhance items, created by the artisan, you can: complete artisan's quest, reform barony into the kingdom, increase specific barony stats and improve artisan's shop (after 1.0.16 patch).

Does this mean, that you can't get all masterpieces in one game session?

[Tomice]

Since it might be helpful for some, here are a few additional tips and links to some community guides. Note that some info there might be outdated following the official post above (those guides were based on gameplay experience, guesswork & testing)

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1534683229
https://steamcommunity.com/app/640820/discussions/0/1730963192539824644/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/640820/discussions/0/1734342161870361435/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/640820/discussions/0/3335371283872795195/
https://pathfinderkingmaker.gamepedia.com/Kingdom_buildings
https://pathfinderkingmaker.gamepedia.com/Settlements

[glbrown201]

Thanks for the very helpful information.

One feature I think is really needed is the ability to cancel an in-progress problem or opportunity. Even if this results in an automatic failure.

There have been times a problem has occurred which is inflicting severe penalties on my Barony every day but the only advisors who can deal with are locked into other projects. Being able to cancel one of those projects would have been great.

[Tomice]

Opprinnelig skrevet av glbrown201:

Thanks for the very helpful information.

One feature I think is really needed is the ability to cancel an in-progress problem or opportunity. Even if this results in an automatic failure.

There have been times a problem has occurred which is inflicting severe penalties on my Barony every day but the only advisors who can deal with are locked into other projects. Being able to cancel one of those projects would have been great.

Agree.
"Pause" would be even better regarding projects - it's not like a 90% finished research project or a 60% finished road just disappear if the advisor does something else for 2 weeks.

[kaymarciy]

You can purchase additional BP from merchant Hassuf in your capital (80 gold = 1 BP).

How about to let players sell their BP back? Even at half a price maybe? Or as an opportunity-project related to other countries of Golarion? I would gladly made my treasury empty before going into a certain House with the vendor who has exorbitant prices.

[FeurinLongcastle]

One minor request when it comes to buying BP -- can you update the UI to allow us to simply enter how many we want? Trying to nab 100 out of the 25000 initial BP is tricky. You have to first pick a smaller number (like 1000) and then whittle it down with the more manageable slider.

[Tomice]

Opprinnelig skrevet av FeurinLongcastle:

One minor request when it comes to buying BP -- can you update the UI to allow us to simply enter how many we want? Trying to nab 100 out of the 25000 initial BP is tricky. You have to first pick a smaller number (like 1000) and then whittle it down with the more manageable slider.

BP conversion should ideally be possible from the empire management screen.

[Joe Jinis]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Tomice:

This is very helpful! Thank you!

IMPORTANT NOTE:
There still seems to be a "bad" window to start projects: Between 10 and 14 days before the month ends!!! Example: If I rank up my advisor on the 18th and it takes 14 days, events that pop up on the 19th will still autofail!
PLEASE RECONSIDER!

Exactly !
Btw "blocking" the player for 14 days to upgrade an advisor or claiming a region is clearly a bad design, that should be a project like every other ones !

Typical exemple of that issue I just had in game : I have 6 advisor slots, every one is screwing around except Joth because I don't have any problem/opportiny/projects except 5 Joth "Search curse blabla" so Joth is occupied for the the next 40.000 years (for The emperor ! hmm nevermind ). So I chose to upgrade one of my other advisor, 14 days pass and Ho big surprise One problem and one opportunity missed ! -_- Make them last two months or better, unlock our activites during advisor training !! ^^

[FeurinLongcastle]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Tomice:

Opprinnelig skrevet av FeurinLongcastle:

One minor request when it comes to buying BP -- can you update the UI to allow us to simply enter how many we want? Trying to nab 100 out of the 25000 initial BP is tricky. You have to first pick a smaller number (like 1000) and then whittle it down with the more manageable slider.

BP conversion should ideally be possible from the empire management screen.

True! It's a pain having to endure two load screens just to fund your kingdom.

Part of the reason I rolled a monk as my main is to deal with all the running around in the capital...

[IKerensky]

6- if your stat level goes under the lower limit of your actual rank (less than 20 for rank II by example).

Nice to see that even the developper don't know how their own system work.

[IKerensky]

And you still didn't answer why the 7-14 day skip for baronny upgrade when your baron's isn't avaliable to answer any enquiry and didn't even rest.

Thoses days skip had to go, you should be able to pause the skip, manage your town/event then start the skip again. The only restriction should be on leaving your capital.

[Joe Jinis]

<3 Exactly what I said ! I really don't understand that illogical mechanic, it's like artificial difficulty where AI can only beat you because it gets more gold *_*

[Game_Demon]

I want a shortcut to exit the throne room to the world map. Also everything this guy said (the doable things anyway) because he is spot on. Best review/critique around.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BUljI4d9FI

[Deathgrasp]

You should add how the players are supposed to get all 10 advisors.
I've read that one should get specific stats to 60, but it sounds quite random. If the quest to get 10 advisors would read something along the lines of "increase loyalty to open the ____ advisor position" it would help a lot.