The desire for higher court positions has gone to absurd levels.

[Mattias]

I haven't played the game in a while but the last time I remember playing, the mechanic of having some of your characters become greedy and aspire to have positions in your faction was suppose to be a dynamic feature. They would attain this desire after spending time in your territorial sphere which simulates their familiarity with your government and their ability to be apart of it. However, for some odd reason most of the starting nobility and the characters travelling the map start off with an unsatisfaction of -30 at the start of the game or enlistment. This makes maintaining satisfaction a nightmare on turn one as you desperately find items to satisfy these greedy characters only for the negative to increase in the next two turns.

What makes this system so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ broken is that you receive these penalties when you are at the rank of noble. You are unable to give these men positions to satisfy them because you haven't unlocked them yet. Prestige is suppose to simulate your character's influence and the complexity of your government. So its like someone asking to be manager of multiple stores on the first day of the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ job when your business only has one store. Why would a character ♥♥♥♥♥ about a higher position when your government isn't big enough to afford that position. The point of the mechanic is for you to receive that penalty as your government becomes more complex.

Ugh does someone know a mod to revert it back to when this wasn't a problem.

[E.R.L.]

Nothing changed - it was never a dynamic feature. The desire for higher court position has always been solely tied to character rank. Higher ranked characters have higher desire for position, which is modified by character traits (Humble, Ambitious, etc.). So, you have to consider if you can accommodate the rank 4 character that showed up in your recruitment pool and keep them satisfied. If you can't, don't recruit them. The only "dynamic" part of recruiting a new character is the satisfaction bonus from being recently hired, which initially offsets (some of) the desire for higher court position, but this doesn't actually have to do with that desire itself. Once it wears off, you'll feel the full force of the desire for higher office penalty.

Depending how long it has been since you last played, there is a new Title system that works by increasing character salary to give a character a title, some bonus satisfaction, and some associated bonuses. This panel can be accessed in the character detail panel, and is useful to help tide characters over when you have no court positions open.

If you don't like the system, there are mods that make it easier or eliminate it. Alternatively, you can play on easier difficulties, which give you less satisfaction penalties (Easy mode actually gives you a satisfaction bonus to all characters) and I think also lowers the desire for higher court position.