Consolidated Brainstorm list for Future SoD Versions

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Cyclohexane

Knight at Arms
This list includes all the ideas from the Suggestions, Brainstorming Thread for V5 and Sod V5 New Map all in one easy to read list.  I will update this thread as needed but there is no need to reply here unless it is about the organization.  I am doing this work because this is an awesome mod and I want to ensure some of these ideas make it into V5 (or maybe in a latter version).  I have read the entire thread and included every feasible idea except those that:

1. have been weeded out because it is already being worked on
2. are duplicate ideas
3. are already in game
4. or to general with no specific instructions

I have edited the posts to be concise and grammatically correct and organized into alphabetic categories.  This means all of the ideas from one of your posts may or may not be together.  Many will be split into different areas but still included.  Nothing was left out except those exceptions I mentioned above.  While many of these ideas are mine, they are placed in no particular order but I did bold a few of my favorites.  The last thing I want the developers to be doing is reading through page after page of replies that are not on topic when they could be using their time working on SOD V5! 

IF ANY OF THE MOD DEVELOPERS WANT ME TO CROSS AN ITEM OFF THE LIST, TELL ME THE CATEGORY AND NUMBER AND I WILL STRIKE IT THRU.  I CAN ALSO CHANGE THE FONT COLOR OF IDEAS (red = decline, blue = implemented) THAT WILL DEFINITELY BE INCLUDED (TO MAKE EASIER TO READ AND SHOW PROGRESS)
 
GAME PLAY
1. Give looters the ability to loot a village.  Once the looters party is large enough, they can begin to raid random villages.  This would have to be balanced so one civilization with a looter spawn point is not always protecting their fief but it just makes since.  As it is now, looters are ignored after a couple weeks of game play. 

2. Add more formations:
  • Add braced spear wall formation to stop a cavalry charge. 
  • Other examples are imposing a square formation for infantry or create 4 lines for better archer defense.
  • Increasing the damage of cavalry charge while decreasing horse HP would make cavalry formations more useable (see Peloponnesian War mod). 

3. Create ability to turn off formations or moral, but not necessarily both on or both off. 
  • The moral system of increased food and less time to check between eating is great but the battle moral system makes battles easy.  Please separate these to allow large armies but challenging battles.  Larger armies and formations (and increased battle size) are nice but more of a challenge without units running in battle is needed.  In addition, the checking of moral in battle seems to create lag (especially with large battles). 
  • Alternately, add a moral attribute to each unit (faith troops never run while recruits have a high probability once the battle turns, Rhodoks are well trained and disciplined, etc.) that would be referenced in the battle to determine stay or run.

4. Allow AI to use the formations effectively (cavalry gets bogged down against each other)

5. Add shield bash to land battles (cannot use in siege battles because of potential exploit)

6. Allow a temporary change (increase or decrease) to unit's weapon proficiency attributes for various reasons.  For example, worshippers of The One become enraged on battlefield leading to temporarily increased battle stats while you raid a village.  Certain factions can have advantages on certain battlefields (i.e. Villianians lower proficiency in fog, Adenians lower proficiency in Mountains, etc.)

7. Tweak Athletics skill of all infantry (and dismounted cavalry).  This will distinguish between slow heavy infantry (like Antarians) and medium infantry like the Villianians or Adenians, and give more meaning to dismounting cavalry.

8. Give bandits (sea raiders, etc) a hibernating virtual faction, as a real threat to any kingdom.  Use the gang up feature to let them assemble a massive army (like the Legion but weaker in terms of troops quality/equipment), that can siege with couple of hundred units.

9. Increase the allowed troop varieties per castle.  Although it presents interesting troop management questions and forces expansion or regiment use, it is more of a headache than anything.
This is hard coded and cannot be changed.

10. When knocked out in battle, it would be fascinating if that took you to an Edit Mode-like bird's eye view where you could zoom around and watch the battle.
Implemented, press "space" to begin "fly-mode",

11. Villages conquered should be able to tell you if they've "seen any enemies recently".  These enemies should include caravans and other factional units.

12. Add a "duel your troops" option with gear (similar to training grounds).  XP at a reduced rate should be awarded. 

13. When in a conversation with any lord, add an option to duel them.  The battle field will change depending on players location and the lord can say no (relationship bonus, neutral, or penalty depends on his honor to yours for friendly fight). 

14. Reduce horse armor / HP overall to make all cavalry more fragile and prone to getting taken down to foot.  This would reduce the over power of Adenians. 

15. Ability to ransom lords in exchange for peace.  For example, if you want to make peace with a certain faction, take the captured lord to any enemy castle / city and request to speak with any lord in that castle.  The price for peace will be reduced by the prisoner’s standard amount (whatever they normally pay) and subtracted from the cost for peace (based on relation with that faction).  This will allow you to use captured lords as bargaining chips but peace will still be expensive. 

16. In battles (or sieges), create an indication of how many more waves of reinforcements both sides have left.  Perhaps displayed next to the alive/dead/wounded stats in the screen that appears when you press backspace.

17. Strategic map:
  • Lords often stop doing what you tell them after a few minutes.  Possible solution:  Once you give a command to a lord, a script continually reminds them every few seconds until the player turns it off (by telling the lord they don't need them anymore).
  • Create an "all lords patrol their fiefs" and "all lords garrison their fiefs" command.  It is irritating to take the time to give a command to each lord and open the map 5 seconds later to find out half of them are doing something totally different. 
  • Create a  "select all" button for lords or preferably, a checkbox system
  • Add ability to make custom notes on the map and / or show icons differently for fiefs fully constructed./li]

18. Make elite units sufficiently important in the auto-resolve system (on battlefield and in sieges) to make the player garrison elite units (or give away more units to Lords) instead of gathering them all in personal army.

19. Add new reports
  • Create a link to each village, castle, or town (like in the quest menu - Locations) inside the reports.  It is nice to know which village needs a building, but it would be better to be able to click the name of the fief and have the map automatically take you there.  This will be very important with the new map in V5 when area knowledge is zero.
  • Add an interface / report (like the one for heroes) that includes population, estimated taxes, buildings purchased, building in progress, and allow upgrades to be purchased if the fief has a post (so it may be the first thing to build)
  • Number of units garrisoned in your fiefs
  • Vassals fiefs, a list similar to the hero equipment list that shows:
    A. Name of the owner what fief belongs to what lord
    B. Fiefs under construction (possibly just a letter like A = archery, B = barracks, S = shrine, etc.)
    C. Fiefs needing construction (possibly just a letter like A = archery, B = barracks, S = shrine, etc.)
    D. Buildings already built (possibly just a letter like A = archery, B = barracks, S = shrine, etc.)
    E. Number units garrisoned in their castles
    F. Their current honor score
    G. Their wealth
    H. Their relation to you
  • If above is too hard, show all buildings under construction and needing construction including other lords fiefs in standard report.
  • Number enemies killed by each companion (help to set their equipment and choose skills by comparing which more effective)
  • Troops killed/wounded by each faction (including own)
  • Add an after battle report detailing who in my party killed what and how many.
  • The amount of tournaments won as well as location and award
  • Bug:  The prosperity fief report cannot be displayed (to long) is have many fiefs

20. Add ability to choose a companion as a lieutenant, bodyguard, etc. (whatever the title) to follow hero into town streets, tavern, castle, villages, etc.  It would be necessary to then increase the number of bandits in the "trap" events I suppose...

21. Decrease healing time: 
  • While moving, you (and party) do not heal unless you or a companion has wound treatment 6+ (in which case you heal at 1/4 rate).
  • While still on the campaign map (in camp or holding space), you heal at 1/3 rate if you or a companion has wound treatment 3+ (below 3, no healing)
  • In towns or castles you heal at normal rate
  • In towns with a hospital you heal faster (says 10% boost).

22. Lower impact of surgery skill.  Loosing 3 troops against 150 enemies is unrealistic.  The current loss ratio of faith troops should stay the same, but losses of regulars are 3-5 times as high.

23. If losses are higher, it would make sense to be able to recruit more peasants if your relation with villages is high (castles are already producing regulars at an acceptable rate). This would make it important to have good relations with villages (maybe raise the relation impact of village cattle, wheat, and bandit quests)

24. Require units to be with you for the entire day in order to gain midnight XP.  This would prevent the exploit of recruiting 30 farmers at 11:59PM and over half of them being watchmen 1 minute later.

25. Do not remove the Claimants (pretenders) but keep them for Machiavellian manipulations and court drama.  For example:
  • Use them to get factions to declare war on each other (equivalent to the raiding caravans quest).
  • Use claimants spy network to gather key intelligence on their faction such as garrison information, food stocks, lord personalities, wealth, and locations of lords.  The more relations with this claimant (as well as persuasion, honor, renown, and inverse relations with “their faction”), the cheaper the price.
  • New special honorable/dishonorable quests.  The claimants would need to have biographies written in relation to their honor or lack of it. 
  • Since Parliament will be implemented, create option to give claimants new roles as optional stewards of territories conquered.  The might-makes-right legitimacy of Lords only goes so far.
  • Claimants could be a special regional-only castle adviser, and after an extensive quest to gain their trust, them would serve you.  They could do things like give bonus prosperity, handle caravans, decrease investment risk, assist with health maintenance, send out patrols to keep order in their cultural area, trigger random events, and lend legitimate royal family credentials to your cause to decrease the probability of rebellions.
  • Or, incorporate claimants in a simplified form.  For instance, instead of a rebellion, make the quest contingent upon capturing the faction ruler and offering him the option of giving up his throne or being blinded with a hot iron.  As a side result, there could be an instant alliance between the player's faction and the new ruler.

26. Tournament Suggestions:
  • Add an entry fee for a special tournament that grants a unique item to the winner.  It can be useful or just some type of trophy (masterwork wooden sword, gold cloak, or something useful but not to useful messing up the balance).  It could also be a quest item. 
  • Add a random quest that occurs after winning a tournament and betting on yourself where you are accused of cheating (your companions do enter) or that you owe money (or even they owe money and it’s time to collect).  This could be similar to the random quest where you get challenged to a duel because of a lady.  They can catch you coming out of the bathroom with only your fists (or dagger, etc) to protect yourself.
  • Add the ability to bet on someone else during a tournament.  This could cut your losses (and winnings) if you see a high ranking lord enter.  However, to avoid an exploit, you should only be allowed to bet on someone else if you also bet on yourself (more money).  Or alternatively, you could bet on someone else but lose a ton of renown (like -50) if caught throwing the fight.
  • Create a fixed cost to enter.  Perhaps it could be based on (character level x .001 [lifetime denars spent] / city relations if nonzero / [random]) or some creative metric.
  • AI fighters could be figured into the system for the payouts.  Regular Fighters and noob char's wouldn't pay much to get in and aren't worth much in the winner's pot, but a tourney with four or five lords competing would be a shining opportunity for glittering prizes.  Perhaps a higher level character encounters more Champion Fighters and Hired Blades who'll be worth more to make up for the ever-increasing cost to entry and the player character's increasing abilities. Ideally the proficiencies and Power Strike/Draw/Athletics/Riding of tourney-specific troops could go up a ways too, to make for a more challenging and violent experience.
  • Allow players to wear personal tournament body armor.  Tournament armor should be flashy, heavy, and less protective than heavyweight battle armor.  Perhaps a character with the "Tournaments and duels" background choice could start with tournament armor instead of a factional armor, as long as the other background choices have cool enough perks so people didn't pick the Tourneys & Duels background every time.
    A. The armor and weapons can be purchased from a Tournament Master (give him a vendor screen so trade skill and city relations affect the price).  You also shouldn't be able to buy a "Cracked" version; it should have a fixed quality.
    B. Alternately, require players to wear tournament body armor or rent it for a price.  This will increase the costs associated with entering.
  • The standard Native blunt tourney weapons are decent for blunt damage.  So, toning down the wooden weapons slightly and upping arena fighters' power strike would be a good move if expensive tournament weapons become an option.  Lords, Xerina, Kradus, Dranton, and champion fighters should have enhanced weapons.  Furthermore, it raises the issue of using these weapons for harvesting prisoners on the battlefield.  Regular weapons should outperform tournament weapons.
  • Allow the maximum bet to increase based on renown, persuasion, character level, and the amount of tournaments won. Additional increments (over base 100) should be small, such as 5 denars per level, 5 denars per 150 renown, 10 denars per level of persuasion, and 5 denars per each tournament won.  The maximum should never exceed 500 denars even on a level 50 character.
  • The random chance of getting drugged before the tournament (or halfway through after many  bets have been placed) with all of the woozy effects  (for example:  decrease all proficiencies 25% and/or start each round with half health).  Winning in drugged state will increase renown 100% (40 points)
  • If win 10 tournaments, character becomes known as a famous dueler.  Then when enter future tournaments, the odds for betting are reduced, but the amount of renown/relation is increased.  You could even gain a small amount of global faith on additional tournaments won since you've become a celebrity.
  • Ability to host tournaments of different types such as old realm pikes, two handed swords, and archery.  This will raise honor / renown and a chance to make money.  Perhaps only lords may participate.  These tournaments allow the use of your own weapons and armor.  Each participant pays set amount for entry and the winner takes whole sum (along with gambling).  Perhaps only allow this function to appear once per year per city to avoid an economy exploit.
  • Instead of the all out war type arena, allow: 
    A. Archery:  there would be targets in a range, and you would have like 10 arrows or bolts (depending what section you chose), and see how many targets you could hit and the other people get a random score depending on their skill.
    B. Duels:  Just like normal duels, except the arena is smaller, and there is a winners ladder
    C. Jousting:  Self explanatory
    D. Melee fights:  Free for all, just like the arena
    E. Team melee fights:  Normal arena.

27. Ability to speak with guild master at initial town screen

28. Zerrikanians / Khergits could get bonus plunder when capturing villages & towns, but reduced benefit to holding them over time

29. Zerrikanians / Khergits could have the ability to recruit from the camp menu (rural folks)

30. The Honor System: 
  • Create a special dialog to go along with honorable / dishonorable lords based on your honor (positive = > 30, negative = < 30, and neutral =-29 to +30).  If you are high or low in honor, it makes since that lords will react differently (more than a slight relation bonus / penalty) and give special quests, or not offer quests at all. 
  • Honor affects the ability to recruit bandits but should also affect lords.  In V5 with rebellions, this could be a reason lords would turn on you.  Honor should also be tied into religions and your people require you to follow this path.  This is true with The One (honorable), Void (dishonorable), and Faithless / Enlightened (neutral, so keep honor around 0 with mix of good and bad).  The Old Gods can be played anyway is seems (perhaps determine if Old Gods worshipped are evil, good, or neutral in character creation). 
  • At the very minimum, their greeting should change based on their honor versus yours.

31. Bring back the training grounds as part of castles or as defensible areas controlled by one faction.  A modified training grounds allowing you to duel your warriors in full battle gear is preferred. 

32. When joining a battle between two factions, decrease the faction relations of the side that you join against to prevent exploits.

33. The option of becoming a vassal to a faction and gaining fiefs is possible although as a vassal you cannot build anything in villages but can in castles.  Either remove the option to become a vassal or fix the bug that creates the inability to build in villages.  Becoming a mercenary to a king should remain (cannot gain fiefs in this manner).

34. Implement Form Ranks!! mod to create battle arrays and formations. 

35. Implement Command Cursor mod which provides you with a method of placing your troops on the battle field with the press of a button.

36. Implement Gameplay Improvements Compilation mods. 
Many cool new features but weapon balancing is controversial.  Focus on features, not balancing.  Game play > realism and the problem with making it an optional feature is that any time the SOD is updated with new weapons, horses, armor, etc., this would need to be updated to.  That means less new features for slower paced action. 

37. Allow crossbowmen to turn around when reloading (so shield will protect from arrow fire).

38. If a vanilla faction's lord decides to defect to your faction, have him recruit your factions troops, felt kind of stupid being the Antarians and having armies of Nord troops.

39. Have the ability to move soldiers up and down in a garrison (or regiment). 
  • We can move the order of troops in our own army, but not in a garrison.  I like to throw a bunch of cheap troops in my castles to get the number up and have a better advantage in a siege (when defending), but I want to use my shock troops first (heavy infantry & elite archers) to stop their top tier troops.
  • As a workaround to the hard code, have a dialogue option when organizing Regiments and with the Marshall inside castles / towns which would shuffle your troops into a more reasonable queue.  The most useful and probably simplest thing would be an order to put the best troops to the front, which would make a given stack or garrison line up by levels.
  • Beyond that, given the way multiple regiments each spawn a few troops from their top slots in each battle, it could be handy to have commands to put Infantry, Archers, or Cavalry to the top of a regiment's queue, in order to balance and tailor your critical first wave to the threat you'll be facing.  By issuing these commands multiple times, you'd be able to do things such as layer a stack Archers / Infantry / Cavalry for a siege.

40. Increase effect of the skill pathfinding (i.e. 6% per skill level)

41. Add the Custom Battle MOD, thanks for Iberon's permission:  Custom Battle MOD

42. Add features from Custom Commander-Rebellions v0.75

43. Create custom forests like in the Chronicles of Talera that have high density and no lag. 

44. Expand the marshal garrisoning options.  For example, set the order:  Garrison 10 Tier 1 infantry daily (100 denars), Garrison 5 Tier 2 infantry (150 denars), Garrison 3 Tier 3 infantry Daily (300 denars), and if available, garrison 1 Tier 4 infantry daily (250 denars).

45. Allow you to use the invaders deserters as an ally (enemy of enemy is a friend type thing)

46. Add a report to access messages about Empire.  Using the “L” button works on the map but after a battle there is to many entries.

47. Make all the new items from the new civilizations available at the merchants (like a 25% abundance).  New items are only nice if we get to wear them.  It’s nice to play the part of your civ and since it is single player, you do not have to buy it if you do not like it. 

48. Currently manhunters belong to the faction “Manhunters” while tier 2 thru 5 (Slave Driver to Slave Chief) belong to the faction “Slavers”.  This is why you never see manhunters spawn with anything stronger than manhunters in their party.  I recommend setting a spawn point for Slavers and have them act independently of manhunters and actually attack you like deserters do or add the advanced troops to the manhunter faction.  This will add more variety on the map.  It will also require some language dialog to be written with the new slavers running around trying to sell you into slavery.  Thoughts?



HEROES
1. Rework the main heroes so their storyline matches with the invasion for story emersion.  In addition, create new heroes from the new religions / factions. 
Done

2. Start the game with a hero from the motherland that serves as a guide through the new story.  The hero could be a squire, priest, or scholar depending on starting conditions in character creation.  This would be a sidekick to follow you around and give you messages as the story progresses and could change depending on starting faith.  For example, you may get a priest from “The One” or “The Void” but they would have completely different personalities. 
Strategy Advisor is implemented and provides detailed troop trees of every faction

3. Implement Custom Commander kit mod to allow control of NPC heroes in battles instead of the player.  It tends always to be the main character will outclass the remaining companions' level significantly.  Heroes that do not focus on combat level even slower but their party skills are needed.  This mod will allow one to train more companions specialized in different battle situations and compensating the lag between the super-powerful main character and other trailing-behind companions.

4. Alternately, increase the XP multiplier in the module.ini file (hero’s rate of gain of battle XP, does not affect training or quest XP).  This will artificially inflate the rate that companions increase in levels.  Currently, the spread between your XP and theirs is huge, so the higher in level you go, the wider the gap becomes.  They do take up one slot out of a maximum of 32 different types of troops.

5. Instead of having the 20 generic Lords to recruit, make it possible to make the 16 companions in the game into Lords when they reach a certain level of experience (i.e. 20, 25, 30, etc.).  Have their Leadership and Training skills determine the amount of troops they can have, rate of advancement of their troops, and advancement levels of their troops.  Would help avoid conflicts while retaining all of them.
This idea was done by one mod but I think it's unplayable. Why would I train my companions to release them later?  I want to have them on my side so I can use their party skills.  Besides V5 will add storyline.  The player will befriend completely new NPCs and old ones will probably be removed.  Plus, since you a 32 slot limit for a party (31 with yourself), if you were to have additional companions, you'd have too few slots left to upgrade any line of regulars!

6. Give heroes the ability to grant special quests after speaking with them or after some event occurs.  The reward or failure of the quest should be great.  Ignoring the hero should also impose a stiff penalty to hero relations (possibly leave).  This could be tied into the new plot.

7. Assign heroes their own button used in battle (like infantry #2, archers #3, cavalry #4) so you could lead a small force to flank the enemy without having to select all of your cavalry or none of it.

8. Allow NPS to read books purchased from the Book Merchant Custom Commander-Rebellions v0.75


ITEMS
1. Add new books such as:
  • Religious based that provide bonuses to prosperity, relations, or prestige (knowing religion better makes it easier to spread)
  • A book of maps.  This would be similar to the training, surgery, or wound treatment book but would provide knowledge of the areas shortcuts.  You keep this book in your inventory and you get a +1 bonus to path finding.  It could be easy to read (IQ 9) but fairly expensive (say $7,500).

2. Add new ranged projectiles:
  • Hammer-headed Arrows / Bolts:  The flat head form of the projectile delivers blunt damage and can be used to knock out enemies (opposed to pierce).  The range and damage would necessarily need to be limited.  This would be perfect for a modified Manhunter troop tree.
  • Harpoon-headed Arrows / Bolts / Javelins:  The harpoon form of the projectile grants +3 bonus damage (can vary weight & number in quiver).
Done (and not), there are now throwing hammers.  Cannot make blunt damage arrows since the bow and not the arrow determines the damage type.  In M&B engine, this would require a special blunt damage bow but then the player could use any arrow (like barbed for example).

3. Special items available from ALL lords with a low chance of finding one per lord defeated. In addition, create an ultra rare unique sword available only from the legions leader Legate (or some king not introduced yet).  Possibly called, you guessed it, the Sword of Damocles.  Does not have to be ultra unique game imbalance weapon (just look different graphically but be of the Masterwork quality).

4. Each faction should have unique items based off of their faction and what they wear (i.e. special Swadian plate armor).
Done for the most part.  The Native factions are the same but all the new SOD civs are completely unique as well as unique Legion and mercenary guilds.  Add to this the fact that there are deserter parties from all the factions on the map, there is tons of variety.

5. Add models for:
  • New bows, throwing weapons, etc.
  • Masks (or helmets with mask-like face parts) and Crowns
  • More decorated weaponry (weapons with jewels, crafting, runes, etc - for visual entertainment)

Done.  SOD has the most amount of items allowed by law.  Seriously, there is a hard code limit and we are at it.

6. Include SMF MOD (Simple-Mini Functions Mod).  The key features to add are:
Compass:  boosts path finding
Torturing tools:  boosts looting and prisoner management
Training Equipment:  boosts trainer
Magnifying glass:  boosts tracking
Tactical Signs:  boost tactics
Telescope:  boosts spotting
Carts:  boosts inventory management
Wound dressing:  boosts wound treatment
Lancet:  boosts surgery
First aid kit:  boosts first aid
5 other items
8 books (not to read, to keep in inventory)

7. Weapons should have a chance to break/become damaged on defense (like shields).  Parrying an axe with a wooden staff shouldn't leave it intact.  Lances should have a chance of breaking after each couched damage attack rendering it useless (for at least the rest of the battle)
Maybe  we could do something to simulate this with weapons randomly dropping from "strong" or "masterwork" to "bent" or "chipped" after battles... purely as a random thing (scaled according to the size of battle you were in, but still not based on whether you swung it or not, and what it hit, etc.)

8. Fix the cloak clipping issue and allow helmets to be worn under the clocks.  In other words, increase the armor value of clocks and the cost associated with that armor value.  In other words, allow a helm and clock to be sold simultaneously.  The name would change to “Full helm + clock” but the graphic would stay the same (or similar).  A masked cloak would be sweet.  Allow these special items to be used when sneaking into a town (better armor).

9. Create a treasure map that crosses into the sea full of pirates (mini quest). 

10. Items dropped by the Imperial Legion after a battle need to have more variety (not just javelins 99% of the time)
Done.


KINGDOM MANAGEMENT
1. Fief management system: 
  • Allow the commission of building structures anywhere in kingdom without being there.
    A. A menu listing all fiefs brought up by talking to the chancellor.  Clicking on one of them brings up the management menu. 
    B. Implement this in a way that you have to hire a professional engineer.  The skill of engineer hired determines the additional cost opposed to paying for building with a hero engineer at the location (will always be cheaper in person).  In addition, increase the time it takes for the buildings to be completed based on the distance from which the command is given to reflect the time it'd take for your messenger to carry your orders
  • Bonus relations should be given (+1) when a building is setup directly at the location (wow, king is commissioning a building in person).

Done.  Different than above but can access in camp menu.

  • In addition, allow multiple buildings to be paid for at once (building queue). 
    A. For example, allow a shrine, mill, and watch tower to be paid for immediately and built one after the other.  It would take the same time frame to build the 3 buildings but there will be no running back and forth to order each building separately.  Doing this way still requires you to roam the map, but not so frequently.
    B. Another option is to allow multiple buildings to be constructed simultaneously for an increased price (hire additional workers to come in and finish multiple projects).  For example, for each structure built simultaneously, increase the combined building cost +25%.  Therefore, if you commissioned 4 buildings to be constructed simultaneously, the price would double (100%) for all 4 buildings.
  • Create ability to order a Regiment, Party Member, or Lord to take money, go to the fief, build structure, and then follow you.  Engineering skill of party is used for building time/money reduction.  If party is attacked and defeated (by party of village infested bandits), money is lost too.
  • Or, make the base menu in towns for the surrounding area only (i.e. Thir controls most of southern villagers and castles, Narra in the North).  If you don't hold that town, then you have to do it the old fashioned way.  It could also be expanded to the capital of the faction to make it less travel intensive.

2. More diplomatic options: 
  • Peace with terms (not just money)
  • Gifting other nations (improve relations with money)
  • Trade agreements (or sanctions)
  • Exchange prisoners and lords when captured.
  • Trade fiefs within kingdom and with allies (if treaty with faction is in place). 
  • Trade soldiers of equal tier with allies (if treaty with faction is in place). 
  • Implement marriage as a diplomatic tool (similar to treaty)
  • Ambassadors:  If relation with another faction is good (60+) ambassadors will spawn at your Capitol city.  Will have the option to pay them (more than peace price) to go to war with other AI factions.

3. If an opposing faction is at war with you and wants to make peace, they should pay:
  • The amount depends on your army size & amount of lords following you (similar calculation to charging a toll to a caravan).  It could be randomly determined if they offer peace with or without a money incentive (depending how bad their situation is with other factions).
  • If we want peace, it costs money.  If they want peace, it is yes or no.  A third option should be that peace is possible with payment.  Your persuasion skill + renown can determine if they say yes or no to counteroffer and pay.  If you request payment for peace, you will lose -5 honor and relations with lord’s king (regardless if they accept or not).
  • If this option is exercised, you cannot “declare war” on that faction for a minimum of 1 month (similar to the way a caravan will say we paid our toll less than 3 days ago if try to attack them again).
  • In the same regards, a truce could be offered for a short duration (with or without payment) and fighting continues after time has expired.

4. Ability to form alliance or mutual protection agreement with other factions (UN of Calradia).
  • Allows AI to declare war on another faction that attacked an ally.
  • Ability to request or be requested to support another faction’s military campaign.  This could be performed by the Chancellor or seeking out a King and starting a conversation.
  • The acceptance of the treaty will be based on your persuasion skill, honor versus king’s honor (if your dishonorable and he is honorable – you better be persuasive), renown (small factor), and previous relations with that faction (small factor).
  • For example, if you are allied with Nords and Vaegirs declare war on you, the Nords will declare war on the Vaegirs.
  • The treaty can be a set time duration and breaking it would cause severe relation penalties with faction, loss of honor, and loss of relation with king.

5. Make domain size affect the total number of manageable fiefs:  Remove prisoner management and replace with the party skill “Stewardship”.  It will be intelligence dependent and for each point in Stewardship the player will get Kingdom Management points (i.e. 4 per Stewardship).  A village will cost 1 point, castle 2, and town 4.  If the player has more fiefs than points, he will receive a 10% income penalty per point. 
Done but different name.

6. Each point in stewardess should increase tax revenue ~5%.

7. Allow “kingdom management points” to improve taxes.  Points could be awarded each week, and those can be used for changing taxes, upgrading troops, building buildings, and researching certain things (maybe you have to research something to be able to build a building, improve siege capability (adding ladders), or better/faster boats).

8. Persuasion could allow you to set taxes higher without affecting relation as much.  Maybe for each point in persuasion you get +1 relation per week, thus 10 persuasion could be useful.

8. After an allied kingdom is defeated, you (as allies with strong relations) take in peasants as refugees (increased population growth) and some of the factions lords offer to join you.  This would require the possibility of allegiance treaties with another kingdom. 

9. Make population growth rate a percent based on food abundance, tax rate, health, & building availability.

10. Villagers that revolt for high taxes but more challenging (already coded in lord quest)

11. Alter the method of hiring Lords/ladies and their "rank".  In game, the more land lords acquired, the greater rank they spawn with.  A more dynamic system would have lords spawn as "Noble" [lord name] and increase in rank based on the number of fiefs owned.  For example:
  • 1 village <  "Lord" < village + castle
  • 2 castles < "Baron" < 3 Castles
  • 3 castles < "Duke" < 5 Castles
  • 5 castles < Count < 7 castles
  • 5 Castle + 1 Town < Prince <  2 Towns + (8+) castles
  • King = 3 Towns + (8+) castles
  • The Lord that achieves King can hire lords (but can be only granted castle and cannot be promoted).  When the player manages to make one lord king, this triggers a event with the council asking to proclaim yourself Emperor, and then letting you know that Prince [lord name] was crowned King of the Province (you choose name).
Renaming / titling lords is a wonderful idea.  Sadly, it did not occur to TaleWorlds, and the M&B system doesn't handle it.  The work-around is insane - literally over a thousand edits to try to circumvent their missing this basic and useful feature.  I have made it so that your "recruited lords" are in random order, to mix things up a bit.  Titles aren't likely to happen.
 
LAWS
1. Player can now issue different laws.  Laws can be revoked at a cost (costly though not impossible).

2. Associate a cost of introducing each law for the first time

3. A method to enforce the laws in place.  In particular, if a lord (enemy or your own) does something and you capture him, a special dialog should be available prior to the execution that may or may not decrease (or increase) your honor.  There should always be some penalty with executing a lord, but not necessarily a penalty to honor.  Sometimes it’s good to kill the bad guys.

For example, you just passed a law making it illegal to have any of your villages looted or loot any enemy’s villages.  Lord X laughed at the law and looted your village burning it to the ground.  You later catch this guy and speak with him in your party screen.  The penalty can be a fine, prison time, or even death depending on how you want to role-play your religion choice.  Of course I am not sure if it is possible to code your lords to make them follow the laws...

4. Villager Protection:  Law that makes it illegal to loot villages.  Passing this law will give you honor, relations boost with your villages, but make any dishonorable lord dislike you.  Now that you can execute lords, this will be fun to enforce.

5. Open Borders:  Passing this law will allow immigrants from all over Calradia to immigrate to your country with the following benefits and disadvantages:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Prisoners can be easily recruited.  Persuasion is now 100% more effective (i.e. level 4 persuasion will act like a level 8 persuasion) due to the fact they will immediately become citizens.  The drawback here is that your men will receive an additional 33% moral penalty.  For example, each prisoner currently recruited gives a -3 moral penalty.  With this law enacted, your men would get -4 moral penalty per prisoner.  If used often, your men may be leaving faster than you can recruit them (dam immigrants).  NOTE:  If it is possible to remove the exploit that allows you to garrison prisoners immediately after recruiting (and they never run away), then the additional moral penalty may not be needed.  

[*] All villages would receive a small boost to prosperity (additional workforce)

[*] All villages would receive a -2 negative relations (per week, month?)  - dam immigrants

[*] All cities would receive a +1 positive relation (free trade opened up). 
[/list]

6. Weapon control law:  10 out of 10 dictators agree that weapons in the hands of peasants are a bad idea.  Historically, this is how the staff, num chucks, etc. came to be used as weapons (swords, crossbows, etc were outlawed).  This law will give regular negative relations with peasants, positive relation to lords, and decreased chance of peasant rebellion. 

7. Controlled press (or guys that read the news):  This law (or method of governing) gives a regular positive relation with Lords and peasants (propaganda) but a higher chance of rebellion (some people know the truth). 

8. Villages’ privileges: 
# to hold village fairs
+10% income in villages/week - trade is generating income
+1 prosperity in villages/week- income is generating prosperity
+1 popularity in villages/week - and it's nice event, makes people happy
-10% income from towns - but the towns were centers of trade and now they are not
-1 popularity in towns/week - and town's merchants are pissed off

# to hunt in king's woods
-5% nobles limit - less animals for them to hunt
+5% population growth - it helps survive hard times
+1 popularity in villages/week - and it's nice of you

# to chop wood in king's woods
+1 prosperity in villages/week - building materials are easier to get
-5% income from villages - but that's your wood and they no longer buy it from you

# to brew ale
-1 prosperity in villages/week - they are drinking more
+3 popularity in villages/week - but that's cool

# for peasants to trial by a jury of their equals
-5% income in villages/week - from fees etc.
+1 popularity in villages/week - you are no longer blamed for injustice

# enfranchisement
-50% nobles limit - noble's rightful land now belongs to peasants?
-10 renown/week - that's just disgrace
+2 prosperity in villages/week - but peasants are now working on their own land
+100% income from villages - pay all taxes directly to you
+20% population growth in villages - can afford more children
+5 popularity in villages/week - and you are true King of the Peasant's
+You are now recruiting 1st tier troops instead of farmers
*excludes serfdom

9. Townspeople's privileges: 
#to mint own coin
-10% income from towns - making money is quite profitable
+1 prosperity in towns/week - same reason as above

#to collect tools
+10% income from towns - rich bastards become even richer
+1 prosperity in towns/week - and more prosperous
-10% income from villages - but it's less profitable to trade and producers suffer
-1 prosperity in villages/week - and when they suffer prosperity also suffers

#to buy and hold offices
+5% income from towns - you can sell offices to commoners
+1 popularity in towns/week - you are happy and they are happy, everyone is happy
-10% noble's limit - except nobles who now don't have sole right to hold offices

10. Temple privileges:  Will not increase local faith because it would make faith buildings useless.  Global faith will be somewhat less important with holy warriors and noble's cap.: 
#to the temple to inherit all material goods of the priest
-10% scoutage income - it was noble's family that could inherit good of their cousin
+10% holy warriors cap

#to tithe from villages
-10% income from villages - quite obvious
+10% income from the temple - it's much less than 10% from villages
-1 popularity in villages/week - and quite annoying
+10% holy warrior's limit - holy or not he must have some money

#to tithe from towns
-10% income from towns - quite obvious
+10% income from the temple - it's much less than 10% from towns
-1 popularity in town's/week - and quite annoying
+10% holy warrior's limit - holy or not he must have some money

#judicial immunity
-10% income from the temple
+10% holy warrior limit - being holy is easier when no one can prove opposite

11. Noble's privileges:  scoutage is paid by lords from their income and for the simplicity it's considered to be paid by other nobles.  Noble's (not lord's) limit will depend on renown, size of a kingdom, and number of knight chapters.
#serfdom
+50% nobles limit - it's good to be noble
-1 prosperity in villages/week - but it sucks to be a peasant
-30% income from villages - it really sucks
-20% population growth in villages - it sucks so bad that it sucks itself in
-3 popularity in villages/week - and you must be a sick bastard to allow something like that
*excludes enfranchisement

#king's obligation to pay ransom for captured noble
+10% noble's limit - you care for nobles
-20% scoutage - but it costs you

#king has to pay nobles for military campaigns
+10% nobles limit - more nobles wants to fight
-20% scoutage income - because they are leeching your hard earned money

#nobles can remove village elders from office
+5% noble's limit - yet another reason to be noble
-1 popularity in villages/week - and yet another reason not to be peasant

#lords can set goods prices in their lands
+20% scoutage - take bribe here, take bribe there, lord's income increase
+10% noble's limit - for no reason
-1 prosperity in towns/week - stiff prices hurt economy
-10% income from towns - and taxes
-1 popularity in towns/week - and who the hell are you anyway to tell a shoemaker how much boots cost

12. Factions could have different types of government to choose from that each have their own benefits and drawbacks.  Alternately, there should be civilization and religion specific only laws (with many shared laws to choose from):
[list type=decimal]
[*] Zerrikanians are tribal and less centralized so maybe should have a different form of government that doesn't adhere to the European style above.  For example, receive population birth rate bonuses, bonuses when raided (peasants are tribal with war like culture), benefits against rebellion (strong tribal ties to dominant leader) yet receive penalties to trade and decreased town / village income.

[*] Zerrikanian law that allows free access to the best horses across the land giving a penalty to village relations but cheaper cavalry troops or improved cavalry units (increased horse riding).

[*] Zerrikanian law that allows slavery:  Allow Zerrikanians to draft population from villages (at cost of popularity).  Give prisoners to villages to increase population and prosperity (small negative to all factions). 

[*] The old gods could require animal sacrifices (- to prosperity but bonus to amount of holy warriors). 

[*] The Void require human sacrifice to prisoners (- prosperity and relations but huge boost to "holy" units). 
[/list]


LORDS / PATROLS / REGIMENTS
1. Dialogues with vassals should be changed to be treated as king, not the lowliest of vassals (it's not right when you greet your king "Well, {player name}").  This should definitely be based on your honor rating (positive = > 30, negative = < 30, and neutral =-29 to +30). 

This will naturally lead to the player’s religion choice.  For example:  A high honor lord will gravitate to “The One” and be addressed as such.  A Void Worshipper will be feared.  An atheist should strive to keep a neutral rating and stay on the fence with most matters.  The other religions are not so specific but allows for role playing and game repeatability. 

2. When a Regiment is formed, make the default setting the "Follow Me" order instead of staying in its position. 

3. Regiments are overpowered and make dealing with Lords politics and isocracies pointless.  Either make regiments a cheat feature to turn on at the Jester or implement the following restrictions to keep this cool feature:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Reduced amount of soldiers in each regiment (40% of the maximum your renown / leadership allows).  For example, if your maximum soldier count is 100, the maximum size of each regiment should be 40. 

[*] If V5 economy is nerfed (administration skill limiting players personal fiefs income), keep the 50% cost increase of regiments. Otherwise, increase the cost upkeep of regiments.

[*] Increase costs for each additional regiment you command by 25%.  For example, one regiment of 40 soldiers is 50% increased cost, 2 regiments of 40 soldiers (80 total) would be 75% increased costs (on both regiments), etc.  At the same time the usefulness of Lord's would increase, since they are cheaper than regiments.

[*] Leadership bonus to decrease cost of units should not affect the cost of regiments.  Considering they are not directly under your command and have a higher percentage they will die, they should be paid more (no bonus reduction in costs of soldiers that are in regiments).  Technically they are still under your command so I could go either way here depending on the increased costs of regiments above (and the simplicity of the code required to be written). 

[*] Make maximum number of regiments based on leadership skill / 3 (rounded down).  If you have 1 in leadership, you cannot form a regiment.  3 allows you to make 1, 6 can make 2, but 8 can still only make 2, etc.  This restriction will require you to invest at least 3 in leadership before a regiment can be formed. 

[*] Allow regiments to be lead by elite soldiers only (i.e. marksmen, knights, huscarls, sword sisters, sergeants, guards, etc.).  You should not be able to grab a mountain bandit for leadership and then stick 50 footmen in the group (you would need a knight or sergeant to lead).  This would make it harder to start regiments in the beginning and add balance. 
[/list]

4. Add back in the feature from older SOD versions that stated when a regiment joined a battle.  It is difficult to know if they joined the battle or not and with reduced numbers and sizes, it is good information to know.

5. Make regiments controllable from the strategic map

6. Ability to take control of a regiment (temporary play the patrol leader unit, including fights).  If position regiments well, can be involved in fights on every corner of your empire.  Would allow scouting without having to do it with main army.  Would give more game play variety (i.e. if patrol leader is elite archer & main character is knight), and battles as patrol leader would be challenging (play a recruit soldier with natural gear, not optimized character).  Main restriction would be to have the main character party immobile in one of its forts/city when the player controls another unit.  A Marshall dialog would be used to take control of a patrol; a messenger post would also be needed to be in contact with patrols).  Also, of course, your character won't gain xp or items when you win battles as a patrol leader.

7. Give bios for all the Lords with known personality traits and include the possibility of treachery (i.e. honor and dishonor).  Provide simple stats for lords such as Tactics and Engineering.  Higher Tactics provides advantages in battle and higher Engineering makes the lord siege faster (hopefully the AI will allow the Lords to determine who does what when teaming up).

8. Add ability to bribe lords or centurions to join your kingdom (persuasion, renown, honor or dishonor, leadership, and a random factor used to calculate chance)

9. Make Lord's courage and aggressiveness levels adjust to your renown

10. Make Lord's relationship levels adjust to your honor.  Some will increase with dishonorable deeds and others will decrease (and vice versa).

11. Two individual follow commands for Lords / Regiments:
[list type=decimal]
[*]Order 1: Follow me but take initiative by chasing caravans, armies, villagers, butterflies, etc.

[*]Order 2: Follow me and only do exactly what I command without getting distracted by caravans, armies, villagers, butterflies, etc.

[*]Perhaps persuasion and relation with Lord will determine how well them follow orders.
[/list]

12. Tweak regiments AI to make them react in a more sensible way toward enemies (i.e. attack bandits). 

13. Allow Lords to join your party and become companions (like a claimant) if requested.  Their willingness to accept would be based on persuasion, renown, honor or dishonor, leadership, and a random factor.  The only way to balance this is if their army was disbanded and they only stay for a brief period (i.e. 1 week).

14. Ability to hire a neutral lord, persuade an existing lord to join (relationship and persuasion skill), or bribe a lord into joining kingdom (random chance plus high price).
As to recruiting Lords, that won't happen. Player has too big advantage over computer now.,

15. Ability for Lords to construct buildings
Player has too big advantage over computer now.

16. Name all 80 Centurions (done with troop editor):
trp_knight_6_01 Centurion_Marcus
trp_knight_6_02 Centurion_Oraelius
trp_knight_6_03 Centurion_Agustus
trp_knight_6_04 Centurion_Helios
trp_knight_6_05 Centurion_Keplos
trp_knight_6_06 Centurion_Velious
trp_knight_6_07 Centurion_Corelius
trp_knight_6_08 Centurion_Varinius
trp_knight_6_09 Centurion_Otho
trp_knight_6_10 Centurion_Hilarious
trp_knight_6_11 Centurion_Mercury
trp_knight_6_12 Centurion_Faunus
trp_knight_6_13 Centurion_Romulus
trp_knight_6_14 Centurion_Quirinus
trp_knight_6_15 Centurion_Tertius
trp_knight_6_16 Centurion_Adeodatus
trp_knight_6_17 Centurion_Liber
trp_knight_6_18 Centurion_Victorius
trp_knight_6_19 Centurion_Laurentius
trp_knight_6_20 Centurion_Fidelis
trp_knight_6_21 Centurion_Sidonius
trp_knight_6_22 Centurion_Pomponius
trp_knight_6_23 Centurion_Silvanus
trp_knight_6_24 Centurion_Publius
trp_knight_6_25 Centurion_Valerius
trp_knight_6_26 Centurion_Camillus
trp_knight_6_27 Centurion_Aquila
trp_knight_6_28 Centurion_Thracius
trp_knight_6_29 Centurion_Gallus
trp_knight_6_30 Centurion_Crescentius
trp_knight_6_31 Centurion_Spurius
trp_knight_6_32 Centurion_Summanus
trp_knight_6_33 Centurion_Quintus
trp_knight_6_34 Centurion_Cornelius
trp_knight_6_35 Centurion_Decimus
trp_knight_6_36 Centurion_Seneca
trp_knight_6_37 Centurion_Octavius
trp_knight_6_38 Centurion_Cato
trp_knight_6_39 Centurion_Cicero
trp_knight_6_40 Centurion_Faustus
trp_knight_6_41 Centurion_Rufus
trp_knight_6_42 Centurion_Longinus
trp_knight_6_43 Centurion_Pontius
trp_knight_6_44 Centurion_Narcissus
trp_knight_6_45 Centurion_Marianus
trp_knight_6_46 Centurion_Vulcan
trp_knight_6_47 Centurion_Jove
trp_knight_6_48 Centurion_Secundus
trp_knight_6_49 Centurion_Sergius
trp_knight_6_50 Centurion_Honoratus
trp_knight_6_51 Centurion_Evander
trp_knight_6_52 Centurion_Aeneas
trp_knight_6_53 Centurion_Hadrianus
trp_knight_6_54 Centurion_Cassian
trp_knight_6_55 Centurion_Livius
trp_knight_6_56 Centurion_Cnaeus
trp_knight_6_57 Centurion_Agrippa
trp_knight_6_58 Centurion_Aurelius
trp_knight_6_59 Centurion_Cyriacus
trp_knight_6_60 Centurion_Titus
trp_knight_6_61 Centurion_Herminius
trp_knight_6_62 Centurion_Avitus
trp_knight_6_63 Centurion_Lucius
trp_knight_6_64 Centurion_Terminus
trp_knight_6_65 Centurion_Claudius
trp_knight_6_66 Centurion_Maurus
trp_knight_6_67 Centurion_Saturninus
trp_knight_6_68 Centurion_Leonius
trp_knight_6_69 Centurion_Horatius
trp_knight_6_70 Centurion_Remus
trp_knight_6_71 Centurion_Marinus
trp_knight_6_72 Centurion_Victor
trp_knight_6_73 Centurion_Appius
trp_knight_6_74 Centurion_Brutus
trp_knight_6_75 Centurion_Consus
trp_knight_6_76 Centurion_Tiberius
trp_knight_6_77 Centurion_Felix
trp_knight_6_78 Centurion_Maximus
trp_knight_6_79 Centurion_Julius
trp_knight_6_80 Centurion_Pollux

12. Create a "Follow but do not engage" order for regiments.  Ability to maximize renown, loot, and key troop experience is one of the coolest things about the regiment system. 
As to choosing who's in a battle to maximize XP, advantage numbers, etc.  That was discussed and the team did not like the idea.  If you drag patrols around, they're in the battle.  If you station them far enough away, they're not.

13. Ability to demote lords or get remove a problem child (i.e. have an accident) and promote another (that matches your negative or positive honor).  Of course, this should come with a huge penalty to most of the other lords (especially if place them on death row) but would be nice role playing as a Void worshiper.

Kings had to deal with politics too.  If you piss off the clergy too much, you suffer retribution (they're a powerful lobby).  Similarly with your Nobles (lords), and with the Merchant class, and even to a lesser extent the peasants.  Obviously you could be arbitrary with your power to some degree... but your position was hardly assured (c.f. Shakespeare).

14. Enhance executions:  Lords can be executed but there could be some sort of 1000:1 chance that if you're captured, the lord executes you for an end-game.  Your lords that are captured could also face the odds.  If honor is implemented correctly, the chance can increase to 500:1 on a dishonorable lord (if you or lord) is captured. 

15. Allow a lord to rebel if relations with the player become low enough (or very big difference in honor rating). 

16. Ability to pay your lord a bonus (via conversation) to raise their loyalty.

17. On the options for tasks for lords, give one that says "Siege this castle".  This could be relation / persuasion based to maintain balance. 

18. Assign “roles” to lords who have been granted fiefs (that can be changed anytime).  Roles assigned could be:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Development:  Lord develops the land, prioritize for economic building.
[*] Fortification:  Lord develops the land stressing military buildings as a priority.
[*] Expansion: Lords priority is to raise army to grab more land.
[/list]

17. Ability to pay ransom for a captured noble (from Chancellor)

18. When a lord defects to your side in V4.1, there is a bug on the strategic map where you cannot give a command to the last lord on list.  You also cannot give the new lord (that defected to your faction) any fiefs in V4.1.


MAINLAND / INVASION
1. Legate Marius is not faction leader but a Marshall to an emperor

2. The homeland should include all five player factions (like a quasi-Calradia across the sea). You not only have the option to liberate your homeland, but create an alliance of Adenians, Villianians, Marinians, etc. to defeat the Empire.

3. New factions could be freelancer War bands that will join for free if you are the same faction as them, otherwise they will act like bandits (can bribe them).  While you aren't around, they will randomly spawn and harass imperial legions.

4. Forts and cities of the old realms should have an imprisoned lord of the appropriate faction.  When the player conquers a center, he frees them and this old realm faction takes control of the city.  These lords are allied with player but not serving him (their faction is their old realm)

5. The player can't steal their fiefs except by declaring war on this old realm faction (then each time he frees a city of the faction he would have to fight a revolt of the freed local lord in addition to imperials)

6. The only cities the player can take for himself without pissing an old realm are the ones of the empire main land (working like Calradia cities once conquered, as the player has to convert them to his own culture) but they are well defended and far from the coast, so the player is rather forced to free the old realms first

7. As long he remain in good terms with an old realm faction, the player can recruit units of this faction from their centers (peasants in villages, some chance of low rank nobles in cities/forts) ; as the units are the natural troops of local culture their upgrade works as in native (need to make 2 copies of the troop trees); forts/cities of the continent also offer a way to exchange troops of the * upgrade version units to their continental version (to avoid stacking problems)

8. Looting old realm villages, even when the empire occupy them, piss the faction of their culture

9. At some point, once the empire is weakened, even if the player has been nice with them the old realm factions will start to act like independent realms (ideally they should even be able to make fleets and invade Calradia)

10. When the player is oversea, corruption reduce his income from the other continent  (corruption may be a new center attribute, with buildings like courthouses to fight it)

11. To collect income, player must visit a center he controls which means he has three options to fund his re-conquest of the second continent: making regular trips back to Calradia to collect money, declaring war on one of the old realms factions and take its cities near the coast, or taking an empire center in its main land

12. The more time the player spend on the new continent the more chance a revolt has to occur in Calradia, re-spawning a destroyed native faction trying to retake his homeland

13. Integrate all homeland factions into new world as renegade kingdoms. Make map bigger and give them a few castles or town (even just lords running around), or have an alliance of old lords put up the resistance in the old land. After the legion has been defeated, the game can switch to a civil war.  In this manner, all the well balanced troops and new units can be seen / used. 

14. Allow legion to be a constant nuisance, appearing near coastal towns to gain foothold in Calradia while you try to establish kingdom in preparation for invading old homeland to kick sandal-wearing bastards out.

15. More emphasis on invasion in beginning.  Menu at character creation asking how character's country was defeated and allowing to chose the invasion scenario (i.e. if player answer "my kingdom was defeated in an epic battle", invasion will be one massive wave, if answer "after a long war" a lot of smaller ones but totalizing more troops, or "empire defeated kingdom with help of traitors", making the empire try more often to buy support of Calradian lords)

16. Another scenario to making the empire active before invasion is legion using raiders to weaken Calradian kingdoms.  It may be done via an imperial raiders faction using units like the sagitarii in groups sufficiently large to attack caravans or via an event converting existing bandits to a faction supporting empire and giving them more units when they join it.

17. Allow Imperial armies to split their main army and spread out (as well as properly garrison immediately or even raise the city).  Make their army attack multiple castles in one general area simultaneously in at least 3 large branches (initial 16K army split into 3 branches of ~5K each).  Following the main army and recapturing towns is very easy and is basically an exploit as you can follow them all over the map weakening their force one by one. 

18. The ability to fight as an ally to the legion invading Calradia.  Perhaps in this mode (selected at character creation), you would conquer the old kingdoms first, then move to Calradia (play the bad guys).

19. Ability to send a messenger to the legion from Chancellor to persuade them to stay away from Calradia for awhile.  Persuading options are:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Send a messenger with a persuasive note to legion commander (depending on persuasion level, it may buy you anywhere from 0 days to a month).  If fail, the messenger is killed and you lose -5 renown. 

[*] Send a messenger with a bag of money (1,000 denars) then tell give them a persuasive note (depending on persuasion level, it may buy you time anywhere from a week to a month).

[*] Send a messenger with a bag of money (10,000 denars) then tell give them a persuasive note (depending on persuasion level, will buy anywhere from two week to a month).

[/list]

20. Ability to hire a spy (from Marshall) to infiltrate the legion and get an approximate day the invasion will begin.  This is much better than using cheats (soothsayer) because it costs money (say $2000 denars).  The spy may be caught and killed.  Your looting level will determine the success of the mission.  The date will become more accurate the closer they are to arriving and will always be a range, never exact. 

21. Some of the towns and a few castles and cities could have been destroyed, which would give the player the option to rebuild them while taking the fight to the imperials, rather than have to take over the already occupied towns, you could rebuild a famous castle/city and use it as a rallying point for all the rebels.

22. Rebels - could have a few smaller bands of rebels, led by the player's father/lord/significant other, etc.  Could even have a further scripted event where in the middle of the fight with the imperials, you receive word that your parent/lord etc has been captured and held at a certain place and is due for execution in 30 days.  You must race to the town with whatever troops you have to save them.  If you save them, huge boost to morale, renown, and honor, etc.  If fail, you lose a bunch of morale and reputation and the imperials get a significant boost.  Perhaps Void worshippers could get a different quest to kill an enemy significant other to stop a large army from spawning and earn dishonor. 

Make Centurions have 100 men from the start, as they were commander of a hundred men in ancient Rome.  It's even in their name: CENT(meaning hundred)urion.  Increase the number of Centurions to make up the difference. 
 
MAP
1. Shipyards (neutral) along the Nord coastline where can talk with Harbor Master to rent ships in different sizes (bigger ship = bigger cost).  When rent ship, party appears on the ocean, capable to move on the water.  Can combat incoming invasion fleets, sea raiders, or Merchant Ships which you can either loot or trade.  Or perhaps you could actually go visit the new continent. When going there, you would find some neutral Shipyards. 

2. Ability to command Lords to "Sail after me" (pay from your treasury), and follow you through sea.  When land, they will land at the selected Shipyard as well.

3. Add a parchment-like drawing underneath tactical map so it looks like a medieval map generals used

4. Add several small islands between Calradia and the homeland continent, with small fishing villages, smuggler dens, Sea Raider hideouts, etc.  It would make things more realistic and inspire the player to explore the sea.  There also could be native colonies (like Nord settlements) in some places.
It is already planned We even talked in PM about Sea Rider's fortress I believe

5. Create special areas on map such as a thief hideout, fanatical religious monastery, etc. (not necessarily visual improvements). A non-uniform map would affect our displacements and kingdom management.  Some areas could be so unstable, it would be hard to secure the villages there.
V5 storyline will take place in hidden places (like hidden sea riders fortress).  Whole map will be reworked to create more choke points. With introduction of faction patrols (not only lords and caravans) bridges and mountain passages can be now really hard to pass if you don't have friendly relations with owner of the castle guarding it

6. Make castles dominate passes. The two on Khergit land should control the pass, meaning that the "can't walk" zone around the castle is wider, forcing you to go close to the castle walls.

7. Create roads:  Calradia and new continent need a road system that gives a nice boost to travelling speed.  Really useful to armies and caravans alike, but force these units onto obvious paths while there may be a shorter route a different way.

8. Trees: Although I hate fighting in forests, there should be a lot more of them. They would look great on the large map, and add new tactical maneuvers.

9. Terrain:  New terrain types, such as marshes and farmland, could make the battles scenes really interesting. Marshes with limited pathways; fences and buildings blocking troops

10. Vertical terrain:  More than I hate fights in forests, I hate fights in hills. The random bumps and cliffs look terrible and play terrible. Flattening them overall would be a starting point, but having an overall gradient (i.e. one side of the map is much higher than the other), combined with a low % chance of random impassable features (cliffs/gullies and crevices in the ground) would make the battle map more interesting.

11. Terrain bonuses/penalties:  Grant each faction bonuses or penalties depending on terrain type (i.e. temporary boost / reduction to units’ proficiencies or speed).  For example:
  • Antarians / Nords:  No bonuses (except from roads). The Empire of Antares was famed for breaking sieges, not for its maneuverability across the countryside.

  • Marinian / Rhodok: Bonus from road travel.  As the wealthy Republic that funded much of the road construction, their troops are used to forced marches on the hard cobbles.

  • Adenian / Swadian: Bonus travelling on "plains" (flat ground). Penalty for travelling through marshes. The horses of the Adenians makes them a maneuverable opponent on flat ground, but they quickly become stuck on the tricky marshes due to their heavy armor.
  • Villianian / Vaegir:  No penalty for travelling in forests, marshes or mountains: The rugged terrain of the Duchies means that Villianians troops are used to clambering over rocks and fallen logs.
  • Zerrikanian / Khergit:  Large bonus travelling on flat terrain. No penalty in mountainous terrain. No bonus for travelling on roads. The tough steppe horses of the Sultanate travel fast across both flat and mountainous terrain, but roads are unheard of in the vastness of the Steppe.
  • Each factions mobility on battle field is also reflected in the strategic map. The penalties could be offset by the Path finding skill leading the Adenians through the marshes for no penalty, but the bonuses would remain for the "maneuverable" factions such as the Villianians and the Zerrikanians.
  • Each faction would receive a proficiency boost and penalty to all units for different battle fields making the game much more strategic (not just tactical). 

12. Add iron mines on the map (special centers or a limited number of the normal villages have this resource income) and the need to control some to supply blacksmiths.  It would also be possible to buy iron from town merchants and change it to the iron resource blacksmiths use but of course would cost far much to keep them supplied than directly controlling a mine.

13. Map icons reflect the upgrade advancements of towns/castles/villages

14. Create borders around cities, castles, and villages (reference National Borders ala Rise of Nations/Rise of Legends).  Each faction has its own border and each fief conquered adds to the border (city > castle > village).  You move faster in your own / allied borders, normal speed in neutral territory, and a speed penalty in enemy territory. This would encourage people to make more strategic travel options rather than just "As the crow flies".

15. Create less regular shapes, add more chock points, and for game play purposes less trees. They look good but they kill the fps of even the best machines in battles. Forests should be placed in strategic positions and be less scattered.

16. The lakes, islands, coastlines, and mountains could be more irregular in shape, more rugged, less "geometrical" or straight (less regular shapes, circles, straight lines).  Maybe not as extreme as the Norwegian coast line but more bays, peninsulas, maybe whole coastline rather than going straight W-E.  Lakes and islands less round.

17. Coastlines:  Currently the sea separating the old and new is divided into a large rectangular strip with a couple of islands.  Suggestion:  One side would be close to the other but with heavily fortified defense (quick to cross but deadly risk).  The distance on the other side is greater with couple of islands (pirate bases) in between, so longer travel through sea (high probability of sea battles).  A peninsular idea could well fit in the design.

18. River:  On the new map, there is one major stream.  Suggestion:  The river is a natural frontier between possible faction placement.  Perhaps add one or more streams, and a bridge that has strategic value.  Different factions can be neighboring each other separated by a river and warring each other through a single bridge crossing (or go all way round to achieve same thing).

19. Mountain pass:  Create choke points, whether to charge direct head on fortified pass positions or go all way round, then army size, troops types intervene, requires more strategic thinking.

20. Be careful with rivers and crossing points.  It might create a "stuck point".

21. Make ocean large enough to be a pain in the butt to cross and help explain why these civilizations do not trade.  There will be some technical issues regardless of the time to cross.  Such as:
[list type=decimal]
[*] How is it possible to collect fiefs from both sides of the map?

[*] Why does one side of the map require special structures to train units while the other does not, etc.?

[*] How will caravans function if spawned in one city and required to travel across the ocean (in the same respect, how will the city quest to escort the caravan work if the city is on other side of sea)?

[*] Will there be naval caravans (trade ships)? 

[*] How are people from another land going to come to you to pay taxes (collect from all territories simultaneously)?  Maybe the maintenance fees on castles from the "new world" should be higher to offset the traveling cost (perhaps 350 per week).  Alternately, create the ability to move your capitol city.  Depending on what land you choose to have your capitol, the castles on the other side of the map will be higher costs.
[/list]
About the sea travel time, it’s probably too little ocean. This is because of concern for older comps and game crashes.  The time it takes to travel (as for now) in a complete straight line across the ocean is 2 time spans (i.e. early morning till noon).

The idea is to get strong in Calradia (the first stage) and then return to a motherland (a second and harder stage).  The sea is not important.


22. Is it possible to make a desert with desert scene battles?  The Zerrikanians seem to come off as a desert / horse civilization and having dessert battles would be fun (dunes, cactus, etc.).  Of course this would have to be located very far from the ocean / snow areas. 

23. Beach battle scenes are something else that would be sweet.

24. It’s possible to control the speed boats to give the illusion of a larger ocean.

25. Sea travel could be emulated entirely using menus & presentations.  Think Indiana Jones style icon moving across a 2D map.  And we could emulate encounters along the way, leading to battles, storms, etc.  So sea crossing can be controlled, or abstracted as we see fit.

26. For the terrain bonus system to work, all lands considered mountainous (advantage infantry) need to be higher than all lands considered plains.  Or use a different terrain type for all really mountainous lands (i.e. cover all terrains that should be considered mountain with snow).

27. Allow cavalry to cross the sea for game play > realism purposes.  The Nords invaded Calderia long ago and settled into a plains area (with no horses) but these boats will be bigger. 

28. As far as boats go, the movement rate should be low (perhaps 4).  After all, it is supposed to be a bunch of slaves rowing the boat (not even sails).  This in effect, will make the ocean seem larger.  Perhaps we shouldn't call it an ocean, but a sea instead.

29. Connect the 2 maps by a small land mass.  On the western side you could create a narrow mountainous passage that would take forever to travel and set a few bandit spawn points to discourage traveling.  This would make it so caravans could travel from one side of the map to the other.  Otherwise, you may be getting bugs with caravans sitting at the shore trying to get across the map to Narra (for example) and no way to do it.
The instructions were clear, the 2 continents must not be connected in any way.  I don't doubt that they will find a way to solve the caravan problems.

30. Extend the east coast (for both new and old world) to actually be the ocean.  It can be small for old computers but just enough to show that the world continues.  Instead of the map ending with mountains (on east side) it can end with the ocean (everything else the same).  You can create some islands with sea raider / bandits for people craving sea battles so there is a reason to travel there.  Or perhaps even a new quest to do something or another over there.  By the way, I view the map with Thir in North and Narra in South.


MISCELLANEOUS
1. Ability to hire spies to find the enemy.  Ever scoured the entire map and never find the last lord? 

2. Ability to choose (or even change) my kingdom's name without text editing (i.e. this thread).

3. Neutral caravans. They travel between cities regardless of war state and are better defended that regular caravans (mercenaries, not only caravan guards).  Possibly ally with manhunters instead of neutral.  They could be the ones paying the manhunters for protection. 

4. Duels that have a purpose such as two sides evenly matched (battle would turn into a slaughter for both sides), and each send a champion.  Provide a morale boost and honor and renown.  Would lose honor if broke terms agreed upon (such as loser retreating, no combat for a certain period, or possibly a tribute).

5. Increase difficulty of assailants during ambush in towns or villages fine (based on level).  Not always bandits but perhaps assassins from enemy faction. 

6. Spawn small faction specific scouting parties that fight with smaller bandit parties. Add to this the regular patrols which are sent out by realms and you have many battlers resulting in areas where the bandits have control and areas where the kingdom troops have control.

7. Persuasion (many suggestions in entire thread): 

A.  Allow units to be hired at a discount based on level (opposed to Leadership which lowers monthly cost).  Say 5% per 2 skill levels.

B.  Allow higher skill to grant a moral boost to men (say +3 per skill level)

Persuasion does have more uses than it used to (influences whether a prisoner will join, likelihood & cost of making peace with an enemy kingdom, and likelihood to convince a rogue lord to join (if we get that feature working).  So it’s not nearly as lame as it used to be (though I'd like to make it stronger when doing the "get my loan back from XXX" quest).

8. The amount of nobles allowed should be based on renown and persuasion skill

9. Faith troops should be limited by faith and persuasion.

10. Mercenary Guilds:  Talk with Guild Master, having following options:
A.  I wish to hire some men to my army (buy regular or unique {if high relations} Mercenary units)
B.  Is there any quests I could help with (to build relations with Guild)?
            -> Letter delivery (same as given by Lords)
            -> Collect debt (same as given by Lords)
            -> Kill XXX in some city or village (same as given by Lords)
C.  I want to entrust you with a task...
-> Raid (select village/castle/town then pick force party size 25, 50, 75, 100, 125, or 150 men)
Raid:  Random group of Guild mercenaries dispatched.  Pay week’s payment (more or less depending on Guild relation) to each mercenary.  Mercenaries do job until finished or killed.  Raid has the following effects: villages will be “Looted” and Castles or Towns will be given to your kingdom if successfully conquered.
-> Attack caravans/lords (select territory (i.e. Swadia), define 1, 2,3,4,or 5 parties with 25, 50, or 75 men per party, and finally define duration of 1, 2, or 3 weeks
Attack caravans/lords: a selected number of parties with the selected amount of manpower will be dispatched; they will patrol around the selected territory (country), attacking any caravans of a selected nation. You pay depending on the length of the task (ie, you say "Do it for two weeks" and then you pay two weeks' salary to each mercenary). The mercenaries will do their job until the job comes to an end or are killed.  Since it's NOT you who attacked the Caravans, relation with the opposed nation drops only -1 point per attacked Caravan.)
C.  Seal a pact. (Pay 1000 denars, gives +30 Guild relation, decreases other Guild relations -15)
D.  Break a pact. (Receive 500 denars, -30 Guild relation, improves other Guilds relations +10)
E.  Each Guild has a certain number of members so you don’t always have the opportunity to dispatch entire armies at the same time.  Over time, the number of members replenish. 
F.  There are many mercenary Guilds and they don’t like each other.  If you give hire one, you increase your relations, but decrease relation with others, so decide carefully.
G.  Guilds have special units, but can only unlock these if relation with the guild is high (40+). The special high price units can only be hired personally and never upgrade (but they are tough at level 25).

The great mercenary guilds are:
A.  Sons of the White Horse
Description:   A Guild that prefers mobility and mounted warfare, many of its members were originally recruited from Khergit tribes.

Special unit:   Taltos Rider (medium cavalry archer).  Fast horse archer; mounts Courser, uses different bows and sabers for combat, moderate armor.

Units for hire:   Mountain Bandit, Steppe Bandit, Caravan Guard, Slave Hunter

Region:   Khergit Khanate


B.  Widows of Conflict
Description:  In older times there were villages in Swadia where most men were dragged away to the battlefield, so the women had to learn how to fight if they wanted to protect themselves from bandits. Eventually in northeastern Calradia these women forged a sisterhood and some even joined the royal army, but nowadays they've descended into a Guild of (slightly feminist) mercenaries.

Special unit:   Valkyre (heavy infantry with ranged weapon, chance for horse).  Armored amazons, pretty well armored, prefers two-handed swords and spears, has access to bows, chance for Hunter mounts.

Units for hire:   Camp Follower, Camp Huntress, Camp Defender, Sword Sister

Region:   Kingdom of Swadia


C.  Iron Wall Brotherhood
Description:   Formed by freelancer Rhodok and Nord tribesmen, the Iron Wall mercenaries combine good defense with brutal offense.

Special unit:  Linebreaker (heavy infantry).  Well armored infantry with board shields and one-handed axes; they are pretty durable, and their axes break shields with ease - perfect against other infantry and lesser cavalry.

Units for hire:  Watchmen, Mercenary Crossbowman, Mercenary Swordsman, Mercenary Horseman

Region : Kingdom of Rhodok


D.  Dragon Slayers
Description:  Not all Nords are willing to become "civilized" and settle down to rot in tiny villages, in fact, there are many who are more devoted to the fight than other Nords. However, some sly businessmen managed to partially "tame" these brutes to act as a mercenary force - after all, if they simply raided they would be rounded up like bandits, but as mercenaries they are treated with more respect.

Special Unit:  Berserker (medium infantry, chance for throwing weapons).  Almost zero armor, but high health, speed and brutal damage, uses two-handed axes and swords to rip enemies apart.

Units for hire:  Forest Bandit, Sea Raider, Mercenary Swordsman, Hired Blade

Region:  Kingdom of Nords


E.  Warforged Fists
Description:  The Vaegirs are made up of many clans and tribes, and leaders within such a society change quite frequently, the predecessor often being banished. But some people don't give up that easily. These mercenaries are the descendants of outcast Vaegir lords, eager to prove themselves in the fires of battle so they may earn a title for their family (and themselves) once more.

Special unit:   Rogue Esquire (heavy cavalry).  Moderately armored unit, rides on War Horse and Charger mounts, prefers heavy maces for combat, also has round shields.

Units for hire:  Mercenary Horseman, Mercenary Cavalry, Slave Crusher, Slaver Chief

Region:  Kingdom of Vaegir
11. Random Mercenary Bands roaming the map that may or may not belong to a Guild (such as above) consisting of above units or neutral standard random mercenary parties made of Watchman, Mercenary Crossbowman, Caravan Guard, Mercenary Horseman, Mercenary Cavalry, Mercenary Swordsman, Hired Blade). They act like factional patrols attacking bandit groups and possibly hired by NPC lords.  In addition, the player could interact with them, and a random event takes place:

1.  Looking for job
- We're just looking for some job, sir/madam. After all, a man's gotta' make a living somehow.
  -> I'll hire you then. (hire mercenaries)
  -> Sorry, but I don't need unreliable men at my back. (nothing happens)
  -> The dead don't need to make a living... (fight)

2.  Assassination attempt
- Greetings, lord/lady. Say, do you, by any chance, know a guy named (player's name) ?
  -> Actually, that "guy" is me. (conversation continues, see below)
  -> Nah, never heard of that name before... (nothing happens)
- You... you are (player's name) ? Why, that's most fortunate !
  -> How come ?
- Because someone paid for your funeral !
  -> I hope it's enough for YOUR funeral expenses ! (fight)
  -> I'm sure we could talk this trough. How does...
      -> 100/200/300/400/500 denars sound ? (gives 30/40/50/60/70 % chance to get away without a fight; if the Mercenary refuses, you'll have to fight but you keep your money)
- Hm... well, I guess peaceful solutions are better. We've never seen each other, okay ? (You lose your denars and the Mercenaries disappear) / Sorry, but a job is a job. We'll pick your pockets afterwards ! (fight)

3.  Raider mission
- Eh ? What do you want?
-> Who are you and what are you doing here?
- Why, we are mercenaries, laddie ! We were hired for a little job by a snobbish Lord. We're going to raid and pillage the village of (village name). The locals hurt the Lord's honor or something. Ah well, a job is a job. But don't get to our way, got it ?
  -> Alright, I'll keep to my own business. (nothing happens)
  -> I won't let you murder innocents! (fight; if win, receive +2 Honor and +5 Renown)
  -> I was planning to rob that mudhole as well. How about joining forces and sharing the loot, eh? (conversation continue, see below)
- Joining forces?  Well, I dunno... why should I believe that you won't steal OUR job and money, huh?!
  -> Nah, forget it. (nothing happens)
  -> Let's talk things trough... (attempt to Persuade, random chance of success based on skill level)
  -> I'll make it worth for you. How does 200 denars sound? (50% chance to persuade)
- No laddie, you won't mislead me! You're trying to steal our loot! But we'll teach you a lesson! (fight) / Guess you are right, the more we are the better our chances are. At least the village militia won't be such a big problem. (the Mercenaries go and attack the village; you can join the battle against the village militia; if you win, you'll receive some loot and supplies, but lose -5 Honor)

12. Un-lockable special companion abilities/items/bonus
A.  Fighter type: special weapon/armor set only wearable by said companion (can be multiple quests as 1 item per successful quest)
B.  Healer type: ability to heal unhealthy village/town once a week, allow new building type like village hospice
C.  Engineer type: ability enhance once a week the siege abilities by shorten the time requirement by half, enhance temporarily main hero' troops weapon attack value and armor defense value by 25%, or special Engineer type building unlocked
D.  Trapper type: travel at boosted speed on overall map (this is particularly handy when traveling with a huge-sized foot soldiers) and the success rate to evade fight
E.  Merchant type: able to buy at fix discount price (no incremental rise) and sells at best rate (no decrement drop)
F.  Leader type: once a week grant a limited amount of top tier noble troop recruited etc. (need more ideas on this mechanism)

Some of these abilities should be activated via the dialog menu and reset weekly if applicable.  The range of figures can be altered accordingly for the concern of game balance.  In order to have access to the companion quest, there is also a prerequisite like xxx abilities score, xxx skills score, xxx proficiencies score, etc.

13. Prisoner Management could be tied up with Looting so it would increase both prisoner capacity and items found after battles (renamed "Pillaging" or "Lawless Arts")

14. Increase money from battles.  Looting skill should have a big effect.  For each skill in loot you should get +10% more money.

15. Increase Party diversity:  Force armies to consist of mostly regulars, some veterans, and a few elites.  It is cheap in both money and time to create an elite. 
A.  Raise training time from regular to veteran significantly
B.  Raise training time from veteran to elite a lot (4-8 times)
C.  Raise cost from upgrading from regular to veteran 5-10 times, from veteran to elites by 15-30 times.  Each elite should be a significant investment of money (100-300 denars)
D.  Keep upkeep of regulars at the current, raise upkeep of veterans to 15-30, raise upkeep of elites to 30-80 denars.
E.  Faith troops are already quite hard to get.  I would keep their upkeep as it is, but still make them significantly more expensive to create.

16. Raise the number of troops NPC lords can lead

17. Significantly raise the training speed of NPC lords (not your companions) so that enemy armies have a lot more elite troops (since the 'homeland' troops seem to be significantly stronger than most native Calradians) and thus create a larger challenge.

18. More animals and the ability to hunt wolves, foxes, bears and have dogs and eagles as pets, etc.

19. Colored texts. The eye sees directly what the important messages for the situation. Hardcode's Color coded messages
Enemy party has joined the battle / besieged fief
Friend party has joined the battle
gain honor
gain reputation
lose honor
lose relation Lord
lose relation Faction
Prisoner escaped your party
Lord prisoner escaped your party
@{s4} looks upset

20. Add back the ability to change your banner in game from Chancellor.  Doing this will give a +5 relation with all enemy factions but -50 to renown. 

21. Personal food stores aren't used up when near settlement/villages/castles/towns of your faction.

22. Add MageLord tweaks:  Hero garrisoning and the tweak that lets you get another quest from a village elder in 36 hours, instead of never if that one hasn't been implemented already.

23. Village interaction:  Option to rebuild village for a price after being raided or if have a nice reputation (40+) villagers will help when mugged.

24. Impose a "horse tax" that would scale up.  As it is now, horse units cost 50% more than foot units.  As the number of units increase, the cost becomes higher, so 100% more after a certain level, then 200% more, etc.  Zerrikanians and Khergits would get a bonus to this tax. 

25. When travelling to towns and villages, add a numerical relationship value at fief menu.  For example, where it says ".... is supportive of you", add ".... is supportive of you (35)”

26. Create the optional ability to call out the legion again after defeating the game.  After the legion is defeated, it would be interesting to have the ability to call out one of the other invading armies from other versions of SOD (i.e. the undead army, Asian style army like China, Mongol, or Japan (Chaos war, Timeless Kingdoms, Rise of Khergit), some small time-travelling armies with modern even future weapons (WWII China battlefield, Blood, Star Wars).

27. Create sub-factions that may have 1 town, 1-2 castles, and 2-4 villages.  They may have a couple Lords with the possibility to expand if they take castles and towns.  A good start is the 5 sub-classes available in this mod. 

28. Practice Ranges could be used to organize archery contests and Stables used for horse races (or jousting fights), and so on.

29. Special recruitment zones in an enemy Capitol city that allows troops of that faction to be hired when you control that city (or allied with the faction via diplomatic treaty).

30. Create one famous tavern that has a higher probability of heroes appearing (along with a book merchant and a Ransom Broker).

31. Implement arrows/bolts that set things on fire in the "Turn into Inferno" (or something along those lines) mod. 

32. Update the retirement screens (from camp menu).  When I retire, the screens still say I am serving another king.  It would be cool to make these screens religion specific as well.

33. Have cities/castles provide small amounts of XP (training 1 for example) to garrisoned troops.

34. Create an “entertainment value” similar to faith.  Villagers love the arena and theaters. The more people that are entertained, the more taxes collected. 

35. Infamy:  When execute prisoners, attack a caravan or loot and raze a village, your infamy increases. It would affect your world-wide reputation, not just relations with that particular faction, that way it would be harder to recruit lords and may create revolts in your lands as people protest your war crimes.  Could affect recruitment in towns as people are scared of you.  Lords might start ganging up on you and make things harder in the struggle to unite Calradia against the invaders. Defending caravans and peasants, saving villages from bandits, etc. would reduce any infamy rating (must be slow to reflect earning the better reputation).

36. Create a technology tree:
  • Unlocks new weapons and armor, better troops, and defenses for the troops to make them stronger, and improve the villages, towns, and cities.
  • To complete a research, a certain amount of points is needed.  To gain points a city that has a university is required.  A University produces a research point each X game days.  If you have 3 cities that have a university, you produce 3 research points each X game days.  Once completed, have a new technology unlocked or new units able to be trained.

37. After executing a Lord, change the Character Log (Quests -> Character) to show diseased.

38. Add control raining and snowing possibilities.  Snowing for snowlands and raining for the other lands. Custom Commander-Rebellions v0.75

39. Add more information about nations in the character creation menu. 

40. Add more information about faith description (if units become more varied) and combinations that will leave you without faith troops (i.e. adenian kingdom and faithless).
 
PLOT
1. Special sighting of an object relished amongst all people of the land.  This storyline would be similar to a "Holy Grail" concept.  Maybe some of the previous new units could be incorporated here such as zombie units or Japanese samurais.  The concept here would be that you have a series of small missions, very similar to TLD (rescue missions of companions held in dungeons, defeat the necromancer, etc.).  At the end of the mission you obtain the object, the Holy Grail and you receive some disgusting amount of renown points and faith troops flock to your side.

2. Another concept could be a Camelot concept to where you unite lords on a round table and together you have to fight a number of missions to retrieve a special item or person.  This idea could go very wild such as your vassals being able to (trigger would be random) choose their own civilization type so that in a sense all people of Calradia would be represented in your struggle for dominance of the new island.

3. Start V5 in the ”new” section of world (new map) surrounded by enemies with an impossible to win battle and impossible to escape (like 50 to 1 odds).  You will be taken prisoner and eventually released.  Therefore the beginning is somewhat random but helps explain the story.  This also allows you to participate in the battle that destroyed your kingdom.  Perhaps the king of your chosen faction is slain in this battle allowing anyone up to the task able to pick up the crown...


PRISONER MANAGEMENT
1. Slaves - turn prisoners into slaves for increase in towns population or create slave soldiers (low tier non upgradable troops).

2. Repatriation:  Pay for travel expenses and join a random fiefs population as farmers & villagers.

3. Conversion:  Allow those that declare themselves faithful to church the chance to go home. Expensive but adds to religious acceptance of random fief.

4. The ability to auto-sell prisoners in a town or castle.  Of course, a small penalty should be applied as a "handling fee" of 5% per troop.  This could occur weekly when finances are paid / collected.  A prerequisite to enjoy this feature is having a Prisoner Tower constructed in the town the prisoners are being held. 


QUESTS
1. Randomly (rarely) grant quest to infiltrate hostile town to perform a "spy mission" based on looting, persuasion, and leadership to allow the prisoners, or a fraction of them to break free and fight captors.  This could be based by modifying already existing code (sneak into town, bribing prisoner guard, and fighting in the streets after a city siege). 

2. Personal rivals:  Back story based on choices during character creation. Only attacks the player and is equipped with a large full elite unit army. Adds challenge to the game and a lot of potential for character development.  Can be as simple as starting a lord with -100 relations. 

3. Eagle and Radiant Cross mod has nice ideas such as delivering false letters, etc.  Faction specific or city specific quests (perhaps when own a city retainers and townsmen petition for action) would be an interesting mix of diplomacy and action.

4. After completing the villager training quest, convert a few of them to watchmen (or perhaps a new unit like village militia) to encourage village training.

5. SHOGUN INVASION / TARANDA INVASION

(interesting but different mod)

6. New Events: Fire / Flood / Volcano
[list type=decimal]
[*] Fire being a common event in medieval towns, due to building materials being largely flammable, and open fire being the norm.

[*] Flooding:  250 denars AND 3 engineering required to construct a dam or lose prosperity.

[*] Volcano - as rare then as today, but utterly devastating when it happened

[*] Random events which give chance to improve or degrade relations with other kingdoms and even end or start wars (as in, you're approached by a representative, possibly through a friend in their empire)

[*] Random events when constructing a building.  For example:

During construction of (any building) in castle XXX, a underwater well was discovered that destroyed the foundation.  You have the option to:  A.  pay for the damages (+ relation with fief) and finish on time, B.  Ignore the problem (building take an addition week to complete), C.  Kill the builder (lose honor and relations but building completed on time and in schedule). 

Others engineering problems could be that materials were stolen, materials not delivered on time, etc. 

There could be other positive events such as finish early  with option to:  A. Reward them (+ relations - denars), B.  Ignore it (no effect), C.  Kill the builder (-honor, - relations, + denars).

[*] One of your villages found a witch,  You get the option to burn her, ignore the problem, or free here (each choice should have advantages and disadvantages based on your religion).

[*] More events related with religion.  For example, let say a plague infects a village.  As a worshiper of the void, you can gain more points on your religion if you selected an option to "withstand the plague, as the void hungers for souls!" but lose relation and population. 
[/list]

7. More interactive events.  Rather than just click the best option in the menu, something that requires more participation from the player. Similar to the quest that requires you to track down and kill a criminal, or duel a knight for a Lady's honor. They should sometimes be tough choices between two evils and the cost of boosting an effect should be significant in duration (reduce the income from the given town for x months) or backfire leading to new complications.

8. Ability to hire an assassin at the tavern (or Marshall). The assassin could attempt to assassinate one of the lords from any of the kingdoms. If the assassination fails, you could lose renown, global faith, and a large negative relation with fraction/lord(s).  To use the assassin, your honor must be higher than 100 (to kill a dishonorable lord) or lower than 100 to kill any lord.  This would give an actual use for honor.  There should be a very low chance of success dependent on the lord you are attempting to kill’s renown (high renown = very low chance / low renown = much better).

9. Add a quest series to obtain an armor set (Ancient King Armor set) with the helm Ornate Crown as a base for colors and look, with an exquisite chests/leggings, gloves and boots.  These items would require travel and obtaining specific alignments with villages/towns to make the first step available.  This would be a good way to gain renown, coins, and men in order to build kingdom or reputation with the kingdom joined.  It would be a long and tough quest that requires, for example to chase after a band of mercenaries (with many lieutenants and a big boss, a sort of nomad hostile faction).

10. Add scrolls that drop from fallen centurions (or soldiers depending on drop rate).  Therefore, you must defeat the first wave to gain access to your homeland and offer a story of what is happening in the motherland.

11. A new random event which requires you to build and expand.  For example, the landlord of <village name here> want to form a guild that requires 7 blacksmith in 7 castles.  If form the guild within time frame, you got the option to have a unique blade/axe/hammer, or your man has upgraded weapons and armor, or you can allow them work at the barracks which help them train better units (like veterans or cavalry) every turn.

12. Create ability to give the nobles quests and pay them for it.  Quests (tasks) could include bring these troops to my castle (save you a trip), bring me 20 fresh recruits from my fief of XXX, siege this castle, take this new masterwork sword I found to my inventory chest in the fief of XXX( to continue the push forward without being weighted down), etc.

13. Create a special dialog when you capture a king.  Allow him to pay for his ransom directly with money or a fief, or even make peace under your terms when you hold him prisoner.  Perhaps he can even offer a special unique item in exchange for his freedom (new crown, sword, etc.). 
The only thing that wouldn't make sense is him giving you a fief.  He's already entrusted everything but the capital to his lords, so really they're not his to give any more.  If as part of a peace deal, he conditionally acknowledges your rule over a part of his territory you conquered, that might make more sense.  However, the idea of taking his equipment is marvelous, it'd be nice to have a fun pathway to special top-of-the-line gear.

14. Review the cattle generation and related quests code.  Villages always have cattle at 22 denars a head, and even if I buy 15 at 22, 45, 67 per set, the village still plummets down to 22 denars per cow again. This is an exploit to trading. 

15. The lady's in the town's / castles offer quests that give positive relations when complete.  Once a lady likes you, you have the opportunity to pay money to gift a lord ($1K per +1 relation). Instead:

Buy a gift for a Lord that the Lord will equip.  Let’s say you spend $8K on new gauntlets, the lord will not only wear the gauntlets, but also give a +8 relation bonus.  In a way, lords will be treated as heroes, at least if you have them follow you.  You could pick a favorite lord and fully deck him out as your most allied follower.  The code would be similar to the auto equip on heroes (if item A > item B, use item A).

16. Lower the level (mid-tier) of troops requested for the Native training quest so it can be done with more Training and less combat.  I would never give up 6 of my precious Sergeants for the measly quest reward, and since I can't procure additional recruits, taking them into combat is not a good idea.

17. Bandits have kidnapped an influential merchant, and you have to use tracking to locate the bandits, and freeing him will give you money/renown.  Similar to tracking down the spy quest and kidnapping but randomly spawned event. 

18. When you are in a city or castle, you can tell the guard to arrest this man.  However, it is impossible.  I can understand why you cannot arrest one of your own lords (somewhat) but it should be possible to arrest a Lord currently in your castle to provoke a war.  It would be cool to actually have the ability to arrest the lord and throw him in the dungeon.  Of course you would lose -5 honor, -30 relations with lord, and possibly declare war but hey, you didn’t execute him (yet) and it is one less lord to fight.


RELIGION
1. Implement new items called RELICS.  Religion plays a huge role in this mod and people traveled for miles by foot to see religious sites. Possible implementations include:

A. A relic that fits into your inventory (like a food item with a different graphic) that boosts party moral when in your inventory and carried into battle.  Unlike food, it would never decay. 

[list type=decimal]
[*] Inventory relics cannot offset the balance of the game and would be minimal in scope but useful enough to seek out.  I recommend a +10 moral boost when they are in your inventory.  Your men rally around your faith and the relic is “proof” of this faith.  This would be like carrying an extra item of food but they should be lightweight (won’t slow you down) and you never have to renew them. 

Only one relic could be used in inventory at a time (if you get lucky and find two of the same, then only one would boost your stats) and it would only work if it is for the religion of your faith (or perhaps half the bonus due to capturing an enemy's relic - would take up inventory for small bonus).

[*] For the old gods, the relic could be a hereditary staff or an banner carried into battle from an actual fallen “god”

[*] For the void, it could be a vial of blood spilt (or stained) from his body at death.

[*] For the One, it could be a grail or even a simple garment (clothing of a saint)

[*] For the enlightened, perhaps an old scroll or some yoga pants (jk)

[*] Atheists do not get anything, they need to believe in something first.  Perhaps they could get a monkey bone or something.
[/list]

B. A relic that you place into the chest of a castle or town that boosts that particular castle or town.  The possibilities are endless here but I can provide a few examples:

[list type=decimal]
[*] A boost that increases the recruitment rate of soldiers to your castle as well as boosting the population.  It should be a small boost (do not want to make it necessary to have them but nice when you get them).  I recommend a 5% to 10% boost.  Since population maxes out anyway, it will not change the end game, just produce some additional income / extra soldiers faster. 

[*] A boost that increases the maximum population limit in a town or nearby village.  Once again, a small increase only (say 5%). 

[*] A boost to prosperity (say 10%) when in castle chest due to travelers coming to visit the town.

[*] A boost to the health of the town.  Hey sugar pill placebos have actually “healed” people due to just believing in it. 
[/list]

Relics could be found:
[list type=decimal]
[*]  Rare drops from Lords.  Perhaps that lord shares your faith or was carrying it to discourage the enemies.  You just need to insert your own role-playing here. 

[*]  Could hide them around the map in villages and in towns (like the “strange” armor in Native is hidden all over the map). 

[*]  Clues could be given to the location of these items by asking villagers for rumors.  Of course people will post where they are hidden but hopefully they will respect peoples gaming enough to place it in a spoiler
[/list]

2. Each country, both native and homeland, should have a dominate (not total) faith so all factions would have access to Faith Troops and make obvious ally choices.  This could be determined at character creation (i.e. Antares is set to have faith in The One while the Villianians are set to the Old Gods, if  player selects Antares with the Old Gods and the game changes the Villian religion to The One).  For example:
Faithless: Kingdom of Rhodok, Republic of Marina
Old Gods: Khergit Khanate, Duchy of Villian
Self Realization: Kingdom of Nords, Kingdom of Aden
The One: Kingdom of Swadia, Empire of Antares
The Void: Kingdom of Vaegir, Zerrikanian Sultanate

3. Religious Arguments with Lord/Kings that could increase or decrease relation/faith (even lead to war).  This should be based on persuasion.

4. Crusades - Make Marshal (or a new religious leader) declare crusades.  Mission type that rewards faith and additional renown for capturing the specified town, but also gives said town enemy faith units to make it more difficult and preventing the player from launching crusades continuously.

5. Alternately, when a Crusade is launched, the player receives Faith Troops (depending on amount of Faith) and earns volunteers from fellow believers.  In example #1 above, if you worship The One and declare a crusade, expect Swadian volunteers.  The Crusade lasts until the enemy is annihilated or Crusade is renounced (latter results in a big morale/honor/renown loss but improves relations with previously besieged nation giving chance for peace).

6. Any faction can launch Crusades.  When a fellow believer country declares Crusade, you receive an "invitation" letter; you can decide to join, or decline, but the latter results in decreased relation with faith-brothers and honor/renown/faith loss.

7. When conquer a fief that has a religion that hates yours, the fief could riot and damage buildings so you would have to repair them (cost money or be disabled temporarily).  Also, if it gets bad enough (high taxes, bad religion, doing bad events) they could rebel spawning 1-3 armies depending on the population of the fief.  So a town with a very high population might spawn 3 rebel armies of 150 while a village might spawn a raiding party of 50.

8. Create a non-interactive dialog featuring some ritual when you promote your first zealous noble to faith troop. 

9. Give religion an influence on how your nobility and faction behave when you, for example, execute an enemy Lord.  If you chose the Void, why would they become upset when you kill one of their enemies?  Actually, The Void followers may lose relation in a faction if you release a prisoner.  But if you chose The One, you would get a negative relation with your Lords and faction if you executed an enemy lord, but the opposite if you let him go. 

10. Ability to sacrifice cattle to gods (The One, Old Gods) for minor moral boost.

11. Ability to sacrifice prisoners to the Void for minor moral boost.

12. Add variety to faith troops.  For example, make some faith troops ranged.  As it is, all faiths are shock infantry and heavy cavalry which make choosing a religion for a certain faction irrelevant.  Engineers could have some nice crossbows and the faithless could gain a cavalry faith (possibly a dragoon with a flintlock pistol).

13. Add a priest to council:
  • Manage how often the priest performs religious rituals (increase religion spread speed with penalties to global income)
  • For example, the Void’s sacrificial pit it sacrifices some of population but increases faith (increasing or decreasing affects population and spread).
  • Religious leader to call crusades (like above)


SIEGES
1. Add more ladders to sieges
The Lords & Realms Siege Pack mod is compatible with SOD.  This will not be added in order to support many different play styles but can be thrown into the relevant files in SoD. 

2. A tactical map before going into the siege battle. On the map, the player can assign the type of troops and how many of those said troops into certain areas of the castle/town (i.e. there are strategic areas for archers yet only a couple archers spawn).

3. Ability to choose a siege tower, ladder, or ram to break through the door (i.e. can use siege tower on a ladder castle if desired)

4. Add a random chance that an attack fails instantly because your siege equipment is destroyed.  Engineering skill could affect this.  For example:
  • Message:  Some of your men managed to get to the wall but the defenders destroyed the ladders.
  • Effect: You wasted time and some of your men are wounded.

5. Siege by breaking main gate to the castle (allow cavalry inside or enemy units may go out).

6. Create siege tower with walls on the sides of ramp to guard troops from ranged fire (only a bridge stays unguarded).

7. Ability to bribe guard (or even a lord) in city / castle before a siege to "open" (sabotage) the castle/town doors as an extra entrance into the fortress.  The higher the persuasion and faction relations, the more likely it will occur.  However, there should be a chance the guard lies and keeps the money and the door remains shut. 

8. Grant defenders a defensive bonus (i.e. temporary boost to proficiency).

9. Destructible settlement gates and reworked spawning points to allow for more interesting street fighting.

10. When in a siege as defender, have option to talk to besiegers leader and persuade them to abandon the siege.  The computer AI may randomly request any of the following options below as well:
[list type=decimal]
[*]Try to persuade lord to leave the siege (very low chance and depends on persuasion and relation with lord)

[*]Bribe to leave: -xxx denar (depending on party size, - 10 honor)

[*]Challenge to a duel:  Gain or lose honor depending on if you win or lose, gain or lose relationship with lord.  The lord may refuse to fight and ridicule you causing you to lose -5 renown.  If win, siege ends (depending on lords honor) and if lose, your HP will be very low at start of siege.
[/list]

11. When in a siege, the map you see after pressing the backspace key is difficult to interpret because there is no sign of where the castle/town is.  Add a simple diagram (outline) of the castle walls on the correct spot.

12. Use engineering skills to build siege weapons.  They'd cost a bunch of money and time, but they could help a lot.  You could make it that you have to have a castle or major city with a special building for it and you can build items like a battering ram, more ladders, ballistas, etc then take them with you on campaign.  They'd slow you down and take up maybe 5-10 or more troop allowances in army for each piece.  When you get to the castle you want to besiege, whatever items you have will affect the defenders, something like as follows:
[list type=decimal]
[*]More ladders - you have more ladders on the walls
[*]Battering ram, catapults, sappers, etc - gives you a second opening to enter the castle through
[*]Arbalests and other anti-personnel equipment would reduce the amount of defenders
[*]Better siege towers:  Archers can fire from them, maybe moves a bit faster, or better protected so you could allocate troops to hide in the tower.
[*] Similar defense:  Stronger/better fortifications, a sally port so you can take the attackers in the side with some troops, things like that. Maybe if you have x amount of catapults yourself, that cancels out/destroys one of the siege towers, eliminating those troops allocated to it.
[/list]

13. Allow parties engineering rank to affect the movement speed of siege towers (minimal effect).

14. Add three times more people in the archer position in siege for defenders.  Add three times the people in the street battle.

15. Allow player to recover ammunition two times in siege defense Custom Commander-Rebellions v0.75


STRUCTURES
1. Ability to assign a capital city of kingdom with bonuses to faith, productivity, and health.  In addition, other bonuses could include allowing the planning of construction to villages / towns here instead of walking all over the map (more details of centralized construction in KINGDOM MANAGEMENT section).  The disadvantage would be that it would take longer and cost more (says 20% to both).

Enemy factions will have a capital city at the beginning of the game (the King’s fief).  Capturing a capital will result in gaining additional renown,  party morale, and faith but will result in losing relationship with the whole fraction and certain lords. 

2. Add upgrades to buildings (prerequisite is previous building) so facilities could be upgradeable and bonuses would increase and penalties decrease (like leveling up).  For example, church > abbey > cathedral or blacksmith > weapon shop > war factory. 

3. Create building choices on fiefs.  With all the new building options being suggested, make it so you cannot have too many buildings on one fief.  For example, if you want a hospital, you cannot have an extended arena / theatre.  This will force you to have different buildings in different cities / fiefs and make it important to control more land. 

4. Ability to directly influence the health of fiefs such as building aqueducts or hospitals.

5. Ability to garrison troops in a village (requires a structure such as manor). These troops join the fight with the peasants. The maximum number of troops should be 20 but it would give negative relation impact (soldiers hassle the girls, fight with the farmers, etc.).

6. Bridge-castles:  bridges can be made settlements, like castles, where troops can be garrisoned. It will offer a tiny income from "tolls" and block the advancement of enemy troops (or yours).  You cannot build structures or hold prisoners there. 

This will require a new scene.  Armies spawn on opposite sides, the defenders side may have a wooden guard tower or some sort of barricades. The biggest problem is how to prevent troops from walking across the water to the other side instead of across the bridge (transparent fence?).

7. Manipulate the population of cities/villages by building irrigation or farms.  A large battle in a field of grain would be a unique and interesting environment for a fight.

8. Make all upgrades for castles/towns visible in game.  For example, a barracks or blacksmith is show graphically when walking streets.  Create a graphical change on villages and cities conquered. Depending on race or beliefs spread, new architectures appear on villages and cities.  If I believe in the one, towns look shiny, and a religious symbol of the one is carved in the gates or whatnot.
As this is not a central part for this mod and based on the number of cities, castles and villages it is not feasible (new map needed for each combination of buildings).

9. When the streets are littered with dead bodies (i.e. bad health in a fief), it would be cool when you walk the streets of this village to actually see some dead bodies!

10. Add new upgrade to castles such as stronger walls to slow down siege speed (same way a watch tower increases time to raid a village).

11. Incorporate a Ballista upgrade for castles (Ibanez had a halfway working one).  Even if it is only able to be used by the player.

12. Consulate building:
  • A unique building that can be made at the capitol city and its settings configured through the Chancellor.  The available options include “Nord consulate”, “Vaegir consulate”, “Swadia consulate”, “Khergit consulate”, “Rhodok consulate”, and perhaps even the new factions.  Only one faction can be selected at a time and costs 1000 denars to make. 
  • A positive relation with the desired faction is required in addition to the 1000 denars to create the treaty.
  • After the treaty is made, that factions troops can now be recruited at the tavern of the capitol city for a price
  • The amount of troops and quality will vary and be random from recruits (cheap) to elites (expensive)
  • The building should be expensive ($4000 denars) as well as take a long time to build (20 days).
  • After speaking with the Chancellor, the treaty is not immediate.  It will take 1 full week to take effect.
  • Breaking treaties to form new ones (i.e. use another factions troops) will carry a heavy penalty with that faction (-20 relations).
  • Alternately, each nation could supply a new type of Auxiliary troop, that doesn't upgrade (much) but is a decent mid-tier troop.  For example:
    Nord Auxiliary Footman:  Mercenary Swordsman armed with 1-h axe, shield, & javelin
    Swadian Auxiliary Trooper:  Mounted light/medium cavalry armed with long sword and cavalry shields
    Vaegir Auxiliary Archer:  Reasonably skilled archer, with decent armor.
    Rhodok Auxiliary Spearman:  Unskilled and lightly armored except for long 1-h spears and board shields
    Khergit Auxiliary Scouts:  Lightly cavalry armed with 1-h spears and javelins/bows (no shield).

13. Allow buildings to be damaged during a siege (town / castle) or raid (village).  A fully destroyed building should cost ¼ the original price and ½ the time to repair. 

14. Blacksmith expanded:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Ability to craft weapons based on your homeland's combat specialties. For example: 

Antarians:   Full plate.  Perhaps special light weight or heavier but thicker.

Marinians:   Best crossbow, special bolts and best pole arm.

Adenians:   Special Armor for a charger what translates to the heaviest horse in a game plus best lance in a game.

Villianians:   Best bow, best arrows, plus maybe a good nice cloak or/and really awesome two handed sword/axe.  Perhaps more arrows instead of perfect weaponry.

Zerrikanians:   Blacksmith will shoe horse (fastest and most maneuverable horse in game), plus the fastest saber in game and a bow and arrows slightly worse than Villianians but better than anything else.  Perhaps cheaper to purchase horses. 

[*] Option to repair chipped, bent, etc. pieces of equipment.  The price for repair should the same price as the difference of a normal item versus the damaged item to prevent an exploit.

[*] Act like a weapon + armor shop where you trade with the blacksmith and he has some small selection of top-notch stuff (or maybe items starts okay, but get better in time as he gets more experienced.

[*] Ability to request specific items that take a while and very expensive.  That way you could commission a "Masterwork Saber" or whatever.  We could even consider having a few items that only blacksmiths of the highest rank can make, and hence the only way to acquire them is to commission them (nothing game-breaking, just an extra +1 speed & damage over the otherwise masterwork version of the standard item).

[*] Ability to create special light high-protection infantry armor. The best protection to weight ratio available comes from a thick or reinforced native light leather, which gives 29-30 body (Studded Leather values) for 5.0 weight and ~5000 denars, and the Exquisite Plate, which is some 55ish Full Plate number for 15.0 weight and your entire life savings.
[/list]

15. Add a Bowyer/Fletcher that appears after building a practice range that could upgrade/make bows, crossbows and arrows, maybe also some special arrows better than +3.  Could spawn (blacksmith and bowyer) in the courtyard.

16. Cathedral:  Increase faith on the entire kingdom

17. Palace:  Make renown, increase the noble incoming to the kingdom, boost on growth and prosperity

18. Hospitals in Cities:  Increase health, make surgeons available (some special units with few battle skills but with healing skills)

19. Healer's Hut in villages:  Increase village health

20. Coliseum:  Improve the arena, 1 Tournament each week.  Increase prosperity + some gold through attendance

21. Village Gendarmerie, Town Gendarmerie, District Gendarmerie:  Creates Patrols. For example, Village Gendarmerie creates very small group of “regulators” that patrols around the village.

22. Defense buildings:  Effects quality of automatically spawned garrisons (arrive as regular*).

23. A theatre in cities that increases prosperity or renown (random small bonus). 

24. Faction specific structures: 
[list type=decimal]
[*] Republic of Marina:  Build trading banks to increase prosperity in cities/towns

[*] Duchy of Villian:  Upgradable practice ranges that garrison archers faster in the towns their built

[*] Kingdom of Aden:  Watch posts that spawn cavalry patrols from cities

[*] Zerrikanian Sultanate:  Garrison which reduces the upkeep costs of garrisoned mounted units

[*] Empire of Antares:  Training center where troops garrisoned by a castle/city have enough XP to become veterans
[/list]

25. Location specific structures (certain cities can build special buildings): 
[list type=decimal]
[*] Cities on the coastline can build ports to increase prosperity

[*] Cities in mountains can build mines to produce income

[*] Cities in forests can build lumber mills to produce income

[*] Cities on the steppes will recruit (and auto garrison) free steppe bandits

[/list]

26. Religion specific structures (grants global and / or local faith): 
[list type=decimal]
[*] The One:  Allows one Apostle Palace in capitol city (NPC = Holy Pope)

[*] The Void:  Allows one Sacrificial Altar in capitol city (NPC = High Priest)

[*] Faithless:  Atheism allows one Tower of Knowledge in capitol city (NPC = High Grandmaster of Wisdom)

[*] The Old Gods:  Allows one Holy Groove in capitol city (NPC = High Priestess)

[*] Self Realization:  Allows one Tower of Solitude in capitol city (NPC = Dalai Lama Reincarnate)
[/list]

27. Allow certain castles on outskirts of map to recruit special "Regional units" that are like mercenary units but with a different name, and lower upkeep.  For example, you could have Woodland Crossbowmen, like mercenary crossbow men with 1/2 the upkeep cost and they spawn very slowly.

28. When build a new building in Lords property, give a relationship bonus with the Lord (pretty much all buildings effect lords except the temple and shrine).  They are getting something out of it so they should appreciate it (ungrateful bastards).

29. Ability to create new structures on the map such as villages, castles, and cities but be very expensive and time consuming.

30. Ability to upgrade the stables to allow extra horses to be stored in that castle / city.  This feature could create an either an extra chest or alternately, unlock the feature that prevents you from sticking a horse in your personal castle chest (use your imagination). 

31. Add taverns and shops to a few select castles

32. A harem for the king.  The building should be very expensive but have no practical use except cause random events to occur such as... 

 
TAXES / ECONOMY

Parliament:

1. Kingdom income will compose of:
[list type=decimal]
[*] Taxes from villages
[*] Taxes from towns
[*] Tax from Nobles (lords - lord's hold fiefs and pay % [base 30%])
[*] Tax from temple's lands (monasteries and temples, shrines and chapels don't count)
[/list]

2. Tax efficiency decrease with domain size

3. Base tax value will be 10% (100% tax income).  0% taxes (voluntary) will give in fact -80% income (base taxes X (prosperity + taxes) so with 100 prosperity there will be 20% still paying for common cause).  Separate taxes will be set for villages and towns.

4. Player will get events asking to lower taxes (by 1% if they are equal or below tithe they can ask for lowering even further if taxes are high).  If he won't agree he will face negative consequences (popularity drop) or will have to pay.

5. I'm not sure if there should be a maximum for taxes.  Though they were rarely higher than 10% in history

6. Player can lower taxes any time depending on Persuasion (ability to sell his deed to the people) he will get benefits from such action, immediate increase of popularity, honor?, population? (immigration to the kingdom) and will get an "Argument" in the Parliament.

7. In order to raise taxes player calls Parliament.  Game menu will show introduction, short explanation of parliament function.  Then can ask Parliament to raise taxes for peasants or townspeople.  Parliaments response will depend on global prosperity (sum of all prosperities divided by number of fiefs villages or towns for peasants or townspeople) and global popularity (same) and other Arguments. 

8. i.e. global prosperity equals 30, it's 20 below average so that could give -2 arguments, global popularity can be 20 giving 2 arguments, that's 0 arguments, minus the base unattractiveness of the proposition i.e. -5 arguments for 1% plus Persuasion (we have 3 in this example good use for this skill finally) and let's say we lowered taxes some time ago and we had one argument saved and finally modifier from current taxes +/- 1 argument for each % below/above 10%, in the example it's 10% already). That gives us -2 arguments.

9. We must prepare a list of demands/privileges, i.e. townspeople can demand lower draft (cap for recruiting? cap for town garrisons?), right to a trial by peers (lowers reputation during time), freedom of religion (lowers local/global faith over time) etc. (thus base popularity/prosperity hit from high taxes should be slightly lowered for game play reasons as a player already "paid" for rising taxes)

10. From this list Parliament will randomly chose demands to counter the Arguments (i.e. -2 arguments will result in 2 demands or one demand worth 2 arguments).

11. If arguments are in favor to a king no demands will be presented and taxes will be raised.

12. Use French model of 3 circles of power.  The first was for the church clergy and other religious authorities, 2nd was reserved for nobles and rich people, and the 3rd was for everyone else (this included doctors, lawyers, peasants, everything). 

The idea here is that you can tax one group more than the other.  Obviously if you tax your people more than your nobles you'll be hurting only them and thus population happiness would decrease.  If you tax your nobles more than the peasants than you might receive more income, but you could have more chance that they don't obey you and receive negative relations with the lords (which has other outcomes as well).  If you tax your religious group higher than the other 2 then you will decrease the amount of faith troops you get, while once again increasing your coffers.

Taxation for Nobles:  Vassals pay Liege, the more they pay the less army they can field and become unhappy.  Together with the Kingdom Management skill, this could provide a good Liege/Vassal relation system.

Clergy pay taxes from temples and monasteries (shrines and chapels have no effect).  The more taxes they pay, the less effective they influence faith and popularity.  Possibly provide the ability to assign fiefs to the Faith to new NPCs-Priests (different names for different faiths).  Gaining faith troops could no longer be based on global faith but from fiefs owned by Clergy.

13. To make voting taxes useful, limit the effect of low taxes.  They are used to affect population growth, health, and prosperity.  The good effects of lowest taxes are so good that you just have to limit your expenses for a while, then money is never a problem even if you keep tax under average level (especially when you end with high leadership/engineering reducing your wages and building costs to about nothing). 

So I think low taxes should not have a lot of effects out of making population happier (but making population happy can become more important, if you need the support of a parliament to vote things, and if events like villagers revolting can occur), and long term evolution be more based on buildings, availability of goods or things like that (i.e.: a system where centers need trade goods produced by other centers to increase their population/health/prosperity ; most of the exchanges would be automatic, and wouldn't need a lot of new code as making centers get close center trade goods is already in native code,

The player would have to bring the missing goods in a region, either by giving them himself, a programmable caravan system, or by giving an order to his merchants guilds (here need to code something like "search the best price for a trade good in player realm", then make player automatically pay it to its centers if the consign to supply villages/towns has been given to his merchant guild and one of his center need it.  The order would include the maximum value the player is ok to spend for developing economy each week and may also have more conditions like only supply towns, or only supply centers under x prosperity).

14. Add stone, wood, and iron to the game.  You can buy these resources from villages (not in the buy menu, but instead you can ask them, and they may have 2 tones of wood for example.  Caravans could also carry the wood, stone, and iron.  You can talk to the merchant guild and tell him what resources you need and how much he should spend for them.  You could then talk to the merchant guild to find out how many resources you have. 

Towns could have requirements to use 1 ton of wood each week.  You would use the resources for building buildings or using buildings.  If you were in need of resources fast you could always go to villages (Vaegir villages for iron for example)

15. Add salt mines back into the game.  Allow slaves to be sold and of course trade salt.  These can be strategically controlled resources. 

16. Instead of manipulating goods (already have food & moral), create a new value called 'resource point' linked to prosperity/health/place location.  It can be earned as the tax on a regular basis (weekly?).  The buildings need resource points to be built and maintained, so not only denars is key, resource points would also has some saying, otherwise, building cannot be built, building less performance (less recruits, cannot upgrade, etc.), destroyed, etc..

17. Trade and / or administration skill (or an average of the two) should affect the revenues from caravans (leeway between characters dominant in INT or CHA).

18. Add trade caravan routes the player can set


UNITS
1. Improve and modify the Manhunter troop tree.  First of all, they need helmets.  The recruits can stay the same, but once upgraded, give them a helmet and some better armor with a shield (tier 3-4 should have mail armor).  As they progress, give them a blunt lance, a one handed crushing damage weapon with (easily breakable) shield, and a two handed crushing weapon. 

If blunt arrows are implemented (see the ITEMS section for details) have a few of them randomly spawn with blunt arrows and bows.  Perhaps even make a new line of possible units to choose from after the first upgrade (melee versus ranged choice) starting with an archer than can be upgraded to a horse archer.  Slave chiefs take forever to train and should ride a charger with nice armor (and a cool helm). 

They need to be beefed up but not so powerful they become the best choice.  This would open up so many new character builds and repeatability focusing on an army that captures soldiers.  Combine with sacrifice as a Void worshipper (or slavery as a Zerrikanian) and we have an Aztec hybrid civilization here and tons of re-playability. 
Add most of the open source items to create more variety in armor.

2. Have all 5 new civilizations unique troops hirable in taverns as mercenaries.  The price would be higher than if you actually played that civilization but this would allow more variety on the battle field.  It is logical that the surviving faction’s soldiers that were recently overpowered are now mad and jobless. This will increase the variety of troops on the battlefield and add a little to the story line.  Even faith troops could be recruited (requires a persuasion skill roll to convert and a ton of money). 

3. New Mercenaries:

Royal Guard: heavily armored close-combat troops.  Less armored than most faith troops and less offensive but faster and just as healthy; they deploy massive shields for protection and wield swords and maces for melee purposes; their favored mounts are Hunter variants.

Inventor (aka. Engineer): moderately armored dangerous ranged attacker; Inventors are much weaker in close combat compared to other Faith Troops, but they excel at ranged warfare; they deploy muskets and heavy/siege crossbows, and wield axes, maces and sabers for close combat; sometimes they get access to shields too, mostly round shields, but board shields are also accessible.

4. Remake Zerrikanian troop tree:
Done!

5. Introduce a more elaborate troop tree for bandits (multiple type of units).  Fighting 50+ looters, sea raiders, steppe bandits, etc. becomes repetitive

6. Increase bandit numbers.  For level 1, around 20 to 30.  By level 30, around 60 to 80.  If troop tree is modified, increase chances of spawning high level bandits as your level increases. 

7. Give Villianian archers another quiver of arrows (even if that means moving away from sword and shield).  Need to be able to have troops that will be firing through the whole battle.  Could possibly make another arrow (looking exactly the same as the other but named “Villianian Arrows”) with another 20 arrows per quiver.  Possibly increase their power draw skill. 

8. Native troop tweak with standardized equipment per faction (only Nords and Rhodoks had overlap with armors). Also, remove shields from Archers since the ranged units seem to outperform most top tier infantry.  However, crossbowmen (especially Rhodoks) wear Pavise/Board Shield on backs.

Vaegir had the best overall army, and archers only second to the Villianians
vaegir.gif


Swadia had the most heavily armored units.
swadia.gif


Rhodok had best trained crossbowmen and Sergeant was dedicated to 2 handed pole arms.
rhodok.gif


khergit.gif


Nord units were the best infantry.
nord.gif

9. Give native factions (Swadia, Vaegir, Nord, Rhodok, Khergit) Noble units.  It's unfair that natives have no access to Nobility and Faith Troops.

Kingdom of Swadia:  Gentry -> Royal Squire -> Royal Knight

Kingdom of Vaegir:  Nobleman -> Boyar

Kingdom of Nords:  Brave -> Champion -> Warlord

Kingdom of Rhodok:  Alderman -> Councilor at Arms or Council Patron

Khergit Khanate:  Khan's Guard -> Khan -> Tarkhan
Gentry/Royal Squire/Royal Knight: the typical heavily armored soldiers; they prefer one-handed swords and sometimes lances for melee combat and have access to War Horse and Charger mounts - it should be noted that Gentry and Royal Squire spawn sometimes as foot soldiers, but Royal Knight is always mounted; Gentry and Royal Squire has chance for crossbows, Royal Knight is purely melee.

Brave/Champion/Warlord: moderately armored infantry (Warlord is heavy infantry) with mostly two-handed axes and swords, fast running speed and brutal melee damage; sometimes they make use of one-handed weapons, in this case they also receive big round shields; Brave has chance for throwing weapons, either javelins or throwing axes, Champion and Warlord have chance for Saddle Horse and Hunter mounts.

Khan's Guard/Khan/Tarkhan: some of the best medium cavalry; they use lamellar armor, big round shields, lances, sabers - all of top quality (Masterwork or Lordly); all of them have a chance for bow, and they ride Heavy Hunters and Coursers.

Nobleman/Boyar: offensive but still well-armored fighters; Nobleman is either on foot or is mounted, Boyar is always mounted; their mounts are either Chargers or Coursers; their favored weapons are two-handed maces and axes.

Alderman: moderately armored unit that spawns either with or without Saddle Horses. They make use of one-handed swords and heather shields for close combat.

Council Patron: slow but extremely armored foot soldier clad in plate armor and massive Board Shield; their favored weapons are long one-handed spears and halberdiers.

Councilor at Arms: moderately armored fighter with reinforced kite/heather shields and Hunter/Steppe Horse mounts; they deploy spears and one-handed swords at melee.

10. Add more graphical enhancements to unique units (especially faith troops).  Some examples are located here and here with the mod Rise of Khergits (best models I have seen yet).

11. Create army specific lords (enemies and allies).  It would be interesting to have an all of one unit army of cavalry, crossbows, or infantry (kind of like deserters but more powerful in larger numbers).  Alternately, make something like this on motherland continent. As empires were broken, lords have retreated and standard armies have scattered into single regiments. I imagine parties like "Sixth infantry division of Antares" or "Marksmen squad Foxtrot" and so on.

12. Give the Imperial Legion some crossbowmen or their elite a proficiency in thrown objects in the 200 - 300 range with a high power throw skill.  Perhaps even increase their shield skill to increase their coverage. 

39. Increase the allowed troop varieties in armies (16 slots is not enough).  Although it presents interesting troop management questions and forces expansion or regiment use, it is more of a headache than anything.
This is hard coded and cannot be changed.
 
Hot tamale, Cyclo! You are a feedback machine, man! :eek:

I think you just made M&B modding a little bit more awesome by compiling and taking stewardship over that big honkin' list. Truly a noble endeavor; the developers should pause and take heed, and the playerbase should make lots of suggestions in the Brainstorming thread to keep you busy.
 
Excellent initiative and noble gesture as Sibilance stated
Bravo, and please do carry on
 
vonmistont said:
It would be great to consolidate whole thread. 37 pages is hard to read :wink:

Thanks!

I will do it.  I wanted to post what I have done and make sure I am not repeating work someone else had already taken care of.  I also wanted to make sure that it is a tool you guys will use before I invested any more time.  If it is just interesting but not in use, then there are other things I can be doing. 

It is a lot of work because I am removing the feelings and consolidating everything.  I am trying to stick to just the facts and hide a lot of the meat in spoilers so it is not so long.  I imagine that 37 pages will be about double this size but there is a lot of repeat ideas.  In those cases, I just combine them.  I also have not cleaned it up for internet viewing (i.e. using bb code for bullets, lists, etc.)

I will keep it updated if you let me know what to strike thru or comment on. 
 
I wish combat was a bit more faster like the mod "Enhanced Gameplay 3", so that I can quickly get into the fight faster then walking slowly... That also goes with weapon speed as well. It will be also very nice if yall can make a technology tree and that we can gain new weapons, armor, troops, and make our fiefs more stronger. To be able to research, we need a university on our cities, university produce points to complete the technology, and if you get more cities that also have a university, the points will increase more which help complete the new technology faster. You gain a point each 3 minutes, if you got 3 cities with a university on each of them, you gain 3 points each 3 minutes, and you can research "militia villages" which cost 45 points to complete.
 
7.  When knocked out in battle, it would be fascinating if that took you to an Edit Mode-like bird's eye view where you could zoom around and watch the battle.


Already implemented.  Press "space" to begin "fly-mode".  Its not perfect, but it works.
 
darkedone02 said:
I wish combat was a bit more faster like the mod "Enhanced Gameplay 3", so that I can quickly get into the fight faster then walking slowly... That also goes with weapon speed as well. It will be also very nice if yall can make a technology tree and that we can gain new weapons, armor, troops, and make our fiefs more stronger. To be able to research, we need a university on our cities, university produce points to complete the technology, and if you get more cities that also have a university, the points will increase more which help complete the new technology faster. You gain a point each 3 minutes, if you got 3 cities with a university on each of them, you gain 3 points each 3 minutes, and you can research "militia villages" which cost 45 points to complete.

Thanks for comment but please do not post new ideas here, use the original thread (linked above).  I want to keep this thread focused on what has and has not been implemented without all the extra words. 
 
I'm thinking about removing the spoilers in many instances.  I initially thought it would make things easier to read but lists inside spoilers do not work as well as initially planned and I'm afraid it will be hard to keep up with what is and what is not implemented if everything is hidden. 

Thoughts / Comments? 
 
Cyclohexane said:
I'm thinking about removing the spoilers in many instances.  I initially thought it would make things easier to read but lists inside spoilers do not work as well as initially planned and I'm afraid it will be hard to keep up with what is and what is not implemented if everything is hidden. 

Thoughts / Comments? 

I personally think the spoilers do make reading easier...
 
NinjaKiwi said:
Villianese are worse archers then vaegirs...
Villianese sharpshooters are the best in the game. I made sure.
Even then they are SUPER easy to get.
Cyclohexane said:
I'm thinking about removing the spoilers in many instances.  I initially thought it would make things easier to read but lists inside spoilers do not work as well as initially planned and I'm afraid it will be hard to keep up with what is and what is not implemented if everything is hidden. 

Thoughts / Comments? 
Matters if you think the info is important or not.
 
jasonxfri13th said:
NinjaKiwi said:
Villianese are worse archers then vaegirs...
Villianese sharpshooters are the best in the game. I made sure.
Even then they are SUPER easy to get.
Cyclohexane said:
I'm thinking about removing the spoilers in many instances.  I initially thought it would make things easier to read but lists inside spoilers do not work as well as initially planned and I'm afraid it will be hard to keep up with what is and what is not implemented if everything is hidden. 

Thoughts / Comments? 
Matters if you think the info is important or not.

Villianese archers use longbows and war bows, they have a powerdraw of 5, vaegir marksman wield strong bows, the bow between longbow and war bow, and they have a powerdraw of six. Better said, if i put 50 marksmen agains 50 villianese sharpshooters, the vaegirs will come out victorious (not with much of course, but still...).
 
"Villianese archers use longbows and war bows, they have a powerdraw of 5, vaegir marksman wield strong bows, the bow between longbow and war bow, and they have a powerdraw of six. Better said, if i put 50 marksmen agains 50 villianese sharpshooters, the vaegirs will come out victorious (not with much of course, but still...)"


maybe you should try that and see how it turns out :lol: ...first of all - the Villianese have a lot better bow using skill compensating for the lower power draw skill ( therefore, better accuracy ), second - better armour...i've seen you downtalk the Villianese in other posts and threads so i actually decided to run a little test on that matter on several occasions with some deserters, and believe me, you're quite wrong...since every time the Villianese were victorious...actually, hardly having any casualties :roll:
 
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