Knights of Honor II: Sovereign News

[h2]Update Overview[/h2]

This is the sixth major update since the release of Knights of Honor II: Sovereign. This time we focused on rebellions and added new features to allow players to better handle rebellions and unrest.
As always, thank you to everyone who tried this version during our beta and provided us with feedback.

[h3]Changes to Rebellions[/h3]

Even the wisest of rulers sometimes cannot prevent a revolt against their rule. Until now, a rebel army could only be defeated in battle. With this update, we are also giving players the opportunity to give in to the rebels’ demands and restore order quickly.

• New Feature: “Pay off rebellion”

Players can now choose to pay off a rebellion to quickly restore order. Paying off a rebellion costs gold and all conquered provinces are ceded to the rebels. Special rebels like loyalists can also demand additional provinces.

• Imminent rebellions are now indicated by a new icon in the city selection UI together with additional information.
• In some cases, the game now warns players earlier about the risk of rebellions.

[h3]Quality of Life Improvements[/h3]

• Multiplayer: Player kingdoms are now indicated on the map by a special icon in the multiplayer lobby.
• Multiplayer: Banners of allied or enemy human players are now outlined with green/red borders in certain cases like city selection and audience windows.
• It is now possible to reorder units in the city garrison by drag and drop.
• It is now possible to merge units in the city garrison by drag and drop.
• Replaced the previous 0.5 per unit-in-garrison local happiness bonus with an army-presence bonus of 1/level for each unit, including visiting armies.
• Changed the shade of red text to make it more readable.

[h3]Balancing[/h3]

• Reduced the maximum stability penalty for religious differences from 30 to 25.
• Reduced the maximum stability penalty for cultural differences from 15 to 10.
• Reduced the global stability bonus for defeating a rebellion from 15 to 10, but it can now be applied up to 4 times (instead of 3).
• Added a 15 local stability bonus that fades over time after defeating rebels.

[h3]Network[/h3]

• Updated the game’s online library files - fixing a rare multiplayer bug where players could potentially lose some information on their multiplayer campaigns.

[h3]Bugfixes[/h3]

• Removed vassal actions for the Pope.
• Fixed several unification quests.
• Fixed some text issues.

Hi everyone and welcome to the Beta of the 7th major patch for Knights of Honor II: Sovereign!

The current Beta version is now available on Steam. To access it just right-click on the game in your library, select “properties”, switch to the tab named “Betas” and choose “publicbeta – Public Beta Builds” in the top-right dropdown.



You can opt-out of the Beta at any time by choosing “None”.

Please note:

• Beta builds are not fully tested like release builds. While we do some tests to make sure nothing major is broken, some bugs are to be expected.
• To play multiplayer with other players, you need to make sure all players are using the same version of the game.
• Mods may not be compatible with the Beta branch. If you plan on giving feedback, please deactivate all mods you have installed.
Please report any feedback or bugs in our bug tracker. You can also discuss the new features either on our Discord Server or the Steam Forums.

Bugtracker: https://bugreporting.thqnordic.com/#/projects/118/knights-of-honor-ii-community/add-issue

Discord: https://discord.gg/knightsofhonor

Steam Forums: https://steamcommunity.com/app/736820/discussions/0/3886103032720889900/


Thank you for your continuous support and have fun playing the beta build!

[h2]Changes to Rebellions[/h2]

• New Feature: Pay off rebellion
Players can now choose to pay off a rebellion to quickly restore order. Paying off a rebellion costs gold and all conquered provinces are ceded to the rebels. Special rebels like loyalists can also demand additional provinces.
This feature is currently only available in Single Player campaigns.
• Imminent rebellions are now also indicated by a new icon in the city selection UI together with additional information.
• In some cases, the game now warns players earlier about the risk of rebellions.

[h2]Quality of Life Improvements[/h2]

• Multiplayer: Player kingdoms are now indicated on the map by a special icon in the multiplayer lobby.
• Multiplayer: Banners of allied or enemy human players are now outlined with green/red borders in certain cases like city selection and audience windows.
• Added drag and drop reorder to units in the city garrison.
• Added drag and drop merge to units in the city garrison.

[h2]Misc[/h2]

• Made Unite the Steppe - Cumania union quest no longer available for the Golden Horde.
• Made Unite the Steppe - Golden Horde union quest no longer available for Cumania.
• Changed the shade of red for the red text to make it more readable.

This is the fifth major update since the release of Knights of Honor II: Sovereign. With this update, we added more depth and features to the game’s Vassalage mechanics, allowing players to choose if their vassals should contribute to their war efforts, economy or books and faith income.
This version also adds more modifiers to the Army Supply system, making it even more important for players to keep an eye on their armies’ situation. Running out of supplies now has a serious impact on your soldiers’ performance and can easily turn the tide in battle.

Special thanks to everyone who tried this version during our public beta. Your feedback was invaluable, and we will certainly continue the public beta with the next version. Keep your eyes open for the next couple of weeks for our beta-announcement on Steam and Discord!
Changes to Vassalage
We added three special types of vassalage: Scutage, March and Sacred Land. Players can change the vassal type with a special option available to their king.

[h2]Scutage:[/h2]

• Vassal is protected by its sovereign; the sovereign must aid it in all defensive wars
• Sovereign receives +100% gold tribute
• Vassal generates +100% gold from population
• Vassal generates +3 gold in every village
• Vassal has 10% cheaper building and upgrade cost

[h2]March:[/h2]

• The vassal is sworn to aid the sovereign in all wars
• Vassal pays no gold tribute
• Vassal has +3% squad manpower for each keep (up to 10 keeps)

[h2]Sacred Land:[/h2]

• Vassal pays no gold tribute
• Vassal pays 20% book income
• Vassal pays 20% piety income
• Vassal develops skills and traditions 20% cheaper
• Vassal generates +2 books in each Monastery/Mosque/Shrine
• Vassal generates +2 piety in each Monastery/Mosque/Shrine

[h2]The following changes affect all vassal types:[/h2]

• Vassals now ask their sovereign to support them whenever they are attacked. Refusing to help a vassal negatively impacts crown authority and opinions.
• Newly created vassals now inherit their sovereign’s relations with other kingdoms
• Players can now convert their vassals’ provinces to their own religion
• AI is now more hesitant to attack vassals of a powerful sovereign
• Increased gold produced by workers from 0.2 to 0.5
• Increased gold produced by rebels from 0.1 to 0.2
• Updated Books income tooltip
• Updated Piety income tooltip
• Decreased commerce upkeep by 50% when trading with a vassal
• Reduced merchant character level bonus to base trade from 1 to 0.5 per level

[h2]Changes to Army Supply System and Morale[/h2]

• Army movement speed decreased by -30% (was 15%) when the army runs out of supplies
• Armies that run out of supplies now have a -75% penalty to archer salvos
• Armies that run out of supplies now have a -50% penalty to cavalry attack
• Increased out-of-supplies morale penalty from -5 to -12 for armies in foreign lands
• Increased leadership morale bonus from 1/2/3 to 2/4/6
• Increased bonus defense granted by high morale from 25% to 50%
• Increased morale threshold that gives no bonus from 10 to 15
• Added a defense penalty for armies with morale below 15. Max. penalty is 50%.
• Increased the maximum flat defense bonus given by morale from 3 to 15
• Added a siege weapon to mercenary armies including the necessary UI

[h2]Misc[/h2]

• “Influence” now has a bigger impact on diplomatic decisions
• Increased the max. influence modifier of diplomats from 20% to 30%
• Changed criteria for AI to accept offered land from the province’s loyalty to its culture and increased the chance of the AI to accept the offer
• Changed the Bug Report Window text to remove "Reports are automatically sent" (this was causing issues with players thinking they automatically sent the report)
• Fixed a bug with knight actions causing 100% success chance if negative modifiers stacked too high
• Fixed Papal States being able to form Italy

[h2]Bugfixes and changes[/h2]

• Fixed a major bug causing vassals to demand their sovereign’s support every time a campaign was loaded. This will still happen if a savegame from a previous patch version is loaded, saving the campaign with this patch version fixes the problem.
• Updated the Convert Vassal Religion Action Icon
• Decreased crown authority penalty for refusing to help a vassal from -3 to -2
• Decreased cleric opinion penalty for refusing to help a vassal from -3 to -1

Game ver. 1.6.0b3, 03-Nov -2023

Build version 31750



- Added translations
- Fixed text bug: replaced "+0.5 gold per worker" with "+100% gold from population" in Scutage tooltip
- Fixed text bug: "Castle" instead of "Keep"
- Fixed ConvertVassalReligionAction counting the wrong type of religions for neighbors penalty
- Fixed a bug that when stacking too many negative modifiers, chances for a successful action would go up instead of being 0
- Vassals will now accept almost any province if offered
- Halved the time required for the 3 Declare Vassal Action
- Made all Vassal Actions require the king to not be leading an army
- Starting wars created at the start of a campaign now have -75% chance to be declared against a vassal (reduces the Demand Sovereign Defend messages at the start of the game)
- Made AI more hesitant to attack vassals with strong sovereigns
- Added DemandSovereignDefend message that auto-triggers when someone attacks a vassal (With this message the vassal requests the aid of the sovereign, or the sovereign faces crown authority, relations and opinions penalties)
- Added a siege weapon to mercenary armies including the necessary UI
- Fixed Papal States being able to form Italy
- Fixed Vassal Provinces being instantly religiously converted
- Fixed bug where scutages would join their sovereign’s offensive wars
- Made marches way more likely to support their sovereign in offensive wars