Unlike other medieval roleplaying games, Crusader Kings 3 stands out for its dedication to accurately portraying the real life history and cultures of Europe, Africa and Asia as they existed in the middle ages. Though the developers have done their best to compile and cram in as much real world, accurate historical data into the game, to the point where Crusader Kings 3 can arguably be called educational material, its hard to get everything perfectly right, and a few cultures or identities can feel a bit underrepresented within the game’s mechanics. However, that doesn’t stop the fans from stepping in with suggestions on how to improve things, and one Redditor has pitched their ideas on how to better represent period Islamic governments in Crusader Kings 3, much to the praise of the greater community.
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If you aren’t familiar, in Crusader Kings 3, players can take on the role of guiding medieval history. Real-world nations, cultures, religions, and politics are represented in a sandbox that allows players to guide history the way it could have gone using period-accurate starting positions as a reference.
Religion and government are two of the biggest driving factors in how borders are formed, shrunk, or expanded in Crusader Kings 3. While a level of Game of Thrones-esque personal intrigue does play a big part in the game, generally, the success of larger states such as grand kingdoms or even empires depends on their type of government and the cultural traditions of the player’s chosen character, the latter often being a huge factor in how you play the game.
As any history buff would know, the great Islamic monarchies play a huge part in the time period, with a rich tapestry of cultures and historical events falling within the Islamic sphere for the period ending on 1453 in Crusader Kings 3. As major of a player these cultures are, however, some CK3 players feel as though improvements could be made to enrich the gameplay experience for Islamic Administrative governments in-game.
Enter Reddit user Familiar-Elephant-68, who pitched a series of Cultural Traditions to create a more interesting and historically accurate playstyle for these governments.
“Seeing how the devs distinguished Greek culture from the Admin Goverment and their recent generalization attempts of the Admin government for other cultures, tt seems fitting to add missing features from great Islamic empires (Umayyad, Abbasids, Ayyubids, Seljuks, Mughals, etc.) such as their utilization of Mamluks, Eunuchs and Harems,” says the user. “Historically, they played a major role in Islamic courts and court intrigue.”
Familiar-Elephant-68 puts forward the suggestion to introduce new cultural traditions that help make Islamic empires and administrative realms more thematic “in the same fashion as the Byzantines” by introducing two new cultural traditions.
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The two cultural traditions, in Elephant’s own words, are as follows:
Diwan Intrigue
- Adds 4 concubine slots, even for cultures with polygamy marital traditions.
- Employ a court Eunuch court position.
- Court Eunuch may perform “Manage Harem” task, increasing concubine opinion and improving a random skill each year.
- Starts with hereditary succession when adopting the Admin Government.
Mamluk Elite
- Mamluk characters are extremely loyal to their employer andย onlyย their employer, not their heirs, etc. They may become a threat to their new liege and even overthrow them.
- May recruit Horse Archer MAA after discovering Ghilman innovation.
- May take “Invite Distinguished Mamluk to Court” allowing ruler to employ powerful characters with the “Mamluk” trait, giving them military and prowess bonuses. This allows liege to recruit them as commanders and other court positions.
Most interesting to me is Elephant’s implementation of more identity to Mamluk characters. Mamluks, for those who don’t know, were a military caste within old Islamic societies that held high influence in the realms they served. Most comparable to European Knights, the most prominent Mamluk society period was in Egypt, which was even known historically at one point as the Mamluk Sultanate.
For those who may take pause with the mention of Concubines and Harems, it’s worth mentioning that while these aspects of medieval society are historically accurate, they play more of a role within the palace intrigue gameplay of Crusader Kings 3, serving as valuable spies, counter-spies, and agents rather than some gross power fantasy or unfortunately accurate historical representation.
Elephant’s suggestions offer a chance to greatly expand upon the gameplay depth of medieval Islamic governments, a section of history rich in diversity and incredible lore, and my personal go-to in any CK3 run. Hopefully, should these ideas gain support from the community, Paradox Interactive might add these new features to the game in a future patch.
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Image courtesy of Marvel Studios.
