Patch #43-45 (MAIN). Big Autumn Update

Hello friends!

Today we are rolling out the Big Autumn Update to the main branch.

It includes the combined changes from patches #43 and #44, plus the new fixes and improvements from patch #45 that we finished this week.

As always, all saves are fully compatible, and your feedback and reviews are like nectar to yellow fanatics for us.

Let’s first talk about the latest changes.

This week we mostly focused on QoL improvements and responding to your feedback.

Steam Reviews: Your Feedback Matters

As we continue to develop and iterate, we'd love to hear your thoughts about the latest changes to Norland. We're reading through all of your feedback, whatever it might be, and Steam reviews are a powerful vehicle to make your thoughts known. It helps a lot, no matter how short or long the post may be. I

Prisoner barracks no longer require a warden

Since prisoners can freely move around the settlement during working hours, we’ve allowed them to take food from the warehouse themselves — the warden is no longer needed. This makes managing them much easier when you don’t have barracks or are short on them — they will no longer starve in such cases. Overall, simplification is almost always a good thing in our book. :)

Improved comfort visualization when building

Now, when choosing a spot for a residential building, zones that increase or decrease comfort will be highlighted.

Display of food reserves in residential buildings

In the Economy menu, you can now see all the food reserves that residents keep in their homes.

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Full changelog below

Below you’ll also find all the changes from patches 43 and 44 in case you weren’t following the beta branch. They are included in this update as well.

General changes and balance

• Updated settlement development thresholds. After 40 population, the next threshold is now 55 instead of 50, and further thresholds increase by 15 people each

• Peasants and soldiers can once again buy meat and ale directly from the caravan trader, but they need ≥120 gold to do so

• Prisoner barracks no longer require a worker-warden — prisoners will take food from the warehouse themselves

• Improved the algorithm for sending lords on inspections. For example, if a lord is busy with low-priority tasks and has an inspection assignment, they will now reset their current activity at 8 AM to start the inspection

• The "Empty pockets" thought has been strengthened to -12

UI and QoL

• In the trade menu, the small price-increase arrow has been replaced with a large red arrow; the arrow indicating possible price increase is now orange

• Loyalty and knowledge icons in lord tooltips on the global map have been enlarged

• Lord buttons in cities now show the lord’s tooltip even if the lord is elsewhere (e.g., in an army on the global map)

• When placing a residential building, negative production zones are now displayed, and the GUI shows the final comfort bonus/penalty for the building

• Total food reserves in residential buildings are now displayed in the Finances menu

• Various daily economic reports have been merged

• Tips will no longer appear until the player has built a Hall

• A marker with an explanatory tooltip has been added next to the Patrols menu header

• Special relationship icons in the Relationships menu now default to showing direction "from the character → selected character" instead of the opposite. Toggling the "From character" option will also update these icons and the tooltip accordingly

• When iron deposits in a mine are depleted, the warning tip about low reserves disappears

• The tip about warriors not training no longer counts disabled training grounds

• The hourglass icon will no longer be red if a soldier’s contract has more than one day remaining

• Puppet tooltip now shows how much gold the puppet has paid to their master

• Tooltips for all other social classes (top-left) now display the number of homeless citizens

• Problem flags will now disappear during battles on the global map

• If a soldier's contract expires while they are on the global map, the contract expiration message will no longer appear during manual battles involving the squad/army that contains that lord/soldier

• The hourglass icon will now turn red only for soldiers whose contracts have already expired

Fixes

• Fixed a bug where the moonshine icon in the trade menu wasn’t highlighted during the tutorial

• Fixed a bug where guitar music wasn’t looping

• The guest-womanizer will no longer try to seduce unattached lords

• Fixed a bug where publicly known knowledge wasn’t visually distinguished in the Knowledge menu

• Soldiers and peasants from other factions leaving the local map no longer affect the city’s departed residents counter

• Fixed missing icons above soldier housing after loading a save in King’s View mode

• Fixed a bug where moving a workplace reset worker preference settings

• Fixed missing context in wealth-related thoughts for soldiers, peasants, and lords

• A character with the "Insane" trait can no longer become a puppet master

• The book tab marker in the trade menu will no longer appear if there are no books available

• Fixed a bug where the required resource amount for upgrading a building was shown in red even when the warehouse had exactly the required amount

• Fixed a bug where a lord forbidden from eating meat could enter an infinite loop trying to eat if only meat was available in their home storage while immobilized

• During battles on the global map, character needs will no longer change — characters can no longer fall asleep in the middle of combat

• Fixed a bug where a character who gained the "Fatigue" trait in a previous global map battle would flee the squad at the start of a new global map battle

• Fixed a bug where a vassal or ally might not request help when someone tried to force them into neutrality

• Fixed a bug where soldier contract expiration notifications could appear prematurely

• Fixed a bug where a plot executor on the global map could disappear after completing their task

Patch #44 Changelog

Rumor System

You will now see a set of rumors in the daily global map report. They give you an idea of your opportunities in terms of intrigue. Somewhere a lord might be ready to be seduced, somewhere a politician has poor relations with their king and just needs a nudge to start a conspiracy, and so on. In general, you will better understand where to start and where you can apply pressure.

Politicians on the Map

Speaking of politicians, they are now more likely to rebel when the king changes (especially if they dislike the new one). Meanwhile, bribing them now initiates a conspiracy rather than a rebellion (otherwise it was too easy).

Reworked Global Map Conspiracies

We redesigned the conspiracy success formula. You can now send a helper lord who increases the success chance. This depends on their combat skill, so combining brains (the persuasion skill used for slander to turn a politician against their king) and brawn (the helper during the conspiracy) is especially effective.

New Books

In beta, the Scriptonic now brings new cultural books every time you upgrade your town level. We are moving toward a system where you will be able to buy only one of them (and next time he will bring different books). For now, we have reworked the sets, removed poorly used books, and added new useful ones. The Tanaya culture got especially lucky. I think they became particularly strong.

By the way, did you know that the Scriptonic buys books at double price? A good way to make money by selling him old books whose knowledge has already become common.

New Recipes

Many resources and buildings now require wooden blanks. This moves us away from the iron dictatorship and makes the game more varied.

By the way, we added iron to the mine on medium difficulty (150 per level), and when it depletes, it no longer completely stops producing iron. Its output drops by 70 percent, which gives around 10 units per day, still livable.

Building Storage Overflow

We discovered that many players do not realize that your peasants do not eat everything you give them. They consume one food per day, and all the excess is stored in the basements of their homes. We added a couple of notifications about this and will add more.

Rain Effect

Rain now increases crop yield for the day, but your residents may get their feet wet if they walk off-road, slowing them down a bit.

Balance

Overall, we continue working on making the early game easier and the late game harder. Vassal tribute has been reduced, and market expansion now happens only for alliances. On the other hand, we reduced annoyance from dealing with vassals. They now more reasonably assess your strength as suzerain and will not constantly spam you with demands to cancel tribute.

After being defeated, kings on the map now hire troops and recover noticeably slower, giving you more opportunities during military conflicts.

Unique guests will now appear more often. Previously, a bug caused their arrival to be blocked by the Scriptonic.

In fact, in the next roadmap we plan to revisit guests more thoroughly. I want to make them not passive bonuses, but active story agents your lords will interact with.

Crime System Adjustments

Another reason this patch is going to beta is that the new settlement level system disrupted crime balance, causing criminals to almost disappear. Previously they appeared due to excess unemployed people, but with migration control this has become easy to prevent.

So we added vagrants who arrive in your city when your neighbors are at war. You can generally stop them together with migration, but then you also lose regular migrants. Full elimination of crime is possible if you gain control over your neighbors and establish peace on all your borders.

UI Improvements

We made navigating and understanding the opportunities for intrigue in foreign kingdoms more convenient by placing all intrigue actions in a separate section.

In the relations menu we added a checkbox that lets you invert the direction of displayed relations from a character to others (as it worked before).

We also added a set of problems that help you understand when something is going wrong, and improved their triggering conditions.

In the army menu, mercenaries now have a yellow clock icon if their contract is about to expire, and a red one if it has already expired and needs renewal. When hiring warriors, icons on their portraits will quickly show what they are armed with.

Woodcutters camps now show the radius within which they efficiently cut trees, and when trees in this radius run out, you will receive a problem flag. It will be easier to monitor their efficiency.

Buildings prioritized for warriors now have an icon in the King’s Eye mode, so you can easily see who lives where.

All in all, there are many improvements and no fewer balance changes.

So play, share your thoughts, and report bugs. We are fixing them too, of course. Thank you to everyone who sends us emails.

Full Changelog (122 changes total)

New books

Varna

• Special spice. Alcohol effect duration x2 in whole province

• Good fame. New settler positive thought x2 duration

• Land knowledge. +30% iron mining bonus

Tanaya

• Church history. Bishop opinion req for teaching/sermons down to 0

• Closed eyes. On dark deeds fail Matriarch upset much less

• Approval sermon. Allows player-ordered approval sermons

• Secret history. Dark deeds cost x0.5

Kaiden

• Hunting traditions. All residents +7 combat skill vs wolf

• Secret fire. Defensive structures burn damage +50%

• Weapon glory. Victory thought x2 strength and duration for all residents

Makkha

• Herb gathering. +30% forest herb gathering bonus

Interface and QoL

• Improved display of the hint about knowledge that has become public

• The technology hint label "The book is written in the language ..." will include a culture icon

• Trade table capacity for exchanging in the caravan trader trade menu reduced from 9 to 7 goods

• Added warrior icon in king view mode, displayed above residential buildings where warriors are prioritized for living

• Added problem flag issue, ragged ones will attack soon

• If the marriage quest disappears from the global map, the corresponding issue will also disappear

• Changed "Prisoners are poorly guarded" issue, it will disappear if no prisoners have escaped recently

• Added problem flag issue when lots of food accumulated in peasant houses

• Added problem flag issue when many empty job slots

• Added problem flag issue when woodcutters camps far from trees

• Added number of homeless soldiers in the soldiers hint (top left)

• "Enemy awaits the moment" advice will not display while the player is under Loving Family protection

• In the "Seduction" order executor hint, current and required interest will be shown as numbers

• In "Abduction" and "Assassination" action hints in dark deeds on the global map, Treasurer's name is added

• Clicking on a lord's portrait in an AI city will open that lord's interaction menu nearby

• Added "Political Intrigues" category in AI city menu orders, some actions moved there

• If a soldier has rutabaga typhus, corresponding icon will show near the portrait

• Scriptonik will have 100-200 coins

• Technology names in caravan trade menu will wrap to multiple lines if long

• Now can rehire a soldier with expired contract without waiting for him to return equipment to storage

• Changed algorithm for forming list of possible resources for sale in caravan menu,

• Added display of new rumors in "World Summary" hint, now can click faction name in hints to go to that faction's city

• Added line to lord hint explaining why this lord is unavailable for interaction in "Lords" category selection menu on global map

• Added rumor system hinting important city events, e.g. AI city politician has bad relations with king and it can be exploited

• Added new modifier "Knowledge does not become public"

• Mercenary cards show their weapon icon

• Added context to approval sermon hints, sermon now available only to politicians, not bishop

• Added job slot recalculation at 21:00

• Woodcutters now show effective radius, issue displays if no trees inside

• Updated advice on lord hatred when attaching/detaching thoughts

• Added woodcatters camp radius display during construction

• Fixed missing text in Matriarch's letter about inquisition attacking player

• Soldier hint shows number needing medicine, not those with inflamed wounds

• Added reverse relations mode toggle in relations menu

• "Close" label appears when opening side menus in army menu

• Building hints in construction menu pin on hover to view required resources

• Red cross on peasant icon when migration disabled, hint shows hall menu button icon

• "Buy dog" task starts instantly after assignment

• Mercenary contract expired notification shows only if mercenary on local map, if on global - after return

Balance

• Tanaya culture will strengthen any prayer thought, not only in temple

• Market volume for carrots increased

• Joy sermon price reduced from 150 to 100 coins

• In AI possible resources buyable from player at 0-, ale replaced with wooden blanks

• AI army evaluation in city menu excludes lord-commander

• Removed "Idol's death" thought

• AI lord visit invitation now checks relations between that lord and executor, not kings

• AI no longer counts forces twice in "Suzerain's army might" thought calc if vassal city has walls

• Changed algorithm for lord money appearance and spending on global map, lords should have more money on average

• AI spends less money on army

• AI lords up to 90 residents in their city equip light armor with spear and shield

• Residents won't buy ale and meat directly from caravan trader

• Prisoner uprisings disabled

• Iron amount in mine at medium difficulty increased from 100 to 150 per level

• Changed thoughts attached after "Flattery" and "Slander" orders on local map

• Changed light armor and shields production recipes

• AI demands remove tribute only at -15 relations to suzerain or lower, not from 0

• AI demands remove tribute only 5 turns after conquest, not 3

• Some production buildings removed negative effect on neighboring residential houses

• Rain wets feet of residents walking off roads and improves field fertility

• Neighbor kings can't bribe non-politician lord with highest army support anymore

• Changed unlock thresholds for some knowledge

• Player's neighbors can now request help not only direct province neighbors but also empire neighbors

• Changed bishop faith sermon thought strength and duration

• Increased chance of unique guests arriving

• Market volume increases only if player in city alliance, not vassal state

• Vassal tribute halved

• AI won't attack player territory bandit camp

• Teacher XP for lesson and knowledge study XP halved

• King gift amount increased from 150 to 300 coins, character poor and gift works better if money < 100

• At game start and after lord aging, 0 to 500 coins

• Slander strength reduced on local and global map, global praise strength reduced

• War consequences happen even on successful defense by neighbors, increased vagrants from war consequence migrants

• Global map conspiracy success chances now based on initiator and player lord total combat skills, on fail player lord captured not executed

• Global map politician bribe now causes conspiracy not uprising

• AI politician can rebel only after king change, rebel chance 50%, or 100% if <0 to new king, army support random 30-70%

• Global map conspiracy can only be started by politician

• Healing ointment produced from 2 flowers, not 1

• Puppet on creation transfers 80% gold to master

• Ring prices increased from 30/15 to 100/50

• Removed market depth doubling on peaceful difficulty

• Changed some building construction recipes

• Removed "Learn new language" desire

• Added rutabaga to resources AI can sell player on global map

• Increased chance marauders target player city

• Player can't attack other lords' vassals if peace treaty with their suzerain

• For "Gift" order lord rich and reduces relation bonus only if >700 gold

Fixes

• Fixed "Comfort" order unavailable hint due to bad bishop and player king relations

• Fixed tutorial block at resource sale to caravan stage

• Fixed bug where player army cost evaluated lower

• Fixed bug where repairing some burned buildings didn't remove negative effect on neighboring residential

• Faith sermon hint accounts for max total thought strength bishop can get

• Fixed frequent "Culture residents unhappy" notification

• Fixed bug where global map city couldn't be selected at max zoom out if army/character nearby

• Fixed bug where global map "Gift" action returned money after execution but not on cancel

• Fixed bug where politician rebellion aid send hint showed two honor debt messages

• Fixed bug where mine depletion notification appeared every resource mine

• Fixed bug where lord mood 25 had yellow portrait background not red

• Fixed bug where global map city menu third tab missing order button and sprite transparency worked wrong

• Fixed possible crash on popup messages

• Fixed bug where player lords suddenly got heavy gear and peasants knives after 90 residents

• Fixed error on showing article popup during tutorial

• Fixed bug where mine depletion notifications reappeared on building upgrade

• Fixed bug where Scriptonik set cooldown on unique guests arrival making them rarer

• Fixed error on saving non-existent knowledge

• Fixed crash when married lord tried seduce commoner to sex and targeted barrack prisoner

• Fixed bug where low relations guest invite impossibility hint showed kings not lords

• GUI memory optimization

Patch #43 Changelog

New Progression System

Below is some theoretical design discussion for those interested in designing complex game systems; you can skip it and move on to the actual content.

Full Changelog

Events & Problems

• Disabled the “Invasion of Vagabonds” and “Yellow Fanatics” calamities.

• Disabled early‑game sequential tutorial advices in the top flag, as they are outdated.

• Added threat display in the tooltip for reaching a new settlement level; added triggers for settlement level‑ups — arrival of the Scriptonic, and a bandit camp at 20 population

• Disabled the “no food/alcohol production” problem indicator

• Removed alcohol‑related advice from the citizen tooltip

• When a problem (flag indicator) is resolved, a top‑screen event and an animated checkmark now appear on the flag

• A child’s coming of age now clears the “child not studying” problem

Politics, Kings & Vassals

• A lord can become a politician if they have the highest knowledge and there are no other politicians in the town except the king.

• Ambitious kings will no longer appear among AI kings whose towns share the same initial culture as the player.

• Bishop can no longer be a politician; if a lord stops being a politician, their active political demand is removed.

• Removed the “King’s Ambition” selection; the ambition hint (top panel) is now replaced with a settlement progression hint. Added display of progress toward the next settlement level

• Reworked the “Lord Marriage” advice — it now lists all lords who qualify for the recommendation

• The “An enemy is plotting” advice will no longer appear while the player is protected by the Loving Family

• AI lords on the global map now start the game with fake parents, making initial AI families properly recognized as relatives

• Politicians will no longer start riots if their relationship with the king is above 0

• Clicking on “Politician Gave a Gift” and “Politician Flattered a Lord” events will now centre the camera on the participants

• Player’s politicians will no longer demand attacks on the player’s unfriendly vassals

• Fixed a bug where a new AI king, if he had +25 or higher relations with the previous king, would receive the “Sworn Enemy” thought toward the player’s king even if the player was not responsible for the previous king’s death

Cultures, Migrants & Religion

• Cultural technology hints now show the culture name in colour with the corresponding icon.

• A child born from a father who is already dead or already an ex‑husband will no longer generate the sin “Forbidden Child”

• Removed culture happiness display from the citizen tooltip

• The Bishop can now hunt and can be invited to hunts

• The Bishop can now perform “Sermon of Joy” on player command

• Province cultures are now distributed differently at the start of a new game; the player can now see cultural distribution during province selection

• Bishops will now improve relations when performing sermons and granting absolution

• Culture names now have unique icons and colours in tooltips

• Religious fanatics in rebellions now gain the “Joy of Rioting” thought, boosting their morale during the uprising

• Migrants from Makha now bring twice as much money; Kaiden migrants carry daggers and have combat skills between 4–7; Tanai residents are twice as likely to become fanatics after sermons and gain double the thought strength from prayer; Varna residents cannot be poisoned by rutabaga and are never attacked by wolves

• Peasants will no longer gain sin for fighting during riots started by a politician

Bandits & Crime

• Bandit camps in the player’s province now spawn and grow by the same rules as in AI provinces. Unhappy departing residents and soldiers will no longer populate the bandit camp.

• Fixed a bug where the number of peaceful residents shown in the top UI panel incorrectly counted bandits as well

• Fixed a bug where unique visitors leaving the player’s city were treated as escaped peasants and could join bandit camps (most common with pilgrims)

• From “war consequences” in a neighbouring province, there is now a 15% chance that a migrant will turn out to be a vagrant. While a bandit camp exists in the player’s province, there is a 50% chance that one of the migrants will be a thug

• Bandit camp spawning reworked: in AI‑controlled regions, camps now have a 5% base spawn chance; if a neighbouring AI city is successfully attacked, there is a 70% chance a bandit camp will appear (triggering a “Consequences of War” notification). The camp may appear in the attacked or a nearby region

Army, Squads & Combat

• Fixed a bug where hourglass icons did not appear on soldiers whose contracts were about to expire

• Fixed an issue where the army list did not refresh after hiring soldiers with expired contracts

• Fixed a bug where enemy squads with an active capture order (e.g., vagrants capturing peasants) did not fully cancel the order and looped between old and new orders

• Recruitment tooltips for peasants and prisoners now indicate that recruitment is permanent

• Soldiers and knights with expired contracts will only appear in the recruitment menu after returning their equipment and joining the mercenary faction

• If squad editing is currently unavailable, the “Edit Squad” button will now be disabled

• Prisoners with the “Humility” trait will no longer attempt to escape

• Switching between lords in the family setup menu during new game creation, adjusting skill levels, and setting talents now happens on mouse press instead of release

• The “Commander Not in Battle” thought now appears as a squad morale modifier in the squad menu when the “Hold Back” option is enabled

• Fixed a bug where it was impossible to select an immobilised soldier by clicking their card in the army menu

• Soldiers who are currently surrendering or retreating can no longer be added to a squad

• Fixed a bug where soldiers added to an existing squad (e.g., via “Modify Squad”) did not receive the commander’s morale bonus or the “Loyalist in Battle” thought if they were loyalists

• Updated the squad menu — it now shows special thoughts that affect squad morale, such as “Squad Losses,” “Enemy Losses,” and others

• Added a new squad morale display method: a numerical morale value now appears near the squad banner

• In simulated battles, archers now shoot slower, and damage to gates and towers is dealt twice as fast — making results closer to those of manual combat

• Characters in a squad can no longer catch fire or take burn damage from burning fortifications (gates, towers, etc.)

• Fixed bugs where the calculation of victory chances and power ratios against the enemy did not account for the city garrison and other factors

• Fixed a bug that allowed lords to be dismissed in the army menu

Thoughts, Morale & Mood

• The “Enemy of My Idol” thought was weakened to ‑15 and now detaches if the lord stops being a puppet or if the idol stops considering someone an enemy.

• Squads will now receive proper “loss” thoughts when soldiers die not in melee (e.g., from enemy archers)

• Updated the condition for showing the “Citizens are unhappy” advice — now it checks only the current average mood instead of a 2‑day average

• Fixed a bug where fleeing a battle did not apply loss thoughts to squads and did not trigger traits that depend on escaping combat

• Reworked the algorithm for determining the strength of “average thoughts” (top‑left population tooltip). For example: if a thought lasted only 1 hour out of 24, it will appear as 24× weaker

• Improved the citizen tooltip (top‑left): advice text now uses full width; cultures have their own colour and icon

• Trait tooltips from talents now include a line explaining how to unlock the trait

• Fixed a bug where a character’s romantic attachment faded from a deceased person before the grief thoughts were attached, causing them to miss the “Lost a Loved One” thought

• Grouped various morale thoughts about fleeing, capture, or death into categories: “Squad Losses,” “Enemy Losses,” and “Commander Loss”

• Thoughts about the destruction of friendly or enemy squads are now applied only to nearby squads

• Added thoughts for witnessing the destruction of friendly or enemy squads

• Added a new prisoner thought: “Caught During Escape”

• Removed the thought “Foreigners are pushing us out!”

• Removed the reduction of negative thought strength for vassals

• The “Handsome” trait now gives +20 to interest instead of +30

• The “Charismatic” trait no longer provides an interest bonus

• Fixed a bug where the strength of the “Hated Culture” thought was lower than intended on peaceful difficulty

• Increased the strength of the thought “Ignored political demand” to ‑18

• Removed the “Malnutrition” trait and thought, which were applied if the hidden hunger parameter fell below 20

• The thought “Obsessed with Desire” will no longer weaken over time

• Fixed a bug where strong positive thoughts were selected incorreсt

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