House Weissschild WIP 0.1

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━ CONCEPT

You control no territory. You have no army. You have no castle. What you have is gold, leverage, and patience.

House Weissschild is a shadow merchant dynasty mod inspired by the Fugger banking dynasty, the Rothschild family, and The Eminence in Shadow. The player operates as a landless patriarch pulling strings behind every throne in Christendom — through investments, debt collection, blackmail, and strategic marriages. Kings borrow your gold. You own them.

Core fantasy: You are the puppet master behind every throne.

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━ HOW IT WORKS

The mod uses a hybrid offmap power system. The custom offmap panel (House Weissschild) sits in the top-right alongside the vanilla China offmap — four buttons opening different hubs:

• Investments — Browse your debtor ledger, forgive debts, trigger debt default consequences
• Blackmail — Dispatch agents to investigate rulers, accumulate leverage, escalate pressure
• Marriages — Collect tribute from rulers tied to you through marriage alliances
• House — Overview of your estate status and room upgrade progress
  

Room upgrades are handled via the Decision Panel (6 rooms × 3 tiers). Targeted actions (invest in a ruler, bribe a character, blackmail a leverage target, collect a debt) work via right-click decisions on characters directly — same pattern as DWR's Wizard Tower and Demon Kingdom Capital.

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━ SYSTEMS IMPLEMENTED

Investment & Debt

• Invest 100g or 200g in any landed ruler — they gain gold, you gain a debt level on them
• Re-investment stacks: debt_level accumulates across multiple loans
• Yearly interest: 10g (L1-2) / 20g (L3-4) / 30g (L5+) — collected automatically
• Collect debts via right-click (scales with level: 100g / 200g / 300g+)
• Review all debtors one by one via the Decision Panel
  

Debt Default Consequences (ws.8)

When a debtor can't pay, you choose from 5 fully deterministic strategic options (no RNG):

• Seize the Crown (L5+ only) — Force abdication, install heir as puppet. Puppet pays 100g/year tribute, you get a positive opinion bonus with their successor.
• Arm Their Neighbors (500g cost) — Fund up to 2 neighboring rulers with 250g each + pressed claims on the defaulter's primary title. AI will likely declare war.
• Seize Assets — Direct gold extraction, scales with debt level (200g → 2000g)
• Impose Debt Servitude — Permanent modifier: -5 stewardship, -3 diplomacy, -2 intrigue, -2g/month. They work for you forever.
• Write Off the Debt — Mercy option. +100 piety, positive opinion.
  

Investigation & Blackmail

• Investigate rulers for 25g — 50/50 success, improved by intrigue and Study room tier
• Leverage is permanent (not consumed on use) — blackmail the same ruler repeatedly
• Pressure escalates with each demand (P0→P1→P2...→P4+), yielding more gold but increasing resistance chance
• Resistance system: P2-3 = 20% chance, P4+ = 40% chance. On resistance: leverage lost, -50 prestige, permanent -50 opinion modifier
• Review all leverage targets in a cycle (like the debtor review)
  

Room System (6 Rooms × 3 Tiers)

Upgrade costs: T1 = 1,000g · T2 = 2,500g · T3 = 5,000g (8,500g per room, 51,000g for all 6)

• Treasury — +2.5 / +5.0 / +10.0 gold/mo · +5 / +10 / +15 stewardship
• Ballroom — +5 / +10 / +15 diplomacy · +0.25 / +0.50 / +1.00 prestige/mo
• Study — +5 / +10 / +15 intrigue · +5 / +10 / +15 learning
• Dungeon — +5 / +10 / +15 intrigue · T2-T3: -0.25 / -0.50 piety/mo
• Slave Quarters — +1.5 / +3.0 / +5.0 gold/mo · T2-T3: +5 / +10 stewardship
• Bedchamber — +25% / +50% / +75% fertility · T2-T3: +5 / +10 diplomacy · T3: +1.25 health
  

Starting Setup

• Play as Heinrich Weissschild — shrewd, ambitious, midas_touched, diligent. Capital: Venezia, 769 start.
• Select "Play as House Weissschild" in Game Rules before starting — auto-switches you to Heinrich at game start (CK2 filters landless characters from bookmark screen)
• Starting gold: 1,000g
• Government: weissschild_merchant_government — city-focused, can't create kingdoms/empires, capital locked
  

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━ PLANNED (NOT YET IMPLEMENTED)

• Phase 2: Agent system (dynasty members at foreign courts), rival merchant houses (AI), Kingmaker event chain, assassination contracts, reputation system, Influence as currency
• Phase 3: Full adult mod integration — slave trade (DWR/IST/LF), dungeon interrogation with WearAndTear, breeding program (Evolution genetics), Ballroom gala events (LF Sexytimes, bdsmSociety), Cheri TD integration
• Phase 4: Custom event pictures (xyz_image_replacer pipeline), Weissschild bloodline, difficulty game rules, sound effects, achievement milestones
  

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━ COMPATIBILITY

Zero overrides of any existing mod files. Fully standalone, all files use unique ws_* namespace. The on_actions file (ws_on_actions.txt) has a unique filename so it merges with all other mods rather than overriding.

Dependencies: None. Works standalone.
Tested with: 50+ mod setup including DWR, LF, IST, Cheri, ABM, HouseIrae, bdsmSociety, xyz_comp_patcher, Evolution, WearAndTear

Future Phase 3 integration points already planned: xyz_slave/xyz_trained traits, WearAndTear interrogation, ABM body traits, LF Sexytimes, IST counter bridges.

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━ FOR MODDERS / CURIOUS DEVS

The ARCHITECTURE.txt included in the mod root documents the full system design, every event, every flag, every variable, and — most usefully — 13 Lessons Learned from the development process. If you've ever tried to build an offmap power mod and ran into silent failures, the lessons section covers:

• Why the player cannot be the offmap governor (CTD)
• Why offmap_history_view must exist in the GUI (CTD)
• Why the governor title requires primary = yes (silent failure — 3 sessions of debugging)
• Why any_ruler with has_character_flag never finds anyone (use any_character instead — documented nowhere)
• Why has_character_modifier in targeted_decision potential is unreliable (use flags)
• Why you should NEVER use history files for offmap_powers/ in a mod (engine auto-manages)
• Decision Panel pattern (DWR Wizard Tower) vs event hubs for management systems
  

21 files · 40 events · 18 room modifiers · 8 opinion modifiers · 4 targeted decisions · 7 self-decisions · ~304 localisation entries

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━ INSTALLATION

1. Place xyz_Weissschild/ folder in your CK2 mod directory
2. Place xyz_Weissschild.mod in your CK2 mod directory
3. In the CK2 launcher, enable xyz_Weissschild
4. Start a new game — in Game Rules, enable "Play as House Weissschild"
   

CK2 mod folder: Documents/Paradox Interactive/Crusader Kings II/mod/ (Windows)

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━ VERSION HISTORY

• Phase 1.5g [2026-03-10] — Puppet System + Neighbor Funding. ws.8 Seize Crown now installs heir as puppet (ws_puppet flag, ws_puppet_tribute modifier, +50 opinion). Puppets pay 100g/year via new ws.51 yearly event. ws.8 Fund Rivals now scopes actual neighbors from the defaulter and grants pressed claims on their primary title — AI will attack. ws_debt_servitude harsher (stew-5, diplo-3, intr-2, wealth-2/mo). ws.8 Seize Crown confiscates gold (up to 500g) + 200 prestige. Write Off piety 15→100. Seize Assets scaled up to 2000g at L10+.
• Phase 1.5f [2026-03-09] — Economy Scaling + Debt Rework. All room costs 10x (T1=1000g, T2=2500g, T3=5000g). Room buff values 5x. Starting capital 500→1000g. ws.8 reworked: 5 deterministic strategic options (no RNG), force abdication, fund rivals, debt servitude. ws_decision_blackmail safety filters + flag-based fix for reliable decision visibility.
• Phase 1.5e [2026-03-09] — Blackmail Right-Click + Marriage Simplification. ws_decision_blackmail (right-click on target with leverage). Leverage permanent (not consumed). Escalation pressure system. ws.31 match-finder removed — standard CK2 marriage interface is better. ws.30 simplified to alliance tribute only.
• Phase 1.5d [2026-03-09] — Debt Default Consequences. ws.8 initial implementation with 3 options (threaten/seize/forgive). ws.9 individual debtor review cycle.
• Phase 1.5c [2026-03-09] — Leverage Review + Resistance. ws.25 leverage cycle. ws.26/ws.27 resistance check system.
• Phase 1.5 [2026-03-09] — Core Fixes. any_ruler → any_character root cause fix (ledger always empty bug). Decision Panel migration (6 room upgrade decisions + review debtors). ws.10 converted to Estate Overview (info-only). Investment cooldown removed. Debt stacking with ws_debt_level variable.
• Phase 1 [2026-03-08] — Core Systems Coded. Room system (6x3 tiers), full event set, investigation/blackmail, marriage hub, annual report, game rule start, full localisation, all events as narrative_event.
• Phase 0 [2026-03-09] — Proof of Concept. Offmap power + player title + governor title + government + GUI verified crash-free. Key fix: governor title needs primary=yes + no history files.