Please tone down the traits/trait generation

[Enosu]

Every turn it seems like on of my governors/generals gets some random trait that can completely change the pace of the game for better or worse. When I get a good trait, it feels super cheap and undeserved; rather makes a lot of my meticulous microing pointless; however, when it's a bad trait, boy is it frustrating. You think you finally got your situation under control? Nope, RNG bad trait and now you need to redesign your entire province. I am also developing a compulsion to check ALL of my character's traits to see if they got some dumb trait.

[Enosu]

aaaand both my governors get religious prosecutor and another aids trait +1 influence & -8% tax rate. uninstalling

[Sheridan]

The traits have a logic behind them. However, with 600 traits there are bound to be some inconsistencies. Have you got any examples of a trait that appeared in a specific situation that you couldn't make sense out of? The more information provided, the more I can do to change it

[synagas]

Would you be up for modifying some of the traits? Religious prosecutor is a very painful trait, but also one that makes no sense in what it does. I think it would make more sense if it added +5/+10 to state culture or something since he is going around killing anyone not of his faith. Other traits might be more interesting if they had more of the positive/negative combination as well so a new trait doesn't feel so... lopsided. I do tend to agree with Enosu that the trait gain seems rather high each turn. I seem to average one per person per turn, and not sure what causes a lot of them. Some seem to be a trait getting worse (or better), but others seem very random in why they are achieved. If there is a document that explains the trait gaining requirements, that would be awesome, though a lot of work if it wasn't used in the design so not at all expected. I think the point made is also valid in how often a leader becomes quite useless in their role (noted in the How to... Rome thread) after a few trait gains. It requires a different level of micromanaging since now one must always keep an eye out for the horrendous +X squalor, -X sanitation, and -X% tax rate traits.

Still, I love the variety of traits since they add a lot of flavor and make each character feel very unique.

[Sheridan]

Shoot some suggestions and I'll see what I can do for 1.0.1h

[Valerias]

Honestly just get rid of randomly generated negative traits.

[Sheridan]

Honestly just get rid of randomly generated negative traits.

Apart from the starting cluster of traits (up to 3 per new character), nothing is random

[Valerias]

So what determines a horrible trait like religious prosecutor? Building any faction specific religious building? Seems pretty dumb.

[Fraxinicus]

We need clear explanations for every negative trait. If we don't know what we're doing wrong, it just feels like random BS.

[sinuhe2]

I love this Mod

[Sheridan]

Just letting you guys know, all trait triggers were revised today. There are no more traits that come undeserved as upgrades. Everything that wasn't tied to an action or very specific situation already has been so now. In other words, you should expect appropriate traits for every given situation. Some trait effects were revised. The Religious Persecutor did not have the effect stated in the OP, but I did change the Popularity loss into increased state culture influence, and also increased the public order hit slightly.

[Fraxinicus]

But why do we get the trait? I'm alright with negative effects, I just need to know what to do and what not to do if I want good traits. Players will continue to be pissed off about the trait system until it's been made transparent. I have no idea what could cause a character to get the religious persecutor trait, considering that religion isn't even represented in the mod, and I've razed no temples.

[Butan]

Why the need for explained negative traits, and not for positive traits? To me it clearly shows a basis against negative traits because it makes the game harder, not a transparency issue (which exists). I guess having +x% tax/trade is more acceptable than the opposite

Real life character development isnt clear cut, so why wouldnt every characters have a potential for both negative and positive traits? You cant really control that stuff, let go a bit and enjoy the added flavor even if its not always in your favor.
Sheridan explained that most of the traits are triggered by events, so there is already a reason for all of them... its not just crystal clear (and will hardly be without cluttered tooltips, UI management is always a major hassle) and will probably have external guides for those that want more control over character development.

Anyway I think the game really benefits from the actual traits frequency and singularities. Makes for some really awesome characters, and some very ambiguous ones

[Valerias]

Well that's an improvement. I look forward to the new update going live.

[Fraxinicus]

When half my characters end up with huge hits to skills and regional public order to the point of becoming worse than useless, I need to know why it's happening. There are no interesting flavor events or interesting stories that go along with the negative traits. I just get slapped with penalties and have no idea what I did wrong. That's bad game design.

[Butan]

The interesting flavor is the traits themselves. Trait generation doesnt require pop-up events or cinematics... it would be such a mess too.
Even if half of your characters end up with bad skills, you have another half that is good

[Sheridan]

The interesting flavor is the traits themselves. Trait generation doesnt require pop-up events or cinematics... it would be such a mess too.
Even if half of your characters end up with bad skills, you have another half that is good

I echo what Butan has already said. If there is an interest in a guide on traits, why don't people go and make one? If our team were to dedicate time to writing up guides for some of the most complex and large mechanics such as traits and ancillaries, we would literally have no time left for modding.

[Fraxinicus]

Seemingly random debuffs are not flavor. They're just a roadblock. There is no flavor if there is no clear causal connection between our actions and their results. If anything, that's anti-flavor, because when a character gets a trait that has no apparent correlation to any of their actions, the feeling of realism and immersion is broken.

Opacity isn't a virtue. Nothing should be so large or complex that it cannot be explained to the player. Complexity without depth is also not a virtue, and there's no depth to a mechanic that a player can't understand. And no, I am not going to spend hundreds of hours playing the mod and making detailed notes of every single trait that every single character ever gains, and crosschecking it with campaign actions, just in order to make a guide so that I actually can understand a single mechanic of a single mod. That's ridiculous. No mechanic should be so complex and so poorly explained at the same time.

[Sheridan]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but vanilla doesn't have an explanation to their traits, which numbers not far from AE. In fact, I haven't seen any vanilla Total War (or mod in its Beta) ever featuring an interface component or guide that details causality between actions and traits, the only exception being Thrones which is a brand new installment. To put it this way, there is no UI support in Attila for that feature. The only feasible option left is a guide. A proper guide detailing a mechanic isn't created by playing hundreds of hours; it is done by searching the files and listing factual relationships. This is not out of reach for anyone with a desire to learn.

[Fraxinicus]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but vanilla doesn't have an explanation to their traits, which numbers not far from AE. In fact, I haven't seen any vanilla Total War (or mod in its Beta) ever featuring an interface component or guide that details causality between actions and traits, the only exception being Thrones which is a brand new installment. To put it this way, there is no UI support in Attila for that feature. The only feasible option left is a guide.

This mod is trying to be a comprehensive improvement over the vanilla experience, isn't it? Thrones has the right idea, and it could be implemented in the mod through a single sentence per trait in the mouseover tooltip.

And if that is too much work, then do you or some other member of the team not have private notes on traits from the planning phase that could be referenced for a quick guide? Again, all we need is one sentence per trait, posted on the forums (and perhaps give players some indication in-game where they can go to learn what actions lead to what traits). I understand if this isn't an immediate priority - the mod is in beta, and the developers have other things to do, including real life. But I would like this mod to be as good as possible, and not solving this problem at some point would be a permanent detriment to the mod.

A proper guide detailing a mechanic isn't created by playing hundreds of hours; it is done by searching the files and listing factual relationships. This is not out of reach for anyone with a desire to learn.

I have many other games (and TW mods) that I could devote my time to. If a mod ends up being more work than fun, I just abandon it.

Also, I am not suggesting to return to the vanilla Attila system. I would prefer either fewer traits with clear explanations about why we got them, or, even better, a lot of traits with clear explanations about why we got them.