Build 26499968

A week ago Three Kingdoms Reimagined came out on Steam. Thank you to everyone who bought it, played it, reviewed it, sent us a save file or told us what was broken. Your reports have already shaped several updates. If you have been waiting, the 33% introductory discount ends on November 13.

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One request kept coming up: let me roleplay anyone I want in the Three Kingdoms era, good or bad. You could already loot and rob caravans, but the world barely answered. This update adds the villain's road, from a stranger's first job to a tyrant's throne. It is open to any ruler in a single-player campaign. If you never take the first job, you never see any of it.

It starts with one job

From day 25, a new section can appear on a town's job board: Whispered at the inn. A stranger offers work that a decent ruler would refuse. Waylay a merchant band. Rob a peasant column. Raid a village. A raid can be traced back to you, which costs you with the owner and gives them a reason for war.

These jobs raise Infamy, a new score that only your own choices can push far. Looting after a battle adds a little, but looting alone can never start the road.

At Infamy 20 you are Notorious. At 45 you are a Tyrant. At 75 you are the Scourge of the Han.

Choices with a face on them

The Black Annals are nine new chapters, each with its own illustration and a window of days to answer. Each one offers a way back, and the price of every answer is written next to it.

• The Green Forest Pact. Outlaws offer a bargain. Swear it and their bands stop attacking you and will ride for you at a price. You can also send them away, or sell them to a town that has suffered from them.
• The Parting. Zhang Jiao warns you once. If you go on, he comes to you without ceremony: "I taught you to raise men, not to feed on them." Promise restraint, let him go, or try to hold him by force. The guards will not do it.
• The Man Who Burned at Chang'an. A black-sealed letter says the man who died in 192 was a double. Accept Dong Zhuo and he brings the Meiwu hoard, Xiliang cavalry and his counsel. Refuse him, or expose him to the Han.
• The Xiliang Call. Li Jue and Guo Si hear their old master's name again.
• The Forged Letter. A letter in another hand draws in an officer, who is told that an adult in the family will be exiled if they refuse.
• A Rescue Arranged. Pay raiders to stop a free officer on the road, then ride in and win their gratitude in a real battle.
• The Truth Comes Out. Later, a witness can come forward. Tell the truth, pay them off, or press the officer into service.
• Terror Tribute. A minor court that fears you sends gold. Take it, demand more or wave them off.
• The Yellow Curse. See below.

Captives can now be pressed into service too. An officer under duress earns no standing, cannot marry or swear an oath, and may run if you lose a battle. Marriage on this road still needs consent, and an officer held by force or fooled by a staged rescue cannot be proposed to.

Fear pays, then it collects

From Tyrant up, levies cost a quarter less, plunder pays a quarter more, and small courts may pay you to leave them alone. In return, free officers are harder to recruit, peace with other courts costs half again as much, and officers who hate cruelty lose patience with you.

The bill comes in stages. A merciful spouse may confront you and go home. The Girdle Edict, a secret order sewn into a jade girdle, names you a usurper, and the men who signed it are in your own court. Zhang Jiao's bands rise in your own towns in the Yellow Curse. Your name also adds weight to the Last Coalition. Win anyway and you take the realm as a tyrant, with your own title and your own closing in the Chronicle.

New for every player

These do not need the villain's road:

• The Girdle Edict. On a normal campaign, the edict names the strongest usurper in the realm, and the conspirators want your banner.
• The Old Flame. A rival who lost in love comes back as an enemy general.
• Oath and Hearth. Your spouse and your sworn brother have stopped speaking, and the quarrel is yours to settle.

Save fixes

We fixed a bug where backing a house at the Reckoning made every later save fail its check. A damaged save now opens from the clean backup beside it, and a failed write can no longer replace a good backup.

Known limits

The new chapters are text only, with no voice lines yet. The villain's road is off in two-player campaigns for now. We tested the road with scripted campaigns, so it has had far less human play than the rest of the game. The Chinese text is new as well, and we welcome corrections.

If an event comes at a bad moment or the road feels too easy or too harsh, tell us what happened and on which day. A save file helps a lot.

Thank you for the first week. We will keep building from what you tell us.