In version 0.3.4 the county is governed by the real officials of Suzhou, official service follows the rules of the Ming and Qing, and businesses grow, link up through supplies and improve along an upgrade tree. Service, household spending and businesses work the new way only in games started in 0.3.4. Saves from 0.3.3 load and keep the old rules.
Officials and battle
- Magistrates, prefects and governors are taken from the 《江南通志》 and succeed each other in their historical years. A new magistrate arrives at the pier, and his servant holds up a 名帖 card with his full name.
- 海瑞 (1569), 湯斌 (1684), 張伯行 (1710 and 1712) and 任惟初 (1660, the 哭廟案) have their own scenes. Fifteen officials have a temperament taken from their biographies: a strict one judges more harshly, and a gift to an incorruptible one counts for half.
- In battle both sides stand in squads, with the player's squad in the middle. A squad has morale: it falls with losses, most of all when its leader dies, and a broken squad flees as a whole. Keys 1–4 command your squad: follow me, hold, charge, fall back. Anyone of the house who strikes down enemies gets a merit entry in the chronicle.
Official service (new games)
- Penalties follow the rules: four 記過 cost half a year's salary from the official's own money, a personal demotion blocks promotion until the rank comes back after three spotless years, and a 記功 cancels service 記過.
- A case goes from the event to an inquiry and a decision: a rumour that is not confirmed is closed. 貪 and 酷 mean dismissal and a lifelong ban from office, 不謹 means dismissal and a three-year ban. An official can be suspended until the decision.
- Tax arrears, a cash shortfall and embezzlement are separate debts. A disaster brings a deferral of one to three years. Confirmed embezzlement goes to the regular court.
- Posts are permanent: each has its province, yield and staff, rivals fill vacant posts, and an appointment can wait for a vacancy. The 回避 rules bar the home province and kin. The best metropolitan graduates go to the Hanlin.
- The service card shows last year's three accounts. The official's file shows grounds, penalties and the conditions for getting a rank back. The pyramid splits the capital into the 六部 and the 翰林.
Businesses and household
- Businesses now have real buyers: sales are spread over the households around them. Buyers stand at the counter in the quarter and walk into the town's shops, and a business card shows who bought this month.
- New games: a business grows with its capital, and a big business works more profitably than a small one. Your businesses can be linked by supplies, and between settlements goods are carried by hired porters. A business has an upgrade tree with Workshop, Sales and Yard branches and a specialization at level 3. Its name grows with years, sales and regular customers. A business can change trade without closing, and demand is higher at the fair.
- Six new trades: 軋花坊, 靛坊, 布莊, 機房, 紙坊, 木行 — each with its own buildings and workers at the machines.
- The houses of the world use all of this too: there are fewer businesses, but bigger ones.
- New games: household spending beyond food comes from the surplus, not as a share of the harvest straight from the field. Fewer households go hungry. The house ledger has a new "household needs" line.
Yard
- A new wall can be laid over an old one and along the neighbouring grid node.
- The helper suggests a house built from walls, prices it with a margin and explains a refusal in words.
- The bottom strip of the building catalogue is visible again at 1920×1080, and the blueprint size is shown in the tooltip.
Fixes
- Your own workshops in a village are now visible from your yard: the business plot lay beyond the village's display range.
- A shopkeeper's shop is visible in town from the first month of a new game, not the second.
- Settlement plans are kept by the passage of time, not by opening a scene. In network play the room is fully reset on leaving, an inheritance no longer passes into another player's house, and a snapshot is written on exit if the world has changed.