宮廷

Each landed character has a court, which consists of the unlanded subjects of a realm. A court may contain family members, knights, lovers, courtiers and guests.

Courtiers

Courtiers are unlanded characters living at a ruler's court. They can be appointed as councilors, commanders, knights or vassals. If a courtier does not have a minor title they have a 2% chance to leave each month. The chance is decreased by -0.1% for each 10 points of opinion above 0 and increased by +0.1% for each 10 points of opinion below 0. In addition the chance to leave can be modified by the following:

Condition	Chance to leave
Child	-3%
Any claim	-1%
Pregnant trait	-1%
Married to the liege	-0.5%
Low health	-0.3%
Liege or another courtier is a friend	-0.2%
Liege or another courtier is a lover	-0.2%
Liege or another courtier is a close family member	-0.2%
Bastard trait	+0.3%
Liege is a rival	+0.5%

Guests

Guests are unlanded characters staying at a ruler's court for three years and then have a monthly chance to leave. During this time they will interact with other members of the court and may take part in random events. They can be convinced to stay permanently in the realm by being given a seat on the council, a landed or minor title, or by using the seduction scheme. Guests can also be directly recruited by paying a variable amount of Gold — the base amount is 10 gold, and increases if the guest has claims, useful traits or high skills. Guests are more likely to visit a court if they have a definite reason, such as the ruler being strong enough to press their claims, or the ruler or one of its adult children being unmarried. The fewer courtiers a character has the more guests it will receive.

Unlanded characters can be asked to visit a court with the "Invite to Court" interaction. The base reluctance is -50 and typically cannot be overcome without a hook.

If a guest with claims is about to leave, the liege will be given the option to convince the guest to stay for one year.

Court physician

The court physician is a character carrying a minor title that allows them to help their liege against health traits. When the ruler or someone at their court gains a health trait while the ruler has a court physician, the ruler will gain the option to try a safe or a risky treatment. A third type of treatment is also available if the court physician has the Wise Man, Mystic or Miracle Worker trait. The risky treatment has a chance to give the character the One-Eyed, One-Legged, Disfigured or Eunuch trait.

Court physicians can be appointed through a character interaction or the Search for Physician decision.

Prisoners

Prisoners are characters who are held at someone's court unwillingly. A character can obtain prisoners via the Abduction scheme, occupation|occupying a character's realm capital while at war or following battles if the enemy commander has low Prowess. A ruler can attempt to imprison any character within their realm but this will incur tyranny, particularly if the prisoner is Noble, unless they are guilty of a Crime. An imprisoned character can be released, ransomed, tortured or executed. Characters will be imprisoned in either the dungeon or under house arrest and can be freely moved between the two. By default prisoners are held in the dungeon if Lowborn and house arrest if Noble.

House arrest effects	Dungeon effects
-5 Diplomacy -20 natural dread -100% dread loss -75% monthly lifestyle experience	-5 Diplomacy -30 natural dread -100% dread loss -150% monthly lifestyle experience +50% stress gain -15 prisoner family Opinion Severe health penalty

In addition if a character stays in the dungeon for more than 5 years they may gain the Ill or Pneumonia traits.

A prisoner will gain stress while in prison and will eventually die if he has too much stress. This is caused by event stress_threshold_prison.3999 and his death reason will be listed as "died in captivity".

Negotiate release

A ruler can offer to release a prisoner in exchange for one or more of the following:

Condition	Acceptance	Opinion
Banish	-50	-20
Demand conversion	-20	-10
Gain weak hook	-80	-20
Recruit	-10	-15
Renounce claims	-25	-30
Take the vows	-30	-10

Ransom

A ruler can ransom imprisoned characters, exchanging gold or a weak hook for the prisoner's freedom. The Ransom interaction is used on the prisoner, not the recipient. The character who is sent the ransom is decided in the following order:

The prisoner themselves if they are landed
Their direct liege if prisoner is a courtier
The prisoner themselves, if they are unlanded

Prisoners and their direct liege may also offer to pay ransom to the jailer, with an additional option of using a hook on the jailer. Vassals and courtiers who have their ransom paid for by their liege gain +5 opinion for 1 year.

Ransom cost

When paying with gold, the ransom cost of a given prisoner depends on the ransom recipient's primary title rank as well as the prisoner's relation with the recipient. If a spouse is also the primary heir and/or close family, only the spouse price applies. If the ransom recipient is unable to afford the full price of the ransom, the price is reduced to as much gold as they have left.

Rank	Ransom cost
Rank	Ruler / primary heir	Spouse	Close family member	Other
Unlanded	—	—	—	10
Baron	30	15	10	10
Count	50	25	15	10
Duke	100	50	25	10
King	200	100	50	20
Emperor	500	250	125	50

If the jailor has the Golden Obligations perk all ransom costs are increased to approximately 6 times the jailor's tax income (minimum of 50, maximum of 300 gold).

Characters who are unlanded and liegless cost 100 gold to ransom if the jailer has the Golden Obligations perk (can be increased further) or if the character at least 100 gold to spare.

Punishment

Execution

A ruler can execute any imprisoned character. Executing a character will incur tyranny unless the character is guilty of a very severe crime. Each execution will grant +30 dread and -20 opinion with the victim's dynasty.

If the prisoner shared the same faith they will be beheaded. Otherwise they will be burned. Burning a prisoner grants 25 piety if the character's faith has the Fundamentalist doctrine. Characters with the Cannibal trait or secret can devour prisoners to lose stress at the cost of a 20% chance to gain the Ill trait.

Torture

Torture is an intrigue action that can be performed upon prisoners and has the following effects:

The torturer character gains +20 dread.
The torturer character loses −100 piety if its faith forbids it.
The torturer character loses −10 stress if they have the Sadistic trait.
The torturer character gains +10 stress if they have the Trusting trait.
The torturer character gains +100 Stress if they have the Compassionate trait.
The tortured character loses −75 opinion for 50 years towards the torturing character.
The tortured character gains the Recently Tortured modifier for 5 years, giving −0.75 Health.
If the tortured character has or knows a secret it will have the option to reveal it to avoid torture.

Castration

Adult characters with either the Ethiopian culture or part of the Byzantine culture group can castrate male prisoners, giving them the Eunuch trait.

Blinding

Adult characters within the Byzantine culture group can blind their prisoners, giving them the Blind trait.

Crime

Crimes are actions that allow a character to imprison someone from their realm without incurring tyranny and may remove tyranny from certain punishments. Crimes of vassals may be pardoned, preventing just imprisonment in exchange for an opinion bonus. Crimes can be personal, familial or religious.

Personal crimes are caused by certain actions taken against a ruler and allows only the said ruler to imprison the criminal character
Familial crimes are caused by certain actions taken against a character and allows any ruler from the same family to imprison the criminal character
Religious crimes are caused by traits that are considered criminal by a faith and allows any ruler of that faith to imprison the criminal character

The following actions are crimes:

Crime	Requirements	Type
Attempted Abduction	Abduction scheme fails on the character	Personal
Attempted Arrest	Liege requests imprisonment and character refuses	Personal
Attempted Elopment	Elope scheme fails on the character's spouse	Personal
Attempted To Murder Me	Murder scheme fails on the character	Personal
Blinded Me	Blinded the character	Personal
Botched My Treatment	Court physician's risky treatment of liege failed	Personal
Castrated Me	Castrated the character	Personal
Declared War	Declaring war upon the character	Personal
Elopment	An elope scheme succeeds on the character's spouse	Personal
Failed To Treat Me	Court physician's safe treatment of liege failed	Personal
Revolted against Me	Civil war ended in white peace or better for the liege	Personal
Refused Imprisonment	Vassal refuses imprisonment and realm has high crown authority	Personal
Refused Retraction	Vassal refuses vassal retraction and realm has High Crown Authority	Personal
Refused Revocation	Vassal refuses Title Revocation and realm has High Crown Authority	Personal
Scheming Against Me	Discovered as agent in a scheme against the character	Personal
Spying on Liege	Spymaster fails the Find Secrets task on the liege	Personal
Tortured Me	Tortured the character	Personal
Attempted To Murder Family Member	Murder scheme fails on a member of the character's family	Familial
Botched Treatment of Kin	Court physician's risky treatment of liege's family member failed	Familial
Failed To Treat Kin	Court physician's safe treatment of liege's family member failed	Familial
Murdered Family Member	Murder scheme fails secrecy on a member of the character's family	Familial
Tortured Family Member	Tortured a family member of the character	Familial
Unlawfully Executed Family	Executed a family member of the character without a valid reason	Familial
Excommunicated	Character has the Excommunicated trait and faith has the Communion tenet	Religious
Known Adulterer	Character has the Adulterer trait and faith has the criminal adultery doctrine for its gender	Religious
Known Cannibal	Character has the Cannibal trait and faith does not have the Ritual Cannibalism tenet	Religious
Known Deviant	Character has the Deviant trait and faith has the criminal deviancy doctrine	Religious
Known Fornicator	Character has the Fornicator trait and faith has the criminal / adultery doctrine for its gender	Religious
Known Sodomite	Character has the Sodomite trait and faith has the criminal same-sex relations doctrine	Religious
Known Witch	Character has the Witch trait and faith has the criminal witchcraft doctrine	Religious
Known Kinslayer	Character has a Kinslayer trait and faith has the criminal kinslaying doctrine for its severity	Religious
Denounced	Character has the Denounced trait	Dynastic