Hello and welcome to the 5th Dev Diary for the upcoming Africa update! Today we shall take a look at the two biggest tags in East Africa and Southern Africa: Kilwa and Mutapa as well as the formables of Africa. Please take into account that all modifiers and numbers are currently under ongoing testing, and as we want to continue gathering your feedback, some may be changed before release. Lets get started with Kilwa!
Kilwa has been historically a great trade power in East Africa with connections to Far East Asia. To represent this, the mission tree is heavily focused on the naval presence and trade dominance of the trade nodes which eventually lead into the Zanzibar trade node. The first column from the left focuses on the gold sources of Mutapa as well as the colonization of Southern Africa. The Gold of Zimbabwe will give you access to a decent conquistador, which allows you to explore the Cape, while the mission The Uncharted South grants you a colonist for 30 years to make life a little bit easier. The second column is more focused on the development of your heartland while the third column revolves around the conquest of the coastline of the Zanzibar trade node and African coasts of the Gulf of Aden coastline. Your final goal, Claim Trade Hegemony, is to funnel the trade flow to your home trade node and to secure it. By doing so you will get a neat +15% Trade Efficiency for the rest of the game. Finally, the fourth and fifth columns are about dominating the trade of Malacca and the Moluccas. Although these missions give you a bonus to colonization, it is possible to complete these missions through trading alone. It is not absolutely required to colonize - with the exception of the Australia mission. Now, there is one mission I want to highlight more, which stands out on its own: Reconnect with Persia. According to Kilwan legends, the sultanate was founded by one of the seven sons of the Persian Emir Al-Hassan of Shiraz. While the historical base of the legend is questionable, it served as the legitimation of the ruling dynasty of Kilwa. The mission goes a step further and allows Kilwa to establish contact with the home land they believe to originate from. You can complete the mission through either allying with the owner of the province Shiraz or by having one regiment positioned in the province of Shiraz (without being at war with the owner) - how you achieve this is up to you. Completing the mission will trigger the following event:
Of course the owner of Shiraz will receive a contact event from Kilwa too:

While the embassies are a nice passive bonus, they also provide some useful events for both countries from time to time. There are 3 random events in total, which are the following:


All three random events share a hard cooldown of 10 years and have a mean time to happen of 5 years. Additionally there are two events for Kilwa, which happen a lot more rarely:

I also should point out that if either nation loses the embassy, the other country will lose their own too, severing the diplomatic connection both had. Additionally to the mission tree, Kilwa received its own set of ideas too! ZAN_ideas = { start = { naval_forcelimit_modifier = 0.25 global_ship_trade_power = 0.2 } bonus = { global_trade_power = 0.1 } trigger = { tag = ZAN } free = yes zan_kilwa_latitude_staves = { trade_range_modifier = 0.25 range = 0.2 } zan_shirazis_legacy = { legitimacy = 1 } zan_the_deal_with_almuli = { diplomatic_reputation = 1 trade_company_investment_cost = -0.1 } zan_kilwa_the_melting_pot = { idea_cost = -0.05 } zan_gold_of_sofala = { monthly_gold_inflation_modifier = -0.2 inflation_reduction = 0.03 } zan_trade_center_of_zanzibar = { merchants = 1 } zan_center_of_migration = { development_cost = -0.1 } } With that said, let us move on to Mutapa!
Mutapa is the successor state of Zimbabwe, and as such your mission tree revolves around surpassing this realm of old times. As Mutapa you also start with your capital Zimbabwe, which declines rapidly shortly after game start:
The third column of the mission tree is focusing on restoring the once great city and to bring it back to its former glory. Fate of Zimbabwe helps fortunately out as it has a very unique reward, which is the ability to increase development through constructing buildings.
The development from the buildings you get harmonizes with the modifier of the building. So in other words you get the following development for constructing the following buildings:

• Trade Buildings increase Local Production by 1/2/3
• Navy Buildings increase Local Production by 1/2
• Army Buildings increase Local Manpower by 1/2
• Production Buildings increase Local Production by 1/2
• Government Buildings increase Local Tax by 1/2
• Taxation Buildings increase Local Tax by 1/2
• Universities increase Local Tax by 2
• All manufactory buildings except for the Ramparts, State House and Soldiers Households increase Local Development by 2
• State Houses increase the Local Tax by 2
• Soldiers Households increase the local manpower by 2

I want to point out that upgrading a building will also add development to a lesser degree. For example: if you build a cathedral you gain +2 Local Tax. If you upgrade a church, which already gave you +1 Local Tax, to a cathedral you gain again +1 Local Tax. This way you have a little bit of an easier time in achieving the mission Restore Zimbabwe, which requires you to have 20 development in the Zimbabwe province again. As a reward the Abandoned Ruins province modifier gets removed and the local development cost is reduced by 15% for the rest of the game. It also gives +0.5 legitimacy too. Reaching 400 development and reaching the borders of old Zimbabwe will allow you to complete the mission Eclipse Great Zimbabwe, granting you the Empire rank and firing the following event for you:

(The borders you see on the image are not required to have to form Zimbabwe) GZI_ideas = { start = { fort_maintenance_modifier = -0.1 land_morale = 0.15 } bonus = { trade_efficiency = 0.2 } trigger = { tag = GZI } free = yes gzi_stone_masonry = { build_cost = -0.15 great_project_upgrade_cost = -0.1 } gzi_ivory_trade = { global_trade_goods_size_modifier = 0.1 } gzi_gold_deposits = { global_tax_modifier = 0.1 monthly_gold_inflation_modifier = -0.2 } gzi_zimbabwes_walls = { defensiveness = 0.25 } gzi_lay_of_the_land = { hostile_attrition = 1 } gzi_tributary_system = { vassal_income = 0.2 } gzi_zimbabwe_birds = { production_efficiency = 0.15 } } While the third column of missions revolves around Zimbabwe, the first one is more about the internal, religious stability of Mutapa. The second column is about getting Southern Africa under your control and becoming one of the great powers. Great Power of Africa especially emphasizes it as you are required to be amongst the top three great powers (or have 700 total development if Rights of Man or Emperor is not active) and have an army size of 100 regiments. As a reward you gain +25 Permanent Power Projection. The fourth column of missions is very similar to the Kilwan trade missions. However, it focuses more on getting access to the trade node of China instead of dominating it. Finally we have the last column on the most right, which is about overhauling your military - and recruiting the Nguni for your army. Recruit the Nguni especially will be interesting for the people who want to tag switch into a strong, military country while still having a challenge to face. For that you must reach administrative tech 15 (which is the Military Administration technology) and develop the manpower of Mtetwa and Natal to 8 for both of them. After that you get this lovely event:

The Zulu are intended to be a fun country to play, even if we know that they may spawn this way much earlier than in our timeline. Because of that we have abstained from creating a mission tree for them. However, because the Zulu here are directly created through militarization of the Nguni, the ideas are heavily inspired by the reforms of Shaka Zulu: ZUL_ideas = { start = { army_tradition_from_battle = 1 land_forcelimit_modifier = 0.25 } bonus = { discipline = 0.05 } trigger = { tag = ZUL } free = yes zul_confederacy_of_clans = { stability_cost_modifier = -0.1 } zul_the_ukubuthwa = { manpower_recovery_speed = 0.2 } zul_the_impi_warriors = { infantry_power = 0.1 shock_damage = 0.1 } zul_zulu_expansion = { core_creation = -0.1 years_of_nationalism = -3 } zul_warrior_culture = { land_morale = 0.15 } zul_shaka_reforms = { reform_progress_growth = 0.1 governing_capacity_modifier = 0.1 } zul_conquest_through_patronage = { accept_vassalization_reasons = 10 } } Also, you dont have to start as Mutapa to create the Zulu. Every country with their capital in Southern Africa has the decision Militarize the Nguni, which has the same requirement as the Mutapa mission. The big difference however is that you dont fire an event immediately. Instead you gain 2 years worth of manpower and increase the unrest in your two Nguni provinces by 5 for 25 years. Additionally, the following event can fire:
It should be noted that the AI will NOT attempt to enact the decision. The Rise of the Zulu event can fire naturally when the year is 1750 or later and is guaranteed to fire around 1816. Speaking of formables: we introduce a bunch of formable countries with patch 1.32 in Africa (and one in the Middle East). Here is a little gallery of what you can expect!
KIT_ideas = { start = { infantry_power = 0.1 manpower_recovery_speed = 0.15 } bonus = { stability_cost_modifier = -0.15 } trigger = { tag = KIT } free = yes kit_legacy_of_the_gods = { legitimacy = 1 tolerance_own = 2 } kit_empire_of_the_light = { prestige = 1 } kit_memory_of_aksum = { embracement_cost = -0.2 } kit_lakes_dominance = { discipline = 0.05 } kit_bachwezi_earthworks = { build_cost = -0.1 } kit_nile_conquest = { core_creation = -0.15 } kit_rich_history = { culture_conversion_cost = -0.25 } }
NBI_ideas = { start = { land_morale = 0.15 hostile_attrition = 1 } bonus = { prestige = 1 } trigger = { tag = NBI } free = yes nbi_our_land = { global_unrest = -2 stability_cost_modifier = -0.15 } nbi_religious_friction = { global_missionary_strength = 0.02 } nbi_desert_knowledge = { land_attrition = -0.1 } nbi_military_strength = { discipline = 0.05 } nbi_nile_control = { trade_efficiency = 0.1 production_efficiency = 0.1 } nbi_christian_ties = { tolerance_own = 2 } nbi_egyptian_relations = { adm_tech_cost_modifier = -0.1 } }
AKS_ideas = { start = { prestige_decay = -0.01 land_morale = 0.15 } bonus = { global_manpower_modifier = 0.33 } trigger = { tag = AKS } free = yes aks_stellae_builders = { prestige = 1 } aks_legacy_of_king_kaleb = { ae_impact = -0.15 } aks_persian_revenge = { province_warscore_cost = -0.25 } aks_christianity_stronghold = { tolerance_own = 2 } aks_mediterranean_contacts = { technology_cost = -0.1 } aks_trade_hub = { trade_efficiency = 0.15 } aks_coin_minting = { inflation_reduction = 0.1 } } @Pava already announced that Judaism gets new mechanics. Because of that we have decided to give one more addition for Jewish countries, which is the formable country of Israel!
ISR_ideas = { start = { legitimacy = 1 religious_unity = 0.25 } bonus = { diplomatic_reputation = 1 } trigger = { tag = ISR } free = yes end_of_diaspora = { global_unrest = -1 church_power_modifier = 0.15 } national_myths_restored = { discipline = 0.05 } return_home = { production_efficiency = 0.2 } jewish_trade_tradition = { trade_efficiency = 0.1 trade_steering = 0.1 } pious_people = { tolerance_own = 2 } people_of_exile = { development_cost = -0.1 } the_chosen_people = { land_morale = 0.1 } } As Butua you can form Rozwi, but your ideas will not change. It is basically a color and flag change and a free kingdom rank for you.
Of course we also have these two as formables now!
Additionally, the decision to form Sokoto has been improved too, allowing you to form them earlier - if you achieve the requirements of course.

One last point I want to address: in my last dev diary I mentioned that Fetishism receives some buffs. I also presented the idea of Cults for your heirs. While this mechanic is a mission tree reward for Kongo, it is actually available for every Fetishist country in the world - but in a different form. With 1.32 we introduce a bunch of new estate privileges, which you can use to improve your experience. Here is a small list of the new privileges we have for you:
These privileges are part of Rights of Man. Embrace Singular Cult improves the modifier of the cult you have active by 100%. Embrace Singular Cult cannot be active with Build Shrines for Heirs and Flexible Cults at the same time. We also have two new privileges for Muslim countries:
These privileges are part of Cradle of Civilization. We also have privileges which are part of the free update for you to use!

Values are all subjects to changes of course. I would like to hear your personal first impression and feedback about the privileges so we can release them in a more balanced state! With that said, I hope you enjoyed this dev diary! [USER=52443]@Pava[/USER] will continue with an overview of the remaining mission trees and the mechanics for Judaism. Until then I wish you a nice week!