The strategic layer of Dominions 5 features a random event system, adding an element of unpredictability and uniqueness to each game. All nations use the random event system and there are various ways to manipulate the system to your own ends.
Each nation can experience up to 4 random events each turn, which occur within a particular province. You will be notified of these with a message at the start of your turn - usually written as "An unexpected event has occurred in…"
The frequency of these events is determined by a variety of factors such as luck, turmoil, order and misfortune scales, as well as the game's global event frequency setting.
There are thousands of events, and which ones you experience also depends on various factors, including:
All of this adds up to mean that it is very difficult to predict exactly what events are likely to occur. You can increase or decrease the likelihood of certain events - such as by making sure you avoid certain scales - but you usually can't decide exactly what happens.
Some events can lead to other events. For example, if an event triggers which puts a cult leader into one of your provinces, you might experience further events where the cult preaches in secret, causing your dominion to reduce.
There is two types of triggered events "Always"1) and "Always (unlimited)"2) -events. The always events will occur every month in every province unless they are limited somehow. Only one "Always" event can occur in each province per month while any number of "Always (unlimited)" events can occur in a single province each month.
Some of these chains are known as "story events", with long, branching chains which can change depending on what you decide to do. For example, you might have the option of rooting out the cult with an army, of infiltrating it with one of your own mages, or converting the heretics with a high level priest. The event will generally tell you what the options are, so make sure to read it carefully. Usually simply having the correct unit(s) in the province will trigger the next step, but in some cases they might require you to issue a special order to a commander.
Story events can be disabled in the game's setup options; this is common for multiplayer games due to the impactful rewards or penalties these events can offer.
Events can have all sorts of effects. Most commonly, you may experience the following:
Some rare events might give you free provinces or even claim Thrones of Ascension for you.
The fortune teller unit ability has a small chance to cancel out the effects of negative events. The turn's messages will display when this happens.
Some magic spells allow you to cause certain provinces to experience a particular event. This is usually negative and directed at one of your foes. For example, Hurricane allows you to inflict a natural disaster on a targeted province, causing population death and unrest. The unfortunate victim will see this reported as a normal random event, although if it happens too frequently they are likely to become suspicious, especially if their scales would not normally allow said event.
Certain units, such as those created with the Summon Firebird spell, have a small chance of forcefully creating an event in a province in addition to those which naturally occur. Each unit with this ability has its effect rolled independently of each other, which can cause large masses of these units to generate many additional events in a single province.
Some random events are global and effect everyone, rather than a specific province. Most commonly this will be the announcements for the Arena Deathmatch and People's Deathmatch, as well as global scale changes due to Thrones being claimed. You will see a ? icon next to global events. Some choices of the wish spell generate events of this type.
Units with the fortune teller ability have a small chance to offer their player advance warning for events of this type.
This relates to the normal common/uncommon events only. There are many events with the "always" rarity which are checked separately.
Events are considered on a per-nation basis, and only for nations that are in the game. Each nation gets a total of four event checks3).
Next, the scales in the nation's capital are examined, and the total event bonus is calculated. By default this is +2% per point of turmoil, -2% per point of order, and +5% per point of either luck or misfortune. This is added to the base event rate above. This value cannot be lowered below 3%.
The event chance is taken as the current turn number * 5 or the calculation above, whichever is smaller. If the game was created with the game setting that random events are rare, this event chance is divided by two. If this is the fourth check, the event chance is also divided by two. Both of these divisions can occur in the same event check. A random number between 0 and 99 is generated, and if this number is less than the final event rate, an event is generated.
Once an event is generated, the game then decides on a province to generate it in (which is done entirely at random). The local scales are then used to decide if the event should be good or bad. For this purpose, any positive luck scales are the province is taken to be 0 if the province does not contain friendly dominion. The chance of the event being good is 50% plus the luck scale's "event is good" value in the province which defaults to 10% per scale.
If the generated event is bad, the game checks for Fortune Tellers in the affected province and rolls each unit's ability value independently. Following this, the game picks the specific event to generate. Experimental evidence suggests that uncommon events make up 20% of events and common events make up the remaining 80% 4).