Table of Contents

Getting started

Enable one copy of Birthright — Ballads of Cerilia in your CK3 playset. The current release is v0.0.3 — Realms & Strongholds, released 18 October 2026, with declared CK3 compatibility 1.20.1.1. Fully restart CK3 when installing or switching versions; enable only one Birthright copy.

Create your first ruler

  1. Choose a human culture, Orog culture or Sidhelien culture. Read its guide to understand its traditions.
  2. Choose a faith that suits your ruler's personality and plans.
  3. For elven ancestry, choose Elven Blood in Ruler Designer: the ordinary entry starts at 25, while Elven Blood — Sidhelien starts at 100. Scores 1–25, 26–50 and 51–99 grant +20, +200 and +500 years of life expectancy; only 100 grants full disease immunity and immortality from age 18. Culture alone does not grant these benefits.
  4. If your ruler is blooded, check their derivation and strength. These decide their possible bloodpowers.
  5. Open Decisions to choose a class. This is permanent in normal play.
  6. Open the lifestyle window, pick a focus and earn perks. Right-click characters for targeted abilities; look in Decisions for abilities used on yourself.

Understand the main resources

Resource or choice What it means
Bloodline strength How strong your divine inheritance is. It opens power tiers and raises RP capacity.
Regency Points (RP) Power you can spend on special actions, bloodline growth and elite troops.
Bloodpower An inherited gift, with permanent bonuses or an activated ability.
Class Your lifelong training: Warrior, Divine, Merchant or Arcane.
Class experience Progress toward perks in your chosen lifestyle.
Source holding Arcane research site with study bonuses and eligible blooded-holder RP income. See Sources.
Ley Line / Arcane realm-spell access Integration remains unfinished; a Source holding does not yet unlock realm casting.

Guardians and wards

Each guardian can educate up to four wards at once, increased from the vanilla limit of two. Use the usual education and guardianship interactions to assign children; the education reminders also recognize the four-ward capacity.

Fully restart CK3 after installing the release. An existing save is sufficient for this change.

Before starting a long campaign

This is a developing mod, and a complete Cerilia map is not available yet. Use a separate campaign or a copy of a save while trying new features. A new game is the best starting point for culture, faith and portrait choices.

Return to the player guide