The second big expansion coming to Crusader Kings 3 this year finally has a proper release date. Silk and Silver, the gold-clinking sibling of recently released Church-centric DLC By God Alone, will arrive on November 17th. Just a couple of days before that which shall not be named, but has resulted in a lot of studios opting to give mid-November a wide berth release-wise.

Part of CK3’s fifth chapter of DLC, Silk and Silver does for merchant republics like Venice what By God Alone did for realms ruled by Popes and priests. This time, the route to power is starting a successful trading company and building up your patrician family to the point of being able to rule as a palm-greasing Doge.

You’ll be able to influence what areas your republic specialises in, such as naval trade, bread and circuses populism, or establishing a deep class of nobles to send out across Europe in the hopes of currying favour. In terms of laws and customs, there’s a constitution you can try to shape to maximise your own ends or deliver good for the people. In terms of foreign policy, it’ll be up to you which trade routes to pursue control of and whether you’re after a monopoly or are happy to work with other republics for mutual benefit in trade leagues.

Sadly, it isn’t set to introduce naval warfare to CK3 despite its maritime trading focus. “We know this is a topic people care about and relate to the republics strongly,” Paradox wrote in deep dive about Silk and Silver earlier this year. “but between a whole lot of balancing and a whole lot of new systems that we are adding to the game, we chose not to spend time and energy on trying to pack in another large feature that we would not be able to give it enough love and time to do well.”

All in all, I’m not sure the marchant republics will have as much meme potential as playable Popes have for CK3, even in cases that don’t see the game glitch out and let you marry three ladies you shouldn’t before having divorce them all in a single day. Then again, being a medieval business tycoon could allow for plenty of other hijnks and tomfoolery that’ll make the decades roll by in funny fashion. Plus, it’s something else to stop us PC folks being starved of new releases as the console lot crack into, well, you know.