effect · promote_leader

Hands-On Usage

promote_leader is commonly used in story events or when national focuses complete, to automatically promote an outstanding Corps Commander to Field Marshal, creating a narrative of military reform or the rise of a war hero. For example, a nation completes the "Army Modernization" focus and promotes a designated character to supreme commander:

# In the complete block of the national focus
complete_effect = {
    every_country_with_original_tag = {
        limit = { original_tag = GER }
    }
    GER_rommel = {
        promote_leader = yes
    }
}

Synergy

• [is_corps_commander](/wiki/trigger/is_corps_commander) — Verify before promotion that the character is currently actually a Corps Commander, avoiding duplicate triggers on characters who are already Field Marshals or hold other positions.
• [is_field_marshal](/wiki/trigger/is_field_marshal) — Used in limit or subsequent checks to confirm whether the promotion has taken effect, preventing redundant logic execution.
• [add_field_marshal_role](/wiki/effect/add_field_marshal_role) — When a character completely lacks a Field Marshal role definition, this can serve as a supplementary measure, working alongside promote_leader to cover more complex initialization requirements.
• [add_trait](/wiki/effect/add_trait) — Immediately grant exclusive Field Marshal traits after promotion, enhancing both character narrative and numerical values, making the promotion event more impactful.

Common Pitfalls

1. Incorrect Scope Pointing: promote_leader must execute under CHARACTER scope. Beginners often write it directly in COUNTRY scope, causing script errors or silent failures — you must first enter character scope using a character token (such as GER_rommel = { ... }) before calling it.
2. Character Already a Field Marshal: Executing this command on a character who is already a Field Marshal will not cause an error, but also produces no effect, easily leading developers to mistakenly believe the logic is working when in fact subsequent event chains dependent on the promotion trigger will not be activated. It is recommended to pair this with [is_corps_commander](/wiki/trigger/is_corps_commander) for preliminary validation.