I am so excited that I won't have event spawned troops that have literally 3 times as many troops as I can possibly raise without spending my treasury on mercs!
What you see here is the result of a Patrician using the Faction window to push for Independence. But since I do not own a duchy title, it results in an instant game over.
Let me tell you a story about a man, a man named Hugo von Lenzburg, second son of Duke Rudolf IV of Upper Burgundy. His father was a nasty man, envious and arbitrary, an inveterate schemer who had ascended the throne by killing his own father. Upon Hugo's birth there was much rejoicing, as it secured the throne in case tragedy hit his elder brother, also named Rudolf. But it wasn't long before it became clear that not all was right with little Hugo. He walked late, he talked late and poorly; it was obvious to all that the boy was slow. Fearful that others would learn of his failure, Duke Rudolf tutored the boy on his own, but never expected much of him.
As he grew, his innocent, playful demeanor enchanted all; it could truly be said that the boy never met a stranger. In a world full of things he didn't understand, Hugo was patient and temperate, never letting anything overwhelm him. If he didn't understand something on the first go, or the second or even the third, he knew that, with time and ambition, he could grasp it. And he had ambition in spades, balanced by his unwavering humility; everything he accomplished he attributed to his teachers. By the age of 14 he had far exceeded his father's low expectations, but desired even more. And so he requested the tutelage of the Mayor of Bern, a scholarly genius widely renowned for his mathematical and managerial expertise. No longer embarrassed of his son, the Duke quickly made the arrangements, and though the Mayor was a tough taskmaster, Hugo studied day and night to keep up with his tough demands.
At the age of 16, as was custom, Hugo was presented to court, no longer a boy, but a man. The child who nobody had expected much of, who had been all but cast off, was now a man all could respect, the best administrator in the Duchy.
Stories like these are what make this game so interesting. Slow, useless child gets all the right traits, has a high base score, and a lvl 4 education in the right field (Midas Touched), leaving him with an awesome 18 in Stewardship (and shit in everything else). Good work Hugo... unfortunately you can't be the Steward yet because I have to keep your older brother happy. But man, what a fun character arc, right?
Hah they buffed the Khazar starting position in the beta patch, maybe we can try again?
In my observer game Orthodox Persia survived for 250 years, from 970 when they formed until the Mongols ran over them. The mongols promptly became Orthodox too, and then 5 year later became heretical Orthodox and kept on conquering.
And is it me or does every time the Golden Horde spawns the Ilkhanate immediately fights 'who has the bigger event stack?' The Thunderdome of Siberia is fun to see once, but it is sort of weird that one always seems to annihilate the other. Though in the current state it does save everyone.
Well the Ilkhanate is supposed to go south and the Golden Horde is supposed to go north but all the Muslims are to big and why fight them when you could just invade your way through cumania instead? So they both end up in the same place and you only get one horde instead of two.
My friend is working on a roguelike game you can play if you want to. (It has free demo)
So whoever had the idea of taking Norse Nantes and invading Sicily, I have go give you thanks. 60 years later and nearly every single island in the Mediterranean are now filled to the brim with vikings, and the world is our oyster to pillage and sack. Sicily itself eludes us thanks to a strong Byzantium, but I did manage to invade Alger and give ourselves a strong base in the region. I'm now contemplating a prepared invasion on Wessex so as to give the Norsemen complete control of the British isles.
I'm trying to reform the Norse faith and managed to take Uppsala from the King of Sweden but somehow the King of Norway owns the holdings, I only control the capital. How can I take the city holdings from him?
Solved: Didn't realize I have county claims since I own the capital and now the former king of Sweden revolted so I don't have to make my ally Norway angry.
so something i noticed about the save game. i re-enabled all my DLC after playing and loaded up the save, and it worked as Ironman. With just the main DLC, it was a regular game....
isn't the ilkhanate only supposed to fight muslim states
i swear i read there were rules about this
They get invasion cbs against everyone, even other mongols. There was a mod that took that away until one horde or the other converted to another religion.
I think it would solve a lot of things with hordes to make invasion not work on tengris in general, as is the case with cumans and hungarians. Make an exception for the golden horde.
Jealous Deva on
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AuralynxDarkness is a perspectiveWatching the ego workRegistered Userregular
I am so excited that I won't have event spawned troops that have literally 3 times as many troops as I can possibly raise without spending my treasury on mercs!
Lost what had been a really promising Dyre the Stranger start to 6000 Orthodox Christians spawning on me in Crimea earlier this week. I've now joined the "event troops are bs" party.
Grabbed the beta patch last night and started a new game. Event troops seem just fine to me. I started a game in Brittany and was able to fend off an invasion from Nantes and, once the truce wore off, Holy War and take it for myself.
There are a few strange things I noticed. I arranged marriages for a couple people in my court and wound up with Fulfilled Marriage Wish bonuses on several of my count vassals for some reason? Also, I'm Cathar (Ruler Designer, Old Gods start) and I can't Holy War on Catholics. Was it always this way? Maybe because I'm still just at Duke-level with a West Francia county, so it's considering me as de jure Catholic or whatnot?
Anyway it's been a pretty neat game so far. I've converted all of my vassals to Cathar and am working on my counties. I had married a Karling prince that was set to inherit Burgundy, but they quickly changed things so I'd get nothing, and then he died young before he could inherit anything. Assuming the one child we had (a daughter) actually ends up as my heir, I'm not sure I'll get anything out of it in the end.
West Francia has been going nuts. At one point the king of East Francia ruled both, but rebellion quickly fixed that. But not before East Francia conquered Aquitaine. So now they have a strange divided kingdom. Anyway, all that infighting has ensured that they've ignored the Cathar Brittany sitting right beside them, which is super swell because I'm in a very precarious position.
I've allied myself with the Spanish Cathoic kingdom (remarried a prince from there), so that's pretty nice. Now that I've taken Nantes, I need to expand, and fast. Problem is I can't expand anywhere fast; I'm surrounded by powerful Karling Catholics, and I have no boats. I just got Shipbuilding I, though, so now I'm going to fix the problem by building some boats. Then I think I'll head toward Cornwall and Wales. Britain is in chaos, so I should have plenty of opportunity to conquer and expand. That way if I do end up losing the homeland to Catholic invaders, I'll have a place to fall back on (and plenty of Nords to quickly conquer). And thanks to the recent Steam sale, I now have the Customizer tool. I don't have to be Great Britain; I can be the Empire of Celtia!
But am I safer than I thought? If I don't get free CBs on Catholics, maybe they don't get them on me either. At worst I may have to give up that one province in Normandy that I start with.
Fleur de Alys on
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
There are a few strange things I noticed. I arranged marriages for a couple people in my court and wound up with Fulfilled Marriage Wish bonuses on several of my count vassals for some reason? Also, I'm Cathar (Ruler Designer, Old Gods start) and I can't Holy War on Catholics. Was it always this way? Maybe because I'm still just at Duke-level with a West Francia county, so it's considering me as de jure Catholic or whatnot?
The bonuses are from helping people fulfill their ambition to get married.
BlindPsychic on
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AuralynxDarkness is a perspectiveWatching the ego workRegistered Userregular
Yeah, the mercenaries owning Italy > that map of Spain; got an equally balkanized and crazy one that's mostly Knights of Santiago and Calatrava but also includes Burgundy and Hungary in that Brittania game at this point.
I had a game where the Holy Roman Emperor went heretic and had a crusade called against him.
The Teutonic Knights ended up Kings of Germany.
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"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
The bonuses are from helping people fulfill their ambition to get married.
Yeah but I only married the people in my court, not my vassals (I had no potential wives any of them would accept). People who shouldn't have had the bonus got it anyway.
I think it eventually corrected itself. But I'm not sure because most of my vassal counts died within the first five years of play for some reason (I had nothing to do with it! Honest! Well, except the guy I made collect taxes I guess).
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
You know that you can usurp Venice, right?
Go into the screen where you can see de jure titles, and usurp that sucker.
Civics is not a consumer product that you can ignore because you don’t like the options presented.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
Invasion comes from altaic/khazar with any pagan religion.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
Invasion comes from altaic/khazar with any pagan religion.
You also get it against a competing religion
Norse get 'Prepare Invasion' CB which gives you event troops based upon your total levy
So, I'm puttering along as the Queen of Denmark in an Ironman game, doing my thing, and an invasion drops 11k troops right on my capital. Wipes out my retinue, it's more troops that I could summon at the best of times, and if I hire mercenaries the stack on my capital will just saunter over and destroy it. No choice, I surrender. I'm reduced to my ducal title and three counties. All of the holdings in those three counties go to my usurper. He's even taken my title as Fylkir, and that shit aint cool. But: I'm a Viking. And Vikings don't stand for that kind of shit.
I go out raiding, taking out pretty much all of Ireland. I needed money if I wanted my throne back. And seriously, fuck Ireland. A decade later, while my "liege" is busy fighting a war against every Karling alive trying to nibble off some of East Francia, I hired a few stacks of mercenaries.
I dropped that merc stack right on my old capital, assaulting every holding. Payback's a bitch, and her name is Rikissa. Revenge is a dish best served cold, and that asshole got served a double helping of it. The usurper tried to bring his army back to fight me. He shouldn't have bothered; if Learning had been his suit rather than Martial he might have realized 4k troops crossing a river against 11k isn't too smart. To bad for him. He died on the battlefield, and his brother inherited; I forced his brother to terms. The terms being, I had my country back, and that pretender was banished from the realm.
Long life the Queen, motherfucker.
I love this game so much.
Civics is not a consumer product that you can ignore because you don’t like the options presented.
It seems more or less the same despite all the changes, unless you get really involved with the math. Flanks are more important now, and you get fewer troops.
My friend is working on a roguelike game you can play if you want to. (It has free demo)
It also feels like troop differences and leader quality matter more now. In the old system it felt like 'bigger number wins always' but now I've definitely seem larger light infantry armies collapse against a viking heavy infantry 2/3rds lead by a 20+ their size.
Which makes it annoying that generals still bounce around at times if you don't pay atttention.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
You know that you can usurp Venice, right?
Go into the screen where you can see de jure titles, and usurp that sucker.
Oh Shadowhope, when will you learn...
Historically, Venice was/is a republic and thus you need to be a Republic to usurp the title of king.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
You know that you can usurp Venice, right?
Go into the screen where you can see de jure titles, and usurp that sucker.
Oh Shadowhope, when will you learn...
Historically, Venice was/is a republic and thus you need to be a Republic to usurp the title of king.
It also feels like troop differences and leader quality matter more now. In the old system it felt like 'bigger number wins always' but now I've definitely seem larger light infantry armies collapse against a viking heavy infantry 2/3rds lead by a 20+ their size.
Which makes it annoying that generals still bounce around at times if you don't pay atttention.
The worst is having to pause, move your army somewhere, rearrange the command staff, and then cancel the move before assaulting things you've been besieging just to be sure.
So West Francia collapsed into multiple wars thanks to delicious Karling in-fighting. Actually the king was really unpopular (and dubbed "the Stutterer"), so it's not unexpected. But the revolt aimed to put the king of East Francia on the throne. That would have been a really quick war, but the Italian Karling was all "nuh-uh" and helped out, delaying West Francia's defeat.
I took advantage of this to launch two quick Holy Wars for Normandy. Lotharignia intervened the second time, but I beat their army in a close battle thanks to two cheap merc armies I brought in. Now I hold the duchies of Brittany and Normandy and, once my cash builds back up, can form the Kingdom of Brittany.
Problem is, Cathar - Catholic holy wars do in fact work, as mentioned above. I forgot you can only Holy War for adjacent provinces, which is why I couldn't go for any British territory without first getting a county there somewhere. On the positive side, this let me grab Normandy, and I'm now putting in a claim on Cornwall so I can begin expansion in a general that-a-way direction.
On the negative side? West Francia is intact and peaceful. The unpopular king died, replaced with a young and popular new Karling king. The rebels went with White Peace shortly after his ascension to the throne, even though they were winning, just because they like him so much. So now he gets the "Crushed a Revolt" opinion boost on top of it. They will almost certainly be coming for me, and soon.
West Francia isn't as powerful as it could be. Aquitaine has a lot of territory, though they're busy fighting a Gascogne independence rebellion. Frisia is independent, and West Francia has not expanded anywhere outside their normal borders (and I control all but one province of Normandy). Still, they're allied with most of Europe, while I'm only allied with Asturias (and they're unlikely to come to my aid in a holy war). I could probably fight off West Francia on a really good day, but I can't fight off all of Europe. My heir is betrothed to a Karling that's a year away from coming of age, but it's the son of a duchess (Burgundy), so I don't get any call-able alliances out of it.
This gives me a few options:
1. Rush to Cornwall / Ireland. Expect to lose my holdings on the mainland and recreate my empire on the British Isles. I'd hate to do this because it's basically starting over just as I'm getting started, but I may not have a choice. My Chancellor is there now, trying to get me a claim.
2. Destabilize West Francia. I'm not sure how to do this. I can't plot-kill their popular king, and standard assassinations are still extremely expensive for me. Besides, he has no male children, so the whole nation would just shift to his bishop brother with no splitting of territory. I don't really know how to use Spymasters to make vassals hate their liege. Generally all I get are opinion penalties on local mayors and bishops. What's the trick for turning counts and dukes against a liege?
3. Convert to Catholicism at the last second when losing a holy war. My subjects and my heir are all Cathar, so that'll give me the rest of my current liege's life (she's 35) to try to build a foothold elsewhere before trying again as Cathar. However, this will turn my existing vassals against me, give me an influx of new Catholic people I don't want, slow the spread of Cathar in my counties, and remove my ability to Holy War against the Catholics in Britain when I begin expanding there, forcing me to take on the more powerful Nords. On the other hand, I have a good chance of getting conversion events, especially if I keep Cathars in the council.
4. Lock West Francia down as long as possible in an offensive war. I can press my de jure claim on their remaining Normandy province and just try to keep the war going as long as possible. I have some boats, and they don't, so with some luck I could evade their armies, retake territory they conquer, and in general try to maintain a sub-100% war score, all without using vassal levies. West Francia, on the other hand, will almost certainly use their vassal armies. If I can hold out long enough, I can get vassal opinions to plummet. If I can survive until then and stir up some destabilization, I might be able to jump in and turn the war around with mercs and vassal armies, gaining more territory and continuing to weaken them. None of this will work if they bring in large alliances, however, so I also need to destabilize other Karling lands (or hope for more wars elsewhere). East Francia may soon collapse on its own; the king is old and has several male children. That just leaves Lotharignia and Italy...
5. Drag out the holy war as long as possible, accepting the loss of Normandy while trying to expand into Britain. With luck I can get enough territory fast enough that I can hold off the second holy war for Brittany proper, possibly by taking advantage of any new Karling drama that pops up.
I'll probably end up doing some save-scumming to try several of these strategies to see what happens. They're all interesting options, and I kind of want to see what would happen trying each of them.
It's crazy how many diverse strategies you can employ. I love this game.
Fleur de Alys on
Triptycho: A card-and-dice tabletop indie RPG currently in development and playtesting
+1
TraceGNU Terry Pratchett; GNU Gus; GNU Carrie Fisher; GNU Adam WeRegistered Userregular
edited December 2013
Okay I'm gonna have to pass my turn, my as I loathe to do so. I'm not getting as much free time as I thought this long weekend so I'm not going to have a chance to sit down and put any time at all into CK 2.
So I have been fooling around with Nantes to see how gamey it could get.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
You know that you can usurp Venice, right?
Go into the screen where you can see de jure titles, and usurp that sucker.
Oh Shadowhope, when will you learn...
Historically, Venice was/is a republic and thus you need to be a Republic to usurp the title of king.
Random thing about my sheep: if I had been facing the exact opposite direction when I took that photo, I would have basically been looking at this.
It's Castle Conwy, in Wales. My sheep is looking directly at what I often make my capital in my favourite demesne.
Alright. Guess my CK2 game was acting up.
Strangely enough, if you save the game and reload it before usurping it, the king title will be destroyed and you will be unable to create it since it then requires a republic character.
Edit:
And then one thing lead to another....
Edit 2:
So I messed around some more to see if I could gain the Papacy without resulting in a game over.
Turns out that Paradox fixed that loophole for good. The entire title itself is flagged as a Theocracy since I own castles in all of my holdings.
Even holding a higher title than king (Emperor of Italy ex.) will not allow me to continue to play. Not even modding away primary title = yes from the game files will prevent the game over screen.
On the other hand, I am able to reload the game again and again. First time I did it, the game actually ran in the background and I got to witness the so-called "Indulgence for my sins" spam events.
So long story short:
If you wish to cripple the Catholic religion permanently early on (no crusades, no money lending, no nothing), do this:
1) Start as Nantes
2) Swear Fealty to a nation with the Altaic culture group
3) Convert to Liege's culture
4) Start an independence faction and win (usually right away)
5) Load up your 40 boats with troops and go to Venice
6) Declare Conquest of Venezia and win
7) Immediately find the King of Venice title and usurp it (impossible to do later if you save/reload the game)
8) Load your remaining troops onto your boats and land them in Orvieto next to Rome
9) Wait for their morale to replenish and then declare an Invasion of Italy on the Pope (try to set your troops to march and declare war 1 day before they arrive).
10) The Pope will spawn about 3,5k troops, but they start at 0% morale, so they are easy to get on the run. Keep attacking them since this adds 15-20% to the warscore with minimum casualties
11) Win the war and viola! The dethroned Pope is now a regular prince-bishop and a vassal of yours. The Papacy has been destroyed, and if you convert to Catholicism, you will discover that there is no religious head for Catholicism and that you have the option of creating The Papacy (Don't! This will result in a game over instantly).
Edit 3:
I actually just found out how to continue playing as the Pope.
Go to the CK2 folder and find "Landed_titles.txt" under Common. Add "holy order = yes" in the brackets under k_papal_state lines. The game will now consider the title a holy order title which doesn't end the game.
You cannot use this method if you are playing an ironman game as the game won't let you start the save.
Current game is as the Republic of Gotland(now Lithuania) from the 1066 start.
This is the first game that I've seen the Ilkhanate and the Golden Horde take their historical paths of conquest. I also realized that the mongols are much scarier in a 1066 start than the old gods start, since provinces and technology are less built up, Europe is absolutely screwed. The Golden Horde has ~90k troops with the Tartaria and Carpathia empires, the Ilkhanate has ~60k troops with the Persian and non-africa Arabian empires. The Byzantines and HRE both have about 40k troops but most likely won't come to each others aid, the Muslim Sultanate in West Africa/Southern Spain has ~30k troops, and everyone else has absolutely zero chance against the hordes.
So, again, I experience the enjoyment of watching a family saga unfold before my eyes. I did not begin as Ivar the Boneless, but instead as his brother, King Halfdan Whiteshirt. However, he did not live long. Ivar's brother died in combat as he attempted to avenge his father's murder. Halfdan died on 18 May, 867.
His son and successor, Jarl Sigfrid the Just took over and began to push outward to expand the family's rule. However, less than seven years into his rule, he and his men, on the way to conquer, stopped to stay at an oddly abandoned inn. The sudden explosion on the morning of May 1st, 874 that soon followed immediately put Sigfrid's 4 year old son Dag onto the throne. Dag and his younger brother Toste were surrounded by a hostile court and hostile vassals. Dag found himself in the care of a sinister and conniving Regent who commanded legions of Spys. In the time immediately after his coronation, a priest of the Dead God came into his court and warned Dag that if he did not convert to the One True Faith of Christ, then Dag would be beset by evil and doomed to die. The Spymaster had the priest siezed and imprisoned immediately. It would not due for the boy to worry unnecessarily, he said to his liege.
In truth, the Regent merely wanted to not give Dag warning or reason to be cautious. He isolated the child and then, on the 28th of May, 878, Dag was found killed on an abandoned stretch of road. It was an accident, they said.
Toste learned from the example. The young eyes of the 6 year old newly crowned Jarl saw the sinister smile that crept along his Spymaster's face. He felt the coldness of the man's touch as it lay on his shoulder, as the man swore to guide him as Regent.
Toste lay low. He allowed his Regent to use the massive remaining armies that had brought his grandfather Halfdan to power. They began to conquer the small island to the West, the one named Irland in the old stories. County after county fell. And Toste slowly moved those of his court out. He gave away land after land, as soon as they were conquered, letting them think they were getting the better of him. Slowly he pulled men and women around him who seemed to truly care for the young Petty King. A kindness occurred when, for a brief moment, a gentle and wise man became his Regent...but it did not last long. Suddenly, the sinister Spymaster reasserted his Regency. And plots to either declare Independence or to put a cousin on the throne were whispered openly in his court.
It was a sudden piece of divine chance, a gift from Odin the All-Father, that saved Toste.
The gift took the form of an attempted Usurpation. Suddenly, 6 Counts declared they would decide who would be their ruler. They would put one of their own on the throne and command the soon-to-be-born nation of Irland. They abandoned their rightful ruler. And the hated Spymaster left, confident that without him, the child would lose.
But the rebellion only cleared the court of those who plotted against Toste. With a wisdom beyond his years, he selected a new teacher to teach him. A new Regent was appointed, one that watched over Toste with a wary eye, but it was a true eye, not one filled with lies and derision. And then Toste turned his massive army against his former vassals. His newly appointed Council fell in behind him, giving the child their support, support that had been denied him for years under the old Council. Toste broke the rebellion swiftly.
When the dust settled, Toste brought his former Spymaster and Regent before him. He imprisoned the traitor/murderer. He stripped the man of his titles. He gifted those same titles to a loyal follower. And then, in the cold morning of a Winter's day, he had the man killed in the ancient manner. No swift death for this man, only the pain of a Blood Eagle.
Toste then formed the Kingdom of Irland. Spread over two landmasses, it crouches and waits. For now, the Western Island is all but completely under his rule. The main island is now descending into wars between the Catholic nations as they attempt to find who their Dead God wishes to rule. But Toste knows they work toward a dead end. He has seen the path he must take. He has learned of an old Empire and heard the tales of glory and legends of his religion. And knows he is destined to bring forth an Empire of Odin's Warriors.
And on this day, the 10th of October, 887, King Toste of Irland, turned 16. He is no longer a ward. He is King in his own right. Perhaps he will take a concubine now. But he knows what his first order of Holy business will be. For you see, King Toste has kept a couple of the blessed rebels in his prison for just this season, as well as the priest who prophesied his brother's death 10 years ago. In a month, Toste will host his first Great Blot.
Okay I'm gonna have to pass my turn, my as I loathe to do so. I'm not getting as much free time as I thought this long weekend so I'm not going to have a chance to sit down and put any time at all into CK 2.
The weekend is also quite busy for me but I decided to give it a go at a higher speed than I am used to. My vassals seems to have picked up on the fact that I did not have full control of my realm and almost immediately tried to force me to lower my crown authority. Seeing how there were several factions working against me I decided to make a stand right there and then, not showing any weakness. The war was won and there was a few years of peace. My kingdom and my three neighbor kingdoms, Germany, France and Italy war also at peace. I took the opportunity to go to Jerusalem and found a deep love for God. The love did not last long, I lost my zeal a few years later and fell in love with my wife instead. All was well in the Kingdom but I didn't feel I had the succession order I wanted for my son so I informed my vassals that this nonsense of gavelkind was a thing of the past. My son would inherit all my titles!
Unfortunately this did not stand well with a lot of my dukes so they rebelled against me trying to install a new king on my throne. The duchess of Flanders decided to take the opportunity and claimed independence. My well equipped retinue and some of my loyal vassals slowly but steadily wore the rebels down. I had it all under control until the King of Germany attacked me. A lot of hard earned gold (lounging around on the throne is hard work, but someone has to do it), was spent on mercenaries to keep the Germanic dogs on their side of the border. Finally all wars was won and again there was peace.
The long war and all the time spent away from my cosy royal bed and loving wife had taken it's toll on my health however, I soon fell ill and never recovered. With my last breath I cursed the King of Germany and asked my son to take vengeance upon him.
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What you see here is the result of a Patrician using the Faction window to push for Independence. But since I do not own a duchy title, it results in an instant game over.
As he grew, his innocent, playful demeanor enchanted all; it could truly be said that the boy never met a stranger. In a world full of things he didn't understand, Hugo was patient and temperate, never letting anything overwhelm him. If he didn't understand something on the first go, or the second or even the third, he knew that, with time and ambition, he could grasp it. And he had ambition in spades, balanced by his unwavering humility; everything he accomplished he attributed to his teachers. By the age of 14 he had far exceeded his father's low expectations, but desired even more. And so he requested the tutelage of the Mayor of Bern, a scholarly genius widely renowned for his mathematical and managerial expertise. No longer embarrassed of his son, the Duke quickly made the arrangements, and though the Mayor was a tough taskmaster, Hugo studied day and night to keep up with his tough demands.
At the age of 16, as was custom, Hugo was presented to court, no longer a boy, but a man. The child who nobody had expected much of, who had been all but cast off, was now a man all could respect, the best administrator in the Duchy.
In my observer game Orthodox Persia survived for 250 years, from 970 when they formed until the Mongols ran over them. The mongols promptly became Orthodox too, and then 5 year later became heretical Orthodox and kept on conquering.
And is it me or does every time the Golden Horde spawns the Ilkhanate immediately fights 'who has the bigger event stack?' The Thunderdome of Siberia is fun to see once, but it is sort of weird that one always seems to annihilate the other. Though in the current state it does save everyone.
i swear i read there were rules about this
Solved: Didn't realize I have county claims since I own the capital and now the former king of Sweden revolted so I don't have to make my ally Norway angry.
They get invasion cbs against everyone, even other mongols. There was a mod that took that away until one horde or the other converted to another religion.
I think it would solve a lot of things with hordes to make invasion not work on tengris in general, as is the case with cumans and hungarians. Make an exception for the golden horde.
Lost what had been a really promising Dyre the Stranger start to 6000 Orthodox Christians spawning on me in Crimea earlier this week. I've now joined the "event troops are bs" party.
Also note that a mercenary band owns Italy.
There are a few strange things I noticed. I arranged marriages for a couple people in my court and wound up with Fulfilled Marriage Wish bonuses on several of my count vassals for some reason? Also, I'm Cathar (Ruler Designer, Old Gods start) and I can't Holy War on Catholics. Was it always this way? Maybe because I'm still just at Duke-level with a West Francia county, so it's considering me as de jure Catholic or whatnot?
Anyway it's been a pretty neat game so far. I've converted all of my vassals to Cathar and am working on my counties. I had married a Karling prince that was set to inherit Burgundy, but they quickly changed things so I'd get nothing, and then he died young before he could inherit anything. Assuming the one child we had (a daughter) actually ends up as my heir, I'm not sure I'll get anything out of it in the end.
West Francia has been going nuts. At one point the king of East Francia ruled both, but rebellion quickly fixed that. But not before East Francia conquered Aquitaine. So now they have a strange divided kingdom. Anyway, all that infighting has ensured that they've ignored the Cathar Brittany sitting right beside them, which is super swell because I'm in a very precarious position.
I've allied myself with the Spanish Cathoic kingdom (remarried a prince from there), so that's pretty nice. Now that I've taken Nantes, I need to expand, and fast. Problem is I can't expand anywhere fast; I'm surrounded by powerful Karling Catholics, and I have no boats. I just got Shipbuilding I, though, so now I'm going to fix the problem by building some boats. Then I think I'll head toward Cornwall and Wales. Britain is in chaos, so I should have plenty of opportunity to conquer and expand. That way if I do end up losing the homeland to Catholic invaders, I'll have a place to fall back on (and plenty of Nords to quickly conquer). And thanks to the recent Steam sale, I now have the Customizer tool. I don't have to be Great Britain; I can be the Empire of Celtia!
But am I safer than I thought? If I don't get free CBs on Catholics, maybe they don't get them on me either. At worst I may have to give up that one province in Normandy that I start with.
The bonuses are from helping people fulfill their ambition to get married.
Yeah, the mercenaries owning Italy > that map of Spain; got an equally balkanized and crazy one that's mostly Knights of Santiago and Calatrava but also includes Burgundy and Hungary in that Brittania game at this point.
The Teutonic Knights ended up Kings of Germany.
"Orkses never lose a battle. If we win we win, if we die we die fightin so it don't count. If we runs for it we don't die neither, cos we can come back for annuver go, see!".
I think it eventually corrected itself. But I'm not sure because most of my vassal counts died within the first five years of play for some reason (I had nothing to do with it! Honest! Well, except the guy I made collect taxes I guess).
I actually think they got their own brides and then gave me a bonus for it even though I had nothing to do with it.
First off, I swore allegiance to the Kjazaria kingdom and converted my culture to Khazar (Altaic group which means access to horse archers). After that, I declared independence and did a conquest of Venice which gives me access to a duke title right off the bat.
As Duke Norse, you gain access to the Invasion CB and since you have so many event troops left (and money), you can easily conquer a kingdom of your choice. I wouldn't suggest the Karlings due to alliances, but Spain is looking awfully interesting with their small kingdoms.
You know that you can usurp Venice, right?
Go into the screen where you can see de jure titles, and usurp that sucker.
Invasion comes from altaic/khazar with any pagan religion.
You also get it against a competing religion
Norse get 'Prepare Invasion' CB which gives you event troops based upon your total levy
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So, I'm puttering along as the Queen of Denmark in an Ironman game, doing my thing, and an invasion drops 11k troops right on my capital. Wipes out my retinue, it's more troops that I could summon at the best of times, and if I hire mercenaries the stack on my capital will just saunter over and destroy it. No choice, I surrender. I'm reduced to my ducal title and three counties. All of the holdings in those three counties go to my usurper. He's even taken my title as Fylkir, and that shit aint cool. But: I'm a Viking. And Vikings don't stand for that kind of shit.
I go out raiding, taking out pretty much all of Ireland. I needed money if I wanted my throne back. And seriously, fuck Ireland. A decade later, while my "liege" is busy fighting a war against every Karling alive trying to nibble off some of East Francia, I hired a few stacks of mercenaries.
I dropped that merc stack right on my old capital, assaulting every holding. Payback's a bitch, and her name is Rikissa. Revenge is a dish best served cold, and that asshole got served a double helping of it. The usurper tried to bring his army back to fight me. He shouldn't have bothered; if Learning had been his suit rather than Martial he might have realized 4k troops crossing a river against 11k isn't too smart. To bad for him. He died on the battlefield, and his brother inherited; I forced his brother to terms. The terms being, I had my country back, and that pretender was banished from the realm.
Long life the Queen, motherfucker.
I love this game so much.
Which makes it annoying that generals still bounce around at times if you don't pay atttention.
Oh Shadowhope, when will you learn...
Historically, Venice was/is a republic and thus you need to be a Republic to usurp the title of king.
Silly sheep ;-)
Baa.
Baaaaaaaaaaaa.
Random thing about my sheep: if I had been facing the exact opposite direction when I took that photo, I would have basically been looking at this.
The worst is having to pause, move your army somewhere, rearrange the command staff, and then cancel the move before assaulting things you've been besieging just to be sure.
I took advantage of this to launch two quick Holy Wars for Normandy. Lotharignia intervened the second time, but I beat their army in a close battle thanks to two cheap merc armies I brought in. Now I hold the duchies of Brittany and Normandy and, once my cash builds back up, can form the Kingdom of Brittany.
Problem is, Cathar - Catholic holy wars do in fact work, as mentioned above. I forgot you can only Holy War for adjacent provinces, which is why I couldn't go for any British territory without first getting a county there somewhere. On the positive side, this let me grab Normandy, and I'm now putting in a claim on Cornwall so I can begin expansion in a general that-a-way direction.
On the negative side? West Francia is intact and peaceful. The unpopular king died, replaced with a young and popular new Karling king. The rebels went with White Peace shortly after his ascension to the throne, even though they were winning, just because they like him so much. So now he gets the "Crushed a Revolt" opinion boost on top of it. They will almost certainly be coming for me, and soon.
West Francia isn't as powerful as it could be. Aquitaine has a lot of territory, though they're busy fighting a Gascogne independence rebellion. Frisia is independent, and West Francia has not expanded anywhere outside their normal borders (and I control all but one province of Normandy). Still, they're allied with most of Europe, while I'm only allied with Asturias (and they're unlikely to come to my aid in a holy war). I could probably fight off West Francia on a really good day, but I can't fight off all of Europe. My heir is betrothed to a Karling that's a year away from coming of age, but it's the son of a duchess (Burgundy), so I don't get any call-able alliances out of it.
This gives me a few options:
1. Rush to Cornwall / Ireland. Expect to lose my holdings on the mainland and recreate my empire on the British Isles. I'd hate to do this because it's basically starting over just as I'm getting started, but I may not have a choice. My Chancellor is there now, trying to get me a claim.
2. Destabilize West Francia. I'm not sure how to do this. I can't plot-kill their popular king, and standard assassinations are still extremely expensive for me. Besides, he has no male children, so the whole nation would just shift to his bishop brother with no splitting of territory. I don't really know how to use Spymasters to make vassals hate their liege. Generally all I get are opinion penalties on local mayors and bishops. What's the trick for turning counts and dukes against a liege?
3. Convert to Catholicism at the last second when losing a holy war. My subjects and my heir are all Cathar, so that'll give me the rest of my current liege's life (she's 35) to try to build a foothold elsewhere before trying again as Cathar. However, this will turn my existing vassals against me, give me an influx of new Catholic people I don't want, slow the spread of Cathar in my counties, and remove my ability to Holy War against the Catholics in Britain when I begin expanding there, forcing me to take on the more powerful Nords. On the other hand, I have a good chance of getting conversion events, especially if I keep Cathars in the council.
4. Lock West Francia down as long as possible in an offensive war. I can press my de jure claim on their remaining Normandy province and just try to keep the war going as long as possible. I have some boats, and they don't, so with some luck I could evade their armies, retake territory they conquer, and in general try to maintain a sub-100% war score, all without using vassal levies. West Francia, on the other hand, will almost certainly use their vassal armies. If I can hold out long enough, I can get vassal opinions to plummet. If I can survive until then and stir up some destabilization, I might be able to jump in and turn the war around with mercs and vassal armies, gaining more territory and continuing to weaken them. None of this will work if they bring in large alliances, however, so I also need to destabilize other Karling lands (or hope for more wars elsewhere). East Francia may soon collapse on its own; the king is old and has several male children. That just leaves Lotharignia and Italy...
5. Drag out the holy war as long as possible, accepting the loss of Normandy while trying to expand into Britain. With luck I can get enough territory fast enough that I can hold off the second holy war for Brittany proper, possibly by taking advantage of any new Karling drama that pops up.
I'll probably end up doing some save-scumming to try several of these strategies to see what happens. They're all interesting options, and I kind of want to see what would happen trying each of them.
It's crazy how many diverse strategies you can employ. I love this game.
I hate the holiday seasons.
@Richard
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ki8tt0txqrvnm6z/WlntYfeNAa/Alsace-Lorraine1039_10_09.ck2
There's the save for convenience.
Alright. Guess my CK2 game was acting up.
Strangely enough, if you save the game and reload it before usurping it, the king title will be destroyed and you will be unable to create it since it then requires a republic character.
Edit:
And then one thing lead to another....
Edit 2:
So I messed around some more to see if I could gain the Papacy without resulting in a game over.
Turns out that Paradox fixed that loophole for good. The entire title itself is flagged as a Theocracy since I own castles in all of my holdings.
Even holding a higher title than king (Emperor of Italy ex.) will not allow me to continue to play. Not even modding away primary title = yes from the game files will prevent the game over screen.
On the other hand, I am able to reload the game again and again. First time I did it, the game actually ran in the background and I got to witness the so-called "Indulgence for my sins" spam events.
So long story short:
If you wish to cripple the Catholic religion permanently early on (no crusades, no money lending, no nothing), do this:
1) Start as Nantes
2) Swear Fealty to a nation with the Altaic culture group
3) Convert to Liege's culture
4) Start an independence faction and win (usually right away)
5) Load up your 40 boats with troops and go to Venice
6) Declare Conquest of Venezia and win
7) Immediately find the King of Venice title and usurp it (impossible to do later if you save/reload the game)
8) Load your remaining troops onto your boats and land them in Orvieto next to Rome
9) Wait for their morale to replenish and then declare an Invasion of Italy on the Pope (try to set your troops to march and declare war 1 day before they arrive).
10) The Pope will spawn about 3,5k troops, but they start at 0% morale, so they are easy to get on the run. Keep attacking them since this adds 15-20% to the warscore with minimum casualties
11) Win the war and viola! The dethroned Pope is now a regular prince-bishop and a vassal of yours. The Papacy has been destroyed, and if you convert to Catholicism, you will discover that there is no religious head for Catholicism and that you have the option of creating The Papacy (Don't! This will result in a game over instantly).
Edit 3:
I actually just found out how to continue playing as the Pope.
Go to the CK2 folder and find "Landed_titles.txt" under Common. Add "holy order = yes" in the brackets under k_papal_state lines. The game will now consider the title a holy order title which doesn't end the game.
You cannot use this method if you are playing an ironman game as the game won't let you start the save.
This is the first game that I've seen the Ilkhanate and the Golden Horde take their historical paths of conquest. I also realized that the mongols are much scarier in a 1066 start than the old gods start, since provinces and technology are less built up, Europe is absolutely screwed. The Golden Horde has ~90k troops with the Tartaria and Carpathia empires, the Ilkhanate has ~60k troops with the Persian and non-africa Arabian empires. The Byzantines and HRE both have about 40k troops but most likely won't come to each others aid, the Muslim Sultanate in West Africa/Southern Spain has ~30k troops, and everyone else has absolutely zero chance against the hordes.
His son and successor, Jarl Sigfrid the Just took over and began to push outward to expand the family's rule. However, less than seven years into his rule, he and his men, on the way to conquer, stopped to stay at an oddly abandoned inn. The sudden explosion on the morning of May 1st, 874 that soon followed immediately put Sigfrid's 4 year old son Dag onto the throne. Dag and his younger brother Toste were surrounded by a hostile court and hostile vassals. Dag found himself in the care of a sinister and conniving Regent who commanded legions of Spys. In the time immediately after his coronation, a priest of the Dead God came into his court and warned Dag that if he did not convert to the One True Faith of Christ, then Dag would be beset by evil and doomed to die. The Spymaster had the priest siezed and imprisoned immediately. It would not due for the boy to worry unnecessarily, he said to his liege.
In truth, the Regent merely wanted to not give Dag warning or reason to be cautious. He isolated the child and then, on the 28th of May, 878, Dag was found killed on an abandoned stretch of road. It was an accident, they said.
Toste learned from the example. The young eyes of the 6 year old newly crowned Jarl saw the sinister smile that crept along his Spymaster's face. He felt the coldness of the man's touch as it lay on his shoulder, as the man swore to guide him as Regent.
Toste lay low. He allowed his Regent to use the massive remaining armies that had brought his grandfather Halfdan to power. They began to conquer the small island to the West, the one named Irland in the old stories. County after county fell. And Toste slowly moved those of his court out. He gave away land after land, as soon as they were conquered, letting them think they were getting the better of him. Slowly he pulled men and women around him who seemed to truly care for the young Petty King. A kindness occurred when, for a brief moment, a gentle and wise man became his Regent...but it did not last long. Suddenly, the sinister Spymaster reasserted his Regency. And plots to either declare Independence or to put a cousin on the throne were whispered openly in his court.
It was a sudden piece of divine chance, a gift from Odin the All-Father, that saved Toste.
The gift took the form of an attempted Usurpation. Suddenly, 6 Counts declared they would decide who would be their ruler. They would put one of their own on the throne and command the soon-to-be-born nation of Irland. They abandoned their rightful ruler. And the hated Spymaster left, confident that without him, the child would lose.
But the rebellion only cleared the court of those who plotted against Toste. With a wisdom beyond his years, he selected a new teacher to teach him. A new Regent was appointed, one that watched over Toste with a wary eye, but it was a true eye, not one filled with lies and derision. And then Toste turned his massive army against his former vassals. His newly appointed Council fell in behind him, giving the child their support, support that had been denied him for years under the old Council. Toste broke the rebellion swiftly.
When the dust settled, Toste brought his former Spymaster and Regent before him. He imprisoned the traitor/murderer. He stripped the man of his titles. He gifted those same titles to a loyal follower. And then, in the cold morning of a Winter's day, he had the man killed in the ancient manner. No swift death for this man, only the pain of a Blood Eagle.
Toste then formed the Kingdom of Irland. Spread over two landmasses, it crouches and waits. For now, the Western Island is all but completely under his rule. The main island is now descending into wars between the Catholic nations as they attempt to find who their Dead God wishes to rule. But Toste knows they work toward a dead end. He has seen the path he must take. He has learned of an old Empire and heard the tales of glory and legends of his religion. And knows he is destined to bring forth an Empire of Odin's Warriors.
And on this day, the 10th of October, 887, King Toste of Irland, turned 16. He is no longer a ward. He is King in his own right. Perhaps he will take a concubine now. But he knows what his first order of Holy business will be. For you see, King Toste has kept a couple of the blessed rebels in his prison for just this season, as well as the priest who prophesied his brother's death 10 years ago. In a month, Toste will host his first Great Blot.
The weekend is also quite busy for me but I decided to give it a go at a higher speed than I am used to. My vassals seems to have picked up on the fact that I did not have full control of my realm and almost immediately tried to force me to lower my crown authority. Seeing how there were several factions working against me I decided to make a stand right there and then, not showing any weakness. The war was won and there was a few years of peace. My kingdom and my three neighbor kingdoms, Germany, France and Italy war also at peace. I took the opportunity to go to Jerusalem and found a deep love for God. The love did not last long, I lost my zeal a few years later and fell in love with my wife instead. All was well in the Kingdom but I didn't feel I had the succession order I wanted for my son so I informed my vassals that this nonsense of gavelkind was a thing of the past. My son would inherit all my titles!
Unfortunately this did not stand well with a lot of my dukes so they rebelled against me trying to install a new king on my throne. The duchess of Flanders decided to take the opportunity and claimed independence. My well equipped retinue and some of my loyal vassals slowly but steadily wore the rebels down. I had it all under control until the King of Germany attacked me. A lot of hard earned gold (lounging around on the throne is hard work, but someone has to do it), was spent on mercenaries to keep the Germanic dogs on their side of the border. Finally all wars was won and again there was peace.
The long war and all the time spent away from my cosy royal bed and loving wife had taken it's toll on my health however, I soon fell ill and never recovered. With my last breath I cursed the King of Germany and asked my son to take vengeance upon him.
Save file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/dlysmrc5it5fxkw/Alsace-Lorraine1039_10_09.ck2
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Also looking forward to reading new updates from this succession game
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