Crusader Kings 2 Thread III: Keeping Up With The Karlings

[Grif]

Hello, shameless plug here! In case anyone still has some faith in me, I'm planning to start a new AAR in CK2, theoretically evolving into a mega-campaign. My earlier EU4 games were well-received if ultimately... unlucky. Check out the thread if you're interested.


On topic though, I think the Intrigue focus has taken things a little too far too. It's far too easy to, say, kidnap Charlemagne as a minor count - with no real penalties - and let him rot in your cells while the realm descends into chaos. I'm not so sure about the technical sides of CK2, but it really needs to account for the target's power and position. Or maybe I just tend to get really lucky, I don't know. From what I hear, Seduction is pretty silly too, or at least was - have these been patched recently?

Supposed to be patched, but still producing a ridiculous amount of children.

[Artanis]

From what I hear, Seduction is pretty silly too, or at least was - have these been patched recently?

It's true that Seduction could (and as Grif indicates, still can) lead to absurd amounts of children. However, I find that in a way, Seduction Focus is even more ridiculous on a female ruler. A female ruler obviously isn't going to have nearly as many children as a male ruler can, but attraction bonuses can get downright stupid when they work on 95% or more of her vassals.

Just one single successful seduction can give her a +15 opinion bonus with virtually every vassal that can (in theory) last up to 29 years even if she switches to a different focus. A few more seductions will bump that up to +30. Add the opinion bonuses that build up with the actual target during the seduction process itself, and a few short years is more than enough for a female ruler to become the most highly-regarded liege in history. As the cherry on top, a female ruler can also guarantee that seductions never, ever result in unwanted bastards because she can start them when already pregnant.

[Anxe]

It's true that Seduction could (and as Grif indicates, still can) lead to absurd amounts of children. However, I find that in a way, Seduction Focus is even more ridiculous on a female ruler. A female ruler obviously isn't going to have nearly as many children as a male ruler can, but attraction bonuses can get downright stupid when they work on 95% or more of her vassals.

Just one single successful seduction can give her a +15 opinion bonus with virtually every vassal that can (in theory) last up to 29 years even if she switches to a different focus. A few more seductions will bump that up to +30. Add the opinion bonuses that build up with the actual target during the seduction process itself, and a few short years is more than enough for a female ruler to become the most highly-regarded liege in history. As the cherry on top, a female ruler can also guarantee that seductions never, ever result in unwanted bastards because she can start them when already pregnant.

Cersei Lannister up in this house!

[Flickerdart]

It's true that Seduction could (and as Grif indicates, still can) lead to absurd amounts of children. However, I find that in a way, Seduction Focus is even more ridiculous on a female ruler. A female ruler obviously isn't going to have nearly as many children as a male ruler can, but attraction bonuses can get downright stupid when they work on 95% or more of her vassals.

Just one single successful seduction can give her a +15 opinion bonus with virtually every vassal that can (in theory) last up to 29 years even if she switches to a different focus. A few more seductions will bump that up to +30. Add the opinion bonuses that build up with the actual target during the seduction process itself, and a few short years is more than enough for a female ruler to become the most highly-regarded liege in history. As the cherry on top, a female ruler can also guarantee that seductions never, ever result in unwanted bastards because she can start them when already pregnant.

So it's a Catherine the Great mechanic, big deal.

[J-H]

I'm up to the 1250s, and my character is the King of Eire, Alba, Bleah Breanach Wales, and Andalusia (I was the only one who showed up for a Crusade). Unfortunately, I've started getting the "Unable to save. Do you have enough file space? Do you have invalid characters in the savegame name?" error. I have plenty of HDD space, and this is an Ironman game (although the game says there's an issue with it so I'm not getting achievements any more) so the name must be OK.

None of the options I found online have worked and I don't have it in me to start another game when I'm almost 200 years into this one and finally doing okay.

[Grif]

Looks like the new patch is live and most of the post-DLC bugs fixed. Those interested in the succession game, shall we begin?

[OrcusMcP]

Sure, let's get this train wreck a rollin'!

[The Great Wyrm]

If a succession game is starting, I'd like to join. I have all DLCs except Sunset Invasion and Horse Lords.

[Flickerdart]

Who's the starting character?

[OrcusMcP]

I don't think we made a final decision on who to play, but I found this summation of options Grif put together, quoted below for simplicity:

Alright, looking through the posts, seems like we have a few popular contenders. I looked some of them up, as well as a few others I thought interesting.

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Ah, yes, the Duke of Axum. Jewish, surrounded by Miaphysite powers, and utterly without friends. Plus the looming Sunni threats from Egypt. Oy vey!


The infamous Sunni Duke of Bolghar. Like our Jewish comrade, he's surrounded on all sides by hostile pagans. The upside is that he's probably much more capable of defending himself.


The Count of Itil. Jewish. Vassal of a Tengri Pecheneng Chief. Probably doomed.


The Idrisid Sultanate. Squirrelled between Umayyads and the Ibadi emir to his east, it is also somewhat isolated. Might get a little boring.


Sammanids. Near the mystical realm of Hindustan. Potentially able to expand East or West.

Some suggestions of my own:

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The King of Georgia. A small kingdom that's bordering the Byzantine Empire, a couple of Muslim emirs and the Tengris to the north. Not quite an easy start, but promises a lot of opportunity.


Duke Ioannes (John) Kommenos. Father of the historical Emperor Alexios Kommenos. Can we guide his son to the throne of the declining Byzantine Empire?


If we're going back to the 867 starts:
I have no idea how to pronounce that duchy name (is it Sweden by any chance?), but ole' Ironsides seems like he's in a fun place to play.


Our local Ibadi Emir. While he doesn't seem to start in a particularly precarious situation, there isn't much room for expansion either.


Ah yes, the Miaphysite Duke of Armenia. Like the Georgian King some centuries later, he also stands isolated in the midst of a powerful Byzantine Empire in one direction, and the fractured, but still lethal Abbasids on the other.


EDIT: Bonus content! I found a Fatimid! Do you feel up to the challenge of recreating the Fatimid blob of 1066?


EDIT2: Another bonus content. A large Jewish khanate just to the north of the Caucasus. Seems like he start in a pretty comfortable position.

[Grif]

Voting anew then? Putting my vote for 867 Fatimid, with the goal of converting to Shia somewhere along the way.

[mythmonster2]

I personally vote for Axum.

[OrcusMcP]

I too vote 867 Fatimid.

[Flickerdart]

I vote 1066 Bolghars.

[Grif]

I'm loathe to decide a game on so few votes, but it has been quite a while. I'm going to put up the thread within the day, starting with 867 Fatimid if no one else changes their mind/put in new votes.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

Historical Improvement Project launched its full Horse Lords compatible version, complete with Eastern Expansion SomeWhat More Historical Map mod. Yay Rajasthan! My current game as the Gaznavids may be cut short due to Seljuq hordes. I may have to join them to avoid being crushed while I convert India.

[Corvus]

Started up a game from the Charlie era, just doing a bit of experimenting while planning on where to start for a new game that I want to try a lets play for. Got about 10.5 years in and the world had gotten very strange. The caliphate had pretty much imploded from victorious independence wars. leading to an independent Egypt, a Zoroastrian nation and loosing large parts of the east, and is currently loosing a war to a Shia uprising down near Egypt. Francia did its split and then very rapidly merged again when King Karl died of natural causes at age 20. And then West Francia went on to conquer half of Bavaria and take over all of Italy. Currently the Byzantiums and Franks are battling it out in southern Italy.

I had been planning on starting a game proper but I wonder if I should keep going a little longer and see how this plays out...

[Eldan]

Have started playing again, it's going rather well. The year is 954. All hail Emperor Hrörekr II the Holy of Gardariki, King of Kings!

specifically, the kings of Volga Bulgaria, Perm, Gardariki and Lithuania. He's young, so with some luck, he'll also be King of Könugardr.

[mythmonster2]

For the record, the succession game has started and can be found here.

[Grytorm]

Why is there a Chinese Duke in Great Morovia? I don't understand. And he has a huge family, all Peking.

Also I started a game as a pagan right on the boarder of Christianity, what are the chances I can convert before someone tries to conquer me?

[Flickerdart]

Why is there a Chinese Duke in Great Morovia? I don't understand. And he has a huge family, all Peking.

Also I started a game as a pagan right on the boarder of Christianity, what are the chances I can convert before someone tries to conquer me?

Chinese Duke? Is Chinese even a culture in CKII?

If you want to convert to Christianity, you can accept a missionary when they send one (which is constantly) or convert in response to a declaration of holy war against you. If you want to convert to something else, you're probably screwed.

[Grytorm]

My mistake. They are of Pecheneg culture. Which is located fairly far away from china. I had assumed they were Chinese because they looked out of place, the similarity of Pecheneg to Peking and I thought there would be a Chinese Culture mainly from random events. Although there is still the question: What are they doing in Europe?

Good to know it will be easy to convert, I just hope I can last until my son comes of age and can marry a chieffess.

[Flickerdart]

My mistake. They are of Pecheneg culture. Which is located fairly far away from china. I had assumed they were Chinese because they looked out of place, the similarity of Pecheneg to Peking and I thought there would be a Chinese Culture mainly from random events. Although there is still the question: What are they doing in Europe?

Same thing the Magyars are - the Pechenegs were steppe nomads, and a bunch of them decided to settle. The King of Great Moravia starts in a pretty unenviable position - half or more of his lands and vassals are pagans!

[Grytorm]

Oh they are good Catholics. Except for the Pecheneg band. Who are Orthodox.

Now the reason I am posting is I have a five year old count in my court. He is my vassal. How can I force him into a betrothal with my five year old daughter? Or can I not do it. Right now I can start a betrothal from his end but it doesn't let me choose my daughter, I could let him out. But then I'm not certain if I could convince his regent to take a matrilineal marriage.

[Squark]

A few questions on playing as a Muslim in CK2, since I want to try a test run before throwing my hat into the ring in the succession game

1) Marriage. Are marriage alliances still a thing? How bad is the prestige penalty for having fewer than four wives? Oh, and with Way of Life, how important is Chaste in a spouse?
2) What's a good start location for learning?
3) I assume the shia/sunni divide is a big deal like it was historically, correct?
4) Anything else I need to know?

[OrcusMcP]

A few questions on playing as a Muslim in CK2, since I want to try a test run before throwing my hat into the ring in the succession game

1) Marriage. Are marriage alliances still a thing? How bad is the prestige penalty for having fewer than four wives? Oh, and with Way of Life, how important is Chaste in a spouse?
2) What's a good start location for learning?
3) I assume the shia/sunni divide is a big deal like it was historically, correct?
4) Anything else I need to know?

1) Marriage alliances are still a thing, but they are not as strict. Prestige penalty hurts a lot if you're small, but is not as big a deal when you're big. Piety is the important thing for Muslims. When you have multiple wives, one of them having chaste doesn't really matter.
2) Mali in 1066 is often considered Muslim Ireland, one of the Iberian emirates are a good way to see how to deal with Catholics.
3) Yup. It is indeed a big deal, but the Christian/Muslim divide is wider in CK2.
4) Piety. Piety piety piety. Get lots and then get more.

[J-H]

I want to like this game, but even with the graphics settings mostly turned off and India disabled, it's still really slow (max speed is ~1.5 days per second)... and it randomly autosave crashes... and all the other countries get retinues (extra instant army power) but I don't because I haven't paid to win for a DLC.

Any suggestions to improve speed (most important)?

[Flickerdart]

I want to like this game, but even with the graphics settings mostly turned off and India disabled, it's still really slow (max speed is ~1.5 days per second)... and it randomly autosave crashes... and all the other countries get retinues (extra instant army power) but I don't because I haven't paid to win for a DLC.

Any suggestions to improve speed (most important)?

There are mods to turn off terrain and water textures and 3D graphics, to help performance.

Retinues aren't pay-to-win - unless you have a high-tech monster realm there's not that many soldiers in a retinue, and if you do have a high tech monster realm, you have more than enough guys from your vassals. The timespan in which a retinue actually makes a difference is fairly small.

[Sallera]

The AI doesn't use their retinues effectively anyway. Only a player can really take advantage of them.

On the performance front, look up how to remove water and fog of war effects (there's a dll to rename). It won't fix things, but it'll help some.

[J-H]

Water, rivers, and fog are off. There's a mod that reduces terrain textures, but it's not up-to-date with the current patch.

Retinues are the only explanation I can come up with for rebelling vassals always being able to pop up with more armies than an entire nation (demense = in size to vassal, plus levies). An extra 400-800 troops is a big deal in the first 50 years.