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This runaway success is compounded on the rare occasion when a feudal dynast is elected to a town (which happens invisibly and really isn't supposed to happen at all unless the player initiates). If the town is his first and primary title, all the feudal lands he inherits are assimilated into the republic, with successors generated randomly rather than inheriting or being appointed

This is what happed to me. The 1st county I attacked was run by a lord mayor, & I ended up giving-it to my successor and was still too confused about succession laws to be able to sort it out.

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Actually, Genoa and Venice just own areas pretty close to their capitals. They're a bit bigger than some of the Italian states (the country is totally fragmented), but not huge.

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Actually, Genoa and Venice just own areas pretty close to their capitals. They're a bit bigger than some of the Italian states (the country is totally fragmented), but not huge.

Well, I guarantee that there will be a tipping point eventually, because of how taxes work with different holdings. Duke-level republics take a percentage from count-level republic revenue, which takes a percentage of baron-level town and church revenue, meaning that they grow faster and more efficiently than their feudal counterparts, which usually only raise taxes from holdings in their own demesne. Again, an argument for vassal mayors, I guess.

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Well, I guarantee that there will be a tipping point eventually, because of how taxes work with different holdings. Duke-level republics take a percentage from count-level republic revenue, which takes a percentage of baron-level town and church revenue, meaning that they grow faster and more efficiently than their feudal counterparts, which usually only raise taxes from holdings in their own demesne. Again, an argument for vassal mayors, I guess.

The issue with vassal Mayors is that you get an opinion malus for different government type, don't you? I actually specifically switched the holder of one of my vassal counties from a Lord Mayor to an Earl at one point to avoid the pretty serious opinion penalty. I think it was a good -30 or something.

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The issue with vassal Mayors is that you get an opinion malus for different government type, don't you? I actually specifically switched the holder of one of my vassal counties from a Lord Mayor to an Earl at one point to avoid the pretty serious opinion penalty. I think it was a good -30 or something.

Yeah, it's -30 in vanilla, but it's allegedly outweighed by the maluses that mayors never get. They never get ambitious (-50), resent increased crown laws (-30), or desire the kingdom they form part of (-20). They also never inherit each other or start wars over dynastic claims. So yeah, the -30 is a bit of a hump, but it's a much more stable realm once you surmount it.

Anyway, I broke down and started the CK2+ Saxony game I'd been talking about, rather than make progress on the Bisson book I need read by the end of the week. Historically, the Billung dynasty of Saxony went extinct at the beginning of the twelfth century, with its two surviving daughters marrying into the infamous Welf dukes of Bavaria and the counts of Anhalt. I'm trying to do one better, but it's not easy.

Here is the state of the world circa 1100 AD. William of Normandy died during his bid to take England, Burgundy broke away from the Holy Roman Empire during a revolt against Henry IV Salian, and the Komnenoi sat on the throne in Constantinople for not even a generation before civil war broke out again.

world-1100.jpg

In the north of Germany, the most powerful supporter of the now-humbled Salian emperors consolidates his power while their weakling Zähringer successor feathers his nest with pitiful raids along the Pommeranian coast.

germany-1100.png

Let me tell you, it's been a wild ride, becoming king of Saxony

saxony-1100.png

From the start date, I had to hurriedly attack Meissen to keep them from claiming my one and only ducal title of Saxony. Marriage alliances forged by joining my sisters to Bohemia and Lower Lorraine, as well as my brother to Matilda of Tuscany, gave me the upper hand there. The ransoms I earned during that brief conflict included two counts, which gave me enough money to create another ducal title, Gelre to the west. I immediately attacked my ally Lower Lorraine, which had all its forces tied up besieging some rebellious vassal.

High off those victories, I tried to foment a plot to revoke the county of Braunschweig from my vassal, the count of Friesland, but it failed like that kind of plot always does. Fortunately, three other counts rebelled along with him. Despite my callous backstab, Lower Lorraine still liked me enough to lend help quashing the revolt of half my realm. Once the offenders were in jail, I banished them all and took possession of their lands and money. The Holy Roman Empire was still hurting from the revolts in Burgundy and Italy, which my nephew had taken part in as the new duke of Tuscany, and hadn't raised its crown laws beyond "autonomous vassals", which meant that I couldn't revoke titles normally. Instead I got a whopping 60 tyranny, which in CK2+ is a permanent trait on a scale from 0-100 that gives you reduced revenues and troop morale as well as huge opinion hits.

saxony-1082.png

It was worth it. Even after the death of Ordulf, my starting character, in battle, his son Magnus had enough money to pay off the rest of his disgruntled vassals and still be within spitting distance of creating the titular kingship of Saxony, which is available in CK2+ to any duke holding at least two titles with a capital in Brunswick or Saxony. I even managed to weather my choice of the wrong side in a massive civil war that broke out in 1082, when Emperor Henry IV was excommunicated for being too fat and horny. I figured that staying loyal would net some of the traitors' titles and cash, but then only Bavaria and Brandenburg stuck it out with Saxony, so you can see our lands being ravaged by Holland and Lower Lorraine above.

Once Henry IV met his death in battle and his infant son by an assassin's blade soon after, the imperial title devolved to a cadet branch of the Zähringen dynasty in Verona. I'd hoped to have the newly crowned Magnus I Billung of Saxony get elected to the throne before he died, but the wave of imprisonments and executions that followed his coronation has left him enormously unpopular with the other German princes. The few that remain of his own vassals still love him only because they all received dukedoms bought by the despoiling of their peers. Magnus only has a few years left in him, but I plan to bring Brandenburg and Thuringia under the control of his successor.

magnus_billung-1100.png

Or not. Oh, that's right. The other German princes also probably hate Magnus because he had five girls and no boys. When he turned forty-five, I panicked, imprisoned his Hungarian wife, and executed her in order to marry some lustful hedonist Breton girl. She produced exactly zero children, but I managed to get the law changed to agnatic-cognatic anyway, so crisis averted. If his Italian cousins in Tuscany had inherited, I'd lose out to revolts either there or in the north, and I couldn't risk the kingdom coming apart after just one generation. The infamy of four banishments (20 tyranny each), one unlawful imprisonment (10 tyranny), and one execution (5 tyranny, oddly enough) weighed heavy on Magnus' mind, causing him to suffer from some mild episodes of dementia. The game tells me he talks to angels, which seems incongruous with a piety of 0.9.

Anyway, his first daughter will inherit now. She's married matrilineally to the son of some German baron that I made duke of Saxony and has one daughter, which could prove problematic, seeing as her husband has decided on celibacy. My plans for expansion to the west and south might have to wait, but that's okay. I've never played a game as a good vassal and I'm looking forward to it, a little.

I'll keep you guys posted if I play any more. I'll probably be less text-heavy when I do, too.

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The infamy of four banishments (20 tyranny each), one unlawful imprisonment (10 tyranny), and one execution (5 tyranny, oddly enough) weighed heavy on Magnus' mind, causing him to suffer from some mild episodes of dementia. The game tells me he talks to angels, which seems incongruous with a piety of 0.9.

He probably just doesn't have much good to say to them, something along the lines of "Tell god to send me a son or I'm converting to Islam". Similarly The Duchess despite her inclination to have some knifed just for looking at her has 830 piety, I think her god must most definitely be the old school smiting kind.

Also I'm wondering is there a way of seeing how much Tyranny you have accumulated in total for a character? because I'd sure like to know if The Duchess got away with her evil deeds and general usurping relatively unnoticed.

Anyway central Europe sure does seem to be a bit crowded compared to the provincial peace and quite of rural Ireland (which was admittedly occasionally broken by a brief scream as The Duchess notched up another kill). It looks like a very different dynamic to deal with. I think when my Irish dynasty has run it's course I'd like to try one of the BIG empires like Russia, the Holy Romans or perhaps if I am feeling brave one of the Islamic countries. Most of my game so far has been about trying to create a kingdom so it would be interesting to be on the defensive a bit more.

Btw what sort of scale are wars with big empires? atm just having 1000 troops in the field feels like a massive force to me, what sort of number do you start seeing when entire fully grown empires are duking it out.

I could do with a little advice again I think, as things are looking tough for my Irish feudalists. My normal methods of diplomacy wont work with the fledgling Republic of Meath, and militarily they are stronger than me, even killing the Doge isn't going to help (note: not that this is going to stop me trying).

So what to do? I'm thinking of hiring some mercs but the problem is that even if i do that Meath will just respond by hiring a few of their own, and I can't expand northwards unless I want the wrath of the whole of scotland on me.

The way i see it i have 2 options:

1. Save up enough cash to hire even more mercs! the problem then is being able to maintain them, although if i use them as my frontline troops their casualties will hopefully soon reduced that.

2. Make a grab for South Wales. Meath controls north and mid Wales in addition to most of Ireland, I may not be strong enough to take him on head 1st. However taking south Wales would give me a 2nd front with which to push when the time is right and give my English relatives time to get back from their foreign wars.

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When a Crusade on France happened in my game, armies of about 20,000 were duking it out (pun not intended).

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When a Crusade on France happened in my game, armies of about 20,000 were duking it out (pun not intended).

Wow 20K is pretty epic, reminds me of a Civ 4 stack of doom :D

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The Breton chick popped out two sons when Magnus was just past sixty, which is suspicious, but beggars can't be choosers. I picked up Brandenburg to the west, Meissen to the southwest, and Thuringia to the south during the latest civil war, then had to endure a fifteen-year regency when Magnus died from wounds received in battle. His son Ernst is first in line for the imperial crown, which worries me because the Empire is in a terrible position right now, fighting four simultaneous wars of excommunication, and I'm not sure the kingdom of Saxony will benefit from one of its own on the throne right now. Twelfth-century problems, I guess.

Also I'm wondering is there a way of seeing how much Tyranny you have accumulated in total for a character? because I'd sure like to know if The Duchess got away with her evil deeds and general usurping relatively unnoticed.

In vanilla, tyranny (for unlawful punitive acts) and dishonor (for failed plots and assassinations) are represented as opinion penalties, so if you just mouse over any vassal's opinion of you, you can read it there.

Anyway central Europe sure does seem to be a bit crowded compared to the provincial peace and quite of rural Ireland (which was admittedly occasionally broken by a brief scream as The Duchess notched up another kill). It looks like a very different dynamic to deal with. I think when my Irish dynasty has run it's course I'd like to try one of the BIG empires like Russia, the Holy Romans or perhaps if I am feeling brave one of the Islamic countries. Most of my game so far has been about trying to create a kingdom so it would be interesting to be on the defensive a bit more.

I played as one of the Rurikovich dukes for a lark once. It's a nightmare, everyone's at war with everyone because they're all related and have claims on each other. Poland is pretty fun, though. You've got seniority succession and two of your brothers as dukes waiting in the wings.

Btw what sort of scale are wars with big empires? atm just having 1000 troops in the field feels like a massive force to me, what sort of number do you start seeing when entire fully grown empires are duking it out.

If you open a ruler's profile and then click on the rightmost of the three buttons in the upper right, you open the realm tree browser. Once there, you can mouse over a percentage that will tell you the theoretical and actual amounts of troops able to be fielded. Like brkl said, the five big powers (France, the Holy Roman Empire, Byzantium, the Fatimids, and the Seljuks) can all field around 25,000-30,000 men at the beginning. Of course, that number is elastic, since your vassals will give you less troops if they hate you and more if they like you.

I could do with a little advice again I think, as things are looking tough for my Irish feudalists. My normal methods of diplomacy wont work with the fledgling Republic of Meath, and militarily they are stronger than me, even killing the Doge isn't going to help (note: not that this is going to stop me trying).

So what to do? I'm thinking of hiring some mercs but the problem is that even if i do that Meath will just respond by hiring a few of their own, and I can't expand northwards unless I want the wrath of the whole of scotland on me.

The way i see it i have 2 options:

1. Save up enough cash to hire even more mercs! the problem then is being able to maintain them, although if i use them as my frontline troops their casualties will hopefully soon reduced that.

2. Make a grab for South Wales. Meath controls north and mid Wales in addition to most of Ireland, I may not be strong enough to take him on head 1st. However taking south Wales would give me a 2nd front with which to push when the time is right and give my English relatives time to get back from their foreign wars.

In my opinion, Meath is only going to get more powerful. You need to nip this in the bud, since you can't count on a civil war to do it for you. There are a few ways of going about this. You say you have a lot of piety. Can you excommunicate the doge of Meath? It'll make all his vassals hate him and prompt other powers to depose him, which will give you a chance to attack. Barring that, you could try to start a civil war by excommunicating as many of Meath's vassals as possible. The doge will probably try to imprison them, so worst-case scenario is that he has a bunch of vassals sitting in jail and giving him the minimum possible troops.

As for mercs, I advise to save up and get a nice army. If you win a lot of battles, chances are you'll capture a lot of bishops, mayors, and barons, all of whom can be ransomed to pay for upkeep. If it doesn't feel too gamey to you, you can hire the mercs, park them on Meath's capital, and then declare war, since mercs don't count as raised troops. As long as you defeat their main army with the first clash, you have a month or so of free reign before the levies replenish. You can even dismiss the mercs after your initial victory, if money gets tight.

Also, marry your sons and daughters to important people. If you can drag Brittany, Scotland, or even England into the war, they'll win it for you.

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Wow 20K is pretty epic, reminds me of a Civ 4 stack of doom :D

While they're rarely in a single stack, late game armies get upwards of 150K. They're not usually together because of attrition.

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So few games where your mother suddenly dies of depression -- and it's systemic, not embedded narrative.

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I'm probably going to have to reneg on the promise of more Saxon diaries, mostly because of an idiosyncrasy in the game's title system. Apparently, upon gaining a higher title, like that of emperor, all vassals not already under their de jure liege default their loyalty to the new title. What that means for me is that, if I get elected emperor, all the dukes I spent years wooing to the titular crown of Saxony become vassals of the Holy Roman Emperor again and are lost to me if my son doesn't inherit the whole kit-and-kaboodle. This has led to a somewhat hilarious and certainly gamey policy of being a raging asshole for no reason other than to keep me from getting elected against my will (yet never so much of a raging asshole as to cause rebellion among my dukes, since they're already touchy about being non-de jure vassals of a titular king).

There's really nothing to report anyway, even though I've made it to 1171. The kingdom of Saxony now holds the entire northern half of Germany and I get to hand-pick each new emperor, since most of my vassals follow my lead. The biggest slip-up so far was marrying Magnus' great-grandson to his niece in a moment of distraction, but fortunately all their offspring died as inbred freaks. Fortunately? This game can be pretty fucked up sometimes.

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The biggest slip-up so far was marrying Magnus' great-grandson to his niece in a moment of distraction, but fortunately all their offspring died as inbred freaks.

Sentences like that are what make me want to learn this game better. I feel like I'd need to understand it more and be more comfortable with it in order to notice and be able to appreciate the little side stories like that.

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I had problems with one king because I had become a Kinslayer, but couldn't remember who I killed. Possibly the dude killed someone before he became king. Now my king died an old man after acquiring the Kingdoms of Brittany, Ireland and Norway in a few years (in addition to Scotland and Denmark), but not having time to consolidate. This could turn ugly.

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So my king dies again, now I'm an 8-year-old Mongol boy in charge of the Khanates of abovementioned countries. My diplomacy is really bad for the first time, which is making things difficult. Five of my vassals rebelled almost simultaneously, which I've been able to deal with surprisingly well. Now I accidentally converted to Orthodox Christianity, which can't be good.

EDIT:

Hahah, yeah, that didn't go well. I lost most of Scotland & Ireland and all of Britain. I'm still making all of the money. Maybe I'll go for Scandinavia and let them be. I've only got like 100 years left anyway.

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So my king dies again, now I'm an 8-year-old Mongol boy in charge of the Khanates of abovementioned countries... Now I accidentally converted to Orthodox Christianity, which can't be good.

Christ, man. Educate your own kids, keep them free of unsavory foreign influences.

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I have an i5 (almost two years old) with an ATI HD Radeon 5650. Running it on a 23" monitor connected to my laptop HDMI. It runs fine on 1920x1080, only really lagging when it's on super-fast and there's a lot happening (which I only found out about because I was more or less done but wanted to get to "the end") and on Jan 1st of every year when it saves. Doesn't seem taxing at all. My system isn't bad but I'm sure it's one of the more modest around here.

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When a Crusade on France happened in my game, armies of about 20,000 were duking it out (pun not intended).

In the game I just completed, the Islamic nations/empires were bringing armies that size on a regular basis. I did successfully claim Sicily as part of a Crusade, but otherwise I found them very tough to deal with, completely overmatching me and my allies.

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Christ, man. Educate your own kids, keep them free of unsavory foreign influences.

That was his grandmother, I think :P It's okay now, though. There was a spurt of kings dying very young, which ended up with me in Denmark with none of my old claims. Denmark is rich, though, and due to inheritance dealies I'm also the accidental King of Georgia. I expect I'll lose Georgia eventually. I've turned Denmark totally Orthodox, though, so no more problems from that little mistake! Also, my Queen turned Danish and everybody just loves me. I've got about 50 years left and I'm hoping to grab the three lower counties in the Duchy of Holstein from the Holy Roman Empire, but that's not easy. I'm hoping for some rebels to grab them so I can steal them. I might start expanding north, but I'm allied with Sweden and they have grown back from being a one duchy state. I'll finish the game today and post the world map at the end.

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Man, playing this with the Koyaanisqatsi soundtrack playing just puts me into a trance.

There's this weird mechanic in the game where it's possible that you wage war against a small state while a another empire is waging holy war against it. Your armies are not hostile. Then, if the other state wins its holy war, it suddenly inherits your war from the small state. Now, if this sort of situation happened in real life, I don't see why I could not have backed out from the war using diplomacy, but in the game I'm stuck in war with England, who is not going to accept even a white surrender. Which is when I decide to just choose a save before the original war.

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There's this weird mechanic in the game where it's possible that you wage war against a small state while a another empire is waging holy war against it. Your armies are not hostile. Then, if the other state wins its holy war, it suddenly inherits your war from the small state. Now, if this sort of situation happened in real life, I don't see why I could not have backed out from the war using diplomacy, but in the game I'm stuck in war with England, who is not going to accept even a white surrender. Which is when I decide to just choose a save before the original war.

They tweaked this around 1.03 or so, because there were too many exploits that could be achieved by ganking a small power currently getting steamrolled by another war. It's not very authentic, I know.

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Man, playing this with the Koyaanisqatsi soundtrack playing just puts me into a trance.

Just got back to CK2 after having a Football Manager relapse (due to reading a football book and it being in the steam sale) with a soundtrack of Kronos Quartet playing Philip Glass. Not that the CK music is bad at all but I think there's definitely something about Glass's stuff which lends it well to any situation where tension's are gently building.

I really should get around to listening to a bit more classical music tbh, I quite enjoy it I just haven't ever made the effort to acquire any recordings of it, and it would be a great match for a lot of the game I play. Anyone got any recommendations?

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Just got back to CK2 after having a Football Manager relapse (due to reading a football book and it being in the steam sale) with a soundtrack of Kronos Quartet playing Philip Glass. Not that the CK music is bad at all but I think there's definitely something about Glass's stuff which lends it well to any situation where tension's are gently building.

I really should get around to listening to a bit more classical music tbh, I quite enjoy it I just haven't ever made the effort to acquire any recordings of it, and it would be a great match for a lot of the game I play. Anyone got any recommendations?

I occasionally listen to Thomas Tallis or Michael Praetorius while playing Crusader Kings 2, which works better than the Hollywood-style medieval music Paradox produced, if only because it's more authentic. Philip Glass sounds great, but I'm not acquainted with modern classical music enough to recommend beyond that. When my friend and I used to duke it out on the original Unreal Tournament, he'd listen to DJ Tiesto and I'd listen to Bach's Brandenburg Concertos. Both have similar focusing effects, it seems.

It's really funny how the right music can change the entire experience of an otherwise familiar game, actually. I've never had a more intense and fulfilling game of Civ IV than when I replaced the soundtrack with my Godspeed! You Black Emperor discography. I had a stress headache for days.

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They tweaked this around 1.03 or so, because there were too many exploits that could be achieved by ganking a small power currently getting steamrolled by another war. It's not very authentic, I know.

You call it an exploit, I call it strategy! :P

Lately I've been listening to a lot of Erik Satie, but I don't know much about classical music. Spotify is terrific for it, though.

EDIT: Man, the Kaiser is throwing 55,000 troops at bleeding Connacht (not mine). I should play nice.

EDIT: Accidentally conquered the Byzantine Empire.

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Ended up losing all of my previous titles because my king died in battle before I had the chance to assassinate his grandson. Now the inheritance was split between his son, who I'd been raising as a proper king, and his grandson (the other guy's nephew). I end up with the nephew and a crippled Byzantine Empire instead of wealthy, glorious Denmark :P I managed pull BE together quite a bit with the help of some Kinslaying, but then time ran out.

Here's my guy at the end: http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/541808684886824407/D13D2AC78B230FB18E11C0FCA7A200A5CF4D4C7F/

Here's house Dunkeld at the start of the game: http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/541808684886836800/C82234D0948BDDFCF3CA35DA2503D6FFEF1FA32A/

And the end: http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/541808684886830585/627E6B31AC47DCEEC11EB47BE0F7E5794CA34859/

Not too bad.

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