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Apparently I'm a dick. I remember now, it's already in the new beta patch. Dewar, if you update to that, there's a good chance your save will transfer over and then you can use the converter.

 

 

Looks like that patch went live today.

 

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?786431-Crusader-Kings-II-2.1.5-PATCH-RELEASED-Checksum-EQEG-NOT-for-problem-reports!

 

Lots of good stuff in there. Ironman only saving every 6 months is really nice, since it was taking longer to save than to play a month at some points during my current campaign.

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Looks like that patch went live today.

 

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?786431-Crusader-Kings-II-2.1.5-PATCH-RELEASED-Checksum-EQEG-NOT-for-problem-reports!

 

Lots of good stuff in there. Ironman only saving every 6 months is really nice, since it was taking longer to save than to play a month at some points during my current campaign.

 

That really pleases me to read. It's been way too long that I've seen Paradox roll out a straight bugfix patch for any of their products, not without also rolling out some more features that could break even more.

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Conversion went well, but I then realized that the complete lack of religeous and cultural unity in India would make it a nightmare to play in EU4, so I decided to go back to CK2 to finish off the last 50 years and try to bring things under control. Besides the obvious step of using your religion counselor to try and convert counties (which seems to work so-so at best) is there anything else I can do in CK2 to help get things a little more unified, especially culturally?

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Conversion went well, but I then realized that the complete lack of religeous and cultural unity in India would make it a nightmare to play in EU4, so I decided to go back to CK2 to finish off the last 50 years and try to bring things under control. Besides the obvious step of using your religion counselor to try and convert counties (which seems to work so-so at best) is there anything else I can do in CK2 to help get things a little more unified, especially culturally?

 

There's a little you can do, but probably nothing that will make an appreciable difference. For religion, make sure your religion has a high religious authority, usually by control of all the holy sites, and the others have a low, by complete extermination if possible. Make sure there are as many tiers of ruler possible over an unconverted area, because count, duke, king, and emperor will all use their court chaplain to convert. It'll be hard, but doable.

 

Culture conversion, you're more or less hosed because there's no active mechanic and the MTTH is fifty years. Question though, doesn't the empire of India translate into Hindustan when ported to EU4? If not, can you form it immediately? Hindustan is a cultural union and all Indo-Aryan and Dravidian cultures count as "accepted" under it.

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No, it transfers over to India. The option to form it is available, and I have all of the counties necessary to do it, but I didn't meet a couple of the other requirements. I'll keep that in mind and see if I can swing it shortly after converting over. India does have some accepted cultures on its own though, just not enough to cover the wide range of cultures that I conquered during the last 30 year land rush.

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Note to self: having played many times as every non-English kingdom in the British Isles, please learn someday that England can never just be "taken care of" in one or two wars.

 

Whichever country you are of Ireland/Scotland/Wales, just take over the other 2 first and try save some money for mercenaries and you can kinda crush them if you attack when England's already at war elsewhere.

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Whichever country you are of Ireland/Scotland/Wales, just take over the other 2 first and try save some money for mercenaries and you can kinda crush them if you attack when England's already at war elsewhere.

 

Well, the issue was that I'd already crushed England. I'd revolted and taken a third of the kingdom with me, then helped a few more revolts that broke up their hold on the north and busted their crown authority to nothing. And then, a generation later, they had everything back together and were menacing me again. Nothing I couldn't beat, but jeez. An England that beats back William is a monster, thanks to elective succession and cultural unity, and I just need to remember to aid every revolt I can.

 

Of course, that's all moot because the 2.1.6 hotfix broke my ironman cloud save, even though it'd survived the big 2.1.5 update. Is anyone else finding that crashes and compatibility errors are more common with cloud and ironman? It certainly seems like it to me.

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I gave up on the cloud because it took so long to save and the saves happened once a month. I haven't had any issues with local ironman.

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I gave up on the cloud because it took so long to save and the saves happened once a month. I haven't had any issues with local ironman.

 

 

is local ironman an option? I've clearly been doing it wrong, as oh my, was the cloud based saving sucking all the fun out my last game. Really slowed the whole thing down

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Yup, I've been running it since Rajas came out. Regardless, the save is only every 6 months now, so that's managable.

 

In other news, religious authority sucks. I've got all five of my holy sites, so my default authority is 70. I had it up as far as 95 due to temple building and leader converting, but those are temporary modifiers. Now that I've converted everyone and built all the temples, my authority is slowly decreasing as those modifiers go away. At this point there isn't much I can do besides hope I guess.

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A Steam friend of mine posted this amazing screenshot.

 

RogerAMuirbe.jpg

 

This fucking game.

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A Steam friend of mine posted this amazing screenshot.

 

RogerAMuirbe.jpg

 

This fucking game.

 

 

any idea if it's the same Roger, or two brothers/cousins both called Roger?

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The confusion of the caption seemed to imply that it was the same person, but perhaps you're right. The portraits appear to be of two different people. That's disappointing!

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The confusion of the caption seemed to imply that it was the same person, but perhaps you're right. The portraits appear to be of two different people. That's disappointing!

The big portrait is usually your spymaster, so he could be plotting to kill himself (although it's likely there's another Robert he's gunning for.) In this case, though, my spymaster totally wanted me to help him commit suicide.

lOt9dU2l.jpg

 

 

I've been playing a Welsh republic (I did some cheatyness to set it up, and to make sure my vassals are all mayors more easily) and once you get to a certain point, money is never an issue.

 

qgEIvCw.png

 

This is on top of the 30,000 gold that's just sitting in my treasury. At a certain point I started getting more money than I knew how to spend. Every holding in my demense is fully upgraded, or on the way to it, every province has been maxed out (with cities, of course) and the only way I can go into the red now is to hire all my boats and then truck my entire retinue down to Jerusalem for some holy warring. I could hire mercs to burn more money, but I don't need to because I have enough retinues (full of archers only) that I can stomp on every other christian power at the same time and still come out ahead. The only things stopping me from becoming insanely powerful are truces (which can be solved with stabbings, and I can afford a LOT of those) and claims. The latter is less of an issue because all the rejects with claims are sent to the Knights Templar, and I can just give one of them land, press their claim, and bam, instant vassal duke.

 

It took me until 1200 to become an empire only because the kings of england would only ever have one son, or they'd die and Aquitaine would inherit and I'd have to wait for the truce with them to end for my campaign in the north to continue (via a pressed claim for the english throne) I ended up forming Francia despite holding Ireland and Scotland for so long that duchies were starting to drift into the kingdom of Wales.

 

I love this game.

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OK, so it took forever, but I finally, finally managed to finish my first game of Crusader Kings II and it was great (most of it anyway). From the 1066 Duke of Munster start, I managed to expand into this, being a sextuple emperor and trigintuple king at the end:

flQHN3G.png

And that's not even counting the minor thrones held by other members of my dynasty.

While I did enjoy most of it very much, I also felt that it went far too well for it being my first full game. When I started, I thought the 100,000 points highscore of House Capet would be a longterm goal to beat, but I ended up with far more than twice as much in the end. Was I just lucky? Is the Munster start so powerful? Wasn't I role-playing enough? Is the default difficulty level considered to be on the easy side?

Over the course of the game, I don't think I ever lost or had to white-peace any war ever, even though I was almost constantly at war after a certain point (for which there didn't seem to be a much of a drawback). There were two or three close calls, but the AI always failed to press its advantage instead allowing me time to regroup and ultimately enforce my demands. Nor was I (or my heir) ever assassinated (as far as I know).

I grabbed more and more land, but nobody seemed to feel threatened by it or even care. The game didn't push back at all and snowballing was in full effect and soon no power within or outside my realm was challenging me anymore, but I kept on conquering just for the sake of it and because I could, which is also the point at which my fun started to decline as most of my time was spent either pushing huge, indefeatible retinue army stacks around (always having to pay attention that they didn't get eaten up by attrition too much) or putting down incessant and annoying, but ultimately pointless, peasant revolts. It was exhausting and not as enjoyable as the early game. Still, this being my first game and all, I was interested in seeing how far I could expand, even though I knew that a world conquest was probably out.

However, now I'm not sure if I have another game in me. It's probably due to a combination of my inexperience, suboptimal message settings, a compulsion to micro-manage everything and warmongering way too much, but I think I must have spent almost 100 hours of that one campaign alone. Is that normal? I'm not sure if I could muster the motivation to finish another game of the length (nor am I the type of personality who can abandon and start a new game when my previous one is still unfinished).

So, I'm not sure what to do now. If I were to play another game what would be the most different from the Ireland start? Restoring the Roman Empire starting as a lowly count somewhere in the Byzantine Empire maybe? Currently, I only have the Sword of Islam and Legacy of Rome DLCs. Should I absolutely get any of the others for my second game? Are any of the achievements particularly interesting or challenging (in a non-annoying way)?

Also, how do they higher difficulty levels work? Do they make the AI smarter or do they just hand them bonus troops and a tendency to gang up on the player? I.e. are they more challenging or just more annoying? Similarly, I feel like a huge part of my ability to almost endlessly expand in this game were my retinues. Would disabling them by disabling Legacy of Rome make the game more interesting or also just more annoying?

What are ways to speed up the game? Is there a way to play on the smaller, pre-expansion map, for example?

Finally, is there any game (or a mod) that is like Crusader Kings, but plays in a fifth or a tenth of the time? Is anybody trying to make one?

Sorry if this is all sounding a bit negative, mainly coloured by the last quarter of the game which I didn't enjoy as much. I did very much enjoy the way to becoming Emperor and then facing off against the other existing empires. It's just that once they were soundly beaten, it very much became smooth sailing and just painting the map my colour for the last century and a half.
 

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That is a very abnormal game, especially for a first time. can you give a basic timeline of how you build that empire? Are you saying you held six empire titles? because the ethnicity requirements should prevent that, unless you game the system on purpose.

 

I'm surprised you didn't face large scale independence revolts based on how much territory with different religions and cultures you have. Or from family members attempting to grab power.

 

There is no war-monger penalty in CKII because warmongering was very common.

 

I usually don't spend 100 hours on a single game, partially because I rarely play games to the end date. Usually I accomplish the goals I set for that game and go play a different scenario. 

 

I find starting as a count on the borderlands between cultures and religions to be entertaining and difficult. or trying to build up Russia to survive the Mongol Invasion.

 

It is not possible to remove India, unless you can revert back to a patch before it was added.

 

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?590415-Difference-between-difficulty-levels

easy = player advantages
normal = even
hard = ai advantages

 

Retinues are not disable-able as far as I know.

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I am also amazed you never ran into revolt troubles. I made the Britannian Empire and the English refused to leave me alone as soon as the throne passes on, but I'm guessing the sum of 100 hours of micromanagement created a smooth transition with each succession?

 

I have two ideas that might help? Note I've tried neither but based on your previous run and how it affected things, would you be interested in:

A) Never pausing, keep the clock ticking indefinitely (unless you're literally getting up to walk off and do something else, obviously). Just to put on more pressure and prevent the perfection you reached here.

B) You could try roleplaying specific personalities for each character. Rather than min-maxing, try to embody a behaviour even if it results in suboptimal plans, like 7 attempted assassinations in a row. If you remember the Thumbs discussing their game with Ragnar, it was what got me back into the game because of the crazy plots you lead yourself down. I'm not sure if this would hold the same appeal for you but it is a different way to go.

 

 

Also you could try moving on to Europa Universalis IV and expanding your empire(s) more.

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The role playing idea is a good one, sometimes I cheat to keep making my kings lustful, greedy, drunken lunatics, then try and hold everything together.

 

Or just making a really evil repressive dynasty.

 

The good vassal is also fun, do everything you can to support your king/emperor without ever plotting against them or trying to take power. (This doesn't always work, I have had other vassals force me to take power by overthrowing the king for me. I was just that nice.)

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Munster is an easy start because your enemies are fairly limited and mostly your size, especially with England starting pretty busy in the Stamford bridge start. There are many places that offer varying levels of challenge. Most different would probably be a Muslim empire, but I personally don't like playing them very much so I don't have a specific one to recommend.

 

I agree with Cordeos though, I rarely finish a game. At most, I get to the point that I've gotten bigger than the empire that's been a pain in the butt for the last couple centuries, break them, then usually call it good. Even in my India game that I wanted to finish and export to EU4, I fast-forwarded through the last 100 years or so just doing basic maintenance tasks and trying to achieve religious unity.

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That is a very abnormal game, especially for a first time. can you give a basic timeline of how you build that empire? Are you saying you held six empire titles? because the ethnicity requirements should prevent that, unless you game the system on purpose.

 

I'm surprised you didn't face large scale independence revolts based on how much territory with different religions and cultures you have. Or from family members attempting to grab power.

 

Yes, over the course of the game I created the Empires of Alba, Francia, Mali, Arabia, Persia and Rajasthan. Is that a bug?

The game went something like this, the dates for conquest referring to when I had gained enough territory to form or usurp that Kingdom:

1066: Started as Duke of Munster

1084: Formed Kingdom of Ireland

1127: Conquered Wales

1134: Peacefully gained Scotland through marriage

1183: Holy Roman Empire took over England, halting my progress there; started waging holy war against the pagans in north-eastern Europe from a single county I happen own in Norway

1196: Conquered Finland

1229: Conquered Pomerania

1245: Peacefully gained Brittany through marriage

1255: Conquered England and formed Empire of Alba after the English duchies declared Independence from the Holy Roman Empire when it unsuccessfully tried to attack me

1260: Conquered Lithuania and by this time also most other pagans and minor independents north-eastern Europe

1282: Peacefully gained Aragon through marriage, giving me a much needed foothold in a new area, including new targets for holy wars

1287: Conquered Navarra

1288: Ilkhanate conquered Anatolia, this will become important later

1289: Conquered France (sans independent Aquitaine), was definitely equal or superior to the Holy Roman Empire by then

1299: Conquered Andalusia

1314: Liberated Anatolia in a successful crusade, finally bordered the caliphates and could start attacking them

1318: Conquered Aquitaine

1322: Formed Empire of Francia

1327: Conquered Mauretania

1347: Conquered Mali and formed Empire of Mali

1356: Conquered Syria and Jerusalem

1365: Conquered Egypt

1366: Conquered Frisia

1375: Conquered Perm

1378: Conquered Africa

1378: Conquered Arabia and formed Empire of Arabia

1382: Conquered Nubia

1385: Conquered Sweden

1389: Conquered Baluchistan

1390: Conquered Mesopotamia

1419: Conquered Persia

1426: Formed Empire of Persia

1440: Conquered Khiva

1449: Conquered Punjab

1450: Conquered Malwa

1452: Formed Empire of Rajasthan

1453: Screenshot and end

 

Most of my territory gains came from holy wars, so I got to distribute them freely afterwards, typically to content Irish Catholic family members of mine which all loved me and as I kept expanding, there were always more of them, and they were only too happy to quickly convert the counties to our faith, too, probably helped by my religious authority always being maxed out and everyone else's crumbling as a further consequence of all those holy wars.

 

And if, say, the Spanish lords were of a mind to start something, they'd be hard pressed to find enough levies to go against my retinues. Most of my money went into the build-up of my retinues, by the end I had more than 100,000 men permanently under arms. After some point, I conquered new duchies faster than I could save up the money to form them all, large swathes of land were just counts.

 

 

A) Never pausing, keep the clock ticking indefinitely (unless you're literally getting up to walk off and do something else, obviously). Just to put on more pressure and prevent the perfection you reached here.

 

That one might be a bit tricky, as I noticed the interface really lagging when the game wasn't paused (at least on my machine and with a large empire).

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Yes, over the course of the game I created the Empires of Alba, Francia, Mali, Arabia, Persia and Rajasthan. Is that a bug?

 

Nah, they removed almost all title creation restrictions with patch 2.0, so now having multiple empires is now no longer a game of trying to cheat out marriages.

 

But yeah, Munster is not the strongest start, but you usually get enough stability to get at least two kingdoms, which is the tipping point for difficulty if you're smart about succession laws and same-culture same-religion vassals. After that point, the only limiting factor is the availability of holy wars and your own patience for micro. I think most experienced CK2 players have one game where they pushed hard for a world conquest, but it's so easy to game the systems once you understand them completely that most of that most tend to set "historical" or just plain interesting goals instead.

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Double post for Gamescom announcement: the new DLC is all about Charlemagne. It'll extend the timeline back to 769, add a large number of events, allow for "custom" titles (whatever that means), and cost 20€.

 

Forum response is lukewarm. This seems to continue Paradox's recent trend of giving its customers not quite what they want but close enough that complaining seems entitled. For instance, the most demanded DLC is a Holy Roman Empire politics/improvement pack, so Charlemagne isn't too far off...

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Double post for Gamescom announcement: the new DLC is all about Charlemagne. It'll extend the timeline back to 769, add a large number of events, allow for "custom" titles (whatever that means), and cost 20€.

 

Forum response is lukewarm. This seems to continue Paradox's recent trend of giving its customers not quite what they want but close enough that complaining seems entitled. For instance, the most demanded DLC is a Holy Roman Empire politics/improvement pack, so Charlemagne isn't too far off...

 

They could totally roll a better version of the HRE into this expansion as the HRE is an offshoot of his domains. They really just need to port some version of the Europa 

Universalis tool over.

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I've finally had the chance to play a couple of hours of this. I find it enjoyable, even though I barely know what I'm doing (just like if I was a King in real life, I guess...)

It's amazing how every 5 or 10 minutes of play I end up with another neat little story about my empire, and how each choice has consequences that I don't necessarily see right away. Its a very fascinating game.

...does anyone know of any guides to make learning how to play a bit easier? I feel like I've got the most basic of basics down, but beyond that it's like I'm floating in a sea of possibilities but I don't know how to swim to any of them.

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