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[Kanil]

This is way better than prestige farming and giving up claims to manage BB that was in CK1.

I disagree.

You really liked waiting for your vassals to revolt so you could surrender to them to conquer more shit?
You really liked beating up a king and not taking anything from him just so you could get prestige to conquer more shit?

[Criptfeind]

You like having to wait for random events to allow you to declare war for a single province? You like only being able to take small chunks of land even if you utterly defeat the foe?

Seriously. The system was not perfect, but it is better then what we have now.

[Kanil]

How's that any different than CK1? Instead of waiting for a prestige event you wait for your chancellor to pop. I suppose it's harder to farm, but at that point you have plenty of options for expansion anyway. Invite claimants or something.

And you could only take shit you had claims on in CK1, much like in CK2 (exception being religious enemies, but holy wars are already super ezmode in CK2 anyway)

[DemonOfWrath]

Expansion's only really slow when you're either a Count/Duke (above that you can swipe duchies or kingdoms at once) or you have very few (or no) neighbours who you can beat in which case you need to wait for them to be weak before you can hit them and swipe territory. Once you get the hang of things there's a size threshold depending on your neighbours where you can start expanding rediculously fast (grab an empire title then start throwing claims on full kingdoms around and then tell me it's too slow, hmm I should start a HRE game and just go for world conquest).

[Mono124]

Hmm, I beat the Aztecs horribly, and then ate the HRE. All hail Britannia. Also the Muslim religion is extremely endangered and near extinction.

Spoiler: Game view (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: Whole map (click to show/hide)

[Tarran]

So does that mean the Golden Horde and Ilkhanate have become Orthodox/are being extremely slow on converting?

[beefy]

Just got the base game + the muslim and rome addon today during steam flash sale... Completely lost... Any tipps on how and where to start?

[Catastrophic lolcats]

From an earlier post.

From an earlier post.

Start as either an Irish count or duke. Ireland is one of the best starting locations for a new player to learn the mechanics. It's mono-cultured, mono-religious and has plenty of room for expansion. Scotland and England will almost always explode into warring states due to culture shifts, leaving you to take Wales easily and possibly uniting the Isles.
If Ireland gets boring try a Russian Prince. The Russian states are all the same dynasty which can either be exploited early for a rapid expansion or can be held onto for alliances. Holy wars against pagans hold much room for expansion and finally forming the Russian empire and fending off the Mongols makes a nice end-game goal. Your low-tech and lack of navy will also change your tactics.

Do NOT start anywhere near a Muslim, even more so at the start. Muslims are crazy over-powered at the start of the game. There are mods that address this and are worth looking into after a few games. I enjoy "Project Balance" since it's goal is to really just improve the base game.

Great chain of being:
Baron (owns a castle) -> Count (owns a county with castle as capital) -> Duke (owns a duchy)-> King (owns a de jure Kingdom) -> Emperor (owns a de-jure empire)
Mayor (owns a town) -> Republic (owns a county with a town as capital) -> Grand Republic (owns a duchy) -> Most Sincere Republic (owns a de-jure kingdom) -> (owns a de-jure empire)
Bishop (owns a church) -> Prince-Bishop (owns a county with a church as capital) -> Arch-Price Bishop (owns a duchy) -> Theocracy (owns a de-jure kingdom) -> Theocracy (owns a de-jure empire)
Note that republics will have a -30 relationship hit with you due to "wrong government type", this means they make sub-optimal vassals. Prince-Bishops no longer have that penalty and are quite good vassals and are better than dukes, some consider them bugged and exploits. Prince-Bishops will not plot for the throne and will always vote for your choice in an election.

Remember to always own 2 duchies, all the counties inside them and to upgrade the holdings as much as possible in each. You'll want the brunt of your military to come from personal levies and mercs, relying on vassal levies is sub-optimal.

If you're having trouble picking traits; a general rule of thumb is to stay with as many virtues as possible. Virtues give you more piety which is often harder to come by than prestige which you can easily win in wars. Plus the church always makes a powerful ally.
I prefer Just over Arbitrary although arbitrary does have some nice decisions linked to it. Honest versus Deceitful doesn't really change much, there seems to be more events with loss of relationship surprisely more with honest rather than deceitful.

Change your succession law from Gavelkind as quick as possible, it offers NO benefits to a new player. I personally prefer Feudal Elective since you can pick your heir. However if you're having trouble keeping your realm under control then Seniority or Primogeniture are decent choices. Primogeniture will generate a lot of pretenders if you have a lot of children so only land the first-born to prevent revolts.

For tech you'll usually want to stick to "tactics" for military, "castle infrastructure" (or city, if you're a coastal nation) for economic, and your choice for culture (I like "legalism").

Another thing that might seem strange for a new player is the concept of wanting to keep your vassals as weak as possible. It might seem odd but it's a rather important part of the game. 
http://crusaderkings-two.wikia.com/wiki/Keeping_Your_Vassals_Weak

[beefy]

Thanks! I'm slowly starting to get it...

[Maldevious]

In my latest game as Sweden, I am slowly chipping away at Norway. I am also King of Denmark. Unfortunately, Poland has now taken over France after a bizarre succession war. I am... very scared. If they hold it, they will be basically untouchable. Any ideas?

[dennislp3]

Worst case scenario would be to become their vassal...

Aside from that I am guessing either lots of political/diplomatic moves to make them like you or somehow disrupt them from holding the place...

Not sure exactly how though given I dont know your armies or money or whatever and with that your ability to assassinate and otherwise wiggle around with shady stuff.

[Dutchling]

Ally one of the empires (that's assuming the Byzantine Empire isn't Fatimid...) and curbstomp them?

[mainiac]

I do not recommend that a new player switch from gavelkind as soon as possible.  The relations penalty from progimature will more then having to shuffle your demesne around.  And as a new player he should learn to be flexible, having his demense change, not tilting at the tides and trying to never change.  Don't try to hold lands, go out and get more lands then give them to your younger sons.  The more you give them while you are alive, the less they get when you die.

Go gavelkind and never land your eldest son.  This will let you keep them in court.  That way you can delay their marriage until they are 25 years old or so (to keep from having too many generations alive at once) and it keeps any potential grandkids in your court where you can control their marriage and education.  The worst thing is to have your future ruler get educated poorly and married to a nobody.

Elective is also really good if you take care to make as many dukes as possible members of your dynasty.  If you do that there isn't much risk of losing elections so they become a chance to pick whatever heir you want rather then a risk of losing the crown.  Vassals that like you and are family members have a strong tendency to follow your lead in elections.

[Catastrophic lolcats]

So the new DLCs are up for pre-order on Gamer's Gate. Apparently they'll unlock on the 14th. It's rather pricey at 10 dollars or 10 euros.

http://www.gamersgate.com/DLC-CK2R/crusader-kings-ii-the-republic
http://www.gamersgate.com/DLC-CK2MP/crusader-kings-ii-mediterranean-portraits
http://www.gamersgate.com/DLC-CK2SOP/crusader-kings-ii-songs-of-prosperity

Disappointing they'll we'll only see coastal merchant republics only. I'm sure there much be a way to make "generic" republic viable even if you're playing as the country rather than a dynasty.

EDIT: Not sure if I'm a fan of the Mediterranean portraits. They all look pretty ugly. The beards are perhaps the best part but I'd rather marry into a Russian dynasty if I want my character to have a fancy beard.
DOUBLE EDIT: It appears by the coat of arms in the screenshots that The Hansa trade league is in the game. There's a chance there might be a historical event that causes them to crop up in northern Germany. That should be fun!

[Descan]

I do wonder if you create a doge, would that count as a playable republic?