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[PanH]

Welp, my genius son got assassinated by one of my wife (one of his mother in law), so I guess I'll let my strong son be the heir, especially since he is a charismatic negotiator (not the best, but nice). Though, I'm facing an issue, as in, the Abassids. I'm the Ummeyyads trying to reconquer their empire, but as of right now, the Arabian Empire dejure is evenly split between me (Mauretania, Africa, a chunck of Syria, and a chunck of Arabia) and them. In addition, I have Spain, and they have Mesopotamia. I can beat them (we have around the same army, 50k each, biggest realms in the world, Persia and Byz are third and 4th with 20k, though Seljuk is coming with 40k soldiers), especially with retinues.
But I don't have a cb (other than a few dejure, and conquest) and they have subjugation. I want to smash the empire, but if I attack, vassals will start loving the emperor (defending vs foreigners). What's the best way I could cause them to implode ?

[EnigmaticHat]

You could ignore them and conquer France?  And then maybe the HRE.  Alternate between holy warring weak states and then invading big ones, works every time.  Then once you're so big they stand no hope of stopping you, then worry about finding a CB.  Just make sure your armies don't drop too far beneath the other guy's, or he could attack you.

[Lukeinator]

So... Any tips for someone who has never played this before? Any particular DLC to get? I mean, I've played /tons/ of EU3, specifically modded with MEIOU. Any mods like that for CK2?

Get the Old Gods, Sword of Islam. These let you play as almost any character on the map and TOG gives you an earlier start date.

[Maldevious]

Getting the most out of your own holdings is different in the new version. You'll want to have as many baronies as possible in your capital duchy, with as many baronies as you can fit in your capital county. With good martial, a marshal training troops and maxed out improvements you can raise around 6k soldiers per barony in your capital county. With the mongols coming you'll probably want to prioritize the martial stat on your sons to have as many good generals as possible as well as ensuring you get the +50% more troops bonus from your holdings.

Can you explain this a bit for me? I used to recall that cities were the best.

[Wiles]

]A retinue is a standing army. It's a nice feature, and if you ever plan on playing Byzantium Legacy of Rome adds a nice bit of flavour.

Can you explain this a bit for me? I used to recall that cities were the best.

You get less levies from vassals now than you used to.

[umiman]

Sunset Invasion is pretty worthless.

Republic is silly since you'll only see the use if you actually play them as they get unlocked in the game for free anyway. Playing as a Republic is very boring.

The rest are good.

[Duuvian]

When do the Mongols show up? When you are about one to three duchies away from forming Russia as Poland.

[Digital Hellhound]

Swear Fealty. Who wouldn't wanna be a Mongol chief?

[Duuvian]

I'd rather fight them, and besides, if I was to do that I'd just do it with the HRE which is right next to Poland. Also I'd have to destroy the Wendish Empire title, which is really easy to form as Poland. Now that I think about it though, perhaps forming a second Empire title isn't such a great idea unless new Empire titles use the Crown laws of the first, which would be Primogeniture preferably as otherwise the second son would inherit an independant Russia.

I don't have any expansions either, so I'd be a Catholic in a Tengri realm.

[Sheb]

I'm fairly certain new titles get the laws of your title at the time of creation. As for being a catholic in a tengri realm, it's okay, especially since you'll be big. Just beware of having your heir converted, or you'll loose if you don't have TOG.

[Maldevious]

I'm fairly certain new titles get the laws of your title at the time of creation. As for being a catholic in a tengri realm, it's okay, especially since you'll be big. Just beware of having your heir converted, or you'll loose if you don't have TOG.

Just created Kingdom of Ireland, which mirrored the laws of the Kingdom of Alba I owned, so I think this works.

[PanH]

You could ignore them and conquer France?  And then maybe the HRE.  Alternate between holy warring weak states and then invading big ones, works every time.  Then once you're so big they stand no hope of stopping you, then worry about finding a CB.  Just make sure your armies don't drop too far beneath the other guy's, or he could attack you.

I could, but I'm not really interested. It'd be really easy (France is controlled by Welsh, has 6k army). The biggest catholic kingdom is Lotharingia/Italy, at 11k soldiers atm. It wouldn't even be a challenge (and Tulunid, the sultan of Egypt, invaded Aquitaine btw, though he lost Egypt to the Abbassids). That wouldn't be a problem to invade the catholic world but I want to usurp the Arabian Empire, and I'm only at 54% (need 81%). Abbassids has the other 46% and there's 124 counties. I'd need to take 34 provinces from them to usurp the title, but I only have single counties cb (which are not really worth fighting a war over). Once I have a title, the rest of their realm will implode, since there's plenty of dukes and not a king title.

[Rolan7]

I'm actually having a lot of fun as a republic.  It does throw a lot of gold at you, and you're basically exempt from the marriage game so you don't have to worry about all that, so it's relatively easy to play.  Easy enough to keep me from getting frustrated and quitting.  (CK2 is apparently really easy once you've properly learned it, but I must be too dim or lazy).

The more relaxed difficulty lets me get into character a little.  I don't just assassinate the other households, for example (unless they try it first).  I might even let one of them win the doge election soon.  There's probably less replayability, but I'm having fun pimping out my trans-dimensional sky mansion (basically a city you'll always own, can't be attacked, with a flavorful and overpowered upgrade tree).

One non-republic thing I have trouble with - how do I know whether starting a war is a good idea or suicide?  Thinking about adjacent duchies, mainly.  I've started browsing their realm adding up the levies in my head, but that's slow *and* inaccurate.  Not even worrying about allies.  I try to keep a mercenary fund, but that gets so expensive (when I'm not a republic).

[Dutchling]

I've started browsing their realm adding up the levies in my head, but that's slow *and* inaccurate. 

Click on someone's (anyone in the enemy realm will do) portrait and go to realm view to see the total levies of the top liege. It's one of the three buttons near someone's dynasty shield. The levies shown there is way higher than their actual levies, but if your total levies is higher than theirs you probably have more troops.

[PanH]

I've started browsing their realm adding up the levies in my head, but that's slow *and* inaccurate. 

Click on someone's (anyone in the enemy realm will do) portrait and go to realm view to see the total levies of the top liege. It's one of the three buttons near someone's dynasty shield. The levies shown there is way higher than their actual levies, but if your total levies is higher than theirs you probably have more troops.

Not that much. At least it's pretty accurate for what I can levy.