Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Digital Hellhound]

On the other hand, marrying your dynasty onto foreign thrones is immensely satisfying as a small power. Subjugating them is just messy and time-consuming; whoring off your family to every court in Europe and hoping for the best is much more fun.

[a1s]

whoring off your family to every court in Europe and hoping for the best.

is the Hapsburg family motto.

[Wolock]

whoring off your family to every court in Europe and hoping for the best.

is the Hapsburg family motto.

There was also ''Keep it in the family''

On another subject, I've started a game as king of Georgia in 867. Nothing bad really happen, but my duke decided to get ambitious and provoked me into a killing spree... Here's what happen :

In the north the Khazar imploded after conquest by Magyars/Hungary, Cumania and the independance of the duchy of Alania. With only three counties to them (one de jure Alania but still Khazar, the other two between the Caspian and Aral seas) I pushed a fabricated claim. At that time my duke declared an holy war on Alania which was also jewish. With me already battling the other jewish state my duke was having a easy time against Alania. It worried me so I try to find something to control him, then my spymaster discovered a plot in which the duke planned to off my choosen heir (I'm running on elective monarchy instead of Gavelkind) I imprison the traitor who's neck encountered a fast moving axe's blade. Then I betrothed my heir to his oldest girl, and then plotted succesfully against his two remaining boys.

When it comes to internal politics, don't mess with me.

[umiman]

Typical barbarians. No class when it comes to politics. Tsk tsk.

[Wolock]

Typical barbarians. No class when it comes to politics. Tsk tsk.

Is it class when a duke overstep his rank and try to be more powerful than his liege king? Is it class when a duke plan to kill the rightful heir of the kingdom? No, this is treason! He dishonored himself and his family and they met the consequence of these acts. I was merciful enough to accept his girl into my family by marrying her to my heir and bestow upon her the title of Duchess of Alania.

[BFEL]

See if you can invite that guy to your court, or failing that just look for other claimants that will join you.

Failing that, there's nothing saying you can't find ways to remove rulers in Byzantine until the guy you want is on the throne. Assassins, plots, excommunication, general wars, etc. Though the empire is big enough that you'll have plenty more chances in the future so don't fret. It's also a pretty good idea to train all your "planned to be married off" children with lots of intrigue so they can steal other people's property.

It's generally better to wait until you yourself are of an empire level ruler, so you can actually just subjugate the entire land instead of replacing it with a family member.

Well in that case the succession war is already over. Its not even an "assassinate till heir" thing anymore, its a "he is no longer in the line to the throne because the line just got cut off and replaced" thing.

Also I am deeply ashamed of how long it took me to figure out that you can marry your courtiers into other courts to have extra plot power for assassinations there
Before I was like "How the hell do I off this guy? EVERYONE LOVES HIM, and the POPE LOVES HIM." Now its "Ah-ha he has a crappy spymaster, I'll just marry this really INTRIGUING courtier off to him, then when courtier gets promoted he has hella plot power AND the former spymaster is possibly in on it too because he's pissed :3

[EnigmaticHat]

See if you can invite that guy to your court, or failing that just look for other claimants that will join you.

Failing that, there's nothing saying you can't find ways to remove rulers in Byzantine until the guy you want is on the throne. Assassins, plots, excommunication, general wars, etc. Though the empire is big enough that you'll have plenty more chances in the future so don't fret. It's also a pretty good idea to train all your "planned to be married off" children with lots of intrigue so they can steal other people's property.

It's generally better to wait until you yourself are of an empire level ruler, so you can actually just subjugate the entire land instead of replacing it with a family member.

Well in that case the succession war is already over. Its not even an "assassinate till heir" thing anymore, its a "he is no longer in the line to the throne because the line just got cut off and replaced" thing.

Also I am deeply ashamed of how long it took me to figure out that you can marry your courtiers into other courts to have extra plot power for assassinations there
Before I was like "How the hell do I off this guy? EVERYONE LOVES HIM, and the POPE LOVES HIM." Now its "Ah-ha he has a crappy spymaster, I'll just marry this really INTRIGUING courtier off to him, then when courtier gets promoted he has hella plot power AND the former spymaster is possibly in on it too because he's pissed :3

Or if he has a good spymaster who likes him you offer to marry the spymaster in such a way that he/she moves and a new spymaster is assigned.

[umiman]

If he's been removed from the succession, just invite him to your court. He'll have a claim on the entire thing.

Click the claimants button if you don't know how to do so.

[EuchreJack]

You could also just leave him where he is and wait for the dukes and counts to rebel with your heir as the figurehead.  Vassals love to change lieges often, especially immediately after changing lieges.

As for marrying off courtiers, look for courtiers that have the "envious" or "ambitious" trait and marry them off to a realm in which you want to plot to kill the liege.  Those type of courtiers often have trouble with their liege, especially if they also vary in culture (if they vary in religion, the opposing liege might refuse the marriage all together, but if not, it's also a major malus with liege, especially if they're also zealous).

It should also be pointed out that you don't want courtiers or vassals that are envious or ambitious anyways.

[andrea]

well, I started a game in the early start date, and I have met one very hard to kill king of west france...

I was originally a vassal of lotharingia, even managed to get a relative on the throne, then switch to elective. my vassals refused to vote for the king, but I didn't really mind. at some point, they even preferred to vote for a possessed guy, which made me turn cathar and convert all my vassals ( a sizeable portion of lotharingia.). this of course was not much liked, so I had to declare independence. the war was quite easy, because I was quite powerful, and much richer. Problem is, it seems that lotharingia was now ruled by a queen. which decided to marry the king of west france (not matrilinearly)! since she was the second wife, at the beginning I am displeased but not worried: the 2 kingdoms will not combine.

but I was wrong... stuff happened, and now king of west francia is heir to the kingdoms of lotharingia and burgundy ( both ruled by my relative). such a neighbor would be able to ruthlessly crush me, since I am heretic. so I resort to assassination. after many costly attempts, I kill the king. and his son . and his son's brother. but eventually I fail to prevent the merge. However, the kingdom is destabilized enough to not be concerned with me, and so I survived the 2 crusades against me.

I still try to destabilize it a bit more, and at some point it seems I succeed. there are rebellions firing for francia and burgundy, and they are winning. Perfect! I spend some time dealing with a crusade sent against me, and the usual invasion from bavaria and frisia , then I see that my enemy has lost kingdom of france to his vassal.

AND THEN HE INHERITED ITALY!

italy, which is much stronger than france.
I guess this is not going to be easy.

on the plus side, catholicism is suffering greatly. heresies are all over the place. and hadn't west francia formed that power block, the old lothringia would be mostly cathar.waldesianshas a couple of kingdoms in spain, and there are fraticelli here and there. however, templars were getting stronger. at some point, they had half of england, and parts of bavaria.  this game is turning to be quite unusual...

edit: here is the religious map

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Wiles]

Did you know that mercenary companies now grow alongside you too. Every single one of the merc companies can field 20,000 men circa 1430. It's a good thing I'm so ludicriously rich. Have you ever seen a 500,000 man army before in this game? It costs 4,000g per month.

I can imagine it would get a little scary if you managed to run out of money and had all of those merc companies decide to invade you. The scaling mercs are great, but they make republic vassals pretty powerful. In my last game every time they rebelled they'd hire a bunch of mercs to fight for them.

[ibot66]

The Christ is Slavic doing in Sweden.

[Dutchling]

Pommerania often conquers or inherits Denmark in my games. They probably spread the faith too.

[andrea]

yes, pommerania is at fault here. used to be quite big in the past.

by the way, situation has progressed since last screenshot. now there are no more catholic kingdoms, I think. besides perhaps a couple minor kingdoms in spain. catholicism is disappearing, and to seal its end, I even conquered rome. furthermore, it seems there are lots of possessed people around in the world.

I guess this is the effect of something they changed in the last patch, because I have never seen such a spread of heresies. the nly religion immune to them is islam, it seems. orthodox stopped exsting a long time ago, replaced by nestorian.

[Rolan7]

yes, pommerania is at fault here. used to be quite big in the past.

by the way, situation has progressed since last screenshot. now there are no more catholic kingdoms, I think. besides perhaps a couple minor kingdoms in spain. catholicism is disappearing, and to seal its end, I even conquered rome. furthermore, it seems there are lots of possessed people around in the world.

I guess this is the effect of something they changed in the last patch, because I have never seen such a spread of heresies. the nly religion immune to them is islam, it seems. orthodox stopped exsting a long time ago, replaced by nestorian.

I noticed that in my recently-ended Amalfi Republic game, heresies seemed to crop up a lot in the Catholic realms.  Wasn't much of a problem for Orthodoxy, which I embraced and championed.  I was blobbing a circle around the civilized world, I had Africa, the Jerusalem-Acre coast, and much of Ireland and Scandinavia.  I was rather relieved to lose (My brother and I had a total of 10 daughters and three sons, and all the sons were murdered by plotters).

I'm actually having a *lot* more fun as Queen Tara IV the Lion.  Raiding is *fun*.  I started as count of Medelpad, promising myself I'd play a sedate game where I merely tried to spread my dynasty.  The viking spirit convinced me that matrilineal marriages are much easier when Scandinavia bows to me, a 10 year old girl.  That was some time ago...

I don't technically have the empire just yet.  I could form Norway and Finland but then my legacy would be divided between my four sons (or 3?  I'm not sure my grand mayor son would inherit anything.  The ponce.)  My main obstacle is Denmark, and my advancing age...  At 55, I keep checking the clock.

Raiding is FUN.  Between expansion wars I'm trying to annihilate Canturbury.  If it's not possible, I'll do it anyway.

I'm a brilliant strategist, a poet, cruel yet just, and shy but secretly lustful.  As my runestone proclaims, I fear nothing (just don't come in, I'm... plotting).  I am the unstoppable geek-queen of Sweden.