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[Il Palazzo]

The latter, I'd say. You get roughly the same amount of troops, but benefit from extra income from cities and temples. Although I do tend to keep a few baronies in my capital county, to make the Marshall recruiting more effective. Even if that's not really that much of a difference.

[ZeroGravitas]

I dont think that confirms or denies anything.


Anyways I have a question for you all: is it better as a ruler to prioritize holding more baronies in one county, or multiple counties  with vassal baronies?

one county with max baronies. of course that generally covers only 5 castles, at most. but your demesne limit should be higher, so counties after that. with priority for your capital duchies counties.

that said, there can be political situations where it's better to have no vassals, or no vassals in a particular area, so you can shift that around for a while.

[Il Palazzo]

one county with max baronies

Y tho?

[ChairmanPoo]

See, I've been wondering about that  as in my last few games I've found it easier to manage with a single massive private county with a huge levy, as to give me a single, strong doomstack to move around in vassal disputes and to defend against raiding, rather than wait for the whole army to muster (and risk smaller army bits getting wiped on their way to your muster point).  Plus noone gets angry about their levies being raised too long.  And its only counties getting gavelkinded, not baronies

On the other hand... having unhappy baron tier vassals is not terribly worrying, as any rebellion they put up is likely to be unimpressive.  I dont think they're even able to mobilize troops by themselves. 

[scriver]

I'd say prioritise more counties/vassal baronies - with two exceptions. Firstly, your capital county gets a 100% bonus to levy in all it's holdings (at least castles), and secondly, all other holdings (at least castles) in you capital duchy gets a 50% levy bonus. So centralize in your capital duchy and capital, otherwise go for vassals.

[ChairmanPoo]

I'd say prioritise more counties/vassal baronies - with two exceptions. Firstly, your capital county gets a 100% bonus to levy in all it's holdings (at least castles), and secondly, all other holdings (at least castles) in you capital duchy gets a 50% levy bonus. So centralize in your capital duchy and capital, otherwise go for vassals.

I 've been doimgnthat but I kind of wonder if its optimal

 Also Second question: lay templeholders or castles? (Pseudomuslim religion)

[scriver]

Muslims receive piety from temple holdings, right? And basically pay for all their casus belli with piety, right?

So if you want to conquer the world, all temples beside your main capital holding (to resist sieges). Make up for lost levy by being big enough that it doesn't matter.

[EuchreJack]

Don't forget Retinues in your calculations.  More vassals = more money, which you can pour into retinues (or mercenaries if you're too small/at retinue cap).

[hector13]

one county with max baronies

Y tho?

You can pop your steward on your capital county and get the tax benefits of hitting 5 castles instead of 1 or 2. Also the aforementioned doomstack you can get in your capital county, plus, again aforementioned, the ease with which you can move around your primary levies, given they're pretty much already together.

I generally do what ZG does: max out the castles in the capital county, then focus on the counties in the capital duchy. Also, setting the crown focus on your capital county when it's got holdings in all the available slots appears to give a chance of an event to pay a lot of pennies to open another slot, allowing you to build even more castles. After I have all the castles, I will then focus on retinues, regretfully, since I'm not a huge fan of retinues, since they just sit around doing nothing a lot of the time while eating your money/prestige.

5 castles gives you, like, 15k guys depending on your martial and tech anyways.

[spazyak]

Don't forget Retinues in your calculations.  More vassals = more money, which you can pour into retinues (or mercenaries if you're too small/at retinue cap).

You can always make a Merc band too for more control over what you get

[Cruxador]

Don't forget Retinues in your calculations.  More vassals = more money, which you can pour into retinues (or mercenaries if you're too small/at retinue cap).

You can always make a Merc band too for more control over what you get

You can't always, that's not available to everyone.

[Il Palazzo]

one county with max baronies

Y tho?

You can pop your steward on your capital county and get the tax benefits of hitting 5 castles instead of 1 or 2. Also the aforementioned doomstack you can get in your capital county, plus, again aforementioned, the ease with which you can move around your primary levies, given they're pretty much already together.

I generally do what ZG does: max out the castles in the capital county, then focus on the counties in the capital duchy. Also, setting the crown focus on your capital county when it's got holdings in all the available slots appears to give a chance of an event to pay a lot of pennies to open another slot, allowing you to build even more castles. After I have all the castles, I will then focus on retinues, regretfully, since I'm not a huge fan of retinues, since they just sit around doing nothing a lot of the time while eating your money/prestige.

5 castles gives you, like, 15k guys depending on your martial and tech anyways.

Yeah, I've been following that line of thinking when playing. But much like Chairman, I'm starting to question if this is the best use of your demesne. For each castle you don't own yourself, you hold another one that is a county capital. That's probably going to cost you about 50% of troops from that castle. But you gain the levy and the cash, from max 6 lowest-tier vassals who don't count towards your vassal limit nor can realistically rebel. That should roughly even out the lost troops, plus you get all that money you can then spend on mercs and whatnot.
The only clear-cut advantage I can see is having all troops immediately raised in one spot, which becomes less important as you grow.
At the same time, that's one less county that you have to give away, which helps in keeping your vassals less powerful.

[ChairmanPoo]

Maybe there is a time for both: early game the doomstack is really important. Later on you can start giving away the baronies and recovering your home counties (It's never been a major issue... just switch to intrigue, spy until you discover shit, and revoke. And nowadays you can provoke a rivalry)

[ZeroGravitas]

Don't forget Retinues in your calculations.  More vassals = more money, which you can pour into retinues (or mercenaries if you're too small/at retinue cap).

retinues arent really affected by money, but yeah, more vassals = bigger realm which makes more retinues:

(Rank * holdings in realm + BuildingBonus) * (1 + 1.5 * MilitaryOrganizationTech)

[Rolan7]

Oh huh, retinues did gain an upkeep cost even when filled.  Back in 2015, apparently.  It's nothing compared to their reinforcement cost, but it can add up I guess.
I haven't played in a few months, but they were still my go-to military after early game, bolstered by personal levies.  Vassal levies can be so awkward to collect.  A retinue can be one day from enemy territory when you declare war, and be optimized for storming sieges (Mass light infantry is pretty bad for fair fights, but great for grabbing territory or raiding).