Crusader Kings 2 Redux

[jimmy olsen]

The most easternmost black shield in the empire is Sylvannia, but I've wiped out the counts.

I should have waited a second to take that screenshot, so it would say The Empire on the map instead of Imperial Riekland.

[jimmy olsen]

Lastest updates to the warhammer mod totally fucked up my saves.

Gonna start over, but at least I know what to do this time.

EDIT: And the price of retinues has more than doubled, lovely.

[Martinus]

Man, I need to play WFRPG again. I have noone to play with though. 

[Queequeg]

Living fuck I missed this game.  Playing HIP as always.

It is 1193 and Mpiraturi Emmanuele I (II in Sicily, Jerusalem and Africa) The Hammer of the noble house of Hauteville rules over the entirety of the De Jure Sicily, Africa, Jerusalem and Jordan and Damascus from Syria, and just won a Crusade for the Maghreb. It's fucking wonderful.

Emmanuel's great grandfather, the King of Sicily Sewal I, ruled from Naples.  His demense was almost entirely in the recently conquered Sicily, but there had been a Shi'ite attempt at a Jihad so I turned to the recently conquered Duchy of Naples.  A new Sicilian culture had developed in Calabria and Apulia, but most of the nobility of the Kingdom of Sicily was Norman in this period (approx 1120).  Adelaide, Emmanuel II's grandmother, was born at around the same year Naples became Sicilian (in HIP it happens naturally in Norman-ruled Greek provinces only).  Roger II died relatively young, leaving Adelaide the Queen of Sicily at around the age of 2.  Luckily, her regent was one of her blood relatives-the house of Hauteville at this point was already huge-and was competent and fond of her.  She married one of the sons of the Bryennios Emperor Constantine-Byzantium had adopted the Elective law and was actually doing really well.  Her husband, Kaisarios, was one of the great warriors of the age, and fathered the future Emmanuel I and his sister.  Pope Adeodatus declared a Crusade for Constantinople when Adelaide was 15, and her Jewish regent did not approve of the Crusade, but when Adelaide came in to her own she immediately joined the Crusade.  Kaisarios, who had converted to Latin Christianity, lead a series of bloody campaigns in the northern Levant against the full fury of an intact Fatmid Caliphate.  The flower of Sicilian nobility was already lost when a shit-ton of troops from across Latin Christendom showed up.  Adelaide became Queen of Jerusalem, and the first generation of truly "Sicilian" nobles found themselves lords of the entire Holy Land. 

Kaisarios lead an attempt to usurp his brother, the Byzantine Emperor, while the Emperor, an enormously skilled man, was fighting off a massive Sunni Jihad for Anatolia.  Kaisarios was captured, castrated and released.  Adelaide, now Adelaide the Great, divorced Kaisarios and he went on to become the head of the Hospitallers.  Adelaide remarried a Basque nobleman from the House of Jimenez, and it was Gauthier who raised his stepson Emmanuel as well as his half-siblings. 

Emmanuele became King at the age of 17, and married his distant cousin, the daughter of another Bryennios Emperor.  Emmanuele greatly expanded Sicilian holdings in N Africa and Syria, but died, tragically young, at age 30.  His 2 year old son, Emmanuele II, was raised by a Castore, a phenomenally gifted son of Gauthier who ruled as Prince of Galilee.  Sadly, the regent-Pio, Prince-Archbishop of Outer Jordan-was extremely incompetent, and I lost all of my crown authority and went through a major civil war. 

TBH one of the more interesting dynamics at work here in terms of gameplay is that it's way, way harder to maintain efficient authority in Sicily.  I control the entirety of the island itself, and the Duchy of Naples, and I'm basically shitting gold.  But the rest of Sicily is an ugly cultural patchwork that means that most of the region is unstable.  A lot of settled Norman families have refused to go native, so while Emmanuele II is a tiny little 3/4ths Greek 1/4th Tuscan man most of the Mezzogiorno is ruled by a few Norman families-cadet Hautville branches, Dregnot, some others-are still acting like they're fresh off the boat from Normandy.  One or two families have assimilated in to the local Italian cultures, interestingly. In HIP, Sicilian is emergent and does not really replace the local cultures of the Mezzogiorno, so you have to wait for Maghrebi Sicily (almost all of the island) to go Sicilian.  Much of the Holy Land is now culturally Sicilian, as well as most of modern Tunisia, while the Mezzogiorno is a total mess.  I still get most of my troops from there, though.  This is by a wide margin the most multicultural court I've ever run in a CK2 game.  There's barely even a plurality of Sicilian courtiers throughout the Empire. 

Emmanuele is shaping up to be one of my favorite characters I've ever played as in CK2.  I figured Sicily had reached a point where a real cultural flourishing was possible, so I focused on scholarship, built an observatory and got in hot water with the Church for pointing out that the world was flat and the earth isn't in the center.  Then I focused on business and built a huge palace.  Then I said fuck it, conquered more of Syria and Africa, then declared myself Emperor, and the next year the Pope declared a crusade for the Maghreb so now I rule Africa from Marrakesh to Eastern Libya.  Egypt is clearly next.  I'm excited to push in to Egypt atm. 

[Queequeg]

Also I am apparently immature enough to smile every time I see the Sicilian word for "county", which is apparently "cuntea."

[Josquius]

I tried the game of thrones mod.
As is my way from as  early a date as possible.

First game, as Starks- aegon doesn't invade. Sits around. I manage to grab a province off the twins after the riverlands all go their own way. Then everyone in the north starts hating me for changing succession laws (I haven't).

Second game as aegon- this is more like it. Pretty cool and challenging at first. The storm king doesn't die in battle so I vassal him. The riverlands need a lord though so that's baratheon. After the initial conquests.... Things get a bit too easy and I end up ruler of the entire world. How? Declare war (dragon conquest)-> 90% of others surrender to escape the wrath of my dragons.

The game has some interesting features. Not just a reskin. Very heavily modified. But still needs work.

[Queequeg]

I love this game, but I think it's in desperate need of a real trade system. 

[Caliga]

I've never been impressed with any trade system P'dox has ever come up with, though I do recognize that it's not an easy thing to simulate well.

[Queequeg]

They're going in to the Steppe, though.  You need the silk road. 

[jimmy olsen]

I think they should release an expansion that extends the timeline to at least 1521.

[Martinus]

I think they should release an expansion that extends the timeline to at least 1521.

There is little point to do so, imo. Instead I think their goal is to keep expanding the map. I assume we will get Romance of Three Kingdoms eventually.

[jimmy olsen]

I think they should release an expansion that extends the timeline to at least 1521.

There is little point to do so, imo. Instead I think their goal is to keep expanding the map. I assume we will get Romance of Three Kingdoms eventually.

Ten Kingdoms maybe, they ain't going back to the 3rd century.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Dynasties_and_Ten_Kingdoms_period

[Martinus]

Anyway, I am betting next expansion will be China.

[Martinus]

I'm really digging the concept of tributaries, by the way:

In Horse Lords, there are two new Casus Bellis related to Tributaries; "Make Tributary" and "Free Tributary" (doing exactly what they sound like.) On the map, the names of Tributary states are no longer shown, though they retain their own colors in the Realms map mode. Tributaries pay a monthly tax to their suzerain and cannot refuse the suzerain's call to wars. However, the suzerain is also expected to protect their tributaries. Apart from this, tributaries are still autonomous. A tributary can only have one suzerain (though the suzerain can be a regular vassal of another ruler's.) The tributary status ends on the death of either ruler, and tributaries can declare wars to free themselves, of course...

I wonder if Poland will start as a tributary of the HRE in some of the starting dates (as this was indeed a relationship for quite a while during the period covered by the game).

Also, loving the stuff that you can now negotiate with raiders and settle them in your lands as your vassals, Rollo of Normandy style.

[Syt]

That should be a useful mechanic if they ever do a new game about Rome.