PDOX Games VIII: Communism Will Win

[The Imperial Reach]

You just seem to have litteraly every issue I have never had in any game beofre. I have often watched as the King of Croatia single handedly wins the first Crusade, I have seen the muslims get BTFO'd out of Iberai every time i plat. I have seen the Byzantine Empire get THICC in almost every game. I have never one seen Isalm spread deep into Eroupe.

Maybe it's because I always start at the Charlemagne start date? Islam has a massive advantage in 769 - more than any other period.

Well first of all, unless I’m EXTREMELY oblivious...

temples do count towards your demesne.
So I have no idea where you got that from.

Also, though a Muslim Hispania does occasionally happen, I’ve seen them get beyond Aquitaine maybe two or three times. Meanwhile, a strong HRE can conquer all of Africa with little to no resistance, the ERE can hold invaders off consistently, the Reconquista usually ends by 1100, and India usually keeps the hordes out unless they strike really early, if you have Turkic Conquerors set to random.

Maybe I was thinking of Tribes? I dunno, I was pretty tired when I wrote that. Still, being able to hold Temples in addition to Baronies is a still an added advantage.

Forget Aquitaine - I've seen the Umayyads go as far as pagan Jutland. No joke. Only ever seen the HRE in North Africa, and even then that's rare. Byz always get wrecked; such is their curse. India pushes out the Muslims every time but only if there's a major kingdom/empire nearby to rival the Abbasids in power; if not, the Caliphate wrecks them too.

Islam being OP really fits with the times though. Aside from several powerful but short eras in Europe the Islamic world was leagues more powerful. It took the Mongols and the Black Death to even the odds. Even then there was a small resurgence with the Ottomans for 200 years or so.

You're exaggerating. The reason the Crusades failed and Byzantium fell was primarily due to infighting and disunity amongst Christians; meaning they failed to pool their strength together and stand united under the same banner. Truth be told, Christians were fighting Christians as much as they were fighting everybody else.

[The Imperial Reach]

Honestly, from what I've seen from YouTube videos it seems hella fun to play Pagan religions (Germanic and Hellenism in particulair). I'm probably gonna buy Holy Fury somewhere in the future.

If you want a fun challenge after you do play Erik the Heathen in 1066 and try to save your religion.

>actually playing pagans

Casuals.

[The Batavia]

Islam being OP really fits with the times though. Aside from several powerful but short eras in Europe the Islamic world was leagues more powerful. It took the Mongols and the Black Death to even the odds. Even then there was a small resurgence with the Ottomans for 200 years or so.

You're exaggerating. The reason the Crusades failed and Byzantium fell was primarily due to infighting and disunity amongst Christians; meaning they failed to pool their strength together and stand united under the same banner. Truth be told, Christians were fighting Christians as much as they were fighting everybody else.

So what you're saying is the Muslims at the time were more competent and overal had their shit together?

[The Imperial Reach]

I concur that a superior option would be to just make the pretenders start a civil war. But would that not be too game destroying? The real problem if you ask me is that at this point it's just way too easy to make sure the new system just ends up being "pick your heir". And that means it's not actually fun.

I can easily forgive historical inaccuracy if it's a fun system. But I can't have fun with a mechanism that I can just bypass easily.

I mean, having Sunset Invasion I guess I can't really complain too much about historical inaccuracy, but at least SI is optional. Things like Byzantium being elective when it shouldn't be, and Zikri existing before it's founder was even born just feel strange and wrong.

Yea, but realistically you only get 2-3 kingdom sized conquest wars per character anyway. And that's the best case scenario of 80 years old pagan religious head with a conquest oriented religion and Alexandrian bloodline to give you the invasion CB. So most of the times you'll be chipping away duchies and counties anyway. And for those you don't really have to care about who you put in power just as long as you remember to save the last one needed to form/usurp the kingdom for a family member.

I don't have Holy Fury so bloodlines aren't available to me, nor do I play pagans normally because I hate Gavelkind.

I very rarely play non-Christian religions, with the only real exception being Zoroastrians but they don't have a lot of good start dates.

True. But as long as you manually marry off the people you give new titles to you can keep the tide of babies coming. Mostly. I've had a few hiccups here and there. But that just means I have to chip away at another kingdom for a while.

Really, the main problem I encounter is the fact the fools intermarry and eventually my carefully handed out kingdoms tend to blob up. But that happens with any vassals, family or not. And with family members I can at least make sure that the inevitable rebel blob is still of my dynasty.

That's another thing I hate: the AI is too stupid to work marriage properly. I watch them constantly marry their only daughter and sole heir to some dude who already stands to inherit shit; meaning his son will get both titles, which often happens. Bunch of morons end up driving their own dynasty to extinction because they wouldn't get it up enough to have a son, aren't worth dirt in a swordfight, or pissed off somebody with access to their kitchen.

I tend to not do any of those things anyway. Not even with regular vassals most of the time. I'll only ever go the assassin/torture/murder route if someone rebels against me or is about to.

Agreed. I'm no tyrant unless I'm forced to be in order to save my titles or dynasty, or punish some uppity little brat, but it's always nice to have the option. Thing is the "Tyrant" modifier only lasts so long while, unless you're Catholic, the Kinslayer trait stays with you for life.

And I enjoy playing games where the stated goal is to place a family member on each kingdom on the map.

You know what? That actually is an interesting objective. I think I'll try that at some point.

[The Imperial Reach]

You're exaggerating. The reason the Crusades failed and Byzantium fell was primarily due to infighting and disunity amongst Christians; meaning they failed to pool their strength together and stand united under the same banner. Truth be told, Christians were fighting Christians as much as they were fighting everybody else.

So what you're saying is the Muslims at the time were more competent and overal had their shit together?

It's not so much they were more competent, rather that they were more dogmatic. Islam is more demanding than Christianity and allows less wiggle room for interpretation. Plus, most Muslims at the time were under the rule of the Caliph who served as both a spiritual and secular liege whereas the Pope could only dream of such things.

The finer details of Christianity were up for debate; whereas the finer details of Islam were already well-defined.

[Bralia]

Never thought I'd seen an AI form Russia in CK2. The Tsaritsa seems really pleased in her portrait.

[Purpelia]

I mean, having Sunset Invasion I guess I can't really complain too much about historical inaccuracy, but at least SI is optional. Things like Byzantium being elective when it shouldn't be, and Zikri existing before it's founder was even born just feel strange and wrong.

Yea. I newer thought about that one. But it is true.

I don't have Holy Fury so bloodlines aren't available to me, nor do I play pagans normally because I hate Gavelkind.

I very rarely play non-Christian religions, with the only real exception being Zoroastrians but they don't have a lot of good start dates.

But... than you get 0 kingdom scale conquest wars at all. And you have to conquer each kingdom county by county. So how do you run out of children to put on thrones?

That's another thing I hate: the AI is too stupid to work marriage properly. I watch them constantly marry their only daughter and sole heir to some dude who already stands to inherit shit; meaning his son will get both titles, which often happens. Bunch of morons end up driving their own dynasty to extinction because they wouldn't get it up enough to have a son, aren't worth dirt in a swordfight, or pissed off somebody with access to their kitchen.

Yea... the AI ain't so great. But it's a paradox game. We take what we can get.

Agreed. I'm no tyrant unless I'm forced to be in order to save my titles or dynasty, or punish some uppity little brat, but it's always nice to have the option. Thing is the "Tyrant" modifier only lasts so long while, unless you're Catholic, the Kinslayer trait stays with you for life.

Does it really hurt that much though? I don't ever remember having massive problems with it.

You know what? That actually is an interesting objective. I think I'll try that at some point.

You definitively should. It sounds easy at first. But you turn your back on the buggers one moment and half the kingdoms get inherited by non dynastic husbands and usurping rebels and the other half end up blobbing up until no tomorrow. So you constantly have to fiddle around trying to make things neat and orderly.

Bonus points for playing with Elective or Elective Gravelkin succession. Anger inducing, but in the good way.

[The Batavia]

Is MuMu really such a good start as people say?
You start with two vassals: One Norwegian cunt who doesn't do anything and another dude who appears to like me but Always starts a faction no matter what I do. Besides, I can't even hire mercs without going bankrupt and I need that extra manpower because if I don't I won't stand a change in a war against my de jure claim neighbour

[Purpelia]

Is MuMu really such a good start as people say?
You start with two vassals: One Norwegian cunt who doesn't do anything and another dude who appears to like me but Always starts a faction no matter what I do. Besides, I can't even hire mercs without going bankrupt and I need that extra manpower because if I don't I won't stand a change in a war against my de jure claim neighbour

Honestly I have no idea why they say that. In my view the easiest start is Charlemagne - Saxony. You start off as Germanic Pagan (best CB combo in the game) with several extremely strong tribal vassal/allies, a single county sized neutral with a castle/city/temple combo right next to you for easy conquest and later conversion into what ever you want as soon as you feudalize AND in possession of one of the sacred spots for easy reformation. I routinely achieve reforming the Germanic faith within the lifetime of my 1st ruler with that start.

[The Batavia]

Is MuMu really such a good start as people say?
You start with two vassals: One Norwegian cunt who doesn't do anything and another dude who appears to like me but Always starts a faction no matter what I do. Besides, I can't even hire mercs without going bankrupt and I need that extra manpower because if I don't I won't stand a change in a war against my de jure claim neighbour

Honestly I have no idea why they say that. In my view the easiest start is Charlemagne - Saxony. You start off as Germanic Pagan (best CB combo in the game) with several extremely strong tribal vassal/allies, a single county sized neutral with a castle/city/temple combo right next to you for easy conquest and later conversion into what ever you want as soon as you feudalize AND in possession of one of the sacred spots for easy reformation. I routinely achieve reforming the Germanic faith within the lifetime of my 1st ruler with that start.

The problem is that I don't have the Charlemagne DLC.

[Abserdia]

Is MuMu really such a good start as people say?
You start with two vassals: One Norwegian cunt who doesn't do anything and another dude who appears to like me but Always starts a faction no matter what I do. Besides, I can't even hire mercs without going bankrupt and I need that extra manpower because if I don't I won't stand a change in a war against my de jure claim neighbour

Perhaps it was made harder with the update, but I always formed Ireland when starting as it.

[The Huskar Social Union]

Honestly, from what I've seen from YouTube videos it seems hella fun to play Pagan religions (Germanic and Hellenism in particulair). I'm probably gonna buy Holy Fury somewhere in the future.

Carving out a Norse Gaelic empire is a favourite past time of mine.

[Bralia]

Today was probably my most fun session yet. With all of Alba under my control, it was time to find a new goal overseas. I feel like I clashed with the Holy Roman Empire 75% of the time during the session, those bastards tributized the Empire of the Maghreb, the owners of Orthodox Iberia. I wasn't in the mood for any of that crap, regardless of how powerful the HRE is. The HRE had up to double my force limits at times. I ended up taking a play out of their playbook and making tributaries out of the French states in order to compensate and punch up. I'm determined to live out the rest of my years in the game rivaling the HRE hegemony on the continent and pushing the Orthodox out of Iberia.

One of my favorite moments was driving the HREmperor to stress, depression AND lunacy. I'm also responsible for his infection, the idiot thought it was a good idea to duel me.

[The Huskar Social Union]

Cold war mod is kind of fun, but ive found it wont build troops for me. It will give them the equipment, but the training bar will never fill so i have to mass deploy them then try and train them manually after they have been deployed. And it does not seem to be doing anything.

Also lags like fucking mad.

[The Imperial Reach]

Never thought I'd seen an AI form Russia in CK2. The Tsaritsa seems really pleased in her portrait.

>German dynasty
>Cuman portrait
>Russian culture
>Catholic religion

This hurts my eyes.

[The Imperial Reach]

Is MuMu really such a good start as people say?
You start with two vassals: One Norwegian cunt who doesn't do anything and another dude who appears to like me but Always starts a faction no matter what I do. Besides, I can't even hire mercs without going bankrupt and I need that extra manpower because if I don't I won't stand a change in a war against my de jure claim neighbour

Mumu is easy but you have to subscribe to the "early tyrant" strategy.

Basically you attempt to imprison your feudal vassals and, if successful, revoke their titles. If they revolt you'll have to fight them, and if you win you can imprison them and revoke their titles as well. You can increase the chance of a successful imprisonment attempt by having your Marshal suppress revolts in the vassal's capital county. After you've taken their titles, invite new courtiers to hold them if you're over the limit. Since they weren't in your court yet the tyrant modifier won't affect their opinion of you.

I've tried it before; it works pretty well unless you're just really unlucky.

[The Imperial Reach]

But... than you get 0 kingdom scale conquest wars at all. And you have to conquer each kingdom county by county. So how do you run out of children to put on thrones?

You know you can fabricate claims on more than just counties, right? Plus, holy wars. Crusades/Jihads/Great Holy Wars work too.

Does it really hurt that much though? I don't ever remember having massive problems with it.

They changed it in the last update, I believe, so there's now three tiers of Kinslayer.

Dynastic Kinslayer is for distant relatives and incurs a -3 Diplomacy and -15 Dynasty opinion penalty.
Familial Kinslayer for members of your family and incurs a - 4 Diplomacy, -20 Dynasty opinion, and -5 General opinion penalty.
And Kinslayer for close relatives which incurs a -5 Diplomacy, -25 Dynasty opinion, and -10 General opinion penalty.

It's not that bad, but it's certainly not good especially the closer the relation to the relative you slew. Apparently Muslims don't get the trait, as it turns out.

[Sefy the Great]

Not what I was expecting to get after getting into the gist of Holy Fury

[Purpelia]

Honestly I have no idea why they say that. In my view the easiest start is Charlemagne - Saxony. You start off as Germanic Pagan (best CB combo in the game) with several extremely strong tribal vassal/allies, a single county sized neutral with a castle/city/temple combo right next to you for easy conquest and later conversion into what ever you want as soon as you feudalize AND in possession of one of the sacred spots for easy reformation. I routinely achieve reforming the Germanic faith within the lifetime of my 1st ruler with that start.

The problem is that I don't have the Charlemagne DLC.

In that case the next best alternative would be Denmark in the earliest start date. After that the Muslim Caliph in any start date before the Mongols and plague hit.

You know you can fabricate claims on more than just counties, right?

I think it theoretically goes up to duchy level. But you need a god on earth levels of skilled chancellor to do it AND even than I've only had it happen like once or twice in several years of playing. So unless they've changed something massive I'd say that you essentially can't.

Plus, holy wars. Crusades/Jihads/Great Holy Wars work too.

But those take foreeever to kick off. Like properly forever. And that's assuming all goes well and the pope does not get ruined before they do.
Like, am I the only one pissed about the fact that all the other great holy wars are tied into the Crusades? Like, I get it. They wanted to have a fixed start date. But don't tie it to the Catholics who can't survive in 2/3 of the games.

They changed it in the last update, I believe, so there's now three tiers of Kinslayer.

Dynastic Kinslayer is for distant relatives and incurs a -3 Diplomacy and -15 Dynasty opinion penalty.
Familial Kinslayer for members of your family and incurs a - 4 Diplomacy, -20 Dynasty opinion, and -5 General opinion penalty.
And Kinslayer for close relatives which incurs a -5 Diplomacy, -25 Dynasty opinion, and -10 General opinion penalty.

Ouch.

[Impaled Nazarene]

You just seem to have litteraly every issue I have never had in any game beofre. I have often watched as the King of Croatia single handedly wins the first Crusade, I have seen the muslims get BTFO'd out of Iberai every time i plat. I have seen the Byzantine Empire get THICC in almost every game. I have never one seen Isalm spread deep into Eroupe.

Maybe it's because I always start at the Charlemagne start date? Islam has a massive advantage in 769 - more than any other period.

Well first of all, unless I’m EXTREMELY oblivious...

temples do count towards your demesne.
So I have no idea where you got that from.

Also, though a Muslim Hispania does occasionally happen, I’ve seen them get beyond Aquitaine maybe two or three times. Meanwhile, a strong HRE can conquer all of Africa with little to no resistance, the ERE can hold invaders off consistently, the Reconquista usually ends by 1100, and India usually keeps the hordes out unless they strike really early, if you have Turkic Conquerors set to random.

Maybe I was thinking of Tribes? I dunno, I was pretty tired when I wrote that. Still, being able to hold Temples in addition to Baronies is a still an added advantage.

Forget Aquitaine - I've seen the Umayyads go as far as pagan Jutland. No joke. Only ever seen the HRE in North Africa, and even then that's rare. Byz always get wrecked; such is their curse. India pushes out the Muslims every time but only if there's a major kingdom/empire nearby to rival the Abbasids in power; if not, the Caliphate wrecks them too.

Islam being OP really fits with the times though. Aside from several powerful but short eras in Europe the Islamic world was leagues more powerful. It took the Mongols and the Black Death to even the odds. Even then there was a small resurgence with the Ottomans for 200 years or so.

You're exaggerating. The reason the Crusades failed and Byzantium fell was primarily due to infighting and disunity amongst Christians; meaning they failed to pool their strength together and stand united under the same banner. Truth be told, Christians were fighting Christians as much as they were fighting everybody else.

You forget the Sunni Shi'a split was as strong as the Protestant Catholic split centuries later. There was massive infighting and civil unrest during the crusades which gave the crusaders a huge advantage. You forget how populous the middle east was before the plagues and invasions. The military traditions of all these different cultures would be adopted by the Caliphates. Implying Europe would have been stronger if not for the infighting is just Europe bias. Hell by that logic if the Islamic world wasn't open to invasions from powerful steppe empires or infighting then they would have conquered a lot more of Europe. At best it would be a constant back and forth over a few key regions. Even the Romans struggled against the Parthians. East and West have been fighting forever with the west winning because the Ottomans who were once considered the greatest Islamic Empire was its doom.

[Lunas Legion]

Right, I'm bored, and I can't wait for HIP to update.

Give me a start date and a character and an endgame objective PDox thread. First come, first served, ironman only.

[The Transhuman Union]

I decided to play as a Mongol in the 769 start date and exterminate humanity by pillaging every holding in the game.

[Abserdia]

Right, I'm bored, and I can't wait for HIP to update.

Give me a start date and a character and an endgame objective PDox thread. First come, first served, ironman only.

As our good boy Haesteinn of Nantes or Ritz or whatever it’s called, form the Empire of Abyssinia OR Kanem-Bornu OR Mali.

[Lunas Legion]

Right, I'm bored, and I can't wait for HIP to update.

Give me a start date and a character and an endgame objective PDox thread. First come, first served, ironman only.

As our good boy Haesteinn of Nantes or Ritz or whatever it’s called, form the Empire of Abyssinia OR Kanem-Bornu OR Mali.

To Africa we go.

[The Imperial Reach]

Not what I was expecting to get after getting into the gist of Holy Fury

Paradox pls

I think it theoretically goes up to duchy level. But you need a god on earth levels of skilled chancellor to do it AND even than I've only had it happen like once or twice in several years of playing. So unless they've changed something massive I'd say that you essentially can't.

It goes up to kingdom at the very least, but only if you have the "Become King/Queen of X" ambition.

For Duchies you just need a skilled Chancellor and I believe they need to be assigned to the Duchy's de jure capital for it to work.

But those take foreeever to kick off. Like properly forever. And that's assuming all goes well and the pope does not get ruined before they do.
Like, am I the only one pissed about the fact that all the other great holy wars are tied into the Crusades? Like, I get it. They wanted to have a fixed start date. But don't tie it to the Catholics who can't survive in 2/3 of the games.

Fair enough, I suppose. Just more reason why Christian religions need to be buffed. Islam is already overpowered and pagans just got buffed even more (not that they needed it), meanwhile the Dharmics, Mazdans, Christians, and Jews have to scrounge in the gutter in order to survive till the end of the game.

You forget the Sunni Shi'a split was as strong as the Protestant Catholic split centuries later. There was massive infighting and civil unrest during the crusades which gave the crusaders a huge advantage. You forget how populous the middle east was before the plagues and invasions. The military traditions of all these different cultures would be adopted by the Caliphates. Implying Europe would have been stronger if not for the infighting is just Europe bias. Hell by that logic if the Islamic world wasn't open to invasions from powerful steppe empires or infighting then they would have conquered a lot more of Europe. At best it would be a constant back and forth over a few key regions. Even the Romans struggled against the Parthians. East and West have been fighting forever with the west winning because the Ottomans who were once considered the greatest Islamic Empire was its doom.

I'm not forgetting any of that, nor am I biased.

Look into the conflicts between Christian and Muslim states during the Middle Ages, especially the larger ones involving multiple participants. The Muslims are often far more organized and united, whereas the Christians are typically comprised of scheming, ambitious, or cowardly lords who'd sooner beat a Christian of a different sect than work with him. For fucks sake, the Crusaders literally fight against the Byzantines in the Third Crusade. I don't even need to mention the Fourth Crusade. Unless I missed something, Sunni's and Shi'ites were able to unite together to fight the Crusaders and never broke their alliance. The same could not be said for Orthodox and Catholic Christians, as the Crusaders and Byzantines were constantly scheming and betraying each other.

This disunity and failed alliance did in fact hamper the Crusaders' efforts to hold onto the Holy Land and also the Byzantines' efforts to retake lost territory.