The Holy Roman Empire in Crusader Kings II

[Jia Xu]

How do you think the Holy Roman Empire should be handled in Crusader Kings II? Should "Holy Roman Emperor" simply be just another title you can create for yourself if you have the right provinces, or should it be more of an institution like it is in Europa Universalis III with electors and the like?

 

[sumdood]

More like EU3 I hope.

 

[Gwyn ap Nud]

This was one of CK1's great failings, imho. HRE wasn't actually represented at all, it was just someone holding the titles of Burgundy, Germany, and Italy, sometimes Bohemia. It was disappointing.

 

[Teep]

More like EU3 I hope.

As has been said, this isnt really possible as the Golden Bull of 1356 which defined the roles for EU3 electors wasn't in place for most if not all of the startdates which could potentially happen.

 

[Jia Xu]

As has been said, this isnt really possible as the Golden Bull of 1356 which defined the roles for EU3 electors wasn't in place for most if not all of the startdates which could potentially happen.

Does it have to be? Via the beauty and glory of the Clausewitz engine you could make it into a decisions, yes? Having things locked into certain dates via events seems really outdated, in my opinion. Building up the Holy Roman Empire from its Carolingian roots to what it is in EU3 could happen over the course of half a dozen decisions which the player could work toward. "Renovatio Romanorum Imperii" and all of that other good stuff.

 

[Teep]

Does it have to be? Via the beauty and glory of the Clausewitz engine you could make it into a decisions, yes? Having things locked into certain dates via events seems really outdated, in my opinion. Building up the Holy Roman Empire from its Carolingian roots to what it is in EU3 could happen over the course of half a dozen decisions which the player could work toward. "Renovatio Romanorum Imperii" and all of that other good stuff.

I am not saying it would be impossible for the system to be developed through events/decisions, I am saying that there would be a requirement to change the methods to something more realistic for the period of the game start which allows an easiky understood mechanic and stability for the whole system (ie no constant cival wars, etc).

 

[Veldmaarschalk]

Does it have to be? Via the beauty and glory of the Clausewitz engine you could make it into a decisions, yes? Having things locked into certain dates via events seems really outdated, in my opinion. Building up the Holy Roman Empire from its Carolingian roots to what it is in EU3 could happen over the course of half a dozen decisions which the player could work toward. "Renovatio Romanorum Imperii" and all of that other good stuff.

But when you start in 1066, you really don't need to built up the HRE to what it was in EU3. Since you would have to take several steps backwards (from a players point of view), to get into the situation of what the HRE is at the start of EU3.

 

[Caranorn]

I think the HRE should indeed find special treatment in CK-II. As I tried to explain in another topic, german kings often spent much of their rule trying to a) gain control of Italy to be crowned Emperor and b) maintain control of Germany while they were thus busy in Italy. Many german kings or Emperors also had anti-kings (suported by the pope, or the old german tribes) waging more or less open (civil)war against them...

 

[telesien]

But when you start in 1066, you really don't need to built up the HRE to what it was in EU3. Since you would have to take several steps backwards (from a players point of view), to get into the situation of what the HRE is at the start of EU3.

Right the state od HRE we know from EU3 is a result of excommunication and special rule of Stupor Mundi himself. That led to loss of central power.

 

[Gwyn ap Nud]

There may have been many differences between the HRE in EU3 era and HRE in CK era, but the EU3 HRE model felt much better than the CK model. I'm confident that whatever Paradox comes up with, we'll be happy with, though. A lot of features are probably going to be built from the ground up. I'm not expecting simply a re-make of CK, like V2 was a remake of Vicky. I'm expecting a completely new game built on the same principals.

 

[unmerged(63836)]

I hope that it will be just like any other realm when it comes to mechanics, perhaps with some special decisions. With start at 1066 HRE is not predetermined to become more decentralised like in EU3 period. There is no chance that this game will return to EU2 style determinism.

 

[SAS]

One word .....Flavor.

 

[Arizal]

I think that would be a mistake to give a special governement to HRE in 1066. In this game, all countries should be able to decentralize itself like HRE historically did. France was not far to the state of HRE, at the beginning, and Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire) was far more centralized until 4th crusade.

I actually think (pretty extreme for me) that HRE should not be represented like it even in EU3, but that any countries should be able to take this path to a slow destruction by decentralization and appearance of local nobles who are more powerful than the king/emperor.

 

[unmerged(28057)]

One word .....Flavor.

...Flav. Yeah boyyy!

 

[RedRooster81]

There may have been many differences between the HRE in EU3 era and HRE in CK era, but the EU3 HRE model felt much better than the CK model. I'm confident that whatever Paradox comes up with, we'll be happy with, though. A lot of features are probably going to be built from the ground up. I'm not expecting simply a re-make of CK, like V2 was a remake of Vicky. I'm expecting a completely new game built on the same principals.

I think that you should be able to centralize or decentralize because of a weak monarch, widespread rebellion (meeting rebel demands), or things like excommunication. That's sort of what happened at the beginning of the Investiture Controversy, when Henry IV (Heinrich von Franken from CK 1066 scenario) came to the throne at age 6. His father had given away a lot of the royal demesne to Swabia and Carinthia and a long regency shook things up. Then Henry declared his majority, tried to depose Gregory VII, and set up an antipope. It could have gone differently, because a lot of human and less random variables were in place. What Henry and other emperors wanted was essentially what the emperor in Constantinople already had, a centralized state and caesaropapism, the Holy Grail (no pun intended) of medieval and early modern absolute monarchs.

 

[Cèsar de Quart]

Yes, RedRooster has a good point.

Why is everyone so eager for a EUIII-like Holy Roman Empire? Don't you see that it's a decay version of the Ottonid empire? No player would like to play a set of decisions that would make his power base and capacities weaker and weaker until his authority becomes almost worthless.

I think that the HRE needs four basic things in CKII:

1 - The Pope has to crown the Emperor, and the subsequent Antipope and Antiking features. Which means that there can be a period with no Emperor.

2 - Conflict between the Pope and the Emperor. The Imperial crown should have special features regarding religion, and a series of decisions would allow the player to become Frederick Barbarossa and stand for your dominium over the Christian World and the Pope.

3 - Imperial Diets to elect the next Rex Romanorum. You could easily control them if you have a strong king and also wide support (or Pope's support), but if you don't... another one will be elected King of the Romans and will probably try to fight you, even though you're the Emperor.

4 - Decay. When the Emperor is weak, the HRE starts becoming more and more like EUIII HRE.

***

Also, I never liked rebellions in CK. They were too weak. I mean, there can be weak rebellions, but when the Duke of Saxony and the Duke of Swabia rebell against the Emperor... God, they were usually crushed with little effort. Rebellions need to be something fearful.

 

[Gwyn ap Nud]

y'know, I'd be perfectly happy as long as the next Emperor didn't steal all of Bohemia just because I happened to own it. If there is such thing as an Imperial Demesne, it should be seperate somehow from what the Emperor owns as Duke of Saxony, for example. This should be possible. After all, Magna Mundi manages to do it, somehow.

 

[.Spartan]

I also feel the HRE should indeed find special treatment in CK-II.

 

[Veldmaarschalk]

y'know, I'd be perfectly happy as long as the next Emperor didn't steal all of Bohemia just because I happened to own it.

You could make creating the 'title' king of Bohemia a decision and then limit that decision so that it can only be made by a duke or count or if you want other kings to be able to create the title, then only make it so that the holder of the 'HRE' title isn't able to do it.

 

[wobbit]

Yes, RedRooster has a good point.

Why is everyone so eager for a EUIII-like Holy Roman Empire? Don't you see that it's a decay version of the Ottonid empire? No player would like to play a set of decisions that would make his power base and capacities weaker and weaker until his authority becomes almost worthless.

I think that the HRE needs four basic things in CKII:

1 - The Pope has to crown the Emperor, and the subsequent Antipope and Antiking features. Which means that there can be a period with no Emperor.

2 - Conflict between the Pope and the Emperor. The Imperial crown should have special features regarding religion, and a series of decisions would allow the player to become Frederick Barbarossa and stand for your dominium over the Christian World and the Pope.

3 - Imperial Diets to elect the next Rex Romanorum. You could easily control them if you have a strong king and also wide support (or Pope's support), but if you don't... another one will be elected King of the Romans and will probably try to fight you, even though you're the Emperor.

4 - Decay. When the Emperor is weak, the HRE starts becoming more and more like EUIII HRE.

***

Also, I never liked rebellions in CK. They were too weak. I mean, there can be weak rebellions, but when the Duke of Saxony and the Duke of Swabia rebell against the Emperor... God, they were usually crushed with little effort. Rebellions need to be something fearful.

While I'm very reluctant to use the term "decay" (there's actually a fair bit of work saying the elected emperors of the EU period had several advantages over the hereditary emperors of the CK period) I would like to see some mechanism that would allow the HRE to change from its 1066 form to it's 1453/1499 form (or indeed back to it's 800 form... but that's another post). I think you've touched on most of the salient points about the HRE. There needs to be some system that determines the importance of papal support, aristocratic support (ie elections, I include the bishops of Germany in this) and blood ties to the previous emperor (I don't think this last one has been mentioned). This would be a dynamic system that could change according to the power of the emperor, pope and nobility of the empire as well as based on events. It would start with the power of inheritance being of prime import, but with a situation that could very quickly make either of the other factors have much more impact. What if Henry IV dies in 1067 without heir? If the papacy is strong enough then it could take a swing at declaring a new emperor. Otherwise, it would fall to the nobles. Either way it would have important consequences for the election of sunsequent emperors.

I would like to see a similar dynamic with the succession of all kings (and thiinking about it, all secular and ecclesiastic nobility). While the bloodline ran strong and son followed father then it was hard for the nobility or pope to intervene in the creation of kings. But if the royal branch died out, then there was much more wriggle room for these groups, again with important consequences for following successions. A similar situation can be found for dukes, counts and bishops.

Of course, this would greatly increase the complexity of the game, so it's probably best reserved for the emperor and other kery positions.