Newbie Q's

[REC0N]

-If you hold 10 provinces and your "efficiency" is 100% is there any reason to create a vassal? Does the provinces generate less income when efficiency is under 100%, is loyalty decreased, or is it something else?

-How do you convert pagan provinces?

-What type of traits or skill does the four options of upbringing give? (raise the child yourself, nannies, monks and nobles)

-As a Duke or Count what is the best way to be granted land? (both in war and diplomatically) Haven't been able to achieve anything in a game without being a liege.


Cheers (BTW I'm playing CK vanilla)

 

[REC0N]

2: Conversion in CK takes place via event. There are several ways of going about this: First of all, there is the option of creating a bishopric in that province- bishopric provinces tend to convert faster, if memory serves. Second, hiring a Diocese Bishop with high piety (?) increases the chance of getting an event where he converts the province peacefully. Finally, there is an event which fires relatively often that gives you the option of attempting to convert the province by the sword.

-How do you hire a bishop? (is it only by event?)
-Is the tribute you recieve from your archbishoprics lower?
-I haven't got the "convert the province by sword" events, is there something that triggers it. Such as denying the pagan subjects celebrating holy festivals?



3: Raising the child yourself gives the child the Parental Upbringing trait, and modifies the development of the child according to your ruler's stats (If I remember correctly). It also causes various child-rearing related events to fire, which gives your child various traits based on the choice you pick. Sending your child off to the nannies gives it the Selfish trait (+1 Stewardship, -1 prestige/mo), monks give the Modest trait (-1 prestige, +1 piety), and nobles give the Trusting trait (+1 Diplo, -2 Intrigue).

-So parental upbringing is to prefer if the father of the child have good traits/skills?



4: There is inheritance through marriage, but this tends to be rather luck-based... Unless, of course, you hire assassins to kill off all the other heirs. But that in itself requires a lot of money, and frankly, if you had that much money it would be a simple thing to fund an expedition to grab some land. Your liege, in case you were wondering, will never grant you land, and your best bet is to strike it out by yourself. It is possible to grab land while still being a vassal, but your liege has a nasty tendency to make peace at rather inopportune times, leaving you frustrated and hanging.

-What determines which lord gets the province after a siege? I have far too often lost provinces even though I were the first one to lay siege.

Cheers m8

 

[TempestDK]

-How do you hire a bishop? (is it only by event?)

You need characters with Ecclesiastical education. Those are the only ones who can take the Diocese bishop position at court, and the only ones who can become a landed bishop or Arch-bishop (if you give him a ducal title). If you do not have any, you might want to make sure some of the kids at court get that education. You can also leave the Diocese bishop position empty, and eventually an event fires where the Pope offers you one of his courtiers.

Is the tribute you recieve from your archbishoprics lower?

Generally yes. Bishop vassals also factor your piety into their loyalty modifiers. So unless your piety is negative or you have Heretic or Excommunicated traits, they should be more loyal than other vassals. But if you do have those traits and bad piety, they will be less loyal.

You do, however, get a piety boost when granting a bishopric to a character the first time. This is instead of the reduction in reputation/badboy/infamy. Any subsequent titles you bestow a bishop are treated as a normal count/ducal title.

I haven't got the "convert the province by sword" events, is there something that triggers it. Such as denying the pagan subjects celebrating holy festivals?

Raise the class power for nobility. Above 33% for both, and the MTTH for the Convert by the sword will drop. The event can fire for any class, but the conversion chance is lower for the other classes.

So parental upbringing is to prefer if the father of the child have good traits/skills?

That depends on what kind of traits you want him/her to have. They do get other traits during their upbringing, and Modest gives higher chance for certain traits, and Selfish for other traits. Some have complained that the events you get during Parental Upbringing are not very good. Also remember that the piety/prestige loss mentioned by Sylon are per year, not per month, and that Parental Upbringing costs a lot of money, and you ruler risks losing health and/or fertility (if I remember right).

What determines which lord gets the province after a siege? I have far too often lost provinces even though I were the first one to lay siege.

in CK vanilla they one with the highest rank gets the siege. So if you are a count and your King comes in just before the siege ends, then he takes the province. This changed in DV (which I would strongly recommend you get), where the firt to arrive got the siege. Though if the army had no commander, the next guy would take control. Any army you personally controlled would take control for you. So if you took control of your Count's army, then you would get control, not the count in command of the army.

 

[REC0N]

Tak for det

 

[TempestDK]

Det var så lidt

I can see though, that I misread the second question about tribute. I read it as loyalty, whch is why my answer pertains to loyalty. The tribute they pay is the same as for other vassals. Though I find it better to set Scutage to 0 for the loyalty boost I get, and the increase in vassal troops.

 

[TheBromgrev]

As the proud new owner of CK: DV, via PI's very nice CK giveaway (thanks Paradox!), I have a question. Which country is a good starter nation? I tried the Kievan Rus, and that turned out to be a bad idea (no surprise there given the mess Russian politics was pre-Mongols). So, which nation is a good starter one for a n00b? France? England? One of the Spanish counties? Obviously the HRE, the various Russian princes, and Roman Empire (Byzantium in-game) are bad choices due to internal conflicts, so what's a good choice?

 

[TheTjord]

Apulia (it is easy to form the kingdom), Poland (lot of pagan neighbours), maybe France (lot of rich provinces, once you expand your domain you'll be probably unstoppable)

 

[Winchester]

Apulia (it is easy to form the kingdom)

I have found Apulia incredibly frustrating as the Italian states really hate each other. It is indeed reasonably easy to form the Kingdom of Sicily (you need to put a little thought into timing your attacks on your muslim neighbours - you cannot afford to fight the three of them at once), but Toscana and Pisa will then never let you alone, and as the Papal Controller starts off as Tuscany you will get Excommunicated to boot. Even if the Papal Controller changes you will be lucky to lose this, and if the controller passes back to an Italian state they will Excommunicate you again.

The Kingdom of Sweden is a good choice, with the option of expanding in Finland and the pagan Baltic should you choose. The Irish Dukedoms are useful for getting to know the mechanics in a fairly peaceful corner of the world while still having options to expand. If you're looking for something more exciting, you might want to consider one of the Iberian kingdoms. There's the possibility you might get backstabbed by one of your relatives (All the Iberian kingdoms have claims on each others' lands) but if you manage to succeed, you can unite the subcontinent and finish the Reconquista.

I fuly recommend the Irish dukedoms.
Castille and Léon are rather tricky for exactly the reason Sylon mentions and I found Barcelona far easier going. Aragon would be an alternative but I think Barcelona is probably easier despite being only a Dukedom.

 

[TempestDK]

I would say stay away from Iberia for the first games, as you will make mistakes, and that area is very unforgiving about mistakes. As soon as your turn your back to either one of the other christians or the muslims, they will strike.

Small kingdoms like Poland, Denmark or Sweden are good, or larger duchies like Apulia and Bohemia. Ireland can be fun too, but a bit limited initially as the income is not great.

 

[Planck]

Hi, I also got the game yesterday through the newsletter. I have a question about culture.

I've been trying to play the Duchy of Apulia according to a recommendation in the sticky thread (Tutorial), and I managed to form the Kingdom of Sicily. But I didn't pay much attention and ended up making some mistakes and having some questions.

1. All my kids are married, and unfortunately not to Italian or Greek nobles. So I reckon their children will never be of the provincial cultures, and I really want to convert Sicily to a culture that is not Arab (any culture, but preferably Norman). How do I do that, having my rulers as "foreigners"?

2. I married one daughter away to a courtier in the Duchy of Brandenburg. She died suddenly, but had a son before (with the surname of its father).
a) Will he be any useful to me?
b) If not, is there any advantage in marrying away daughters?
c) If I want them to stay in my court, is it possible to get men to come to my court after marriage? This is related to the next question...

3. Being a kingdom, my court is pretty empty. Some people died, other left. Several positions are unoccupied, and I can't seem to get anyone that is not from my family (they already have counties and duchies). How do I get 'new' people as courtiers, that is those without my surname, to help me?

Thanks in advance

 

[TempestDK]

Hi, I also got the game yesterday through the newsletter. I have a question about culture.

I've been trying to play the Duchy of Apulia according to a recommendation in the sticky thread (Tutorial), and I managed to form the Kingdom of Sicily. But I didn't pay much attention and ended up making some mistakes and having some questions.

1. All my kids are married, and unfortunately not to Italian or Greek nobles. So I reckon their children will never be of the provincial cultures, and I really want to convert Sicily to a culture that is not Arab (any culture, but preferably Norman). How do I do that, having my rulers as "foreigners"?

2. I married one daughter away to a courtier in the Duchy of Brandenburg. She died suddenly, but had a son before (with the surname of its father).
a) Will he be any useful to me?
b) If not, is there any advantage in marrying away daughters?
c) If I want them to stay in my court, is it possible to get men to come to my court after marriage? This is related to the next question...

3. Being a kingdom, my court is pretty empty. Some people died, other left. Several positions are unoccupied, and I can't seem to get anyone that is not from my family (they already have counties and duchies). How do I get 'new' people as courtiers, that is those without my surname, to help me?

Thanks in advance

1) There is a small chance the kids will take the culture of the province. I think it is something like 70% chance of father's culture, 15% of mother's culture and 15% of capital province culture.

There are events that change culture, but they are difficult to trigger. You will need to be at peace a lot and give high power % to Burghers and Nobles (above 33% gives bonus to MTTH for conversion events). I'll check to see if I can find one of the threads on the subject.

2)
a)He is of no use to your dynasty. he can actually be a threat if you have Semi-salic inheritance laws, as he could potentially inherit, if you run out of male heirs. You cannot inherit anything through him.

b) Money and prestige when marrying away the oldest daughter. I think it also gives a relationship boost to that realm (not sure though). For younger daughters, I tend to marry them to courtiers, so I have amble supply of courtiers later on that are not of my dynasty.

c) No, the girls always leave to stay with their husband. So the only way to have them stay and produce babies in your court, is to marry them to courtiers. The only time the husband joins her court, is if she is a ruler.

3) See above ... A good trick can be to keep your Diocese Bishop position open. You can get an event where the pope will then send one of his to your court. You don't have to let him be Bishop and if you leave it open, he will eventually send more.

Also there is a minimum number of courtiers allowed at a court. As a King it is 5 I think. This includes children and spouses also. If it ever falls below 5, the game will generate a random courtier for you.

You can also gain some that lose their realm. So sometimes you will suddenly see the influx of a whole family to your court ... whether you want them or not.

Edit: Here is the link to the cultural conversion thread: http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?355258-Cultural-Conversion

 

[Blastaz]

I have found Apulia incredibly frustrating as the Italian states really hate each other. It is indeed reasonably easy to form the Kingdom of Sicily (you need to put a little thought into timing your attacks on your muslim neighbours - you cannot afford to fight the three of them at once), but Toscana and Pisa will then never let you alone, and as the Papal Controller starts off as Tuscany you will get Excommunicated to boot. Even if the Papal Controller changes you will be lucky to lose this, and if the controller passes back to an Italian state they will Excommunicate you again.

I have been playing around with Apulia to try to remember what I could from back in the day and find out what DV changed, and it's been pretty easy. Grand mobilisation allowed me to beat down all three of the moors in Sicilly right out the bat, and you start with claims on 2 of the 3 independents in Naples, and more than enough prestige to claim the 3rd. After I'd got the money back to form my Kingdom I was able to set up a de Hautville in each of the four Neapolitan dukedoms, my OCD really kicked in there ., while keeping Sicilly for myself. A mass attack on Malta picked that up for me as well.

I've had no problem with excumunication though I'm tempted to blow 800 prestegie before my king dies and annex the pope. What exactlly are the consequences I will face for doing that?

 

[unmerged(109046)]

I've had no problem with excumunication though I'm tempted to blow 800 prestegie before my king dies and annex the pope. What exactlly are the consequences I will face for doing that?

The pope will get back in some backwater province in Germany (most likely in Germany) and be very, very cross (read: have claims back on Rome). At least that's what always happened to me.

 

[Blastaz]

The pope will get back in some backwater province in Germany (most likely in Germany) and be very, very cross (read: have claims back on Rome). At least that's what always happened to me.

Will I get constantly excomunicated, or can i just war him again and make him give his claims up?

 

[unmerged(109046)]

Will I get constantly excomunicated, or can i just war him again and make him give his claims up?

I'm not sure on this part, I rarely pursued Pope all the way to Germany, and when I did kick him out, I wasn't catholic usually - so I didn't bother with excommunications. But I hear it's generally a bad idea to get on the wrong side with the Pope.

 

[Veldmaarschalk]

Will I get constantly excomunicated, or can i just war him again and make him give his claims up?

As long as the Pope holds a province and you are not at war with him, he won't excommunicate you for holding Rome.

If the Papacy has totally disappeared and you hold Rome (as a catholic) then an event will fire, where the Pope asks Rome back. If you refuse you will get excommunicated.

If you go to war against the Pope, there is a chance that you will get excommunicated.

The Pope (if the Papacy exists) won't go to war against you, for holding Rome. He is just a 1-province minor and won't declare war on anyone who is stronger or not a direct neighbour. There is no need for you to go to war against him to force him to give up his claims. In fact if you do go to war against him. it is better to allow him to keep his claims, since this will give you more prestige.

This of course only applies if you are a catholic, what happened to Kalontas only happened to him because he was an orthodox. And the Pope won't ask Rome back if it is not held by a catholic.

 

[NGAC]

What is a good independent Duchy to start off as in the Balkans? If there are any there at all, that is.

 

[TheBromgrev]

OK, I noticed something kinda odd. Continuing my Kiev game a little longer, I was asked by the pope to join a crusade. But Kiev is orthodox, so they don't care what the pope thinks, they barely follow the Patriarch of Constantinople. Is the pope demanding an orthodox nation join the crusade an oversight or intended?

 

[Veldmaarschalk]

What is a good independent Duchy to start off as in the Balkans? If there are any there at all, that is.

Try Dioclea

 

[TempestDK]

OK, I noticed something kinda odd. Continuing my Kiev game a little longer, I was asked by the pope to join a crusade. But Kiev is orthodox, so they don't care what the pope thinks, they barely follow the Patriarch of Constantinople. Is the pope demanding an orthodox nation join the crusade an oversight or intended?

I think all nations will know when there is a crusade, but Orthodox rulers do not lose Piety to Crusade expectations. So that simulates that the Orthodox don't really care what the Pope orders