A Grand Finale/ Absolute Chaos CK2 Game / AAR

[TheButterflyComposer]

This has been semi-disucssed in The Butterfly Effect and elsewhere but as the last AAR planning thread actually worked quite well for my idea storage, here's the new one.

CK2 is seemingly complete as of the launch of CK3 and not going to be added to further. This therefore seems an ideal time to reflect, celebrate and bask in the absolute madness/genius of a very good and memorable game that has launched the AAR careers of several hundred writers (including myself).

It is also a perfect time to indulge the sheer insanity of how mental the game got in the end updates with mystical, magical events, dragons, Welsh bears etc. etc.

So, I propose an AAR to record the game at its absolute peak: a shattered world, one county max start, with randomised cultures and religions all over the map, magical and absurd events cranked up to maximum, all outside context invasions set to max, difficulty ramped to insanity...

And we watch/switch around at random per lifetime of the ruler.

I have a few default thoughts on the world start however:

1) the above, everything on and switched to maximum. The absolute most crazy start possible with nothing making sense until well into the game.

2) the randomness toned down a little. Relgions map with their cultures, animal kingdom turned off (no animal characters ruling by default, though could still happen by random event). The world is chaotic but slightly easier to make sense of.

3) the world as we would recngise it in 769, cultures and religions in the right place...just a random and unexplained calamity has caused a collapse into one county minors for everyone. No set kingdoms, or empires. A fresh start for everyone, with just the established tools each county has to see what would happen in a timeline similar but divergent to our own.

Thoughts?

 

[Idhrendur]

My inclination is for #2.

 

[Wraith11B]

I'm down.

Just realized that this was a vote system: I'd go with #2 as well.

 

[stnylan]

I think number 2 as well.

 

[HistoryDude]

Number 2 sounds best to me as well...

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

Ok 2 is winning out quite well so let's get into that one.

How the shattered world works is that everything is individually up for customisation. Counties will stay the same as will duchies, however kingdoms can be randomised to be made up of a varying number of (base game) duchies (and wow does autocorrect keep wanting to change that to duckies), and the same either empires in regards to kingdom numbers.

This means in theory you can have quite random looking kingdoms and empires established, though in our game these will just be suggestions for the AI to shoot towards (everyone will start off with a single county, no one holds any other rank).

Cultures meanwhile, if not set to full random, tend to match with their family group. We would see for example the west germanic group together, so English, Anglo-Saxon etc. I also think we should open it up to dead cultures because why not? Have a random Roman culture county in there next to the Greeks.

It's been a while, but I think religion does map to the culture groups in makes sense for them to be with, unless you fully randomise.

In essence, we could see, for example, German culture throughout India, with their branch of Christianity/paganism depending on timeline, whilst the norse in Mali worship the old gods, and the San people of Great Britian are animalist.

So, some questions:

1) how large and small can/should kingdoms be? What range of number of duchies should be included?
2) same for empires, bearing in mind some kingdoms may be much smaller or larger than others. This will thus produce varying empire sizes.
3) cultures. Are we going for culture groups together, and relgions matching?
4) and should we revive dead religions and cultures if we can, without fully randomising the groups as in Q3?

One last point:

It is possible to 'level the playing field' and make every county contain the same number of building slots, tech level at start, set the inheritance law to be the same for everyone at start, and/or keep it the same as the historical map/what would make sense for that culture at that time.

Should this be kept historical to essentially simulate the 'natural' centres of power, or should we randomise or level the playing field for the start?

 

[Wraith11B]

1) 4-5 counties per duchy, 4-8 duchies per kingdom? Perhaps 500 possible duchies and 100 kingdoms?

2) maybe 30 empires?

3) go wild with it. Gives a good chance for fun backstory that aids a deeper story!

4) Absolutely. Why is this even a question?!

I'd definitely level the playing field, within reason. There has to be something that people are driving towards, which is up to you to direct the story. I'd say that it wouldn't be fun if it's just a repaint of the map.

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

1) 4-5 counties per duchy, 4-8 duchies per kingdom? Perhaps 500 possible duchies and 100 kingdoms?

Alas, I do not think duchies can be randomised in this way. Someone no doubt has tried to mod this though...

Those are some huge potential kingdoms, which may or may not be unbalanced, but that might be fun too.

I'd definitely level the playing field, within reason. There has to be something that people are driving towards, which is up to you to direct the story. I'd say that it wouldn't be fun if it's just a repaint of the map.

I'm thinking playing in one place for the lifetime of a ruler, or for 50 years or something like that, then random switching to somewhere else. Can come up with challenges for the specific situation as and when. If a Jewish ruler spawns close ish to the middle east, have them try to recreate the biblical kingdom of Israel etc.

 

[Idhrendur]

No opinion on these settings.

 

[El Pip]

Ok 2 is winning out quite well so let's get into that one.

As @nuclearslurpee would say, cowards.

1) how large and small can/should kingdoms be? What range of number of duchies should be included?

Largest possible range, utterly unbalanced massive kingdoms which should be as unstable as possible and collapse the moment there is a less than very-strong leader.

2) same for empires, bearing in mind some kingdoms may be much smaller or larger than others. This will thus produce varying empire sizes.

As for 1.

3) cultures. Are we going for culture groups together, and relgions matching?

No, keep it random to help with the massive instability of everything.

4) and should we revive dead religions and cultures if we can, without fully randomising the groups as in Q3?

Definitely include dead cultures, religions, languages, beasts and anything else that can be turned on.

Should this be kept historical to essentially simulate the 'natural' centres of power, or should we randomise or level the playing field for the start?

Keep the historic centres, it will help to make the random empires more uncanny if they are in the same sort of place as historic powers while being different in every other significant detail.


Should this actually happen I may have to dump my upcoming CK-ish work into the CK3 area, though as it is very much nearer to being a Fan Fiction as opposed to an AAR (not least due to their being no actual game involved) this should not be a problem.

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

Largest possible range, utterly unbalanced massive kingdoms which should be as unstable as possible and collapse the moment there is a less than very-strong leader.

As for 1.

I will have to test this to see if it actually leads to this result. If it does, yes.

Keep the historic centres, it will help to make the random empires more uncanny if they are in the same sort of place as historic powers while being different in every other significant detail.

This makes sense as well.

Should this actually happen I may have to dump my upcoming CK-ish work into the CK3 area, though as it is very much nearer to being a Fan Fiction as opposed to an AAR (not least due to their being no actual game involved) this should not be a problem.

Depends on what you're thinking, I guess? They are quite different games when it comes down to it, tonally and to some degree mechanically as well. CK2 is bloodthirsty and exceedingly nasty AI wise, whereas CK3 is very concerned with individual characters and building a narrative around them all interacting together all of the time.

 

[Specialist290]

My two ducats:

1) how large and small can/should kingdoms be? What range of number of duchies should be included?
2) same for empires, bearing in mind some kingdoms may be much smaller or larger than others. This will thus produce varying empire sizes.
3) cultures. Are we going for culture groups together, and relgions matching?
4) and should we revive dead religions and cultures if we can, without fully randomising the groups as in Q3?

1 & 2. No particular preferences here.
3. Max randomness FTW!
4. Yes to dead religions and cultures, absolutely!

Additional suggested game rules:

• Mongol Invasion, Turkic Conquerors, Sunset Invasion - All Random
• Exclave Independence - Harsh
• Provincial Revolt Strength - Extremely Powerful (churn and burn!)
• Defensive Pacts - Off (because I hate this mechanic)
• Gender Equality - All (because why not?)
• Supernatural & Absurd Events - Both Unrestricted
• De Jure Requirement - Required (I never play without this)
• Raiding & Dueling - Both Unrestricted
• Major Epidemics - Dynamic (I think Deadly is a little too deadly)
• Minor Epidemics & Non-Epidemic Diseases - Both More

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

Mmm. Yes, good suggestions.

My two ducats:

1 & 2. No particular preferences here.
3. Max randomness FTW!
4. Yes to dead religions and cultures, absolutely!

Additional suggested game rules:

• Mongol Invasion, Turkic Conquerors, Sunset Invasion - All Random
• Exclave Independence - Harsh
• Provincial Revolt Strength - Extremely Powerful (churn and burn!)
• Defensive Pacts - Off (because I hate this mechanic)
• Gender Equality - All (because why not?)
• Supernatural & Absurd Events - Both Unrestricted
• De Jure Requirement - Required (I never play without this)
• Raiding & Dueling - Both Unrestricted
• Major Epidemics - Dynamic (I think Deadly is a little too deadly)
• Minor Epidemics & Non-Epidemic Diseases - Both More

 

[TheButterflyComposer]

Okay! Figured out a vague arching or framing device/starter plot. I'll start off the earliest start date in Lancaster County, and redo Elfwine Lamcaster, Christopher Fallows and Local Torturer Stephen Hack as they try to rebuild something out of a world gone mad. Then after a lifetime (or let's say max 70 years given its Elfwine and he may end up immortal or regenerating/reincarnating) of them we can randomly switch to somewhere else on the map and do 50 year chunks (or one ruler lifetime, whichever is shorter) around the map.

I say start in England because of the entire map, its rhe least likely to be interesting later on due to just being...y'know, an island chain where one kingdom invariably inevitably takes over everything. May well be proven wrong this run though...