Ashina the Lightbringer - Nomad Run in 769

[jwalche]

I have been playing with Khazaria in 769 for a while, and I think I have a good sense of how to become the world power with it.

The goal of the game is collecting as many bloodlines and artifacts as possible, while changing government from Nomadic -> Tribal -> Feudal and religion from Tengri -> Religious Fluidity -> Catholic.

Almost or full WC is necessary to collect some bloodlines. While I won't go beeline for the fastest WC, I won't purposely delay it either. You may still find that my progress is faster than average.

Note that. I have all DLC, but no mod, and the game was started with all settings as default and Ironman with achievement enabled.

Let's Start with our ruler Khagan Baghatur of Khazaria. He has unusually good stats. I am very happy with him, although I will probably play only first 3 months or so with him.

Before we go any further, let me show you a screenshot of the current date, so you can get a pretty good idea of what kind of run this is going to be. We have some decent expansion in 7 months and 17 days. As I said earlier, I won't purposely slow down the conquest.

 

[Monturiol]

"Decent expansion in 7 months and 14 days, okay, let's see the world screensh-ohwhatthefucaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"

 

[jwalche]

I invited some noble women and waited 14 days, so that I can make them my concubines and get a few hundred prestige. I wanted to have the prestige to revoke counties from my vassal khans before granting them independence.

Made all three of my former khans independent, after spliting a new khan from one.

And from him, full 8 new khans have been created! By the way, we are now Christians so that we can invite some Christian ladies and gentlemen.

Each new clan comes with a 500 men horde and 100 ducats. And there can be up to 4 girls who I can take as my concubines for 100 prestige each. It's not much. But Nomads start so poor so I need this.

After some killings, I ended up with some seed money, a decent horde, and huge negative piety. All a day's work.

 

[jwalche]

Ashina starts as bloodthirsty warriors and we need some enemies to crush. The three former vassals are good, but not enough. Let's create more enemies. By granting them independence, and executing them afterward, I can declare wars right away. Humiliation CB is great for both prestige and population. We need 10k pop to subjugate Byzantine and 30k pop to spam invasion wars.

First ambition is achieved!

And now we are fighting with a bunch of former vassal clans. They are all considered as "external" wars for bloodline. But he won't create a bloodline until his grandson and son create one each first.

 

[jwalche]

Meanwhile, we got our hands on a couple of tribal counties for the first time. It provides what is vitally necessary to expand our realm - HOLDINGS!

I gave the tribal holding to a Christian gentleman who I recently invited, an unlanded son of a count, and brother of 3 French counts!

After that, I gave the county to a vassal khan, so the tribal baron became the khan's vassal, before absorbing the khan's clan.

That gives the county to the tribal baron, and made him a count so that I can give him a ducal title. I created two of them in the middle of my initial tyranny for this purpose.

When I executed my new vassal duke, his brother count inherited the duchy. Because what he had inherited was of higher rank, the brother is now my vassal. And those highlighted former french counties are now mine!

Now that I have a feudal vassal duke, I transfered him to my next khan to absorb. This way, the khan's former nomadic khan title becomes a permanent titular king title for me to use in so many ways!

There is an art in imprisoning and executing. Don't kill them all. Save the girls by making them my concubines while executing their father and brothers. I save piety for spilling less Christian blood, and I get some prestige as well.

After executing all the invited Christian ladies and gentleman, I have a decent presence in Christian world. Executing Lombardy's tributary made me a tributary.

 

[jwalche]

I have just enough population to Subjugate Byzantine!

Meanwhile, I got some coastal counties with cities, and made a few republic counts. I can make one merchant republic by giving a ducal or kingdom title.

Let's imprison the MR safely while he is still a vassal of my vassal khan.

When a patrician family dies out, a new family with just one member rises with 300 ducats. By keep executing the patricians, I can make the Grand Mayor to collect all the ducats, and inherit it from him. For details of this exploit, please read my other postings.

I will do it three times for 100 patricians each. The first 30k ducats will be for me. And I will make two imprisoned courtiers with 30k ducats each, for my successors to collect with a banishment.

 

[jwalche]

Sometimes you get an important vassal like this one with a bloodline to collect. The problem is, when you revoke all his titles to make him a courtier, he moves to another court even though he is in your dungeon.

This solution is an African lady that I favor invited. If he is not too old (something like under 50, and not married, you can make him your courtier again by offering him as a consort to your African courtier lady.

Then you can release their consortage by taking the lady as your concubine.

As the Lightbringer of the world, I don't want to pillage. But pillaging some tribal holdings in the beginning is just necessary to get that 30k population without taking forever.

Meanwhile, our realm has expanded a little bit more.

This concludes Chapter 1 of our great journey.

 

[Monturiol]

Meanwhile, we got our hands on a couple of tribal counties for the first time. It provides what is vitally necessary to expand our realm - HOLDINGS!

I gave the tribal holding to a Christian gentleman who I recently invited, an unlanded son of a count, and brother of 3 French counts!

After that, I gave the county to a vassal khan, so the tribal baron became the khan's vassal, before absorbing the khan's clan.

That gives the county to the tribal baron, and made him a count so that I can give him a ducal title. I created two of them in the middle of my initial tyranny for this purpose.

When I executed my new vassal duke, his brother count inherited the duchy. Because what he had inherited was of higher rank, the brother is now my vassal. And those highlighted former french counties are now mine!

Now that I have a feudal vassal duke, I transfered him to my next khan to absorb. This way, the khan's former nomadic khan title becomes a permanent titular king title for me to use in so many ways!

I am learning more exploits in the first hour of this AAR than I've learnt in the past year, so thanks for that. Can I ask you, great Jedi master, to go over this one again in a little more detail? In my own game I'm currently stuck with one very annoying county that keeps flipping back to independent tribal every succession and I want to know the exact process to make it stop. This looks like it's close to the solution I need...

 

[jwalche]

I am learning more exploits in the first hour of this AAR than I've learnt in the past year, so thanks for that. Can I ask you, great Jedi master, to go over this one again in a little more detail? In my own game I'm currently stuck with one very annoying county that keeps flipping back to independent tribal every succession and I want to know the exact process to make it stop. This looks like it's close to the solution I need...

I think your issue is low vassal limit and too many vassals. It has nothing to do with Nomad.

Still, you can find all my exploits from my past posts. Everything is explained in detail.

14 Months WC in Ironman.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/july-1-769-holy-roman-empire-found.1255761/

And previous trials with detailed instructions.
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...inal-abbasid-speed-run.1167700/#post-25358923

 

[jwalche]

What's coming up in Chapter 2;

A Large Nomadic Fleet from Each Mayor for free;

Imprison Tibet's Heir without sending your army. (For 50% war score when you start Subjugation war later, or to prevent them from attacking you)

 

[terr0rizm]

This gives me literal headaches for more than one reason.

 

[jwalche]

This gives me literal headaches for more than one reason.

I promise that I won't try to do world conquest in a year. While I might be able to do that, I am in for a 700 years game.