Few Questions On Lore

[Pattorz]

I've been playing this mod for a while now and love it to bits.
1). I've always wondered since the time line dosent go all the way up to 1066 how so many empires and kingdoms became so fragmented in the first place?
2). I love Alexanders descendants and there religion focused on Alexander. But I find it impossible to expand as Phillipos of the argedad dynasty as he requires huge amounts of piety to expand and it takes many many years to do that without cheats.
3).will any characters get updated bios on the intro screen when you pick a character? As most are really short and since the time line dosent get up to 1066 it's hard to fully immerse myself in them, and Phillipos Argedads one is incorrect saying he has a diadochi princess as a wife and has an ambitious son called craterus.

Just a few things that's bothered me for years and now I got a paradox account I thought I'd finally ask. Thank you for all your hard work it's truly an amazing mod.

 

[Numahr]

Thanks for interest, and most of all, feedback.

1) Well, the official timeline goes until 1020, just 46 years before the game start. Still, the level of fragmentation is not entirely explained in the lore. My own personal explanation is that a terrible climatic disaster, maybe caused by a mega volcano or a meteorite fall, has caused a worldwide catastrophe which has shattered the world. I even considered adding in an introduction message making reference to humanity just recovering from God's punishment, and about the need to restore the truth once for all to avoid a new apocalypse, surely caused by divine displeasure about the world's impiety.

2) Interesting point which takes us to the rules of casus belli. In LI, downright territorial conquest is relatively rare: this is to respect the conservative set up displaying dynasties surviving centuries. However as a ruler of a martial soul religion, honouring the memory of Megalos Alexandros, you are supposed to be able to wage wars more easily. This is partly true. First of all, you can launch wars to make realms pay tribute from day 1. Then Martial or intolerant religions have access to a special CB called Sacred War, which is just about fighting religious enemies for holy glory. This lets you accumulate piety. Once you have farmed enough piety through victory on the field of battle, then you can use this piety to launch actual conquests.

Now you had 2 issues:
- You need to be neither content, nor cynical, nor tolerant to use this CB. After all CK2 resolves around characters, and we should make their traits meaningful.
- You need a lot of authority (prestige) to use the CB... or let's say you needed, as I just re-balanced the CB to make it more accessible. It can now be used almost from day 1, but the piety accumulation is slower.
So you can either start wars for indirect conquest, or work towards loosing your content trait. Yes it is not easy... that is the reality you have to deal with though, would you expect that a content drunkard would start huge empire-building conquests at once?

You can also start as Alexandros III of Alexandria, also a descendant from Megalos Alexandros, but Platonic Islamic. Another alternative is Antiochos XXIX from the Seleucid dynasty: he is obviously not from the blood of Alexandros, but his religion is Alexandros-Ammonite, i.e. he Worships Alexandros Ammon as his God. This one can do sacred war for Alexandros' glory on day 1 with my rebalance.

3) Would you like to contribute and become a published author?

 

[Pattorz]

Thanks so much for your response, answered everything brilliantly. Apologies but what is a published author?

 

[wingren013]

The best way to expand in LI is to go slowly and build up cash until you get a character with good stats and then go ham with the glorious conquest CB. Most of my empires are largely conquered within the lifespan of 1 to 2 characters. Large vassals (btw it can't be intentional that vassals don't get realm duress penalties from size) and dejure CBs can also speed up conquest. Prestige is the most powerful thing in LI. It's the key to both conquest and keeping an empire together. Just be aware that big empires in LI very accurately model that whole assassination disease the Romans had going on.

 

[spendabuck]

1) Well, the official timeline goes until 1020, just 46 years before the game start. Still, the level of fragmentation is not entirely explained in the lore. My own personal explanation is that a terrible climatic disaster, maybe caused by a mega volcano or a meteorite fall, has caused a worldwide catastrophe which has shattered the world. I even considered adding in an introduction message making reference to humanity just recovering from God's punishment, and about the need to restore the truth once for all to avoid a new apocalypse, surely caused by divine displeasure about the world's impiety.

Can this be added to the official lore? This sounds really interesting and is a great explanation for why the world is so fractured in the mod.

 

[Numahr]

Maybe... a starting event giving this narrative.

But to do it justice, we should go deeper and mention how the sun is progressively winning this long struggle against darkness (I picture a sort of atomic winter, except not atomic, caused by excess of particles in the air. A bit like the historical Year Without a Summer, but longer and more severe.) This would require adding some severe province modifiers progressively getting back to normal, some traits on characters, reference to it elsewhere in lore... A lot of work that is not so urgent.

 

[Furion Matsuya]

I always assumed much of the fragmentation was simply a gameplay decision eg Byzantium is definitely splintered by the Sassanids and some other places actually are not. Very decentralised yes but not actually the fragmented messes like the Byzantines and Rome, the rump HRE and Britannia are etc