Year 1059
======================
First part with Emperor Setyamka (at it's beginning) starts. He is our 6th Emperor of Permo-Siberia and 11th King of Perm. He has also a clear task in front of him - prepare his realm for feudalisation in the future. So far many factors turned quite well for us - China resisted Mongol invasion in last part, holding slots are at least acquired in minimal scope and we're on our way to sort out religion issues. On topic of: after shameful defeat we suffered in last part and with Adventurous half-sister preparing invasion from Slavic Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Ireland it is time to pack things up and return our raiders from abroad. I will have to check but "I think" after we deal with that nonsense we might start raiding from our borders onward again as 20 years cooldown should be near. After last part I also spotted problem - there should be "A Tower is Born" event for Great Work construction in Pi'lva (from Primal Taiga). Yet there was none. After looking up Great Work history seems I did not make mistake in counting years. So probably then Saint Emperor Varaka "the Apostle" must had been unavaidoable. It could be one of his many seclusions. Well it is fixable - just have to build another feature. With that in mind we start constructing Tavern for that sweet event removing "stressed". It will take us 16 months. Just enough before invasion begins. Also no investor update - we are still stocked
.
Time to fix some past mistakes. Tavern might help us get rid of Stressed from business focus, saving us 1 ability to focus change
Beside that, due to losses we suffered our prestige income went down to -12.1/month. Thus in less than a month we will drop below 1000 prestige requirement for Kowtowing before Chinese Emperor. The only solution? To go now! We should make it in time to be back before another war erupts in full.
So the time flow starts. Initial winter months are spend on babysitting returning raiders (to not run into another big army). Then in March our 70 years old Master of Horse dies. He had 700g and no one (but us) who could inherit it. So we recovered our funds spend on Tavern. I also had one last spare investor - 44 y.o Bedouin with 960 gold and Great Pox - Mansur ibn Abdul-Wahab. Given some spare time I do check up on all vassal within realm. Schemer hunt at it finest. Three new vassals for excommunication are thus spotted. Only 1 of them remains directly under my rule and he is geographically close to Chief Nalka from Narim that we had in our crosschair since last part. We also have 16.000 troops in north-eastern Siberia/Cumania, marched there previously all the way from Perm itself, as precaution for quite big adventurer host that was pillaging. So now after ordering another excommunication we can sweep those lands clean.
Administrative duties never truly end.
Almost instantly over 1.200 Pechenegs visits us in Bolgharia, so our Border guards further west-south in Burtasy (3.000 strong light infantry-archer mix) are dispatched at once. Soon in May news on Prosperity front arrive - Kolva reaches 3rd (max) prosperity level giving us spare county to work on, once we are done with Kudymkar, Turgay gets it's first level. Soon we get reached by mercenary escort on our travel to China - I chose to pay them to avoid any unpleasant suprises. Imagine risking your Genius character to save like 10g
? Meanwhile half of our Permian levies splits further and arrives on both vassal counties. As there is around 4.000 of them and defenders have only 150-200 men behind walls, the siege won't take long.
With beginning of July we catch unruly Pechengs and even though I splitted troops into 2 flanks. turns out we didn't had to (this time at least). We handily beat nomads with shieldwall and feint tactics and no narrow tactics on enemy end. Our raiders are still moving through neigbhouring kingdom of Galicia-Volhynia. Wasn't stopping them to resupply but their attrtition is under 1% so it isn't the end of world. Soon they will replenish in full luxury of home province. One of extraction wars already finished - the other one had complication in shape of one of our other vassals (chief of Qarazhyra in Kazakh high chiefdom) betraying us to stay together with one of our targets. Thus occuping both initial counties did not give us two 100% warscore in both wars. This is more of an annoyance as together they still have under 1.000 troops, which doesn't pose serious threat to our 16.000 warriors nearby. For now I conclude war for Katun tribe. As the schemer was landed on already Orthodox and Komi land, new administrator doesn't need to be high stewardship character. Instead as it is one of counties on the border with nomads, I assign there a high martial character (after gifting him 30g to not make him not instantly bankrupt and thus start accumulating all negative province modifiers). With 18 martial new Katun chief grants +40% bonus to garrison and levy size
. Making local tribe much harder to siege or downright non-siegeable for smaller raiding forces. Soon on other side of Empire Pechenegs are repelled costing us 94 lives to claim 240.
As Autumn arrives, finally our raiding retinues return within Perno-Siberian borders. We preserved over 6.300 of them and will replenish further 1.200 before invasion of our Empire begins. That's not bad
. Another update on kowtowing expedition occurs and I decide to let Setyamka write letter for his wife. She is older so, if by any chance we manage to make her a lover, we might get nice +health modifier later down the line
.Unexpectedly we get attacked by Karadaid host in Irgiz (south-western Cumania). Seems not only I make mistakes, as 1.250 nomads had no chance with our border guard (2.700 men). We exchange 56 men lost for 342 enemies and peace of mind for few years =D.
Another adventure time! It will probably cut into our prestige later, but hey - those several points of extra grace won't hurt. Also want to get all such travels done asap to have uninterrupted reign later.
By October second extraction war is done and yet another martial oriented character is appointed there. All according to our true and tested methods. Thus the full garrison sours up to 600 men, which makes them just too big for 250 and 500 strong hordes (quite common). There is also no sign of that adventuring host returning. I checked "looted" modifier (when it times out) and turns out it will take another 2 years. No point in keeping levies raised and paying them till them. Still will have to remember to prepare them ahead of time due to travel distance.
By December I take on somewhat risky option and start yet another 2 excommunication wars. This time not on schemers (as we cleaned everyone we could - others are under our brother's - king of Nenetsia Patriarch authority) but on weak administrators, that could but probably won't convert their orthodox tribes to Komi culture.
Chief of Vagay is also double chief thus we can reduce his power thanks to excommunication
Once again someonet tries to utilize this instability to raid our borders - Khagan Jukun of Tersin has 750 riders with him and more bravado than common sense, but he will realise it as soon as our border guards from Irtysh arrives in Ob county (north-eastern Cumania). Meanwhile Emperor of Permo-Siberia is a guest to some local ruler on the road to China. We spent a night under his roof and develop a friendship on top of acquiring some not too shabby modifier to health
.
Year 1060
======================
Intensive year begins. We will have to hush-hush it, as we are working on a timetable: by April Primal Taiga finishes it's construction of Tavern feature, before that we want to conclude current wars (called in my vassals to not fool around). Then on 21st of July our half-sister Ruzava (currently "highly suspicious" and pregnant) will crash into our realm with not exactly family visit intention. Meanwhile we hope that Setyamka will finish his journey to the east. If he doesn't - I can always pause feature construction and await his arrival
.
By February we are done with Mordva extraction, and now new chief with 15 stewardship can try to Komi'nise local Khazars. We also do beat recent nomad incursion, without them being able to inflict any harm upon our subjects. So far so good. There is also some news from Monastic society. Once again one of brothers in Christ has written to us about his latest botanical feats. As I still have positive modifer "Green Fingers" till 1062 there was little point in picking that route. Instead I sent someone to collect his roses at the start of March to receive this positive bonus instead:
Small but nice to have I suppose. Better than nothing or penalty from my regular path through this event.
Takes up to 3rd of April to conclude last exctraction war. I was keeping in mind my Primal Taiga's Tavern finish date but it seems to occur at start of May. So new chief was generated and it is lovely - we got Thrifty 36 y.o Clerk Hunchback with 15 stewardship (optimal), that is also a Gardener known for his kindness, temperance and humbleness
. He will try to change the customs of Orthodox Pechengs in Ishim.
May starts exactly as expected - Tavern did finish. But I didn't realise that we are still on kowtowing mission. Thus it might not generate event again - we will see. I still have 4th slot to use. But on other hand -> prosperity event from crown focus fires. Another modifier for Kudymkar!
More prestige is always welcomed. It is 2nd such modifier in all of our lands We want to collect them all anyway.
Having nothing better to do I watch as our Kin from Ural high chiefdom suffers revolt of his vassal - they definetely choose the worst moment for it. The vassal also doesn't seem likely to win. More adventuring raiders appear in Sarysu (central Cumania). Adventuring ones. I will try to catch them but they don't seem to be interested in looting us upon spawning. Then our Master of the Hunt dies (58 years old). He had some gold and I think we got it (as we are currently at 23.266 gold).
Then the war we were expecting finally begins. Seems she was not able to muster the equivalent of our imperial might. Still it might take some time, as she needs to arrive with her 14.000 troops, then we need to catch her and grind down those event troops.
Was expecting more of a challenge. Still it will take some effort to win this war. Time in which we could be raiding.
Soon after we do get information from our Steward - he finally managed to convert Irtysh tribe to Komi culture. Took bloody long enough! I think we had several generation of Stewards working on that issue. Well now it's no longer a county of Pecheneg culture. But it still needs conversion from Sunni to Orthodoxy. Which reminds me that - I probably haven't used Permo-Siberian Patriarch to convert (due to how succesful he was in last part I forgot). Yup. It checks out ;D". So now we can send him there, as thanks to having the same culture as province he has really great yearly chance (47%).
This marks 100th province of Komi culture. We surely went a long away since beggining Still included our brother realm, as I have nicely arranged realm into smaller chunks thus making it easy to keep track of.
Orthodoxy is still going strong (even though some wars were and will be lost by our newest Norse convert in Pomerania) - 100% MA! Funny enough even though, those Christian realms keep getting obliterated, the faith spreads as most of conquerors religions have abysmal MA themself thus they are unable to convert our provinces away. So slowly Orthodoxy and it's heresies are making the way on the border between de jure Kingdom of Poland and Germany. Also game kindly reminds me that my steward has nothing to do - thus I move him onto converting yet another personally owned tribe in the middle of Siberian part of our empire. Among flood of letters from vassals we also get 2 notification from vassal realm priest's about converting 2 more provinces to Orthodoxy - sadly I misclicked and dismissed them. One of them was Ashli in Bolgharia (previously Bogomilist). We are down to 5 heretic provinces, 3 pagan Suomenusko (got rid of both Tengri and Old Germanic we recently acquired) and 12 muslims (10x Zikir to 2x Sunni). There is also single Mazdaki province (probably soon) on the chopping block. Which by simple calculus would mean there are currently 105 Orthodox Provinces in the realm. So with 79% Komi population and 83% Orthodox believers we are coming closer and closer towards unity.
By August instead of beloved half-sister armies, we see what China looks like (as we enter it). There are some hostiles to beat - the new owner of Syganak county south of us (containing simple temple that I so love to raid and probably helped provoking uprising) crossed the border into Turgay with his over 3.600 strong army. Good thing I mobilized retinues from Irtysh to chase that adventurer, together they will have almost 6.000 men to deal with newest arrival, while adventurers escaped anyway. Perhaps our Marshal took current ordeal to his heart and performed another massive recruitment in Udmurts (+6 prosperity).
We finally enter China capital. Time for acquiring some souvernirs!
By October, Syganak riders loot our tribe in Turgay. There was no way around it - with siege pace of 25% per tick our troops couldn't make it in time. They will make it in time to prevent sacking of local temple though. We also seem to have entered it's capital (was expecting one more pop up before) and we can make good impression by our knowledge of Chinese literature. I could get 30% for +1 Stewardship but I would rather max kowtow trait instead.
Our warriors do relieve Turgay's temple on the last possible moment. We get into really advantegous battle for us with twice the number of what enemy has.
Commanding the center - Robin (Hood) Tobolid. Remember him ? Probably his last battle as he is 70 y.o. Marrion died 8 years ago.
We crush enemies swiftly in skirmish phase after, which merciless pursuit commences. For the price of 190 Komi warriors we claim 1.900 Syganakians. Ouch. This will seriously put a dent on their martial capability. Especially as most of those troops were event generated thus don't reinforce
.
Thus the year ends with Emperor Setyamka away, busy buying chinese artifacts while her half-sister still didn't manage to cross the sea and land her army on our soil. Also it turns out our China-adventure did prevent "town is born" event again
. Dammit...
Year 1061
======================
Absolutely nothing worth mentioning happens till April. No looting attempts, no enemies to be seen from distans England (even though they have more than enough ships to transport all at once; damn - they even started attritioning >.>" ). Thus the first news to arrive in 1061 is the finish of Watchtower Network construction for Uralic Walls.
First feature completed. We are better not starting the 2nd one yet, due to ongoing war.
Given so much time, our retinues are almost fully replenished (and we once again have positive prestige income) and had also time to check up on Mercenaries. They are currently taking part in Scotland civil war and are doing just fine. I have the impression that after passing 10.000 gold mark they slowed tremendously in speed of earning gold though.
In May our spymaster reports another technology stolen and thus +50 economic tech points are gained. We are currently sitting on not insignificant amount of them stored. So it is great time to start pushing them higher to let spread happen. We spend over 2.000 economic tech points on Construction VIII (well ahead of time), Infantry VI (to start improving our future armies) and Majesty VI (more prestige and piety gain!). I wonder if we will upgrade something again before feudalising (that is planned to happen in around 40 years).
Notice that technology spread to personally held counties happens fast, as those lighter areas far from duchy of Perm itself are all held by Emperors themself. For example Burtasy reached already Construction V, Irtysh - IV and Irgiz almost IV
With that we officially have the most technologically advanced capital county in the world. Then halfway through May our kowtowing comes to and end. Sadly once again 2nd out of 3 ranks is achieved. And poof - there goes 1.000 prestige putting us currently at -107. But with current income of over +23 a month, this state won't persist for long. Some problem is picked up by me as I look around borders. Remember those Syganakians and their event troops? Turns out that for whatever unholy reason they are reinforcing. Oh hell no! Won't let them fully replenish to have around 5.000 troops to harass me later with. Not on my watch. So stationed close retinues, now bolstered by vassals (called into war) are moved onto them in force (19.000 men). They currently have only 2.100 event troops. Problem is... He is hostile towards us only for 2 more days (after we beaten him). Damn shame...
During long Summer finally some Ruzava's armies were spotted. Which took me totally by suprise because instead of naval landing in Nenetsia, they appeared in our brother Mosheq lands (Vladimir duchy). There is only 2.000 of them too. After regency for our Emperor ended, we regain our full demense limit of 13 counties thus our maximum levies once again can have 16.000 men instead of 6.400 we currently had with 3 counties over the limit. I throw another excommunication targeting counties that could be culture converted and send my over 9.000 retinues to deal with invaders. We finally catch them after some manouvering in Yaroslavl tribe.
They have Hills, they have narrow flank and they still are losing rapidly "
The whole engagment ends with us losing 73 replenishable members of retinues and them losing 972 non-replenishable event troops. Warscore rises up to 27% in our favour, meaning we want half-sister to feed us more of her troops. Meanwhile some raiders arrived in somewhat unexpected county deep into our realm - Magnitataya on the eastern side of Ural mountains. I thought this county is not adjecent to any nomadic realm - thus was proved incorrect. Or maybe it was a local court member answering call of adventure? Who knows...
Then nothing happens. In October our Marshal once again fires event for "Massive Recruitment Drive" so more prosperity. Warscore starts ticking away in our favour (up to 30%) but no additional enemies were spotted. Instead I look onto those few Great Conquerers I mentioned in previous parts and how are they doing. Ethiopian King Jayaraja "the Great" is still fighting against Jihad and loosing but has most of his troops (33.000) still intact. But event troops melted down to 16.000. I don't think he will achieve much more, as he could still win if adopted tactic that didn't favour his enemies. Danish King Ubbe the Liberator is humbly expending (has currently 4 truces active) into Scandinavia 1 county at the time. There wasn't much going on in strongest realm of theMatiyid Sultanate as previous conquerer died and just this year his heir - Cathar Sultan Ibrahim took over. He is far cry from his father but with having still over 54.000 troops under his command he can carve more lands for his realm. The most succesful last - 50 y.o. King Niezamysl "the Great" of Ireland is eating British isles. Good think he has title of Irish king as English crown is still held by Italian Catholics
". Crown only as they didn't had any holdings in de jure land for decades. Still he is close to having 100% of Wales thus probably will be able to create Empire title.
Just look how busted are those event AI characters . He is doing the best even though he has the least event troops remaining.
Then nothing happens for months. Beaten invaders came back but their numbers are insulting. Not sure what AI thinks by commiting with only 2.000 out of 14.000 troops to siege our realm, while rest remains in York. We catch their 1.200 survivors from first wave again and inititate battle at 31 of December.
Year 1062
======================
We kill Ruzava's men down to the last one. Which gives us 71% warscore. I wonder if she will commit yet another chunk of her army or not. If not it will be quite some time before this whole war concluded =.=. With change of date our younger brother succumbs to stress and Dysyntery at the ripe old age of 26. Thus his son Kezhay III takes over. He is our new heir. Well didn't expect that (as our ruler is older of the siblings and has un-solvable heart symptom). We will take over education of future Nenetsian king ourself (we could grant him our Monastic society bonuses).
In February after getting another excommunication (I started thinking about doing some more extractions) we spot another invader 2.000 strong army arriving from southern steppes. Well for invasion originating in England they sure make sure to come from unexpected sides x]. We will catch them as they are already locked into moving with our retinues in Burtasy.
Will give them points for trying with that narrow flank with 11 martial lightfoot commander specialist. A for effort " F for overall war strategy.
Thus ends the last battle of this war to "waste everyone God damn time". We lose 50+ men pretender - 730. That is enough to enforce our demands and we do. We have more interesting things to do instead of entertaining our half-sister misguided ambitions
. We do get 130 prestige of this whole ordeal, while offending side losses their claim on Empire. She also is relocated into Permo-Siberian house arrest to prevent her from ever trying anything funny.
Freshly out of war in April, we can activate "looting" mode on our eastern border patrols. Why? To ambush those reinforcing Syganiakans troops across border. The sooner we strike the better. Our Patriarch also managed to convert Irtysh from Sunni to Orthodoxy and was moved to deal with last Bogomilist county on this side of Ural mountains. Probably won't take him long as thanks to our high MA and same culture we are rocking 63% yearly conversion chance. Our religion is stil going strong even with half of "Infidel temples looted" modifiers timing out.
We get Monastic flower event once again. Well given it is year 1062 we can renew "Green Fingers" that will soon vanish. But instead of that... We get option to get Gardener trait! It is so great. Was waiting for it on Business focus but instead we can get it this way and retain Trader modifier (+2 stewardship). This is no brainer and pleasant suprise
.
Monastic Society surely delivers when it needs to!
With that our MTTH for prosperity events also improves. It reaches the same proficiency as it was during our last character:
New Holding Slot - 25,18 years
Province Modifier - 17,43 years
With little luck it means another holding slot during this reign and maybe 2 more province modifiers
? It also frees Setyamka to pursue different hobbies (we no longer need stewardship related focus (well it would help book writing but we have Genius and high stewardship on top of risky decision to become sick earlier to improve quality and we don't want Quality 4 book anyway). We also just acquired stewardship lifestyle trait that helps. Should be ok? I hope...
So what now? Well our Emperor is 32 years old and stressed yet doesn't have heir. Time to start thinking about it. If we procure genius heir once again it will still take up to Setyamka's 50-ties before junior comes out of age. Meanwhile we will have to "clear" all his older brothers to make room for him. I could risk it for Rulership but it will add us Depressed and that is scary (we still have that symptom granting us -2 health, putting us at -3 from traits). So either Seduction for quick heir-making or Family for slower but more safe future (as it grants +1 health). I like Family, as we haven't had this in long time. Already having Kind trait also helps meeting requirements of family oriented events.
Then some search happens during summer and I replace 2 concubines with 18 years old Genius from Ilmenia and 17 y.o. Quick Komi
women. Then after lifting up vow of Celibacy everything is set according to my wishes. Also canceled Monastic mission as for next 5 years we won't be picking theology anyway and it was clogging our devotion gain (currently at 851/2000). Soon we are visited by Khazars from Araslan clan in Syrt, so boys in Burtasy start marching there.
Coming back to Syganakians - we finally give the order to march onto them. They fully replenished so we will have to attack them several times. Well I will commit to it anyway. Our Court Physician asks us for funds for better tools. Shame it won't help Emperor himself :/. But sure - him getting better will benefit any future imperial children chance of survival. Soon he informs us that it ended in one big failure anyway. Still was worth trying for 10 gold.
Operation - delete the annoying neigbhour ccontinues
After first engagment we delete 2.000 out of 3.600 event troops. Not bad
They will replenish a little but we will give chase soon. Probably will take 3-4 such battles to completely eradicate them. Then on 26th of October our nephew's Patriarch converts Vladimir from Sunni (8 remaining) to Orthodoxy (107 now). I left our retinues on Syganak county to loot it, while defenders are away. Also keeping up with my Excommunication game - we currently have 4 targets that soon might be extracted. Given that it seems much time will be spent passively I can start 2nd attempt at fixing Primal Taiga (now that trade expedition, pillgrimage and Kowtoing travel are behind us).
Wanted to wait with that feature to better showcase how much they might help us later in maximizing our city income but well - beggars can't be choosers. Really nice bonus to tribal levies with those Archers - I wonder if they get boost from empty buildings slots. Will check it soon
By my estimation as we started it on December 4th, taking 16 months it will pop up around 4th April 1064. Also realised we can start that 2nd feature of Uralic Walls. Let's not commit another mistake this time. This will take 5 months later so it should be September 4th. Additionally got bamboozled by one of our vassal offering training other commanders. We gave him favour for not so great Flanker, as I thought he will give his Lightfoot leader trait without checking. Well doesn't pose serious consequences as we can always fix situation via excommunication.
Year 1063
======================
We start another year with sacking of Syganak castle. For once it gives us some loot (+36g) as it is bordering us. Also our events boys for bullying are kindly waiting next door so lets move and kill them. They replenished only 200 men, so we have good odds at wiping them out in just 2 battles
.
They replenished another 100+ men with next tick thus making us not as likely to end it all.
Sadly we couldn't kill them all yet. Around 600 men retreats from battle. Given previous experience I think the 3rd time will be the charm. Meanwhile those troops can keep sacking their home county
. To break monotony of peace first time since long ago some trading caravan visits us to tell us tales of "Hindustan". We get offered yet another Eunuch but he is mediocre - highest attribute is 12 (Martial) and has single commander trait - Inspiring Leader on top of Strategist (+20% Defence) and Brave (+10% Morale Defence). Not exactly great for tribal armies. He will perform his duties as Court Eunuch.
Before March ends we also get forced into accepting our Commander and Chief of Kerzhenets as our new Martial (removing previous 24 Martial holder of office). It isn't as bad as new Marshal has 20 Martial and has that... wait it was not Lightfoot leader but Aggresive Leader (+25% Pursuit, +10% Damage, -10% Defence). Well still it would bre great to spread it around other commanders, who are relatively green and it synergises with our battle tactics (breaking enemies in skirmish).
In May we deal with one of schemers under King of Nenetsia (forcing him to flee, becoming part of another realm thus not being able to target us via scheme focus) and become tutor of his heir
. Also Syganak temple is looted giving us +1% to MA (which still is at max value). One of our kin builds temple in Yugra high-chiefdom. Something I did not expect that can ruin my carefully crafted administrative division post feudalisation. Let's not freak out yet but keep an eye if this will keep happening.
By Summer we siege out Syganak fully thus leave it to entice those <800 event troops into coming back. We also get another crown focus event in capital.
2nd out of 6 possible prosperity province modifiers here. Would be even more for coastal or forest/jungle/mountain provice
Soon oblivious Syganakians return and lock themself on movement into our trap. Meanwhile we do confer first monastic ward bonuns to our nephew Kezhay III -giving him +3 Diplomacy and +2 Learning to his base stat. He is just 6 years old so it was really quick! Sadly we still managed to fail at wiping out neighbour event army. Two hundred riders survived xD. Well will get him next time! For sure!
With Autumn our spymaster steals another 50 economic technology points. Rest of year is spent on shadowing retreating event troops across our border towards west. We also lose our Chancellor (who achieved nothing in Anatolia) thus replace him with superior statesman (22 diplomacy) and send him to fabricate claim on some Anatolian single holding as, a staging ground against Khazars. Given this we get just enough loyalist on council thus we can make some law reform. I pick last level of Tribal Organization (required for Feudalization). Better to have it than realize too late that this is an issue.
We are legally ready to convert our goverment. Still has to build those stone hillforts.
Year 1064
======================
Important year awaits. Time to finally nail those extra holding slots from Great Works. Sadly the Syganiakians gave us a slip. As they stopped being marked in red due to timers on hostility I did not see them as they moved under us. Well whole chase wasn't great idea anyway as it risked exactly this outcome - them not longer being valid target for further molestation and us too far away from making it viable again. Well at least there is only 600 of them.
Few days before April Suomenusko county of Torzhok get's converted into Orthodoxy. This will make local Mordvin population convertable, which is desirable. At this point I also slow down the game speed to not miss anything suddenly happening. And thus...
On 1st of April Road Tolls are constructed in Primal Taiga. Now everything should be A-ok and we should expect event to pop up within 50 days. In few weeks our retinue finally can start marching onto Syganakians (who reinforced to over a 1.000). I realise that we already dealt some damage to them, as their current max is 1/3 lower. Seems we fully annihilated one third of their army contingents. Now only to do the same with 2 remaining.
Soon enough both things come true. We finally manage to wipe out every single event troops from Syganakians thus finally achieving our aim. Then we get extra holding slot in Pil'va from our (many) attempts at it. Good think we know that it is fixable mistake. Now we only await 3rd holding slot in Pil'va (where Uralic Walls are) to not lose on any free city generated by Feudalising. Our retinues are also sent towards 2 excommunicted leaders nearby in preparation for extraction.
Finally. Took us long enough (3 attempts at getting feature check right). Well at least we managed it without having to upgrade whole bloody Primal Taiga again.
During summer out of nowhere our Chest Pains symptom gets an event. For some reason they vanish. And I have no idea why. Maybe we needed to go above some negative health value (which was achieved by picking one of +1 health focuses)? If anyone knows I would be interested to know why x]. Not that I will complain - it helps tremendously to not have un-solvable -2 health. That should radically prolong this character lifespan.
Somewhat funny that after I concluded it is bugged, that symptom went away. Especially after whole saga regarding it in the last part ;D
Then another pop up from Monastic Society arrives. We get an opportunity to steal relic from society. It might give us ambitious but don't be fooled - Monastic Society will get rid of it in time. Also from memory it does require around 15+ intrigue for decent chances and failure results in ban for live from being member of such Society. And what is the relic? Quality 3 Nail of the True Cross, which grants monthly prestige and piety. Not worth the risk IMO. If it was Seamless Robe of Jesus or Holy Grail on other hand I would try. But I would rather acheive what we set out to do with ruler at 3rd Monastic Rank and maybe even 30 further years to live instead of getting extra 180 piety and around 120 extra prestige during those sime period of time.
I think it was the lowest possible quality relic that got generated. Worldwide there are already 4 fragments of true cross. We could obtain in via other methods if we wanted.
At least we get rewarded with Content trait (further increasing our devotion gain). We soon get ordered another mission - penance. Won't make mistake of trying to rush it before our 2nd feature in Uralic Walls concludes. After that - sure.
Then after carefully managing game speed, Uralic Walls succesfully and without any disturbance manage to have it's feature constructed. To answer my previous quiry - those +150 extra archers are counted towards base to which all the benefits apply. Thus Kol'va tribe ends with 454 archers out of 1154 troops
. This will help us rolling that Feint tactic. But there is more good news - our Patriarch converted Bogomilists from Saur back to Orthodoxy.
4th September Uralic Walls feature finish. Now that we are free of such timers, we can embark on spiritual pursuit for Society of Saint Basil. While our border patrols can perform yet another administrative war to replace chiefs of Orthodox-Pecheneg provinces with better stewards.To my suprise - one of the targets somehow managed to acquire 1.500 gold! So we will have to banish him later to get control of that fortune. Can't allow excommunicantes to keep control of such riches
.
By November our Stewards achieves another success and our county of Tura in the middle of Siberia gets converted to our culture. Only one more personally held tribe to convert remains and that's where (Boqtybay county) he will go next. Meanwhile our Patriarch is trying to eradicate Mazdaki religion from our realm (only 26% for chance though - might move him for something with higher % later). Our 2 out of 4 extraction wars are already over. We get over 1.500 gold coins from seized treasure thanks to banishing traitors
. Sadly we fail at interpreting bible passage, thus no Erudite Trait was acquired (we had 60% success chance).
Love when for some reason one of our targets also turns out to be suprisngly wealthy. Makes those excommunications extra worth it.
In December our Chancellor manages to generate claim on Guria under Khazarian rule. Now with that we can squash Khazars out of Anatolia and help Byzantine empire by feeding them weak 1 county ruler without anyone to help them survive. They already started this on their own as some Greek vassals started liberating parts of Anatolia, while biggest vassal and king of Bolgharia is currently trying to seize half of Galilee for himself (why not target Jerusalem that is as difficult war but offers 4 instead of 2 counties and is adjecent to Greek exclave in holy land - is a question I would like to ask AI). Meanwhile Basileus is trying to vassalize by war some Georgian lands.
Year 1065
======================
Another year starts with some administrative tasks - I imprison one of scheming vassals thanks to having knowledge about his plot and throw him into oubliette. Then I excommunicate another plotter directly under me. That leaves just one to deal with. At the same time my retinues are marching onto capitals of 2 vassals soon to be replaced with better stewards.
By the end of February Pechenegs arrive in Bolgharia (Naberezhnye tribe) trying to loot. So once again our troops from Burtasy are sent in to deal with. Still commanded by our Old Robin (Hood) Tobolid. He is 75 years old, has pet parrot and serious wound. Seems he made his peace with death of Marion, as his current ambition is to get married again. In the backrground our character is dealing with his penance assigment. We risk trying to secure bigger success in dealing with vice but fail (40% success chance) but luckily don't get punished with receiving Greedy trait. We do get "Rampant Sinner" modifier penalty for 3 years, reducing our piety gain by -0.25 but recuperating 50g invested into being more charitable. Sadly it does make us fail whole penance meaning we are devoid of that extra 200-300 devotion :/.
Steady wins the race. It is around 100 years till we first conquered most of those lands and by constant swapping of local rulers we already assimilated most counties.
With change of season we finally get to another extraction. We already have our retinues on targeted tribes so it will be quick. Just to avoid any unforseen problems I do call all of my vassals in (just to make them not ally with rebels). While we are happy besieging, first pulse event from Family focus fires. We improve our relations with our wife and get "Family Man" modifier confering us +10% Fertility. Both of those things are really nice - our wife is older so if we make her our lover and she dies we will get "Lover memento" modifier for that extra +0.5 health. Fertility isn't too shabby either. Together with Thrifty Clerk (+5%), Family Focus (+25%), Stressed (-10%) and being in Monastic Society (-15%) it puts us at +15% atm. Well we still need an heir.
At the start of June we finish both wars and by spending little less than 100g we generate 2 new chiefs with starting funds to sustain them, while they speed up culture conversion. Almost forgot but our troops did catch Pechenegs and are in the process of "trashing them". We lose once again 99 men but kill over 300.
Next month greets us with news about Jihad for Yemen failing. Meaning our observed King Jayaraja 'the Great" prevailed. With around 30.000 troops still. Probably means we haven't seen the last of him (though he is 70 years old). Then once again Monastic ward fires for our Nephew king Kezhay III. What's suprising is the fact that this time he is offered stewardship alongside learning instead of previous diplomacy+learning attribute combination. Was led to believe that whatever the game rolls the first time will keep happening. Well not that I will complain. He got +3 Stewardship and +1 Learning to his base attributes. He might get this event only once more and it will be the first time I spot such occurence but he has to trigger it within 2 years, as after that he will be too old for event requirement (he is 8 right now).
Damn. I wish my own heir would keep getting those events so often ".
On the first of September I create some more retinues - 2 more hunting parties (Light Infantry + Light Cavalry) to even out border guard in south-western Cumania to 3.000 and 4 more trapper parties (Light Infantry + Archers) to add to our previously raiding force. After dew days tick by I realise we can go ham on those, as our prestige income remains high (over +21/month). So I crank up the trapper retinues up to 14x contingents - which will total 14.000 Light Infantry, 4.000 Archers and 3.200 Light Cavalry (27.6/29.1 K limit). That drops us to 150 prestige but we still remain in the positive on monthly change (+15).
Was quite some time since last time we expanded our retinue forces.
During October Patriarch converts Kerzhenets (that I moved him towards to instead cause better - 63% chance of success). That leaves exactly 3 heretic provinces within realms. Orthodoxy MA remains high cause we are positive on "Holy Wars" modifiers(+42% -21%) and our current Ecumenical Patriarch Leon is doing fantastic job. Even though he has only 7 Diplomacy, thanks to Theology he accumulated over 1.000 piety already and on it's own is providing +26% MA (not counting +5% from holding holy site). Can't move our realm priest onto another heretic county yet - will be able by end of December.
Year 1066
======================
I start the year with visiting Primal Taiga for yet another SPA relaxation and de-aging
. Thus Setyamka turns out to be 33 instead of 35 years old. This is also the year in which another Catholic Crusade is possible. But we won't be taking part in it. Not worth sabotaging nice thing we have going on in the Empire. To be honest I should thought more about raiding middle-east or other realms neigbhouring Greeks. Once we feudalise it no longer will be an option and thus would be great to somehow make Byzantines take over last 2 Orthodox Holy Sites.
On 8th of February another Temple holding is built by one of our vassal. This time it was in 3 slot county so it doesn't matter. But must be noted that it happened again. As I move to request another excommunications it turns out that thanks to failure in Monastic Society mission, we can't get Patriarch to agree to our demand. This will persist for next 3 years :/. Well that was... unexpected. Rumour of our failure in being good christian surely bite us back.
Being thus free I start planning another conquest campaign. We still want to enlarge our Nephew domain to make him strong enough to fend for himself later. Thus we can probably initiate 3 holy wars (to also start the truce timers ticking for later). Here is what I have in mind.
Adding more population dense counties to nephew Kezhay III lands should strenghten him enough to even out relative weakness of Nenetsia.
So we declare 3 holy wars at once and call in all of our Allies. We will claim all of Tver high chiefdom and last 2 counties in Veps with that. Turns out Queen Eufrozyna of Galicia-Volhynia came out of age (and turned dumb
") but started fending off attackers with her around 13.000 strong armies. Well I hope she decided to finish her previous wars before commiting to us as I don't want to destabilize her further (and invite yet another Khazarian expansion into eastern Europe).
With beginning of May we start besieging Polish holdings in Tver and our Persian Hindu investor dies, passing to us his 700g fortune. I order all of our vassals to "besiege holdings" as I don't care much for micromanaging it myself. They should be capable of this, when there is above 50.000 of men in their armies. Otherwise they would just stick to my various retinues, in some cases (border guards in Siberia) not contributing at all.
By August we occupy 2 tribes in Tver and our Quick Komi concubine Potyava becomes pregnant. Nice
. Then 2 weeks later our biggest investors dies, passing his 4.000 gold coins to his son that is in our court already. At the same time our Chancellor generates us another claim in Anatolia (Trapezos) giving us 2 such claims to press at once against Khazars. I move him onto another Khazarian possesion in Anatolia. It only hurts that it costed us 150 prestige, thus halving what we had. Then we get asked to donate some gold for charity and we do, which puts us at 1851/2000 devotion needed for last rank within society (and that juicy conversion counties power). We also get rewarded with Charitable trait.
In September another temple is constructed by one of our Vassals - this time in Naberezhnye. Still not issue (3 slot province). Then we get unlucky while siegeing temple in one of Tver counties - they trigger bad events for us 4 times in a quick succession, eating up 20% of besieging force. That cuts down our prestige gain from +15 down to +3. Then after moving I do not spot huge (10.000 strong) Galicio-Volhinian army and will have to fend for myself with just 4.800 troops before other half arrives.
Tough battle ahead as their center commander is aggresive leader.
Initial battle is rough as both sides roll Feints on their center :O. We endure till reinforcements arrive but then battle devolves into melee and I don't have my heavy infantry... So after routing their center containing half their troops I decide to run. We will reinforce with levies, still arriving in Vladimir, while recuperating losses. We lose 2.900 members of retinues for 1.500 enemies. Well not the worst of defeats.
By November we finish writing the book aaaand... We missed again. We got another quality 3 books: "Feeding the Realm". Guh! So close. There are only 2 quality books about stewardship left and quality 4 book. Seems we are somewhat unlucky in this playthrough. So next attempt will give either "On Komi Architecture" (finally that -10% building cost) or "Gardens of the Moon" (+1 Stewardship, +1% National Tax Modifier). Still we are missing that Stewardship book from Great Work. And the time is ticking.
Funny enough this is the 3rd and final (possible for us) cookbook. You can say our dynasty is really culinary inclined. Also that Book by itself will more than pay for itself - across next 400 years it will generate 1.440 gold. Not too shabby
Year ends with yet another defeat cause one of armies didn't track properly and got ambushed again (another 800 retinues bite the dust).
Year 1067
======================
Well I might have been little too confident but to my defence - I was expecting more than 1.000 vassal warriors to be helping me. Instead now we have 10.000 Poles and 6.000 Finns in our lands. Well it isn't the end of world but I would like my vassals to fulfill their obligations better.
Funny enough enemies are not sure what to do either, thus we still have our captured holdings slowly ticking warscore.
By March I amass enough to contend with one of adversaries but let's wait some time more and crush them all. In first week of this month Setyamka becomes father to a girl - Mel'shay Permyakid. I also start marching my over 20.000 strong army and keep eating attrition thus soon we are left with 17.000 troops. Some of them are our retinues but they already were somewhat trashed. Usual arctic winter catching me off-guard.
By May winter goes away and we can start taking apart our enemies. I decide to start cleaning them up from smallest first. To make bigger contingent easier to break and avoid any unpleasant suprises. We can also finally rank up in Monastic Society.
Soon we achieve our first victory, 740 of our men for almost 3.300 Finns. Then more combat follows.
Meanwhile our second wave of levies arrived and now 12.000 strong army pushes towards Polish army in Mordva. One of our most western counties (that is currently occupied) also get's converted from Suomenusko to Orthodox. Superb! That will take away Finns defensive advantage while fighting there. Soon we catch even more enemies and in quick successiom achieve 2 more victories.
Before Autumn our nephew (lucky kid) get's his 3rd monastic ward event! Another Diplomacy/Learning split and both increase by +2. Wow
So it can really happen! Also we succesfully get rid of Bogomilists in Bolghar tribe. Only remaining heretic province remains in north-western Nenetsia and there we send our Permo-Siberiach Patriarch next.
In October yet another concubine becomes pregnant. Maybe this time it will be a genius heir? It is a 30% chance this time as both parents have that trait. So one can hope. Then we get involved into some fight with 28.000 troops on our side against 3.000 enemies in Zubstov but it goes really bad. We win but lose 3.000 troops compared to 2.500 that enemies lost. Somehow we were defending and had 3/3 narrow flanks thus enemies were slaying us tremendously >.>.
December starts with one of our vassals converting other Bogomilist province to Orthodoxy, which leaves just 1 more
. I thought that we would be able to conclude current war in this part but it seems it might not be the case. Even after smashing their armies we are still months away from having enough warscore. Thus on the note of catching yet another Suomi Finnish army and smashing it to pieces I leave you in this part.
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