Crusader Kings II

Philistine said:

This game is SO hard to get into. I really think I would enjoy it if I could figure out what I'm supposed to do!
Example: I'm starting as William of Normandy in 1080. I have decided that since I have the biggest army and the biggest balls, that I deserve to be King of France. How do I make that happen? The first thing I learn is that if you have an army you can't attack anybody [) so I'm supposed to disband my army, declare war, then re-assemble my army? I will lose one of my vassal's territory because I do not have succession rights, how do I take it from him? How do I lay claim to friendly territory? The game will allow me to declare war on a neighbour, Count Simon, but how do I know what forces he can gather, or who will come to his aid?

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I can't relly help you myself since I haven't played the game for a couple of years and have forgotten a lot about it but one thing that helped me was watching a let's play on YouTube. For example, a youtuber by the name quill18 plays Paradox games regularly and by watching him you can learn about a lot of mechanics. I would suggest finding a more recent playthrough, though, since the game has received a ton of expansions. Of course, those videos take time but maybe you could glance over them.

CK2 is a game best learnt by starting small. Try playing as an Irish count and taking over Ireland. If you can do that you would understand the game enough to be able to play other characters.

To get a claim on a neighbour you need to assign your councillor to make a claim.

To look at other army strength use the ledger army tab.

CK2 is a game best learnt by starting small.

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I tried that , but on my first offensive a huge army appeared to support the county I attacked and crushed me.

To look at other army strength use the ledger army tab.

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Where is that? I know where my own army is listed but not my someone else's. Also, as I just said I was defeated in my first play by an army that came in from somewhere else ( not my target). How I supposed to be aware of threats like that?

There is a tutorial to play that covers a lot of the questions.

Philistine said:

How I supposed to be aware of threats like that?

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You check who they are allied with before declaring war. Also helps if their friends are already fighting another battle. Another good time to attack is straight after they have already fought a war and their reserves are low or they are in an independence war.

Philistine said:

I tried that , but on my first offensive a huge army appeared to support the county I attacked and crushed me.
Where is that? I know where my own army is listed but not my someone else's. Also, as I just said I was defeated in my first play by an army that came in from somewhere else ( not my target). How I supposed to be aware of threats like that?

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bjon045 said:

You check who they are allied with before declaring war. Also helps if their friends are already fighting another battle. Another good time to attack is straight after they have already fought a war and their reserves are low or they are in an independence war.

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Bjorn explains it well.
Before attacking, make sure they are not allied to any other countries.
However, note that attacking a county belonging directly to another duchy or kingdom will automatically have their liege join the fight.
That's why Ireland is a good way to learn, because at the start of the game, they are almost all small independent counties.

Also, note that as a one-county minor, building in your capital is very useful to make you stronger than neighbours because the extra 50 levies can make a massive difference.

Another important thing is that you can assign leaders to your armies once they have been raised. Make sure you give them the best Martial score leader you can as they do affect battles quite heavily.

To get alliances yourself, you would need to marry some of your daughters off to other counts near you.


Also, you're making me want to replay the game now ...

You can see anyone's current army strength in their character window, it's one of the numbers there. It doesn't include potential allies coming to help though, for that you need to check their 'pacts' tab where you can see if they have allies (they may or may not accept their call-to-arms). In any case when you are on the war declaration window it shows little flags on each side saying who would join the war.

You can't have your army up when declaring war mostly because of gameplay (otherwise you could put your whole army next to their county, declare war and destroy them before they even gather their armies). You can have mercenaries up though.

As for the losing a vassal alert, usually it means they don't have children and their heir may be someone from another kingdom. Just marry them to someone and when they have kids they will become the heir and problem solved. A different thing is that when you die your possessions are distributed among your children and you'll play as one of them when you die if you have a 'gavelkind' (or similar) succession law, so your new character would lose those territories to his/her brothers/sisters. To stop that you change your succession law to primogeniture (oldest kid gets all), ultimogeniture (youngest kid gets all), elective (someone elected gets all) or similar.

Anyone try their hand at the newest DLC yet, Holy Fury? I grabbed it but haven't had time to play yet.
I typically wait for a few patches before diving in.

wiretripped said:

Anyone try their hand at the newest DLC yet, Holy Fury? I grabbed it but haven't had time to play yet.
I typically wait for a few patches before diving in.

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No, I have been playing Thronebreaker lately.
Probably will play it at some point.

Great another DLC and patch to break my mods.

So no I haven't played it and probably wont for a while.

I am rather excited about this DLC though, which seems almost as feature-rich as the Old Gods one did.
That said, I can't shake the feeling that this is the final, wrap-up DLC, where they tie up some last loose ends and implement those last few features that were still missing from CK1 (like canonization).

Philistine said:

This game is SO hard to get into. I really think I would enjoy it if I could figure out what I'm supposed to do!
Example: I'm starting as William of Normandy in 1080. I have decided that since I have the biggest army and the biggest balls, that I deserve to be King of France. How do I make that happen? The first thing I learn is that if you have an army you can't attack anybody [) so I'm supposed to disband my army, declare war, then re-assemble my army? I will lose one of my vassal's territory because I do not have succession rights, how do I take it from him? How do I lay claim to friendly territory? The game will allow me to declare war on a neighbour, Count Simon, but how do I know what forces he can gather, or who will come to his aid?

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Some tips before you declare a war:
1) Make sure you have a war chest (meaning, that you have a solid buffer of gold in your coffers): depending on the size of the opponent I would recommend at least 200-300 gold. This will allow you to hire mercs should things start going south.
2) Make sure you have maxed out your retinues (if available): your retinues represent your standing, professional army, and are the best troops you got. This opposed to your levies, who indeed you can't have raised before declaring war (I assume this is to prevent a player from positioning his levies prior and then just carpet-sieging the AI).
3) Get allies: marry into families with territory near your opponent, and make sure they hate their guts.
4) Check your opponent's allies: these guys will come to your enemy's aid in a defensive war, UNLESS they're suffering from heavy war exhaustion or are wrapped up in a war already.
5) Bide your time: this is arguably the most important one, you need to wait until they're weak. Wait until they're wrapped up in another war, or until their biggest allies are so they won't come to your enemy's aid.

As for the vassal inheritance warning, that depends on your crown laws. Check this wiki page. Basically, to be able to revoke his title should at least have your "crown authority" at limited. If you have it at high, the problem is moot completely: titles will not be able to pass from your realm anymore (so this is what you'll want to aim for).
Typically this occurs when he married someone else with a title too (and a different liege), so the heir will have claims to both titles. Depending on who the heir inherits from first (or which title is higher), the title might go to the spouse's liege instead. Murder could be a viable way out of the situation: murder the heir, murder the wife, and let him marry someone else and produce a new heir.

But enjoy the game! Once you start learning the intricacies of medieval politics and court intrigue, you'll have a blast.

All I see on this thread is WAR WAR WAR. Can you win without WAR ?

you said:

All I see on this thread is WAR WAR WAR. Can you win without WAR ?

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You could but then those 500 years will be boring. Though your liege lord might call you to war, or some rebels might kill you, and your whole family. It's a game of chance.

Play a republic and focus on building your family, and trade empire instead of conquest.

you said:

All I see on this thread is WAR WAR WAR. Can you win without WAR ?

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There is no "winning" the game: there are no victory conditions whatsoever, you set your own goals.
But, you can indeed acquire territory without war, but it'll require long term planning and a careful and deliberate strategy of marrying (and murdering) the right people hoping to inherit.

Like Couch said, it's probably a bit more boring as it's more of a waiting game and is partly up to chance.

So I read everybody's advice and watched some youtube videos and I'm still struggling (almost at the point of giving up). I've tried 3 different Irish chieftains and have yet to gain a county. If a claim appears naturally the target's forces are around double mine, so I daren't attack. I've tried to fabricate claims on weak counties, but they never appear before my chieftain dies. I usually have strong allies (King of Scotland, King of Brittany) but how do I get their aid? Also, in my William play, I attacked Count Simon, so the King of France declared war on me but died in battle! I occupied Paris, but no crown for me because I had no claim.. ended it there to try Ireland.

Philistine said:

So I read everybody's advice and watched some youtube videos and I'm still struggling (almost at the point of giving up). I've tried 3 different Irish chieftains and have yet to gain a county. If a claim appears naturally the target's forces are around double mine, so I daren't attack.

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Build up your gold so you can hire mercs. Wait until the enemy is embroiled in a war, then attack. Pool your levies with your mercs: usually it's a matter of killing their one big stack so do that first. Once their army is defeated you can disband the mercs since they cost a lot of money in maintenance, and focus on occupying his territory.

Philistine said:

I've tried to fabricate claims on weak counties, but they never appear before my chieftain dies.

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Myeah, claim fabrication depends on the roll of the dice basically. I haven't played in Ireland in a while so I am not sure what other casus belli are available to them. If you're at least Duke level, you could invite people with claims to the title to your court, and marry them to your kins(wo)men (marry matrilineally if the invited courtier is a man). When the heir inherits the title, you can then press his/her claim and because he's of your house, you'll end up as their liege.

Philistine said:

I usually have strong allies (King of Scotland, King of Brittany) but how do I get their aid?

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Do you mean they're refusing to join your war? Or that you don't know how to invite them to it?

Philistine said:

Also, in my William play, I attacked Count Simon, so the King of France declared war on me but died in battle! I occupied Paris, but no crown for me because I had no claim.. ended it there to try Ireland.

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What you get from a war depends indeed on what you were fighting for and what you have claims on. You're not going to become King of France simply by fighting over a backwater county.

I don't know how to invite others to join the war. Do you have to do it after you declare? I'm concerned that they are to far away, by the time they arrive too many of my troops will be dead. Also you said something about retinues? How do you get them?

Hm, I thought that you could do so in the dialog in which you declare war. Either way, after you've declared war there should be an icon on the top center of your screen that will allow you to invite them (if there's any to invite). Or, I think you can also open the character profile, and then right-click "invite to war".
It's actually been a while since I played though (I've been holding out until this new DLC was released), so my memory is a little vague.

As for retinues, you need the "Legacy of Rome" DLC for that, then check the military tab. Depending on the level of your title (you probably need to be at least Duke level) and how well your demesne is developed (certain buildings raise the retinue cap) you may or may not have enough of a cap to create retinues.

Philistine said:

I don't know how to invite others to join the war. Do you have to do it after you declare? I'm concerned that they are to far away, by the time they arrive too many of my troops will be dead.

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When you marry someone of your dynasty (or yourself) to another realm you don't get an automatic alliance, you get a non-aggression pact. To get the alliance you need to right click on the other ruler and select 'form alliance'. Then when you declare war you can invite them, or you can invite them after the war starts also (you get an alert on top if there are allies that would join).