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Monophysite Holy Order for unloved Ethiopians

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NewbieOne said:
I really hope the devs read this thread. [...]
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Thank you for putting some serious thought into this. It is an unbalanced area of the map to play. Although the interesting thing is that in the time since I started this thread, I have been publishing my Abyssinian AAR and occasionally folks will respond with their winning Ethiopian strategy. There seems to be three main strategies that you can take to have a prayer of a chance:

1. Alliance by marriage. The Abyssinian king starts out with an unmarried son, and you can get breathing space from the infidels by causing them to hesitate to invade when you establish an alliance with the HRE. I tried this in my AAR and the emperor said no dice, but at least one person has been more capable than I and managed this.
2. Swearing fealty to HRE or Byzantine Empire or to the infidels. Any one of these will get you in the clear, although you may well have to take a huge piety and/or prestige hit to make yourself acceptable (converting from Orthodox heretic to Orthodox costs 500 piety, for example).
3. Assassinating the Shia Caliphs like a madman. Their succession laws make them ripe for civil war, and when they are fighting themselves they are not fighting Ethiopians.

Someone had the good idea (as Axum) of swearing fealty to Abyssinia. This consolidated two Ethiopians realms into a more powerful one.

All this being said, while it is possible to survive as Ethiopian, it really shouldn't be *this* hard. The best ideas to help them, from posters in this thread, would probably be adding mercs they can employ and preventing Holy Wars between Ethiopians and Muslims.
 
principiis said:
Philo, you'll be pleased to know I'm currently working on a mod to address a lot of the issues that have been raised here. In addition to adding a couple of my own ideas, I'm borrowing bits and pieces from other mods that have tackled certain aspects I want to include, in order to cobble them together into something resembling a comprehensive Abyssinia buff. Once I have an ETA, you'll be the first to know. :happy:

P.S. If you want to catch an early look, you might want to drop by the CKII Modding IRC channel, where you'll probably find me desperately trying to flag down some of our more esteemed modders here for help with all the walls I've been running face-first into -- plus, it'll make Meneth happy! :laugh:
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Thanks, principiis, it sounds great. Please do let me know when you have it running--I would love to try it out. (I know nothing whatsoever about modding, unfortunately, so I can't help on that end.)
 
Philo32b said:
At first I made this suggestion as a joke, but the more I think about it, the more it seems like a good idea to make a Monophysite Holy Order. As the game is currently set up, occasionally you will be surprised and see Abyssinia or Axum rise up against the raging infidel masses all around them. But that is rare (and usually brief). Usually they are just quickly crushed.

There is not much love for the Ethiopians:

  • Except for Nubia, they are are heretic Orthodox, so no help from others.
  • No available mercenaries to hire.
  • Their tech starts at 0 surrounded by Muslims with very high tech.
  • Muslims in Egypt have lots of horse archers, which easily destroy the light stuff the Ethiopians have at their command.
  • The biggest problem is that there are massive numbers of infidels all around, just waiting to do an easy Holy War on helpless Monophysites.

A Monophysite Holy Order would add some strategic depth and make playing Abyssinia more than just an exercise in the tragic. (See my AAR for a blow-by-blow example of such an exercise.) Having an Ethiopian HO with heavy cavalry like knights in armor would be absurd, of course, but why not just have it be light infantry, light cavalry, and archers? (Maybe horse archers too?) Basically, the head of one of the last Monophysite rulers calls up a summons of all the people capable of picking up a weapon to fight against infidel invaders. The strength then would not be in the type of troop, but in the sheer numbers that answer the call--I'll throw out 15,000 men, just for kicks. They come pouring out of the mountainous and arid countryside, eager to defend their faith or die trying.

Possible objection: wouldn't this unbalance the Muslims, because now Ethiopians can easily sack Egypt? In order to prevent this, we could have the HO carry massive maintenance costs... which of course wouldn't have to be paid if you are defending against infidels.

As Monophysite ruler, ensuring your heirs are very pious would be of the utmost importance (make them humble, chaste, zealous, etc. through tutoring). And this would also add strategic depth and flavor.

A Monophysite HO would seem to help, then, ensure the Ethiopians could stay in the game longer and be a viable player option.
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I know it has been a long time since this was posted but it would not mess with the game much because Egypt is rich with a lot of rich and populated provinces, making it a super power, and your forgetting the mamluk death machine.
 
Wait, wait, wait. Has anybody thought that they could possibly add the defensive bonus Slavic/Suomenusko/Romuva pagans will get to the Miaphysites/Monophysites as well? If it will help the Pagans right next to the HRE so much, maybe it could do the same for Abyssinia. Of course they could always disable holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites, too, that would be nice.
 
Theddude said:
Wait, wait, wait. Has anybody thought that they could possibly add the defensive bonus Slavic/Suomenusko/Romuva pagans will get to the Miaphysites/Monophysites as well? If it will help the Pagans right next to the HRE so much, maybe it could do the same for Abyssinia. Of course they could always disable holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites, too, that would be nice.
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interesting idea. but what we really need is the Baqt. a breakable but ai resistant treaty that prevents war between Nubia and Egypt.
 
I support the idea of a HO it can even be vassalized - the Holy Order of Severus of Antioch with a holy knucklebone as a relic. And the first leader of the order should have name Tesfaye of course.
 
Theddude said:
Wait, wait, wait. Has anybody thought that they could possibly add the defensive bonus Slavic/Suomenusko/Romuva pagans will get to the Miaphysites/Monophysites as well? If it will help the Pagans right next to the HRE so much, maybe it could do the same for Abyssinia. Of course they could always disable holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites, too, that would be nice.
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I will raise this issue. Good idea. :)
 
I have modded my game so holy wars can only be initiated against heresies, against parent religions, and by muslims and christians against each other if both religious heads are landed. I have also modified the de jure claim CB to work only within the same religion. Finally, I enabled early jihads and disabled muslim invasions. This lets Abyssinia survive much longer.
 
Theddude said:
Wait, wait, wait. Has anybody thought that they could possibly add the defensive bonus Slavic/Suomenusko/Romuva pagans will get to the Miaphysites/Monophysites as well? If it will help the Pagans right next to the HRE so much, maybe it could do the same for Abyssinia. Of course they could always disable holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites, too, that would be nice.
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Shouldn't they also have the ability to raid? I recall that during discussion like this some time ago somebody mentioned it.

Also, how can you do the trick with vassalizing mercenaries? Maybe Abbysinia should just start with "Abbysinian Band" as a Mamluk-style vassal?
 
Theddude said:
Wait, wait, wait. Has anybody thought that they could possibly add the defensive bonus Slavic/Suomenusko/Romuva pagans will get to the Miaphysites/Monophysites as well? If it will help the Pagans right next to the HRE so much, maybe it could do the same for Abyssinia. Of course they could always disable holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites, too, that would be nice.
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Wouldn't this make converting to monophysitism crazy powerful for people not directly adjacent to religious enemies?
 
CzokletMuss said:
Shouldn't they also have the ability to raid? I recall that during discussion like this some time ago somebody mentioned it.

Also, how can you do the trick with vassalizing mercenaries? Maybe Abbysinia should just start with "Abbysinian Band" as a Mamluk-style vassal?
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Theoretically everyone should be able to raid, especially Maghreb Muslims, but they've decided to make it Pagan-specific. It would be interesting if Holy Orders could raid though, it would be fun seeing the Knights Hospitaller raiding kind of like their later piracy, we could even give them Malta and Rhodes just for fun! :laugh:

Rubidium said:
Wouldn't this make converting to monophysitism crazy powerful for people not directly adjacent to religious enemies?
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I don't know, since we don't have all the details on how the attrition mechanic will work. Presumably though, it doesn't apply to other pagans (probably all pagans, but at least of the same type) or that would be a bit strange, so maybe other Christians wouldn't take that kind of attrition. If that were the case then converting to Miaphysitism in France wouldn't really confer much of a bonus.

Now, I haven't figured it all out myself, but I share your concern that it could be OP, so there would have to be something balancing it out, maybe not allowing Miaphysites to Holy War, making them a kind of "defensive" Christianity like there are "defensive" and "offensive" Pagans. However if it's implemented it could stand a good chance of representing the historical reasons Ethiopia wasn't conquered, Baqt or no.
 
Philo32b said:
Someone had the good idea (as Axum) of swearing fealty to Abyssinia. This consolidated two Ethiopians realms into a more powerful one.
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That would be me, ages ago. :)

I could add to your list - betrothals. You can't declare war on someone if there is a betrothal between close relatives. Keeping constant betrothals in play between your siblings or children and the siblings, children of the Caliph effectively makes war impossible without breaking the betrothal, which the AI seems very, very reluctant to ever do.

The 'new' mercenaries for Abyssinia are sufficient safeguard against any other local threat.

From an historical perspective, the problem with Abyssinia in the game is three-fold:

1. Desert attrition isn't nearly harsh enough.
2. There's no real simulation of trade (except for Republics) and no ports on the Red Sea/Indian Ocean.
3. Half or more of the historical kingdom is off map.

I've moved on to playing Project Balance with the SWMH map and in that mod combo Abyssinia (though I still prefer staring as Axum) is much, much easier: more counties, a better cultural retinue, significant cultural modifies to the various troop types, and no holy wars between Muslims and Miaphysites. It can be difficult to expand beyond consolidating de jure Abyssinia, but there's little to no chance of getting steamrolled - which is a fair trade in my mind.
 
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