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maxirage

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Apr 5, 2012
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Hey, here's a little interesting game I'd like to share. Following in the spirit of "How to Conquer the World in 25 years", I decided to go with something equally gamey but much more gimmicky -- own all of the Brittanian Empire, but as a count. That alone would be too easy however (you could use Nantes:happy:), so I expanded the restrictions:

-Start as a Christian
-Ironman mode
-As fast as possible
-Culture change to Welsh (why not?)

We'll start as the Duke of Wessex.

1-2.jpg

Now you might be thinking "wait, he's not a count!". That is a valid concern, but what matters is that we end up as a count, and we can accomplish that later (using gamey magic). But you know, his stats kinda suck. It would be much better if we were his brother, Alfred the Great of Wessex. So we will.

2.jpg

This is the same game, mind you, but we gave up the duchy title to Alfred. Notice the previous duke is still alive and is the heir. And there's the main trick in this run -- you can basically "die" and pass on your titles without actually dying, by getting yourself willfully deposed. This lets you do ridiculous things such as uniting all the Karling lands within a year, which I've done before.

Next part of the strategy is to take over Mercia. The problem is that Christians suck for conquest as they can't just tribal invasion everything :sad:. As to not rely on fabrications, I start-scummed until the Duke of Mercia had a negative opinion with the pope. Then you ask the pope for indulgences, which gives +10 opinion with him each time, easily maxing it. However, even if Mercia has a negative opinion and you have +100, asking for a claim only works around 50% of the time. Each attempt costs 100 piety, mind you, and you can't infinite-piety loop because that gives you tyranny which ruins papal opinion. It's the most annoying part part of the run, but luckily this is the only point in which I have to use it.

3.jpg

And fortunately it works on the first try. Now go full North-Korea Mode and crush Mercia. Afterwards we have a new mission: save Northumberland from the pagans. Why? Because otherwise we'll need to wage 3 holy wars to take that area back, which is a pain in the bottom. East Anglia is done for, however, so forget it.

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One down. In the intermission, I swore fealty to Scotland. Then I attacked Ivar the Boneless for East Anglia.

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Also check out my awesome advisers. That's not luck -- I invited all of them over. After winning we will use factions to change Scotland's laws to Elective Monarchy, and then push ourselves as claimant.

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Notice that I get it at medium crown authority, even though I should get autonomous vassals. It's neat but doesn't really matter in this run

And now for the second major trick in this run: how do you utilize NK mode in ironman? After all, you can't just pump your intrigue up to 90+, so failing to imprison a vassal would mean you have to fight a war each time. Well, I snooped around and noticed there is a way to imprison someone with no chance of failure.

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Oh noes, he ran away! Wait, no he didn't! He can't run away because he's landed, but he can't declare war on me either because he's not my direct vassal. You can imprison anyone with no penalty as long as they're a vassal of a vassal :happy:. So prop up some 0 intrigue loser, transfer vassalage to him, and voila.

Now we war everyone using the classic invite claimant -> land -> push claim, and use de-jure claims for anything that doesn't allow it. And here is the reason why I saved Northumbria before:

8.jpg

Now we'll form Britannia.

9.jpg

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And clean up the stragglers.

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Now we own all of Britannia. Wait a sec, we forgot about all that "count" business -- we're an emperor! No problem. Land a Welsh dude on Orkney, give him a kingdom, and vote him to inherit the Empire. Destroy all other titles.

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Now just depose yourself twice and culture change.

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Push for and independence and...

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We're done. We're now the Count of Manchester who owns the entire British Isles. All done within 4 years.

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Count.png

Hopefully this was informative ;).
 
That was both really interesting and impressive.
But could you please develop how you depose yourself in such little time ? Do you try revoking a rebellious vassal then intentionally lose the war ?
I don't really understand how you get yourself from king to count (and i am REALLY interested in that)
 
Do you try revoking a rebellious vassal then intentionally lose the war ?

Exactly. Though failed imprisonment is better than revocation. What you do is attempt to imprison a vassal with high intrigue; if you succeed, release them and try again. Eventually you will fail and they will DoW you, at which point you surrender. You get deposed and your heir gains all your titles.

You can use this to "downgrade" yourself if your highest title is elective. I made Scotland into an elective monarchy by faction, and then took it over. If you don't use factions then you have to wait 10 years until you can manually change the inheritance law. Then, any new title you make will also be elective, including the Empire of Britannia. I gave Scotland to a vassal so he can become a valid a candidate for the vote for Britannia. Then I destroyed all my other kingdoms and duchies, and set the king to be heir for Britannia.

Elective is different from the other laws as your "successor" (the king of Scotland) only gets the top-most title, leaving the counties to pass by normal inheritance. When you get deposed, the designated heir will get the empire, while your dynastic heir will get the rest of the titles. If you destroyed all your duchies and kingdoms, then you only own counties. i.e, you become a count.

This is the only way possible to downgrade yourself. Because it uses elective, it's limited to non Pagans/Muslims, so it's more of a gimmick than anything. The biggest downside is that you need to disband all your mercs and retinues, because those are inherited with the top title. The only real benefit is that you can culture change yourself by decision, as I did.
 
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Can I get a link on that Karling unification you mentioned? Do you have any other ... such things?

This feels like Art House of Crusader Kings II, thanks for sharing.
 
So since your a count again, you should be able to swear fealty to another kingdom, and push for elective again and rinse/repeat, unifying all of Christendom in a matter of years, right? Without ever really needing to go to war.
 
Do you enjoy breaking the game, coming here to brag about it forcing PD to try and fix it and make the game harder for the rest of us?
 
I like the evolution of Aethelred's mustache between the first image and the one after you gave away the Empire :happy:

As for breaking the game, the only real problem is with the unfallible imprisonment.
 
IAs for breaking the game, the only real problem is with the unfallible imprisonment.
I feel as though this is balanced under normal circumstances because you have to transfer the vassalage of many smaller realms to one, so it would make a very powerful entity within your state if you unpaused at all during it.

Also, can I just say that I love this, this is like my favorite thing, and I might try something similar really soon. I've really been itching for a World conquest, de jure drift entire world into the Byzantine Empire in NK mode so no rebellions, and then give out the titles.
 
So since your a count again, you should be able to swear fealty to another kingdom, and push for elective again and rinse/repeat, unifying all of Christendom in a matter of years, right? Without ever really needing to go to war.

I thought about that, but turns out there are two reasons why it doesn't work:

- A single character can only push a single elective succession faction in their lifetime.
- The claimant faction has a capped success chance of around 20%.

So usually it's faster to use tribal invasions.