Any updated tutorials on this game? Watched Arumba already.

[Coffee Fox]

Trying to get into CK2 - I've noticed there is a severe lack of (new) noob-friendly guides that are clear, concise, and don't get too complicated. Arumba's tutorial was great, but seems to be pretty dated. Are there any other tutorials out there that are good? Preferably not from 2014? And not about Conclave? I mean, there are tutorials with all the DLC, but none that are recent and any tutorial that is recent has Conclave tacked on...

Also, can anyone answer these questions?

1. Just started my first game, I have only one claim on a another county and seemingly no way to build up my levy to the point where I outnumber my potential enemy. Anyway to achieve this? When I sized the guy up using the realm tree, I outnumbered him, but in a few years he outnumbered me by around 400 men. I mean, I seduced a ton of people in his court and systematically murdered anyone with high marshal score, and put a child on the throne but it didn't help - He still outnumbered me.

2. How do you get a ton of gold? Arumba's "Borrow money and expel the Jews" doesn't work if your not a Duke.

3. Arumba's "This guy doesn't like me, replace him and control the Bishopric directly" doesn't seem like a good idea in war. Levy seems to only fill up when the garrison is full, which empties when you change ownership apparently. Not ideal when my ruler is 65 and I need to press my claim soon or I lose it (I do lose it, right? It's a strong claim). What should I do? On that note, anyway to speed up levy reinforcement rate other than the marshal?

4. Can spymasters only scheme in owned territory? What should I use the spymaster for other than studying technology?

5. Can someone expalin to me WHY THERE IS AN EXTREMELY VAGUE TOOLTIP THAT SAYS "Will not accept your offer" WHEN EVERY OTHER BOX IS CHECKED WHEN YOU TRY TO INVITE PEOPLE TO COURT OR MARRY THEM? WHY HAS NO ONE COMPLAINED ABOUT THIS BEFORE?UJGVWRDZBHIUOUHJWIUHGWKGNBURIBNWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRY!

6. My vassals seem to be utter trash. They never, ever give me troops even if I try to up my relationship with them. Anyway to fix this other than being a goody-goody and never doing anything wrong?

Thanks for your help guys.

PS: I'm playing as Desmond (Can't remember the local name) - Should I play another county?

 

[Knotz]

1. Just started my first game, I have only one claim on a another county and seemingly no way to build up my levy to the point where I outnumber my potential enemy. Anyway to achieve this? When I sized the guy up using the realm tree, I outnumbered him, but in a few years he outnumbered me by around 400 men. I mean, I seduced a ton of people in his court and systematically murdered anyone with high marshal score, and put a child on the throne but it didn't help - He still outnumbered me.

Mercenaries, you don't need to keep them around for long, just long enough to defeat the enemies main army. Just make sure you have enough men to siege his holdings (you always need to defend the defenders to siege). And attack when he doesn't have any alliances.

2. How do you get a ton of gold? Arumba's "Borrow money and expel the Jews" doesn't work if your not a Duke.

That depends. If you're feudal raise taxes and wait, set your steward on collecting extra taxes too. Build a war chest if you can.

If you're an Irish tribal you need to save enough to build ships and then you can raid Muslims lands. Very slow going tho, especially compared to Vikings. I wouldn't recommend a single Irish county tribal start to a noob.

3. Arumba's "This guy doesn't like me, replace him and control the Bishopric directly" doesn't seem like a good idea in war. Levy seems to only fill up when the garrison is full, which empties when you change ownership apparently. Not ideal when my ruler is 65 and I need to press my claim soon or I lose it (I do lose it, right? It's a strong claim). What should I do? On that note, anyway to speed up levy reinforcement rate other than the marshal?

You don't lose a strong claim upon death unless it's fabricated. Pretty sure you lose it then. If it isn't fabricated it becomes a weak claim, you can still push those as long as you meet certain requirements. And no, I don't think there's another way to increase levy reinforcement besides your martial. I think your leader's martial also influences that.

4. Can spymasters only scheme in owned territory? What should I use the spymaster for other than studying technology?

Blackmailing vassals out of factions when you have some.

5. Can someone expalin to me WHY THERE IS AN EXTREMELY VAGUE TOOLTIP THAT SAYS "Will not accept your offer" WHEN EVERY OTHER BOX IS CHECKED WHEN YOU TRY TO INVITE PEOPLE TO COURT OR MARRY THEM? WHY HAS NO ONE COMPLAINED ABOUT THIS BEFORE?UJGVWRDZBHIUOUHJWIUHGWKGNBURIBNWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRY!

I think there's a flat negative modifier you need to outweigh too.

6. My vassals seem to be utter trash. They never, ever give me troops even if I try to up my relationship with them. Anyway to fix this other than being a goody-goody and never doing anything wrong?

Assuming your relationship with them is in the high greens they may not have any men to give you.

PS: I'm playing as Desmond (Can't remember the local name) - Should I play another county more friendly to noobs?

If you wanna learn by starting off small I'd recommend doing so as a vassal of a powerful king. Just stay on his good side.

Starting off tiny means starting off slow, you often measure progress in rulers, not years.

Dunno about any good tutorials though, trial and error and reading the Wiki aren't awful teachers.

 

[VoodooEconomist]

It's been a while since I've lloked at any tutorials (since Sword of Islam actually) so I can't help you there, but I'll do my best with the questions. I don't consider myself a very good player though.

1. Just started my first game, I have only one claim on a another county and seemingly no way to build up my levy to the point where I outnumber my potential enemy. Anyway to achieve this? When I sized the guy up using the realm tree, I outnumbered him, but in a few years he outnumbered me by around 400 men. I mean, I seduced a ton of people in his court and systematically murdered anyone with high marshal score, and put a child on the throne but it didn't help - He still outnumbered me.

A difference of 400 men can be a lot or can be a little, depending on 1) the total number of the troops 2) the overall quality of the troops and 3) other battle cirumstances. It is possible to defeat an enemy that outnumbers you if you have better leaders and use terrain to your advantage. If you're not playing Iron Man just save the game and try to go to war - if it doesn't work out analyse why, load, and try again. Sometimes however, you just have to wait until your opponent suffers from other turmoil and is weakend and strike then - in the meantime fabricate/gather claims on other realms, preferrably weaker ones.

Other ways to increase your forces include:
1) Conquest of new holdings
2) Developing existing holdings
3) Building new holdings
4) Hiring a better Marshall to Train Troops
5) Increasing your own Martial score
6) Hiring mercenaries

2. How do you get a ton of gold? Arumba's "Borrow money and expel the Jews" doesn't work if your not a Duke.

Convert to Islam Gold is gained, in my experience, predominantly from war and taxation. So if you're a small, poor realm, you'll have to either work on your Stewardship, send a good tax collector, and wait or conquer and gain vassals. Remember that you can change your vassals' taxation rules in the Laws tab!

3. Arumba's "This guy doesn't like me, replace him and control the Bishopric directly" doesn't seem like a good idea in war. Levy seems to only fill up when the garrison is full, which empties when you change ownership apparently. Not ideal when my ruler is 65 and I need to press my claim soon or I lose it (I do lose it, right? It's a strong claim). What should I do? On that note, anyway to speed up levy reinforcement rate other than the marshal?

Hover over the claim on your character screen to see if it's inheritable. Holdings of not your type are generally a bad idea in my opinion, maybe as a last-ditch effort to balance scales, but not a strategy to be relied upon regulary?

4. Can spymasters only scheme in owned territory? What should I use the spymaster for other than studying technology?

Scheming is used to detect plots and to discourage vassals to join factions (or to convince them to join yours if you're both vassals). I usually set my Spymaster to Scheme in my capital to protect myself from plots. More details can be found here: http://www.ckiiwiki.com/Council#Spymaster

5. Can someone expalin to me WHY THERE IS AN EXTREMELY VAGUE TOOLTIP THAT SAYS "Will not accept your offer" WHEN EVERY OTHER BOX IS CHECKED WHEN YOU TRY TO INVITE PEOPLE TO COURT OR MARRY THEM? WHY HAS NO ONE COMPLAINED ABOUT THIS BEFORE?UJGVWRDZBHIUOUHJWIUHGWKGNBURIBNWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRY!

Could you explain in more detail hich exact tooltip you mean?

6. My vassals seem to be utter trash. They never, ever give me troops even if I try to up my relationship with them. Anyway to fix this other than being a goody-goody and never doing anything wrong?

Passing laws that increase minimum levy size will give you a portion of their levy no matter their opinion. However, if you really want to maximise the number of troops you get from vassals, you should increase your relations with them. This doesn't mean being a goody-good, just not pissing your vassals off

PS: I'm playing as Desmond (Can't remember the local name) - Should I play another county?

I'd suggest trying to play an independent Duke or King - Counts can be pretty boring. If you're set on Ireland and counties, try Dublin in the 1066 start, I think you're in line to inherit a neighboring county if I'm not mistaken.

 

[WSnova]

What? When did they nerf the borrow money and expell the jews?

A lot of the fundamentals still work, so Arumba still is a good starting point though. I´ll try to answer some of your questions though:

1.- When you are in this situation, its either getting a good alliance and calling them in or saving up for mercenaries. You can get your marshall to train troops but it won´t be nearly enough to outnumber them unless you have a very good marshall and a very good martial score on your character.

2.- Well, since the jewish exploit was apparently fixed, raise relations with your vassals so that they pay more taxes, raise taxes on cities and put your steward on collect taxes duty and wait. Raiding is also an option but its not available to everybody. One of the focus gives you money upfront through an event, I think its stewardship. Don´t waste money upgrading your holding yet, they take quite a bit to pay themeselves so its better to use that money for mercs and claims.

3.- Hover over your claim it will tell you if it can be inhereted.But it seems you are fabricating it so its not unless you press it IIRC.

4.- He can discover plots your vassals/courtiers are doing. You can get valid reasons to imprision them. He can scheme and discover plots everywhere you put him. He is quite useful once you have powerful vassals that can threaten you. You can use him to discourage them from joining a faction.

5.- This is on paradox, a lot of frustration has been caused by this. The AI has some base reculctance.

6.- Early on they are like this. Give them honorary titles and bribes if you want to speed it up. Over time they will like you more. The # of levies depend on your law too.

 

[ModerateOsprey]

I am pretty new at the game, but I have had the situation where I was playing as a one county count and have had a claim on a county where I was outnumbered.

I did lots of things to try and even the score. I used my chancellor to sow dissent and got my spy master to try and uncover plots in his county. Over time this had the effect of lowering his vassals opinion of him and so reducing the size of his levy. I did do some building, I think it is was a keep that added a bit to my levy and gave me a slight edge as he hadn't yet upgraded his, so mine held longer in a seige. I also did everything I could to raise the opinion of my own vassals to give me the largest levy possible by giving out gifts and occasionally swapping my chancellor back to my county to improve relations.

When I finally declared war, I was still slightly outnumbered, but I took the county by the skin of my teeth. The heir of that ruler eventually went on to rule Wales