Crusades: How often do they succeed?

[Kaazmodan]

I am quite new to CKII, but I'm learning now and getting more and more intrigued by its complexity and having more and more fun with roleplaying it. I feel that roleplaying is almost mandatory in such a person-driven game.

Now in my second game, I have played for something like 38 years as King Svend II the Holy of Denmark, who is breeding like a rabbit (something like 12 sons and 8 daughters, I can't keep track any more, barely of the ones alive and much less of all of my grandchildren) and refuses to die (he has had the traits consumption, ill and pox and all of the times recovered within a year. He is now 75 years old).

In that time, I have successfully led campaigns against the heathens in Ösel, northern Estonia and Uppland and taken their territories for my plentiful offspring. Most of my sons now become bishops, as it apparently removes them from the succession line, and I have more than enough heirs to fight for my small kingdom. I also managed to get a grandson as a ruler of the heathen lands around Mecklenburg (who then spent the next decade insulting and plotting against me, thus I "forgot" to answer his call for arms, when the heathens took their realm back. As far as I know, he now resides somewhere, landless, with his father, the now deposed king of France).
Sadly my French alliance didn't pay off. I had planned to use my French allies to fight for Normandy back, while I successfully could take back my rightful English holdings from the Norman bastard. Sadly, the French king proved useless, and even with my help, was unable to even keep his own throne

I have also married quite a few of my offspring off to various rulers, even gotten a few matrilinial marriages for my daughters and granddaughters in the HRE.

So being such a devout being, when the Pope in 1091 called for a crusade against the vile Fatimids to recover southern Italy, I naturally answered the call.
First I just raised my personal armies and ships, and sailed my 4,000 men to northern Sicily, both successfully winning a few battles and managing to fully occupy Messina. Then the main armies came from Egypt, and I barely got half of my men out of there alive, while I let a HRE army of 10,000 take a beating by a 25,000 man strong muslim army.
I then sat back and recovered for a few years in Denmark, before going for broke. I raised all my personal armies, all of my vassal armies and even emptied most of my coffers to raise mercenaries, in total for what I deemed a respectable army of 11,000 men. To pay for it all, I passed a harsher tax law. Then I marched down through the HRE. I expected that the Emperor would raise some armies to assist, but I am now fighting pretty much alone in southern Italy. And after three defeats of my army, I am now left with less than 8,000 men and having lost my beloved son-and-heir with a martial skill of 24 (he had led most of the campaigns so far).

My question is then, can I expect any help from my fellow Christians, or should I just withdraw and limit my now considerable losses, or should I stay back, fight the smaller armies, and hope for reinforcements, and hope that the 30k Muslims in southern Italy don't stomp me and Rome to the ground, before they arrive?

Also, how is the land divided, in case of a successful crusade, can I expect to get anything at all, even if I occupy some parts myself? I like roleplaying as the pious King Sven the Holy, but I have some lands at home I need to defend too, and there are heathens right at my doorstep, with lands ripe for the taking.

 

[Battle bunny]

In vanilla, crusades rarely succeed (at least not in the Holy Land, they have better luck in Sicily and Spain) and the winner takes it all - the "winner" being the one with the highest contribution. Expect the King of Scotland holding vast swathes of Southern Spain in a few games.

Some mods tweak this to make it more sensible. In CK2+, for example, crusades succeed more often and the kingdom is formed as an independent, but the first king gets to be a member of the dynasty who contributed the most to the crusade.

 

[tnick0225]

First in a Crusade, the person with the highest war contribution gains all the land. You can see how our war contribution ranks compared to everyone else by mousing over the Crusader flag.

Second Crusades can succeed it really depends on when and who the Pope calls them and what Christians join in. Sometimes the more powerful Kings/Emperors are too busy fighting their personal was to give a damn about what some Pope in Rome wants.

But since your Pope called it against Fatimid Sicily I dare say there is zero hope of winning it, unless the Fatimids implode due to the Caliph dying. But since at your point Holy Orders probably don't exist there is little chance of success I would imagine.




edited: Battle Bunny beat me to it lol

 

[Dr Pearceson]

In my game, which is my first, there have been three crusades. The first one was for Jerusalem, and was a failure (I did not intervene as I was busy unifiying Ireland). The second was for Jerusalem again, and this time I joined. We won, but I didn't get the lands. The most recent won was for southern spain. I joined again, and this time we won and I got all the land. I say the sucess of a crusade is based on three things: The strength and number of crusaders, the player intervening and the strength of the ruler defending. The first crusade lost because it was up against a very strong egypt. But the second was up against an
egypt that was suffering from major civil war.

To answer your question on how land is divided, it is given to the person who contributes the most to the crusade, and they get all the holdings personally like a holy war

 

[Kaazmodan]

Thanks a lot.
Since the Emperor has already contributed 61% to my 21%, I have little chance of being the one who gets it all, and even less chance of being on the winning side. And I have been fighting far more than my size should dictate anyway.
My armies shall march home and prepare for a fight against the heathens along the Baltic coast, those holdings look nice enough too. Perhaps my craven old king might croak off too in the meantime, and I guess I will have some work cut out for me, re-uniting my kingdom once more, until I can get a proper succession law in place.

 

[Yakdast]

not that often, I don't like it when they do (if I'm playing a Christian ruler), because my vassals may join in and take some land without asking my permission. The pope is an assh*le, I envy orthodox rulers - they have no crusades and you can do what you want. The only good thing from succeeding crusade (for me) is higher moral authority of my religion, which prevents (at least to some extent) heresy and makes my rule less troublesome.

 

[Kimberly]

Thanks a lot.
Since the Emperor has already contributed 61% to my 21%, I have little chance of being the one who gets it all, and even less chance of being on the winning side. And I have been fighting far more than my size should dictate anyway.
My armies shall march home and prepare for a fight against the heathens along the Baltic coast, those holdings look nice enough too. Perhaps my craven old king might croak off too in the meantime, and I guess I will have some work cut out for me, re-uniting my kingdom once more, until I can get a proper succession law in place.

Fighting armies gets you far more contribution score than besieging provinces. If you can find a few good-sized armies that you can destroy, you can definitely catch up to the Emperor.

 

[MartinSWE]

not that often, I don't like it when they do (if I'm playing a Christian ruler), because my vassals may join in and take some land without asking my permission. The pope is an assh*le, I envy orthodox rulers - they have no crusades and you can do what you want. The only good thing from succeeding crusade (for me) is higher moral authority of my religion, which prevents (at least to some extent) heresy and makes my rule less troublesome.

I love crusades because as long as you have a male ruler you will get a decent prestige/piety boost just by taking your crappy army to the target of the crusade not to mention the awesome free Crusader trait that gives a huge +30 relation bonus with other crusaders (including the Pope), relation bonus with the church in general and a nifty +2 martial bonus which doesn´t hurt either.

Also to the OP: Any crusade that takes place before the very powerful knightly order(s) have been created is unlikely to succeed unless the HRE decides to tag along. After the knightly orders have been formed there is a much greater chance that the Crusades will succeed.

 

[RustyTurban]

Well I've had games (in the current patch) where 3 crusades for the Holy Land we're won, all against the Fatimids, the Byzantines blobbed into Persia and Christians won in Iberia. BUT I was playing as Galicia so I can't say that would have happened otherwise. Christians OP? No. Its just a bit random.

 

[Kaazmodan]

Fighting armies gets you far more contribution score than besieging provinces. If you can find a few good-sized armies that you can destroy, you can definitely catch up to the Emperor.

Perhaps. But the crusade failed so miserably, that the Fatamids now are ruling Italy up to Parma. Stupidity has a habit of paying you back, and in this case, the Pope paid by now having Rome surrounded by heathens with a larger fighting force than most of Christian Europe combined, and him dying in a prison dungeon.
My reasoning for withdrawing from the crusade was that I was outnumbered 4-to-1 at that moment, my treasury was bleeding and with the Fatamids having better commanders and soldiers than me, so I decided to withdraw to take care of my original objective: Becoming ruler of all of Scandinavia. I have taken large parts of heathen Sweden, and I am pressing south through Ducal claims in a few years.
Sadly I was not able to use King Sven II the Holy's (who finally died at the age of 83 at the hands of the ungodly Swedes) strong claim on England, as I deemed myself too weak to take on it, and now his son King Sven III only has a weak claim.
I am currently able to press a weak claim on the French throne for my son, but I am not sure on whether I should use it:
1) I might get horribly murdered for taking up a fight on a realm that much larger than mine.
2) Even if I win, it'll be a far different game than I ever wanted.

How can I press weak claims on England? Will I have to hope that only a weak claimant actually gets the throne? I don't have a casus belli for it.

Another question: I can press De Jure ducal claims for two counties in the HRE, due to my holdings in Slesvig and Lübeck, but if I press them through war, will I have to fight the whole of the Empire? (which in that case, means a big no-no)

 

[Kimberly]

Perhaps. But the crusade failed so miserably, that the Fatamids now are ruling Italy up to Parma. Stupidity has a habit of paying you back, and in this case, the Pope paid by now having Rome surrounded by heathens with a larger fighting force than most of Christian Europe combined, and him dying in a prison dungeon.
My reasoning for withdrawing from the crusade was that I was outnumbered 4-to-1 at that moment, my treasury was bleeding and with the Fatamids having better commanders and soldiers than me, so I decided to withdraw to take care of my original objective: Becoming ruler of all of Scandinavia. I have taken large parts of heathen Sweden, and I am pressing south through Ducal claims in a few years.
Sadly I was not able to use King Sven II the Holy's (who finally died at the age of 83 at the hands of the ungodly Swedes) strong claim on England, as I deemed myself too weak to take on it, and now his son King Sven III only has a weak claim.
I am currently able to press a weak claim on the French throne for my son, but I am not sure on whether I should use it:
1) I might get horribly murdered for taking up a fight on a realm that much larger than mine.
2) Even if I win, it'll be a far different game than I ever wanted.

How can I press weak claims on England? Will I have to hope that only a weak claimant actually gets the throne? I don't have a casus belli for it.

Another question: I can press De Jure ducal claims for two counties in the HRE, due to my holdings in Slesvig and Lübeck, but if I press them through war, will I have to fight the whole of the Empire? (which in that case, means a big no-no)

The French throne: don't bother unless you have a strong foreign ally; the French can be mighty powerful. You will also find it difficult to rule France from Scandinavia... I suggest you consolidate in Scandinavia first, unless you're really feeling adventurous. In any case, if you go this route and succeed, prepare to beat down quite a few rebellions.

The English throne: you can only press a weak claim if there is no clearly legitimate king on the throne, i.e. if the ruler is female, if there is a regency, or if there is an ongoing succession crisis or someone else is pushing their own claim. (If you win the throne while someone else is pressing their claim, you will be at war with them.)

The Holy Roman Empire's counties: yes, because you can only declare war on the highest liege, you have to declare war on the Emperor himself. This can and will bring the wrath of the whole empire's armies upon you. What you can do is wait until a rebellion happens; if the owner of the counties (or the owner's liege) rebels, they become temporarily independent, and you can declare war on just those counts or dukes. Do note that if the rebellion ends (whether victorious or defeated) before you win your war for the counties, your war ends inconclusively immediately.

 

[lolciokuba]

Perhaps. But the crusade failed so miserably, that the Fatamids now are ruling Italy up to Parma. Stupidity has a habit of paying you back, and in this case, the Pope paid by now having Rome surrounded by heathens with a larger fighting force than most of Christian Europe combined, and him dying in a prison dungeon.
My reasoning for withdrawing from the crusade was that I was outnumbered 4-to-1 at that moment, my treasury was bleeding and with the Fatamids having better commanders and soldiers than me, so I decided to withdraw to take care of my original objective: Becoming ruler of all of Scandinavia. I have taken large parts of heathen Sweden, and I am pressing south through Ducal claims in a few years.
Sadly I was not able to use King Sven II the Holy's (who finally died at the age of 83 at the hands of the ungodly Swedes) strong claim on England, as I deemed myself too weak to take on it, and now his son King Sven III only has a weak claim.
I am currently able to press a weak claim on the French throne for my son, but I am not sure on whether I should use it:
1) I might get horribly murdered for taking up a fight on a realm that much larger than mine.
2) Even if I win, it'll be a far different game than I ever wanted.

How can I press weak claims on England? Will I have to hope that only a weak claimant actually gets the throne? I don't have a casus belli for it.

Another question: I can press De Jure ducal claims for two counties in the HRE, due to my holdings in Slesvig and Lübeck, but if I press them through war, will I have to fight the whole of the Empire? (which in that case, means a big no-no)

to answer your questions, if you have a weak claim on England and your claimant is male you can press it when there is already a succesion conflict going on, but in case of England you should be in Luck since that place implodes in Civil Wars like Crazy.

Secondly yes if the current owner does not rebel against the Kaiser you will have to fight the Emperor with all his might.

Edit: Someone beat me to it, never mind

 

[Kaazmodan]

The Holy Roman Empire's counties: yes, because you can only declare war on the highest liege, you have to declare war on the Emperor himself. This can and will bring the wrath of the whole empire's armies upon you. What you can do is wait until a rebellion happens; if the owner of the counties (or the owner's liege) rebels, they become temporarily independent, and you can declare war on just those counts or dukes. Do note that if the rebellion ends (whether victorious or defeated) before you win your war for the counties, your war ends inconclusively immediately.

I'll remember this. It might be slightly gamey, but those counties are very nice. It seems like the heathen Baltic and Sweden is the target for the foreseeable future. I have several marriages still going on with the Norwegian crown, so they are not going be be a target in the next decade or so. King Sven III is a current pretender to the Swedish throne, and soon he'll have another of his vassals owning Värmland.
I guess I'll have a look at England through a few marriages.
Even if Svend III is a pious man, he doesn't seem to mind breeding more sons, than there are counties to rule in the land. Their family reunions must be very numerous (and awkward for that matter, since three of his seven living brothers are currently imprisoned).
I like this game.

 

[Kaazmodan]

to answer your questions, if you have a weak claim on England and your claimant is male you can press it when there is already a succesion conflict going on, but in case of England you should be in Luck since that place implodes in Civil Wars like Crazy.

Oh, God were you right. England imploded in civil wars. I was able to make use of my weak claim and went in, and before I had defeated the English king, he had won his civil war, and rekindled his kingdom. I won the war against an extremely decimated king, and King Sven III is now the king of England as well. I now have the tooltip that tells me that one of my vassals (The Count of Öland) will inherit me as King of England when I die. Can I prevent this? I also see that I can destroy the title of Kingdom of England. In that case what happens (other than the prestige loss)?

In any case, I see few advantages to becoming king of England. My income seems to rise as years go by, but I can't seem to raise any armies in England, other than my suddenly much larger retinue cap.

 

[Alyiakal]

The succession laws for England are probably different than Denmark. Possibly Elective with all the vassals disliking you, but I've personally never seen England go that route. Preventing the title loss really depends on the scenario, so we'd need details.

As for destroying the title; since you already hold another kingdom title as primary, destroying the title will cause England to begin drifting into Denmark. Unfortunately, it will also slap a -50 relationship penalty on all the de jure vassals in England. Which means they will probably rebel. If you've got a ton of troops on hand and can put down the rebellion, this will actually allow you to revoke titles for free (and throw people in jail indefinitely).

To be honest, it probably would have been a better idea to request an invasion from the pope (as you can request an invasion if you have a title claim, even if it's weak). That would have let you clear out all the trash English vassals and install your own loyal Danish ones.

 

[unmerged(149861)]

The rulers taking part need an event whereby they get some free troops (ala independance faction) to represent the really minor nobility getting in on the act. At present it's too easy to beat crusaders; the military movement that spanned Western Europe should be more than a few dozen dukes landing men willy-nilly along the coast.

Also, some sort of feature with a "crusade commander" is needed. Basicly, one ruler controls all the crusaders (bar the players if he doesn't want it to) so that the irritating issue of tiny levies getting defeated in deatil is solved. Could also be a nice series of events with nobles fighting over who is in charge ect (ala First Crusade).

 

[Kaazmodan]

To be honest, it probably would have been a better idea to request an invasion from the pope (as you can request an invasion if you have a title claim, even if it's weak). That would have let you clear out all the trash English vassals and install your own loyal Danish ones.

LOYAL vassals? Both my first king, King Sven the Holy, and his son, Kind Sven III have been breeding like rabbits, and all they seem to do is complain and rebel. I think that half of my current brothers and several of my sons are in jail as of this moment (1105). If my own brothers are this good, how in the world would I have good vassals? King Christian II's bloodbath of Stockholm is nothing compared to what I have in mind at this moment.

I did decide to free all of my English prisoners when I won the throne of England, to get better relations, and when I checked, none of them decided to rebel against me the first time when England rebelled (when I tried to imprison the former king of England). I still don't know whether that was a mistake or not, I don't mind my subjects (including my mother) in a prison cell, they seem to be much more loyal that way.

I will keep the papal thing in mind though. It took me years to learn all the nooks of EU3 tactics, it'll probably take the same for me to learn how to play CK2. I'd barely even considered the papal mechanics so far, I guess I should check them out.

 

[Double Event]

My last game I ws king of Ireland and one of the Spanish kings started a crusade, I didn't join, but then a couple decades later the pope calls for a crusade in Aquitaine. I was like, wtf? I hadnt been paying attention to the continent at all. Turns out the Arabs overran all over eastern Spain and pushed deep into Southern France. :facepalm:

Another game I was playing as the King of Castille, I think, and a crusade was started by the Spanish king in Portugal (forget the kingdom name). I joined the crusade, defeated a couple Arab armies before a super army showed up and kicked the crap out of me and then the Arabs rolled up the coast of Portugal and all that was left was the two northern most provences by the time the crusade came to an end.

It seems like maybe the Spanish kings when AI controlled should hold off on campaigning in force against the Arabs for a century or so... They don't seem to stand any chance at the begining of the game.

 

[istoptime]

I talked about this in another post I made, but there was a Crusade for Greece I joined because I like free stuff but I got too much free stuff. We won and I became the King of Greece and that was waaaay to much. I would have been fine getting slowly kicked out of Greece but someone had claims on both my original lands in Hungary and for the kingdom of Greece and he pushed all claims, so I lost that fight and I lost everything.

 

[NewbieOne]

My experience is that eventually a crusade will work, but sometimes this will be much later than 1095. Late starts tend to see the European Christians more powerful in comparison than they were around the beginning IMHO.