Demesne too easy to get high ?

[Jester]

Does anyone else think that it is too easy to get a high demesne. I mean it is not hard to have a demesne of 9 or more with just a bit of getting a high stewardship stat combined with your wife's.
This means that is is not hard for someone to own the whole kingdom of Ireland, Brittany, Wales, or Bohemia to name a few. This seems too easy to me and takes away from the managing of vassals aspect of the game. From a purely gameplay perspective I have changed the bonus from stewardship from a 25% bonus to a 10% bonus. A 25% bonus means you get 4 extra demesne provinces from a stat of 10 which is an average or mediocre stat. The 10% means you only get one extra province from every 10 points of stewardship.

Anyone else's thoughts on this and how it diminishes the game somewhat.

Later,
JESTER

 

[Bluebags]

I think the number is fine for normal play. It does seem a bit high, yes, and there's no reason why you can't lower it using methods like your's, but from a "gameplay perspective" I'm sure the demesne sizes we see in the game are a deliberate choice of the developers. Smaller demense sizes, whilst still allowing a fulfilling game, likely didn't fit in with the overall design of the game.

The main problem probably lies in the fact that, although Counties are much more valuable than Baronies, the penalties for holding them are the same. If (for example) every County after your 2nd counted twice as much against your demense size, or if the Barony-level vassals were more than the pushovers they are now (and thus you'd rather just hand the bothersome Barons over to a loyal Count), then that might give you the gameplay feel you are looking for.

In the mean time, I don't think you really need to reduce any of the calculations affecting demense-size unless you want the AI to be playing by the same rules. You can easily just put the restrictions on yourself in-game.