As an emperor of alba who is hoping to expand onto the continent, what is the best strategy for keeping under your vassal limit? The way I see it, there are two options: I could keep my king of ireland title and give out scotland and england as viceroyalties or I could destroy all the kingdom titles and just make a bunch of dukes. Thoughts?
Destroy all kingdoms and make a bunch of dukes or viceroys
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I don't find there to be much need for vassal kings until you're at multi-empire stage. Don't be afraid of having dukes with multiple duchies. If you're running primogeniture (most vassals will try for this), they will eventually start to consolidate their lands anyways. They will still be weaker than a vassal king and more of them will have to gang up on you to take you and your loyal vassals down in a civil war.
Maybe destroy England but I don't see why you can't hand out Scotland and Wales as viceroyalties. It's be the same as having 2 mega-dukes in those areas but the viceroys will be much more grateful. Especially if you keep choosing old people that will die before you.
Grateful vice royalties are good. Imprisoned direct vassals with +100 opinion and no heir are even better.
Also, vassal kings suck. Tax and levy size will suffer big time if they have to pass two levels of lieges to arrive.
- Kingdom Titles -
Give a shitty tribal county to someone not of your religion. Give him a kingdom title after making sure that no vassal is attached to it. Grant him independence. Forget about it. You can take it back any time 5 years later.
- Duke Vassals -
Give a shitty but still feudal county to a plotter. Give him a duchy title, making sure that no count vassal is attached. Imprison him tyranny free. Now you have a duke with no vassal and one demesne county, nicely imprisoned.
The duke will become loyal because you will transfer up to 20 counts to him and each count you transferred to him is +10 opinion. Make another loyal and imprisoned duke if you have more than 100 counties. The whole empire of Britannia won't need more than two duke vassals.
If you need 2+ dukes, make sure that all of them have count vassals every where - make crazy border mix ups. So that you can raise all of their levy anywhere in your realm.
Use ducal titles that their de jure kingdom title is not yet created, so that you can transfer them to any king in the future if needed.
Also, feel free to regularity
- Count Vassals -
Choose decent courtiers, give each of them maximum number of counties that each count's demesne limit can handle. On average you need one count for 4~5 counties. Transfer those counts to the above imprisoned duke. This way one imprisoned but very loyal duke can hold 100 counties (20 counts x 5 counties per count)
- Merchant Republics -
Use the left over ducal titles to create single county merchant republics, up to 10% of your realm counties.
- Research Complex -
You still have ducal titles? Make more imprisoned single county dukes. Use shitty tribal counties. Vassal dukes and kings can generate tech points that you can inherit. Leave them for several years. Eventually murder them to inherit tech points they have collected. One spymaster sent to Byzantine is good. 20 spymasters are even better.
Also, vassal kings suck. Tax and levy size will suffer big time if they have to pass two levels of lieges to arrive.
- Kingdom Titles -
Give a shitty tribal county to someone not of your religion. Give him a kingdom title after making sure that no vassal is attached to it. Grant him independence. Forget about it. You can take it back any time 5 years later.
- Duke Vassals -
Give a shitty but still feudal county to a plotter. Give him a duchy title, making sure that no count vassal is attached. Imprison him tyranny free. Now you have a duke with no vassal and one demesne county, nicely imprisoned.
The duke will become loyal because you will transfer up to 20 counts to him and each count you transferred to him is +10 opinion. Make another loyal and imprisoned duke if you have more than 100 counties. The whole empire of Britannia won't need more than two duke vassals.
If you need 2+ dukes, make sure that all of them have count vassals every where - make crazy border mix ups. So that you can raise all of their levy anywhere in your realm.
Use ducal titles that their de jure kingdom title is not yet created, so that you can transfer them to any king in the future if needed.
Also, feel free to regularity
- Count Vassals -
Choose decent courtiers, give each of them maximum number of counties that each count's demesne limit can handle. On average you need one count for 4~5 counties. Transfer those counts to the above imprisoned duke. This way one imprisoned but very loyal duke can hold 100 counties (20 counts x 5 counties per count)
- Merchant Republics -
Use the left over ducal titles to create single county merchant republics, up to 10% of your realm counties.
- Research Complex -
You still have ducal titles? Make more imprisoned single county dukes. Use shitty tribal counties. Vassal dukes and kings can generate tech points that you can inherit. Leave them for several years. Eventually murder them to inherit tech points they have collected. One spymaster sent to Byzantine is good. 20 spymasters are even better.
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That's the problem with PI games. You either play with a plethora of dirty tricks to be good at the game, or you try to keep it real severely hurting yourself in the process.
When I played my game in Britania, I kept all of my important titles in England, and promoted gavelkind elsewhere.
Cons:
- Polnische Wirtschaft all over the Isles (except England);
- taxes from Ireland and Scotland down form 5 potatoes to 3 potatoes per decade;
- little to no control over internal affairs of your backwaters.
Pros:
- immersive approach;
- few vassals in rural areas, hence high centralization and large demense in civilized areas;
- no "wrong govt type" vassals;
- vassals hating each other more than hey hate you;
- vassals claiming each others' titles and forgetting about yours;
- large vassals constantly breaking down on succession
When I played my game in Britania, I kept all of my important titles in England, and promoted gavelkind elsewhere.
Cons:
- Polnische Wirtschaft all over the Isles (except England);
- taxes from Ireland and Scotland down form 5 potatoes to 3 potatoes per decade;
- little to no control over internal affairs of your backwaters.
Pros:
- immersive approach;
- few vassals in rural areas, hence high centralization and large demense in civilized areas;
- no "wrong govt type" vassals;
- vassals hating each other more than hey hate you;
- vassals claiming each others' titles and forgetting about yours;
- large vassals constantly breaking down on succession
I'd not bother to destroy the Kingdoms if you're not facing revolts aiming for these titles- if you intend to expand, you'll need them soon enough for vassals.
If you create megadukes and destroy the Kingdoms, they'll simply form them under you when they hold enough de jure land
Longterm, viceroys are a comfortable way to go, even if they cause a bunch of issues and will spend up to a century revoking their vassal titles, redistributing them and revoking them again until they eventually end up holding the capitol- To reduce this issue, make sure a viceroy gets the de jure capital of his Kingdom, as well as possibly all (viceroyal) Duchy titles himself.
If you create megadukes and destroy the Kingdoms, they'll simply form them under you when they hold enough de jure land
Longterm, viceroys are a comfortable way to go, even if they cause a bunch of issues and will spend up to a century revoking their vassal titles, redistributing them and revoking them again until they eventually end up holding the capitol- To reduce this issue, make sure a viceroy gets the de jure capital of his Kingdom, as well as possibly all (viceroyal) Duchy titles himself.
I completelly fail to understand what half of this thread is saying. Can someone please break it down for me? I am very confused and/or annoyed at what I am reading because either I am embarrassingly stupid and have been for months, or maybe I'm not.
Ok so if you want to have less vassals (so you have more space for more vassals) when you start a campaign to conquer mainland Europe... Why on earth would you destroy Kingdom titles? IIRC Scotland is a Kingdom that has 6 Duchies, and if I understand how the game works, then if you want less vassals why not have a King of Scotland who then owns those 6 duchies either personally or trough subinfeudation? That's having 1 vassal vs having 6 if we assume that each duchy has an unique duke. Or 3 dukes if you give 2 titles each to 3 dudes or 2 dukes if you give 3 each. At any rate last I checked the number 1 was worth less than the numbers 2, 3 and 6. So if you want less vassals you should be creating Kings and giving them rule over their de-jure duchies. Not the other way around.
Ok so if you want to have less vassals (so you have more space for more vassals) when you start a campaign to conquer mainland Europe... Why on earth would you destroy Kingdom titles? IIRC Scotland is a Kingdom that has 6 Duchies, and if I understand how the game works, then if you want less vassals why not have a King of Scotland who then owns those 6 duchies either personally or trough subinfeudation? That's having 1 vassal vs having 6 if we assume that each duchy has an unique duke. Or 3 dukes if you give 2 titles each to 3 dudes or 2 dukes if you give 3 each. At any rate last I checked the number 1 was worth less than the numbers 2, 3 and 6. So if you want less vassals you should be creating Kings and giving them rule over their de-jure duchies. Not the other way around.
@Pollux26
Let's say that you're the emperor of Britania and have 2 vassal kings, one in Ireland and one in Scotland. Some parts of the British Islands are still independent.
You're preparing to gobble them up. You're almost ready to press the "send" button under a declaration of war when there's a ring-a-ding-ding announcing that king Haggies and king Potato decided that emperor Haggis suits them better than emperor 5 o'clock.
Your future looks grim, and soon, your outlook has metal bars obscuring some of the view.
tl;dr
powerful vassals can carve you a new asshole when they get too strong
Let's say that you're the emperor of Britania and have 2 vassal kings, one in Ireland and one in Scotland. Some parts of the British Islands are still independent.
You're preparing to gobble them up. You're almost ready to press the "send" button under a declaration of war when there's a ring-a-ding-ding announcing that king Haggies and king Potato decided that emperor Haggis suits them better than emperor 5 o'clock.
Your future looks grim, and soon, your outlook has metal bars obscuring some of the view.
tl;dr
powerful vassals can carve you a new asshole when they get too strong
Understandable strategy.
But what if I make sure every count has only one county, and every duke has only one duchy, and every King only has his de-jure dukes? That wouldn't be a very consolidated realm now would it? So maybe it would be less of a threat that way?
Could you not post all of your exploits in every thread? Almost all of us want to play a game without exploiting the hell out of the game. I really don't need to know the most optimal way to play the game whenever I read any thread.
Let me clarify the discrepancy: As hinted at in the post above, people simply take different approaches to the game, and some make a sport out of taking more time to ensure they can at anytime kill off vassals that dislike them, and prevent those vassals from having heirs, than crushing a full scale faction revolt would in most cases.
I personally recommend common sense instead of this- you've done the maths already, and obviously investing King vassals is the way to go if you intend to expand further and a bunch of petty Dukes fill out your vassal limit.
Well, investing in strong king vassals has its own benefit. With the same number of counties, a proper king will have larger retinue, more prestige, and can be made to be a lot more active on expanding your realm where you are stuck with defensive pacts. More so if you convert to pagan Altaic culture and have your vassals with same religion and culture. Feudal still can call powerful tribal invasion if you stay in elective gavelkind succession. It costs 500 prestige which is easy for you to give to your kings through high born concubines.
The tax you didn't get to collect would be used by your vassal kings to fund their wars that will expand your realm.
Vassals kings can also handle those pesky raiders on their own, while you have run to save your dukes.
It is fun to control them properly too, through opinion boosting methods, marriage and using dynasty members.
The tax you didn't get to collect would be used by your vassal kings to fund their wars that will expand your realm.
Vassals kings can also handle those pesky raiders on their own, while you have run to save your dukes.
It is fun to control them properly too, through opinion boosting methods, marriage and using dynasty members.
Ultimate proof why every online form of communication needs a facepalm emoji.
I hate to be a dick but, the op asked for how to handle his vassal limit, as Emperor of Alba- you're seriously throwing in converting to Altaic culture might be useful?
To be as diplomatic as possible: When giving advice on specific questions, read through the thread, and take in account the described situation.
Converting to Altaic to enable freshly generated vassals invasion CB might be useful for an Abbasid who's snatched half the world within 3 years only to then dump his title on a nephew to be "only King tier", but it's simply not an option when playing casually as Emperor of Alba, on the British Isles!
I hate to be a dick but, the op asked for how to handle his vassal limit, as Emperor of Alba- you're seriously throwing in converting to Altaic culture might be useful?
To be as diplomatic as possible: When giving advice on specific questions, read through the thread, and take in account the described situation.
Converting to Altaic to enable freshly generated vassals invasion CB might be useful for an Abbasid who's snatched half the world within 3 years only to then dump his title on a nephew to be "only King tier", but it's simply not an option when playing casually as Emperor of Alba, on the British Isles!
I think not too powerful vassal kings are manageable as long as they either love you, owe you a favor, are of your dynasty, or you make a big mess out of their territories (giving each of them territories within the kingdom of the other) so that they will be busy fighting each other instead of you. Keep expanding to remain more powerful than them, though. Otherwise viceroyalties are best when you've reached your vassal limit. You could also try increasing centralization so you can have more vassals if you prefer the dukes.
In terms of vassal kings - I owned all of Africa and a bit of Europe in my last game and had tried out vassal kings instead of viceroyalties and they never rose up against me (they conquered more lands instead). So I guess it can work out without blowing up in your face.
In terms of vassal kings - I owned all of Africa and a bit of Europe in my last game and had tried out vassal kings instead of viceroyalties and they never rose up against me (they conquered more lands instead). So I guess it can work out without blowing up in your face.
In regards of the comparison between viceroys and vassal kings:
Pro viceroy:
-Title can be redistributed, allowing a hefty opinion modifier on the receiver, ensuring they will be in line after a title grant
-Formation of unwantedly huge vassal realms within the realm less likely due to eventually aquired non de jure vassals transferring back to the top liege every generation
Con:
-Distributed viceroyalties opinion modifier stacking and growing: I'm at -120 now from granted viceroyalties in my current Rome game, which already outweights the +100 "granted a Kingdom" and makes me rely on other modifiers
-AI viceroys will spend quite some time aimlessly revoking titles, again and again as it passes them back out, before it actually becomes an asset by own initiative
Pro viceroy:
-Title can be redistributed, allowing a hefty opinion modifier on the receiver, ensuring they will be in line after a title grant
-Formation of unwantedly huge vassal realms within the realm less likely due to eventually aquired non de jure vassals transferring back to the top liege every generation
Con:
-Distributed viceroyalties opinion modifier stacking and growing: I'm at -120 now from granted viceroyalties in my current Rome game, which already outweights the +100 "granted a Kingdom" and makes me rely on other modifiers
-AI viceroys will spend quite some time aimlessly revoking titles, again and again as it passes them back out, before it actually becomes an asset by own initiative
I find that the Ultimate Exploit involves using the console to grant yourself ownership of all kingdom and/or empire tier titles. Why, you can complete a Full World Conquest in mere minutes!
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Only the non viceroys hate you for viceroyalties. So if you have only viceroys as direct vassals (even if they also own hereditary titles) you should be OK.
The thing with the constant revocations and redistribution is a bug that happens mostly when the duchies are viceroyalties too (so it should be worse inside the Byzantine/Roman empire).
At the moment I'm playing a campaign where I have 4 viceroys with only feudal/hereditary dukes under them and they behave just fine. The ones in contact with infidels are always trying to expand the realm.
Yeah the revoking issue is indeed related to Viceroyal Duchies (however not owning the Kingdom's de jure capital will as much trigger endless circles of the Viceroy plotting to or simply deciding to revoke the title, only to then again grant it out to some noble per some event or whatever).
I decided to not go for hereditary Dukes wherever I could, as the base concept of the viceroyalties for me is to prevent the formation of large vassal realms by combined inheritages.
For all I found out, "preparing ground", i.e. distributing (viecroyal) duke titles de jure and putting a Viceroy on top, leads to nothing productive, as the AI simply doesn't like it. In Sicily and Croatia respectively, I installed viceroys early on when I got elected emperor, only to then see them struggle for almost a century- particularly Sicily had some severe issue, he kept revoking Palermo, his de jure capital, only to grant it out to nobles again and again constantly- at some point even making a city county out of it until I decided to rectify the situation after inheriting the title back.
Following this experience, I proceeded to set up conquered territory in a way where simple single counts are put under one Exarch holding all the titles and the de jure capital. Consequently, my Exarch of Syria- which I took much later than the de jure territories in Italy and the Dalmatian coast- started to invade further muslim territories right away, while the Croatian guy took almost a century of revoking plots before he eventually moved out to press a de jure claim against the Duke of Balaton in the north.
I decided to not go for hereditary Dukes wherever I could, as the base concept of the viceroyalties for me is to prevent the formation of large vassal realms by combined inheritages.
For all I found out, "preparing ground", i.e. distributing (viecroyal) duke titles de jure and putting a Viceroy on top, leads to nothing productive, as the AI simply doesn't like it. In Sicily and Croatia respectively, I installed viceroys early on when I got elected emperor, only to then see them struggle for almost a century- particularly Sicily had some severe issue, he kept revoking Palermo, his de jure capital, only to grant it out to nobles again and again constantly- at some point even making a city county out of it until I decided to rectify the situation after inheriting the title back.
Following this experience, I proceeded to set up conquered territory in a way where simple single counts are put under one Exarch holding all the titles and the de jure capital. Consequently, my Exarch of Syria- which I took much later than the de jure territories in Italy and the Dalmatian coast- started to invade further muslim territories right away, while the Croatian guy took almost a century of revoking plots before he eventually moved out to press a de jure claim against the Duke of Balaton in the north.
Fewer vassals are easier to handle. Just give them a seat in your council and they won’t revolt.
More vassals give tou better income tough but many small vassals are much more dangerous for your rule.
If you consider major wars against other rulers you might want your backyard to be calm, make them multidukes or vassal kings. This might weaken you in the war because you have fewer troops and income but you don’t have to fear revots during your war.
Also I recommend to max out your demense and upgrade your castles there.
More vassals give tou better income tough but many small vassals are much more dangerous for your rule.
If you consider major wars against other rulers you might want your backyard to be calm, make them multidukes or vassal kings. This might weaken you in the war because you have fewer troops and income but you don’t have to fear revots during your war.
Also I recommend to max out your demense and upgrade your castles there.
I've only experienced this once in my Byzantine/Roman campaign before Holy Fury. And only with one viceroy.
So you did what the buggy AI does? Didn't the vassal counts passionately hate the Exarch and constantly faction against him?