Well first a little story to get it started, I was playing de Melgueil 9-1066, a fairly rich count under of duchy Toulouse under kingdom of France. As I started to expand and contest the title of duke Toulouse, I found out the duchy had change hands many time and was running elective succession. After I was elected, I failed to change it to the primogeniture succession because France can't raise the crown authority to high as Normandy, which have many votes, is at English hand. So I was force to use elective succession. As my elective duchy built up, I discover elective succession is actually not that bad at all. So here are the pros and cons of elective duchy that have only one elector or few electors that are of same family:
Pros:
- You have better heirs. If you are the sole elector, you can elect whoever you want. If not, you can bribe your family members to elect whoever you want. Even you family member counts don't agree with you, they will still get you powerful family member heir as long as you make sure no outsiders get a count title in your duchy. Compared to primogeniture and gavelkind, which you always stuck to first legal child no matter good or bad and can't avoid regency, and seniority, which your heir are old man/woman that will die at any moment, Elective give you better heirs and hence better rulers.
- Fewer succession war. The main disadvantage of primogeniture is that you will have tons of succession war as long as you give titles to non heir children. Elective however have few succession war, so that your new duke doesn't need to spend his parents 20 years savings to fight succession war in his day 1.
- Keep the blob in one piece. The worst succession is secession. Like primogeniture and seniority, you duchy won't shrink to one holding when your duke die.
- Easy to start. Elective succession doesn't require crown authority. You can keep the kingdom crown authority as low as you can, so that you paid less levy and most importantly can "grow" within your kingdom.
Cons:
- Your vessel will give you a huge negative option as you and your family hold all elector. They can't revolt you but it hurt the taxes from mayors and very hard to change laws.
- To ensure only your family inherit your title, all your counts must be your family member. You avoid grant outsider titles. That will slow down your expansion if you want to expand further.
Overall it works, May not be as good as primogeniture but very acceptable. And I also have few question:
Is it true Gavelkind is the norm of Europe in Middle age? it seems primogeniture is more reasonable unless you had really big chuck of land that was more than enough for all your kids. If not why set it to default?
What is the reason to set primogeniture threshold so high (high crown authority)?
Can we have a more reasonable Gravelkind that allow one heir to inherit multiple holdings as long as it doesn't exceed certain number like base * rank?
Pros:
- You have better heirs. If you are the sole elector, you can elect whoever you want. If not, you can bribe your family members to elect whoever you want. Even you family member counts don't agree with you, they will still get you powerful family member heir as long as you make sure no outsiders get a count title in your duchy. Compared to primogeniture and gavelkind, which you always stuck to first legal child no matter good or bad and can't avoid regency, and seniority, which your heir are old man/woman that will die at any moment, Elective give you better heirs and hence better rulers.
- Fewer succession war. The main disadvantage of primogeniture is that you will have tons of succession war as long as you give titles to non heir children. Elective however have few succession war, so that your new duke doesn't need to spend his parents 20 years savings to fight succession war in his day 1.
- Keep the blob in one piece. The worst succession is secession. Like primogeniture and seniority, you duchy won't shrink to one holding when your duke die.
- Easy to start. Elective succession doesn't require crown authority. You can keep the kingdom crown authority as low as you can, so that you paid less levy and most importantly can "grow" within your kingdom.
Cons:
- Your vessel will give you a huge negative option as you and your family hold all elector. They can't revolt you but it hurt the taxes from mayors and very hard to change laws.
- To ensure only your family inherit your title, all your counts must be your family member. You avoid grant outsider titles. That will slow down your expansion if you want to expand further.
Overall it works, May not be as good as primogeniture but very acceptable. And I also have few question:
Is it true Gavelkind is the norm of Europe in Middle age? it seems primogeniture is more reasonable unless you had really big chuck of land that was more than enough for all your kids. If not why set it to default?
What is the reason to set primogeniture threshold so high (high crown authority)?
Can we have a more reasonable Gravelkind that allow one heir to inherit multiple holdings as long as it doesn't exceed certain number like base * rank?
