Giving titles: evrything below or not?

[Gamera]

Hello, newbie question here!

So, we're all limited by our demesne size...which leads us giving titles to vassals. Still, you can choose to keep as your own vassals all the titles under that one you just gave (like you give a county to someone, but all baronies, cities, temples inside that county are still your direct vassals).

so....

1)is there a malus to how many vassals you can have?

2)should I give the main title + all the lower titles to my vassal so he has a court, or should I keep them my direct vassals? for my understanding of guides so far, it's better to keep direct vassals, as you get more money from them and that keeps your counts and dukes weak.

3)additional question: I'm just owning 3 duchies (no kingdom)..I change taxes and levies in my main duchy...does that apply to all my duchies?

thanks for your help!

 

[delra]

1. There is no malus for having too many vassals, but a smaller group is generally easier to handle, as statistically fewer of them will be ambitious or envious.

2. There's a benefit to giving your vassal the city and the bishopric below him - they will pay taxes to him and allow him to upgrade his castle. If you don't give them those lower titles, they will be very unhappy about it, leading to a lot more strife inside your realm, bigger factions, more often civil wars. Generally the game is set up for them to hold those smaller titles under them.

3. I think so, yes.

 

[feastonthrones]

1. I dont think there is a limit to the number of vassals you can have. Your vassal number will be limited by the number of demesnes you have how many holdings in each demesne there are.
2. Lets first start by saying that as the ruler of a demesne you dont 'own' each holding in the demense. Hence why you have so many vassals. You dont have control of the church or city, they are controlled by other people. When you give away the demesne, automatically the leaders of the church and city are transferred. You dont need to worry about that. The only reason you would choose to give all titles / when you actually see a bonus from giving all the titles is when you personally control/own multiple holdings in one demesne. For example you might have 6 holdings in one particular county, you might own 2 or 3 if there are 3 castle holdings. If you just transferred the county to another person, you would hold onto the other 2 minor holdings in that province, and that when they get annoyed at you. To negate that and to get a bonus diplomatic score you would select give all titles and you would give him the county and the other 2 holdings in that county. Does that make sense. Its difficult to articulate. So to answer your question, when you give a county away all the vassals associated with that county are transferred too without your input. There are a few times this doesnt happen but for the basics you dont need to know.
3. Owning 3 duchies? Arent you taking a popularity hit for owning more than 2, you might want to address that? Your primary title controls the tax laws, levy laws etc in the area that you own or have control over so you dont need to worry about that.

Hope that helps, if you have any queries just say so

 

[nestorius]

malus isnt really used penalty is better.

Anyway.

1. yes two 1. eventually the game drags to a stand still. 2. vassals want control over everything that is their dejure and get an opinion penalty to you if they don't have it. This leads both to rebellions and less tax and levies.


2. As said there is an opinion penalty also most of the time baronies go with the county. I just give away whole duchies its easier imo.

3. yes you only change taxes for the realm, this isn't the case with authority and inheritance law but only one tax for all. You can own as many Duchies as you want though as soon as you become a king you need to keep to a maximum of two. Just to point out bad opinion isnt just a threat of rebellion it is also less tax and less levies.

 

[Talq]

You get -20 opinion for every vassal below he is missing. That starts to hurt after a while.

3. Owning 3 duchies? Arent you taking a popularity hit for owning more than 2, you might want to address that? Your primary title controls the tax laws, levy laws etc in the area that you own or have control over so you dont need to worry about that.

There is no penalty if he has no kingdom. Of course, being duke level has its disadvantages (like not being able to press others ducky level claims and keep them as vassals.

 

[Ruwaard]

1. There is no malus for having too many vassals, but a smaller group is generally easier to handle, as statistically fewer of them will be ambitious or envious.

2. There's a benefit to giving your vassal the city and the bishopric below him - they will pay taxes to him and allow him to upgrade his castle. If you don't give them those lower titles, they will be very unhappy about it, leading to a lot more strife inside your realm, bigger factions, more often civil wars. Generally the game is set up for them to hold those smaller titles under them.

3. I think so, yes.

Only a small nitpick I have to add :

@1: a smaller sample size doesn't change the distribution of traits in this case. Or to put it differently the (expected) percentage of vassals with such traits will be the same, which therefore results in more vassals with such a trait, if the number of vassals increases.

 

[Rozmarzony]

1. But still, it's easier to kill 5 amibitious than 50. : p

 

[Lord Finnish]

1. But still, it's easier to kill 5 amibitious than 50. : p

Not if the five are Kings and while the 50 are counts. And of course, how often you have seen factions involving more than max 10 people?

A strong vassal needs only one or two allies to launch revolt, while counts need to stack up forces for years to even stand a chance.

 

[Rozmarzony]

But if you give some gift and one title to king, he wouldn't start faction.
You can't do it to all those counts, and there will be some factions anyway.
I played all game with big vassals without any factions even existed.

 

[smeggy]

Balansing the power in your realm is one of the hardest things todo in this game. Let me explain how I do it by an example:

I, the christian king of some state, conquered this neighbouring Islamic country. So I got the country, and all it's castles, mosques, etc. The first thing I do is right click all the lower holding, the town, etc, everything except the main one, and assign a new ruler to it. Second I go check if there's a duke in my realm who has the country du-jure in his dutchy. If so, I give him/her the county. If not, I either keep it myself for a while if my demesne cap isnt reached, or I go to the characters panal, set it to 'men/same culture/same religion/no ruler', search, and pick a nice new count.

The thing is here, if, for example, you keep the county yourself when it belongs du-jure to one of your dukes (or kings, if you're an emperor), the county will give more trouble as it's taxes are worth. The duke will get a '-25 desires county XX' toward you, will be more likely to revold, pay less taxes etc. Keep du-jure stuff together.

Well, this is my GENERAL approach. Ofc there're numerous exceptions

 

[nyah]

If you're giving a county away and the holdings within it all have barons/bishops/mayors then they will always become his vassals. The 'all titles below' only refers to titles that you hold directly.

But yes, in general you should have one duke per duchy, and one county per count, with all titles below held either by him or a vassal of his. No king vassals, destroy all kingdoms when you become an emperor.

 

[Prime624]

If you're giving a county away and the holdings within it all have barons/bishops/mayors then they will always become his vassals. The 'all titles below' only refers to titles that you hold directly.

But yes, in general you should have one duke per duchy, and one county per count, with all titles below held either by him or a vassal of his. No king vassals, destroy all kingdoms when you become an emperor.

Oh good. I was getting scared there for a sec.

 

[JonStryker]

You can abuse your vassals by keeping direct vassals for yourself without incurring much trouble!

Here's how (I tried that in a recent game):

Say you holy-wared a big duchy like f. i. Brittany. Then create all the bishoprics and give every on of them the county they are in. Select a capital and give the bishop the duchy and the remaining vassals in his county. Now you have a bunch of cities and baronies which are your direct vassals and pay taxes to you.

There are no real side effects: The Duke-Bishop won't resent you as there is no land he wants from you. The counts will resent you but that doesn't matter at all.

 

[nestorius]

If you're giving a county away and the holdings within it all have barons/bishops/mayors then they will always become his vassals. The 'all titles below' only refers to titles that you hold directly.

But yes, in general you should have one duke per duchy, and one county per count, with all titles below held either by him or a vassal of his. No king vassals, destroy all kingdoms when you become an emperor.

Rencently playing an Abbadid game where I had all Hispania Scandinavia HRE Britania and Frankia plus several other kingdoms. At that point you want to start thinking of vassal kings even if it is just to prevent a major slowdown. Though I agree having vassal kings is imo dangerous, particularly if the kingdoms are large. Having the king of Bohemia as a vassal isnt as dangerous as having the king of Greece or Italy as a vassal.

Either way noticed the game drags to a halt when you have too many vassals not sure at what stage this becomes a problem.