How do dynasties work?

[KevinG]

I just played through a game with Austria and Castille. Played both of them all the way to the end date. The only time I shared dynasties with anyone as Castille was with Aragon, and with Austria I got a Habsburg on the Hungarian and Bohemian thrones, but that was it. I had several RMs with the other major powers for most of the game and I never got my family line to any of their thrones in 300+ years of gameplay.

Meanwhile the AI Spain in my Austria game managed to get Britain, Savoy, Bavaria, and even PLC in a PU, and in my Spain game Burgundy got at least 6 medium sized HRE countries in PUs due to sharing the same dynasty. Is there something the AI is doing that I'm not aware of or is it all just luck?

 

[Opus]

Nobody knows, nobody knows...


Nah, but from what I understand, three things are crucial to get a PU: Diplomatic reputation (increaseble by the Diplomatic ideagroup and the Expansion ideagroup, and by advisors) and prestige. And above all, luck.

You can press claims for a PU when you have your dynasty on another throne, so you don't have to rely on luck in all cases.

But the AI seems to get way, way more PU:s then the player though, so I think it's in the games design. WAD or not, I don't know.


But I'm no expert at the subject, havn't really done full on a diplo-game yet. Should try it out, maybe today.

 

[RadRussian]

Keeping prestige at constant 100 will make your country/you dynasty more likely to ascend to the throne when their current rules dies without an heir.

 

[Juggernaught]

AI Luck effects PU's In every game I play one major is always guaranteed to PU another major. It is especially overkill to see Russia PU France and vice versa.
It is also possible to get a PU of different dynasties but it is extremely rare. Atm I guess best way to spread dynasties is to keep diplomatic reputation high hence picking diplomacy and expansion and RM majors early on.

 

[RadRussian]

AI Luck effects PU's In every game I play one major is always guaranteed to PU another major. It is especially overkill to see Russia PU France and vice versa.
It is also possible to get a PU of different dynasties but it is extremely rare. Atm I guess best way to spread dynasties is to keep diplomatic reputation high hence picking diplomacy and expansion and RM majors early on.

According to the tooltip, prestige is responsible for dynasty merging, not diplomatic reputation. Forming PUs with outer countries is rare but it happens. Think about it as every time you don't have an heir, if a ruler dies, you fall under PU and vise verse AI.

 

[Korashy]

I'm not actually sure on this, but the AI may also know when the other ruler dies and then use Claim Throne. It happened to me (only once) I was to have a PU with a country that had no heir without actually claiming their throne. On the 1st of a month (AI diplomatic tick) Austria claimed their throne and 2 days later their king died giving austria the PU. This may be pure coincidence, I have no clue. Just throwing it out there.

 

[RadRussian]

I'm not actually sure on this, but the AI may also know when the other ruler dies and then use Claim Throne. It happened to me (only once) I was to have a PU with a country that had no heir without actually claiming their throne. On the 1st of a month (AI diplomatic tick) Austria claimed their throne and 2 days later their king died giving austria the PU. This may be pure coincidence, I have no clue. Just throwing it out there.

I did lots of testing and claiming a throne from someone who isn't of your dynasty has no effect on succession.

 

[Arfa]

I did lots of testing and claiming a throne from someone who isn't of your dynasty has no effect on succession.

Here's a simple test that proves that is false: start a new game as Austria and claim the throne of Portugal. It will switch from 'A noble from the Lancaster dynasty' to 'Personal union with Austria'.

'Claim throne' will put you straight into a PU if their heir dies if you have more prestige.

 

[KevinG]

I should have been more clear. I'm talking about getting the same dynasty as another country. I already know that the claim throne button is worthless without a shared dynasty, so I wanna know how to get the same dynasty.

 

[l3ol3o]

AI Luck effects PU's In every game I play one major is always guaranteed to PU another major. It is especially overkill to see Russia PU France and vice versa.
It is also possible to get a PU of different dynasties but it is extremely rare. Atm I guess best way to spread dynasties is to keep diplomatic reputation high hence picking diplomacy and expansion and RM majors early on.

Yup. I had a super Castile blob form in my game. Aragon PUed and integrated Naples. Castile PUed and integrated Aragon. Austria PUed and integrated Burgundy. Then Castile PUed and integrated Austria.

So in the end Naples, Aragon, Austria, and Burgandy all got integrated into Castile. Portugal and the UK also both have Lancasters on the throne but have yet to unite.

Edit: I only managed to get Hungry in a PU. I'm playing as Russia.


It seems like if you don't get a PU in the first 50 years it isn't going to happen at all. After that RM's are way too common and it's rare to not have heirs for more then 5 years or so.

 

[zodium]

I did lots of testing and claiming a throne from someone who isn't of your dynasty has no effect on succession.

Can you post your tests? This contradicts TheBloke's extensive testing on the issue (I don't have a link handy, but I'm sure he'll show up).

 

[GamingHUD]

I did lots of testing and claiming a throne from someone who isn't of your dynasty has no effect on succession.

Yes it does. The only noteworthy difference between claiming a throne - non dynasty vs dynasty - is that one gives you a CB and the other doesn't.

 

[IndoEsia45]

In my game as France, I managed to PU Savoy and inherit Burgundy. The former was rather random and the latter was because of inheritance event. I was just trying to expand into NA in early 1600 when I was notified of this union. Though afterwards my Valois dynasty ended and someone from the Habsburg came and pretty much bring everything down with only 20 claims. A civil war event was triggered in few months together with the country separated already from the reformation. At least I enacted the Edict of Nantes at the earliest possible time or else the massive rebellions that happen could possibly end my game. Fyuuh..

 

[Korashy]

I did lots of testing and claiming a throne from someone who isn't of your dynasty has no effect on succession.

It does. If the other country has no heir.

If it says noble of XXX dynasty ascends to the throne and you press claim throne, then 1 of 3 things can happen:

1. Noble of YYY dynasty ascends the throne (your dynasty)
2. Forms PU with YOUR COUNTRY
3. Succession War (This often happens when there would already be a succession war)

 

[RadRussian]

Here's a simple test that proves that is false: start a new game as Austria and claim the throne of Portugal. It will switch from 'A noble from the Lancaster dynasty' to 'Personal union with Austria'.

'Claim throne' will put you straight into a PU if their heir dies if you have more prestige.

Yes, that is true. I wasn't clear enough to say that in my games a noble from my dynasty would always be assigned to rise, so in that case claiming throne does absolutely nothing*.

I just tested and having more prestige does not guarantee that a noble from your house will rise by default (Austrian-Portuguese example). But even in that case I don't think -20 prestige and -100 opinion is worth claiming a throne.

*In my testing, however, I did not find out how to determine whether "A noble from my dynasty will rise" will happen or "Personal Union with me" will.
Bohemia was destined to go under Sweden, so married them which which changed Bohemia to a noble from my house. I claimed a throne and it changed to PU with me. That may be an coincidence because I claimed thrones many times after that but it would still go to my dynasty, not me directly.

 

[Korashy]

Yes, that is true. I wasn't clear enough to say that in my games a noble from my dynasty would always be assigned to rise, so in that case claiming throne does absolutely nothing*.

I just tested and having more prestige does not guarantee that a noble from your house will rise by default (Austrian-Portuguese example). But even in that case I don't think -20 prestige and -100 opinion is worth claiming a throne.

*In my testing, however, I did not find out how to determine whether "A noble from my dynasty will rise" will happen or "Personal Union with me" will.
Bohemia was destined to go under Sweden, so married them which which changed Bohemia to a noble from my house. I claimed a throne and it changed to PU with me. That may be an coincidence because I claimed thrones many times after that but it would still go to my dynasty, not me directly.

Sometimes it's dynasty, sometimes it's PU, sometimes it's direct inheritance without Pu.

I'm not entirely sure on the factors but I'm fairly certain that their prestige matters a fair bit in the calculation, it's also likely that lucky nations are unlikely to the PU'ed directly. Furthermore, size must certainly be a modifier, since direct inheritance usually only happens if the target is small.