How do I keep factions under control?

[adam_grif]

Going through my first Legacy of Rome game (last time I played CK2 was like v1.03 or something early, so there have been HUGE changes) and I didn't even know factions existed until my current idiot emperor took the throne and factions started getting out of control. Prior to taking over as this guy, I'd installed him on the English throne, after which time he had earned himself the kingslayer trait somehow and ended up with about 8 diplomacy despite my best efforts to breed for diplomacy skill. Long story short, there's an independence faction that I can NEVER get below 30% power. It's already revolted once and I put it down with an assassination, but if that hadn't worked I don't think it's even possible to win a war against them. Their warscore skyrockets too quickly to 100% before my armies can even reach the leader's provinces. It's like "oh, you have 2/3 of the nation on your side, the massive cataphract retinue, mercenaries and levies up the wazoo, but unfortunately they sieged some worthless holdings in Syria and Scandinavia, so you've lost the war!"

1. Is there a way to actually fight them off effectively?
2. If not, how can I get them to stop trying to revolt? Am I just boned?


On a partially related note, is there a way I can break England or other foreign holdings away from the empire without a war of independence? This isn't worth the trouble but if I just give in to independence demands, my borders are completely wrecked, and I lose all sorts of provinces in the middle of my contiguous de jure territory, not just the foreigners.

 

[yezhanquan]

Check your vassals. Who are the ones joining the faction? As Emperor, you are slightly screwed if your vassal kings are joining. If it's dukes, check their de jure kingdom. If you are holding the title (which you should be, as characters cannot plot against their liege's liege), pass it on to someone you can trust, and let him handle the dukes. Maintain high opinion.

During a revolt war, try to take back any holdings the rebels had taken. That should be your priority. Holding the 'right' holdings ticks the warscore to a side's advantage.

 

[Blademonkey]

Additionally there is usually a ring leader. It's a bit gamey but concentrate on capturing his or her territories while protecting your own. You can usually win most succession crises and faction wars by concentrating your armies and taking out the head of the faction.

I found my Byzantine Emperor, who was already 'The Great' get landed with a succession demand just after driving the Almoravids out of Sicily. Not a month or two into that war the Seljuks who controlled pretty much everything east of Anatolia declared war. I recruited every merc I could afford, sent my retinue after the Doux of Cyprus who was the ringleader of the faction to put my idiot brother in the purple and ignored other Byzantine rebel forces while taking out every small Seljuk force with my levies and mercs (put my best generals in charge here as well). Eventually, I was able to broker a white peace with the rebels, released the ringleader immediately (kept my brother in prison) and got a handy influx of troops from the rebels (who included the Despot of Bulgaria). I managed to beat the Seljuk armies sent against me and have the Sultan sign a humiliating peace.

Sadly Alexios Komenos II (Alexios The Great) died during one of the mopping up battles and was succeeded by his son. Who did get a handy prestige hit following the victory and a triumph.

 

[lokomoko]

There are a few ways I deal with factions, they are as follows.

1) Check if you have a revoke reason on the faction leader, if you do take everything he has until he's removed from the faction. If you can't literally take everything just take something to weaken the overall faction.

2) Alternatively if there are no revoke reasons, Try paying them off. Start with the leader and then bribe the most powerful members first, etc until you've gotten them all to leave it.

3) Tyranny. If nothing before this works, and the faction is dangerous enough to your divine-rule, you'll have to start imprisoning people--eliminating all opposition--Again, start with the leader and go through from the most powerful first.

EDIT: 4) If you can't stop the faction by any means and they've declared war, just put your spymaster on 'build spy-network' wherever the faction leader or claimant is and try to end him.

Hope this helps

 

[Thrumdi]

If you have a good spy-master it can really help to put him in the ring-leader's county and have him "Scheme". In my latest play-through, this has kept the post-succession factions under control.

There are also usually vassals who are involved in more than one faction, so often times you can kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.

 

[lokomoko]

If you have a good spy-master it can really help to put him in the ring-leader's county and have him "Scheme". In my latest play-through, this has kept the post-succession factions under control.

There are also usually vassals who are involved in more than one faction, so often times you can kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.

That usually takes a fair while though, and the really bad factions are the ones which can revolt at any second.

 

[adam_grif]

If you have a good spy-master it can really help to put him in the ring-leader's county and have him "Scheme". In my latest play-through, this has kept the post-succession factions under control.

There are also usually vassals who are involved in more than one faction, so often times you can kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.

The good news is my Spy-master has 25 intrigue. So he's definitely good.

The bad news is he's part of the independence faction.

P.S. my idiot eloped with a woman before I betrothed him to anybody at like, 19, because my previous dude had the kind trait. The wife he picked has ZERO intrigue, and he has 10. His entire life is like a three stooges sketch.

 

[aniuby]

Taking out the leader of the independence faction through assassination, once he revolts, will immediately end the war. Which really doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but it works. Alternatively, since you already know that he is about to revolt, raise all levies and ship a lot of troops over to his provinces and immediately assault once he rebels. Hopefully you might be able to take him down before the doomstack appears in his territory - or at least you'll be prepared to fight the doomstack.

Another way to postpone an independence revolt is to join the defence against an independence revolt taking place in another country! Amazingly, this sort of hits a flag in your vassals that "our king is already defending against an independence revolt" and causes them to all immediately leave the faction. It's probably a bug but it's also one hell of a lifesaver if you need it, though it doesn't solve your faction problem for the long term.

I found that the ideal way to avoid or at least delay the next round of independence revolts is to fight the current revolt until they agree to surrender and do not accept white peace! You will get to imprison all the rebelling vassals and can revoke one of their titles, so hand out those duchies and counties to your cronies. This should keep them happy enough to buy you time for the short reign penalty to go away.

Lastly on your extra question on how to grant vassals in a foreign country independence or transfer them to another ruler, I asked this question before and it turns out no one really knows a good way of doing so. It seems the only way to get them to leave is to annoy that vassal enough to cause them to rebel (e.g. failed imprisonment), then surrender to them. Or you could just bide your time and hopefully use them as a base for expansion in the future.

 

[Talq]

You can use arrest/revoke reasons to take out members (particularly large members) one by one (remember active plots and excommunication are grounds for imprisonment). Excommunication may be an option.

Children cannot join factions, so if a duke has an unfortunate 'accident' and a child inherits that land is safe (until they become an adult...).

Use the spymaster against craven (threaten), just (obligate), and homosexual (blackmail) vassals. Unfortunately, the SM frequently takes a long time. If your SM (or chancellor) is part of a faction, just sack him.

Finally, remember you get strong claims if you give in to their demand for independence and when the fighting begins. You can turn around and take them all back one by one if they win AND remove the vassal and replace them with someone content. (and its not really gamey when the AI does it too). In your situtation it sounds like this last option is the best.

 

[yourworstnightm]

Download a mod where they are nerfed. Or just prepare civil wars every other year. Something that irritates me alot is that only the faction leader is usually arrested, his co-conspirators get to roam free (unless captured in battle) and just start to form a new faction and revolt in a year or so again.

 

[adam_grif]

Idiot emperor finally died, replaced with his much better son. I still had a factional revolt early, which I put down efficiently (HRE is an ally, and has taken all of France, half of Spain, most of Italy...). Less than a year later, the dangerous faction indicator pops up again. Independence is back! This time, with different members, who I all have 50 or higher relations with. The King of England has +100 relations, and has since before the last revolt, and we're Best Friends Forever pretty much. We fought alongside each other in the last revolt! But no, he's at max relations and happily joined into to the faction. FFS.

 

[Talq]

Those are frustrating, and probably borderline broken.

The person at 100 relations has probably been bribed into faction (via spymaster). Of course, there is no sensible way to get him out. (and if he has all of england's de jure territory he has most of that factions power.)

Still, you are the ERE? Are most of those 50+ relation people far away?

----
One other hint - you can see factions from inside the intrigue window. A lot of dealing with factions is breaking them up before they get dangerous, so pretty much from the moment you get a new king be prepared to cut down faction members until you're short reign penalty goes away (by which time, most factions have all the members they are likely to get & small ones simply won't ever rise).

 

[adam_grif]

What is ERE?

I'm Byzantium, but I've not restored Rome because Rome got snatched up early by the HRE and the HRE is RIDICULOUSLY HUGE + my long time ally.

The inclusion of the English king is bothersome because he contributes 25% to the faction D:

 

[_krampe_]

Bribe some dukes who are quite young (they are cheaper) to 80+ relation. They will soon quit the faction and this buys you time to use your spymaster, start with the king and continue until everyone has left the faction.
They won't join a faction again in their/your lifetime

 

[aniuby]

Idiot emperor finally died, replaced with his much better son. I still had a factional revolt early, which I put down efficiently (HRE is an ally, and has taken all of France, half of Spain, most of Italy...). Less than a year later, the dangerous faction indicator pops up again. Independence is back! This time, with different members, who I all have 50 or higher relations with. The King of England has +100 relations, and has since before the last revolt, and we're Best Friends Forever pretty much. We fought alongside each other in the last revolt! But no, he's at max relations and happily joined into to the faction. FFS.

Sadly this is why I always imprison anyone in the independence faction if I can do so with a reason, whatever the relations. Similarly, I never agree to transfer vassals to their de jure duke if the duke is not of the same culture as my king - they might hate me and want to join the independence faction even more, but that means that they're weaker. They're also more likely to start a plot to fabricate claims (on something which is their de jure territory anyway, silly AI!) so you can get a reason to arrest them.

If that King of England does in fact rebel, revoke his kingship to break the country up into counties and duchies. In my opinion all King titles should be held by your character to avoid this problem of ridiculously overpowered rebel lords who own lots of land.

If all the people in the faction have 50+ relations with you, it might be worth throwing a feast to raise their relations just that little bit and cause them to leave the faction. Releasing a prisoner might help too - if you don't have a prisoner, imprison a OPM count who's giving you trouble and release him immediately, to sacrifice one to raise relations with all. It'll be even better if he rebels, since after revoking his title he'll just be a commoner with no land, yet still give the same prisoner release bonus.

I hope PI's been paying attention to the ridiculous amount of trouble this nonsensical faction is causing the average player.

 

[Beagá]

Download a mod where they are nerfed. Or just prepare civil wars every other year. Something that irritates me alot is that only the faction leader is usually arrested, his co-conspirators get to roam free (unless captured in battle) and just start to form a new faction and revolt in a year or so again.

Pretty much this. The problem is how easy it is to rebel again in 1 year. No truce, nothing. Either you arrest all the bastards or you´re screwed.

 

[Lessing]

Does imprisoning really work? I remember I tried that, and the imprisoned guys were still part of the independence faction when it triggered.

 

[aniuby]

It takes a few days for the imprisonment to resolve and take them out of the faction. You have to ensure that you imprison any potential troublemakers early before the faction grows too large. In addition, once the faction has sent you their ultimatum, you can no longer imprison any of the faction members as they are "immune to hostile action" - in other words, it's too late as they no longer answer to your authority.

Imprisonment also won't stop a faction supporting a claimant, as losing the war for that person's claim will result in them being freed from jail. Jailing and oublietting a claimant is a great way to kill them off, though. In contrast, lords seeking independence should probably just be left to rot, as killing them means that their successor will be free to join the faction once again.

 

[yezhanquan]

Idiot emperor finally died, replaced with his much better son. I still had a factional revolt early, which I put down efficiently (HRE is an ally, and has taken all of France, half of Spain, most of Italy...). Less than a year later, the dangerous faction indicator pops up again. Independence is back! This time, with different members, who I all have 50 or higher relations with. The King of England has +100 relations, and has since before the last revolt, and we're Best Friends Forever pretty much. We fought alongside each other in the last revolt! But no, he's at max relations and happily joined into to the faction. FFS.

What's his opinion with the faction leader?

I still find it a bit odd, though. At +50 and above, they should be quite subdued even when in factions.

Sadly this is why I always imprison anyone in the independence faction if I can do so with a reason, whatever the relations. Similarly, I never agree to transfer vassals to their de jure duke if the duke is not of the same culture as my king - they might hate me and want to join the independence faction even more, but that means that they're weaker. They're also more likely to start a plot to fabricate claims (on something which is their de jure territory anyway, silly AI!) so you can get a reason to arrest them.

If that King of England does in fact rebel, revoke his kingship to break the country up into counties and duchies. In my opinion all King titles should be held by your character to avoid this problem of ridiculously overpowered rebel lords who own lots of land.

If all the people in the faction have 50+ relations with you, it might be worth throwing a feast to raise their relations just that little bit and cause them to leave the faction. Releasing a prisoner might help too - if you don't have a prisoner, imprison a OPM count who's giving you trouble and release him immediately, to sacrifice one to raise relations with all. It'll be even better if he rebels, since after revoking his title he'll just be a commoner with no land, yet still give the same prisoner release bonus.

I hope PI's been paying attention to the ridiculous amount of trouble this nonsensical faction is causing the average player.

On holding all kingdom titles, it really depends on who your trouble makers are. Most of the times, they are dukes. Find someone content/you can trust in any way, throw the kingdom with the most problematic dukes at him. Sometimes, the faction does explode in your poor king's face.

Also, scroll through the plots window. With any luck, you can find a "revoke title" plot involving someone you want to imprison. Find fellows to build %, and execute the plot. You get a controlled rebellion which you'll be more likely to crush, and you can imprison the fellow for free.

I agree: When your highest title is a king, dukes can be a pain to handle.

 

[Beagá]

First years of any reign can be very turbulent and I´m having huge headaches as France... had to reload here and there lol

Until the king has very good diplomacy, caving in sometimes is inevitable. But to be honest I kinda like it. Was too easy to play as king before, in 1.05. That the HRE blob can muster armies 3 times the size of France doesn´t help either... guess the way to play it is too grab pieces of Britany and Spain until HRE or England is in major turbulence.