I'm emperor. Should I delegate kingdoms to vassals or not?

[unmerged(68578)]

As a lazy man, the only reason I hand out kingdom titles is to deal with peasant revolts. The peasants rise up against their count in some backwater part of my empire that I only conquered to make my borders pretty? Well, there are two liege levels between me and him (his duke, the duke's king) with the resources to deal with it.

I also love this perk. I hate having to send armies to distant lands just to crush a few rebels. It also means I can't declare war and react to situations as fast as I otherwise could when I have troops raised.

It's risky. Kings will take themselves far more seriously than dukes and counts. They'll be less likely to submit to your demands and more likely to want independence.
On the other hand, it makes things a hell of a lot easier to manage. Instead of having 60 vassals, you only have five or six.

In my experience everyone submits to my demands equally. The only chance that comes to mind that is not the same is assassination chance. However, as far as I know, other empires may have more issues as Byzantine and Rome gain some nice bonuses making it easier to control an Empire.

Actually, in a game I'm playing as Byzantium now, I destroy kingdom titles upon acquiring them, so I can keep a tighter grip on my vassals and so they won't be yearning to usurp my title

I've never had anyone try to usurp my title. In my experience, it was always pretty easy to keep them under control. Once in a while, one or two kings might get upset and want to try something stupid, but everyone else liked me so much that nothing ever happened. I think something people forget about is a gift of gold. For around 100 gold you can get something like a 60 bonus to their opinion, which is normally enough to simply get them to disband a faction in my experience. This normally allows me to go until either they, or my ruler, dies and allows me to start fresh. In the case of a new ruler it also works well, and the bonus lasts until your ruler is much more established.

 

[Oktobermensch]

When playing as byz/rome, I usually treat kingdom titles as governors for places that are distant from the centre of the empire.
Places like Italy, Africa or even Syria first get balkanized properly, then a king title is placed upon a count of the smalled county in the region.
That way, I can keep a grip on distant provinces with minimal effort, while they have their hands busy in dealing with their own vassals.

Places closer to home like Anatolia, Greece, Sicily or Balkans themselves never get any kingdoms. I keep all douxes there directly below me.

In the end its a question of strategic choice and I mix it up depending on my current situation. After all, keeping 100+ dukes from conspiring against you in factions is horrbile in itself in the de jure byzantium, let alone 300 that you get by the time you form Rome.

In HRE however, the historical setup is pretty much the norm. I keep only dukes, save for historical Bohemian kingdom. De jure HRE is manageable in itself, and it is surrounded by kingdoms that can be absorbed and claimed for bonus prestige. The difference between the two is that HRE is inevitably less stable from the start than byzantium, so lower level of authority is inevitable to keep it together, whereas byz can be kept centralized with a good planning beforehand.

 

[riknap]

if you like getting a high dynastic prestige, what I do is that I usually give out kingdom titles EXCLUSIVELY to dynastic members. This has a the effect of significantly increasing your dynastic prestige since each co-dynast kingdom has their own court. It helps that they are allied with each other as well so if some overpowered duke vassal of theirs tried something stupid like claiming the crown, the rest of my co-dynasty kingdom vassals march on him.
Of course, the downside is that they ARE allied with each other AND that this strategy requires you landing as many children as possible (you can avoid landing your heir maybe, but if he dies and his brother who is landed replaces him, luck becomes the game).

Of course, this depends if you're an elective empire like the HRE, a modified-primogeniture empire that is the ERE, or a custom empire like Brittania. If you're elective, having dynasty-members exclusively as electors means you're very unlikely to have a game over.

 

[1zarathustra1]

I like handing out King titles because only having Counts and Dukes pretty much means any chance of serious internal rebellion is gone, making the game even easier than it already is once you have reached Empire-level, since it basically gets rid of the main parameter of difficulty in the game, which is maintaining positive vassal-liege relations. I do understand why people do it from a power-gaming perspective where they do not care about their dynastic score though.

 

[TipTravHoot]

If you build an ahistorical empire (think Britannia, Francia, Hispania, etc) and decide to give out King titles, does it make sense to hold onto your primary King title? I'm hoping to become Emperor of Britannia within a generation or two and would give out Kingdoms of Scotland, Ireland, Wales but keep the Crown of England personally and pass to my heir.

 

[Lord Finnish]

If you build an ahistorical empire (think Britannia, Francia, Hispania, etc) and decide to give out King titles, does it make sense to hold onto your primary King title? I'm hoping to become Emperor of Britannia within a generation or two and would give out Kingdoms of Scotland, Ireland, Wales but keep the Crown of England personally and pass to my heir.

I think you can give England away as well, but think how smart would that be? You would be giving away the heartland of your Empire, and with all the British Isles under vassal control, even one of them can start a faction that immediately outnumbers your power and will make short work of your heirs, especially any infant emperors.

 

[MagisterLumiere]

It is not true about getting less Levies. I am a Russian Tsar with a Polish King under my rule. For 15~ provinces, the Polish King gives me 11k. Where as if I put together 15 provinces worth of Dukes, I would get no where as much. At most, the equivalent territory in Dukes gives me 6-7k.

The only problem is when said Polish King decides to declare independence a few years before I have to fight Mongol hordes and I can't excommunicate or assassinate him (with good success).

 

[riknap]

It is not true about getting less Levies. I am a Russian Tsar with a Polish King under my rule. For 15~ provinces, the Polish King gives me 11k. Where as if I put together 15 provinces worth of Dukes, I would get no where as much. At most, the equivalent territory in Dukes gives me 6-7k.

The only problem is when said Polish King decides to declare independence a few years before I have to fight Mongol hordes and I can't excommunicate or assassinate him (with good success).

I think it's because having multiple dukes with various opinions of you give you an amount of men depending on their average opinion of you.
For example, duke A has -1 opinion of you while duke B has 100. Duke A will only give you the very minimum dictated by your crown laws while duke B will give you the maximum dictated by your crown laws (NOT necessarily 100%).
If we have 1 king instead of multiple dukes, then the amount of men you can draw is directly proportional to his opinion of you, disregarding the opinion of multiple dukes below him.

 

[Unready]

If we have 1 king instead of multiple dukes, then the amount of men you can draw is directly proportional to his opinion of you, disregarding the opinion of multiple dukes below him.

By the way it is in my opinion too controversially made.
Here I have the title of count and hate my dukes and kings.
But Duke loves the king.

Why then when I asked the troops Duke, I give the least.
And when the king asks, I give (or rather, the Duke gives) a maximum?

 

[JMensch]

If you build an ahistorical empire (think Britannia, Francia, Hispania, etc) and decide to give out King titles, does it make sense to hold onto your primary King title? I'm hoping to become Emperor of Britannia within a generation or two and would give out Kingdoms of Scotland, Ireland, Wales but keep the Crown of England personally and pass to my heir.

I think you can give England away as well, but think how smart would that be? You would be giving away the heartland of your Empire, and with all the British Isles under vassal control, even one of them can start a faction that immediately outnumbers your power and will make short work of your heirs, especially any infant emperors.

Cant give away your primary king title. You could give England to someone but you would have to make one of your other king titles your primary first.

 

[Dracko81]

Cant give away your primary king title. You could give England to someone but you would have to make one of your other king titles your primary first.

You don't need a king title if you are Emperor.

 

[darviathar]

I rule over most of the eastern world as Basileus but I haven't created any kingdoms other than Greece; which I hold. Yes, it means I have to contend with a ludicrous amount of Douxoi but it also means that I don't have to deal with men who rule over huge chunks of my empire conspiring against me. After all, vassals seek only to piss you off usually at little to no personal gain and the last thing I want is one with such a huge demesne.

I avoid creating the Kingdom of Greece, because I recall that it resulted in the Empire being divided among my heirs in a strange way. Is that no longer the case?


I've sort of avoided creating Kingdom of Bulgaria and Serbia, figuring that it might result in the King of those two realms seeking independence, even though they are Greek.

 

[Hootieleece]

Even when they are holders of just a barony.They can field large Armies.(I'm HRE Emperor,I gave Lotharingia its Independence.I then fought a claim war for all claims.The Lotharingian King was left with just a Barony.I gave the Duchy of Luxembourg which was his personal Desmesne to my second son now King.A faction appeared in Lotharingia and old King Usurped it back as a Baron.I have declared war again(by trying to imprison)and this time the Bastard is gonna die.(unless He has large stack of gold.then banish)

He was able to field about 15k troops.My son the Duke had 15k also,when I raised the levies.(I have 100K levies,and 25K retinue)I just want a short war.

I had been resisting creating the King titles,but will after this game.Since a proper hierarchy will make things easier to control.

 

[Patricius]

I worry it might result in land leaving an empire through inheritance.

 

[Alerias]

I worry it might result in land leaving an empire through inheritance.

It cant if your empire includes the kingdoms De Jure and has High crown authority.

Even without that, its extremely rare, and you get advance warning for dangerous inheritance. A quick assassination can solve 95% of these.