Learning the Game Without Strategy Spoilers

[mercury529]

Hey Everyone,

I am fairly new to Crusader Kings 2 (only having played it for a few days about a year back). I have played through the tutorials which are a bit lacking for me in terms of finding out deeper information about the mechanics of the game. I have tried searching the web to find info so I can better understand the game.

The major problem I am running into is that when I search for more information about the game, virtually every source I have found includes strategic notes about the mechanics I am researching. I am trying to learn more about the game while avoiding any "spoilers" on strategies to use. For me, most of the fun is devising and refining strategies.

If I had more time, I might be more inclined to simply try to discover the mechanics more organically. But in a game as complex as this, it would take a prohibitively long time. Does anyone know of any good sources for learning more about the game without strategic advice scattered throughout it?

Thanks a lot for any help you can provide.

 

[LFA]

The classic advice is : go for Ireland, very peaceful and slow paced, lets you plenty of time to learn the mechanics as you grab the counties toward your kingdom one by one.
Over all the british isles and brittany are good places to learn the game, also being a vassal in France is nice and cosy, finally i would also recommend a dutch vassal of the HRE
1066 start dates are much better to get acquainted with the game, much more stable and slow paced gameplay.

 

[cosmeIII]

Well, most of the game's features follow a more or less sound logic. So just head in and start hovering over everything to find out what it does. The more you play, the more you'll learn, this isn't a Dwarf Fortress type game where complexity is prime.

 

[Tapio]

Try learning the ropes as a pagan count or duke in Scandinavia or Lithuania.

 

[Knotz]

Toulouse is a pretty good starting place I think, not super dangerous but with the Muslims just south you can't afford to get complacent either.

 

[mercury529]

Thanks a lot for all the replies everyone.

For clarification, I want to have a deeper understanding about the mechanics of the game so I can devise strategies of my own. I was hoping to find documentation about it so I don't have to intuit them from a large number of playthroughs. Here are two examples of the type of info I am trying to understand so I can make better decisions:

1.) Years in the future, I intend to marry for the purposes of advancing a tier. In the interim though, I was hoping to benefit from a marriage for the associated stat boosts. The intent was to end that marriage, possibly through a plot to have my wife killed. When I right click on her and select the plot, it has a 26% chance of being successful. I want to better understand what factors influence those odds of success so I can increase them (or at least know before making a decision to get married what my odds are of being able to end the marriage that way).

2.) As a count with no claim to a duchy, the king decided to award it to me in the course of normal gameplay. I want to understand what factors contributed to the king making that decision so I can replicate them in other games.

Thanks again.

 

[RX2000]

1.) Years in the future, I intend to marry for the purposes of advancing a tier. In the interim though, I was hoping to benefit from a marriage for the associated stat boosts. The intent was to end that marriage, possibly through a plot to have my wife killed. When I right click on her and select the plot, it has a 26% chance of being successful. I want to better understand what factors influence those odds of success so I can increase them (or at least know before making a decision to get married what my odds are of being able to end the marriage that way).

You can find this out by reading about plots on the wiki page.

The more plotters that will join your plot, the higher the chance of success you have in it succeeding.

As far as 2 goes, if he has more duchies than he can hold, he will give them out to one of his vassals, usually a count within that duchy, mostly based on his opinion value with said counts.

 

[RelVleDy]

Thanks a lot for all the replies everyone.

2.) As a count with no claim to a duchy, the king decided to award it to me in the course of normal gameplay. I want to understand what factors contributed to the king making that decision so I can replicate them in other games.

I don't have the numbers or data files in front of me, but his opinion of you seems to impact this, so just do things that make him happy (educating children, donating gold, etc.) Don't count on him gifting you titles very often though. Using your chancellor is the quickest way to raise relations, but I prefer using them for forging casus belli's.

 

[Rags17]

FWIW plot "chances" are kind of deceptive. They have massive break points starting at 100% and increasing every 50% after that. Thus pushing "plot power" from 84% to 98% is not that useful, but pushing it from 98% to 103% IS. The event that fires the plot basically halves the time to fire at 100% and every 50% thereafter so go large or go home - if you can't get to 100% power then it probably won't happen, at least in a reasonable time.

As to what affects plot power just use common sense and go from there. For instance, if you are plotting to assassinate a vassal then getting his wife or spymaster onside is ENORMOUSLY powerful (think - they have constant access to the target), getting a petty courtier not so much.

The same goes for being gifted titles. If your lord has a good opinion of you, you are acting as a Councillor or Commander and you have good Diplomacy then your chances are higher. Similarly, if you are crabby, have terrible stats, are disloyal or are a plain nobody then your chances are greatly reduced, if not nil.

I have found that in 97% of all cases starting off using common sense is a great approach.

 

[mercury529]

Thank you very much for all of the input everyone. There doesn't appear to be any websites that provide the strategy spoiler-free breakdowns of the mechanics I might have hoped, but the suggestions here have come in handy. I appreciate you taking the time to give me a different perspective to approach the game with.

 

[Bernard95]

Something else you might want to try is anything duke-tier in the 1066 HRE. I won't give many details since you're looking to avoid spoilers, but suffice to say basically any of those dukes are very beginner-friendly.

Tuscany in particular would definitely be worth trying, though do make sure that as a female ruler you get a matrilineal marriage for reasons you'll discover. Also, look at your neighbors. You should be able to figure out a quick way to gain a neighboring county through means other than a fabricated claim.

 

[Tristen91]

My advise it to watch one or two episodes of a Ck2 play though on YouTube. I recommend Quill18, arumba or NorthernLion.