Liege losing his title ends some vassals' wars, plus Braindamaged AI CtA behavior

[BlckKnght]

I've just been playing a game that just had a massive three way war for the crown the HRE. As the wars ended, I experienced three different issues (I'm only reporting them together because the situations that lead to them are closely connected).

To summarize the situation and issues:

The Emperor, "A", gets attacked by a pretender "B" (and a bunch of allies) and another pretender "C" (and a few allies).
One of A's loyal dukes "D" declares a separate war against one of B's allies "E" (who's become temporarily independent thanks to the war).
B defeats A, becoming the new Emperor. He's still at war with C.
A few months later, D (who's now a vassal of B) has one of his own vassals "F" rebel.
C defeats B, becoming the new-new Emperor.

Issue #1 is that B's defeat of A ends the war between D and E, even though they're allowed to go to war again almost immediately since Crown Authority got reset when the pretender took over.

Issue #2 is that after B's initial victory, most of his allies choose to answer a call to arms from the other pretender C, even though that means they're now trying to overthrow B who they'd just put on the throne.

Issue #3 is that when C overthrows B, it ends D's war with his rebellious vassal F, with a result identical to if F had won the rebellion. This may be a variation on issue #1.


Here's the details:

The first issue is related to a the three way war for the HRE crown. I was a vassal of the original HRE (holding a bunch of duke titles) and was one of the few who remained loyal (neither of the pretenders called me to their side or I would have joined in). Rather than have my troops killed in the doomed war on my liege's side, I took the opportunity to declare my own war against a duke who was independent because of joining one of the pretenders in the main war. HRE crown law had been preventing vassals from declaring wars on each other, so my claim against him had been waiting a long time.

The issue came up when the Emperor lost the war to one of the pretenders. I had not yet completed conquering the one duke I had singled out, but my warscore was over 40% and I know I would have won if my war had continued. But instead it ended "inconclusively" when the new emperor took over (and my opponent ceased to be independent). However, due to the successful overthrow of the ruler, HRE Crown Authority got reset to low, so I was allowed to declare war on the duke I'd been beating on again immediately (or rather, immediately after dismissing all non-mercenary levies).

My opinion is that my war shouldn't have ended when it did. Only if the original Emperor had won the war (reestablishing High Crown Authority and so making vassal vs vassal wars forbidden) should the war have been aborted.


The second issue came up a short time later. Many of the allies of the pretender who won the war against the original emperor (and thus became his vassals when he took over) suddenly became independent again, as they'd been called to arms by the third side of the war, a second pretender to the throne.

This seems like broken AI coding to me, as an ally to a pretender shouldn't ever join a different pretender against their victorious friend (one or two leaders changing sides in the middle of the war would make for an interesting event, but it's broken when half the realm does it).


My third issue may actually be a variation on the first one. After winning my Ducal claim war on the second try, I was planning on sitting out the rest of the HRE's war. However, I foolishly attempted to arrest a plotting count of mine. He escaped and rebelled against me. I raised some troops (difficult to do, since more half my territory was still being occupied in the larger war) and started besieging his two counties. Before I could finish him off though, the second pretender won his war against new Emperor, and became the third Holy Roman Emperor in as many years. This unexpectedly ended my war again, though without any message about it being "inconclusive" this time. We were just suddenly at peace. The counties I was besieging were still held by the count who'd rebelled, but he was now a direct vassal to the (latest) Emperor.

This seems like it might be related to the first issue, but as there are a few differences in the details, it is not entirely clear (for instance, neither of the sides in the war in this issue was independent). I would expect that I'd be allowed to carry on fighting my own rebelling vassal regardless of who our higher liege was.


I have a couple of saves from various points in these events, but I'm not sure which one are which at the moment. If they're needed I can post a few of them tomorrow.

 

[Slossius]

This sounds similar to something I experienced twice today.

I am the Duke of Transylvania. A huge war broke out in Hungary with a pretender trying to steal the throne. I joined the war against the king. While the war was going on, one of my vassals (Bacs) started a war of independence against me. I sent my army to take care of the count of Bacs, and before I could win, we won the larger war against the king. A new king took over, and Bacs became a vassal of the new king, ending the war against me. So, I lost Bacs without losing Bacs' war of independence. I couldn't take it back because I didn't have a claim, and I was under Medium Crown Authority.

This seems to me like a bug, but I'm not sure. I'm afraid I don't have a save, but I thought I'd mention it in case it helps.

 

[BlckKnght]

Here are some saves. Unfortunately the save I made had from just prior to issue 1 cropping up was an autosave which got overwritten later.

This save is from just before any of the wars broke out. When the previous HRE died I suspected there might be succession wars, so I made this quicksave. If you play it through to about July you'll see the realm thoroughly fractured. When trying out games loaded from this save however, several dukes tend to declare independence in this version when they'd joined up with the Duke of Meissen's war for the throne in my original play thorough (notably, the dukes of Bavaria and Lower Lorraine). I'm not sure why things go differently, though I vaguely remember the original HRE at about this time asking for Absolute Crown Authority just before the wars broke out. You can probably replicate issue #1 by going to war with Baden shortly after they join one of the pretender's wars (though if that pretender gets fewer allies you might have enough time to actually win the war, unlike I did).

This save is from shortly after the end of the first war, and shows how many of the Duke of Meissen's allies joined up with the other claimant (the duke of Lower Lorraine) after helping him win. It might have information useful for documenting issue #2 (but I'm not sure if it has enough, since it is already after the allies have changed sides). I wish I had kept the autosaves I had from the few years before this!

Finally, this autosave is from the later stages of the second war, where the Duke of Lower Lorraine (with his many allies) was gradually defeating the former Duke of Meissen (now HRE). You'll find yourself at war with a rebelling vassal, the Count of Gizeh (in Egypt). Before you can finish sieging his territory though, the larger war is likely to end, forcing you into an instant peace (and letting the count keep his independence from you). That is issue #3, and alas the only one that is trivially reproducible from my saves.

Anyway, I hope this helps! I may try playing from the first save attached a few more times to see if I can get the three way war to go more like it did in my original game, so as acquire a save from during the first part of it (making issues #1 and #2 more reproducible). Please feel free to ask any questions you have about the issues or the situation that lead to them.

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Edit: I forgot one other thing I'd wanted to add after going through the saves, a key to the characters from my initial summary:

• "A" is Emperor Martino I of the HRE. His father just died a few weeks before the first saved game above, leaving him the tile. Everyone hates him, probably because he's an Italian trying to rule a lot of powerful German Dukes.
• "B" is Prince Ruprecht of the HRE, Duke of Meissen, Savoie and Barcelona. He's Martino's younger brother and became Emperor part way through the events described here.
• "C" is Duke Caspar I of Lower Lorraine, Duke of Lower Lorraine and Sicily. He's a cousin to the two princes, and inherited his claim to the throne from his father (who was a prince).
• "D" is my character, Duke Gotthard I of Brandenburg, Duke of Brandenburg, Lombardia, Alexandria, Holland, Verona, Courtland and Genoa. Yeah, I've been busy.
• "E" is Duke Ludolf I of Baden, Duke of Baden and Carthia. I want to take Treviso from him, as its part of my De Jure duchy of Verona. (You could also go to war with the Duke of Bavaria over Trent or the Duke of Provence over Brescia.)
• "F" is Count Hartwig of Gizeh, Count of Gizeh and Quattara. He may rebel if you try to imprison him (I don't remember exactly what his crime was, trying to assassinate somebody in the extended family, probably). He hates me, so I'd like him to die.

 

[K-vald]

Sorry for late answer, I will look into this. Thank you for reporting it.

 

[K-vald]

I was not able to reproduce issue #1 in the manner you described it. The crown law was set to Medium when the first war ended and thus my war with Baden ended and could not be declared anew.

Indeed "B" won the first war and thus became the emperor so the scenario seems to have played out similarly to what you described in the first post.

I was able to somewhat see the issue you're describing in save #2, referring to issue #2.

I was able to reproduce issue #3.



It would seem that issue #3 is similar to the issue that Slossius is describing as well. I will pass this forward.

 

[BlckKnght]

I may have misremembered the details of issue #1 as I don't have a save from the time during the middle of the war (though I reloaded autosaves from that time during my original playthrough). Perhaps I declared my second war after Baden joined the second part of the succession war (C vs B). In that case I suppose it might be WAD, other than the fact that Baden's leader does the buggy behavior of issue #2 (and so becoming exposed to my own repeated war).

Thanks for investigating, and following up!