basicly for a way to rule without being all nice and kind. if people fear you, they wont attack you. i.e. by murdering a entire house when they rebel.
More ways to rule
- Thread starter SweArdaia
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I wouldn't actually agree with you. In fact, I'm missing opportunities for my rulers to be goodie-two-shoes. There's too much bribery/ruthless mechanic in the game already as it is!
Plus, folks fail to notice all sorts of good things you do to them. 'Spared after rebellion' modifier was a step in the good direction concerning this.
I'm gonna play a bit of Devil's Advocate here.
First of all, I think a lot of this is already implemented in a way. Since 1.08, vassals do not really revolt when they hate the ruler anymore. They revolt when they feel their faction is strong enough to take on the ruler - so this in a sense implements the idea of divorcing revolts from relations. At the same time, the "Crushed Major Revolt" or "Long Reign" modifier does not really represent you being "liked" - it's more the sign of respect of your strength and position.
On the flip side, I think many people confuse two things when it comes to talking about "tyrannical" rulers.
There is one type of a "tyrannical ruler" that it just a ruthless guy (best representation would be Louis XI of France) who uses every opportunity to strenghten his power, but always uses a good feudal excuse and does not act in a manner that would seem arbitrary or just cruel. You can play such ruler in CK2 perfectly without ever inducing a negative modifier to your relationships with vassals (except perhaps for raising Crown Authorit). Just plot to revoke titles, imprison those who plot and rebel against you etc.
Now the other type of a "tyrannical ruler" would be a much more arbitrary, often insane guy engaging in random acts of injustice and cruelty (like Haqim the Mad, for example, or Caligula). Such rulers are almost always toppled in a massive revolt and very rarely die a natural death. So I don't think the game should be promoting such play style.
First of all, I think a lot of this is already implemented in a way. Since 1.08, vassals do not really revolt when they hate the ruler anymore. They revolt when they feel their faction is strong enough to take on the ruler - so this in a sense implements the idea of divorcing revolts from relations. At the same time, the "Crushed Major Revolt" or "Long Reign" modifier does not really represent you being "liked" - it's more the sign of respect of your strength and position.
On the flip side, I think many people confuse two things when it comes to talking about "tyrannical" rulers.
There is one type of a "tyrannical ruler" that it just a ruthless guy (best representation would be Louis XI of France) who uses every opportunity to strenghten his power, but always uses a good feudal excuse and does not act in a manner that would seem arbitrary or just cruel. You can play such ruler in CK2 perfectly without ever inducing a negative modifier to your relationships with vassals (except perhaps for raising Crown Authorit). Just plot to revoke titles, imprison those who plot and rebel against you etc.
Now the other type of a "tyrannical ruler" would be a much more arbitrary, often insane guy engaging in random acts of injustice and cruelty (like Haqim the Mad, for example, or Caligula). Such rulers are almost always toppled in a massive revolt and very rarely die a natural death. So I don't think the game should be promoting such play style.
Listen to this guy. What the OP is asking for is already in the game, in a sense. And Martinus is right about that - if so you choose, you can play the badass in the game and still be able to enjoy it.
However there are more implications that can be considered about imposing rule through fear: how about a reduce peasant revolt chance for regions where force was used to repress those that are ruled? How about factions supported by peasants? (with increased troops as the main effect - if the peasants also feel oppressed). And anyway, by being tyrannical / arbitrary you get a lot of negative opinion modifiers - which are ok as they are, IMO. But the game makes it really difficult to hold the land together, while in actual life we had plenty of examples where these rulers had a pretty smooth journey. In CK2 this happens when you increase crown authority, have a strong retinue army and laws allow you to recruit a lot more than your vassals. No fool should revolt when you have almost absolute power -> in the game they still do.
You mean the "suppress revolt" marshal action?
You mean the random doomstack armies that support them in a revolt?
My wording was perhaps a bit bad. Peoble is'nt asking for tyranny with no consequences, just another way to play the game than acting like a saint. As it is now the charectars with good traits such as kind, just and charitable can afford to be more cruel and tyranical than the charectars with with the more evil traits. So if a vassal of yours have a county you want, you best wait to strip him off his title until you have a kind charectar. Also I find it kind of wierd that only pious charectars can imprison peoble (-10 piety for each imprisonment), so you need to be a man of god before the game mechanics allow you to act like douche. The current opinion system is really bad for roleplay, and thats not a good thing since the game is maybe even more a RP game than a strategy game.
Maybe a fear system could be more tied to the traits than the actions of the charectar.
This is something that has been discussed since the release of the game. Maybe it is something, paradox will keep in mind for CKIII.
Reading this through I think the underlying theme is one that comes up in other discussions... I think the AI does not act "afraid" because it has no sense of self-preservation...
The classic example if the revolting nobles (particularly for independence) that stand no real chance of surviving on their own even if they win...
The AI thinks in terms of winning (i.e. getting more and higher titles) and taking advantage of any opportunity that comes up.
It seems combination of a very high positive opinion of the target and a strength comparison with the target are the only things that slows it down...
"respect" (which could be love, fear or something else) is bolted in under some of the +opinion adjustments (long reign, personal diplomacy, crushed major revolt, etc)...
Other than that the AI has no fear about acting against anyone.
Abstractly you could ask why any noble would put up with a classically evil and scary ruler if that ruler did not have a rather large army standing behind him, no matter how scary the person might be face to face...
The classic example if the revolting nobles (particularly for independence) that stand no real chance of surviving on their own even if they win...
The AI thinks in terms of winning (i.e. getting more and higher titles) and taking advantage of any opportunity that comes up.
It seems combination of a very high positive opinion of the target and a strength comparison with the target are the only things that slows it down...
"respect" (which could be love, fear or something else) is bolted in under some of the +opinion adjustments (long reign, personal diplomacy, crushed major revolt, etc)...
Other than that the AI has no fear about acting against anyone.
Abstractly you could ask why any noble would put up with a classically evil and scary ruler if that ruler did not have a rather large army standing behind him, no matter how scary the person might be face to face...
Don't improsonment cost -10 piety if its without cause? If not, then ignore that part.
But good you bring up executing, sometimes I don't even get why they implemented it into the game. Its very rarely an advantage to use, mostly its just a way to screw yourself over.
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Not if you can get the guy excommunicated first and his heir has a decent opinion of you...
It is interesting that executing someone who is excommunicated given no negative opinion.. executing a random prisoner is -10 opinion (tyranny) and -10 piety, executing a heretic that has not been communicated (can he be excommunicated?) is only a -10 opinion (tyranny)...
Of course that -10 opinion (tyranny) only applies if it is a member of your realm. If from another realm the negative opinion only applies to them (you still get the -10 piety unless the individual is of a different religion)...
I think it makes perfect sense that a character with a reputation for being kind, just, etc., can get away with a lot more than a character with a less than stellar reputation.
Executing nobles really should only be of advantage to you on in rare cases. Generally execution was for commoners; nobility were usually expected to play nice with each other.
EDIT: I forgot to make my more general point-- tyranny is already very easy to get away with, you just have to "budget" for it when it comes to vassal opinion. I think the issue is that people are so afraid of the tyranny opinion malus that they instantly back away without realizing that it generally doesn't hurt all that much. Plus it's pretty easy to circumvent anyway. Want a title off your vassal? Just send your chancellor to fabricate claims and you'll get it without tyranny.
From a roleplay perspective it makes no sense at all that a kind character is acting like a tyrant, yet its way easier to be a tyrant when your character is kind. Also, having kind traits doesnt equal you having a reputation for kindness.
The smart thing to if you have one of your vassals improsoned is to release him if you got decent relations with him, you then get +10 relations with all your vassals. Thats kind of a wacked signal to send to your vassals, be merciful to traitors and they will love you. Were noble traitors historically shown merci like that?
The smart thing to do is release one prisoner. The bonuses for multiple prisoners don't stack. Given that in medieval thought, rulers are expected to show mercy, releasing some prisoners makes perfect sense. Generally noble prisoners were ransomed. A failed rebellion wouldn't generally mean death for a noble until after CK2's timeframe.
Unfortunately, these threads pop up every so often, where a player wants to play a king from the age of absolute monarchs. This game isn't about that time period: the nobility jealously guarded their rights. In fact, I think walking all over your nobles is way too easy in this game. Once you learn how to play, they are almost never a threat to you or even an inconvenience, just troop factories to further your conquests.
Suppress revolts need to be changed to be more useful, The way it works now just is not an effective use of the marshals time Suppressing revolt risk in one county for 9 months before being able to change jobs or locations when every month there could be multiple counties revolting as vassals seem completely incompetent and incapable of defending their own territory and always need their liege to bail them out. If a man's county is completely sacked and he has more than one I feel that if I should be able to revoke the county without tyranny for "gross incompetence" Why should I spend my soldiers lives to save you little man? how did you manage to have a mob of 4000 angry peasants at your door? If i can't take it away from him then I feel he should at least pay me extra taxes for a period of time or something.
I don't disagree. I'm just pointing out that the concept exists in the game.
Suppress revolts would be much more useful if a revolt was something that was actually dangerous to the ruler. Right now, it's a free relations boost with the owner of the county for stomping the tiny little stack that appears.
Suppress revolts would be much more useful if a revolt was something that was actually dangerous to the ruler. Right now, it's a free relations boost with the owner of the county for stomping the tiny little stack that appears.
So becouse it was custom that kings showed mercy, vassals would'nt fear their king if he executed another vassal for whatever crimes he committed? That would'nt make them think twice before they would do anything to cross him? Peoble is'nt asking for some OP mechanic that makes you able to kill all your vassals whenever you want. See it as a roleplay tool, another way of playing the game. Though this may be hard for you, since you think it makes perfect sense that only kind characters should be able to afford acting like tyrants.
A way which you could implent this without doing too many big game mechanical overhauls is for usually negative effects, to have a positive one on certain vassals.
For instance; Wroth represents an angry, tempered ruler and a violent one. Usually this does a -10 opinion modifier on vassals. But what if one of those vassals were craven thus cowering in fear of his lieges wroth? Alternatively a vassal with the brave trait, would have a bigger negative impact on relationship. Or simply have the tyranny modifier give either "positive" and negative relations between vassals at random. Some might get scared, some might get pissed. This could be calculated on the relative power of the person. A powerful vassal might be more pissed than afraid, while less powerfull vassals would cower in fear.
For instance; Wroth represents an angry, tempered ruler and a violent one. Usually this does a -10 opinion modifier on vassals. But what if one of those vassals were craven thus cowering in fear of his lieges wroth? Alternatively a vassal with the brave trait, would have a bigger negative impact on relationship. Or simply have the tyranny modifier give either "positive" and negative relations between vassals at random. Some might get scared, some might get pissed. This could be calculated on the relative power of the person. A powerful vassal might be more pissed than afraid, while less powerfull vassals would cower in fear.