Once more about 'AI not creating second duchies' - please read for once!

[Battle bunny]

So, in order to prove it's more than just a sinister rumor, I'm copying everything here from the patch thread that I feel needs to be said about the bug (the one that AI dukes do not create more than one title and thus cannot create a kingdom). Here is a set of guidelines to test this bug:

Alright, since this has turned into a discussion about this specific bug, I'll share my observations here. See if any of these allegedly formed duchies fit some of the criteria here.

• The AI does create a first duchy. They also seem to be willing to create a ducal title if they have a tribal title (Obotrites, Lettigallians), but not if their first title is de jure.
• The AI does usurp duchies through subjugation wars. For example, I watched Rurik turbo-conquer the kingdom of Rus in an observation game. They received no second duchies from most realms as any ducal titles were titular/tribal (e.g. Muromians). Then suddenly, they finally conquered the Duchy of Chud, which was de jure, through their subjugation CB. A few days later, they formed the kingdom of Gardariki.
• The AI does create duchies AFTER it has already become a king.

If you think a second duchy has been created without fitting the above conditions, check the history of the ducal title! This is the easiest way to determine if the title was really created and not usurped. If I, and many others, are correct about this bug existing, either the title was owned by someone else first or was created after its creator became a king. I have seen zero counterexamples.

In a test game I ran, Sjaelland, Svithjod and Holmgardr all managed to usurp a de jure duchy through a subjugation war. Pomerania also did, after a few decades of staying with only Pomerania (even though they had plenty of money and several uncreated duchies). On the other hand, the most notable example of a duchy that did not and could not become a kingdom was Sudreyjar, which conquered all of Scotland, but didn't get a second duchy in the process. I'd upload the savefile, but I observed that game with patch 1.101, and although nothing changed since then, I'm not sure if anyone would care about an outdated save. If necessary, I can simply create another save and upload that one, but I'll only do so if Paradox responds to this thread (right now I'm not even sure they'll read this sentence, so I don't want to waste my effort).

The problem isn't restricted to pagans. Either way, something changed since 1.09x that screwed up the AI behavior. I don't know the code, so I don't know if the AI can even create second duchies at all, or the conditions are just overly restrictive and thus never fulfilled. Either way, the AI should create secondary duchies as normal if it fulfills the conditions to form any kingdom, and then should concentrate on just that.

 

[eaducac]

I'd like to throw in that in my experience this applies to kingdoms as well. In my current game the Norse AI usurped the kingdom of Scotland and proceeded to conquer all of the British Isles and much of northern France, but over a period of several decades they never created a second kingdom to be able to form Britannia. Finally I loaded as them and created Wales, saved (no time had passed), and reloaded as my original character, and a few days later the AI created Britannia.

 

[Doomdark]

I have investigated the issue and something had indeed broken after I checked it last time. It will be fixed in the next patch.

 

[brxbrx]

This may also be related. The AI isn't forming higher titles (like, there's a rich guy who owns every county in Brittany, but who won't make Brittany the duchy, despite fulfilling all prereqs)