Shipbuilding as tribal

[Wakizashi]

I have looked around for a solution for this issue, and while I have found some tips, none of them seem to really work in my current game.

I'm playing a reformed Romuva Lithuanian playthrough at the moment, still being tribal, and I was wondering how I can get to actually build shipyards so I can expand my raiding beyond the border areas.

Sure, I can just leave around in Poland and Russia, but those areas are dirt as a general rule, and their rulers often can't even afford the random for imprisoned family members. So obviously I'd look beyond the land borders for income.

I have stolen enough tech from the Byzantines to have Shipbuilding level 2 in my capital, but so far none of my coastal counties have received enough benefit of that to be able to construct shipyards.

I have seen tips saying to hire mercenary ships, but the only ones available are those part of a massive merc company that costs a truckload of money that I evidently don't have.

Is the solution here basically only the choice between just waiting until the tech spread reaches my coastal counties, or just sit it out until adopting feudalism? Or is there a shorter term solution for this?

 

[Rags17]

Move your capital to the coast and set your Councilors to Study or Steal teach, IIRC that would be the Steward and Spymaster. Also, take the Learning focus as that aids tech growth. All you need is Shipbuilding Level 1 in your capital to gt the shipyards, once it appears it should spread fairly quickly down the coast. In 50 years or whatever the cooldown is you can then move your capital back.

Starting in the 769 start and using the above tactic I have managed to get Irish raiders to sea by the late 780s (ie 20 years), but I have read that it can be a lot faster if you have a high Learning ruler with good traits.

 

[DPS]

There's no real need to move your capital. Lots of time, if my capital isn't coastal, by the time I take a coastal county, it already has shipbuilding 1. Obviously, thought, if that's not the case, moving your capital can speed up the process. Whether you're tribal or feudal doesn't really matter here--all it takes is shipbuilding 1.

 

[SSA]

The only benefit of having a coastal capital is if you decide to adopt a merchant republic rather than a Feudalistic or Tribal government. But otherwise you can keep your capital in the same place and still invest in shipyards in your coastal counties.

 

[JonathanOfArc]

Here's a tech tip that you might like.

Before you create a Kingdom, while you are a Duke, you can move as many times as you'd like between the default county capital of any duchies you own as long as the duke title for that land has been created. For instance, if you own the duchies of Northland, Eastland, and Westland (just examples, not real) you can freely move to each of their duchy capitals whenever you want. If Northland is your primary title, but say you want to move to Westland because their tech is super low. All you would do is make Westland your primary title and then you can move. Spend all your tech points upgrade that county. Then switch back to Northland as your primary title and you'll be able to move back, no waiting time involved. Get more tech points and do the same for Eastland. Now you'll have higher techs in those capitals and tech will spread throughout your entire land much quicker.

This will work for a King only if you have multiple Kingdoms, but now you can only go between the capital counties of the Kingdoms. Owning Poland and France would mean I could go between France's capital of Paris and Polands capital of Krakow as much as I'd like. Just by switching my primary title which by the way costs nothing.

The only time you'll be stuck is if you move to a different county that is not a capital, however you could do that to give it tech points before moving back to a capital. You'll only get one of those moves though so use it wisely.

I do this all the time to keep tech levels high through out my land. You'll notice your kingdom has much stronger units throughout rather than just the land you've choose to play out of. Sorry if this is confusing or looks like chicken scratch. I can try to explain better if there's any confusion.

 

[Wakizashi]

There's no real need to move your capital. Lots of time, if my capital isn't coastal, by the time I take a coastal county, it already has shipbuilding 1. Obviously, thought, if that's not the case, moving your capital can speed up the process. Whether you're tribal or feudal doesn't really matter here--all it takes is shipbuilding 1.

Unfortunately that doesn't seem to be the case for the Baltic coasts that I captured. It's around 803, and no shipyards are available to be built yet. I guess the tech didn't spread yet from Vilnius.

 

[Tryvenyal]

Can you raid overseas? Isn't that feature restricted to Germanic faith and Norse/Norman/Berber and maybe a few more cultures?

 

[CoSMoS]

Can you raid overseas? Isn't that feature restricted to Germanic faith and Norse/Norman/Berber and maybe a few more cultures?

Common misunderstanding because of poor wording in-game. Anyone who can raid can raid overseas, the only difference is how much you pay for ship maintenance, making it more profitable if you are of those certain cultures.

 

[Dragatus]

Anyone can raid overseas. What's special about vikings is that they have 90% reduced ship maintenance, so the raiding is actually profitable. But anyone can make a profit by using vassals' ships instead of personal ones (though this makes the vassals poor and stunts their own development).

 

[Wakizashi]

So for my case, I can only just wait until the tech spreads, basically? And potentially speed it up a bit by moving my capital to the coast, is that correct?

Raiding on land generally gets me 20 gold tops in my area (and that's only in Warrior Lodge quests) so that gets old fast.

 

[JonathanOfArc]

So for my case, I can only just wait until the tech spreads, basically? And potentially speed it up a bit by moving my capital to the coast, is that correct?

Raiding on land generally gets me 20 gold tops in my area (and that's only in Warrior Lodge quests) so that gets old fast.

As long as you haven't moved and are happy with staying in your capital with this character, yeah go for it. Move to the coast and spend tech points to upgrade your ship building. When you're done (you could have it paused and all of this can take place within the span on a single day) just move right back to your Kingdom capital. Since you're a King with one Kingdom you'll only get to move to that coast and then back to your capital for that characters lifetime.

Edit: Right around Bremen of northern Germany/HRE there are a bunch of counites that are lead by Prince-Bishoprics. Head for them, they are close by and since their first building is a Church it will go down quick and usually before anyone can respond. A few counties right around there have those counties, they are ripe for raid and won't kill your bank sailing to. Once the church burns, move to the next county, don't stick around because the castle will be next and take too much time.

 

[Ambion Iskariot]

There are some slavic and sumounesk temples arround that area, too. You have to loot them anyway to get your MA for Reformation. Later on, I think at King Level, your warrior lodge loots will give you 50 Gold.

 

[Castimirr]

So for my case, I can only just wait until the tech spreads, basically? And potentially speed it up a bit by moving my capital to the coast, is that correct?

Basically, yes. Spreading the tech is the only way for you to do it.

Moving the capital lets you do it by spending tech points to buy Shipbuilding I. Your capital is also the county that tech spreads to if your spymaster is Studying Technology. In addition to the random tech points you sometimes get it also creates a connection that allows technology spread between the target county and your capital. So if you need to rush a particular technology, target the county within diplomatic range with the highest level of that technology and put your spymaster there. How fast technology spreads depends on both their skill and the difference between the tech level in the target and your capital, the larger the gap the faster the technology spreads. If the levels for a particular technology are equal (or apparently within .1 of each other per the wiki), it will not spread at all through that mission.

You could also set the coastal county as your crown focus and hope for events that aid tech spread, but that won't help if it doesn't have somewhere with Shipbuilding I or higher to spread from (either elsewhere in your demesne, the neighboring counties, or apparently anywhere you have tradeposts.) Though I don't know if tradeposts connect all of your counties or just your capital, and obviously won't really apply in this situation anyway.

If you were feudal you could use your marshal to speed up the spread of military techs to that county as well with the research job.

I would love if crown focus (or some other mechanic) could determine which county you can buy tech in without moving your capital and all the effects on your levies and realm, even if there was a cost increase for not doing it in your capital. It might cause problems if it made tech levels advance even faster than they already do (an issue I tend to run into on early starts). Though it might help some by encouraging the player to spend points evening out the technology in their demesne to access buildings/buff taxes/buff soldiers rather than running up the tech level in one county to extreme levels so it spreads faster to the rest of your demesne.

 

[Rags17]

Somewhat off topic but if you plan on raiding defended coasts I have found one good trick is to place my Spymaster one province inland to Set up a Spy Network. He will give advance warning of any incoming counter-raider forces, if you have the game speed set to 2 or 3 you should be able to get to your boats before they show up.

So much fun making them play whack a mole with your agile raiders !

 

[majdavlk]

also , temples have some base shipai think

Here's a tech tip that you might like.

Before you create a Kingdom, while you are a Duke, you can move as many times as you'd like between the default county capital of any duchies you own as long as the duke title for that land has been created. For instance, if you own the duchies of Northland, Eastland, and Westland (just examples, not real) you can freely move to each of their duchy capitals whenever you want. If Northland is your primary title, but say you want to move to Westland because their tech is super low. All you would do is make Westland your primary title and then you can move. Spend all your tech points upgrade that county. Then switch back to Northland as your primary title and you'll be able to move back, no waiting time involved. Get more tech points and do the same for Eastland. Now you'll have higher techs in those capitals and tech will spread throughout your entire land much quicker.

This will work for a King only if you have multiple Kingdoms, but now you can only go between the capital counties of the Kingdoms. Owning Poland and France would mean I could go between France's capital of Paris and Polands capital of Krakow as much as I'd like. Just by switching my primary title which by the way costs nothing.

The only time you'll be stuck is if you move to a different county that is not a capital, however you could do that to give it tech points before moving back to a capital. You'll only get one of those moves though so use it wisely.

I do this all the time to keep tech levels high through out my land. You'll notice your kingdom has much stronger units throughout rather than just the land you've choose to play out of. Sorry if this is confusing or looks like chicken scratch. I can try to explain better if there's any confusion.

i thought that was not possible to do with ducjies, it did not allow me to few patches back when i tried to

 

[Mauveen]

Now I haven't played the game in a while so I had a major upgrade to current version 3, so I don't know what has changed on gameplay lately, but I just can't get any ships raised.

I started out as Rurik, a tribal nord. He has 40 ships and some levies permanently raised. So I go raiding in the Mediterranean sea when suddenly he dies. My ships instantly disappear and I have to march my army back home.

Currently I am a couple of heirs down but I still haven't been able to raise any ships. I have shipbuilding technology 1 in my coastal area which has a tribal holding. But I cannot build a shipyard. While in my vassals neighbouring county I have sponsored the building of a shipyard. It has beem build, but doesn't give me any possibility of raising ships.

I have googled my way, but can't find what I am doing wrong and all posts are from previous versions.

Can anyone help me? I don't want to end up a lonely old boatless viking.

 

[Wam]

Now I haven't played the game in a while so I had a major upgrade to current version 3, so I don't know what has changed on gameplay lately, but I just can't get any ships raised.

I started out as Rurik, a tribal nord. He has 40 ships and some levies permanently raised. So I go raiding in the Mediterranean sea when suddenly he dies. My ships instantly disappear and I have to march my army back home.

Currently I am a couple of heirs down but I still haven't been able to raise any ships. I have shipbuilding technology 1 in my coastal area which has a tribal holding. But I cannot build a shipyard. While in my vassals neighbouring county I have sponsored the building of a shipyard. It has beem build, but doesn't give me any possibility of raising ships.

I have googled my way, but can't find what I am doing wrong and all posts are from previous versions.

Can anyone help me? I don't want to end up a lonely old boatless viking.

Just a quick check, you do know that except for the market and the fort (or whatever) all tribal buildings are bought with prestige? Do you have enough of that? Second question, are you sure you can build a shipyard? I think I read somewhere that Rurik doesn’t start with a coastal province since Holy Fury.

 

[Mauveen]

Thanks for your response. I have captured a coastal county and it is my direct county now (not a vassals). The shipyard doesn't show up in the buildinglist.

It did show up in the neighbouring vassals county. Which I bought for him.

 

[WJS]

Would this coastal county be on Lake Ladoga, and not the Gulf of Finland? Lakeside counties don't count as coastal, even if you have river navigation. They're counted as large rivers.

 

[Mauveen]

Ow wow, this might actually be it. Man I'm dumb. I'm gonna check this out. I knew there was a flaw in my thoughts and not in the game.