Part V (801-808)
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Part V (801-808)
Year 801
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The year starts fantastically, as we get our very first prosperity event! It is also the one we need the most at that - extra holding slot! We obviously purchase it (around 70g = equivalent to 2.5x year income). With that Perm now has 4 out of 7 holding slots, making our best county (on top of being capital). Two more such events and we are golden - the 7th holding slot will be acquired through different means. Also it was really quick - just in 2 years after reaching prosperity level: booming in Perm, when Medium Time To Happen (MTTH) is equivalent to 65 years at base. That's pretty good luck, if I say so myself and puts us nicely on time table for our goals.
Slowly turning taiga into settlements
I've also been thinking about changing Rulership focus. We have been on it for better part of last two decades. Normally I would move onto something different, but thanks to already having an heir, I can be more greedy/ambitious. So we will remain on it till Omurtag II reaches age of 40. After that I have to move on - remaining any longer will be too much of a risk (Stressed/Depressed are common outcomes of rulership and dangerously diminish health). Maybe, just maybe we either pick stewardship education trait level up (making us eligible for better MTTH for prosperity events) or Just/Ambitious. At this point while interesting RP wise, I don't really need to become administrator. It is enough we have seen one Legendary Wise + Respected Ruler in this playthrough.
While reading various CK2 wiki articles, it caught my attention that releasing prisoners of the same religion gives piety. Thus it might be possible to patch my current piety deficit (-161) with pillaging? I toggle Prisoner to only show those, who are not ransomable and fire release button. Most of them aren't of our religion but we still get around 15 piety. While not much in itself, it is important that now I tested how to do it. Possibility of exploiting it in the future might be on a menu. Knowing all that we proceed pillaging Mari lands.
Out of note, between sessions I noticed something profitable. If you remember in previous parts I did an "Ooopsie" with inviting some Slavic courtier to our land, resulting in fiasco. I kept him marked as character of special interest and somehow, he outlived his then liege. Whoever took over, no longer saw our dear Nikita as important and didn't bother to keep him on his council. Thus he became eligible for cashing our favour, becoming part of our court with his 210 wealth! We make him one of our Venerable Elders, as he is more than old enough (69 years old).
Fixed mistake
Before end of january, we get notification about Great Festival progress (started in last part). I decide to splurge on most expensive trinkets mostly to check for any better outcomes. I will spoil you now - I get nothing in return (beside obvious bits of Piety).
In march our spymaster generates 50 military techpoints, as our raiders outmanouver Mari defenders to move onto their capital. We also push Practise Range towards second level in Pil'va. During festival it turns out it is "poetry competition edition" and we participate. Once again the victor title goes to lowborn wife of Galich Mersky chief, which is from now on known as "the Word Master". I decide on not paying her, as she is both not of my culture and has Cancer while being 48 years old (making fostering any good relations pointless due to how shortlived it would most likely be).
Out of nowhere another Trade route upkeep event hits us. I'm suprised - didn't even know that Pil'va had it! While it helps us in the long run, it makes me feel kind of bamboozled! But still we pay that gold. While we loot Mari capital, somehow we don't capture anyone! Scandalous! We then move onto another vassal of Mari capital.
To get money, you have to spend money. Previous owner contribution
We fare better economically as in Autumn our stewards manages to settle our people into Vologda. Not only does it reduces revolt risk but also removes penalty to tribal levies due to mismatch of culture/religion. I very much like such elements of realm managment and assimilating subjects into our culture. Those lands are of our Suomenusko religion already, so now we get 100% levies from them. But this year just keeps on giving. By December we also fire another rulership event! Once again our Drunkard vassal causes mess, and once again we fine him! Sadly it is 4th out of 5 times as we fail coin flip on success. Still those rulership events be firing like crazy often.
Planting culture for future passive spread
Year 802
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Another year starts with some eastern Khagan arriving at our Siberian vassal's land to pillage. There is nothing built there + it wont be my treasury that will hurt. Assessing such little importance for us, I don't plan to return our raiders (currently advancing towards Novgorod). We have to beat down it's defenders, but I hope it will be worth it. Then we split our army into retinues and regular levies to sack twice as fast. Luckily we have enough commanders with extra winter supplies.
Checking one of Suomenusko holy sites for loot
As 900 hosts rampages through Siberia up to Ural, I decide on starting another big project. It is time to start our relations with China. Luckily we are in range of diplomatic interactions with them, cause one of Nomads to the south had to consolidate enough to have some silkroad trade posts in his domain. Or are we? As it turns out - I lied. We are not within diplomatic range of Chinese Empire. I'm not sure how was I able to interact with them in my private test run as I'm pretty certain I wasn't holding any silkroad county within my realm. It creates a rather serious setback. I'm torn on how to proceed, because currently we lack good CB for conquering steppes towards silkroad. I could snipe single no trade-post county and keep loosing it via my game settings on each ruler death. It isn't worth now given how old Omurtag II is. I can also wait till we convert, as with Holy War CB I can nicely carve our final realm shape, while also setting convert to conquest culture flag (making our future life easier and much less bountiful in nomadic uprisings), and what I aim for is barely on silkroad. There is also third option - I can combine different objectives before conversion - snipe single county in Crimea, next to Byzantine Empire (our conversion potential sponsor) while also beating down big yellow nomadic blob (Khazars). I'm interested on your opinion on that subject.
Silkroad situation - so far away...
Rest of year passes uneventfully. By August we are once again able to worship ancestors, as 10 years from previous sacrifice has passed. Obviously we do, this time without being side tracked we go towards economic boons (counting on extra prosperity levels in our personal domain).
Year 803
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As we move aggresively from north to west, we consolidate and target baltic Romuvans for some pillaging. Some of them can afford ransoms, but also are remarkably more tough (having between 1000 to 1700 troops).
Time flies and date moves toward second calendar month, we get yet another prosperity event - this time it is one of province modifiers. Those modifiers have no expiration date and are overall pretty nice. We rolled +levy size modifier, which while great is the least attractive for us. One is down, 5 more to go. This is also good place to check terrain types in our capital duchy. Udmurts is listed as Forest, Tynea as Hills and everything else is Arctic. Both Forest and Hills have an extra terrain dependent modifier. Still we are mostly poor - Arctic is as barebone as it gets. Not only do we accumulate prosperity the slowest, but contrary to other difficult terrain types we won't benefit from our subject hard labour.
Prosperity modifiers collecting game begins
Spring greets us with events, in which we instruct someone in warrior lodge (costing us some gold) but also get another honor duel - this time against Finnish woman with just 7 PC. We accept.
Somehow while pillaging around Riga, we fail to capture almost anyone and thus fail in relieving those tribals of their heavy pockets :/. Then by accident in June, raiding host is moved onto over 2000 enemy warriors with just 1900 of our own. Before battle commences, I manage to focus everyone in single flank under our best leader and luckily we roll "Feint tactic" which allows us to minimize losses. Still - ouch. More importantly we can start another Ukon Juhla festival and we do as we need that prestige and piety.
Chilling with boys on Baltic coast
August: prosperity level increases in... Kostroma. Not that it matters much (we won't hold onto it longterm ourselves). We get our prestige and piety for finishing feast. Which puts us at 400 prestige and -126 piety. At this point I was still thinking that we just need 500 prestige to visit China and was not using it. I probably could invest it sooner. Well it will take me some more time to realise, that it will take much more to make use of those Jade Dragon DLC mechanics.
In november merchant caravan arrives in our lands. As always they do tell us about mythical lands of hindustan (like Ukko'dammit, can't they make us somehow able to interact with China?) and gift us interesting character upon departure. Greek Eunuch with 14 intrigue, Impaler, diligent and shrewd. That's a lot of goodies despire somewhat middling intrigue score. Perfect candidate to replace our current aging spymaster in her byzantine tourism, or to just throw into fights as commader because of his extra +morale damage (especially if he would get few improvments from Marshal). Our brave warriors move south to Memel, nearing Gulf of Danzig to keep good work.
Year 804
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Another year, another vassal in Siberia gets looted. Then we get update on our Ancestor Veneration sacrifice - we get... 50 gold. Which is suprising, as wiki doesn't mention it as possibility. I will happily take it but it seems like another thing to investigate further. If we theorytically could get 50g every time that would translate into 500 gold per century. Which is significant. Not reliable but still significant assuming we sacrifice freely acquired personal.
Excuse me, what?
Rest of winter is spent on checking honorary title,s I notice we have both 2 free slots for elders and commanders. This wasteful situation is quickly rectified by inviting 2 christian nobles (from Greece and Armenia) and 2 nomads (Buddhist + Zoroastrians). They will spend their retirement days in our court and we will take over their wealth at some point. It will cost us 380 gold for gifts and favours. If everything goes as expected, not only will we retrieve those funds but get 600+ gold extra. It will take some time though. Perhaps I will keep doing this more, as I found out better method of quick searching for investor targets - by looking at their names labels (it allows to excluse all councillors).
4 honorary members of our court from 4 different religion denominations
We loot Memel for no prisoners (hello? Followers of Otso I want to report a bug - I keep not getting prisoners while sacking...) and move onto next prussian chief capital. All targeted investors accept, so things proceed swiftly. Currently we will have 6 "investors" in our realm. It sliced our treasury in half, so at least there is some limiting factor and alternative cost paid. Our ruler also loses another fleeting costing us 75 prestige - ouch. I think it would be better to take smaller prestige penalty first instead of trying to gamble our prestige. As our influencers arrive, it turns out I can't make them commanders, forcing me to relieve some of our native Elders from that honorary title, as well as making one Court Jester.
By Spring I decide to recall steward from settling tribes in Kostroma. It is of the same religion and adjacent to province with our culture, so given our ruler higher than neccesary stewardship it should convert passively. Meaning our Steward might be of better use somewhere else. Steward can administer the realm to speed it up but also help prosperity gain. I'm having an urge to screw myself again, so Marshal goes from training troops to Organizing Raid - maybe we can use those troops to raid our closer non-nomadic neighbours.
With May, Nikita - our Volhynian slavic investor mentioned previously passes on... GOLD TO OUR COFFERS by dying
. Lived till 73, which was quite a while. Worry not - instead of just looking for replacement, I just move court jester onto elder position. We also sack Marienburg and get whole one prisoner. Better than nothing I guess. Now we have choice - either move along coast or go inland to visit Polish chiefs. I decide for 2nd option, as there are more targets with overall more gold.
Time to check polish coffers
Summer presents us with new possibilities. Chief Rateg of Khantia connives to get High Chiefdom of Yugra. That sounds just like imprisonment reason. I don't bother for now - our troops are far away. Will closely monitor situation though. I would gladly either take his gold, or replace him with Komi culture ruler.
Plock gifts us with 2 heirs to chiefdom and "strange box" event. Hope are this loot box contains something. It would replace our thin months so far. Have anecdote regarding that event. It always seems to me, like I need to keep searching general area, in which I found box to found the bloody key. Most likely it is not tied, but every time I fail in unlocking strange box it is also the time I didn't sack the area of origin. Then we split and go for both Kujawy and Sieradz tribes - capitals of 2 vassals. It is bad day for High Chief Bezprym Ironside of Mazovia :V. And thus we spent rest of year along Vistula river.
Suprise mechanics of IXth century
Year 805
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Our king finally reaches age of 40. We spent as long as possible on Rulership Focus, and it is high time to move on from it. It works perfectly for Seduction, as I already have perfect candidate for our king affection. She will just came out of age in August
. So now we have time to "train ourselves" a little in art of courtship.Almost at the sime time, we loot both Sieradz and Kujawy collecting 8 prisoners. That's what we like. Time for Sandomierz and Sacz Tribes further south. And how lucky! We get another extra holding slot in Perm! The last one was just 4 years ago, and base MTTH is 65 years if I remember correctly. With that, optimally I need just one more holding slot. Sadly I still need other 5 prosperity modifiers. But this is so lucky, to have this event fire twice in one part of this AAR.
Extra holding slots events speedrun any %
Our warriors beat local defenders down, we manage to capture heir to High Chiefdom of Poland. That will sell well. I suppose, there is benefit to fighting those armies parked on top of tribes, instead of avoiding them. We instantly ransom him - so maybe we will capture him again.
In may we get note from our Chancellor: he managed to procure us, a claim on Galichy Mersky. While it does cost us, I decide on paying for it. My reasoning being: in case we get our ideal heir, we have those counties as present to our first son. Time to move him to do the same thing he just did - but in tribe north - Hlynow. For anyone wondering how Omurtag II seduction goes - we fail but keep building relations.
June gifts us with extra 50 mil points from spymaster. I would rather get either Economic or culture tech points, as they will directly feed into our economy. What can you do. RNG giveth, RNG taketh. We also get issued another mission from lodge and it takes me a back. It turns out one of our rivals somehow made it to Hero rank, and issues us mission. I have mixed feelings about it. While probably there is no influence, I think games warn us at this point. My ruler while veteran is mediocre in his martial ability and I would rather keep hitting those lucky prosperity events instead of dying. Additionally I don't really need more lodge currency. So had skip!
Sandomierz gifts us with 3 extra prisoners. I was forced to devote both stacks to siege as it had almost 2000 defenders. If you wondered how profitable it is and how much our treasury contains here you go.
Perm's kickstarter initiative going smoothly
It turns out we did manage to capture heir to high chiefdom of Poland again. And we still have to yet siege it's ruler capital. Then August arrives, so comes of age girl worthy of our Permyakid dynasty. She is bethrothed to chancellor of our vassal (future husband suffers from Cancer). So we decide to target her in seduction. Contrary to our hillarious expectations by end of September we don't capture polish heir for the third time. Stil those Lesser Poland adventures were more than profitable. So onto Greater Poland I suppose. As wise men said - you don't change succesful habits.
Not a huge fan of eugenics but it is difficult to argue against economical benefits long term
You know what is good on top of raiding? Corruption. So on october 1st our marshall finally comits to it. Time to appoint new one, and through him catch the old one. Over 200g from his industrios nature. He will not be forgotten - but missed. While looking for future corrupt martial I find that one of our investors is neat: brave, deceitful, arbitrary. He doesn't has great martial score but if he somehow gets himself killed, it just means we inherit gold sooner. And I have no important missions for marshal at the moment. We collect Ber's funds, yet somehow make a mistake and appoint Irter first (before imprisoning) and find ourselves not with greatest arrest chance. So I replace him and now I can't make him marshal again, because of him being upset and having some game flag making him not eligible to return to office. I'm not sure how long that it lasts. Let's find out!
Still staying on top of our corruption game! We even start thinking about combining old-minting with corruption to speed things up
Also another merchant caravan visits us. What the hell is going on? That's a lot of not common events firing like every other year. This time we are presented with Ethiopian Chancellor. He replaces previous Chancellor wwith slightly more diplomacy (21 vs 20), not being lunatic but diligent. We also comfortably park our raiding crews in Greater Poland. Had to micro the split to be able to siege both Poznań and Nakło at the same time. We also are at almost 1300 wealth before year end and ransom for another 180.
Year 806
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As good as those polish lands were with bounty, Bolgars arrive again at our western vassal lands. Seems that after greater poland, I will have to think about returning and dealing with nomads issues.
After making sweet moves onto our love at february 14th, we get notification 2 days later of our success. First good result in over the year of trying. Magic of valentines I guess. We "love her and leave her" only to reattempt seduction again.
Securing bright future. Surely nothing bad will result from it!
It seems gods were not happy with our Komi Casanova, as we immedietely get notification of peasant uprising. Well now it is REALLY time to go back. They spawned almost 3900 troops and demand indepedence. Out of curiosity I check rebelion risk map mode and it shows 0% for that province so no extra modifiers. So at least my vassal do semi good job of governing those lands, which is often not the case for AI.
As we finish Poznań (6 prisoners), I realise that I have some trick to play. Having already called to arms my vassals, but I also can (and do) call for help from my tributaries. Maybe we assemble just enough troops to deal with all the issues home by rallying everyone onto our 900 retinue left in capital. Upon calculating it doesn't turn out this way. We will get around 2300 troops, which will even if we win to too much losses in retinue. So we have to hail back.
In March after 2nd succesful 'tumbling" (and one scandal) we get different seduction event. We find Quick/Attractive lover. Really good
. I'm always value highly sources of good "genetics" while playing as minor religion/culture. This one also already starts as Lover. If playing a woman ruler, seduction is usually even better. I think male version of spawned character is Strong and Quick.
How do you not like this event? Seduction at it finest for tribal
In may luckily for us Bolghars fight off some nomads from Siberia. One less annoyance and disturbance to our realm. Sadly rebels rush straight down to our capital. Something that I did not expect. Now that is real risk of losing prosperity :/. It forces me to disband 600 troops in Poland to raise 4250 warriors in our lands. We have to scamper off from Perm, but don't lose too much in that retreat. Soon we are ready for revenge after assembling our host.
Bloody peasants! Leave my booming capital alone!
We descent on them with great fury and vengeance: roll Feint tactic at every single one flank. Such bonuses: +100% Light Infantry Attack, +50% Light Infantry Defence and +150% Archers Attack are powerful. It does penalise our Heavy Infantry Attack and Defence by 50%, but this is more than worth it. In over 1400h of playing I never noticed that graphic on top of combat window changes, as I don't remember such snowy looking one. It is perplexing as game still suprises me with such details. As our warrior fight in the arctic plains of Perm, our ruler beds again pregnant woman. He is now considered Aspiring Seducer. I hope to be able to claim fatherhood of child to be born. Soon battle reaches conclussion and rebels forces are no more!
Serves them right - bastards tried to ruin our prosperity thing going
As we are no longer at war, I can move my warriors towards pillaging nomads in the east. Changing our laws is also possible. I move Burgher obligations one step towards tax oriented. It will be important for far future and currently there is no city vassals to object. Win-Win. Our love gifts birth to daughter. Her husband claims fatherhood and we don't intervene.
Start of optimising our Obligation laws for future profits
By december our oldest daughter starts developing interests in religion. As she is already attractive, I choose to make her Kind and still have Idolizer for either Zealous or Erudite. She becomes Zealous anyway as I never can remember that it is only "trying to" make character develop in some way. Kids am I right? I also assign her Intrigue education - she has two good modifiers for it. Maybe she will become our future spymaster. At the very least if married off, she will be able to take care of herself in foreign court.
Year 807
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We progress with pursuit of nomads in Votyaki tribe and Chindyapa Kichayid in bed sheets. Unlucky we roll Feint on both "holding flanks" and shiellwall on our main flank. Our enemies rolled even worse though and we have 4:1 advantage so we still win easily. But don't inflict as many casualties as I would like to. At least we capture vassal to nomads: chief of Kerzhenets. As he is worth 70g, I put him in house arrest. Upon inspection he turns out to be on "Intrigue" focus tree. I'm not sure if he can release himself but... I can lend him 39 gold to let him ransom himself for 70g. This way I don't risk much. I have to overpay 6g, as I can gift him 15g at the time. Still 25 gold more than we had. Kings becomes lustful due to seduction focus. Now this is somehow problematic. We currently have 7 traits and the game will try to move us towards 5 or 6. We can most but I don't want to lose Diligent or Temperate as with them we are still at 18 Stewardship treshold for prosperity events even without stewardship focus.
Our CEO after Business, Rulership and now Seduction focuses
Now that external raiders have been dealt with, we can try imprisoning our vassal in Khanty. Despite 66% chance we fails and he rebels... Meaning - we will get that county. I don't call in vassals, as I want to raid on that side of Ural mountains anyway to retrieve gold from nomads (who mercifully liberated it from my vassals pockets). Also supply issues. As I didn't manage my commanders so far, it is high time to invite three Lodge Commanders (for 900 society currency). One of them turns out interestingely. Arvo Arvo has both Deceitful and Arbitrary ano no other corruption-affecting traits. We select him for marshal for now - I will keep checking for Irter and when he will be capable. But this isn't worse, that said Ideally I would get corruption from both so getting our old investor onto that position first would be better. As soon as April starts I move out but only with my regular levies.
New Marshal. I wonder how long will it take to get character that has all 3 corruption traits (Deceitful, Arbitrary, Greedy)
In July our ambitious 18-stat steward dies. Sadly he didn't manage to work out extra cash for us. I find good Prussian replacement - Genius, Ambitious, Proud. All those trais provide us with good events. One problem - he is heir to chiefdom of Galindia tribe. Current chief 33 years old chief and brother to our candidate has no years and has no male offspring on his own. I give him one concubine from our dungeons and proceed with invitation. Also I notice he has 445 gold! I think about marrying later our steward to our daughter. This way if they roll on some not important county I can even let them keep it for all that gold.
Interesting new steward with interesting family
By october the rebelion is put down. I ransom some before ending war. After getting almost every single coin of Khanty chief in question had, we become new owners of his tribe! I move our prussian steward there as Khantia is of wrong culture and doesn't neighbour any province of our Komi culture. If we succeed in fixing culture, then one of our already Komi vassals will be able to also convert his tribe (assuming he rolls rng chance for it). We end year with slightly over 1600 gold and 9/10 holdings.
Year 808
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For current new year resolution I decide to keep on looting eastern Siberia. Time to cut those nomads down to the size. We are also offered claim on Hlynow in february, which we take. Our plan to to present our firstborn with whole or even two high chiefdoms - Mari and Vologda slowly comes together. As we can educate him we will make sure he is, as able of administrator as his father and thus help us with culture conversion of those tribes.
Preparation for creation of influencial branch family (just in case)
While defeating Khagan of Gyla, we secure his 3rd son which sells for quite a lot. Even after ransoming he has almost 200g so we keep on sieging his holding. This is one of the consequences of making independent Khagans empire tier - their prisoners sells for lot. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure it was usually him that was bullying our vassals in Ural duchy. We can call this a just retribution. This way we can use nomads to help us in acquiring the capital for development of our economy. As long as no one develops into regional power house, we are fine.
Big nomad piggy bank
According to my earlier prediction: Kostroma tribe converted it's culture quickly (may), without even need for our steward to be administrating the realm. That is one advantage of high stewardship rulers - they be culture converting under right circumstances like crazy. Hope is I will be able to spread Komi culture as quickly after conversion. After a while I have a realisation though: I don't see constant seduction pop-ups. I remedy it. Seems like being for 15 in-game years of hands-free Rulership left some habits. Funnily Chindyapa wants to kill our current 69 years old infirm wife. Nothing against it, but I wish they luck as our current partner has bunch of intrigue traits. That said: truly love knows no bounds!
Culture managment #101
November warns us about world being full of dangers and plots, so just in case spend my current prestige in Tynea and Pilva on upgrading buildings to level 2 (Warcamp and Practise Range accordingly). We don't need repetition of our ruler father's case, which died with bunch of prestige/piety. Then I look through intrigue menu, but there is nothing out of note. I have strong preference to not check "auto-end plots" box after trying it out. Game is in my opinion much more interesting this way and in this AAR - we get bunch of occasions to cash in while performing our Law administering duties. We are not well liked by few chiefs still remembering subjugation. Luckily in few last months some of them died off naturally and were replaced by new generation. Just to be safe I switch my 100 relation spymaster to scheme stance (passive chance to increase chance of discovering plots).
Potentially interesting options for securing some wealth
As our oldest daughter finishes her education soon, we get to decide on our last intervention. I can make her Ambitious and rival but decide against it. With probably high level of Intrigue education, that could be deadly. She can still become patient through traits, so Omurtag does nothing. I'll keep close eye on her as there might be things we can do with her, beside establishing additional branch of family without having to give away land. Her together with some seduced women could help us in acquiring wealth but I have yet to think it through. We release non-ransomable prisoners for around 50 piety (but still are in deficit). Before end of year we loot eastern Khanty chiefs and decide on big heist - time to loot Khaganate of Sibir!
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