in my current game, the newly founded (2nd) kingdom of Sicily has now held its own for a little while, but it owns two duchy's in southern Italy, Malta, Sicily, Tunisia, and is related to most of the royals in Spain. We will see how long it lasts.
Sicily underpowered
- Thread starter darviathar
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There you have it. This game simply does not simulate smaller factions that have superior troops. It is all about numbers. The Normans were simply superior soldiers to their opponents, including the Byzantines. Sicily has no prayer whatsoever against Byzantium in this game. This is one of the reasons that playing Byzantium is just too easy, even if you set difficulty to max. In my 300+ hours of playing as the Byzantines, I have never once had any threat whatsoever from the west. Quite a contrast to my Medieval 2 Total War games, in which I was constantly under attack by 5 factions. I had hoped this Byzantine expansion would better simulate the historical Byzantine position of this era, but the campaign is if anything easier now.
I've managed to build a solid strong kingdom as the count of Capua. It was my first and only game in southern Italy, and I don't consider myself a CK2 strategical/tactical mastermind... I suppose luck and randomness are involved
Southern Italy was a mess during the period the game starts in. Norman mercenaries taking over, countryside pillaged by constant Moorish pirate raids, Sicily in the hands of those same pirates but about to be kicked out by the Normans. The countryside was studded with ruins both old and new. People either lived behind thick walls or fled.
If anything the game paints a rather rose coloured view of the place at that time.
If anything the game paints a rather rose coloured view of the place at that time.
yes, southern Italy is mess - cultures, religions mixed together. But of course in the hands of a human player it is always easy - I made it from Count of Reggio to King of Sicily, Africa and Croatia in 75 years.
LoR was (among other things) supposed to be a gift to Byzantine fanboys, and it delivered.
I certainly count myself among them. I suppose I'll have to play the 4th crusade scenario for a real challenge as Byzantium.
While Sicily doesn't do well, playing as a Duke from the Byzantine had became very fruitful because you can get a free siege on Palemo most of the time. My current game as a scheming Duke of Athens is one of the best games I've had so far in CK2.
Well, I started in 1066 as the Duke of Apulia. His first act was to have a vision of God and thus be inspired to swear fealty to the Pope.
On the positive side, it turns out that this provides a lot of security.
On the negative side, it doesn't take too long for the chain of succeeding Popes to establish Absolute Authority. So you have a bit of time to try to expand the Papal States: Salerno, maybe part of Sicily, then that's it.
After that, all you can try to do is to turn crusades into victories, with the Pope receiving all of the credit.
On the positive side, it turns out that this provides a lot of security.
On the negative side, it doesn't take too long for the chain of succeeding Popes to establish Absolute Authority. So you have a bit of time to try to expand the Papal States: Salerno, maybe part of Sicily, then that's it.
After that, all you can try to do is to turn crusades into victories, with the Pope receiving all of the credit.
Once you have enough land to form the Kingdom of Sicily or all of the de jure land it should be easy to gain Independence from the Papacy. That's what I did in my 1.07 Southern Italy campaign. Watch out for Egypt invasions when they near 500 piety time to assassinate or plot to kill. That will avoid them using their invasion cb on you.
Chances are northern Italy will constantly have faction wars against the HRE so you can fabricate claims on duchies (Venice and Genoa)and invite duchy claimants and give them land in your realm. Once they start their rebellion wars again st HRE you press your claims and swallow up northern Italy before HRE even masses together troops to squash the northern Italian rebellion.
Who do you want to play as? Are you looking for Catholic and Italian or other?
Would prefer an Italian Catholic. Played as the normans before and didn't really enjoy it.
i thought there isnt one really, southern italy is either greek or norman for most of the time, only northern italy gets italian culture really i think.
Salerno is the only italian in the south ... and probably the easiest of the small, since there's a ton of siblings to get alliences from
In the Norman-Byzantine wars, in large battles both sides usually fielded about 20000 men. It would seem that a large empire should be able to get far more people in the field than a bunch of adventurers from a recently conquered and hardly subdued kingdom. And there are a lot more examples of two-bit dukes fielding an army of equal or larger size than emperors and kings. William against Harold comes to mind, or for example the Battle of Vlaardingen, perhaps only known to the Dutch history enthusiasts, where the lowly count of west Frisia, hardly more than a robber baron ruling over a piece of swamp, defeated an Imperial army numbering a few hundred. Defeating the emperor as a count in CKII without a large number of allies is all but impossible.
So I guess, it wasn't as easy for an empire to throw it's weight around as it would seem. Perhaps armies could only have a certain size, depending on the logistics of the campaign. Perhaps it should be very difficult in-game to field an army overseas, without support from allies.
So I guess, it wasn't as easy for an empire to throw it's weight around as it would seem. Perhaps armies could only have a certain size, depending on the logistics of the campaign. Perhaps it should be very difficult in-game to field an army overseas, without support from allies.
Well, in regards to army numbers, the main problem is that running at the lowest crown authority, you get a opinion bonus, which will often mean more soldiers. And if you run at the higher crown authorities, you simply get more soldiers by default. There's no real option for the vassals to choose not to support a specific war, be it defensive or offensive..