Threat

[DeftSwede]

Is it me, or does threat take a ridiculously long time to decrease unless your norse?

This is a screenshot from just after I formed the Roman Empire and I have 96% threat with a monthly decay of 0.21%. This means that it will take 38 years for that threat level to decrease to 0. I'd be fine with this if the game didn't take 5 minutes to run one month at full speed. Is there anyway to make it decrease quicker?

 

[StijnVeb13]

Yep, I also think that threat decreases a bit too slow. If you want to lose threat, you could give independence to some non de-jure vassals, how bigger they are, the more threat you lose. But I don't think you're gonna do that, so good luck with waiting.

 

[LeSingeAffame]

You have probably enough troops to crush every defensive pact you will face

 

[DeftSwede]

Yep, I also think that threat decreases a bit too slow. If you want to lose threat, you could give independence to some non de-jure vassals, how bigger they are, the more threat you lose. But I don't think you're gonna do that, so good luck with waiting.

Yeah, since i want to reclaim the old Roman Empire borders, there is very little leeway i could leave for granting vassal independence

You have probably enough troops to crush every defensive pact you will face

Probably, but in the ensuing chaos, leave myself open to rebellion within the empire and the last time i checked, it looked like everyone was in a defensive pact against me.

Its simply a matter of it taking too long, as i said, I don't mind much of the wait, so long as the wait wasn't half a day of gameplay. It probably should allow for some form of decrease when succession happens, but in my experience in this particular game, that hasn't happened.

I think I'll attack Sussex with imperial cb and offer vassalisation to everyone in England as they seem to be wholly unaffected.

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

Threat decreases based off the tier of your title.

More accurately it increases based off the tier of your title.

I can gobble up an entire kingdom as a duke and not get more than 20% threat, if that. Holy war a small duchy as an emperor? 50% threat.

 

[DeftSwede]

Yeah, after waiting however many years, I bled it all off to 4%, so everything disbanded, then attacked in holy war for the duchy of tripoli

I mean, come on, 42% threat for three counties, that's ridiculous, i'll never be able to restore Rome's old borders at this rate, especially since my vassals are losing holy wars every which way they can draining my moral authority. How can I be threatening, in 50 years only I've taken 4 counties and i can hardly grant independence to many if i want to achieve something and as i said, it takes half a day to wait that long

 

[Gans]

Yeah, after waiting however many years, I bled it all off to 4%, so everything disbanded, then attacked in holy war for the duchy of tripoli

View attachment 195663

I mean, come on, 42% threat for three counties, that's ridiculous, i'll never be able to restore Rome's old borders at this rate, especially since my vassals are losing holy wars every which way they can draining my moral authority. How can I be threatening, in 50 years only I've taken 4 counties and i can hardly grant independence to many if i want to achieve something and as i said, it takes half a day to wait that long

You shouldn't wait until those def pacts disbands. In my Rome campaign I sit on 100% threat all the time. Tricks are: betroth christian realms for NAP's which you can broke when you attack them. Attack revolting realms which are never in def pacts. And the main thing: don't sit there all day siegeing, use assaults for swift and fast resolutions.

 

[StarSword]

You shouldn't wait until those def pacts disbands. In my Rome campaign I sit on 100% threat all the time. Tricks are: betroth christian realms for NAP's which you can broke when you attack them. Attack revolting realms which are never in def pacts. And the main thing: don't sit there all day siegeing, use assaults for swift and fast resolutions.

In addition to what he said:

• Marshal your retinues, which as Roman Emperor you can afford a shit-ton, in a border province that has strong levies in the area before you issue your war declaration. Then declare war, raise the levies immediately, and march into your war target immediately, preferably using a commander who has Organizer. Meanwhile get the rest of the levies you need headed for target.
• Get commanders with Siege Leader or Architect to deal with cities, tribes, nomad capitals, and temples, and assault all castles. Once you have occupied all holdings in the war target, you'll either have 100% warscore if that's the whole country, or you'll start ticking warscore going in your favor. After that, go after provinces where the demesne levies are raised since the defenses will be weaker.
• The enemy won't come at you as a single giant doomstack, it'll look more like a great holy war where they come in dribs and drabs. You might be able to have one army capturing targets and another as a flying column smashing stacks.
• Take full advantage of defensive terrain. If you can trick a similarly sized enemy army into attacking into it, you'll crush them.
• If all else fails, in the Mediterranean and Britain you can redeploy and reposition your troops by sea in a pinch.
• Exclusive to Christian emperors, convert to Catholicism (which if you've mended the schism will now be an Orthodox heresy), vassalize the pope, and you can abuse papal mechanics to get claims and sanctioned invasions to conquer coreligionist realms much faster. The sanctioned invasion CB is worthless for everyone else: the other Christian denominations have autocephaly, and Jews and Zoros have to restore their head of religion first and then convert other realms (which basically means you can only use SI on pagans).
• If you're playing with Conclave, buy favors to invite claimants to kingdoms, land them, and press their claims. This works especially well against Muslims due to open succession meaning that every son has a strong claim.
• Don't be afraid to break truces and kick your enemy while he's down. Prestige has essentially no value to Christian feudals and the opinion malus doesn't apply to vassals.

This is based on thrashing all of India as Persian Emperor a couple days ago in a holy war for Sauvira, including the Hindu holy order the Followers of Arjuna. It's all about strategy.

Personally, I think that defeating a war against a defensive pact should grant a bonus to diplomatic vassalization rates, make neighboring rulers more willing to swear fealty peacefully in exchange for not having their balls kicked up between their ears.

 

[Gans]

In addition to what he said:

• Marshal your retinues, which as Roman Emperor you can afford a shit-ton, in a border province that has strong levies in the area before you issue your war declaration. Then declare war, raise the levies immediately, and march into your war target immediately, preferably using a commander who has Organizer. Meanwhile get the rest of the levies you need headed for target.
• Get commanders with Siege Leader or Architect to deal with cities, tribes, nomad capitals, and temples, and assault all castles. Once you have occupied all holdings in the war target, you'll either have 100% warscore if that's the whole country, or you'll start ticking warscore going in your favor. After that, go after provinces where the demesne levies are raised since the defenses will be weaker.
• The enemy won't come at you as a single giant doomstack, it'll look more like a great holy war where they come in dribs and drabs. You might be able to have one army capturing targets and another as a flying column smashing stacks.
• Take full advantage of defensive terrain. If you can trick a similarly sized enemy army into attacking into it, you'll crush them.
• If all else fails, in the Mediterranean and Britain you can redeploy and reposition your troops by sea in a pinch.
• Exclusive to Christian emperors, convert to Catholicism (which if you've mended the schism will now be an Orthodox heresy), vassalize the pope, and you can abuse papal mechanics to get claims and sanctioned invasions to conquer coreligionist realms much faster. The sanctioned invasion CB is worthless for everyone else: the other Christian denominations have autocephaly, and Jews and Zoros have to restore their head of religion first and then convert other realms (which basically means you can only use SI on pagans).
• If you're playing with Conclave, buy favors to invite claimants to kingdoms, land them, and press their claims. This works especially well against Muslims due to open succession meaning that every son has a strong claim.
• Don't be afraid to break truces and kick your enemy while he's down. Prestige has essentially no value to Christian feudals and the opinion malus doesn't apply to vassals.

This is based on thrashing all of India as Persian Emperor a couple days ago in a holy war for Sauvira, including the Hindu holy order the Followers of Arjuna. It's all about strategy.

Personally, I think that defeating a war against a defensive pact should grant a bonus to diplomatic vassalization rates, make neighboring rulers more willing to swear fealty peacefully in exchange for not having their balls kicked up between their ears.

Just adding on that, as Rome, he doesn't really need his retinues up there before he declares. It isn't bad, of course, but they can be quite expensive to replenish if he uses them to assault. So as I was saying, he doesn't need them because he is in the Mediterranean, and can ship more levys much much much faster than the enemy can actually march there.

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

Yeah, Italy and de jure Byzantine Empire are about the strongest empires due to the ability to ferry tons of troops over to wherever you need.

I'm trying a Zorastrian campaign and man, the Empire of Persia may be richer and stronger, but it sure as hell is not as easy to mobilize.

 

[Gans]

Yeah, Italy and de jure Byzantine Empire are about the strongest empires due to the ability to ferry tons of troops over to wherever you need.

I'm trying a Zorastrian campaign and man, the Empire of Persia may be richer and stronger, but it sure as hell is not as easy to mobilize.

Yeah I'm playing with them too. I kinda not want to get into war with the Abbasids, Byzzies and whole of India and Steppes at the same time as it takes me years to march from one place to another, while I actually do have the troop number required to deal with them.

 

[Naufragus]

I have a question related to this. Are there some CBs which cause lower or no threat?

Like is it better to Claim X for Duke Y rather than Dejure Claim or Holy War?

Currently I base my actions on the size of the territory. Not getting 50% threat for some pissant two holding county

 

[Gans]

I have a question related to this. Are there some CBs which cause lower or no threat?

Like is it better to Claim X for Duke Y rather than Dejure Claim or Holy War?

Currently I base my actions on the size of the territory. Not getting 50% threat for some pissant two holding county

Uh, no. You get max 50% threat whatever war you do and once you are so big you wont get much less anyway, so it's better going in big and push kingdom level claims. Great holy wars however don't seem to give you any threat so they are good. But that is maybe only because my Moabadan-Moabad isn't landed. Who knows how exactly that works...

 

[Naughtius Maximus]

Uh, no. You get max 50% threat whatever war you do and once you are so big you wont get much less anyway, so it's better going in big and push kingdom level claims. Great holy wars however don't seem to give you any threat so they are good. But that is maybe only because my Moabadan-Moabad isn't landed. Who knows how exactly that works...

Actually no. I mean you do still gain a ton of threat but a claim generates less threat than a holy war of the same size (aka duchy.) Say a claim for a duchy would give you 50% threat, a claim may give you 20% for the same size or something like that.

I only know this for claims, I haven't really explored invasion, liberate, and other CBs as a threatening empire tier character.

And yeah I've never had great holy wars/jihad/crusades generate threat.

Holy War is the absolute easiest way to blob out of control in this game, I can see why they would do it.

 

[Gans]

Actually no. I mean you do still gain a ton of threat but a claim generates less threat than a holy war of the same size (aka duchy.) Say a claim for a duchy would give you 50% threat, a claim may give you 20% for the same size or something like that.

I only know this for claims, I haven't really explored invasion, liberate, and other CBs as a threatening empire tier character.

And yeah I've never had great holy wars/jihad/crusades generate threat.

Holy War is the absolute easiest way to blob out of control in this game, I can see why they would do it.

I've had duchy level claims pushed for 44% or similar, so for me duchy claim or holy war doesn't do much difference. Max is 50%, that's for sure, and the bigger you go in the better.

 

[AchedTeacher]

Wait. Does threat decrease faster as Norse? Whyy..?

 

[DeftSwede]

Wait. Does threat decrease faster as Norse? Whyy..?

I don't think so, but it was just the last germanic norse scandinavia game I played, even when i had fully owned every de jure province the threat decay was -0.4% a month, so I'm not sure if it is different, but it just feels that way.

Actually no. I mean you do still gain a ton of threat but a claim generates less threat than a holy war of the same size (aka duchy.) Say a claim for a duchy would give you 50% threat, a claim may give you 20% for the same size or something like that.

I only know this for claims, I haven't really explored invasion, liberate, and other CBs as a threatening empire tier character.

And yeah I've never had great holy wars/jihad/crusades generate threat.

Holy War is the absolute easiest way to blob out of control in this game, I can see why they would do it.

I guess that's why orthodox absolutely sucks, as it has no crusade/great holy war/jihad equivalent, I should've thought about that before I mended the schism, oh well

I guess I'll just have to go all out in trying to take everything against every defensive pact, just brutal

 

[Aardvark Bellay]

....I guess I'll just have to go all out in trying to take everything against every defensive pact, just brutal

Again, there are ways around it, NAPs, Blitzkrieg with retinues/mercenaries and probably favors or stuff with Conclave, but it's just terribly annoying and doesn't
make the game better, more realistic, immersive or deeper in my opinion...... apart from the fact that real life is annoying of course...

To clarify i'm curently in my first ever ironman game and achievements hunt (i play since 2012) with the ERE and it works with tricks and simply
ignoring the most stupid, unrealistic and immersion killing feature this game ever had, but it's still just annoying. Feature creep.

Well if you are not going for achievements and don't have to play on ironman as the prospect of cheating is too strong, then you could use
the console (cheat) or a mod to get rid of infamy/Threat/coalitions.
If...

Did i already mention that its the most annoying feature ever...?
Mods save lives.

 

[StarSword]

Yeah, Italy and de jure Byzantine Empire are about the strongest empires due to the ability to ferry tons of troops over to wherever you need.

And Britannia. Except for k_england 90% of the counties are coastal which means a hell of a lot of ships, especially if you mix in a vassal merchant republic. They just start out weaker than Italia and Byz.

I guess that's why orthodox absolutely sucks, as it has no crusade/great holy war/jihad equivalent, I should've thought about that before I mended the schism, oh well

I guess I'll just have to go all out in trying to take everything against every defensive pact, just brutal

You can still get crusades back, it just takes a little effort. After you mend the schism Catholicism and Fraticellism become heresies of Orthodoxy. Convert to one of them (for example, by moving capitals to Rome) and vassalize whichever pope you want, and you'll be able to call for specific crusades.

 

[StijnVeb13]

Before Conclave it used to be so much simpler to grab the SPQR achievement (I never got it due to an update which corrupted my save file), and I hope that they will tweak threat in an upcoming update. Which brings my to my next point: when the *secret dlc* is released, which as they said will be a minor one (but still a must-have for every fan like me), will this dlc corrupt my amazing navarra empressive game or will it just change it a little. Because with different dlc releases I've had both experiences...