Ways to defeat factions

[s1eepy]

What are all the ways to defeat factions?

Obviously.. you can just build an army and invade.

You can also assassinate their faction leader + all heirs.

What other ways can you defeat factions? I know you can make them your vassal, but is that really defeated?

[Tristan de Castelreng]

Taking all their settlements comes to mind

[Khan]

You seem to have to have grasped the more common ways to defeat a faction ie complete annhilation resulting in that faction no longer existing. Yes I would say that being a vassal takes away your freedom (by having to pay tribute) and therefore that faction is 'practically' defeated, especially if they hold one territory surrounded by yours.

For other ways of defeating factions it gets a bit more tricky. I don't think that there is another in-game way to defeat them but role-play can come into it at this stage say for instance running the Egyptians out of the Holy Lands or the Byzantines out of Greece/ Anatolia could be very good moral victories.

[s1eepy]

So you cant marry their princess and then take over their faction if she's the oldest heir?

Or get your spy recruited as one of their generals and then made king somehow?

[Qilue]

Originally Posted by s1eepy

So you cant marry their princess and then take over their faction if she's the oldest heir?

Or get your spy recruited as one of their generals and then made king somehow?

This assumes your spy isn't someone else's spy. Ah, the joys of espionage in Knight's of Honour.

[Drogba26]

You I tried to eliminate the English with my Scottish assassins and let me tell you, it was impossible. I killed lots of young men in the family, had the cheat on to make sure I didn't miss anyone and there was still someone who became king after I killed the last guy. Something wrong here?

[Sevis]

As far as I know, the important bit is that they don't have any heirs remaining. Whether they still have cities or not is (IIRC) not of importance.

Thus, if you're attacking their last settlement, consider launching a mini-attack just to kill their leader, and then slaughter the resulting rabble on the next turn.

[Cute Wolf]

Eliiminating their faction leader and heir in the same turn ALWAYS WORKS! tried many times both in RTW & M2TW

[twgameraddict]

Kill all their royal family members by whatever means possible, or take all their territories.

[Tristan de Castelreng]

Originally Posted by Cute Wolf

Eliiminating their faction leader and heir in the same turn ALWAYS WORKS! tried many times both in RTW & M2TW

Only provided there are no other family members to take up the crown...

[gollum]

Originally posted by s1eepy
I know you can make them your vassal, but is that really defeated?

Welcome to the .org s1eepy, enjoy your stay.

Vassalization counts the client state's settlements/regions towards the victory conditions of the overlord state AFAIK. It does not mean they are defeated though, as they can brake off the vassal status at any time they desire.

[Cute Wolf]

Originally Posted by Tristan de Castelreng

Only provided there are no other family members to take up the crown...

Just try to "test" this things in Vanilla RTW... Play as Gauls, and Sent spy to search for Flavius Julius and Vibius Julius. After that, load two stack of Army and Kill both of them in the same turn.... BAM..... The House of Julii are destroyed...

In M2TW though, things are more complicated as you must kill off the heirs first before killing the Faction leader, as if you kill the Faction leader, the engine automatically made the Heir a new faction leadeer, and they got a new heir afterwards... but of course, eliminating them in single field battle is always sucessful in killing them. (I said ELIMINATE, not capture... as if you capture them, and kill them, the remaining FMs will get a new king... It's best to use your crossbows and guns than chasing them when they rout...)

[Tristan de Castelreng]

Not sure about RTW, too long ago and too few games...

But in M2TW, I can assure that as long as there remains a single family member (not a general) to the faction you're trying to get rid of, he'll become the new faction leader, whatever the order in which you've killed the FH or FL, IIRC. Though it may be true this won't happen if you get rid of them in a single turn as the game won't be able to assign the new trait during the turn.

[Diamondeye]

Either claiming all settlements or eliminating heir and ruler at once seems the best ways.

I remember when I was fighting Carthage in RTW and they had all of their royal family members out on Mallorca, outside Palma. Catharge was defeated by two groups of Balaeric slingers stoning their entire royal family