Knights could simply refrain from swearing an oath until they find a nobleman who is willing to give them a province or an army command. In the beginning, the only people with military power are going to be the Faction Leader, the Faction Heir, and the Chancellor. There's not going to be much pandering to the starting Baronets because those Baronets can't give you much of anything. It's more likely that people would seek to buddy up to the three people (two if the FL or FH becomes the first Chancellor) with power. And of those three people, the FL can't even have vassals. It's likely that the FL would simply end up conquering a couple provinces himself and them handing them out to Knights to create independent Baronets who are not vassals to anyone. Better for the FL to have people in his debt than in the debt of other nobles. This is doubly true if the FL is the first Chancellor, since he'll have essentially all the military power in the game.
Yeah, it may be a bit fluid and improved in the beginning, but the beginning will have relatively few battles and movements, so it will go pretty quickly. I wouldn't be surprised if the first term was only 1-2 weeks. If it helps reassure anyone, I plan on taking a recruitable general to start instead of a beginning landed avatar if it is offered to me. I have enough confidence in the system that I'm willing to start from scratch.
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