Here's Charles the Bald's great-grandson. I'm not sure when they created the HRE, but there's been a lucky string of one-son inheritances down to him and they've kept everything together. You can see he has Aquitaine and Burgundy left to himself, and then West Francia, Italy/Lotharingia, and East Francia/Bavaria as vassals. Literally every single kingdom in the region, the Karlings have.
My current liege. He's been on the throne since he was a baby. After surviving the initial succession war, nobody wanted to touch him and he started conquering, Italy-first. As soon as I knew I was next I swore fealty rather than lose everything. I'd been anticipating having to do just that, so I spent a lot of money ensuring I was Doge at the time, too.
Finally, me and my little Republic. My own family's ancestry goes back to Naples and other places in southern Italy, so I thought it would be fun to ruler-design a Patrician family and see where I could get. Off to a slow start so far due to the low-tech trade post penalty, but we're starting to speed up. The Emperor jacked crown authority up to Medium, so I can't consolidate among my fellow vassals. Yet. I am anticipating by the time he dies I'll have enough money and there will be enough support to lower Crown Authority, and then I can really get rolling.
Once I can create Sicily and take all of the de jure territory, I'll declare independence. That's the plan, anyway.
Also, a couple of tidbits:
-You can see Venice is gone. They got eaten by the Swiss Band when they couldn't pay their bills.
-Genoa also got destroyed, but was reformed as a Frankish-culture republic under the Karlings.
-The Cumans have reformed Tengri.
-There was a formidable-looking Pagan Kingdom of Lithuania earlier; they had most of Pomerania too. They're in a civil war now.
-Norse are up to all sorts of mischief but ultimately still fractured.
Re: Crusader Kings II
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