Crusader Kings Newbie

[The Wizard]

Byzantium is a juggernaut in 1066. Try my current project -- turning it into a juggernaut in 1337. Or, choose the county of Holland in 1187 and try to become the master of the Baltic

[el_slapper]

The main thing to look at is piety & badboy.

Badboy(known as BB) is a nasty thing, as it does not appear directly on any screen. You've got an inderect value when hovering your mouse pointer over your vassal's portrait : you'll get -0,4/100 loyalty per month per BB point.

You earn 1 badboy point per assassination attempt(succesful or not), per declaration of war, per county conquered outside crusade, and per title claimed(bought by prestige). Badboy is extremely nasty as it destroys your relations with others, & destroys your vassals loyalty. If one vassal gets disloyal, he breaks, you beat him, which grants you 1 BB point for conquering its county, then other's loyalty gets even lower, then other get disloyal, then......

BB goes down only when you die & your heir inherit(-33/100) and when your piety is positive. Count 1BB less per year around 1000 piety(exact formula unknown, it seems logarithmic). So piety is faaaaaaaaaar more important than prestige, as if you don't have prestige, you're still alive. If your piety is under zero, your fall is nearing.

Thus the interest of the beta patches(though they say 1.05 is not for long) as they provide with "targetted" crusades, which are extremely juicy in terms of piety & prestige(2000 piety & 1000 prestige for the target itself, & already much for provinces around).

[TheSilverKnight]

Yeah, I'm an experienced Eu2 player and BB really destroys my countries in EU2 if it gets too high. Thanks for all the tips on Byzantium.

Any other tips you can offer a CK noob? Perhaps tips on armies, upgrading provinces, different types of social reforms and upgrades?

[TheSilverKnight]

Byzantium is a juggernaut in 1066. Try my current project -- turning it into a juggernaut in 1337. Or, choose the county of Holland in 1187 and try to become the master of the Baltic

You and your dreams, Tom

[el_slapper]

General tip : you may have foes, but your only real foe is the Mongol. All the rest you'll crush easily. Mongols are known to have made world conquests - at the expense of experimented players.

Which means that you have to be strong around 1220-1230, and keep strong muslim kingdoms in the east. Crusading in Spain is top notch, crusading in the middle-east, at least before the Mongol problem is solved, is long-term suicide. They will not stop the Horde, they will slow it down enough so that you counter-attack & grab the whole lot.

Which means you have to avoid having too much knights in your armies. The feodal contract is to avoid. It will help against everyone else, but as the Mongols are your only really dangerous foe, and they'll make sheeshkebab from your knights, forget it.

Which means you have to learn guerilla warfare. Mongols can't be beaten on 1 against 1, & if you add more troops, attrition will kill you. So you have to make medium-sized armies, besiege your enemy where he is not, and wait for him dividing its forces. That's long, tough, & you'll probably experience bitter losses even before the first waves of reinforcements. But here is the real challenge. The rest is childplay - use it to get ready for the end-level boss.

[The Wizard]

You and your dreams, Tom

The thing is -- I pulled it both off. Pwnd foo'!

In the beta patches Spain just gets overrun like crazy... it's basically impossible to win unless you gain control of three or more kingdoms (read: unifying the Iberian Christian kingdoms).