Can vassals betray me?

[lilo lol]

Hello there, this is my first post on this forum so I'm not sure whether this has been posted before.

I recently started playing a grand campaign with the english, vh/vh. At turn 10 I forced the scottish to become my vassals. After that I gifted them scotland and ireland. The scottish have served me faithfully since. Now at turn 40 the French have become my vassals too, but after gifting them the middle of france they have "war" as their priority's. Does that mean that they can betray me? It would be kinda stupid because I would crush them with one hand behind my back Note that there is no risk of me attacking an ally of France, because they're at war with all of europe.

I hope someone can answer my question.

[ReiseReise]

Yes.

I hope you are good friends with the Pope and they are not, that way they will get excommed and you can seek your revenge with impunity.

[lilo lol]

I've got the pope in my pocket so that's no real problem Anyway, are there ways of preventing them to attack me?

[ReiseReise]

Not sure, the AI seems to attack no matter how large your army is. If you are lucky they will attack once (or blockade one of your ports for no reason, oh God), get defeated and then beg for Peace. But I would recommend let them attack and get excommed. You can tell if they are really serious because they will get a warning from the Pope on the first turn and will withdraw from their sieges. If they stay at your walls/ports get ready to unleash all hell upon them, they will get excommed and will be fair game.

[ReiseReise]

BTW welcome to the forum. There are many helpful people, you will know if you have been lurking. You will hear from me often. I can be a jerk sometimes (not this time) but I am just trying to help you.

[lilo lol]

Ok thanks for your help

[Jason X]

i've only had them break off alliance when i attack one of their allies. but i'm unwilling to stretch this anecdotal evidence into a theory of any sort.

[ReiseReise]

@Jason
Unfortunately I don't remember the exact circumstances, but I do remember a vassal attacking me once, mostly because it was like wtf does he want to get wtfbbqpwnd?

PS I never saw that phrase before using this forum but then again, I never played Quake or CounterStrike or Battlefield or wherever that phrase originated.

[TheLastPrivate]

After you make someone your vassal and when you try to request something other than "generous", the vassal will break alliance via diplomatic declaration and wage war on you pretty soon. Of course they take a huge rep hit and will be crushed like ants in a matter of a few turns but that's the AI in VH...lol

[WhiskeyGhost]

Hello there, this is my first post on this forum so I'm not sure whether this has been posted before.

I recently started playing a grand campaign with the english, vh/vh. At turn 10 I forced the scottish to become my vassals. After that I gifted them scotland and ireland. The scottish have served me faithfully since. Now at turn 40 the French have become my vassals too, but after gifting them the middle of france they have "war" as their priority's. Does that mean that they can betray me? It would be kinda stupid because I would crush them with one hand behind my back Note that there is no risk of me attacking an ally of France, because they're at war with all of europe.

I hope someone can answer my question.

I've actually managed to keep my allies/vassals in line, by keeping a clearly visible army either in their borders/on the border (not just a 1 unit army, an actual army, like more then half a stack). Even with War as their intentions, they wouldn't dare attack because they knew i was 'prepared' for them. I also had a few ships sitting near my border ports, just so they don't send single ships out to raid either. I believe in that game (one of the few i actually got a vassal in, let alone more then 1) i kept them from attacking me for nearly 60 or so turns, till they stopped funneling me money to support the troops i had maintaining the borders.

[FactionHeir]

Your vassals with absolutely never attack you in terms of betryal.

The only way they can betray you is diplomatically, by forging an alliance with your enemy (leading to ceasefire for all), and breaking the vassalage/alliance when you go to war with one of their allies or make an offer in the diplomacy screen and you get an "undecided" result.

[aimlesswanderer]

The few times I have managed to get myself a vassal (I tend to just slowly grind up andexterminate opposing factions), they have been faithful, and with only 1 province and a tiny army, they are a good source of income, as they have nothing to spend their King's Purse on, so the money gets funneled to you, no to mention that they may have built up a large treasury since they couldn't spend anything while under siege....

[Brutal DLX]

By themselvers, they don't betray you, you also don't need to keep an extensive military presence on the borders with them, and that's kind of the idea of having a vassal. What you must keep an eye on is their alliances, if you are the aggressor and attack a faction they are allied with, they will break the vassalage with you. Another reason can be your getting excommunicated.
As a general rule, it's best to gift them small sums of money from time to time to keep relations up. Other than that, you shouldn't need to bother with them anymore for the rest of the campaign (other than maybe gifting them provinces as buffer states - they will still count to your total amount of provinces, so no loss there).

[FactionHeir]

It doesn't matter if you are the aggressor or not in attacking/defending against a vassal's ally. It depends mostly on standing (faction and global) and an element of chance.

[Brutal DLX]

It doesn't matter if you are the aggressor or not in attacking/defending against a vassal's ally. It depends mostly on standing (faction and global) and an element of chance.

That may certainly be so according to the stats/scripting used, but as a rule of thumb, they hardly ever side with the aggressor, which is also likely, since the aggressor takes a rep hit and that's a factor in their decision.

[FactionHeir]

Attackers don't take a rep hit for attacking neutrals in vanilla. Only for attacking allies.

[Brutal DLX]

True, although we're discussing effects on vassal alliances here, not on neutrals. Attacks on neutrals (neutral to the vassal) have no effect on vassalage status.

I was probably not clear enough. What I meant is that you get a rep hit for sure when breaking an alliance. Since this happens a lot between AI factions (and especially also regarding alliances between the human player and the AI), the human player, if he is playing a more passive game, will quite often have a better reputation than AI factions. Since his being passive (or reactive, might be a better word) and his having a good reputation are thus tied together, the natural result is that when the player has a vassal, and an ally of this vassal attacks the player, the vassal will be on the side of the player. However, for the reverse to also be true, you must have a very good reputation and the attacked faction's one must be quite bad indeed. I guess you could provide us with some exact stats, I don't really want to dig into the files as by now I can estimate the chances for either case pretty well by intuition/experience.