I got around to playing CKII last month, and it's a lot of fun! I played as Pfalz, starting in 1066. My first count tried to gain control of Lower Lorraine, but failed. His lord was merciful, and thereafter he was a loyal vassal. The second count, however, was able to become Duke of Lower Lorraine. From there I had a nice base in the HRE for decades - not particularly powerful, but interesting enough.
A couple generations down the line, around 1150, everything started going really well. My ruler married the Duchess of Savoy, and thus his son inherited Savoy. The son was a great duke, and made his most controversial decision around 1200 - converting to Lollard at the advice of one of his bishops. This looked like a terrible idea at first. But then an interesting turn of events happened. My duke arranged a marriage between a close relative and one of the claimants to the Empire, and she converted to Lollard. Around the same time, the Emperor died. In the resulting upheaval, the faction supporting her claim to the throne won, and the Empire became Lollard! Although the new Kaisirin would die by the blade in about a year, her son would rule long enough to begin a decades-long conversion of most of the Empire to Lollard.
My next Duke of Savoy was Catholic, unlike his father. At first this was good, but by 1225 it was increasingly a liability, and he eventually converted to Lollard. However, he was a poor ruler, lost the Duchy of Lower Lorraine, and generally saw a decrease in the family's fortune.
But then I had another great duke. Over the decades, he'd reclaim Lower Lorraine, expand slowly, and eventually become King of Lotharingia! All was honey and roses! Except that the Emperor hated him for proclaiming himself a king. Revokation of titles and eventually imprisonment followed. Thus the lesson of being too fast of a rising star was learned.
Fast forward a bit, and one of my rulers would find that in another war for the Emperorship, a faction was advocating him as Emperor! So he joined, and succeeded without too much difficulty over an Empire weakened by previous claimants. Thus began my era of greatest prosperity. At first, however, it was difficult. I was forced to concede an Elective Monarchy, rather than Gavelkind, at the Empire level. But for decades, I would expand the Empire, re-claiming northern Italy and claiming the better part of France as well. Fueled by both a small feudal tax and all the bishops paying taxes to their lords, not the Pope, the Empire was healthy like rarely before. My Emperor would live to the ripe old age of 85 before being succeeded by his eldest daughter, winner of the election. The game had actually been becoming almost boring for the last 5 - 10 years - even an alliance of Pisa, France, Castille, and the Danish-English-Norwegian union couldn't stop the Holy Roman Empire.
The new Kaisirin would only rule a couple years before dying a natural death, and that was not enough time to secure the Empire for her successors. One son became King of Burgundy (due to Gavelkind), and the one I played ruled the Kingdom of Italy (an Elective Monarchy). As the new king, I joined the Independence faction, which surprisingly was granted freedom with just myself and two duchies as members (one of which was quickly absorbed by Poland). I didn't really expect this, but it's been okay, and less steamroller-y. So far I've expanded south against Pisa. With fewer levies, I've had to hire lots of mercenaries - at one point I had nearly 60,000 mercenaries in the field at once to fight Pisa (who had tens of thousands of their own mercenaries), France, and Castille at the same time. Thank goodness for the huge war chest I'd built up while I was Emperor!
My current goals are:
- Secure the Kingdom for my heirs. I plan to leave Italy as an Elective Monarchy as long as I don't start losing the current election, but eventually I plan to go to Primogeniture. Ultimogeniture if the situation won't allow Primogeniture, but we'll see.
- Gain more of the Italian peninsula from Pisa.
- Perhaps train an heir with Italian culture, go across to Africa, destroy Carthage!
I do have a claim on the Empire, but I'm not sure I want it. It would almost be too easy again if I got it. That is, if I could keep the Empire, which is far from a sure thing.
One of the Muslim caliphates, currently ruled by the Hishimid dynasty, has been very successful, currently ruling most of Arabia, northeast Africa, Anatolia, and a good chunk of Greece as well, plus Catalonia and a few provinces in southern Italy. The Ilkhanate is also doing very well, having recently reclaimed Hungary after a previous Crusade had retaken it for the west. My successful efforts to convert the HRE to Lollard have certainly contributed to the sorry state of affairs for the Catholic world. Oh well.
