Crusader Kings 2

[coanda]

Ok, I've been persuaded. I'm trying Elder Kings.

Initial impressions, not having played much at all so far...
The good:
The races are excellently executed.
The education traits are a much more interesting set, and they're better integrated into the rest of the game too. It's no longer just a set of stat changes.
There's quite a few fun events adding lore-ish flavor.
It's got a lot of the general balance / gameplay adjustments and additions I've seen in some of the other popular mods. Those are good there, and good here.
The map is a fun change of pace.
It may be that I just lucked out, but it seems like the two regions I tried starting games in (just played ~10 years in each to get a feel for it) both had some interesting local event dynamics, which would definitely add to replay.

The bad:
The magic system is definitely a work in progress. I like the promise of it, but it's got a ways to go.
The restrictions on who can be marshal also impact who can lead armies, which caused me some confusion - there's no easy way to check what you need in order to lead armies, so when my mage kept bouncing between 13 martial and 15-16 (from fortify spell), it kept toggling whether he could lead an army or not.
Retinues are a bit of a mess - the custom retinue subunits don't play nicely at all with the cultural tactics or tactics in general.
It's signficantly more resource-intensive. It runs noticeably slower, and takes longer to load.

Overall, it looks good and I'll probably play a full game. Debating between Altmer, Dunmer, Nord.

 

[Double A]

It's signficantly more resource-intensive.

The modders really want it to be slower than vanilla. I can't imagine why, vanilla is too slow for me unless I've got expansion opportunities lined up for a good five years.

 

[Arakhor]

.....

That would be why. You posted that whilst I was offline and when I came back, my cookies had reset and marked everything as read.

The modders really want it to be slower than vanilla. I can't imagine why, vanilla is too slow for me unless I've got expansion opportunities lined up for a good five years.

The game-play is supposed to be more restrained, given the much longer timespan in which to play. The actual speed of the mod and its resource-hogging is definitely not intended!

 

[cybrxkhan]

The modders really want it to be slower than vanilla. I can't imagine why, vanilla is too slow for me unless I've got expansion opportunities lined up for a good five years.

Modders can't do much on the speed. If you add more stuff to the game, it's going to be slower, to put it in simplistic terms. Big overhaul mods tend to slow because of that.

 

[Double A]

The game-play is supposed to be more restrained, given the much longer timespan in which to play. The actual speed of the mod and its resource-hogging is definitely not intended!

I thought he meant wealth, prestige, and favor, not comp resources. Of course, I was falling asleep at my computer.

 

[SouthernKing]

I think it has a lot to do with the fact that the EK map is huge. Much bigger than vanilla.

 

[Double A]

Oh, definitely. I recommend the no Akavir and eastern islands submod if your game's slow, because they really don't add much to the game at this point.

 

[Arakhor]

I'm not a fan of Akavir, Atmora etc., but the extra provinces and characters don't really add that much to the slow-down. I imagine that heavy event-scripting would have a bigger part to play in that.

 

[Quintillus]

Finally picked this game up when it went on sale this weekend. Had some fun just trying to see what crazy situations I could make up. Ended up getting executed by my brother, and since he was my heir, then got to play my executor. Not quite how I expected to move up the ladder! Since then I've been messing around in internal politics, generally making everyone angry at me for something while watching my vassals get involved in petty wars with foreign powers that I (usually) disapprove of. Oh, the joys of weak crown authority!

I also managed to ensure my dynasty will go extinct on my death. Oops.

Didn't pick up any expansions yet. Looking forward to the Norse one, though.

 

[Bowsling]

Haha, getting killed by your heir has to be one of the most annoying things. Especially if they get caught, or do it right before you switch to primogeniture, and lose titles.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

Dev Diary #3 - The Heathens Are Coming!

The arduous duty great privilege of writing this week's Dev Diary has fallen to me, and in a desperate but vain attempt to fill Doomdark's shoes, I am here to talk a bit about the various options that are open to pagans when waging war.



Prepared Invasions

Norse Pagans, or Vikings as they are known to the common man, have the unique ability to launch Prepared Invasions against non-pagans. This undertaking can only be done by small to middling Viking realms, and the target of your invasion can't be too small or too big (it needs to have between 9 and 40 holdings).

The way this works is that you declare your intention to invade a particular realm. This will cost you a lot of prestige (which can be gained through looting, as explained in the previous Dev Diary), and you'll have two years to prepare before going to war. During this time warriors from across the Norse lands will flock to your banner, hungry for loot and plunder. Needless to say, if you fail to declare war before these two years are up, you will lose face.



Subjugation

Pagans won't shy away from fighting each other, and all pagan rulers may make use of the new Subjugation casus belli. This lets them attack other pagans within a specified target kingdom, but it can only be used every ten years unless your ruler has the new ”Become King” ambition. If you are the victor of a Subjugation war, you will vassalize all lords within the target kingdom.

Pagan Conquest

Pagans can always declare war for control over a single neighboring county, and in addition to this, Norse Pagans may also go to war for any coastal county.

Tribal Invasion

This casus belli can only be used by independent Altaic (Turkish and Mongol) and Magyar pagan rulers, and it targets entire kingdoms in what amounts to massive horde invasions. You may have been on the receiving end of these before, but now you'll finally get a chance to unleash them yourself as you ride in from the steppes to carve out an empire.




And finally, a few more items that have a significant impact on pagans and how they wage war:

Non-pagans suffer from a significantly smaller supply limit when in pagan territory, which limits their ability to march massive armies towards the heathen homelands at the start of the game. This penalty will eventually be removed as you progress through the Military Organization technologies.

As was touched upon in the last Dev Diary, Norse and Tengri pagans lose prestige if they have been at peace for too long. The Suomenusko, Romuva and Slavic pagans are less focused on offensive warfare and do not have this penalty. In addition, their warriors enjoy several defensive bonuses, especially when fighting in provinces with their own religion.

That's all for now!

Link

 

[Ailedhoo]

...and so the Horde will sweeep through, heading as West as possible to make the great empire, perhapes to face off with the Aztecs in epic contest of power, the HRE even at risk while Rome is tested to see if it becomes a temple for the Aztecs or just made another member of the list of cities conquered by the Horde!

 

[civ_king]

What is the more or less newbie county/whatever? I just started playing today. I want to know where to start so I can build my skills up.

 

[Double A]

Ireland. Dukes are the easiest, and counts in Ulster (northmost four counties) have it a little harder than other Irishmen, but it's not that much of a difference.

 

[coanda]

Ireland is calm, slow-paced, and safe. Iberia is hectic, fast-paced, and risky. Either of them will let newcomers learn plenty for future games; it comes down to whether you're more concerned about losing or about being bored.

 

[mechaerik]

Ireland. Dukes are the easiest, and counts in Ulster (northmost four counties) have it a little harder than other Irishmen, but it's not that much of a difference.

And the Count of Ulster's dynasty is named Sithrigi. My first real game was Ulster; I believe AA's was as well.

 

[scheva007]

Ireland is indeed known as the beginner island. especially dublin (cause you will inherit leinster). So its excelent to learn the ropes. You can become king of ireland with your first ruler (or second, if your claims take a bit longer)

 

[cybrxkhan]

Ireland. Called Tutorial Island by CKII forumites, it is slow-paced, simple, and allows you to learn things at your own pace.

 

[Joecoolyo]

I don't recall Ireland being slow at all!

England invaded me at least 3 times before I even formed my duchy, let alone my kingdom. It was a miracle I survived their doomstacks, in fact, I don't even remember how I did it. I think a liberal use of mercenaries solved it (which incidentally caused a mercenary revolt when I ran out of money, which in turn I had to put down with more mercenaries).

 

[cybrxkhan]

I don't recall Ireland being slow at all!

England invaded me at least 3 times before I even formed my duchy, let alone my kingdom. It was a miracle I survived their doomstacks, in fact, I don't even remember how I did it. I think a liberal use of mercenaries solved it (which incidentally caused a mercenary revolt when I ran out of money, which in turn I had to put down with more mercenaries).

Really? Was this with one of the later patches?

I played a couple of Ireland games with 1.06, the latest running all the way to around 1290 (it took me about a century to form Ireland, since I was a noob), and England never invaded me at any point.


Could just be terrible luck on your part. Frankly in all the test games I've run I've never seen England take Ireland. I mean I've seen HRE get random parts of Ireland now and then, even France, but rarely England.