catholic clergy in ck2>every church in your realm belongs to various bishops>this makes it practically impossible to sway literally every single one of them>if they like the pope more than you, all their troops and gold goes to him, rather than you>this ensures that to very broadly raise your opinion with the clergy, and get their allegiance, you have to lead a pious life and closely follow the tenets of Christianity>you have to be a lot more subservient to the various bishops due to the general need for support among them and since they also share some "church's view" opinionscatholic clergy in ck3>lmao just sway the 1 (one) bishop in your realm that owns all the churcheshow the fuck did they drop the ball so fucking hard
not to mention the only role of pope in ck3 is to give us cash if we were good boys
>>1806059>switch to free investiture>send each bishop a bribe>they now like me more to the pope and they will repay the bribe in taxes within a yeargg no re
>>1806106>switch to free investituregood luck duking it out with the pope every 20 years
>>1806059How did they drop the ball so hard? Casualisation.
>>1806120was it worth it tho
>>1806119He can't do shit about it and you don't need his approval unless you want to ask for cash or claims, though free investiture became worse after Holy Fury because now he throws a fucking fit if you ask him to crown you while you have free investiture.
>>1806106>make the pope like you>proceed to ask him for gibz me datz claims on your neighbors and even on your liege whenever they pick free investiture (as the AI Pope deeply dislikes it)Your move, ghibelline
>>1806059Alternatively in CK2>you make use of your investiture power to appoint successors (They'll love you for it)
>>1806059CK3 was designed to be easy from the ground up. Did you know only 1 AI character is allowed to plot to kill the player? Did you know there is a hard cap on other AI rulers to not declare more than 3 wars on the player?
>>1806314>Did you know there is a hard cap on other AI rulers to not declare more than 3 wars on the player?Does this not exist in 2? I feel like the AI never declares war on you in 2 unless you're circling the toilet drain
>>1806059because there were no notable bishops. they don't have strong lands as allies, they pay less taxes then mayors, and they're micro-intensive to care for and, even then, just get replaced by some literal who. the idea of the court chaplain being assigned as the leader of your church was that you'd have a single character to summarize all of the meaningless actions against, but then paradox forgot about including any kind of politicking with said character so, as you said, you just sway until you've a positive opinion. They might touch up on it when they do religious reworks, but this is also Paradox so it'll stay as a revolving door of "they guy who falsifies claims"
>>1806347I actually don't think I've had war declared on me once in my current ck3 campaign, and it's been going for over 100 years
>>1806121>more people played the free game than the paid oneWhat did he mean by this?
>>1806203still fairly unrealisticPope should just order invasions of people with free investitute.Like Anglo-Saxons essentially had free investitute, and part of the reason William got approval of the pope was because he justified it by bring papal investiture to england
>>1806516>Like Anglo-Saxons essentially had free investitute, and part of the reason William got approval of the pope was because he justified it by bring papal investiture to englandMost of that was just post-hoc cope/propaganda to retroactively present the invasion in a good light. None of the contemporary chronicles mention anything about it, even the chronicle that does (~hundred years later) is completely contradictory about it>pope sanctions invasion because the english church is out of control>pope supposedly seethes about the bloodshed at hastings and demands billy build a monastery as penance for...the invasion the pope himself approved
>>1806516If you have free investiture he's more likely to excommunicate you and grant invasion requests, which is fair. If the pope is also being a dickhead or temporal rulers are strong enough they should just be able to tell him to fuck off, the investiture controversy could've gone either way historically.
>>1806523but the excommunication doesn't matter because you can just install anti-pope who will lift your excommunication.Anti-pope are so overpowered, only real negative is that it tends to cause heresies, which doesn't really make sense.
>>1806524Skill issue from the Pope's part if his policies are so bad that temporal lords feel the need to replace him
>>1806524>"only real negative is that it tends to cause heresies, which doesn't really make sense.">theocratic power is split between supporters of the two (or more) papal contenders>firebrand preachers are running around trying to get everyone hyped up to support their guy>wonders why heresy is able to come out of the woodwork with this erosion of the church's authority going on
>>1806539Entire 14th century there were 3 popes.France's antipope in in Avignon, Aragon's antipope in Aragon, and another pope in Rome.Yet all heresies that spread were relatively minor, most notable being Hussites.But in CK2 the heresies spread like wildfire.Clergy management and teachings are different.
>>1806544>there were few heresies in the 14th centuryeh?
Here's what CK2 is actually like:>you can appoint any male character to be the chosen successor for any individual bishopric, even prince-bishoprics>you can, if you want to, just give it all to one person just like in CK3>this is only really important in the early game, if you start as a count, because you really want your bishop's taxes, so you send him a gift, honorary titles and whatever>later on it's still good optimization to have your bishops like you>theology is by far the most powerful lifestyle in the game for Catholics and insanely exploitative>at a certain point with enough virtues, you can almost get any claim you want>you are a count and you want a claim on your liege's duchy?>leave his council, join a faction, who wants to put a female claimaint on the throne, park all of your troops on his capital>he accepts the demand>instantly ask the pope for the title you just helped the woman win>get it, because she's a woman or even better a girl>now as a duke under a king or the Holy Roman Empire, you can just go around claiming all of the duchies you want and eat up the vassals of your top liege like a parasite>the pope just casually watches you completely destroy the feudal structure of an empire>it would have been easier, if he just gave you a claim on the holy roman empire, but you might as well om nom, until you are clearly the most powerful duke in the Empire>by this point you probably have many daughters or children in general and you can just exploit betrothals to get alliances, so even if you are the weakest duke, you can easily conquer the other dukes with your allies, because the AI is very bad at alliancesAnd I didn't even mention how powerful theology is. You can get green traits much more effectively than any other lifestyle, you get the pilgrim trait, you get zealous, piety and positive opinion of your bishops. Catholicism breaks the game with all of the free bullshit they get.
>>1806683For me it's>use business focus to print gold while you're waiting for claims>when you have some claims to push you should have amassed enough gold to buy mercs to push your initial claims even if you are a one province count with 2 martialBut your strategy sounds fun, I haven't used the theology focus that much because it seems like family/business/hunting is just overall better. I know theology is useful for getting rid of vices but I didn't think about using it to stack virtues so all the clergy love you.
>>1806701I also used to think the business focus was goat, but it's honestly not needed. Your early game goal is to be the second weakest count-vassal of your duke-liege. The old vanilla early game strategy, which was to just build the militia quarters and other upgrades to your castle, works well enough. You just need enough to beat the weakest vassal and siege his holdings. You don't need to waste all of that money on mercenaries. But if you really need them, you can always go into debt.I prefer to use the time in the early game to get good traits, maybe good artifacts from one of the monastery societies, because these will help me by the time I am a Duke. And this early game time also allows the other AI rulers to produce some children. You can always use alliances to basically get a mercenary army for free. So in my opinion seduction is excellent to get some family members for alliance and theology is excellent to improve your character. You should go hunting, when you are older for a doggo. Business just seems like a distraction. I always invite a very high level steward to my realm and he gives me special tithes frequently enough to have a good enough financial situation. Also you can always take the war chest decision to steal from your subjects. There are so many ways to get money as a count, I really think the business focus is just a waste.
>>1806711Yeah I suppose business can be a bit overrated if you want to powergame, I think I like it because I like playing tall so I try to get a trade route up in every single province I own, even though the result isn't the same as just blobbing for more income, but I hate managing vassals so I don't want every game to just be a blobfest until you become an unassailable empire. Theology run seems like a fun strat though, I'll give it a try. Shame they put a cap on the amount of bishop vassals you can have, seems like it would be absolutely busted with this strat.
>>1806711Also forgot to mention. Theology might give you enough of an opinion boost to get taxes from your bishop. When you pick business, you have to wait on a random event to give you anything. So you might get 300 gold from an event after 5 years, but during all of this time the bishop didn't pay you his 3 ducats of taxes every month, which is 180 gold in 5 years. The business focus gives you stress, while pilgrim gives you an opinion boost with everyone. And getting a good trait, which improves your stewardship like diligent or temperate increases your taxes even more. Zealous makes you even more liked by priests. Seriously. Theology is so extremely OP.>>1806716Give it a try. One time I was even able for the pope to give me some money, which is really hard to do. He loves to shower you with claims, but getting a divorce or some money out of him is hard.
>>1806544>Most notable being the biggest and most stubborn heresy before the reformationWell if that's all.. Also you're forgetting the Lollards.
>>1806059Ironically, being a good guy in CK2 is the most op way of playing it. Trying to be an evil piece of shit is such a waste of time when being a good human being is so much better and rewarding. Joining a monastic order as a Christian is op as fuck because, alongside the theology focus, you’re practically guaranteed to have crazy good rulers. That being said, the most fun way to play is family focus and getting as many children as possible. Children = Power because Power = Land and Children = Allies & Claims which, in turn, means more available land. I practically never have my Chancellor fabricate a claim because I’ll just obtain it through familial connection (I also play with matrilineal marriages off tbf, but that’s because that’s the historical case. I prefer trying to historicalize the rule set most of the time).
>>1806717How well do churches perform compared to cities and castles in terms of tax and levies? I noticed that if you rank up in the Christian orders then they become ridiculously cheap to build, like 200-300 gold for building the fifth and sixth settlement in a holding, but are you gimping yourself by spamming temples everywhere?
>>1807438church holdings are designed to be balanced between tax/troops. Feudal holdings give more troops but little money, city holdings give lots of money but almost no troops, hurch holdings give a moderate ammount of money and troops.
>>1806059>switch to free investiture >tell the Pope to fuck off
>>1807442Yeah I know that's what they say on paper but is that true in practice or will you end up with a situation where you have something that (sometimes) pays noticeably less cash than a city while also providing shit troops, just like light infantry and few archers/HC?
>>1807438Only reason to spam churches would be if you’re trying to reform a religion for the +1 moral authority you should only build castles that you intend to hold. Building a castle in a county that someone else holds will eventually be revoked and increase their levy count and strength. Better to spam cities for the income.
>>1807438Churches are inferior, because they pay less taxes and that is what you want from minor holdings most of all.
>>1806717Giving it a spin now, it seems incredibly OP, especially inside the HRE where there are endless dukes just waiting to be conquered. I started out as an OPM in Switzerland, managed to snag 2 more counties then took my liege's last two counties so the title went vacant so I could recreate it with all my absolutist laws in tact. From there I was strong enough to just attack random dukes and even the king of Bohemia, I'm currently waiting for our truce to expire so I can press my claim on Moravia (I already have the duchy of Bohemia) and usurp a kingdom title.
>>1806203Sometimes that retard asks me to depose the Anti-Pope of France. As a mere fucking King of Brittany.
>>1806059>casually makes all the other religions obsoleteIt's retarded how you can go from absolute drooling schizo slob to the most pious man in history.Is there even a reason to play as Orthodox when you're a character from Byzantium?
>>1807727I can't remember what the old advantages of Orthodoxy were. Guaranteed income from bishops and nothing else? IIRC the bishop spam strategy that led Paradox to implementing a cap started out as a Byzantine strategy
There's a mod for that you whiny faggot
>>1807620I just got elected Holy Roman Emperor against my will so now the run is no longer fun, I guess I should've done this in France or a non-elective kingdom. My ruler is pretty old so I guess I could just chill for a while and hope I die and lose the title quickly.
Count of Dijon>Duke of Burgundy run trying the same strat but in France, works like a charm but I've run into a bit of a snag now where I've reached my vassal limit and I can't really get my hands on a king title. My liege went absolutely apeshit, formed and empire and now holds 5-6 king titles and he's way too strong to rebel against so I fear my only shot is managing to snag all of Brittany or something.
>>1808007Domestic situation
>>1808007>Count of Dijonshould've started as the count of macon for that cluny larp
Do you guys have any favourite mods that aren't HIP or whatever was the name?I got HIP to work on a 100% discount version two years ago, hopefully I can get the rest working now too.
>>1808199Nah, I just made my own mod by stealing and combining a bunch of other mods, like flatmap and other graphical upgrades, decisive battles, more trade routes, trait softcap remover, bigger interface, that sort of stuff.
>>1808199Alongside HIP + its bugfixes patch, I like theseMandatory:>JARB - Just a Rape Button>Religious and Cultural Hatred>Sin's Genocide Mod>Sin's Young Love>Visible Ethnicity>MTA - Specific Punishments>MTA - Vice and Virtue>Less Random Deadly Duels>Bring Child>Rich ChildhoodSocieties:>The Great Trade League>The Orders of ChivalryAdditional HIP addons:>HIP - A More Navigable Rivers>HIP - Better Balkans>HIP - Expanded Trade>HIP - Mend the Eastern Schisms
>>1806059It is minor shit like this that puts me off CK3... there are so many tiny things that add up into a massive lack of content and replayabillity that I just can't prefer it over CK2.Considering all the DLC they have released for CK3 so far (almost four years later), I have already given up on the game. Only the modding community still makes me look forward to things.I understand they wanted to make the game more popular and easily accessible, but it is frustrating to see it go in this direction.
>>1808335>I understand they wanted to make the game more popular and easily accessible, but it is frustrating to see it go in this direction.Clearly even that isn't enough.I lurk on /r/crusaderkings, and every day there is some faggot who tries about the game being too hardI cannot fathom this shit, this the game where you can literally bethrode your daughter to Byzantine Emperor and then call full might of AI to all your wars, while in CK2 you at least needed to turn non-aggression pact to alliance
>>1808376saw some normie during my uni lecture fail to hastein into wessex, just being utterly retarded throughout any time i cannot fathom how someone on reddit can be so stupid, i just imagine him being that guy
>>1808244>HIP - Expanded Tradeis it any better than medieval trade routes?
>>1808845They're different mods for different maps so neither is better since expanded trade only works for the HIP map and MTR only works for vanilla maps, or at least maps that don't make changes to the vanilla provinces.
>>1808882>MTR only works for vanilla mapsi meant the hip version
>>1808376>bethrodeOh my god, this retard again. Buy a fucking dictionary.>redditSome mysteries solve themselves.
