Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Wrathbone » Sat Sep 05, 2020 8:06 pm

Raid wrote:
Sat Sep 05, 2020 3:31 pm
So I grabbed this from gamepass and tried the tutorial. This is, err, a bit complicated looking. I made it through the tutorial (or what may have been the start of the tutorial, it wasn't clear), and while it talks you through the basics of the systems, it doesn't exactly leave you with a distinct goal to work towards while you learn. To put it another way, I sorta know how the interface works, but not really why to use any of it.
It’s kind of a sandbox in terms of goals, and it largely depends on who you are and what you rule at any given time. I started CK3 as the Earl of Northumbria, and the long term goal I’m working towards is to become King of England. I’m halfway there as I’ve conquered the upper half of England and unified the duchies under the Kingdom of Northumbria, with England forming the lower half.

I had a major setback when my exalted ruler died in battle and left me playing as his spotty 16 year old grandson who was immediately lumped with vassals who all hated him. Within a couple of years I’d been deposed to a lowly earl again and then set myself the goal of reclaiming my throne. I eventually managed this about 15 years later by waiting until the Queen (my aunt) was embroiled in several wars, at which point I betrothed all three of my children to powerful new allies, who I dragged into the war to press my claim to the throne. It was close but ultimately successful.

In broad terms, the general idea is to widen and solidify your realm. The ways in which you go about doing that (and in which your situation can be flipped on its head) are the real decisions to be made in the game.


On a completely separate note, what’s with all the nudist characters? Every other person seems to be parading around their court stark bollock naked.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Snowy » Sun Sep 06, 2020 9:38 am

Wrathbone wrote:
Sat Sep 05, 2020 8:06 pm
On a completely separate note, what’s with all the nudist characters? Every other person seems to be parading around their court stark bollock naked.
Haha not seen any of those characters myself, will keep an eye out
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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Sun Sep 06, 2020 10:15 am

Yeah, I've only played a few hours but not seen any nudists yet.

There does appear to be a disproportionately high number of dwarf nobles to marry, though.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by DjchunKfunK » Sun Sep 06, 2020 1:00 pm

Snowy wrote:
Sun Sep 06, 2020 9:38 am
Wrathbone wrote:
Sat Sep 05, 2020 8:06 pm
On a completely separate note, what’s with all the nudist characters? Every other person seems to be parading around their court stark bollock naked.
Haha not seen any of those characters myself, will keep an eye out
I believe that is one of the religions that can happen.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Wrathbone » Sun Sep 06, 2020 2:59 pm

Yeah, it seems to be the Adamite sect that has taken over lower Britain. Everything south of Nottingham is a nudist colony now. :lol:

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by DjchunKfunK » Sun Sep 06, 2020 6:17 pm

Wrathbone wrote:
Sun Sep 06, 2020 2:59 pm
Yeah, it seems to be the Adamite sect that has taken over lower Britain. Everything south of Nottingham is a nudist colony now. :lol:
:D

I'm well on my way to taking over Ireland and around 150g away from forming the Kingdom of Ireland. On the downside Wales is slowly slipping into the grasp of England thanks to the Duke of Northumberland who over multiple generations has taken provinces off me and my family.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Tue Sep 08, 2020 9:51 pm

I feel like this may not be for me. Perhaps because I didn't really play CK2 for any length of time and therefore don't have the deep knowledge of the game's various systems, it all feels a bit obtuse to me and end up bouncing off it more than I'm enjoying it.

This evening decided to move on from the Irish-based tutorial campaign, and started as the petty king of the West of Scotland (crappy islandy bits). Within 12 months my ruler - aged 21 - had fallen ill, lost a leg after a botched surgery, and died. Leaving his 14-year-old half-brother in charge of things. Ok, I think, let's keep going. Gradually I rebuilt my council, got a claim on the Isle of Man, only for the King of Scotland to decide he didn't like us independent upstarts, and rocked into town with 2k+ soldiers and flattened us (we could only muster 500-odd levies), and another ruler death, this time leaving no heir.

All this happened within 2 game years of starting :lol:

I don't know, I'm sure there's a game here for people comfortable with the mechanics, for a short time (before his untimely death), it seemed like it might be fun to try to take over Scotland as a one-legged king with the worst court physician in history, but that dream was crushed pretty promptly.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Wed Sep 09, 2020 3:28 pm

Had a slightly better time today in Wales (new game). Over the course of 20 years managed to bring the country under my rule, both through conquest and buttering up lords until they were happy to become my vassal, and then saved up enough gold to declare it as the kingdom of Wales.

Had quite a nice time until the king of Lapland (wtf?) decided he liked the look of my kingdom, and invaded with his 4,000 troops (I can only field around 1k). Which was quite annoying.

He conquered my northernmost territory, so I let him get back home, get my numbers back up and this time declare war on him, calling on a bunch of allies I'd gathered through various marriages.

It was going well, until midway through the siege my king died (he was old, that's fine), but before his heir had time to don the crown all his allies fucked off, just in time for boatloads of angry Norsemen landed on my coast and beat the living daylights out of me.

Which was extremely annoying.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by DjchunKfunK » Wed Sep 09, 2020 6:52 pm

The Norse are extremely powerful early.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Snowy » Thu Sep 10, 2020 8:07 am

It is worth sticking with Sly - you are choosing some bloodlines that are in a hard position by the sounds of it - there are other places that have it a bit easier :)

Plus, for every bloodline than ends up trampled in the dirt, there is often a great little story that unfolds behind it. The ups and downs are what make the game so enjoyable.
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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Thu Sep 10, 2020 8:52 am

Snowy wrote:
Thu Sep 10, 2020 8:07 am
It is worth sticking with Sly - you are choosing some bloodlines that are in a hard position by the sounds of it - there are other places that have it a bit easier :)

Plus, for every bloodline than ends up trampled in the dirt, there is often a great little story that unfolds behind it. The ups and downs are what make the game so enjoyable.
I did continue after that, in fact, although I did the slightly dishonest thing of reloading my save before I declared war. When he died during it became such a clusterfuck, added to the annoyance of having gone from an inevitable victory to a crushing defeat, that I couldn't see way through it.

This time I waited for the king to die. Then when his heir took the crown, he spent his first 4-5 years on the throne forming alliances with the likes of France and Holy Roman Empire through marrying off his kids, while carrying out plot after murder plot against each of the Lappish lords of the captured Welsh territory. He was so adept at this, that in short order he'd earned the title of murderer :lol:

At around the 5-year mark, when by some quirk of fate over in Scandanavia the faction leader died and the new dynasty ruler was living in my occupied territory, I began bumping off their rulers until the Lappish throne was held by a petulant four-year-old girl.

I was about to declare war on that point, when the game abruptly decided to throw another spanner in my works, in the form of King William II of England declaring war on me.

This time, however, I was ready. With war declared I called on all my carefully-assembled allies to join my cause. In the end, they weren't even needed. King Willy marched into Wales with twice as many troops as me, however I'd spent the intervening years working on my army so half of it was comprised of professional troops rather than just levies. I also had the funds to hire a band of mercs to beef my numbers up further.

Sure enough, Willy launched himself into battle, but though outnumbered my men were killing his twice as fast, and even before the French and German armies could arrived I'd beaten him to a bloody pulp, and by stroke of good fortune also captured him. I let him go on the proviso he drop the war and give me around 400gp.

As of last night I'd immediately declared war on the Lappish toddler-queen, captured back my territory and am waiting for the Norse army to arrive, this time with far greater numbers of battle-hardened troops at my disposal, and am confident of victory and reclaiming my lands.

So, yeah, I did enjoy that a fair bit more :)


One part of the game I feel like I'm not getting the most from is diplomacy. I'd love to be spinning a web of ties and allegiances, but the options to do so are sparse. Not sure if I'm missing something?

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Wrathbone » Thu Sep 10, 2020 10:07 am

I've found one of the best ways to weave a web of diplomatic intrigue is to have your spymaster perform the Find Secrets task in counties where you've got someone you need to persuade/coerce/blackmail. You should periodically get juicy secrets which you can use to create hooks on various characters, which can then be used to do things like modify your feudal contract (e.g. get more levies or tax from vassals), force someone to accept a proposal they're otherwise reluctant about (e.g. a marriage, relgious conversion or coming to your court) or even relinquish a title.

If you want to be more honest in your dealings, you can sway vassals and be generous with granting them titles so that they stay on side and willingly provide the correct amount of tax and levies rather than shortchanging you. If you go above your domain limit of counties (i.e. what you personally own) and none of your vassals are complaining that you hold their de jure counties, it's best to grant your spare titles to unlanded people in your court who have good stats and little ambition - i.e. they'll adore you while making their new lands prosperous.

Marriage is your other big diplomatic muscle, usually in the form of using your children as currency. :lol: A shrewd marriage can win you crucial alliances or provide claims on titles for your vassals. If you're very cunning or lucky, it can be possible to marry your heir to the heir of another major title, thereby making their child the inheritor of both sides of the marriage. I've not had many opportunities for that in CK3, but in CK2 I once managed as the King of England to marry my heir to the daughter of the Holy Roman Emperor, who also had a son. The son was sneakily murdered by my agents, as was every wife the Emperor married until he died, meaning his daughter became Empress and her son (my grandson) inherited the Empire. That's a very rare scenario, though, and it was only really possible because I had a ludicrously high intrigue stat, which allowed me to murder everyone who could prevent the exact inheritence situation I wanted.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Fri Sep 11, 2020 7:00 am

This has swallowed my life.

Spent most of yesterday conquering Ireland, which was slow going as a couple of the rulers had made powerful alliances, and starting a war with them brought thousands of additional soldiers down on my head. Still, I did then discover a way on the declare war window to see how many allies and troops your target has, so there's that :)

Another king dead, although he was a bit of a Prince Charles, he was so old by the time he came to the throne he only got a decade before he'd popped his clogs. However, his heir had just come of age, so he's had a long reign and is now getting on for 50 himself. I married him to a genius wife, so all the kids they're popping out are intelligent, which I hope will pay off.

Once I've finished with Ireland I'm going to turn my attention to Scotland, I think we'll be bigger than them then, in fact over the years I've fended off multiple attempts by them to reclaim the Isle of Man.

One interesting discovery was that in the Stewardship perk tree there's one that allows you to get people to pay you for the hooks you hold on them, which has been a great source of income. Even though it caused my king to get stressed because he's Just.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Wrathbone » Fri Sep 11, 2020 8:04 am

Glad you're enjoying it! :)

I've now united the British Isles (and Iceland) under the Empire of Britannia, and I'm turning my eye to France to steal all their croissants.
One interesting discovery was that in the Stewardship perk tree there's one that allows you to get people to pay you for the hooks you hold on them, which has been a great source of income. Even though it caused my king to get stressed because he's Just.
The perk trees weren't in CK2 and I really like them as a new addition, as you can provide some level of direction to your ruler. My last few rulers have either been stewards or intellectuals, which gives some useful advantages, but my first ruler was an out-and-out schemer. You get all sorts of wonderfully horrible options to inflict upon your subjects.

Also, if you think a just king is tricky to handle, avoid shy kings like the plague. They get stressed simply by trying to sway people, and feasts don't relieve stress. My shy king was despised by almost all of his vassals because he couldn't talk to them and kept having breakdowns (it's quite tragic, really), and the only way I could maintain control and relieve his stress was by torturing prisoners to appease his sadistic nature. The resulting dread kept vassals in line.

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Re: Crusader Kings 3: on Steam and PC Game Pass

Post by Sly Boots » Fri Sep 11, 2020 8:50 am

Wrathbone wrote:
Fri Sep 11, 2020 8:04 am
Glad you're enjoying it! :)

I've now united the British Isles (and Iceland) under the Empire of Britannia, and I'm turning my eye to France to steal all their croissants.
One interesting discovery was that in the Stewardship perk tree there's one that allows you to get people to pay you for the hooks you hold on them, which has been a great source of income. Even though it caused my king to get stressed because he's Just.
The perk trees weren't in CK2 and I really like them as a new addition, as you can provide some level of direction to your ruler. My last few rulers have either been stewards or intellectuals, which gives some useful advantages, but my first ruler was an out-and-out schemer. You get all sorts of wonderfully horrible options to inflict upon your subjects.

Also, if you think a just king is tricky to handle, avoid shy kings like the plague. They get stressed simply by trying to sway people, and feasts don't relieve stress. My shy king was despised by almost all of his vassals because he couldn't talk to them and kept having breakdowns (it's quite tragic, really), and the only way I could maintain control and relieve his stress was by torturing prisoners to appease his sadistic nature. The resulting dread kept vassals in line.
Quite tickled by the thought that perhaps Richard III was just a misunderstood introvert :lol:

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