[Tapper]

Thw way I deal with my demesne-down-sizing: giving your eldest son a slew of baronies and counties when he's already an infant, if need be, also award him ducal titles. Since you're not playing him, the administrative penalty won't hurt you. He'll get a bit of income (which he'll invest in his baronies, doing that job for you), he'll like you better so less chance of a rebellion, and when you die and you become him, the baronies in question revert to the crown.
If he dies without heirs, the lands revert to you. The only issue is if he has 2 sons and dies before you, because then gavelkind hits and your king will have fewer lands for himself and may lose a ducal title or two to his brother.

To prevent gavelkind of hitting, plotting to murder your wife after she's given birth to one or two sons is a good strategy, too.

This post has been edited by Tapper: 12 June 2012 - 08:48 AM

[Gothos]

I couldn't bring myself to murder my lovely wife

[Kanubis]

I went to buy it last night but it wasn't on offer for me ><

[Tapper]

Gothos, on 12 June 2012 - 08:51 AM, said:

I couldn't bring myself to murder my lovely wife

Oh, I do have trouble with it. But then I see the vast tracts of land of the next wife (no euphemism) and think of all the good the next marriage would do...

[Macros]

I want this game now.

[The dancing game]

I love games.

[Loki]

The teaser trailer for Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs came out today. Looking forward to playing it. I really like that thechineseroom worked on it - Dear Esther was cinematically brilliant imo.

[Tapper]

Hmm, to continue the tradition of Mid-action reports in CK2:

I started a Castille game. Turns out that the various Iberian kings are all kids of one father, and therefore, you are one another's heir. Your siblings also have a penchant for declaring holy war against the muslim emirates on the peninsula, who can all muster 4-6k men each where your own cap is 1.5k.

So when my dear brother sitting on the throne of Galicia declared war for Porto and was getting trounced by the hordes of the various sultans, I didn't hesitate and declared holy war on the other side of Spain, quickly capturing a few independent 1 state emirates. I then murdered my dear brother, ending the war and ending up with La Coruna while the muslims held on to what they'd conquered at the war's end (everything else of Galicia). The next step was consolidating the duchy of Aragon, as my acquisition of Zaragoza and surrounding lands had given me 50% of its estates. I usurped the title from another brother and immediately declared de jure war on him, usurping 1 of his 2 provinces and giving me a 3/4 majority in the duchy, meaning he can't usurp back. Then, my dear sister in Leon rebelled against my dear brother, she died conveniently (official sources say I had nothing to do with it), left her county to me and giving me a claim on Vallodolididididid or whatever it is spelled.
So by now, I had acquired 5 counties outside of my starting territories and a quick browse through muslim held territory showed there were no easy pickings there. I sent my chancellor to Ireland to fabricate a claim or 2 (which he did with consumate ease... 22 diplomacy is awesome), invaded the isle and took 3 counties there. Then the emir of Cordoba decided to pick a fight with me in a Holy War. I could never win that with my own troops, but couldn't surrender either. So I married my daughter to the infant king of France (who later became Othon the Moron or some such, he was a terribad ruler but he has a great many soldiers, which he did send after a year or 2). Soldiers I may have lacked, but having a management of 17 or so meant I had loads of cash to burn, so mercenaries happily flocked to my banner, as did the duke of Brittany (who then left my alliance mid-battle when it seemed I was going to clinch victory and saddled me with an army that was defeated and lost 60% of its troops) and most of the independent dukes of Ireland (who lacked ships to transport them to Spain, nevermind that), and I managed to match the musselman man for man and hire swords long after his coffers were exhausted. Upgrading the defenses of my castles to 5.5 and 6.0 meant he wasted much more time on sieges than I did, which also worked to my advantage. In a 15 year war, I managed to win the attrition battle and he was forced to accept humiliating peace, paying a very hefty indemnity to me.
I then recovered, saw the Templars being founded, and declared a holy war of my own, hiring the stupidly strong 7k strong holy order to do the fighting for me, and conquered half of Cordoba. Currently, I am stuck.

My dumb Leon cousin got war declared on him while also fighting rebels, and since he holds my flank (until I can usurp him) I tried to bail him out by joining his war. He then immediately declared an offensive Holy war on another sultanate which was neutral until then - and I lack the Piety to hire Holy Orders, and the only way to get it reasonably quick is by going completely celebate next time that event pops up. With only one male heir who has come to age and is leading troops, that's a very significant risk. I may have to leave Leon to fend for himself, just prolonging the inevitable while strengthening my grasp on Ireland and perhaps also taking Navarra from my distant cousins to give me a couple of 1000 soldiers extra to feed to the meatgrinder that the emirates will unleash on me next while building up the money and piety for another round of Holy Orders + mercenary bands, also hoping that my acquisitions in Cordoba will convert to Iberian culture and catholicism rapidly so I can raise their levies, too.

This post has been edited by Tapper: 15 June 2012 - 09:48 AM

[Gothos]

Allright so I've been playing some more Crusader Kings II.

It is now 1220-ish, and the Piast dynasty of Poland has grown quite strong. Among the lands held by the polish King and his vassals outside their starting borders are these duchies: Pomeralia, Samogitia, Volhynia, Turov, Kiev, Galich, Ungvar, Nyitra, and the following counties: Jacwiez, Yatvyagi, Minsk and Stettin. With some resistance from vassals, the Piast dynasty managed to reach High Crown Authority and Primogeniture inheritance. With power secured, the Piasts now command the second largest military in the game, surpassed only by the Holy Roman Empire. It is quite uncertain how to bite the Empire, since it has a ridiculous amount of troops - over 110 thousand listed, with the next Poland at a meagre 28 thousand, and the Byzantines with 24 thousand. The Kingdom of Bohemia, now part of the HRE, would make a great addition to the polish domain, especially since the current King's five sons will each need a fief. It's either that, or moving east against Ryazan, or north against either Sweden or Denmark. But it might not be a good idea to tangle ourselves in a war right now, as the polish King is also heir to the Kingdom of Jerusalem through marriage, and it might just come to blows with the heathens in the Holy Land. Another threat is the rumored Mongol horde, which might be making its way towards Europe right now... and who can stop them?


Allright, with all that, how is it possible that the HRE has this many troops? It's ridiculous!

[Tapper]

Gothos, on 18 June 2012 - 06:08 AM, said:

Allright so I've been playing some more Crusader Kings II.

It is now 1220-ish, and the Piast dynasty of Poland has grown quite strong. Among the lands held by the polish King and his vassals outside their starting borders are these duchies: Pomeralia, Samogitia, Volhynia, Turov, Kiev, Galich, Ungvar, Nyitra, and the following counties: Jacwiez, Yatvyagi, Minsk and Stettin. With some resistance from vassals, the Piast dynasty managed to reach High Crown Authority and Primogeniture inheritance. With power secured, the Piasts now command the second largest military in the game, surpassed only by the Holy Roman Empire. It is quite uncertain how to bite the Empire, since it has a ridiculous amount of troops - over 110 thousand listed, with the next Poland at a meagre 28 thousand, and the Byzantines with 24 thousand. The Kingdom of Bohemia, now part of the HRE, would make a great addition to the polish domain, especially since the current King's five sons will each need a fief. It's either that, or moving east against Ryazan, or north against either Sweden or Denmark. But it might not be a good idea to tangle ourselves in a war right now, as the polish King is also heir to the Kingdom of Jerusalem through marriage, and it might just come to blows with the heathens in the Holy Land. Another threat is the rumored Mongol horde, which might be making its way towards Europe right now... and who can stop them?


Allright, with all that, how is it possible that the HRE has this many troops? It's ridiculous!

I hate overly fertile marriages. I've been trying to refrain my kings from becoming lustful in their thirties just to keep them away from siring too many sons.

Have you tried building churches and giving them to your non-primary-heir sons? This removes them from the chain of inheritance and they'll thank you for it, too. In my playthrough, Ireland is covered by monasteries run by Jimena bishops, for example (and this can be done regardless of your investiture settings). While theoretically a church is worse than a castle or city (less quality troops and less tax plus worse learning bonus respectively), the bishops of churches you build are still your vassals, meaning that if the local lord rebels, they'll have to take the bishopric holding before they have full control of their own fief, which is quite handy.

[MTS]

Money's been a bit tight lately, so after finishing Mass Effect 3 last week I decided to have a go through Dragon Age 2 again and check out the DLCs. They were pretty decent, and I enjoyed Felicia Day's character. The item packs are godly as well. Also, holy crap, the patches seriously nerf a lot of abilities. Not being able to rack up 25000+ criticals with my archer makes me a sad panda...

[Gothos]

The HRE nearly collapsed. I've managed to nick away Pomerania Zhmud and fighting to get Bohemia under my wings as well now. The Kaiser is enough trouble that I actually have more troops than him.
That said, a few things. My current king was heir to both Kingdom of Poland and Kingdom of Jerusalem. Turns out waging war against a jihad half a Europe away from your lands with 3 factions that total 2x your standing troops is somewhat tricky. I had to surrender. Ultimately gave the Kingdom of Jerusalem to my uncle, was too much trouble to be worth it, especially now that.......
The Golden Horde has arrived.
Fuck me don't they have a lot of troops. They've already gobbed up Yaroslavl, the largest and strongest of the Russian factions. I've managed to quickly use this to grab Chernikhov off the Golden Horde before they could reach the warzone, but the next holy war for Pereslavl they did managed to reach me with 3 of their 25k+ doomstacks... well, there it goes, white peace. I now have rather decent standing with the Khagan, but who knows how long that will last? I've installed the Teutonic Order in Chernikhov to add some sort of a bulwark between us while I work around the weakened Kaiser and incorporate more lands into my Kingdom to build up properly for any future wars with the Mongols.
So yeah. I'll have to reload as I've picked the wrong CB against the rebelling Bohemia and the vassal I gained it for, despite being my kinsman, didn't actually become my vassal when we won - he even took the Duchy of Turov that he held with him and away from my crown... so yeah, not an option, chum.
Damn this game takes turns.

[Tapper]

Well, shit went tits up.

France annexed part of Navarra because the Navarrese king is also duke of Brittany and that got them both into spats. A further war saw 12k stacks marching over Murcia and Mallorca, and now Spain owns the old emirate of Cordoba, meaning they control 8 or so regions on the Spanish east coast. I have no clue how I am going to kick them out of there.
Half of the duchy of Barcelona (a whopping 6 regions with 4 slot baronies, Barcelona even has 5) went to the HRE. They can usurp my claim on the duchy as they control 50% of it and I am pretty much powerless against them, meaning that I'll have to fear for my half of it.
My cousin in Leon kept picking the wrong wars and was steadily losing territory to the Beja Emirate, which can field quite a host itself. I tried and win some territory back, succeeded finally in controlling Vallodolid so Leon is now safely boxed into a corner where I control the surrounding lands, but I'd say the Beja and I are as powerful as one another, so a war would be a slow and gradual affair... where France can just waltz in and conquer shit rapidly.
I brokered an alliance with the English but the result of that is that I am called into their spats with Scotland instead of having their help elsewhere.

Furthermore, I am still waiting for 7-10 regions to convert to my religion and culture, spreading my armies thin and seeing a lot of my lords marrying to Sunni muslims, which in turn has my court chaplain calling for burninations at the stake of a great many of my most capable (and future) henchmen. What is even worse, my king is Frankish, meaning I have a 5% revolt risk.

[Tapper]

Ok, so from tits up, to well and truly fucked. One of my dukes decided that marrying his daughter into the russian ruling house was a good move. It was, for him. He died without a male heir and house Rurikorovich established another 2 province stronghold on Iberian soil. So now I am faced with the French, HRE and the Russians, all of whom march 12k stacks across my soil in their attempts to grab more land. I declared war on France when a shedload of dukes rebelled, but they were put down and a 57k stack (oh, the attrition they must face) marched into Spain and set me straight, while the Russians created a duchy and declared more limited war... 9k on my face. At this point, persevering just doesn't pay.

[lastname]

Skyrim with a little bit of Dragon Age 2 thrown in right now.

Early days still but Skyrim's been fun so far. The game looks great and the combat is pretty satisfying. Started and dropped a few characters before getting my orc up to level 29. I do wish the writing wasn't so meh. Not saying Bethesda should go hire SE , but they could look at games developed by Bioware or Obsidian (Black Isle).

Getting to the endgame in DA2 and don't feel any great urge to go finish the game. I am generally a big Bioware fanboy but this one just didn't do it for me.

Jean-Claude Van tiam, on 03 June 2012 - 10:31 PM, said:

I started up a Skyrim file. I really enjoyed my Stealth archer on my first run through so went an Orc heavy armour fighter (which I never do as theres no flexibility in methods of fighting) for something different but started on master this time. Difficult to begin with and I dont know what id do without berserk but now im tempted by an Orc archer to see if the Berserk thing allows for double damage for bow stealth shots.

Ive put in about 50 hours before I activated the dragons like I did on my first run through. Now they dont survive a few berserk power attacks with 2 one handed weapons but this will change when I get Elder Dragons im sure. My archer was so flexible for all the guilds (except the mages guild) but im not sure how good the Orc is going to be. Hes a tank though with severe weakness to magic.

Not that I'm any sort of Skyrim expert but could you start pumping your Orc's magic stat a bit and maybe start levelling Conjuration using a bound sword? That'd get you an elemental meatshield and help with the lack of flexibility that you mention. I've started doing that the last couple of levels (mainly for variety) but I'm not sure if I'm going to keep at it.

[Mentalist]

Hey Gothos, Soul Reaver 2 is on GoG now.....

this weekend's gonna be crazy busy, since i'll be working. I expect that when I go home i'll be too exhausted to dive into the two Deus Ex Mods I have installed right now (2017 and The NNameless Mod), so i'll likely end up doing a lot more high-velocity killing in E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy since I got to the Temple with a level 30 char, and I don't really see a way to progress further, I might just re-roll as a psychic, and finally see if the new patch is worth all the fuss....

[Nocturnal]

Finally finished Assassin's Creed. I delayed playing it for far too long that it lost all it's unpredictable charm. Well, I don't have time to play through any of the new games this summer, but I am anxiously waiting for Extended Cut DLC fro Mass Effect 3.

[Silencer]

I'm taking a break from Kingdoms of Amalur (kinda lost a bit of interest due to game-breaking Chakram pwnage and the fact that everything is less interesting after the mid-game boss and mediocre reward ) and am instead giving Mirror's Edge a shot. Really interesting concept, even if the gameplay is somewhat trial-and-error/"Oh shit where do I go next?! Why is the Voice with an Internet Connection/Mission Control character treating me like I know this city back to front when I clearly do not!" XD

The first-person perspective is done REALLY well. I love it that this game actually feels like you're right there doing it (though it really highlights the disconnect between game and reality, as I sometimes am very tempted to check where my feet are, which I wouldn't need to do IRL) and the fluidity of motion is a neat aspect to focus on (let down partially by the context-sensitive buttons not always *quite* getting it right), and it avoids a lot of the disorientation and weirdness in other games when moves like rolling come into the mix. The missions do so far feel somewhat linear...but I'm not sure whether that's just me or the actual design. Still, good fun! And neat concept, if nothing else.

[Princess]

I'm doing my gajillionth replay of Psychonauts right now, while betatesting the new and upcoming MOBA Smite (Still have two betakeys left, if anyone's interested).
I wonder why there is no Psychonauts 2 yet. The Story, Gameplay and entire concept is insane, and insanely good.

I also finished Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots a few days ago and am eagerly awaiting the Metal Gear Solid Bundle for the Playstation Vita. MGS4 is another great game, i've read some complaints about the hour-long cutscenes scattered throughout the game, but to me they just tie the game together. Can't wait to play Metal Gear Solid 2, 3 and Metal Gear/Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake.

[Silencer]

Ben A. Delat 2: Eclectic Boogaloo, on 23 June 2012 - 01:16 PM, said:

I'm doing my gajillionth replay of Psychonauts right now, while betatesting the new and upcoming MOBA Smite (Still have two betakeys left, if anyone's interested).
I wonder why there is no Psychonauts 2 yet. The Story, Gameplay and entire concept is insane, and insanely good.

I also finished Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots a few days ago and am eagerly awaiting the Metal Gear Solid Bundle for the Playstation Vita. MGS4 is another great game, i've read some complaints about the hour-long cutscenes scattered throughout the game, but to me they just tie the game together. Can't wait to play Metal Gear Solid 2, 3 and Metal Gear/Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake.

Psychonauts is probably best left without a sequel. Otherwise it risks suffering MASSIVE sequelitis. Think about it; it's hard to duplicate or better "insanely good" .

And I have to say, lack of a PS3 is really starting to irk me these days. And lack of a handheld gaming system. I never thought I'd miss any handheld titles (there actually aren't that many that I *really* want to play, probably, but not being ABLE to play them probably increases the 'want' factor in some perverse twist of internal logic...) but I think if I could justify the expense to myself I'd get one of some description...even if it was just to tide over the break times at work, possibly with some ridiculous JRPG...
And the PS3...mostly it's just a few major titles that I'm missing (MGS4, obviously, plus a couple of others) but now that it is in the final stages of its lifecycle the catalogue is considerably better than it used to be. Still can never go back to the platform because of the controller, granted, but DAMN THE WAY MY BRAIN WORKS. >.<