What is the point of duchies if you're king?

Question

Example: I'm king of France and count of all counties inside Normandy. I'm also the duke of Normandy.

What benefits does this 'duke of Normandy' title give to me exactly? I tried to give the 'duke of Normandy' title to another noble, and it didn't seem to change anything except he was now the duke of a duchy without any county (the counties still 'belonged' to me and seemed to have been ejected from the duchy).

Sorry if this is not very clear, I'm very confused.

Asked by Quentin

Answer

• It gives you prestige
• Makes it easier to handle your kingdom (controlling 60 count vassals is harder than controlling 20 duke vassals)
• Allows your vassals to expand on their own (i.e. if your duke owns 2 of 3 counties in a duchy, you can press the claim on your own, or you can let him do it himself.
• Dukes are more likely to make improvements on their own (since they gain more money), so less micromanagement.

The main reason to me is #2 above. My first game I didn't make any duchies, all counties reported directly to me, which was all fine until I wanted to change a succession law. One of the requisites is that no vassals can have a negative opinion of you. Try to achieve this when you have 60+ counts to take care of and a bad king with no heirs. I just couldn't do it.

As for your second issue, when you give the duke title to someone, it's only a title at that point, you should either give the duke the counties in the duchy if you own them, or if the counties are controlled by your vassals, do 'transfer vassalage' of the other counties in the duchy (barons most likely) to the new duke if you want to remove the 'desires such and such county' penalty.

Answered by Rodolfo

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Unable to switch primary location in demense upon inheritance

Question

So have a weird situation going on in my ireland game. Have the duchy of leinster and meath, has it so the eldest son inherits everything. I gave all the sons mayoral titles while they wait for dad to drop dead.

So dear old dad finally drops dead. The eldest inherits two duchies, four counties...and the mayoral title. The problem is it keeps complaining that the county that the town is in, is the wrong type to have demense wise. Cant' give away the mayoral title, nor switch the castle and town for being primary location in that county. Best part is now it says that instead of my son that would inherit, it's the chancellor that isn't even connected to my family tree at all.

So is my game buggered, or is there a way to fix this?

Asked by canadiancreed

Answer

Right click on the demise and convert to vassal. Your character isn't technically allowed to 'run' a city or a church. (S)He may only run Baronies as they are literally in the royalty hierarchy.

Why is this? Cities want to elect their own Mayor so the townfolk would prefer a mayor to a King. The church thing is a bit more complicated but until you become a King, you have free reign over who succeeds as a given church's bishop but once a character controls the demise the usual problems for removing a title crop up.

A second note on the Bishop problem, if future readers are curious, is that once your main character becomes a King (s)he has the issue of crown laws and the subsequent issue of free or Papal investiture. You'll have to look more into the consequences of either choice but the relevant issue is that under Papal investiture your King has no influence over Bishop appointments.

Answered by Adam

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How can I persuade my lords to pass a law?

Question

I am trying to raise crown authority, but currently too few lords support the vote. Are there any methods to persuade the lords of the realm to support the new law?

Asked by Xenox

Answer

Raise their opinion of you. Give them titles, send gifts, be a ruler with many virtues. If they like you they would vote almost immediately.

Answered by Alien-47

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Who should I give titles to?

Question

I've been playing for a few days, but still I'm not sure who should I give or not give land titles. Should I give it all to my heir so when I die he gets everything? Or should I spread it to people in my family? or maybe to people not in my family? (I've noticed some vassals in my family (with the little blood drop) have like a -50 relationship penalty with me for wanting a duchy or something like that.

In that order, should I give even more titles to vassals that don't like me trying to appease them or is it just worsening the situation (like, will they start hating me again after a while, but now with a bigger army to fight me if they rebel)?

Great game, but so confusing.

Asked by Rodolfo

Answer

There is no one-best-recipe.

Your vassals should never have too many titles - in this case they will have power to singlehandedly overthrow you and usurp your title or make you to lower crown athourity or taxes or levy size. And be sure - there will be time when they want it.

Also don't give titles to someone who hates you - in this case make them your vassal's vassal - this is a suitable solution for unlanded sons or brothers. It also makes them harder to raise war for your crown, because they should firstly became duchies, and this involves war with their liege, whom they may hate no so strongly.

Give titles to ppl who have Content trait (+50 relations), to someone with same sins and virtues as you, also try to make your king as good as your can - vurtuous, kind, just, prestigeous, piuos.

Look for vassals' background - dont give land title to priests and mayors - they will have "Wrong goverment type" penalty.

Respect - is everything. You can fight with rebel vasslas, but not with all of them at the same time.

Well, maybe messy, but here are some tips) Hope it will be helpful.

Answered by Alien-47

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Why is my army size halved?

Question

When my king died, the next king (oldest son) could only raise like half the army (levies) I could before. What happened?

Asked by Rodolfo

Answer

I think the reason your levy decreased is due to your heir's vassal-leige relationship score being different than your original king's. It could also be that your levy base providing buildings are not in your heir's personal demense.

The levy system is actually kinda complex but once you have a feel for it I suspect it'll make sense.

I originally said (in comments) that I thought this was related to titles, and it's not quite right. There's a few things at play.

If you don't give your sons any land then you can end up with the "unlanded sons prestige penalty". You need to give your first son some lands (but not the 2nd or 3rd as it'll increase a chance of war on inheritance). This shouldn't affect your levy though, except as it may indirectly affect your relationship with your vassals.

I came across a pretty decent description of the levy system [here].1

If you lose any of the following, you'll see a bad drop:

• Castles give 225 base Levy (150 HI, 60 LI, 15 LC)
• Churches give 130 base Levy (45 HI, 45LI, 40A)
• Cities give 115 base Levy (75LI, 40A)

Here's where you could be losing levy... especially note that if the castle isn't in your personal demesne you'll take a hit.

You raise 100% of the Levy in your own holdings. Since castles give the most and best types of troops you want to have castles in your demesne unless you don't want to use only mercenaries and vassal levy.

The following is what I was talking about with the V-L Relation

Relation with your vassal and Levy Laws determine how much of the vassal levy you can raise. Crown Authority sets the minimum levy you get and Levy Laws set the maximum:

Crown Authority → 0 min /10% min /20% min /30% min /40% min Feudal Levy Law → 60% max / 70% max / 80% max / 100% max (225) City Levy Law → 50% max / 65% max / 80% max / 95% max (115) Church Levy Law → 50% max / 60%max / 70% max / 80% max (130)

You always get the min levy set by crown authority but the actual amount up to the >maximum is determined by vassal-liege relation (VLR). Relation is transformed into >percentage value (P) according to the following formula:

P = ((25 + VLR) x 0.69)/100

Now when you apply P to the maximum levy set by law (MXL) you get the percentage of >troops (PT) you get from the holding:

PT = P x (MXL/100)

Multiply by the number of levy (NL) in the holding and you get the actual troops (AT) >you can raise:

AT = PT x NL

Hope this helps and good luck! Sorry about any confusion!

Answered by Stephen

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