CKII is released.

[Volrath]

Steam has a Crusader Kings II sale. All of the older DLC's and the base game have a 75% discount.

Somebody stop me from pushing the button.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Somebody stop me from pushing the button.

 

[Zero Credibility]

Is anyone else still playing this game? I feel like bitching some, so here it goes.

I've been playing with HIP mod lately, trying something new. I was thinking of playing an indian religion, but didn't want to start in India because of how ugly their portraits are compared to anyone else in HIP. So I decided to bring indian religions to Europe instead. Started as that buddhist nomad south-west of the mongols, just after the 4th crusade. More powerful nomads to the north and west, muslim blobs to the south, and 90% of my military actually comes from my muslim vassal dukes just itching to get rid of me. Oh, and less than 10 years before mongols start rolling everything in their path.

I gathered what military and gold I could and just started punching straight to the west as fast as I could while everything behind me turned blue. Mongols in HIP are fucking scary. They get a special invasion CB that they immediately declare on everyone holding any land in a de jure kingdom, all at once. That way they can pick off an entire kingdom in one go, no matter how fractured it is. And they spam it constantly so that they are at war all the time. And it has only 3 years treaty, so once it's passed I could expect a new war in a matter of months, regardless of their opinion of me, or if they had troops in my lands (or indeed, on top of my capital). Because they are cheating bastards.

But the biggest problems are their event troops. 100k of zero maintenance, attrition free, reinforcing (though slowly) murder stack. It's pretty fucking insane. I've seen them park that thing in the middle of snow-covered mountains in winter with no effect. It brakes my immersion so fucking badly - what the fuck do they eat there? I suppose men could be eating horses, but what do the horses eat, men? I guess higher supply limit makes sense for them in the steppes, but in the fucking mountains where the owner of the county can't have 1/5 of that force without them starting to die?

It took me 30 years to fight my way 5000 km to Greece where I destroyed the Latin empire and settled my people, with mongols on my back and pushing me every step of the way. Even now they are my neighbours, though they have been strangely inactive for the past few years, so maybe they have reached their kill limit for now. They hold pretty much everything west of me though (except for India, because fuck India). Seen them have a couple of truly massive rebellions, where 4/5 of the blob joined in, only to be easily crushed by the event troops.

But it turns out that playing indian religions in Europe isn't that hot after all. I even took Byzantine empire using my usual religion shenanigans with the eventual goal of restoring the Roman empire under a jain ruler. Yeah, not going to happen even if the mongols fall apart. First, forgot to take jain (and hindu) courtiers with me when I left and now I can't get any (and can they even raise jain / hindu kids in my nomad court?) so I can't convert. Second, nobody outside of my realm wants to even touch my kids without a stick, let alone marry them. I got a hot princess and a county (hell, make that a duchy) for some lucky landless noble? No takers. And finally, it turns out a lot of things that should be tied to title or culture (I converted to greek after settling) are tied instead to religion. The classic two-headed eagle CoA got turned into a randomly chosen indian one - two cows. Had to edit save game to turn into two-headed swan (probably). Hey, at least it's a bird. No imperial reconquest cb for me (it's a HIP thing). Also, no Byzantine honorary titles. And the born in purple mechanics conflicts with the heir designation, so I can't use one of the main reasons I am playing an indian religion in the first place.

Ah fuck it, I'm pretty much burned out on this game anyway. Not worth it in the end. It does show how isolated the whole indian part of the game is from the actual core of the game is though.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

The two-headed cow of Rhomaioi! top lel material right there.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

>Play CK2Plus >Cheat for AI so there's a whole lot of other reformed pagans in Europe for added lulz >Get pissed off at all these goddamn High Priests with kingdoms >Mod localisation to give proper titles for all of them >Notice you still have Zunists to go >Add FOA "The most grossly incandescent" > https://media.giphy.com/media/R8Ll4UBZaT3La/giphy.gif

EDIT: I'm actually pretty pleased with the little customization work I did combining a Finno-Ugric portrait and unit sprites from the sources given by DLCs. Swapped out the rather strange lamellar dress guy for a differently equipped (Saxon sword and Norse shield) Turkish litchina infantry after seeing a post about a "Baltic helmet" in the forums, and swapped the Holy Order model for the F-U pikeman (with a Slavic shield) since I friggin love that model's design and to me he looks much more fitting as a "shaman-warrior" than the other guy. Light Infantry got replaced with the Saxon pikeman using a regular spear and small F-U shield, looks very nice as a tribal warrior (honestly, more Light Infantry should use spears). Finally combined Norse portrait pack and Turkish portrait pack for creating the look itself, with Norse faces and hair with men getting Norse clothing and Turkish hats (very good combination) and women getting Turkish clothing and hats.

 

[Whisky]

Holy shit, I can't believe it. Elder Kings finally updated.

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/release-version-0-1-6-general-release.888726/

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I'm more pleased with my success in adding DIVERSITY to the style of settlement graphics, since I was getting really pissed off with Norse and Finno-Ugric cities looking the same as French cities, much less with how jarring it looks in Constantinople. Swapping Indian settlement graphics for Byzantinegfx looks much better and in style with the structures left standing today (okay, kinda too dark in shade, but at least the Indian buildings have more similar architecture), and it looks much better when Eastenslavicgfx, Ugricgfx, and Norsegfx have tribal houses around the castle. Achieves a great deal of style and gives this sense of there being different cultural-economic areas defined by architecture. Pity there don't appear to be Nomad tents, I'd have set those for Turkics and Mongols (though Muslim buildings do work for them).

 

[Internet]

The game of throne mod received a big update today.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Wasn't there an immortality trait at some point in CK2? Was it removed? I checked the wiki but it's pretty light on the modding side. I just wondered if it's possible to create a vampire ruler.

 

[Whisky]

Wasn't there an immortality trait at some point in CK2? Was it removed? I checked the wiki but it's pretty light on the modding side. I just wondered if it's possible to create a vampire ruler.

It's hidden in the traits files somewhere. You can't access it otherwise, it was made just for modders.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Yea, the Warhammer mod for example uses the immortal=yes property for Elf, Nehekharan, Orc and Goblin race traits and Vampire type traits, and there's a craftable magic potion that makes you immortal. I'll also add that they've actually got pretty good custom portraits for vampires.

 

[IDtenT]

Would an immortal character with all the worst traits be playable?

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Well, yea, since immortal means you can only be killed, can't die from disease or old age.

 

[Xeon]

I think you can still die from disease. Only old age is safe I think.

 

[IDtenT]

Can it be an inheritable trait?

 

[IDtenT]

Actually, it would be cool to contend with that in heirs, kinda like genius.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Playing a vampire, elf or orc (but especially vampires) in the Warhammer mod is essentially like that, since once you get (or start with) a jackpot statted ruler you never want to lose them. Vampires are doubly difficult in this respect in that you will quickly end up with a fuckload of heirs (since everyone you turn into a vampire can be made a part of your dynasty and a possible heir) who tend to be quite good because you handpick them (and because vampires automatically remove all injury and disease effects they don't have an expiration date besides being killed either).

It's actually kind of funny to look at Elves in Ulthuan or Naggaroth, since both of them live the most hardcore CK2 existence imaginable thanks to their ability to survive all the shit that happens to them. Usually it only takes Malekith a few years before he's maimed, disfigured, and incapable from all the dueling and battles. Like half the Elven population is disfigured by combat in the mod whenever I play.

EDIT: Incidentally, this is what those settlement graphical modifications I made look like (aside from pic being taken before Muslim port gfx being added to Byz):

Spoiler

 

[GarfunkeL]

Can I edit it to my save game / current ruler or do I actually need to fiddle with game files?

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

I don't think it's doable to an existing save game, since you'd need to create an immortal trait first.

 

[GarfunkeL]

So this:
http://www.ckiiwiki.com/Immortality

and then create an event that gives that trait to my character?

 

[Xeon]

If you just want your character to be immortal, you can just edit your save and add immortal=16 or any age you want them to look like.

 

[Delterius]

Ever thought of making an ultra agressive immortal unkilleable AI that is essentially the god king of humankind and then trying to stop him from blobbling the world? Like the ultimate mongol horde, except its byzantine somehow.

 

[Zero Credibility]

Heh, seen a LP somewhere of a player doing exactly that recently, world conquest with a single, effectively immortal character - by just using exploits and nothing more. He did it by abusing religion conversion to and from islam and repeatedly going on a muslim equivalent of pilgrimage, that gives you a good chance of gaining a health point. You only need some 5 extra points I think to be practically immortal. In the end he was also augustus, religion head of multiple religions and who knows what else. Craziest LP I have seen ever, completely broke the game.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Ever thought of making an ultra agressive immortal unkilleable AI that is essentially the god king of humankind and then trying to stop him from blobbling the world? Like the ultimate mongol horde, except its byzantine somehow.

Nah, immortal means they can still be killed. And that's not exactly impossible to do, any random duel can kill them.

This is why Warhammer mod mixes things up a little with Vlad, who is immortal AND unkillable (he simply respawns instantly when killed thanks to the ring) until he loses the ring (event driven; 10 times killed for AI, X number of provinces in realm for player).

 

[Zzz]

If you just want your character to be immortal, you can just edit your save and add immortal=16 or any age you want them to look like.

This Paradox thread slightly expands on what Xeon wrote, and it's worked for me previously.