I am King, now follow me you puny minions!

[itay]

So I've started my own faction, grabbed Weyha and Caraf Castles, and also Shiraz.
I have like 10 Emirs in my prison chamber, honor rating of 4, renown of 800+, R2R of 22.
I have one vassal, my companion Katrin made into a vassal because I cannot defend 3 properties at a time.
The Sarranid hate my guts, -100 faction relation, because half of them are deep in my chamber with no parol option

I'm trying to get myself some new vassals. I encounter Emirs, talk to them privately (notice-we are at war), ask them what they think of Sultan Hakim, they say he's a lying pretender and has bad odour, I tell them I can unify Caldaria, and then they go something like: Military wise - I'm better off without you (which is wrong, since I'm clearing the desert with my Swadian Knights), Politically I surround myself with vultures (Huh? I have no vassals, what are you talking about?), and that I cannot unify Caldaria because I'm weak (I suppose it's a R2R issue). Then, they tell me to shove off and I'm forced to attack them, and make them run to Sultan Hakim and cry on his camel.

What do I do? How can I make people join me? Seariously, I don't mind giving fiefs and throwing great parties. How can I make them see it?

 

[DSlayer]

The whole recruiting thing is a load of garbage. I tell him the most favorable option, he says I have a stronger military, he prefers my company over that of his kings, is happy about my goals. His reputation is 90+ and "Devoted" while he hates his king. Does he join me...? Nope!

I have the most renown of all the lands. My R2R is near the cap, I've eliminated an entire faction. Have handfuls of honorably and likeminded lords. And some people still don't join me for whatever reason. I have free fiefs that can be given to them upon joining so that can't possibly be the reason. And my persuasion is maxed if that has anything to do with it.

Sometimes I have better luck, but others just seem hardwired to never betray their king no matter how many times you reload. I mean if he's that loyal then why doesn't he just say "Long may he live" and never get the option to try and persuade him? I've also noticed the military issue is bugged as all ever. You can have 200-500 mid-high tiered garrisons everywhere, and have the lords faction to his last city and he says it's weak.

As for your problem. You probably shouldn't have made Katrin a vassal. People get picky over making commoners vassals. Matheld or Aelyed, whoever the nobles are would be the better choices. After you wiped out a bunch of factions and have more lords than you know what to do with sure then make a commoner your vassal. Other than that there's not much else you can do but hope you don't get screwed by their horrible logic. "Durrr, I think I'll stay with my king who's about to be wiped off the map instead of joining with the faction with all my friends, available fiefs, and the strongest military might."

 

[UnfortunateCrow]

I have had luck recruting Lords who have previously been kicked out or defected from their first faction.

Also you will have a AMAZINGLY greater chance of recruting vassals if you have a castle that is without a lord (towns don't seem to cut it).  If you keep a castle or two "available" (not collecting rent, and not fiefed to another Lord), you will start to see these guys take you up on your offers.

 

[Yozzer]

I have just had my first 3 Lords join one after the other, 2 said they were safer were they were. I can only think it is my honour rating which is 63, my RTR is 31, but I would watch the honour rating does not go too negative, or all the kings will turn against you which is what happened in my previous game. I restarted with an imported character and it is playing better the second time through, just the crashes I get drives me potty!

 

[itay]

Thank you all commentors.

I'm going to try and up my honor rating, maybe that's the trick.
If not, I'll just start making more companions into vassals and the hell with all those nobles.

 

[Deneidez]

... then they go something like: Military wise - I'm better off without you (which is wrong, since I'm clearing the desert with my Swadian Knights),...

I think game calculates amount of all troops your kingdom has(garrisoned too) and compares it to their own faction. With current income from fiefs player would be bankrupt financially, if player would have more troops than any other faction even if player would have more castles/towns when starting a kingdom.

 

[BlackRainZ]

I have 100 honour rating, 79 Right to rule, and close to 2000 renown, plus I have taken over half of swadia and all of Rhodok and I still can't get some vassals to join me. Now I check them out and one guy, he has minus 79 to his liege, -79!!! When I talk to him, he says, militarily he would be better off with me, he likes me more than his liege (relation is 30 with him) and when I pick something like I will unite calradia, or any other option actually, he even says people would understand if he joined me, and he STILL doesn't join me!

 

[dzorro]

maybe persuasion skill does play a higher role now ?? Maybe those that have problem how high is your persuasion skill or leader skill etc.. ???

I haven't really had a chance to recruit yet, but it does make sense that you will need some persuasion skill to back it up other then renown etc.. Charisma should also play a big role into how the others persieve you. Atleast i would think so.

 

[dhowlett]

Ive never had problem recruiting lords who were even relations of -10 to me and i only had 4 perswasion.

I had 5 friends in swadian lands when i made my kingdom and i made mathew my first vassel. I then got 3 of my friendly lords asap and as they also all liked each other made it all pretty easy and form there just continued to recruite more and more. The father of my wife who does like me alot however still wont join me. going to try and max my relations with him as i want him on my side.

 

[Hudson]

  It took me a lot of work but I found that my relations to the lord really had a large part to play in things.  I had one game where I started with Lady Isolla in rebelling against Swadia and reclaiming her crown.  I had mediocre relations with most of the lords and I got 9/10 of the way through conquering all of Swadia with just my party before I started getting lords to join us.  I reloaded that game and spent some time building up relations with the lords of Swadia and the second time around I was able to get about half the lords to join us by the midpoint of conquering Swadian territory.  Past that my reknown was only in the 200's and all of my other stats were nothing exceptional.