Recruiting lords into your kingdom is pretty much essential.I read somebody say they cleared the map by recruiting everyone and I need to go find it and ask them for more info. As I've read most people have trouble getting a good outcome from recruiting vassals.
It's totally not I took the whole map solo on hardest settings.Recruiting lords into your kingdom is pretty much essential.
I try to recruit tier 5 clans into my kingdom as they usually have a few lords in their clan. You get their fiefs when they defect too.
I have tried the "kill them all" approach, recently. But I think everybody gets mad at you this way, which is a bit weird? At least the game kept pinging away after each mass beheading with relationship drops including names that did not seem to belong to the immediate clan / kingdom I was giving the chop. I admit that I didn't really check though, as my plan was to kill everybody anyway. (Simple improvement suggestion: I do not need to be alerted with banners and sounds if I am dropping relations with someone already at -100...).My advice is, until they add more stuff and fixes, just do your best and enjoy building up, being a vassal or trying to be a kingdom.... then when you can't hack it anymore go mad king and start murdering everyone in the world who stands up to you.
That's definitely not true as a general rule. I have had plenty of defectors leaving with their fiefs, indeed with the fiefs I conquered for them. But I agree that recruiting higher tier clans tends to be advantageous as they have more lords that can help out.I try to recruit tier 5 clans into my kingdom as they usually have a few lords in their clan. You get their fiefs when they defect too.
Absolutely everybody in the world starts to hate you when you execute. Even notables of villages if you kill their faction people, don't know the exact rules but it very easily got to be -100 everywhere for me.... but it turns out forced recruitment is better then normal. The head chopping is an all in style, sure you could execute a few for fun but the real killing spree is to wipe out the entire map. You're right though, they don't react or behave differently weather they like you or not, I hope that get's changed at some point. Anyways what I'm saying is because the vassal system is (or was, could be better in 1.4.1?) broken, you could just finish the game by executing everyone when you're done trying to manage vassals.I have tried the "kill them all" approach, recently. But I think everybody gets mad at you this way, which is a bit weird? At least the game kept pinging away after each mass beheading with relationship drops including names that did not seem to belong to the immediate clan / kingdom I was giving the chop. I admit that I didn't really check though, as my plan was to kill everybody anyway. (Simple improvement suggestion: I do not need to be alerted with banners and sounds if I am dropping relations with someone already at -100...).
Anyway, the murdering did seem to slow down attacks somewhat, but not quick enough to make it viable for me in the short to medium term. Also, after some initial glee this gets old quick. There are a lot of heads to chop off, and the AI just happily sends one member of a clan after the other. There is no sense of self-preservation there. The slow down is purely from having less nobles / armies to send, not from them getting "scared" by a murderer who has slain dozens and dozens of nobles already.
I tried the opposite tactic next: release everybody you capture, getting relationship boosts. That also wasn't good enough, i.e., the AI kept attacking too much for me even if everybody kept telling me how sad they were to fight a friend. However, purely by game feel (no hard numbers, single runs so no stats) I would say that reduced attacks more than the head chopping. Maybe the AI does avoid attacking "high relations" targets somewhat? Anyway, it seemed to me like the "Mr Nice Guy" strat may have more legs (and certainly more heads...).
Convincing people to join your kingdom, and keeping them, is way too difficult. You have to hunt them down first, then you have to convince them in a mini-game that gets boring quickly and is begging to be save-scummed. And if you don't convince them, they will reject further advances for a long time (for ever?). They often ask for unpayably high bribes. And if you do get them, and build them up by giving them fiefs, they often just pack up and leave, usually to rejoin their old kingdom - with the holdings you conquered for them.
Suggestion: I don't know how to fix the current system, I just find it tedious and broken. However, I suggest that if one conquers the last holding of a clan, then that clan becomes amenable to recruitment with a reasonably high probability (50%?). And clans that have switched sides should find it very difficult to rejoin their betrayed old side at least. Maybe there also should be a chance (20%?) to lose a holding to "rebellion" upon switching, with a lost holding added like newly conquered to the old side. That way a frequent switcher attritions down.
I applaud your murderous perseverence, but I don't think this is for me...Anyways what I'm saying is because the vassal system is (or was, could be better in 1.4.1?) broken, you could just finish the game by executing everyone when you're done trying to manage vassals.
I probably shouldn't have used essential.It's totally not I took the whole map solo on hardest settings.
Yes, I've noticed some clans grew in my campaign. One clan for example only had himself and another male lord, deeper into my campaign I noticed his clan had grown to 8 or so members.Do AI clans actually ever grow, e.g., if they level up? Magically find a cousin behind the couch, or something?
gaining indepence as a separate kingdom
Actually I believe we all do want those things.<responding to blackbellamy two posts above>
I'm not sure that one can chracterise fairly the election system simply as "my lord gave me". But setting that aside: I like realism in games, but not to the point where it affects game enjoyment negatively. I'm playing a computer game after all, I'm not trying to do historical reenactment...
Furthermore, if you think the current system represents the lord trying to keep his vassals in line "realistically", fair enough. Then I would also like "realistic" options to deal with this, like being able to conspire against the lord with other clans in the kingdom or external powers, bribe, marry or murder my way onto the throne, etc. Realism in games always falls short, where it ends is a game design choice.
Found your problem.
In current EA state, proceeding to independent kingdom is asking for tears. The kingdom management, diplomacy, and a host of other mechanics for that stage of the game just aren't there yet. Not merely "only partially implemented" or "poorly balanced"; not there at all. They told us as much pre-release in devblogs. Of the 8 bulletized points you listed, I think this explains at least 4 or 5 of them.
I am NOT suggesting that you somehow made a mistake or played poorly by creating a kingdom. Instead, I criticize TW for allowing kingdom creation in the first place. They knowingly (and, to be fair, openly) left a void in the game...and in EA, I don't necessarily have a problem with that in itself. But then they gave us a door (via the main quest) through which the player can step into that void anyway. That's the decision I find completely inexplicable. (and now in 1.4.1 they've given us a "sandbox" route to do the same thing even faster...like that's gonna help...).