We Need a Jagiellon! - A Crusader Kings 3 Story

[pindicator]

How is the son situation? Just kind of general dullards or "oh hell, these morons are going to wreck the kingdom"?

More general dullards.  My player heir, Skirmantas, is Fickle (+1 Diplomacy, -2 Stewardship), Shy (-2 Diplomacy, +1 Learning), and Forgiving (+2 Diplomacy, -2 Intrigue, +1 Learning).  So as his traits all largely cancel each other out, it's no surprise his stats are all poor.  He has excellent Diplomacy thanks to being a Grey Eminence (+8 Diplomacy), average Learning, and is poor or terrible in everything else.  And that's with his wife's genius stats giving him +2 in everything.

The other brother, Drevanis, is worse.  He is Just (+2 Stewardship, -3 Intrigue, +1 Learning), Honest (+2 Diplomacy, -4 Intrigue), and Lazy (-1 to all stats).  He actually is good at Learning at 16 thanks to being a Master Philosopher (+8 Learning), but poor or terrible in everything else. Heh, he seems like the type of typical hipster you would run into in coffee shops in Portland a few years back.

If it wasn't for both of them having Genius wives then I'd fear for the whole family.  But perhaps the ladies can help right the ship.

The sisters show a little more promise but both are still underage and learning.  Roze is going to be a handful for some lucky chieftain, as she is Just, Arrogant, and Deceitful.  Daddy tried to teach her right but she just went the opposite direction.  But she looks like she is going to have some good stats.  Saule is Compassionate and hasn't picked up her other 2 traits yet.

And then there's Zygimantas who is only 2 years old.  Who knows how he'll turn out.

[pindicator]

Sventaragis, Part Five: Leaving a Legacy

Once the Defender of Dievas had finished building the Hall of Heroes at Breslau, suddenly I found that vassal opinion mattered a little less to me.  I have let my vassals do whatever they wished for most of the reign, free to declare their own wars on each other, free from consequence from me as their lord.  But some respect and fealty was due me now, and these distant chiefs waging war against true Vidilist rulers was unacceptable.  If they would not submit to Deivas, we would have to take the steps to reign them in.



The tradeoff was that we lost the +10 Vassal Opinion that came with the No Tribal Authority setting.

At 64 I can feel my time is starting to slip.  There is still much to be done, and perhaps I should no longer care about opinions of those lesser than me.  Most pressing seems to be capturing the Holy Site at Osel.  The ruler of Livonia is a child of 8, Chieftain Deryab II.  I declare for his lands within the de jure duchy of Estonia: Osel and Laanemaa.  The war is not noteworthy in the slightest and in December of 1088 we enforce our demands and take the territories.



My son Skirmantas' betrothed is finally old enough to marry.  Soaba is a genius and hopefully that will pass down our line.  She is Content, Generous, and Fickle and is educated as an Intricate Webweaver (+6 Intrigue).  I think she will make a good Queen one day.

Meanwhile my eldest daughter Roze continues her rebelious ways.  I had tried to guide her myself, but she only seems to take my opposites.  I caught her in a clear deceit and she stuck to it.

I am keeping an eye on Rogvolod's war against my cousin Duke Svarnas.  Svarnas seemes to have lost the initial battle and his army, but has now earned an ally in Chief of Sambia by marrying his sister Gintare off.  Now he has twice the men in the war and I am confident they will defeat the Orthodox Rogvolod.

Finishing up Masuria is the next war: High Chieftain Milzas still has 2 counties (my Chief of Bartia already took one), and we declare in December of 1088 for his lands.  Anyway, same story: destory army, capture Chieftain, take lands, give a rule to one of my favorite Champions.  This time it is Giemund's turn:




That would be my last war.  As the winter cold of 1089 started to settle in, Sventaragis found his body not reacting well.  He had felt age slow his speed and sap his strength, but this was different.  Now he was starting to become a prisoner in his own body:




The game decides that is not blunt enough, and I now have the following notification at the top center of my screen:




I do my best King Leer impersonation and divide my realm now, before my time is up:  Dravenis gets the Raseini and will inherit the High Chiefdom of Samogitia upon my death.  Young Zygimantas is given Yatvyagi and Trakai.  This will allow my heir, Skirmantas, to receive Breslau and the capital Kernave.  Zygimantas was going to be given Breslau without any action, and I do not want the Hall of Heroes falling out of my player heir's hands.

Really my mistake here was that I never should have given Skirmantas Siauliai, as that wasn't as important to me and since he was my player heir it stands against his inheritance.  So I had to give the other sons lands before I could give Skirmantas anything further, as the game won't let you just gift everything to one son at the end, you have to gift lands in order so everything stays evenly divided.




Noaidi was a treasure in these final months.  She gave me a gift, a wood carving.  It wasn't particularly good but I liked the thought.  And after infirmity began to set in she took me to readings.  I do not mean to speak ill of Gaila, as fate took her too soon, but Sventaragis was fortunate twice in marriage and Noaidi was never unfaithful (that I know of) and was rather sweet in his final year.

I like to think it was after one such reading that King Sventaragis went quietly in his sleep.  I'm sure he would have a preferred a warrior's death, but he was just too damn good at winning.




And so on January 14th, 1090, at the age of 66, Sventaragis Palemonaitis, the First King of Lithuania, lost his only war.  He was the head of his Culture and Dynasty, was Dreaded, Exalted Among Men, a Devoted Servant, Gallant, and fought in 20 wars.



***


The wider world in 1090






Long Live King Skirmantas!

[Amicalola]

So can we now expect a civil war between the brothers?

ahem I mean, RIP Sventaragis.

[pindicator]

So can we now expect a civil war between the brothers?

Hopefully never!

But I've done a little poking around so far and Skirmantas doesn't look like he has an easy start. Hardly anybody likes him! But I think it's fixable, we'll see what he can do.

Would you all prefer a short "state of the kingdom" post, or just jump into the action on the next update? Also, I think next update probably comes this weekend, as I'm going to have some time on Sunday.

[Cyneheard]

So can we now expect a civil war between the brothers?

Hopefully never!

But I've done a little poking around so far and Skirmantas doesn't look like he has an easy start.  Hardly anybody likes him!  But I think it's fixable, we'll see what he can do.

Would you all prefer a short "state of the kingdom" post, or just jump into the action on the next update?  Also, I think next update probably comes this weekend, as I'm going to have some time on Sunday.

I think I'd want a state of the kingdom - inheritance is different here from CK2 and this would help show some of that.

[Amicalola]

I'd also enjoy a short state of the kingdom post. The context would enhance the main updates quite a bit.

Has anything interesting happened in the non-Lithuanian world? It looks Hardrada might've won 1066 in this timeline.

[pindicator]

Skirmantas, Interregnum

A deep winter covers Lithuania as Skirmantas inherits the kingdom:




We have 15 vassals throughout the empire:  3 High Chieftains & 2 Dukes, and 10 Chieftains.  They don't really care for us too much.

Here's the same map broken down to show vassals.  I've added the ruler and their opinion of Skirmantas and highlighted the Powerful Vassals in red:




Powerful Vassals are a new addition to CK3.  The game determines the 5 most powerful leaders and they will all expect to be on the council or they become unhappy.  Powerful vassals get -40 Opinion for not being on the Council and anybody on the Council gets +10, so that's a 50 point swing.

So out of 15 vassals, only 3 have a positive opinion.  If you remember, High Chieftain Poklius was the guardian of Skirmantas, and that has paid off in that they became friends and Poklius is the person with the highest opinion of our new king.  I think a few of these leader opinions are salvageable: High Chieftain Pukveras of Bartia, Chieftain Skirmantas of Gardinas, and High Chieftain Sotvaras of Latigalia should all come positive once I give them council seats.  Varaka is a lost cause and is already plotting independence against me.  I hope to keep anyone strong from joining him, but likely I'm going to have to defeat Varaka in the field and imprison him.  Chieftain Kugas might come around if I give him a seat on the council and have a sway mission against him.  I am a diplomat this time, so let's play to that strength.

There are currently 3 wars going on within the realm:




High Chieftain Poklius is in a tough spot, defending in 2 wars.  First, Chieftain Meinekinus of Zemigalia is fighting to depose him.  Second, his other two vassals Chieftains Grobin and Totivilas are fighting for Grobin's claim for his title of High Chieftain.  Poklius has been soundly defeated and only has 50 men to his name.  He is allied to Sotvaras and Count Toke in Varend way over in Sweden, but Varend is currently losing a battle in this war.  It does not look good for Poklius to hold on to his title.  Did I mention he is the only vassal who really likes me?

Duke Svarnas of Polockas is still defending against Count Rogvolod's attempt to oust him.  However, the tables have turned with Svarnas' alliance to Sambia.  He also has added an alliance to High Chieftain Sotvaras and the Latigalian & Sambian armies are currently sieging down Rogvolod's palace at Lukoml.  I expect this war to be over within a few months.


Some people also asked about how inheritance works, so I'll touch on that a bit:




The blue outline is roughly the lands I had before Sventaragis died.  If you recall, we had already given the county of Siauliai to Skirmantas, so that is now added to our domain.  The game was going to automatically divide out titles to the 3 children, taking into account the fact a few facts:

• Skirmantas had already been given Siauliai (so you can't give everything to one son right before you die)
  
• Skirmantas was guaranteed to get Kernave because that is the capital.  He then gets the corresponding duchy and kingdom (and emperor if I go that high) titles for Kernave, so he is guaranteed to get Duchy and Kingdom of Lithuania titles.
  

With that in mind, the game doled out the High Chieftain of Samotigia to the 2nd son, Dravenis.  It was going to give him a county outside of Samotigia, and so I made sure to gift him Raseiniai so that he would have a county within Samotigia and we wouldn't have too awful of title gore.  Secondly, it wanted to give Breslau to Skirmantas but the game was going to give it to Zygimantas.  I had to gift Zygimantas both Yagvyagi and Trakai in order for Breslau to stay with Skirmantas.

I don't know the exact logic, but I would guess it went as follows:

• Everybody has been gifted at least 1 title so we skip to the second allocation.
  
• Skirmantas received the capital county title of Kernave and automatically gets the Duchy of Lithuania and Kingdom of Lithuania.
  
• Dravenis received the High Chiefdom of Samogitia title and all vassals that go with it
  
• Zygimantas had already received 2 titles and so is skipped
  
• Skirmantas received Breslau, the last remaining title to give out.
  

It would be unfortunate if Zygimantas befell some accident before he comes of age and produces an heir.  His titles would then transfer to ... well, to me!




The succession screen shows my current inheritance laws for my top title.  Later on I'm hoping to change this to be a single-inheritance law, or at least High Partition, which would allow all the county titles within my realm capital's duchy to stay with my player heir.  Things can get confusing because every title has it's own inheritance laws and different titles in the same realm can have different laws!  But right now everything should be Confederate Partition and Male-Preference.  I'll try to remember to show this later in the rule of Skirmantas so we can see how the game shows how the titles will be doled out.

And yes, Skirmantas has already named his son Sventaragis.  How original of him.




Sadly, Sventaragis Jr did not get his mother's Genius trait, but instead ended up with Ugly (-2 Diplomacy, -20% Fertility).  Tough luck, kid.

***


As far as outside Lithuania, not a whole lot has changed that wasn't touched on already.  Chernigov to my east has splintered, and both are weak, but I do not see how I can take advantage of this.  Aside from Pomerania splitting, the remaining baltic tribes are largely the same.  Farther south, Hungary has joined the HRE.

Wide world, Amicalola already noted how Hadrada has won England.  The Normans failed and then were gobbled up by France.  in Spain, Sancho II has united the Jimenez brothers' lands but has yet to push into Andalucia.  The Byzantines have pushed the Fatamids back out of Syria, but the Fatamids still hold Jerusalem.  The Seljuks have transformed into the Persian empire and have taken some land from the Byzantines in Armenia.

[pindicator]

I've played through a bit, and without giving away too much of what's going on, I am at a bit of a crossroads with Skirmantas. He is able to undertake some real warring finally, and I have 3 really nice targets. Do I:

• Invade Poland and take the Duchy of Moravia. Poland was starting to look like a monster but their king recently died and they are relatively weak now. This is an opportunity to knock them down a peg.
  
• Invade Pomerania and continue my march west along the Baltic coast. Aiming for the last Vidilist Holy Site in Veletia, to the west of Pomerania.
  
• Invade Veletia directly. Owning all 5 Holy Sites would allow my to Reform the Vidilist Faith, but that will probably have to be with another character - or I will have to spend the rest of Skirmantas' rule trying to get as much Piety as I can. I'll need at least 8,000 Piety and my character isn't particularly Pious: we only have 600. There are ways, however.

Help me choose while I put together an update for the first part of Skirmantas' rule

[thestick]

I have no idea what's going on, but I say, Pomerania with a goal to getting Veletia later. Gotta reform the faith while keeping borders aesthetically pleasing.

[Amicalola]

Pomerania with the goal of your descendant reforming the faith sounds fun. Not sure what Skirmantas could do after that though, kinda depends on the wider world I suppose.