Best Korea: Part 09: 1513-1518: First War for the Mandate

It was to help Ming fall harder.

I had 44k troops to their 46k. They also had 22k with their disloyal vassals.

A much bitter problems were endless swarms of rebels I'd rather not run into, more than both our armies put together.

Unfortunately I couldn't avoid the rebels, and Ming was so far from being a great power Chagatai attacked their horde Kara Del, completely ignoring Ming's protection.

Ming's army was almost inconsequential, and its vassals did nothing except accidentally bumped their ships into my navy. Rebels on the other hand, those were really annoying.

Rebels ignore fort zones of controls as much as AI. Here Qi rebel march through Beijing's fort like it's not there.

Ming got completely obliterated. They lost Nanjing and their whole coastline. Even Chagatai took some provinces. By event Ming fleet established itself on part of Taiwan I didn't control - I made them my tributaries as well.

Unfortunately I got regency and 89k pretender rebels.

In a few years situation stabilized a bit.

Yue, Wu, Kham, and Ryukyu signed an alliance with presumed intention of gaining independence from Ming, but they didn't have balls to trigger it yet. No matter, they'd surely do next time I beat up Ming.

Anyway, that's it for this campaign. From this point on, it would just be waiting for mana and truces, and trivial wars with Ming, Japan, and various Chinese minors.

I don't have Colonialism yet, but my 5th colony in New World is due to finish soon, so that won't be much of a problem.

Rebels probably won't trigger normal defections, but they'll trigger Mingsplosion by special events.

Ming fell to 3rd place as great power, but by income, manpower, and realistic army strength it's really like 20th or so country, like Qara Qoyunlu or Jaunpur, not like the first league. And its collapse is not even halfway done.

Overall, it was a fun little campaign. It turned out to be a lot easier than I expected. I initially thought by 1518 I'd be just about finishing unification of Manchuria and maybe doing some fighting in Indonesia and New World because Japan and Ming would both be too strong for me - and I'd only go after them once I have Malacca money.

Confucianism and Rebels

Big surprise was just how terrible Confucian is while I'm harmonizing. Permanent 0 legitimacy and -3 tolerance of true faith adds up to +9 extra unrest:

• -3 tolerance from harmony
• -1 tolerance from zero legitimacy
• -2 unrest reduction from zero legitimacy
• lack of +2 unrest reduction from full legitimacy
• lack of +1 tolerance from full legitimacy

It also causes -2 diplo rep, so I couldn't annex Yeren in 45 years!

I generally thought that unrest in EU4 is too trivial. I guess I never played Confucians before. Knowing what I do, I'd probably have been better off converting to Shinto by rebels. Maybe even Vajrayana or Tengri (is converting to Tengri by rebels possible?).

Now it's not quite as bad, as -1 yearly legitimacy can be overcome or at least alleviated and RNG resets legitimacy on succession, so penalty would be somewhat smaller, but even at half legitimacy it's still +6 extra unrest. It's really tedious.

Korean Mission Tree review

Korean mission tree feels poorly designed. I liked two disasters (first one finished, second one I only got first event from) in it, with missions that remove them. The rest is bad.

For example the "Expand Homeland" mission for 30 Korean provinces. But Confucian blocks culture conversion due to religious differences, and trade company regions block conversion by colonization. So Korea is the worst country in the world to expand its culture.

The whole Japan subtree is gated by mission to have 30 galleys and 5 heavies. I crushed Japanese and Ming fleets and conquered most of Japan without building a single war ship - just starting ones and captured ones were enough (I built transports and later some lights for trade).

Manchuria mission chain is gated by taking and coring Liaoning state from Ming. Which I even did, but my vassal holds part of it, so I can't finish Manchuria chain even though I held it for half the game.

Korean missions seem OK in isolation, they just fit play pattern very poorly, even if I do what missions ask me to (conquer Manchuria, Japan, and North-West China coast).

If Korea wants to colonize instead, which is probably the second most obvious strategy, missions get totally nothing.

Mingsplosion is back

EU4 rebels are a nuisance, and Ming needed a lot of scripting to be able to fall over and die. It's huge improvement over eternally stable Ming from previous patches.

It still feels like fighting for throne of China is not worth it. You need three cities (Beijing, Nanjing, Canton) to not constantly lose legitimacy. If you have them, you probably have whole Chinese coastline at least, plus whatever was your home territory. That means you're probably #1 great power at this point - and nobody in East Asia can possibly oppose you, as your nearest potential threat is Ottomans or maybe by late game Russia.

It's still great news if you're playing a random minor, and want to grab some land in the resulting chaos.

Best Korea: Part 08: 1503-1513: Fall of Kyoto

Ming Crisis disaster triggered, bringing them down to 7 mandate, and spawning rebels everywhere.

Confucian is the worst religion

I had so many rebels it felt like a crisis too. That's a combination of a few issues.

First, Confucianism is just poop tier religion with permanent 0 harmony, permanent −3 tolerance of true faith, and permanent 0 legitimacy no matter what. If you harmonize other religions, you'll have 0 harmony. If you convert, you'll have zero harmony. Buddhist got karma rebalance, so it's by far the worst religion in the game. Unless you don't expand at all, then it's OK I guess.

Once you harmonize every religion, and that takes 10 times 33 years, and you let your country recover a bit, it actually becomes good. But that's 1775 and at this point the campaign is over.

OK, you can probably skip Zoroastrians and Jews, maybe save a few harmonization years due to events, and finish 1700.

Normally if you have unrest issues, you could take religious or humanist.

Unfortunately neither works. Religious gives you huge bonuses to conversions, something you're penalized for doing. Humanist gives you bonuses to tolerance of wrong faiths, but they don't apply to harmonized faiths. Your tolerance of own faith will often be worse than your tolerance of other faiths due to permanent 0 harmony.

Second, if I'm Asian I get bad religion and bad culture in trade company regions, even though I can't make them trade companies. This is really annoying.

You can't even culture convert them with mana - as Confucian you pretty much can't convert anyone due to no missionary strength bonuses, you can't convert at all if you harmonized them, and harmonized religions still don't count as yours for culture conversion, so it's hard blocked.

And third and fourth, I got cruel trait and many events that piss off my estates because why not, let's pile it up.

Still, rebels in EU4 are just mostly harmless annoyance. They force me to keep army upkeep at high during peace time, and make me lose manpower and money reserves, but I'm not terribly hurting for either.

Third War with Japan

One of Ashikaga's OPM daimyos turned into another daimyo tag, without a truce with me. That's really convenient, as Ashikaga's and Ming's truces were really close to each other, so by saving just a few years I can 100% them both much more comfortably.

The war was very easy, I took Kyoto for myself, and a few other provinces for my vassal daimyo. It turns out this breaks their relationship, so now they're allies/tributaries of Ashikaga, but as independent countries. If I knew that maybe I'd have done it sooner. Oh well, it's still two wars to take over the rest of Japan.

Ming Crisis

Ming is covered by rebels and with nearly no mandate. It had to appoint autonomous governors of Yue and Wu in the South, and lose of direct control over Canton costs them another -0.05 mandate a month, on top of penalty for Beijing.

Yue and Wu are technically their vassal, but since they're both completely disloyal I wouldn't worry too much about them.

I could just watch them burn, or I could speed up the process a little.

Mingslosion has begun. Technically it's their land, just as marches.

In practice Ming doesn't have much time left.

Best Korea: Part 07: 1499-1503: Korean Beijing

I have 2 mountain forts protecting West and East pass from Manchuria to Korea, but if Ming moves fast enough, they have enough artillery and good enough generals, and they could take them and be on my capital before my troops come back.

Even worse, they could also get all their navies together and prevent me from ever returning to the mainland. It would be disastrous.

There's often huge tactical advantage for the attacker, since they can have troops and fleets in place the moment of attack. It's a good thing AI rarely takes full advantage of it.

Still, I really need to finish war with Japan as soon as possible. Fortunately their armies were really poorly coordinated, and I got that Age of Discovery ability  to let me transfer vassals for half cost, so I got myself 64dev Ogasawara and 32dev Tokugawa as vassals.

That leaves Ashikaga with just 3 OPM daimyos, and since they control Kyoto and Tokyo they could annex them and form Japan.

Ming's military was completely lost. They were unprepared for my quick return from Japan, and their fleets and armies were divided between North and South frontlines. Soon Beijing was sacked, and half the Ming fleet was under water.

It looks impressive, but Ming has so much depth and so many armies pushing for 100% war foolish.

I didn't have paper mana to even core what I took anyway.

Originally I hoped to white peace Ming as soon as possible, but the war unexpectedly went really well.

Ming was far from crushed, and they just reached neutral mandate point of 50. I knew exactly what I needed. Beijing with its whole territory, two nearby forts, war reparations, and 682 gold to be divided between us, with me getting 468.

I could get so much as Ming attacked me with Unify China CB, not Enforce Tributary CB, and that gives 50% warscore cost discount on all lands in China region. It's really their fault for walking into this trap. Any other CB, and there's no way I'd be able to get that much.

I hoped to get Colonialism, as it can spawn for anyone who discovered a single New World province, unfortunately Portugal got it. Portugal already finished one colony in Caribbean and is building 2 more, and I barely started one in Aleuts, so I guess they deserve it.

Eyeballing it, I think we had 3 eligible provinces each, and nobody else had any, so it was a 50% shot that I lost.

I can get Colonialism without dev push if I get a colonial nation, so I guess that's the priority now.

And so ends Age of Discovery. Age of Reformation is upon us, and we're definitely reforming Confucian faith to include other faiths.

Pretty typical timeline elsewhere.

So far everything went really smoothly this campaign.

I got into many fights which were against the odds on paper, but I had some kind of leverage in them all.

Ming waited too long with its attack, and was too indecisive.

If I also got Colonialism, that would just be ridiculous amount of luck.

Great Powers:

• Ming - much weakened due to foolish war, and loss of Beijing is costing it mandate. Due to have Crisis of the Ming Dynasty disaster in March 1507
• Korea - freshly took Beijing, and controlling 1/3 of Japan directly and 1/3 through vassals
• Ottomans - took some border provinces from the Mamluks with a fort. This looks trivial on the map, but AI Mamluks is doomed in their next war
• France - a bit stuck what it's doing
• Muscovy - it needs either Ryazan or Smolensk (held by the Commonwealth) to form Russia, and it foolishly allied Ryazan, so Russia might not form at all
• Castile/Aragon/Naples/Navarra - needs to remove Grenada to form Spain, and Grenada is allied with Morocco, Tunis, and the Ottomans, so best of luck
• Poland/Lithuania - can form Commonwealth as soon as it gets the right tech
• Mamluks - expanded a bit into the dessert, but already started losing to the Ottomans

Other interesting countries:

• Lan Xang - after breaking free from Ming, it got 2 tributaries for itself, and that blocks it from ever becoming Ming's tributary
• Khmer - also broke free from Ming, rival of Lan Xang in spite of their shared alliances with Korea and Pegu. Has has Zhu dynasty as Ming and Korea.
• Ashikaga - has 3 OPM daimyo vassals, could technically form Japan if it annexes its daimyos and I annex my 2 independent daimyos, but I don't plan to let it
• Timurids - expanding into Persia instead of into India. I'd really love to see some Mughals
• Bohemia - new HRE emperor. First reform passed, but reformation already started, so that's how far it's likely to go

Best Korea: Part 06: 1486-1499: Ming attacks

My great relations with Ming didn't last long, and soon after Ming's rival Ashikaga got crushed, Ming decided to rival me and break our alliance.

My backup plan was already in place. In addition to Lan Xang, and Khmer, I also allied Oirats. So if Ming decided to attack me, it will instantly dismantle their tributary zone. Well, assuming my allies join that war, but AI usually joins defensive wars.

I also got Pegu for added protection, since it was ally of my ally, so fairly safe one.

Ming entered Golden Era in June 1493. I hope they don't survive it all.

I took expansion as second idea group. I'll need administrative and maybe humanist next, so my paper mana is going to be extremely pressured.

I started establishing tributaries in Southern Islands, and I got first taste of the Ming conflict, as Ming's tributary Malacca attacked my tributaries Palembang. I first sent my fleets, then even some troops to knock out Sulu out of the war, but it was like 10% participation.

Ming sent some insults my way, but didn't actually attack.

By the time second war with Japan was due, it was nearly unified, with just 5 daimyo under Ashikaga clan.

Order of battle, me:

• 32k inf, 8k cav, 2k art (42k total)
• 6 lights, 10 galleys, 13 transports (29 total)
• I told my vassal Yeren to stay out of it, so not counting their troops

Japan, its 5 daimyos, and Ryukyu:

• 36k inf, 5k cav (41k total)
• 13 lights, 14 galleys, 16 transports (43 total)

With mil tech advantage of 8 to 7.

Unfortunately while I was happily sieging Kyoto, Ming attacked. Oirats betrayed me, but Lan Xang, Khmer, and Pegu joined.

Order of battle, our side:

• 60k inf, 24k cav, 3k art (87k total)
• 4 heavies, 24 ligcht, 22 galleys, 31 transports (81 total)

Ming:

• 56k inf, 15k cav, 13k art (84k total)
• 1 heavy, 7 lights, 15 galleys, 23 transports (46 total)

Ming at 43 mandate suffers minor penalties, and they have tech 8 unlike my allies still at 7.

It's about even in theory, but there's pretty much no way my allies will effectively coordinate it.

I already achieved one objective and removed 323dev of Ming tributaries from their list, leaving them with just 422dev. Unfortunately by this patch, non-tributaries no longer cause mandate loss, but at least Ming will gain mandate more slowly.

Also Ming is currently being ruled by a 1/2/3 empress with petty (-0.05 monthly mandate), as a regent for a 0/0/3 boy. That's seriously miserable.

If I can quickly finish war in Japan and safely move my armies and fleets to Korea, I should be fine. I'd like to use transfer vassal to get remaining daimyos cheaply under me for half price - I don't think I ever used this ability.

I'm fine with a stalemate, or even minor concessions to Ming, next age is just a few years away, and they get some painful disaster chain.

Best case scenario is that Ming somehow fumbles so hard they lose their mandate, and I take Beijing in first war, but I'm not counting on that.

Best Korea: Part 05: 1479-1486: First War with Japan

I started creating network of tributaries with Brunei, which prefered that to our alliance. Unfortunately they patched it so AI will never accept tributary unless you border them directly - it's generally sensible, but I don't see why minor islands and Kamchatka OPMs wouldn't want to be my tributaries, I'm a sea zone away. I'll deal with it eventually.

It was high time to show some Great Power Energy, so I declared war on Japan.

My forces:

• 26inf / 6cav / 2art (34k total)
• 6 light ships
• 8 galleys
• 10 transports
• plus technically 4inf 1cav from Yeren, but no way they'd actually help
• plus technically 2 lights / 2 galleys / 3 transports from Yeren

Enemy forces (participating):

• 37inf / 6cav (43k)
• 17 lights
• 16 galleys
• 20 transports

They're also quite far behind on tech, with most of Japan being on mil tech 5-6 while I'm on mil tech 7. Paying for Renaissance early is totally worth it.

War goal was part of Hokkaido occupied by the Japanese.

I don't actually fight all Japanese daimyos, as some are at war with each other, and that blocks it. Otherwise they'd have something closer to 55k-60k troops.

There was zero coordination between enemy fleets so I scored victory after victory in spite of their numerical superiority. I didn't lose a single ship and I sunk 43 and captured 6 of theirs, including somehow capturing a heavy ship that wasn't there originally.

From Hokkaido my armies marched to East Honshu. This turned out to be a disaster - enemy armies overwhelmed me with numbers.

So another plan - declare two more wars on damiyos who did not originally participate. First take Tsushima (separate tiny war), then Kyushu (half of it in separate war), then Shikoku. All while using my naval superiority to prevent enemy reinforcents.

After that I tried invading Hoshu from Shikoku, and I failed miserably again.

Japan got some reinforcements, as daimyos who originally were blocked from joining the war got unblocked and joined halfway. Then rebels brought Mori back to life, instantly as their daimyo, and with 10k free stack.

Third invasion was more successful - road from Shikoku to Kyoto isn't too far, so first I stack wiped a few tiny armies for warscore. Then I carpet sieged surroundings, and put my stack on Kyoto.

Once I sacked it, that got Ashikaga clan really interested in peace talks. I took Tsushima, Kyushu, Shikoku, their last province in Hokkaido, and two provinces on Honshu cutting it in half, just next to Kyoto.

A lot of my warscore was from ticking warscore on that Hokkaido province, and from naval battles. I never really reached convinging superiority on land, but it was good enough.

That's 97dev of Japanese land, or a bit over a third of it. Next war my naval superiority will be of little use as Japan has only its one island left, island trap strategy got nerfed many patches ago, and there's no obvious easy ticking warscore, but just balance of power should be much more even.

Ming is slowly recovering from low mandate due to first reform.

For second reform I took +2 promoted cultures over -0.05 monthly autonomy change. Empire of China requires weird culture juggling, and if I need less autonomy I can always force it upon peasants.

It's going too well. Machuria is fully controlled, I'm independent from Ming, Japan is defeated, and my colonies start spreading both North and South.

On the downside my unrest is killing me as Confucian monarchies are awful, Ming refuses to collapse, and I don't have any clear next steps after Japan.

Best Korea: Part 04: 1476-1479: New Great Power in Asia

A few weeks after 2nd Ming War for Oirat Tribute began, our troops also crossed the border. It was a race with Ming who gets to their capital first, and Ming won, so I took just 6 provinces for 53% warscore and called it a day.

Ming succeeded at making Oirats pay tribute and taking some Mongol land. Oirats are probably better off this way, as this will protect them from falling prey to other hordes attacking from the West, as happened after their previous war against Ming.

My cousin Ming emperor passed the first reform, and I wasn't really interested in continuing tribute payment to someone so obviously not favoured by the Heavens. He officially withdrew his protection in April 1478, instantly turning us into 3rd great power after Ming and Ottomans.

I strategically prepared for this by alliances with Lan Xang, Khmer, and Brunei. I thought this would lead to confrontation, and initially there was hostility from Beijing court. However, diplomacy won the day. My cousin had no fight in him, we agreed to border in Mongolia, and signed an alliance. Well, that went a lot easier than expected.

This got Ashikaga clan of Japanese shoguns really worried - both Ming and Korea are hostile to it. They have just 14 daimyo vassals, and with each vassal providing 3k army and some boats pretty much regardless of their size, this weakens their power compared with how they started.

Great power situation:

• Ming with very strong South-East Asian tributaries and a pet horde
• Ottomans with Constantinople and Crimea as vassal. They control Moldova which they took by force.
• Korea with Yeren horde as a vassal who wants to start building its tributary network
• France who clearly won the Hundred Years War
• Poland/Lithuania with Danzig vassal, and Teutons completely destroyed
• Castile/Aragon/Naples/Navarra union, which somehow still left Granada as OPM 
• Timurids, who survived in spite of Shah Rukh dying in 1447. This is actually a big downside to Fun and Balance. Vanilla Timurids start over relationship limit, so their vassals' rebellion really wrecks them. Fun and Balance has higher limit, so they get a few allies, and generally win. Could Mughals form this timeline?
• Mamluks who so far avoided big showdown with the Ottomans

Other countries of interest:

• Muscovy just got kicked out of the list by Korea's entrance.
• Lan Xang waited out coalition against itself
• Austria is still the emperor
• Portugal started exploring and settling minor islands in the Atlantic

Overall fairly typical timeline outside Korea.

Best Korea: Part 03: 1462-1476: Struggles of the Peasantry

Reign of king Yung I Zhu started much less exciting than his predecessor.

For the first government reform I gave nobles more power in exchange for more manpower. I'm not really sure if it's better to do this, or take extra taxes.

First colonists arrived, and given choice between colonizing South or North, I chose Taiwan. Event founded second colony on Taiwan, getting me over colony limit right away. Paying 6 gold for 2 colonies is expensive, but nothing crazy, and they grow faster when they border each other.

I started getting some allies down South - Lan Xang (which has a coalition against itself) and Brunei. Not really sure what I'll do with them, I can't really spare any troops for colonial adventures, but it could change someday.

The Ming-Oirat war ended up with Oirat paying 600 gold plus reparations to Ming. As soon as that ended, Oirats immediately got attacked by Uzbek and Chagatai hordes.

I requested our rightful clay Gaizhou from Ming, but it was denied. What an outrage.

Toki, one of the daimyos, conquered most of East Japan, and so got 2 coalition wars, conquest war, and reconquest war against them simultaneously.

I got annoying Struggles of the Peasantry modifier giving me massive unrest. I was also at permanent 0 legitimacy, as Confucianism and monarchy apparently don't mix. Ming can get away with being Confucian, as it doesn't use legitimacy.

I even got a plutocratic coup ticking on top, caused by game inexplicably recalculating "Controlled Provinces %" for estates without anything actually happening. The most annoying part of estate interface is that the tooltip lies, and whenever I think I figured out all its lies, it turns out there are some more. They'll never fix it, they plan to replace the whole system in next patch.

I took one loan, developed all provinces in Korea to 6dev+, and that let me do the mission and get rid of peasant disaster.

Finally I managed to harmonize with Pagan religions of my Manchu subjects. That gave me -0.5 unrest bonus, as well as finally got religious unity to reasonable level. Coming next is Vajrayana, but that's a much smaller minority.

Both colonies on Taiwan are nearing completion. For now I'll stick to one colony at a time unless I get another by event.

Ming started another war against the Oirats. This could be good time to grab myself a chunk of Mongolia and maybe some gold.

Japan is down to just 14 daimyo vassals. It's reaching the point where attacking them would actually be sensible, but I'd need to invest money I don't really have into a fleet.

Borders didn't really change, but first of two unique Korean disaster chains averted.

Based in income and armies I'd say I'm about 1/3 as strong as Ming, and they currently have a much more stable country.

Best Korea: Part 02: 1453-1462: Legacy of King Sejong Do Yi

Capital of Hanseong got developed to 37dev, making it the richest city in the world, ahead of Constantinople, Nanjing, Paris, Milan, Beijing, Cairo, and Rome.

I adopted Renaissance in 1455, five years after Montferrat. It's slowly spreading to China due to our friendly relations.

It was time to clean up Manchuria a bit. Korchin had no friends. Haixi was allied to my rival Oirat, but Oirat was fighting and losing war to Ming, so they joined war against me, but couldn't afford to send any troops to help Haixi.

The last act of king Sejong Do Yi was sending ships of exploration to the Northern sea.

My king Sejong Do Yi died in 1462, ending the Yi dynasty, after disinheriting three of his heirs as disappointing.

He took Korea from a 135dev minor exposed to risk of Manchu raids into 385dev power and overlord of the still rebelious Manchu tribes. He brought Renaissance to Korea. He diligently sent tribute to Ming China every year.

Due to extensive intermarriage with Zhu dynasty ruling China, a 3/4/3 King Yung I Zhu took the throne, cousin of the Ming emperor.

The new king already started talking that he's the rightful ruler of China, not his cousin, but only when there were no Chinese to hear that.

The Ming-Oirat war has been ongoing since 1453, completely exhausting Ming, Oirat, and Oirat's vassal Mongolia. 240k Chinese and 50k Oirats died, and Ming has been on the offensive, but they can't capture the wargoal that is Oirat capital.

Ming can only hire 30k mercenaries, and it has long ran out of manpower, with barely 20k of its troops left. Oirats and Mongols have nearly 30k between them - not enough to invade Ming, but sufficient to fight for stalemate.

Ming is still holding a lot better than the Oirats, and their war will probably end with Oirats just paying some monetary reparations, with each dead Chinese peasant being worth very little.

Ruling Ashikaga clan of Japan still has 19 daimyos under it out of 30 it started with, with civil war raging between the daimyos but nobody yet strong enough to challenge Ashikaga.

The goal for next decade is consolidate Korean rule over the Manchus, and start colonizing. Oirats, Ming, and Japan are all too strong to challenge directly.

Best Korea: Part 01: 1444-1453: Peace in Manchuria

It's been a while since I last played EU4, and also this blog has been fairly inactive since Google Plus died.

I've been looking for countries with decent content, and Korea looks like one. It has 7th biggest mission tree, Emperorship of China got major rebalance, and Mingsplosions being a possibility again is going to make this part of the world a much more interesting place than it was in previous patches.

The rough outline of my plan is:

• stay Confucian and Korea
• rush unify Manchuria region by force, deal with coalitions by eliminating any potential coalition members
• colonize my way to Malacca node and get Pacific coast of the New World, turning Pacific into Great Korean Sea
• conquer Japan
• if Ming refuses to explode, push them a bit
• challenge Ming for emperorship of China
• dev push for institutions if necessary

Some difficulties:

• I only border Ming and Jiangzhou, but I have truce with Jiangzhou until 1450
• Korea gets a lot of custom disasters
• There's a lot of missions, but they very poorly fit any sensible strategy

First order of business was war with Donghai and Korchin. Korchin is inland, so I couldn't take any land from them, so I took all their money and humiliated them. Donghai got fully annexed.

Next quick war was attack on Udege, which got divided between me and Solon. Their ally Korchin tried to help, but got attacked by Ming.

Then war with Jiangzhou, in which I took most of it while vassalizing Yeren. I couldn't take 100% without going through overextension.

Then a war with Nivikh, Solon, and Ainu to feed my Yeren vassal. I annexed Nivikh for my vassal, Ainu for myself, and Solon unfortunately had to be left with a province as numbers didn't add up.

Unfortunately Haixi which up to this point was a good ally broke our alliance.

This is close to solving my Aggressive Expansion issues. Korchin, Haixi, Jiangzhou, and Solon are the only countries left in the region. Oirat, Ming, and Japan don't care due to cultural and religious differences.

I'm 82% towards developing Renaissance in my capital. It should have been easier, but I got a lot of bad events making burghers disloyal and increasing development cost. This all cost me a lot of points, but my starting monarch is a 6/5/5, so this early push is worth it. Unfortunately I had to give two of my heirs swimming lessons. Hopefully I get someone decent.

My vassal Yeren horde is feeling disloyal, but I have time to deal with it.

I'll clean up Manchuria, but I'm definitely safe from the hordes for now. Oirat and Ming are fighting, for now I'm OK paying Ming for protection.

Next goal is exploration for establishing peaceful trade relations with good people of Southern islands of the Great Korean Sea.

Japan is right now very difficult to deal with thanks to their crazy vassal swarm, but they'll only get weaker as daimyos conquer each other.

I've check some youtube guides, and a lot of them are "Wait for your truce with Jiangzhou to run out in 1450". How about not doing that?

Iron Century Piasts: Part 13: 1071-1074: Imperial Love Affairs

I invited my distant cousin Wszebora, queen of Vladimir, to secluded garden, and tried to seduce her, but she not only rejected my advances, but overreacted and attacked me with a knife. I managed to overpower her, and in the fight she died.

My steward erected a grand monument in middle of Vilnius - of a couple making love. It caused a minor scandal, but I liked it.

My servants found a newborn boy in a basket under the magical rose bush of my dryad lover. I adopted him and named him Sieciech. After hearing this story, my daughter Nadzieja wanted magical brother-husband, so I promised that they'll marry once he comes of age.

My Chinese wife was really unhappy about all this, going even as far as challenging one of my lovers to a duel.

All this chasing tail exhausted me, and I died at young age of 40, succeeded by my older sister Zwinslawa.

The family gathered on Przemyslaw's funeral, and there was already talk of dividing his realm. Khazars, Hungarians, Bulgarians, and even Sicilians keep ravaging South and East parts, and one empress can't handle it all. Zwinslawa also somehow gathered 6 king titles, which goes against how this empire was meant to be organized.

Any reorganization should be discussed with my cousin (also named) Zwinslawa, empress of the Romans, as our realms are intertwined.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 12: 1061-1071: Empire of the Romans

My grandfather Pothos was the rightful emperor of the Romans. It was time to press his claim. I already have an empire, but my aunt deserves one as well.

My great-grandfather was Satan himself, but since Satan is immortal, there will never be any claim from that.

Conquest of Rome

Even though my aunt's claim was somewhat distant, Rome was already in state of civil war, so I pressed her claim.

It wasn't too hard to defeat the Romans. Her primary title as queen of Wallachia going with her was fine, but I'm seriously annoyed that she somehow inherited Novgorod and random duchy on coast of Norway, creating massive bordergore.

She soon got herself a huge revolt against her rule, and I had to help her.

My aunt Empress of the Romans died of camp fever. As high priest I pronounced her a saint.

She was succeeded by my cousin Zwinslawa, who married my father Sambor after my mother died.

Failed Conversion of Bulgaria

My ploy to get Slavic prince inherit Bulgaria succeeded without any bloodshed. It only took a few months before he managed to get his vassals revolt over some revocation, and Bulgaria is back in Orthodox hands.

Conquest of Serbia

I got young queen of Serbia betrothed to my cousin, so my family could inherit that throne. Sadly faction demand spoiled those plans.

I tried to deal with these problems discreetly, but Serbian queen falsely claimed that I attempted to murder her. I had to intervene, taking Serbian crown for myself, and giving my cousin and his Serbian wife a duchy each.

All revoked land was given to my family members.

Conquest of Germany

Slavic khan of Germany got overthrown, but his vassals installed his Tengri son instead - married to a Sunni woman. Unfortunately it wasn't to last long, and Germans installed a Catholic king soon after. Still, he only ruled about half of Germany.

Well, former khagan and former king Blush was still very much claiming to be the rightful ruler of Germany, and his unfaithful vassals needed to be punished. This time I kept him as a vassal, and once kings of the Germans was my vassals, I pushed on to unite scattered pieces of Germany.

There were some rebellions on the way too, but in the end, nothing was left of old German aristocracy other than duchy of Mecklenburg which somehow converted to Slavic faith at the right time.

Meanwhile in Aquitaine

Queen Pernette of Aquitaine is married to my brother Szczesny, duke of Bavaria. There's just one small problem that they aren't making any babies.

Personal Matters

Continuing family tradition, I slayed one of the Old God.

After that I went on a seduction spree, with many duchesses bearing my bastards.

I made Serene Republic of Venice my tributary, but then peasant revolt overthrew the whole system over there.

There's been endless raids by Germanic hosts, which is surprising as this religion is basically dead in the open, and really just something our family practices in secret for the sake of it.

To the North-East, there's been very successful missionary activities, and most of those countries are Slavic now.

This realm is long overdue for division now, I was just too busy to do this
Piast sphere of influence now covers almost all of Europe from Barcelona and Brittany to Perm and Caucasus

Iron Century Piasts: Part 11: 1055-1061: Emperor Przemyslaw

Succession roulette returned emperor Przemyslaw. I had to mod the game to make bloodlines hereditary through either parent.

Family council gathered at memorial service for empress Zwinislawa, and to avoid the inevitable family bloodshed it was decided that emperor title will be mostly ceremonial, and 10 constituent kingdoms will be ruled by their 3 kings and 7 queens having wide autonomy, and right to leave the empire. So far everybody's happy to remain.

Everyone was closely related:

• Sambor of Bohemia - my father
• Katarzyna of Wallachia - my aunt
• Zofia of Sweden - my cousin
• Zwislawa of Poland - my sister
• Dobrava of Ruthenia - granddaughter of my great grandmother Zofia, queen of Lithuania
• Zofia of Denmark - granddaughter of my great grandmother Zofia, queen of Lithuania
• Savonia of Novgorod - granddaughter of my great grandmother Zofia, queen of Lithuania
• Wszebora of Vladimir - great great grandson of my great great grandfather Mieszko, king Mieszko of Poland
• Feodor of Chernigov - great great grandson of my great great great grandfather Siemomysl, king of Poland

It's a shame the game wouldn't use the "third cousins twice removed" and such system. I don't actually know what it means, but I'd probably learn after a while.

Actually we were a lot closer than that due to high degree of intermarriage between siblings and cousins.

And of course my wife Wszemila was also my sister.

Feodor's branch of the family became Russian provincials, everyone else was properly civilized Polish.

Religious Matters

So in spite of being the head of Slavic church of Perun, I was actually secretly Germanic. As was my wife, my father, and overall 6/10 kings in the empire. It wasn't anything serious, just a passing fad in high society.

Then again, rumor has it empress Zwinislawa was daughter and high priestess of Chernobog. And before that her mother Zofia was the lover and high priestess of Chernobog.

Chinese Wife

My sister-wife got punished for heir whoring and died of great pox.

Nobody in my family was available. I had a small affair with my sister, but she was already married to my uncle, and I'm not going to assassinate my uncle just to make her avaialble.

I was looking for a new wife for myself, and noticed that Pernette, a 1 year old Orthodox Karling queen of Aquitaine was facing a revolt, and was desperate for help of any kind. She's far too young for me, but I betrothed her to my 10 year old brother.

I sent all the troops to fight her revolt, got it to 99%, was about to deal them the final blow, but she white peaced the rebels the next day. Stupid girl.

I couldn't find anyone worth marrying in known world, so I send for a wife to China, and he sent me Wuyasu, a 20/6/6/4/7 attractive Jurchen girl.

War for Germany

Germany was in state of civil war, so I invited a claimant, had a quick religious conversion ceremony, and joined German Civil War, calling in queen of Aquitaine as an ally.

It turns out my claimant inherited Sariyi horde - small Cuman horde to the east of the Khazars. Khan Blush decided to settle in Germany leaving his faraway pastures to other Cuman clans.

One of major German revolts broke free, then parts of it started falling apart.

This didn't conquer Germany, but it guaranteed that it will be a total mess for a long while.

Southern Wars

I sent troops to install Slavic ruler of Serbia. Bafflingly, a faction almost immediately demanded installation of an Orthodox claimant, who then became my vassal. What's going on there?

I also convinced heir to Bulgaria to convert.

Umayyad caliph Adfuns the Evil attacked queen Pernette, so I came to help aid. Their army was about as big as both ours put together, but Adfuns refused to use ships, and he just couldn't coordinate between Pernette's defense of Aragon and my raids on African coasts.

Call for Crusades

After fall of Germany to Slavic Cuman khagan, pope Stephanus VIII called for crusades, but he was too busy defending Italy from Shia Caliph Nizam. Nizam's jihad was going well at first, but then stalled and ended up in a white peace.

The Pope is still busy defending leftover Catholic emirs of North Africa, but once those wars end, crusades will be called, and directed where?

Then again, who's exactly going to join? Umayyads took Spain, Germany is in ruins, France/Aquitaine is ruled by a Orthodox girl betrothed to a Slavic prince. England is the closest Catholics have to a real power, but it's also in state of civil war.

There's a band of Catholic states from Hungary through North/Central Italy, Arles, then North into Flanders, and then British isles.

Oh and Empire of the Romans in is state of civil war again, and I have multiple dynastic claimants to it.

So far Novgorod got inherited by queen of Wallachia, and Denmark got inherited twice. Most elder councils favor either my sister queen of Poland, or my aunt queen of Wallachia, but it changes a lot.

Germany used to be the strongest Catholic state, now it's completely destroyed.

Aquitaine/France might join the family soon.

I'm not sure why Serbia became my vassal, I'll probably just release them.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 10: 1050-1055: Last Will of Zwinislawa

Time for next Great Holy War was coming, and it's very tempting to break Catholic power by attacking England or Germany, but there's much more urgent matter.

Orthodox Bulgaria holds Wallachia, and in it the last Slavic holy site. It wasn't a particularly difficult fight, as Empire of the Romans with its 3 emperors was too divided to send more than token forces to help Bulgaria.

I delegated responsibility for Wallachia to my daughter Katarzyna as queen, and that was a sign of things to come.

Vilnius Garden

My final life project was finishing Vilnius Garden to level 2.

I invited my genius grandson Przemyslaw to secluded area of the garden, and he gave his grandma a good tumble.

Once the gardens were finished I summoned my father Chernobog to take me to Hell, leaving behind realm in good hands of my family.

Great realm before succession. Two worst threats Khazars and Germans are both in turmoil.

Division of the Realm

The realm was far too broad to rule it directly, so I decided to setup vassal kings and queens. Only 3 of my children survived, but I had abundance of grandchildren, nieces, nephews, and more distant relatives.

Crowns were given to:

• grandson Przemyslaw - empire, Lithuania, and high priesthood
• son Sambor - Bohemia
• daughter Katarzyna - Wallachia
• granddaughter Zofia - Sweden
• granddaughter Zwislawa - Poland
• niece Dobrava - Ruthenia
• niece Zofia - Denmark
• niece Savonia - Novgorod
• distant cousin Wszebora - Vladimir
• distant cousin Feodor - Chernigov

I only left merchant republic of Adger, high chiefdom of Eltelkoz on Pecheneg borderland, and some Lithuanian counts as undelegated vassals.

I did some amount of border cleanup, but I'll leave it up to them to figure out how to resolve minor border disputes.

A 10-way succession roulette is coming.

On succession 6 counties returned to the Khazar horde, but at least the Pechenegs are now all civilized.

It's technically still one empire, but responsibility for it is divided between 10 family members.

Minimizing visual bordergore was far more important than de jure borders considerations.

Meanwhile Abroad

Shia caliph of Africa called for Jihad for Italy, but Italy is so divided that means basically Jihad for Tuscany and half of Sardinia.

Orthodox conquest of North Persia and Mesopotamia fell apart completely, but it probably shielded Empire of the Romans from Muslim aggression while it was most vulnerable.

Empire of the Romans is halfway toward reunification now, with only 2 of 3 emperors remaining, and some of formerly independent vassals returning to the fold.

France coalesced from 4 kings to two - Orthodox (after his mother) Karling king of Aquitaine controlling most of it including Paris, and Catholic king of France controlling just scraps. If it wasn't for religious differences, Karling king would be able to unify it with one button press and some gold.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 09: 1029-1050: The Slavic Union

It was time for the realm to take a break from wars and build up castles everywhere. This was a slow process.

Khazars kept raiding, so I raided them back, mostly to send a message, they didn't have any meaningful money anyway. Some of my raids got beaten back, they're still too strong to treat so casually. Khazar khagans kept dying in mysterious circumstances.

Pechenegs had to be dealt with once and for all, so I conquered their lands, and spent a lot of money to civilize it. A few clans broke off the Khazar horde, and I seized their lands too, again spending far too much money to maybe civilize it.

Some peasants rebelled in Scandinavia, so since I was already sending my troops there, I organized a bit bigger expedition and cleared up some land.

Instead of fancy royal palace, I started working on a Magnificent Garden in Vilnius.

I sent my lover and former chancellor Glitterhoof on a diplomatic journey to empire of China. It was highly successful. He died under suspicious circumstances soon after coming home.

Religious Matters

Sunni jihad for Africa succeeded, reversing what was the greatest Catholic victory so far. Africa faced Shia rebellion afterwards, so the ones who benefited from Sunni jihad was shia caliph Nizam.

Quite a few nearby minors converted to Slavic, and some even then accepted becoming my vassals.

Catholics were fighting each other who's the rightful pope.

I vassalized Warriors of Perun by granting them a small duchy, but then they decided to give me back the duchy and 4 castles they held in my land as they see me as unfit ruler. Well, if that's what you want, thanks for the castles I guess.

Slavic Union

Lithuania is culturally mostly Polish now, so it feels like it should get de jure Slavic Union, but it's just Russians, Poles, and Bohemians.

There's the decision to create The Slavic Union, which requires full control over 7 kingdoms. I didn't think it's possible - I only had Poland and Novgorod. Just in case I cleaned up some minors in the East to get Vladimir and Chernigov.

Due to Bulgarian succession their lands in Galicia-Volhynia broke apart, so I seized that. Warriors of Perun held some castles in Ruthenia and (not needed for this) Lithuania, so it wouldn't be possible to get them, but they decided to get vassalized then un-vassalized.

It still left one county in Bohemia, and I really didn't want to go to war with Germany over one tiny county, but it turns out Cathar uprising took just two counties next to me, so it was free real estate.

A lot of things had to randomly go right for this to happen, but it did.

As the popup says:

Centuries ago, the three brothers Lech, Czech and Rus, our venerable ancestors, parted ways to settle their people. Divided by rivers, forests, mountains and wicked conquerors since time immemorial, we proved that blood is thicker than water, as today we celebrate the unification of all brothers and sisters of the great plain

This meant I founded 2 bloodlines.

Unfortunately my husband died a few days before my recrowning, without ever sitting down on throne in Constantinople, but giving by heirs weak claim to Empire of the Romans.

Dreams of Retirement

County-level government type map. Russians are still resisting feudalization. This means 11 of my counties are at risk of falling back to Khazar and Pecheneg hordes on succession.

I created a merchant republic in Adger. Their technology is too miserable to get anywhere, but they have no competition nearer than Genoa, so they have time to figure this out.

My final ambition is to finish Magnificent Gardens in Vilnius, then I'll retire like my mother did, letting my children handle the realm. Only 4 of them are still alive.

I'm not sure how I'll divide the realm as 3/4 have demesne in Scandinavia.

Feudal transition I hoped for didn't really happen. It turns out AI is 10x slower to press the button if it doesn't share ruler's culture, and half my realm is Russian. Not coincidentally that half is still largely tribal.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 08: 1024-1029: Great Reunification

I summoned an Old God, and killed him by ramming him with a longboat. Godslayer +3 martial, +2 intrigue, +13 personal combat skill.

I almost inherited Ruthenia and Novgorod, but its dying king managed to convince the elders to give it to his son Wielislaw instead of me. Wielislaw was also my half brother, as my mother and my cousin married... I think the Piast family tree reached the point where only the most learned understand what's going on.

I seriously did not feel like spending rest of my life defending him from Khazars, fortunately stray arrow shot by a lone bowman acting without anyone's knowledge ended his life, and I inherited those thrones.

Empress of Rus

Southern borders of Ruthenia were suffering from constant Pecheneg and Khazar raids.

The only meaningful long term solution was to support conversion from tribal to feudal.

On 23 December 1018, I crowned myself empress of Rus.

Just two months later my cousin died of injuries, and to my surprise I've been informed I inherited Poland, Bohemia, and position as high priestess of Perun - in addition to already being high priestess of Chernobog by right of being Satan's daughter. I didn't even know I became an heir, he was doing his best to get his child elected.

This gave me the greatest empire in the world, even if it's largely backwards tribal land, about evenly split between Polish and Russian vassals.

I'm a 29/28/22/42/32 genius, daughter of Satan, direct descendant of Perun, slayer of an Old God, the Warrior Philosopher, and overall the most amazing person in history of creation.

But for lesser men and women, this much land will be too much to handle. It's far better if I divide it myself instead of letting my children fight between each other.

My grandfather Mieszko did the right thing dividing realm between 4 his children. At just 48 years of age, I still have plenty of time ahead of me.

I didn't attack anyone to get those lands back together, the elders just gave it all to me.

Germans and Khazars would still be challenging to fight, and even more so if the realm divides on succession. At least there are no crusades or jihads yet.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 07: 1014-1024: Queen Zwinislawa, the Warrior Philosopher

Queen Dobroslawa of Poland died under suspicious circumstances I had nothing to do with, and my cousin Vasilko who's Russian took over Poland. He somehow switched to Polish culture later.

While Pechenegs and the Norse were wrecked, Germans and now Khazars started attacking with full force. Germans were beaten back without too much trouble, but while we were busy defending from the Khazars, Vasilko decided to declare Great Holy War for Bohemia. Good idea, awful timing. I tried my best to help both wars at once.

Vasilko managed to take over Bohemia and crown himself a double-king. I was so impressed by Vasilko's actions, we had a wartime romance in Bohemia which resulted in a baby.

Khazars we only managed to white peace, with great effort.

Blood of the Warrior Philosopher

My mother Zofia, Satan's lover, died at ripe age of 70.

I felt awful about it, that I had a romance with my horse, and even nominated him a chancellor for a while. I got better eventually.

A Norse OPM asked me to mass convert his realm to Slavic, and I agreed, even paying for construction of a Slavic church in his capital. His lands were conquered by heathens soon enough.

High Chief of Tver was still old Slavic, so I invited his heir and talked some sense into him. Then by a coincidence the heretic high chief had an accident. Who would have thought.

I got 5k prestige, and decided to try for a bloodline. The most obvious one was no win 15 wars, and so I did that, becoming known as "the Warrior Philosopher".

I spent most of my realm so far fighting Scandinavians, and it might be a good idea to try crowning myself Empress of Scandinavia. I'm doing it a great favour, converting their backwards tribal societies into modern feudal system, with my numerous children each getting a duchy in this frozen wasteland.

Dreams of an Empire

I only control 28/98 countries, and need 79 to create a legitimate empire title, but it's largely a matter of persistence. Local pagans are weak, and Catholics

My cousin-lover Vasilko has 34/72 (needed 58) of the potential Wendish Empire, but he can't complete it without attacking either me or the Germans.

My other cousin Mieszko II has 50/90 (needed 72) of potential Empire of Rus, and it would be relatively straightforward to just seize lands from Russian minors, but Khazars are giving him so much trouble, his mind is not on expansion.

It's a race.

Also it looks like elders of Ruthenia/Novgorod refused Mieszko's choice of his son to succeed him, and would rather see me on those thrones. It's very smart of them.

It's a reverse situation in Poland/Bohemia, where my lover wants me to succeed his throne, but his elders would rather see Agafya on the throne just to spite him.

My husband is not happy that his claim to Empire of the Romans is not pressed, but I only got to 50 ships for 8.2k army. His children will have Constantinople. Or at least the children he thinks are his.

Of my 11 children (8 still surviving), I had there with 8 men, but my husband has no idea:

• Waclaw was a bastard from before I got married, vanished without a trace, rumors of Satanic rituals are obviously silly
• Stanislaw was actually Milzas's
• Sanbor was Swietoslaw's, and is my chosen heir as ambitious strong genius
• Gosciwuj was Zegota's, died a sickly infant
• Odon was actually my husband's
• Malowuj was actually my husband's
• Katarzyna was Zbyszko's
• Konstancja was Zegota's again, died a sickly infant
• Jadwiga was Lambert's
• Wincenty was actually my husband's
• Maslaw was my cousin's Vasilko's

Well, 3/11 his is not the worst result.

France is slowly reforming, with Bourbon queen gone and only 3 claimants remaining.

Barcelona king has extensive holdings in Italy as well.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 06: 1000-1014: Daughter of Chernobog

When my daughter Zwinislawa came of age, I handed over leadership over cult of Chernobog. Now it was time to give her Lithuania. At ripe age of 47 I retired to county of Riga.

Zwinislawa is a 25/22/20/42/25, genius, strong, envious, diligent, lustful, deceitful, ambitious, cruel, possessed, left-handed Grey Eminence. She's a 19 year old daughter of Zofia and evil god Chernobog.

End of Children of Mieszko

I matrilineally married a strong claimant to what's left of Empire of the Romans. I had a few babies he's convinced are his - one of them with my brother Zegota, who used to be married to my sister Danuta before she died of some minor illness.

Between one incestuous romance and another, I fought the Norse to retake South Baltic coast.

My sister's vassal high chief of Pomerania pushed hard into Denmark. Pechenegs completely collapsed between internal struggle, fights with Khazars, Bulgarians and us. I helped my sister defend from some German attacks as well. Not so long ago it seemed like we were at risk of getting overran from every direction, but our divine ancestors would not allow that to happen.

It wasn't going perfectly, and Germans won some of their wars against Poland, but overall it was going quite well.

King Wielislaw of Ruthenia and Novgorod died, succeeded by his son Mieszko II.

His wife queen Scholastyka died a few months later, succeeded by her niece Dobroslawa, daughter of Miroslaw, brief king of Novgorod.

Mieszko II had claims to all Piast lines. His father was king of Ruthenia and Novgorod. His mother was queen of Poland. And his wife was former queen of Lithuania. All three of course children of Mieszko.

The last surviving child of Mieszko was my mother former queen Zofia, now high chieftess of Livonia, and wife of Mieszko II.

Due to succession issues, two minor Pecheneg hordes broke free, but they're far from the menace of a few generations ago. Khazars could be dangerous, but for now they didn't threaten us.

Quest for Norse Ships

My husband kept nagging me about helping him recover his rightful Roman throne. It's a great idea, but we'll need a lot more ships for it. And who has the ships? The damn Norse!

Those wars took forever, but finally Scania and Uppland were taken by me. Also Holstein and Jylland by high chief of Pomerania, but Holstein was then lost to the Germans.

Norse Sweden went Catholic. Catholic Norway broke in half, with two kings of Norway in Norway itself (which finally went feudal) and in Scottish Moray (which is still tribal).

So many kings

50 Shades of Blue joins 50 Shades of Purple

Germans are the biggest threat right now, so Perun willing we'll see 50 Shades of Grey too.

I'll probably expand further into Scandinavia, as it's heavily fragmented.

Those wars tend to drag on forever without decisive battles, and my vassals hate me for it.

Hungary had two kings as well, one became tributary of Bohemia, the other had just scraps of land.

Empire of the Romans had 3 emperors, in Constantinople, Nikaea, and Georgia.

Greek adventurer spawned in Mesopotamia, and somehow became kingdom of Apulia, located mostly in North Persia and North Mesopotamia.

None of that was close to how many kings France had. There was king in Troyes, king in Toulouse, king in Barcelona, and queen in Bourbon - Waldensian for a good measure. Kings of Breton Brittany and German Arles looked at this and wondered what the hell.

Fitna Fracture mod is really improving my experience here.

I think countries can recover from this, Germany was somewhat fragmented for a while, but it's back to being the strongest country in Europe. Maybe France and others will do well too.

I was hoping my family would finally go feudal, but Poland moved its capital from well developed Poznan to much more backwards Krakow, setting it back for decades.

Inheritance of Ruthenia/Novgorod happened without its traditional capital of Kiev, and new king set himself up in Chernigov, which is probably the most backwards village in known world, and makes even damn Krakow look like Constantinople.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 05: 980-1000: Feudalism in Lithuania

I summoned Chernobog, God of Darkness, and had a daughter with him. Chernobog left his mark on Zwislawa, making her left-handed. For a lesbian I had a lot of children, with my husband, my consorts, and even with the devil himself.

My husband refused to ally me, even as he was losing his kingdom. He also went native, and behaved like a filthy Russian now. A lot of our family went Russian. Going native kinda makes sense long term, but it feels really annoying just how quickly characters go native. I feel the mtth should be far lower.

Feudalism in Lithuania

I finally went feudal in 985, but rest of my realm was still mostly tribal, so it meant a lot more gold, and a lot fewer troops. Better quality troops (mostly heavy infantry rather than mostly light infantry), but a lot fewer of them, especially from the vassals.

Pechenegs attacked Ruthenia, but in a rare case of joint cooperation between all three Piast realms, we beat them back.

At this point I was the chosen heir of elders of Poland, Ruthenia, and Novgorod, and with great intrigue powers, but I'll see more benefit from those tribals as allies than vassals.

It was clear that I'll need to sponsor feudal transformation with my own funds, and the best way is some raiding. I can raid, but awkwardly I don't have the 90% ship upkeep discount the Norse do, so it's not clear if the loot would even cover obscene ship cost.

Raiding Time

I summoned the Dark Lord to kill High Chief Vasily of Bryansk, the one who poisoned my father on his wife's orders.

My husband got murdered on orders of some minor chieftess. My other brother did his duty and avenged his death by burning her at the stake.

I didn't want to marry outside my family, so as soon as he came of age, I married Mieszko, my sister's and brother's only shared son. I tried to recruit Mieszko to the Chernobog cult, but I failed. If he's not into satanic orgies, I set him up with some exotic side wenches, at his young age he probably needs more than just his wife.

Catholic King of Germany outright attacked my sister's Poland while it was busy with with Pechenegs. I did the clever thing, and raided German coast to deny him money and split his armies.

My looters were gathering funds for development of Lithuania, while contributing to the war effort. Everybody wins.

Divine Xwedodah Combo

Let's talk family situation. Mieszko had 4 children:

• daughter Scholastyka
• son Wielislaw
• daughter Zofia
• son Miroslaw

Scholastyka is married to her brother Wielislaw, and they have son Mieszko.

I was married to my brother Miroslaw. After he died I married their son Mieszko and my nephew.

It turns out Scholastyka and me are both homosexual, so used my great seduction skills to seduced her and make her my lover, while being married to her son.

Scholastyka is also head of the Slavic church, while I'm head of the Chernobog cult.

There's a lot of divine marriages in next generations too, between siblings and cousins.

I really like where this is going on.

Year 1000

 The daughter I had with the Dark Lord Chernobog.

None of the Elders want to vote for her. It's probably because she's left-handed.

The daughter I had with Chernobog usurped my position as leader of Chernobog cult.

I try to get either my sister-lover or my satanic daughter elected as my heir, but the elders don't want to hear about it. I guess I could bribe them a bit. My husband-nephew is heir to the other three titles.

I've been fighting what turned into Sweden and Finland for some minor scraps of land. They each have 3x more armies than I do, but refuse to use ships, so I just outmaneuver them. I hoped they'd gavelkind by now, but both bastards created kingdom tier titles moments before dying, like they knew.

Poland and Ruthenia/Novgorod aren't that far away from adopting feudalism and starting transformation.

Empire of the Romans pretty much shattered, with three emperor claimants, and a lot of independent dukes. Maybe someday it will reassemble.

In faraway lands Timbuktu went Sunni, so very few African pagans are left. Muslims took Crete as well as most of Spain, but they also have a lot of breakaway vassals.

King of Italy took over Muslim Africa, and Sunni Caliph called for renewed period of Jihads.

These are huge Ghaznavid Persians. Most of the time event-spawned dynasties like Seljuks got nowhere in my games.

Also annoyingly Mecca is Chinese tributary. Yeah, I play without diplomatic range, but this is still dumb.

You can also see 50 Shades of Purple in what was once united Empire of the Romans

Iron Century Piasts: Part 04: 969-980: Fall of the Norse

My guardian Umay understood my homosexual tendencies, and she didn't believe that marrying my brother was the best idea, so arranges for three best speciments of manliness in the world to be my consorts. At least according to her ideas.

Once I reached adulthood, I made sure Yevpraxia, the unfaithful wife who killed my father, died for her sins. Then I bribed the maid to smother her daughter with a pillow, ending the cursed Rurikid line.

I seduced pretty much all the noblewomen in Lithuania, and I got so skillful at it that even my male vassals all loved me for it. I had a baby daughter with one of my consorts. How do they know who's the father exactly?

We've been losing small bits of land to Pechenegs, Norse, and Catholics.

I killed heir of petty king Toste of Uppland, who went close to uniting Sweden, and took county of Novgorod from my husband. Then I tried to kill Toste himself, but he passed of natual causes, splitting his land in two, with the bigger part being inherited by a Suomenusko Finnish boy.

I attacked petty king of Smaland, captured and sacrificed his wife and two daughters.

Then I got myself into a fight against Denmark, which was basically unwinnable except by the fact that king of Denmark was unwilling to split his army or use ships, so he inevitably lost by warscore.

Queen of Norway converted to Catholic in 980, taking all her peasants with her. That's just filthy. Uppland and Denmark are still Norse, but there's little hope for their religion, attacked from all sides.

Peace between Mieszko's children lasted for a while before being finally broken, when Wielislaw of Ruthenia and his sister-wife high priestess Scholastyka of Poland attacked my brother-husband Miroslaw of Novgorod.

I finally managed to get tribal organization and buildings improved enough to go feudal, but it's not clear that it's actually the best idea.

Oh and I joined the Cold Ones, and became the Vedma. If my sister can me high priestess of Perun, I can be high priestess of Chernbog.

Splitting the realm was a mistake, and everyone except me lost some land. That doesn't mean that I approve of this Ruthenia-Novgorod war!

At least I managed to defeat the Norse threat, and Pechenegs seem busy fighting Bulgarians and each other.

Norway mass-converting Catholic and Khazar expansion are new threats. When will we have peace?

Iron Century Piasts: Part 03: 960-969: Children of Mieszko

I had to clean up unruly vassals and leftover pagans around.

I got my brother Lestek and my sister Lucja betrothed, and granted them both land.

I betrothed my oldest son Miroslaw with oldest daughter Zofia. I also had a son-daughter twins Scholastyka and Wielislaw, and they got betrothed as well. All with appropriate land grants.

My concubines were getting old, so I gave them each a temple to retire in. I even granted some land to my secret bastard daughter.

All that thanks to council which finally agreed to pass religious revocation law, so every vassal had to accept the true faith or lose their land.

Unfortunately everyone was plotting against me. My wife Yevpraxia did so. King Antso of Navarra, husband of my sister Adleta did so. Who knows who else did. I wasn't careful enough and I was poisoned by high chief Putiata of Bryansk, acting on orders of my wife.

Last Will of God-King Mieszko

Mieszko's killers went unpunished, and four kingdoms ruled by his children are weak

Dying, I could still dictate my will. To my three crowns of Poland, Lithuania, and Kievan Rus, fourth crown of Novgorod was added, and the realm was split between:

• king Miroslaw of Novgorod
• queen Zofia of Lithuania
• queen Scholastyka of Poland, and new high priestess of Perun
• king Wielislaw of Ruthenia

King Miroslaw of Novgorod, age 10, is timid, brooding, and curious. 2/5/3/3/4.

Queen Zofia of Lithuania, age 9, is quick, playful, and conscientious, 6/5/6/6/10.

Miroslaw's and Zofia's mother was German princess Liutgard Liudolfinger, daughter of German king Otto. After her father lost crown of Germany, and Mieszko divorced her, she left for China.

Hopefully they'll marry when they reach adulthood.

Scholastyka, age 6, is already quick, curious, 4/5/7/4/6.

Her twin Wielislaw, age 6, is curious, 1/4/2/2/2.

Scholastyka and Wielislaw's mother was Mieszko's Pomeranian concubine Edyta, now retired as priestess in holy site in Novgorod.

Hopefully they'll marry when they reach adulthood.

Division of their father's territories was reasonably clean, and mostly based on where they got first granted their demesne.

Now the children had to deal with unruly Russian vassals, Romuva and Old Slavic peasants, Pecheneg and Norse raids, the ever present risk of invasion from Catholic Germany, and task of perhaps adopting feudal customs.

Childhood of Queen Zofia of Lithuania

I didn't do it on first two successions, but it's finally time for gavelkind roulette, between 4 children each with 25% chance. And I got 5/16, so playing as Queen Zofia of Lithuania.

So I'm just a little girl, but my advisors tell me the peasants are all heathens, of three different barbarian cultures.

My brother and husband-to-be Miroslaw got into endless defensive wars, but somehow managed to win them.

All that happened to me were some cattle raids both ways and a peasant revolt. One cattle ended up with my troops seizing a minor heathen province.

Pechenegs took some Russian minors, and Polish and Ruthenian troops tried to stop them and failed. Then they attacked Ruthenia itself, sacking its capital and seizing some border land.

Poland and Ruthenia saw some peasant revolts as well.

Holy order of the Warriors of Perus, almost 7000 strong, was created.

Meanwhile China decided to invade Sistan, and made it its tributary state.

Coming of Age

Zofia grew into a 6/10/16/15/14 quick, temperate, patient, cynical, deceitful, homosexual Fortune Builder. Wedding with her brother Miroslaw was coming, but who she really loved was her Cuman guardian Umay.

Umay did not return my feelings, and my marriage with my brother Miroslaw was weird and cold, so I spent a lot of intimate time with other ladies of the courts instead.

Also awkwardly it looks like elder councils of all realms want my aunt and uncle to rule, not us.

None of the Piast children are willing to ally each other. Not even my husband king of Novgorod.

It's a dangerous world, even if we don't fight each other.

Iron Century Piasts: Part 02: 953-960: God-King Mieszko, great great grandson of Perun-Piast

Mieszko, new king of Poland, is a 31 year old 20/13/10/11/12. Grey eminence, quick, shrewd, content, arbitrary, greedy, trusting, humble.

My father and grandfather were in warrior society Champions of Perun, which resulted in a lot of duels, a lot of wounds, and that's probably what killed my grandfather. The Cold Ones (Slavic Satanists) tried to recruit me, but I chickened out, as it seemed to dangerous.

My only other option was the modded society Great Trade League, which is just perfect for a greedy character.

Conquest of Lithuania and Rus

With such a long list of traits, what kind of person am I? Well, I'm quick, shrewd, greedy, and arbitrary. Exactly the kind of person who'd first take over his brother's Lithuania. But I'll take good care of Lestek, and be his tutor until he grows up.

Next thing to do is to attack Kievan Rus. It's only slightly bigger than me, but had a lot more loyal vassals.

It's not a good war to fight, as I have no advantage. I have no boats, they have slightly bigger army, are on defensive, sieges count for very little against tribals, and the game bugged out and didn't even count most battles to the warscore. AI even weirdly had competent commanders. I don't even control my army, as half of it are vassal levies. I hate allies in every game. At least I had a stash of inherited gold from raids I could use to hire mercenaries to pad my ranks.

There's also a question of game rules. I have shattered retreat on, but no movement lock. I'm not sure these are good values. Maybe either have shattered retreat off so battles are very decisive, or have movement lock on to make getting AI into battle easier?

How far I needed to go to convince Yevpraxia to marry me and merge our realms

Kievan Rus also had some Pecheneg land, but it flips nomad on succession without some serious investment tribals can't afford

Marriage of Mieszko Piast and Yevpraxia Rurikid

During this war king of Rus died, and his older unmarried sister inherited the throne. I could see no other way than to divorce my cheating wife, and marry defeated Yevpraxia.

I needed some console commands to break Yevpraxia's previous betrothal and to make her say yes, but it's a much better story this way.

My new wife Yevpraxia was the last living descendant of Rurik. It's a patrilineal bloodline so it won't inherit, but it's fine.

She's a 22 year old 7/14/9/3/3. Dull ambitious diligent tough soldier and child of a concubine. She's still unhappy about that war, but I'm sure we'll have many children together.

Slavic Reformation

My traits changed slightly during first few years of my reign. Now I'm Grey Eminence, quick, shrewd, content, arbitrary, greedy, humble, kind, zealous.

I finally had 4 holy sites, and just barely enough piety and moral authority to reform Slavic religion. And so it goes...

Piast, grandfather of my grandfather, was actually Thunder-God Perun who came down to Earth. As God's great great grandson, I'm divine. I'm the rightful ruler of all mortals, in temporal and spiritual matters.

The infidels all deserve to be given blessings of Perun, and missionaries should spread the great news from Ireland to Cathay. Only as last resort, armed missionaries.

My children are also divine, and should marry other divine beings, not common mortals. Just as Gods and Goddesses must both be worshiped, all my children have the same right to rule. A council of elders will be instituted to choose which of them will rule the mortals before joining ancestors in the sky.

Spirits of my divine ancestors can be seen on the night sky. They will also show the future in a properly performed goat sacrifice ceremony.

So the traits (with mod for 6 instead of the usual 2 doctrines):

• Leadership: Temporal
• Nature: Proselytizing
• Doctrine: Children of Perun
• Doctrine: Divine Marriage
• Doctrine: Astrology
• Doctrine: Equality
• Doctrine: Ancestor Worship
• Doctrine: Haruspicy

Yevpraxia claims that Rurik also had some divine ancestry so our marriage is totally valid. Once upon a time Gods more frequently visited Earth.

What it means for gameplay

All these bonuses, as tooltips describe them:

• The reformer will become the new Head of this religion
• Great Holy Wars are allowed
• This religion encourages missionary work
• Rulers waging war against members of their own faith lose Piety
• Fleets can navigate through major rivers
• Short reign penalty is disabled
• Rulers can spend Piety to improve their Courtiers' Attributes
• Close-kin marriage is allowed
• Close-kin marriage amongst nobility is considered a divine union
• Characters are assigned Zodiac traits on birth and by decision
• Grants access to the Hermetic Society
• Absolute Cognatic law is enforced
• Female rulers are not penalized
• The Religious Head can decide upon dead ancestors to give special status
• Enables Eldership succession law
• Diviners read the signs before war to try to improve troop morale

I don't know why Eldership only becomes available not instantly active, while every other religious law gets activated immediately on reform, so I also made it happen by console.

Overall this combination isn't too powerful, and better combinations (Warmongering/Dogmatic, Temporal, Agnatic/Enatic Clans, Temporal, whatever for last doctrine) with just vanilla 2 doctrines are a lot better than what I got with 6. Divine Marriage is pure roleplay, Equality just advances laws you can pass 100 years into the game, Haruspicy does basically nothing, and Eldership is maybe better than Elective Gavelkind, but will probably end up hugely annoying.

It's a huge Poland, but maybe a quarter is my culture and religion, and even they are mostly angry

What were my other options

I'm a bit surprised it worked. My other options were:

• get third holy site from Bulgaria, going through Pechenegs land or through Hungary - it looks like less clay on the map, but would probably be even harder
• ask king of Germany for mass conversion to Catholic
• become secretly Catholic to follow my first wife's religion
• ask emperor of the Romans for mass conversion to Orthodox
• flip Romuva, I can get 3 holy sites by just cleaning up minors, reform that
• flip Germanic, conquer big chunks of Scandinavia, reform that

But since I got zealous by event, these weren't really a consideration.

For other reforms, I thought about getting hierocratic leadership (a single religious head), but it seems to have a lot fewer features than actual Papacy or Caliphate.

There's also obvious Religious Tax doctrine, but it doesn't seem to work for tribals, so my greed would no t be satisfied by it.

Transition

To celebrate the reformation, I released all the prisoners who were still stuck in my dungeons.

I left Great Trade League, and I'm planning to join the Hermetic Society once cooldown timer allows me, to study ancestor-spirits in the night sky.

There's 10 years of -40 penalty with all vassals due to going Eldership, and I have very unstable realm already, full of Russians, Lithuanians, Pomeranians, Romuvas, heretics, and so on. At some point I'll try missionary work, but first I need to bring true faith to my own realm.

If I survive next decade or so, it should get a lot easier. Or I could just let some vassals go, I only needed that much land for the reform.