Old thread was getting ungainly; time for a new one.

Previously, on CKII: Our heroes have gone from ruling the combined Byzantine / Bulgarian empire, to being a minor Byzantine vassal, to retaking the Bulgarian Empire and expanding it to new heights.

And now? https://twitter.com/coinaday1/status/1248392948317749250

More immediately, the last bits of Estonia are up for conquest next. We've got a faked title on their Duchy controlling their last two counties, which isn't inheritable and our current Tsar is getting long in the tooth.

This is a weird timeline: England apparently converted to Islamic a few generations back (no idea how that happened). And the Third Crusade was so successful, with a Crusader state now covering Egypt and Jerusalem, that the Fourth Crusade is declared...on Wales.

Well that's disappointingly anticlimactic.

Estonia secured. I'm not quite sure where to go next. Might be time to pick something off the Byzantine Empire again.

Byz would be a lot easier, but there's a weak claim which can currently be pressed in Germany on this map gore but sizeable Duchy. I think I need to keep chunking Germany whenever possible as they are by far my largest threat.

Remember how the Crusade got called off? Well, apparently the Crusaders didn't get the message. A current view of the Isle.

The war with Germany is getting started; early maneuvering so far. No major battle yet.

Oh shit. Sense of foreboding increases.

Meanwhile, war with Germany going fairly well so far. I declare war, assemble troops around their inholdings and let them come to me. Able to overcome their overall slight numerical advantage through information advantage and tactics.

Huh. I won the war, but it only added two counties, not all the territory outlined in blue like it normally does. Not sure what happened there.

Oh well. The war was fairly easy. The inholdings are a tactical advantage, giving me something to conquer and draw them in.

Next war is against Romagna. It's a good hunk of territory. I gained the Pretender from the Tuscany conquest, and he's already landed. Another vassal Kingdom to be gained.

Also, the proximity to my demesene makes things easier for the conquest.

And just like that, Bulgaria became a significant North Italy power as well.

Up next...we make Germany a vassal Kingdom!!

That went rather smoothly. The strategy I developed for fighting defensively after declaring the war works great against this AI.

Behold: BULGARIA MAGNE!

Basically doubled my military power too, while eliminating my last major rival.

I could create a lot of kingdoms at this point although I don't quite see the point.

The new vassal levy from the King of Germany is like 40k, so large it creates attrition immediately when raised.

Imagine yourself Tsar Zdeslav, ruler of the Empires shown above.

What do you do next?

Well this is interesting. I hadn't looked over there to notice that Temujin had arrived on stage. Now, 100k or so troops /is/ concerning...but with my new vassal Germany and general defensive strategy, I think I can take them. Just need to get into war with them, so East we go.

Not a lot of good Pagan targets. A couple islands left the Pact. Otherwise, this Norwegian county was the only one. Also taking a de jure claim on the remaining independent county pictured as well along the way.

Doesn't get me East, but maybe next round.

If I can't get my borders close enough to the Mongols...I think they'll reach me anyhow. Apparently some major fighting going on.

Long-lasting inholding just had a war where ruler changed...so they weren't in the defensive pact yet. Down they go.

Atyrau is Hindu, which doesn't count by the stricter definitions of Pagan, but it's also bordering on the Mongol Empire, so helps to accelerate that conflict.

Huh, game won't let me create HRE. Seems narrow-minded.

Also, a "usurper" won back Germany from my Pretender. This happens a lot. On one hand, I still am sovereign; on the other hand, the new one always likes me a lot less - and thus my vassal levy is smaller.

I got the new King of Germany happy with me: transferred a vassal he wanted and created a new Duchy for him. Even got him to convert to Orthodox along with no longer supporting the factions.

Put down a revolt and as a bonus removed the title of the King of Pannonia (Hungary).

Two minor Pagan counties I'm taking out, mostly because if I understand how the reload trick works, it seems like the same ones will keep coming up unless I remove them to free up others.

I'm getting pretty sick of the takes from the chronicler. Zdeslav conquered Germany and spread Orthodoxy. One might think that merits a mention.

His heir is his half-brother due to reasons. Sort of a placeholder / stepping stone to the nephew (now son).

Bogoris: Tsar of Bulgaria, Rus and Carpathia; King of Galicia-Volhynia, Pannonia, Chernigov, Croatia, Wallachia, Crimea and Bulgaria; Duke of Lithuania, Moesia, Abkhazia and Strymon; Count of Samogitia, Zachlumia, Palermo, Egrisi, Craiova, Astibus, Nish, Tyrnovo, Sofia, ...

(continued) Nikopolis, Dorostotum and Rashka; Baron of Etropole and Iskar.

Of course, as usual, a lot of these titles need to be immediately unloaded. But that's the view at first upon succession.

Both the Holy Wars failed through the succession. One of them just disappeared. The other failed when the treacherous bastards converted in the middle of the war.

Fighting for the Duchy of Milan from the Kingdom of Egypt, because it's a good hunk of territory.

Managing Germany's vassal levy is tricky for logistics. Gotta be careful where to raise it because attrition hits fast.

I can't disagree too much here. Bogoris did have a bit of a career while Heir, as he fought various wars with the excess holdings. But mostly he helped to ensure an orderly succession.

And now I need to transfer the "heir holdings" off again.

Also, a message from Chainsmokers on Pandora just now referenced "the airport in Split in Croatia"; I 'recognize' Split from having fought over it in this campaign. Learning some detailed geography success!

At first I wasn't able to start giving my son titles, because he was in a foreign court. But I was able to get him back by sending him a gift...and the heirloom artifact sword. Now I can make him a King.

Captured Milan. Now to send the troops to the East for a Holy War "I" had started as an heir and need to finish off.

Temujin (Ghengis) has joined the Defensive Pact against /me/. I'm flattered, honestly.

Currently busy managing a bunch of rebellious vassals who want to declare independence. Flattering some; will crush others.

Time to see who's truly loyal. And I'll be destroying that %^&* Pecheneg Republic after this. They've always been trouble.

So even when opinion was 100, didn't stop them from revolting together. Well, no worse than if we didn't try. Going to raise everything we can: personal, vassal, some mercenaries, and fight as best we can.

So I've got 49k with vassals, personal, and the "local mercenaries" (companies which are very cheap, some sort of discount rate). I'll add about 20k more mercenaries, but going against 100k or so in rebellion. Going to be tough.

It was touch-and-go down to the last moment, but got them. Needed everything I had, both troops and strategy. Attrition from concentration definitely a major issue on both sides.

Now time for retribution.

It's costly but necessary. This title has always been a key organizer of trouble, in part because as a republic it's constantly passing to some new random who's expensive to bribe and don't want to give more titles, etc.

Wait...never mind: upon gaining it, it did switch to normal succession. It's just that there's something weird with my main heir vs other son on some of these. So I'll just manually gift this to the heir now and it should be fine.

Hahaha, so sweet all these uppity vassals now being imprisoned and being able to have their titles revoked. Took the Kingdom of Germany. Gave it to heir as it's too much for me to manage but that'll keep it in trustworthy hands.

Tons more to do.

Well, my son and heir now has 73 of 35 vassals, so he'll have some reorganization to do himself, but he'll figure it out.

Besides him, only Novgorod, Serbia, and Ruthenia left as vassal kings. The rest are revoked and passed to heir. He has 12 Kingdoms!

And there's another 9 Kingdom titles that could be created and another Empire too (Wendish). I'll leave that to a later, more decadent generation. For this ruler, Tsar Mikica, is satisfied with having destroyed the power of so many rebellious vassals.

Okay, continuing on after that climactic struggle. Now taking the Kingdom of England because we have a claimant. Not really any other justification. It was previously an Islamic Kingdom but isn't now but...oh well. Going to be ours.

Ha, and we start out with 50% won because we have the current King's father prisoner...because he was our previous candidate, revolted, then we imprisoned him, revoked the title and gave it to current candidate.

Funny how things go.

Ha, this feels like such magical cheating: we get massive levies from our son, our heir, and can get them basically wherever we want because he has territory everywhere.

Quite convenient!

Huh: strong revolt declared against my son. Looks like he has fewer troops available than the revolt. Concerning, but on the other hand, he'll still have a strong claim on it once he inherits my part, and I could fight the vassal if he's bad enough.

Not to plan though.

We took England...and accidentally converted it back to an Islamic kingdom from a Christian one as a result. Got the Usurper to convert to Orthodox to fix that up nicely.

Adding some local vassals to him as well as untidy vassal relationships were part of the issue for our son.

In other news, the Mongol Empire now has a solid border connection to the Bulgarian Empire. I'm hoping they'll declare war on us, to add "attacked by foreigners" modifiers but I am considering declaring war on them instead if it doesn't happen soon.

Going to do a small war to take Leon. I'd been planning to take a neighboring county from Byzantium I just faked a claim on but I'll do that next.

Well, that was clearly coming. I blame myself for having overloaded my son with vassals rather than consolidating them better.

We'll see if this new King of Germany behaves...otherwise the title is coming back anyhow.

Bunch of vassals organizing in the "independence" faction again...including our new King of Germany. We'll see if they get enough to push a revolt; right now they're about 60%. If so, another tough war and then a lot of titles coming back.

With that wrapped up, going to fight against the new King of Germany: better to fight against him now before the faction becomes stronger. Pretext is some insignificant plot he's got going on.

That's for daring to revolt against my son and then conspiring for independence!

Now I'll take his Kingdom and give it to my grandson, the heir's heir, to avoid the overwhelming with vassals my son had previously while still keeping the power consolidated in loyal hands.

Argh...Germany doesn't allow revocation. WHO CARES: THE EMPIRE OF BULGARIA /DOES/ AND WE JUST ESTABLISHED THAT'S SUPERIOR!

Annoying. So, still have a dangerous vassal, merely locked up, for all the good that does me.

So I can't revoke his titles. Banishment would lower vassal opinions. Executing him would lower their opinions less than banishment. It's an option but I think I'll just let him quietly rot in prison for now and execute him if he starts joining factions from there.

Still a fairly strong independence faction going and I've got cause to imprison a couple of them, so going to do that to cut back the faction a bit.

Various wars of expansion I'd like to do but internal stability first.

Finally ended the war against "King of Bavaria" (basically vanity title he made; annoying as it means that's all I could take without negative opinion after). Took longer than it should've due to losing some close battles from mountain defensive bonus.

Now minor defensive wars.

Wrapped up the couple wars against me. Asked a few vassals to convert to Orthodoxy.

I think it's time to take Scotland next; I've got a claim on it. Ahh, never mind: my vassal already declared the war while I was sailing my last raised levies back from Island (Iceland).

Best title ever?

I think I'm going to press one of my claims on neighboring Byzantine counties. They're weak enough compared to me at this point it's a relatively minor war and helps to keep them weaker and adds a strong county.

I had gotten two faked claims on counties; this is the first time I recall noticing the "Press all claims" (strong only) option; I might've not been in this situation before.

Quite handy, that. Saves an extra war.

Was fairly straightforward.