It's good to be the Duke ...

[The Blind One]

Because as long as you are a duke and pledge fealty to a king ...

You can eat his vassals under his nose and there's nothing he can do about it. The moment you are independent and want to nibble on his vassals, he'll go all ham on you. So if you're still a duke and not a king, just pledge fealty to your target kingdom and spread like cancer through his realm and absorb him from the inside out ... like a good little parasite sucking on the blood of his host.

Then ... if you're really bad ... finish him off by eating his last county ... the kingdom will disappear and you can pledge fealty to another willing host ...

You as a player literally have no power to stop this as well from your fellow vassals if you are on autonomous vassals crown authority. You have less power as a king then as a vassal inside a low crown authority realm.

Your king dares to get Limited Crown Authority? Just conspire to lower it again which usually isn't too hard ... and voila ... you have an incapacitated host that you can freely feast on ...

Something tells me something is pretty broken ... lmao ...

[Turian14]

Nah this is historically accurate. Absolute monarchies weren't a thing in this time period.

[Yaldabaoth]

Originally posted by Turian14:

Nah this is historically accurate. Absolute monarchies weren't a thing in this time period.

One duke conquering the whole kingdom (minus the king's land) on made-up claims is certainly not historically accurate. Certainly not without all other dukes stopping him long before that or the king stepping in to preserve the power balance. But they made the system gamey for casual players.

[The Former]

Kings don't care who their vassals are, so long as they remain vassals. One mighty vassal or a dozen weaker ones, it's still the same amount of soldiers going to the king's levy.

Also you as king do have the power. You can demand any vassal cease their wars if your crown authority is high enough, and if they refuse, it's lawful grounds for imprisonment. If you can't maintain that crown authority, you don't deserve to tell your vassals what they can and cannot do. Men with wealth and soldiers respect men with more wealth and more soldiers.

[ThatsMrAnon2u]

yes but taking over too many of his vassals will push you beyond the allowable size of what a powerful Duke can hold, the AI then kicks in and turns your vassals against you (opinion and reduced taxes/levies) and wants you to form a kingdom...but still, its good to be a Duke until you become the king by independence :-)

[The Blind One]

You can also form mini satellites states inside the kingdom you are trying to take over.

Especially now that claims remain up to 6 generations deep, you can seed smaller duchies inside the kingdom of your dynasty while you keep the lions share for yourself. Then when you are ready for the final take over, you can conquer them all back through your claims instantly and complete the hostile take over. That's how I took over Lotharingia and parts of northern france. I kept pledging fealty to the king I wanted to steal vassal lands from and kept shifting between different kings as they continued to suffer from their kingdom titles dividing the carolingian empire. Whenever the king tried to consolidate I simply joined the Liberty Faction and lowered crown authority till he was basically just a monkey on a throne ...

In my pratihara game in India, I literally have all the land except for the kings duchy. He's encapsulated by my dukedom ... he's a king in name only as 90% of his levy is dependent on my realm. I am finishing up the claim on his duchy and that will be the end of him ...

[CrUsHeR]

Something direly missing: tributary states.

Probably DLC material.

[LzDK14]

Originally posted by The Blind One:

Because as long as you are a duke and pledge fealty to a king ...

You can eat his vassals under his nose and there's nothing he can do about it. The moment you are independent and want to nibble on his vassals, he'll go all ham on you. So if you're still a duke and not a king, just pledge fealty to your target kingdom and spread like cancer through his realm and absorb him from the inside out ... like a good little parasite sucking on the blood of his host.

Then ... if you're really bad ... finish him off by eating his last county ... the kingdom will disappear and you can pledge fealty to another willing host ...

You as a player literally have no power to stop this as well from your fellow vassals if you are on autonomous vassals crown authority. You have less power as a king then as a vassal inside a low crown authority realm.

Your king dares to get Limited Crown Authority? Just conspire to lower it again which usually isn't too hard ... and voila ... you have an incapacitated host that you can freely feast on ...

Something tells me something is pretty broken ... lmao ...

Lmao:-)

One thing you forgot to mention is that you don't pay your liege any taxes and send only token forces as levies:-)

Yeah, playing as vassal in earlygame is much easier in CK3

[Sentient_Toaster]

Kings can revoke your titles if they feel that your'e growing to be too much of a risk, and can also do annoying stuff like repeatedly convert to the heresy of the week and screw over all the vassals by demanding that they also convert -- in which case you'll take rep hit until you convert your counties, if you can even do so before your liege picks the *next* heresy to force everyone to adopt.

The other major risk is that they can do boneheaded things like yield to peasant rebellions that they really should have been able to deal with, or let your land all get occupied by an invader, where you cannot retake your land without yourself declaring war on the attacker. It's not all roses, basically.

[T-Murdah]

A real challenge is to start as duke in the Holy Roman Empire and manage to not swiftly get elected emperor

[Aldrnari]

Penalties and limits might eat you up first though.