Non-Holy Fury guide to playing Pagan

[4powerd]

So I bought Old Gods since I heard that it was one of the best DLCs for CK2.
I booted it up and in typical me fashion, hit the random button till I landed on a non-vassal, Pagan ruler. After 5 minutes I realized I didn't know how to play Pagan, so I looked online and found 2 things.
1: Reforming your religion is the number 1 goal
2: All of them assumed I had Holy Fury, I don't.
I then spent another 30 minutes ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ around with the different pagans before finally deciding to start a thread here and ask for help. So, anyone have any good tips for playing Pagan?

[JD]

1) Found your de jure kingdom.
2) Conquer other nearest kingdoms/duchies/countries that are part of your de jure empire and have holy sites (consider that usually it doesn't worth to fight against other kingdom only for 1 country). You need to control 3 of 5 holy sites.
3) Reform your religion.
4) Conquer everything that belongs to your de jure empire. Nevermind if you go over the vassals limit, last time I had about 15 vassals over the limit (but ofc there is always a risk that your ruler will suddenly die and you will lose them), since you can create duchies and kingdoms later. You need to control 80% of the empire and this is the main goal.
5) Burn your prestige and upgrade all the buildings in your primary duchy.
6) Adopt feudalism.

I'd highly recommend Jade Dragon DLC, it adds 8 casus bellis that will help you a lot https://ck2.paradoxwikis.com/Casus_Belli#Jade_Dragon_CBs

[Mr_Faorry]

A little note here before I answer;
ToG was one of the best dlc as it added Pagans, an earlier start date with more Pagans present, Zoroastrians and more dangerous revolts, however it no longer is due to Holy Fury and Iron Century.
However with the release of HF that first part was voided as HF also allows playing as Pagans only with better reformation, the Iron Century update gave an earlier start date with more Pagans present for free and Charlemagne also giving an earlier start date along with all the other Charlemagne features leaving just Zoroastrians and better revolts as ToG exclusive features.

Actual answer to your question

The easiest pagan start would be as a Germanic Viking since you can use ships to raid with very little cost.

Without Holy Fury reformation is pretty bland but still worth it.

Reforming simply requires 50% Moral Authority and minimum 3 Holy Sites under your control, once you meet those you can spend 750 piety to reform. Germanic reformation is the best as it makes the reformer the religious head where as every other Pagan religion simply creates a watered down Pope.

https://ck2.paradoxwikis.com/Pagans#Reformation
Everything in 'reformation' section before the 'reformation with Holy Fury' should help you in regards to reformation.

As for playing as a Pagan in other regards, raid, raid and don't stop raiding, this will get you much needed money since as a tribal you make next to nothing, when raiding as a Germanic Pagan it's fairly easy to amass more wealth than most feudal lords.

You're biggest goal should be to become either Feudal or a Merchant Republic (the latter requiring 'The Republic' dlc). As a tribal most of your troops are light infantry and will get decimated by feudal armies even half your size, once you move away from tribal you'll begin getting better troops and will be able to compete with other non tribals.
To change to fuedal you need to either be a reformed Pagan or part of an organised religion (Christian, muslim, Jewish, Jain etc.), max tribal authority and a level 4 fort in your capital province. When you do have the ability to move away from tribal make sure you have plenty of gold in reserve, at first you'll be extremely weak and will have little in the way of troops or income.
https://ck2.paradoxwikis.com/Tribalism#Changing_government_type

Once you've weathered the storm and you begin to strengthen as either feudal or a MR it'll be like starting as a feudal/MR lord only you'll have access to all Pagan benefits too.

As a tribal Pagan you should play aggressively, I'd recommend starting as a single province count and taking the 'become king' ambition, it gives you unlimited use of the subjugation cb within the de jure kingdom, normally Pagans only get to use the subjugation CB once per ruler. When you aren't expanding your realm you should be raiding, raiding will be your main source of income.

[Tammy the Muffin]

Originally posted by Mr_Faorry:

it gives you unlimited use of the subjugation cb within the de jure kingdom

Which is yey since you can declare Subjugation war on someone even if he has 1 county in de jure borders of desired kingdom. But you can use it only if you're unreformed and has certain succession laws. Like, if you raid Ireland for bloodline and use it to set Tanistry succession, Subjugation will be blocked even if you're still unreformed.

So its powerful CB, but has its cons like Glavekind.

Originally posted by Mr_Faorry:

When you do have the ability to move away from tribal make sure you have plenty of gold in reserve, at first you'll be extremely weak and will have little in the way of troops or income

Few tips here:
- You can raise troops before changing to feudal or MR, and those will stay there. So you'll have some basic troops. More than you can spawn before upgrading modern buildings.
- You can update county's capital to castle/city (depends on goverment) by destroying capital of county. Option is avaliable once all building slots in county are filled. Might be helpful.
- If your culture or religion allows raiding, you can raid even after reforming goverment. Like, norse can raid always, even if their religion doesnt allow it. Viking style!
- Holy sites may work as backups of religion. If you (you, not your vassal) own a holy site, you can RMB on it can change to holy site's religion. So if you want to rush into modern goverment , you can adopt christianity (doctor event, wife/concubine, whatever), reform into feudal and then flip back into Pagan.

[corisai]

Reformation & even going feudal isn't number 1 goal since patch 3.0 and tribal retinue. Only really highly advanced feudal armies will be better then your retinue now (+you can get far large retinue then feudal +/- similiar sized country, it's ~ almost 1 level of military organization tech). Of course it's REALLY depend on your starting date.

Best retinue is either LI+LC one (basic LC is VERY strong in curent meta, only camels are more powerful + best melee cultural retinues able to stand against massed cavalry too), either your cultural HI - but it's very expensive. HI also are very strong in assaulting castles (how it's important again depend on starting date as only lvl 4 Improved Keep stop you from assaulting).

Without HF you don't have high priority for reformation (as reformed religion pre-HF don't have any notable bonuses) and just need to get off elective gavelkind. Cheapiest way is to get christian concubine - shift to her religion - turn on gavelkind - shift back.

Actually playing reformed pagan before HF is more like a challenge - it will be better to convert into something civilized (catholics or islam, as orthodox is a meh) later.

[Mr_Faorry]

Originally posted by corisai:

convert into something civilized

Originally posted by corisai:

islam

There's a reason we need to retake the Holy Land rather than leave it in saracen hands, that's sounding like some wack heresy coming from you there.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Mr_Faorry:

Originally posted by corisai:

convert into something civilized

Originally posted by corisai:

islam

There's a reason we need to retake the Holy Land rather than leave it in saracen hands, that's sounding like some wack heresy coming from you there.

OP already infidel as playing pagan, so who care? xD

Jokes aside - without* HF reformed pagan is insanely boring. No fun aside from doing it's as some kind of challenge.

*one of most dumbiest typo in my life. seems that multitasking isn't my kind of stuff...

[Tammy the Muffin]

Well, since infidel is anyone who adheres to not yours religion (or heresy)...
We will take Jerusalem! Set sail, bravest vikings, infidels awaits!