Eric the Heathen, 1066 Start (for Achievement) discussion

[Myll]

For those few of you that have earned the Achievement for the Eric the Heathen, using a 1066 year start, I wanted to start a thread to get the best advice and hints at how to get through this effectively and earn the Achievement. I have just started on an attempt at this, but would like to hear from you players that already have it, as to what you found most effective to play it out.

FYI, for players not familiar with this, the Eric the Heathen achievement is the 3rd most rare Achievement to earn in CK2, and has been referred to as the sort of real challenge in the game, that helps distinguish CK2 (especially from current CK3). I'm not trying to start a CK2 vs CK3 debate here, just interested in the feedback and advice for this Achievement, however.

[SaD-82]

To be honest: This achievement isn't hard.
I guess that it's just that some people won't bother to do it - besides: Not everyone is an achievement hunter (I don't care for achievements at all - I just got it when I played as Eric - you could say I got it by accident).
What did I do? I learned to duel, won against the other Eric, got me a nice throne, conquered parts of Norway and Denmark (and they had some holy sites in them), turned my vassals into germanic pagans, raided like hell and reformed the religion.
Not very hard. For many people maybe just too tiresome - for me, because I rp my CK 2 games, it was a natural progression and I didn't even think about any achievements (I didn't even know that this one would exist).

[Hieda no Ajuu]

When you start as Erik af Munso, you already have a claim on the throne and you're like 3rd or 4th in succession after the king and his kids. So there are many ways to become king, whether it's by war, assassination, faction, even joining the wolf warriors and sending a duel challenge which you'll probably win since you have Mjolnir.
Once you are king, the rest is just clean-up. Start converting or replacing vassals, go conquer the holy sites in Denmark and Holland, raid Christian temples for moral authority, then reform the religion.
Honestly the Denmark conquering England one is probably harder than this, it's just this one was added so late into the game's life that nobody bothered with it.

[Curithane]

When I tried it, and got a lot of bad RNG with Eric I remembered an old saying: The Green pastures of Ireland are were Empires are made

If the stuff the people above me have said do not work, try conquering Ireland.

[Myll]

Just finished this Heathonous Ways achievement in CK2. I found the following challenges along the way:
1. Taking over Sweden can lead to RNG "Game Over" potential. When I took over, Sweden had only an "Elective" succession rule. Not Elective Gavelkind, but just Elective. Which meant that if I died, whoever had the most votes becomes King of Sweden, no matter what Dynasty you're from. For nearly 10 years, I had to hope that my Main character didn't die, while I had to enact new Laws for Revoking Titles, then Revoking for Religious reasons (was forced to do those 2, back to back in order to ensure I retained control). I was the only Pagan ruler with all other Catholic, so none of them were voting my Dynasty choice in as next King, and it was near impossible to bring every Count and above, to a positive view of my Main Character (can't change Succession for 10 years, and even then you can't change if at least one Count or above hated your Main Character). Once I had Revoke for Religious reasons set, and a Rebellion kicked off, it was then rapidly resolving to the point that I had jailed and then Revoked all the leaders except one Duke (my brother who was pagan). I paused game and just Revoked like crazy - at the highest, I had a Demesne of 30 or more holdings temporarily, to include revoking all temples (priests) and cities (often different culture also but at minimum Catholic). So it was a massive purge, and then went through my entire Dynasty list to hand out counties and duchies to Germanic pagans who were in my Dynasty, and the game totally changed from there on.

2. The 50 Moral Authority is the most difficult task in the game, depending on how strong your neighbors are, and become. I could not effectively grab the 4th and 5th Holy Sites, had to stay with just the Denmark and Norway counties that had the other 2 Holy Sites, because the Holy Roman Empire (HRE) was not only formed and dominating Europe, but had two highly successful back-to-back crusades to the Middle East. HRE emperor had nearly 40K troop total he could call up. I was sitting at less than 10K, no way to fight against that scale of power.

So I had to constantly grind out these tasks to get Moral Authority (MA) over 50:
- Raid and pillage Catholic churches, over and over, and over again, for 1% Moral Authority each. As reminder, you can't simply siege a Catholic province church during a normal War, because War doesn't count toward the MA ticker, it only counts by Raid/sieging (pillaging).
- Defended successfully against one holy war started by Scotland against a fellow pagan in Ireland (a relative of mine), which was quite a boost when we won.
- Successfully take Counties from other religion kingdoms.
- Build Temples (+1% for each, very costly way to grow MA).
- And not screw it up, because your religion gets negative points for unsuccessful county grabs, unsuccessful "Prepared Invasions" (I had 3 different moronic pagan relatives who kept trying invasions that failed, almost like the AI working against me). This was a total of nearly -16% by the time all the screwups were completed. And you as player don't have much control for those events, because it's a different ruler making those decisions to go to war. Any Germanic faith ruler, can screw up the numbers on you. Which is why I say - it's a bit of a grind to keep on Raiding, over and over, and over again. I would prioritize the counties where the church was the 2nd slot (the 2nd in line to get Sieged), and then move on after the Church was sieged, not even worrying about any barony or city in the 3rd slot and beyond, because timing matters.

You can get some interesting special loots when you put so much RNG into play as you Raid this many times. I got the +2 "Epic" Axe (funny when it happens, I won't spoil all the looks and aspects of it, for those who haven't earned this before). Underwhelming in stats, but a humorous event for those who've played old-school RPGs a lot. Also found a green chest made of mysterious metal that you can't open (and I never did open it, and probably not playing past the achievement so it will remain closed).

Anyways, this was my own experience getting this, and I do highly recommend going after this achievement - it was a decent challenge, and you will find yourself on the verge of Game Over at some point during the attempt, but it was worth the time and effort.

"End Game" for me, was right after I finished reforming the Pagan Religion. No desire to carry it further, as that in itself felt like the end.

[Hieda no Ajuu]

1) I found I didn't have to do a crazy amount of purging, though yeah, the Catholic lords won't like it too much when you come into power. In fact, they revolted against me quickly, but that ended up being to my advantage since I could win and toss 'em in jail. At which point I revoke their duchy titles, give to one of their vassals, then demand the former vassal to convert to Germanic religion. Since they're so happy they're the duke now, they go with it. The secret catholic society might happen but that's a problem for later, well after the achievement gets popped. And then since your direct vassals are happy and pagan the election becomes much less troublesome.

2) Yeah, there's no way you're getting the Paderborn site with HRE in play. Denmark's is essentially free, Norway is just a couple of wars away, Holland can be done depending on the army situation, but Paderborn is pretty much off limits until you're stupidly huge. So raiding and holy wars to get that 50 MA are the order of the day. I beat up the other pagans nearby as well as raiding the churches in Norway regularly.
And since Germanic faith is by default aggressive your vassals are going to "try" to do their part. If they're successful, it can be a great help, but more likely they decide to pick a fight with England or France and get punted. I don't remember if it's possible to get "Forbid Vassal War" law passed at this point but this is maybe the only time I'd recommend going for it.

Congrats on getting your achievement!

[Snorktop]

I didn't get the achievement yet, but Erik the Heathen is the most fun start for me. Except I started in civil war with Erik of Sweden and it took me over 5 game tries to win the war. You are outnumbered, and the key is to attack immediately and pick off his army in smaller groups before they consolidate. After the first couple of battles, it's easy. Also, I sent gifts to invite commanders with 20+ martial right at the game start and they get in my army one day before the first battle.

Once I won Sweden, all the Christians hate me, and I think all the pagans are Satanic, and they all want to rebel immediately. So I just revoked everyone's title, fought again the Christians who refused, and then appointed my own pagan lords. Now everyone loves me.

I am not strong enough to mess with HRE, I wonder if conquests will get me there.

[Myll]

Originally posted by Snorktop:

I didn't get the achievement yet, but Erik the Heathen is the most fun start for me. Except I started in civil war with Erik of Sweden and it took me over 5 game tries to win the war. You are outnumbered, and the key is to attack immediately and pick off his army in smaller groups before they consolidate. After the first couple of battles, it's easy. Also, I sent gifts to invite commanders with 20+ martial right at the game start and they get in my army one day before the first battle.

Once I won Sweden, all the Christians hate me, and I think all the pagans are Satanic, and they all want to rebel immediately. So I just revoked everyone's title, fought again the Christians who refused, and then appointed my own pagan lords. Now everyone loves me.

I am not strong enough to mess with HRE, I wonder if conquests will get me there.

With Erik the Heathen start, it's important to get to new policy for Revoke Titles for Religious purposes, as then you can internally align within a Duchy that you have loyal pagan vassals (and take as many counties as possible to maximize your demesne holding limit also). Getting the manpower required to take on the rest of Sweden, Denmark, Norway -- that's what you must prepare for, and not just jump into the game start and rebel right away. You have to quick-build/grow your way into a potential rebellion.

[Yxklyx]

Secret religious cults should help with this one no? I always have that disabled though and it's one of the few achievements I haven't gotten yet.