Help with Zoroastrian

[pad93]

Hi all, I have playied CK 2 for quite a while and I managed so far to win the game with mostly every important religion. But i never went far with zoroastrian and I never achieved to create the empire of persia. What do you guys suggest? What strategy do you normally use? Even with small victories i always get subjugated from Sunni an arabian powers...

[Kust]

I would suggest expanding up north into the weaker Pagan states. This is an easy expansion and a great way to prevent the Muslims from attacking you. Once you feel comfortable with your size and power, you can then move against Khiva and the Saffarids. Keep in mind that while you are expanding, so too will the Saffarids so it is very important to move quickly and stay ahead of them.

[Evil Crusader]

Eat up Khiva from the inside via factions, then expand northwards, then roll back south whenever you can exploit a rare weakness of the Saffarids. That's almost all.

[Surimi]

Depends how you're planning to do it. While Karen is the only realm to start Zoroastrian (and got a massive buff recently which makes them much more viable) with the ability to change religion now you can always play as the much more powerful Saffarids and just convert to Zoroastrianism once you've got things under control. Heck, the Yabguids might make for an interesting Zoroastrian game as well, since it's very easy for them to convert (just take a Zoroastrian concubine) and they can easily build a huge Steppe empire prior to moving into Persia.

The real challenge is building up enough strength to face the Abassids. You should absolutely avoid bordering them unless you have a huge number of troops, or the ability to hire mercenaries.

Heck, while it's a slightly unrealistic and gamey option, you could try playing as the Abassid caliph yourself, subjugate Persia and then convert to Zoroastrianism.

[pad93]

Thank you guys for all your suggestions. You are awesome!

[Corrupted Sanity (Vex)]

I started out by attacking a Shia duke to the SW of Karen (I think you start with a border), provides another easy target that won't really get assistance just like the pagans. You can work on Khiva from the inside, though I haven't done that - They actually had a rebellion so I was able to go and snatch a bunch of territory from them.

You kind of have to be lucky and hope the powerful Muslim states don't decide to go after you.
There are a bunch of Muslim dukes around (you can attack the ones across the lake too BTW) which you can go after if the big guys are too busy to defend them. There are a few Miaphisites and a Jewish kingdom to the northwest which also aren't as powerful.


As a funny story, in my game the Byzantines randomly became Catholic around 1000 so the smaller Orthodox states provided additional easy targets. On the other hand, crusades should've been more dangerous, but I've never actually had one targeted at me even though I've owned Jerusalem for a hundred years or so (I have a pretty big empire now, haha)

[Razanur]

Magyars make the best Zoroastrians. Form Hungary, conquer all the necessary territory, make Arpad jr. the Saoshyant before he dies, PROFIT!

[Razanur]

I've been thinking about doing the following experiment, start as magyars, form hungary, take byzantine land, usurp or recreate Byzantine Empire, take all Roman Empire land, convert to orthodox when ruler is old, form roman empire, let ruler die so that the heir is tengri again, conquer all persian empire land, convert to zoroastrianism, make your ruler the saoshyant, with born in the purple,augustus and saoshyant descendant should give you a 35 bonus opinion with all zoroastrian vassals(25 with others). I think it should work.

[Evil Crusader]

Huh. Yeah? I suppose? I don't see why it shouldn't?

[Yami]

Before ROI what i did was at the pause screen dow on the counntry to the right of you for the 3 county duchy. You should have enough retinue+levy to take that duchy. then i dow on the country north for that duchy. saved up a huge amount of cash. got dow on by saffraids. raise all the mercs i could and camped in the mountains. Shifted my capital to the new duchy as it is more defensivable and just won the war through attrition.

Continue to dow on the country next to you to get all the provinces u need to form the kingdom. then plot to kill or assassinate the ruler of the saffaids. wait for succession wars and dow during then to take as many duchies as possible.

Dont forget to marry your family members along the way to get bonus relations. The abbassids was only a problem once i formed the persian kingdom. I only had to reload my save once cause i had 2 jihads declared on me(shia and sunni) the tengri to the north converted to shia and was a pain to deal with.

[Strategyking]

Before RoI came out just blitzed the country to my immediate right as soon as possible. I gained the region of Khiva out of that, and then I took Turkestan. Luckily the Ruler of the Saffarids died before he could form Persia, and his "empire" was split between his two infant sons. I took over the weaker one, built up my powerbase, and gradually took over the other successor.


Basically, I got reallllllly, realllllllly lucky. One Jihad when you aren't ready and your entire ironman game goes down the drain. After you can take over Persia though, it's pretty easy.

[TM]

I don't know how feasible Zorastrian games are since Rajas of India, but heading north and into Cumania etc. never worked for me. The problem was that if I wasn't doing anything to make the muslim states to my south weaker, no-one else was either and they'd inevitably end up far more powerful than me. In the end, my only successful Saoshyant game came when I abandoned the northern strategy and simply made sure to blitz my southern neighbours from the off.

[Evil Crusader]

TM, there is so much more land to the north that you can become much more powerful with them, fight defensively, and only then go back to Persia. If you can bide your time, it's (sadly, becasue I hate that route) totally meaningful to do so.

[TM]

Originally posted by Evil Crusader:

TM, there is so much more land to the north that you can become much more powerful with them, fight defensively, and only then go back to Persia. If you can bide your time, it's (sadly, becasue I hate that route) totally meaningful to do so.

As you say, sadly luck deserted me when I tried it :-(