Point of Chancellor Sowing Dissent in Rival's Realm

[DarkKnight]

I frequently use my Chancellors to fabricate claims in my AI opponents' kingdoms, and somtimes to patch up diplomatic relations. But I don't see much use when it comes to sowing dissent. If I am France, and I have a claim on Provence, but I am wary of going to war with the Holy Roman Empire for it, I want to place my chancellor at the capital of HRE and have him cause friction between Provence's count/duke and the Emperor, with the deteriorating relations leading to a revolt. Then I can swoop in and conquer Provence before the Emperor has a chance to crush the uprising himself and re-assert the HRE's hold. Yet, 100% of the time, I end up sowing dissent between the Emperor and his capital's local counts, bishops and mayors. Any ideas?

[alexraoul]

Place the chancellor on one of the Emperor's vassal's capitals. You will either damage relations between said Duke and his minor vassals, or between the Duke and his Liege.

Not really easy to trigger a civil war within a large nation though. You need to lower relations with several powerful landholders who already have strained relations to begin with, and the Sow Dissent ability is just so random.

[Arkeangel]

The problem also with sow dissent is you used to be able to (they may have fixed this) sow dissent between a vassal and himself.

A better approach is to assassinate the King/ruler and then declare war on him and destroy his army this is far more effective than sowing dissent.

[DarkKnight]

A better approach is to assassinate the King/ruler and then declare war on him and destroy his army this is far more effective than sowing dissent. [/quote]


That sounds like a good idea, but not always applicable. Say Kaiser Frederick of HRE is a good commander and gets bumped off. What if his son is even better? Plus, if I get caught, I get excommunicated. I only assasinate people who have wronged me or the kingdom [murder, repeated rebellions] or non-Christians because of this.

[Arkeangel]

I have never been excommunicated for an assasination. Maybe you are just unlucky.

[Nef]

I've only every been excommunicated because someone asked the pope nicely.

I never use sow dissent these days. It's never done my any good and all it ever seems to accomplish is making people angry with me when they inevitably discover my chancellor doing it (no matter how awesome he is).

[kurrlann]

if you kill the king all vassals like the heir less at the start of his reign so in theory he should get less troops from all vassals making his stacks much smaller

[BalaminienGS]

I myself stumbled upon this forum 2 years and some months later attempting to get alittle more insight searching "Use of Sowing dissent" which gave me this. Learning some more now I've returned so incase some searched the same thing and is reading this they'll see this rambling. I'm making this if likewise anyone else browses through here.

With some of the latest updates and time that has passed, the inclusion of the threat system makes for a system to challange one's consistent hunger for aquiring more land, power and prestige. For the sake of demostrating what extent sowing discontent can aid in those plans one imagines a few examples. The key to keep in mind are varibles.



The previous comments, great examples of how sowing dissent is indirect strategy and how in you're paticular play through it may offer a needless detour to attain something.

Some examples where sowing dissent can begin to be used could be discribed as looking for the janga piece that'll make a whole section of a tower fall. Better yet it's the crack in the wall of a dam you have stumbled on. Except here you're convincing another that it's in their interest to bring this structure down. The effects, the hope to sow what will one day be reaped, only time will tell.

Generally, speaking: Traits, factions and Imbalance in power between nobles are the biggest things that'll even tell you it could work.

To quote the wonderful user alexraoul, " [It's not] really easy to trigger a civil war within a large nation though. You need to lower relations with several powerful landholders who already have strained relations to begin with ... "

____The Ruler may have N-A (Non-Agression) pacts that may make a civil war useless.

____Clicking on portaits of nobles in the rulers land will show you an example how much strength they possibly have from their demense. This portion will make up the portion of the rulers army (Based on their laws) so you can guage how much could be turned against them and what they would have left. This is hugely important.

Finding a imbalance that isn't protected against is how likely any civil war will turn out in the place in question. Getting there now reflects the nature of this strategy. It's indirect, so you add in more indirect strategies:

_______A Spymaster can help spread rumors

_______Assinating the Emperor/King/Duke can lead to greater instability if it leads to a scenerio of a net loss of popularity for the Sovereign. Culture, Religion, bad traits, HORRIBLE traits (I'm looking at you inbred).

_______Assinating the (maybe soon to be) Sovereign's best friends to ambitious, cowardly, gluttonous, a-holes.

So then if there was finally a breakout of war you helped implement, what do you get?

______________So the next King may have some great martial skills, but it wasn't enough to win a civil war and now a lowering of Authority now means you have a smaller army to deal with on the field.

______________Indepence was had by some portion of the Duchy/Kingdom/Empire, the great rock has been cracked up.

______________The Civil War leaves a duke or count exiting and there you are with open arms to offer him a place in your Empire (My case, helped that he was part of my family).

______________As a smaller guy you can try to use this as an opening to escape destruction maybe on your terms. Joining under a women, family memember, same culture, religion, ect is better then the worse.

Alone sowing dissent isn't much. It may not even be applicable. Like how fabricating a claim may be useless without an army that'll win or in a kingdom not allowing internal wars. It relies on planning and the use of other indirect strategies. It offers an avenue that could serve your situation well or maybe just offer a different and fun challange. I've only started using this feature and it's provided for some good returns in some cases. Honestly though, it's left me a bit fustrated and empty handed at others. Cause as alexraoul finished with:

"....the Sow Dissent ability is just so random."

In anouther scenerio as pointed out by arkeangle it may be more prudent to "declare war on him and destroy his army[,] this is far more effective than sowing dissent."

"Know the stats, know the scenerio, know your place and then act" is the greatest strategy of all to follow in Crusader Kings. Hell, maybe in life aswell.


{This needless bump was brought to you by Dexedrine. Dexedrine, it makes people with ADHD do things.}