whats the point to vassals?

[Imperator]

sorry for the length... got carried away skip down to TL;DR for the quick vrsion lol

Early on Sicily decided to try and get come florin from me threatening to attack if i dont, took them ten turns to finally follow through prompting an on off war (i would agree to a cease fire for 5-8k so it would be one less hostile to deal with since ive basicaly been alternating with France, Hungary, Portugal, Sicily, Egypt, the Moors, Poland and Russia. they all instigate except for the islamic nations even France when they were my second strongest ally lmao.)

ANYHOW, that was the early 20's in turns and its now turn 65 or something and since the 30s ive had them pushed back to Tunis alone as far as i can tell since the Moors are to the west a rebel settlement to the east and then the egyptians. their power is pathetic wealth is meagre aposed to my 300-400k wealth and whats classed as supreme power controling 45 regions as the HRE. i siege Tunis until its 1 turn from surrendur or im ordered by the dang pope to leave them alone.

YET they have refused to become vassals despite offering them back Naples and Parmelo or whatever and up to 200k UNTIL i threw in Ajacio and upped it to 300k.

nothing has since changed except we share military access, trade rights, they are classed as my ally and vassal with an odd addition of my hostilities with france apparantly ending automatically. i dont have access to their settlements, they refuse to attack hungary, russia, moors or egypt.... what kind of servants are allowed to refuse their master? (when they refused in the past they said something about not wanting to be my servants)

TL;DR

why make vassals if you have no control over them?

is it somthing more worthwhile if they actually pose some threat or dificulty with wiping out?


im kind of sentimental and would rather not have to keep wiping nations out like i ended up having to do with Milan.

[CHE]

Originally posted by MARSHALL:

sorry for the length... got carried away skip down to TL;DR for the quick vrsion lol

Early on Sicily decided to try and get come florin from me threatening to attack if i dont, took them ten turns to finally follow through prompting an on off war (i would agree to a cease fire for 5-8k so it would be one less hostile to deal with since ive basicaly been alternating with France, Hungary, Portugal, Sicily, Egypt, the Moors, Poland and Russia. they all instigate except for the islamic nations even France when they were my second strongest ally lmao.)

ANYHOW, that was the early 20's in turns and its now turn 65 or something and since the 30s ive had them pushed back to Tunis alone as far as i can tell since the Moors are to the west a rebel settlement to the east and then the egyptians. their power is pathetic wealth is meagre aposed to my 300-400k wealth and whats classed as supreme power controling 45 regions as the HRE. i siege Tunis until its 1 turn from surrendur or im ordered by the dang pope to leave them alone.

YET they have refused to become vassals despite offering them back Naples and Parmelo or whatever and up to 200k UNTIL i threw in Ajacio and upped it to 300k.

nothing has since changed except we share military access, trade rights, they are classed as my ally and vassal with an odd addition of my hostilities with france apparantly ending automatically. i dont have access to their settlements, they refuse to attack hungary, russia, moors or egypt.... what kind of servants are allowed to refuse their master? (when they refused in the past they said something about not wanting to be my servants)

TL;DR

why make vassals if you have no control over them?

is it somthing more worthwhile if they actually pose some threat or dificulty with wiping out?


im kind of sentimental and would rather not have to keep wiping nations out like i ended up having to do with Milan.

Yeah, I, too, generally prefer to keep factions in existence, rather than wiping them out.

Vassals can be useful for getting extra income (50% of that faction's income, if I remember correctly), while not needing to pay for the costs of their building upgrades and military units.

You might find it easier to make a faction into a vassal if you have achieved a very trustworthy reputation, and/or if you have treated that faction well, thus increasing the positivity of their relations with you, e.g. if you've been at war against them, but you have released any troops of theirs after capture, and not sacked nor exterminated their settlements.

[Imperator]

Originally posted by CHE:

Yeah, I, too, generally prefer to keep factions in existence, rather than wiping them out.

Vassals can be useful for getting extra income (50% of that faction's income, if I remember correctly), while not needing to pay for the costs of their building upgrades and military units.

You might find it easier to make a faction into a vassal if you have achieved a very trustworthy reputation, and/or if you have treated that faction well, thus increasing the positivity of their relations with you, e.g. if you've been at war against them, but you have released any troops of theirs after capture, and not sacked nor exterminated their settlements.

ive manage to get a reputaion of reliable and that was a massive strugle since France, Spain, Portugal, Hungary, Poland, Russia, Moor, Millan, Egypt and the Byzantines have all instigated war at least once.

ive been in near constant war with France since turn 15 (now at turn 69) with the ceasefire the French would pay 5k+ for lasting at most 2 turns before they attacked again.

the rest have been rather quick aside Sicily which has been never ending since a turn in the late 20s after i got sick of factions asking for peace just to rebuild and attack a couple turns later so i sank my teeth into Sicily hard.

i sacked the first 8 rebel settlments i took then realized thats not good for reputation and since then i have only ocupied.

ive always released prisoners... well not really... ransom those buggers off.... and i think Sicily stopped paying to get their men back in the early 40s...alternating between outright refusal and claiming they cant afford it (France has always outright refused, i guess they adopted the "no negotiation with terrorists" stance but forgot the last two words)

soo its been hard to maintain my reliable reputaion, perfect relationship with the Papal States and Top notch standing with the Pope though i feel having had at least 5 cardinals (currently 8) and the popes being mine since the first one died has probably helped though the second pope almost excomunicated, me friggin traitor.

[Voss]

The vassal mechanic is tricky, for it to work you really have to have a good reputation at best be very trustworthy otherwise the AI will refuse to cooperate even if it is the most sensible thing to do.

The difficulty of the campaign also affects the AI's behavior with diplomacy greatly. If you play on easy, the AI are pushovers and will pretty much agree to anything. Medium difficulty, they are a little bit more wary but not much. Hard difficulty is the best in my opinion, they have high standards but not too unreasonable. I've had factions sue for peace after devastating battles that crippled them.

Very Hard difficulty is the worst, the AI are basically programmed to hate you no matter what, they will refuse to negotiate even the most basic of terms like trade rights unless you fork over lots of cash. They will never accept or offer a ceasefire and they will send wave after wave of their people to their deaths because screw the human player. They will almost never accept being a vassal even if they have 1 settlement left and no armies. If they do, they will most likely just declare war on you in couple turns because screw the human.

When it comes to getting your vassals to help you in war, I'd try to get to first get relations with them up before calling their aid, vassals act like allies but more tied to you. Maybe help clear rebels in their regions, give them money, fight off enemies that attack them. That may make them more inclined to help you. Remember, they are still AI and they still behave like an alliance.

[Imperator]

Originally posted by Vossman:

The vassal mechanic is tricky, for it to work you really have to have a good reputation at best be very trustworthy otherwise the AI will refuse to cooperate even if it is the most sensible thing to do.

The difficulty of the campaign also affects the AI's behavior with diplomacy greatly. If you play on easy, the AI are pushovers and will pretty much agree to anything. Medium difficulty, they are a little bit more wary but not much. Hard difficulty is the best in my opinion, they have high standards but not too unreasonable. I've had factions sue for peace after devastating battles that crippled them.

Very Hard difficulty is the worst, the AI are basically programmed to hate you no matter what, they will refuse to negotiate even the most basic of terms like trade rights unless you fork over lots of cash. They will never accept or offer a ceasefire and they will send wave after wave of their people to their deaths because screw the human player. They will almost never accept being a vassal even if they have 1 settlement left and no armies. If they do, they will most likely just declare war on you in couple turns because screw the human.

When it comes to getting your vassals to help you in war, I'd try to get to first get relations with them up before calling their aid, vassals act like allies but more tied to you. Maybe help clear rebels in their regions, give them money, fight off enemies that attack them. That may make them more inclined to help you. Remember, they are still AI and they still behave like an alliance.

hmm, seems like parts of this game could have been done alot better lmao.

my relations with France, Sicilly, Portugal and Hungary are abysmal since they got their asses handed to them time and time again after declaring war on me. relations with Papal States are perfect, England and Holland are very good, Moors and Egypt are so-so, and everyone else is amiable.

how am i to build up relations with sicily if im trying to keep them bankrupt and with pathetic military? or do those not really effect their willingness to bow to the Heiliges Romisches Reich?

[Millan was bankrupt, pathetic and surrounded entirely by me. and with 1 turn before their last hold out was to surrendur i was curious so i turned off FOW to see if they had any merchants diplomats or really anything else out there, which they only had their princess who i already had a diplomat ready to talk with her one last time to offer vassalage. she refused and the Milanese rule ended their 3 cardinals inside the city died and the princess vanished (no death animation just poof gone) so that was disapointing but at the time i actually had amiable relations with them since they lost merseile to the french (ping ponged back and forth) before i took it so i really only had to take Geona and crush 2 half armies which there were no survivors and they never routed]


i guess ill just wipe out the rest of Christendom if they are too pridefull to preserve themselves by coming into my folds lol. which are utterly massive...
the 3 southern regions of Spain.
-two western regions of France.
-western border fo the continuous empire consists of: Marseille Dijon Paris Bruges.
-all of italy except Rome (Im not ready to destroy the figurehead of Christendom and make every christian nation and my own people hate me)
-Eastern border: Ragusa Bran Thorn and Iasi and Halyach but not krakow (got Iasi and Haylach from poland in exchange for peace so they now have 2 regions... whcih are seperated by Iasi and Haylach)
- the three itallian islands (Ajacio Cagliari and Palermo)
-and the farthest reach is Jerusalem and Acre (got the first from a crusade and the last form Egypt in exchange for peace) and since they are so friggin far away and the Pope wouldnt accept them they pretty much operate as their own little nation full army in the garrison and two more in forts... its a massive expense but hell so is real life Isreal lmao


its my first time with the game so i have it set to medium with hard battles.

[justinsane11]

Originally posted by Vossman:

The vassal mechanic is tricky, for it to work you really have to have a good reputation at best be very trustworthy otherwise the AI will refuse to cooperate even if it is the most sensible thing to do.

The difficulty of the campaign also affects the AI's behavior with diplomacy greatly. If you play on easy, the AI are pushovers and will pretty much agree to anything. Medium difficulty, they are a little bit more wary but not much. Hard difficulty is the best in my opinion, they have high standards but not too unreasonable. I've had factions sue for peace after devastating battles that crippled them.

Very Hard difficulty is the worst, the AI are basically programmed to hate you no matter what, they will refuse to negotiate even the most basic of terms like trade rights unless you fork over lots of cash. They will never accept or offer a ceasefire and they will send wave after wave of their people to their deaths because screw the human player. They will almost never accept being a vassal even if they have 1 settlement left and no armies. If they do, they will most likely just declare war on you in couple turns because screw the human.

When it comes to getting your vassals to help you in war, I'd try to get to first get relations with them up before calling their aid, vassals act like allies but more tied to you. Maybe help clear rebels in their regions, give them money, fight off enemies that attack them. That may make them more inclined to help you. Remember, they are still AI and they still behave like an alliance.

what an answer!!

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Vossman:

I've had factions sue for peace after devastating battles that crippled them.

I never accept. Once they're asking for peace, they're clearly screwed. :P And I march on mercilessly with my ten-dread ten-command Faction Leader.

Okay, I play this game brutally. But such is total war...

... may or may not have converted half of Middle-Earth to Dwarfendom. No longer are there Elves in Caras Galadhon, no Elrond in Rivendell, no Heir of Isilidur, no King Brand, no Dol Amroth...
... although it was Mordor's doing that took out Gondor, Edoras, Lothlorien, and Dol Amroth. I just came up afterwards and cleaned them up - including Mordor, of course. :P

Originally posted by MARSHALL:

TL;DR

why make vassals if you have no control over them?

is it somthing more worthwhile if they actually pose some threat or dificulty with wiping out?

im kind of sentimental and would rather not have to keep wiping nations out like i ended up having to do with Milan.

The problem with M2 is that the AI is a backstabbing idiot. Which is, on the whole, historically accurate. It does mean that it's impossible to keep an alliance with certain factions and difficult for most - although every now and then you'll hit upon an ally that will keep one front clear-ish (e.g. England and Spain).
The AI doesn't like expansionists - because if somebody is whacking up everybody you're probably next. This means it will backstab you, even if doing so is signing its own death warrant.

Vassals are a shiny idea - you let them live, they give you money. The problem is making them vassals in the first place (VERY DEMANDING!), and then keeping them... the only way to keep an AI truly happy is to give them money, which defeats the point of a vassal.

I say conquer the lot - if you have one less frontier that's much more money for you, as well as one less full stack.

[Inardesco]

I can has perfect relations with the AI on Very Hard without any issue.

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Inardesco:

I can has perfect relations with the AI on Very Hard without any issue.

How many AI?

[Inardesco]

All my 5-6 allies :p Then again, having a killer economy that brings you an income of 40-50k a turn allows that.

I'm secretly instigating wars all over Europe because no other faction is strong enough to beat me :P

[Monchhichi]

If I remember correctly, you can use vassals as human shields and you will need all the human shields you can get for when the Mongols come...

[Inardesco]

Not really, once you get the hang of the Mongols, all you need is 1 decent army and a nice spot to defend.

[Ruinae Retroque Rursus]

Originally posted by Inardesco:

Not really, once you get the hang of the Mongols, all you need is 1 decent army and a nice spot to defend.

Especially in Retrofit, where Boiling Oil comes into play.

Crusade on Antioch + Take the surrounds & make them all Castles + Spear Militia Spam = Win

[Jungfaha]

My other nick name is necromancer.... not
Any way.. :)
For those whom still play this game there is a sweet trick. even on HARDEST difficulty that can be exploited to make other factions like u. In theory this can also work for your enemy. But its a bit tedious.

Getting the AI to become your Vassal

1. Reduce their army to "Pathetic"
   
2. Be sieging one ot both of their las 2 cities.
   
3. Use Diplomat to speak wth whom ever.
   
4. Give them a present of 350gold FLorins denarri what ever (more gold may be needed but usually not more then 450
   
5. Next time you speak to them to make "another offer" but still within the same session of communiating with them.
   
6. At this point you will see. "PLEASED" instead of "NUTRAL"
   
7. Make the offer and to become Vassel or WE WILL ATTACK and give them about 2grand (2,000)

-- tada :) I just tested it with Milan

How to get the AI to LOVE YOU

OPTION A

• when talking to ai u want to be friends with ALWAYS give them PRESENT of 350 gold upfront and always make sure you see "PLEASED"
  
• then ovffer 25florins over and over for about 500 - 1000. by this time relation ship will get better
  
• its tedious for sure

OPTION B
After becomming allies, use above tactic to help improve relation to make alliance.

• Be sure you see "PLEASED" before proceeding
  
• offer them something such as military access but demand it also.
  
• know they will refuse up to around 10-12k depending on ur reputation
  
• over them this over and over with about 6k florins on the table
  
• repeat rinse and continue untill your relation ship is PERFECT :)

im sure others have done better job explainning, maybe ill come by later to revise this ZZZzzzzzz.....
or delete it... any way hope this helps :)

maybe ill make a video and post it on utube if no one else has... shall check when i wake..

ZZZZzzzzzz.....

peace


As im passing out I realize I forgot to answer the question.

Well the point is simple.
MONEY. Once you decimate their army. They won't have that upkeep cost. So then you will be rolling in dough. I went from having 1k to 2k at the start of every turn to having 20k and I'm on turn 15.