Marriage Strategies for Debutantes

Right from the start, carefully arranged court marriages are vital to equip your empire for survival and conquest. Alas, it's a dilemma of competing choices requiring some prolonged head scratching.

How to do Matchmaking

A good marriage would be between a blind Wife and deaf Husband.

Michel de Montague (1533-1592)

Paradox makes searching far and wide for just the right match pretty easy:

1. Scroll down your list of courtiers (hotkey F5) then click each thumbnail portrait to find those who are unmarried
2. Right click and choose 'Find Spouse' to see who's available in your region. (Ignore the option 'Arrange Marriage' since it restricts the candidates just to your own court)
3. You'll see an interface like that pictured below. To find the kind talent you want, choose from the drop down list (or else click on a skill attribute icon).
4. Click the partner you want. This opens the Marriage window to seal the deal.
But Beware: When your damsel seeks to bring that male talent into court it's vital to checkbox 'Matrilineal Succession'. Otherwise they will both go off to faithfully serve some other court entirely!

But anyway, what really IS a 'good' match?

Marriages for Alliance

"Beauty is in the eye of the beer-holder"

- Al Bernstein

You can opt to marry off a your Ruler and/or any single members of your immediate royal family with a view to securing powerful alliances.

At first glance this seems like THE obvious choice, since allies can aid your battles, and even the mere existence of a slumbering giant ally may well deter predators. But maybe an alliance marriage is really NOT so advisable right at the start. That's when you're probably just scrapping in the dirt with small neighbours, so your first Ruler probably may never need call on alliance support.

However you allies will often call YOU to join their own wars - just when you don't have any military to spare. Sure, you can agree to their alliance wars and then cravenly just forget to show up. But after a while this can lead to nasty Prestige penalties


Also, if you marry JUST for an alliance you could find yourself sleeping with a talent-less, sterile, insane troll. You're much better off saving a catch like this for your little brother, and get the alliance that way.

Your Ruler's Primary Spouse

"I could be a housewife... I guess I've vacuumed a couple of times"

- Debbie Harry

Your primary spouse has a special seat on your Council that allows's her to transfer some of her own skill points to add to your own. Clearly you want a REAL talent there, but is it better to choose an good all-rounder or a narrow specialist?

All-rounders:
The advantage of an all-rounder is that you can expect better outcomes from minor game events that are periodically checked against any one of your spouse's skill stats (Diplomacy, Martial, Stewardship, Intrigue and Learning). Personally, I feel these events are too infrequent and inconsequential to justify an all-rounder.

Specialists:
The advantage of choosing a specialist is the whopping stat buffs they can give your Ruler (up to +50% of a selected spouse’s stat added to your own). I like to choose a Stewardship specialist and assign them with them with Manage Domain for a very welcome income bonus, plus a handy increase to my Domain cap. However, if your ruler can have multiple spouses you can marry up to four specialists and easily swap them into the Primary Spouse role as needs be. For example, swap in your high intrigue spouse before attempting a murder scheme and set her council task to assist you with that.

Your Heir's Primary Spouse

Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes.

- Jim Carrey

Likewise, I'd my Heir to marry a really good stewardess (ha ha not the airborne kind). But I'd NOT have him married off too early. Since by the time he takes power, the happy couple may have spawned a vast litter of title claimants - all eager to tear the Dynasty apart in its third generation.

On the other hand, if you're intent on creating a dynastic master race, you might well want him hitched early to some good genetic stock. Ideally, a girl sporting the Genius, Amazonian or Beautiful traits.



Of course, if you're playing a polygamous culture, once installed as Ruler your Heir can have a highly skilled Primary Spouse alongside some good breeding wives as his Secondary Spouses. Well, that's Romance for you!

Marrying in Council Members

Each council position has a key attribute stat which greatly effects their performance. Your goal is find a real rockstar for each position, preferably with an 'Excellent' level their key skill (17 or above).

- Bishop's key skill is Learning. However most faiths disallow rulers to choose their own Bishop. So you may just have to live with an idiot in the pulpit.
- Chancellor's key skill trait is Diplomacy (usually it’s a male only position)
- Marshal's key skill is Martial (usually male only)
- Steward's key skill is Stewardship (usually male only)
- Spymaster's key skill is Intrigue (usually open to both males and females)



You can see from the number of 'male only' council positions that every unmarried woman you have at court is a valuable honeytrap to snare some great talent with. So maybe start off seeking a female Spymaster first, so your women can find councillors for the other roles.

(Note: Powerful vassals can sometimes take real exception to being booted from their council seats for some low-life. You may have to keep the real talent just hanging round the Court until it's safe to promote them).

Marrying in a Physician

This is probably the most important lesser court position to fill. Sure, you can just advertise for one, in the hope of finding a couple good randoms. But by marrying-in a Physician to your Court you get a much wider choice (plus it saves you the recruitment fee).

This job can usually be filled by either a male or female. Look for high Learning, but additional medical traits are great if you can find them (including Herbalist, Physician & Mystic).

(Fun Fact: One novice physician removed my Ruler's testicles as a cure for the plague. In a reciprocal gesture the Ruler removed his head).

Marrying in Knights and Commanders

Typically your Knights roster is a boys-only club (depending on your culture). So again, your courtly babes will come in handy as recruiters.

• For knights, a high Prowess is the key stat to look for, since this massively influences their battlefield performance.
  
• For Commanders. Martial is the key stat. However there's a number of 'commander traits' giving very useful tactical bonuses to any armies they command.

Marrying in Guardian Educators

Most anyone from your court can become a guardian and educate child. But it's much better to recruit a couple of really talented educators (male or female). For a great all-round great tutor look for:

1. Any education trait (Genius, Intelligent. Quick / Shrewd .... the more candles the better).
   
2. A very high Learning attribute

Old Maids are Hot

Hey, even the Mona Lisa is falling apart.

― Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

Don't forget the oldies in your Court
Your weather-beaten old widows can be extremely useful for bringing in young talent. This is because they've accrued high Prestige scores over their long lives - giving them access to a large list of potential partners. They can be great for recruiting high-Prowess knights.

Exploit Divorce to Arrange Impossible Marriages

As House Head, the Enforce Divorce interaction is available if:
a) You have the Allow Divorce marriage doctrine
b) The target is within your House (and, I think, unlanded).
c) You can afford the Piety fee (100-300 points)
d) Your spiritual Head of Faith approves (easy if that's you)

Beauty and the Geek
Maybe you want an ideal wife for some spotty young courtier. But since his Prestige is so laughably low, this Goddess never even appears in his Find Spouse searches. Try this trick:
1. Marry in the target to your Court using an older high prestige House member
2. Use the Enforce Divorce interaction on that House member, and their newly ex-wife stays on as an unmarried member of your Court.
3. Use the 'Arrange Marriage' interaction on the Goddess, to wed her to the slack-jawed youth.

How to Corrupt a Monogamist
If you're a polygamist Ruler second wives can be hard to find. That's because your 'Find Spouse' searches will only off up other polygamists. But there's a workaround:
1. Marry in the target to your Court using a single House member
2. Use Enforce Divorce on that House member.
3. Use Convert Faith on your prospective bride (if she's unwilling you can usually bring her round by raising her Opinion of you first)
4. Use the Arrange Marriage interaction on the newly converted polygamist to wed her to yourself.

Half of all marriages end in divorce — and then there are the really unhappy ones.

~ Joan Rivers

Some Relevant Wikis

https://ck3.paradoxwikis.com/Traits
https://ck3.paradoxwikis.com/Council

[bloom]

The quotes XD