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Content, Movies, Silly

Everyone Who Dropped the Ball in INFINITY WAR (Spoilers)

I liked this movie a lot. If you haven’t seen it, go do that. SPOILERS HERE.

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Right? Okay. So leaving the theater, it occurred to me that the heroes actually had a ton of chances to stop Thanos’ plan, and the fact that they didn’t manage it is sort of astonishing. Just for fun, here’s a list of everyone who, by not being slightly smarter/more ruthless, bears direct responsibility for the death of half the universe:

  • Loki could have left the Tesseract behind on Asgard to be destroyed.  This is maybe half a point, since it’s not 100% clear this actually would have destroyed it.  But later events imply that the stones are actually destructible, so maybe?  (Side note: having the stones be indestructible would make waaaaaaay more sense.)
  • Loki gives up the Tesseract to save Thor.  As will become a theme, it’s not super clear where he had it or what would happen if he actually held out on Thanos, but everyone acts as though he’s actually giving Thanos something.
  • Doctor Strange could have destroyed the Time gem immediately on hearing Thanos was doing stuff.  They handwave that he’s sworn to defend it but you would think not giving Thanos unlimited power would take priority?
  • Doctor Strange decides to bring the Time stone with, instead of leaving it somewhere slightly safer then hanging around his neck.  If the spell really does prevent anyone from taking it, even when he dies, he could also have safeguarded it by dying?
  • Iron Man decides to take the ship (and the Time stone) to Titan.  Not taking it back to Earth is understandable, but you know what other option was available?  Literally anywhere else in the universe.  The one thing Thanos emphatically does not have throughout the movie is perfect knowledge of where the stones are, because he’s constantly asking people.  So just like … go lose yourself somewhere?  Space is big.
  • Gamora goes along with the plan to go to Knowhere and … do something?  It’s really not clear what the actual plan is since if Thor, Hulk, and Loki got curb-stomped by Thanos it’s pretty clear Starlord, Gamora, Drax, and Mantis aren’t going to be able to take him out.  Maybe they thought they could get the stone first and run away, in which case you can add Starlord for not just turning the ship around and running away.
  • Gamora for not killing herself once it was clear Thanos was there, or indeed earlier.  That seems harsh but she did ask Starlord to kill her, so she was obviously aware this was a problem.  She could also kill herself later, when Thanos has her in prison and apparently unsupervised.
  • Gamora for giving up the location of the Soul stone to save Nebula.  This one is particularly bad since she a) knows exactly how bad this is, and b) has no expectation that Thanos won’t be able to take the stone once she tells him.
  • Starlord for ruining what was actually a perfectly functional plan to get the gauntlet away from Thanos that almost worked.  He is just the worst.
  • Scarlet Witch and Captain America in some combination for balking at Vision’s perfectly reasonable request to let him sacrifice himself for the good of the entire universe.  Extra points because Cap never really answers Vision’s comparison of his WWII era sacrifice of himself to save America.
  • Doctor Strange, again, for giving up the Time stone to save Iron Man.  At this point he had some vision of the future to guide him, but it’s not clear what would have happened if he’d held out, similar to Loki above.

I think that’s it?  Thanos was really pretty lucky that all the stones were in the hands of good people who would give them up when friends or loved ones were threatened, rather than like Magneto or Doctor Doom or somebody.

Also, note to Thanos: even with a slowly falling world birthrate, human numbers approximately doubled (from 3.8bn to 7.5bn) between 1972 and 2018.  Assuming other civilized planets are similar, you’re going to be doing this again roughly every fifty years, forever.  Probably more often actually, since the greater availability of resources will lead to faster growth rates.  Read your Malthus, man.

Excluded, News

The “Help Django Clean Out His Garage” Sale!

So here’s the deal: there’s a lot of books in my garage. Most of them are stock I acquired for selling at cons and other assorted stuff. I would like to get rid of them! So, in celebration of the release of The Infernal Battalion, I thought I would dust everything off, count it up, and see who wanted it.

I have a few sweeteners to throw in, as well:

  • For starters, I’m going to charge a flat $7 for shipping every order, in the interests of not driving myself insane. (This means big orders are cheaper — get together with your friends!)
  • EDIT: I should have specified this initially, apologies, but I can only offer flat shipping to the mainland US.  I will happily ship internationally and charge whatever it costs me; be aware, if you’re in Europe, this can be a lot.
  • I will add a Shadow Campaigns and Forbidden Library bookmark to every order.
  • I will sign and inscribe your books however you want me to!
  • T-Shirts! I have a very limited number of these, left over from convention promotions. Until they’re gone, every order of at least $20 of books, I will throw one in. Specify shirt and size in your order, looking at the table below to see what I’ve got. They are black, with a BW book cover on the front and the title and year of the book on the back.

 

Pricing and descriptions of the books are as follows:

  • MMPB: Mass Market Paperback: the standard US “small” paperback. $10.
  • TPB: Trade Paperback: a larger paperback, similar in size to a hardcover. UK versions have UK covers. $15.
  • HC: Hardcover. $20.

 

Caveats:

  • Books are mostly in good condition, occasional squashing or slight bending caused by being in a box for five years.
  • No idea if they’re first editions or not.
  • First come, first serve! I’ll update this post with running totals, but I’m not at it 24/7, so it’s possible what you want may be sold. I’ll go in order I get the mails!

 

To Order: Send an email to garagesale@djangowexler.com with what you want. I’ll send you a total via PayPal. Make sure to include: your PayPal email, format of books, size/type of T-shirt, and anything you want me to write in it. (Please don’t ask ME to pick what to write, I’m terrible at picking!)

Okay, on to the books! Here’s what I’ve got (US editions unless otherwise indicated):

Title Format Count
The Thousand Names    
  MMPB 0
  UK TPB 0
  Italian TPB 1
The Shadow Throne    
  HC 3
  MMPB 7
  UK TPB 6
The Price of Valor    
  MMPB 12
  UK TPB 23
The Guns of Empire    
  HC 0
  UK TPB 10
  Polish TPB 1
The Forbidden Library    
  HC 3
  TPB 2
(*Unique art! Not reprinted!) UK HC 5
  Taiwan TPB 3
The Mad Apprentice    
  TPB 11
  UK TPB 1
Palace of Glass    
  UK TPB 3
The Fall of the Readers    
  HC 3

And, here’s what I have for shirts:

Title XS S L XL
The Guns of Empire 0 0 2 1
The Price of Valor 0 0 3 3
The Infernal Battalion 1 0 0 2
Movies, Reviews

On STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI

Well, it’s that time again, where I have an apparently boundless appetite for talking about STAR WARS.  Last time I was musing about the failures of Rogue One and talking about why Star Wars is more than the sum of its parts.  This time, obviously, I’ve just seen The Last Jedi, and I figured I would wrap my opinions up in a blog post rather than on Twitter because it’s easier to warn for spoilers.

SO!  Spoiler warning for The Last Jedi.  And another kind of warning, too.  I’ve seen a few arguments play out along the theme of “don’t crap all over people’s joy for liking something”, which is a sentiment I 100% agree with.  Unfortunately, the line between “engaging something critically” and “crapping on it” can be somewhat difficult to walk, and where precisely it is varies from person to person.  So, while I basically liked this move (spoiler alert!) I’m going to also talk about the parts of it I didn’t like.  Please don’t take that to mean you shouldn’t like those parts!  (And/or, just don’t read on.)

Right!  So.  Last Jedi.  Where were we?

I think, basically, I liked the movie, because I like (most of) the characters and their relationships.  That said, there were some issues that really distracted me and probably kept me from loving it.  I have to try really hard to keep myself from going all Comic Book Guy and Worst.  Empire.  Ever. because I’m kind of a worldbuilding nerd first and foremost, and that’s where the failings are.  So I’m going to try real hard to restrict my critique to things that actually matter, and not stupid stuff like “why do they use gravity bombs in space?”

So what were the good bits?  Rey is great in this movie, visibly more confident in the role and with some really good stuff to do.  Her stuff with Luke is great, her stuff with Kylo Ren is wonderful.  The scene with the two of them and Snoke in the throne room was by far my favorite part of the movie; the fight that follows against the Praetorian Guard is probably the best fight scene in all of Star Wars to date, threading the line between the awkward non-choreography of the original trilogy and the hyper-choreographed “endlessly hitting each other with glowsticks” of the prequels.  (While also avoiding the “heroes effortlessly disposing of CGI mooks” from both the prequels and the Marvel universe.)

Finn and Rose both work for me as characters, but I was honestly left a little cold by their role in the plot.  Some of that is logistical (see below) but some of it just that retrieving the codebreaker from one very particular planet felt like a video-game-y arbitrary obstacle.  A fetch quest, essentially.  It doesn’t help that a) BB8 essentially completes every mission for them (seriously they should literally just send BB8 out alone) and b) it turns out to be not only pointless but counterproductive.  (Since they don’t disable the tracker, but do provide the information the First Order uses to blow away dozens of rebels transports full of people.  This could arguably be blamed on Poe.  Pro tip, Poe: compartmentalize information.  If you have a secret plan to get away, maybe don’t talk about it over an open mic to Finn?)  Finn’s arc, the progress from self-sacrifice to needing to look beyond that, mostly works, but it has some logistical problems.  (Again, more later!)

Poe — dunno, I think I’m in the minority on Poe, but I’ve never been fond of him.  His snarkiness has always felt kind of off to me, something that would be more at home in the Marvel universe with Tony Stark.  I like his arc in this movie, though, his natural assumption that he should be the hero and at the center of all events thwarted over and over until he finally gets that not everyone is about his personal story.  Dan Olson mentioned something I thought was a good point — the introduction of Holdo is basically a gag, and I think it does her kind of a disservice.  Like they’re announcing the new commander, and Poe is getting ready to stand up, and then ha it’s Admiral Rando!  Except it turns out she’s not just some rando nothing character, she’s important, but we’re already primed against her.

Kylo Ren — again, I might be in the minority, but I liked him a lot in the first movie and I loved him in this one.  His arrogant insecurity makes him totally believable as both a villain who does awful things in an effort to be a badass and someone who’s genuinely conflicted about it.  He, more than anyone else, is directly tied to the themes of the movie, and it’s great.

There’s more (Luke and Leia are both great, loved the moment with Yoda, etc) but you get the idea.  Good characters, good relationships, strong themes!

So, why do I feel the urge to nitpick?

Well, I’ve thought about it a bit.  There’s two basic issues that stand out to me.  First, the movie sacrifices plot mechanics and logistics in favor of hitting its themes in ways that strain my suspension of disbelief, and second, the First Order completely sucks and fail as villains.  The first one is probably more important, but the second one is more straightforward, so let’s take that first.

Kylo Ren is a fine villain.  Whatever you think of his character, he’s at least initially intimidating — in The Force Awakens, his ability to stop a blaster bolt in mid-air is cool and new, his saber is weird and janky, he gets the information he needs from Poe.  But the rest of the First Order, while they have the same blocky, brutalist design and color scheme as the old Empire, are completely undermined by being utter failures at everything they try to do.  By the end of The Last Jedi they’ve become utterly toothless and comical, and it constantly undermines the tension of what are supposed to be exciting scenes.

So, I’m not saying we need to have the bad guys win in the end, and I’m not begrudging our heroes defeating stormtroopers with ease, not getting killed, etc, etc.  That’s just normal dramatic logic, I’m fine with that.  But what’s missing from these two movies so far is the scene where the bad guys get to do their thing, and establish that they are in fact a force to be reckoned with and not a clown patrol.

Think back to the originals.  The opening scene of A New Hope is flat-out brilliant symbology, with the tiny rebel ship literally swallowed by the huge Star Destroyer.  Then you have the hallway shootout, with the stormtroopers mowing down the rebels, and then in comes Vader, lifting and choking people.  It’s enough to give you the general sense that the Empire basically knows what they’re doing; in turn, this means when our heroes triumph, it feels like a heroic victory against incredible odds instead of showboating against losers.  Empire Strikes Back starts with Hoth, and once again we get the awesome might of Empire in action — Luke goes out, and does some damage with luck and the Force, but the rebels still get trashed and barely escape, the AT-ATs effortlessly brushing aside their defenses in spite of all their efforts.  Same deal — if we want the heroes to be heroic, the bad guys have to be at least basically competent.

These are the scenes that are absent from the new movies.  We start The Force Awakens with the First Order massacring a random village, which feels more like a war crime than a battle.  After that there’s never a scene where they successfully accomplish their goals, aside from the unopposed initial firing of Starkiller base.  They fail to catch the Falcon, fail to catch it again at Maz’s, fail to protect the base, and so on.  (In A New Hope, remember, the Falcon gets captured by the Death Star, then their escape is deliberate!)  

Now, in The Last Jedi, it felt like we were going to see a little bit of that, since we start out with the First Order chasing the rebels away from their base.  But no — the first sequence is a ship bigger than even the Star Destroyers warping in, and Poe destroying it with a handful of fighters and bombers.  By the time Snoke’s even bigger ship appears later on, it’s not intimidating at all, since apparently the damn things are useless.  The best they accomplish is blowing up a few abandoned support ships.

Now, you can (maybe) come up with in-universe justifications for everything.  The First Order is new and relatively incompetent, not the military machine of the old Empire, whatever.  My point is that in the story we’re clearly supposed to think of them as intimidating, and they’re just not.  Their leader is a joke, their ships are useless, and they can’t win even against mooks.  It’s disappointing.

Okay, second nitpick.  The strength of this movie is in characters and theme.  I talked about the former, but the latter is great too, and it’s very clear.  Whereas The Force Awakens was about a new generation trying to deal with having to live up to their legendary predecessors (much as the movie itself had to live up, this is not accidental) The Last Jedi is about the idea of whether being linked to the past is being bound to it.  Rey finds Luke, in an effort to tie herself in to past glories — to become the apprentice of the great Skywalker, heir to the Jedi, etc, in the same way that Kylo thinks of himself as the heir to Vader and is descended from the Skywalker bloodline.  But things don’t work out the way Rey wants — Luke won’t teach her, and the big reveal about her parents is that there is no reveal.  She’s not the heir to anything.  But that means she’s free; whereas the past wraps around Kylo like a chain.  It’s why they can’t join up, in the throne room — they kill Snoke, and Rey is ready to leave the past behind, and Kylo can’t.  It sets up their next confrontation, with Rey being the new, the unencumbered, and Kylo representing the old hatred and Skywalker family drama that has laid waste to the galaxy.

Whew!  It’s great, I love it.  (It’s partially why I think Finn’s arc didn’t work as well for me — it’s only tenuously tied to this theme.)  The movie nails this part so perfectly, but it feels like they sacrificed something in the writing for it, because the rest of the plot doesn’t make a lot of sense.

(You can read the rest of this in Comic Book Guy voice if you want.)

Obviously it’s stupid to quibble about how fictional technology works.  So when they tell us that the rebel cruiser can outrun the Star Destroyers in realspace, fine, I’ll go with it.  But what’s less easy to suspend disbelief is why the First Order doesn’t, you know, try anything else to do something about it.  They have TIE fighters, for example.  Literally hundreds of them!  Kylo Ren and a whopping two seemed to be able to do some serious damage, and Kylo already blew up the rebel hanger, so … maybe send ’em out?  Isn’t that what they’re for?  

Finn and Rose sneaking away from the cruiser with no real difficulty, and knowing that it will be there when they return, once again drains all the tension from the situation.  The First Order has a huge fleet of super-scary ships, but it’s fine, nothing will happen until we run out of fuel.  (Can they not like call in some other ships to get ahead of the rebels?  Something!)

Similarly, the ease with which a single bomber manages to destroy the First Order dreadnaught raises serious questions about why you bother to have capital ships in the first place.  The things are supposed to be tough — the fact that Death Star II was able to take them out in a single shot was a big deal!  Now they explode like firecrackers.  (The First Order vs. rebel casualty ratio is literally tens of thousands to one, not even counting however many people were on Starkiller Base!)

Similarly, Holdo’s lightspeed kamikaze run — a great visual and climactic moment — raises some kind of terrifying worldbuilding questions.  If ships can decimate entire fleets that way, why don’t they do that more often?  Why not ram the Death Star with a frigate?  For that matter, why doesn’t the ruthless First Order use that move to take out the rebels?

Again, while these are nitpicks … they bug me.  I don’t need like detailed technical-manual specifications for things, no one cares.  But basic consistency with the rest of the movies — so that TIE fighters do the same things, and Star Destroyers are always Star Destroyers — make it easier to suspend my disbelief in a fantastical world.

I have less issues with the Force stuff, because the Force should be mysterious and weird.  So Luke uses a new power — he’s had twenty years to figure that out.  Doesn’t bother me.  There is, though, a seriously philosophical question that bears examining, concerning the nature of training people to use the Force.

So, Luke blames himself for screwing up Kylo Ren’s training — he’s super powerful with the Force, and ends up falling to the Dark Side.  Luke says he never should have trained Kylo, and refuses to train Rey.  But … does this make any sense?  The key question is what happens if a Force-sensitive person gets no training?  Do they figure it out on their own?  Or do they just not ever get any powers?  Probably it matters how strong they are, which implies that people like Ben Solo and Rey are going to get something Force-related.

Crucially, this affects the question of what the galaxy looks like without the Jedi, which is what Luke is initially advocating.  Does it mean just no more Force-users?  Or does it mean that no one is training ascetic warrior-monks, but anyone strong enough in the Force and super-angry still falls to the Dark Side, so there’s tons of unstoppable evil guys around and no one to fight them?  We don’t know this but I feel like Luke probably should.

One last point on the down-side.  There has always been this question of whether Snoke “was someone”, was a character coming back in disguise or something like that.  The answer seems to be, no, probably not, since he gets summarily dispatched in this movie.  While I like that answer (it fits the theme) it leaves him kind of underdeveloped.  We really get no answers about what his deal is, how he got to Ren, whether he’s a Sith or just powerful with the Dark Side or what.  Kind of disappointing.  Maybe they’ll get to it later?  Who knows.

Whew.  Okay.  Those are my thoughts, for those who wanted to read them.  Like I said — basically a good movie, basically liked it, with some world-design stuff that rose above the level of nitpicks and actually impacted my enjoyment.  But that’s just me!  As always, these things are personal.

When does the next one come out?  Like, next week?  Right?

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Eleven

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, Part Nine, and Part Ten. This is the grand finale!

The relentless march of the legions continues!  Onward to the old borders and beyond!  Emperor Ioannes commands it!

Go to your room, Young Ma’n!

Okay, but seriously.  This guy happens to be the heir to one of the larger sub-realms of the Hafizids, my eternal enemies to the east.  If I can get him on my side and press his claim, I may be able to take a big bite out of them.

Meanwhile, my forces have taken Kent.  Because England is composed of many small realms, it’s relatively trivial for me to take them in quick succession.

Mercia is next.

Noooo, there are Lollards in Fife!  England is great for silly words.

The Emperor decides to have some of his Hermetic Society buddies over for a shindig.

“Hear me out, boys — what if we made some kind of inter-net?  You know, for fishing boats?”

Bishop Ioannes is being a dickhead, and he has the same name as me.  Oh, it’s on!

That’s what I thought!  And I’m changing your name to Butt-Face!

I have to imagine this going via a Hamilton-style cabinet battle.

While Ioannes’ high-minded theorizing continues, I’m trying to kill enough people to get Prince Ma’n on the throne.

We’ve invented … a thing that measures angles in the sky … I guess.  Honestly I was hoping for, like, warp drive?  But this is … fine.

My incursions into Hafizid territory continue.  They’re weakening, but it’s still going to take a while to wipe them out.

Unfortunately, Emperor Ioannes the Hammer isn’t doing as well as the empire.

His doctors try chopping some bits off at random, but it doesn’t seem to help.

But, with another holy war, we’ve finally driven the Hafizids out of North Africa completely.

It’s Ioannes’ last achievement.  His drinking buddies/alchemist companions will miss his insight and his wine cellar.

I choose you, Konstas III!

Konstas III is … pretty lackluster.  He’s a twin, born in the purple, Augustus, kind, humble, slothful, shy, brave, and depressed, with below-average stats across the board and no children.  We can work on the last one, at least.  

On the plus side, the death of the Emperor means an early end to the truce with the Hafizids, so I can take another shot at them.  Time to finally complete my control of Gaul.

I have had it with these MFing Lollards in my MFing Fife!

Just one more county to go down at the tip of Brittany.

To keep the vassals in line, sometimes it’s good to make an example.  This guy hates my guts.

This is actually the intended result, because it gives me the chance to burn down all his shit.

Bulgaria doesn’t last long against the might of the Empire.  I don’t raise my full levy for anything short of a jihad anymore.

On the other front, I’m still pressing into the desert against my old friends the Muradids.  Unlike the Hafizids, they can still pull together a respectable army.

Aha!  While Ma’n never got with the program, his heir Isma’il is willing to convert to Orthodoxy (after I captured him as a child) and be my puppet claimant!  As soon as the truce with the Hafizids runs out, I can press his claim.

No, I don’t care if he had his fingers crossed during Mass, you are not to set him on fire!

I finish the war with the Muradids, taking a big chunk of Syria.

And I’m salivating at the prospect of taking over Isma’il’s claim in Spain.  Almost there …

The King of France, on his own initiative, is finishing off Brittany.  GJ king!

Blah blah blah, we want “rights” and “powers” and “some kind of say in literally anything”.  Hasn’t anyone explained the concept of rule by divine right to you guys?

Well, consider it MFing explained, MFers.

With Brittany taken by France, all of Gaul is at last Roman once again.  Caesar, you are avenged!  (I know that makes no sense but it sounds cool.)

Still waiting for the truce to expire, but there’s a rebellion in Spain, so I can grab some land off the rebels.

And multiple Muradid revolts give me the same chance in the east!

The King of Jerusalem calls in a favor to get me to help press his claim on some sultan, which honestly is the kind of thing I do anyway.

The borders are expanding, east and west, although now my label is kind of messed up.

Konstas has been doing some serious conquering, if you know what I mean.  And what I mean is that he has syphilis.

Fortunately, his doctor is here to help with sweet, healthful mercury!

And now it’s finally time to launch my war for Prince Isma’il’s claim —

Wait.  God damn it, guys, what did I tell you not to do?

Set Prince Isma’il on fire.

And what did you do?

…set Prince Isma’il on fire.

Now I have to conquer Spain the old-fashioned way, one duchy at a time with holy wars.  Bah.

Fortunately, they’re getting weak enough that my larger vassals like Italy and France will take shots at them.

I take over York to console myself.

“Whosoever pulls this sword from the stone, and has the backing of 100,000 Roman legionaries, shall be King of England!  Or queen.  Whichever really.”

Rapid cleanup ensues.

This seems a little bit late.  I discover the problem later — in order to claim an old province, every holding must be my vassal.  Even if all the counts are mine, sometimes there’s an independent baron or a temple owned by some random dude causing problems.  This caused a lot of carefully clicking through each county.

But, anyway, woo!  Roman order marches on!

I’ve subdued all the independent realms in Britain except for the Kingdom of Wales, so it’s time to start grabbing stuff off them.

My doctor has a new and exciting syphilis cure to offer!

I’ve taken over enough in the east that I look up where the old borders were so I know what to aim for.

I also have a nice juicy claim to Pomerania, which technically isn’t within the old borders, but close enough.

Konstas’ illness is getting to him.  Syphilitic madmen are traditional Emperors!

I’m going to have to take Brunswick at some point.  It just look untidy sitting there all gray.

Catholicism has been almost entirely wiped out.  The Shia are making a bit of a comeback, surprisingly.

An Imperial Reconquest and some revolts gets me most of the Kingdom of Wales.  Still a few bits left to mop up.

Konstas’ son Gabriel has a stupid hat.  He’s a reasonable steward but a crappy diplomat, so I grab him a high-diplomacy wife to compensate.

As a bonus, said wife has a claim on that untidy duchy of Brunswick…

My doctor finally takes care of my syphilis problem for good by cutting out my eyeball.  Unfortunately, I’m still crazy.

I take some more land off the Hafizids, and one of their vassals is rebelling, so I get a bonus round!

Sadly, the Hafizid ruler dies and the rebellion ends.  But he loses the truce on his death, so I get another bonus round!

Nom nom nom.

I now own a 51% stake in Wales, so I get to be king.  This has the happy side benefit of splitting up the remaining Welsh territory until several easily-gobbled sections.

Konstas applies his awesome legal mind to the most pressing problem of the day: ventilation.

Nearly there!  Just have to grab that long pointy bit.

At this point, the old boundaries are in sight.  I need to finish off the Hafizids, grab a few pieces of territory in the east, and finish England.  I may take Ireland also just for kicks.

Also, my gold has gone totally bonkers.  The empire has always been rich, but now I have waaaaay more than I can spend coming in, and the treasury is up over 20,000.

This … was never a province, honestly.  But I’ve taken the Scots Isles.

Konstas himself is still pretty mediocre, but he managed to have a hell of a lot of sons!

“Philaretos the Noble?  What could we possible blackmail him about?”

I get my wife Brunswick as an anniversary gift.

With my threat pinned at 100%, even my own holy order is constantly fighting against me, and they’re probably my most annoying remaining opponent.  Fortunately, it occurs to me that I can simply press a claim to them on behalf of one of my vassals, and then they’re out of my way!

With a little border cleanup, Illyricum (Greece and the Balkans) rejoins the fold!

The Shia caliph declares a jihad, which is … not very threatening.  Hardly anyone shows up.

There’s also a fresh outbreak of the Black Death, but the great hospital at Rome keeps the Emperor safe.

He is having phantom eye pain though.

Devon, the last holdout in Britain, finally gets its turn.

Hooray!  Another province!

Wait, the province of what now?

Emperor Konstas dies of confusion.

I choose you, Gabriel!

Gabriel the Wise is not particularly wise, although at least becoming emperor has relieved him of his stupid hat.  He’s also in the middle of a war for Holstein.

That doesn’t last long.  I do like a tidy border.

I investigate the problem with Britain.  Italia getting completed was coincidence, it turns out, and the issue is that there’s some baron in Leicester with delusions of grandeur.  I send ten thousand men to camp on his doorstep until he changes his mind.

Much better.  Welcome back, Britons!

Similarly, Furstenburg has both a delusional baron and and uppity bishop!  Who gives these guys crazy ideas?

Eat my dust, Trajan!

*taps Holy Roman Emperor on the shoulder, clears throat*

The conquest of the Hafizids continues amid revolts as their power dwindles.

Things are a little slow, because I have to wait out truces with the same few enemies so I can finish off the last little bits of the old empire.  To cheer myself up I press a vassal king’s claim to Denmark.

Getting closer…

Ireland, Gabriel decides, should really be a part of the empire too.

The Irish object, but not very effectively.  Here, though, I actually have to forge claims, because it’s Orthodox and outside the old empire and thus not subject to reconquest or holy war.

Eventually, I’m able to create the Kingdom of Ireland, which gives me de jure claims on all the remaining counties.

In the east, I push my borders out a bit against the Muradids, who are once again united.

Fortunately, I don’t need to wipe them out, just get to the edge of Mesopotamia.  Another province off the shopping list!

There’s a revolt in Iceland!

…when did I even get Iceland?

With most of Norway under my control, it seems impolite not to take the last little bit.

One of my duchesses wants to be marshal.  Unfortunately she’s a drooling imbecile.  Does this count as Dunning-Kruger Syndrome?

Almost done!

In Syria I have to root out one of the Muslim holy orders and take their castles to complete my province.

Shazam!

Sadly, Gabriel can’t quite go the distance.  They’re not kidding about the fabulous riches, though, my treasury is now over 50,000.

I choose you, Gabriel II!

Now that it’s mostly irrelevant, Gabriel II is actually kind of awesome stats-wise!

He gets to work right away subduing the last few bits of Ireland.

There.  A nice, soothing red.

Also not actually a province, but sure.

The emperor got mugged in the woods.  Just like his great-to-the-nth grandmother!  I wonder if the family will ever find that chalice…

Weirdly, now the Arabian Empire collapses!  You couldn’t have done that two hundred years ago, guys, and saved me some trouble?

The crimson tide is rising.

Ah, what the hell.  One last civil war for the road!

Well that’s a mess.  Fortunately, if I need to I can hire literally every mercenary in the world.

Ultimately it doesn’t come to that.  I slap the rebels down, and clean up the last few counties in Spain.

One last war against an upstart baron…

And we’re done.  My most inveterate foes the Hafizids are vanquished, the last province is recaptured, and the ancient borders of Rome are restored!

 

Actually waaaay more than restored.

Here we have our emperors.  Surprisingly few, with long reigns!  Thank goodness for primogeniture.  Standouts include Chrysgone Ironside, who built the Kingdom of Anatolia; Tiberios the Usurper who used it to become emperor; Methodios the Glorious who mended the great schism, restored the Roman Empire, and then descended into dark sorcery; and Ioseph the Wise who heeded the voice of Jesus to become the greatest general who ever lived.

Restoring the old borders was a fun challenge!  It got a little tedious at the end, just because the various mechanisms the game has to stop you steamrolling everything break down one by one, until it’s a matter of fighting out a hundred tiny wars.  There’s actually 300 years left in the game, too — if I could tolerate the tedium, I could probably take over the rest of the map.  But I’d rather move on to other things.

Thank for reading Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo!

Current Year: 1165 AD.

Current Status: Maybe just one more war…

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Ten

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight, and Part Nine.  Updates Wednesdays!

We left off with mad Emperor Ioseph the Wise having just conquered France and receiving new cures daily from his crazed dwarf doctor.  Onward!

He must have mixed the red powder better this time, because it actually works.

My heir Ioannes has survived consumption, thankfully.  At age eight he’s looking pretty good.

I launch a war for the Sinai.  At this point, every war means fighting the entire world, and at first things go rather badly as poorly-defended frontier castles fall to the allies.

However, once I blitz the actual war target, the Caliph changes his tune and surrenders at a measly 33% warscore.  I think what’s happening is that the castles held by the allies contribute to the overall war, but don’t affect the target’s calculation about whether he’s winning or not.  (Which makes sense.  News that distant allies have taken a castle in Germany is small comfort when I’m burning down all of Arabia.)

At 42 Ioseph is an extremely solid emperor with middling-to-good stats.  As I transition to ruling the Roman Empire, stewardship has become less important, since my personal demense is a tiny minority of the realm as a whole.  Diplomacy is now more critical because it affects my vassal limit and relations with the lords.

Iospeh is (deep breath) shrewd, Augustus, brawny, zealous, charitable, paranoid, craven, cruel, lustful, humble, possessed, lunatic, and consumptive.

With a demonstrated ability to win wars vs. the entire world, the only limit on my expansion is truces — after each war, there’s peace for ten years, unless one leader or the other dies.  I pick off smaller realms like the Taids while waiting out truces with my largest enemies: the Muradids in the east and Hispania in the west.

So much for humble.

This is weird.  So there is already a Kingdom of Jerusalem, and one of my vassals is king of it.  However, as a Christian, I can create a special Kingdom of Jerusalem, too?  It gives a massive amount of prestige and piety so I do it and award it to the same guy.  He’s double-king now!

This apparently causes the Lord to take notice, because next thing I know I’m being negged by Jesus.

On the plus side, after literally decades, my consumption has been cured!  Praise the PUA Christ!

While in this timeline the Arabian Empire has never truly collapsed, it does undergo periodic crackups and reconsolidations.  These are opportunities for me, since I don’t have peace treaties with the rebels, so I can grab territory off them.

The voice of Jesus has tempered Ioseph’s zealous cruelty.

Making progress!  Gaul is still pretty ugly though.

Through the usual means of bribery and packing the council with my toadies, I have achieved absolute rule.  Soon the council will be abolished, and the last vestiges of the Old Republic will be swept away.

Fear will keep the local vassals in line.  Fear of my extremely overpriced assassins.

Hispania has become the Hafizids, but they remain my greatest obstacle, since a proper Roman Empire should include all of Spain.  Also, my invasion of England has begun!  Londinium is back under Roman control after six or seven centuries.

Jesus is still back-seat Emperoring.

Whenever the truce runs out, my legions push west along the North African coast, taking it back from the Hafizids duchy by duchy.

A second ancient province is complete!  I’m not paying too much attention to these for now — I’ll clean up the bits later once I fill in the broad strokes.

My heir has come of age, and he’s quite good!  Unfortunately he hates me, because he’s ambitious and that makes me his rival.  Well, bring it on, son!

With Jesus’ help, Ioseph has lost craven, and his stats are edging up into “great” territory.

He did, um, seduce the 17-year-old wife of one of his cousins.  Sorry about that.

Fortunately any problem can be solved with a large enough sack of gold!

Bloody comets are considered a positive sign, right?

It’s time to clean up Gaul.  I’ve picked off most of the small realms, so now I start on the bits held by other Christian kingdoms, using the Imperial Reconquest cassus belli.

This apparently pleases the Lord, because Jesus starts dishing out the dirt.  Who knew Jesus was such an awesome general?

So, at fifty, with Jesus’ help, Ioseph is a reasonable diplomat and steward and the best general who has ever lived, far above pikers like Genghis Khan and Ottar the Unspeakably Vile.  Predictably, my wars go well!

A little charity is a small price to pay for Hax Jesus.

Huh.  According to Jesus the Church hasn’t got everything straight …

Fortunately my daughter is able to talk me back around to Orthodoxy.

“Don’t you think maybe a little democracy …”

“Sorry guys.  Jesus says I should be in charge.”

Jesus also tells me to stop sleeping around.  Man, why are you such a buzzkill, Jesus?

Can’t argue with results, though.  Look at that martial!

The North African frontier takes another lurch westward.

Saxony holds an annoying amount of widely-separated land, making reconquest slow.  Fortunately this guy a) is the younger brother of the king and b) despises his brother with the fire of a thousand suns, making him willing to join my court, be appointed King of Aragon, and then launch a bid for the Saxon throne.

Noooo lord why have you abandoned me!  Now all I have to rely on is my crushing military superiority!

Fortunately, that’s enough.  Another chunk of France and Germany comes under my rule.

More progress.  France is much tidier.  My vassals can make headway on their own against the smaller states in the north-east, but only the might of the full empire can take on the Hafizids.

What’s that, Jesus?  I should stop boning entirely?  Yikes.

This apparently spurs Iospeh into the decision that he doesn’t want to visit the kingdom of Heaven yet.  I’d be quite happy for him to live forever, he’s pretty awesome.

I send out my spymaster, since he’s ridiculously awesome at spying.

Did you really have to sneak into my room at night to ask for money?

Whiiiich he promptly spends on hookers and blackjack.  So much for that plan.

This heretical mystic is now my court doctor.  I’m sure he’s just as good as the crazy dwarf, right?

Hmm.

Well, though he only lived to be 56, Ioseph had a good run.  With Jesus’ help he led the legions to victory, vastly expanding my domain in both the east and west.

Ioannes, I choose you!

Ioannes is 24, with excellent stewardship and martial but lackluster diplomacy, which causes problems with his vassals.

He hires a witch to be his doctor!

The witch gets married and leaves him in the lurch.

His wife gets him a dog!

The dog eats the holy remains of John the Baptist.

And the peasants are revolting.  Good times in the Roman Empire.

Once they’re dealt with, another holy war secures this annoying green dot in the middle of my field of peaceful red.

The vassals are unhappy with the new emperor, as usual.  Commence the traditional revolt sequence!

Except, somehow, it doesn’t happen!  I imprison a few nobles and my Mystikos gets the rest under control.  Score!  To celebrate I hit the monastery.

Drunken sot?!  Come on, I had one beer.

Drunken or not it’s time to take more territory off the Hafizids.  This is becoming more or less routine at this point.

Creeping ever closer to Gibraltar.

Then the nobles decide they do want to revolt after all!  At least they politely waited for me to be done with my war.  That’s, what, four kings and four dukes?  I can take ’em!

These civil wars are getting to be somewhat large affairs!  But I bring the rebels to their knees and peace is soon restored.

Briefly.

Oh come on.  I refuse to believe there’s such a thing as a Szekesfehervarian.

Emperor Ioannes is feeling sorry for himself.

The bad news is that the Muslims have gathered a huge army.  The good news is that they can’t feed it out in the desert, so I just wait around for them to starve to death.

Once they’re whittled down to a more reasonable size, I jump them.

Eventually, the Caliph pays up to end the war.

A triumph for Ioannes!

At 34 Ioannes is a crappy diplomat, but still improving as a general.  No word yet from Jesus though.

A Hafizid revolt gives me a chance to blitz some more territory in the west.

About time I did something about this ugly purple blotch, too.

Much better.

Brittany is next on the shopping list, along with another chunk of Egypt.  I lose so few troops in these wars I can run them continuously, letting the levies of some vassals recover while I use others to fight with.  Italy, France, and Africa are all good sources of troops.

My vassals have been pushing at the northern border, too, including grabbing a random county in the middle of Scandinavia.

The cleanup of Gaul continues with Loon and Alsace, where nothing bad will ever happen again.

Another war with the Hafizids follows.  Almost to the coast!

Meanwhile, as a distraction from constant war, Ioannes has decided to become an alchemist.  This is another secret society, though a little less malicious than the Satanists.

Now he must face his most difficult opponent: a term paper.

When building a laboratory for esoteric science, it helps to be richer than God, which I now am.

On the war front, I’ve managed to enlist a claimant to the duchy of Thoringia, which will go a long way toward cleaning up northern Europe.

I am the Emperor.  (And my prestige is over 10,000.)  I don’t accommodate anybody.

I have prepared a paper on … fermentation.  It will help with the preparation of, um, alchemical elixirs.

Are they buying it, bro?

WOO they bought it!  Barkeep, another round of alchemical elixirs!

I’m Emperor of, like, the world.  Can’t I tell them not to do this?

Thoringia falls, pushing my northern border up to the Baltic Sea.

Then somehow the Duke of Gelre (that brown bit next to gray Brunswick) inherits Paris?  That shouldn’t be legal, but who knows.  Fortunately, this is not a catastrophe, since my vassal King of France gets a claim on Gelre in return.

A quick assassination takes the King of Gelre out of the game, putting a child on the throne.

And I take both territories back in the counter-attack.

Fortuitously, a claimant to the Kingdom of Alban drops into my lap, and I launch a war for that even though it’s really beyond the old borders of the Empire per se.  Ioannes, though, is more concerned with his alchemical shenanigans, breaking into a rivals library to steal his secrets.

This goes poorly.  You’d think “I’m the Emperor!” would be a pretty good trump card, but apparently not.

Fortunately, he’s willing to let me go for a sack of gold.

And Alban has fallen.  Soon it’ll be time to get serious about occupying the rest of Britain, which will not be terribly difficult.

First, though, another stab at the Hafizids gets me, finally, to the west coast of Africa.  They’re weakening — hopefully soon they’ll be small enough my vassals can bite off pieces.

A simple war to grab this purple county in Gaul turns out to be much more annoying than I planned.  This is partially because France has the plague.

Mostly, though, it’s because this is what’s left of Aquitaine, which now consists of like four randomly scattered counties all over the world.  So subduing each one (while the rest of the world fights me) is a bit of work.

But we’re going to petition the Divine Being!  I have some … interesting flasks … of elixir?  I hope the Divine Being likes Bud Light.

The Divine Being proves less than completely helpful.  Should have given him the box wine instead.

I’m so busy stargazing that I drift off in a council meeting, and when I wake up I’ve fired someone called Exarch Evangelos the Evil.  So that’s probably a net win.

Finally, Ioannes discovers a new star, which he generously names after his wife instead of himself.

He is extremely pleased with this result.

And the war against Aquitaine finally, finally ends!  I celebrate by starting a war against the Muradid Empire, which is ironically much easier.

Roman power is now pushed all the way to the southern border of Egypt!

And another ancient province is reclaimed for the Empire.  Getting there!

 

Current Year: 1077 AD.

Current Status: Stargazing.

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Nine

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, and Part Eight.  Updates Wednesdays!

All hail Sibylla, Empress of Rome!

Unfortunately, she’s not great, with pretty terrible stats.  She’s already infirm, though, so at 53 I don’t expect her to last that long.  Fortunately her son survived to adulthood, incidentally making all of Methodios’ abduction and Satanic sacrifice a bit pointless.

People are not terribly fond of Sibylla, either, mostly as carryover from the terrible opinion her father had accumulated by the end of his reign for openly worshiping Satan.

This definitely sounds like someone I want as my doctor and not locked in a padded cell a long way away.  Ew.

Sibylla’s husband dies almost immediately, and I replace him with this guy, an ambitious genius paranoid lunatic with one hand and amazing stats.

With that done, Sibylla brings the still-ongoing rebellion to a speedy conclusion.  The timing on this actually works out nicely, as she gets the “crushed a revolt” modifier, plus the bonus for confiscating and redistributing rebel titles.

I make my son Exarch of Jerusalem and put him on the council, which gives me a sympathetic vote to help pass more powers for the crown.

Said son is pretty good stats-wise but is craven, possessed, and lunatic, which doesn’t bode particularly well for the dynasty.

Let’s definitely get involved in his screaming fights with his wife, that’s sure to end well.

Not a bad empire, but we’ve got a ways to go.  My goal is the reclaim the borders of the old imperium, which presents three major obstacles.  In the north-east, France is big enough to be at least a little problematic.  More difficult are the two big Muslim empires, Hispania in the west and the Muradids in the east.  The old borders include all of the former and a big chunk of the latter, so there’s quite a lot of work to do.

To continue expanding into Gaul, we need to attract people with claims on big chunks of land to my court.  This guy is promising — apparently his liege humiliated him, so he’s open to joining my team and has a claim on Aquitaine.

I make him Exarch of Bulgaria, and marry him to a young wife to breed some children to inherit those claims, since he has cancer and may not last.

Sibylla the Gouty.  I’ve had better nicknames.

Unfortunately, my expansion plans have to be put on hold, as the Sunni Caliphate comes calling.

Various Christian leaders help out by sending their thoughts and prayers, and sometimes the occasional soldier.

The opposing armies gather around Antioch and Constantinople.

As usual, good use of fleets is critical for getting me superiority in the big battle.

Unfortunately, Sibylla is losing her grip on reality.

Her pus-licking, scab-eating holy woman doctor manages to revive her briefly with a swarm of bees.

The war is going well, but big Muslim armies continue to stomp around the Holy Land.

Sadly, even bees can only do so much.  Sibylla didn’t have much of a chance at being Empress, since she was already sick on taking the throne.  At least I’m now another generation removed from Methodios’ horrors.

Ioseph, I choose you!

For some reason this causes the jihad to come to an end?  This is actually sort of annoying because I was winning and hoping for a big indemnity.

Meanwhile, I’ve inherited Ioseph’s own holy war, which is going quite badly.

Ioseph hasn’t improved much in five years.  His stats are good, at least, and he’s got a son already.

For the moment, anyway.

Speaking of physicians, I need a new one.  A forest dwarf sounds like a better bet than scab/bee woman.

Because he’s crazy, Ioseph gets to name his dog Lucifer.

Buuuut he draws the line at actually worshiping Satan.  I’ve heard stories about granddad.

Another revolt breaks out, as usual.  This one isn’t much of a big deal, though.

Not sure why this turns up now since I’ve held Cyrenaica for a while.  These provinces (there are fourteen of them, though two are not technically provinces) are my ultimate goal.  Controlling them all means restoring the ancient borders of the empire and claiming victory.  There’s a ways to go, though.

Aha!  It showed up now because one of my vassals grabbed some bits of the southern Mediterranean coast.  That’s looking tidier, anyway.

There’s actually a large Russian kingdom forming in the north, but they’re still tribal so they’re weak.

Around this time, these start turning up in my mailbox.  I believe Raymond de la Tour du Pin is the husband of one of my aunts, but everyone in the empire hates him, because I get invitation after invitation to have him killed.  Raymond, what did you do?

What the … what?  

This boils down to a tiny little duchy declaring war on me.  Since my threat is still high enough I can’t launch any conquests, it’s a welcome distraction beating the stuffing out of them.

Seriously Raymond, they wouldn’t be this mad for no reason.

Ioseph is following in granddad’s footsteps again…

Guys, look how old he is.  Just wait a few years.

My threat crosses the crucial threshold, which in this case is 75%.  Above that, I have to fight everyone; below that, Christians won’t join wars against non-Christians, so I only have to fight the Muslim world.  That, I can handle, so I launch another holy war against the Muradids.

I’m also working on killing the king of Aquitaine, so that I can install my own claimant.

My wacky schemes worked for once!  Unfortunately, the effect was for Aquitaine to fragment into little pieces, which is not what I wanted.  I’ll get back to them later.

Look, if you all can’t manage to kill him without me, you can’t be very good murderers.

Victory!  Another chunk of Egypt returns to Roman rule.

My threat is still too high to deal with the Aquitaine situation, but a revolt almost immediately breaks out against the Muradids, so I take advantage of that.  Revolt leaders don’t join coalitions, so they’re easy targets.

That dwarf is all right!

A second Muradid revolt gives me the chance to grab even more land, although doing this kicks my threat back up to 100%, again.

When the Despot of Sicily dies childless, I have an excellent opportunity to finally take advantage of my Aquitanian claimant.  I make him the new king of Sicily, and then move to press his claim.

Burgundy is the biggest remaining chunk of Aquitaine, so I go for that.  Once again I’ll be fighting literally everyone.

It goes considerably better than you might expect.  This war makes me realize I basically don’t have to worry about threat anymore — while everyone forms up against me every time, most of them aren’t really in a position to help.  What happens is various armies lay siege to castles at the edge of my empire, while I assemble my forces by ship and blitz the target, assaulting their castles and smashing anyone who gets in my way.  It’s expensive in manpower but much faster than laying siege, and I have manpower to burn.  Typically, the target surrenders before their “allies” in the rest of the coalition can intervene.

This is … a dangerous realization, because it means the only things standing between me and constant war are truces and actually having claims on territory.  And as Roman Emperor I have a lot of claims.

My vassals have been doing solid work, too.  Gaul is really coming together.

Still working on stripping the council of having any say whatsoever over policy.

Fortunately, I can always count on loyal Glitterhoof’s vote.

Sadly, she dies not long after, having gone mad from syphilis.  G…glitterhoof, what were you getting up to?

At 34, Ioseph is now “the Wise” in spite of still being possessed and insane.  He’s managed to have a string of children, including at least one boy born in the purple, who is now heir.

Waaaait a minute, I’ve already seen this episode!

Sure enough, the Black Death is back, though we must have develop some immunity because it mostly stays in western Gaul.  Inspired by this, though, I start building a hospital in Rome to help protect the emperor, which eventually becomes the largest in the world.

The emperor does get sick, but it’s just food poisoning, and Dr. Dwarf is on the case.

Unfortunately he follows this up immediately with consumption.

This time, my little friend is less helpful.

Ioseph doesn’t let illness interfere with his … um, rabid dog beating.

Butt stuff: not always the answer, especially to lung disease.

But!  I have a new Despot of Africa, who happens to have a claim on the Kingdom of France!  I wonder how that happened…

War with France (and everyone else) quickly ensues.

Third time’s the charm, I guess, eh Demetrios?

France quickly falls before the might of the legions.

Definitely looking a bit more empire-y.

Orthodoxy is spreading nicely, too, with the few Catholic holdouts mostly concentrated in England.  Don’t worry, their time will come …

 

Current Year: 1035 AD.

Current Status: Insane but it’s not all that bad, really.

 

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Eight

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six, and Part Seven.  Updates Wednesdays!

I am the Emperor of Rome!  All former Imperial possessions please form an orderly queue.

No?  Well.  We’ll see about that.

First, though, I decide to try for five years of peace, to let my threat decline a little bit.  

I also move the Imperial capital back to Rome, which only seems appropriate.

Here’s one of the main benefits of reclaiming the empire — I get access to the “Imperial Reconquest” Casus Belli.  This is basically like a Holy War, but it works on anyone within the old boundaries of the empire, and they don’t get to call in co-religionists to help.

The problem with peace is that it’s boring.  Having both mended the Great Schism and restored the empire to its former glory, Methodios needs new adventures.  Random trysts while hunting are nice, but that’s not going to cut it.

His thirst for novelty leads him down different paths.

Darker paths.

After all, having conquered the Church and the secular world, that means there’s only God left to fight …

Hilariously, Methodios’ stated goal is to cure his daughter, who just has, like, the flu.

“Dad, I have a sniffle!”

“I will sell my soul to the dark powers!”

“Dad, I’m feeling much better, can we –”

“Not now, sweetie, carving a pentagram into my flesh.”

Where does Lucifer get these femme fatales?

The refuse option here is a little weak.  “I’m a married man!  If I was unmarried, sure, I’d be totally down for your weird Satantic sex-initiation.”

So, now I have a cool black hoodie and worship Satan.  Good times!

You know what that means — orgy time!

Did … did we orgy some dude to death?

Satan demands virgin sacrifice!

Fortunately, my dungeons are well stocked from various wars.  This seven-year-old girl should do.

What?  It’s like sacrificing children is bad or something?  Jeez.

On the plus side, even though I’m at peace, my vassals are doing good work pushing the boundaries outward.  The old province of Gaul is a mess of several different kingdoms, so that’s going to need some sorting out.

Oh, and I’m still trying to wipe out the entire Muradid dynasty.

The things I do for love political power.  Doesn’t have the same ring to it.

Wait, he flew off like an ostrich?  I mean … I guess that works …

Only two Muradids left!

I already worship Satan, how much worse can dealing with witches be?

Waaaaait a minute.  That was just vodka!

Damn it, hold still while I’m trying to wipe out your entire family!

Hurrah!  Five years of peace!  Now we can get back to warrin’.

Satan tells me to burn things.

Climbing the ladder!

What kind of a name is Herbert for a high priest of Satan?

Also, that witch totally ripped me off!

Given my predilections, I’d be shocked if it did anything.

Satan demands blue blood!

Whatever you say, snicker Herbert.

To cure my food poisoning, my doctor has switched me with my evil good twin!

Still worships Satan, though.  He’s just more humble about it.

Time for plotting.  This fine fellow has claims on Austrasia, Germany, and Saxony, and he’s willing to come to my court.

I marry him to the young princess of Italy.  His claims are heritable, so if they breed I’ll have some useful children, too.

They’re weak claims, though, which means I’ll only be able to press them if the current monarch is female, a child, or otherwise weakened.  Fortunately, the heir to the throne is five.  So if I can kill this guy …

Somehow, I assume through a wacky sit-com mixup, I have become lovers with my own wife in addition to my Satanic sister.  I’m looking forward to the episode where they almost meet at the restaurant.

Come on, bandits!

Bah.  Stupid bandits.

Hmm.  Until now my oldest daughter Sibylla has been heir.

Aha!  In Agnatic-Cognatic Primogeniture, a daughter with a son outranks a daughter without a son, regardless of birth order.  Your move, Sibylla!

Come on … carriages?  

Nice!  So that’s the Austrasian throne up for grabs.  I’ve got some time, though, since the heir is young.

My buddy is dead, but not before he managed to have a son, who has inherited his claims.  Perfect.

Meanwhile, this guy has been plotting against me.  And I still need a ruler to sacrifice to Satan …

Guards!

He rebels, of course, and I get to work burning down his castles.

Another bonus: if you’ll recall, in order to take Italy/Lombardy, I had to grant a kingdom to a claimant and press the claim.  (Much as I’m planning to do with Austrasia.)  Unfortunately, that leaves the claimant as a Despot (a hereditary ruler by right) as opposed to an Exarch (a ruler appointed by the Emperor).  When the Despot dies without an heir, though, the kingdom reverts to me, and I can bestow it on someone useful as an exarchate!  (The other way I can convert it is by having the holder rebel and stripping him of his title.)

This lady is the new ruler and as you can see she’d very fond of me, in spite of my craven, slothful, drunken murderishness.

I like that craven, slothful, drunken murderer adds up to -25, whereas “attractive” is +30.  “He may be a drunken lazy coward murderer, but man is he easy on the eyes.”

Satan’s commands alternate between horrifying and petty.

“I totally peed on that dude and held a decadent feast in his name!  WOO GO SATAN!”

Sibylla’s back in the lead!

It’s all tied up at one son each!

With the revolt successfully concluded, the unfortunate Duke finds himself on the Satanic altar.

Satan rewards me with total insanity!

My threat is down below 75%.  When I attack Austrasia, I’ll be fighting pretty much everyone (since they’re Christian) but with less than 75% the Christians won’t join in if I attack a Muslim.  So, first step, holy war against the Muradids!

Things go pretty badly at first.  Those are some big armies they have there.

I distract myself with another Satanic orgy.

Wait, Satan already has a dwarf, I just met him!  What is it with dwarfs?

My wife doesn’t love me anymore.  At least I still have my Satanic mistresses.

In spite of some early setbacks, I get the war moving in the right direction.  The AI is really bad at using sea travel, which means I can generally run rings around it while it marches overland losing men to attrition.  Also, it gets distracted attacking whatever holdings are closest, whereas I go straight for the war goal, which counts more toward the total score.

The AI also runs out of money to pay its mercenaries before its army even arrives.  Bad planning right there.

Before too long, the few defeats I had back in Anatolia are outweighed by my victories in the field and control of Cyrenaica, and the Muradids call it a day.

Sure.  I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?

See!  Azazel is totally chill, guys!

The raven is black like my soul.

Psh, people, who cares about them?

Can we please make it a law not to set the Emperor on fire?!

I’m still smoldering, but it’s time to get this party started.  I make little Merigo King of Croatia, and then launch my war to press his claims to Austrisia, which control a grab-bag of land through France and Germany.  With my threat high, this means fighting almost the entire world.

This turns out to be pretty hard.  At first I make the mistake of trying to do it conventionally, fighting the enemy on the battlefield, but they have a lot deeper manpower reserves than I do, even if they’re bad at getting them to the field.  So I win some battles but lose a lot of troops.

The problem is, winning battles doesn’t actually help, since you don’t get warscore for battles against the target’s allies.  So I switch things up and sail around taking over Austrasian castles, while letting the enemy slowly besiege my own.

After a few tense years, this works out pretty well, and the Austrasians finally surrender.

God damn that’s an ugly border.  Don’t you people know how to draw maps?

My new best buddy also has a claim on Germany, which would fill in some of the gaps.  

We need to wait a little while, though, since the last war took so long my vassals are pretty pissed.

Orthodoxy continues to spread.  Although of course I now reject God and all his works, I do like seeing maps filled in with one color.

Still trying to nail down those last few elusive Caliphs.

Oh, a tricky one, are you?

Satan wants me to possess some random woman.

Unfortunately, I only succeed in driving her mad.

Now, however, we have succession questions to worry about.  Here’s the problem.  Leontia’s son has died, so she’s out of the succession sweepstakes, and Sibylla will be the next empress.  She’s already quite old, though, so I’m looking to her children.  She has one son and three daughters.  If the son lives, he’s heir, but if he dies the eldest daughter becomes heir.  And she has inconveniently gotten married non-matrilineally, which means her children will not be part of the dynasty.  We can’t have that.

Eat black magic, grandson-in-law!

Cursing people just always makes me smile, somehow.

Unfortunately, the oaf recovers from his illness.  My attempts to kill him conventionally don’t go well either, so I ask my fellow Satanists to try and abduct him.

This works out great!  Once he’s in my dungeons, I sacrifice him to the Dark Lord.

Then I make sure Alexia’s new marriage is on more appropriate terms.

The Muradids are having problems, though they have bred enough new dynasts that I reluctantly cancel my plan to wipe them out.

My wife is 74 but she has aged fantastically.

See, Zenon is a better name for a high priest of Satan.

Damn it, Alexia was pregnant before I sacrificed her husband to Satan!  Now she has a non-dynastic son.  That’s not acceptable.

I give the infant smallpox and wait to see if he dies.

Meanwhile, before Merigo grows up too much, it’s time to press his claim on Germany.  This means another war vs. the whole world, but I’m getting better at those.  I dodge various armies and sail around demolishing German castles.

Note that my council nearly stopped me from going to war, and I had to bribe them.  We’ll see about that …

I expect my new chancellor to be much more reliable.

Satan wants another virgin, apparently.

This woman is in her forties, but has been in my prison since she was seven years old.  So I sacrifice her, but it doesn’t work.  Apparently there’s some shenanigans going on in the dungeons.  (Apart from me sacrificing the prisoners to the devil.)

Another little kid for the Dark Lord, then.  He’s so picky!

But he rewards me with demonic possession!

Also crippling illness.

Methodios is losing his grip, but the German war is finished, adding another swathe of territory to the empire.

Still a little fragmented, but looking better.  Hopefully my vassals can clean up some of the smaller states.

Both smallpox and my assassins have failed me, so once again I turn to my buddies in Satan to rid me of inappropriate heirs.

Unfortunately, sacrificing little Michael to the devil is a step too far.  The priests have caught on.  While they can’t burn me at the stake, they kick me out of the church and everyone now hates me.

Methodios, alone in his castle, grows ever more deformed and strange.

Even my council hates me.  All except loyal Glitterhoof, who will stand by his master to the end.

To cheer myself up, I dose random tavern crowds with hallucinogens.  Love that Joker!

Everyone may hate Methodios, but he has one last thing to accomplish.  The defeat of his final enemy: pants.

Pants are hereby forbidden in the empire!  We we all be happy again!

Man, central Europe is kind of a mess.  Someone should clean that up.

The Patriarch decides that since I haven’t sacrificed any children to Satan this month, I can come back to the church.  Everyone else still hates me though.

This includes my new wife, since poor Blanche finally died.  She’s a chaste genius, and they’re in love, but love doesn’t outweigh “Known Demon Worshiper”.  I kind of feel like this is a horror story now?  Chaste young genius marries elderly murderous demon worshipper?  

…still got it…

For very weird definitions of “it”.

Finally, predictably, the vassals have had enough of Methodios’ madness.

Civil war begins, Italy vs. Anatolia.

“An artifact, you say?  I will send my most loyal servant to search for it!”

“Sir, that’s your horse.”

“My most loyal servant.”

(Honestly, I’m impressed Glitterhoof attends council meetings.)

Unfortunately, she’s not great at searching for artifacts.

Methodios’ feelings toward Glitterhoof are mixed.  He doesn’t like that she failed at the search, that she’s a horse, or that she’s stupid.  On the other hand, he finds her sexy, and she has accumulated some prestige.  And he’s grateful for some reason?

At the end of his reign, Methodios looks back and decides that all in all, it was pretty great.

With that happy thought, and the empire still riven by rebellion, Methodios dies.  He united the church, recreated the Roman Empire, and sacrificed children to Satan, but according to his biographer the real issue was that he cheated on his wife.  (With Satan.)

Sibylla, I choose you!

 

Current Year: 1013 AD.

Current Status: Burning in hell.

 

 

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Seven

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, and Part Six.  Updates Wednesdays!

New Basileus Methodios is finally an adult, and is ready to start racking up the piety in order to mend the Great Schism.  Are you ready for some humble prostration before the Lord?!

Step one: Theology focus, hoping for some good events.

Step two: Continue trying to convert Jerusalem to trigger the formation of my holy order.

My high-stewardship wife is a Catholic, but fortunately she’s willing to convert.  Why her title is “Khatun” I don’t understand, though.

Methodios is very down on the heathens.

Huh.  I guess we can add “God” to the “medieval stress relief” list alongside dogs, murder, and cheating on your wife.

Must … become … pious …

Step three in my piety plan is to win holy wars against heathens.  Fighting someone named “King Vukasin the Monster” seems like a good place to start.

“Hey, guys, have you ever actually read this thing?”

The Muslims have gotten the jihad ball rolling, but fortunately not in my direction.

“I mug the monk and take all his piety!”

Aha!  The holy city is holy again!

This, in turn, triggers the formation of the only Orthodox Holy Order, the Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre.  They’ll join my team for future holy wars, but that’s not the most important reason I’m happy to see them.

Speaking of holy wars, this one turns out well, and I grab two counties of coastal Serbia.  Granting the temples to fresh bishops gives me MOAR PIETY.

And I now have a better claim to Serbia than its former “king” does!

Slowly but surely, I’m subduing the Balkans.

Here’s the real reason I’m happy to see the Holy Sepulchre.  Donating money to them grants me piety on a one-for-one basis, which is a far better return on investment than anything else I can do.  And it’s repeatable, immediately.

So, basically, being rich equals being pious, now.  And I’m very rich.

Oh, yeah.  I am pious as balls.

With the world convinced of how god-damned holy I am due to dropping a wagon full of gold on the doorstep of the Holy Sepulchre, it’s time to mend the Great Schism!  We’ve got plenty of moral authority and I still control all five sites of the Pentarchy.

Sorry, Your Holiness.  That’s check and mate.

Much of the Christian world immediately converts to Orthodoxy, Catholic moral authority is shattered, their holy orders disappear and there’s no longer any danger of being targeted by a crusade.  That means this will be my first playthrough without having the Pope come after me!

Methodios is now known as “the Saint” for his holiness.  With piety accomplished, I switch him back to family focus to try and add some more children.

Not that I’m done with holy war!  There’s still land to take in the Balkans.

Time to look toward my next goal, which is proclaiming myself true Roman Emperor, heir to Caesar and Constantine.  Taking Lombardy has brought me a long way toward that goal, but we’re not there yet.  I still need Venice and the rest of Croatia, which are controlled by small Christian nations and should be easy enough.  But parts of Antioch and Alexandria are still in Muslim hands, as is the entire Duchy of Tunis.  That’s going to be a little harder.

I’m going to try and get this done in Methodios’ lifetime, though, because he already has the 3,000 prestige needed.  Prestige is easier to get than piety, but it’d still be convenient.

One holy war down, anyway.

My brother has decided he would like to have my daughter killed, which is actually kind of convenient because I wanted his county back anyway.

Perfect!  Have fun in prison, bro.  That’s what you get for messing with my kids and also having land I want.

The empire is growing nicely, especially in the far east where my vassals are pushing out the frontiers against the heathens of the Caucasus.  

I set my chancellor to forging a claim on Venice, while some of my vassals continue the fighting in the Balkans.  I’ve got bigger fish to fry.

Tunis is conveniently held by the Talalids, who are relatively weak.  However, they have an alliance with the Muradids, who are extremely strong.

The best way to cause trouble there is to assassinate the Muradid Caliph, so I start trying that.  No shortage of eager helpers in his court.

This works poorly.  Not only does he refuse to be assassinated, the Muradid Caliph quickly takes over Tunis.  So we’re going to have to fight him one way or the other.

And, to make my job even more fun, there’s a plague coming!  I’m not sure why Methodios thinks he predicted it though.

A Muradid revolt breaks out, and I decide to use the opportunity to grab the county of Archa, which is the last piece of Antioch I need.  Hopefully between the plague and the revolution they’ll be too busy to fight back.

And, as an added bonus, I get a shot at the Caliph!  Come on, viper, I believe in you!

Nice.  Anything that sows confusion in the ranks of my enemies.

Because he’s paranoid, Methodios is convinced that the plague is here for him personally.

Honestly, judging by its trajectory, he may not be wrong.

My war-plan is a success, though!  Soon after I seize my target, plague sweeps through the region, killing everyone and making it impossible to keep armies in the field.  So I continue to hold Archa by default as the warscore ticks up.

Methodios wisely decides to seal himself in the palace to keep the plague away.

Probably a good plan, to be honest.

Get me some adorable fluffy cats!  For … um, examinations.

I asked about the plague, and Strategos Fluffykins says he didn’t do it.

I declare her official cuddlebug of the Empire!

Poor Belisarios’ love is unrequited and he has to settle for being “friends”.

Okay, seriously guys.  Cats are not the problem.

Enough with the cats!  I am the god-damned Emperor around here, and I say Boots is Grand High Patriarch!

Food is running low, though.  High Patriarch Boots, bring me back some rats or something!

Who’s a good kitty?

The new Caliph, who is eleven, finally gives up the fight since basically everyone is dead anyway.

Oh, so hiding in my palace while the people suffer and die makes me a coward, is that it?

Good times, good times.

While most of Europe is still pretty plagued, Anatolia is recovering, and I cautiously emerge.  Everyone is mad at me for some reason.

Hmm, promising you say?

Holy crap!  I make him chancellor and send him to forge a claim on Venice, which he accomplishes immediately.

I’m still threatening enough that attacking Venice is going to piss off the rest of Christendom.  However a) most of them have the plague, and b) Venice is a single-county realm so it should be easy to storm.

As predicted, it’s a short war.

Getting there!  Venice and Antioch are off the shopping list.  That leaves Alexandria, Croatia, and Tunis.

Croatia’s going to be annoying, since it’s held by three different people.

One of them is a single-county realm, though, so in spite of high threat I can rush it down like I did Venice, before any allies get involved.

Progress!

Taking Tunis, meanwhile, means fighting the Muradids, who I still have a truce with.  The easiest way around that is to kill off the Caliph.  That’s an expensive poisoning, but it’s good to be the Byzantines, who are basically the Lannisters of medieval Europe.

I have to assume we poisoned him with pure gold.

With bureaucratic niceties out of the way, the holy war can begin!  Fleets and armies from across the empire converge on Tunis.

The first Muradid counter-attack gets bushwhacked by a peasant rebellion army on the way over.  That’s just embarrassing, guys.

I get my score to 99% without any Muradids actually coming out to fight.

The Caliph isn’t required to surrender at that point, but he does anyway.  I’m getting the feeling the Arabian Empire is kind of a paper tiger here.

See this is how you crush a peasant revolt.  It’s all in the wrist.

I choose my new rulers from dynasty members who don’t already have land and have the highest opinion of me.  Since Methodios is attractive, this tends to mean the gay ones.

Prince Sabas is ready to be introduced to the realm!  He’s turning out okay so far.

Since I need to take more territory off the Muradids, that means killing off yet another Caliph.  I’m really thinning the herd here.

Unfortunately my threat is getting ridiculous.  The Muradids are big enough that they only join the defensive pact at the highest levels, but we’re getting there.

Man, you’d think the Caliphs would invest in some anti-snake defenses.  Mongeese or something.

In fact, it’s possible I could wipe the Muradids out completely.  There are only four male dynasts left.  I’ll give it a shot, on the theory that if they fall the empire might splinter and make things easy for me.

The chief of Hum, in the Balkans, is inexplicably not part of the grand coalition against me.  I take the opportunity to jump on him.

Chalk up another Caliph.  I’m not sure anyone in the empire believes the story about “bandits” at this point.

At last we have triumphed over the Humians!  Next stop, the Isle of Man.

Hooray for health-dogs!

Hmm, last time this happened they worked it out and became the best of friends.

Not this time.  That cat chases the dog somewhere and presumably devours it, since we can’t find any trace.

Oh well.  Cats, amirite?

But apparently my dog is still growing up … somewhere …

“The Emperor has the flu!  I need 20 pounds of toad, stat!”

My heir has come of age and immediately gone bald.  I secure him a wife who doesn’t mind.

Meanwhile, my vassal the Patriach has won a war against the remnants of Croatia, bringing them under my control!  Someone is getting a Christmas bonus this year!

It’s down to just Alexandria.  The Muradids have dropped out of the defensive pact, and they have two of the counties I need, so I go after them first.

This doesn’t take long.  Now there’s only one county to go, owned by the Talalids.  They are part of the grand alliance against me, but because the territory I need is so small, I should be able to rush them before anyone else intervenes.

The prince has rabies?

Did he find my dog?

What about the dog, damn you?  What do you know?!

Well, shit.  At least I foresightfully got Sybilla a safe matrilineal marriage to guard against this possibility.

Anyway, back to the Talalids!  It’s me vs. literally everyone, but literally everyone is a long way away.

As expected, the province falls long before the combined armies of the world can intervene.

There we go!  That’s the lot.

SPQR, MFers.

At 44, Methodios is now “the Glorious” and bears the ancient title Augustus.  Not a bad run at all.

But we’re not finished yet, by a long shot.  After all, the Roman Empire used to be much larger than this …

 

Current Year: 986 AD.

Current Status: Veni, Vidi, Vici.

Content, Crusader Kings Series 3, Excluded, Games

Pax Romana 2: Electric Boogaloo, Part Six

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, and Part Five.  Updates Wednesdays!

When we left off, my attempts to gain some territory were frustrated by threat generated from retaking the territory I already had.  Man.  Kinging is hard guys.

On the plus side, I get to hold a triumph!  

I’ve also got authority to grant titles now, which combined with the ability to revoke them are the most important rights to take from the council.  Their idea of who needs to have titles is usually at odds with mine.

While I wait for threat to tick down, it’s time for some more scheming.  After the war with Serbia I have two Serbian princesses in my dungeons.  A little gold convinces them to join my side, and they have tasty claims I might be able to exploit.

Conveniently, I have a couple of unmarried younger sons!  I betroth them to the princesses, in the hopes that they or their offspring will come in handy some day.  

My chancellor has managed to forge a claim saying that the Romans do, in fact, own Rome.  So that’s good.  But my threat is still pretty high, and the claim will only last as long as Emperor Michael does.

So if I start the war, I end up fighting the entire Christian world.  But the Pope only controls one or two counties — once his territory is fully occupied, the war is over.  I decide to go for it on the premise that I can blitz him before the rest of the Christian world gets its shit together.

The Pope hires some mercenaries to help out, of course, but things pretty much go as planned anyway and I’m able to give them a good beatdown.

Bingo!  No other Christian armies even got close.

Rome for the Romans!

That’s three of the Pentarchy under my thumb.  (Constantinople, Antioch, and Rome.)  The remaining ones are Jerusalem and Alexandria.  It’s time to start thinking seriously about mending the Great Schism, which would basically make Orthodoxy triumphant over Catholicism and remove much of the threat of a crusade against me.

Lombardy is Italy now, I guess?  It’s all gonna be Rome anyway!

Michael is getting on in years, which is kind of a shame because he’s come together nicely.  He’s a falconer, a hunter, humble, greedy, just, gregarious, diligent, and lustful, with above-average administrative skill and eight children.  Not a bad career!

Well, maybe I spoke too soon about just.

I was a little worried they’d head straight for me after I took Rome, but apparently not.  Awesome, guys, good luck!

One of those princesses decides she likes me better than the little kid she’s betrothed to.

Well.  Women have needs, you know?

I try for five years of peace, on the off-chance that Michael lives that long.

However, my clever chancellor manages to forge a claim on Alexandria!  Hmmmmm.

While my threat is still high, the big empire that dominates the Muslim world isn’t part of the defensive pact against me.  So really it’s only two smallish nations I’d be going to war with.  Worth it!

My stupid cowardly council thinks this is a bad idea, so I fire and bribe people until they go along with it.

Egypt is weak and fighting on several other fronts, so the war turns out to be pretty easy.  I told you, guys.

Victory!

That’s four of the Pentarchy in my hands, now.  But Michael is 66, and our threat is too high to go for Jerusalem yet.  Plus Michael is unlikely to have enough time to gather the 2,000 piety needed to mend the Schism.  So we wait, for now.

I pass my twilight years gambling on chariot racing …

…assassinating interfering adventurers …

… and arranging promising matches for my daughters!

Finally, Michael’s best friend Maximos dies.  Since I’m basically waiting for him to kick the bucket at this point, I decide to help him along.  Who wants to live in a world without Maximos?!

Though some of his schemes were thwarted, Michael has a pretty awesome career, adding all of Italy to the empire and capturing two more of the Pentarchy.  Getting closer to my goals!

Anthimos, I choose you!

Anthimos is 38, with decent diplomacy and so-so stewardship.  He’s my first emperor Born in the Purple, having spent his whole life in imperial splendor.  He’s humble, charitable, deceitful, and depressed.

This guy is diligent and trusting, which is probably why he’s willing to come to my court and ends up married to my daughter.

New quack!  Heretical sorcerer sounds great.

At first I thought this was going to be the nun-who-is-Death thing, but it turns out some monks just need money.  Happy to oblige!

The piety will come in handy, too.  It’s time to get serious about this Great Schism thing.  In addition to Jerusalem, I need 90% moral authority and 2,000 piety.  The moral authority won’t be hard — I’ll get +10% for Jerusalem itself — but the piety is going to be a stretch.  Anthimos only has about 500, and my options for getting more are limited.

I haven’t managed to forge a claim to Jerusalem, so that means it’s time for Holy War.  The huge Muradid Caliphate is busy with a civil war, so I’m optimistic that I’ll only have to face the Taids, who are small.

As I launch the war, I acquire a son!  Better and better.

There’s currently a plague in Jerusalem, so the land won’t support many troops.  This mostly works to my advantage, making it hard to the enemy to organize.

Soon I’m laying siege to everything in sight.  As I hoped, the Muslims are distracted with various internal wars.

Like many of my wars, it was surprisingly straightforward!

The last of the Pentarchy is under my command.  Whether I’ll be able to hang on to them is another matter, of course.

Moral authority has gone up, too.  So the only remaining obstacle is piety, but that’s a pretty high bar.  I get a bit of a boost from the holy war itself, and more from bestowing the newly captured churches on worthy vassals, so I’m now close to 1,000.

Although this … could be a serious problem.

But on to gaining piety!  The problem is, not being Catholic, my options are fairly limited.  There aren’t any Orthodox holy orders to donate to yet, and there’s no Pope to buy indulgences from, so I don’t have a great way of turning cash into holiness.  

Instead, I work on my churches.  Normally I don’t pay much attention to my church holdings, since the castles provide most of the troops, but you can upgrade them and they contribute piety every month.  I also start building some new churches, which will both contribute piety and give me a lump sum when I grant them to vassals.

If I could declare holy war, I could seize more churches and grant those, but my threat is over 50% so I’d have to fight the whole world.  Sigh.

I’m trying to be pious here!  I’m not hiring a witch as my doctor!

Instead I appoint Bishop Narses, who is learned as hell and shockingly handsome to boot.  He’s the George Clooney of the ancient world.

I shift my own focus to theology, in the hopes of getting more piety-granting events.

Because of his high learning Bishop Narses is shockingly effective at finding heretics.  Burn the Catholics!

Burn the witches!

You know what?  Just keep burning people until I tell you to stop.

Does friendship increase piety?  No?  Then what good is it?

Of course, I love … whatever the hell that is.  Is it food?  I bet it’s food.

Yes!  Ponder away!

Crap.  Anthimos is getting old before his time.  Must be all the praying.

When I said to keep burning people, I didn’t mean me, dammit!

I’m up to 1400 piety, but Anthimos is going senile at the age of 47.

Sadly, all my pious strivings are for naught, and poor Anthimos dies tragically early.  Not much of a career, but at least he got Jerusalem.  And the churches I built will continue providing piety to his successor, who unfortunately starts back at zero.

Methodios, I choose you!

Methodios is seven.  He was born in the purple, and is attractive and conscientious.  That’s promising, at least.

Unfortunately, we’re in for nine years of regency, and the vassals are plotting against me.

Can’t start being pious too early!

Methodios knows you just have to stand up to bullies.

Though he can be a little twitchy.

Orthodoxy is working its way into Italy.  I’ve sent the oh-so-pious Narses over to Jerusalem, because if it becomes Orthodox I get my own religious order, which would help a lot.

Consumption: also working its way into Italy.

Inevitably, my vassals rise up demanding more power.  Bring it on, fools!

Italy is in revolt, which means if I win, I’ll be able to switch them from a hereditary kingdom to an appointed viceroyal exarchate.

The big battle happens outside Constantinople, and I give the rebels a good kicking.

Victory!  I take the Italian crown from Erelieva, who hates me anyway —

— and bestow it as a viceroyalty on the appropriately grateful Symeon.

Methodios is fourteen, and has picked up diligent and stressed.  Turning out nicely!

And he manages to get through two more years without anything horrible happening.  He picks up ambitious, which is great, and his stewardship education worked out well.  His martial could be better, but all in all not bad.  

At sixteen, his piety is 332.  He should be able to make 2,000 before dying if I really try, right?

 

Current Year: 958 AD.

Current Status: Hopefully Not Foreshadowing.