​

During the Classical Era, the great Roman Empire was split into two factions: the Latin West and Greek East. The barbarian armies descended upon the great cities, plundering gold and salting the ancestral lands. The Golden Age of Enlightenment, stretching from musky Spain to forested England, had fallen to the Dark Ages, as the Old Gods of the Norse and the heathens of the Muslim South divided what was left of old Rome. As Christendom fought amongst itself and created a divide, named the Great Schism, the glory of Rome was lost to the annals of time.

House DLP, your people in Byzantium look to you still. They hope for a great House to once again unite the fractured Byzantine Empire and prevail against the hordes of savages nipping at their borders. Although Constantinople is only a simulacrum of Roman power, it is the only bastion of enlightenment in the East. House DLP, a family of lowly Counts, dreams of uniting the dissident Byzantine people. Will these dreams be fulfilled? Can the lowly House DLP restore the Empire of Rome?

Can you build a Civilization that will stand the test of time?​

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Succession Game:
Rules-
1. The Top Three Heirs must be named after the next person in the sequence. Spares can be named after other people.
2. NO SAVE SCUMMING. Whatever happens, happens. It's okay if you screw up: that's what the other players are for.
3. Before the end of the last player's reign, succesfully Restore the Roman Empire, with all Imperial lands in Spain, France, and Britain restored, and the Great Schism Mended.
4. Never lose Constantinople and Athens at any point in the game. If either of those Counties are lost, this Succession Game is declared as over.

--


We begin in the Year of Our Lord, 867, in the Old Gods beginning. Of course, House DLP needs a sigil, and it must be a phoenix on a background of green. What else?


Count Zeitgeist has some damn awful traits. However, we will use some Grand Hunts to flip some of these.


In order to become an Emperor, we first need to become a Duke (Doux). And will you look at that? Our liege wants us to be his Spymaster...


Of course we plan to kill him. House DLP must rise from the ashes, and we must become the Doux through unsavoury means...


Bye-bye, Mister Doux. Who said that a Spymaster can't be treacherous?


Oh my, the Emperor has now given us our old liege's position. How fortune turns.


And the Emperor is so generous, giving us an extra County from our old liege. Now we have all the Counties in our Duchy, being promoted from Count to Doux.


Ambition is the way forward for House DLP.


We have our firstborne child! Say hello to Lady Grinning Lizarda.


Battle wounds are awesome.


I'd prefer to be your Spymaster, but Chancellor could work.


A son! My wife isn't barren after all. We still might kill her, though. The Duchess should be younger and more fertile.


It was nice knowing you in a Biblical way.


Wife No. 2 gets to business straight away. This is why you marry lustful girls.


In the interrim, we've already had a few other children. But this is our first genius! She shall be called Lady Irene of DLP.


Meanwhile, we have been fabricating a claim in Croatia, and finally, we have access to one of those independent counties.


Betrothing our second-borne son (Grinnin Lizardo) to the daughter of a Byzantine Duke. When we eventually attack the Emperor, we need some internal allies to fire that Faction.



Wife No. 2 is definitely a fertile Myrtle. Preggers again!


And the child is a Genius son! GrinningLizarde, you will have to be my Heir. Screw the other three sons: this is why we should get Elective Succession.


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Part 1 of the Reign of Zeitgeist is completed. Part 2 is coming [Images per Post limit].

 

I couldn't get into CK2 at all.

 

Awesome! A little sad that you did not make him roman/hellenic.

 

Part 2 of the Reign of Zeitgeist.

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...Are you serious? What an honour. And what an opportunity to kill you, Child-Emperor.


It's time for our liege to meet an untimely death. The more regencies and instability we have, the more House DLP can consolidate its power within the Byzantine Empire.


You really must be enjoying my bed, Wifey?


We have twins. Of course, one will be called Vir...


...And the other will be called Vira. Yes, Vira is a boy.


Vira is slow to talk? We will beat the stutter out of him! Get off your lazy ass! You're a scion of DLP, not a common farmyard hand.


Time skip. Our firstborne, Lady Grinning Lizarda, is already off to get married. How the young grow so quickly!


Meanwhile, the Tengri have Reformed in the North and have formed a fearsome Holy Order. That does not bode well for our future.


During all of this tumult, we had a son called Lungs. He turned out to have shitty stats all around. Damn.


You're now a monk. Deal with it. My least favourite son, unfortunately. No babies and wives for you.


Lady Irene of House DLP is a Genius, Scholarly Theologian. Basically, she likes reading books, is incredibly smart, but she will never put out for you. Sounds about right.


And our Heir via Elective Succession, Lord GrinningLizarde, has become a Grey Eminence. Basically, I educated him literally right before he turned 16. At the cusp of his birthday, I threw him at a courtier with the Grey Eminence education, and bam!


Vira is an "Indulgent Wastrel", which is a euphemism for "lazy". Why are all my non-Irene children so awful? At least the Heir is good.

FUCK YOU, GAME.​

Accomplished:
1. Moved up from being a Count and gained Duchies of Thessalonika, Rascia, Krete via Fabricated Claims.
2. Switched to Elective Succession.
3. Pimped out two daughters (Grinning Lizarda, Irene) for crucial alliances with other Byzantine Dukes.

4. DIES BECAUSE MY FUCKING IDIOT LIEGE SENDS ME TO HUNT. FUCK YOU.​

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Situation for Grinning Lizard, as he takes the next stage of the game:



I'm extremely worried about the formation of FOUR EMPIRES in Europe: Francia, HRE, Alba, and Hispania. Extremely fucking rare, but then again, the Karlings own half the map in the beginning of Old Gods. Either GL or Aekiel will have to do something about those four Empires, or else Imperial Reconquest will be extremely difficult when we attack Gaul after dealing with the Muslims.

Thankfully, the Muslims are very fractured, although the Tengri have Reformed. Also, the Byzantine Empire is currently under a Civil War to lower Crown Authority, leaving it extremely vulnerable to the Tengri Hungary up North. GL will need to neutralise that threat very quickly.

Also, GL is currently betrothed to a niece with a Weak Claim to the Empire. However, the girl is only 10 years old at the moment. He will need to wait ten years without having any children and then need to find the right moment to press her Weak Claim, before the Byzantine Empire goes into Elective Succession instead of Primogeniture.

That's a lot to do, and all of those internal issues will need to be sorted before we can even think about attacking the Muslims for Jerusalem. Be careful of the Northern Tengri.

 

Is the kingdom south of Cumania zoroastrian or muslim?

 

I'm not sure, but it's probably Muslim.

 

Green map colour is usually reserved for Muslims.

 

Haven't played on Very Hard for a bit, but I'm impressed with the blobbing going on. Alba in 31 years - WTF happened there? Jorvik take over all of England and the Duke of Albany (or something) just took over once event troops were depleted? It's early days, and I'm guessing at least two Empires are going to fall before the end of the next reign (if it's at least decently long), but still, that's damn impressive.

 

One of the strategies I use for breaking up empires is to go to the kingdom level and gather as many claimants as possible, marry them to various courtiers, then gather your allies and go install the new guy as the King of Wherever. It's useful if you can marry him/her to your heir, but if not it's no big deal. A divided empire is better, especially when you're allied with half of it.

 

I've never seen all those empires exist at once in any one game. At least it wasn't that Hungarian Empire or whatever it's called, particularly if it included Bulgaria, holding the territory that it does. Is Francia and HRE still run by the same dynasty? Because that's going to be annoying if so.

 

It is interesting, since I usually play a modded game, and one of the things I turn off is the extra 'de jure' empires.

 

If GL doesn't show soon over this week, I'll send Equinox the game file, and we'll take it from there.

 

This, this is pure awesome. I've never played the game and have no understanding of how it works, but this is cool.

 

Depending when that happens you may have to give it to the person after me. I'm going to be fairly busy for the next few weeks, then I'll be gone for a bit. Depends on the timing as to whether I can squeeze this in as it currently stands.

 

So... Can we just skip GL now and get on with playing this game?

 

We would need to restart. The new patch/DLC is incompatible with older saves.

 

Ah, true. Forgot about that.

 

I'm happy to start again and post here before the weekend's end, presuming that we have enough people to play. Aekiel, Banta, klackerz: you all still in?

 

Yep.

/10char

 

Sure.

/filler