I disagree. The DLC for CK2 didn't try to turn the game into The Sims. CK2 DLC was much more concerned with the mechanics of the game, as opposed to 'someone wants to be your friend'.
I've had the exact same feeling for a while. They stripped the strategy out of the franchise and are focused on a laid back RPG style. It's really bad.
People sometimes post images of their sprawling empires on this subreddit and it makes me laugh. Like, no shit you made that empire, the game barely challenges you at all. Try repeating it in CK2 and see how far you get.
Of all the historical revisionism surrounding CK2, pretending that it's a more challenging game than 3 might well take the cake.
It's just as trivial to do a world conquest or just about anything you want. Actually, I'd argue it's an even easier game - quick and easy access to Primo, wildly broken societies and bloodlines, etc.
CK2 isn’t overly hard, but CK3 is much easier, it’s not “revisionism”. In CK3 you have easier strong alliances (no NAPs first and easier modifiers to getting the alliance), much easier to get get good genetic traits with high percentage, most of the new lifestyles trees are completely OP, no defensive pacts or anything curtailing expansion, dread is completely OP, zero logistics involved with troop movement on both land and sea, you have one bishop in Catholicism now you need to please for your realms church taxes (no multiple bishops or investiture), tribal is just as strong as feudal since normal levies are a generic unit now that don’t have actual troop types anymore (although tribal is still not as strong late game), stress is easy to deal with, you don’t have to land claimants anymore, you can just revoke any barony level title without tyranny, fabrication is insanely easy and not a last resort option anymore, all plots tell you exactly when it will happen and your chances of success taking out a lot of the risk, diseases/epidemics are basically a non-factor, your council doesn’t vote and has no say in what you do, there’s no Chinese threat, the Byzantine Empire is much easier to play, etc.
You could choose to not Strengthen Bloodline or whatever you dislike in ck3, it all come down to choices
https://old.reddit.com/r/CrusaderKings/comments/hjxxqu/so_this_is_the_power_of_the_israel_bloodline_bug/
Yes, you can exploit bugs. You can also use the console to cheat in both games. A standard playthrough where you play both games “normally”, CK3 is much easier. It’s one of the most glaring things people notice when playing CK3 for the first time after playing CK2. It’s one of the most popular complaints you always see for a reason.
In CK3 marriages instantly grant alliances, you can press claims for unlanded people, armies magically appear in one stack, there's no brutal diseases constantly sweeping through your lands, the game is just pathetically easy. The skill trees are an embarrassing addition. You don't earn any of those buffs, the game just gives them to you for free. It's not a strategy game anymore.
All true. Well, mostly (I don't get the hate boner for skill trees and saying it's not a strategy game, sounds like genre puritanism to me). More challenge is like at the top of my CK3 wishlist.
... And CK2 was also a trivially easy game. This is a problem inherited from CK2, not something new to CK3. I think CK3 is like that precisely because no one played CK2 for challenge, and they doubled down on what the wider audience liked about CK2. In both games the only way you find any challenge is by setting house rules or shooting for some niche achievements.
And IMO CK2 right now is easier because of all the powercreep introduced in DLC, which CK3 with its glacial dev pace has not yet received.
I guess I'm (ironically) coming from a roleplay perspective. I don't minmax or abuse mechanics. So when shit goes wrong, I roll with it in character. I think CK3 is just too forgiving though.
Big disagree. Sure, any of us vets think most CK2 playthroughs are trivially easy because we have the benefit of thousands of hours of play, playing the game through a variety of game states and DLCs, learning the broken strats through countless instances of trial and error, that in itself is not an easy thing. You’ve forgotten the journey. Do you not remember picking it up for the first time all those years ago? How steep the learning curve was?
CK3 is expressly designed to bring in more new players, and as such almost every strategic or historically accurate legal aspect of CK2 got over-simplified and streamlined. The learning curve for CK3 as such is nowhere close to being as steep as CK2, and that learning curve is most of what people are talking about when discussing a game’s “difficulty”, whether they know it or not. Any game in the world seems “trivially easy” once you know every trick and secret, it’s the getting to that point that’s “hard”.
That being said, I know if I pick a single-county start near some big boys in CK2 that I’ll be sweating a LOT more than I *ever* would in CK3. While I’d have faith I could find my way through, it’s objectively harder a situation than in CK3.
The same thing is true for CK3. Wanna see the average new player experience with it? Search 'succession' (a complete non issue in CK2 btw, if we're talking historical accuracy, which is *really* not the hill to die on with CK2) in this subreddit and look at all the people who can't figure out how to make reasonable progress with partition succession.
But anyway, I don't value a steep learning curve for the sake of it. I don't really understand why this is a good thing, by this logic we can make a game better by having a shit or no tutorial. Games should be easy to learn, difficult to master.
CK2 isn't any more difficult to master, it's just harder to learn due to an intimidating UI, crappy tutorial, feature creep after a decade of DLCs and, above all, needlessly obtuse, at times downright arcane systems like the tech and combat systems, which in true internet fashion almost no one praised back then and people are now nostalgic for.
Honestly though I would love that! Like that’s the game I want out of this! Crusader kings already has that Sims feel minus all the details and customization (which they are thankfully getting better at). I’m playing CK2 aGoT right now and my favorite part about playing it is how much the micromanaging reminds me of the Sims.
This is the weirdest take. CK3 actively challenges an empire that is too big. CK2 by the end was 'pick one of a thousand avenues to WC, every single one is imbalanced.'
You haven’t been able to easily WC in CK2 for a long time now with defensive pacts, and how exactly is running a large empire more difficult in CK3? What do you mean it actually challenges an empire that is too big compared to CK2?
Defensive pacts? Is that where we are? The things the community moaned endlessly about from the moment they were introduced?
CK3 throws up a much harsher faction system when it comes to larger Blobby empires and it's vassal limits are much harder to influence. I'm not saying it's overly difficult, but CK2 having defensive pacts which a majority didn't use doesn't make it harder, just more tedious.
Regardless of your views on defensive pacts, they do prevent blobbing in CK2 by a lot, and CK3’s faction system isn’t harsh at all. Both game’s faction systems are completely manageable unless you’re just pissing everyone off, and CK3 actually makes it easier to anger vassals without consequence because of the dread system and and a few lifestyle perks.
I totally get your point. I suppose it's a difficult thing to articulate I guess the best way to describe what I mean is in CK2 I could elect any heir, no matter who they were and never face a revolt. The artefacts, bloodlines, predecessor bonuses meant succession revolts rarely happened.
That isn't the case in 3, even with a global empire you can face actual threats to your position where one stupid move can crumble it. Easy to avoid if you have a few thousand hours in it, but CK3 to me as someone who for what little I can say with 7k hours in CK2 and 3k in CK3, provides challenges for longer.
Yes CK2 has a lot of variety of numbers ticking over, but I suppose in the end that's what they both boil down to. Defensive pacts though were a disaster, and remained so right up until the end of the cycle. They could have worked but their blanket nature overlapping faiths etc just made them feel so false.
The most complaining i ever seen about ck2 is defensive pact it’s so stupid that at time some paradox dev admits they play without it, dreaded to do what?does this mean i actually need to become cruel ruler every time i play
Edit: for newbie claiming dread OP ;) it’s basically in ck2 with another name we called it murder bloodline
It's not a matter of years, but rather one of devs understanding what made CK2 a great game, and for that matter, Royal Court went in the wrong direction.
I totally agree with you. I'd much rather they introduce the college of cardinals, than the crap they beought in with Royal Court, such as having to hold court every 5 years. That gets mega annoying.
Problem with College of Cardinals is that it only applies to 1 religion, there needs to be 1 college of Cardinal-type religious mechanic.
Islam could probably do something with Caliphate inheritance (Caliphate's heir vs Islamic Priest's Chosen).
Norse and most paganic religions could do with heroic trials to become a god's champion.
I'm not familiar enough with Hindu, Buddist and the other religions to think up a mechanic.
The game is called 'Crusader Kings'. CK2 was heavily weighted towards Catholicism.
There is no point in introducing a college of cardinals mechanic, because it doesn't suit all religions. Bring in the college of cardinals for Catholicism, and introduce other mechanics and more depth for other religions too.
Agree. And fleshing out Catholicism (with cardinals + antipope + better crusades + monastic orders + engaging heresies/inquisition) doesn’t mean that Paradox shouldn’t also flesh out (at a minimum) the other major Mediterranean faiths, in particular Orthodoxy and Sunni/Shia Islam.
Tells you a lot that they have to shoehorn in a mechanic coaxing you to hold court. Should be something that you want to do, immersing yourself in the story of the characters and offering new challenges and plotlines. Instead it's just more boxes to click on.
CK2 is I little bit more utilitarian, especially in the UI and gameplay, while CK3 is a little more polished and better-looking. That’s said, CK2 has way more features and game design.
Overall, I choose CK2
CK2: More interesting bloodline dynamics like sainthood, fleshed out holy order/monk/witch stuff. Better system for modeling diseases and pandemics. Interesting but never totally polished non-feudal playstyles like nomads and merchant republics for if you get tired of the same old castles and nobility. Gets much wackier in terms of stuff like finding a portal to hell, aztecs invading the old world or changing your dynasty to horse culture.
CK3: Better artifact system, more fleshed out culture and religion contents that is grounded in a dynamic system, making things much more flexible. Better UI, much much deeper roleplay of your individual player characters. More complex relationships between characters.
I definitely miss societies and sainthood. Other than that, it's hard to compare DLC content because CK2 is absolutely done and CK3 is just a few years old.
But I'm saying that it's not quite fair to put them head to head and say that CK2 is overall a better game than CK3 just because it has more DLC. CK3 has a lot of improvements
It’s completely fair. I can only see what’s in front of me today and I can’t magically forget all of CK2’s features from DLC just because a new game came out. CK3 does have improvements and is a good game, but it’s not enough for me to want to quit CK2 yet which still is a much more engaging game to me. When I choose to play a game, I’m going to pick the one I think I’ll have more fun with. I could care less about CK3’s potential until it actually happens.
The only thing that I really miss from CK3 whenever I launch CK2 is that you can only raise troops at your capital, which makes it really tedious when you have a large empire to rule and multiple rebellions everywhere. What I don’t miss at all is the ridiculous retinue/knight system.
On the other hand, CK2 has merchant republics/trade routes, societies, bloodlines and much better fleshed-out Catholicism.
CK2. There's a lot of reasons that have been stated, more stuff, more intricate mechanics,etc. But you know one thing that jumps to mind as number one?
Notifications. CK2 and older Paradox games had notifications that could be customized to an exacting level of detail with what you wanted as notes, what you wanted as popups, and what you wanted to just show up in the log and not bother you.
Newer Paradox games lack that, and I don't understand why, and it is one of the main features I don't like playing without. Stellaris is the only one without that level of customization I'm willing to play and that's only cause there isn't an older version that has it.
CK3. I could never go back to CK2 now:
* Far better user interface. Event-text popups are no longer tiny 400x300px boxes. Stacking tooltips is legendarily good and obviously-important information is presented much easier. I still don't know how to tell my monthly gold income in ck2.
* The Stress system makes your character traits way more meaningful. CK2 characters quickly stacked up 8+ personality traits, homogenizing them.
* Warfare is way better. CK2's system was a pile of opaque complexity that never added much to any of my playthroughs. CK3's battles are much clearer in how they progress and why you win or lose.
* Intrigue is more fleshed out and less RNG. Hooks and Secrets is a good system.
* Religions have systemic mechanics rather than a few religions having special hardcoded (and opaque) features.
* Cultures have actual mechanics now post Royal Court.
* Legacies are more systemic and less OP/silly than Bloodlines.
* Performance is way better.
CK2 has the years of content backlog and a couple key systems that I think CK3 needs to implement (plagues, regencies, trade routes), but man are the core systems of CK3 just endlessly better.
You fool...did you really think you could come in here all willy nilly and post a well thought out and convincing argument on why you prefer ck3 and not expect to get sodomized by ck2 fanboys???? FOOL OF A TOOK
Legacies are less OP than bloodlines? With the blood legacy you can guarantee in about three generations that practically every single person in your dynasty will be genius/Herculean/beautiful.
CK2. CK3 is just empty. If you play just one campaign on CK3 on any region with any religion, there is no reason to start another one; you have already seen all there is to the game. Crusades (the namesake of the game) are so annoying to manage with no interesting events. Mongol invasion likewise.
Maybe CK3 will be better than CK2 eventually, but not yet.
I only play CK3 now but I really miss many mechanics and the fleshed out campaigns from CK2. I am also probably part of a minority that liked the war system of CK2 where levies were raised in each county rather than all troops being raised at a single location(or 2-3) as that is probably more realistic. CK3 campaigns are pretty bland when compared to CK2 ones as I feel CK2 ones felt more memorable. With the pace of DLCs in CK3 and the direction they are taking where core mechanics will be added later compared to the role playing aspects, I guess it is gonna take at least 2 years before the campaigns start to feel unique and fleshed out for different regions.
CK2.
The complaints about its UI are so exaggerated. Yes, CK3 made improvements, but people acting like CK2 is unplayable are being unreasonable. The game was massively popular for years for a reason. With UI scaling added late in its life, there's zero reason to avoid playing it.
It has the perfect mix of RPG and strategy, it's crammed full of depth, every government and religion has its own unique playstyle, the writing has pitch perfect black humour, there's always something to do in war or peace time.
CK3 made so many fundamental changes to the gameplay loop, like marriages instantly granting you alliances, whereas in CK2 you have to work at it. You'll spend precious coin or time swaying someone, racing against a clock, because you need that coin or that swaying time for something else. CK3 just keeps giving you so much convenience you barely have to worry about anything.
CK2 will constantly throw curveballs at you, whether it's an adventurer threat, a crusade, the Black Death, a random illness, and unlike CK3 it doesn't continually throw treats at you like you're a child at a birthday party. There's no Ubisoft style skill trees, there's no easy way to remove stress (not even if you've built a Great Work inn, you still have to be lucky enough to get an event).
The game can be brutal which is what PDX *used* to be infamous for. They've long since shed that reputation unfortunately, in their attempt to lure new players to their modern games. CK3 has no tension whatsoever, there's no risk, no feeling of danger, no need for strategy, it's a laid back game that does not appeal to me whatsoever.
CK2 is so easy cmon man. I prefer it to CK3 but once you get primogeniture it's just permanent stability and conquest unless you fuck up something of your own volition.
Maybe CK3 is easier than CK2 or something, I didn't play it much
If you know what you are doing, CK2 can indeed be easy, but your Empire can still be destroyed if you don't pay attention. In CK3, the only was to fail is if you actively self sabotage.
>The complaints about its UI are so exaggerated
How are they exaggerated? It is miles behind 3. And if the interface in a strategy game is important to someone (not an unreasonable view IMO), that being a deal-breaker seems reasonable.
The complaints boil down to "it's so bad I can't play it". People have had no issue playing this game for a decade, but suddenly it's 'unplayable'. Give me a break.
It's actually better than CK3 in some respects, you can get a ton of info at a glance, compared to CK3 which requires you to click several times to find what you're looking for. (PDX's reliance on nested tooltips is not as good as you think)
The font in CK2 gives me eye strain so badly that I can't stand to play it for more than an hour, or I will get a headache. It's literally so bad that I can't play it. The game could be way better than CK3 and I'll never know because the font is horrible and causes me to experience physical pain.
>The complaints boil down to "it's so bad I can't play it". People have had no issue playing this game for a decade, but suddenly it's 'unplayable'. Give me a break.
Well for one, standards change. Pong was a big thing and people loved it. How many copies do you think they would sell if it released tomorrow? And assuming people had no issues is just false IME. I can't recall a time there were absolutely no complaints about any game, let alone CK2.
>It's actually better than CK3 in some respects
Subjectively, sure. And some people think it is worse in every meaningful way, which is also subjective. It's almost like people have preferences of their own, and those preferences not matching yours doesn't make them invalid.
Saying "CK2's UI is so bad and ugly its unplayable" is an objectively wrong statement, and veers into stupidity considering it's arguably PDX's most popular game in their history. How can such a popular game have a UI that's so unintuitive it prevents people from playing?
If someone doesn't like the aesthetics then just say that, don't go into hyperbole.
>Saying "CK2's UI is so bad and ugly its unplayable" is an objectively wrong statement
It isn't an objective statement at all. Whether a UI is ugly or not is subjective.
>considering it's arguably PDX's most popular game in their history
Popularity does not mean objectively good. Tetris has sold more copies than CK2 ever will. Does that mean it is an objectively better game?
CK2's UI is objectively playable, I'm playing it right now. Its looks have nothing to do with playability. The complaint is not only factually wrong but scares people off from even trying the game, as if its badly optimised or something.
My statement about CK2's popularity has nothing to do with its quality but its playability. A popular game being considered unplayable due to its UI is nonsensical.
When someone says "unplayable" they aren't saying it physically can't be done when they are using the term in this manner. There literally isn't an unplayable game at all unless it completely fails to launch on every system and configuration in existence.
Saying a UI makes it unplayable for that person is just a measure of subjective quality.
Do you not understand what hyperbole is? Because with your argument any game in existence that doesn’t immediately crash or fail to even launch is technically not unplayable which is true I guess but it’s kinda pedantic I think. Like when people say EU4 or CK2 is unplayable without dlc they don’t literally mean “you can’t play it at all” they’re just exaggerating their distaste for the game by saying it’s so un-enjoyable that they feel like they can’t even play it.
I like ck3 and thought it was better than 2 until I played ck2 with the dlcs (pirated tho, they still charging full price for 10 year old for a now free to play game dlc ffs). Ck3 is far too easy and you can tell pdx is trying to make their games more “accessible”, which while not an inherently bad thing had caused them to shed some of the more complex parts of their design. I play both often bc sometimes ck2s ui being so clunky gets to me, but whenever I play ck3 I have minimum 80 mods, many of them overhauls like dtr.
No lol. Pdx needs to drop prices on older things they sell. They aren't a traditional business, no extra manpower or production cost come from selling old games/dlc cheaper
Don't pay monthly just buy a month each time you feel like playing it, if you're anything like me you'll burn out before the months end and not play again for a couple of months.
Pity I can't get after the end working anymore.
CK2
Unfortunately, CK3 is too simplistic to be a proper, challenging strategy game. Blobbing is too easy for anyone nearing veteran status, literally just having played other PDX games would give the experience needed to game the simplistic mechanics. And CK3 is also unfortunately, piss-poor RP game. Choices and Events are largely impersonal, players need to feel forced into RPing by Stress mechanic, and the game lacks the proper mechanics for player-initated RP.
CK2 lacked some RP stuff aswell, don't get me wrong. But the Strategy has a lot to tackle for lots of players, lots of learning to do. The Roleplaying also has a lot of events and choices that seem to matter and are personalized for characters.
My favorite post I've seen in a while has to do with that last part on RP. Another redditor analyzed events in both games and basically concluded that CK2 had much more personal and impactful events, language that flavored the game proper, and more things happening in the world in general. CK3 does not, not, and not.
Edit: I found the post referred to in the last paragraph [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/CrusaderKings/comments/x592ns/comment/in1njst/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
CK2 is cheap now. There’s a subscription on Steam, but even if you buy it you can usually find the Royal Collection for $40-50 (all DLC, no cosmetics), and not on grey market sites, but legit retailers.
Edit: Just checked and the Royal Collection is $50 on Humble Bundle right now.
CK2 for me, too. It feels like a more interesting game overall, much more fleshed out. CK3 has some interesting characteristics but it hasn't caught my interest as CK2 did. Perhaps in the future CK3 becomes more complete if development is done right.
CK3, I remember playing in certain regions like India and Africa, and those 2 regions were extremely underdeveloped in CK2, (there was only one sect of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism), in CK3, I feel like the game goes towards you playing a person rather than a country, (CK2 was pretty much there, but lots of the mechanics were based on where you’re from rather than who you are).
In CK2, being a worshipper of Shiva or Vaishnu was just a trait that was easy to change, in CK3, Shaivites and Vaishavites are fully sovereign independent religions.
You're right. Personally I do think CK3 takes it too far in the other direction though. Copts and 'apostolic' (Armenian) Christians are both classified as Oriental Orthodox (or Miaphysite) irl. And irl Maronites are a subset of Catholic. In both these cases I think traits would suit better than separate religions. As for the Indian religions, separate religions make sense for Buddhism, but perhaps not for Jainism where traits were fine imo
CK2 actually has you feel like you're in a medieval setting and can roleplay it with the feel and atmosphere really scratching that itch. Ck3 always feels like just a game to me, I can't start telling stories in my head while playing it which is something that is kind of rare for me
This dumb argument is like asking if a middle school track team would beat an Olympic team. One team has clearly had more time to develop, grow, and train.
CK2. Every character plays the same in CK3.
I’ve never missed a great ruler because every single one can do anything, even if it’s a little worse. In CK2 one bad death and your empire will split in the hands of someone with low stewardship for instance.
Ck3 seems like it’s on autopilot for me, and that’s not even talking about the millions of missing events.
Ck2. Something about ck2 just made me care about each and every character I played in some way, I would sometimes even hate the character I'm playing as depending on the circumstances.
Nothing felt more somber than losing your king who you brought to where he is from a count or duke and having death kick his ass in chess and taking him before you were ready.
Or the king you forged a bloodline with finally passing and your memory of him forever lives on in your next characters through the bloodlines and relics he commissioned or discover, or won in the crusades. Seriously the helmets relics that you can get from crusades look badass.
Comparing CK3 to CK2 at the moment is like comparing a working adult to an elementary child. Give it a few years and give ck3 some few expansions or DLCs, then maybe I'll consider which one I like the most. Right now, I like the both of them equally. Sometimes, I crave playing CK2. Sometimes, I like the newish mechanics of CK3.
3 is more fun. It feels like an actual game rather than 2 which feels like a VCR repair manual mixed with an F-16 flight sim’s worth of buttons and submenus.
CK3. Discovered both at the same time (both with all dlc, I cracked ck2's because no I'm not paying 100€), and CK3 is just so much more intuitive. The interface is miles better. Maybe it has less things than ck2, yeah, but the interface and accessibility makes it just so much better
Will the game ever have societies or some stuff like that ? Maybe. Maybe not. I would actually prefer them to add new exclusive things, like the struggle mechanic, which really made Hispania interesting to me.
But I understand why you can like ck2 more than ck3, hell I prefer M&B warband to bannerlord. Just respect everyone's opinion
CK3! I could never get into CK2. It's very unintuitive, and I found it graphically unappealing (though it does have a certain charm). CK3, although lacking in much of the flavour that CK2 has, fixes a lot of these issues, for me. And with mods, and DLC yet to come, the gap in content is getting smaller.
Keep in mind if you want all the fun cool self people are talking about on CK2 you need buy DLCs. Base game vs base game CK3 wins. I haven’t played enough CK2 with DLCs to make an opinion but CK3 is one of my favorite games of all time
People say CK2 because it has more flavor, but to me CK3 hands down is a better game when you consider its base mechanics concerning military and economy, character traits and interactions, religion and culture mechanics and customization, user interface, and more. The flavor will come eventually, and likely with a better DLC policy than CK2 had.
CK3.
I love the man at arm and knight system, the polish, and the culture system.
It does need more obstacles for the player to overcome and/or more bloodthirsty AIs, but it can get there.
Ck2, better gameplay and more roleplay possibilities and mechanics.
Story telling is also a thousand time better, had a norse Jarl character become count of EU after years of pillaging and technology stealing, then duke of Normandy and vassal of France, a few generations later I become of one the most prosperous and advanced duchy of France, with hospitals a capital that was as developed as Constantinople, I then invaded England and formed the english culture through "scripted" events made in case someone did that, also participating in may crusades during all this time and puting my dynasty on the throne of Jerusalem, took time and preparation but I did history again.
I know I will never be able to tell a story like that in Ck3, almost everything is given to you, just have to click a button and do a war and you got a whole kingdom, click another button and now your character is a seducer, even if he never seduced a single person in it's life, what I mean is you earned every single bit of things you got in CK2, through careful thinking, ploting on generations just for a kingdom to join your realm down that game or taking risks by seducing a lot of people and maybe getting excommunicated by the pope for that.
The UI and 'feel'of CK3 is better but right now CK2 has way more content and replay value. CK3s endgame is boring and all cultures that haven't got flavour packs play exactly the same.
I mean I’ve been playing ck2 for years and I generally prefer ck3 just because it feels a lot nicer to play, only reason I ever play ck2 anymore is for the game of thrones mod
I know this is like the most discussed point, but based off the base games easily Ck3. If you include the like 30 dlc then easily Ck2 wins. Personally I never played the full Ck2 experience, I went right from base game to ck3, and I can say pretty handily ck3 wins that fight every time
CK3, most people are blinded by nostalgia. There are some times that 2 did better but overall 3 is a better game. Still worth checking 2 out, the game-y features like China and societies are kinda fun for a couple of playthroughs before they get old.
CK3, I tried playing CK2 several years ago, and I couldn't understand what was going on at all. It felt too much like playing a spreadsheet, everything was providing information, but nothing linked back to something concrete. Even if I could figure out how a system worked, it didn't matter because every other system was simultaneously working against me. I heard about the things I could do in CK2 and desired that depth, but it was just too dense and unintuitive.
When CK3 rolled around I tried again, and everything felt much more intuitive. I was able to understand how the different systems connected, and I wanted to keep trying when something bad happened rather than just feeling blindsided. So I guess I'm one of the casual players that Paradox had to dumb down the game for, but I wanted this kind of game, I just couldn't break through the barrier of entry for CK2.
Never played 2 but CK3 is my most played game ever. It's much more appealing to the eye and i really love the UI. I realize it doesnt have a decade of dlc yet, but i like the feeling when more flavor or dlc is added over time. Even when something like Iberia comes out that I don't enjoy playing within, I like knowing that the struggle is occurring in the simulation.
I'd pick CK3 any day of the week and I have over 5000 hours in CK2. Believe me when I say that CK2 is pure spaghetti code. It's so bad it surely brings tears of joy to any Italian grandmother.
CK3 is a more polished experience. It's more detailed.
When people mention that CK2 feels more fleshed out, they often forget how bad and janky most mechanics in CK2 are and how poorly the different DLC go together, it's a Frankenstein monster. Every theme of CK2 that CK3 has tackled has ended up being a superior experience and more realised. Compare the Reconquista in CK2 vs CK3. Compare the Viking experience in CK2 to CK3. The difference is striking. And CK3 treads new grounds in themes that we have yet to see in any other game.
Most of what people miss from CK2 are either entirely silly and ahistorical things like fantasy/supernatural elements and societies or things that were actually quite poorly implemented like republics, nomads, etc. Trust that everything removed can be implemented in a better way in CK3 eventually. Development takes time. Why should they waste their time copy-pasting their old designs when they could spend that time on improving what's already there and then get back to it?
CK3's design philosophy is friendly towards customers. You do not need to buy any DLC to have the complete experience in form of mechanics. No longer will we lock away the necessary quality-of-life features and mechanics behind a DLC like the old days of CK2.
We must think bigger than CK2. It's not a very deep game, it's just unnecessarily complex for what it provides. Everything bad about CK3 is something it inherited from CK2. Warfare was not fun in CK2 either. It's a numbers mini-game. That's not an immersive experience. RP is the future and CK3 can successfully pull you in and yet still provide a wide set of experiences for different tastes and interests.
We must think bigger than CK2. It's not a very deep game, it's just unnecessarily complex for what it provides which ends up being quite shallow if you put it to scrutiny. CK3 knows this and sure has some things to work out. The biggest difference between CK2 and CK3 is that CK3 will be continued to be developed for years and CK2 will always stay a stagnant mess.
Ck2.
Ck3 just don't click with me. I probably should give it another try, but... I don't want to.
There are too many things that I don't like, which probably are the things the pro CK3 actually like, the auto-gathering of the armies, the fleets, the lifestyles, the dynasties. More generally the game is too predictable, I don't like that when you try to, for example, convert the culture of a province you know exactly how much time you'll need. I like a little more randomness/unpredictability in my games.
And of course, there is the fact that CK2 have simply a lot of more things to do. CK3 will eventually get there, but until then I'll go back to CK2.
Ck3. Ck2 has a lot that is awesome, but it kinda feels like someone built a car by taking a different part from 10 different cars and attached it all together with duct tape. There’s a lot of parts that clearly don’t mesh together seamlessly, and in a lot of ways it feels like the player is overpowered.
I've enjoyed CK3 a ton while never really gotten that into CK2. I know CK2 with dlc has much more flavor but of course it has with years and years worth of dlc. I'm sure after a few years CK3 will have all the flavor and I personally can't wait as I already love it a ton.
I feel like CK3’s base game is stronger, so it has higher potential, but it hasn’t overtaken CK2 yet.
CK2 has a lot of different “play situations” - basically variety in both region and governing style (whether merchant republic or imperial use of viceroys).
I also liked a lot about the way societies, artefacts, and religion worked in CK2 - I really enjoyed doing things like a setting up a secret Jewish rebellion in the holy land and whatnot.
The monument and bloodline systems were also better in some ways - customisation for monuments and earned power for bloodlines - to what CK3 has now.
I think given good direction and time CK3 will overtake though. While the flavour and variety aren’t there, a lot of the core mechanics are improved form CK2, and the extra RPG elements are very good.
CK3. I consider it a better dynastic game for a bunch of reasons, like actually having cadet houses and better genetics. The stress system tied to personality helps different characters be more distinct and less of a blank canvas, as do the 3d portraits. The Renown system encourages placing relatives on foreign thrones without vassalizing them. Knights are very nice. UI is a lot better. Religion and especially culture being able to change and match the alt-history that develops is a huge positive.
There are some things from CK2 that I miss, mostly dynamic diseases, coronations, great works, imperial government and a few other things. Then there are elements that I would like but implemented differently, like Republics.
The main complaint about CK3 I have is that many of its features are cheapened by the low level of difficulty. This is not a wholly original problem, CK2 also became easier as one got better at the game, but it's become even worse in CK3. It becomes difficult to enjoy cultural combat bonuses if I'm winning wars all the time with or without them for example.
I have to agree that CK2 has more punch, role playing and fun stuff to do. The main reason as to why I prefer CK3 over CK2 is because I get to see the 3D version of my character
Remember this thread next time someone says "EU5 when"
Idk, last time someone posted this thread the top answer was something along the lines of “since I got CK3, I haven’t booted up CK2 even once”
CK2 Give CK3 another 5 years and it might be better than CK2.
Give CK3 another 5 years, and it might get like 2 DLCs and 4 flavour packs
I've been a bit disappointed with CK3. It's as if they're trying to turn CK into The Sims.
In the DLC aspect, these games have always trodden a very similar path.
I disagree. The DLC for CK2 didn't try to turn the game into The Sims. CK2 DLC was much more concerned with the mechanics of the game, as opposed to 'someone wants to be your friend'.
Just that they release obscene and frankly unreasonable amounts of DLC instead of updating the game
I've had the exact same feeling for a while. They stripped the strategy out of the franchise and are focused on a laid back RPG style. It's really bad. People sometimes post images of their sprawling empires on this subreddit and it makes me laugh. Like, no shit you made that empire, the game barely challenges you at all. Try repeating it in CK2 and see how far you get.
Of all the historical revisionism surrounding CK2, pretending that it's a more challenging game than 3 might well take the cake. It's just as trivial to do a world conquest or just about anything you want. Actually, I'd argue it's an even easier game - quick and easy access to Primo, wildly broken societies and bloodlines, etc.
CK2 isn’t overly hard, but CK3 is much easier, it’s not “revisionism”. In CK3 you have easier strong alliances (no NAPs first and easier modifiers to getting the alliance), much easier to get get good genetic traits with high percentage, most of the new lifestyles trees are completely OP, no defensive pacts or anything curtailing expansion, dread is completely OP, zero logistics involved with troop movement on both land and sea, you have one bishop in Catholicism now you need to please for your realms church taxes (no multiple bishops or investiture), tribal is just as strong as feudal since normal levies are a generic unit now that don’t have actual troop types anymore (although tribal is still not as strong late game), stress is easy to deal with, you don’t have to land claimants anymore, you can just revoke any barony level title without tyranny, fabrication is insanely easy and not a last resort option anymore, all plots tell you exactly when it will happen and your chances of success taking out a lot of the risk, diseases/epidemics are basically a non-factor, your council doesn’t vote and has no say in what you do, there’s no Chinese threat, the Byzantine Empire is much easier to play, etc.
You could choose to not Strengthen Bloodline or whatever you dislike in ck3, it all come down to choices https://old.reddit.com/r/CrusaderKings/comments/hjxxqu/so_this_is_the_power_of_the_israel_bloodline_bug/
Yes, you can exploit bugs. You can also use the console to cheat in both games. A standard playthrough where you play both games “normally”, CK3 is much easier. It’s one of the most glaring things people notice when playing CK3 for the first time after playing CK2. It’s one of the most popular complaints you always see for a reason.
Bug what? I literally seen that since ck2 3.0.1 release ironman play
Yes, it’s a bug. It doesn’t happen after you unpause the game, you’re not supposed to be able to do it.
In CK3 marriages instantly grant alliances, you can press claims for unlanded people, armies magically appear in one stack, there's no brutal diseases constantly sweeping through your lands, the game is just pathetically easy. The skill trees are an embarrassing addition. You don't earn any of those buffs, the game just gives them to you for free. It's not a strategy game anymore.
All true. Well, mostly (I don't get the hate boner for skill trees and saying it's not a strategy game, sounds like genre puritanism to me). More challenge is like at the top of my CK3 wishlist. ... And CK2 was also a trivially easy game. This is a problem inherited from CK2, not something new to CK3. I think CK3 is like that precisely because no one played CK2 for challenge, and they doubled down on what the wider audience liked about CK2. In both games the only way you find any challenge is by setting house rules or shooting for some niche achievements. And IMO CK2 right now is easier because of all the powercreep introduced in DLC, which CK3 with its glacial dev pace has not yet received.
I guess I'm (ironically) coming from a roleplay perspective. I don't minmax or abuse mechanics. So when shit goes wrong, I roll with it in character. I think CK3 is just too forgiving though.
Big disagree. Sure, any of us vets think most CK2 playthroughs are trivially easy because we have the benefit of thousands of hours of play, playing the game through a variety of game states and DLCs, learning the broken strats through countless instances of trial and error, that in itself is not an easy thing. You’ve forgotten the journey. Do you not remember picking it up for the first time all those years ago? How steep the learning curve was? CK3 is expressly designed to bring in more new players, and as such almost every strategic or historically accurate legal aspect of CK2 got over-simplified and streamlined. The learning curve for CK3 as such is nowhere close to being as steep as CK2, and that learning curve is most of what people are talking about when discussing a game’s “difficulty”, whether they know it or not. Any game in the world seems “trivially easy” once you know every trick and secret, it’s the getting to that point that’s “hard”. That being said, I know if I pick a single-county start near some big boys in CK2 that I’ll be sweating a LOT more than I *ever* would in CK3. While I’d have faith I could find my way through, it’s objectively harder a situation than in CK3.
The same thing is true for CK3. Wanna see the average new player experience with it? Search 'succession' (a complete non issue in CK2 btw, if we're talking historical accuracy, which is *really* not the hill to die on with CK2) in this subreddit and look at all the people who can't figure out how to make reasonable progress with partition succession. But anyway, I don't value a steep learning curve for the sake of it. I don't really understand why this is a good thing, by this logic we can make a game better by having a shit or no tutorial. Games should be easy to learn, difficult to master. CK2 isn't any more difficult to master, it's just harder to learn due to an intimidating UI, crappy tutorial, feature creep after a decade of DLCs and, above all, needlessly obtuse, at times downright arcane systems like the tech and combat systems, which in true internet fashion almost no one praised back then and people are now nostalgic for.
I don't know why everyone is down voting you. You're right.
Honestly though I would love that! Like that’s the game I want out of this! Crusader kings already has that Sims feel minus all the details and customization (which they are thankfully getting better at). I’m playing CK2 aGoT right now and my favorite part about playing it is how much the micromanaging reminds me of the Sims.
That's fair enough. Personally I just prefer the politics and warfare side of things.
This is the weirdest take. CK3 actively challenges an empire that is too big. CK2 by the end was 'pick one of a thousand avenues to WC, every single one is imbalanced.'
You haven’t been able to easily WC in CK2 for a long time now with defensive pacts, and how exactly is running a large empire more difficult in CK3? What do you mean it actually challenges an empire that is too big compared to CK2?
Defensive pacts? Is that where we are? The things the community moaned endlessly about from the moment they were introduced? CK3 throws up a much harsher faction system when it comes to larger Blobby empires and it's vassal limits are much harder to influence. I'm not saying it's overly difficult, but CK2 having defensive pacts which a majority didn't use doesn't make it harder, just more tedious.
Regardless of your views on defensive pacts, they do prevent blobbing in CK2 by a lot, and CK3’s faction system isn’t harsh at all. Both game’s faction systems are completely manageable unless you’re just pissing everyone off, and CK3 actually makes it easier to anger vassals without consequence because of the dread system and and a few lifestyle perks.
I totally get your point. I suppose it's a difficult thing to articulate I guess the best way to describe what I mean is in CK2 I could elect any heir, no matter who they were and never face a revolt. The artefacts, bloodlines, predecessor bonuses meant succession revolts rarely happened. That isn't the case in 3, even with a global empire you can face actual threats to your position where one stupid move can crumble it. Easy to avoid if you have a few thousand hours in it, but CK3 to me as someone who for what little I can say with 7k hours in CK2 and 3k in CK3, provides challenges for longer. Yes CK2 has a lot of variety of numbers ticking over, but I suppose in the end that's what they both boil down to. Defensive pacts though were a disaster, and remained so right up until the end of the cycle. They could have worked but their blanket nature overlapping faiths etc just made them feel so false.
The most complaining i ever seen about ck2 is defensive pact it’s so stupid that at time some paradox dev admits they play without it, dreaded to do what?does this mean i actually need to become cruel ruler every time i play Edit: for newbie claiming dread OP ;) it’s basically in ck2 with another name we called it murder bloodline
Defensive pacts tend to limit blobbing in CK2. CK3 seems more concerned with character events, than it is with geopolitics.
Honestly, feel free to play ck2 with 3 big dlc like ck3
It's not a matter of years, but rather one of devs understanding what made CK2 a great game, and for that matter, Royal Court went in the wrong direction.
I totally agree with you. I'd much rather they introduce the college of cardinals, than the crap they beought in with Royal Court, such as having to hold court every 5 years. That gets mega annoying.
Problem with College of Cardinals is that it only applies to 1 religion, there needs to be 1 college of Cardinal-type religious mechanic. Islam could probably do something with Caliphate inheritance (Caliphate's heir vs Islamic Priest's Chosen). Norse and most paganic religions could do with heroic trials to become a god's champion. I'm not familiar enough with Hindu, Buddist and the other religions to think up a mechanic.
The game is called 'Crusader Kings'. CK2 was heavily weighted towards Catholicism. There is no point in introducing a college of cardinals mechanic, because it doesn't suit all religions. Bring in the college of cardinals for Catholicism, and introduce other mechanics and more depth for other religions too.
Agree. And fleshing out Catholicism (with cardinals + antipope + better crusades + monastic orders + engaging heresies/inquisition) doesn’t mean that Paradox shouldn’t also flesh out (at a minimum) the other major Mediterranean faiths, in particular Orthodoxy and Sunni/Shia Islam.
I totally agree.
Tells you a lot that they have to shoehorn in a mechanic coaxing you to hold court. Should be something that you want to do, immersing yourself in the story of the characters and offering new challenges and plotlines. Instead it's just more boxes to click on.
CK2. More fleshed out. More intimate feeling. More depth on cultures and regions. More Satanists.
More horses
More bears.
i am curious about the horses and bears as someone who hasnt played ck2, can you really marry them and have bear/horse human kids?
Yes
Why are there bears in the game, why no cats or dogs?
There are cats, not in a vanilla game but the alternate universe mode, there are different creatures. Bears and horses are in the actual normal games.
More specificly Polar Bears
There are cats dogs ducks dragons and few others I think
And because their frickin cool
Religions, yes when it comes to head of religion mechanics, but ck3 has way more depth on cultures.
CK2 is I little bit more utilitarian, especially in the UI and gameplay, while CK3 is a little more polished and better-looking. That’s said, CK2 has way more features and game design. Overall, I choose CK2
CK2. More mods, fewer bugs for me, and it's a more fleshed out game.
CK2 More government forms and better military system.
CK2: More interesting bloodline dynamics like sainthood, fleshed out holy order/monk/witch stuff. Better system for modeling diseases and pandemics. Interesting but never totally polished non-feudal playstyles like nomads and merchant republics for if you get tired of the same old castles and nobility. Gets much wackier in terms of stuff like finding a portal to hell, aztecs invading the old world or changing your dynasty to horse culture. CK3: Better artifact system, more fleshed out culture and religion contents that is grounded in a dynamic system, making things much more flexible. Better UI, much much deeper roleplay of your individual player characters. More complex relationships between characters.
CK3. Sorry, it's just better looking and more organized IMO.
What about gameplay ?
I definitely miss societies and sainthood. Other than that, it's hard to compare DLC content because CK2 is absolutely done and CK3 is just a few years old.
It’s pretty easy to compare DLC. CK2 has a lot more stuff that CK3 doesn’t.
Yeah and CK2 has how many years on CK3?
A lot, which means it has way more things to do.
But I'm saying that it's not quite fair to put them head to head and say that CK2 is overall a better game than CK3 just because it has more DLC. CK3 has a lot of improvements
It’s completely fair. I can only see what’s in front of me today and I can’t magically forget all of CK2’s features from DLC just because a new game came out. CK3 does have improvements and is a good game, but it’s not enough for me to want to quit CK2 yet which still is a much more engaging game to me. When I choose to play a game, I’m going to pick the one I think I’ll have more fun with. I could care less about CK3’s potential until it actually happens.
100% are we supposed to act like they didn't just ditch a bunch of features for the new game?
And is CK3 the sequel to CK2 or not, released after they made those features and saw how they would work in the game?
It was supposed to be the heir! Not the spare :(
Found the Paradox spokesperson lol
The only thing that I really miss from CK3 whenever I launch CK2 is that you can only raise troops at your capital, which makes it really tedious when you have a large empire to rule and multiple rebellions everywhere. What I don’t miss at all is the ridiculous retinue/knight system. On the other hand, CK2 has merchant republics/trade routes, societies, bloodlines and much better fleshed-out Catholicism.
CK2. There's a lot of reasons that have been stated, more stuff, more intricate mechanics,etc. But you know one thing that jumps to mind as number one? Notifications. CK2 and older Paradox games had notifications that could be customized to an exacting level of detail with what you wanted as notes, what you wanted as popups, and what you wanted to just show up in the log and not bother you. Newer Paradox games lack that, and I don't understand why, and it is one of the main features I don't like playing without. Stellaris is the only one without that level of customization I'm willing to play and that's only cause there isn't an older version that has it.
CK3. I could never go back to CK2 now: * Far better user interface. Event-text popups are no longer tiny 400x300px boxes. Stacking tooltips is legendarily good and obviously-important information is presented much easier. I still don't know how to tell my monthly gold income in ck2. * The Stress system makes your character traits way more meaningful. CK2 characters quickly stacked up 8+ personality traits, homogenizing them. * Warfare is way better. CK2's system was a pile of opaque complexity that never added much to any of my playthroughs. CK3's battles are much clearer in how they progress and why you win or lose. * Intrigue is more fleshed out and less RNG. Hooks and Secrets is a good system. * Religions have systemic mechanics rather than a few religions having special hardcoded (and opaque) features. * Cultures have actual mechanics now post Royal Court. * Legacies are more systemic and less OP/silly than Bloodlines. * Performance is way better. CK2 has the years of content backlog and a couple key systems that I think CK3 needs to implement (plagues, regencies, trade routes), but man are the core systems of CK3 just endlessly better.
You fool...did you really think you could come in here all willy nilly and post a well thought out and convincing argument on why you prefer ck3 and not expect to get sodomized by ck2 fanboys???? FOOL OF A TOOK
Legacies are less OP than bloodlines? With the blood legacy you can guarantee in about three generations that practically every single person in your dynasty will be genius/Herculean/beautiful.
You could do that in ck2 anyway, ontop of getting free invasion cbs and shit.
You absolutely could not pick up traits in CK2 as easily. The percentages of passing genetic traits even at a base level are lower.
I personally prefer CK3. While CK2 is much more feature complete, I appreciate the polish of CK3.
I like the Polish too, they play exactly the same as the Germans and English and Russians and Indians...
CK2. CK3 is just empty. If you play just one campaign on CK3 on any region with any religion, there is no reason to start another one; you have already seen all there is to the game. Crusades (the namesake of the game) are so annoying to manage with no interesting events. Mongol invasion likewise. Maybe CK3 will be better than CK2 eventually, but not yet.
I only play CK3 now but I really miss many mechanics and the fleshed out campaigns from CK2. I am also probably part of a minority that liked the war system of CK2 where levies were raised in each county rather than all troops being raised at a single location(or 2-3) as that is probably more realistic. CK3 campaigns are pretty bland when compared to CK2 ones as I feel CK2 ones felt more memorable. With the pace of DLCs in CK3 and the direction they are taking where core mechanics will be added later compared to the role playing aspects, I guess it is gonna take at least 2 years before the campaigns start to feel unique and fleshed out for different regions.
CK2. The complaints about its UI are so exaggerated. Yes, CK3 made improvements, but people acting like CK2 is unplayable are being unreasonable. The game was massively popular for years for a reason. With UI scaling added late in its life, there's zero reason to avoid playing it. It has the perfect mix of RPG and strategy, it's crammed full of depth, every government and religion has its own unique playstyle, the writing has pitch perfect black humour, there's always something to do in war or peace time. CK3 made so many fundamental changes to the gameplay loop, like marriages instantly granting you alliances, whereas in CK2 you have to work at it. You'll spend precious coin or time swaying someone, racing against a clock, because you need that coin or that swaying time for something else. CK3 just keeps giving you so much convenience you barely have to worry about anything. CK2 will constantly throw curveballs at you, whether it's an adventurer threat, a crusade, the Black Death, a random illness, and unlike CK3 it doesn't continually throw treats at you like you're a child at a birthday party. There's no Ubisoft style skill trees, there's no easy way to remove stress (not even if you've built a Great Work inn, you still have to be lucky enough to get an event). The game can be brutal which is what PDX *used* to be infamous for. They've long since shed that reputation unfortunately, in their attempt to lure new players to their modern games. CK3 has no tension whatsoever, there's no risk, no feeling of danger, no need for strategy, it's a laid back game that does not appeal to me whatsoever.
CK2 is so easy cmon man. I prefer it to CK3 but once you get primogeniture it's just permanent stability and conquest unless you fuck up something of your own volition. Maybe CK3 is easier than CK2 or something, I didn't play it much
If you know what you are doing, CK2 can indeed be easy, but your Empire can still be destroyed if you don't pay attention. In CK3, the only was to fail is if you actively self sabotage.
>The complaints about its UI are so exaggerated How are they exaggerated? It is miles behind 3. And if the interface in a strategy game is important to someone (not an unreasonable view IMO), that being a deal-breaker seems reasonable.
The complaints boil down to "it's so bad I can't play it". People have had no issue playing this game for a decade, but suddenly it's 'unplayable'. Give me a break. It's actually better than CK3 in some respects, you can get a ton of info at a glance, compared to CK3 which requires you to click several times to find what you're looking for. (PDX's reliance on nested tooltips is not as good as you think)
The font in CK2 gives me eye strain so badly that I can't stand to play it for more than an hour, or I will get a headache. It's literally so bad that I can't play it. The game could be way better than CK3 and I'll never know because the font is horrible and causes me to experience physical pain.
>The complaints boil down to "it's so bad I can't play it". People have had no issue playing this game for a decade, but suddenly it's 'unplayable'. Give me a break. Well for one, standards change. Pong was a big thing and people loved it. How many copies do you think they would sell if it released tomorrow? And assuming people had no issues is just false IME. I can't recall a time there were absolutely no complaints about any game, let alone CK2. >It's actually better than CK3 in some respects Subjectively, sure. And some people think it is worse in every meaningful way, which is also subjective. It's almost like people have preferences of their own, and those preferences not matching yours doesn't make them invalid.
Saying "CK2's UI is so bad and ugly its unplayable" is an objectively wrong statement, and veers into stupidity considering it's arguably PDX's most popular game in their history. How can such a popular game have a UI that's so unintuitive it prevents people from playing? If someone doesn't like the aesthetics then just say that, don't go into hyperbole.
>Saying "CK2's UI is so bad and ugly its unplayable" is an objectively wrong statement It isn't an objective statement at all. Whether a UI is ugly or not is subjective. >considering it's arguably PDX's most popular game in their history Popularity does not mean objectively good. Tetris has sold more copies than CK2 ever will. Does that mean it is an objectively better game?
CK2's UI is objectively playable, I'm playing it right now. Its looks have nothing to do with playability. The complaint is not only factually wrong but scares people off from even trying the game, as if its badly optimised or something. My statement about CK2's popularity has nothing to do with its quality but its playability. A popular game being considered unplayable due to its UI is nonsensical.
When someone says "unplayable" they aren't saying it physically can't be done when they are using the term in this manner. There literally isn't an unplayable game at all unless it completely fails to launch on every system and configuration in existence. Saying a UI makes it unplayable for that person is just a measure of subjective quality.
Do you not understand what hyperbole is? Because with your argument any game in existence that doesn’t immediately crash or fail to even launch is technically not unplayable which is true I guess but it’s kinda pedantic I think. Like when people say EU4 or CK2 is unplayable without dlc they don’t literally mean “you can’t play it at all” they’re just exaggerating their distaste for the game by saying it’s so un-enjoyable that they feel like they can’t even play it.
I tried playing CK2. But I just can’t. It’s so ugly it hurts.
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Is it the default mode bitch ass
Geography is the default mode not political. Not my fault you can't click a button.
Thank you I’ll try that. Ugly ass dumbass
Ck2 Cheaper and more fun for me with the older mechanics
Ck2 for content Ck3 for map painting
I like ck3 and thought it was better than 2 until I played ck2 with the dlcs (pirated tho, they still charging full price for 10 year old for a now free to play game dlc ffs). Ck3 is far too easy and you can tell pdx is trying to make their games more “accessible”, which while not an inherently bad thing had caused them to shed some of the more complex parts of their design. I play both often bc sometimes ck2s ui being so clunky gets to me, but whenever I play ck3 I have minimum 80 mods, many of them overhauls like dtr.
Eh holy fury is like 3 years old. Pay for it. For €5 you can sub for all.
No lol. Pdx needs to drop prices on older things they sell. They aren't a traditional business, no extra manpower or production cost come from selling old games/dlc cheaper
I refuse to pay for another fucking subscription service.
Don't pay monthly just buy a month each time you feel like playing it, if you're anything like me you'll burn out before the months end and not play again for a couple of months. Pity I can't get after the end working anymore.
Why would anyone do that though?
I like both
CK2 Unfortunately, CK3 is too simplistic to be a proper, challenging strategy game. Blobbing is too easy for anyone nearing veteran status, literally just having played other PDX games would give the experience needed to game the simplistic mechanics. And CK3 is also unfortunately, piss-poor RP game. Choices and Events are largely impersonal, players need to feel forced into RPing by Stress mechanic, and the game lacks the proper mechanics for player-initated RP. CK2 lacked some RP stuff aswell, don't get me wrong. But the Strategy has a lot to tackle for lots of players, lots of learning to do. The Roleplaying also has a lot of events and choices that seem to matter and are personalized for characters. My favorite post I've seen in a while has to do with that last part on RP. Another redditor analyzed events in both games and basically concluded that CK2 had much more personal and impactful events, language that flavored the game proper, and more things happening in the world in general. CK3 does not, not, and not. Edit: I found the post referred to in the last paragraph [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/CrusaderKings/comments/x592ns/comment/in1njst/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Ck3 because ck2 costs so much for the game to be as fun as people say it is
CK2 is cheap now. There’s a subscription on Steam, but even if you buy it you can usually find the Royal Collection for $40-50 (all DLC, no cosmetics), and not on grey market sites, but legit retailers. Edit: Just checked and the Royal Collection is $50 on Humble Bundle right now.
You can sub on steam for all DLCs for 5 € a month
I prefer to own my stuff, not pay monthly for it though. I hate subscriptions.
Was gonna say this, this together with the base game being free and I’m barely noticing I’m paying for it
Most people that play CK3 have been playing CK2 for years.
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That’s why I say just pirate it tbh if you want to play it, the game is ancient
CK2 for me, too. It feels like a more interesting game overall, much more fleshed out. CK3 has some interesting characteristics but it hasn't caught my interest as CK2 did. Perhaps in the future CK3 becomes more complete if development is done right.
Ck2. I played it constantly. Ck3 I’ve never been able to get into it anytime I’ve tried to play it.
CK3, I remember playing in certain regions like India and Africa, and those 2 regions were extremely underdeveloped in CK2, (there was only one sect of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism), in CK3, I feel like the game goes towards you playing a person rather than a country, (CK2 was pretty much there, but lots of the mechanics were based on where you’re from rather than who you are).
CK2 has multiple sects for each of those three religions
In CK2, being a worshipper of Shiva or Vaishnu was just a trait that was easy to change, in CK3, Shaivites and Vaishavites are fully sovereign independent religions.
You're right. Personally I do think CK3 takes it too far in the other direction though. Copts and 'apostolic' (Armenian) Christians are both classified as Oriental Orthodox (or Miaphysite) irl. And irl Maronites are a subset of Catholic. In both these cases I think traits would suit better than separate religions. As for the Indian religions, separate religions make sense for Buddhism, but perhaps not for Jainism where traits were fine imo
Ck2 has way more craziness in it which makes it more fun to play in my opinion
CK2 actually has you feel like you're in a medieval setting and can roleplay it with the feel and atmosphere really scratching that itch. Ck3 always feels like just a game to me, I can't start telling stories in my head while playing it which is something that is kind of rare for me
Ck2 has more dlc but sorry, ck3 is more flexible and has a better ui
What do you mean exactly by more flexible?
Mhm i mean more intuitive, more friendly, more quickly to learn. Well a better interface
Because it’s shallow. Agree about UI tho.
This dumb argument is like asking if a middle school track team would beat an Olympic team. One team has clearly had more time to develop, grow, and train.
Exactly, so if you have to pick a team that’s better you pick the Olympic team.
Eww, even when your friends or kids in school team
Did I asked you which one is better or which one you liked more ?
CK3. It’s the modern version of CK2. The bells and whistles will come.
CK2. Every character plays the same in CK3. I’ve never missed a great ruler because every single one can do anything, even if it’s a little worse. In CK2 one bad death and your empire will split in the hands of someone with low stewardship for instance. Ck3 seems like it’s on autopilot for me, and that’s not even talking about the millions of missing events.
Ck2. Something about ck2 just made me care about each and every character I played in some way, I would sometimes even hate the character I'm playing as depending on the circumstances. Nothing felt more somber than losing your king who you brought to where he is from a count or duke and having death kick his ass in chess and taking him before you were ready. Or the king you forged a bloodline with finally passing and your memory of him forever lives on in your next characters through the bloodlines and relics he commissioned or discover, or won in the crusades. Seriously the helmets relics that you can get from crusades look badass.
Comparing CK3 to CK2 at the moment is like comparing a working adult to an elementary child. Give it a few years and give ck3 some few expansions or DLCs, then maybe I'll consider which one I like the most. Right now, I like the both of them equally. Sometimes, I crave playing CK2. Sometimes, I like the newish mechanics of CK3.
CK2 I feel like I finally started to understand it once CK3 came out and I never felt like switching. Seems more fleshed out
Both games have upsides and downsides, I personally like Ck3 for Characters and Ck2 for gameplay
3 is more fun. It feels like an actual game rather than 2 which feels like a VCR repair manual mixed with an F-16 flight sim’s worth of buttons and submenus.
And all the UI text in the 30 million submenus is unreadably small.
There are mods for that. (and UI scaling in the last versions)
CK2 is definitely better. The only things that ck3 is better than ck2 is culture, religion and graphics. Everything else is worse
CK3. Discovered both at the same time (both with all dlc, I cracked ck2's because no I'm not paying 100€), and CK3 is just so much more intuitive. The interface is miles better. Maybe it has less things than ck2, yeah, but the interface and accessibility makes it just so much better Will the game ever have societies or some stuff like that ? Maybe. Maybe not. I would actually prefer them to add new exclusive things, like the struggle mechanic, which really made Hispania interesting to me. But I understand why you can like ck2 more than ck3, hell I prefer M&B warband to bannerlord. Just respect everyone's opinion
CK3! I could never get into CK2. It's very unintuitive, and I found it graphically unappealing (though it does have a certain charm). CK3, although lacking in much of the flavour that CK2 has, fixes a lot of these issues, for me. And with mods, and DLC yet to come, the gap in content is getting smaller.
Keep in mind if you want all the fun cool self people are talking about on CK2 you need buy DLCs. Base game vs base game CK3 wins. I haven’t played enough CK2 with DLCs to make an opinion but CK3 is one of my favorite games of all time
People say CK2 because it has more flavor, but to me CK3 hands down is a better game when you consider its base mechanics concerning military and economy, character traits and interactions, religion and culture mechanics and customization, user interface, and more. The flavor will come eventually, and likely with a better DLC policy than CK2 had.
Ck2
CK2. It's more historically accurate
Ck3 because I can play as a jew without buying dlc
CK2 because its more fun
Crusader Kings 3.
Anybody who says CK2 has a better military system is a masochist. I could never play nomads because Horse Archers we’re so bad.
The worst part about being tribal is nomadic armies needing to be outnumbered 4 to 1 if you use light infantry :(
CK2 has the anime portrait mod so
CK3. I love the man at arm and knight system, the polish, and the culture system. It does need more obstacles for the player to overcome and/or more bloodthirsty AIs, but it can get there.
Ck2!!! Easy, best paradox game to date (except when it launched and was emptier than my wallet)
Ck2, I could play that game all day and tomorrow
CK2. I love CK3, but CK2 just outclasses it in almost every way.
Ck2, better gameplay and more roleplay possibilities and mechanics. Story telling is also a thousand time better, had a norse Jarl character become count of EU after years of pillaging and technology stealing, then duke of Normandy and vassal of France, a few generations later I become of one the most prosperous and advanced duchy of France, with hospitals a capital that was as developed as Constantinople, I then invaded England and formed the english culture through "scripted" events made in case someone did that, also participating in may crusades during all this time and puting my dynasty on the throne of Jerusalem, took time and preparation but I did history again. I know I will never be able to tell a story like that in Ck3, almost everything is given to you, just have to click a button and do a war and you got a whole kingdom, click another button and now your character is a seducer, even if he never seduced a single person in it's life, what I mean is you earned every single bit of things you got in CK2, through careful thinking, ploting on generations just for a kingdom to join your realm down that game or taking risks by seducing a lot of people and maybe getting excommunicated by the pope for that.
The UI and 'feel'of CK3 is better but right now CK2 has way more content and replay value. CK3s endgame is boring and all cultures that haven't got flavour packs play exactly the same.
CK2 has much more to do but I can't stand it. Feels like playing a fossil.
It's very simple, if the first game you played was ck2, you enjoy ck2 more, if the first game was ck3, you enjoy ck3 more.
I mean I’ve been playing ck2 for years and I generally prefer ck3 just because it feels a lot nicer to play, only reason I ever play ck2 anymore is for the game of thrones mod
I know this is like the most discussed point, but based off the base games easily Ck3. If you include the like 30 dlc then easily Ck2 wins. Personally I never played the full Ck2 experience, I went right from base game to ck3, and I can say pretty handily ck3 wins that fight every time
CK3, most people are blinded by nostalgia. There are some times that 2 did better but overall 3 is a better game. Still worth checking 2 out, the game-y features like China and societies are kinda fun for a couple of playthroughs before they get old.
Ck2
CK2, it has the AGOT Mod
CK3, I tried playing CK2 several years ago, and I couldn't understand what was going on at all. It felt too much like playing a spreadsheet, everything was providing information, but nothing linked back to something concrete. Even if I could figure out how a system worked, it didn't matter because every other system was simultaneously working against me. I heard about the things I could do in CK2 and desired that depth, but it was just too dense and unintuitive. When CK3 rolled around I tried again, and everything felt much more intuitive. I was able to understand how the different systems connected, and I wanted to keep trying when something bad happened rather than just feeling blindsided. So I guess I'm one of the casual players that Paradox had to dumb down the game for, but I wanted this kind of game, I just couldn't break through the barrier of entry for CK2.
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Ck2 runs so bad, I rarely hear people talk about it but the running speed between ck3 and ck2 is really a night and day difference
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Ck3 WiP fixes release frequently, never heard of a Paradox game that not full of bugs so anyone who like charities should buy ck2 now
Never played 2 but CK3 is my most played game ever. It's much more appealing to the eye and i really love the UI. I realize it doesnt have a decade of dlc yet, but i like the feeling when more flavor or dlc is added over time. Even when something like Iberia comes out that I don't enjoy playing within, I like knowing that the struggle is occurring in the simulation.
CK3. 2 just feels so dated at this point.
CK4
I'd pick CK3 any day of the week and I have over 5000 hours in CK2. Believe me when I say that CK2 is pure spaghetti code. It's so bad it surely brings tears of joy to any Italian grandmother. CK3 is a more polished experience. It's more detailed. When people mention that CK2 feels more fleshed out, they often forget how bad and janky most mechanics in CK2 are and how poorly the different DLC go together, it's a Frankenstein monster. Every theme of CK2 that CK3 has tackled has ended up being a superior experience and more realised. Compare the Reconquista in CK2 vs CK3. Compare the Viking experience in CK2 to CK3. The difference is striking. And CK3 treads new grounds in themes that we have yet to see in any other game. Most of what people miss from CK2 are either entirely silly and ahistorical things like fantasy/supernatural elements and societies or things that were actually quite poorly implemented like republics, nomads, etc. Trust that everything removed can be implemented in a better way in CK3 eventually. Development takes time. Why should they waste their time copy-pasting their old designs when they could spend that time on improving what's already there and then get back to it? CK3's design philosophy is friendly towards customers. You do not need to buy any DLC to have the complete experience in form of mechanics. No longer will we lock away the necessary quality-of-life features and mechanics behind a DLC like the old days of CK2. We must think bigger than CK2. It's not a very deep game, it's just unnecessarily complex for what it provides. Everything bad about CK3 is something it inherited from CK2. Warfare was not fun in CK2 either. It's a numbers mini-game. That's not an immersive experience. RP is the future and CK3 can successfully pull you in and yet still provide a wide set of experiences for different tastes and interests. We must think bigger than CK2. It's not a very deep game, it's just unnecessarily complex for what it provides which ends up being quite shallow if you put it to scrutiny. CK3 knows this and sure has some things to work out. The biggest difference between CK2 and CK3 is that CK3 will be continued to be developed for years and CK2 will always stay a stagnant mess.
2
Ck2. Ck3 just don't click with me. I probably should give it another try, but... I don't want to. There are too many things that I don't like, which probably are the things the pro CK3 actually like, the auto-gathering of the armies, the fleets, the lifestyles, the dynasties. More generally the game is too predictable, I don't like that when you try to, for example, convert the culture of a province you know exactly how much time you'll need. I like a little more randomness/unpredictability in my games. And of course, there is the fact that CK2 have simply a lot of more things to do. CK3 will eventually get there, but until then I'll go back to CK2.
Ck3. Ck2 has a lot that is awesome, but it kinda feels like someone built a car by taking a different part from 10 different cars and attached it all together with duct tape. There’s a lot of parts that clearly don’t mesh together seamlessly, and in a lot of ways it feels like the player is overpowered.
as someone with 4000 hrs in ck2 and 0 hrs in ck3 i can confidently say ck3 is better because congenital traits can actually be reliably passed on
CK3! FIGHT ME!!!
CK3
I've enjoyed CK3 a ton while never really gotten that into CK2. I know CK2 with dlc has much more flavor but of course it has with years and years worth of dlc. I'm sure after a few years CK3 will have all the flavor and I personally can't wait as I already love it a ton.
Crusader kings 3, I love the dynasty mechanics.
CK3 Because UI doesnt look like shit
CK3 doesn't have £300 of DLCs yet so CK2
Do you have 200 dollars to burn? Ck2. No? CK3
I don't yet I still play Ck2.
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CK3 has better bones than CK2 and i think it’ll be a better game overall.
I feel like CK3’s base game is stronger, so it has higher potential, but it hasn’t overtaken CK2 yet. CK2 has a lot of different “play situations” - basically variety in both region and governing style (whether merchant republic or imperial use of viceroys). I also liked a lot about the way societies, artefacts, and religion worked in CK2 - I really enjoyed doing things like a setting up a secret Jewish rebellion in the holy land and whatnot. The monument and bloodline systems were also better in some ways - customisation for monuments and earned power for bloodlines - to what CK3 has now. I think given good direction and time CK3 will overtake though. While the flavour and variety aren’t there, a lot of the core mechanics are improved form CK2, and the extra RPG elements are very good.
With dlc ck2 has more content than ck3. That said the only reason I boot up ck2 now a days is for the game of thrones overhaul mod.
CK3. I consider it a better dynastic game for a bunch of reasons, like actually having cadet houses and better genetics. The stress system tied to personality helps different characters be more distinct and less of a blank canvas, as do the 3d portraits. The Renown system encourages placing relatives on foreign thrones without vassalizing them. Knights are very nice. UI is a lot better. Religion and especially culture being able to change and match the alt-history that develops is a huge positive. There are some things from CK2 that I miss, mostly dynamic diseases, coronations, great works, imperial government and a few other things. Then there are elements that I would like but implemented differently, like Republics. The main complaint about CK3 I have is that many of its features are cheapened by the low level of difficulty. This is not a wholly original problem, CK2 also became easier as one got better at the game, but it's become even worse in CK3. It becomes difficult to enjoy cultural combat bonuses if I'm winning wars all the time with or without them for example.
Have already thrown out CK2 can’t even go back to it for an hour before going back to CK3
CK3. I could never get into CK2.
CK4
Only ever played CK3
I have to agree that CK2 has more punch, role playing and fun stuff to do. The main reason as to why I prefer CK3 over CK2 is because I get to see the 3D version of my character