Crusader Kings 3 Royal

[Tempeste Villada]

Kingswere deeply involved in these sorts of legal matters because as kings they both set the law and were expected to at least oversee its enforcement. For common crimes, that might mean the king acting as the head of a larger legal system but of course for disputes (and vassals) that occurred above the purview of those judges, the king would have to involve themselves personally. Moreover, of course, for the king to get personally involved and to hear the cases and disputes himself, provided an opportunity for the king to be seen doing so, which was important to establishing legitimacy, to look kingly.

The way the new grandeur statistic works in the expansion also goes towards working forms of legitimacy into the game. The cultural expectation the societies the game focuses on was that kings were supposed to be lavish and generous, forever giving out gifts to their supporters and spending in conspicuous and grand ways.

But overall, this addition, pushing players at the upper-reaches of the nobility to effectively spend money and time building legitimacy through performing royal judgement and spending extravagantly on their elite subjects is a fairly good expression of how one part of monarchy works, albeit in a fairly gamified form.

I still remember from almost 20 years ago getting into some political trouble with an event that an eligible noblewoman from the clan had multiple suitors, and we were supposed to pick one for her to marry. I asked the girl in question which of the three guys she preferred, and it was scandalous, instant mood loss.

> I am also reminded of the Roman emperors Tiberius and Vespasian, both of whom for solid financial reasons could be as profligate as their predecessors, but are treated as misers in the sources for it (Vespasian gets away with it because unlike Tiberius, he had a sense of humor).

This DLC certainly presents a more accurate model of kingship than the earlier version of the game, where power was maintained by regular executions of peasants and foreigners to keep your Dread stat high.

Augustus absolutely fills all three roles. He waits for Lepidus to die because the position of Pontifex Maximus was for life and the optics of killing the incumbent were terrible. It was clearly always his intent to take the position though.

The Alexiad has something similar. Anna describes how her father heroically rescues many men while on the retreat. When in reality the battle went poorly and he had to retreat, but she still tried to sell it that even though they retreated he was still doing great.

Depending on how magic works in this setting. The more random magical abilities are, the truer your statement is, but if magic can be taught like a mundane skill or inherited like eye color, then it could easily be controlled by the ruling class through a magic academy/apprenticeship system for noble children and/or light eugenics.

In a ruling class, only some people are rulers. The king can throw the crown prince in a dungeon and disinherit him. No amount of eugenics or instruction will prevent that the younger generation will have a lot more clout than the older might like.

People build dams for reasons! Those reasons might be bad, or might have become bad since it was built, but there was always a purpose for them! But they never even hint at what that purpose was, and a more compelling story exists if you do that, even without changing the villainy.

So losing the dam would mean losing these benefits to Arendelle, and, as I said, they paid a lot of money to get them. Plus, you get path-dependence. If they started cultivating additional land because it was now not flooding or had more irrigation, the people on that land will be very, very angry with the king if he tries to take it back. Or if the capital is relying on the water provided by an aqueduct from the dam, it may have enabled it to grow to a point where it *needs* the water to stay viable as a city.

But the villainy would at least make sense if he was in a bind where he would either torque off both his nobles and his peasants by not keeping the benefits of the dam after spending all that money he extracted to build it!)

A dragon-king could get away with more than a mortal king could, just as the king of a centralized monarchical state could get away with more than the leader of a decentralized federation of nobles. But if King Smoog wants to get anything useful out of his kingdom, he still needs enough legitimacy (in whatever form is relevant to his subjects) to convince them to go along with his rule.

Girl Genius has one version. Traditional nobility (based on their ancestors chopping off heads but also some sort of legitimacy) getting bumped by Sparks, Mad Scientists, usually far better at superweapons and creating people-substitutes then at people skills. Since they *are* good at such things, the world (or Europe, anyway) descends into chaos and terror as they squabble with weapons, minions, monsters, and plagues.

The worlds of _The Black Company_ and _The March North_ are similar, except with more actual overpowered wizards. (And in the latter case, one egalitarian counter to them.) (And in the former case, the Lady seems to have built up some legitimacy via good governance, though personal magic power of herself and the Taken is also important.)

Right! And a recent Christmas side story hinted at another legitimacy-building custom of the Heterodynes. OTOH, being accepted by the Castle comes with a terrifying amount of violent power at your command, too.

On the flip side, Klaus had a partial legitimacy in the eyes of common people like Master Payne, for not being an asshole, making peace, and getting essential shit done. But he was illegitimate in the eyes of royals like Tarvek and Martellus, and whatever long game he might have been playing cost his son dearly in the short term after things went chaotic.

The ruler would still need the apparatus of the state (or the assistance of nobles) to get a lot of things done. Magic might make you a one-man army, but are you also a one-man tax collector, road builder, judge, police officer, etc?

Magic can do anything the author says it can, so of course throwing more magic at the problem is always a solution. But outside of some very high-powered settings like Exalted (where the god-king can be a one-man army, bureaucracy, diplomatic corps, construction company, and then celebrate their accomplishments by singlehandedly catering the best royal banquet ever), you probably have some use for subordinates, if only to limit the number of things you have to pay attention to at once.

For example, I once read a portal fantasy (whose name and author I can infuriatingly no longer remember) in which the rightful King (or ruling Queen) was by grace of God always right about any matter of politics or war. It would be fun arguing for democracy in that society.

At a very basic level, the former might give the player the option each time court is held to pick the vassal who plays host (for a big opinion bonus with them, but perhaps also enhancing their ability to scheme against you)

Alexander famously sent an elephant to Aristotle, and the sum of money needed to keep it to his academic rival (so forcing them to make up). Lionel Sprague de Camp turned it into a historical fiction (An Elephant for Aristotle).

My first thought, though, was that the role of judge is probably the most primary role of government, from a tribal level to modern states. I remember reading articles on the Taliban and ISIS, and without fail they set up courts. Often quite brutal courts, but in Afghanistan in particular where having efficient and even slightly fair local courts was not a given, the Taliban were often praised by locals quoted in these sort of articles for having set up courts in villages and settling disputes. Closer to home, what is the BLM movement if not a critical movement of the justice system (in more ways than one).

This is a man who knows how to manage his appearance and actions to cultivate legitimacy and support from the people of his nation. And for whom the path from playing the role of authority, to actually exercising authority, is not even slightly a metaphor.

I suspect that the audience for a simulation with more verisimilitude is also relatively small. Most influences/content creators as they like to call themselves are just memers and the audiences they bring are similar. Putting a pretty facade over a crumbling edifice and and calling in the clowns could probably keep Paradox from falling apart financially for another decade or so.

Hadrian is said to have told and importunate old woman that he had no time to hear her. Then stop being emperor! She replied. Hadrian took her point and heard her out. Alfred the Great was pursued into his private chamber by petitioners. He heard them out patiently and gave a fair verdict.

Another popular trope was queens or consorts interceding with their husbands, tempering his sterness with her compassion. Male rulers were supposed to be strict but there was nothing unmanly about allowing the pleas of their beloved wife to temper cold justice.

The other archetypical story is the ruler walking around incognito and delivering snap judgements to those secretly corrupt. Harun al-Rashid and Charles XI both have legends to that effect. (and in the latter case, at least slightly based in reality: He did have a habit of showing up on surprise inspections)

> The situation for monarchs is actually more acute than for other forms of government. Democracies and tribal councils and other forms of consensual governments have vast pools of inherent legitimacy that derives from their government form

Which is why our President is about to call together the legislature, all but one of his line of succession, and selected citizens and give a speech in which he will describe his plans and talk about his successes, which will be broadcast to the nation. It also satisfies a constitutional requirement, but a letter would cover that too.

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