Crusader Kings III Engineering a Dynastic Master Race Strategies

First, create one genetically outstanding superhero qualified to unlock the ‘Strengthen Bloodline’ decision. This guide compares some of the strategies available to get you there. In my examples, I’m using a male-inheritance polygamous dynasty.

This Guide’s Focus

This is a strategy guide, not a basic guide. So I’ve assumed you already know how to reinforce congenital traits, how they can be made to appear in offspring reliably, and the risks of in-breeding etc.

But if f you need a refresher on all that check out this wiki page.

The Strengthen Bloodline decision

This gives your entire Dynasty these permanent:bonuses:

• +0.25 Health
• +40% chance of inheriting good congenital traits
• +400% chance of new good congenital traits

But first you need to breed a ruler qualified to unlock this decision:

• He must be the Dynasty Head
• Have no negative congenital traits
• Have one of the 3rd tier positive congenital traits (Genius, Beautiful or Herculean/Amazonian)
• Have one positive manifestation of “each” of the congenital traits above

Tricky to pull together but worth it. Combining it with 3rd level Dynasty Legacy perk in ‘Blood’ gives you another -30% Chance to inherit negative traits -30% Chance of new bad congenital traits. From then on you’re heading up a dynasty of megastars set to rival even Dame Edna’s.

Strategy 1: Marry well and let Nature take it’s course

I think you’ll need to be more pro-active than that breed your superhero with in a reasonable time frame

Shortcomings:

• It assumes there’s often suitable genius/beautiful/amazonian wives to be found.
• Doesn’t bring into the your Court any bonus available genetic talent – especially any males with this these qualities.

Strategy 2: Hoovering up all the world’s best Dynastic blood

By this I mean frequently scouring the marriage lists for the best mates to pair with genetically matching dynasty members. Seems obvious – you don’t want all that good sauce wasted in the other courts right?

It’s problematic:

• This will eventually make it hard to find many good unrelated breeding wives for your King – posing the risk of inbreeding.
• Hold off on this strategy until after unlocking The Strengthen Bloodline decision

Strategy 3: Inbreed and Damn the Consequences

Once finding yourself stuck in the above situation, it’s tempting to risk kings marrying with close relations anyway, just to keep the project going. And if any of your princes are born with handicaps then just callously eject them from the Court right?

Two faults with this strategy:

• Recessive genetic traits can still form, yet remain unexpressed for a generation or two. So while you may think you’re purging court of all the bad blood, this may well be an illusion.
• Your kings will likely be your dynasty’s biggest breeders, so habitual close-relation marriages will eventually narrow the dynastic gene pool substantially . After several generations this will likely cause negative traits to popping up elsewhere within your Dynasty.

Strategy 4: Breeder Families

This one’s still a work in-progress. It aims to let you hoard genetic talent within your Court, but in a form still largely usable to your Ruler.

Method:

• Create at least 3 non-dynastic ‘Breeder Families’ to provide a reserve source of unrelated breeder wives for your Kings to marry. (Three main Breeder Family types: Intelligence, Beauty and Strength)
• Any genetic hoovering is now directed at strengthening the bloodline of these Breeder Families
• Your polygamous King reserves one secondary wife slot for each trait line
• Princes with the highest intelligence-line traits are given preference to succeed the throne (use ‘disinherit’ or ‘take vows’ orders to displace any unsuitable Primary Heirs)
• The Primary Heir is, ideally, betrothed only to a Genius wife (due to this trait’s best all-round benefits). His other wives are taken after he succeeds to the throne.

One Problem:

• Since inbreeding is still possible, secondary wives are still preferentially sought from outside the court. The creation of additional breeder families should also help matters.