CK3 Inheritance Guide: Overview & How to Pass Everything to One Heir

Inheritance & Succession Guide in CK3 by BreadGod. Learn the basics of succession and multiple methods to funnel your lands into one heir. In CK3 land = power, so we want one heir to inherit everything possible.
0:00 Intro
0:42 Confederate Partition - First & Worst Law
3:37 What is De Jure
5:23 Tip: Change primary title
6:02 Bonus tip: Move realm capital
Succesion Methods: General
7:20 Elective Succesion
14:02 Selective Conquest
15:42 Strongest Sibling Wins
Succession Methods: Child management
16:07 Disinherit
16:33 Make a Monk
17:31 Make a Holy Knight
17:47 Faramir Technique
Succession Methods: Marriage Management
20:00 Murder Spouse
20:39 Imprison Spouse & Dungeon
20:44 Divorce Spouse
22:42 Do not Marry Matrilinealy (as male)
23:45 Bastard Family
Other Multi-Heir Succession Laws
28:49 Partition
30:10 High Partition
Single-Heir Succession Laws
31:23 House Seniority
32:34 Primogeniture & Ultimogeniture
34:18 Clan Succession
35:59 Impassive Succession
36:39 Antagonistic & Competitive Succession
37:18 Friendly Succession
37:29 Harmonious Succession
Bonus Succession Methods
39:29 Bound By Faith
41:26 Finding 'Atlantis'
Game ver 1.11.3 DLC's: Royal Court, Tours & Tournaments, Northern Lords, Fate of Iberia, Legacy of Persia
Illustrations and Information credit to paradox's official ck3 wiki: ck3.paradoxwikis.com/ unless otherwise listed

[@breadgodgaming]

Updates & Suggestions 1) Learning tree 'Embrace Celibacy' perk enables decision to stop having kids. Use after you've secured an heir 2) Sadistic personality trait enables murder own kids. (Thanks crocworks). Sadistic is a sin for catholicism so it may not be ideal and it is not inherited. If you have the Wards & Wardens DLC you can almost permanently transfer the sadistic trait to your heir. Not as ideal with new legitimacy mechanic as sins reduce initial legitimacy. 3) Absolute crown authority's "Designate Heir" with House Seniority Law allows for pseudo primogeniture. (Thanks Thommy_) 4) Roman Culture has 'Noble Adoption" tradition allowing you to adopt children. You can avoid marrying for children and instead only adopt one valid heir (like a single son). You can even adopt as many daughters as you like for alliances etc. 5) If your faith lets you choose your court chaplain, you can set one of your heirs as the chaplain and this will remove them from succession as long as they are the chaplain, including your primary heir. 6) Due to legitimacy update in 3/2024, disinheriting, asking to take vows, and asking to join holy order give big legitimacy loss. However, they normally give tyranny anyways so it didn't change my gameplay but reinforced the idea if I want to be tyrannical I need the power to back it up.

[@uchi5171]

house seniority + absolute crown authority is the best measure, house seniority doesn't split titles and abs authority will make you designate whoever you want as heir

[@breadgodgaming]

It's definitely an amazing combo. Your method will all depend on where you start / what's available to you at the time :)

[@brawlfan9999]

Let me do you one better. If your primary title is small enough you can always win the vote for it, making it elective will make whoever is winning the election your heir. If you then have House Seniority, that lets you pick basically any member of your dynasty to inherit all your titles. Your Niece was married matrilineally to a second son of a kingdom you want and gave birth to a perfect child who inherited all those juicy, juicy claims? You absolutely can pick that child. Your character just noticed he'll be dead within the year and there's no way you'll get to absolute crown authority on time? Just elect that genius of a 7th son you wanted. You just got Table of Princes and are still 50 years away from even getting to early medieval? Don't you worry fam, you can still Frankenstein that primogeniture Best done in conjunction with a very small kingdom, like, Bohemia, Mann and the Isles, or better yet, an empty kingdom like Sardinia or Trinacria after you Secure the Mediterranean

[@nonconformist9930]

lol, that might be a decent suggestion but none of that is available in 867 even if youre feudal

[@brawlfan9999]

@@nonconformist9930 If you start as Czech, you can immediately start researching Table of Princes which gives you House Seniority early, and can get it done before Early Medieval. And Feudal Elective is always available if you're feudal, so you can, in fact, get a version of the combo going at 867 pretty early on, just make sure you win the election

[@TrippyTheShroom]

Oh my god this video is such a lifesaver lol. I have over 200 hours into CK3 and still get confused on how titles are passed down, differences in government types, etc.

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind words!

[@kianvandenberg6364]

Your CK3 guides are awesome, if you keep making these great guides you will no doubt grow a lot

[@breadgodgaming]

Thanks for your kind words!

[@asszudemi3650]

Great Guides. You deserve way more subscribers than you currently have

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind comment and support :)

[@yairo01]

Another method is to imprison your unliked son and negotiate release whit the condition of him becoming monk, this will work only if the faith let you and also if he is not married also if he was married and he have childrens and you do that the kids that he had they will not inherit.

[@GamingWO-]

Gives you tyrant, no? I think there’s some gained tech that removes that, but I mean in general.

[@DLLW93]

"Try to find Atlantis" LOL That caught me off guard... thanks for the tips

[@breadgodgaming]

I'm glad you enjoyed my sense of humor :) Thank you for the kind words

[@hughy897]

19:40 "Famrimir style" but he's a giant 20 prowes and he kills the 200 stack and becomes a legend

[@-mokerly-5984]

I always force my spares into holy orders. I may not get all of them, but one or two is manageable for post-succession wars and boating accidents.

[@breadgodgaming]

I love the boating accidents haha.

[@timuravar8229]

Watched your genetics video before, your channel is insane man Ill leave a like and sub for sure!

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind words!

[@otaconzz]

Good stuff man. The seduce / bastard aspect for Confederate partition is like a mini game all in its own Very informative videos, keep up the good work! Hopefully you get a viewership bump with the player count increasing with new DLC coming down the pipe!

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind comment! It's exactly as you say, it becomes a fun mini-game and definitely makes playing female rulers more unique than males in terms of bastards. You can seduce nearby kings and bear children that will have claims on those titles so you can, as an Empress, use your children to expand your realm very quickly and in an interesting way

[@paulschumacher4308]

OMG, I needed this video!

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind feedback!

[@jmedlin81]

25:46 always good advice!

[@Thommy_]

You can also get quasi primogeniture by combining house seniority + designate heir

[@breadgodgaming]

Thanks for the info! I haven't played with house seniority much so it's useful to know. I've added your advice to my pinned comment :)

[@HopefulHarrier14]

You deserve way more subscribers dude

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind words and support :)

[@donnel5516]

Definitely trying to find Atlantis my next game.

[@Lutasiren]

as a vet player always playing in -3 domain rule(to nerf me and the stewardship) it's freshing to see what new players are worrying about. still, i shall point out many suggestions in the vid are suggestions that actively hurts your dynasty, which is somewhat important in the mid-late game. i'd rather have hundreds of dynasty members with 15-20 in all of their stats wondering in my empire in the mid game than getting one or two more duchies in the early game.

[@nonconformist9930]

i wish i had seen this video a few weeks ago before i almost rage quit and broke my laptop. i havent yet played past the 3rd generation because i get exasperated dealing with sucession. i can see how im kinda screwing myself too by creating a bunch of kingdom and dutchy titles. ill be smarter next time

[@breadgodgaming]

Don't be too hard on yourself, everyone has been there! All it takes is some knowledge and it changes your game completely :) I actually played a bit when CK3 first came out but put it down for over a year since my friend and I couldn't understand it.

[@AlanJ88]

Thank you for all your videos about Ck3! So great!! Can I ask you an advice about it? Thanks again

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for the kind words. Of course anything!

[@AlanJ88]

@@breadgodgamingIn your opinion I will be able to play Ck3 with an i7-6700, a Gtx 970, and 16 gb of ram? If so, you advice me to play it with "base" game or with some (or all) of its DLC. Thank you again

[@breadgodgaming]

@@AlanJ88 I sometimes play it on my old laptop which has 6700HQ and 950M. I think you’re on a desktop so you should be fine there. It can get laggy when you get really late game but that’s like after 10-20 hours into a run and a lot of people don’t play to the end date (1453). With more DLCs it can get laggier faster. I would start with vanilla ck3 since there is already a lot to learn about. DLCs have mixed reviews because a lot are based on price for amount of content and seem to trend better when price is discounted. Once you learn the game, you can better judge how appealing each one is for yourself. I personally enjoy northern lords a lot, tours and tournaments was well received and I also like. Iberia and legacy of Persia both added struggles which is fun imo. I think Iberia is more polished.

[@AlanJ88]

@@breadgodgaming Thank you a lot for all your advices! You're very kind

[@JMW10o0o]

Ive been playing for about two years now. My first playthrough was the Irish tutorial. Going to play Irish again after all this time to see how i improved:) Definitely remember the succesion kicking my ass on my first playthrough.

[@breadgodgaming]

Awesome :) succession is always a big surprise as a new player.

[@AntoniThePiano]

9:39 I like the new term for absolutist authoritatianism: _~Managed democracy_

[@bombidil3]

Ah yes! The Biblical King David method: Send'em to the frontline with Uriah.

[@breadgodgaming]

My first time learning about Uriah, interesting character thanks for sharing!

[@anassbouzit9357]

could you consider doing a full playthrou of one of your most interesting starts you are the best player that i saw on youtube so im curius what it would look like love the vids keep up the great work

[@breadgodgaming]

What kind of start did you have in mind? I'm working on a custom character guide and in it I put a few recent build ideas and I'll also have videos on playing through the builds :) Thanks for your kind words!

[@anassbouzit9357]

@@breadgodgaming im intrested to see a playthrough of either one of the two norse guys in russia in 867 novgrad or kiev i saw many people try them by i still yet to see someone take full advantage of how good they are

[@bonog7763]

Very nice video, can you do some best starts custom characters ? For best genetics,treats …et

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you! I'll make a little list and see what I can do :)

[@bonog7763]

@@breadgodgaming I would love to see your favorite custom characters build, in different situations, you already showed for a genetic run, how about a Roman start? Viking?

[@afrovarangian]

15:30 This only applies to your primary heir. If you switch your primary heir, by for example voting for someone else, you will be able to grant titles to your preferred heir. Afterwards you can simply vote for your preferred heir again and he will inherit your primary title while retaining his counties. Obvious downside though is that you kinda need to know when you die but oh look a bird, damn my game crashed.

[@breadgodgaming]

You are 100% correct, and yea timing the passing of crown lands down to your primary can be tough. I totally forgot to put a transition for "election" to "selective conquering". The advice was meant as the start of 'here are other methods not based on election'. I wish I could edit stuff in. Ty for the feedback

[@bohfadeeze5329]

ive used the scandinavian elective strat with great success in the past. i started a new playthrough and only the children of my player character are showing up. in the past i was able to choose my best heir from grand kids, nephews etc. the only thing i can figure, this time i did an anglo-nordic hybrid culture and even though i kept the ting-meet tradition, i chose the west germanic heritage pillar... or maybe its a bug. have you ever experienced anything like this? i am not able to choose saxon elective which limits the choices in my dynasty to rulers legitimate children, and scandivian elective still describes "an heir amongst the ruler's extend family.."

[@breadgodgaming]

It doesn't state this in-game, but on the wiki it says that children of candidates cannot be nominated. So if your son/daughter is still alive, then the grandchild is not eligible to be nominated. But once the son/daughter in between you and your preferred grandkid, then they will become eligible. I'm not sure if this was since the beginning, since I only really started playing CK3 in 2021. I will admit at times the candidates feels off since sometimes I couldn't nominate some of my direct children, probably because they were due to inherit a barony (which also makes them ineligible), which I mostly experience in Lay Clergy faiths

[@molybdaen11]

If you flay with female rulers and accidentally your heirs has kids with another dynasty, you can still save the game. Either get adoption as culture or if there is not enough time, try house seniority. Also try to make all your primary and secondary heirs sadistic. This gives you more... options... to select who will Inherit your stuff.

[@breadgodgaming]

I really enjoy the noble adoption tradition, you can get a bunch of kids and get a ton of alliances suddenly! Although you'd also have a lot of obligatory wars

[@MightyMikeincgallant]

“So an accident happened to our son” *was executed in your orders* 😂

[@breadgodgaming]

"Dear wife it was an act of God when he happened to crawl into the guillotine" 😂

[@crocworks]

Also, sadistic characters can plot to murder their own kids.

[@breadgodgaming]

I totally forgot about this. Thank you for reminding me! Probably because I never use it / other methods imo are more consistent. I've put it into my pinned comment :)

[@elsulini3551]

There is always the same problem for me: I have an old ruler with 80+ years and have a 16 years old great-grand-child which i want to play asap. How to i get there? I have to consolidate my realm every time with a new ruler until i get there and losing so many years with my perfekt candidate.. Maybe youncan Help with this conundrum?!

[@elsulini3551]

Found it here in the comments. House sen. With high crown and designate heir. In short czech culture. ☺️

[@breadgodgaming]

That is probably the easiest way. If you can’t get to house seniority and absolute crown authority quickly then another way is using election. If feudal/Scandinavian etc. Depends on your realm size / how well people like you, and if you have 2+ duchies. You can put election on the top title and 2 duchies and vote for the child / grandchild that would get that great grandchild in line. Depending on the number of siblings you can help skip the line by imprison and executing the ones in the way. A grandchild will be eligible once their parent (your child) dies and so on.

[@molybdaen11]

You could increase your stress level to the Max. This either kills your current ruler or force him into retirement. Another way would be to make him have a accident. But unfortunately it's often interrupted unless your religion allows it. 😅

[@amaratc]

Any idea how electors are chosen?

[@breadgodgaming]

You can see the rules for electors in these sections: 1) when adding a new succession law the box at the right will have elector details 2) once the law is added / is there already, you can click on the title and hover over the "Feudal Elective" text for the same info. imgur.com/a/p4j10EV CK3 wiki has a breakdown of the types if you wanted to see all of them as well: ck3.paradoxwikis.com/Laws#Title_succession Most elections will be similar: the direct or de jure vassals of the title, and one or two ranks below the title. Meaning for duchies as long as you hold all the counties you are the only elector. For a kingdom, direct or de jure dukes and sometimes counts can be electors as well. So kingdom and empire titles have a harder time controlling election because so many people are eligible to vote. The only election that is different is princely elective, but that type is only available on the Holy Roman Empire title. Those electors are always: Duke of Angria, Duke of Bohemia, Duke of East Franconia, Duke of Luticia, Count of Cologne, Count of Mainz, Count of Trier Let me know if you need any more clarification!

[@amaratc]

@@breadgodgaming so I posted one more comment with situation I had, but I have no idea what happened there, maybe I didn't clicked on the button to reply it or whatever. 😁 But I had issue while trying to figure out what happened in my game, as electors for duchy in England were dukes from Sweden (I had land there as well). Turns out it was some mod that made the mess. But thanks for the info in any case and keep up the good work!

[@breadgodgaming]

@@amaratcsometimes the app is glitchy for sure no worries. Ah it's always the mods making the game messy! Thanks for letting me learn and for your support :)

[@ProperSavagee]

Leinster is pronounced like Lenster :)

[@breadgodgaming]

Thank you for pointing it out! I enjoy learning the correct pronunciation and I am slowly learning how to pronounce all the names from viewers like you :)

[@kianvandenberg6364]

23:37 “an accident”

[@breadgodgaming]

It was my regent, I swear :D

[@D0zyfox]

9:38 I see what you did there lul

[@gabrielh3900]

Faramir technique 😂😭😭

[@LordAryu]

Seems like the new legitimacy mechanic punishes you for most of these

[@breadgodgaming]

Legitimacy does decrease for a lot of these options, but in the end power is more important than legitimacy so I think it is usually still worth it

[@niki8280]

This probably would have been a very good informative video if it ran 10-15 minutes.

[@breadgodgaming]

Thanks for the feedback! Do you think it would've been more appropriate to have like 3 separate videos? Since this video is basically all 3 of these: 1. Inheritance tricks 2. Succession laws (feudal and tribal) 3. Clan succession

[@niki8280]

@@breadgodgaming I guess you coul either 1. Break down into separate videos. 2. Read your script and trim it down. Then repeat and keep repeating as needed. Trim the fat as they say. Only a few gamers will dedicate more than 15 minutes of one's time to a tutorial video. Marketing studies and speech lessons say 5mins is when attention span of most of the audience wavers so maybe 5 minutes per topic. Stick to short sentences direct t the point while maybe (if possible) simultaneously giving the example in the background with short descriptions (e.g. as seen here with Count Dooku of the Dune County). I cannot say. You're the one making the video so you know your experience better than we do.

[@breadgodgaming]

@@niki8280 Thanks for the continued feedback! It was nice just to talk to you about 'video making' since I have no one to talk to, so thank you very much; I appreciate any and all perspectives! I will definitely think about content organization better and try to trim my drafts more. Believe it or not this video was 6200 words and this final product is about 5500 xD

[@gazjaz2010]

@niki8280 do you have any examples of your own 10-15 minute informative videos, on any subject? please share some links, am curious to see what you've produced (if anything, ever) after your comments

[@niki8280]

@@gazjaz2010 me? I am not a content creator. I am talking as a video consumer. A lot of casuals looking for guide videos would not stay too long. Don't be too salty. I chimed in with my two cents to help out. No need to be salty if you cannot take it as something constructive, well, I don't really care so whatever.