Crusader Kings 2 Duchies
Many of the major cities of Eastern Europe/Western Asia are pretty badass. Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, is probably the best starting city in the whole game that I've seen. Baghdad, Damascus, and Cairo are also awesome, but you do have to do some major crusading in order to claim them. Or have the DLC that allows you to play Muslims, which I highly recommend to anyone who is invested in this game.Poland is also a good starting place. You're in a fairly inoffensive portion of the map, with no major threats (you're a long way from the Islamic kingdoms, and the Golden Horde rarely stretches further west than Poland and Hungary (which is historically accurate btw)), and in the early game you get to swallow up a lot of small pagan duchies to the north and north east and convert them to your faith.
Crusader Kings 2 Province Map
So long as you don't do anything to piss off the Holy Roman Empire, it's a pretty good kingdom to start playing as.And here's a good rule for playing CKII; never play as France unless you're up for a stiff challenge. Seriously, the number of times I've seen that kingdom absolutely cut to shreds is ridiculous. The vassals are incredibly unruly, and if the Muslims take a significant hold in Hispania, which they often do, then.
@SilvergunThe Dutchy of Bruges is actually really good. You start with a 5-6 slot county and a number of smaller but still high quality counties, and even though you are a vassal of the King of France, you're probably the strongest Duke in France and have a lot of good options when either England or France implodes. As stated earlier, Ireland is the good 'easy' choice too, hard to go wrong with an entire island you can easily take over in a few generations. Should be able to do it in like one generation. @Leptok said: @SilvergunThe Dutchy of Bruges is actually really good.
You start with a 5-6 slot county and a number of smaller but still high quality counties, and even though you are a vassal of the King of France, you're probably the strongest Duke in France and have a lot of good options when either England or France implodes. As stated earlier, Ireland is the good 'easy' choice too, hard to go wrong with an entire island you can easily take over in a few generations.Few? Should be able to do it in like one generation.Absolutely, but considering that a lot of people who are starting with Ireland are less experienced with the game, I think 2-3 generations is a more reasonable goal. Doing it in a single generation requires a little luck and good execution.
Yeah, it's like a house of cards. Only direct vassals count. When you grow, you need bigger vassals. First try to expand as much as you can by only having count vassals. When you reach your vassal limit, start creating dukes and give them 2-4 count vassals. When you reach vassal limit by having dukes start creating king vassals and again give them couple vassals each time.Try to always avoid creating strong vassals and try to stay close to the maximum amount of weakest possible vassals your limit allows.
Also keep maximum amount of land directly in your personal control.