The issue with Diplomat tree is that Paradox is obsessed with adding random garbage events instead of actually improving direct interactions between characters themselves. How much cooler it would be if you had diplomatic interactions? Demanding submission via tributes, negotiating potential integrations into the realm, calls to aid in exchange for opportunistic favors. Procurement of favors by doing diplomatic deeds. Yet worse, they don't even touch councillor tasks or their events. There is a frightening lack of interaction frankly which makes a lot of the trees just worse than they should be.

That intrigue tree is definitely better than C tier.

I think you underestimate the potential of the family hierarch tree. I agree that the finisher trait is underwhelming, but the befriend scheme is very powerful, since contrary to sway, it makes characters like you permanently (unless you treat them absolutely horribly) and prevents them from joining factions against you (and also prevents many other hostile actions). I always try to get at least the starter perk that unlocks the befriend scheme if my ruler is not a diplomat, but if he is, I go down that skill tree for the friendship related perks first 9 out of 10. You mentioned the extra skill points, but the perk that gives you less stress gain per friend really needs a shoutout, since that one has NO LIMIT regarding the number of friends it counts for. So if you get enough friends, you can do anything imaginable and shrug off every strike of fate without ever taking any noteworthy stress (or actually zero stress, if you have 20 friends - less if you have other traits or perks that reduce stress gain).

Seducer actually turns out to be pretty good if you're a woman ruler living in a mans world. Most rulers are hetero males so you can manipulate them easily with the tools from the seducer tree. The fertility bonuses are also more impactful for women. The 40 attraction opinion from the capstone is actually massive for women.

I've always gone down Scholar and architect and haven't really put much thought into the Marial lifestyle. Definitely going to try out Galant!

Finally someone that gives diplomat the respect that it deserves. I've played it a lot too and I don't understand how some people can compare it to something like the trees of the intrigue lifestyle.

I hink torturer is a tier, to me it is stonger than administrator and strategist as it makes it much more likely that your vassals will not rebel, and terrified people often have acceptance boosts to your demands against them(vassalisation, joining your court, etc...). That plus the 30% increased taxes and levies, it's really good.

I always start a new ruler with diplomacy to get thoughtful. That way I can buy off any vassals that are looking at independence. The problem is keeping them at bay for the first 2-3 years until you can earn that perk, hoping there's enough with ok enough opinion of you to gift normally and if not, then granting one or two independence that you can re-vassalize later. With that in mind, I will head down the August tree to get the +20 vassalization and also across to get the befriend option. Once I've got them, I jump over to learning for health benefits and fill that one out to the max. That said, I play Paradox Mega campaigns so having already built up a decent sized realm in Rome: Imperator, my main focus is to hold the realm together, just allowing my vassals to expand by themselves (being careful that one doesn't get too powerful in the process).

Seducer should have some kind of bonus for having multiple lovers. Be it just extra stats or something cool because yes as of now its pretty bad. It can be good when playing a female ruler but even then you only want it for the attraction bonus but you could get the same effect and then a whole lot more from diplomat

for me i love intrigue its the best way for me to relieve stress with the forgiving personality trait with hooks also to get the best councilors and kidnapping o win easy wars if im desperate

They're all good for what you want to do. If you're not gonna be a commander, most martial nodes and traits would be useless, yet for some reason you placed them higher than intrigue. Why would you do an intrigue lifestyle if you don't want to use intrigue? To me, it's the perfect intrigue tree, I also can't play any character without using schemes so this one's just perfect for that. It's easily a high a.

Good video! As a CK player with 1000+ hrs., I more or less agree with most of your picks. Just for fun, I'll go through the perk trees and give my own thoughts (sorry for the long comment lol). One thing to note is that I usually tend to switch between lifestyles to pick up specific perks, rather than finishing an entire tree. Not necessarily optimal, but just how I tend to play, probably because I'm bad at planning ahead, lol. Diplomat: I usually only go into this tree if I want Forced Vassalage to vassalize a lower tier neighbor. It's quicker to get (3 trait picks vs 5) than True Ruler from the August tree. However, the size of the realm which can be vassalized is dependent on tech, so it's not very useful like early on in an 867 start playthrough. Very situational, C tier for me. August: I will go into this one and get maybe the first 4 perks if I need prestige or a certain level of fame, for something like a major decision. Really just something to do while sitting on the Majesty lifestyle to generate prestige. Writing History (Epics) is good for this too, but usually I will have enough prestige before getting to that point. Also quite situational, C tier. Family Hierarch: Not really useful except for putting 1 point in for Groomed to Rule, like you said. D Tier. Strategist: The best warfare tree if your ruler is not a competent army commander, since a lot of the bonuses apply to your armies generally, rather than being commander bonuses. The Men-at-arms stat bonuses seem really strong; I'm putting this at A tier. Overseer: Like you said, Serve the Crown + Strict Organization are good if you need to increase county control, like after conquering territory you are going to hold yourself. Otherwise not the best, C tier. Gallant: The best warfare tree if you plan to command your own army (basically required for at least Stalwart Leader). I actually think Never Back Down is really good, stacking commander advantage is what can make commanding your own army worth it (+5 from leading your own troops, +5 from Chivalry lifestyle, +5 from Never Back Down, plus your martial stat). The increased marriage acceptance from Promising Prospects actually seems quite good, I've always pretty much skimmed over it because the rest of the left side of the tree isn't very useful. Overall very good tree, A tier. Avaricious: Good if you're in debt or otherwise really need gold. Not much more to say, B tier. Architect: Best tree in the game in most cases, IMO, and the only one I pretty regularly end up finishing. Once I've got my core domain built up, I often end up rushing this for Divided Attention on each new ruler (unless they have really high stewardship stat), since I want to hold on to all my core counties. In the meantime, Domain lifestyle and spouse on domain focus should make up for 1 domain limit, for the other I'll just take the penalty for being 1 over if I have to. Administrator: Not very useful. Toe the Line (vassals less likely to join independence factions) sounds good, but factions are typically most dangerous right after succession, so unless your character specced into this before you started playing them, probably not going to be helpful. Honored to Serve also sounds good, but being 8 picks deep, just doesn't seem worth it to me. Claim Throne is useful when you need it, but that's usually at most once per playthrough. D tier. Schemer: Swift Execution and A Job Done Right are very nice to have when there's another character that you'd just really like to get rid of for one reason or another. I guess maybe I use intrigue more than some, though it's not my main focus. Stuff like killing a ruler to break up their huge list of alliances, or getting an inheritance to go the way I want (I sometimes like to try to get my dynasty on the throne of other realms). A Job Done Right is also good if you need to do some other hostile scheme, like fabricate a hook or claim throne. Still a situational tree, so C, but top of C tier. Seducer: Not useful other than I guess RP purposes if you're into that, lol. D tier. Torturer: I haven't really used this tree, but it seems pretty solid; upon closer inspection, better than I previously thought. B tier. Whole of Body: Good if you end up needing your character to stay alive for a long time, though this is pretty situational since I find its usually not great to have your heir be too old when you start playing as them. Being able to choose when to stop having kids is always useful though. I'd put it in high B tier. Scholar: A lot of really good perks in here, I often go into this tree after Architect, if I have nothing else specific that I need to get. However, for reasons I mentioned before, I'm usually rushing architect first. S tier. Theologian: As you said, situationally good for creating/reforming a faith or converting counties. I think that's useful enough for me to put it at the bottom of C tier.

Thriving in Chaos under torturer really needs to remove stress health penalty, that would make it an excellent pickup.

Always good to see new content creators for this ol' girl of a game. I don't necessarily agree with all of your rankings but then, I play heavy intrigue and love to leave bastards all over my diplomatic range. I think it's funny when Charles the Bald or Louis the Younger notices his new son's skin tone (I typically play Nubian rulers) and doesn't get the least bit suspicious. I've even managed to impregnate Queen Teutberga of Lotharingia (who was notoriously barren, which is why Lothaire got his kids from Waldrada).

Whole of Body, Diplomat, Architect, Gallant, Scholar are probably the most universally good ones but I think most are useful. I still don't get the appeal of Torturer most of the tree is useless and the increased imprisonment chance is not useful since vassals have to rebel on a rejected imprisonment demand anyway which will lead to them being in prison. Schemer is way better imo.

Nice! What do you think are the best lifestyles for starting as a count with a single province with no claims? :D

The fact that all the lifestyle traits have blue backgrounds just bothers me

Just 2 months into CK3 and Paradox after a decade and a half of the Total War and Creative Assembly productions. Really enjoying the game and the help from creators like yourself. Subscribed😊

deplo is playing ck3 in easy mode... and playing easy mode means a short campaign cuz u get bored.. hence why people don't play diplomacy that much atleast i don't anyway lol but i also always play steward or martial so my opinion dont mean shi on easy mode part 😂

Commander trait tier list!

This guy has never played a character with the Schemer trait, clearly.