Overview
I made this short guide to describe how legitimacy works when playing as Mide. I noticed there is quite a bit of confusion on this mechanic while working on my achievement guide. So, while I initially wrote this as part of the achievement guide, I decided to create a separate guide. Especially as it soon took up too much space in an already extensive guide.Feel free to ask any questions in the comments section, so I can update / improve the guide where necessary. And thank you to everyone who helped improve the information included in this guide!
Allies:
Forging alliances:
Creating an alliance (military or defensive) with other Irish factions will increase your legitimacy the most (something like +5). As far as I could tell this does not happen for allying yourself to non-Irish factions.
Liberty!:
Liberating (non-Irish) factions will also add a substantial boost to legitimacy.
Breaking alliances:
Breaking Alliances will results in a loss of legitimacy, so plan them wisely and be prepared to be dragged into a lot of wars.
Settlements:
Losing settlements:
When enemies conquer any settlement of yours, your legitimacy is lowered by -1 legitimacy.
Taking settlements:
Conquering a settlement in Ireland will increase your legitimacy by +1 (so this does not hold for settlements outside of Ireland).
This means it is not a problem to lose a settlement in Ireland, as taking it back will once again raise your legitimacy by the same amount. However, losing towns outside of Ireland means you lose legitimacy but do not get it back when you retake the settlement.
Raids:
Setting your armies in raiding stance in enemy territories is a great way to improve legitimacy (+1 per army per turn).
Annex:
It takes 20 legitimacy to annex a faction. Only Irish Gaelic factions can be annexed as Mide, and factions can decline annexation even if you have 20 legitimacy.
Factors:
Your relationship with the faction (friendly/unfriendly) and and balance of power (the yellow/red bar in diplomacy) influence whether factions are likely to accept annexation. Generally if you are very friendly, or are much stronger than the other faction, annexation is more likely. Yet as with all diplomacy in this game: these factors help, but never guarantee success.
Vassals:
It is NOT possible to annex vassals, so if you want to annex a vassal it is important to first break the vassal kingdom status. Unlike breaking an alliance, this should not lower Legitimacy. So it is possible to break the vassal status and immediately annex them (you might want to save before trying this as they might decline annexation).
Technology:
There are two technologies that provide a (one time) +20 legitimacy bonus. While this can definitely be a beneficial boost, the technologies are far up their tech branches. This means that it can help to time when you unlock these two, yet they should probably not be given too much priority as the boost is not permanent.
Events:
As it has been a while since my Mide campaign I am not entirely sure what these events are. However, this likely means the faction events that occasionally pop up and pose a choice to player. Your choice then determines whether you legitimacy increases or decreases.
Decrees:
One of Mide’s faction bonuses is “Fair of Tailtiu: A unique version of Decrees that has each option available more oftne but provide pnuses for a shorter period of time.” These decrees cost (-3) legitimacy.
Natural decline:
Legitimacy only declines over time when you are at war. It does NOT decline when you are completely at peace.
So try to keep your wars short and make peace as soon as you stop taking over settlements to prevent decline!
Buildings: (or lack thereof)
Unlike Circenn, Mide does not have buildings that improve legitimacy. The ‘buildings’ modifier is not even included in the list of factors (if you mouse-over the Legitimacy bar).
Payments:
In a forum post, ‘Mile pro Libertate’ pointed out that:
“You will gain Legitimacy from receiving monies via Diplomacy from other factions; you will lose Legitimacy when you make payments to other factions that are not gifts, e.g. pay another Gaelic faction to agree to a peace treaty”.
I have not noticed this during my own playthrough, however, I have also not looked out for it particularly. So you might want to give this a try yourself to see whether it works.