Invade realms that are stronger than you on paper, increasing your de facto power through alliances or by hiring mercenaries and holy orders.For example, only invite a claimant at the last minute. If a realm has not yet joined a defensive pact, avoid gaining a CB on them until you're ready to attack.They will never join the pact, when they are in a civil war. Pick off vassals who are rebelling against their liege.It takes 1 day for them to join the pact. Attack new realms the day they are created, before they have a chance to join defensive pacts.With the Conclave DLC, if your council can vote on war declarations, be sure to have Glory Hounds voting if you wish to pursue this strategy and not cause tyranny and council discontent.ДЄttack targets who are not in defensive pacts This is your last chance to attack moderately weak realms until (1) you can take on entire regions at once or (2) your threat decays. When fighting a war that would take you from 40% threat to 90% threat, declare as many other wars as you can handle at the same time. There are many things you can do other than simply waiting for threat to decay. They will join with a score above 110 and leave with a score below 70. Pact needs assistance: pact is less than 70% strength, an existing member of their religion/culture/dynasty, and you are notДЄI will then compute a score to decide whether to actually join:.You're too big: Less than 20% your size in provinces.You could attack me: Less than 80% troop strength and you have a CB (except 'Make tributary' or 'Humiliate nomad'?).They are within 300 distance, or 400 distance if another religion group.Thus, any threat beyond 100% will be lost.ДЄny realm can join a defensive pact against you if:

Religious groups other than yours will band togetherД®ven your religious head and holy orders will join all wars As threat increases, even infidels will fight together when defending against you. In addition, you can request an alliance.ДЄt low levels of threat, defensive pact members are organized by religion group note that rulers following a religion's heresies can join a pact alongside rulers following the mainstream religion. It is best if you already have a non-aggression pact with the vassal you plan to release, so they can't join defensive pacts this is more important if the vassal being released is not of your religion. Releasing your furthest vassals can also shrink defensive pacts, because fewer foreign realms will be close to your borders. This encourages you to release outlying vassals, especially those who provide fewer levies due to de jure structure. Granting independence to vassals decreases threat based on the number of counties freed. However, land lost when a vassal becomes independent by obtaining a title with the same (or higher) rank as their liege will not reduce threat. With Monks and Mystics DLC, your Chancellor can be assigned to a job which increases threat decay.ДЄny land leaving your realm can reduce threat this includes land lost via inheritance and conquest.

The exact amount depends on your military strength(?). Threat decays at a rate between 0.21% and 0.4% per month.

This effect is much smaller than the effect of expanding on your own, since any given vassal is too small to generate much threat per county. If your vassals generate threat, some of this threat will be added to your own. A single source can add at most 50% threat. Diplomatically vassalizing other rulers, or personally inheriting titles when you are already a ruler, also increases threat, but at a lower rate than war. Claim and de jure wars generate less threat. The exact amount depends mostly on your realm size(?). 3.9 Arrange to peacefully regain kingdoms granted independenceД®ach county conquered adds between 2% and 15% threat.3.5 Support vassals in their external wars.3.2 Attack targets who are not in defensive pacts.

Ck2 you are threatening