I assume this would work for non players as well .. I think its a good choice.. when no heir is apparent a possible solution is strongest champion option..

I am not sure we need a heir system but I think one could add fun to a game. However we definitely need a solution to the "kill one leader" and an empire disappears. Individual rebel cities (like minor races focused on survival not empire), next in  line heir(NPC or PC), strongest champion or any combination of these are  all viable solutions to take from a immersion stand point..

As to the discussed "save on issue" matter. In a single player game this is a non issue. Let the single player play as they choose, its their game and they paid for it, and frankly how each game owner has fun is not our concern. If I want to play Iron-man style or save on issue only matters to me.. In mp it is up to the other players to self police this and since only the game starter can save and there for load (at least that what I have gleaned so far about MP)  the MP community will quickly be able to identify some one who did this as a tactic to avoid bad happenings in an MP game....

@Froggy  Thanks for the explanation    It's reasonable.

I'd still like to see an unaligned champion grab off a city to form a new minor faction (especially if said city is poorly garrisoned and/or on the margin of that empire and/or is recently founded) -- minor factions are already in the game so it 'shouldn't' be too hard to include -- but that's just 'icing on the cake'.

It also allows things like:

-if we'd prefer #2 to take over instead of #1, would we send #1 on a suicide mission?  We'd trade a short term loss (losing a powerful unit) for a long term gain (better kingdom in the future).

-upon #1 succeeding would there be a chance that the other offspring revolt and grab a city (or 2) and split off?

-random events -- in a 'cut-throat' family/kingdom, would there be a random event (not player-inspired) where one sibling might off the next-in-line to move up?

-etc.

While this might be a decent fix midgame, it is pretty pointless at the end, when all you have left is two factions. Killing the enemy sovereign becomes the immediate and only goal. This is also true when you have a three or four way war, when it's very unlikely that the factions would marry their enemies.

Admittedly, at this point in the game, the suggestions along the line of breaking up into neutral factions, or to different heirs doesn't really help much either (breaking up just makes them targets). The only realistic fix is to either make the sovereign not die permanently, or to pass the empire on.

Now that's a compromise I can get behind - it completely changes the situation. Currently, we have an immortal, invaluable, irreplaceable sovereign - if he dies, how many will continue playing as the heir when they can reload and try again? Some, yes, but not enough that succession should be a priority I think.

On the other hand, if no matter what you're going to lose the sovereign eventually (it just might happen sooner if you take some risks with him), then taking risks and accepting his death if it happens is a much more reasonable proposition, and probably not an automatic reload for most people. In this case succession becomes an essential part of game balance, something you want to think about not only for your own kingdom, but simultaneously worry about how your enemy's/ally's succession will work.

A separate idea, not necessarily related: what if marrying off children had non-negotiable, involuntary diplomatic repercussions? You'd still of course choose when to marry them off, but you'd have to choose carefully if it initiated a binding alliance. Say I marry my daughter to your firstborn son, now as long as he's the heir (or even the ruler, after you die), your nation is automatically allied to mine, sharing enemies and refusing to turn against me (we are relatives, after all, my daughter is involved in your court politics and influencing your leadership in my favor, just like real life!). If she dies before having an heir and your son remarries, or the son dies before having an heir and succession passes to someone else, all bets are off - I no longer have any influence over your line of succession. If she does have an heir, we're inextricably linked as long as my bloodline controls your line of succession. This isn't irreversible, of course - you could deliberately kill off the inconvenient heirs that link you to a nation you're no longer so friendly with, it'll just cost you the units themselves and probably provoke war.

This could lead to some really interesting situations - what if your second son is married to a third nation, my enemy? They might go out of their way to assassinate the heir (i.e. the one married to my daughter who favors my nation), so succession passes on to the second son that they can influence, turning you against me. The politics could get very medieval European/Song of Ice and Fire-ish. Keep in mind you only have to let this direct your politics if you want to - nothing would force you to marry off your heir, indeed I'd hope you'd think twice about it first, and you'd always be able to send a diplomatically inconvenient heir on a suicide mission. Ideally a smart AI would take advantage of such a system and try to pressure you into an arranged marriage to seal an alliance, but you'd still have the choice.

Also, keep in mind that the "marrying the heir = forced alliance" idea is not dependent on having a functional succession system or a mortal sovereign as mentioned previously; marrying the heir could have diplomatic consequences even if he never actually inherits (the game could track the line of succession, i.e. first in line for the throne, second in line, and so on, even if inheritance never happens - in fact I think it already does/did at one point in beta?). This of course reduces the heir from "future you" to "pawn in the political game," but that's not so bad - still makes for a very interesting political system.

And a word on sons inheriting - it may be the classical European way to only consider sons as heirs and ignore daughters until you run out of sons, but there's a way to give players the option of having daughters inherit equally (i.e. oldest child is heir regardless of gender): just tie it to the Egalitarian trait. Perfect, isn't it?

I would love to have sovereigns die of old age.

Lets take it a step further, apon death there is a chance that some of your cities might leave your kingdom, or rebel due to instability.

I like it, Brad have a look at this:)

What if the next in line is unmarried? Does that mean no one inherits and it just goes poof and it's basically a game over for me? Can my unmarried heir take the throne?