I tend to play goodly monarchs, but I bring the hammer down hard on rebels and heretics.

Also, I've nearly unified the Spains under a single king now. The Christian Spains, anyway. I've still got to reconquista these damn moors.

Has anyone tried playing the Muslims or The Golden Horde yet? Does it play any differently?

I haven't yet. I didn't realize the expansion allowed you to play the horde. I predict the most significant difference when playing a Muslim ruler is the multiple wives thing, which sounds great.

I saw the horde on the map and assumed you could play them, I don't know though.

Finally got back to my game (one of my best friends has been in town for over a month w/ his sick mom, as a result I've been playing games with multi-player content to spend time with him).

King Magni the I is hard at work bringing Ireland fully into line. Sweden has dissappeared. Poland is wracking up a huge empire to my east. Gonna be a clash with them. But for now, Magni's daughter is Queen of Poland and we are allies.... but only for now.

Oh, lord, I was pretty well done w/ CK2. I liked it enough that it was on the list of games I would love to 'get back to' but that I was also honest enough to admit would likely never happen. And then this got announced. I am back in big time!

So I picked up this game after reading this thread, and I have to say, I'm hooked.

It's got a very steep learning curve, but it's awesome in how deep it handles successions and royal families, etc.

I have a gameplay question:

I was playing as an Irish duke. (eventually I became a vassal to Scotland, but I'm not going to tell that story right now) I managed to consolidate most of Ireland under my rule, but then when my character died, many of the duchies got given away to my vassals and other family members rather than my heir. Is there a good way to "keep it in the family" so to speak so you can maintain control over these areas? Another thing was that Scotland had a law in place that didn't allow vassals to attack each other, so any province that I lost in succession was off limits to get back afterwards, regardless of Cassus Belli (or however you spell it)

Kinda yes. It all comes down to your succession laws. And as a vassal, you might not have the ability to change those directly.

Would it work if I just revoked all the titles and gave them to my heir? (assuming I could survive pissing off all the vassals that had titles)

It would keep them out of my Demense and yet still keep them in my own succession.

I wasn't able to claim independance due to Scotland also being the King of England and Poland (He cleaned up during his invasion of England) and me constantly fighting regional wars (Hard to defy your king with 3000 men when he can raise 14000 without raising a sweat)

It would. But you would be asking for trouble not just when you pulled the titles back but when you died and passed them on to your heir. The heir is not likely to have the talents, skills, experience, & loyalty stored up to take on all his vassals.

You are right that what you really need to do is gain full independence. But that is hard, hard work for the reason you mention. Best bet is to wait until your liege in neck deep is a conflict far, far away and then make your move. With luck, you can consolidate your holding by the time he gets back.