Saltborn: A Crovan AAR

[Saithis]

It seems like the Crovans have overestimated their own abilities. Give a Crovan Brilliant Strategist and he'll find a way to muck it all up!

[Ivir Baggins]

The Crovan are back to their usual tricks again, I see.

[Axe27]

Buy some mercs then. You're swimming in dough. Might as well use it.

[delimeat567]

Well, if he combines those stacks, can't he take care of the small enemy force in the north, then march down and take out each of the stacks one at a time. They might have assaulted and lost a few soldiers by then.

[Maestro Ugo]

Great AAR, read it in one sitting!

[Avarri]

Wonderful AAR, had me disturb an entire Uni library from laughter!

With over 1k gold seems like Mercs could buy a victory for the Crovan!

[Alfred Packer]

Maybe it is just something about the name, but "Crovan" just screams "insanity and hijinks." Brilliant AAR, just outrageously funny!

[mayorqw]

Very nice. I'll be subbing to hear more Crovanic insanity.

[Alex Borhild]

I'm confident that, whatever the outcome, you'll find a way to write something hilarious, even if this brilliant Crovan strategist gets caught in his stirrups and trips on his sword while leading an ineffective charge against the English army.

[AlbinoPolarBear]

Nearly a week without any updates on the Crovan front? What up with that? I think I'm getting the wd's....

And don't you, esteemed writAAR, attempt making any excuses either, citing work, school or a naggy wife and kids as the reason why you haven't updated! If that's what's keeping you, then it is clear you got your priorities all mixed up!

Anyway, since I don't have this yet, and I'm trying to form an opinion on the game by reading the various AARs around here, is it just me or is the "raising levies-going to war-disbanding levies" thing a bit tedious to handle? I mean compared to other similar games, even other Paradox titles?

[JuvenalianSatyr]

It can get tedious micromanagement wise, but once I learned to use the military window to its full effect it seemed fine to me, I like the management aspect of mustering the levies and having them possibly being caught out (and similarly doing the same to my enemies). Plus it stands to reason considering the nature of levies that you'd need to be at war before you call them, and the DOW restriction just keeps you from doing some silly things like standing on top of their capital with an army before you declare war.

[delimeat567]

It is tedious at first, but you learn within a few hours how to maximize your levies and from there on out it is smooth sailing.

[Stuyvesant]

I missed a bit the last few days. Thought the CTD sequence was particularly inspired. Oh, and the Sicilian Emir of Croatia nicknamed 'The Great' (or whatever convoluted combination that was). Good job crusading in the Middle East, too - oh wait, that didn't end up so well, now that I think of it...

Good luck putting your house back in order - whatever the outcome, it'll be fun to read about.

[Thewarlord]

Subbed.

[Leviathan07]

Anyway, since I don't have this yet, and I'm trying to form an opinion on the game by reading the various AARs around here, is it just me or is the "raising levies-going to war-disbanding levies" thing a bit tedious to handle? I mean compared to other similar games, even other Paradox titles?

You haven't played vanilla Victoria 2, have you? CK2 is a dream compared to the military micromanagement hell in Vic2.

[Werewhale]

Unfortunately, I find my favourite mercenaries, the Breton Company, to be already employed. By me. Huh. I can get the 4500-man White Company for 375 pounds of gold, plus 18.457month, but that's a bit overkill, and I want to be able to afford a long war. So I hire the Saxon Band, the very cheapest company in range. Then I descend upon each of the Saxon armies in turn with my concentrated force:


I actually had to circle around the army in Strathearn and attack them from Clydesdale. If I marched from Argyll, they could march into Lothian before I arrived. On the other hand, the distance between Clydesdale and Strathearn is shorter than between Strathearn and any other province.

Boo-yah! Crovan's back on track! I shatter the Saxon armies and even manage to capture King Estmond's nephew in combat. Not too shabby.

A month later the last vestiges of the army are destroyed in Dunbar, just south of Lothian, though of the initial 22000-man army, only 14000 remain. Still, I think the English got the worse end of that deal, despite their starting manpower advantage.



Furthermore, the respite of throwing the English back allows me to disband my depleted levies and raise fresh reinforcements, adding nearly three thousand men to my total army.

King Estmond is not quite through yet, however, and he lands an army of 6000 men to besiege Ulster. I answer with 9000 men.



I am racking up some serious warscore now without taking a single holding.



Six thousand angry Scotsmen cut a swathe of destruction down through Northwestern England, chasing after fleeing remnants of armies and fresh levies, and the first English holding falls to siege. Several more follow.

The war is finally concluded in March 1312:



The war reparations put King Estmond into heavy debt, so I generously offer to shoulder some of his burdens:



Just like I have no idea how I lost my claim to England, so do I have no clue as to where my claims on Gloucester and Somerset came from. But I'm happy to pursue them.

The war is not terribly complicated. Many of the holdings captured earlier have but a fraction of their standard garrison size, so I can assault the castles with ease. By July 19th, every county within the Duchy of Lothian has been fully occupied. I leave 5000 men to siege castles in Cumberland and Northumberland while 14000 men march south to find some Saxons to murder on the field.

[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/fQgr1.jpg[IMG]

Humiliated over and over again, King Estmond folds early in order to allow his rectum to recover.



God it feels good to be on the conquering road again!

I immediately make my son Offa Duke of Somerset and Gloucester so that he'll stop whining about not having a title. I hate it when kids do that. To my horror, I find that he has become Maimed somehow during the war, and he only has a daughter to his name. I really hope the story of Máel-Máedoc the Sonless doesn't repeat itself.

In February 1313, he contracts Measles. And survives that as well. Tough kid, I'll give him that.

On the home front, things are looking quiet as well. The only vassals with negative opinions of me are the Duke of Ulster and Duchess of Connacht, both imprisoned, and the Duchess of Munster, with an opinion of -4, and is apparently fighting a small civil war where her two vassals are trying to depose her. The war is prolonged by the fact that neither side can muster enough troops to reduce each others' castles.

King Estmond dies sometime in the second quarter of 1314, probably of shame after being humiliated by the God-forsaken Crovans, of all people. I send his successor, Waltheof II, my deepest condolences. Since I'm spending the stamps anyway, I toss in a declaration of war along.



While I and Waltheof are doing our early-war maneuvering ballet, Prince Offa comes under fire from Duke Eadmund of York, who has arranged for my son to be excommunicated. Which means that Offa is a man, at last. They grow up so fast!



The target of the DoW is captured after just over three months.



Then most of England's army is shattered in Bristol.

It's a cakewalk from there on. Except that King Waltheof is a bit too eager to prove his worth to his nobility and refuses to peace unless I absolutely defeat him.

So during this disproportionately long war, my second and third sons comes of age:



I try to give my non-inheriting sons titles for roleplay reasons and to avoid the prestige loss from Unlanded Sons, but I think I'll have Waltheof stay in my court. Crovans are bad enough vassals without high Intrigue scores. In the meantime, I have hot-tempered but honest Sigered married to a Welsh girl of the Dinefwr family, hoping for his issue to get claims on Dyfed, the last county in Wales outside my realm.

It takes an embarrassingly long time for King Waltheof to see the writing on the wall:



One county. ONE. COUNTY. Tens of thousands of men died FOR ONE COUNTY, WALTHEOF. ARE YOU HAPPY?

In October 1319, Prince Offa completes his rite of manhood as the Pope agrees to lift the excommunication on him, at my request.

Soon thereafter, I have to tell Sigered's new wife not to plot murdering Offa. She will fit right in our family.

Maldred, my youngest child, graduates in the same month, taking after me:

[IMG]phttp://i.imgur.com/uHbek.jpg[/IMG]

I suppose he'll make a fair marshal for me or one of his brothers.

In Spring 1320 my period of peace and reflection is broken by King Raoul I of France.



Apparently I married my second daughter Eadhild off to him a while ago. Huh. I have an alliance with France, whaddya know?

I rise to the challenge, raise my personal levies and sail off to France. There are a few sieges and small skirmishes until the rebels are on the ropes. Then King Raoul accepts a white peace with them, to my utter confusion. It's like he doesn't want to keep as many of his vassals in his dungeons as possible. I'll never understand continental politics.

I shake the confusion out of my head and march south to dick around in Catalonia, which is under Mauretanian rule, along with about half of Iberia, the rest being under the control of the Emirate of Murcia and the Sultanate of Al-Andalus.

I come face-to-face with a great Muslim host of 15 thousand men besieging French Barcelona and bravely avoid them, instead storming the holdings of Lleida, each of which were defended by less than fifty men. But they were really really really fierce-looking.



Less happily, the Duchess Hunydd of Normandy inherits the County of Dyfed somehow, bringing the province under the French Crown and making it that much harder for me to consolidate Wales.

Domestic intrigue rears its ugly head in September 1322 as Duchess Adalmode of Galloway, supported by Duke Máél-Dúin II of Connacht and Duchess Der-Lugdach of Ulster, conspires to Institute Elective Monarchy in Scotland. She is allowed to institute whatever the hell she wants in my dungeons. Duchess Der-Lugdach then conspires to Acquire the Kingdom of Ireland, and Acquires a dank cell instead.

Waltheof and Maldred give me two grandsons, Oswald and Malcolm respectively. There's a pool going in the court as to how long they will survive in the Crovan household.

Around this time, I take a casual look at the ledger:



Third place in the world. No longer just local opportunists, the Crovans are playing in the big boys' league now.

So it's time to stop wasting time and get to beating on the little kids:



It is time to replace the Muslim hegemony of Spain with Crovan rule. God have mercy on the smallfolk.

[mayorqw]

Smite the heathen!

[naggy]

I'm sure the Spanish will love the Crovans as much as the English, Scottish, Irish, and Welsh do.

[AlbinoPolarBear]

I was wondering when this was going to sail off to new horizons.
Not that the British Isles or the odd Crusade wasn't fun, but I am itching to see how a well cultured and tolerant bunch like the Crovans handle prolonged multicultural exchanges.

It is time to replace the Muslim hegemony of Spain with Crovan rule. God have mercy on the smallfolk.

God have mercy! Period.

EDIT: Would it be too much to ask for a map depicting your exploits at the end of each update?

[Werewhale]

The Emirate of Murcia has a fraction of the troops I do, but I hire the Knights Templar anyway, because fair fights are not the Crovan way. Unfortunately, I only get a third of the usual number of soldiers because the other two holy orders are serving Sweden and Turnovo.


Of course they're fighting a civil war with Braganca and being attacked by the Emir of Castilla, whyever did you think I attacked them?

To my irritation, the Bragancan rebels are besieging one of the counties I want. Luckily that war ends before New Year's, so no-one is cheating me out of my candy. On the other hand, it means I am fighting a fully unified Emirate.


This fails to impress me.

The Moors dare not take me on in the field, so there is just a whole bunch of besieging and capturing. Fall 1327 brings my next target into the crosshairs:


If you don't know, Middlesex is the province where London is.

Two weeks later, King Raoul of France calls me again to help him with another civil war, this one started by the Duchess of Berry, claiming the throne of France. Pfft. What kind of an idiot king can't keep his vassals in line?

In November, I finally reach warscore 100% against the Emir of Murcia, but I finish one battle first just because it is the only battle of the entire war. Winning a fight without looking your adversary in the eye(or at least the back of his head) just feels unclean somehow.



I grant the counties to my sons Waltheof and Maldred, completely forgetting that Sigered was the pliable one. No matter, I'll just make Maldred Duke of Galicia, forcing him to deal with Waltheof himself.

Queen Consort Theognosia dies in December. I open the BrideFinder and sort by Stewardship and marry the girl at the top of the list. I have her slaving away in the study as soon as she arrives.

The civil war in France is beaten down without my help and nearly immediately, a new one takes its place with Duke Maldred of Valois(no, not my Maldred) declaring War for France. Really, now, it's like he wants to be fighting his vassals all the time.

The war itself is uneventful except when my beloved son Offa decides to experiment with new martial tactics:


With no access to high explosives, suicide attacks were rather less effective during the medieval period.

Fortunately, his son Andrew, age 9, already displays great promise, being born with the 'Genius' trait. I bet I will outlive him as well.

In August, the war ends with a white peace. My son died for a bloody white peace. Fudge France.

Like a man directs his righteous anger on to his redheaded stepchild, I furiously declare war on England.



I return the favour and call France into the war, even though I expect them to contribute exactly nothing to the struggle. King Estmond calls Slesvig again. I am not impressed.

This time I decide to blitzkrieg the crap out of the English and send half-assembled armies to invade Northern England and scoop up any English levies too slow to get out of my way:



As I make my way through East Anglia, heading for London, I am greatly surprised to find six thousand Frenchmen waiting for me, already besieging the capitol, Westminster.

Naturally, King Raoul then decides to kick the bucket, leaving the throne to his son, my son-in-law, who rebuffs my call to arms. Dick.

There is little else of note during the war. While I besiege King Estmond's holdings, another army of mine runs around gobbling up smaller forces before they can gather into something that poses any sort of threat.

Meanwhile, Prince Andrew picks up the traits 'Patient' and 'Just'. I might dare to begin to consider hoping to expect great things from my grandson.

Sometime in September 1331, King Estmond gives up the ghost as well, probably to spare himself the shame of having to bend to the will of the Crovans like his father. His son, Eardulf, is burdened with that responsibility.



I grant the Earldom to my last unlanded son, Sigered. God help Andrew when he has to deal with his uncles.

The twilight of my reign is approaching, but this is no reason to halt the expansion of the Crovan family. Iberia has just devolved into a clusterfudge of civil wars after the Sultan of Mauretania successfully conquered the Sultanate of Al-Andalus.


This map requires more Crovan.

The ledger even shows that we have more soldiers available than Mauretania and their rebelling vassal, Kabylia, has even more than us. Without further ado, I throw myself into the fray with the aim of taking Asturias, the two-county duchy to the east of Galicia.

The Knights Templar, now at full strength, are recruited again as I ship my armies in several waves across the waves.

With the region in question having been fought over very recently back when Castilla was fighting Murcia, the garrisons are not fully replenished and fall quickly to assaults. The lightning offensive is so overpowering, in fact...



Yup. That's me defeating the second-most powerful force of Islam in about nine months. I really am awesome.

I'm so happy that I gift the County of Astorga to Grandmaster Guy of the Knights Templar. He then declines to become my vassal. Apparently you need to be their de jure liege(in this case, the King of Leon) and the same culture as them(Frankish for the KT). I hate it when I forget to read the fine print...

The other county, that of Asturias de Oviedo, I hand to Donald Crovan, brother of Andrew.

As I gear down into peace-mode, I institute the Small Feudal Tax, it having been dropped to None earlier somehow, and fail to force Prince Maldred to end a plot to Institute Succession by Gavelkind. Since I want to spread my family around a bit and imprisonment has a negative effect on fertility, I let him be for the moment. I just keep tabs on his plot and scare away anyone who tries to back it.

Meanwhile, Andrew is picking up positive traits like they're going out of style:



In February 1337, I can finally usurp the Duchies of Asturias and Galicia. Both are handed to Donald, Andrew's younger brother. Dangerous, you say? Keep in mind that those are newly conquered provinces that will give little to no levies for twenty years and even after that, Duke Donald will still have his vassal uncles to worry about. Uncles that Andrew will not have to mind.

In February 1337, Andrew finishes his education, becoming an Elusive Shadow. I'll just let you see for yourself:



Within three months he has already uncovered a plot to murder his brother and to institute Succession by Seniority. Both are intimidated into submission.

My wife decides to retreat to the convent for a short while. I respond by invading the Emirate of Castilla:


It is a complete coincidence that they are already involved in three different wars when I made this decision.

Before I sail off, I do remember to knock up a courtier by the name of Agatha of Dundee, producing Sigeric the bastard, whom I acknowledge but don't legitimize. Earlier, my new accountant-wife had given me another son who's name I have completely forgotten and don't bother to look up. Really, he's number what, five? I can only keep track of so many offspring. Not like he will amount to anything anyway.

The war should be a breeze, what with my army outnumbering theirs by a fair margin. I don't even call up my vassals. There's a small battle in Zamora.



Well naturally.