Part 09 - Dodging the English fleet
The war is progressing nicely. Their fleet remains a problem, but fortunately it is still several decades until blockading becomes possible.
With French forces torching much of the country, England offers a white peace, since they've already achieved their goal in annexing Tyrone. France absolutely refuses this ridiculous notion.
The first conflict with the Duke of Connaught left us victorious, but severely wounded. When the Duke braved to return to Andalucia with a mere thousand infantrymen, not even his shock score could save the day.
Good governments, indeed. Free coin is always appreciated.
Growing desperate, Edward IV sends an actual offer. Hardly sufficient for our ambitions, the offer is declined.
Even more good news. Since France has no shortage of manpower, any such choice is easy; always taxes. I'm almost baffled the event choice doesn't also include a slight increase in revolt risk for a short period of time.
And here, the explanation why the game engine gave us some goodies - it planned to slap us with a whopper. Rather than revolt, they turn to smuggling. Darn provincial hicks, ruining everything. Given the two choices, and since we do have a cash reserve, we opt to stop them rather than ignore them. As an expansive power, we'll probably make up the lost cash in taxes and trade over a ten-year period.
With much of England under French control courtesy of our ten cavalry regiments out of Scotland, they are pushed above the 'magic number' for War Exhaustion. Now, it is simply a matter of time - and luck. Antwerpen with its Center of Trade is the greatest possible gain, but will it be among the provinces with a lower Mean Time To Happen than normal?
Aragon, taking advantage of our distraction and the expiry of our Granadan Guarantee, rushes the Sunni outpost.
We deliberately avoid sieging Kent, since the English warships are anchored there. The minute our rowboats head out to sea anywhere north of Iberia, this fleet would lay in a pursuit. This prevents us from reaching Ireland, but we have a cunning plan...
After leapfrogging up to Cumbria one sea province at a time - each time chased by the English fleet - our transport fleet is in posision. The warships set sail again, but not to our transports, this time. Another fleet left port before the Cumbrian detachment...
...namely, a single ship out of Galicia. Baited by this, the English commander chooses to ignore the transport fleet ferrying troops to Ireland. Our bait ship retreats to the safety of port before the enemy can reach firing range.
Half the original harassment cavalry force is thus sent to quell Ireland, starting with rebels.
Saintonge defects - which is oddly enough a
bad thing, given our ultimate goals. It's a core province of ours, and would have given zero BadBoy points on the negotiation table. Still, we want to weaken England as fast as possible and reduce our Prestige loss from uncontested claims, so we accept the penalty.
In reports from the south, we learn that Aragon has secured the province of Murcia. This is unfortunate, but at least the damage was not worse.
