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loveactually

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Jan 1, 2014
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Albanian Coat of Arms

The Tale of the Eagle
An Albania AAR



After I accomplished my Albania – HRE run in 1.4, I never play Albania again. But recently, after a new achievement introduced in the new patch, I feel challenged to do it once more. Especially since the scorched earth cheese is not working anymore. This is an ironman 1.9.2 game.
Hope you will enjoy it :)
Also, sorry for the bad grammar since I'm not an English native speaker.

So, my short term goals are:
1. Survive Ottomans’ invasion - survived for now
2. Make a solid base in the Balkans - in progress
3. Enter HRE - done
4. Invade Italy - in progress

Also my long term goals are:
1. Become HREmperor (did it as Albania in 1.4)
2. Unite HRE (did it before as Albania) or dismantle it
3. Invade Iberia (get the achievement)
4. ??? (I’ll decide it later if the game goes well)

Kings:
Gjerg Skandenberg Kastrioti (1444 - 1471)
Dukagjin I Kastrioti (1472 - ???)



We start our campaign in a dire situation, at war with the turks and outnumbered 10:1


Also, our land is very poor, 1 BT with wrong religion.
We don’t understand why those kebab vendors really want to annex our poor land. But, fortunately we have our brave king who will fight until death for the glory of Albania.



Our King talked with the council and decided to burn the city to stall the turks and lead the army to invade Bosnia in the north.



The problem is, to enter Bosnia, we need to pass through our hostile neighbor, the Serbians. Luckily, when the sentries came into contact with the Serbian’s army in the border, they easily let us pass through their border. They mentioned that they would love to see the Bosnian lands burn into ashes, which is our goal.



So, we marched through the Serbian lands which are as barren as our land, but they have a rich gold mine (and we really want it to fuel our country’s economy). Maybe if we survived this war with ottomans, we will try to claim this land…

The war with the Bosniaks was easy; our God King slaughtered their army like there’s no tomorrow.



We also received news that a saint in our barracks healed our wounded troops. This miracle made our country slightly more stable. People are feeling safer even though we are still at war.



While sieging all of the Bosnian fortress, suddenly a messenger came from the south.

Messenger: “My king! We are almost out of time; the turks already penetrated our 7th layer of defense. We only have 5 more layers. What should we do?”
Skanderbeg: “That is indeed a dire situation. I understand. We should make haste! All troops! We are only going to annex Donji Kranji! But our war is far from over! We are going to attack Ragusa, the merchant republic!”
Army commander: “But, we don’t have a valid reason to attack the my King. We will suffer stability loss again if we attack without reason.”
Skanderbeg: “Are you sure? Check your book again commander! We have claim in their land!”
Commander: “When did you……do that?”
Skanderbeg: “Chaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrgggeeeeee!!!!!!”




Suddenly, in the middle of the war, the king gathered all of his commanders.
Skanderbeg: “Send messenger to Albania, we are going to abandon the city and flee to Donji Kranji!”
Commanders: “....... but? Why?”
Skanderbeg: “No questions! Do it now!”
Commanders: “As you command!”
Skanderbeg: “We will not forget this humiliation, Mehmed……”



After surrendering to the Ottomans, we made Donji Kranji as our new capital. We also used the Donji Kranji castle ruins as our new home. Burnt, but it’s our new home.

Meanwhile, the Ragusan already surrendered. We don’t want to annex them for now. Instead, they join the realm as our vassal. For now, we need their wealth



Our diplomat also successful in gaining the Holy Roman Emperor’s love. The Austrian agreed to form alliance to protect both nations in the future. Although, it will be us using their help more.



Skanderbeg: "Mehmed, I'll be back..."
 
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After successfully made alliance with the emperor, we feel much safer and aiming to gain more lands for our people's benefit.
The emperor also hinted that if Albania wants to enter the Holy Roman Empire, it needs a capital inside the empire.
The closest land to do that is Dalmatia, which is owned by Venice and direct rival of the emperor.

Without thinking twice, and seeing that Venice is busy helping Castile beating Aragon and Naples, we declared war on Venice for Dalmatia, of course with the help of our new ally, Austria.



While at war, the emperor generously gave us subsidy. We feel so happy.
Show them boys!



even though the clergy from the church accused our philosopher as a heretic, we didn't care. honestly we are not a good catholic. we preferred to support the philosopher who's trying to introduce many new things to us



Dalmatia was taken easily from Venice, we decided to move the capital to Dalmatia and join the emperor







now we feel much safer from the ottoman savages in the south ..



Also, our war of conquest is far from over. we want to help our lovely emperor to weaken their rival. the next target is Hungary. with the help of Austria, we happily declare war on Hungary.



Sadly, in the middle of the war, a stray arrow struck our prince in his chest. this made him lost his balance and he fell to the ground. The Hungarians soldier captured and eventually chopped him to pieces.



This event sparked anger from the soldiers, with a new general, Albanian soldiers slaughtered all of the remaining Hungarian army in command of Janos Hunyadi, an old enemy of our King.

We annex some of the Hungarian lands, and released as a new vassal, Croatia
sadly this caused a coalition to form against us



Didn't want a weak target to join the coalition, the King quickly declared war to take what's left of Bosnia. this time we felt more confident and didn't call Austria



Bosnia was easily annexed in only 1 year. we welcomed all the Bosniaks to the realm



Our country also got a new heir, the saint's prophecy told us that this boy will lead our country to become stronger. The kings announced that the country will have a huge feast for 7 days and 7 nights for this new heir.



In the same year, the King launched a swift invasion against Serbia and Wallachia. this time, our new ally in the east, Poland with the Lithuanian hordes agreed to help us.



right in the middle of the siege, we received a news that our country is becoming more stable. praise the catholic god!



while sieging the serbian lands, suddenly several cavalries came from the north. the messenger brought message and a young man who looked like a peasant's son.

Skanderbeg: "What brings you from the north?"
Messenger: "I offer you my apologies my king, but I'm here to bring a good news and a bad news from the capital"
Skanderbeg: "Make it quick!"
Messenger: "This peasant boy here is our new Jousting champion. He defeated Black Bear, our jousting champion for 10 years in row. This boy may not look appealing, but his skills are real"
Skanderbeg: "And what is the bad news?"
Messenger: "If you decided to take this peasant boy to the vanguard, our troops and noble will feel disgusted because a non-nobility from a farm suddenly took charge of a unit. your legitimacy and prestige will decrease Sir!
Skanderbeg: "Hmmm.. that is indeed worrying. What about his army tradition?"
Messenger: "I believe he has 100 army tradition sir"
Skanderbeg: "Boy, draw your sword. you are in charge of that 2000 man unit!"
Boy: "As you command my King!"
Skanderbeg: "Also, tell me your name!"
Boy: "My name is Lulezim, my King"
Skanderbeg: "Good, now lead those 2 units to battle! Godspeed!"
Lulezim: "I won't go home until those bastards surrender!"
Messenger: "Does it mean that you will take him my King?"
Skanderbeg: "Who cares about prestige and legitimacy as long as I have elite troops and commanders!!"





We decided to make Serbia as a new vassal to protect us from turks in the south. We also made the greedy catholic pope spit out Urbino for our next Italian invasion plan

 
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Liking this so far! Keep them coming.

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We got information that one of our advisor had contact inside the Papacy, and could easily bribe them to make our capital as a seat of cardinal.
Since we never like the pope, we decided to reject the proposal and used the money to improve our administrative system.



Our King decided to once again attack the Venetian to give the land of Istria to our Croatian vassal. It turns out that the current Duke of Croatia's great-grandfather from step-brother once bought that land from the Venetian, but the greedy Venetian tricked him and seized the land back. It is time to reconquest it.



The greedy Venetian surrendered in 3 years, We only took what we need.



Few months after that, We received a news that Naples has broke free from Aragon. The King felt that this will be a good time for us to invade and make base in Italy. Apparently we already had claims all over their eastern lands.



Naples surrendered in 2 years. While fighting Naples, The King also decided to invade the small kingdom of Urbino.



We made Naples our vassal. Their lands will be a good base for our King's Italian ambition.

On the same month, Urbino surrendered. We decided to annex them and made it as our temporary headquarter in Italy.



As a result of our endless war, a coalition of Italian minors + Aragon formed against us. But the King dismissed the situation.



"We survived the Muslim Juggernaut onslaught! Those petty coalition will give me more reason to fight!"

And so, another war was declared. This time, we decided to invade Hungary again. We used the claims made by our (now) loyal vassal, Serbia



Outside of a Hungarian fort...

Lulezim: "This war is boring, I haven't meet a worthy opponent for a while!"
Cavalryman: "My apology Sir, it seems that our allies Austria and Poland is slaughtering the Hungarians and left nothing for us to fight."
Lulezim: "Heh! So, what's the meaning of this war for us? No fighting and all we did was fishing and made barbecue beside the moat, waiting for those fools inside the castle to starve"
Cavalryman: "Actually this was one of the strategy given by our King, Sir. Let our allies do the fighting to prevent the loss of our man"
Lulezim: "While we sitting here? Isn't that a cowardly strategy?"
Cavalryman: "Order is order sir"
Lulezim: "Sigh. Very well, who got smaller fish will treat the winner a full course at that brothel!"
Cavalryman: "Isn't that a brothel which only has man as prostitute?"
Lulezim: "Indeed."
Cavalryman: "........I ain't gonna take the bet."

suddenly a messenger in a horse is approaching them, he has a dire look on his face

Lulezim: "Tell me the news"
Messenger: "We have spotted 13,000 Hungarian soldier lead by an unknown General marched towards Serbia Sir!"
Lulezim: "Serbia? That is just 20,000 pikes from here! Marino, go get my horse!"
Marino (previously known as cavalryman) : "But, we are ordered to stay here, Sir"
Lulezim: "Curse the order! It's been 2 weeks of boring siege! I want to rape those guys!"
Marino: *blinked confusedly* "Rape? as in sexual rape, Sir? But those are guys, they don't have the "hole", Sir"
Lulezim: "Oh they have another one in the back! Do you want to try mine, Marino?"
Marino: *shudder* "No Sir, thank you. Good luck with your hobby. I'll go get your horse"
Lulezim: "Make haste!"

And so, Lulezim marched towards the Hungarian army to prevent them crossing the border. The battle was one sided.



Lulezim: "What is this? No one survived! No S&M plays for me tonight!"
Marino: "S&M? what is that Sir?"
Lulezim: "Do you want to know? come to my chamber tonight!"
Marino: ".............."

Meanwhile, in Dalmatia castle...

Advisor 1: "My King! we have a bad news!"
Skanderbeg: "What kind of news? tell me! Also, is '1' really your name?? what kind of name is that?"
Advisor 1: "That is my code name Sir, no one knows my real name. It is for safety Sir, Big brother watched us."
Skanderbeg: ".......do as you like. And tell me the news!"
Advisor 1: "We received the news from the Iberian peninsula, the Castilian and the Aragonese heir has decided to wed!"
Skanderbeg: "That is a good news! I love weddings! Do they invite us? Tell the maid to prepare my clothes!"
Advisor 1: "........My King, their wedding will slow our Italian ambition. Aragonese is now under Castilian's PU. Castilian is much stronger, and we can't take our vassal's land in Sardinia easily."
Skanderbeg: "........Bring me my axe, I need to cut something"



In the same time that year, Ragusa was annexed by our glorious kingdom



also, the Venetian decided that this is the right time to made us as their rival. We welcomed their decision. We will have more reasons to attack them in the future.

 
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Our beloved king fell ill while our army still fighting the Hungarian army.
and he passed away the next year.



also, because our beloved heir was still young, we entered an awful regency
oddly enough, we got the die please die achievement from this regency



March on the same year Hungary surrendered and we gave some of their lands to our vassal, Serbia



after coring Ancona, Umbrian culture is accepted by our kingdom.
our time for Italian domination is nearing



but, the day after that we received very bad news.
France, big kingdom on the west, which we never had any contact before suddenly entered coalition against us.
we were very confused with this and felt very scared since we didn't have king at this time..



fortunately, even though our regent didn't have good adm/dip/mil skills, he had bravery.
so, even though huge coalition already formed against Albania, he still took risk and thought about the next route of expansion in Italy by fabricating claim to our rival, the catholic pope



King Dukagjin took the throne in the next year. with his superior military skills, our Italian dream will become reality.



we decided to attack the catholic pope and take rome, our next objective before they joined the big coalition. we also called our eastern ally, Poland to help us with this war.





General Lulezim took the lead and decided to kill all the pope's army because he's not interested in pope's man.
the battle was one sided for our side



meanwhile in the capital, our military and infrastructure advisor consulted the boy king about the plans to strengthen our kingdom's defense against future enemy. King Dukagjin ordered to fortify the border provinces first because it will serve more important roles in our future expansion plans



because of the absence of the army, some mercenaries who ran away from the war decided to rape and burn Ragusa provinces.
unfortunately, our army was too far to return because the italian HRE states refused to give us military access. so, we can't do anything about the thing...



we took Rome from the pope in 1475 and because of it's value and richness, we decided to annex and make it as our kingdom's province.
our people need wealth, while god didn't need it.



 
because we decided to annex the catholic pope's golden throne, scraped it and used the gold to pay mercenaries for future expansion plans, suddenly all the catholic nations hated our guts.





can't they understand that the catholic pope did nothing to our people?

also, I think we are blessed with genius generals. we got another new joust champion which could lead our army in the future



meanwhile, the castilians managed to ward off their peasants' revolt by killing thousands of innocent people... poor peasants..



On March 1477, the new Holy Roman Emperor was chosen by the elector. As a member of the Holy Roman Empire, our king went to the emperor's seat in Wien to give formal greeting



Meanwhile, in the same year we finally made Roma as our core. we wouldn't let the filthy pope retake it again from us



Also, our brilliant diplomat's action made our little nation getting more attention in the Europe as an emerging regional power. we are getting stronger now.



long period of peace also made our people to give more focus in agriculture. we got really good harvest in 1478.
we decided to use the income gained from the harvest to improve our administrative system for our people's sake



we decided to give more attention to our army's quantity now. more soldiers are always good.





because of good relations with our western neighbors, they decided to share their secret knowledge of renaissance. we could use this to our advantage.



again, we used this knowledge to improve our kingdom's administration.



on the same year, we acquired our second italian vassal without shedding blood



our faithful ally in france called us for an offensive war against the burgundian. we accepted the call to arms but our diplomat already told the french king that we will only send armies when needed.



even though we already took control of rome, it seems that the lombard ethnicity still didn't like us. they threatened the government to give them more autonomy.
to prevent more bloody conflict, we decided to give rome more autonomy for the time being



in 1496, we decided to retake our vassal's cores in sicily. we asked our french friend to help again this time and they happily accepted it.





our navy and naples' navy wiped the portuguese fleet in the engagement in messina strait



with superior number, capable general and superior miltech, our army destroyed the aragonese army which stationed in sicily.



we managed to take romagna from the catholic pope and forced them in exile out of italy



during the war, one of our general died of old age. we mourned this loss and hoped that we will always have capable man to lead our forces.



in 1500, castile surrendered and agreed to pay for war reparation and returned naples' cores back to our vassal



this war made the castilian angry and they decided to make us as their rival.



nevertheless, our expansion in italy is looking better. all italy will soon be united under Albanian rule.