Trapping the king

[Imperial Buffoon]

Hi,
Just pulled off something that may be of interest, but I'm still wondering why.
I'm playing an Aragon/Early/Hard campaign. Got Valencia by bribing el Cid and Navarre. The Spanish ally with me, then attack Valencia, I retreat and attack to take advantage of the Cid's +2 command and take it back. Then repeat the operation once, they offer alliance only to attack again and this time be repelled.

Now for the interesting bit. I move my best troops from Valencia to Aragon, the Spanish, who had just offered me an alliance (which I accepted) attack Valencia with few but good troops, including the king (Sancho, with 4 command +2 defence and valour 6 or so) and one of his heirs. I lose but manage to thin his troops down. The next turn I raise a mercenary army and invade Castile, where his other heir is, and he retreats. Meanwhile, he attacks Valencia castle so awkwardly the first heir dies and the king's unit gets severe damage.
The year after, he attacks Castile with all his troops from Leon, but the King chooses to stay in Valencia. I beat him in Castile (this was the only challenging battle of the lot given that I had no chance in either battle in Valencia), killing the second heir, the year after the King, trapped between a rock and a hard place, faces me in open ground in Valencia where I take care of him.

Now, I guess this can be used as an opening "capture the king" move for Aragon, although this King won't surrender so you need to either wait 'till he dies or make him run away before to lower morale.

I was wondering, however, why are the Spanish so insistent on Valencia? And is it a feature that in hard they'll assault castles or does the AI actually care about ex-comm?

Just a couple of random thoughts...though I may get to understand my girlfriend before I understand MTW's AI... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
IB

[katank]

that's interesting.

on hard? how did you get enough cash for navarre and the cid?

I always take navarre on first turn with initial troops, towers and inn there.

I will sometimes bribe the cid but always hit toulouse.

if I see any thing good in the inns, I hire it and hit castille with mostly merc army.

I managed to not excommed only once when a spanish civil war broke out and the spanish king was trapped in a castle in castille with his rebel heir in Leon.

other times, I woudl get excommed when I finally took Leon castle.

anyhow, it doesn't matter much and soon I'm crusading the infidel almos.

Bonused knights santiago sure rock.

I can crusade to my heart's content all the way across North Africa and into the Holy Lands.

by the time I finish, I have about 3 stacks of knights santiago alone as well as 4 of order foot and loads of fanatics.

I then sit back and fight a defensive game while teching to lancers.

lancers as soon as you hit high is crazy strong while I would also have bonused chiv knights from toulouse if I like.

[Imperial Buffoon]

Quote[/b] (katank @ May 13 2004,16:47)]on hard? how did you get enough cash for navarre and the cid?
Hmmm, my sentence was misleading, I bribed el Cid but took Navarre by force of arms.

Otherwise, I found the Spanish were very aggressive towards me, but that meant it wasn't difficult to wipe them out without being excommed as they retreated from Castille and were wiped out completely the year after.

The one bad thing about bribing el Cid is that it does leave you in dire straits for cash so after that you need to be pretty agressive (well 7* helps for that :-) and you can't really make war on two fronts that soon.

IB

[katank]

The fact that he costs so much and essentially makes it near impossible to build anything for a few turns on hard and esp. expert means that I find it hard to justify it.

sure he's a good commander, but is it really worth it?

I could simply build up my king and he produces good princes too.

[squippy]

The Spanish are keen on Valencia becuase it is a rich trading province. IMO Aragon with just Valencia and Aragon itself is probably amongst the most productive territories by the sqaure mile. The Aragonese with Valencia are a rival peninsula power to the Spanish; without it they are just a minor power.