For the Cross - A Norman AAR

[Ignoramus]

This is my first AAR. It is as the Normans(Sicilians) recreating the First Crusade.

My Rules:

- No attacking the Papal States.
- As soon as Jerusalem becomes a Crusader target, then the king will petition the Pope to send a Crusade to Jerusalem.
- If this takes too long, then the Crusade will be directed against Antioch.
- No attacking the Byzantine Empire, instead an alliance and friendly relations are to be sought.
- The route of the Crusade shall be as follows: The Crusade will cross the Adriatic at the "heel" of Italy via a fleet. The Crusade will then march overland to Constantinople where it will cross to Anatolia. It will then march to Iconium via Nicaea. Iconium must be taken before the Crusade proceeds any further. Then the Crusade shall march to Adana, which shall be left alone unless it has been captured by the Turks. Then the Crusade shall proceed to Antioch. Antioch must be taken before the march south to Jerusalem cna proceed. Then finally the Crusade will march south to Jerusalem and capture it.
- There can be more than one general going on the Crusade.
- No Catholic faction is to be attacked before or during the Crusade. If the faction attacks first, then only defence will be conducted until the conclusion of the Crusade
- Any territories captured in Anatolia except Adana must be given to the Byzantines.

Expect the first update soon!

[Magraev]

It sounds like you should make more than one crusade to accomplish all that.

Historically the byzantines were victims of crusades, so why dissalow some minor looting of their lands?

I wish you luck on the crusade, the normans have one of the most interesting unitrosters imho.

[katank]

Sounds pretty interesting. However, your route will most likely result in massive desertion as you'll be heading away from the crusade target a good deal of the time. You might want to reconsider.

A gamier approach is simply a crusade to Antioch ASAP and then carve out a kingdom of heaven from there. I tried that in my Sicilian game and it was quite interesting.

[Ignoramus]

I'm managing it alright so far in my test run. I have a spy with me, and though it requires a lot of saving and reloading I've managed to take Iconium(sold it to the Byzantines) and am about to assault Adana - all without desertion yet.