A fun experience regarding crusades

Today I continued my last Turkish campaign, and I had a rather fun episode with a french crusade. The french crusade had been camping in Constantinople for years, but it never attacked my two border provinces. The crusade was really huge with some good quality troops in it. The Byz also had two full stacks of +3 armour katanks, varangian guard, byz inf and treb archers +++

I wanted to invade constantinopel, but with those two armies there it could potentially be nasty business. So I attacked with some 4-5 Turc Horse just to see what happened.

The byz sent some byz infantry and treb archers after me, but the main part of the army attacked the french. So I was just relaxing and skirmishing a few byz units while the french and the byz duked it out bad. The byz routed the french eventually and I just withdrew my TH after running out of arrows.

How come the byz allowed the french crusade to enter byz territory in the first place? Anyone else experienced something like this?

Most factions will let a crusade pass through their territory, as long as they're not at war with the faction that launched the crusade. However, when two armies from neutral factions appear on the same battlefield, they will fight each other, since only one side can hold the field at the end. While you may not have realized it when you did it, attacking with a small army was a very clever move, as it ensured a battle between the French and the Byzantines.

Good to know - I have two crusades sitting on my border in my game and all 3 factions are neutral - this could get interesting ;)

A classic case. Because I play the Turks so often I've seen this alot. It's great if you've got e.g. french, italian and german crusades sitting in Bulgaria and a large Seljuk era garrisson of Saracens, Futtuwas, Ghazis, AHC's etc, waiting for them in Constantinople. If they don't attack and decide to sit there, you can wait a few years until their units get a bit more whittled down by desertion, then attack Bulgaria with half of the more mobile part of your force and watch the enemies destroy each other before swooping in to pick up the pieces. Losing the crusades may cause a civil war for those factions involved and could put them at war with each other.

This kind of behaviour also shows up in more common circumstances. For example in my Polish PMTW campaign my puny two-unit-garrison in Pereyaslavl was attaced simultaneously by the Crimean Tatars from Levidia and by a Russian force from Chernigov. Although both intended to hit me and each outnumbered me by about 4:1, I hid in a forest and watched the Tatars batter the Russians (both formed an alliance only a turn or two later :dizzy2:). Later they engaged me but failed to lure me out of the woods, which is why their HA army failed miserably against my Cossacks.:2thumbsup:

On a side note, the AI will behave similarly. If two factions attack a province(no alliances involved), the defenders will back off and watch the two attacking armies battle each other, whereupon they'll slug it out with the survivor. Amusingly enough, you won't be at war with the other neutral AI attacker even if you have crushed their main army including heirs etc.....

Interesting; I never knew this before. Of course, in my games it's rare for two factions (who are neutral with each other) to invade one of my provinces at the same time, so I have very little experience with the phenomenon. Although come to think of it, I've twice had my Egyptians/Fatamids invade the Big C when it had a Crusade sitting there (in addition to the Byz garrison); both times I watched with delighted amazement as the Greeks and Franks proceeded to rip each other to shreds. :inquisitive: :laugh4:

Now I'll have to try and avoid doing that, since I now know it's a bit of an exploit (unless I'm defending, of course). I was usually too chicken to attack Constaninople anyway if there was a Crusade sitting there, so I'll just keep roleplaying that. ~:)

I just had an interesting thought: What would happen if there were two Crusades sitting in Constantinople, both of whom were allied with each other? I'm curious if they'd attack me first, or the Byzantines? Now I suddenly want to fire up an Egyptian campaign and see if I can find out.... ~;p

Here I am trying to get into RTW and Martok & Co are here causing my MTW icon double clicking finger to twitch... :inquisitive:

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Originally Posted by Caravel

Here I am trying to get into RTW and Martok & Co are here causing my MTW icon double clicking finger to twitch... :inquisitive:

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C'mon; do it, Caravel. You know you want to!

[zombie voice]Come, join us....don't be afraid....[zombie voice] ~D

martok:

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I just had an interesting thought: What would happen if there were two Crusades sitting in Constantinople, both of whom were allied with each other? I'm curious if they'd attack me first, or the Byzantines?

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if the two crusades are allied, i would expect the larger one to get the province and the smaller would sit in the same zone with permission from the larger crusade. if they are neutral to each other they may attack one another, but being crusades they may allow each others presence and act as though they are allied.

if a western power non-crusade army was to invade the same turn as a crusade army if the non-crusade army is bigger everything might be okay with the crusade army staying with permission. if the crusade army was bigger then i think they must fight it out. that is because the smaller army can not get permission to stay there like a crusade would.

interesting to test out the theories though.

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Originally Posted by highlanddave

martok:


if the two crusades are allied, i would expect the larger one to get the province and the smaller would sit in the same zone with permission from the larger crusade. if they are neutral to each other they may attack one another, but being crusades they may allow each others presence and act as though they are allied.

if a western power non-crusade army was to invade the same turn as a crusade army if the non-crusade army is bigger everything might be okay with the crusade army staying with permission. if the crusade army was bigger then i think they must fight it out. that is because the smaller army can not get permission to stay there like a crusade would.

interesting to test out the theories though.

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I didn't get any of that :dizzy2:

It seem there's no limit to how long this game treats me with some new experiences:2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Caravel

Here I am trying to get into RTW and Martok & Co are here causing my MTW icon double clicking finger to twitch... :inquisitive:

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Join the dark side, Caravel! We have cookies!

i guess my main point is that crusader armies are treated differently than normal armies in that they can have permission to remain where they really do not belong. with multiple armies involved in a single conquest things can get a little screwy. sorry for the round-a-bout type explanation of what i thought would occur.:juggle2:

the biggest number of factions i have seen at once was in my current xl mod crusader game. i was attacked by 3 factions in a single province at once. the almohads, the french and the sicilians attacked my crusader army in greece. was epic with my 850 crusaders seeing off around 5800 enemy.~:thumb:

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Originally Posted by highlanddave

i guess my main point is that crusader armies are treated differently than normal armies in that they can have permission to remain where they really do not belong. with multiple armies involved in a single conquest things can get a little screwy. sorry for the round-a-bout type explanation of what i thought would occur.:juggle2:

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No offense meant, mate! I had quite a few beers last night, and that's probably why your post seemed less understandable than it normally should ~:cheers:

beers = goodness:2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Biggus Diccus

It seem there's no limit to how long this game treats me with some new experiences:2thumbsup:

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Same with me! Yesterday I experienced for the first time that marrying off princesses is good for something else than sparing me those saddening messages that a fair lady of the royal line just retired as a spinster: I got some province! When the French (to whom two of my princesses were wed) collapsed into utter civil war and were extinguished several years later, one of their former provinces, I think it was Champagne, was occupied by the Dutch (PMTW mod), but they couldn't provide enough garrison troops so there was a loyalist uprising the next turn.....and the loyalists were Polish (my faction)! Don't know if this was a bug but it was cool. (even though they were far too weak to withstand further Dutch attacks with whom I have been at war since....those darn loyalists cost my alliance!)

erm sorry for getting off-topic :embarassed:

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Originally Posted by Deus ret.

Same with me! Yesterday I experienced for the first time that marrying off princesses is good for something else than sparing me those saddening messages that a fair lady of the royal line just retired as a spinster: I got some province! When the French (to whom two of my princesses were wed) collapsed into utter civil war and were extinguished several years later, one of their former provinces, I think it was Champagne, was occupied by the Dutch (PMTW mod), but they couldn't provide enough garrison troops so there was a loyalist uprising the next turn.....and the loyalists were Polish (my faction)! Don't know if this was a bug but it was cool. (even though they were far too weak to withstand further Dutch attacks with whom I have been at war since....those darn loyalists cost my alliance!)

erm sorry for getting off-topic :embarassed:

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And erm ... sorry for replying off topic, but I've still never seen that happen before. I finally saw another faction die out from having no heirs (besides my own), but I had failed to marry off one of my princesses to them before they were gone.

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Originally Posted by Galagros

And erm ... sorry for replying off topic, but I've still never seen that happen before. I finally saw another faction die out from having no heirs (besides my own), but I had failed to marry off one of my princesses to them before they were gone.

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Marrying off your princesses to them doesn't work, IIRC. You have to marry their princesses to get a claim on their lands.

Oh, gotta love free-for-all battles in the regular campaign. Always a sight to behold, and great for some screenshots.

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Originally Posted by Ludens

Marrying off your princesses to them doesn't work, IIRC. You have to marry their princesses to get a claim on their lands.

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Yes, that is correct. Marrying your princess to another faction gains you nothing, except for a possible alliance (if you were only neutral with that faction before). To "inherit" land from another faction, your king and/or prince must be married to a princess of another faction.

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Originally Posted by The Wizard

Oh, gotta love free-for-all battles in the regular campaign. Always a sight to behold, and great for some screenshots.

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Heh. I remember a long time ago during a Danish campaign when I invaded Pomerania. When the battle started, it turned out that only had my allies the Novgorods invaded it as well; but so had the HRE and Polish! ~:eek: The latter two factions immediately started wailing on each other, and then the Novs and I moved in to finish off the survivor (HRE).

(Unfortunately, Novgorod won the province. I had the smaller army, and at the time didn't know that the territory went to the larger force. :wall:)

Neutral factions duke it out in battle while the defender sits back and waits? I haven't seen it, but then again I haven't seen many multiple faction battles.
I had at least one battle which proved different. It was somewhere in the steppes where I (the English) attacked a large rebel force. I was promptly joined by a Byzantine and German force all equal to mine (rebel force was at least twice the size of my force but there were a lot of peasants and woodsmen).

What followed was an decent coördinated attack of our three forces with me taking care of the left flank, the byz of the centre and the germans of the right flank. No soldier of our alliance even dreamed of swinging/trusting/firing his weapon on another soldier of the alliance.

I must admit that I did the least of the killing (mostly cav against spearmen,woodsmen and peasants in woods) and won the province in the end. But in my defence I did isolate their right flank and routed it, took a hell of a lot of prisoners, killed the the rebel general and inflicted a lot of confusion moral loss. Sadly my allies were not impressed, within the decade both the HRE as the Byz attacked my precarious position in the steppes.

BUT as this story shows I have more experience with coördinated attacks than with attacking forces attacking eachother first. But it could be that I was allied to both factions.

An interesting battle there, Phil. I don't think I've ever been involved in a battle with more than one ally before, so it was kind of cool to read your recap.

One thing I'm curious about, however: I wonder how the game determined which faction would take which position in that battle? Given that you were probably invading the province from the west/northwest, it would make sense for your army to take the left flank. But the Byzantines were probably coming from the east/south, and I imagine the HRE would've attacked from the west/southwest. Given that, you'd think it would be more natural for HRE to have taken the center, and the Byz to take the right flank. :inquisitive:

Oh well; it's just an idle curiosity! ~:rolleyes:

The battle was a few months ago, so I don't remember everyone's position. I think you are right about the angles we all went in: me from the north east and the west (I was letting the baltic provinces rebel to train troops, which was mostly cav based at that time), the Byz from the south east and the HRE from the south west.
I have no idea how the game calculates where armies start, but I do notice that my allies start to my right side. Is this coincidence? I don't know.

I just noticed for the very first time that crusades can pass through MONGOL territory freely when their goal is a Muslim province! I was playing Turks in late, and there were several bedraggled crusades coming my way. Well, I thought, at least Bulgaria and Georgia are held by the Horde, perhaps their garrisons will be wittled down a bit. But the German crusade passed through Georgia (...?) without problems and sat in Armenia (Mongol, too) for several turns being afraid of the garrison on the Muslim side of the border. Meanwhile, a French and an English crusade were sitting in Mongol-occupied Bulgaria not daring to attack my large garrison in Constantinople...

Historically, there was an alliance proposal once: Pope Innocent IV. wanted to recruit the Mongols as allies against Dar al'Islam. Seems it worked out fine, at least in my game...

In a recent English Late game I sent a crusade down to (Almohad) Cordoba. My allies the Spanish had a crusade for the territory nested under Cordoba on the Iberian peninsula (can't for the life of me remember the name!) which was also owned by the Almohads, so I figured they could do half the job for me...

The neutral French (not sure why I hadn't killed them yet...) also wanted to play, sending a third crusade down to Algeria.

As soon as it arrived, considerably bolstered by Welsh Longbows and many units of Late Royal Knights, I sent the crusade into Cordoba and the enemy retreated. Too easy.

The next year, the Almohads retaliated with a viciously large army. Whilst my own army was larger, a lot of it wasn't the kind of unit I do well with on the field. Fortunately, the Spanish and the French sent their crusades through my new land in the same year.

We lined up to fight and I was somewhat surprised - and amused - to see the pitiful French force listed as the enemy (especially since I'm sure the briefing screen said otherwise!) The Spanish attacked the Almohads from my left, the French from my right, and I sat there watching (and firing my Longbows!) as they chased each other across the front of my army. I sent in a few cavalry units to capture Almohads and French scum as they fled.

The second wave of the Almohad force must have joined the battle just as the last French were fleeing (the Spanish has retreated long ago). I guess I may have wasted my arrows somewhat on the earlier troops, but that did not worry me - I simply wthdrew them and brought on some good melee and cavalry units in their stead. The Almohad general (a prince no less) long dead, routing the second wave was easy.

Three crusades and another army (unfortunately not a Jihad, which followed ineffectually a couple of years later) - as battles go, this one was pretty different for me!

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Originally Posted by Peasant Phill

I have no idea how the game calculates where armies start, but I do notice that my allies start to my right side. Is this coincidence? I don't know.

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My allies are usually on my right flank as well, but not always.

I suspect it might actually be whoever has the largest army starts in the center/left, and the smaller army gets the right flank. In a Danish campaign from a couple months ago, both I and the Novgorods had invaded Pomerania. I had a smaller army (by about 100 men), and I started out on the right flank in that battle.

I don't consider this conclusive proof of course, especially since 95% of the time it's my faction that has the larger army in allied battles anyway. So since I don't have much to compare the experience to, all I have is a theory; and whether or not it's correct could be difficult to prove. :shrug:

@Empirate: Yeah, I remember that happening to me once in one of my Egyptian campaigns. I was sitting there minding my own business when I spotted a Crusade headed my way (Edessa). I wasn't worried, though, since I knew it would probably have to fight its way through the Khan's territory. So you can well imagine my "WTF??!" reaction when it zipped through his lands with nary a scratch. :wall:

@Zild: Yeah, that's a pretty funky battle you fought! I wonder why the French were listed as an enemy, though. Were you two then at war after the battle, or did you both go back to being neutral?

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Originally Posted by Martok

@Zild: Yeah, that's a pretty funky battle you fought! I wonder why the French were listed as an enemy, though. Were you two then at war after the battle, or did you both go back to being neutral?

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We were at war. Normally war with the French is how I start my English campaigns, but in this case I think it actually turned out to be my downfall - I'd just stretched my troops a bit too thin. I can't recall if I had been in and out of war with them before in that campaign or not - I actually think not, for a very rare change, which made the whole experience even more disturbing...

A less fortunate crusade experience I had (again, recently) was when I sent my (small but adequate) crusade into the target province, not knowing that one of my allies was going to send a force of their own. We won the day but they received the province due to superior numbers.

I expected them to hand the province over to me, given my crusade technically entered the province - but it did not happen! Instead, my crusade (which had helped liberate the target province) was disbanded because the province was back in the hands of the catholics. The loss of influence immediately trigged a civil war that marked the downfall of my empire! I knew my King's influence was low, but I had hoped a cheap-shot crusade would improve things, not put the final nail in my kingdom's coffin!