Slow Role-Playing Style Game - House-Rules

Warning! Long post ahead!

Dunno how many people out there are into playing a slow Role-playing style game. But I thought it'd be interesting to hear some of your house-rules and ways you play in such a manner. I'll share mine first.

Mods Used:
-Lusted's Land to Conquer v2.0 (modifed so Portugal only has Lisbon but gets extra money units to compensate)
-Horsearcher's Skymod_blood mod
-Dearmad's Titles, Civil War, Princesses, Privy Council v1.5a
-Shaba Wangy Diplomacy Mod 1.4

Settings:
-Faction = Portugal
-M/VH
-Manage all settlements
-1 year = 2 turns

Basically, I like to try to play as "realistic" as game possible. Here are some of the concepts I use:

Faction Organization:

Privy Council:
-Members
- King - Faction Leader
- Marshal of the Grand Royal Army - Faction Leader (or by appointment)
- Counsellor of Foreign Affairs - Diplomat (or by appointment)
- Chancellor of the Exchequer - Merchant (or by appointment)
- Minister of Intelligence - Spy (or by appointment)
- Lord Regent of Lisbon - by temporary appointment

-Basically, the idea here is that these are all the king's men - his trusted advisors. The king ultimately has final say over all decisions effecting the realm, but these men should be present during the decision-making process (e.g. whether to declare war, what diplomatic missions to undertake, regions to focus intelligence gathering, etc.). If the king is away from the capital, he may appoint a regent in his stead. The council can then act on all matters except those concerning military deployment. If no regent has been appointed, the council can take no action on their own without authorization from the king.

-The council sits in the faction's capital city or wherever the king resides, unless in case of emergency, in which case it can sit in any city/castle safe deemed from enemy forces.

Alliances:
-Alliances may only be offered if expressly authorized by the king.
-Alliances may only be accepted if the king is sitting in the castle/city the foreign diplomat has presented himself to.
-Alliances may only be broken by formal declaration of cessation of alliance (i.e. no unilateral breaking of alliances by act of war). This is subject to an exception if the king himself decides to attack an allied faction. Basically, generals or family members are not to enter a state of war with an allied country unless authorized by the king.

War:
-An act of war against a fellow Catholic country in good-standing with the Papacy should be preceded by a formal declaration of war (i.e a demand for the contested region or else face attack offer)
-An act of war against a Christian country should be preceded by a formal declaration of war
-An act of war against a rebel or Muslim territory need not be preceded by a formal declaration of war

Foreign Embassies:
-A foreign embassy (i.e. a diplomat) must be established at the capital (or castle/city where the king is residing) of any allied faction.
-A foreign embassy (i.e. a diplomat) must be established at the Vatican City.

Military Excursions in Muslim Lands:
-On all military excursions in Muslim lands, the military leader must take with him a member of the clergy
-After all successful military excursions in Muslim Lands, the governor must erect a church if the region is lacking one.

General Rules for Playing:

I am going to try to play from the point of view of the individual characters and not as some omniscient overseer with all the information on the map at his disposal. Basically what this means is that I can only act with the information any particular character has at the moment.

So say the King has decided to send his minister of intelligence to gather information on troop strength in Cordoba. I cannot send in forces until after the spy has returned to report his findings to the king (whether in Lisbon or afield in anticipation of impending attack).

The idea here is that this will force me to expand slowly and somewhat historically accurately (i.e. no throwing all my troops on ships and sending them to conquer London the first turn).

Because I can only act on information my king and his council have at any moment, I anticipate having to establish a vast spy network throughout Europe and abroad. I will have to use a bit of a pony express system whereby each Spy carries the information with him until it reaches the King.

So Spy #1 gather troop strength information on Antwerp and passes it on to Spy #2 in Paris who passes it on to Spy #3 in Toulouse region who passes it on to...you get the idea. I will also have to develop a strong navy to act as transportation for my information network.

Keep in mind that anyone can act as messenger. So a spy could pass on the information to a nearby wine-trading merchant who can carry it to a diplomant, and so on. Essentially, every character on the map can be used to give the king the information he needs to act for the benefit of his kingdom.

I'm not interested in rushing my armies to take Cordoba right off the bat. I suppose that could be possible, but since the AI is already at so much of a disadvantage, I need to limit myself to acting on what the King would know given all the resources he has at his disposal.

So no double-clicking on a city you don't have anyone near to see number of units and if it's small enough sending the first available army that way. We need to gather information first. Or no double-clicking on foreign fleet off the coast to see if it contains an invasion force.

House-Rules:
-NO RELOADING!!
-No adoption of anyone over 25 years of age. Adoptions are only to be undertaken for exemplary young men with promising attributes. And then only when the royal line is in danger of dying out, (i.e. wife past child-bearing age, no family members who will likely come-of-age before king's life ends.
-Armies can only be led by generals unless:
a) The army is comprised of reinforcements.
b) The army is dispatched to defend an invasion force
c) There are no generals aside from the King left.
-No standing mercenary armies. Mercs may be recruited freely but must be disbanded after succesful military excursion.
-All cities/castles must have a garrison of at least two militia units at all times, but a city can never have more than five. A castle may contain the maximum number of units allowed.
-Castles have to be specialized - 1) siege/infantry 2) siege/ranged 3) siege/cavalry.
-Can only auto-resolve sieges on Rebel cities/castles. Otherwise, must fight.
-Merchant forts allowed only if stationed with garrison of at least one unit.

Sorry again for the long post. I'd be interested in hearing anyone else's thoughts. As soon as I test to see if there are any bugs with the mods I plan on using, I'll probably start up a game as Portugal.