March Of The Penguins - A Spanish AAR

This is my second AAR/fan fiction. I am playing as the Spanish faction. It is played on VH/VH, vanilla M2TW, no patches. To make things more interesting, I am limiting my army recruitment to peasants only. No other troops will be allowed in my armies save for my generals.

March Of The Penguins : A Spanish AAR
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Prologue
It is the year of our Lord 722. We have endured the rule of these blasphemous Moors for over a decade now. But it appears our prayers have finally been answered. Last year, in their arrogance, the Moors attempted an invasion across the Pyrenees into the Kingdom of the Franks. Our Christian brothers managed to drive the devils out of their lands and back into Iberia. Keen to regroup after such a defeat, the Moors decided to consolidate their power in Iberia before marching again on the Franks. Our leader, Pelayo, had only 300 men loyal to him. An army of over a thousand Moors marched on us here in Asturia. We have been hiding from the Moorish armies for over a decade, but Pelayo was determined to make a stand. He marched his army into the mountains of Asturia and guarded a mountain pass, waiting for the Moors to strike. The Moors were slaughtered as they attempted to break our lines. We had finally bested the devils on the field of battle, and we were now determined to drive them out of Iberia as well. The Reconquista had begun.

The Reconquista, Early Years
It is the year of our Lord 966. No longer mere rebels who run and hide at the sight of the Moors, we have carved ourselves out a small kingdom in Northwestern Iberia. We have made our capitol at Leon. Our expansion has been marred by our impoverishment and internal rivalries. Nearby Castile has been challenging our power, and the western territories of Portugal have tried to claim independence one more than one occasion. But at least we live free of the Moors. Our backwater territories leave much to be desired in terms of real wealth and our leaders have there eyes set on taking Toledo, a major city to the south.

The Taking of Toledo
It is the Year of our Lord 1088. Toledo has fallen to our forces. The city and it's client kingdoms brought new wealth to our impoverished people and mark a major milestone of our Reconquista. Yet while our king Alfonso was fighting the enemies of all of Christendom, our political rivals took the opportunity to strike out against us. Portugal has yet again broken away from our empire and declared it's independence. Worse still, Castile struck at Leon itself and decimated our forces. Leon remained in our hands and Alfonso was able to stamp out the last of his political rivals in Castile, but he was truly devastated that his own people took up arms against him. He therefore passed a new law that declared only the royal family and their entourage of guards were permitted to own weapons and amour. All others, even our own army, were strictly forbidden from owning or even possessing weapons of war. This way, Alfonso would ensure that the Royal Guards would be able to quickly stamp out any signs of rebellion. The flip side of course, meant that our army would have no weapons or armour, and would have to fight with pitch forks and other crude farm implements. An ineffective army perhaps, but Alfonso felt it was the only way. And so the old army was disbanded and a new army of peasants was begun. Recruitment of this new peasant army progressed slowly, even with Leon converted into a castle to speed the recruitment. Alfonso was unhappy with this slow progress and was berating his underling, Fernando.

"Fernando! This half dozen units of peasants you have assembled is unacceptable! How am I to enforce my title of King of Spain with such a force at my command?"
"I am sorry my liege. We have only recently completed our mustering hall at Toledo and converted Leon to a castle. Perhaps we should include a few non peasant units in our army? We could hire..."
"Never! I will not risk a repeat of the rebellion. Continue training peasants as fast as possible. We need to grow our armies quickly."
"My liege, no kingdom will take us seriously with a peasant army at our command. Perhaps you should at the very least think up some terrifying name for our new empire?"
"No! The lower opinion the enemy has of our armed forces the better. I want to lull them into a false sense of security. We shall be the Empire of...what was that strange bird your cousin told me of from his distant journeys? Those flightless birds that waddle around?"
"Penguins?"
"Yes. We shall be the Empire of Penguins. Make the necessary preparations."
"<Gulp> Yes my liege."

The Empire Strikes Back
Since taking Toledo, we have had a uneasy peace with the Empire of the Moors. We had finally assembled a full army of peasants and were preparing to launch a campaign to take the rebel city of Valencia, when the Moors laid siege to Leon. If anything, we had expected A Moorish thrust to come from Cordoba and hit Toledo, not Leon. No matter, our army was close enough to relieve the siege of Leon. We engaged the Moors in the hills outside of Leon.
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Though we outnumbered them about nine hundred to their six hundred, our predominantly peasant army was outmatched. Worse still, the Moors had moved their forces to the top of a hill. By the time our peasants had finished climbing the hill, they were now exhausted and under enemy fire. Our peasants had just gone from ineffective to worthless. It was now up to the Royal Guard to save our capitol from these devils. All five of our Royal Guard units charged the enemy archers. These were easily routed. The enemy spearmen put up a bit more of a fight, but with five of the Royal Guards hitting a single unit of enemy spearmen, they were broken one by one as well. Next, the Royal Guard charged down the enemy general and managed to capture him. With his capture, the moral of the enemy troops began to waver. We sent in our peasant forces at this time to join the assault and the enemy began breaking in droves. Only the enemy cavalry remained who thus far had managed to elude our forces. But with the rest of their army broken, our forces easily routed the enemy cavalry and the entirety of their army as well.
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We ransomed the prisoners back to their Sultan, Tahar, who paid a premium of four thousand gold pieces for their return. With Leon safe and our new army battle tested, their was now nothing to stand in the way of the Reconquista. King Alfonso issued orders to head south, beginning what would come to be known as The March Of The Penguins.

All peasants army? Wow! Good luck to the spanish campaign! Anyway I enjoyed your Egyptian AAR, hope you'll do better with this one!

March Of The Penguins
Before tangling with the devil empire again, we decided to march on Valencia first. With Zaragosa having fallen to the Portuguese, it was the last rebel stronghold in all of Spain. We sent our spy ahead to open the gates for us. When our army arrived, there was no siege stage and we moved immediately to battle. With no hill to climb this time, we would get to put our peasants to work for a change. We sent the entire lot of them into the enemy gate. They were intercepted by some mailed knights and a pair of Jinetes. We didn't want to lose too many peasants so we sent in the royal guards to help. The enemy must have sensed they were being overrun, and brought their archers and spearmen down off of the walls. They must have been trying to withdraw them to the town square. Instead they ran smack into the middle of our advancing Royal Guards. The guards had no trouble cutting them down, but it meant the peasants would be on their own a bit longer. Apparently, the rebel cavalry had enough of being surrounded and withdrew what was left of their cavalry forces to the town square. Their infantry forces were not so lucky and were all cut down. The only full strength enemy unit left was their general. We sent in our peasants ahead to occupy the attention of the enemy units. Then the Royal Guards charged in and cut down what was left. Valencia was ours. We had gained a new peasant training facility as well.

We doubled up the wounded peasant units and marched the remainder down to Cordoba. It was time to teach the devils another lesson in warfare. Apparently they needed it, for they left their capital with minimal defenses. The battle to secure Cordoba was even easier than the battle for Valencia. The city was ours. Even better, Granada had feeble defenses as well. We marched our army south to Granada. With the help of our spy, we were able to take the city in the same year as Cordoba. Things seem to be going extremely well when three pieces of dreadful news hit our empire at the same time.

Firstly, Portugal declared war on us. They wasted no time in laying siege to Valencia. With only one army in our empire and it being stationed at Granada, we would not have time to relieve the siege of Valencia. Secondly, the devils brought the bulk of their army just outside Cordoba. It was a huge force, a full army of enemy troops. They must have emptied their garrisons and had this army enroute to take our cities. Then they turned around when we took theirs. That would explain the minimal resistance we faced sacking their cities. While victorious in the last three battles, our casualties were not light. We were now down to five peasant units. It did not seem likely we could stop this huge devil army. The final bit of bad news: the Portuguese made an alliance with the devils. This was perhaps the most damning news of all.
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"What are the Portuguese thinking? They suffered along with the rest of us under Moorish rule. Are they so blinded by their petty posturing that they would sell themselves to the Devil?"
"I imagine it is more an alliance of convenience my liege. The Portuguese saw our cities vulnerable with our march against the Moors and decided to act on it. They saw a common enemy in us. They would probably turn on each other once we were out of the way."
"They have gone too far this time. Allying themselves with the blood enemy of all of Spain is unthinkable. I do not intend to allow the Portuguese off lightly as my predecessors have done. We will cut down every last one of those rebellious scum and end their insurrection once and for all!"
"Then, you would have us order our army to march on their cities?"
"No, not yet. First we must allow them to cripple themselves by alienating his holiness the Pope. Until that time we will fight a defensive war and drive out the last of the devils from Spain! Order a diplomat to be sent to Rome, in case we need to sway the Pope to our cause with a donation or two."
"Yes my liege."

The next few years brought some interesting developments. We moved what was left of our army to Cordoba to protect the city from the Moors. Shortly thereafter, the devils laid siege to the city. For some reason, the Portuguese lifted their siege of Valencia. We were not sure why. It was too early to be feeling any heat from the Pope. And while their siege force was rather small, we were certain they could defeat our garrison force which consisted of a pathetic two units of peasants. Perhaps they grew wary of the large garrison of peasants massing in Toledo? At any rate, we were grateful for this respite as it allowed us to concentrate on the Moors and finish the Reconquista once and for all. With no other army available, it was up to the garrison of Cordoba to defend themselves from the Moorish siege.

End Of The Reconquista
We saw no reason to sit around and wait for the devils to attack us. We sallied forth and attacked their besieging army. Though we were outnumbered about four hundred to nine hundred, and our peasant forces were completely out classed, we had god on our side and knew in our hearts we would prevail. The enemy lined up their troops with a pair of cavalry skirmishers to our left flank, and the bulk of their army on our right. Their archers and crossbowmen were out in front, spearmen behind them, and their general cowering way in the back. He probably wet himself when he saw the Royal Guards charging out of the gates. First they went after the enemy archers. We only engaged one of them before becoming entangled in fighting their spearmen, probably the enemies exact intention. We had all five of our guards charge one enemy at a time and managed to route two enemy archer units and two enemy spearmen units. But fighting enemy spearmen in a war of attrition is not what we wanted. We sent in all of our peasants to keep the remaining spearmen and crossbowmen busy. We completely ignored the enemy cavalry skirmishers. The Royal Guards decided to go after this coward of an enemy general next. All five targeted him. His army tried to aid him but it was too late, he was killed. With this event the enemy's moral began to waver. With peasants hitting them from the front and the Royal Guards hitting them from the rear, the devil infantry began to break one by one. We ran them all down before turning our attention to the hitherto ignored devil cavalry skirmishers. We charged into them and routed both of them as well. Sadly, we lost one of our precious generals in this engagement. But the battle was ours.
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With one more battle that same year to take care of a small devil reinforcement army, the Moors were finally driven out of Spain. The Reconquista was over, Spain was ours! Only one threat left to deal with before we could claim to be the masters of Spain, those treacherous Portuguese. King Alfonso was determined to see them all cut down like lambs to the slaughter. Join me for me next installment: Silence Of The Lambs.

Silence Of The Lambs
Still wishing to avoid attacking another Christian nation less we risk the wrath of the Pope, King Alfonso spent the next few years driving back the invading armies from Portugal. With most of our peasants killed battling the Moors, we had to send the now depleted Royal Guards off alone. In one such engagement, we were lucky enough to catch the King of Portugal himself, Henrique. He had less than two hundred men with him, and Alfonso took great pleasure in riding Henrique down himself. Still, Alfonso grew tired of waiting for the Pope to take action against these traitors. We had to teach the Portuguese we mean business. Alfonso took the Royal Guards and marched on Lisbon itself. Wishing to avoid as much conflict as possible while in Portuguese lands, we snaked our way past two armies before siegeing Lisbon. We had been training spies like mad in Cordoba for just such an occurrence. They opened the gates before Portugal could bring up their armies to help them. The Portuguese were no match for the Royal Guards and we sacked Lisbon to teach them a painful lesson.

We don't know if the Pope was waiting to see if we were powerful enough to defeat Portugal, or if his ultimate had finally run out, but the year before we laid siege to Lisbon Portugal was excommunicated. We were delighted at this news as we could finish off the Portuguese without repercussions. But after we took Lisbon, the Pope forgave the Portuguese indiscretions and welcomed them back to the Church. He still wanted to see the Portuguese burn in hell, but they were no longer excommunicated. We were back to treading lightly for Alfonso did not wish to anger the Pope. At least Lisbon was ours so we could take out all western Portuguese armies without fear of reprisals. Despite having no peasant support, the Royal Guards were able to accomplish this task. Portugal was quick to respond however and send two armies to lay siege to Toledo and Valencia. They also joined forces with the Moors to blockade every single one of our ports, strangling our trade income.
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With the Royal Guards busy in the west, we had no choice but to engage the Portuguese besieging armies with nothing but peasants. Fortunately our castles spent the last several years training a large number of peasants. We engaged both enemy armies in the same year and drove them back to their lands. One battle was a heroic victory and we gained a Royal Guard unit in the east to lead one of our new peasant armies. We sent one of our eastern armies against Zaragosa and the other against Pamplona. After their defeat in the last battle, we had weakened the enemy armies enough to take Zaragosa without too much trouble. We were delighted again when we laid siege to Zaragosa that the Pope excommunicated Portugal for a second time. But just like clockwork, once the city was ours the schizophrenic Pope had forgave the Portuguese again. Our Pamplona army was defeated and was forced to retreat. Portugal combined all their remaining eastern forces to the defense of Pamplona. Likewise, We combined all our eastern forces for the final battle of Pamplona. Fourteen hundred peasants vs. three hundred Portuguese, mostly knights and generals.

Our spies opened up the gates of Pamplona and soon we had all fourteen hundred of our peasants inside the castle walls. We feared the enemy would mass in the town square, where their moral was strongest and they could cut down any peasants that invaded. Much to our delight, they sent their king in alone to charge into our throng of peasants. As his body guards were dying, the king called for some mailed knights and jinetes to back him up. But even with these reinforcements, they were no match for our overwhelming numbers. We struck down their king and the remaining knights fled:
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We had hoped to rest for a bit as our forces were growing tired, but the enemy allowed us no respite. A fresh general unit charged into our forces joined by the rallied mailed knights. These too eventually broke before overwhelming numbers. This pattern repeated for some time. They would charge into us, break, then rally and start the whole cycle over again. Their few infantry forces joined the assault and were cut down as well. Our men were now exhausted. Even the long lulls between charges were not enough to recuperate our men. Still, the enemy was down to less than ten percent of their original strength and we felt we could risk a charge even with exhausted troops. We were not disappointed. The few troops at the town square were slaughtered and the city was ours. The Portuguese were no more. The sacking of their cities ensured they paid a hundred fold for their treachery. Now Spain was truly ours:
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By the time our diplomat arrived in Rome, the Portuguese had already been eliminated. The Pope was none to happy at this news and did not great our diplomat very warmly.
"So, the wicked have come to my halls to beg my forgiveness. We thought the Spanish were honorable, good Christians. You actions against Portugal tell a different story however."
"Your holiness, it was the Portuguese who rebelled against us, who treacherously made war on us when we were driving the devils out of Spain, and were even excommunicated twice by your own decrees. Surely you would agree they were no friend of Christianity."
"That doesn't mean we wanted to see them all exterminated. You accuse the Portuguese of treachery, but your actions are taking you down the same dark path as well. You would do well to make amends for your sins."
"Your holiness is wise in all things. We do wish to purge ourselves of these sins with a donation to the church of two thousand gold pieces. Also, please, accept this map of all known Spanish territory, may it contribute to your wisdom."
"Perhaps the Spanish are good Christians after all. We gladly accept your donation as restitution for your sins. Go now, and tell your king God smiles on him."

A small donation and the Pope was happy with our faction again. If the Pope is willing to forgive genocide, he may be willing to forgive anything, for a price of course. We will have to keep this in mind the next time some Christian faction annoys us. For now we had other matters to attend to. The devils used the respite we gave them to raise a new army and were invading Spain again. We were sure the Pope would be delighted to see the fall of these people. We left a large army at Pamplona, just incase the French decide to make war on us. We then started concentrating our forces in the south, for it seemed there were Devils Abound.

Devils Abound
The invading army of devils consisted of about five hundred men. At first this was not too much of a concern as we had over eleven hundred men in the area. But the Devil's force was comprised predominately of cavalry and mounted skirmishers, which were difficult for peasants to catch let alone kill. We decided to wait for the Royal Guards to come up to assist in this battle. They had been chasing down rebels and the remnants of the former Portuguese army.
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With the Royal Guards in the battle, victory was a foregone conclusion. We sent our thousand plus peasants forward in a massive charge. Those who stood their ground were cut down where they stood. The Royal Guards rode down the remaining cowards. With the Devils driven out of Spain yet again, the way was clear to invade the Devils' homeland. We took Marrakesh without too much trouble, but another large force of Devils was nearby. At first it looked like we would not have to engage this force. They joined the Jihad that was called against Baghdad. Those slimy devils did not march on Baghdad however. They just used the Jihad to recruit religious fanatics to use against us and used the speed boost to hunt our army down. We joined our army with some reinforcements from Granada and killed this latest devil army. We then marched on Algiers and took what we thought was the final Moorish city. But even with Algiers in our hands, the Moors still lived.

Religious Matters
"Fernando! Are these devils or cockroaches? Every time we think we have killed them all more spring up somewhere else."
"Alas my lord, it appears we are driving them east. With each new territory we conquer they claim another on the opposite side of their empire."
"Then we will have to redouble our drive eastward. We need to take out the last of their territories before they claim more. And what is with that heretic outside of Leon? Did you know he has converted the last four priests we sent to stop him into heretics as well? He is starting a heretic cult in our own capitol, from our own priests! Where is an inquisitor when you need one?"
"It appears this heretic is most persuasive my liege. We should send our cardinal to deal with him."
"Very well. But I fear I will not live to see the end of the Moors Fernando. My health begins to fail me."
"We will carry on in your name my liege."

Our king's prediction of his own demise proved accurate, he died later that year. Ironically, the Pope died the very same year. Luckily, we had two seats in the Cardinal college and managed to carry the vote of our favored Pope. He was elected, and was most grateful for the support we showed him. It took many more attempts to denounce the heretic of Leon. But after years of effort, our Cardinal was finally successful. We should have been careful what we wished for however. Rumors of the heretic of Leon had started to spread and drew the attention of an Inquisitor. He already denounced one of our own priests as a heretic. We scattered all of the Royal Guard and priests in the area before he could denounce them as well. Nice that he shows up after we have already dealt with the matter! Our new king, Rodrigo, made sure to keep the Pope happy, and if our relations ever dropped too low we would raise them with a donation or two. It appears not all the Christian rulers held the Pope in such high regard. Milan and England had already been excommunicated once and looked in danger of becoming so again. Denmark and Hungary were not enamored to the Pope either.

Events Far And Wide
While we were busy conquering the Moors, we kept a close eye on events in Christendom. It appears it was not the French we had to fear but Milan. They had already taken all but two of the French cities, and were marching a full army at Spain! We had spent the last few years raising a second army on the French border, bringing our total armies to three: one in Africa and two on the French border. Wherever it appeared Milan would invade, we would rush our two armies to persuade them to leave. They would then try to go around the Pyrenees and invade from another route. We continued this cat and mouse for a few years when Milan finally declare war on us. Apparently they grew frustrated at trying to catch us off-guard and laid siege to French held Toulouse instead. Toulouse barely held, leaving the French with Reims and Toulouse in their possession. Milan's empire now stretched from Milan to Bordeaux, and north to Angers and Paris. They were laying siege to Rennes as well. This latest act of aggression against France and England persuaded the Pope to excommunicate Milan again. With their latest defeat at Toulouse and their excommunication, this was an ideal time to strike and Milan and stop them before they dominate all of Western Europe.

Rodrigo had been waiting for just such an opportunity. Unlike his predecessor, Rodrigo did not shun the more nefarious methods of war. Indeed it seemed even before Alfonso's body was cold that Rodrigo began training a pair of assassins. They had been practicing on some rebel commanders who made the mistake of camping near Toledo. Year after year they would practice their deadly art on the rebels and their skills began to grow. One of the assassins fell during this training, but the other, Bernardo the Killer, had grown his skills as far as they could go. All he was waiting for was the signal from Rodrigo to begin employing his deadly art. Milan's declaration of war provided just such an opportunity.
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"Bernardo, the time has come for you to let loose your full fury on Milan."
"Did you have a particular target in mind?"
"Yes. All of them. Target every of of their generals and take them out before our armies arrive in their territory. If you encounter a particularly tough target like their king or faction heir, bypass them for now. We need you alive to kill more of their generals and can't risk losing you on a risky target."
"As you command my liege. Milan's generals will make excellent additions to my collection."

Bernardo's "collection" was something that was not spoken of in polite company. He collects personal trophies from his victims. He cuts off the left index finger of each target he has slain. Up until now his collection only included rebel fingers. Now Milan had the honor of joining as well.

We marched both of our northern armies against Milan. One laid siege to Bordeaux and one went north to Angers. Bordeaux's light garrison fell easily, but Milan managed to intercept our Angers army with one of their armies. Bernardo managed to kill the general of this army. Without leadership, their army's moral quickly began to falter and their army was destroyed. Angers then fell to our forces, and the English defeated the Milan army laying siege to Rennes. We began training a third northern army while continuing to battle Milanese counter attacks. Their attempts to wrest our conquests from our hands were unsuccessful. Checked in the west and north, Milan decided to hit Toulouse again. This time they managed to take the city from the French after a fierce battle. Meanwhile, the Pope had grown tired of England's disrespectful attitude and soon they joined Milan in excommunication. The Pope encouraged us to march on England as well so we laid siege to Rennes and took the city for ourselves. Our third army was about to lay siege to Toulouse when tragedy struck. The Pope died.

This was most unfortunate timing. We had just started a war with two of the Pope's most disrespectful enemies and now the new Pope says "all is forgiven". Milan and England were brought back into the fold. He then delivers an ultimatum to us: "Make peace with Milan or be excommunicated yourself." We could not believe the impudence of this little man. We had lost hundreds of lives battling for the honor of his predecessor and now he would have us excommunicated. For not ending a war Milan started no less! Still, we did not wish to upset his holiness, so we sent out peace feelers to Milan. They were most insufferable in their demands. They wanted twenty thousand gold pieces to end the war, a war they were losing! Rodrigo would sooner tear off his own arm then strengthen the Milanese by giving them twenty thousand gold, so he told the Milanese king to go procreate with himself. We then marched the third army on Toulouse and took the city. We had already burned several years off of the Pope's ultimatum, and it looked like we might be excommunicated soon. Fortunately, even this impudent little pope soon saw Milan for what they really were, and excommunicated them again. He then withdrew his ultimatum to us and we were free to continue our war with Milan. A few years later, England was excommunicated as well and we were back in the good graces of the Pope.
Our African army took Tunis and Tripoli and wiped out the last of the Moors as well. All was right with the world.
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Poland had got itself involved in a multi-front war. They were facing Denmark in the west and Hungary in the south. Hungary itself was fighting two other enemies, Venice and Byzantine, and eventually bowed out and sued for peace with Poland. Russia was quick to step in and declare war on Poland however. These two front wars proved too much for Poland and they were eliminated as a faction. This was not welcome news to us as it meant the powerful Danish faction now had no enemy to fight. They had destroyed Poland and made the Holy Roman Empire their vassals. Perhaps they will come to the aid of their vassals in their war with Venice? Or perhaps they will declare war on Russia? Let us pray they do no declare war on us, for we already have our hands full with Milan and England. Rodrigo was contemplating making an alliance with the Danes. The Pope's excommunication of them put an end to that thought however. Our next move would have to be against England, and their great fotress city of Caen.

Peasants? The guys with the pitchforks that are completly plauge ridden cannon fodder?

Lol! That's great! It's so hillarious! And the map shows that you have taken a pretty good portion of map. Lol. I'd bet some Medival rulers would see this and think... why didn't I just send meat after the enemy? I coulda saved so much money! Lol. Excellent!

The Struggle for Caen
Caen was the greatest fortress in all of western Europe, perhaps the world. The English had assembled a mighty garrison to defend the fortress: generals, mailed knights, dismounted Feudal knights, billman, spearmen, militia. What did we have to defeat this mighty force? Peasants. Lots of peasants. Our two northern most armies had been weakened fighting Milan and we combined our best troops into one army. After fighting many battles against the Portugese, Milan, and now England, our armies were starting to gain experience. This, combined with some padded armour and greater numbers saw the effectiveness of our peasant armies rise compared to our early armies we fielded against the Moors. With the remainder of our armies down for retraining, this left only seven units of peasants for our second northern army. Wanting to weaken the garrison of Caen before the final battle, we sent this seven units of peasants to siege the city first. Our spies opened the gates of the fortress and our peasants made a dash for the gate. Some enemy mailed knights came rushing out to intercept us. We killed about a dozen of them when they retreated back inside the fortress. We tried to pursue them but some dismounted feudal knights blocked our path. We killed them too, but now fresh dismounted feudal knights, spearmen, and the rallied mailed knights hit our peasants all at once. This was too much and soon our entire army was routed. Our mission had been accomplished however, we had killed over one hundred and thirty of the enemies most heavily armoured troops. Their garrison was down to five hundred and forty seven men. We had a horde of over eleven hundred peasants, plus three of the Royal Guard as well:
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Our main force moved to siege Caen. Again, our spies opened the gates for us. The remaining dismounted feudal knights moved to block our path. But their pathetic sixty men could not stop our horde of nearly twelve hundred. We came through that gate like a swarm of locusts and enveloped the poor saps standing against us:
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We caught some spearmen units that had saw us and tried to run for their lives. By the smell of things it seemed they had soiled themselves. They were all run down. We decided to sit back and rest for awhile. Some billman came down from the town square but turned around at the sight of us and ran. Our Royal Gaurds ran them all down. Their general came out to play too but we ambushed him from two sides and killed him. Most of them enemy army was dead at this point and a final charge ended the struggle for Caen.

Milan Strikes Back
The horde of troops Milan had under it's control was almost beyond belief. We would destroy a Milanese army of a thousand men and two more armies would spring up to take their place. Rodrigo was convinced they had a forge somewhere that was creating legions of troops as easily as we would fashion a sword. We had to postpone our cross channel invasion of England to take care of this threat from Milan. Our strategy of sitting back and letting them hit someone else had proven ineffective, for they had rebuilt the armies we had destroyed earlier. We would have to take out the rest of their cities and castles if we had any hope of stemming this endless tide of green plague that was infecting our borders. We began with Paris. A large army of nearly nine hundred men from Milan-occupied Paris had marched to our border. They seemed intent on taking Caen. We mached our thousand man peasant army to intercept them. Before engaging, we sent Bernardo in to assasinate their general. Thus they now had a large, high quality army led by a moron:
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We didn't bother with any fancy tactics this battle, we sent our entire line forward in a frontal assault. Our lines were longer then theirs so we had several of our peasant units unengaged at the flanks. We sent these in to flank the enemy. Similtaneously, we sent our Royal Guard unit to charge one of the enemy archer units that was already engaging a unit of peasants. Their archer and one of their flank units broke. This freed up more troops for flanking duty and more enemies began breaking. As more enemy units broke, fewer and fewer of their men were available to hold back over a thousand of our troops. A chain reaction was started until their entire army was fleeing. Our general rode down the cowards and gained himself a heroic victory in which we captured more men then we killed:
https://img249.imageshack.us/img249/9840/motp25asf8.jpg

With this defeat, Paris was wide open to our forces and we took the city with minimal casualites. We then marched our Toulouse army on Marseille and took the city. The next year we marched on Genoa and took it as well. Milan was being defeated on every front. In the north, we had bumped into French occupied Reims and decided not to make war on France. Instead, we send the majority of our army against Dijon and took the city.


The End of England
Meanwhile, we sent a small force across the channel to take London. London's garrison was small and we were certain we could achieve an easy victory. However, It turns out they had a large army just outside the city. We could not defeat the garrison and the army. So we decided to rush the town square as quickly as possible and take the city before their army could come up. Our spies opened the gates of the city and our entire army double timed it into the city. The garrison attempted to bog us down in skirmishes but soon their moral broke and we took the town square. Th enemy army could not come up in time and London was ours. Nottingham had a more significant garrison, and the large army just outside London was still there. England also had other troops scattered around the countryside. The entire English army outnumbered our tiny London garrison by a significant amount, but if we could somehow take Nottingham, the rest of their forces would turn rouge. The Nottingham garrison was significant:
https://img265.imageshack.us/img265/...amenemyac4.jpg

Meanwhile, our forces were pitiful:
https://img265.imageshack.us/img265/...mfriendcj9.jpg

Our spies opened the gates and we got into the city ok, but a squad of mailed knights was waiting for us. Our peasants pushed into the city and slowly began widdling away the mailed knights. The battle was going well when some armoured knights came down off the walls and hit our peasants from the flank. We had to route those mailed knights now before our peasants were widdled away from these two forces. Our Royal Gaurds charged into the flank of the mailed knights and routed them. We were hitting the armoured knights from three sides before they finally broke. The Royal Gaurds chased down the survivors. We stopped to rest our men for awhile when some more mailed knights charged into our mass of peasants. One enemy unit against seven of our units saw them break before too long. The enemy would continue this foolish pattern for some time, charging one unit of their mailed knights or generals into our entire army, breaking, rallying, then starting the whole process up again. By the time the last of their charges ended, we were down to forty peasants left and our Royal Guards were not unscathed either. We decided the time was right for a charge on their town square and we rode down the remaining enemy knights. As we were finishing these off, some billman came up and threatened to hit our weary Royal Guards from the flank. We retreated our forces until our peasants came up. We sent in the last of our peasants to engage the billman in a frontal assault. We hoped they would at least weaken the billman but our peasants were dropping like flies. We charged into the billman from their flank with our feeble Royal Guards, down to less than ten men between the two of them. If the billmen had been fully concentrated we would surely have fallen. Fortunately, the billman were strung out over a large distance and seeing their lead elements overrun by our forces they broke. The battle was ours. Nottingham fell to our forces and the English were no more. The remaining English units turned rouge and would be no trouble to dispatch in the future. Our focus turned back to the mainland, where Milan had made an Indecent Proposal.

Indecent Proposal
Our people had much to celebrate. The English had joined our growing list of defeated foes, we had Milan on their heals, and our empire was now the largest and richest in the world. With our recent conquests of Genoa and Dijon, Milan was widdled down to just two territories: Milan and Bern. Rodrigo was in the middle of deciding which city to hit next when he was interrupted...

"My liege, an emissary from Milan requests an audience."
"Come to beg for our mercy no doubt. Show him in, I am going to enjoy this."
"Greetings King Rodrigo. I represent Count Noddo, heir to the mighty Milan empire. I have come to extend a proposal to you."
"And just why is Count Noddo sending me this proposal? What of his father Duke Gimignano?"
"Gimignano is a simpering fool. His aggressive policies have led us to war on all fronts and now it is the Milanese people who are suffering for it. Over three quarters of our lands are now lost and if Gimignano is left to rule we will surely lose what little we have left. Count Noddo therefore would like you to kill Duke Gimignano. Such a move would enable Noddo to take command of the empire."
<Rodrigo was speechless at this outlandish proposal and just stared blankly at the diplomat...>
"Of course Duke Noddo would be eternally grateful to you for doing this service for the Milanese people. Together our peoples would stand side by side against our common enemies. Noddo would also be willing to send you a gift of five thousand gold peaces for this service."
<Rodrigo continued his blank stare....>
"You need not decide now. If you decided to accept our offer the results will become abundantly clear. I will take my leave of you now and look forward to a profitable future between our two peoples."
<Rodrigo watched in silence as the diplomat left...>
"My liege, are you going to take him up on this proposal?"
"I can't believe their own family members seek to betray each other. It was bad enough when the Portugese broke away from us. But to have a family member betray you?"
"Count Noddo does have a point my liege. If it weren't for Gimignano's aggressive policies we would never have been at war with Milan and their empire would be second only to ours. He has brought disaster to Milan. Perhaps we should consider his proposal. Bernardo is in the area. He may be able to dispatch Gimignano for us."
"Slaying a king is a stretch even for Bernardo's considerable skills. I doubt he would even have a fifty percent chance of success. We need Bernardo too much to risk his capture and execution. If we are going to do this, we should send our army at Genoa to take Milan and kill Gimignano. This way we would be ensured of success."
"Then you are going to accept Count Noddo's proposal?"
"Indeed, this is perhaps the only way we will have peace with Milan. But this slimy business of family betrayal leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Order the army to march on Milan. Let us be done with this as soon as possible."
"Your will my liege."
https://img259.imageshack.us/img259/...ndecentix6.jpg

Our army at Genoa marched on Milan and took the city after a fierce battle. The city was ours, and Gimignano was dead. 'Duke' Noddo took command of the remaining Milanese forces. With the death of Gimignano, the Milanese excommunication was forgiven by the Pope. However it seems Noddo was not happy with the loss of Milan and betrayed our agreement. There would be no alliance, no five thousand gold peaces. Instead 'Duke' Noddo assembled an army and was marching to retake Milan.


The End of Milan
"I should have expected this. Any man who would sell out his own family can't be trusted. Order our forces from Milan to march on 'Duke' Noddo. I want him dead!"
"But sir, his armour heavy army out powers us by a factor of two to one. And Milan is no longer excommunicated. The Pope...."
"You heard me! I will not let this betrayal go unchallenged! Order the attack!"
"Yes my liege."
https://img260.imageshack.us/img260/...enoddoasn8.jpg

We intercepted 'Duke' Noddo's army just outside Milan. Thought the 'Duke' had less than six hundred men and we had nearly nine hundred, our peasant horde was still outmatched against the high quality army Noddo commanded. We fought this battle much the same way as we fought the Milanese's Paris army: A full frontal assault with our peasants and flanking the enemy with our extra forces. The result of the battle was the same as well, a heroic victory for our forces and 'Duke' Noddo was no more:
https://img148.imageshack.us/img148/...dodeadazv0.jpg

With the last of their great armies destroyed, taking Bern was a simple matter and Milan was no more. Our African army had finally completed the long march from Tripoli to Timbuktu and had taken the city. They were now taking the long march from Timbuktu to Marrakesh. With all of our recent expantion, this is how our empire looks now:
https://img255.imageshack.us/img255/3522/empire3ba6.jpg

Following the defeat of our last enemy, we had peace for a scant one year before All Hell Broke Lose.

This is amazing! I don't know how you've managed this just with peasants and generals. Maybe the shield bug has worked in your favour?

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Originally Posted by Ignoramus

This is amazing! I don't know how you've managed this just with peasants and generals. Maybe the shield bug has worked in your favour?

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Yeah, I think the shield bug may be working in my favor. I got the idea to use a mass peasant army during my previous AAR, when my wall of high-quality troops was being overpowered by a pathetic bunch of pilgrims. I decided I wanted to try using a throng of worthless troops myself and see how it worked. They are performing much better than I expected. Especially in siege battles, where the stupid AI charges it's units one at a time into a throng of a thousand peasants. But peasants are doing reasonably well in field battles as well. A full frontal assault often sends the enemy running away after a few seconds of battle, especially against captains and low level generals.

Hey Kublikhan, I at first did not like this AAR as much as the previous ones, but lines like "so he told the Milanese king to go procreate with himself", "devils or cockroaches", "peace feelers", "By the smell of things it seemed they had soiled themselves" brought me back to the fold again. You do have a gift for humororus AARs. Keep it up, please! :)

Czar Alexsandr:

Quote:

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Lol. I'd bet some Medival rulers would see this and think... why didn't I just send meat after the enemy?

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So how exactly do you propose medieval lords read this M2TW AAR? ;)

All Hell Broke Lose
The beginning of our troubles was a Mongol invasion. We had planned to march on Egypt and seize their lands for ourselves. But with the arrival of the Mongols, we turned our African army around and marched on Timbuktu instead. Perhaps after we take Arguin and march back to Egypt the Mongols would have worn themselves out by then. Or perhaps all of Turkey and Egypt will be under Mongol control :/ The second item on our list of pain was a plaque that broke out in Dijon. We still had our main army stationed there and this plague has lasted for years and shows no signs of abetting. Even worse, the plague has now spread to Paris and infected our army there as well. Third on our list of tortures was a declaration of war on us by Venice. We had not had two years of peace before some other godless faction decided to make war with us. We had already routed two of their smaller armies but now a large force was laying siege to Milan. With the bulk of our northern armies quarantined in Dijon and Paris, we had little left to face Venice with. Fourth on our list of misery, Scotland declared war on us. Not only are our forces in England miniscule, but Scotland is one of factions most beloved by the Pope. We had routed two of their smaller forces out of our territory and refrained from invading Scottish territory, hoping the Pope would soon either get Scotland to stop this war or excommunicate them. Instead, our relations with the Pope went down and Scotland's went up! We would have to have a serious talk with this mockery of a Pope soon. Next on our list of reasons to wish for death, a Danish army was marching our way. Denmark was both large and powerful, and they had already passed through two rebel territories and appeared likely they were marching on us. War with the Danish was imminent. Worse still, Venice and Denmark declared a truce, likely so the could concentrate more of their efforts against us. Denmark had France as an ally and the Holy Roman Empire as a vassal. If they made war on us, the number of factions we were at war with would jump from two to five. We are barely hanging on in a two front war. if forced to fight on five fronts, our forces would collapse. Perhaps the most devastating news of all, our Great King Rodrigo had died. He had lead our people to countless victories, but now he was gone. Our new leader, Johan, would have many more crisises to deal with than his predecessors.

The first matter to deal with was the Danish. We must stop this war from happening at whatever the cost. The only forces we have along our northeastern border are all under quarantine.
We had intentionally left Reims under French control and Bruges and Antwerp under rebel control so we would have a buffer against the Danish. But the Danish bypassed our buffer territories and sent an army directly to our border. We had not expected such brazenly aggressive actions, but in hindsight we should not be so surprised. Milan pulled the same trick against us. Truly we did not understand why other factions hated us so much that they would bypass rebel territories so they could make war on us. While still technically at peace with Denmark, our relations with them had dropped to very poor. We sent a diplomat to the Danes and offered them a gift of ten thousand gold peaces. This immediately changed our relations from very poor to perfect. The Danes turned their army around and declared war on Russia instead! Just to be sure, we sent a gift of six thousand gold to the Holy Roman Empire as well.

Their seemed little we could do about the plague in Dijon and Paris. We have never heard of a plague lasting this long before. A curse on Milan for bringing this blight down on us! If only our armies were not trapped in the city it would not be so bad. We will have to make do with other troops for the time being.

The Mongols were not an immediate threat to us. We were content to take the last of the rebel cities in northwestern Africa and let the Mongols and Egyptians slug it out. We did start training a second African army however. We could not delay our conquest of the Holy Lands indefinitely.

The Struggles against Venice
The Venetians were the greatest threat our empire now faced. With the route of their two smaller armies, they finally brought an army big enough to challenge us. Milan was under siege and they had more troops on the way. Bernado the Assassin was perhaps the only Spaniard happy about this war with Venice. He had grown tired of killing off priests and diplomats and was waiting for more of a challenge. Many Venetian fingers found their way into his collection and he was instrumental in keeping the Venetian armies lead by inexperienced captains while their generals lay slain. Our armies were outnumbered but still fought heroically. Our armies brought us victories year:
https://img405.imageshack.us/img405/...big1ya2.th.jpg
After year:
https://img402.imageshack.us/img402/...big3am4.th.jpg
After year:
https://img248.imageshack.us/img248/...ig4bab7.th.jpg

Our Royal Guards and their peasant support had finally routed enough of the Venetians to go on the offensive. We took Bologna from the Venetians, but they had a large army guarding the bridge to Venice. We knew the Venetians were aggressive fools so we just sat back and waited for them to throw themselves at us. After defeating them, they were down to less than a thousand men guarding Venice, 300 guarding the bridge and about 700 in Venice itself. We only had 500 men ourselves, mostly peasants, but we were determined to take Venice once and for all.

The Battle For Venice
We could not attack Venice directly because of their army at the bridge. But when we attacked their army the garrison of Venice came out to meet us as well:
https://img409.imageshack.us/img409/...enice1bbx3.jpg

We setup our army as a crescent at the bridge and waited for the Venetians to throw themselves at us. Their pathetic army of 300 was slaughtered from three sides as they left the bridge:
https://img185.imageshack.us/img185/...ice2lr8.th.jpg

Now we had to defeat a larger force of 700 men, and this time they had archer and artillery support. Their foolish general and two other units charged across the bridge and were slaughtered. But our forces now came under archer and artillery fire. They had a few units of spearmen defending their archers so a direct frontal assault looked like it would have few chances of success. Worse still, with us having no archers or artillery and they having plentiful amounts, we could not attack them at range either. We fell back outside their artillery range to consider our options. The Venetians fell back as well to just outside the bridge. Perhaps if we charged across the bridge quickly enough we could get our army onto the other side before their spearmen could react. But it was not meant to be, as our throng of peasants was crossing the bridge, their spearmen moved to intercept us. Flaming trebuchet shots were flying overhead as we clashed with the enemy spearmen. Deciding we would rather take our chances with the enemy spearmen then risk getting hit by a trebuchet shot, we bunched our entire army against the enemy spearmen. They dared not fire on us less they risk hitting their own troops. Eventually the enemy spearmen were defeated by overwhelming numbers and their archers and artillery were now open to attack. Our Royal Guards immediately ran down the trebuchets to end the threat there. Meanwhile their archers and crossbowmen started breaking one by one until suddenly their entire army was routing. We took nearly three times as many prisoners as slain and the battle was ours:
https://img265.imageshack.us/img265/...enice4bbg4.jpg

With no armies or garrisons left, we simply walked into Venice and sacked it. The Venetians still had a number of territories under their command and even now an army was marching to reclaim Venice, but we had achieved a major victory today. No longer did we fear Venice and soon they would meet the same fate as do all who challenge us. While our Italian armies were fighting the Venetians, another sort of battle was being waged in the Papacy. Our former allies, along with their Scottish puppets, were becoming a Scourge.

Scourge
The next matter to deal with was Scotland and the Pope's backing of them. We do not know why the Pope would side with Scotland against us, Scotland is the aggressor here! Perhaps the Pope is still bitter with us for exterminating the last of the Milanese, especially since they were not excommunicated anymore when we exterminated them. We sent a small gift to the Pope and brought our relations with the Pope neck and neck to those of Scotland. We would just have to continue to fight a defensive war until the Pope came to his senses. Meanwhile we will try to reinforce our armies in England. This will take time, as most of our cities in western Europe are completely tapped out in terms of peasant recruitment.

Our army in England was getting slowly reinforced with peasants from the mainland, but these mainly served to replaced peasants going back to the mainland for retraining. Our sole English castle at Nottingham could not keep up with the casualties that were pouring in. We had managed to fight off the Scottish invasions thus far, but the Pope continued to show a blind eye to their transgressions. It appears the Pope was happy to take our gold but disinclined to do anything to stop Scotland from making war on us. King Johan was growing impatient and sent our diplomat to speak with the Pope again.

"Your eminence, thank you for seeing me."
"Back again so soon? We did not expect to see you again this quickly. But perhaps we should not be so surprised. The sinful Spaniards have many crimes to purge themselves of. Have you come to make restitution for your crimes with a gift to his holiness?"
"No. We come to inquire why you are allowing the godless Scottish to make war on us."
"Watch your tongue! The Scottish people are most beloved by us and lead by a divine mandate. You would do well to follow their example."
"Waging war on other Christian nations is the example you would have us follow?"
"No, you seem to have a firm grasp of that skill all on your own. Being content with what god gives you is the example you should follow. Why have the Spanish spread through France, England, northern Africa, northern Italy, and more? Your expansive nature does not sit well with us."
"It was your own predecessor that urged us to declare war on England after they were excommunicated. And we only made war on Milan and Venice to defend ourselves. They started the war after all."
"Enough. Your excuses are growing most tiresome. Know that your continued expansion and sacking of cities will no longer be tolerated by us. Other nations that oppose such ruthless expansion will see nothing but support from his holiness. Leave us now, our tolerance level of sinful Spaniards such as yourself has reached its limit."

King Johan was not happy with the report the diplomat sent back. He was discussing the situation with his new advisor, Gomez.
"So, the Pope seeks to back our enemies because he fears us. We shall have to adjust our tactics Gomez."
"What would you have us do my liege?"
"No more gold is to find it's way to the Pope. For all we know he is giving it to our enemies. And order our English armies on the offensive. We will not sit idly back as they kill us off one by one."
"Buy sire, This strategy will undoubtabley bring us into conflict with the Pope and possible excommunication."
"We shall see. Scotland has no problem waging a war against a fellow Christian faction. Our relations with the Pope are high enough to get us through a few rough years with the Pope. With any luck, Scotland will be gone by then, or the Pope will have died. If not, we may have to expidiate this Pope's journey to the hereafter."
"<Gulp>. Yes my liege."

Our English army wasted no time in laying siege to York and taking the city. Next, we marched on Edinburg where King Farquar himself was defending the city. We had fresh reinforcements from the mainland whereas the Scottish had depleted many of their armies in their invasions years earlier. With only one hundred sixty three men available for the defense of Edinburgh, we outnumbered them nearly three to one. We had no trouble taking the city and killing the Scottish king. Inverness, the last substantial Scottish holding in Northern England was left completely defenseless. We have no idea why they would leave such a grand fortress without defenders but the Royal Guards rode into the city and sacked it the same year Edinburgh fell. The only Scottish held city left in England was Caernarvon. While we were busy sacking Edinburg and Inverness, the Scottish marched an army to lay siege to York. We rushed a unit of peasants down to help, but they had to wait for the rest of the army to come up. The Scottish lifted their siege and chased our peasants down instead. This bought us time to reassemble our army at Edinburgh and we routed their army. The surviving cowards fled to their navy that was anchored just off the coast. We then marched our army to lay siege to Caernarvon. We had the Scottish on their heals while events elsewhere in the empire drew our attention.

Trials and Tribulations
The Pope was not happy with our continued aggressions. Our relations continued to drop to the point where the Pope sent an emissary demanding an explanation.

"His holiness demands to know why you continue your expansion when we warned you against such actions."
"Why? Because I can thats why. I am instigating new policies: any faction that attacks us will be destroyed. Any faction that annoys us risks the same fate as well."
"His holiness demands a large restitution of gold as compensation for your crimes. His holiness is also issuing a formal notice to you: end your wars with Scotland and Venice or be excommunicated."
"Excommunicated? Golly gee not that. You mean I won't be able to give the Pope any more gold for his 'support'? All my 'restitution' payments would not end up in the hands of my enemies either? Well we certainly can't have that. I will stop the wars immediately!"
"Your sarcasm belies the seriousness of this ultimate. You will be cut off forever from the church, you will find it more and more difficult to rule your empire."
"Let me worry about ruling my empire. And as for you, you may tell his holiness that I will give him his gold when I see him in hell! Good day to you!"

This latest exchange of harsh words only worsened the diplomatic fallout. The Pope offered one last olive branch to our empire: Join the Crusade against Constantinople and wash away your sins. But king Johan was far too angry with the Pope to accede to his demands. Besides, Constantinople was currently held by our allies the Turks. We did not want to make war with our only ally at the behest of the Pope. We had made such mistakes in the past, no more. Instead, we must prepare for the coming war with Denmark and their proxies: the French and the Germans.

The Danish did not sent the bulk of their forces after Russia as we hoped. Instead they took the two rebel cities of Bruges and Antwerp. They then started massing armies on our border. It seemed we had only bought ourselves a brief respite with our bribe. It appeared Denmark was preparing for war with us. The Russians offered us an alliance and we gladly accepted. The enemy of my enemy is my friend after all. Denmark also made an enemy of the Turks by joining the Crusade against Constantinople. The Danes took the city, but we have no further intelligence on that front. Hopefully the Turks are wearing Denmark out over there. Battle lines are being drawn across Europe as factions are polarizing into two camps. On one side rests the Penguin Alliance consisting of: Spain, Russia, and the Turks. Standing against them is The Greater Denmark Coalition consisting of Denmark, France, and Germany. Scotland and Venice are not officially part of the Coalition, but their ongoing war with Spain makes them highly influential "unofficial" members. Likewise Hungary is not an official member of the Alliance. But their ongoing war with Venice made them friends of the Alliance. Byzantine on the other hand is trying to hedge its bets by allying with Russia and Venice while making war with Turkey and Hungary. Such diplomatic maneuvering could undermine the strength of the alliance. We shall monitor this situation and see how it developes. It may be necessary to break Russia's alliance with the Byzantinizes in order to prevent alienating Turkey and Hungary. Such events are far from our borders however and we have more pressing concerns. The Pope makes no secret of his disdain for the Alliance, and has offered assurance to members of the Coalition that they will have Papal blessing in any war against the Alliance. Sicily is perhaps the only European power that has managed to stay aloof of both camps and is strictly neutral. For now, we shall turn our attention to the lesser members of the Coalition for the time had come to Seperate The Wheat From the Chaff.

Separating the Wheat from the Chaff
The plagues in Paris and Dijon have finally ended. At last our Northern armies are free from quarantine. Meanwhile we have been marching other reinforcements from Spain to the front lines. We had not squandered the expensive peace we bought with the Danes and have significantly reinforced our border. But before we make war with Denmark, we must first deal with the two weaker members of the Coalition: France and Germany.

The French have been massing the bulk of their army on their border near Paris. With only Reims in their possession, the French would be easy to dispatch. We sent a small force from Dijon to take Reims, bypassing their large army entirely. Our spies opened the gate and the city was ours. The French were no more. Their army turned rouge. We could dispatch them at our leisure. More worrisome, Reims was infected with plague. Thankfully this plague ended quickly and our army did not have to endure a long quarantine.

The Germans had four cities in their possession, Metz, Staufen, Innsbruck, and Nuremburg. All were castles save for Nuremburg which was a city. We originally had not planned to assault the Germans with the Scottish and Venetian wars still raging on. But they managed to slip an army behind our lines and were roaming freely through our territory near Dijon. This could not be tolerated. The bulk of the German army was at Nuremburg, with a smaller force annoying us at Dijon. Their castle garrisons were pathetically small, one or two units each. We sent our spies into the German castles to open the gates for our armies. We then positioned two of our armies to strike at Metz and Innsbruck simultaneously. Both castles easily fell to our forces. The Royal Guards at Metz then marched on Staufen and took it that same year as well. All three castles fell to our forces. Meanwhile some reinforcements from Spain took out the marauding Germans that were near Dijon. All that the Germans had left was Nuremburg. Our spies entered the city and we were horrified by what we found, they had nearly three full armies at Nuremburg! Two armies just outside the city and a slightly smaller garrison in the city itself. Worse still, the Pope was true to his word and issued an ultimate to the Alliance: Make peace with the Coalition or be excommunicated. We had Scotland on their knees and the Germans were down to one territory, we could not stop now! We brought both our Metz and Innsbruck armies to approach Nuremburg. If we were lucky, we might be able to slip by the powerful German armies and assault the garrison directly. But fate would not be so kind. One of the powerful German armies intercepted our Innsbruck army. We tried to withdraw but they hunted us down and forced us to fight. Less than six hundred of our peasants vs over one thousand of their troops.

We positioned our army on a hill, forcing the Germans to climb a steep slope to engage us. They sent some archers and crossbowmen up the hill to fire on us at range. We charged them and routed them all. Next they sent their general after us. We killed all of his bodyguards but the coward fled the battle and got away. Now we were forced to fight the bulk of the German army. Several spearmen units charged us and their archers and crossbows tried to provide support fire. They were having trouble finding their mark however since they had to shoot up a hill. Our entire army now engaged the enemy spearmen and managed to route some of them. Some mailed knights and dismounted sergeants tried to stabilize their line but these too were routed. With their spearmen dead, the Royal Guards had no trouble riding down the remaining archers and crossbowmen. The battle was ours:
https://img254.imageshack.us/img254/...man1va4.th.jpg

The Germans allowed us no respite however and marched their second thousand man army against the remnants of our once mighty Innsbruck army. With less than three hundred men we knew we had no chance. We order the Royal Guards to do what damage they could but to stay alive. They barely escaped with their lives, but less than one hundred fifty peasants made it out alive. They had accomplished their mission however. With one German army destroyed and the other out of position, we could now easily overwhelm the Nuremburg garrison with our second fresh army. In order to travel at the fastest speed possible, only the Royal Guard units traveled from Metz and Staufen, our peasants stayed behind. Still, this was the largest number of Royal Guard units we had ever assembled in one place: ten Royal Guards and their entourage of body guards. With such a force at our command, the Nuremburg garrison did not stand a chance. They were all slaughtered and we sacked the city. The Germans were no more. Their armies turned rouge and we could eliminate them at our leisure.

In Africa, Timbuktu and Arguin were firmly in our possession. We converted them to castles so they could train some peasant garrisons. We had some trouble in Arguin with unrest and had to leave the Royal Guards there longer than we would have liked. No matter, the Mongols seemed to be taking their time with their invasion and had not even engaged the Egyptians yet. We had plenty of time to link up the Royal Guards with the two armies stationed at Tripoli. Both of our spies in Egyptian territory had died however. We are in the process of converting Tripoli to a city so we can train some new spies and see what the Mongols have been up to lately.

Meanwhile, our English army sacked Caernavon. The next year they boarded our navy and sailed for Dublin. Our spies opened the gates and took the city effortlessly. The Scottish were no more. The Pope wasted no time in making good on his threat and excommunicated king Johan from the Catholic church. It was worth it however, two members of the Coalition had fallen and a third enemy of Spain was gone as well. Seeing as how we were now fair game for any Catholic faction, the Danes wasted no time in declaring war on us and laid siege to Rheims. More worrisome, our people have grown upset with our King's excommunication status and several cities are threatening revolt. We must now decided if we are to swallow our pride and beg the Pope for forgiveness, or weather this storm of revolt of our cities. Both prospects make us nauseous. Our border with Denmark:

https://img243.imageshack.us/img243/...anyaba6.th.jpg

And a map of our current empire:
https://img248.imageshack.us/img248/...ermanybpd8.jpg

Sorry for the delayed posting, but I decided to finally finish this AAR.

Excommunicated
With the fall of three of our empire's enemies, we had grown supremely confident in our abilities. Yet things had gotten quite messy in our empire. The remnants of the German army had turned rouge and were blocking most of the roads in and out of German territory. The Danes were laying siege to Rheims with a powerful army and we had no troops in the area to relieve the siege. Sicily broke their neutrality and sided with Denmark against us. Their declaration of war came quickly after our Excommunication. Worst still, cities all across our empire were rioting and teetering on revolt. Our deeply religious people were not happy with the schism between the Pope and our leader. They were making their discontent felt all across our empire. This revolt will have to be the first matter to deal with.

The solution seemed simple enough, buy ourselves back into the Pope's goodwill. We had a large enough treasury to accommodate any demand he could possibly make, and it was certainly the quickest solution to the revolts. If we lost control of all the cities in disorder, it could take years to raise armies and march to the corners of our empire to reclaim them. Yet King Johan had difficulty stomaching this. The Pope had sided with the Greater Denmark Coalition and we would not soon forget such wanton betrayal. We were in the middle of deciding what to do when the Pope decided to force the issue and sent an emissary to us. King Johan was not happy to see him.

"Greetings blasphemer. You should have headed my advise. Now you are the enemy of all of Christendom and even your own people are revolting against you. It will cost you dearly to win back the Pope's favor."
"Do not presume to give me advise you forked tongued devil. Just tell me how much he wants this time."
"Insults will not help your cause. I do not think less than thirty thousand gold pieces will be sufficient penance for one such as you."
"30,000 gold pieces?!? Not even the mightiest of cities cost that much to build! No way I will give that much to an enemy!"
"We know you could easily afford such a penance. You would be wise to accept our offer. The price of one city will pale in comparison to all the cities you lose should you continue to defy the Pope."
"If I am to send a city's ransom to the Pope, it will not be my own money that I send. Here take this instead."
"What is this? A declaration of war on the Papal States?!? You can't be serious!"
"I am deadly seriously. I intend to sack Florence to raise the funds you require. Or maybe if I am really lucky the old windbag the Pope will perish in our assaults and no restitution will be required. I am already the enemy of all the remaining Christian factions, I have nothing to lose."
"Except your immortal soul! Cease this madness at once."
"Oh please. Everyone knows the current Papacy is a parody of virtue. Perhaps with a new, more amiable Pope we can reach a future accommodation with the Papacy. For now you would do well to leave my site, enemy."
"You have not heard the last of us! Ours is the mightiest army in all of Italy. You will regret this!"

So it was the Papal States were added to our growing list of enemies which now included the Papal Sates, Sicily, Venice, and of course, Denmark. War with the Papal states removed the option of buying ourselves back into the Pope's goodwill, the only option now was to try and kill him, while maintaining civil order as best we could. The recent additions of territories in the north were experiencing the most violent riots. Kin Johan moved our Capitol to Paris and lowered taxes in all rioting cities. Extra peasants garrisons were trained and dispatched to put down revolts. These actions quelled the riots in all cities but one: Venice. Being one of our largest cities and closest to Rome, Venice was inconsolable. Even the army we recalled from the march to Zagreb was insufficient to quell the uprising and the city revolted from our rule and declared itself independent. A huge German army, now rebel, was blocking the road into German territory where the majority of our armies lie. We had been marching several generals around this blocking army, and were bringing in additional troops from the army besieging Zagreb and recent recruits, but they arrived too late. We were forced to lay siege to the city again. The pitiful rebel forces were no match for our imperial armies. We slaughtered the inhabitants of Venice, to serve as an example to others in the empire who held dissident thoughts. The riots quickly died down after this and we could turn our attention to another matter: Denmark.

The Last Member of the Coalition
By taking out the weaker members of the coalition in a blitzkrieg style campaign, we had left Denmark alone and without allies. True, they shared a common cause with Venice, Sicily, and of course the Pope, but the only thing they had in common was their hatred of us. This would be more like three separate one front wars, as opposed to one allied enemy hitting us from three sides. The former was much more manageable, the latter more deadly. But the blitzkrieg against France and Germany left our northern front vulnerable and Rheims fell to Denmark. The army they hit us with was mind bogglingly powerful. Over a thousand armored warriors tore through the city. And there were more Danish armies on the way. This was too much for us to handle in open field battles. So King Johan came up with a new plan. Actually an old plan, for we copied the very tactics that the Roman empire used against Carthage and Hannibal. Instead of attacking the powerful Danish army in huge pitched battles, we would strike at their cities in numerous spots and avoid big battles.

The strategy worked well. While Denmark was busy conquering Rheims, we marched on Prague and took the city. Our first major engagements with Denmark ended in a stalemate: one win, one loss. Denmark marched their army south threatening to take Metz or Dijon, but turned around to chase away a small force we sent to reclaim Rheims. This pattern continued for some time. we would siege Rheims, they would attack our army and we would run away. Meanwhile in the east, we took Magdeburg, Breslau, Hamburg and the Danish capitol of Arhus. Our English army landed on the mainland and took Bruges and Antwerp. Our Arhus army was making the long march to Oslo when we finally assembled enough forces in the west to face the Danish army in the open. We had actually engaged them once already with relatively even numbers, nine hundred of our peasants vs. one thousand of their heavy troops. Our army was decimated, while we inflicting fewer than two hundred casualties on them. It took us years to rebuild, but this time we had a throng of over twenty five hundred men, while their army was down to less than eight hundred:
https://img225.imageshack.us/img225/...ark1sn0.th.jpg

We had half of our forces behind the enemy and half engaged them in a full frontal assault. Our cowardly rear army approached the enemy and stopped, refusing to engage the enemy. This is what happens when you forge an army without one of the Royal Guards to lead them. We had to deal with the entire enemy army our self with only half our army. Fortunately their strongest enemy unit, their general, charged our rear force and was slaughtered. At least those cowards were able to accomplish something. Leaderless and greatly outnumbered, the Danish army quickly broke and the battle was ours:
https://img169.imageshack.us/img169/...ark2nt2.th.jpg

Denmark had two other armies near Rheims but these were dispatched as well. The only city Denmark had left in Western Europe was Frankfurt. From an original empire consisting of twelve territories and a powerful army, they had been whittled down to six territories and their armies were decimated. They were now but a shadow of their former strength and would be easy to dispatch.

The Italian Front
We wasted little time making good on our threat to sack Florence. With a minimal garrison, the city quickly fell to our forces. But the Pope was quick to respond and sent a large force against us:
https://img144.imageshack.us/img144/...pal1py2.th.jpg

Though we had three members of the Royal guard present in the battle and a large, veteran force at our command, the battle was ferocious. Every time we tried to outflank the papal guards with our Royal Guards, they sent their vile knights and generals at us and we were forced to break off. We fought tooth and nail and eventually destroyed the enemy army. But of an original force of nearly nine hundred, only fifty five men came out alive:
https://img183.imageshack.us/img183/...pal2xp3.th.jpg

At least we could take solace in the fact that the Pope died in the battle:
https://img263.imageshack.us/img263/...pal5gg5.th.jpg

However another Papal army, even larger than the first, laid siege to Florence while an army from Sicily laid siege to Bologna. Our Italian army was just decimated and was in no shape to fight these forces. We controlled the majority of the seats in the Cardinal college and thus were able to ensure our favored candidate was elected Pope. The new Pope was most grateful for our support in the election. Our Excommunication and state of war against the Papal States was ended in one swift stroke. Good thing too, we were about to get whooped by the Papal States. Our revitalized Royal Guards, along with some reinforcements from Innsbruck, managed to destroy the Sicilian army laying siege to Bologna and destroy a Venetian army looking to reclaim Venice. They then took Zagreb. Our continued assaults against Denmark and Venice occasionally produced demands from the Pope for us to make peace, but we just countered with a gift of gold and kept our relations with this new Papacy high.

African Front
Our African cities were furthest from our new capital and thus were experiencing the worst of our remaining unrest. We had to leave the Royal Guards in Arguin and Timbuktu to maintain order. While we were waiting for order to be restored, the Mongols and Egyptians finally engaged each other and the Mongols took Jerusalem. While we were happy to see the Mongols and Egyptians slugging it out, we were not happy to see a holy city fall to those smelly barbarians. We assembled three mighty armies and sailed for Jerusalem. We overwhelmed the Mongol defenders with over three thousand troops and half a dozen royal guards. The city was ours.

End of the Coalition
Denmark still had 6 territories left, making it the largest of our remaining enemies. But without their mighty armies to protect them, they were easy prey for us. We easily sacked their remaining cities, putting an end to the coalition once and for all. With the most powerful empires in Europe now but provinces in our expanding empire, no one dared challenge us anymore. All across Europe, our enemies were capitulating to our demands. We had won. We beat them all with an army of peasants. Our empire:

https://img98.imageshack.us/img98/2568/finalkz4.jpg

Hi kublikhan3

Great post. Well done. Good to see a campaign being played with constraints on it to increase the complexity. An all peasant army :no: ...not for me.

arn't the peasents like really really really good in M2TW 1.0 Vanilla ? not that that wasn't impressive, congrats.

Haha nice read, very good style methinks.
Anyways, an all peasants army in 1.0 isn't that much of a challenge, especially if you adopt generals (Bodyguards are the most elite bunch you can meet)
I usually play without adoptions which makes the first 40-50 turns of a campaign (read: where you can win it if you want to) quite a challenge because of only having two to three generals.
I would try the peasant restrain but I fear without adoption I'll have a hard time.
I'm always up for a challenge though, so let's see what I can do with the HRE (although I make my life even harder with that) when I have a bit more time on my hands.

Thanks for the comments guys. I will probably wait until 1.2 goes official before starting another campaign. Maybe check out one of the mods this time. Not sure how long I'll have to wait for the mods to be updated to 1.2. Haven't decided which faction to play this time. Went back to RTW for now to keep myself busy.