Success!!!

Thanks to the advice and the twcenter thread Jason X kindly linked, I was just able to vassalize Scotland in Kingdoms: Britannia.

I was playing the Irish, VH/VH, and going slow, taking my time kicking the English out and teching up before I did anything on the big island.

After releasing some prisoners and occupying some settlements, I got my rep up to "Reliable" and then "Very Reliable". Made allies with the Scots, Welsh, and Baron's Alliance, and got peace & trade rights w/ England. No relations at all with Norway.

Scotland had kicked Norway entirely off the mainland, and so I was thinking I'd try to get Norway under my thumb. Rather than declare war on a neutral faction and risk the rep hit, I got military access w/ Scotland (Ireland = cash for diplomacy) and sent an army up near Wick, where some Norwegian armies were milling around waiting to take back the castle from the Scots. I expected they'd attack & I'd reinforce my allies the Scots, and me & Norway would be at war, at which point I could get to work trying to make them my vassal.

Things took a different turn, however, as Scotland betrayed me & attacked my army (guess I made them nervous). I quickly secured an alliance w/ Norway (they were desperate for it) and set about trying to beat back the Scots. They were rated "Supreme" in strength, and had lots of stacks -- indeed, their attack on me wiped out my only army in Scotland.

Over the course of several years I grabbed Arran and Dumfries off them, and whittled their armies down a bit (Mounted Calivermen helped immensely here - 8 units of them in an all-cav stack is really all you need). Meanwhile I just kept gifting them cash to get our relations up from "Abysmal" or "Terrible". Also meanwhile, Norway took back Wick and Inverness from the Scots.

An offer of "Ceasefire" was normally considered Very Generous by the Scots, but I was holding out for "Become a Vassal" ("Very Demanding"), so I waited. At one point, I noticed my offer of Ceasefire was considered "Very Demanding", so I gifted some cash to get our relations up a bit. Just on a lark, I tried demanding vassalhood -- "Balanced"! They barely accepted, and I immediately gifted them cash to get our relations up to "Outstanding".

That forced a ceasefire w/ Norway and Scotland. I only directly control 10 regions myself, but with Scotland's territories I "own" 18, which is very nice.

This all happened around turn 100. My rep at the time was "Trustworthy", and when I demanded vassalhood our relations were I think "Terrible". I guess my offers of cash, my decent rep, and getting squeezed from the north by Norway were what did the trick.

Very cool to know this can be done with some reasonable certainty. Now I've got to hope I can *keep* Scotland as my vassal. Problem is, they're allied with England, and I'm allied with Wales and Norway, so that leaves me with no options for expansion. I'm traipsing an army through Wales' territory right now (they own most of England; we have military access), killing rebels and hoping the Welsh betray me. Maybe it's time to make some outrageous demands....

Anyway, sorry for the long post, thanks to all for the advice!

CountMRVHS