Civil War!?! :furious3:

[EatYerGreens]

The fleet goes to your side since the rebs can't have ships.

Okay, thanks for resolving that.

I could be barking up completely the wrong tree but I recall seeing a recent posting from someone about being presented with a screen, at the outbreak of civil war, whereby they were given news of the relative numbers on each of the two sides and were expected to choose who to back, with no detailed knowledge of what units were on which side. Plumping for the side with the largest number of troops - logical enough thing to do - apparently left him with all the naff units...
My worry was that one's own ships would either take sides and start sinking each other or else there's a chance that you lose the lot, if you pick the wrong side.

Underage heirs?

My delusions of having any knowledge of this game are shattered...

Well, it does warn you not to risk your ruler in battle when he comes to the throne still heirless and, IIRC, it's only the message when the third son comes of age that starts using wording like 'your line is now secure and you can risk your king in battle'.

It seems like 14+ princes can become king in rare cases. It's an undocumented feature. You'll get it if you reload and play out a no heir situation enough times.

It could be undocced because it's a reemergence related thing where your king dies and his heir reemerges on the same turn.

If it was documented, players would only come to expect it and feel cheated if it didn't. Since it seems to be probability related (equivalent of a die-roll), it's probably best left unsaid.

Actually, I think it's quite cool that so much variability is encoded into the game. No two players' experiences of the game can ever be completely the same. Naturally that also means that one player gets to see different things happen when they play multiple times which, I suppose, is the whole point.

Historical footnote:
I'm going to have to Google this to get the name and dates right but one of the English kings (Edward the something-th??) came to the throne at age eight. Obviously, the nation couldn't literally be ruled by a child of that age, so it meant that various court advisors and maybe an uncle were able to wield power for a number of years. The game doesn't emulate this in a way that the player can ride it out, since the uncles become generals. So, instead, you get situation (2), as in antisocialmonkey's previous post.

I hope my terminology is right if I refer to this as a protectorate (or am I confusing that with the Cromwellian interregnum? By contrast, a regency is where the heir rules in lieu of a living, though incapacitated, monarch (e.g. George III).

[Ludens]

Historical footnote:
I'm going to have to Google this to get the name and dates right but one of the English kings (Edward the something-th??) came to the throne at age eight. Obviously, the nation couldn't literally be ruled by a child of that age, so it meant that various court advisors and maybe an uncle were able to wield power for a number of years. The game doesn't emulate this in a way that the player can ride it out, since the uncles become generals. So, instead, you get situation (2), as in antisocialmonkey's previous post.

That must be Henry the third, son of John Lackland (Richard Lionheart's 'evil' brother). I did think of him when I wrote that a child could not rule, but since they had to change the law to get him on the throne, I considered this an exception. England was in urgent need of a king at that time: they had crowned a French prince, but he turned out to be more generous to his French followers than to his English supporters, so they turned back to their own monarchy. After Louis was driven out, everybody agreed that nothing happened and because of this, Louis is never mentioned as a King of England even though he was crowned.

[EatYerGreens]

After Louis was driven out, everybody agreed that nothing happened and because of this, Louis is never mentioned as a King of England even though he was crowned.

Interesting stuff. But if it was all supposedly hushed up, how did you get to find out about it and share this with us? Is this coming from one of those 'shocking truth finally revealed' type books?

Speaking of which, I recently saw a repeat of an interesting documentary in which Tony Robinson (of UK Channel 4's Time Team fame) runs us through some research done into the English line of succession. I forget the exact names and details but it had to do with Henry Tudor's already oblique claim on the throne all falling back on a distant Royally-connected ancestor, whose date of birth implied a conception date which coincided with his father being on a campaign in France at a time when his mother was back home in England. The birth of the couple's second son was marked with feasting and celebrations worthy of a firstborn, by contrast to events after the previous one. A convoluted way of saying that every royal down the line since the Tudors is decended from a.... err, 'someone of illegitimate birth'.

He proceeds to track down a living Plantagenet, to give him the news that he is the rightful king of England but he's been living in Australia for nearly fifty years (a 'gap year' in his twenties never actually came to an end) and, to everyone's amusement, is a staunch republican (to Ozzies this means pro-Ozzie republic, not republican as per US political party). They finish the program with an amusing 'what if' situation, in which a look-alike for HM Queen is seen portrayed as an ordinary German housewife, popping into a supermarket to buy some bratwurst... LOL

[Ludens]

Interesting stuff. But if it was all supposedly hushed up, how did you get to find out about it and share this with us? Is this coming from one of those 'shocking truth finally revealed' type books?

No, I got this from a BBC documentary by Terry Jones. The series was called 'Medieval lives', and in it he strove to put right some myths about the Middle ages. So, in a way, it is a 'shocking truth finally revealed' and not quite as respectable as a true history, but I think it is more reliable than the kind of book you had mind.

Jones devotes an entire chapter to the lives of Medieval Kings. Off course, given his Monty Python background, this happens in a rather silly way, and one of the Highlights is the King of England that no one has ever heard of. King Louis is not mentioned in the roll of Kings, but he did rule for a year and received homage from the citizens of London, most of the English and Welsh nobles and the Scottish King. He was not crowned (I got that wrong in my last post), but then the crown had been lost by the King John and at least two kings that do appear in the roll of Kings weren't crowned either.

Anyway, the documentary is quite interesting provided you can stand silly humour. I don't know if they'll run it again, but like all BBC documentaries there is a book available that contains most of the information in the series.

[EatYerGreens]

The really daft thing is I know I watched the series you're talking about but either my attention slipped during that bit, or I missed an episode or, worst of all, the memory's going. They forgets, you know... [creak]