Gah! Those crazy Germans.

I think we might have been burned by playing like we're dealing with the vanilla game and being reminded we're playing SS, again. The supply system and loyalty systems were a bit of a change, but this. . .this is unexpected.

Despite some severe short term consequences, I welcome this sort of surprise. The less predictable the AI, the less likely we are to meta-game.

Of course short term, a massive Crusade army is out there somewhere while most of our troops are on the other side of the Empire, our western and northern borders are bare and Aleksios is a bit isolated. I can almost hear the theme from Jaws playing.