conquering England

[vaalen]

I started a game as Normandy, with the intent of conquering England, using the 1.03 beta patch.

On my first turn, I spent a claim event on London, England. I got several other claims in England on the following turns.

I concentrated on building up Normandy, especially its income. William the conquerer is a very able monarch, and commander. I decided to wait for an event.

In the early 1060s, the event occurred, and I got a fleet and a large army. The army was composed of volunteers, who were very cheap to maintain. I also had a fleet of eight war galleys appear. I declared war and set sail for England. Once I landed in England, I played a mercenary company event and got five good units, also volunteers. I set about the conquest, and had a great time, winning most of the battles, and ended up conquering Wales, as well as England, and defeating a French attempt to conquer Normandy. I lost a number of the volunteer units during this period, and the troops I raised to replace them had normal upkeep costs.

A big problem was then number of regions I had. Even with peers of the Realm in all provinces, I was over the limit, which was bad for authority. I created a couple of vassels, and just barely got it under control. Then, after 62 turns of brilliant rule, William died, and his heir was a poor administrator. This created the too many regions problem once again, and the only solution appears to be to create another vassel. I will get a higher domain limit once I advance beyond being a petty kingdom.

I am truly enjoying this campaign. I did this post to inform others of how you can invade England as Normandy, thanks to the 1.03 beta patch.

[Pocus]

This is a nice and informative account, thanks!