The British Isles were finally united with the acquisition of the Orkney islands through holy warfare; the King of Norway had some disagreements with this arrangement. Swiss and Scottish mercenaries landed on the islands far off the coast, even going so far as to attack Iceland whilst British levies repelled the Norwegian invasions of the British mainland, managing to kill the Norwegian King.
My firstborn son is a 'mastermind theologian,' a womanizer and an imbecile. He is the absolute embodiment of the courtier, well-educated and capable of quoting stunning poetry with never a single bit of understanding for what he's saying. He is Ken: The guy.
Balthere's investments in mainland Europe continued as Britannia seized a Spanish county from a Duke known as 'the Cruel.' I figured Catholic or no, it's ok to ruin such a person. From that county I waged war on the Umayyad Caliphate over just one more county, mainly just to lower their religious authority and to halt their attacks on France. I had my expeditionary force of Huscarls ready, 13,500 men strong in the Iberian peninsula and they launched their assaults on the county in question with frenetic success. All our side had to do was wait and win, we already had our prize. The Umayyad Caliph knew this and decided to try and take the county back from us; our siege had left our huscarl force down to 9,700 men when the Muslim army attacked with 16,000.
It was a crushing victory; we slaughtered the rabble and dealt an absolutely embarrassing defeat upon the Umayyad Caliph. I wonder if Balthere was just as surprised as I was, they were completely routed.
It was highly amusing chasing around fleeing enemy generals with a smaller force. Needless to say, this battle had vastly bolstered my impression of huscarls and Balthere.
I had planned to wage war on the Umayyad Caliphate, Norway and the most evil Bavarians until something happened in response to the Byzantine shenanigans...
DEUS VULT, THE OLD GODS ERA IS OVER - I WILL REMIND THEM
It took 3 weeks of deliberation before the Pope decided to use the newfound power of crusade calling to call a crusade. Needless to say, I took this as a welcome challenge; I would have my chance to knock down the #1 world power whilst dealing with the issue of muslim conquest now instead of later.
My idea upon joining this crusade was that I would be able to send a few thousand troops towards the end to
look good in the eyes of my pious vassals protect my peers from infidel conquest. The unfortunate thing was that the entirety of Christendom had failed to defeat Osweald when he went on his happy Cathar slapping of Catholic Britain and Osweald was far weaker than the might of Arabia. Arabia promptly dick slapped Christendom. After I had finished a lengthy war capturing Aquitaine from another aristocrat known as 'the cruel' I set off with the full might of Britannia's huscarls. They had humiliated the Umayyad, they would humiliate the Abbasid.
It seems I forgot to check the ledgers before waging war, as the Abbasid army had since doubled to over 40k.
Whilst laying siege to the Caliphate's shores and scoring the first victory for the Crusade (seriously, no one else had succeeded in battle before then) considerably more Muslim soldiers showed up and attacked the British siege camps.
The British had the superior generals, the Caliph and the Prince were both present; if the leaders of either armies fell it would change the course of the war entirely. Completely outnumbered the centre and right flanks of the British army not only held strong, but they also routed 17,000 Muslim troops.
Unfortunately the Caliph took this abysmal failure and turned it into victory, breaking the British left flank (led by a great siege general, but not the best in leading heavy infantry in the hills) and ultimately defeating the entire army. Every huscarl died, though not before Prince Balthere escaped on a ship to Aquitaine. Balthere's huscarls had bought the crusade time it desperately needed, that army was previously on its way to Constantinople and had just been halved.
So I figured since I had just become the contributor of 48% of the Catholic war effort (besides the angry zealot Knight orders no other Catholic nation could be bothered to offer significant support in more than words) and the huscarls had just wasted a large portion of the Abbasid army (and if I'm honest, I was personally annoyed that the Caliph had just personally destroyed my elite army, which was the perfect mindset to be in as an angry crusader King) and so I rounded up the entire levy of the British Isles for war.
This was supposed to buy the Crusaders more time to rally greater forces towards Jerusalem.
It just made things worse.
The British were slaughtered to the man.
By the time Belthere returned to the British Isles Norse pillagers had already had their way with much of the land, now emptied of many of the soldiers lost to the crusade. Normally this would be the point where such a King would give up and call their losses, but Belthare is not just a King; he is a merchant King, the richest man in Europe. He mobilized all of his money for one last push into the Holy Lands, even going so far as to welcome the Jews back into Britain just to take their money immediately afterwards. Hired the Knights Templar, the Knights Hospitaller, the Knights of Santiago and two of the largest mercenary bands and set off with a massive fleet to deliver the death blow of to the Abbasids. Belthere was nearing his 70th birthday, if he didn't win this war his last act in life would be failure. It was all or nothing.
The combined crusader force arrived just in time to stop the crusade ending in failure. When the last expedition landed the war score was -95% and falling fast as no one had managed to successfully take and hold Jerusalem from the Abbasid yet. A month later would have been too late.
The Abbassid army tried to catch the Knight orders off guard whilst they were fresh from their journey across the sea and their morales were not fully recovered.
A sound strategy, but it did not work. They were routed and run down to death.
As successful as this army was, this army cost a high premium. It seems even for the richest man in Europe it was too much.
The mercenaries I had hired did not seem placated when I offered to pay them later, and tried to seize payment by force. This also happened during a peasant uprising led by a former soldier of the ill-fated second expedition.
The Knights remained loyal and I kept them at the forefront of tough fighting to keep their numbers (and their monthly cost manageable) whilst my levies and huscarls slowly recovered from the rebels and Norse raiders.
At last, it was over.
Of course, it is never over.
But some developments are abound. Three Knight orders have settled in my lands, one in Kent and two in Jerusalem.
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Topic: Crusader Kings 2 is released. (Read 2092777 times)