I figure that if we put up a 4x4 grid of garrisons at the optimal locations (from 69,60) to (97,87) we'll look bigger on the map than Cardolan does. This is the layout I'm thinking of based on Cardolan's:
The little houses are the towns: Ashford is the city at center right. Black Rooks are where there are Bay12 garrisons already that I know of. Blue is where I propose we should build more. Locations are based on being 4 tiles from the right and bottom of the map so that if the pattern is extended then it will fill all the space with the minimum number of garrisons. Sometimes a city is in the way, so two garrisons are used to fill that gap.
We could probably forgo the northeast one and northwest one, and the bottom row of 4 isn't as close to controllable cities so it's only important for controlling more land / making us look bigger. The core idea would be to prioritize the centre two rows (a total of 8 garrisons), and the couple of black ones in the northwest, since there are a couple of free cities near there. Zangi has one black garrison, I have two. So if everyone else can put up a total of 7 garrisons in the center two rows, and think about building a second one in the lowest row, then we will be able to have a huge block of one color.
I'm thinking of starting tower construction tomorrow on my two fortress locations, it might be good if we get a head start on land-controlling constructions before the kingdom is actually started. A tower costs:15 wood, 8 iron, 6 stone, 16 clay. These seem pretty plentiful in the stores so the main thing is the cost. I work out a tower costs under $2500 based on the local store, which isn't too much. I can fund this from my next dungeon raid then see what the next level of fortress costs.