Scotland cooperative game thread

[Velociryx]

Yep....keeping my practice at it up! (the typing, that is!)

As for the Bankrupcy penalty....IIRC it's +20% inflation and 5 years of morale penalty for the army...OUCH!

That sounds like a good plan, and a sound analysis of England's position....perhaps they're not quite ready to bail in the war yet, especially as you say, since France seems more interested in trouncing Burgundy.

Here's another idea, and for this one, I'll toss our our troop costs:

Infantry 7d on the thousand
Cavalry 16d on the thousand

Warships 59d for one
Galleys 11d (might not be a bad option for Scotland, to give us transport capacity on the cheap)

One thing that can boost our money intake would be if we raised 1k cav in Lothian and send them on a pillaging mission through the English provinces we've not touched yet, or not touched in a while (per that latest screenie, it seems that Northumberland and Lancashire are both ripe for pillage.

Training time is ~4 months for cav and it'd take a month to make Northumberland, then they'd be good for 2 provinces a month....they could easily pay for themselves via the pillage income--already checked our armies laying siege, and sadly we lack excess manpower in any of our siege groups to pull off some guys for pillage work.

The potential drawback is that we're already above our max supportable troop limit, and if we see peace made, then we have an extra 1k of cav to pay for, and no means of making them a money machine for us.

Your thoughts on that, good sir?

-=Vel=-

EDIT: If we go the "pillage our way to wealth" plan, then we'll likely need to delay an offer of peace to England....I do not believe that Wales will hold out till the end of the year, and we'd need to give our pillage force ~6 months to make their rounds, which puts us to approximately June of next year before we would want to make an offer of peace....that might be pushing the envelope slightly....don't know.

[Velociryx]

Another option along those same lines would be to use the Army of Douglas (currently in Wales) for pillaging after the siege concludes there. He'd prolly be ready for such use around or before we could train a new cavalry garrison....could split off his infantry and take the cav only for speed, make the rounds, marching the infantry contingent to the English capitol to hold, and wind up with the cav arriving there after riding thru the other English lands, to lay in a siege.

If we wanted to, once either Gunther or the Yorkshire regiment finished their sieges, they could backtrack thru Lancashire and Northumberland to pillage there, before advancing to their next siege point....gotta think in terms of coin with those loan due dates looming on the horizon....

-=Vel=-

[ravagon]

Originally posted by Velociryx
One thing that can boost our money intake would be if we raised 1k cav in Lothian and send them on a pillaging mission through the English provinces we've not touched yet, or not touched in a while (per that latest screenie, it seems that Northumberland and Lancashire are both ripe for pillage.

Training time is ~4 months for cav and it'd take a month to make Northumberland, then they'd be good for 2 provinces a month....they could easily pay for themselves via the pillage income--already checked our armies laying siege, and sadly we lack excess manpower in any of our siege groups to pull off some guys for pillage work.

The potential drawback is that we're already above our max supportable troop limit, and if we see peace made, then we have an extra 1k of cav to pay for, and no means of making them a money machine for us.

Your thoughts on that, good sir?

I wouldn't go raising any new force unless you absolutely have to. Not at this stage anyway. A 4 month period to rear cav sounds like far too much. The war could've been over by a couple by the time they arrive. If necessary you could set your other sieging forces to cover instead and break them up into raiding bands.
I don't imagine you're planning on continuing the war for long enough to actually win those provinces ... ?

Heh. I didn't realise you got the inflation hit along with the morale penalty (which, by and large, shouldn't really matter as long as you don't go picking fights before the next round with England).

[Velociryx]

Update!

Played thru to November, and we now have a SERIOUS peace offer tabled by the English....I shall let the screen shot speak for itself....a good offer, beacuse one of the provinces in question shares our cultural heritage....

We have not, however, concluded the siege of Wales, and so no pillage work has been done.

[Velociryx]

This is good for us because it sets up a possible expansion against the Irish....with Meath as a base to operate from, we could swing the naval squadron around, and plant a worthy force in Eire (with whom we have a standing CB, because we have shields on the whole of their island)...three of their provinces are unfortified, and so we could grab them swiftly and easily.....continuing our war with THEM, and gain money via pillaging there, plus, we'd have a 5-year window of peace with the English (at which time, hopefully, our two loans will have been paid in full).

The drawback to a war with the Irish.....if we win--and I believe we could--we'd grab three unfortified provinces, which would mean that an enormous amount of effort would have to go into constructing fortifications there, and it is doubtful that we could accomplish both that AND the repayment of our loans before the English decided to go another round with us....so we'd HAVE to garrison the Emerald Isle to retake our easy-picking provinces....that might spread us a bit thin in the face of an extremely angry England....

-=Vel=-

[Maniac]

Go for it!

[Velociryx]

I dunno....the more I think on it, the more my opinion would be to wait a bit longer yet....not that the offer isn't a good one...it certainly is! However, by waiting, we further increase our war score (wales is now -5....won't hold out long), and we can pick up some extra money by pillaging.....an EXCELLENT suggestion that was posed was to wait till after Douglas finished up in Wales, then split his force into its infantry/cavalry components, march the infantry thru Lancashire and Northumberland, then south to Anglia, while the cavalry command under Douglas himself sweeps through southern England, pillaging as he goes, and finally meeting the infantry in the English capitol for a siege there....that gives us some badly needed money without ending either of our other two sieges--which, when concluded, will give us an even MORE impressive war score.

However, at this stage of the game, the longer we slug it out, the more likely we are to get peace dictated to us by the French....which could leave us with nothing.

I will abide by the wishes of the council, however...

-=Vel=-

[Nikolai]

I agree with your view, Velociryx. Build up your powerbase and forces, untill the truce is over! Then...

[Velociryx]

So, that's one vote against accepting the offered peace....

[Maniac]

I dunno....the more I think on it, the more my opinion would be to wait a bit longer yet....

Whatever. Then don't go for it!

Training time is ~4 months for cav and it'd take a month to make Northumberland, then they'd be good for 2 provinces a month....

An enemy army has to be present in a province at the end of the month to pillage it. So only province per month.
Also, don't forget to put yor tax slider at max while pillaging!

Btw, where's the main discussion thread for this game?

[Velociryx]

I'm...actually shifting the main discussion to here, so chime in!

-=Vel=-

[Velociryx]

Thus far (and I'll be playing a bit further when I return home this evening), it appears that we will reject the offer of peace for Meath and Northumberland and continue the fighting, with the goal of concluding the siege of Wales, and then sending Douglas to pillage (at the rate of one province per month--though we can still do some faster than that via leaving covering forces with the cav as they march-- and having Douglas end his march through lower England in Anglia to take up a siege there, being joined by the infantry under his command as they swing through the northern non-pillaged provinces and then south.

Once we have initiated a siege at Anglia, we shall take stock of the situation and see what peace might be arranged--and how our treasury is looking--note to self: max treasury slider! (I think it's already there so we're not hemmoraging money, but will double check!)

I shall check back here before playing through, to see if anyone has objections to this course, and if not, then I will report back when I reach the point described above.

-=Vel=-

[ravagon]

Originally posted by Velociryx

The drawback to a war with the Irish.....if we win--and I believe we could--we'd grab three unfortified provinces, which would mean that an enormous amount of effort would have to go into constructing fortifications there, and it is doubtful that we could accomplish both that AND the repayment of our loans before the English decided to go another round with us....so we'd HAVE to garrison the Emerald Isle to retake our easy-picking provinces....that might spread us a bit thin in the face of an extremely angry England....

-=Vel=-

Would you actually have to fortify those provinces though?
The big advantage of having no fortifications is that you can often pull off a supply trap whereby an enemy force is cut off very quickly.
Additionally, if you did have Meath as a staging point - could you try a force-vassalization of Ireland instead of actually gaining those provinces (I'm not entirely sure of the conditions needed to vassalize though - even in 1.06)?
You wouldn't miss out on too much income either with the 30% loss from not having a land connection to your capital in addition to the higher tech costs from a larger number of provinces.
Much better to take only 50% of their income and no tech "penalty" IMHO.

Add to this the benefit of splitting an English counterattack between Northumberland and Meath (which you wouldn't really be able to defend but then again Meath isn't really worth that much as far as war score goes) and you have the makings of a significant advantage.

Q: How does the battle fare in France?
If you're racking up the points against England then so are the French as the head of your alliance (although I'm still not quite sure how that equation works either).

[Velociryx]

Update thus far:

All did NOT go according to design. On January 28th, 1421, the English made their peace with France, which saw Orleanes and Caux fall into French hands, but our French masters were generous, and got Northumberland and Lancashire for us. These are two provinces which we had CB shields on, and so there is no revolt risk....although they are off-culture, they are still among the more valuable provinces under our control, and this boon sees our Kingdom grow by an impressive 50%. I would have preferred some monitary gain, over the second province, but alas, it was not meant to be. We have some time yet before our loans are due, and I have no doubt in my mind that we will NOT be able to pay them both off. For the time being, I am keeping with a heavy minting policy, and even at that, we are losing 0.6d per month.

I promoted Tax Collectors in our two newly gained provinces in the hope that once those appointments are made, the increase to our economy will be sufficient at least to allow us to break even each month, and perhaps see a slight gain. Nonetheless, the majority of our annual increase in ducats will come from the annual census tax, and my goal is to preserve as much of our income as possible.

Once the TC appointments are completed, I'll see how that impacts the total number of troops we can support (10k at present)....in order to save money, we will probably have to disband some segment of the army....Infantry, no doubt, and no doubt from the ranks of Gunther's mercenary band....given the current situation, I think it would be unwise to stage an attack against Eire, although their allies are all land-locked german minors and Navarra, and would pose us no threat. Since we do not have Meath as a base, however, and given the scant naval presence we have--with no funds whatsoever to increase it, we could only stage a one-point landing, which would likely get us killed, and not much else. So....we're stuck....for now.

[Velociryx]

Hmmm....that's a very good point, Master Rav....and to that end, I shall swing the Scottish naval squadron 'round the Emerald Isle and take shots of the conditions there....will post those shortly, to see if you are in favor of an invasion of Eire....

-=Vel=-