Post your Empires!

[Varakiel]

http://speedy.sh/x8pk8/saves

Check out my saves. Both Persian and Byzantine Empires built up and ready to destroy everything.

Delete above post and use these links. Enjoy!!!

http://speedy.sh/dwAcw/9.sav

http://speedy.sh/E4K84/Autosave.sav

http://speedy.sh/M9Vq9/KhwarezmianEA.sav

[Competizione]

Hi, long time player, first time poster. I've been playing Stainless Steel for a few months now and I must say it is one of the most addictive modifications I ever played. When I saw this thread I felt like this was the perfect place to share my empires. I usually play as the Byzantine Empire, but lately I've been feeling like having a little more challenge.

I decided to play as the Holy Roman Empire (H/H) this time around, since with it's focus on heavy infantry it would give me a challenge not to solely rely on heavy cavalry to do the job.



Starting out, I really wanted to play more as the Austrian Empire than the Holy Roman Empire. So I sold everything in Frankfurt, Magdeburg, Hamburg, Cologne and Nuremberg and pushed them into rebelling. I used the freed up armies to create a few large armies to quickly conquer the settlements I needed. After setting my capital to Vienna I was ready to start playing. First ten turns can be summed up as getting a marriage alliance with Genoa, taking Croatia with the armies from the Austrian region, taking Bern and Milan with the Staufen and Cologne forces, taking Prague with the Magdeburg and Hamburg armies and getting excommunicated for going to war against Venice. After that I turned my attention onto Venice, which falls pretty easily if you blitz them in their cities and try to avoid them in the field. Capturing Venice also allowed me to fix my economy. After this early campaign I took the remainder of the forces, reinforced with mercenaries (I don't know about you guys, but I tend to rely on them big time in SS6.4, they often give me the edge I need in the first 100 turns) and went to war against Hungary. With a simultaneous assault on Esztergom and Varad it wasn't too hard to bring them on their knees. Considering I still had ample of troops, I instantly turned my attention to Brasov and Kassa. At around 1218, I managed to unify Austria Hungaria :p. But to fully build the austrian empire I still needed to get my hands on Krakau and Halych. With these subdued I noticed Konigsberg wasn't in Lithuanian hands yet so I quickly stole it off the field. At this point by military power was virtually non existant anymore, so I started what I like the most at Stainless Steel, the diplomacy.

While the marriage alliance secured a safe southern border, I knew it wouldn't be long before the pope would call a crusade on Vienna and all of Europe would be attacking me at their whim. Apparently by recruiting a priest in every settlement I had, I managed to max out the papal favour, which I used to instantly call a crusade on Granada. From there on I've been the papal favourite ever since, delivering all the popes. In the meantime I made an alliance with the Byzantine Empire, securing my southeastern flank. The thing I didn't anticipate was them growing out of epic proportions like you can see on the map. I kept them in check at first with a marriage alliance I had with Kiev, but at some point the Byzantines decided to go to war against them anyways and well, THAT happened. Other long time alliances would be with the Papal States, Denmark, Aragon and England. To top it off I convinced Poland to become a vassal, so I could begin a time of peace for my kingdom. It took me quite the effort, but I did manage to get the Merchants Guild, Hanseatic League, Assassins Guild and Thieves guild to set up their HQ's in my empire, which is a first for me, since I usually only get the merchants HQ.

In the meantime I had to keep busy somehow. Lithuania went early to war against Novgorod, and both parties for some reason neglected to take Reval and Riga. All the better for me I guess. While not originally the plan it sounded like a good move back then and certainly paid off. The same went for Cagliari and Palma, they were still unclaimed and I wouldn't say no to maritime strongholds. With the papal approval high, I figured I could pick crusade targets at my leisure and went for Gaza, which would become the start of my humble crusader kingdom.



I took the liberty of renaming the cities a bit though. It's not geographically correct but I preferred to use the settlements in the vicinity that always fascinated me historically (except Amarint, that's just my thought of how the Germans would name Amarintium, which was the name I gave it when I conquered it with the Byzantines, it stuck ever since). Sending in two full stacks proved to much for the fatimids to defend against and I used the momentum to quickly seize Kerak as well. After that, things stalled. Making peace with them never lasted long and the armies I built up always dwindled as soon as they sent full stacks to take back their castles. At the same moment a Jihad was called on Jerusalem, so I lied in wait, pr(e/a)ying on a muslim faction to take it so I could call a crusade on Jerusalem in turn, which would give me the required extra armies. For some bizarre reason, the crusaders actually survived wave after wave and even managed conquer Damascus and Tortosa in the process. I had to do something with a crusade, so I went for a cheap victory and crusaded against Acre (Tyre), which was a rebel settlement. I took the liberty to send a European crusader army straight to Al Aqaba (Amarint).

This is the point where things started to turn for the worse. It began with Genoa attacking Aragon, at this point Genoa already held all of the yellow on the North African part apart from Fes. And since I like playing as Aragon myself I took pity on them and took their side. Genoa took Zaragoza, Barcelona and Valencia before finally being excommunicated. I answered that by calling a crusade towards Toulouse. The papacy surprised me by actually being in an awake state and took Pisa, which was a thorn in my eye to say the least (apparently you need Pisa as the HRE to win, go figure). So on the way to Toulouse I figured I might as well sack genoa while I was at it and trade it for Pisa. The papal states didn't accept that and swindled me out of a whopping 25k tribute for 20 turns. Needless to say, my economy tanked. Right at the point where I finally had the chance to upgrade Konigsberg to a Citadel, a goal I sacrificed my faction leaders excellent command skills for just because he was the only one who could do it. I took Toulouse and sold it off to the French. After that, things settled down as France conquered Marseille strongholds in Europe and Aragon reclaimed all their lands but Barcelona. I held a crusade to Antioch, the Crusader States reclaimed Aleppo and the Byzantines took a foothold in Benghazi.

I was feeling uneasy with the Byzantine expansion, considering they already held alot of kievan territory at this time (ca 1180 AD). So I rushed to claim Alexandria and Damietta, since the Byzantines already held Cairo. Further along the way they seemingly lost Benghazi again and claimed Luxor. The only upside is the Fatimids haven't bothered me since. With my tanked economy, the entire game came to a halt for me. I had to actually sit out the remaining 16 turns getting more and more frustrated at only seeing my realm slowly progress. At least Konigsberg got upgraded so I could start training Teutonic Knights from there. In the meantime France got excommunicated and someone called a crusade on Paris. I used the situation to take Bruges and Antwerp at the time and let the English take Paris, they could use the papal favour more than me.

At around 1200 AD I became aware of the monster I allowed to be created. The Khwarezmians and Byzantines not only made peace, but formed an alliance, which results in the current map where they have wiped out Novgorod, Kiev and the Cuman Khanate. It got worse as the Byzantines allied with France and the Papal States went from moderately active to hellbent on wiping France out. Funded by the money I paid for Pisa, they set out to conquer what you see on the screenshots. Me being blissfully ignorant of how that could have any possible drawbacks, I went for a stroll in Iberia. Crusaded to Silves to help out the Portuguese, which I apparently allied with in order to get their papal votes when the college of cardinals wasn't overcrowded by my clergy. The moment I set foot there I got the message "faction destroyed" and found out it was Portugal. Even though they were doing great in their reconquista they just died. No time to mourn though since I might as well get my hands on their lands. I quickly took Oporto and Lissabon after that and thought I could beat the Moors into submission with Aragon just taking Granada. Apparently I destroyed their faction at the siege of Seville.

All those years I didn't see the Byzantines abusing their military access to get to Italy and attack the papal states in 1219 AD. Considering I control the papacy, I felt obliged to help them out and broke my alliance with the Byzantines. At the same time England and Denmark have gone to war so I have all the reason to finally conquer the german counties I gave up in the beginning of the game. I've got almost three full stacks crammed with heavy infantry, heavy cavalry and Pavise crossbowmen around Konigsberg just ready to give the Danes a headbutt back to Scandinavia. Together with a full stack in Bern, Salzburg and Innsbruck, it would be a walk in the park. Unless the Byzantines consider my lands fair game. I've allied with the CS and Sicily and started funding their wars against the Byzantine Empire, hoping it'll distract them enough to stay out of my lands. I've already got a diplomat ready in Konigsberg to make sure I ally with the Teutonic Order when they emerge instead of them trying to conquer my baltic states. Apart from that I'm hoping the mongols will crush both the Khwarezmians and the Byzantines, but the way things look, I'm concerned the mongols may actually be held back.

Tl;dr: built the austrian empire, byzies got too big. Oh dear the next century is going to be bloody.

[High Fist]

Very interesting Comp, +rep. Your way of expansion is pretty cool; a bit of land over here, another smidgen over there, a swathe of land here...

The Byzie wars will be pretty immense I imagine. I wonder, when do the Timurids arrive?

[Competizione]

Well this is embarassing, my computer posted before I actually finished my post. I hope a moderator can remove that post, sorry for that :/

Anyway, thanks, I try to expand in a slower way for historical accuracy at first and then just because I wanted to slowly progress so I can still have alot of fun in the renaissance period. It seems the gothic knights are locked until the 1400s and I don't really want to tamper with the mod files to make them easily available. I'll post some progress about the next 100 years when I get there, I'm curious to see how the byzies will fare with the upcoming mongol and timurid invasions. And if I should worry about my eastern borders myself since I've noticed those invasion forces can get as far as Hungary.

[General Maximus]

What will happen to the super Eastern Roman Empire that you've got there?

If only they used that energy to reconquer the Mediterranean instead of going into Russia.

[CountBelisarius]

[IMG][/IMG]hey guys I have read stuff in this page before. Quite an expectator but I guess I will like to drop in and show my empire. Its the Byzantines (it quite matches my profile name). I have already beaten the game and want to keep expanding. I dont have the Varangian guard since I knew I need the lates embasy (it blows I know) and its second Jihad on Constantinople, I lost but it didnt too me long to recapture it. I think it serves in my advantage since like the last time the AI focuses on that spot.

[CountBelisarius]

I am also just recently past the black plague.

[Competizione]

What will happen to the super Eastern Roman Empire that you've got there?

If only they used that energy to reconquer the Mediterranean instead of going into Russia.

I sadly had to give up the campaign as it really went worst case scenario. As you can see the Byzantines conquered all of Russia and got most of Italy by turn 1240. And that was the point where they apparently decided they wanted my lands. I don't even know how they manage to send stack after stack after stack, while I was going bankrupt trying to keep my stacks full. I lost all of the baltic, poland, hungary, austria and italy simply because I couldn't afford more troops :/. At the same time, Leon and Genoa started to attack my settlements in Iberia so all I was left with were my crusader cities, and at the pace the byzies were going at the CS, it wouldn't be long till they were at my doorstep. When Vienna and Konigsberg fell in 1257 and Tyre came under siege, I knew that was the end. So I started a new campaign, at least I'll learn from my mistakes.



I followed the same strategy as last time again. I took the bet and left the german cities to rebel, sent my Hamburg general to Konigsberg and focussed again on creating the Austrian Empire. So at turn 10 I managed to destroy venice again, at turn 20 Hungary followed suit and at turn 25 I managed to vassalage Poland again. The reason I managed to expand faster after that is because instead of calling a crusade to prevent it going to Vienna, I asked for a first one to Gaza and requested reconciliation the next turn. Only difference this time is I did some reading and noticed the Babenbergs were Austrian nobility, so I used the Hohenstaufen generals as heavy cavalry and now I've got an Austrian dynasty



As you can see getting Gaza was a success. I had some luck with my politics in the East though, the Byzantines made an early alliance with the CS, so I figured it would be a smart plan to do the same. If I can keep the CS strong, it'll help me out when the byzies inevitably turn on me. I spent alot of time and resources helping the CS out defending against a Jihad on Jerusalem. It left my coffers quite empty at around 1235 and launching a crusade against Acre (which the CS never bother to take for some reason) kept my treasury just out of the red. Since I couldn't just let the muslim factions take Jerusalem and have the CS shrivel, I swallowed my pride and scammed the French. They seemed keen on having Staufen and I sold it to them for 25k for 20 turns and an alliance. If you're relations are good and you've got a diplomat with 10 scrolls, it appears you can get alot done. Hence the reason why my treasury has a whopping 330k in it for a change. When the Jihad failed, the Moors were the first ones to come ask for peace. And well, I did like the idea of having a castle in Spain so I demanded Burgos, which they accepted without a problem. I got lucky with it as well since they seemingly just conquered it and the population was still mostly catholic. The Moors their holdings still went all the way to Valencia and Toledo (the Portuguese are clearly being awake this time) and the Fatimids weren't hard to hold back so I figured I'd help out my allies the Portuguese and allied with Aragon as well. I'm not allying with Leon cause well, they were cause to my defeat the previous game and I guess I keep grudges :p. The Turks also came asking for peace and I demanded the settlement Qarisya in return, after sending a priest and half a stack there, the rioting stopped and I had myself a nice new outpost. I'm still considering whether or not I should give it to the Crusader States, because they seem to have become pretty dormant with the Byzies conquering the Seljuks and me giving them a safe border from the Fatimids. I called a crusade out of boredom on Alexandria and took both that and Damietta in a single turn. Siege weapons and a healthy dose of luck can do miracles.



Ofcourse with a crusade it's easy to force a peace treaty against the ones you're crusading against. So it wasn't hard to make peace with the Fatimids. I know well enough they'll be back, but with the Crusader States to back me up I shouldn't have much of a problem. They're the only reason I manage to hold Kerak. At that point it was 1240 AD, it's surprising how much I'm getting done in this short amount of time. Since I've built a decent army in Burgos I set out for Toledo, after an ambush by the Moors I had the good fortune to have the choice to adopt the captain for his heroics. When I took Toledo afterwards I had luck once again, it was ready for upgrade to a fortress. After the fortress was constructed and the governor ancillary were given to a newly trained general, I took my family member to the next stop Granada, which in turn was again ready for upgrade. In two turns that one will be done as well and I'll start thinking about how to handle the Moorish armies around Cordoba. I'm glad to see Aragon managed to conquer all the way to Murcia and Genoa seems incredibly weak this time. Fingers crossed the campaign continues as well as it's been going so far

[High Fist]

Nice campaign indeed. Maybe instead of leaving N Germany to rebel you could sell them to the French or Danes? How long did it take for them to take them?

[Competizione]

It usually takes them 30-40 turns, and by just letting them rebel I'm trying to not give other factions the possibility of becoming superpowers early on. My economy usually goes pretty well, especially early in the game.

[General Maximus]

In situations when there is a massive empire at my border, growling at me and has the backing of unending doomstacks, be that in any TW game, I rush. I gather all of my armies and retrain as many of them as I can, get them together, and migrate as fast as I can away from the hotspot of war and establish myself over a weaker faction.

In a similar game of mine where ERE was ruling half the world, me playing the French (who were driven into central Europe by the Iberians) I fought some armies of ERE and then bribed them for peace. The situation with the Aragonese was hopeless, they had way too many armies to be defeated, while I was running out of money. So I simply retrained all my armies, gathered them around a huge doomstack led by my King, and then simply walked into the territory of ERE without bothering with military access. And then I took Constantinople and sacked it, with my armies surrounding it. Armies of ERE were unable to take it back due to huge army guarding it from all sides, while I sent one of my armies to Anatolia to slowly conquer it while enemy armies were busy in Syria. Once I had a good income again, I retrained (or rather, re-recruited) my almost shattered army from repeated Roman attempts to retake their capital.

Eventually Aragon and Venice conquered all of my holdings in central Europe. Once bordering the ERE, they began a war against the Romans whose army got busy there while I snatched Greece from them.

[Balor]

My Scottish Campaign has reached the year 1700, wherein I control nearly a third of the world. To this effect, the royal family has redubbed scotland as the Praetorian Empire, and I decided to go slightly nuts and mod line infantry in for them. Historically inaccurate or not, it is wildly entertaining shooting up armies of thousands of knights with uniformed line infantry.

Awesome! Any screenshots? I'd love to know how to mod... Can someone tell me how to change settlement names? I know its a bit off topic. Excellent empires by the way. I think I'll start posting mine here too.

[High Fist]

Settlements I think you can just click on the name from the top of the construction tab and type it in there. You have to own it, as such.

[Lord-too-fat]

This looks great

[Competizione]

Well it's been a while, didn't have alot of time to play with my exams coming up. I initially stopped my campaign but picked it up again during my breaks between studying. Spending all your time over a law book gets pretty boring. The year's 1186 and there's been some interesting developments. First things first, my Iberian campaign sadly ended quite horribly. My invasion force faced a crushing defeat near Cordoba, which lead to the Moors revitalizing their war effort and taking back Granada from me. With the Crown of Castille waging war on me as well, I figured the smartest thing to do was sell it to the Crown of Aragon (yes I edited both kingdoms to reflect their names in the late campaign). I exchanged both settlements for Palma and moved my remaining armies there. At least I have a mediterrean trading post as a consolation price. I also had an excursion to Sardinia, which I managed to hold from 1164-1184 when the Sicilians took it over. If there's one certainty in Total War, it's that Sicily will always started attacking you the moment you're in the neighbourhood.



Now I've taken some time to post here because 1186 has all the things to be one of those starts of a new era. On the European theatre most surprising is Scotland completely eating England. I do wonder how it'll turn out for those guys, at least I'll feel less bad about inviding Great Scotland over Great Britain. Genoa has been destroyed by the Papal States as well, but suprisingly the PS are being very friendly to France. The Sicilians kicked the Romans out of Italy and occasionally grab Durazzo for a turn or two. More worrying though is the pace at which Norway is creating a superpower and conquering Denmark. I was allied with both them and France for quite a long time, but when these nations attacked I decided it was in my best interest to side with France. I was intent on breaking my alliance with Norway one way or another, which I'll show in the Eastern theatre too. With Konigsberg a citadel again and the good fortune of housing the swordsmith guild HQ there, I'm building up baracks there to create massive stacks of heavy infantry. The norwegians rely on infantry themselves so the combination of my cavalry and infantry should be able to run them down. The Ritterbruders are a massive bonus to my army as well, since Gothic Knights seem to be locked till the Renaissance. Lithuania and Kiev are easily kept in check, I'm not going to venture in those lands because dealing with the Teutonic Order has proven to be very detrimental to my empire in the previous playthrough. Still, if they want Konigsberg, they'll need to pry it from my cold, dead Imperial hands. I've got the Citadel status to thank to my Kaiser, who has seemingly become a demigod if anything. It's pretty shameful if at age 81 he's still the best general around. With his son being 56 already, there's a distinct possibility the throne will skip a generation directly to the grandson. It seems that he'll be in charge of the addition of Germany to the Empire. I'm already building armies in my border castles for a blitzkrieg on Norway, I've got spies in each settlement so it shouldn't be too hard. And with an Imperial pope I doubt there will be much repercussions. It will be interesting to see how it'll play out, but I'm confident this should be a walk in the park. I'd have to say goodbye to my replica of the Austrian Empire but that proved its problems later on in the game anyway :/. Last point in Europe is buying Bessarabia of the Roman Empire, sure I have Kiev on my back now, but it's a fair price over the Romans pouring into Russia.



On the Eastern theatre, the usual happened. The Romans conquered all the Seljuk lands and got stuck on the Kwarezhmians, no surprise there. What was surprising is that they made peace with the Cumans and even allied them. To keep that in check I decided to ally with them as well to keep the powers in check there. The Crusader States moved a bit around, eventually conquering Tayma and Luxor. I first believed I'd give them a hand and called a crusade on Medina, which the Norwegians won to my surprise. Ofcourse peace is brittle in here and for some suicidal reason the CS declared war against the Romans. With the Romans already having swept from Benghazi to Cairo again, it'd be suicide for me to ditch them over the CS. The next turn the CS declared war on me too, well isn't that nice... What they forgot was I had a full stack at Askalon and Amarint, which I quickly used to sweep in for Tayma and Jeruzalem. I sold off Tayma to the Romans, because that too was too goad Norway into war with my allies (warring against Norway has been on my mind for quite some time and my orchestrations their results were inevitable). After the Romans took Antioch and Edessa they vassalaged the CS. I didn't like that and sent my army on Damascus, the Romans sided with me and went to war again. Next turn they vassalaged the CS again. Ah well, their choice, I just wanted to extend my crusader kingdoms borders to Damascus and got my way. I don't complain.

So my campaign is progressing quite nicely, it's now just preparing for a long war against Norway. With the French attacking them in Belgium and my first full stack reaching Metz in 1188, it'll give for a nice war.

[Balor]

Settlements I think you can just click on the name from the top of the construction tab and type it in there. You have to own it, as such.

Didn't notice that. Thanks!

That Austrian Empire is brilliant.

[Deteriorate]

Here is my Venetian campaign early period with submods: Soulson campaign AI, Viva la Rebellion + Expanded, Kingdoms, Empires, Republics, and Regional Knight Orders.

Campaign up to now:
I allied with Hungary early on, offering a full alliance with mutual military access, map information etc and after capturing Belgrade, Zagreb, Ancona, Milan, Scopia I immediately went to war with the Roman Empire attacking their troops who were massing near Scopia. Hungary has been the perfect ally, hammering the Romans with me the entire campaign And now the only European continent territories in Roman hands are Adrianople and Constantinople.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Gandalfus]

Loving it. You should definitely make an all conquering Italian Republic and take Rome from the pope

[RobotGonzo]

Awesome stuff

[Deftu]

Well as soon as I can figure out how to make my PC take a screenshot of my Empire right now it currently only wants to take my desktop. I will throw it up there. Its two turns per year with extended build times.... on very hard. I'm not ever getting a chance to breathe.
I went with the idea of playing as Leon and Castille and had dreams of conquering the Iberian peninsula..... the Portuguese immediately allied with me and Aragon against waves of Moorish cavalry and spears by about the fifth turn. After taking Entredurma in 1225 (I think) I had somehow gotten three cardinals and was able to call a crusade on Granada, and take Murcia along with Andalusia in an all out surprise attack no sieging just blowing out the front well.... gate. Somehow I won all three with troops to spare. About 2 turns later Portugal shows up with about 60 units and hits me at Salamanca and Entredurma. I lost Entredurma as it had 3 garrison and Salamanca I managed to sally forth a heroic victory and build up my troops to survive another siege on the following turn. However, by this point I was in the red about 5000 florins so I had a couple choices either sell land, hold it and die, or do exactly what I did to the moors and hit them with another sneak attack. They foolishly left their holdings with about 4 companies each. So I took all of my troops from Toledo and took back Entredurma, same turn took Lisbon and that other tiny city underneath it and managed to get Oporto by the skin of my teeth. Faction = destroyed. 10 turns later I had taken Pamplona and had all of Spain (minus Zargosa, Valencia, and Barcelona) and dubbed myself the Iberian Empire. Apparently the Moors weren't too happy and built up three giant armies and sent them to Andalusia, but they held off sieging for 4 turns allowing me to build up an army of knights and defend my turf creating a fort at Gibraltar manned by foot knights from across my holdings. However, I couldn't do much more than defend as I was fighting being broke nearly the entire time.

Then, craziness happened. The Moorish Caliphate capitulated. The royal family apparently died out and left their entire holdings to rebels. At first I thought that the Fatimids were closing in so I was terrified. However upon blockading the ports I realized that the Fatimid were having a hard time just fighting an awkward Crusader States- Mongol alliance. With all of the ports blockaded I managed to get out of the red and start building an economy.

However, I started noticing something odd. Not only did I have stupid amounts of money in about 20 turns. But from 1228 to 1242 (last pope to be killed), 19 popes had died. NINETEEN POPES. However, this was not seen as a destabilization of the Catholic faith. Just my 12 Cardinals and 1 from the Crusader states (who I nominated to be the 20th pope). I sent my spies to realize that *GASP* Venice had butchered the Papal states and was pushing back a Hungarian force occupying most of the Balkans and Constantinople, and a Polish force which with their Denmark-Norway-Poland alliance had the HRE sitting in Switzerland and France on some delicate ropes and obliterated Lithuania.

So I took up the Holy Cross and called a crusade on Rome (ironic). With four decent sized armies, I left Toledo and marched onto Genoa and Milan taking them with relative ease by about 1243 Winter However, then things got dicey. In fear of a Hungarian rule over Rome and the destruction of my Papacy-in-pocket strategy. I marched one army with reckless abandon to siege Rome while my other two put Pisa and Bologna under Iberian jurisdiction. However, Venice wasn't giving up Rome to my schemes. And summoned four stacks of 16-20 units each and surrounded my poor 20 units. I immediately rushed over my cavalry from both companies and on-route was ambushed by another 20 unit stack. However, being mostly spear militia, I made them rout with only 40ish casualties and was able to support my army sieging Rome. The next battle was one of the closest I ever fought in one of these games.

In the Winter of 1245 The Venetians marched on my troops. Naturally I decided to control both of my armies and had my 16 groups of mixed cavalry start the battle. two stacks came from West and Northwest, one North, and one East. The Western Group spawned pretty close to my out-of-map reinforcements so I had to take them out first. However, the Doge was in that army with two feudal knights and spears by the many along with a trebuchet and a magonel. My cavalry killed the Doge and routed the others with few men to spare. With 50 odd units still closing in, I had thought to retreat at first, however I noticed something about one of their units that surprised me. It had a lot of artillery. 3 catapults, 1 ballistae, 3 trebuchets, and 2 magonels. and then CROSSBOW MILITIA 8 companies of them. They were heading to regroup with their buddies so I took the last of my cavalry and killed as many of them as I could while my javelinmen feudal knight based unit tore up one of the other groups with a quarter casualties. Then a miracle happened. I ordered one of my Jinetes groups to spear the general's bodyguard on the last unit. I heard the miraculous words:" our men have slain the enemy general now his men will lose heart" and that they did I managed to win and got a Clear Victory (utter bullcrap if you ask me) with over 3500 kills and captured for my army. Venice never recovered. and I made the papacy my ally with Rome as bartering material. reducing Venice to well.... Venice as the Polish and Hungarians took everything else.

It is 1300 now and I have conquered half of Africa and recently claimed Ireland along with Rhodes and Crete from the ERE. Sadly, my Aragonian buddies fell to rebels as well in about 1270 and I took all their cities (and a lovely French rebellion in Toulouse) for my own. Currently, the Mongols own about a third of the world. with Hungary in second (though the Mongols just took Constantinople so they will be below me soon.) However, I am by far the most military strong and rich. None of the other countries even attempt to war with me (minus Mongolia.... those jacks are coming for me after the Fatimid.) Denmark and Norway have surprisingly shot up and are taking it to the French while Poland attempts to keep Novgorod at bay. The English have just been excommunicated a third time, so my next plan is to build up ridiculous wealth while putting the Iberian stamp onto the British Isles. However, the Mongols will soon be coming for me in Africa so I am preparing for an onslaught of forces and pagan priests.
Only 29 territories. But I have held richest faction for more than 30 turns and production for more than 12. Militarily the Mongols and I switch back and forth a lot as well as overall. They've got me beat in population ridiculously but I am somehow second. mostly all of my stupid citadels from when I thought that Hungary was gonna invade me (but they are having a hard time putting down Venice with four settlements now and the Mongols.)