A Guide to the Danes
Had some gaming computer problems over the weekend, but on the bright side it gave me time to complete this. Enjoy!
A Guide to the Danes
This guide was based on playthroughs at M/M difficulty level and with default unit sizes.
When you decide you want to play as the Vikings in Viking Invasion II, you’ve got a choice: do you play as the Norwegians, or the Danes? I have yet to complete a campaign as Norway, but my few attempts have been short-lived: plagued with debt, rebellious settlements, and aggressive neighbors, I’ve found the going harder than expected. Troop differences between the two Viking factions are also a factor: although the Norwegians boast the fearsome Berserkers, they totally lack cavalry, apart from mercs.
The Danes always struck me as the more “civilized” of the Viking factions. They have the (limited) ability to make use of their enemies’ technology: To reflect the Danes’ Had propensity for horse-rustling, the developers decided to allow them to train Horsemen – but denied them the ability to build Stables. This means that, in order to train their one and only cav unit, the Danes must first take over a settlement (either Anglo-Saxon or Celtic) that has already built a Stable – in effect, the Danes are “stealing” the horses; a nice touch!
Also, the Danes are positioned to take over perhaps the richest part of the map: southern England. With many ports and good farmland, the regions of East Anglia, Wessex, and Mercia can provide an excellent base for a Danish conqueror. Compared with the relatively poor and slow-growing lands of northern Scotland that the Norwegians inherit, it’s easy to see why the Danes appeal to a player like me who prefers turtling and building up an effective infrastructure *before* going on a rampage.
The guide that follows is based on my preferred playstyle, and as such may not appeal to every player. But I found that a strategy of economic consolidation and precision conquest was quite effective – so effective, in fact, that I had no need to engage in the classic Viking “smash & grab” raids which are probably necessary to succeed as Norway. Instead, my progression seemed rather to reflect the historical Danish conquest of the region that became known as the Danelaw.
Of course, this doesn’t mean you can’t follow my advice *and* burn down a few churches. But if you do make use of these tips, raiding will be merely a pleasant diversion from the tedium of running your prosperous and far-flung empire, not a method to keep your financial head above water.
First, meet the Vikings:
Beards, boats, and battles: Viking troops
Like the Anglo-Saxon factions, Viking armies are foot-heavy. Your infantry provide your defensive anvil and your offensive hammer in battle. The most basic Danish unit is the Spearmen, trainable at the 1st-level barracks and functionally identical to the Anglo-Saxon Spearmen: no shield-wall, no throwing spears; nothing fancy, but a solid, workmanlike unit that you’ll rely on into the endgame.
In order to hold your armies together, you'll want to lead them with Hirdmenn - the bodyguard unit that comes with any family members you have. Don't be shy about sending them into battle, especially if you can spare a few family members to toss in with a stack. Obviously your general will want to hang out just back from the center of the front line, so your spears get the morale boost; any other Hirdmenn can be used as flankers or anchors for the line. But once battle is joined, don't hesitate to get your general into the mix, either through a flank/rear attack on the enemy, targeting the enemy general, or sending him straight through any openings your own troops have provided. It's generally preferable to lose a few bodyguard units, after all: their numbers will replenish overtime, with no need for retraining, and getting a few experience chevrons is extremely helpful, especially in the early years.
At any port, you can train Leidangr, making these axemen the most prolific Viking unit along the coasts. They throw spears, too, making them good flankers or second-row men. Their defensive stats mean they will flee if they take heavy losses, so don’t get them in over their heads. Two to four units per army is probably sufficient; more than that and you’re in danger of a mass rout if one unit runs away. Otherwise, they make great garrison troops.
Vikingr can be trained at your 2nd-level barracks. With axes, round shields and blond hair they certainly look the part, but recognize these men for what they are: raiders and flankers, not professional killing machines. Their stats are quite similar to the Leidangr, but without spear-throwing capability; the upkeep is a bit lower, at 83 shillings per turn. That makes them good garrison troops and army-fillers, but they shouldn’t be front line troops. Although they can perform a shieldwall, I got better results letting them run around and flank. I like to have them hang out behind Leidangr on the flanks, or in the second row, behind the Spearmen. Used to charge the flanks or rear of engaged enemies, they can be effective.
At the 3rd-level barracks, things start to get interesting. Now you can train Armoured Spearmen and Huskarls, perhaps your two best troops. In addition to looking awesome, the Armoured Spears can perform a shieldwall, and they also have secondary weapons: swords, which they pull out when performing a charge. In your battle line, the Armoured Spears won’t let you down. I like to have them at the center of the front line, with regular Spears flanking them, and other units (Leidangr, Vikingr, or mercs) flanking the Spears. I generally train four units per army.
Huskarls also have swords as a secondary weapon, but their primary weapon is the famous Danish axe. Since they take 2 turns to train and are expensive, I usually only have one per army, positioned near the flank and a little back, so they don’t become a target for enemy archers or get run down by cav. Their war-flag keeps morale high for nearby troops, so the flank seems like a good place to put them, while my general hangs out on the opposite flank. Huskarls are good for hacking down horsemen, the enemy general, armoured troops, or just flanking around the back of the enemy army and acting like the black-mailed wrecking balls they are.
On Jutland, a family member outside Ribbe can often hire Mercenary Jomsvikings. Their special ability is the “Tortoise Arch” formation (the Testudo from RTW), but chances are you won’t use it. Tortoise Arch would theoretically be helpful if approaching an enemy position under fire, such as at a siege, but your Jomsvikings are so badass, and unretrainable, that you’d probably find some other unit to act as a missile sponge. On the battlefield, the Jomsvikings scare other infantry units, and they’re apparently constructed out of an alloy of titanium, iron, and bad intentions. If a Jomsviking kissed your girlfriend, you’d give him a high-five. They’re that cool. Of course, they’re also that expensive, so only take them on if you can afford it. I like to position them near the flanks and in the second row; that way I can sweep them out and around the enemy once they’re engaged. Getting hit by Jomsvikings in the back is like … well, I’m sure you can come up with your own comparison involving Chuck Norris. It’s like that.
Other mercenaries of note include the omnipresent Mercenary Rabble, Mercenary Lithsmen, Mercenary Fyrdmen, and Mercenary Butescarles. I’ve extolled the virtues of the merc Rabble elsewhere; for the Danes, however, who can train Leidangr, the Rabble are simply an extra. The Lithsmen, Fyrdmen, and Butescarles can be trained or hired in the field, depending on location. Lithsmen are good flankers; Fyrdmen, with shieldwall and javelins, make good front-liners; and Butescarles are good for killing horsemen, the enemy general, or armoured units.
Archers can only be trained by the Danes in Jutland, meaning they’re likely to be rare in your armies. Still, train them as you can, because they’re a quality unit. Use Mercenary Archers or, in Wales, the Mercenary Longbowmen you can train at inns, as supplements to your ranged power.
And then there’s the cavalry. Of course, there are the Mercenary Horsemen you can hire most everywhere – and you should – but as the Danes you should also train your own Horsemen when you can. Your Horsemen are much cheaper, for one thing, and they seem to perform better in melee. Don’t leave them in the scrum for too long, but use charge & repeat tactics. As a Viking faction, a perpetual problem is how to make your battle victories truly decisive. With Horsemen, you can ensure that the routing enemy don’t all get away.
Finally, a word about boats. None of your ships are all that expensive in upkeep, and the Snekkja are in fact free. Eventually, you’ll want to build some more – either for a long-range invasion up the coast, or to deal with a stubborn enemy navy. Mix in a few Drakkars with your Snekkjas; they’ll help even the odds on most anything you fight at sea. The imposing Jarnbardi may not be strictly necessary, but it is a matter of pride for a Viking leader. It’s nice to have one around for bragging rights.
Getting started
The Danes begin play in possession of three settlements: Ribbe, your Royal Residence in Jutland; Hrafnesgate on the isle of Thanet; and Cantwaraburh on the mainland of Great Britain. On Medium campaign difficulty, the Danes also begin with a hefty bankroll – unfortunately, they’re operating at a loss.
A look at your starting armies and fleets will show you that you won’t overcome these losses simply by disbanding your armed forces. For one thing, the Snekkjas that make up the majority of your fleet have zero upkeep costs! Even your Drakkars, the next step up, only cost 50 shillings per turn. Go ahead and disband some of those Drakkars, but keep four or so scattered around with a few Snekkjas, in case of attack. Remember to keep some ships in every port that you own, especially off Jutland, for ease of troop transport.
With all the free ships at your disposal, you may be wondering what you can do with them. Blockading ports and attacking the ships of other nations is all well and good, but I also like to use my navies as spies, especially in the early years. Send some ships around the southern coast of England to keep an eye on West Saxon settlements like Salesau (?) and Uintanceastir, and up the east coast to track the ownership of regions like Lindissi, Dere, and Lindisfarne/Beornice. Your naval power means you can stay informed about which factions are likely to become a threat, and when you should move to take certain settlements. And all those safe ships in your ports mean you *can* move decisively with your armies when a need arises. This is obviously a tremendous advantage over landlocked factions like … well, everybody except you and Norway.
It’s unlikely that you’ll face a serious challenge from the fleets of other factions. The West Saxons may scrape together a Longboat or two, but with your overwhelming naval superiority they’ll be little more than an irritation. Ditto for the Northumbrians – if you let them get too big.
In fact, the only faction capable of challenging you at sea is your ally, Norway. Depending on the fortunes of your campaign, Norway may emerge as a major power in the north – or they may get kicked off the mainland by the Albans and wither away, spending their last few years crying over mugs of mead in Orkney, thinking of what might have been and listening to The Cure.
Either way, for much of the game you should be able to remain allies and stay out of each others’ way. Of course, if the Norwegians get too big for their britches and begin to threaten Northumbria – in other words, if you ever get the message that the Men of Alba have been destroyed – watch out. You’ve taken too long dealing with southern England and need to turn your attention north. This is in fact what happened in my most recent Danes campaign, and I ended up at war with my erstwhile ally. (It was a good war, though – properly epic, featuring some high-tech units on both sides.)
Turning to your land forces, you’ll notice the Danes begin play with several high-cost and high-quality units: a few Armoured Spearmen, Huskarls, and the supercalafragalisticexpialadociously expensive Jomsvikings. It may be tempting, but don’t disband any of these men: there’s a lot of fighting to do, and you’ll need them all. Instead, take the first couple of turns and train a few more units, put them all under command of a nearby family member, and recruit some mercs. Then march on London.
Meanwhile, send your other family member(s) from Ribbe, along with an army of their own, to make trouble in East Anglia. Note that Mercenary Jomsvikings can often be found for hire in Jutland; make use of your starting funds to snap up whatever you can find or train. Also note that your Archers can apparently only be trained in your Scandinavian homeland; you can’t build Butts in England. So train Archers in Ribbe to send along as necessary.
The goal here is to have two or three sizeable stacks roving through East Anglia and eastern Wessex. Attack the enemy wherever they gather – especially those small stacks of 2 or 3 Spearmen you see in between settlements. You want to eliminate those guys before they join a bigger army and become a problem for you. As you’re able, take settlements. Elmham is a good first target for your landing army, and if you can quickly move west to take Eely, East Anglia can be crippled early on. Still, they’ll field plenty of Spearmen and the occasional Beardsmen. If necessary, don’t hesitate to retreat to the ships and target another stretch of coastline.
London is likely to be held by Wessex, but by making use of the nearby bridges you should have little trouble taking it with your strong army. Keeping it is another matter: early on, don’t be surprised if you see Wessex fielding some high-tech units of their own – Armoured Spears, Fyrdmen, and Thegns. The key to dealing with these units is attacking them before they join up with a sizeable army under a general.
Danish conquest early on is facilitated by the fact that you can instantly train Leidangr at every coastal settlement you conquer, as long as you keep the ports intact. Leidangr come in unit sizes of 50 men, cost a mere 88 shillings in upkeep, and can throw spears (a rare ability for Viking units) in addition to wielding axes in melee. They’re not your best units, but they’re a good supplement to your Spear-heavy early armies and make great garrison troops.
Conquest – settlements and religion
Every settlement I take, I prefer to hold and keep. Exterminating the populace can be a good option, at least when your conquering army is small and the population is several thousand, but it has the obvious drawbacks of decreasing the number of taxpayers and cutting back on settlement growth. Mouse over to take a look at the settlement on the campaign map before you decide to exterminate, enslave, or occupy. If you see a blue, yellow or green face, occupy. If the face is red, check to see how many people you’d be killing by exterminating. I prefer to exterminate only if I’d be executing a thousand or more; if the number is lower, I can probably just occupy and deal with the disloyalty by cutting taxes or increasing the garrison.
The other option is slavery, but I didn’t find myself using this at all as the Danes. Since your sea power gives you the ability to invade your choice of settlements, building up a core of homelands isn’t as important for you as it is for a more sedentary faction. Plus, my family members were often out fighting, not administering a city (and slaves only increase the population in cities with governors); even those who were acting as governors weren’t necessarily governing the cities I’d prefer to get the pop boost for. If you’re the kind of player who has a good idea of which cities would benefit, though, then slavery could work.
Once conquered, I’ve found that it’s possible to hold a settlement even if the loyalty is as low as 45% - as long as you can increase it somehow. You can usually last through a few turns of revolts. After taking a few cities and building up a bit, you’ll find you can train spies, and these may help by kicking out or capturing enemy spies that are stirring up trouble.
If spies aren’t an option, you can look to the building roster for some help. The first objective after taking an enemy city is to tear down those useless troop-training buildings; in your case, that means Anglo-Saxon (or Celtic) Muster Fields and Butts. These buildings do nothing for you, so they may as well make you some cash. Do NOT destroy any Inns or related structures, as these offer a loyalty boost and can often be used to train your spies, assassins, or regional mercenary units – Mercenary Fyrdmen will be the most common during the first phase of your conquest. Also, be sure to keep any ports (you can use these to build ships, train Leidangr, and get trade and tax bonuses) or Stables (these will allow you to train Horsemen).
The only question marks here are what to do with those Christian buildings – the shrines, priories, and abbeys. In short: keep them.
Historically, the Danes had something of an ambivalent attitude toward religion. Their conquest of eastern England was not a pagan crusade, and conversion to Christianity didn’t always “take”. As the Danes, you can build Pagan Shrines and Pagan Sacrificial Shrines, and most of your family members will be pagan, at least in the early years, so it may be tempting to tear down the churches and forcibly convert the population. In my experience, though, that is a lot more work than it’s worth.
For one, tearing down Christian buildings will result in tremendous unrest: I made that mistake in one of the settlements northwest of London, and lost the town for my trouble. The only way you can get away with it is if a majority of the population is already pagan, which you can accomplish in any combination of three ways: make sure enough of the neighboring regions are pagan (a catch-22); build pagan shrines (which will often result in massive Christian unrest – check your Settlement Details scroll before you go ahead with any construction plans!); or get enough pagan characters, such as spies and family members, in the region you want to convert.
Using the last of those methods, I was able to convert enough of the population of London to paganism, to the point where I could destroy the churches and build the pagan shrines. But so what? I still had to keep my eye on the loyalty of the town, and, although the pagan shrines provide a nice law bonus, the point was moot after I moved my capital from Ribbe to Elmham and then Eely.
Besides, eventually you’re going to begin to get some Christian family members (Christian Vikings are Roman Christian, which means they’re better off in Anglo-Saxon areas than Celtic). You can use these converts to govern your newly-conquered Christian cities, and keep all the loyalty and trade benefits some of those Christian buildings provide.
One thing to keep an eye on, especially in the areas of East Anglia and Northumbria, is whether you can construct a Pagan Shrine without incurring huge Christian unrest. In most settlements, you’ll see (by queuing up a Pagan Shrine and checking the Settlement Details scroll) that a Pagan Shrine would bring 100% Christian unrest – so don’t go through with building it! In some places, however – like Elmham, Eely, Colneceaster, and Eoforwic, among others – a Pagan Shrine will bring no Christian unrest at all, and only confer the law bonus. This is obviously a great advantage, as law not only increases happiness but also decreases corruption, thereby increasing your actual income. Note, however, that once those settlements grow to the level of a minor city, construction of the Pagan Sacrificial Shrine will often bring the 100% Christian unrest. So always check your options.
Overall, it’s best to get comfortable with the fact that you will be running an empire of Christians *and* pagans.
The Danelaw
The natural progression for the Danes is to attack and destroy East Anglia and Wessex first, and then work on Mercia and Northumbria. Of course, since you have so many ships and some regions relatively safe from invasion, you may decide to go off and invade Ireland or Wales instead. But since you’ll *need* to take most of eastern and northern England to win anyway, it’s best to eliminate your strongest opponents first.
It would be nice if you could get peace, trade rights, and even alliances with some of the other factions, but the Danes begin the game at war with everyone save Norway, and Emissaries are a long way off for you. Some of the other factions may come calling first, so get trade rights from them if you can. The Northumbrians make decent trade partners – until you attack them, anyway – and Mercia would in theory as well. But in practice, as soon as you wipe out East Anglia and brush up against their borders, Mercia will attack you.
That’s fine – don’t want them getting too big, after all. At this point in the game, you’ll need to keep pressure on Wessex and Mercia simultaneously, but if you’ve been making good building choices in your settlements then you will likely be turning a decent profit.
It was around this time in my recent game that I learned Alba had been destroyed. My Snekkjas confirmed that Norway had conquered all the way down to Edinburgh and was soon to besiege Northumbria in Maelmin. Fortunately, my income allowed me to get together an extra army and sail it up the coast to Eoforwic – still held by rebels – before anyone else could grab it. At the time, I didn’t border Dere, but taking York was still a good move; not only is it a victory condition, but it provides another place to crown your king, has good income and training potential, and the title “King of Jorvik” adds to troop morale. From here, I was able to throw my weight around in Northumbria while I continued my conquest further south.
Northumbria isn’t exactly the richest region on the map, but getting more coastland is always a plus for the Danes. Also, it’s imperative that you keep any one faction from gaining too much power. While you can control a lot of what happens in the south, it’s likely that either Norway or the Albans will come out on top in Scotland before you have much say in the matter. Getting some land in Northumbria allows you to strike at the winner of that war more easily.
South of the Humber, you have the advantage of being able to strike before any one Anglo-Saxon faction takes control of the majority of the rich farmlands. After your initial victories, Wessex and Mercia will field mostly Spearmen against you, which cannot stand against your more attack-oriented Viking troops. Keep an eye out for the many mercenaries in the region, especially Mercenary Horsemen, which are a good complement to the axe-wielding Horsemen you’ll be able to train in your captured Stables. Mercenary Archers will have to supplement your own trainable Archers as well.
As your realm begins to spread west and north, consider moving your capital from Ribbe. Elmham, as stated above, makes a good capital; later, as you expand into Wales and further north, Eely is a better candidate.
Wales and the North
If you’ve been beating up on the Mercians and Wessex, it’s likely that the Welsh have had free rein in the west. In my campaign, they conquered all the way up to Cumbri, and gave me some trouble around York for a few years before I could drive them back. If that’s the case in your game, you may have some setbacks: Although their infantry leaves something to be desired, the Welsh are strong in two areas where you are weak: cavalry and archers.
This is where mercenaries come into play. By the time you’re fighting the Welsh in earnest, you should be in possession of some quite rich lands, and you may be a candidate for the richest faction. Use that money to keep building – especially toward Huskarls and Armoured Spears in your bigger cities – but also grab troops where you can. Mercenary Lithsmen and Jomsvikings can be found in eastern England and Jutland, respectively; Mercenary Archers, Rabble, and Horsemen everywhere else. Your goal is to assemble a horde of troops to face the hordes of Spearmen and Archers the Welsh are sending your way.
Often, the Welsh will attack you with large stacks full of Spearmen, led by a mere captain. Even a single unit of Jomsvikings, with their fear attribute, can help hasten the inevitable rout. The real danger the Welsh pose is not necessarily that they’ll defeat you in battle, but that they’ll whittle away your forces and make it harder for you to take & hold their rebellious settlements. Mercs allow you to fill some gaps in your unit roster, and also allow the Welsh to kill less valuable units while your sturdy Spearmen, Vikingr, Leidangr and Hirdmenn do the mopping up. Even Teulu, the Welsh bodyguard unit, can’t stand up for long if they’re surrounded by Lithsmen and Spears, or being shot down by Merc Archers.
As with every faction in VI2 that must conquer parts of England, your conquest is likely to be slowed by the expansive lands you must defend with what feels like too few men. Once you begin to conquer your first Welsh settlements (most likely Pouis), it may seem as though you need to keep your armies bottled up in town forever just to prevent rebellion. But I found that taking my family members outside Welsh settlements sometimes *increased* the loyalty of those towns. It may be easier than it appears to keep your steamroller rolling.
Though they train a lot of troops, Wales is unlikely to be your biggest threat, partly due to the long frontier you share: while their main army is threatening one of your towns, you’re besieging a couple of theirs. In the north, however, whichever faction won the war for Scotland is going to be crawling over the corpse of Northumbria and ready to pour all their strength down on you. You need to be prepared to answer that threat, if only because the most straightforward route to victory requires you to conquer several settlements to the north of Edinburgh.
In my game, Norway had won that war and was besieging Hagustaldsae, just north of York, when I decided I needed to move. As we were allies at the time, I joined their siege of the town and then assaulted, taking it for myself. Norway immediately besieged me, breaking our alliance – for the rest of the game we were at war.
If you face Norway, you’re liable to see some interesting units across the battlefield. You’ll see plenty of the ubiquitous Spearmen, of course, but mixed in with the infamous Berserkers and occasional Huskarls. Since they controlled Scotland, the Norwegians in my game also fielded lots of trainable Pictish Infantry and Longspearmen mercenaries, along with Ostmen.
The one thing Norway lacks entirely, however, is cavalry. You can make life a lot easier by bringing up a few of your trainable Horsemen and Merc Horsemen – a couple units of each per army is a good ratio. While your footmen hold the battle line, your cav can do their thing and charge repeatedly into the backs of engaged foes. A few good charges can cause trouble even for Hirdmenn; against armies that are not led by a family member, they can lead to a quick rout. A “good” charge requires that you line up your cav facing the direction they’re going to charge, with enough distance to allow them to get up to speed. If you see your Merc Horsemen lowering their spears before impact, you’ve pulled it off; otherwise, pull them out and try again. With the axe-wielding Horsemen it’s harder to see, but if they’re pushing back and killing the enemy, let them stay until they start to take losses.
These battles will likely be among the longest you fight, since your sides are so evenly matched – especially if Norway brings Huskarls, which inspire their own troops to keep fighting. By this time, though, you should have a few Huskarls of your own, along with Armoured Spears, to get the edge (don’t train *too* many; 2 or 3 Huskarls and 4 to 6 Armoured Spears should do it, with Spearmen, Vikingr/Leidangr and Mercs to make up the difference). Still, expect to fight many large stacks before you can make progress into Scotland.
Berserkers may be intimidating, but they aren’t battle-winners on their own, and you can use their impetuousness against them. Often they will charge in, howling, well ahead of their friends; flank them with some Lithsmen, Vikingr, or Horsemen, and you can quickly cut them down before engaging the rest of the enemy.
Once I was at war with the Norwegians, I thought I’d be clever and steal Norway from them. So I trained up an army and sent in with a fleet to the north. To my surprise, I landed to find that they’d been busy: At least three stacks’ worth of Spearmen and Archers awaited me. Perhaps I could have fought through them all, but tragedy struck: faced with what seemed like insurmountable odds, I retreated, only to find that I didn’t have enough movement points or something, and so all my precious troops were vaporized by a quirk of the engine. It hardly seems fair – why should I even have had the *option* of retreating? – but I stuck with the results and abandoned my dream of conquering Norway.
Fortunately, I was rich enough by that point to absorb those losses. After clearing out the area around Maelmin – which can be quite well built-up by the late game, and allowed me to train my best troops – I was able to keep up the pressure into the north; Norwegian resistance fell apart once I took Edinburgh.
If the Men of Alba had come out on top in the Scotland war, things would most likely have been easier. Alba has good cavalry, especially its Mormaers, but the AI tends not to use its cav most effectively. If you can catch them with your heavy troops, you can hack them down. The Alban Armoured Spearmen and Pictish Infantry would be more of a problem, if led by a competent general, but to a large degree fighting Alba is like fighting Wales: watch out for their archers and spear-flingers, send in your heavies, and surround with cav.
Overall, the Danes have the advantages of a sturdy Anglo-Saxon style army, but with more offensive capability and far greater mobility thanks to their fleets. The paganism of your generals isn’t that much of a hindrance to conquering the essentially Christian British Isles, and by focusing on a coasts-first program of conquest, you can quickly build up a rich and powerful empire, even without making pyramids of skulls or torching every building at hand.
When your Danish victory comes, take satisfaction in knowing that you’ve done Cnut’s work a century early.
Edit: A word about hording.
It may not be immediately obvious, but the Danes (and presumably the Norwegians as well) are a horde faction. This means that, if you were reduced to a single settlement, you could abandon that settlement and become a horde. I've seen some players mention that they like to take that approach, but it's not one I have done myself.
For one thing, the addition of Hrafnesgate, on its island east of Canterbury, makes it a bit harder for the Danes to be threatened with extinction as a faction, as the AI is usually rather slow to conquer island regions.
Second, your substantial starting troops near Canterbury make any loss of your starting settlements unlikely, provided you go on the offensive within the first several turns. In short, I find it easier (or more palatable) to try to hold what I've got rather than relinquish it.
Hording does have its advantages, if the opportunity presents itself to you. You get a large number of "free" troops, which have zero upkeep costs and can be used to stage multiple simultaneous invasions. On the other hand, the total lack of settlements you'll experience as a horde means your income is limited to whatever you can loot from cities, and you have no way of replenishing your troops other than hiring mercs - who *will* still demand their pay.
Hording also allows new options for dealing with conquered settlements: the "sack" or "settle" options. Sacking means you'll get a large amount of cash and destroy buildings to your heart's content - but the settlement will belong to Rebels. Settling gives you control of the town, but decreases your horde troops. Obviously, to eventually win the game, you'll need to start settling at some point. But one good way to make use of your horde would be to target a particular faction for destruction and sack all their settlements, leaving only rebels for you to mop up once you settle. It's just a question of how much damage you can do with your horde troops, and making sure that when you *do* settle, you aren't suddenly in a far weaker position.
Again, my own preference is to act like a "normal" faction with the Danes. No doubt hording may be quite effective in some players' hands, but I have a hard time bringing myself to abandon hard-won regions and deal with zero infrastructure, even temporarily.
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