Emperor Raynaud II of Francia, 1218-1227 AD

(Previously on Royal Dispatch.)

First of all, a brief intermission in Loading Screen Studies. Crusader Kings rotates through a series of vaguely period-esque watercolor-ish images while loading, mostly scenes of battle and pomp. But there’s this one domestic tableaux of a couple with new baby and lurking evildoer that always catches my attention.

Forget the lurker, let’s zoom in on the couple.

Her ladyship sure looks dewy and composed after giving birth to her rather large and gray-haired baby. Guess it was an easy labor! But check out the beside table:

Is that… is that a ham? I keep trying to see it as a flower or corsage or something less meaty. But I’m pretty sure it’s a ham? A traditional medieval birthing ham. That must really take the edge off. I guess the artist figured there’s always copious Henry VIII style meat platters in medieval paintings, why should this scene be any exception.

Anyway, that Bavarian war took way too long due to the intermissions in the north, meaning my vassals are all grumbly about a long offensive. So I need to let everybody cool off for awhile. On the plus side, my archbishop has fabricated numerous juicy claims for me to pursue in England once the dust settles.

The king of Italy dies, and his heir decides to make his other kingdom title primary—goodbye Italy, hello Sardegna e Corsica. Somehow as part of this, the remaining county of Cornwall outside of my control becomes independent. I snap it up in a quickie war before someone else grabs it.

I spend a year spending money on realm improvements and avoiding conflict to get those negative opinions turned back around. That done, I focus on the next target in England: the duchy of Hwicce, whose de jure lands are split between the petty kingdom of East Seaxe and Hwicce itself. Neither are consequential threats, so I begin with East Seaxe.

I’m midway through that mini-war when my son and heir Raynaud has his first child, a son, also named Raynaud. He’s a Genius like his dad. Promising! I make sure to claim him as my ward straightaway to influence the fate of this potential future emperor.

We haven’t even taken all the of targeted land of Hwicce when we capture the East Seaxean heir in battle, ending the war quickly and neatly in my favor.

After a short chill-out period, it’s time to hit the petty kingdom of Hwicce directly, which now only controls one of its own de jure counties. They have a powerful Italian duke as one of their allies—well, not powerful compared to an Emperor you understand, but if he sends troops here it will take a little longer to crush them. So why not! To arms!

I don’t have to stay long in arms, as I capture both the heir to the petty kingdom and the petty queen herself in short order.

Southern England has taken on a lovely shade of French blue.

This kind of pursuit is known derisively in strategy games as “painting the map.” I like painting the map!!! However there’s still lot more map to paint, to gain the empire of Britannia, shown here in de jure form.

So far I just have that little foot part at the bottom, comprising 14 of the 75 counties I need. But I have 14 of the 21 counties I need to create the kingdom of England, which would give me the the right to take over quite bit more, as shown in this map of the four kingdoms which constitute the empire of Britannia.

Once I have England in hand it will be a small matter to take Wales, and then enough of Scotland to create the empire. And then, of course, as always with the British, it’s time for Ireland. Eventually!

My son Ancel comes of age, so I wed him to Princess Sofia Karling-Acqui of Sargedgna e Corsica (formerly known as Italy) to re-establish that useful alliance.

The next target in Britain is the petty kingdom of Mercia, which presents a special challenge. It’s a large duchy—nine counties—and I’d rather not piecemeal it. Ideally I’d have claims on five of the nine counties before going to war, so that with victory, I’d control a majority and could usurp the title. However, I only have two claims so far, and I’m 50 years old. It’s cutting it a little close, but I’m going to wait and see if I can live long enough to make a proper war of it.

Which means I need to look elsewhere for military entertainment while the claim machine gets to fabricatin’. I turn my attention to the Franconia twins, East and West, who gave me static during the recent war with Brabant.

Only West Franconia is still allied with the county of Brabant (which de jure should be mine), so I’d have to fight the former just to gain the latter. But it turns out a visitor in my court has a claim to West Franconia itself. If I win a war on that claimant’s behalf, he’ll take the title and become my vassal. So I might as well get the big reward if I have to fight the large-ish West Franconian army anyway.

West Franconia’s Duke Liutpold Chatenois-Kleve does indeed have an outsize army, and he’s also flush with gold. I should still be able to prevail, but it will be costly. So I wait for a while to punch up my own resources, and also in the hope that Liutpold might die (he’s 67) and I can fight his weaker successor.

But he stubbornly remains alive, and I need something to occupy me while the Mercia claims cook along. So I declare war on West Franconia for that courtier’s claim on the duchy.

I march my troops into West Franconia and grab a few early victories. Duke Liutpold gets very spendy on mercenaries, and eventually his few allies make their way over to the conflict zone. Even in aggregate they are no particular threat, but they form into several smaller spoiler armies that could mess with the multiple sieges I’ve laid across the land. So as insurance I call up my sole ally, King Gandolfo Karling-Acqui of Sardegna e Corsica, just to keep things spicy.

My obese genius son and heir Raynaud 3 is stricken with consumption, which ain’t good.

I have a quite talented court physician, so I go the route of cautious treatment. This gets him the “Reduced Disease Symptoms” result, which is passable and at least didn’t result in any surprise amputations.

Duke Liutpold and his rapidly diminishing armies make several feints at my sieging forces but never break through, losing more men and nobles with each engagement. My skillfully nefarious archbishop manages to cinch a fabricated claim to the entire petty kingdom of Mercia, making the next war in England very lucrative indeed, territorially speaking.

Eventually the West Franconians can no longer resist my hordes of brutal French thugs, and the duchy falls. It’s part of the long-fragmented kingdom of East Francia, which I’m not particularly interested in reconstructing, but this victory reduces an annoyance on my border. Now I will rest from martial labors for awhile in preparation for gobbling up Mercia up in grand merry bloody ole England.

Next: New crown, new law, and nude duke.