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How I managed to win a grand campaign without ever hiring a marshal and without reloading.


Ajukreyzi

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Hey fellow kings, here is how I reached my goal to win a grand campaign on very hard with no marshal's and without realoading. It took 7 hours and 15 minutes (ingame time) to do so.

Starting Setup:

Time period: 1360 AD
Difficulty: Very Hard
Kingdom size: Historical
Religious standing: Challenging
Starting King's class: Historical
Starting Gold: High
Aging speed: Normal
Espionage: Full
Kingdom: Principality of Wallachia (2 Provinces)


Generation 1:
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Starting out in the beautiful lands of Wallachia with their respective provinces Tirgoviste and Severin, Grand Prince Nicolae resides on the throne. The lands of Tirgoviste are blessed with goods, such as wood, wine and herbs, as well as crops, settlements and a monastery. The neighboring province has metal, lime, lodestone and salt ready to be mined. Grand Prince Nicolae is already married, and is blessed with 3 childs, two daughters, one of which is already married to the prince of our neighboring kingdom Vidin and a young prince who wants to be a merchant someday, unlike his father who is a diplomat. Grand Prince Nicolae spends his reign building up the economy of his provinces, estableshing trade agreements and using his diplomatic skills to gain powerful allies.
Despite the rich lands the principality of Walachia lacks income at first as well as knowledge and religous beliefs. But that doesn't stop our Grand Prince to do everything in his power to build up his kindom until he died of age.

Generation 2:

Grand Prince Vlaicu, already an adult, inherits his fathers throne and is faced with immediate troubles. The neighboring Kingdom Vidin, where his sister is Queen claims inheritance rights to the province Severin. With no money and no armys he has to accept their claim. But Vlaicu is determined not to give up. Using his incredible trading skills he manages to build up an incredible trade center and despite only consisting of one province building up more income than great power kingdoms. He is married to the princess Doroteja of Serbia and has two daughters and two sons all young adults. His firstborn daugher is queen of hungary, and his second daughter will be queen of Lithuania one day. The young prince is married to princess Euphrosine of Byzantium. Until his death the kings determination is clear. Trade and using his money and influence to gain powerful allies.

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Generation 3:

Grand Prince Dan ascents the throne and is determined to take back the lands which he thinks were wrongfully stolen from his father. The people of Severin are still loyal to Wallachia, but multiple negotiations to claim back the land failed. But the trade empire his father left is of great use as the royal treasury bursts of gold. He hires the best spy gold can buy to infiltrate Vidin and destabalize their kingdom. But he is facing severe inflation because he has no more lands to build on. But that should change. His spy reported that Hungary is at war with Vidin and that Vidin's armys don't stand a chance. Hungary, always a loyal friend of Walachia more than welcomed the kings wish to assist them in their war. Using his incredible gold reserves he hired three highly trained mercenary armys who immediately marched towards Vidin. With 6 armys crushing them the Vidin's stood no chance, and the mercenary armys with the help of the hungarians laid siege to both enemy cities, which would later surrender to Wallachia.

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After estableshing order in Bdin, the former capital of Vidin, Walachia's economy thrived with the access to new goods like gold, metal and horses. The immense gold reserves helped building up the war torn provinces in no time and the new trading potential was used to import various goods from their trading partners of the Teutonic Order, Transylvania and Hungary. As Walachia's trading power was unmatched and it's friendship with surrounding kingdoms at an all time high it secured them a place in the 9 most powerful nations in the world.

And the opportunities wouldn't stop. Lithuania declared war to Moldavia, Wallachia's northeast neighbors and it looked like the Moldavians wouldn't stand chance. Grand Prince Dan was an opportunist (which would almost be his demise) and so he joined the winning side of Lithuania and send his mercenary armies to attack the already weakened Moldavia. When Karvuna, southeast neighbor and long time trading partner joined the war on Moldavia's side, they imprisoned Great Prince Dan, who was at the time doing business in their capital. But thanks to the quick reaction of spy Ban Stefan he was able to get rescued. Unfortunately Ban Stefan was caught in the process and later killed when he was trying to instigate a prison riot in order to ecape. However, the war was going well for Wallachia. With the Moldavian armys depleted both their cities fell under siege by the mercenary armies and later surrendered. Just when the last enemy city fell and peace with Karvuna was established Grand Prince Dan died early, leaving the throne to his son Matei who was already an adult.

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Generation 4:

Grand Prince Matei was unmarried and his sister was Queen of Serbia. And Serbia now claimed inheritance of the province Bdin. Still having access to the mercenary armies and gold beyond counting Matei declined their claim and quickly hired the armys again. Unfortunately south neighbor Bulgaria supported Serbias claim and joined the war on their side. Luckily for Matei war always seems to attract mercenarys and so he managed to hire three more armies into his service.
Now having 5 armys at his disposal two of them marched against Serbia while three dealt with the bulgarian invadors pushing them back into their homelands. The mercenary armies were really worth their money as they managed to conquer the Serbian province of Ras, while the other ones laid siege to Tarnovo in Bulgaria. But Matei wasn't like his father, and the newly gained lands would provide nothing new to his kingdom. So he offered Serbia to give them back the province of Ras for a peace treaty which they accepted, ending the war with Bulgaria in the process.

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Grand Prince Matei was of peaceful nature and so he used his influence and gold to hire and train more diplomats to salvage the war damaged relations and to stabalize relations with all surrounding kingdoms, while building up the economys and infrastructure of the provinces Yash and
Cetetea Alba his father conquered from Moldavia. He finally found a wife when he was already of old age, but his juices were still flowing as he managed to father three sons, Gelou, Balc and Seneslav despite his old age. He had a cathedral and a university build and established many traditions his kingdom would benefit from greatly. The last months before his death he spend sleeplessly trying to establish a trade agreement with Sicily, because they had access to the production of silver bars which Wallachia more than needed. Only after receiving three carriages full of gold they finally agreed. After that, just when his son Gelou became of age to rule, he died peacefully. (Guys I tell you it was literally FOUR seconds after the prince was eligable to rule.)

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2040727177306227335/CC6E721B2776D11D39428CB1669BCB2A89E8F7A1/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false

Generation 5:

Young and handsome Grand Prince Gerou was now near victory. Through the actions of his Father and the trade agreement with Sicily his kingdom only lacked two more things to become the most advanced culture in the world. Those were Saltpeter and even more... building space. Saltpeter was easy to find as the Knights of Rhodes, located just southeast of Bulgaria were already trading it so he immediately send in his diplomats to establish a trade agreement. For new lands he decided the country of Yedisan, a small province nation just east across the black sea would be great, where he saw the opportunity to have a trade port and a royal palace build. Though Gerou was gentle in nature he now smelled victory and if Yedisan would fall in the process, so be it.

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Though he had to postpone his plans for a few more years. The peaceful times and stable relations his father left him made mercenary armys leave Wallachia and search for other opportunities. During this time he married his childhood friend, the princess Elena-Evgania of Bulgaria and they had two beautiful daughters. But then Gelou couldn't wait any longer. He had his court establish an invasion plan and convinced his most powerful allies to join. Lithuania the Knights of Rodes and Transylvania all agreed to help, which later unfortunately didn't work out because their armys were occupied in their own wars. Also Cleric Latcu convinced Gelou that before his time in service of the gods he did military service and could lead a small army into battle. That and a powerful elite mercenary army who seemed to set up camp near Yash was enough for Grand Prince Gelou to be confident that his plan would succeed. And so after buying cleric Latcu a small army from mercenarys in Transylvania he declared war to Yedisan.

The Yedisan army was much stronger than expected and the promised help of Wallachia's allies wasn't in sight. Also cleric Latcu's battle experience seemed to be a bit of a hoax as he lost the battle near Yedisans capital where he outnumbered the enemy army two to one, and after retreating was even imprisoned. The ransom was high but nothing compared to what the royal treasury had accumulated. With cleric Latcu's army dismantled, the mercenary army fallen and no help in sight the war seemed all but lost. Even more when Lithuania and Bulgaria left the war. Cleric Latcu felt miserable about his failure, and wanted to make up for it and convinced Grand Prince Gelou to give him another shot. So be it. There wasn't much hope, but a very small mercenary army was able to catch the enemy generals one by one and nearly wiped out the entire enemy military. But they themselves had only 400 men left and cleric Latcu's 1800 men army, who already laid siege to the city of Oleshye seemed to have no chances to succeed.
In a last effort Gelou asked Karvuna for their support, and they would grant it, for 25000 gold coins, again, nothing for the royal treasury. And they would keep their word and immediately send out three powerful armies to support. Also cleric Latcu proved to be much better at sieges than in open battle as he managed to hold out until the Karvuna armys arrived. With the combined effort they managed break the defense and the city fell.

After the population of Oleshye accepted their new leadership immediate orders to build up a trade port and a royal palace were executed. Meanwhile Grand Prince Gelou signed a trade agreement with the Knights of Rhodes and immediatley establishing the import of Saltpeter which his alchemists mixed with sulfur to create gunpowder. Right after the Royal Palace was finished Gelou and his family moved to Oleshye not caring about the builders who were still working on various enhancement to the royal palace and the trade port. There our Grand Prince noticed that there's one thing missing, he doesn't really need it but he always wanted to have it. Trained Camels. The Mamluks in Africa were breeding them but didn't want to trade with Wallachia. But 100 000 gold coins from the royal treasury quickly convinced them to so and so even the import of camels was established.
Gelou will spend the rest of his time with his wife, three daughters and his son who will eventually inherit his fathers kingdom. They are wandering around the wine gardens, hunt in the nearby woods and ride horses on their horse farm. Occasionally visiting the monastery for prayers and to thank god for their luck.

And that was the story of Wallachia, a now 6 Province Principality which rose to power without ever feeling the need to invite a military commander to their court.

https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2040727177306584518/DB4267D119F2F29497CCAE36741CAC9FA96F2812/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false


Thank you very much for reading if you made it through. I originally had everything screenshoted but i play in german and so I loaded up a few saves i made to provide screenshots in english because i think it fits better. Also forgive me for not wording everything perfectly in english 🙂 Also i switched from presence to past at one point, I'm really sorry ^.^
I have to say that was a unique experience, in more than one way because i mostly play Cleric or Diplomat as King's. Also having no military that you can directly control was feeling weird, but in the end great fun, much more time for diplomacy and trading and checking good matches for marriage. I spend half of the playthrough on the kingdom map looking for where i can profit rather than just commanding armys around. Great great fun.

Edited by Ajukreyzi
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