Lords of the Earth 

CAMPAIGN TWENTY-FOUR – THE WEST

Turn 87

1418 ~ 1421 Anno Domini

821 ~ 824 in the year of the Hegira

4055 (Earth Dog) - 4058 (Metal Ox)

                                                                

New for T73

Noble House rules have been added – please take a look at these here.

 

New Spreadsheet for the Renaissance has been created – this can be found here and must be used from now on.

 

Some tinkering with the Religious Order rules.

 

I’m going back to standard movement rules – sigh – as it is just taking too much time to rewrite these. Please continue to give your orders in year chunks though – The newly created spreadsheet should help with this

New for T59

Paths to victory: There are several options open to a player when an NPN has been defeated

 

  1. Take the victory conditions (see NPN rules) available for NPNs and allow the NPN to go its own way. This is a useful option if you do not want to increase your imperial size or bother with the NPNs internal affairs.
  2. Keep it as either Pacified or Pacified Tributary. You will not get victory conditions but will get income from the NPNs Homeland/Friendly regions and cities. Also, as the years from conquest marker goes up it may turn Friendly or Tributary. Using this option treats the NPN as a super-region.
  3. Old school, you will have to take the regions you want and conquer each in turn. If the capital is taken then some of the NPNs ratings will be added to yours if higher. The NPN will cease to exist.

 

Dealing with hordes: Hordes can be dealt with a number of ways rather than just an outright battle. These are

 

  1. Threaten them. Hordes respond to a show of strength and may leave you alone if confronted with enough force.
  2. Bribe them. They are looking for gold and lands to settle or pillage so if you offer them it on a plate they may well go away. They may also just take it and attack anyway.
  3. Use diplomacy. It does work and I suggest chucking in a royal princess or two.

 

You can also use a combination of the above. If the horde becomes a FA or A, you can direct its attacks or its path of migration.

New for T57

Non-player rules update: I’ve updated the NPN rules to fit better with the Lord’s system. Please check them out.

New for T53

Restrictions on Royal Marriages: Due to the complications arising from these rules only K, H or P leaders can benefit from a Royal Marriage. Members of the Royal Family that have not come into play are not considered eligible. Also, Primate, Order and Secret Empire positions are not eligible for marriage bonuses. These are meant to be diplomatic arrangements between sovereign states.

New for T52

East – West Split: I’m going to try to split the East and the West parts of the game so that I can process the orders quicker – don’t know if or how it will work yet but lets see if it’ll happen

New for T51

No Orders: If I don’t get any orders in for a position and the player doesn’t answer my emails then I’ll put the position back to a NPN and put aside the players cash (if any) until they pick it or another nation up again.

New for T50

Request Royal Marriage: Used to ask a NPN nation for a bride for one of your Princes or a suitor for one of your little Princesses. Cost is 6AP, Charisma based. The leader doesn’t have to be in the NPNs capital but if he isn’t then he needs to be in your homeland/capital.

New for T49

Naval Reaction and Blockade: Naval Reactions can only occur when there is action in a Sea Zone that the fleet is based at. The fleet has to be based from a port and not the Sea Zone. Also, the Reaction can only occur when your own lands or those of an ally benefiting from a Defensive Pact marriage bonus are attacked. It also applies to any merchant fleets you operate through the Sea Zone in the case of piracy.  Naval Blockade’s only work if your fleet is based in the same Sea Zone as the target port and you spend all (every single one) of your APs in the blockade. The fleet must be based from a port and not a Sea Zone.

New for T48

The use of fleets for Reaction and mitigating the effects of Pirates: My understanding has now changed since we GMs have had some discussion on the list. The use of Reaction has been explained on the Wiki and Patrol is no longer used in the Base Rules.

Reaction

 

Trade Route Escorts

 

 

Updated NPN and Primacy rules: Yep, been tinkering again but I feel a almost serene sense of satisfaction with my latest offering. See what you think.

 

Added the ability to hire mercenary captain when there is no mercenary company available: See the mercenary tables

New for T47

Improved cultivation at TL5: If a nation has reached the dizzy heights of TL5 than it can benefit from improved cultivation. You can Improve a cultivated homeland region from 2GPv to 3GPv, or any other controlled cultivated region from 1GPv to 2GPv. This is a level one megalithic construction.

New for T46

NPNS: I’ve tweaked the NPN and Primacy/Order rules a little to make them fit better with the 24 game. I’ve also reduced their overall RRV to make diplomacy easier.

New for T45

New Rivers: I’ve added in some new possible rivers onto the map. These are rivers that were once passable by light traffic (remember Cogs cannot travel on rivers) and have now become silted up. You can dredge a stretch of the river (along one region border edge) as a 0.5 level project.

Gripes:

Agro as conversion – this has restrictions (see 2.11.5.3) which I will be enforcing from now on.

Rivers can only support light ships – as far as I know Cogs cannot travel on rivers. This also includes Cogs built for trade.

New Primates: We have two new Primate positions this turn. Jumal Skyfather, which is an Estonian god and the Coptic Church based out of Axum.

New for T44

Minor islands and City States: I’ll be allowing minor islands (Corfu, Jerba, Wight etc) and city states to be used as locations from T44. Just let me know the rationale behind why you want it separate and if reasonable I’ll add it in. Once they are created as locations, they obey all the rules of islands etc. However, their Gpv cannot go above 0.

Flooding: The last few turns have seen a massive increase in the amount of flooding that has occurred. It appears that the years are getting warmer and wetter. As a result of this some of the minor rivers on the map are once again becoming passable to river traffic.

Denmark: Following on from the Minor Islands stuff, you can see that Denmark is now separated out to Jutland and Syaland (Zeeland).

Announcements and items of note

General Stuff: Please use my Paypal account (stephenbrunt@yahoo.co.uk) for all Lords’ 24 payments. If you cannot use this facility then please let me know and I will see what I can do about filtering US funds to my account. I may also stop using the throneworld email address due to the mass of spam I’m getting!

 

Order Form: Please use the standard excel order form

 from now on. I’ll update the site with a link to it next week when I get some time. This is important as it helps me process the turn more quickly. THIS IS NOW MANDATORY.

Non-Payment: some of you still owe me some cash. Although it may come as surprise that this is not my main source of income, I see it only polite that you pay for the occasionally night out. So, if you’re under zero next turn I’ll not process you orders.

Version 6: Lords 24 uses version 6 of the basic rules

The Map: The map now includes India as well as Europe, Central Asia and Africa. I’ve greyed out repeated areas on the maps to make my life easier. However, this means some player nations are split across more than one map. I may increase the size of the main map but I’ll have to think on this.

Tithes and Tribute: I think these are automatically updated by the stats program, so no need to declare them in your orders.

Control of the Papacy and Religious Orders: In Lords 24 we will not always have a player Pope (or Caliph etc for that matter) and the following rules are used to determine which player faction controls the Pope’s actions, Papacy Rules. I’ve also added some stuff about gaining support from their armies

How to make your GM happy (PLEASE READ! REALLY!):

Please send any and all Lords24 correspondence to stephenbrunt@yahoo.co.uk .

LORDS 24 WEB RESOURCES

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All of the on-line resources, including order forms, mailing lists and web-sites for Lords of the Earth are summarized on this page: 
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You can subscribe to the Lords 24 mailing list by pointing your web-browser at: 
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…and following the instructions on that page.

VARIOUS FEES AND LEVIES 

At the moment the turns cost $5 – please pay up of you owe

We are using the latest v6.3.5 of the basic rule book that can be found here

http://lords.throneworld.com/players/loterule/rules.html


 

Africa and Moslem Spain


The Akramid Caliphate

(Sunni Islam Civilized Open Empire)
Tiroman V, Caliph of the Akramids

akramid

Cordoba was to grow in size and the losses suffered to the royal guard through attrition were replaced. In Seville, over twenty ships were added to the fleet commanded by Admiral Mikhail. In a attempt to modernise his Caliphate, Tiroman was to spend vast resources in moving away from the traditional slave based economy to give the peasants more rights.  His missionaries in the west were able to remove the growing Christian minority in Liguria and were active in Savoy even after the German invasion of the province. Whilst the Caliph himself was to rule from Andalusia his son the Prince Tiroman was to father a son on his wife Brinn of Zirid. Tomas was to move to Oran where along with Saladin, Kazim and Hisham he was able to gain full diplomatic control of the city.

 

Usama-Yoruba Onium of Ibo    

(African Pagan Civilized Open Empire)
The Patriarch of Boure, Oni of Ibo

Yoruba

With the Onium preoccupied with events to the East, the Khalem declared themselves an independent kingdom, as did the Copts in Kanuri. King Bunta concentrated on affairs closer to home as he ruled the Onium from Ibo. However, his reign was short lived as he was to catch a fever in 1420 and die shortly afterwards. Tired of the chaos caused by previous dynastic disasters, the Onioum were to declare that the patriarch of the House of Boure would become the new King. He was himself unmarried as his last two wives had died in childbirth, a fate shared by Bunta’s wife shortly before his death.  One of Bunta’s last commands was to extend the royal highway from Ife to Oyo as well as ensuring the defence of the Onium by building fortifications throughout the realm.  He was to purge the population once again in an attempt to remove any trace of the Ogboni from his kingdom.  N’bona travelled to Benin where he was able to gain the support of the province through a marriage, albeit short-lived, of a Benin princess to the king. In Oyo, N’Do gained the support of the local ruler after spending several years in his province.

 

 

 



 

Arabia and the Middle East


The Buwayid Sultanate

(Sunni Islam Civilized Open Empire)
Lamman, Sultan of the Buwayids

baghdad

Despite their attempts to stop the Buwayids from infiltrating their universities and guilds, the Ligurians and Egyptians were unable to halt the Sultanate’s agents.  However, the Romans and the Salernese were able to prevent the Buwayid agents from gaining any valuable information.  Once again, the vast cities of the Sultanate were to grow in size with resources mainly concentrated in in Levant and the east. With the death of his father in the years previous, Lamman was to take control of the Sultanate and rule from Mesopotamia, although he was unable to father an heir during this time. Through the efforts of Yamain Sa Iban, the province of Cilicia was to become a full part of the Sultanate. Ingar was able to gain a full alliance from the Farasi after spending years with the Emir and his household.

 

 



 

Western Europe

crusader


Norman Kingdom of France

(Roman Catholic Civilized Open Empire)
Philippe, King of France

image028

These years saw the cities of Marseilles and Calais grow in size as King Philippe continued to rule from Paris with his Queen Eleanor of Burgundy. The King was blessed with two more daughters but still lacked a male heir to ensure his dynasty.  Before his death in 1420, Thibault had persuaded the Burgonois to become an integral part of the French nation. Also to die in late 1420 was the King’s advisor and confidant Count Bernard. In the south of the kingdom, Count Enguerrand continued to ensure the safety of the nation from his garrison in Aquitaine.

The Kingdom of Germany

(Roman Catholic Civilized Open Empire)
Sigismund, King of the Germans

images

Over fifty thousand elite infantry were raised in Saxony for the King who then marched south to Provence before attacking the Ligurian Emirate.   Attempts to procure favour with the Knights of Malta by building Preceptories in Cannes and Provence met with failure as the Provencal resented the extra taxes to be paid. German attempts to convert the Moslems of Liguria were also thwarted by Akramid Imams who were active throughout the province.  Attempts to convert the German society to a more open one met with resistance by the revisionist nobility who remained stuck in the past. Count Wilhuf remained in Vienna where tribute was finally gained from the city, such as it was.  It was Count Karlmann that managed to gain an alliance with Lyonnais after spending these years there.  Whilst the King was marching south, Count Heinrich took the fleet and scoured the Sardinian coast, gaining a substantial amount of gold and badly affecting the islands economy However, his attempts to raid the Ligurian coast met with disaster as Hector, called Al’Kabih by his subjects, was on alert with the Emirates army. Heinrich was to lose over twenty warships and to take wounds himself; although these proved to be non-mortal. However, the Count had done King Sigismund a service by pulling the Ligurian army to the coast. The King’s attack on Liguria was then timed to occur during Heinrich’s raid and proved fatal for Al’Kabih. His forces were mired in the south preventing Heinrich’s attack when Sigismund’s force attacked from Provence. Outnumbered and out-manoeuvred by the Germans the Ligurian forces were all but destroyed. Al’Kabih himself was cut down by Sigismund’s knights as he fled the field. The German losses were not insubstantial as almost all their regular foot were killed along with a fair number of cavalry.

 

 


 


 

Scandia and the Out Isles


Kingdom of Orkeneyjar

(Roman Catholic Seafaring Open Empire)
Linnea I, Queen of Orkney and the Isles

Queen Linnea ensured that any losses to the great fleet of the Orkneys were replaced by commissioning more warships. In far Nordheim a mighty citadel was built within the city which continued to grow expand as new fishermen and settlers moved there.  Orkney priests were able to secure land and buildings for new Preceptories for the Le Marteau Order in both Halland and Munster.  The Queen was once again to send vast sums of gold abroad; this time a great convoy sailed for Byzantium to secure a deal for newly built Caravels from the merchants in the city.  The convoy was led by Ovar with the assistance of Wotan and Calder and sailed south to collect the newly constructed Roman ships before returning, without issue, to Kirkval. Lacking any sons, the Queen decided to allow here daughters Olga and Ragnhild to the Kirkval court to assist her in her duties.  Prince Ewan was busy in the city recruiting mercenary cavalry for the Orkney army.  Asvald had taken up residence in the Saxon capital London and continued to gain the support of the young King Eadig.  Ovar had harboured in the city after returning from the East and was to provide lavish gifts for the Saxons.  In the far West, Innu Spirit Speak left his encampment in Naskapi and travelled the length of the St Lawrence river with Prince Latrell, Brother of the Le Marteau, in order to explore and map it for the Orkneymen.  The House of Avesnes based in Holland was to establish trade with the English, French and Germans from the port of Amsterdam.

 

 

La Marteau de Dieu

(Roman Catholic Civilised Religious Order)
Tanguy, Hammer of God

images (3)

The Order was able to construct an Oratory in Lothian on some land set aside just outside of the city of Berwick.  In Bremen a House was raised for the Order but there was little success in windswept Stornoway. Clerics from the Order had some success in converting the Moslems of Liguria before the Germans invaded the province.  Brother Tanguy, now Grandmaster of the La Marteau, was to personally supervise the work in Lothian before returning to Kirkval. He had previously dispatched a Brother of the Order to the Orkneyman to aid in their affairs.  Prince Latrell remained in the West where he accompanied Innu Spirit-Speak of the Naskapi in exploring the St Lawrence river. After returning to the Orkneys to fetch fresh men for Prince Latrell, Brother Brian was to establish small camps on the Mecatina and Manicougon coasts.

 

 


 


 

Eastern Europe


The Varangian Rus of Kiev

(Orthodox Civilized Open Empire)
Peter, King of the Rus

kiev

The conversion of the Rus economy from one based on society to landed peasantry to freemen was complete and a new era of prosperity for all beckoned. Peter VI ruled from Kiev during these years but was saddened by the loss of his wife Queen Sigrid during childbirth. Clerics and lay brothers started to arrive from the Order of St Vladimir to support the Rus government after the princes Ragnar and Harald held meetings with the Order. The king had ordered Smirnov of Smolensk to lead agents of the crown to look for anything untoward in Pereaslavl but nothing nefarious could be found. The same region, Stephen, Peter and Osberic were able to persuade the boyars to commit themselves to the kingdom.

 

 

The Oriental Roman Empire

(Roman Catholic Civilised Open Empire)
Alexios, Emperor of East Rome

images (1)

The dockyards of Constantinople saw the first Frigate added to the Roman fleet. The new ships were stronger and faster than the older Carracks. The city was to grow in size as some of the old prosperity returned to the Empire.  The Emperor was to suffer a heart attack in 1418 and never recovered. His young son Alexios was declared the new Emperor while the Prince was in Athena on a diplomatic mission.  Agents of the Empire were continually beset by Buwayid spies intent on stealing the Roman technology but were able to thwart their attempts. In Corfu, the Empire was to raise an Order House to for the Maltese Knights but Roman missionaries were unsuccessful in converting the Taman.  The now Emperor Alexios had little success in persuading Athena to become part of the Empire but Duke Isaac did manage to procure an alliance from the Atticans. Duke Stefans spent a couple of years ferrying troops to Pontus and Bosporus as well as taking the raw materials for the planned walls of the city. He was then to continue his support of Duke Katakalon in patrolling the seas off Constantinople.  The newly formed Republic of Crimea wasted little time in establishing relations with its neighbours by gaining alliances with Armenia and the Kubans and tribute from the Rum Khanate

 

 

The Order of St Vladimir

(Roman Catholic Civilised Religious Order)
Dmitry, Grandmaster of the Order of St Vladimir

Dmitry travelled to Goryn to oversee the settling and cultivation of the province by peasants loyal to the Order. He was assisted by Ragnar, Sigurd, Eric and Hrolf  in persuading the Beg of Goryn to commit himself to the Order.  A House for the Order was built in the newly converted lands of Galich.

 

The Knights of Malta

(Roman Catholic Civilised Religious Order)
Stephan, Grandmaster of the Knights of Malta

Malta

This was a time of consolidation for the Knights. Rutters were received from the Order’s Roman allies. In addition, the Emperor had raised an Order House in Corfu. The Grandmaster took full command of the fleet out of Valetta and patrolled the waters around the port. Brother Guy travelled the short distance from Athena to establish an Order House in Morea but the Order’s attempts to increase their holdings in Lombardy and Burgone were unsuccessful.

 

The Noble House of Byzantium

(Roman Catholic Civilised Mercantile House)
Anastasius Makrembolites, Chairman of the Noble House of Byzantium

greek_merchant

The northern allies of the Romans from the far Orkneys were promised Caravels built in the Constantinople dockyards owned by Makrembolites through a deal brokered by the Rus. Makrembolites himself continued to improve his trading network in Atelzuko before travelling to Pechneg to procure a Factor there as well. The growing success of his mercantile exploits meant that he enlisted the aid of his brother-in-law to support him.