true. fair enough, I haven't played V2 enough to be familiar with balance needs in that one.

As one of the guys who made up the variant (and seeing as Tadar's gone off the VDip radar), bare in mind that one of the critical points of the variant is historical accuracy. I very reluctantly agreed with the concept of the Free Cities Passage (there were historical precedents) and having French duchies able to be invaded without the French king intervening (eg William the Conqueror did invade the Duchy of Brittany, but provided he still gave tutelage to the French crown it was considered acceptable.)

But having cities in the Holy Roman Empire and further afield takes the variant away from its original intent. It is *meant* to be fought over England. That was what 1066 was all about: who gains the upperhand over the British Isles.

I'm more than happy for Airborne and others to take the map & the rules and make changes provided its clear its got some broader name and variant positioning. Incidentally if it was done this way I find the map proposed would work well in encouraging greater three way action, particularly Norwegian vs Normans.

I am all in favor of keeping it close to historical accuracy, but I don't know the history very well.

Would moving the armies and fleets like I suggested be reasonably accurate? It would delay the conflict between the English and the Normans.

Otherwise, How about moving the Norman fleet from Bayeux into The Channel Islands? If that is still historically accurate, the Normans will be able to get a build in the first year, without sacrificing its coastline.

What bassically happened was Edward the Confessor (king of England) in 1064 announced William Normandie, was his heir. Edward fell into a coma in 1065. On January 4th of 1065 the Archbishop of Canterbury declared that Edward had woken up, declared that Harold Godwinson, not William Normandie should be the heir before falling back into his coma. The Archbishop was a relative of Harold and so had a motive to lie about this (not saying that he did. It is also unclear whether or not Edward actually named William as heir).

As a result when Edward died the following day, Harold was crowned king.

William was outraged and raised an army of 20,000 soldiers to invade England, but the overwhelming naval superiority of England meant that he couldn't do anything.

Fast forward to September. Tostig, Harolds younger brother, gets into a fight with Harold and with 3000 soldiers, he flees to Scotland and declares that Harald, king of Norway, is the true King of England (Tostig and his army represents the army in Hadrians Wall at the start of the game in the diplomacy variant).

Norway then invades England. With the English army and navy distracted William uses the opportunity to cross the Channel and invade England. After Harold Godwinson defeats the Norwegians in the battle of Stanford Bridge, he rushes south and faces William and Hastings. While his force does outnumber Williams, his men are fatigued from the long march (17 days of forced marching to get there) and using superior tactics William is successful and Harold is killed in the battle.

William would be crowned King 2 months later and the rest is history.

It sounds like shifting the Norman fleet from Bayeux to Channel Islands would be more accurate then. A single Norman fleet would be unable to move into the North EC by the English fleet in Winchester, but it also causes a brief standoff. (Which, from your description, sounds historically accurate.) This would allow the Normans to get a SC, without allowing England easy access to the Norman coast. This might not be enough to balance the sides though. It might be worth a couple of games in the lab.

problem with that is it wouldn't address the problem of Norway and Normandy not fighting.

My suggest would be the double the size of the map and the number of scs in the map and make is so that 2-way draw is impossible (by needing less then 50% of the scs to solo)

What this would do is force a standoff between Norway and Normandy. If they ally against England, eventually they will be forced to attack each other.

If England has ~5 scs, Norway has ~10 and Normandy has ~15, Norway and England will likely work together against Normandy.

I would then make each turn be half a month (rather then half a year) for a more historical time plot. Start in July 1066 and we should have a rather historically accurate more balanced (albeit very different) 1066 variant.

From what I think you and Ambassador have said about the history of it, the Normans and the Norwegians didn't fight. They both attempted to take England independently. So, if we are going to balance the game, and keep it historically accurate, it should be balanced by having England sufficiently strong to potentially withstand both attacks with reasonable ability to gain a victory. But, both the Normans and Norwegians need to be adequately strong to potentially gain an advantage, should England collapse.

Also, it sounds like Ambassador does not want to redraw the map, without changing the name of the variant. I agree with him on this, it is an excellent map as it is, it just needs a small adjustment.

The reason they never fought is because Harold had defeated the Norwegiens before the Normans landed in England.

Say he was unable to do so, then it is more then probable that the Norwegians and Normans would have fought, given that they both wanted to sit on the throne in Winchester.

Fair enough, I am with trying to preserve historical accuracy too: I’ll abandon any “Northern Germany” idea since, as I anticipated, it’s against the spirit of the variant. Actually “I am with trying to reach a good compromise between historical accurate and playable variant” would be more proper.

Tostig’s army in Hadrian’s wall is painful for England, in the best hypothesis it denies England the control of GLD, and it’s going to become a problem in the early game if combined with a Norwegian fleet coming from NW North Sea. If the initial position of Tostig’s Norwegian army is not questionable I will agree with Devonian that England has to start with an extra SC: 5. There’s no other way to get a reasonably strong position otherwise.

In this case the initial position of England’s units needs a review. Their current (3 fleets) naval power is directed towards the Normans and County of Flanders, while the Norwegian can gain control over the whole North Sea, having guaranteed Sweden and Denmark most of times.

With the V_2 units displacement County of Flanders is going to be a warfare front extension between England and Normans, not what it is supposed to be: the SC where the Normans and Norwegians meet each other (I assume that strip of European land was originally meant for that).

… I don’t feel like the solution lies solely in a review of England’s units position.
Gobble got the point: “Norman and Norwegian don't realistically fight”

We may think in moving a bit the Countries’ barycenter:

England – westward
We might make GLD the 5th SC instead of the SC in Norfolk. We must acknowledge the idea that England’s coasts, especially south and east coast, are meant to be assaulted by the 2 “foreign” powers. Possibly both, not only Norway. We may discuss whether keeping Norfolk as a neutral SC with standing army or not.

Norman – eastward
Perhaps merging Ecclesiastes with Flanders in a single SC coast territory? This might attract more Norman players to an eastern opening. Also, we may consider to merge Denmark with FCP in order to move up the contact between Normans and Norwegians.

Norwegian – southward
This is hard. Making Denmark a Norwegian initial SC instead of Trondheim? I don’t think this one would work. Else we could make Sweden a non-SC neutral territory. Else, we could force the Norwegian player to start with 3 units, without the fleet in Trondheim: Sweden is guaranteed the first year. This way the Norwegian sailing in North Sea is delayed 1year, making the presence of Tostig’s Norwegian army tolerable by England.

Thanks all for the ongoing discussion. A lot of the suggestions are historically inaccurate eg GLD can't be an English SC as it was never brought under control by the English until the 13h century. Southern Wales fell to the Normans 20-30 years after the original invasion of England by the Normans.

Turning Ecclesiastes (which were Papal held independent city states and territories) into Flanders (which was its own feudal fief) isn't accuratre either. That said even with that change it would make little difference to Norman growth. Starting with 3 units and requiring 2 to dislodge a neutral army in either Flanders or Brittany, won't make any difference if you combined the two.

Denmark was similarly its own kingdom and fiercely anti Norse.

Fasces suggestion of monthly rather than 6 monthly turns would be excellent but I don't think code here supports that.

Long story short I think the only accurate way of reducing Norwegian power, and not making England too strong in the south to take out the Normans would be moving the SC from Norfolk and move it to Lincoln.

Thoughts?

Could Hadrian Wall be expanded into SC region, Newcastle upon Tyne and take out Kaupang? This would represents Norway's lack of economic power and population while Newcastle represents the Norwegians vested interest in Northumbria. With Newcastle, Norway is a bit more open to English attack and the Scandinavian Core is reduced to 4 which makes thing harder for Norway if the lose their foothold in Britain before reniforcements arrive.

Hadrian's wall is like a regular land locked province

@Ambassador,

I don't know how that will help the Normans. England can still move to SW North Sea and prevent the Normans from taking Flanders. Meanwhile, the fleet in Winchester has a 50% chance of being in the Channel Islands or South EC, severely compromising the Normans.

However, If you also add a coast of Flanders (or just redrawing the SW North Sea), so the English fleet can't be adjacent to Flanders after the opening move, it might work. The Normans would be able to get a build by taking Flanders or Brittany. Right now, the Normans can only go for Brittany, because England can stop them from taking Flanders too easily.

I personally think it will still be too small of a change though. Is there a historical reason the Normans cannot start with a fleet in the Channel Islands instead of in Bayeux? I think that change would give the Normans a reasonable chance.

If we genuinely care about historical accuracy, how probable would a Norman conquest of Flanders or a Norse conquest of Denmark have been in 1066? The Normans did eventually conquer Brittany and Anjou and Main, but they never moved North. The Counts of Flanders ruled more land that did the Kings of France and were related by marriage to them. Also it is worth noting that Flanders is almost alone in having nearly totally resisted Viking incursions during the raiding period. It is a few hundred years later, but a little bit before the Hundred Years War, Flanders defeated the French in mass at the Battle of the Golden Spurs. The idea that Normandy would conquer Flanders alone seems unlikely to me.

The Normans might be given Anjou in their rear. Also, weren't there two major lords in the North of England who refused to fight for Harold and ended up left to fight William on their own after Hastings when they suddenly realized that the outcome mattered to their interests? An additional Northern SC might therefore make sense beyond Wales.

I realize that, fasces. I played as Norway practically every time I played 1066

Gopher, I think that historical accuracy can’t be taken into account after the game is started. If we have to simulate historical events we have to give up diplomacy. If we set Flanders as a strong neutral +(2standing neutral territory, same as Buda&Pest in Viking variantID=63) or if we set Flanders impassable we may make it more historical accurate, but at the same time we are worsening the behavior of the diplomacy variant, cause we are closing the already narrow zone of Norman-Norwegian interaction.

Ambassador, right, any “merging” around Flanders can’t help the Normans…
…until the English player has free access to SW North Sea in the first move.

We should encourage Norman eastern openings: County of Flanders is normally meant to belong to the Normans after the first years of play, as same as Sweden is meant to belong to Norwegians after the first year. Because of this, I am against keeping Norfolk as an English SC with a fleet.

I also like the suggestion of moving away some SCs from Europe to the main island… that makes sense especially for the Norwegian SCs. This variant is supposed to focus on Britain, in general there’re too many SCs outside of the main island: once I’ve been crowned king of England without owning a single British SC… gameID=8843 .

Ok, accepted GLD as neutral SC.
Another small twist proposed for England:
Fleet instead of army in York; English 5th SC in Heart of England (+army) instead of Norfolk.
Norfolk neutral SC with standing army.

I wasn't the one calling for Historical Accuracy. But if we care about such things, then why not get rid of the European SCs and force Normandy and Norway onto the Island.

I understand what you mean, Gopher.
Your proposal, which makes sense, is a complete re-design of 1066, so that the concept is similar to variantID=69 but... basically we are talking about small adjustments in order to make the current 1066 a balanced map.

we could make the county of flanders part of the territory free cities passage, removing the sc and closing the distance (in # of territories) between normandy and norway

Welcome to the debate gopher, glad to see you here.

I'm ideally looking at tweaks that will improve the gameplay, are reasonably historically accurate and aren't a pain to change to the map/code.

I like the suggestion of reconfiguring the SW North Sea border. If the 5th starting unit of England was in Lincolnshire rather than Norfolk, and Lincoln's coast only bordered NW North Sea that'd be a good step forward.

Alternatively I don't mind the concept of removing the extra 5th unit from the east coast and plonking it in Heart of England (renamed Warwick). My only concern with this is that it pretty much guarantees in autumn England capturing GLD, unless a clever Norwegian holds GLD from the Wall.

I'm open to York being a fleet instead of an army. If the 5th English SC was removed from the coast a fleet would be a good step forward. Similarly without a fleet starting in Lincolnshire or Norfolk there's probably no reason to change the borders of SW North Sea.

I'm guessing these changes are going to make England stronger, and as others have identified that's bad news for the Normans. That got me thinking based on some of the conversations here. Norwegians start with 4 units and 3 SCs. Maybe the same could be done for the Normans by putting an extra fleet in the Channel Islands.

I take gopher's points but in my limited reading it seems the County of Flanders was stronger in the 12th rather than 11th century. So in which case I don't think it has to be double neutraled (like Buda-Pest in Decima's suggestion.) Similarly Tostig got kicked out of Northumbria so I don't think the Norwegians should automatically start with a 4th SC.

What are people's thoughts BTW on Central North Sea. I popped that into V2 to prevent/slow what had happened a fair number of times which was rapid movements from Norwegians down toward SE England.