[Abe Sargent]

Wow, when Ulster was taken by Scotland, I figured that we’d never get it. Barring an alliance with England. But with them losing and England grabbing the rest of their kingdom from De Jure we had a chance, and I took it! In EU4 I would have taken Ulster, and some mainland Scottish stuff.

Now we have Civil Issues with Earl Aed VI grabbing a faction to replace me when I die instead of my son. We’ll need to work on that next. He is related distantly, although not our House Briain and better than my son, but I cannot allow that to happen.

We are currently being raided, so I leave my army together and order it back to Ireland.

Now, obviously, I cannot attack our CB in coastal SW Wales for a while since we need time to rebuild my army and wait until fighting down raiders. Now that I am just on the Islands, there is a good reason not to hit Wales and expand there – that I am walking next to the big bad of England. I could go Scotland again, but they are too big, so that leaves the three Welsh Duchies that are called Principalities there in their culture and their 12 Holdings in the Kingdom of Wales. No one is the King of Wales, so if England forms it, then they will have two of four Kingdoms needed to form the empire of Britannia, and once that happens, they will have De Jure wars on us to gobble us up very fast. I need to play long term defense in Ireland by taking the King of Wales title. Then even when England takes out Scotland, they’ll only have two of four and cannot declare De Jure wars against us. Also, if I do that then I should be able to gobble up the rest diplomatically there just like Ireland, and then I will have two Kingdoms of four in Britannia not England.

Hence Wales is the key defense as well as a good place to expand. But here is the main issue, I still share my titles with my male children on death, so if I take Wales and then Ireland and have two male children then we’ll split this thing up. So, I need to grab the Empire title in order to stop that, and my only male grandson has gained the Lustful trait so he’s more likely to spawn. This is not good.

Also, we could ally with Scotland and try to hit England but that’s less likely to happen. After grabbing Wales and becoming the King, I need to grab enough Scottish territory and then I don’t know how CK3 works when you take a majority of territory from someone with that title already. Can you steal it?

As a reminder, here is how I finished Ireland:

Step 1 – Start with 3
War #1 – De Jure - Take in my Petty Kingdom Desmond in a War vassalize them - size 4
War #2 – Claim CB in Ossory, take it in War annex and ours – size 5
War #3 – Claim CB in Athlone, take it in War annex and ours – size 6
Peace – Vassalize the two provinces of Dubhlinn – size 8
Claim Ireland Title
Peace - Vassalize the four holdings of Connacht – size 12
Peace – Vassalize the one holding of Ailech – size 13
War – De Jure – Take in my Kingdom Ulster from Scotland – 14

11 later we have finished the island