07/15/55 -- Sir John Griffyn

Situation
Once that you arrive in Plymouth, the town is in a minor state of upheaval: it has ran dry. There are brawls at night, and the Welsh Spearmen have been called by the Prince of Wales to break fights at night. Your unit is billeted in the Northern end of town, where frightened civilians are barricading their houses every night in fear of being invaded... by your men among others.

Mobilization Outlook
Unchanged from July 1, will be updated in Aug 1 (next turn).

1. Requested forces :  1000 archers (momentum, eager, likely)
2. Bows, string (shortage of strings, somewhat likely)
3. Steel headed arrows (acute shortage, unlikely)
4. Training arrows (plenty!, very likely)
5. Uniforms, textile and manufacture (recycling old uniforms, unlikely)
6. Blades (on course, somewhat likely)
7. Horses (shortage, very unlikely)
8. Departure within 4 weeks (likely)

Instructions
It is mid-July, your men are trickling in and are getting into trouble as well. You have been ordered by the Prince of Wales to execute 3 troublemakers in a show of tough discipline. You men are confused and angry that they get punished for the shortcoming of the Prince (failure to provide drinks and shortage of other victuals). 

1) Do you carry on the orders? Some units have simply dismissed the culprit after a good beating. 

2) How do you handle the situation for the next two weeks? Things are getting worst every day?

08/01/55 - Prince of Wales

An evening in Plymouth with 10,000 of your closest
sober friends.

Personal Situation

The Prince of Wales is currently based in Plymouth, riding through town to quell the unrest unleashed by Plymouth's tavern running out of booze.

Situation
Things have had a turn for the worst in July as the beer shortage triggered brawls throughout the location. Stern discipline was distributed the following morning as ordered. Unfortunately, local loyalties got in the way and discipline was not exacted uniformly. On the following night, the Prince of Wales ordered the Welsh spearmen to break the brawls in town. Desperate attempts to find lodging out of town were unsuccessful, exceptional attempts to source beers from other shires also were futile. The civilians in Plymouth are asking for protection from the Sheriff, but the castle is already overfull with knights and nobles.

There is no headcount at the moment, but there are more knights, baronets, earls and Dukes in Plymouth than anyone could have anticipated. The expeditionary fleet is small, but ready. There are piles and piles of hurdles and gangways on the docks, but not enough ships to retrofit. The food supply is holding on, but barely and largely because the Prince of Wales is getting the archers to hunt during the day so it is easier to clean up the mess from the previous night.


The next update will be in September 1, at the planned departure time, for a final tally of the mobilization.

Mobilization outlook

1. Troops
1. Archers (3000) : On target.
2. Welsh Spearmen (1000) : Will be there as expected.
3. Knights and retinues (6000) : Overwhelming response.
2. Victuals
1. Food : short, due to larger numbers of knights accumulating in Plymouth.
2. Wine/beer : We're now entering the rioting phase.
3. Fodder : Plenty harvested and purchased.
3. Supply
1. Archery (bows, arrows, strings, heads) : Plenty.
2. Horses : shortage, not enough for archers.
4. Navy
1. Acquire shipping : Slow, but steady.
2. Staff ships : All arrived ships are ready, not enough ships.
3. Retrofit ships (gangways, hurdles.) : All arrived ships are ready, not enough ships.
5. Embarkation
1. Billet troops : OK for now.
2. Discipline : Not good, will get worst without drinks.
3. ETA : Sept 1, 1355 may be delayed by shipping.
6. Funds
1. Level : Plenty!
2. Creditors : The investors have contributed. 
3. King's funds : Arrived.
4. War tax : Funds are in.

Instructions
Consider your situation and prepare a list of things to focus on, in the order of importance. Refer to the post on strategy to help formulate your instructions. Here are a few notes:

1. An almost full size force could sail now if you decides to go this way. 
2. You may expect desertion to become a factor in the following few weeks as morale is about to plummet.
3. The sea is good at the moment.
4. Welsh spearmen have been acting as MP for you, but this makes them even less liked by the Englishmen in the force. 
5. The archers are the main source of brawlers.
6. Knights and men-at-arms are forming the bulk of the men on the ground, they are not above reproach here. Nobody likes to wait in an overcrowded place while sober.

07/01/55 - Prince of Wales

Edward of Woodstock, enjoying a shaved face
for the last time in a long long while.

Personal Situation
The Prince of Wales is currently based in Plymouth, overseeing the retrofitting of the navy and the billeting of the expeditionary force in and around the port town.

Situation
The whole kingdom is droning with activity. Between the Duke of Lancaster in Britanny, the King preparing for Calais and the Prince of Wales for Aquitaine, everyone in England has war on their mind. The nobility and knights are responding in numbers larger than anticipated: baronets are showing up with larger retinues, older knights are accepting indentures when they were not expected to. This is good new except for the fact that the procuring of victuals isn't following the recuitment. Worst, Plymouth has been drank dry and the purveyors can't find enough beer and wine to supply the expeditionary forces. The supply is barely a few days ahead, not a stockpile of a few weeks as we'd prefer. The harvests are good, however, and we have much more fodder than we need for our horses.

As for shipping, our aggressive efforts to impress ships and crew has picked up, but remains slow. We have large piles of gangway and hurdles for retrofitting ships to ferry horses, but most of it is waiting for ships to work with. However, we have a small fleet of ready ships waiting in the harbor and ready to go. There is not enough horses here for our archers, we may need to purchase horses on the continent to solve both the horse and the shipping problem.

A number of civilian tradesmen have answered the call, arrived in Plymouth. However, the shipping situation and the shortage of drinkable stuff (wine, beer), has convinced many to turn back to their residences. Should we pursue the policy of bringing civilians to France?

The next update will be in August 1, at the height of arrivals of soldiers into Plymouth.

Mobilization outlook

1. Troops
1. Archers (3000) : On target, momentum lost.
2. Welsh Spearmen (1000) : Will be there as expected.
3. Knights and retinues (6000) : Overwhelming response.
2. Victuals
1. Food : short, due to larger numbers of knights accumulating in Plymouth.
2. Wine/beer : Major problem here! We can't go to war sober...
3. Fodder : Plenty harvested and purchased.
3. Supply
1. Archery (bows, arrows, strings, heads) : Plenty.
2. Horses : shortage, not enough for archers.
4. Navy
1. Acquire shipping : Slow, but steady.
2. Staff ships : All arrived ships are ready, not enough ships.
3. Retrofit ships (gangways, hurdles.) : All arrived ships are ready, not enough ships.
5. Embarkation
1. Billet troops : OK for now.
2. Discipline : Not good, will get worst without drinks.
3. ETA : Sept 1, 1355 may be delayed by shipping.
6. Funds
1. Level : Plenty!
2. Creditors : The investors have contributed. 
3. King's funds : Arrived.
4. War tax : Incoming (ETA: Aug 1)

Instructions
Consider your situation and prepare a list of things to focus on, in the order of importance. Refer to the post on strategy to help formulate your instructions. Here are a few notes:

1. The SOP is to sail only once. You may be tempted to ferry some right away, but there is not a lot of troops ready by now to go. It takes 15 days per legs, so a month turnaround time. Only a small force is ready to go, but fodder is ready to go. There could be maybe a 1000 knights and men-at-arms ready to go right away. A small fleet is vulnerable to pirates and French patrols.
2. Drinks should be available in, of all places, Bordeaux.
3. You are bathing in money at this point. Finding stuff to buy is the real problem.

07/01/55 -- Sir Griffyn

Gronou ap Griffith, leader of the Welsh
spearmen bound to Aquitaine. 

Situation
Breakthrough, Sir Griffyn appealed to the veterans of Crecy for the unit's colours. As a result, scores of old uniforms were donated to Sir Griffyn to be used in the coming chevauchee.  Strings can be sourced from the Northern reaches of England from the surplus of the last campaign into Scotland. However, this means that even though the spindles must be sold at King's wage, the transportation cost almost doubles the price. At any rate, it looks like there will be more than the target number of arrayed archers that will assemble in Plymouth on Aug 1. There should be enough string initially, but the stock may be low. As for steel arrows, it turned out that the shortage is caused by the aggressive sourcing of these by the King's puveyors in early June. There should be plenty of them from the Prince of Wales' pile in Plymouth (should). As for horses, about 1/3 to 1/2 of the archers are taking their own horses, which value will be assessed and guaranteed by the King before sailing off to France. The missing horses will have to be purchased somewhere else: there is just not enough available in Cheshire at this time.

Note. About half of the arrayed archers are small land-owner with some means to their disposal. These can provide their own horses, bows and whatever they fancy for armor (mail, padded armors mostly). The other half must be provided for.

Cheshire Archers

1. 20 Experienced trainers over 8 locations within Cheshire. (training is likely to bring troops to trained level rapidly). Lots of activity going on every day: new recruits, training tournaments, sparring.
2. Tradition of excellence: Prince of Wales signature unit.
3. Eager population base.
4. Funds : sufficient for requested levels.

Mobilization Outlook

1. Requested forces :  1000 archers (momentum, eager, likely)
2. Bows, string (shortage of strings, somewhat likely)
3. Steel headed arrows (acute shortage, unlikely)
4. Training arrows (plenty!, very likely)
5. Uniforms, textile and manufacture (recycling old uniforms, unlikely)
6. Blades (on course, somewhat likely)
7. Horses (shortage, very unlikely)
8. Departure within 4 weeks (likely)

Instructions
There is less than a turn before setting to Plymouth. Any instructions?

15/06/55 - Prince of Wales

Few artwork depicting navy ship from the 14th century
has survived. This is a painting of the battle
of Sluys, 1340. 

Personal Situation
The Prince of Wales is currently based at the tower of London, where war supplies are piling up. He is preparing to travel to Plymouth where he will reside in a local Castle and oversee the pre-embarkation maneuvers.

Situation
The Prince of Wales personally has devised a network of counter spies to monitor the troops in Plymouth. Normal practice is to forbid all outbound maritime traffic from all English ports until the army sails. Therefore there are some counter-intelligence agents on site already, but this plan is novel. It seems that it will be effective, mainly because it was implemented long before Plymouth is teeming with bored soldiers. Here is the report from various aides:

The response from the shires is extremely positive. We should meet or exceed our targets in archers, knights and their retinues of men-at-arms. The tower of London is filled to the brim with grosses of arrows and spindles of strings as well as bow sticks. We are, however, unable to source enough horses, either destriers, palfreys or sumpters, from the coastal areas. We are going to scour the hinterland, but the price to get them to Plymouth will be greater. This is the same story with all kinds of victuals. This isn't a problem because we are running a surplus for now. However, if we don't provision Plymouth and find enough billeting space, we are going to have a troop morale problem.     

 More worrisome is the poor reports from the King's agents recruiting merchant shipping into the navy. The prediction are that we may not be able to ferry everyone. We may have to allow some of the men to purchase their horses in France from the base in Bordeaux. Prioritizing horses from the Nobility is also an option, although a foot-borne body of archers would make us very slow.

Mobilization outlook

1. Troops
1. Archers (3000) : Enthusiastic response
2. Welsh Spearmen (1000) : No news yet.
3. Knights and retinues (6000) : Enthusiastic response
2. Victuals
1. Food : shortage
2. Wine/beer : shortage
3. Fodder : shortage
3. Supply
1. Archery (bows, arrows, strings, heads) : On target.
2. Horses : shortage
4. Navy
1. Acquire shipping : Dire reports from the Admirals
2. Staff ships : Slow, lack of ships to staff.
3. Retrofit ships (gangways, hurdles.) : Order sent, no news. 
5. Embarkation
1. Billet troops : Not enough billeting space found.
2. Discipline : Shortages and space: signs of troubles.
3. ETA : Sept 1, 1355
6. Funds
1. Level : Suitable
2. Creditors : The investors have contributed. 
3. King's funds : Will be on time (ETA: July 1)
4. War tax : Excellent forecast (ETA: Aug 1)

Instructions
There is a difficult decision to make: source what is missing from afar and pay a higher price in shipping or be more aggressive with what can be found in the coastal areas. Surplus of funds will attract even more men to the venture, but we have to be careful to ensure that we can feed them, keep them from mischiefs and get them into boats on time. Once the men arrive in Plymouth, we must pay 6 months of service in advance: this is mostly where the funds will go in the coming few weeks.

To address the shortage of ships, we may want to raid the French coast for shipping: after all, the ships have to be somewhere out in the channel. The downside to this is that some of the civilian ships would have to be used as raiders instead of being retrofitted for transportation. This is a gamble, but an option.

07/01/55 - Gronou ap Griffith

Situation
Your appeal to the controller of the Exchequer remains to this day without a response. It is possible that this is because of the nation-wide chaos created by the mobilization. If anything, most purveyors are known to skim the funds to their own profits: the purveyor that you dealt with was more aggressive and left you in a bad financial place. Speaking of finance, the prescribed King's price for blades and spears are too high and you find yourself in the strange situation where you simply cannot purchase enough weapons to meet your recruitment targets. However, even if you had more money, you cannot source enough chainmails, gloves and boots to meet targets. Finally, although the recruitment is going well, it is probable at this point that you will not be able to array the required number of men for the Prince of Wales.

Gronou is spending part of his time instructing mens to assemble to travel through England as a unit. The response is cold: most men believe that they are better off finding their own food and accomodation while travelling within the home nation.

Welsh Spearmen

1. Growing numbers, hard to predict at the moment. 
2. Strong unit cohesion.
3. Chauvinistic outlook on Englishmen.
4. Finance : Low.

Mobilization Outlook

1. Forces of 1000 (not enough people, likely)
2. Spears (insufficient funds, somewhat likely)
3. Armors [chainmail, leather] (shortage, funds, somewhat likely)
4. Anticipated training level at assembly : untrained
5. Assembly in Plymouth on August 1 (enthusiastic, somewhat likely)
6. Funds : low

Instruction
The last two weeks weren't pleasant, but not atypical. There are some decisions that can be of consequence to the mobilization. First, it is a shame that there are weapons available but they are out of reach because your funds are too low. As for armors, it hopefully can be made up in Plymouth from the Prince's stockpiles. As it goes now, you'll have an enthusiastic but maybe short-staffed unit. Let me know if you have specific instructions or whether everything is good to go. Next turn, July 15.

06/07/55 - Gronou ap Griffith

Situation
A purveyor from the King has disbursed to you the funds to array 1000 pikemen for an upcoming operation. Obviously, the purveyor has not disbursed the funds in full, but there is nothing that you can do to prove this assertion. You are to do the following: recruit 1000 men and provide them with enough funds to travel from the limit of the county to Plymouth. Once there, you will get enough funds to provide 6 months of wage up front. Men do not need to travel in column and are free to walk on their own or as a small group: you will know only in Plymouth whether you have met your targets at some point in August.

Welsh spearmen are treated as second-class soldiers because of their ethnicity and the fact that they are footmen. You could try to get them on horses, but your funds, even if the purveyor didn't scam you, are woefully insufficient for this. However, you usually play the role of auxiliary, which makes you special: you are a walking anti-cavalry wall often used to funnel the attacker somewhere, or block a flank.

Welsh Pikemen

1. Skeleton crew of about 50 experienced trainers. 
2. Strong Unit cohesion.
3. Chauvinistic outlook on Englishmen.

Mobilization Outlook

1. Forces of 1000 (likely)
2. Spears (somewhat likely)
3. Armors [chainmail, leather] (somewhat likely)
4. Anticipated training level at assembly : untrained
5. Assembly in Plymouth on August 1 (somewhat likely)
6. Funds : low

Instructions
Low funds means that it will be hard to meet recruitment target because there will be not enough money to pay the men to travel from North Wales to Plymouth. As usual, the Welsh are dealt a poor hand. About 1/3 to 1/2 of the men will choose to travel with you while the other will make their own way, unless otherwise instructed. The Journey will begin in mid-July, and should get you there by early August.

06/15/55 - Sir Griffyn

Situation Update
Two weeks have expanded since the mobilization has been called. The response from the counties is very positive and the other officers are reporting amazing progress toward the recruitment target. The purveyors are reporting acute problems with bow strings, steel arrows, green cloth for the uniforms and horses.  This is no very unusual, but this is not where we want to be. The trainers are working the newly arrayed men very hard: tournaments are taking place on weekends and all activities other than archery are banned.

We need to keep a tab on funds in the coming two weeks, with strings and steel being much more expensive than planned. We also will be slower on the way to Plymouth if we're short of horses.  We are going to assemble in two weeks to travel to the coast.

Cheshire Archers

1. 20 Experienced trainers over 8 locations within Cheshire. (training is likely to bring troops to trained level rapidly)
2. Tradition of excellence: Prince of Wales signature unit.
3. Eager population base.
4. Funds : sufficient for requested levels.

Mobilization Outlook

1. Requested forces :  1000 archers (momentum, eager, likely)
2. Bows, string (shortage of strings, somewhat likely)
3. Steel headed arrows (shortage, unlikely)
4. Training arrows (plenty!, very likely)
5. Uniforms, textile and manufacture (no green cloth, unlikely)
6. Blades (on course, somewhat likely)
7. Horses (shortage, very unlikely)
8. Departure within 4 weeks (likely)

Instructions

The uniform seems like a minor thing, but it is a matter of unit pride. Don't underestimate this, although this is not like you can start weaving yourself.  At any rate, anything missing can be purchased later on the way to Plymouth. You can try to be aggressive and pay more for stuff, or take your chance and try to buy what's missing (you may not be alone trying to do this). Things are not that bad, are there any special instructions?

06/01/55 - Sir Griffyn

Cheshire Archers

1. 20 Experiencedtrainers over 8 locations within Cheshire. (training is likely to bring troops to trained level rapidly)
2. Tradition of excellence: Prince of Wales signature unit.
3. Eager population base.
4. Funds : sufficient for requested levels.

Mobilization Outlook

1. Requested forces :  1000 archers (likely)
2. Bows, string (somewhat likely)
3. Steel headed arrows (unikely)
4. Training arrows (very likely)
5. Uniforms, textile and manufacture (somewhat likely)
6. Blades (somewhat likely)
7. Horses (very unlikely)
8. Departure within 4 weeks (likely)

Instructions

We are about  to set on another enterprise with the Prince of Wales. The men and women of Cheshire are eager to bring riches from France one more time. Sir Griffyn, knighted after his exploits at Crecy, is the de factor leader of the Cheshire archers. Your deputies will oversee the procurement of material and the distribution of funds to the arrayers and purveyors. Everything seems to be looking fine, except for the endemic shortage of suitable horses and textile so far inland. Shall we proceed or re there special instructions that we should consider before mobilization?