I got fed up with tard wrangling crusaders and geting my arse kicked by Fatimid doomstacks, so I decided to play a nice, relaxing game with a mod that adds African Romance and Pannonian cultures. I thought I'd start as an African ruler and reconquer Mauretania from the Muslim petty kingdoms. The result is this:
This is a 769 start, so this all happened in less than 50 years. Religiously, Mauretania looks like this:
The Catholic faith is no longer the religion of a few Berber coastal towns and Latin villages it was fifty years ago and now covers almost all the coast, as well as Mauretania's overseas possessions with the exception of the recently conquered Sardinia.
Crowned by the Pope himself, Rei Serbastianu d'Africa is a sight to behold, having personally orchestrated the reconquest of Sardinia from the iconoclast Byzantines by the clever strategem of "waiting for the Bolghars to try and attack Constantinople and then declaring war" - incidentally the same tactic his grandfather used to conquer the Balearics. He also managed to conquer Valencia from the Ummayads and pushed the Ibadis back into the interior after a rebellion in Algiers.
His grandfather, who started a resurgence of African culture:
and his father, who converted to Christianity along with half his vassals, later becoming a zealous Christian:
(don't ask me why he's a court physician)
Of course, every Christian state surrounded by Muslims needs a good enemy, and Mauretania is no exception:
Yes, the Abbablob ate the Kingdom of Africa due to inheritance between cousins. No, it hasn't been interested in me and prefers to ass-rape the Hindus and Zunists. Yes, I'd rather it stay that way.
The Ummayads haven't really been that threatening and I actually managed to grab Marrakesh (back when I was Ibadi) and Valencia (as a Catholic) off them. They've preferred to expand to the north - as you can see they grabbed Galicia off Asturias, managed to get Navarre back after losing a holy war for it, and will probably pick on Italy which got Barcelona a few years ago next. Sardinia fell into my hands after I decided that an ambitious, wrathful king with a zealous father would surely want to do something about his Sardinian brothers being under the yoke of heretics and granted myself claims to its counties with the console. Before you insult me for cheating, remember that I had about half as many troops as Byzantium on a good day and that I only won because the Byzantine AI tried (and failed) to stop Muslim Wallachia invading Thrace.
And now, just like in every CK2 game I play, here are the obligatory bloopers:
Have you ever felt seasick? Just read the Koran and you, too, will learn that drinking ginger is apparently a Muslim cure-all!
On the topic of Islam, this king seems to be very religiously confused:
This guy (who's weird enough since he's an independent nomad with a king-level title) magically turned up with 500 Manichaean horsemen and started raiding an inland province in the Maghreb.
For reference, this is what came up when I clicked on his coat of arms:
My favourite book to read is the The Bible.
At least it isn't on the level of Paradox's classic religious errors such as "Are you a Jewish?", "The difference between a Catholic and a Catholic is that...", "Tengri will strike down their 'Tengri'!", or my personal favourite:
