Hundred Years' War 1337–1453

Plantagenet and Valois, and between them the great lords — Burgundy, Brittany, Navarre, Flanders — who change their overlord; the free companies loosed after every treaty.
A captured king comes home for a ransom, and the end is not 70% of the towns but a treaty: Brétigny, Troyes, Arras.
750 historical figures, eight scenarios, eighteen factions, four languages.

May 1337 — Guyenne confiscated

Philippe VI of Valois confiscates the duchy of Guyenne from Edward III of Plantagenet. Edward answers by claiming the crown of France from across the Channel.
The longbows of Crécy and Poitiers, the three-million-écu ransom of the captured Jean II, the peace of Brétigny, the unemployed companies that tear at the land after every treaty, the Black Death, Agincourt and the dual monarchy of Troyes, Orléans and the coronation at Reims, Burgundy turning at Arras — and Castillon in 1453, when Bordeaux closes.

Those hundred and sixteen years are the board. Between two crowns, who reaches their own end?

Four pillars laid over the map game

- Fealty. The great lords choose their overlord. Loyalty rises when the overlord out-prestiges the rival crown and gains towns; it falls when he fails to defend your towns or you lose your ancestral seat. Below 35 they switch sides — Burgundy in 1419 and 1435, Navarre three times, Brittany playing both.
- Ransom. Captured kings and lords are not executed. The price follows ability and title (a monarch pays tenfold) and the captive's side pays it in half-yearly instalments. A captured ruler gets a regent; when both sides hold captives, exchange them. When the treasury runs dry, borrow from the Bardi, the Lombards, the Medici or Jacques Cœur — three missed months and you are bankrupt.
- Treaty. The end is a treaty. When the war tilts, the stronger crown demands towns, a renunciation of the claim or the succession; the weaker sues for peace with concessions. Once the seal is set, the free companies are loosed on the land and ride their chevauchées.
- The clock. Each scenario runs to its historical end — Brétigny 1360, 1364, 1380, 1396, Troyes 1420, 1422, Arras 1435, 1453 — and 80 historical events shake the board before then: Sluys, Crécy, the plague, the Jacquerie, Brétigny, Agincourt, Montereau, Troyes, Orléans, the coronation at Reims.

Every faction has its own end

England: the dual monarchy (Paris, Reims, Rouen and the succession clause of Troyes) or a treaty. France: recovery (England's only continental town is Calais) or forcing the renunciation. Burgundy: the corridor from Dijon to Flanders. Brittany: the eight towns of the duchy. Navarre: the Norman domain and Champagne. Flanders: the liberties of the three towns. Foix: sovereign Béarn. Anjou, Orléans, Bourbon and Berry: the apanage and the regent's seat. The companies: their wages and one town. The ledger's "The end" tab ticks each condition.

Generative-AI disclosure
The painting behind the title and ending screens (battlefield, castle, knights), the UI clip-art (gilt frames, wood grain, shield buttons, banners) and 646 of the 750 character portraits (people of whom no likeness survives — name, station and age follow the sources; the face is invented. 374 were made with ChatGPT and Gemini, 272 with SDXL-Turbo on the author's own PC — Powered by Stability AI) were made by the author with generative AI. All generated images ship as files; nothing is generated while the game runs.
Everything else — the other portraits (104 public-domain images), the map, the text, the biographies, the figures, the game logic, the music (public-domain scores rendered in code) and the sound effects (opengameart, CC0) — was not made with AI.