West Francia Puns

I have done several playthroughs as Wessex so i can build up England and I have seen some crazy stuff and usually the whole of Europe (especially France and Italy) just implodes, but this time everything has stayed relatively intact while I was building up England. This is the first time I have seen West Francia just swallow Italy whole like this. I was allied to Italy and they called me in for the war, but they captured the King of Italy in the first battle before I had even made it halfway there. So now I have a murder plot against the King of Francia just so I can see how badly the whole thing implodes lol

Oh and "West Franconia"? That is Haesteinn's family. The crazy old bastard took all of East Francia and then drank himself to death.

https://preview.redd.it/yk36vmbozd481.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=c46caf03775fc42423f05ea52eb902cb6a2b8e88

For context, I am an MA student studying Early Modern and Medieval Europe. I am familiar with textbook definitions and have seen a chunk of primary sources describing the feudal contract and such. One of the most famous would be the words of the Bishop (I believe) describing that the contract must be easy, practical, reciprocal, etc. (I hope you know what I’m referring to.) I’ve also seen diplomatic documents like John the Softsword of England giving England to the Papacy and taking it back as a fief. I’m mentioning this just to give any potential commenters the idea that I’m somewhat familiar with these concepts but still not really satisfied with my understanding of land management and politics.

I want to know not only what it was and how it functioned, but how land politics and ownership worked where feudalism wasn’t the predominant system. Where can I, a historian in training, learn the historiography of the term and develop an accurate view of “feudalism?”

I’ve become king of both after starting as a count in 867 and I hate it saying West Francia instead of France

I know EPE exists, but I don't like what it does to CFP, but really, why aren't religious names sorted out from the choices of names based on religion? Why Andrzej a acceptable "Polish cultural name" for a freaking Pagan while "Andrew" is religious?And why are all Christian names in the religious name-category in English anyway?

Both countries had histories of elected monarchies, such as Hugh Capet and the Robertians being elected King of France and East Francia only started electing monarchs after the death of Louis the Child. What made France centralise much more easily than that for the Holy Roman Empire?

Edit: I love all the responses so far!! As an add-on, could you explain how France managed to pivot towards primogeniture whereas the HRE continued to engage in its elected monarchy despite both initially having really powerful dukes? I feel that this shift towards primogeniture made it much easier for Louis XIII and Louis XIV to consolidate power.

This is a question I have because I often play from the 1066 bookmark, and when I try the Viking Age bookmark I either lose quickly or WF implodes into pure border gore.

This has got to be one of the most satisfying things to do in this game.

https://preview.redd.it/w2m1qf7wagn61.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=5545a1ed9d6007b0d68dd2e096a28e27f027753d

Hello everyone, first post here.

I've been trying to learn the game by picking Count Haesteinn of Montaigu and following some youtube videos for the early years to get the ropes of it all. Every single other player started by invading Britany, and they did it without any difficulty. I've restarted my game 3 times, and every single time I've declared a war against Britany, the king of West Francia decided he wanted to stop my conquest and arrived with an 4000 strong army to kick my ass.

What am I doing wrong ? How do I know about West Francia's alliance with Britany ? How can I invade them without the french twat ruining my pillaging and blood sacrifices ?

Thanks

From my understanding, after Charlemagne's son died his empire got split into three kingdoms- West Francia, Middle Francia, and East Francia. Throughout the middle ages, Western France seems to have successfully maintained itself as a single cohesive unit in the form of France, while East Francia wound up as the Holy Roman Empire, which to my knowledge was a collection of states that elected their emperor while still having some independence- from an outside perspective, a seemingly stark contrast.

What happened to East Francia that caused its disintegration- or alternatively, what allowed West Francia to stay intact?

EDIT: I read up on Wikipedia to get the basics right, and forgot to change the title to reflect that it wasn't after Charlemagne's death but someone else's.