The Sublime State - An Ottoman AAR

[loki100]

future crisis that would threaten the entire Empire

... I do like a nice plot teaser and that is one big tease

nice reversal of fortunes in the Balkans, given where you were a few years back a peace with actual gains is some achievement

[Enewald]

Nice WE!

[gabor]

And yet he wins. Now I wonder whether the MM Helius's mechanics of anti-Ottoman crusade will trigger or not. Did you have a rebel problem during this war? Btw, why Cilli? Wasn't Triest more tempting?

[aldriq]

Things didn't end as badly as they could have... Now Suleiman is safe and can cook his revenge for as long as he wishes

[daemonofdecay]

Posting from London today (it's cold and I'm jet-lagged), as I won't be home again until early next year. I can't believe I'm missing Texas weather, but then it was in the mid-70s (F) when I left...

I miss wearing shorts.

Great AAR, Great storyline.
Only problem; We need more and more frequent updates

Thank you; glad you are enjoying it. And I am fully aware of my inability to post with any kind of speed or regularity; a glaring fault for which I have no proper apology.

Hopefully I can pick up the speed a bit in 2011.

Excellent... Suleiman is turning into quite the Sultan, given the perilous start of his reign.

This following sentence I really like:With just those two words at the end, you sketch out quite a bit of the future of Suleiman's reign. "Patient retribution", I really like the image that conjures.

He isn't one to rush these kinds of things, for reason of personality and practicality. And in the end, as much of a bastard Mahmud was, he was still a Sultan - blood is thicker than water.

... I do like a nice plot teaser and that is one big tease

nice reversal of fortunes in the Balkans, given where you were a few years back a peace with actual gains is some achievement

I was a bit worried, but thankfully Hungary was so weak that it surrendered quickly, and Brandenburg was keen to abandon the conflict (for a price). The benefits of having such a large empire are impressive manpower reserves during war, but the problem is that marching the reserve armies from Egypt or Iraq take a great deal of time. Especially when you need to keep forces in the area to deal with the occasional revolt.

Nice WE!

Thanks!

And yet he wins. Now I wonder whether the MM Helius's mechanics of anti-Ottoman crusade will trigger or not. Did you have a rebel problem during this war? Btw, why Cilli? Wasn't Triest more tempting?

Oh it will... but thats for a later update. Rebels are generally not a problem except for very unfortunate circumstances - they are more annoyances than anything. But they can divert forces away at unfortunate times. And Triest probably was, but then I wanted peace to avoid more war exhaustion and didn't want to keep fighting.

Things didn't end as badly as they could have... Now Suleiman is safe and can cook his revenge for as long as he wishes

Revenge is a dish best served boiling hot with a cream sauce and plenty of lemon and salt. It hurts more when its poured into the lidless eyes of those who dared to defy the House of Osman!

[Stuyvesant]

Enjoy London. As far as the shorts go: pah! In Minnesota, there are idiots who'll go around in shorts (and possibly sandals) when it's about zero degrees (yes, Fahrenheit), so there's no reason why you couldn't wear them. Now, as to being comfortable...

Looking forward to Suleiman's revenge. Of course, with your posting habits, the 'patient' part of the retribution might take on unexpected relevance.

[loki100]

pah.. London, you should come to Glasgow where men are men and women are ....

back in the 70s there was a brief and awful craze for wearing Hawaiin shirts. In the bulk of the UK all this did was to send people blind, unfortunately by the time the craze reached Glasgow it was also mid-winter ... I believe in parts of the East End you can still see the frostbite scars

[RGB]

You know, with all these armies advancing, retreating and then counter-advnacing, the countryside must be really suffering.

But surely, such victories are a great boost for the Sultan even domestically...let's see what his next move is.

[daemonofdecay]

Well first off, I need to apologize for the delay over the last few months. I had been planning on updating some as a break from school, but real life has continued to keep me from finding the time or desire to resume. I'm graduating within a month, after which I need to find a place to live and employment. So between university classes and making sure I don't die of starvation/exposure once I graduate, I have found little willpower to work on the next chapter.

I've had a few false starts: I already have all the screen-shots edited for the next chapter, but I can't seem to get started on the more important part of actually writing things down. Hopefully once school is over and I'm settled in I should be able to continue (I do want to finish TSS), but if I update again in the near future it will probably be the only one for a while.

The good news is that I still possess all my game files and such, so I haven't had any tech problems sabotage me (yet). With that, on to the (very delayed) answers to previous comments.

Enjoy London. As far as the shorts go: pah! In Minnesota, there are idiots who'll go around in shorts (and possibly sandals) when it's about zero degrees (yes, Fahrenheit), so there's no reason why you couldn't wear them. Now, as to being comfortable...

Looking forward to Suleiman's revenge. Of course, with your posting habits, the 'patient' part of the retribution might take on unexpected relevance.

Yes... I am just roleplaying, is all. These last few months of silence were me being "in character."

... Thats my story, and I'm sticking to it.

pah.. London, you should come to Glasgow where men are men and women are ....

back in the 70s there was a brief and awful craze for wearing Hawaiin shirts. In the bulk of the UK all this did was to send people blind, unfortunately by the time the craze reached Glasgow it was also mid-winter ... I believe in parts of the East End you can still see the frostbite scars

Ouch. I've spent most of my life living in warm climates (California, Texas, Singapore, etc.), so I would probably panic if I ever had to deal with weather of that magnitude.

You know, with all these armies advancing, retreating and then counter-advnacing, the countryside must be really suffering.

But surely, such victories are a great boost for the Sultan even domestically...let's see what his next move is.

The people of the Empire are a hardy folk.

[gabor]

Great to hear from you again! Writer's block can happen. I see three solutions to break it.
1) Wait until your better half asks you to clean/do some DIY/defrost the fridge/iron your own shirts (oh, the monstrosity! ), I assure you, you'll feel the sudden surge of creative inspiration.
2) Unclog your mind. Read a good book on history. The more controversial or unusual, the better. Not necessarily a serious one. Horrible Histories might do. And when you actually start writing, it should just start writing itself.

[aldriq]

And if all of gabor's advice fails, you can always re-watch the Adventures of the Baron Munchausen. If that fails to inspire you, nothing will...

[gabor]

aah... aldriq thank you for the third solution to overcome a writer's block
ever absent-minded, it now dawned on me, I mentioned three, put two
oh, how could I have overlooked this; the third solution is...

Enjoy (hopefully)
There are more, sadly none's related to the OE history.

[Stuyvesant]

Good luck with all those niggling, inconsequential details also known as 'Real Life' and we'll see you back once you have time for more important stuff.

Seriously, though, I hope everything works out to the point where you can devote some time to this story. Whenever that might be.