SPF (18)36 - The Danish quest for the perfect tan

[Tanzhang (譚張)]

What happened to Valley of the Kings in 1.2?! It was a painless event in 1.1

[Justo]

With the whole clippers and steamers consuming your budget one thing you can do is go into the trade screen and set clippers/steamers to manual trade. Set the buy amount to nothing or really little. Your navy will lose organization but your entire army will not need to suffer with it. When you go to war you'll need to set this back to get your org back but you will be able to maintain a larger fleet this way without sacrificing army readiness and going bankrupt.

[badger_ken]

As always, thanks for the input!

"outrageous assault" and two exclamation marks...

I wouldnt have thought the Danes get so mad when they loose a small part of their vast ammount of beaches.

It's not the beach per se, it's the reduced tanning opportunity

Actually, your US doesn't look all that bad - all its provinces are contiguous and there's no Russian America visible. My current Germany game has a much more battered looking US which has lost New England to independence and New York to the British. Even I (reluctantly) went to war with them when my Russian allies decided to reconquer Alaska.

Yeah, that's the problem with resizing these world grabs - things just get too small. The US has lost both New England and New York (both to England) - the little piece that you see in the northeast is Connecticut.

I see what you mean about Russia, though, that's odd as you can see in the more detailed screen grab in my "Chapter 4" post that Russia had both Oregon and Idaho. I don't remember seeing any notice about any war between Russia and US, don't know what happened. Odd.

I can see another change, too - looks like the US got Texas back.

What happened to Valley of the Kings in 1.2?! It was a painless event in 1.1

I seem to remember [Valley of the Kings] was pretty good in 1.1. I never beeline Nationalism and Imperialism, so generally its not an option by the time I get it, but I think it gives you a slight constant prestige boost (0.01 per month) and the chance of discovering Tutankhamen's tomb for a big one-off gain.

I did it once, and the result was that the Egyptian government didn't like me and wouldn't allow me access to the tombs, or something like that, and I lost something like 5 prestige.

Are there any soft targets in Europe that you could use to increase your population/industry?

good idea. Due to the lack of Prussian expansion, there are many little German provinces around, but it seemed like grabbing one of them would be a short-lived victory (in addition to costing 20 Infamy).

With the whole clippers and steamers consuming your budget one thing you can do is go into the trade screen and set clippers/steamers to manual trade. Set the buy amount to nothing or really little. Your navy will lose organization but your entire army will not need to suffer with it. When you go to war you'll need to set this back to get your org back but you will be able to maintain a larger fleet this way without sacrificing army readiness and going bankrupt.

wow, thanks for the tip! Will this affect railroad building in colonies? Doesn't that also come out of the stockpile, and need clippers/steamers?

[Tanzhang (譚張)]

I did it once, and the result was that the Egyptian government didn't like me and wouldn't allow me access to the tombs, or something like that, and I lost something like 5 prestige.

I can assure you, that has never happened to me in ANY of my V2 games (not even in my Japan or China games). You must be really unlucky...

[Justo]

Whenever you need clippers/steamers simply set it back to automatic trading or manually increase the number your purchasing until the port/railroad/ships start construction. As you've experienced in this game after 10 or so years your economy will be able to handle the large clipper/steamer expense and once it reaches that point I usually set it back to manual.

[Surume]

I did it once, and the result was that the Egyptian government didn't like me and wouldn't allow me access to the tombs, or something like that, and I lost something like 5 prestige.

This just happened in my AAR. I'm not sure what the factors exactly are, and I hadn't seen Egypt refusing in prior games while they refused both me and Russia in that one. Luckily, you get chances to try again after some time.

[Tanzhang (譚張)]

This just happened in my AAR. I'm not sure what the factors exactly are, and I hadn't seen Egypt refusing in prior games while they refused both me and Russia in that one. Luckily, you get chances to try again after some time.

I think if you own Luxor, you don't need to negotiate with Egypt for the permit. If they refuse you and you take Luxor, maybe that's when you get to try again?

[Surume]

I think if you own Luxor, you don't need to negotiate with Egypt for the permit. If they refuse you and you take Luxor, maybe that's when you get to try again?

I'm playing Iceland. I din't have the ability to take Luxor.

I think it might be tied to the international pressures modifier you get when you enact the decision. That goes away after some time (6 months? a year?), and then one is ready to try it again.

[badger_ken]

I've had a lot of free time lately , so here we go again with another chapter - enjoy!

oh, no, not again....

When we left Denmark, it was August 1870, and I had just gotten machine guns - let the African land-grab commence!

However, I have barely begun when a crisis erupts, as in October 1870



Austria DOWs me again! Here you see a portrait of the Danish king on receipt of this news:



The situation goes from bad to worse:



my sole significant ally, the Netherlands, bails on me.

Oh, and this time Austria wants "Jylland", one of my two remaining home provinces (the part connected by land to Europe). This would be a huge blow.

I cast about for some cavalry to rescue me - and remember that in this game, unlike EU3, you can call an ally after a war begins. I go through each of the other GP, and all say that an alliance is 'Impossible', with one exception, Prussia, who says 'maybe'. I ask them to ally with me - and they accept! YES!

What a difference Prussia makes

Even better yet, when I call them to help....



they accept! Oh frabjous day! They then take leadership of the war effort, which isn't great, but a very small price to pay.

The Prussians tear into Austria - (why oh why did they need me to get them to do this?): here's an example of the feeding frenzy, as Prussian armies swarm in to Austria:



Another sign of how overmatched I am is when I take a look at the Austrian navy - it was 37 ships last time -



and now it's 81! Luckily, the Prussians have been spamming their navy as well, with a little help from me (and I'm not being falsely modest here ) the Austrians are chased back to port.

The war ends in June 1872, as Prussia ignores my request to have Austrian Holstein returned to me (oh well), and instead grabs Moravia. Whew!

I get another piece of nice news in January 1873, when France allies with me - yes!

A-colonizing we go....

While this has been going on, I have already started colonizing Africa. There are so many options - I want provinces that (a) strategically, help 'block out' other GPs from expanding - the other coastal provinces, (b) economically, seem like they'll be the most valuable (I wind up going primarily by province size).

My first two choices are below: (1) Somaliland, to 'block out' the eastern coast of Africa and expand my toehold there, and (2) the few iron-producing provinces in Africa.



A Great power again

I get a big lucky break in August 1873, when Danish explorers discover the source of the Nile.



This gives me almost a 50% bump in my prestige. A few months later, I am a GP again. Nice....

The Kenyan jewel

I continue steadily colonizing, my goal is to link my northern part with my southern part. I stumble across a big find in February 1875 - coffee is ridiculously profitable. I discover this after colonizing Kenya.



My #1 province (by far), and #3, are these two recent additions. Wow.

The valley of the kings

At the urging of this forum (thanks all!), I try the 'Valley of the Kings' decision again, and this time it pays off big-time. First a small gain as Egypt allows me access to the tombs



but then a huge gain (like discovering the source of the nile), when I discover a tomb.



wow.

An opportunity squandered

There is a huge opportunity to knock down the UK several pegs, as in February 1877 there is a successful rebellion in the UK.



Why is this huge? Because when a rebellion happens, all alliances and sphere of interest are reset. In the case of the UK, that means that they've just lost a good chunk of India:



Note the big gray chunks that used to be green (this is the UK diplomatic view).

This is a golden opportunity for people like France, Russia, etc. to jump into India in a big way. Sadly, none of them do.

Why don't I? Because, in short, I feel that I already am hyper-expanding, and adding yet more masses of populace won't really add anything, especially when they can be taken from me easily by any other GP. Also, most of the knocked-loose areas are interior, which means I'd be trying to influence them rather than conquer them, and all my diplomatic influence is spent (fruitlessly) trying to knock Sweden into my SOI.

but yeah, this is kinda wimpy of me - maybe I should have tried to grab one. Let me see if anything is left when I resume playing

Coffee FTW

I learn from my Kenyan experience the value of Coffee, and grab Coffee whenever I can, as I'm expanding my two African 'halves' together. Check out this ledger from April 1878:



My top 3, and 4 of my top 5, money-makers, are from Coffee.

More Prussian weirdness

Other than the one time I pulled them in, Prussia has done exactly nothing all game - not a single war against Austria - very very odd. In 1878 they finally bestir themselves - and DOW Egypt to grab a little piece of coastline near Ethiopia



Very odd.

Colonial expansion summary

By April 1880, I have linked up - here's the new map of Africa:



(1) shows Danish africa.

However, the bad news is, my exclusive monopoly on this expansion is ending. Portugal (2) has expanded a little inland, the UK (3) is starting to colonize north from South Africa, and (off-map) France (4) is starting to colonize into West Africa.

One good effect of this is that I am now making pots and pots of money - my money worries are a thing of the past. I decide to not yet embark on a naval building spree, as my hope is that within 10 years I will have Cruisers. For now, I just let the money pile up.

One bad effect of this is that Denmark is depopulating at a significant rate - from roughly 600K (total) to under 500K. This seems a price worth paying, though, as I've said before, it means no factories are being built, and the two I have are mostly empty. sigh.


Dogs that don't bark

After the first war with Austria, as you can see, this has been a quiet 10 years. I've been patiently waiting for any of the following to happen, and none have:

(1) Somebody (if not Prussia, maybe Russia or the OE) to get into a major war with Austria, at which point I could try to reclaim my lost lands

(2) Sweden to enter my SOI. I moved to the recommended 'broad front' strategy of attacking all countries with Russian influence, and still it hasn't helped.

(3) Transvaal to give me a border incident. I would like to annex them, but without a border incident this will cost me 20 infamy, and I'll also have to expel them from my SOI.

(4) The political situation to allow me to do some reforms - while the parties have fragmented mightily, the MIL is still very low, and I've come nowhere close to being able to do anything, like health care

Hopefully some/all of these will happen next chapter - until then!

[starchristian]

hmm if your having problem to get Sweden into you SOI try to influence some that are parts of the russian SOI whic will draw russia away from Sweden (at least in my games)

[badger_ken]

hmm if your having problem to get Sweden into you SOI try to influence some that are parts of the russian SOI whic will draw russia away from Sweden (at least in my games)

thanks my Danish friend
That's exactly what I'm doing - I'm trying to influence Krakow, Japan, and I think Serbia, but all it's done so far is get me banished from 4 countries instead of one

[Baltasar]

If your factories in your homelands are not producing much, why not build some in your new colonies? There should be enough workforce around.

Btw, I've tried to encourage population growth (immigration into my country) by reducing taxes, but this does not seem to work really, even when I reduce taxes to like 10%. Any suggestions as to how taxes affect population?

[AllmyJames]

This is more of a question than any sort of advice, but I'm curious. If Danes emigrate to Africa, and proceed to assimilate the Africans, would it be possible to attract the Afro-Danes back to Europe by building factories there? Or does immigration only work one way (Europe->everywhere else)?

[badger_ken]

If your factories in your homelands are not producing much, why not build some in your new colonies? There should be enough workforce around.

Goverment type (interventionism) doesn't allow me to build factories, only to subsidize them. And this 'constitutional monarchy' business means I can't pick the ruling party at my pleasure .

Btw, I've tried to encourage population growth (immigration into my country) by reducing taxes, but this does not seem to work really, even when I reduce taxes to like 10%. Any suggestions as to how taxes affect population?

Well, taxes apply to everyone, so this doesn't seem like it would change internal immigration. It might affect _external_ immigration, as it makes your country a more attractive destination, but remember you have to be in the Americas for this to happen.

[lordvagrant]

For Transvaal, do you have good relations with them being in your SOI? I've read that border incidents only happen with poor relations.

[winsingtonIII]

Goverment type (interventionism) doesn't allow me to build factories, only to subsidize them. And this 'constitutional monarchy' business means I can't pick the ruling party at my pleasure .

Isn't your government Prussian Constitutionalism? You can definitely pick the ruling party with that. Just wait until immediately after the election and pick a party that has state capitalism. I haven't noticed that POPs get that angry when you only choose a new ruling party every four years.

[Alexspeed]

Very interresting chapter, especially that war where you got Prussia to join against Austria!

I also wasnt aware that coffee could be such a moneybringer.

For Transvaal, do you have good relations with them being in your SOI? I've read that border incidents only happen with poor relations.

I think i read that border incidents dont happen if you have relations over +40, but i am not sure if its true or not at the moment.
I also dont know if it matters if a nation is in your soi, i would be interrested to read more about that.

[aldriq]

Nice colonial expansion in Africa. You should know about coffee being king by now

Maybe you should consider turning one or two of your colonies into states to get some factories going.

[Dewirix]

Are Portugal still a Secondary Power? That's quite surprising given you're a GP yourself and there are much bigger countries than them around. If they're not, then they can't colonise anymore and you can concentrate on colonising to the southwest to cut off the British coming up from South Africa.

The collapse of the British SoI is good news however you slice it. In my experience they'll never be able to build up anything like as large a sphere again.

Not sure what more I can say with regards to Russia and Sweden. Just keep plugging away. The bannings are irritating, but once a year's up they may well not have put enough influence back in to try that trick again.

[olvirki]

Nice AAR !!

Danish Africa... Cool....