The Historic Inevitabilty of Epic Failure

haha an update
you can leave the OPMs , in Europe , they are likely to be annexed by someone... or maybe doW them , wipe them , and let the vultures prey on them.
Ming I would try to get them eaten by Khazakh , or just have their provinces defect to them while you are at war

Japan is a pain to do , they should have the priroity , same for Brunei
Those lv 5 and 6 trade buildings are really overpowered!

Do you plan on going Absolute monarchy for Imperialism?

Hey Prawnstar,
First of all, thanks for the reply - I somehow completely forgot, like an idiot, that you were doing an under the limit WC. Don't know how I forgot, but the important thing is that the reasoning makes sense now

I believe your best choice here would be to leave Ming alone and hope they get eaten by the hordes - serves them right for building that unsightly wall! I recommend annexing Mali - for whatever reason, they love to spam with spies in my game, probably due to their relative lack of anything else to reasonably spend money on. Any OPM's should probably be left alone in the hopes that someone else will annex them, but if they are surrounded by your own territories it might be easier just to annex them. Probably most important would be at least one province in Japan to hope for Boundary Disputes (although that won't really help if the shogunate isn't unified, will it? Maybe you can 'nudge' them in the right direction by targeting one state or another, leaving the others untouched?). Lastly, Hindustan and Manchu should probably be annexed, Hindustan because they can, and Manchu because they are large enough to take several provinces per war, so maybe two wars will be enough.

Hum, though question ... if you didn't decided to suicide your fleet, my answer would be definitely Japan + Brunei. Even in your current situation I would probably go atleast Japan even if because Japan is a PITA to handle in general The rest ... well, I agree with sprites in general: leave the Euro OPM out , since they will be most likely eaten out fast by someone ( and you can most likely go Unan Sactum on them later with some luck ), Ming is to be left to be eaten by the hordes and maybe you could engineer a way to get Delhi and Punjab out of the OPM equation ( Hindustan still has cores in them or not ? It would be very nice to see them in Hindustan hands again for your proposes ) ... and Manchu + Korea are probably for side dish at this point ... this leaves pretty much Brunei and Japan to munch

Just a question ...are you thinking on going Bohemia and Milan for your cores before 1650 ? The game really wants you to , but I do not think it is advisable unless you get a lot more cores out of the deal.

I feel 60 BB is probably on the low end - you're 15 off the limit now (11 if you somehow roll a 5 diplo leader) and four cardinals average seems like a good estimate - so that's anywhere from 61 to 65 BB, plus you'll be finishing up the last Holy Wars sometime around 1653 or so, giving you another few years.

From a diplomatic perspective, the European OPMs are the most likely to be gobbled up - though you really would've expected that to happen before now anyway. Still, if they can get eaten, it's good for you as it saves you some BB down the road if you don't annex them. That leaves the East - I'm not sure how the Ming-Nomad tech gap is, but if it's sufficiently large, the Nomads are more likely to be eaten than to eat Ming. I have doubts about getting the entirety of Japan in 4 wars (1628 start is needed if you assume 2 years per war and then the 5y of truce) and Brunei will be left alive courtesy of your stated strategy. I think the Japan-Brunei provinces that you're not taking are likely going to be anywhere from 15 to 20 total (something like 6-8 for Brunei and the rest for Japan). Japan isn't quite big enough to make half the provinces be 2-4 % WS a piece, I think. Your strike force might also become isolated as naval superiority in the theatre is wrested away from you.

That leaves 74-79 BB to trim to 61-65: Cut 4 for the European OPMs, cut a few Ming provinces if you think Nomads are sufficiently advanced to smash vases. I think whacking Manchu has to be done as they might get entangled with Japan somehow (though it's been ages since I played vanilla, so I might have my mechanics mixed up somewhere). I think I saw the two Indian OPMs border each other, so that might resolve itself? Hindustan vs Korea depends on Hindustan having ports - if they do, then they might go and have fun over in Mutapa, which is not something you want. If you need to take Hindustan out, Korea survives to post-1650 I think. I also think Mali might survive just because they're so far from the rest of the battle and they really don't fit anywhere in your schedule.

-edit- that's 4 cardinals and a 9 diplo leader for -2 BB/year. You're probably also going to be getting Cabinet a few years ahead of schedule, so there's a little more BB to be spending.

Nice update. Good progress, again. Your cutting Ming into two has already borne some fruit. Therefore, I agree with the majority on Ming, you can leave most of it to the nomads. I'd also leave the Europeans to be gobbled up by their larger neighbors. I don't know the mechanism on Japan in DW, so I'm not sure, but it seems good to me to maximize the chances of border disputes, so it's probably useful to get onto their islands.

Trying for a more systematic approach to your question: there are 2 things to take into account, (1) the BB cost of alternative CBs for the same provinces and (2) your chances of getting freebies.

For the second, you'd do well (a) to maximize the chances of nomad takeover (applies only to Ming, as far as I can see) and (b) to extend your borders as much as you can. This means getting onto the islands first. I don't know how much weird borders offend your sense of cheesiness, though.

As to alternative-CB costs, you've already avoided Colonial CB targets. IIRC the other CBs don't make a distinction between religions or cultures, so it doesn't really make a difference which provinces you take unless you have reason to suspect that Revolutionary War might not apply (i.e. European states who are likely to go republican). This leaves the costs of annexation as compared to taking a province. Quite rightly, your approach is to avoid annexations wherever you can possibly engineer a takeover by another state. On the other hand, it's much cheaper to annex under Holy War than under another CB. Double annexation price costs you more BB than double province price. So if you have to annex, do it now.

Edit: Aminti is right. You save a lot of BB if you keep the nomads from getting eaten. If they eat Ming, my logic is right. If Ming eats them, intervene ASAP.

Japan, Manchu, Ming and Mali neatly add up to 60, so do that.

Leave the OPM's, and focus on Brueni and Japan. Taking island nations later on is not very effective infamy-wise.

You are also likely to build up some boundary disputes with the nations you border on the mainland.

Also, a good strategy would be to attack every single holy war target you can, 6 months before holy war ends. This is because you can then peace out several nations, but still be at war with some others. Then, over time, once you have your infamy reduced from the first set of peace deals, you can get peace with the other nations, while still using the holy war casus belli, in like 1655. You would finish all the wars at 1660 at the latest, in my opinion.

In fact, these last holy wars could be used as annexation wars for most of the pagans. I think this is your best option.

homy_dog34 said:

Leave the OPM's, and focus on Brueni and Japan. Taking island nations later on is not very effective infamy-wise.

You are also likely to build up some boundary disputes with the nations you border on the mainland.

Also, a good strategy would be to attack every single holy war target you can, 6 months before holy war ends. This is because you can then peace out several nations, but still be at war with some others. Then, over time, once you have your infamy reduced from the first set of peace deals, you can get peace with the other nations, while still using the holy war casus belli, in like 1655. You would finish all the wars at 1660 at the latest, in my opinion.

In fact, these last holy wars could be used as annexation wars for most of the pagans. I think this is your best option.

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I second that.

At what point do you think you'll have the numbers to stand up against the entire rest of the world at once?

Japan and Brunei should be the main targets, as they will be hard to conquer afterwards.

homy_dog34 said:

Also, a good strategy would be to attack every single holy war target you can, 6 months before holy war ends.

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No cheese rule: PrawnStar has said he will only use the Holy War CB just prior to 1650 if the countries he's attacking would be logical targets anyway.

homy_dog34 said:

In fact, these last holy wars could be used as annexation wars for most of the pagans. I think this is your best option.

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Pagans have their own special CB with .8 infamy/province, so he'll probably start wrapping them up soon after the Holy Wars end - possibly raiding them for cash first as cash is always in short supply.

PrawnStar said:

This province is Pegu in South East Asia and it’s affected by benefits from buildings in the British Isles.

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If you open every postbox like that, it's not surprising
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZv5GmgGd18

Attack Japan as soon as you have sufficient force in theatre. Get it there as fast as possible.

Again, solid gains. Looking very good.

PrawnStar said:

Shaanxi was a COT so 56 war score although I disbanded it straight away.

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I'm not sure if this was the right thing to do though. The AI will probably just build another CoT which then is rather expensive for you to take, no?
I mean, it probably won't matter since Ming will be annexed by 1650 anyway...but it's inefficient!

Thanks for the update, great to see your progress.

I too were wondering about your motive for disbanding the COT ?

I went back a few pages (page 46), and noticed that you, despite good compete chances don't seem to hold absolute monopolies in any of your COTs, although Andalucia, Ile de F., Kutch and Hormus seems to be cleared of most competion.

Is there a reason that you don't clean out all competition? Or is just that you cant hold the absolute monopolies when your infamy spikes?

That Anson just keeps going on. A DIP 9 ruler is just so good to have, both from an infamy point of view and generating boundary disputes.

Those 6 western Ming provinces should be revoltable to nomads. Hopefully the Manchu will annex the Koreans. Turning two OPM into TPM is relatively straightforward. DOW one and destroy the army and remove all treaties. This usually is enough for the other OPM to invade. Hey presto a TPM. Te question does arise as to how you are going to invade Japan. You're likely to lose your fleet. Removing that yellow daimyo might help propel Japanese unification. Taking Mali and Hindustan to free up invasion armies. Going for Japan makes Manchu a primary target. Knocking Brunei and Japan down to around a dozen provines each.

Aminti said:

Pagans have their own special CB with .8 infamy/province, so he'll probably start wrapping them up soon after the Holy Wars end - possibly raiding them for cash first as cash is always in short supply.

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By pagans, I basically meant holy war targets. I was too lazy to look up the correct word. :/