Hello!

After a long hiatus playing this game I decided to give it another go with a part of the world I hadn't played yet, South America. I chose Argentina for... reasons.
My plan was to grab Paraguay and Uruguay as they're same culture thus should help me get more focuses, and Chili for pretty borders, whilst at the same time studying cultural techs for prestige bonuses and literary boosts, and working towards a more liberal society so I can eventualy form into a Democracy and get all those sweet, sweet war wary European immigrants to fuel my industry.

This worked pretty well until 1870, my neighbours didn't put up much of a fight, my literacy was at 35% and several cultural techs had already made me a secondary power. My latest conquest of the Chilean capital had brought several thousand craftsmen under my control (they had a canned goods factory. not the best industry to start with imho). I built a steel mill, some lumber mills, a paper factory and a furniture factory as these were all supplied by RGO's inside my border, and for the rest of the game, this handful of factories remained the only ones that could maintain a profit. The last 60 years was basically my capitalists building a factory, waiting two months, and declaring bankruptcy because of a lack of input goods. Subsidizing was just a money sink, as the output was still a big fat zero for most factories. I had no coal. There was no coal available to me on the world market. Luxury RGOs like silk? forget about it. I got a very good stream of disappointed European immigrants who were just dying to put in 16 hours at the glass factory, but were forced to go to the Pampas to go harass some cows instead.

I am aware what the problem is. I am a secondary power due to a lacklustre industry that can't bankroll an army. As a secondary power my market is limited to myself and whoever chooses to sphere me. The problem with South America, as I have found out, is that nobody wants to sphere you. Half a continent and at the end, 20 million people, and not a single great power even made an attempt to get to cordial.

I want to succeed as an Argentinian Industrial power house, but see no other alternative but to bite the bullet and cheese my way to a border with the English to get them to stop ignoring me. I hope I am missing something as forcing a border just so I can buy some coal seems a little cheesy.

Edit: Also interesting! There hadn't been a war involving two great powers or a large revolution for 60 years by the end of the game. Everybody was still content in their own little HM's Government and Prussian Contitution bubbles.