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I remember Irsh saying something along the lines of being sad that he didn't play in CK because he didn't get to interact with all the personalities. Well, he now has oddman, vR, KoM, and Frosty for neighbors. Irsh, you're dealing with crap as bad as any of us ever dealt with.
 
So yeah apologies regarding the somewhat lower stream quality, I hadnt realized that WiFi is terrible.
 
The War in Pictures

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Russia has sent major forces south, overrunning the Croatian Black Sea coast. Whilst Croatia blunts the northern attack in a battle around its very capitol, Kongolese forces counterattack the overextended southern flank and retake Burgas, cutting off 162 Russian regiments in Greece. In this picture, Kongolese forces pursue the surrounded Russians through Greece whilst a second army attacks the other Russian forces in the Black Sea coast area to prevent them coming to the rescue.

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The Russian rescue effort to break the encirclement has failed, and the battered Russian defenders retreat towards the Albanian mountains, hoping to make a stand.

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However when Kongolese pursuers arrive and force the mountain passes before they can be fortified, the demoralized Russians surrender en masse, in the largest stackwipe of the war.

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With that done, the Kongolese armies turn northwards again. A murthering great battle in Romania as Kongolese and Croatian armies force the Russians back into their own territory.

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The Battle of Budjak, as the allies pursue the retreating Russians across the border, is the largest single battle in the war and possibly in all of recorded history. You can see Russian stacks being cycled in and out of the battle in the screenie: an effective tactic that eventually convinces the allies to abandon their attempts to break through the narrow and heavily defended Romanian front.

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Instead, a massive flanking maneuver is launched. 300 Kongolese regiments are landed in Georgia and the Crimea to draw Russian forces away from Romania. (Remind you of anything?). The screenie shows Kongolese forces defending their Crimean beachhead against a Russian counterattack.

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Kongolese forces swiftly go on the offensive in the East, striking northward. Meanwhile, Croatian and Kongolese forces break through the weakened Romanian front as more Russian forces are withdrawn to combat the amphibious invasion.

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The static defense in the west is broken.

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1k regiments in a single province. ;) Also, in the battle screen you can see Kongolese forces elsewhere stackwiping another twenty or so Russian regiments. Not a major thing, at this point, but every little bit...

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Eagle's eye view of the war at this point, showing the overall strategic situation.

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Which quickly begins to collapse for Russia as its retreating armies are pursued and attrited.

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Some of the last large battles. Russia surrenders soon after.

~~~~~~~~~

So Kongo has now thoroughly reformed its society. The fleet still partly exists, but can hardly claim anymore to be competitive with any real naval power; the only reason Kongo still fields warships is in order to have sea control in wars where there are no real naval powers involved. We do also field a large transport force, for obvious reasons – with commitments all over the globe, the ability to drop a hundred thousand troops here or there on a few month’s notice is invaluable. Kongo is, in fact, significantly over its naval forcelimit. Can’t be helped, though – I’m not building any more naval bases. Ship costs aren’t that bad anyway, the one naval idea I kept was Press Gangs.

With the army, on the other hand, I am expecting to hit a thousand regiments this session. We’ll see if I succeed. Such investment is obviously necessary, in order to stave off the massive Bengali threat to the civilized world ;)
 
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We appear to have hit the 18th century of politics then: Little border movement . So who is going to go all Revolutionary France on the world?
 
The five Russian provinces that were on my Siberian border. This is in accordance with the policy that Russia followed in annexing western Siberia: One slice at a time, usually of five provinces.
 
Senator, Cadet, Equestrian

The reforms of Achilles had opened the ranks of the Equestrians to tribesmen not of the Komnenoi. That is to say, men who had done their twenty years' service in the legions, the regular standing army as opposed to the tribal levies raised for particular wars, were allowed to declare their support for a particular Senator, and thus lend weight to his vote in the Forum. However, the upper ranks of the Komnenoi state remained firmly in the grasp of the noble houses of New Byzantium, comprising perhaps as many as a thousand adult males at any one time. Election to the Senate required (albeit by custom rather than law) that one's father or grandfather had held the position. Thus the number of eligible men was more or less constant in spite of the increasing population, as men failed of election or simply pursued other interests; on average only one son of a Senator followed his father, and to get three sons into the Senate was held to be a notable feat.

The Komnenoi thus came to have three tiers, with men of Senatorial rank - either actually serving, or eligible for the office - at the top. At the bottom (although the poorest Komnenos still ranked before any tribesman or other subject) were the Equestrians, whose main privilege apart from their share of the State revenue was that of serving in the regular army. (Confusingly, the Equestrian class is distinct from the Equestrian order. The latter consisted of those men who had served in the legions and could thus vote for Senators. The former consisted of those Komnenoi families with a tradition of sending their sons to the legions, and who had no other political or economic distinction. Thus the order consisted of enfranchised male veterans, not all of whom were Komnenoi, while the class consisted of Komnenoi, with or without the vote, including many women and children.) The enfranchisement of the tribesmen had somewhat diluted this privilege; but volunteers for twenty years of arduous service were not so common as to make the vote meaningless. Moreover, privileges in law were one thing, and proximity to the center of power another; it was a rare Equestrian who had no friend in the Senate, and the Komnenoi stuck together. It was possible for a citizen of Equestrian rank to fall into poverty, but only by dint of considerable effort to demonstrate that they did not deserve the aid of the more fortunate. Alcoholism was the most common cause of such falls from grace. The majority, however, did well enough with small family businesses, with Senatorial charity (usually in the form of interest-free loans) as a fallback.

Between these two classes were what came to be called Cadets, originally consisting of men descended from Senatorial families but who were not eligible for the Senate, or who had repeatedly failed to be elected - this was more common, though not universal, for younger sons, hence the name. They nevertheless retained the right to a tenfold share of State revenue (where Equestrian males had the right to a single share), for this privilege of Senatorial families was enshrined in law and not mere custom; Cadet families therefore commanded great wealth. Eventually the class came to be defined by wealth rather than descent; increasing trade led to some individuals amassing incomes beside which a tenfold share could be quite insignificant. (Shares, of course, increased in value in proportion to Roman GDP, which in this agricultural period was growing at about half a percent yearly; but their value was also inversely proportional to the Komnenoi (not total) population, which was growing at a much more rapid 2% clip.) Thus the boundaries of the Cadet class were fluid, and initially there was a division within it. Men could fall into Cadetry from the Senatorial ranks, in which case their income was likely to be mainly from their share of the state's income; or they could rise to Cadet rank from the Equestrian class, in which case their income was likely to be much larger and derived from trade. In 1673, however, a law was passed which made State-revenue shares alienable, that is, they could be bought and sold like stock in a corporation. Since every nouveau-riche former Equestrian made it his first priority to acquire income from a respectable source (and the shares therefore traded far above their net-present-value as future revenue streams), the distinction soon vanished.

It is worth noting that in the first Rome, 'Equestrian' had been a noble rank, albeit a minor one. The naming was deliberate: The Komnenoi were declaring themselves to be all nobility, all aristocrats - even down to their poorest members, who made a living by taking in laundry! Hence, incidentally, the vulgar tribal phrase for visiting a prostitute in New Byzantium: "F---ing a duchess". The proud tribesmen were on occasion rather nettled by Komnenoi pretention, especially after seeing the mud-and-clay buildings of the poorer quarters in the capital, and were rarely shy about expressing their contempt. In fact Komnenoi women were very rarely forced to resort to prostitution, and most of the 'duchesses' had fled from one tribe or another. But insults need not be reasonable, and anyway the 'duchesses' generally did their best to act like noblewomen fallen on hard times, including exquisite manners as well as makeup to lighten the skin and prostheses (or even primitive surgery) to mimic the stereotypically sharp Komnenoi nose. If the result would not always have passed muster in a Senatorial salon, that did not matter as long as all parties got what they wanted: For the tribesmen, an opportunity to symbolically restore their equality with their overlords; for the Komnenoi, a safety valve against their subjects' resentment; and for the 'duchesses', a livable (if squalid) income.

Fashions in prostitution were the least of the effects of the Komnenos claim to nobility, however. It contributed signally to the martial tone of New Byzantium; "a dreary barracks town, endlessly marching to the drum and trumpet, without charm or grace", as one Russian ambassador (possibly not entirely unbiased) put it; if the Komnenoi were nobles, they were very much a military aristocracy. It pushed even the poorer Equestrian voters towards a long view; although the Komnenoi controlled no great estates (the factor that was supposed to make European aristocrats consider decades and centuries), shares in State income had a similar function as a long-term revenue stream affected by policy. Conceiving themselves an aristocracy among commoners, the Komnenoi tended to stick together; no nobleman likes to see another fall on hard times. Indeed, the same applies to every class except the lowest wherever men organise themselves in social classes, which is to say, in every state above the tribal level; and although wealth varied widely among the Komnenoi, class is not necessarily tied to wealth, as is usually thought in industrial societies. In New Byzantium the markers of class were dialect, manners, skin tone, and facial features, not money; and the city was small enough that the differences even in language between Senators and laundresses were not great. Hence the legendary solidarity of the Komnenoi, of whom it was said that they would rather barbecue a hundred foreign children than see one of their own suffer a scraped knee.

From Ever the Twain Shall Meet: Custom and Law in the Roman Khanate,

Thomas Mattson,

Oxford University Press, (c) 1972.​
 
Hoo boy, an exciting session. Let's see if I've got all the wars:

  • Ethiopia attacked Malaya; allies were called, but obviously this was always going to be mainly a naval campaign. Malaya eventually surrendered five provinces after consistently losing many more ships than they sank. Ethiopia had an advantage of five naval-tech levels.
  • Kongo attacked Bengal. The diplomacy surrounding this is rather confusing. Qin had a NAP with Kongo, but stationed troops in northern Bengal, thus preventing Kongo from occupying these regions - not through combat, but because an attack on Chinese troops would, obviously, break the NAP. However, southern Bengal is fully occupied. Further, Punjab joined the war on Bengal's side. Kongo claims that this is a breach of another NAP; Punjab claims that it has the right to defend its allies; Kongo says that this right only extends to Persia, which is specifically mentioned in the treaty. In any case Punjab seems to have got rather the worse of the war.
  • Which may be because it's also at war with Tripoli. Punjab claims that this was supposed to be a one-versus-one war, no allies; Tripoli claims that this was never agreed. Several neutral players have said that they also understood Tripoli to have agreed to these conditions. However, Punjab is crumbling under the attack of Tripoli and its allies.
  • Croatia attacked Persia, with help from Ethiopia, or was it Kongo? In either case, they marched through Tripoli, which Tripoli apparently had promised not to allow. Persia eventually handed three Anatolian provinces to Croatia, but has promised to remember.
  • Russia attacked the Khanate, seeking the return of the five Siberian provinces from the previous war. This is still ongoing. Russian troops have pushed somewhat into the Khanate, but have taken ridiculous losses in doing so. This, of course, may not be decisive; Novgorod has nothing if not deep reserves of manpower.

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Government of Egypt will address the press about the Defensive War against Punjab. Any mission details about MI6 or MI5 won't be discussed in specific detail and no questions about them will be answered. Mean while Tony Montana in youtube will provide the unofficial statements of the Caliph of Egypt with his famous quotes.
 
So do you think you can fight for at least a draw KoM?
 
[*] Croatia attacked Persia, with help from Ethiopia, or was it Kongo? In either case, they marched through Tripoli, which Tripoli apparently had promised not to allow. Persia eventually handed three Anatolian provinces to Croatia, but has promised to remember.

This one isn't quite right. Croatia joined against Persia in defense of its allies: Persia had joined the Bengal war, been offered a WP, and refused. It was the same war as the Bengal war.

As for the marching, it was a mistake on my part, I missed what Ike had told me earlier about not using his land in all the chatter. All my stacks were re-routed through Jalayirids, or else amphibiously landed in order to comply with the treaty once Ike told me again - only a few, two or three, actually did enter Persia through Tripolitanian lands before that.

Which is more than can be said of the opposite situation of Persia marching through Punjabi lands to attack India in violation of Punjabi treaties, a sustained breach of treaty that neither Persia nor Punjab made any attempt to correct. Although a minor breach compared to the major one of Punjab joining the war itself.
 
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