Imperium Ottomanicus.
This game is an attempt unify the entire world under a relatively benevolent and "modern" regime. (full free. Full centralised. Innovative. probably plutocrat.) There will be no cheating or reloading. (save CTDs) On the other hand I *will* use any tactic I can dream up no matter how cheesy or exploitative it may be...
V-hard, furious, 1419, ottomans.
Reign of Mehmed I.
Jan 1.
My ministers report that I have a treaty of millitary access with the Byzantines which is really a shame as I would really like to add that great city to my domains. On the other hand the Byzantines have a millitary alliance with Trezibon. And Trezibon exists only on my sufferance. (permanent CB. The ottomans have a lot of those.)
I order that the farmers in the empire be given the right to buy the land they work if they can scrape up the cash. (-1 serfdom), also I ban catholics and shiite from publicly worshipping in the empire. Not that there are any shiites or chatolics in the empire
but it seems to please the orthodox and sunni clergy. Further I order all my millitary forces save the 8 cannon I bought from a foreign trader to march to Byzantium.
Due to really abdismal state of the roads I make the decision to divert all public funds save millitary maintaince to infrastucture. One can't build a decent new roman empire without roman class roads you know. In fact. Lets mothball the fleet.
(maintainance to a minimum) Buzy day.
Jan 23. Finally the last of my armies stand before the treble walls of Byzantium.Gee, they've fallen into disrepair. (Only a level 2 fortress? WTF?) I order them merged and split into a cavalry and infantry army, and dispatch a diplomat to Trezibon with a DOW. Marvels of marvels. The Byzantines honour their treaty and
battle begins. Allah is great. So is massive mumerical superiority.
Feb 9. After 16 days of battle the byzantine armies are destroyed to the last man. I order 10.000 foot and all my cavalry to march on Trezibon. This leaves 20.000 foot sieging Byzantium. I ispatch my cannon to help with the siege.
march 27. A force of 2000 raw recruits make a doomed sally from byzantium. They die.
April 15. My 15000 strong cavalry arrive in trezibon and vipe out the 6000 men stationed there.
April 27. 6000 _very_ recently knighted trezibon cavalry charge out of the gates. They lose, and a few days later the infantry I sent to trezibon arrives to take over the siege and I dispatch the cavalry in pursuit of the fleeing Trezibon army.
may 30. The last of the Byzantine + Trezibon armies are defeated in angora. I order 12000 foot to move from the siege of byzantium to Macedonia and dispatch my cavalry to the same location. The duchy of Athens stands is in the way of complete
conquest of byzantine territory. That cannot be tolerated.
July 11. My armies stand ready in Macedonia and I dispatch a DOW to the Duchy. The courier is closely followed by an army of 14400 cavalry and 2 armies of 6000 foot. Given that the total forces of the Atheneans are 6000 men the outcome is pretty
predictable. Morea is undefended and I dispatch one of the foot armies to siege it and withdraw my 13800 cavalry to Macedonia. Time to wait for the sieges to complete. Hellas falls in december but refuses to yield as they still have allies. 9000 of whom
are suddenly sieging Smyrna. Hmm. Checks. Only 900 cavalry. I order my cavaly to remove them from my territory. Tuscany looses 9000 men and offers me a 50 ducat peace. hmm. No. Siena and Modena offer white peaces. I take those.
Then I offer to Annex the Duchy again. Yhea! Success. Stab = 2.
Feb 1420. Byzantium falls into my hands. I dispatch my cannon to Morea. Trazbon also falls to my armies but due to a shortage of diplomats I can't annex them just yet.
May. Got a diplomat trained, annexed Trezibon, Stab = 3, all 8 cannon arrive in morea.
June. Tuscany offers me a 10 ducat peace. I take it. Morea falls. I can't make any ultimatums to byzantium just now as I am rather lacking diplomats. But the byzantines offer 79 gold and Morea, which I accept.
The Byzantines seem to have made another millitary alliance to replace the one with Trezibon. They've allied themselves with Genoa and Georgia. I dispatch my cannon back to byzantium (I still have millitary access.) and move my armies
(save 10000 foot and 8 cannon in Byzantium) to Trazbon to await the training of another diplomat.
August sees the development of a new taxation system to support my roadbuilding and infrastructure programme. (Infrastructure 1. I build 9 taxcollectors, wiping out my treasury.) In septemper I get a report from my mothballed fleet, that while idleing around the harbor one of my officers has come up with an
improvement to the shipboard ballista. I order him promoted. And he is now an idle captain instead of an idle navigator.. (Naval tech 1)
November finally sees the training of a new diplomat and I DOW Georgia. Byzantium honors the treaty and I start sieging the great city again. I raise war taxes and charge Georgia. Stab 2.
December. Moldavia DOWs me? Pretty suicidal. I'll deal with them when I've got Georgia under siege. Darn. I loose a battle with Georgia despite massive numerical and cavalry superiority. my armies retreat to Trazibon and I decide to wait for morale
to rebuild. On the plus side Genoa offers me a white peace. Which I take.
1421 July.
Reign of Murad II.
New Monarch. Very *good* monarch. And millitary commander. Murad II appears in Trache. I leave him there to speed up the siege. Georgia is subdued and left under siege while the surplus armies are sent to byzantium. War taxes raised again. Stab 1. 4000 cavalry hired.
July. Trache falls. 10000 foot under my personal (murad II) command dispatched to deal with the invasion by the moldavian alliance. Bulgaria has fallen to Wallachia and Drobuja to Moldavia. I decide to pound the Moldavians into a thin paste and ignore their allies. When the leader falls the rest will follow.
December. If only the allies would ignore *me* My army, en route to drobuja was attacked by 26000 wallachians. I kicked their asses though. (Murad II is a 3,3,4,1 millitary leader. Helps a lot.) The 4000 new cavalry arrived just in time to be joined with the rest of the army before attacking the hostile forces in drobuja. Numerical superiority, morale superiority, cavalry superiority,
superior leadership. Even if Murad II says so himself, the outvome of that campaign was not in doubt.
1422 January. I raise wartaxes again and annex byzantium. Net result: stab 1.
March. I decide the fate of the patricate. I appoint a new patriarch. +1 centralisation. +1 stab. Stab = 2. I make constantinople the new capital. Yhea! Further centralisation + 2 stab. 3 free convesions to state religion and turkish culture.
Stab = 3. Also I tear up the trade agreements with Vencie and Genoa and a trade center appears in Trache. +2 mercantailist + 6 merchants.
November. The cities of Georgia finally fall. Also a plauge strikes
Hellas. Georgia refuses an offer of 2000 gold and sochi for peace.
I'll try again with a request for 1000 gold and Sochi. They yield. and pay me 70 gold, Heh.
April 1424. *Finally* moldavia falls. I thought that siege would go on forever. They yield bujack and the contents of their treasury readily enough. Another 10000 cavalry are hired bringing my armies up to 12000 foot and 16000 horse. + 8 cannon.
May. Gift to the state. +100 gold.
June. I DOW Albania to get at Ragusa who are in an alliance with venice. Albania looses all their armies in less than a month and I leave a sieging force, DOW Ragusa and march on that city(state).
March. The venetians have captured smyrna and have troops all over the place.. But Ragusa just fell the the cannon and cunning of Murad II and as the leader of their alliance I ask the Ragusians for all the venetian provinces I have CB shields on. Which is all of them, save their capital. Dalmatia, Corfu, Crete and Ionia fall into my hands. Also 276 gold.
I did say I'd use any tactic short of cheating didn't I? Since I now have catolics inside the empire I decide to tolerate them.
July. Ak koyonly, Dulakir, candar and the golden horde invite me to join their war against Georgia. Whatever did the Georgians do to offend the gods so? I decide to pile on their misery and join the alliance. The sheikh-ul-islam office is suggested. Thanks, but no thanks. +1 innovative. -2 stab. Albania falls and is annexed. +30 victory points (mission) +1 stab. stab = 2.
Naples who were Albanias feudal overlords and allies offer me a 25 gold peace. Sure.
October. I take charge of the siege in georgia with 3000 horse and a reigning monarch. 4000 soldiers from the papal states attempt to siege Dalmatia. I am at war with the papal states? Infrastructure II is reached. I increase naval maintaince and pull my rather large navy out of mothballs.
(I've gotten such a pile of galleys from annexations.)
Time to put a hurting on the pope. 6 merchants are sent to Alexandria.
january 1426. Georgia falls and is annexed. Stab = 3. Two naval victories over the pope and the fleet is approaching dalmatia
with a 14000 strong relieving force. A few victories and some 8000 papal casulties later the pope suggests that he might graciously agree to a peace if I pay *him* 30 ducats. Okay.
Whatever. Just go away.
I get a natioalist revolt in sochi and send the army to deal with it. Apparantly since they were never a part of the original roman empire they don't want to be a part of my empire either. We'll see about that. A state gift is sent to our friends and allies in candar enormously improving our relations.
In May the ruler of candar offers me his daughter in marriage. I accept. In october the ruler of ak konloyo does likevise. I accept. It is /good/ to be a muslim prince. I do hope they'll get along.
In july I DOW Serbia. Wallachia and Moldavia join the fun. In august I get hit by "poor goverment policies" Must spend less time with wives and more on paperwork. Hmm. Unless I can persuade the wives to help with the paperwork.
December. Serbia falls, freeing up enough troops to essay an assault of 10000 cavalry on wallachia. Victory! Muhrad II is the greatest commander ever So say both his lovely brides. ))
Ak Kuyonlu ask that I honor my treaty of alliance and DOW Qara
Okay. I am also asked to DOW karaman and Teke. Again ok.
I recruit some more cavalry, leave 5000 men sieging wallachia and rush to kosovo since cannon + my personal persense should reduce that province in short order, freeing up troops to attack elsewhere.-
november 1428. Kosovo captured. moldavia under siege, wallachia fallen. Then I get "support for dissidents abroad" And I don't have 25 gold. Arrghh. I take the stab hit. Stab 1. I Annex wallachia. Stab = 2.
January 1429. I suggest to my favorite banker Abraham that it might be a good buisness proposition to loan peasants the cash they need to become self-owning farmers. He agrees. For some bisarre reason this upsets some members of the nobility. (-1 serfdom. -1 stab)
Stab = 1
I lay siege to the city state of Teke and the capital of Karaman.
April. Moldavia falls and is promtly annexed. Stab = 2
April 1430. Have vassalised teke, am sieging all of karaman and Qara. Karaman looses all but their core provice and are vassalised to boot. Qara gets vassalised. An exceptional court painter shows up and gets hired.
January 1431. I invade Cyprus and Rhodes.
Cyprus falls in june and is promtly annexed. Stab = 3. Rhodes holds out until septemper. I raise wartaxes and annex them.
December. Another painter? I'll hire her. Thanks to the wartaxes at peace and stab = 3 the census tax nets 400 gold. Nice. Lets repeat that stunt a few times. I hire some more cavalry and DOW Ragusa. Bosnia, Venice and Genoa honor their alliance with Ragusa. I decide not to involve my allies. Bosnia falls in the spring of 1434 and venice and genoa offer white peaces, Which I accept. I hold of on the war-taxing and annexing until July so that wartaxes will still be in effect come january 1.
Ragusa holds out until june 1435 and gets annexed (with accompagnying wartax) in july. Then I DOW croatia. Who are Allied with hungary, transylvania, and a couple of
german minors. Then somebody assainates a noble. Darn.
Stab =2
June 1436. A foreign drill instructor is available. Since I'm pretty flush with cash he gets hired. Croatia, transylvania, banat and serbia falls. Transyvania gets annexed (stab = 3)
and I use the 100% peace with croatia to grab a buch of CB provinces from hungary. Hungary is reduced to 4 provices..
November. I enter a Royal marriage with the golden Horde. Must pick the last one with care. The prophet did decree a maximum of 4 wives after all. I send a personal gift to the inlaws in Candar.
Then eveything goes to shit. Poland + lithuania DOW me and I loose some 20000 horse fighting them in the very hostile lands called "the polish winter" I can't afford this. I mean that literally. My armies cost a bleeding fortune to raise (19 gold per 1000 horse) I decide to avoid major battles as far as possible and concentrate on sieging lithuanian provinces. (lithuania is the leader of the alliance.) I start replenishing my armies. On the bright side 1439 sees a strengthening of the yeomanry, as I pass new laws restricting the maximum length of apprenticeships to 5 years. (-1 serfdom)
This naturally pisses of a number of guild masters. I could hardly care significantly less.
Infrastructure reaches III. I could now commision distilleries. If I had the money, that is.
in 1440 an uncooperative philosopher arrives from Spain and instantly starts critising my regime. I can see why the spaniards kicked him out, but I restrain my passing impulse to have him thrown in the dungeons. (+1 innovative. -2 stab.)
Stab = 0. Must annex somebody soon.
I also reach landtech 2.
After I've conqoured 3 lithuanian provices the polish-lithuanian alliance agrees to relinquish jedisan, and return the provices the poles had occupied.
In june 1441 another drill instructor appears and I take out two loans to pay the man. Arrgh. thats 2 % of inflation i did not need. on the upside my armies are just one step from full quality and two from full offensive.
Febuary 1442. Getting tired of the occasional revolt I decide to distract the population with a display of martial glory. I DOW Croatia with the aim of annexing that country.
Yhea! I appoint an excellent minister. Go me.
The mameluks and the bohemian alliance then DOW me. I get the impression I am less than perfectly popular. (and my rep is a mere very bad too.) Croatia falls to my armies and I annex em. That should rid me of the 1% revolt risk. Hmm. The Bohemian alliance includes several one-provice minors.. Free stabilty!
Venice DOWs me. I think I need a larger army. Venice and Mantua get marked for death and I return 106 percent worth of coreprovinces to hungary. This drops my badboy to "rather bad" and blocks the path the armies of the Bohemian alliance would have to take to get at me. I plan to retake those lands in 5 years.. I also hire 15000 cavalry.
april 1443. Some 60000 of my enemies are piled up in Istra dying of attrition.
Stab increase from monarch skill. Stab = 2
Then the clergy announce that the way my regime tolerates artists, jews, and artificers is an affront to god and must be dealt with. I tell them to go screw themselves. I think I may have hit a sore spot there, because one of them had a heart attack
on the spot. I think this may disturb the populance a bit..
stab = 0. Lombardia just recived a deathsentence.
I sail troops past Istra and lay siege to venice and mantua.
The alliances against me just keep pouring in men to the siege of Istra. I estimate that several hundred thousand die by attrition.
Manuta falls in september 1444 and promts several members of the "anti-ottoman" alliances to settle for a white peace. Including milan and I accidentially accepted. *Arrgh*
Stab = 1
Venice soon falls and is annexed.
Stab = 2
January 1445. Is an exceptional year. Yhea! Inflation = 0.
the remains of the armies sieging Istra get crushed by my armies returning from the siege of venice. Are the fools going to sue for peace soon? Ah yes. They did. My navy is absurdly large at this point as I inherited the venetian fleet.
October. I get hit by a wave of obscuratism... That is pretty horrible. For the first time in the game I move the finance slider away from full infrastructure.
To full cash.
I need to buy a peace with the mamelukes pronto. Also the loans are coming due pretty soon.
June 1446. The loans are repaid in full, peace has been bought with the mamelukes and I am rushing hinter and youn putting down revolts. Slider is put back to full infrastructure.
1447. I am petitioned for redress. Hmm. No.
Stab = 1.
I spend the next few years trying to imrove the relations with my eastern co-religionists and rebuilding the army. In 1449 I decide to say "screw that", ban slavery and slavetrading within the ottoman empire (-1 serfdom) and DOW Hungary.
And then I get a boundary dispute with the mamelukes. Yhea! free stab. Stab = 1
1451. New monarch. And he is actually *better* than Murad II. 9,9,9 monarch skills, and military commander skills to the tune of 5.6.4.2. A veritable demigod.
And then Milan DOWS me. YES! They are so going down. I may only have 13700 horse. But those are 13700 landtech 2 horse with strong morale and under the command of Meh.Med II. This is pretty much an invincible army. Milan just declared themselves "Free Stab"...
Anybody interested in the further adventures of the ottoman world-conquest?
This game is an attempt unify the entire world under a relatively benevolent and "modern" regime. (full free. Full centralised. Innovative. probably plutocrat.) There will be no cheating or reloading. (save CTDs) On the other hand I *will* use any tactic I can dream up no matter how cheesy or exploitative it may be...
V-hard, furious, 1419, ottomans.
Reign of Mehmed I.
Jan 1.
My ministers report that I have a treaty of millitary access with the Byzantines which is really a shame as I would really like to add that great city to my domains. On the other hand the Byzantines have a millitary alliance with Trezibon. And Trezibon exists only on my sufferance. (permanent CB. The ottomans have a lot of those.)
I order that the farmers in the empire be given the right to buy the land they work if they can scrape up the cash. (-1 serfdom), also I ban catholics and shiite from publicly worshipping in the empire. Not that there are any shiites or chatolics in the empire
but it seems to please the orthodox and sunni clergy. Further I order all my millitary forces save the 8 cannon I bought from a foreign trader to march to Byzantium.
Due to really abdismal state of the roads I make the decision to divert all public funds save millitary maintaince to infrastucture. One can't build a decent new roman empire without roman class roads you know. In fact. Lets mothball the fleet.
(maintainance to a minimum) Buzy day.
Jan 23. Finally the last of my armies stand before the treble walls of Byzantium.Gee, they've fallen into disrepair. (Only a level 2 fortress? WTF?) I order them merged and split into a cavalry and infantry army, and dispatch a diplomat to Trezibon with a DOW. Marvels of marvels. The Byzantines honour their treaty and
battle begins. Allah is great. So is massive mumerical superiority.
Feb 9. After 16 days of battle the byzantine armies are destroyed to the last man. I order 10.000 foot and all my cavalry to march on Trezibon. This leaves 20.000 foot sieging Byzantium. I ispatch my cannon to help with the siege.
march 27. A force of 2000 raw recruits make a doomed sally from byzantium. They die.
April 15. My 15000 strong cavalry arrive in trezibon and vipe out the 6000 men stationed there.
April 27. 6000 _very_ recently knighted trezibon cavalry charge out of the gates. They lose, and a few days later the infantry I sent to trezibon arrives to take over the siege and I dispatch the cavalry in pursuit of the fleeing Trezibon army.
may 30. The last of the Byzantine + Trezibon armies are defeated in angora. I order 12000 foot to move from the siege of byzantium to Macedonia and dispatch my cavalry to the same location. The duchy of Athens stands is in the way of complete
conquest of byzantine territory. That cannot be tolerated.
July 11. My armies stand ready in Macedonia and I dispatch a DOW to the Duchy. The courier is closely followed by an army of 14400 cavalry and 2 armies of 6000 foot. Given that the total forces of the Atheneans are 6000 men the outcome is pretty
predictable. Morea is undefended and I dispatch one of the foot armies to siege it and withdraw my 13800 cavalry to Macedonia. Time to wait for the sieges to complete. Hellas falls in december but refuses to yield as they still have allies. 9000 of whom
are suddenly sieging Smyrna. Hmm. Checks. Only 900 cavalry. I order my cavaly to remove them from my territory. Tuscany looses 9000 men and offers me a 50 ducat peace. hmm. No. Siena and Modena offer white peaces. I take those.
Then I offer to Annex the Duchy again. Yhea! Success. Stab = 2.
Feb 1420. Byzantium falls into my hands. I dispatch my cannon to Morea. Trazbon also falls to my armies but due to a shortage of diplomats I can't annex them just yet.
May. Got a diplomat trained, annexed Trezibon, Stab = 3, all 8 cannon arrive in morea.
June. Tuscany offers me a 10 ducat peace. I take it. Morea falls. I can't make any ultimatums to byzantium just now as I am rather lacking diplomats. But the byzantines offer 79 gold and Morea, which I accept.
The Byzantines seem to have made another millitary alliance to replace the one with Trezibon. They've allied themselves with Genoa and Georgia. I dispatch my cannon back to byzantium (I still have millitary access.) and move my armies
(save 10000 foot and 8 cannon in Byzantium) to Trazbon to await the training of another diplomat.
August sees the development of a new taxation system to support my roadbuilding and infrastructure programme. (Infrastructure 1. I build 9 taxcollectors, wiping out my treasury.) In septemper I get a report from my mothballed fleet, that while idleing around the harbor one of my officers has come up with an
improvement to the shipboard ballista. I order him promoted. And he is now an idle captain instead of an idle navigator.. (Naval tech 1)
November finally sees the training of a new diplomat and I DOW Georgia. Byzantium honors the treaty and I start sieging the great city again. I raise war taxes and charge Georgia. Stab 2.
December. Moldavia DOWs me? Pretty suicidal. I'll deal with them when I've got Georgia under siege. Darn. I loose a battle with Georgia despite massive numerical and cavalry superiority. my armies retreat to Trazibon and I decide to wait for morale
to rebuild. On the plus side Genoa offers me a white peace. Which I take.
1421 July.
Reign of Murad II.
New Monarch. Very *good* monarch. And millitary commander. Murad II appears in Trache. I leave him there to speed up the siege. Georgia is subdued and left under siege while the surplus armies are sent to byzantium. War taxes raised again. Stab 1. 4000 cavalry hired.
July. Trache falls. 10000 foot under my personal (murad II) command dispatched to deal with the invasion by the moldavian alliance. Bulgaria has fallen to Wallachia and Drobuja to Moldavia. I decide to pound the Moldavians into a thin paste and ignore their allies. When the leader falls the rest will follow.
December. If only the allies would ignore *me* My army, en route to drobuja was attacked by 26000 wallachians. I kicked their asses though. (Murad II is a 3,3,4,1 millitary leader. Helps a lot.) The 4000 new cavalry arrived just in time to be joined with the rest of the army before attacking the hostile forces in drobuja. Numerical superiority, morale superiority, cavalry superiority,
superior leadership. Even if Murad II says so himself, the outvome of that campaign was not in doubt.
1422 January. I raise wartaxes again and annex byzantium. Net result: stab 1.
March. I decide the fate of the patricate. I appoint a new patriarch. +1 centralisation. +1 stab. Stab = 2. I make constantinople the new capital. Yhea! Further centralisation + 2 stab. 3 free convesions to state religion and turkish culture.
Stab = 3. Also I tear up the trade agreements with Vencie and Genoa and a trade center appears in Trache. +2 mercantailist + 6 merchants.
November. The cities of Georgia finally fall. Also a plauge strikes
Hellas. Georgia refuses an offer of 2000 gold and sochi for peace.
I'll try again with a request for 1000 gold and Sochi. They yield. and pay me 70 gold, Heh.
April 1424. *Finally* moldavia falls. I thought that siege would go on forever. They yield bujack and the contents of their treasury readily enough. Another 10000 cavalry are hired bringing my armies up to 12000 foot and 16000 horse. + 8 cannon.
May. Gift to the state. +100 gold.
June. I DOW Albania to get at Ragusa who are in an alliance with venice. Albania looses all their armies in less than a month and I leave a sieging force, DOW Ragusa and march on that city(state).
March. The venetians have captured smyrna and have troops all over the place.. But Ragusa just fell the the cannon and cunning of Murad II and as the leader of their alliance I ask the Ragusians for all the venetian provinces I have CB shields on. Which is all of them, save their capital. Dalmatia, Corfu, Crete and Ionia fall into my hands. Also 276 gold.
I did say I'd use any tactic short of cheating didn't I? Since I now have catolics inside the empire I decide to tolerate them.
July. Ak koyonly, Dulakir, candar and the golden horde invite me to join their war against Georgia. Whatever did the Georgians do to offend the gods so? I decide to pile on their misery and join the alliance. The sheikh-ul-islam office is suggested. Thanks, but no thanks. +1 innovative. -2 stab. Albania falls and is annexed. +30 victory points (mission) +1 stab. stab = 2.
Naples who were Albanias feudal overlords and allies offer me a 25 gold peace. Sure.
October. I take charge of the siege in georgia with 3000 horse and a reigning monarch. 4000 soldiers from the papal states attempt to siege Dalmatia. I am at war with the papal states? Infrastructure II is reached. I increase naval maintaince and pull my rather large navy out of mothballs.
(I've gotten such a pile of galleys from annexations.)
Time to put a hurting on the pope. 6 merchants are sent to Alexandria.
january 1426. Georgia falls and is annexed. Stab = 3. Two naval victories over the pope and the fleet is approaching dalmatia
with a 14000 strong relieving force. A few victories and some 8000 papal casulties later the pope suggests that he might graciously agree to a peace if I pay *him* 30 ducats. Okay.
Whatever. Just go away.
I get a natioalist revolt in sochi and send the army to deal with it. Apparantly since they were never a part of the original roman empire they don't want to be a part of my empire either. We'll see about that. A state gift is sent to our friends and allies in candar enormously improving our relations.
In May the ruler of candar offers me his daughter in marriage. I accept. In october the ruler of ak konloyo does likevise. I accept. It is /good/ to be a muslim prince. I do hope they'll get along.
In july I DOW Serbia. Wallachia and Moldavia join the fun. In august I get hit by "poor goverment policies" Must spend less time with wives and more on paperwork. Hmm. Unless I can persuade the wives to help with the paperwork.
December. Serbia falls, freeing up enough troops to essay an assault of 10000 cavalry on wallachia. Victory! Muhrad II is the greatest commander ever
So say both his lovely brides. ))Ak Kuyonlu ask that I honor my treaty of alliance and DOW Qara
Okay. I am also asked to DOW karaman and Teke. Again ok.
I recruit some more cavalry, leave 5000 men sieging wallachia and rush to kosovo since cannon + my personal persense should reduce that province in short order, freeing up troops to attack elsewhere.-
november 1428. Kosovo captured. moldavia under siege, wallachia fallen. Then I get "support for dissidents abroad" And I don't have 25 gold. Arrghh. I take the stab hit. Stab 1. I Annex wallachia. Stab = 2.
January 1429. I suggest to my favorite banker Abraham that it might be a good buisness proposition to loan peasants the cash they need to become self-owning farmers. He agrees. For some bisarre reason this upsets some members of the nobility. (-1 serfdom. -1 stab)
Stab = 1
I lay siege to the city state of Teke and the capital of Karaman.
April. Moldavia falls and is promtly annexed. Stab = 2
April 1430. Have vassalised teke, am sieging all of karaman and Qara. Karaman looses all but their core provice and are vassalised to boot. Qara gets vassalised. An exceptional court painter shows up and gets hired.
January 1431. I invade Cyprus and Rhodes.
Cyprus falls in june and is promtly annexed. Stab = 3. Rhodes holds out until septemper. I raise wartaxes and annex them.
December. Another painter? I'll hire her. Thanks to the wartaxes at peace and stab = 3 the census tax nets 400 gold. Nice. Lets repeat that stunt a few times. I hire some more cavalry and DOW Ragusa. Bosnia, Venice and Genoa honor their alliance with Ragusa. I decide not to involve my allies. Bosnia falls in the spring of 1434 and venice and genoa offer white peaces, Which I accept. I hold of on the war-taxing and annexing until July so that wartaxes will still be in effect come january 1.
Ragusa holds out until june 1435 and gets annexed (with accompagnying wartax) in july. Then I DOW croatia. Who are Allied with hungary, transylvania, and a couple of
german minors. Then somebody assainates a noble. Darn.
Stab =2
June 1436. A foreign drill instructor is available. Since I'm pretty flush with cash he gets hired. Croatia, transylvania, banat and serbia falls. Transyvania gets annexed (stab = 3)
and I use the 100% peace with croatia to grab a buch of CB provinces from hungary. Hungary is reduced to 4 provices..
November. I enter a Royal marriage with the golden Horde. Must pick the last one with care. The prophet did decree a maximum of 4 wives after all. I send a personal gift to the inlaws in Candar.
Then eveything goes to shit. Poland + lithuania DOW me and I loose some 20000 horse fighting them in the very hostile lands called "the polish winter" I can't afford this. I mean that literally. My armies cost a bleeding fortune to raise (19 gold per 1000 horse) I decide to avoid major battles as far as possible and concentrate on sieging lithuanian provinces. (lithuania is the leader of the alliance.) I start replenishing my armies. On the bright side 1439 sees a strengthening of the yeomanry, as I pass new laws restricting the maximum length of apprenticeships to 5 years. (-1 serfdom)
This naturally pisses of a number of guild masters. I could hardly care significantly less.
Infrastructure reaches III. I could now commision distilleries. If I had the money, that is.
in 1440 an uncooperative philosopher arrives from Spain and instantly starts critising my regime. I can see why the spaniards kicked him out, but I restrain my passing impulse to have him thrown in the dungeons. (+1 innovative. -2 stab.)
Stab = 0. Must annex somebody soon.
I also reach landtech 2.
After I've conqoured 3 lithuanian provices the polish-lithuanian alliance agrees to relinquish jedisan, and return the provices the poles had occupied.
In june 1441 another drill instructor appears and I take out two loans to pay the man. Arrgh. thats 2 % of inflation i did not need. on the upside my armies are just one step from full quality and two from full offensive.
Febuary 1442. Getting tired of the occasional revolt I decide to distract the population with a display of martial glory. I DOW Croatia with the aim of annexing that country.
Yhea! I appoint an excellent minister. Go me.
The mameluks and the bohemian alliance then DOW me. I get the impression I am less than perfectly popular. (and my rep is a mere very bad too.) Croatia falls to my armies and I annex em. That should rid me of the 1% revolt risk. Hmm. The Bohemian alliance includes several one-provice minors.. Free stabilty!
Venice DOWs me. I think I need a larger army. Venice and Mantua get marked for death and I return 106 percent worth of coreprovinces to hungary. This drops my badboy to "rather bad" and blocks the path the armies of the Bohemian alliance would have to take to get at me. I plan to retake those lands in 5 years.. I also hire 15000 cavalry.
april 1443. Some 60000 of my enemies are piled up in Istra dying of attrition.
Stab increase from monarch skill. Stab = 2
Then the clergy announce that the way my regime tolerates artists, jews, and artificers is an affront to god and must be dealt with. I tell them to go screw themselves. I think I may have hit a sore spot there, because one of them had a heart attack
on the spot. I think this may disturb the populance a bit..
stab = 0. Lombardia just recived a deathsentence.
I sail troops past Istra and lay siege to venice and mantua.
The alliances against me just keep pouring in men to the siege of Istra. I estimate that several hundred thousand die by attrition.
Manuta falls in september 1444 and promts several members of the "anti-ottoman" alliances to settle for a white peace. Including milan and I accidentially accepted. *Arrgh*
Stab = 1
Venice soon falls and is annexed.
Stab = 2
January 1445. Is an exceptional year. Yhea! Inflation = 0.
the remains of the armies sieging Istra get crushed by my armies returning from the siege of venice. Are the fools going to sue for peace soon? Ah yes. They did. My navy is absurdly large at this point as I inherited the venetian fleet.
October. I get hit by a wave of obscuratism... That is pretty horrible. For the first time in the game I move the finance slider away from full infrastructure.
To full cash.
I need to buy a peace with the mamelukes pronto. Also the loans are coming due pretty soon.
June 1446. The loans are repaid in full, peace has been bought with the mamelukes and I am rushing hinter and youn putting down revolts. Slider is put back to full infrastructure.
1447. I am petitioned for redress. Hmm. No.
Stab = 1.
I spend the next few years trying to imrove the relations with my eastern co-religionists and rebuilding the army. In 1449 I decide to say "screw that", ban slavery and slavetrading within the ottoman empire (-1 serfdom) and DOW Hungary.
And then I get a boundary dispute with the mamelukes. Yhea! free stab. Stab = 1
1451. New monarch. And he is actually *better* than Murad II. 9,9,9 monarch skills, and military commander skills to the tune of 5.6.4.2. A veritable demigod.
And then Milan DOWS me. YES! They are so going down. I may only have 13700 horse. But those are 13700 landtech 2 horse with strong morale and under the command of Meh.Med II. This is pretty much an invincible army. Milan just declared themselves "Free Stab"...
Anybody interested in the further adventures of the ottoman world-conquest?
