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That's a little misleading. The eastern half of Iceland is part of Branbenburg
D), so even if the province itself is not part of the HRE (and it may be, I never checked), it would show up green on the Imperial map.
That's a little misleading. The eastern half of Iceland is part of Branbenburg
Oh, I see. Thanks for clarifying.
Issue #28
Reason VIII
This game is too easy.
Issue Twenty-eight
This game is too easy.
Issue Twenty-eight
You might have noticed that I was away for an unusually long time. Well, unless you are reading it months (years?) from now, in which case, greetings from the past! How are you doing? I hope you are better off than we are. Were. Anyway, I had to put this project on hold because I needed some challenge so I played some more modern games that are not that easy. But enough of that, you are not here to hear about my excellent adventures in Call of Duty, are you?
By the way, it's already 1710, so there's only a little over a hundred years to go!
Of course the only thing I remember from the last session is that I wanted to go after the Holy Roman Empire and of course I won't read back to figure out if I had a plan or anything. So again, the targets are:
- Croatia They have two provinces but we have a truce and I have no Casus Belli. Yet.
- Meissen They have only a single province but I also don't have a Casus Belli.
- Mecklenburg Single province, no Casus Belli.
- Oldenburg I already have them in my pocket, being allied to them.
- Silesia Single province, no Casus Belli.
- Papal States They have quite a lot of provinces and I also have a Casus Belli: Liberation. The problem is that the Pope knows the Excommunicatio spell ("It's Excommunicatio, not Excommunicatio!...") and that hurts. A lot. I would need two consecutive wars to make them serve me, which would take many years of being loathed by everyone. Well, not everyone, because of those hipsters of the Reformed church, but still. They are also at war with half of Europe but are allied to Austria (and Norway).
- Brandenburg They have a lot of provinces but little to no army right now. I have a Liberation Casus Belli against them. Still, they should be the last to be taken care of because I don't need to defeat them, only control their capital, which shouldn't be too hard.
So, in the end, I guess it will be the Pope I need to attack first. But since I have good relations with them, I'll first have to tell his Highness about my opinion regarding his choices in clothing.
Hey, I just met you and this is crazy, but your hat is ugly, so DOW me maybe?
In order to keep my extreme edge in technology, I also went for another round of twenty years of 'Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité'. The -20% in Technology cost should easily make up for the +8 National Revolt Risk. France is a police state already anyway. Also I'll put off the first invasion on the Pope (The War of Papal Liberation where I liberate the Pope of the responsibility of holding on to some excess land) until August of 1711, when I'll reach Land Technology level 43, granting me all different colours of Coats for my Infantry. Sounds awesome, doesn't it? Oh, yeah, and +0.25 Morale as well, although with the current 6.45, that doesn't really matter much.
Also at this point I felt it was time to finally take care of that stupid bug with the Grain Depot and fixed the related file. I won't let the game screw with me! That +20% Troop Limit and -20% Maintenance cost will make a huge difference! Well, not that I need it, really. I have more Artillery than Poland has troops altogether and I'm 7 levels higher in Land tech than the next country (Mecklenburg for crying out loud!), but still.
I DOWed the Pope in December, 1711 (between Christmas and New Years, thoughtful of me, isn't it?) and started the invasion right away. Their alliance with Austria wasn't in place anymore which is good because Norway doesn't really pose any kind of threat and I've dealt with Brandenburg multiple times in the past, I'm not afraid of them. This war also provided a new opportunity never present before: 'Declare Statute in Restraint of Appeals'. Sounds nice, doesn't it? I'm already on a paved way to Hell, so why the Heaven not?
This first war didn't last long for a lack of proper Papal resistance. They had like 50.000 men on paper at least but I never met them. Maybe they were somewhere in Russia on vacation, I don't know. At any rate, I gave them a break after 58% War Score and only forced them to release five of the six possible minors. I will still need a Casus Belli five years from now, you know.
They also had to renounce their claim on Ansbach. I don't know where they got that in the first place...
They are still at war with Wurzburg, the Hansa and Ansbach though. Tough luck. Still, I hope they won't be too beaten. As I said, I need that Casus Belli!
So, now we wait. In early 1713, Spain took control over the Curia which is nice because they don't hate me that much. In fact, a few well-placed bribes here and there may assure that they keep the Pope in line and make sure he doesn't start swinging around with his magic wand.
Also with the -20% in Tech cost, I've started to make a new advance in Government Tech per year, despite of being like 15 years ahead of time. Can France into space?... At any rate, August of 1713 brought me level 41 and with it, a new National Idea. I had trouble selecting one the last time, but I made some nice advancements in other areas since then, making Scientific Rebolution and Smithian Economics available. +20% Production Efficiency nation-wide sounds nice, but to be honest, I have enough money as it is. -10% Tech cost permanently on the other hand will be incredibly useful for the rest of the game! Now I'll make almost two advances a year. Constitutional Republic, here I come!
The five years didn't go without incident though. In 1715, I got a call from Mazovia.
"Kitten, I think what I'm saying, is that sometimes, sh*t happens, someone has to deal with it, and who ya gonna call?"
The campaign didn't take too long. I still had 20.000 men in Estland and they made short work of the 12.000 strong Lithuanian and 13.000 strong Ukranian armies (both were like 20 levels behind me in Land Tech) and a few short sieges were enough for Ukraine, the overlord of Lithuania to reconsider her viewpoint of Mazovian independence. I love being the good guy
It was a short but kinda satisfying campaign.Later on I recieved another call, this time from Thuringia, being under siege by the Hansa, Wurzburg, Frankfurt, Utrecht and Anhalt. Strength in numbers, huh? What I don't understand is that they were already at war with Austria, wasn't that enough?... Wait a minute, it was Thuringia that started this conflict. That makes a little more sense. But it doesn't mean that I won't get involved, oh, no! Let's roll! While I was busy fighting the Hansa, the Pope annexed Würzburg. Baaaad Pope! And a little later Sicily joined the war which is bad because now the Hansa is also a junior participant in the war just as I am and thus we can't negotiate. Stupid rules! And of course I can't make them release their vassals or new minors through Sicily either... I also don't really want to fight Sicily directly... And then Sicily bought their buddy Sweden in as well. I mean WTF?! I guess this is quickly getting out of hand and brings more trouble than it's worth. If I was the leader of my side at least, it wouldn't be that bad, but I won't protect Thuringia against Sweden, that doesn't make any sense. I'm outa here!
In May, 1717, the truce with the Papal States expired, so I sent another Declaration of War. This time not only Norway but Brandenburg also joined the conflict and they also brought Croatia to have some fun as well. Excellent! They were easy to vassalize. One less Elector to worry about. Dealing with the Pope was slightly less easy. (It wasn't hard, mind you, only less easy.)
After his latest exploits, I wasn't able to vassalize the Pope but I made him release Cologne, Mainz and Würzburg and also to renounce six of his unlawful claims in the neighbourhood.
And I also made two interesting observations. First, while I was occupying the Pope's capital, they weren't listed on the independent countries' list on the 'Dismantle the HRE' button, which indicates that if I manage to get into a war with all of them at the same time, I don't need to vassalize them. That would save me some Infamy, but I'm not sure if it would be any less inconvinient because of the Stability hits. The second observation was that Baden is listed as an independent elector, even though they don't even exist...
Anyway, I'm still at war with Brandenburg, Norway and as of late, the Teutonic Order. My 'independent' buddy Mazovia will help a lot with that
They had some forces running around and even had two army-sized formations. The first of these showed up early on but was wiped out by my two armies. The second arrived too late to prevent the humiliating defeat of the mighty emperor:
And in a few days after the resolution of that war, I was called into arms again, this time by Hausa. In case you don't know what a "Hausa" is, let me enlighten you. No, it is not the undereducated sister of Hugh Laurie. Hausa is my Central African minion, edged between the remnants of Mali and Kanem Burnu (yet another obscure Central African piece of wonderland). The really interesting thing though is that they were attacked by Hedjaz, which is a Middle Eastern sheikhdom. I mean, WHY? They also have even farther away from Central Africa, in Central Asia. Don't let the "Central" part confuse you. They are very, very far. Although Hedjaz does have some colonies in Eastern Africa, so only like, two thousand miles of Wasteland separates the two. Makes sense.
In fact, the only real problem with this whole conflict is that I really don't want to go to the Middle East. Maybe this war will just go away if I ignore it hard enough.
Further investigation revealed that the independence of Hausa was guaranteed by Swahili. Which, in turn, is right next to the colonies of Hedjaz, and by the time I was called into arms, was already taken over almost completely by them. That, I must admit, is kinda clever... It must have been an accident.
In December, 1719, I reached level 47 in Government Technology, making Constitutional Republic available. I think I already explained earlier why I want to take that government type over my current one so I won't go into detail now. Let it be enough that +20% Production and +1 Tolerance to Heretics and Heathens beats -2% Prestige Decay, especially since I gain 4 Prestige yearly, so it should still be only -1% without that 2% modifier from the Monarchy. (Unless it works completely differently from how I think it does, but I'm afraid you can't divide by the number of craps I give at this point...)
Of course this move had the inconvinient side-effect of dropping my Stability by 4 points to -1. It will take a few years to recover from that, but it is worth it in the long run. And isn't it funny that I kept my previous King as the Head of State? President Louis XV de Ávalos. Yeah, sure. Well, alright, I get an election event, but I can keep him
I would also like to point out that these elections are kinda stupid. I mean how come that if I choose the "Buroucrate", I get a guy with 7/9/3? He is much better at Military than at Administration. He is also worse at Diplomacy than my previous guy. Still, this is a little more interesting than hereditary rule was. I guess I might have some fun with this (Even if not too much...)With this 7 Military rating, comes the ability to 'Establish a Naval Convoy System'. It would give a huge 5 Inflation right away and increase the cost of Colonists and Big Ships and also their build time but makes my ships slightly braver and increases overseas income by 10%. My current Tarrif income is 21 gold a month, which is about 3% of the total, so this would give me a 0.3% increase in income. Wooow. Still, if I don't take the offer, that stupid icon will stay there forever and I don't want that. So let's establish. I guess I should consider doing something about that 5 points of Inflation though. It is reduced by 0.14 each year, but at this rate, it will take 35 years do get rid of it completely! Bah, whatever.
My positive Stability was pretty much what kept the country together for the last hundred years or so, thanks to that stupid Religious Turmoil (which I will never be able to get rid of), so I had some rough years during the transition from Monarchy to Republic. And maaaan, was it boring. I had to check my schedule because I started to think that we reached another Reason. But no, I still have 30 boring, unchallenging years. Then I got this gem of a stupid event:
A Constitutional Republic is UnConstitutional!
The other option would have been returning to the Constitutional Monarchy and gaining back 1 point of Stability. No, that won't do at all. (Of course that won't make things any harder, only more annoying...) And yes, this event is stupid. I would understand if the Separation of Power modifier would cause problems if I went to an Absolute Monarchy for example or even a Republican Dictatorship. But what would contradict the Separation of Power in a Constitutional Republic? Bah... (And while we are at it, how on Earth can I still have the 'L'état c'est moi' decision?!)
After defeating Swahili, Hedjaz soon sent a White Peace to Hausa. That of course didn't end my war with them, but fortunatelly they were willing to accept a White Peace with me as well. By the way, isn't it funny how enemy junior partners swarm you with insane peace demands when you have 0% War Score? I mean come on! Why would they expect me to release vassals and pay ridiculous amounts of money when we haven't even met on the battlefield? It is even worse when said enemies are 1-2 province minors and you are a multi-continent mega-empire...
Did you ever notice that the different rebels can fight eachother? I had a bunch of Particularists get attacked by the Royalists that wanted me to get back to the Constitutional Monarchy. The later have won but they got beaten enought hat my pursuing army squashed them easily. Funny.
And if that stupid wave of rebellion wasn't enough of an annoyance, Morocco declared war on my friend, Hausa. Over my dead body, dude! Quite literally, considering that they need to go through my territory to get there. But that won't happen of course. I won't attack Morocco though, because that would mean Ottoman involvement (Defenders of the Faith) and that's the last thing I need right now. So it's passive resistance for now. Not for long of course. Hausa called me in June, 1721. On to Morocco! I wanted to put them back into place for quite some time now, but the timing is not the best I'm afraid. Still, there can be only one!
Fighting Morocco kept me occupied (and I kept Morocco occupied) while my Stability was slowly climbing back up. In the end, I got bored and allowed them to get away with only releasing the four countries they annexed earlier: Tunisia, Ethiopia, Trebizond and Funj (that must be some kind of skin disease).
Meanwhile in Europe the 10th Annual Flag Festival is held.
That should be sufficient for now. Don't miss the next interesting Issue! (In which something might actually happen. Or not.)
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The highest rival Land Tech level is 36 in 1711? Your game's AI has some rotten tech.
Happy to see an update!
Happy to see an update!
Issue #29
Reason VIII
This game is too easy.
Issue Twenty-nine
This game is too easy.
Issue Twenty-nine
Last time I made some progress towards utterly destroying the Holy Roman Empire, but I'm still far from success. At least I managed to liberate some North African tribes from their oppressors.
But back to my plans. The current electors are Meissen, Mecklenburg, Silesia, Oldenburg, Croatia and the Papal State, plus Brandenburg is the Emperor. From these, I have Oldenburg and Croatia in my pocket, so I still have four, plus for some reason, Baden is also listed as Elector, eventhough they don't even exist. But that's not a problem, I can make them reappear, which should solve the problem right away. Problem is, the Palatinate (current owner of Baden) is at war with Austria at the moment and all their provinces are occupied by them. So if I defeated the Palatinate, Austria would annex them and I wouldn't get what I want. Wurtenberg also holds a province of Baden in Breisgau, but Baden can't be liberated from there, only the capital. (It's funny, considering that Wurtenberg's supposed capital, Würtenberg, is in Austria, and doesn't even have a Wurtenberg core anymore...) So I'll have to wait for that one a little more. In the meantime, I think I should take care of the Pope. So that's my first objective.
I don't have a Casus Belli anymore (I made them release everyone last time to make sure that they will be vassallizable this time), so it will cost me 2 Stability points. Oh, well. It also gave 2 Infamy (I wasn't aware of that before), but that shouldn't cause too much distress either, considering that I had none before. Brunswick, Gerle and Brandenburg all honoured their alliance with the Pope.
Taking the Pope's single province was quite easy, I didn't even have to fight his Army, he chose to retreat. I could annex him but that would do me no good: a new independent Elector would be chosen and even the Pope would only relocate to somewhere else I guess. And I only wanted a vassal, anyway. I also forced him to renounce all the foreign cores he held. That didn't end the war of course, since Brandenburg took the lead. Also in the meantime, the Palatinate accepted a White Peace from Austria. Excellent!
In December, 1723, we held Elections again. My current President (7/3/9) was perfectly suitable for the post, so I kept him in office. Meanwhile the two minors in Germany were humiliated, but left alone. They couldn't even pay any money... Defeating Branbengurg wasn't that much harder either, and they could even pay 200 money in addition to renouncing a core. After that war, I decided to keep a 40.000 strong Army in Pommerania, just in case. That tactic worked very well in Scotland, too.
So, with that taken care of, the next target is the Palatinate, to liberate Baden, the Ghost-Elector. This time around I have a Casus Belli, so this war will be even esier. Occupying Worms was enough to force the release of Baden. One more Electors on my side! (The funniest part is that the Palatinate was entirely replaced by Baden!)
That leaves only Mecklenburg, Silesia and Meissen to deal with. Now the problem with these is that I don't really have any Casus Bellis and it would be kinda difficult to forge one based on territory, all of them being one province minors and all. So here comes the tricky part: Silesia is Protestant, Mecklenburg and Meissen are Reformed, which means they are all Heretics from my Catholic point of view! Replacing Church Attendance Duty with Unam Sanctam will give me a free Casus Belli against all three at once! Changing National Ideas will cause a 3 points drop of Stability, but that's only half the cost it would be to make three unlawful DoWs, not to mention the unnecessary Infamy hits. I'll wait until November, 1725 though, for my Stability to climb up to three again before setting my Master Plan in motion!
I changed the National Idea in November and it took until December for the engine to update the Casus Bellis.
Purge ALL the Heretics! (And conquer Holstein from all of them!)
Now of course I don't want to actually win any of these wars, or at least not by any normal means. My main (and, well, pretty much only) goal is to occupy all the capitals of the Electors and Dismantle this stupid HRE once and for all! And I will do that, if it isn't for those meddling kids! Which, in this case is Switzerland, Defender of the Faith. By the by, that also comes in handy, because my current Mission is to convert Switzerland! Awesome!
The Great Dismantling War started on January 6th, 1726.
And when all of the pieces started to click into place, Oldenburg suddenly decided to go independent again. ARGH!!! No matter, I will declare one more war, and it will be over! This time I will even bring some reinforcements, just for the laughs.
Betrayal!
And with that, the whole Holy Roman Empire was under my control and I could finally do away with it!
So, it's over now. The only thing left is to let the smoke settle and rebuild Europe from the ruins. With the objective now complete, I can make peace with the minors at least. They pay me some money, revoke some cores and renounce som treaties. I don't really care about their religion, nor do I want to get the Infamy from forcing another one on them. Naples, defender of the Protestant Faith also quickly sues for a White Peace, which I accept. My only concern now is Switzerland and their heresy. I almost got to the point where I could claim Wallis in addition to my final demands, but I ran out of steam.
That concludes yet another fine mission.
Now I guess I should start to worry about revolters...
This new Democracy thing didn't really turn out as people hoped it would.
Note that I'm still not afraid of the rebels or anything. Sure, they are annoying, but they can be dealt with easily. I wasn't afraid of half of Europe getting involved in my attempt to bring down the HRE either. They were stepping on eachothers toes to back out of the war once they realized how serious I was. This game is getting rather boring... But I still have 23 years to go in this Reason alone! Bah...
The new mission after bringing back Switzerland into the light was to build an Academy of Fine Arts in Limousin. It will be done in February, 1732. Again, a simple task that takes a long time. But at least once started, it does not require my attention at all.
The past few wars pumped my War Exhaustion to 13 points (causing serious issues with Revolt Risk, Unit Recruitment and Stability increasing), so I guess I'll have to spend a few years whack-a-mole-ing those rebels instead of doing anything worthwhile. Yay.
In the Election of 1727, I went with the Diplomat for a change. 8/6/4. (By the way, why does the new ruler notification window have the order of attributes different (Adm/Mil/Dip) than the ruler window(Adm/Dip/Mil)?) This new President could turn the nation into an Absolute Monarchy. I won't do that of course, so now that stupid Icon will keep staring at me for four years. At least.
And of course nothing interesting happened for a very long time. In March of 1730, though, I got a notification that I could most likely diplo-annex Wales. That would of course cost me 1 Stability (I had +1 at the time), and for that, I would recieve a single province of Orthodox Welsh fishermen. Then again, it was another thorn in England's side, so I went for it. I will have to fight them again one day, won't I?
Anyway, I thought I would pretty much spend the rest of this Issue with nothing to do, but then I noticed that I have the "Nationalism" Casus Belli on Cyprus. For some reason, the island became inhabited by Cosmopolitan French instead of the Greek and Turkish. Strange. But the best part is that they have absolutely no diplomatic relations to anyone, so I can take the island with no consequences at all! Excellent!
That was easy... Also great timing for the next election campaign!
Well, I guess sometimes even I can get lucky:
That +2 Stability would be a complete waste in normal circumstances, but right now it comes in handy!
With that, my Stability is back at +3 and I can finally get back to working on my Governmen tech to get my next National Idea.
In the 1731 Election (it was held in November due to the passing of my previous President), I chose the Beurocreat President: 6/3/8. Oh,whatever.
After the Fine Arts Academy was finished in Limousin, thus completing the mission, I got another mission with the same task, in Artois. I won't do that. One Fine Arts Academy is more than enough. The replacement mission was much more interesting: Incorporate Augsburg into our country! This one is especially nice because it gives a core on the province once the mission has been fulfilled. Now, Augsburg is my vassal, so obviously I will try to diplo-annex them instead of forcing the issue through war. It will take some time, but it is much better than a new Fine Arts Academy... Some quick bribes revealed that I'll need to wait until 1740 for the diplomatic solution to become available. Fine. In the meantime, I'll just sit idle or something.
Aaaaand I guess it is kinda lame to end an Issue with nothing happening, but that is basically what's going on in the game, too: nothing.
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Shape Europe according to your will!
Btw, this AAR with its 15 months : 9 pages ratio is pretty obscure
Btw, this AAR with its 15 months : 9 pages ratio is pretty obscure
Yeah, especially with almost 90.000 views But what can I do? People are stunned by my AWESOMENESS
But what can I do? People are stunned by my AWESOMENESS
Issue #30
Reason VIII
This game is too easy.
Issue Thirty
This game is too easy.
Issue Thirty
Since I'm really running out of patience here, I decided to finish this Reason with this Issue, so we'll have to sit through 15 years of bore. I've also decided to not do anything and let the events be forced upon me. Maybe if I don't have any plans, I might get a tiny fraction of a challenge.
Well, things did happen without me actively doing anything, although Baden being attacked by Holland and Switzerland is hardly a challenge. I gained Wallis.
When I reached Government Tech level 50 in 1737, I chose Grand Army. With that, my Army Support Limit went up to 423. This calls for an immediate Army expansion!
By the way, I wouldn't mind if the Election candidates would run a campaign or something so I could have an idea of their qualities. Then again, they would probably lie anyway...
In December, 1740, I diplo-annexed Augsburg, fulfilling my latest mission and gaining a core in the province. Of course the next mission was building a Fine Arts Academy (in Timbuktu of all places!), which I declined. So I was tasked with building a University in Cuneo instead. That's something I'm willing to do, if reluctantly. I have a metric sh*tload of different manufacturies already, so it costs 6087 money (inflation included) but whatever, I have like 10.000 with an annual profit of over 1180 (although with 4.4 Magistrates per year, I spend about 2-400 of that on new buildings each year, but that still leaves over 500 in the treasury, pileing up).
Around 1741, I refocused my reserach efforts from the now 28 years ahead-of-time Government tech into Land tech and in mid-'42, I recieved the Royal Mortar. Sounds fun, huh? Especially in a Constitutional Republic. Then I researched some Production techs because they are dirt-cheap.
In 1743, I finally got a decent President (6/8/7). He will remain in office until he dies of old age I'm afraid. He also made the "Abolition of Slavery Act" possible and I decided what he heck, let's do it! I was curious what it would do to all those Slave "producing" colonies I had in Western Africa! Well, it changed the production of those provinces into "Unknown", which later became something else like Grain, but mostly Ivory. Ivory is good because the 33.9% of the World's production gives me +2 Diplomatic Skill, which is a much needed addition to my retarded Presidents...
After another round of declined Fine Arts Academies, I was tasked with forcing Malacca to open their markets for me. I don't even know where that is!...
In 1746, Revolutionaries started to appear in Europe. That sounds like fun! They didn't last very long though. Nevermind.
Aaaand yeah. That's pretty much it. Unimpressed? Can't blame ya'!
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Well, that's certainly a compact 15 years. Good thing there's a new Reason coming up, it seems that you couldn't bear this one any longer.
Good thing there's a new Reason coming up, it seems that you couldn't bear this one any longer. 
Wait...your reason for not updating for that long was Call of Duty?! Forget attacking the pope and destroying the empire of Christendom, that alone qualifies you for burning as a heretic
Great AAR though; the "this game is too easy" reason may have been more impressive if you weren't playing France, however. Maybe having those same borders except as a Japanese daimyo
Great AAR though; the "this game is too easy" reason may have been more impressive if you weren't playing France, however. Maybe having those same borders except as a Japanese daimyo
Issue #31
Reason IX
There's too much graphics, too little content.
Issue Thirty-one
There's too much graphics, too little content.
Issue Thirty-one
So I checked the game folder and it is a little over 1 GBs, but 157 MBs from that are my four saves and two screenshots (seriously?...). About half of the rest (around 440 MBs) is the gfx folder, 20 MBs of tutorial which noone will ever use (it even crashed the game for me with some of the expansions) and another 186 MBs are the sound and music, which leaves about 250 MBs of actual, relevant content. I rest my case.
Anyway, I found Malacca. It's a Sunni Sultanate in the non-Dutch East Indies. I'm not entirely sure how this works but I believe I would need to defeat them in a war to be able to force them to open their market for me. (The interface tells me I can use either diplomacy or war, but there's no relevant Diplomatic Action except for Offer Trade Agreement, and that would be Impossible.) They are a one province minor, so that shouldn't be too hard, the only problem is that they are not natives so I don't have any Casus Belli against them and the Ottomans are still Defenders of the Sunni Faith. So I would lose 2 Stability, travel half-way accross the world and fight the Ottomans at the same time. I guess I'll wait a little longer for my Naval Techs to catch up so I can colonize some province in the neighbourhood first.
The Christmas Island sea province is giving me the finger! How rude!
Banten, a province on the Western edge of Java, is the closest non-colonized province in the region. Don't let the colour of Sumatra fool you, Lampang, Benkulen and Palembang have Qin cities in them. I guess they arbitrarily chose that colour to blend into their surroundings... Also note the province of Priangan, next to Banten, a province of the Ottomans. That province is a colony, with only about 100 Turks and no fort of course. It will make my colonization effots a lot easier I hope.
In July, 1751, I reached level 51 in Naval Tech, reaching 630 Colony Range and thus I could send my first Colonists to Banten. They had a 81% chance of success and were supposed to arrive in August, 1752. I wanted to send some troops there by then, so I recruited 20.000 Infantrymen and gathered a fleet to transport them. The journey was long and perilous, but no ships sunk thanks to my carefully planned route. The AI is rather stupid in this regard, using the shortest route rather than the safest.
Founding the colony of Banten had multiple advantages:
I have no idea why I would get a Shipyard in Ayshire, though. That's in Scotland, and not even the most eastern coastal province I have!
With the East India Comapny founded, I got another decision, called "Pass Joint-Stock Companies Act", which would give me some more Trade Efficiency and Compete Chance at the cost of increased Merchant Costs. I went for that, too. In December, 1752, I reached level 52 in Naval Tech, allowing me to start another colony in Sunda as well.
And in February, 1753, I declared war on Malacca. I decided there would be no way of gaining a Casus Belli, so I had to settle for an unlawful war. Oh, well. The Ottomans, Malaya and Brunei joined right away. Good. And especially so because I realized that the game has tricked me, the mission was for Malacca the province, not Malacca the country! (Of course they have absolutely no connection to eachother by now...) So actually my quarell was with Malaya, not Malacca. Great. Of course there's no "Open Market" stuff against Malaya either. So how am I supposed to make them open their market for me exactly?...
So I checked that on the Internet (because of course the game wouldn't tell me how to fulfill the mission it gave, that wouldn't be annoying enough...). I need to either take the province itself by force or I could have just improved relations with the owner. Obviously I can't do that now. And since Malacca is the capital of Malaya (you are doing this to me on purpose, aren't you?!), I can't ask for that in a peace. And they have too many provinces, so vassalizing them is out of the question too. And the worst part was that for some reason, Malaya was leading the war, not the Ottomans, so even occupying their entire country gave only 8% Warscore against them.
And here's the trick I did to still get out of this as a winner. First, I annexed Malacca, so they could be released as a new country. Then, I offered 25 gold to the Ottomans to buy some candy and leave me alone. Which they did. (I beat some 38.000 men of theirs before, so they probably didn't want to mess with me too much either.) Then, with the Warscore suddenly jumping to 85%, I forced Malaya to release Malacca. Thus Malacca practically replaced Malaya, having 200 Relations with me and being my ally. (Despite being annexed by me just a few weeks earlier. Go figure.)
But for whatever reason, this still din't work quite as well as I expected. The option to "Open Market" appeared on the interface, but if I clicked on it, it showed a window for a split second and then disappeared. This is just great... This game hates me. I tried saving, quitting and then reloading, which fixed the problem because the market was open already.
'nough said.
I noticed that Malacca didn't completely replace Malaya, a small enclave remained the Adamans island and another province in India. Good for them. Not that it really concerns me.
Of course the mission of opening trade was not only about actually opening the trade: I need to get 5 Merchants there! Easier said than done... I'm full Mercantilist, which is awesome for owned CoTs, but crap for foreign ones. And since I couldn't conquer the targeted CoT, I'm having a hard time getting more than 3-4 there at a time. But there's nothing I could do about that, really. The +1 yearly Merchants from the East India Company helps a little at least. Well, actually it wasn't even that hard. I got lucky and my fifth Merchant arrived in July, 1755. At the same time England requested Military Access which I refused of course. They don't deserve the air they would be breathing on French soil.
The next mission was a manufactury again: this time a Weapons Manufactury in Lothringen. I started the construction right away.
Is there a reason why the Trade Technology levels are becoming less expensive as I'm getting forward? Maybe there are some hidden variables for that, I don't know.
Soooo... Is that a bad idea to diplo-annex the Pope?
Eversince the dissolution of the HRE, he was my vassal and I can do that by now. I guess the Papal States will reemerge somewhere, but that's not really important. I renounced the Pope decades ago, so there's no reason why I should treat him any different from other rulers. It also gave me a Weapons Manufactury in Limburg. And of course the Pope did claim the throne of an earthly state again, this time Aquileia.In 1760, France invented aerial bombardment:
The sheer awesomeness of the Flying Battery!
With the Weapons Manufactury finished in Lothringen, I was tasked with building a University in Languedoc. That would be awesome, I'll admit, but I'm starting to run low on funds, at least compared to the cost of Manufacturies: the next one would cost 6200 gold, and I only have 6000 right now. So that will have to wait. I could decline this mission, but the next would be a Fine Arts Academy anyway. (I just know it would.)
On April 1st, 1761, the USA came to existence. I'm not sure, but it was probably an event or something. At any rate, I'll try to have good relations with them, maybe they can sort out the chaos in North America:
I mean Venice? Seriously? And that pale yellow to the North East is Granada. And Delaware is the colony of Norway.
My colonies in the East Indies started to grow to provincial size in late 1762 with the former Ottoman colony Priangan being first and shortly followed by my first local colony, Banten. Sunda and Demak were a little late to the party but they also made it in the end. Meanwhile the Papal States keep surprising me:
A wise, if a little strange, choice.
I mean I'm pretty much the worst Christian ever. The national religion might be Christian but I probably have more Muslim and definitely more Protestant and Reformed provinces than Christian ones. Still, that +1 Yearly Prestige is nice and I don't mind the Diplomats or the Stability Cost reduction either. Anyway, it didn't last long, Spain became the new controller a month later. Which at least makes sense. In October, 1763, with the 55th level of Land Technology, I chose Impulse Infantry. They sound awesome and I argued that with my insane technological advantage, overruning the enemy is probably more efficient than having more defense points which won't be used anyway. (Of course I have very little idea how the combat of EU3 works, but I don't really care either. It's probably crap anyway.) Not that it really matters, because in a few months, I reached level 56, which allowed yet another new unit type, and I was using Drill Infantry in February of 1764 already. I started to build my Unversity at Languedoc to celebrate. In July, 1765, I was already using Mixed Order Infantry and Latin Chassuers.
Unfortunatelly the cost of those two last Manufacturies now prevent me from enacting "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité" again. It has the advantage of not having +8 National Revolt Risk, but on the other hand, I really would love to have that -20% Tech Cost. But I would need almost 9000 money to do that. A shame, really. Then again, with 1680 yearly profit, it won't take that long. In fact, I can mint 105 Gold a month without any inflation thanks to some stuff and the reduction in tech investment will be more then offset by that -20% cost very soon! Excellent! I made the decision in March, 1767 and I'll deal with the consequences in the next Issue.
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