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Chapter 15: The power of administrative efficiency

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Jodhaa and the entire court were a bit exhausted after the recent festivities in the French capital of Champagne.

Emir De Valois sure knew how to throw a champaign party :eek:

The Mughals took a party holiday of 2 years, to let war exhaustion tick away... We are integrating Persia and Manchu, and we simply can't pay it down with diplo points, due to diplo total being between 0 and 20 non stop.

Oh well. No targets anyways :rolleyes:

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Before the last peace deal with Austria and Tuscany, THIS happened..

Interesting. GB and Scandinavia used to be allies, but the meddling of the Mughals changed that ;)

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Jodhaa also ordered another batch of 75 twodeckers.

Our sailors were confident in handling them now :cool:

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Scandinavia didn't sit idle in the American independence war. They actually invaded, and sieged London :mad:

But GB wouldn't go down without a fight. They were still making troops again after I peaced them out. They first killed the rebels, and then turned on the Scandinavians...

Jodhaa watched all this with great interest.

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And with a hangover :oops:

Emir de Valois always was TOO generous with his champaign..

Jodhaa and her entire court were a bit exhausted after the recent festivities o_O

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But... Duty awaited once more.

Jodhaa grunted, and started her work once more.

The Ottomans are once again eager to help. Be my guest ;)

Spain got overrun. Nothing more to say about it really.

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One thing I like about Mare Nostrum changes: coalitions will keep on forming, as forcelimit and manpower pool are lowered late game due to territories/states mechanic.

It made coalition dodging in Europe interesting.

Jodhaa declared on a small coalition. Funny enough, the conquest in Europe even angered the Christian American native tribes o_O

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Russia. Once a big bear, now a laughable excuse of nation..

They didn't even have the ducats to upgrade their forts :confused:

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Scandinavia couldn't join a coalition, as they were still busy with the American independence war.

Jodhaa took the opportunity to invade them.

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"Hi Scandinavia! Yeah, it's me, Jodhaa. Say what? You will call the Ottomans if I dare to attack? That won't be possible I'm afraid."

The Ottomans couldn't help them out, as they were helping us versus Spain. History repeated itself..

The Mughal twodecker fleet arrived on the scene!

A LOAD of troops were busy in the American independence war... Which left their capital vulnerable ;)

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"Spread and siege, boys!"

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The Scandinavians put up some small resistance. But they got CRUSHED.

We are on par with their army now!

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Yeah, Mughal line infantry is now the best in the world.

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"Oh my, our rifle men are so... powerful!"

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Our quality troops made short work of the sieges and the troops in Scandinavia.

One of our advisors became famous for his work, and gave the Mughals -10% admin tech cost for six years.

"Now THAT we can use!"

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Jodhaa invited Islâm Shâh Jahan to the palace. The man gladly accepted, and left his work at the Islamic center of Scholarly learning..

She needed his advice on some planned reforms of the government..

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The advisor arrived, and gave counsel to Padishah Jodhaa Sharqi.

"These are enlightened times, my Padishah. The time is right for your proposed reforms. However, we lack willing people to fill the vacant government jobs.. Most of us look down upon government clerks and such, and noone wants to work for the government..

It would benefit our nation if we abolish slavery. The freed slaves will be grateful, and they will fill the needed jobs to make our government more efficient."

Jodhaa listened with great interest, and agreed.

Slavery was abolished in the Mughals, and another -5% tech cost was the short term reward.

Jodhaa once more focussed on reforming the Mughal government, just like she helped her father to do so, around 1720..

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Meanwhile, the wars went on. A 40k Scandinavian stack was messing around Poland since the beginning, and now they got engaged, on Scandinavian Russia.

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115% discipline, 8.1 morale, and +10% infantry combat ability.

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Let's show those Scandinavians who is boss :mad:

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*STOMP*

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Jodhaa had other things on her mind now then gawking at the ... :oops: PERFECT :oops: ... line infantry.

She pressed her reforms, and advanced the Mughal empire to administrative tech 27.

The freed slaves filled up all the vacant jobs in the government and in the subject puppet governments.

This had drastic consequences.

Manchu and Persia integration finished immediatly, as the new adminitrative effiency 3 pushed their integration past 100%.

"Bye Persia.. You have been nothing but trouble!" Jodhaa muttered.

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"Looking back, I should have paused their integration with clicking scutage on/off repeatedly until their LD would go +50%. That way, I would have avoided paying 700 diplo points too MUCH for Persia. But what is done, is done. "


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"Bye Manchu.. You were one of the most stable vassals imaginable."
 
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The next month, the map looked a whole lot different :eek:

Jodhaa assigned new state territory, gave more land to estates, and REMOVED land from estates where autonomy had ticked down to 0%. Most provinces in India has no estates anymore, and Ming is slowly ticking down to 0% also.

Important tip: You can use the +loyalty estate interactions to batch remove land from a specific estate. If provinces tick down to 0% autonomy, there is no need to keep estates. So REMOVE estates from provinces where needed. I don't know for sure if granting new land gives more loyalty close to the 40% loyalty treshold.. But it is always good idea to FIRST remove estates in heartland provinces up to 40% loyalty, only to increase it again by granting provinces in fresh integrated high autonomy land. And then you remove some more heartland estates.

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Jodhaa looked at whatever SPAIN held around the map.

The new adminstrative efficiency opened up a unique chance.

Jodhaa sent a stack across the ocean (to the bridgehead port in Louisiana) to siege down the fort protecting those stray Spanish provinces..

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The American independence war was WON by Great Britain. They are FAR from beaten :(

You can see two stacks of the Mughals here, sieging down key forts.. One in Spanish Mexico, and one on the capital of VINLAND up north, the CN of Scandinavia.

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Novgorod rebels had made Novgorod independent, right near the White Sea.

And then, we vassalised them ;)

They have administrative and religious ideas. Perfect feeding vassal.

We had need of them, as Jodhaa was close to making some SERIOUS peace deals.

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Firstly, Russia gave almost all of their territory. They got expelled to Siberia.

Secondly, Scandinavia gave us THIS. And all the territory of Vinland.

Note that Jodhaa is returning cores to Novgorod, to push their opinion to positive. And right after, she enforced religion upon Novgorod!

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Jodhaa wasn't done yet.

She did a blunt FULL ANNEXATION of Spain. Which needed the 2 Spanish provinces in Kansas, Louisiana.

That is why she sent the stack to that fort.. To be able to ask for them!

And that is also why she got the bridgehead port in Louisiana in last chapter ;)

Jodhaa had seized entire Spain and their colonial nations, thanks to the power of administrative efficiency.

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"Yeah, this was all planned ahead." says Jodhaa to our dear readers.

For those who never played with administrative efficiency 3 in 18th century... You can do CRAZY stuff with it if you combine it with -20% province warscore cost from diplo idea group, and imperialism cb (75% province warscore cost).

I got no clue if the bonus stacks additively or multiplicative.. I never was good with the numbers behind Eu4 mechanics.

But those two combined give maybe 50-55% province warscore deduction..

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The world stuttered for a few days, computing the effects of all these peace deals o_O

I would also, after such a peace deal spree :rolleyes:

First result: the full annexation of Spain made all their colonial nations OUR colonial nations. The Mughals now have colonial nations in 8 colonial regions :eek:

@Tom D. yeah it works like that ;)

Second result: Mughals own land in Canada, and cored 5 overextension native American provinces to form a new CN in Canada. Number 9.

Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Mexico, California, Caribbean, Canada, Alaska and Australia Cn. All GREEN.


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Third result: Moldavia was in the Russian coalition war. The land there got given to Poland, and they once again have a port in the Black Sea!

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Fourth result: Poland also has clean borders in the northeast, as the two enclave ports from Scandinavia became their territory. Plus Gotland.

Gotland?

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Jodhaa wanted some lamb fleece clothing. Scandinavia, Novgorod and Canada were too cold to her liking..

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Jodhaa grinned sheepishly.

SHEEPishly.

.......

bad pun :oops:

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Fifth result: Poland got its belly filled with more Baltic ports, and Catalonia got more Dutch land. Even France has a port up north now!

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Sixth result: Our fresh vassal Novgorod got some Juicy Russian provinces, and their bely was FULL now. Kniaz Constantin was pleased. He began converting his cores, and coring Moskva.

Note that Novgorod got its historical ideas, as they came back on map thanks to REBELS. In such cases, the nation takes its historical ideas.

Important tip: Novgorod is one of the best European one faith vassals, alongside Byzantium, as they take administrative and religious. The best in Europe though is Teutonic Order. +1 missionary, and +2 missionary strength. No administrative if released though. The absolute best outside Europe are Najd and Ajuuraan. Anyways, Novgorod has +missionary strength, religious idea group, administrative for easier coring, and plutocratic for a nice army. And trade and economic to sustain economy/forts. But you need to RELEASE them to get their historical idea set. Random idea choices can ruin these good potential vassals..

Which is solved by releasing them instead of force vassalising.

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Seventh result: Catalonia got its belly filled also with the holdings of Spain in South Italy.

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Eighth result: Aragon got released from the lone province of Teruel, and Jodhaa granted them EVERYTHING Spain had left in Iberia after Catalonia got all their cores back.

France and Catalonia got spread in this weird way, as some provinces got occupied in their name, and Jodhaa HAD to give it to them.

Aragon has religious ideas. Which makes them good vassal for the Mughals. They started converting Teruel, and cored the rest.

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Ninth result: the Ottomans alliance had to be dissolved. Way overdue. BYE Ottomans :p

Jodhaa started to make an invasion plan for them!

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Jodhaa announced another two years of national festivities, to celebrate the greatness of the Mughal empire!

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Emir De Valois threw another champaign party..

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The new French palace was a nice spot to organize it.. It was designed to accomodate BIG parties!

And it also had the biggest champaign cellar in the world :rolleyes:

With the usual shameful results :oops:


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Jodhaa and her favourite court lady sneaked away to the French Hareem.. After a wink to her husband and some other ladies :cool:

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Yeah, the Mughals have quite the unique party mentality :D

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2 years was MORE then enough time to sleep off all that champaign (and all the war exhaustion).

The English and their native American buddies came out of truce.

Jodhaa shipped a big invasion force to the bridgehead port near London!
 
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A load of troops were recruited in France, ready to cross the channel.

They amassed in Normandy, to do a reverse D-DAY into Great Britain!

Two stacks were on way to siege the Irish forts.

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FIRE!

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*STOMP*

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5 forts were besieged now in Great Britain. Our fleet merged, and ferried over the recruited troops.

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The sappers of the Mughals had become more and MORE efficient at sieging down level 8 forts. London fell within 6 months :eek:

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Important tip: don't EVER combine heavy ships with frigates or transports. The new idiotic naval battle system seems to pick the 'involved' ships of the max combat width of ships AT RANDOM, which resulted in 32 transports engaging mainly British frigates.

Instead, make seperate fleets, and use the transports only when no naval battles can occur.

The Mughals LOST those naval battles, despite having silly high amount of heavy ships.. Why? Because the morale of the entire fleet lowered with each transport that sank. Simply because the heavy ships didn't get involved :rolleyes:

Silly system.

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Oh well. Great Britain got overrun :mad:

A few stacks were messing around in America also.

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Another war was declared, this time aimed at straggler nations on the map. Brandenburg included.

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Great Britain was occupied, and the troops got shipped over to Brazil.

The independent Brazil, not Green Brazil, our colonial nation ;)

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Our fleet arrived in our fort province, on top of the besieging Brazilian army o_O

Jodhaa had totally missed those troops being there :oops:

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She gave the invasion of Brazil some attention now..

"That is that!" said Jodhaa, and never looked back.

Brazil went up in Green Brail shortly after.

Brazil vanished off the map.

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Time to say goodbye to one of our big old enemies.

Brandenburg vanished off the map.

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Denmark got invaded.

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Teutonic order got invaded.

A small coalition had formed, and the Mughals stomped it!

The Mughal troops marched south into CHILE now..

In the end, they ceded the colonial Peru region, which then went to Green Peru CN.

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The capital of Friesland is in HAVANA. Friesland got kicked out of Europe a LONG time ago o_O

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The intent was to full annex them, but it seemed they still had a hidden fort in Oceania! It became their new 1/1/1 capital...

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Poor Friesland. First they get kicked out of European continent, and then they get kicked out of the Caribbean, only to be expelled into a 1/1/1 Oceania island group..

At least the scenery is nice! Better then the Caribbean..

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Denmark vanished off the map.

Great Britain once more got ravaged by rebels..

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Jodhaa TRIED to full annex Great Britain, as planned ahead.

TRIED :mad:

But they had colonized Guinea.. Which had driven warscore above 100% :(

Jodhaa cursed hard.

This would mean the Mughals would have to fight the CN of Great Britain also, in the far future..

After they got independent.

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Great Britain got expelled to Guinea, and took capital there.

The British generals could only agree to our peace terms, and started packing.

Jodhaa had taken all European provinces of Great Britain, thanks to the power of administrative efficiency.

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The coalition got annexed :eek:

Teutonic Order, Ryazan, Apache and Pueblo vanished off the map.

And then.. there was peace :D

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First result: Novgorod got fed, they absorbed Ryazan.

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Second result: Poland got fed with Teuton provinces, until their belly almost burst. The Mughals cored the leftovers themselves.

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Third result: France and Catalonia got fed with Enlish provinces, until their bellies almost burst. The Mughals cored the leftovers themselves.

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The rebels in Great Britain got dealt with, and the Mughals started chewing on 91% overextension..

Jodhaa looked at the map, and frowned.

The protectorates in Asia and Africa had proven invaluable to secure a good trade income...

But Jodhaa now saw them as unnecessary specs on her world map :mad:

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ALL the protectorates got cancelled, AFTER the Mughals seized key bridgehead ports inside all the protectorates. The royal marriage with the Ottomans got cancelled.

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NAJD appeared on the map once more, to replace the diplomatic relation slot of the Ottomans.

Jodhaa granted them provinces until they bordered the Ottomans near Bagdad, and she also gave them a corridor from Ma'an to the Mediterranean sea!

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The Aztec were attacked, and Canada protected them.

Jodhaa raised the stability to +1 manually, and the economy is still looking good. Only because we started to levy war taxes.

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And the Ottomans were next :mad:

The Mughals took on the Ottomans and their 300+k army and their 200+k manpower pool, and their allies.

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We will conquer until the grey is gone!


In case you wonder now, dear reader..

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Jodhaa had decided to go for a one tag world conquest after all.

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She prayed for a successful campaign against their former ally, the Ottomans.

Hope you enjoyed this chapter!
 
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Is it going to be a true one tag or just a "normal" one (should such a thing exist)? :D

Heh, I already did a true one tag with Qing AAR, with no CN around at the end.... Too much fuss to go for it again :oops:

Hope you don't mind ;)
 
Is it true? Do I really see Pagarruyung as a protectorate over there :eek:? Heresy!

Jodhaa grinned sheepishly.

SHEEPishly.

.......

bad pun :oops:
The beginning of the end, cheap jokes are on the way :p.

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FIRE!

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*STOMP*

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This is almost an overkill, but I love it.

Important tip: don't EVER combine heavy ships with frigates or transports. The new idiotic naval battle system seems to pick the 'involved' ships of the max combat width of ships AT RANDOM, which resulted in 32 transports engaging mainly British frigates.

Instead, make seperate fleets, and use the transports only when no naval battles can occur.

The Mughals LOST those naval battles, despite having silly high amount of heavy ships.. Why? Because the morale of the entire fleet lowered with each transport that sank. Simply because the heavy ships didn't get involved :rolleyes:

Silly system.
Thanks for mentioning that, didn't know this!

Is something wrong with Jodhaa, or do I really see cavalry over there?

What is that, those dark mud spots on the terrain, never saw that before, is it part of the mod?

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Poor Friesland. First they get kicked out of European continent, and then they get kicked out of the Caribbean, only to be expelled into a 1/1/1 Oceania island group..
Poor Friesland? Seems like live is good in Fries Palau :D.


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Jodhaa had decided to go for a one tag world conquest after all.
Really? How surprising, that blink of an eye tells everything.
 
Is something wrong with Jodhaa, or do I really see cavalry over there?

HMMMMM. Looks like it.

Want to know the shameful truth? I only NOW tried the 'template' army builder, and made new template including 4 cavalry in each 25k artillery stack.

So... Cavalry will enter the scene in the following chapters.

What is that, those dark mud spots on the terrain, never saw that before, is it part of the mod?

Marsh terrain. The ghx overhaul mod shows some new terrain (weather) effects, like dark puddles for marshland on terrain mapmode. Look at battle screen, and picture that shown marshland. The look at tose dark mud spots again. I immediatly linked it to marshland after that.

The GFX mod doesn't make it look like the witcher 3 marshland, but still.

To be honest, I can't recall how original game looks like, as I have been using my mod collection for SO long now. It might be some effects are 'new', as the gfx overhaul mode still gets updated.

I use mod to keep oceans same as before, by the way. In the mod, the ocean is changed into gulfing water. But looking at it with a hangover made Jodhaa sea sick.

And no, I'm not kidding there.

The armies of your enemys are always so cute.

I guess you imply the unit packs? ;)
 
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Heh, I already did a true one tag with Qing AAR, with no CN around at the end.... Too much fuss to go for it again :oops:

Hope you don't mind ;)

It's completely up to you. I still think you are crazy because most of your AAR's end up as a WC and I could never endure that micro/attention-to-detail hell over and over again ;)
 
It's completely up to you. I still think you are crazy because most of your AAR's end up as a WC and I could never endure that micro/attention-to-detail hell over and over again ;)

I do it for the readers, they want me to go on instead of doing achievement aar. I think.

Also, I like showing 18th century and 19th century gameplay to readers, as I think many never play past 1650.

Also... I like the idea of proving that even a dirt poor 5 development OPM vassal can one tag the world before 1820.

I'm the kind of player that does one BIG campaign per patch, instead of multiple smaller ones (achievements and the likes).

And... I'm pretty crazy too, probably.

Although I like the word 'eccentric' more ;)
 
Good shape, what about one faith? :)

I went with -2 revolt guy for ages. If I had used missionary guy from estates, I would look at 100% sunni provinces.

I should have really, as it would have allowed me to take the UNIFY ISLAM decision.

But what is done is done. I do admit I made mistake there.

Regarding one faith: nah, I won't bother converting all the CN land.

Think it is way too late now to go for one faith. I preferred the -revolt risk advisor, to have less rebels. The theologian advisor pushed most conquered converted land to NO revolt risk at stab 3. I liked that a lot, as the lower force limit makes massive rebel surges spreading your stacks too thin for 'safe' invasions of greater powers.. Especially on very hard difficulty!

If 100k troops had to do 'whack-a-rebel' constantly, then the wars that matter (versus Scandinavia, Ottomans and whatnot) might have become losable.. If that makes sense.

tl;dr: I rather had all my troops near Ottomans and Scandinavia, rather then doing rebel fighting. The result was 95% sunni provinces instead of 99 or 100%.
 
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Chapter 16: The 103rd Mahratta

Last chapter, Padishah Jodhaa Sharqi started her first war against the Ottomans. Scandinavia is involved too.

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A Swedish stack on Stockholm got sniped.

FIRE!

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Most of their troops are south around Holstein, and Jodhaa ordered to rush for the fort on Skäne.

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Meanwhile, an easy war versus the Aztec and Canada was started also. We don't have all the time in the world , so may as well.

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The Ottoman war is what is important here.. The brunt of the Mughal empire is trying to reach Constantinople, and one stack is assigned to siege down the stuff in Crimea.

The Mughal line infantry is WAY better then the Ottoman infantry, so 1 on 1 fights the Mughals would always win..

They also had janissary decadence..

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The Ottoman forts are a joke :confused:

They never upgraded anything past level 2 forts.. Mainly because the Mughals and whoever never posed a real threat..

Beats me why they never upgrade their forts.. Seen it happen plenty of times in various nations.

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They do have quantity and offensive, and +33% land force limit ambition. Which leads to HUGE force limit on very hard, for their size.

Maybe they simply don't have enough income to upgrade their forts..

I actually looked that up, and the Ottomans only had 135 income at this point, no loans, and treasury of 180 ducats.

They have a force limit of 300, but they can only afford 237k troops (no mercs).

So, they simply don't have the ducats to improve their forts.

Which leads me to the theory that nations with force limit bonuses from any kind are less inclined to upgrade their forts, because the AI priotizes building an army up to force limit FIRST, using all income on army maintenance. And if their forcelimit is big, the AI ends up with big army but low level forts, due to being too poor to upgrade them..

Feel free to comment on that, as I may be wrong :rolleyes:

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The Ottomans are gunning for a stack :eek:

I wish to note that I am using my preferred late game way of sieging here.

Siege enemy fort, and place reinforcement stacks nearby, in a way that they can all reinforce one another.

If had been the Ottomans, I would have brought my entire army and I would have attacked with 237k doomstack. I would have retreated then, until the other troops were freed up.

BUT, they decided to send 80k to someplace else.

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The moment the reinforcement stack enters Maros, all stacks that weren't movement locked HALTED.


....


They really must be afraid of our army o_O

And for good reason..

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The Ferocity of an angry Mahratta is unmatched!

Jodhaa had made an ELITE 103rd Mahratta light infantry regiment in 1768. Only the most hardy, frugal and disciplined soldiers were allowed in..

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The Maratha light infantry was formed as the 103rd Mahratta in 1768, making it the most senior light infantry regiment of the Army. The class composition of the regiment is primarily formed by hardy, frugal and disciplined people from the former Maratha Empire.The men are drawn from the state of Maharashtra , with some percentage from Marathi speaking areas of Karnataka including Coorg. Their regimental centre has been Belgaum, Karnataka, since 1922 , which was part of the undivided Bombay state at that time. Since Independence, battalions of the Maratha LI have taken part in every armed conflict; Jammu and Kashmir operations in 1947-1948, entry into Junagarh, Hyderabad Campaign (1948), Invasion of Goa, Daman and Diu, the Sino-Indian War, conflicts with Pakistan in 1965 and 1971 against the Chinese on the Sikkim watershed in 1956, the operations in Sri Lanka, the ongoing operations in the Siachen glacier and in counter insurgency operations.

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The 103rd Mahratta engaged the Ottomans, and slaughtered them. There really is no other word for it :confused:

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The Ottomans threw the other stacks in also.. But way too late :rolleyes:

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The 103rd was victorious! They celebrated their first victory with their victory dance..

Their commander Babur, the son of Jodhaa (and heir to the throne), led the dance.

It was introduced by his grandfather Padishah Akbar after the defeat of the Holy Roman Empire decades ago..

You can watch it below if you want :)


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Padishah Jodhaa watched all of this with great amusement. She was proud to see Babur as charismatic commander.

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Babur reminded her so much of her father Akbar.

He really had a striking resemblance to his legendary grandfather, Padishah Akbar..

And he showed the same prowess in battle :)
 
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The 103rd Mahratta got strengthened with the most hardy, frugal and disciplined Indian mercenaries.

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The siege stack in Skäne got engaged by all the Scandinavians had left.

In the end, they threw EVERYTHING in, like 80k troops. The Mughals also threw in everything (100+k), and the fight lasted for ages..

The Scandinavians got routed back south.

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The 103rd Mahratta started to PUSH. And oh boy, they pushed.

The Ottomans got pushed across the strait!

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The 103rd Mahratta executed their battle plan flawlessly. Jodhaa marked the strait as frontline, and ordered the rest to advance into Southern Greece.

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In Scandinavia, same story. They got pushed across the strait.

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The Mughal fleet got defeated in the Sea of Marmara. The 103rd couldn't move past the strait :mad:

But their entire fleet moved away, to prevent our siege stacks from moving into Southern Greece.

........



Silly Ai :rolleyes:

It STILL cannot come up with decent tactical fleet movements. WHY didn't they simply split their fleet here?

@Tom D. I made the mistake again. The Ottoman fleet engaged my fleet and defeated it, mainly because the transports got randomed to fight the fleet battle, due to their BIG number compared to the number of heavy ships. The entire fleet lost morale due to sunken transports everywhere, and it lost.

Old habits die hard..

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The 103rd Mahratta started to PUSH once more.

Jodhaa advanced the front line into a vertical line across Ankara, and the Greek taskforce got sent towards the Crimean war theatre, as there was good chance that the Ottomans would try to defend that area..

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The Mughals started to push around the GLOBE o_O

Scandinavia had fun with Polish forts, while the Mughals pushed.

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The Aztec got overrun, and Canada also..

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The Ottomans did as predicted. They moved stacks into the Crimean theatre.

They REALLY should have stayed together though :rolleyes:

Jodhaa maneuvered the troops, to have a shot at engaging all the stacks separately.

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The Ottoman stacks got wiped, one after another :cool:

Jodhaa actually felt bad doing so :(

She had hoped the Ottomans would have put up more of a fight. But they spread their troops out too much.

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"If you ASK to get slapped, that is what you will get!"

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The Scandinavians also had enough of Jodhaa's slapping. They accepted her patented 'annul alliance' peace deal.

The troops moved south to slap Tlemcen (ally of Ottomans), and southeast to reinforce the 103rd Mahratta in Ottoman turf.

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The front line around Ankara got occupied.

Jodhaa moved it east again, placing it between Trebizond in the northeast and Haleb in the southwest.

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The transports stayed around Constantinople, and our twodecker fleet went in hunter/killer mode.

Jodhaa voiced it several times already... The new naval battle system is utter CRAP.

It makes galley fleets utterly useless, due to low combat width. The heavies simply soak up too much damage, and each galley sunk gives entire enemy fleet less morale.

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"I mean.. combat width at SEA?" said Jodhaa. "What are they smoking?"
 
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Fun fact: the AI KNOWS the above, and will never EVER engage a big fleet consisting of heavy ships only.

Because they usually don't HAVE that much heavy ships. Even Great Britain at its peek had... 20 heavies :rolleyes:

They preferred trade fleets..

Anyhow, the fleet that blockaded Scandinavia arrived in Canada, and allowed our troops to lay siege to the Canadian capital island.

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The Ottomans got baited with a small leaderless siege stack. When they were movement locked, Jodhaa sent in commander Babur with more troops from the west.

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The 103rd Mahratta etched its name in stone. They simply squatted the Ottomans aside, even when being outnumbered two to one o_O

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Commander Babur had the time of his life :)

wonder where the above screenshot comes from?


they actually made an Android game about the Maratha empire hero ruler Bajirao, called 'Blazing Bajirao' o_O

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The Ottoman ruler saw his entire army routed south.. Mughal siege stacks are arriving in the Iraqi theatre.


"War won..." said Jodhaa. "Time for a break!"

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The Mughals also passed the Iberian strait into North Africa, and started to PUSH from the west.

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The 103rd Mahratta finished their siege in Haleb, and they did a hot pursuit of the Ottoman army.

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Jodhaa returned to the war table. And frowned. A siege stack in Erzincan got overrun by almost 70k troops.

It seems the Ottomans conjured up another big stack out of nowhere :oops:

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"I was doing my hair! Sneaky buggers!"

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Jodhaa grunted, left her hair unbraided, and started paying attention to the wartable once more..

Both the Ottoman stacks got engaged!

No more surprises please :confused:

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The troops arrived from Scandinavia, right in time to wipe the Ottomans in the northeast..

The 103rd occupied the Egyptian holdings of the Ottomans.

"Err.. war won!" muttered Jodhaa.

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The Aztec-Canadian war concluded. The Canadians got expelled to some crappy islands.

There was fort on that 6k stack island that got overlooked while someone was doing her hair.

"Give me a break..." muttered Jodhaa.

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The Aztec ceded their eastern enclave, and a corridor from Green Mexico towards Green Columbia.

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In other news: The CN of Great Britain got their independence. Say hello to USA and British Louisiana in North America.. And Peru and Colombia in South America.

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The war versus Burgundy was a coalition war. So, Jodhaa invaded what she could before call for peace hit..

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Burgundy couldn't be handed to France, as France was still chewing on 9x% overextension :rolleyes:

Instead, Jodhaa took Sardinia and Corsica.

Tlemcen got peaced out, and the Ottomans had to swallow a 100% warscore peace deal.

She asked for all.. this o_O

for 213% overextension.

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Aragon was granted a corridor into the Red Sea, after Gazza was given to them in the peace deal..

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Najd received the area of Iraq, Syria and a lot of the coastline in the Mediterranean.

Including NAXOS!

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Poland also got some land around Wallachia. The Mughals cored the rest, around Constantinople..

And then... there was peace.

Commander Babur and the 103rd Mahratta got a victory parade in the capital of Delhi, as reward for their outstanding performance in the first Ottoman war.

Jodhaa had prepared a warm welcome.

Well.. watch for yourself ;)


Hope you enjoyed this chapter!
 
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note that I took a week of vacation, hence why chapter was short in time length. But it was a good spot to end with anyways.
 
note that I took a week of vacation, hence why chapter was short in time length. But it was a good spot to end with anyways.
Praise yourself, I've got a lot less to quote now ;).

Which leads me to the theory that nations with force limit bonuses from any kind are less inclined to upgrade their forts, because the AI priotizes building an army up to force limit FIRST, using all income on army maintenance. And if their forcelimit is big, the AI ends up with big army but low level forts, due to being too poor to upgrade them..
Can the fact that the AI don't border any hostile nation be a factor too, to not upgrade its forts? If not, your theory seems possible.

"I mean.. combat width at SEA?" said Jodhaa. "What are they smoking?"
I thought someone called it 'Wiz Weed' ;)?
 
Can the fact that the AI don't border any hostile nation be a factor too, to not upgrade its forts? If not, your theory seems possible.

that was my first guess also, but it can't be that. Ottomans bordered RUSSIA for decades, and they never upgraded forts either.

Russia didn't improve them, Scandinavia didn't improve them.

But nations like SPAIN and GREAT BRITAIN did.

I don't know what causes it if it isn't due to my theory..
 
I think it's actually income related. In my games nations that were fielding biggest armies (like Ming or Ottoman) didn't upgrade any forts but rich nations like Venice, in my play through Venice eventually controlled most of southern Germany, did upgrade everything. In general looks like that countries that have surplus of income tend to upgrade buildings as much a possible.
 
Chapter 17: Another mouse eaten

I want to apologize for the long wait :oops:

I hardly had chance to play Eu4 in July, to due vacation and other stuff.

Last chapter the 103rd Maharattas had beaten the Ottomans for the first time. The Mughals took a BIG bite out of them, and filled the overextension bellies of Najd and Poland also.

This is now officially a ONE TAG attempt, so we need to annex and integrate everything!

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First target: West Africa. Timbuktu is a big blob, and has Mali as ally.

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Padishah Jodhaa ordered an invasion from the north, backed by naval invasion from the south.

Her son Bâbur and his 103rd happily obliged.

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Bâbur led his 103rd south, once the block fort was sieged up in Morocco.

A big battle ensued in Gao.

Timbuktu and Mali combined have an army of several hundred thousand soldiers, so caution was in order :confused:

Jodhaa left +5 siege roll artillery stack (25 artillery, 6 infantry to siege level 8 forts with 30k minimum +1k) on all Moroccan forts, and sent the rest south through the corridor, towards Goa and the Timbuktu capital.

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This is very hard difficulty, so the Ai attacks, attacks, and then attacks some more.

The bonuses to AI allow AI to reinforce at crazy speeds, and all stacks just keep coming back to attack all our siege armies o_O

Bâbur had his hands full..

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MORE then his hands full :eek:

Maybe this naval invasion wasn't a good idea...

More then 150k Timbuktu soldiers are threatening our coastal siege stack!

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The big Timbuktu stack is threatening our siege stack from the north. The 103rd forced marched to reinforce the battle in Cayor!

...and swept aside Timbuktu reinforcements on the way ;)

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HOLD THE LINE!

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VICTORY!

This battle was the turning point of the war. Bâbur went on the offensive now, as many forts in West Africa had fallen.

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A vertical frontline from the Sahel to the Benin coast, and the 103rd started to push EAST..

The capital of Timbuktu fell.

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A big battle happened once more, in the province of Kong..

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"These West Africans are giving me more trouble then the Ottomans!" muttered Jodhaa.

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The reinforcement stack bluntly wiped a demoralized stack, on the way to Kong..

The Mughal infantry in Kong is getting a smacking! They better hurry :eek:

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"In the end, we always come out on top.."

Jodhaa really admired the courage of the West Africans though.

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Mali got peaced out, and was left battered and without allies.

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Jodhaa was getting on top of things, on her wartable.

Bâbur smashed Timbuktu to bits, on the battlefield..

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Timbuktu was beaten. Jodhaa moved her gaze SOUTH, to the Kongo Basin. She ordered ALL available troops south, through the Cameroon coastal corridor.

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In other news: Our subjects are all loyal, and thriving. France and Poland are integrating, and our marriage policies are paying off.

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Kongo stood completely alone, and quickly fell to the might of our army..

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The protectorates of Timbuktu got annexed, and then Timbuktu ceded THIS.

Got to love administrative efficiency 3 :D

It makes calculation of HOW much to take difficult.

After checking the sum, Jodhaa asked a few provinces LESS. Don't feel like going over 100% overextension again :rolleyes:

Timbuktu can wait. Mali also.

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The Mughals started chewing on overextension in the Niger Delta, and Catalonia started chewing on Catalonian Africa..

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Kongo got occupied swiftly, and Jodhaa ordered all troops to march east, towards the port enclave in Kilwa.

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Not only Africa got invaded.. South America also.

Chile got overrun..

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Jodhaa started a BIG war versus all her former protectorates. They were still all allied to one another, and that needs to change!

Wars on three continents... Micromanaging horror.

The Mughals are really lucky that Jodhaa is a real micromanaging fetishist ;)
 
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