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(( I'll be continuing on this, but I assume getting out of Valencia would require a roll? And if any other players would wish to maybe step in and do something, then the oportunity is there. ))

Unable to find a horse that could climb walls or walk on water, the only way out of the city while riding such a beast was to charge through one of the gates during the rare moments they were opened for supply carts. During these times though, the gates are heavily guarded, and any attempt to charge through would surely result in being riddled with bullets.

* * * * *

((Private))

Joan leaned back in his seat, letting himself relax after hours of hashing out a new Assembly. After he had finally gotten Ferran to cooperate, the Crown Prince had proven an invaluable help. Admittedly, their final draft was not what Joan had hoped for, but Ferran had calmly provided logical reasons for his every suggestion. Under that lazy exterior was a shrewd man that knew what he was doing.

The Regent read over the draft again, still feeling bothered by one thing. "I still say we should increase the number of appointed seats. They are our best way of ensuring a loyal Assembly."

"That will only backfire," Ferran said. "The appointed seats have been a point of contention since their creation. If you truly wish to remove this threat that this false Assembly presents, you must make the new Assembly exactly the same as the old one. They cannot continue to protest against you without appearing as hypocrites when you give them the exact same Assembly they had back. You must ensure the loyalty of the Assembly with other laws, not by altering its composition."

"We should at least remove the 92 provincial seats. We don't even have 92 provinces anymore. It seems a waste of time and effort to have to create a second arbitrary layer of electoral districts that shift every time a new province is added or removed."

"That problem can always be addressed later. The Assembly could be adjusted if its members agree with you," Ferran said. "As I said before, your best chance of defusing this situation is to make the Assembly exactly the same."

Joan tapped his fingers against his desk, mulling things over. "I suppose with the new vetting procedures, we can at least ensure those with questionable loyalty are not allowed in Parliament."

"So we are agreed, then?"

The Regent spent a moment thinking things over again. His instincts told him that the Assembly must be changed, but he needed the Crown Prince on his side at the moment. He supposed, if it came down to it, the Assembly could be adjusted later to make it more malleable. Serious vetting procedures would have to do for now.

"Indeed, we are," Joan said. "I suppose we have a declaration to make."

* * * * *

JpsioAG.png

His Highness, Regent Joan de Trastámara, and His Highness, Crown Prince Ferran de Trastámara, hereby announce that the Parliament Act of 1816 shall be reinstated and the Assembly recreated under its previous form. Elections shall be held at the end of the year, with the Assembly to convene at the start of 1836. All groups or individuals who refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of this parliamentary body and the Crown's authority to create it will be deemed traitors to the Crown.

His Highness, Regent Joan de Trastámara, and His Highness, Crown Prince Ferran de Trastámara, also wish to announce the passing of the Clarification of Elected Positions Act, to be instated into law immediately with this declaration.


The Clarification of Elected Positions Act

I. All elected officials within Hispania, both inside and outside of Parliament, are considered representatives of the people within their jurisdiction, granted their position by the authority of the Crown.
II. All elected officials within Hispania, both inside and outside of Parliament, are expected to fairly represent the interests of their constituents to the Crown, and are expected to carry out their duties on behalf of both their constituents and the Crown.
III. It is the responsibility of the Crown to ensure that all elected officials will properly represent the interests of their constituents by ensuring their loyalty is only to their constituents and the Crown.
a) Any group or individual with known ties to criminal organizations or criminal records of their own shall be ineligible to run for any elected position within Hispania.
b) Any group or individual that expresses or publicizes anti-monarchy or pro-republican sentiment shall be ineligible to run for any elected position within Hispania.
c) Any group or individual deemed by the Crown to present a threat to public order or the Hispanian people shall be ineligible to run for any elected position within Hispania.
d) If there is any doubt as to whether any group or individual fits in any of these categories, it is up to the discretion of the Crown to determine whether said group or individual is eligible to run for any elected position within Hispania.​
IV. If any constituents believe that their elected official is not representing their interests or the interests of the Crown, they have the right to petition the Crown to request that an by-election be held to select a new elected official.
a) It is at the discretion of the Crown whether said by-election will be held and whether the current candidate is deemed ineligible to run for any further elected positions.
b) If over 50% of constituents petition the Crown to request a by-election, then one must be held for the contested elected position. It is still at the discretion of the Crown whether the current candidate is deemed ineligible to run for any further elected positions, including the contested elected position.​
 
Lluis Faixòn reached Valencia as quickly as he could with his trusted horse, only to find the gates shut and an order to let nobody in or out of the capital. Martial law. He cursed as he turned around, thinking about how to get in. Then he remembered what his father asked about when he left. Time to use it for his advantage.
Lluis rode around the city until he found what he searched and waited. When thick smoke appeared in the distance, a smile crossed his lips and he went into that direction. Reaching the train, he turned his horse around and followed, gesturing and shouting to his father's men. It did not take long and it halted.

"What do you wish, sir? The garrison is in need of fresh supplying last we heard."

"Exactly", Lluis answered. "Wish is why my father sent me. I have to supervise that the train reaches its destination and then negotiate a new contract if necessary. Also tend to other business, see how our partners fare. As well as get first-hand knowledge of the situation in the capital."
The men had no reason not to let their employer's son on board, and so Faixòn was fairly certain he would find himself in the city soon.
 
Etxeto-arms.gif

Coat of Arms of the Etxeto
The Etxeto Clan, a rough but haughty tribe of nobles from the highest reaches of Navarre, were crumbling under their own weight. Gran Duque Guillen III was 74 and nearly incapable. His eyes, orbs of milk, viewed the world without distractions of higher processes. An indeterminately kind man, he often spent his days in the parks of his estate, giving sweeties to his great-grandchildren and servant's children alike. To which, an advisory body was drawn up, to last until the passing of the Gran Duque. A regency of sorts, headed by Guillen's middle aged son Tomas and flanked by cousins Santiago and Samuel, was now in charge of the creaking family.
 
Unable to find a horse that could climb walls or walk on water, the only way out of the city while riding such a beast was to charge through one of the gates during the rare moments they were opened for supply carts. During these times though, the gates are heavily guarded, and any attempt to charge through would surely result in being riddled with bullets.

This was an obvious trouble in the young troublemaker's plan, however not something he couldn't think of a solution for.
After all someone in his position had to always come up with unorthodox solutions to his problems. He couldn't waste time thinking of a sophisticated method, every minute counted.
What he came up with might be considered crazy by some standards, but it was a fairly simple solution that gave him a solid chance at getting out.

He prepared a simple human-shaped dummy out of animal, putting a cloak over it to hide what it really was.
He purchased a very simple caparison to put over his horse, and he hid underneath it, tying himself to the underbelly of the animal with ropes.

And with the preparation done he waited for the gates to open to try and rush out through it.

(( I'm just hope the guards will focus more on the rider himself than the horse, and I hope the plan is explained well enough :p
And I hope it's good enough to roll those dice! ))
 
((Probably a good time to address the issue of industrialization, seeing as I've reached that point in the conversion. In regards to railroads, the converter did not give us any. It just put them in the vanilla spots. I will be giving us one near Valencia, but only as a result of one of the votes that decided that the government invested in industry. Seeing as that vote was for 1835, it is likely that said railroad is currently under construction and will probably not be finished until 1836. I don't know exactly how long railroads take to built, but I imagine Hispania's first would take at least the entire year to get the line done.

I have also noticed several references by players to their characters owning factories. I'm fine with that if they are all considered small operations, since only capitalists and the state will own the in-game factories. I'm more bringing this up now because the converter only gave us about half a dozen factories, all around Valencia, so it seems unlikely that every character and their grandmother owns their own factory. Industrialization is only just beginning for us. I will be moving some factories around, since I don't like that the converter stuffed them all in one state, and add some to represent investment by the government. I just wanted to straighten this out now so everyone has an idea of where we are at in regards to industrialization.

Since I'm talking about the conversion, may as well mention what I've done so far. I've fixed the problem I had with colonies becoming states, so that's no longer an issue. I also took the opportunity to clean up our army so all the regiments actually have POPs that can support them. I'll probably move the navies around next, since they're scattered all over. The issue of the noculture North Germans has been fixed thanks to the converter having a spare German culture I could use. I've gone over every western nations reforms, although I haven't fully decided what each nation should have. Noticed some interesting things, like how France, Scandinavia, and Scotland's monarchs put Joan to shame when it comes to repression. :p

The most interesting thing I noticed was that Hispania and Scandinavia were the only nations with slavery outlawed. I decided to rectify that, since it seemed dumb that our colonial nations would be trading in slaves behind our back when we still have significant influence over them, as well as made Bavaria and Transdacia do the same. Also decided to outlaw slavery in Norway and Tyrone due to their relative small size and isolation, and also Germany due to their liberal history. I'm treating the Eastern European states with slavery as having serfdom instead. Of course, the real question is where are they getting all these slaves when we control 95% of the African coast. Either the French are working overtime shipping slaves out their tiny ports in Africa, Kongo is serving as the source of slaves despite being a Scandinavian protectorate, or we have a serious slaver problem. o_O))

This was an obvious trouble in the young troublemaker's plan, however not something he couldn't think of a solution for.
After all someone in his position had to always come up with unorthodox solutions to his problems. He couldn't waste time thinking of a sophisticated method, every minute counted.
What he came up with might be considered crazy by some standards, but it was a fairly simple solution that gave him a solid chance at getting out.

He prepared a simple human-shaped dummy out of animal, putting a cloak over it to hide what it really was.
He purchased a very simple caparison to put over his horse, and he hid underneath it, tying himself to the underbelly of the animal with ropes.

And with the preparation done he waited for the gates to open to try and rush out through it.

(( I'm just hope the guards will focus more on the rider himself than the horse, and I hope the plan is explained well enough :p
And I hope it's good enough to roll those dice! ))

Controlling a horse from underneath proves much more difficult than when riding in the saddle, and making it do as command is not an easy task. The horse moves awkwardly as a result, drawing many stares from the guards. When the gates finally open and the horse is spurred into action, the guards have already noticed the strange horsemen. The attempt to charge through the gates meets another setback as the sudden gunfire directed at the dummy in the saddle startles the horse and makes it rear up on its hind legs. The dummy topples to the ground and the horse turns around to sprint back into the city away from the gunfire, carrying its passenger tied to its underside several city blocks before finally calming down. The attempt to escape the city has failed, and worse yet the guards are certainly suspicious now, but at least a prison cell does not await.


((Well your roll was pretty bad, but not bad enough to get caught. At least you provided the guards with a story to tell all their friends. :p))
 
((On the subject of the conversion, I have a few small suggestions:

1. Make the capital of Germany Frankfurt. Historically during the 1848 revolutions the liberals proclaimed a unified Germany at the Frankfurt Parliament, intending to make it their capital (I think). Frankfurt has historically been a large and major city in Germany, so it would make sense for the Sponheims to move their capital there in the 19th century.

2. Qing's name in the vanilla game and all unedited converted games is "Chinese Empire," regardless of if Ming or any other dynasty exists. In this situation, it would make more sense to rename it "Qing Empire" or something and call Ming "Ming Empire" so that there isn't a "Chinese Empire" surrounded by some other Chinese dynasties.))
 
((On the subject of the conversion, I have a few small suggestions:

1. Make the capital of Germany Frankfurt. Historically during the 1848 revolutions the liberals proclaimed a unified Germany at the Frankfurt Parliament, intending to make it their capital (I think). Frankfurt has historically been a large and major city in Germany, so it would make sense for the Sponheims to move their capital there in the 19th century.

2. Qing's name in the vanilla game and all unedited converted games is "Chinese Empire," regardless of if Ming or any other dynasty exists. In this situation, it would make more sense to rename it "Qing Empire" or something and call Ming "Ming Empire" so that there isn't a "Chinese Empire" surrounded by some other Chinese dynasties.))

((I most likely won't be moving the German capital. Frankfurt may make sense historically, but this is alternate history. There's also the fact that Frankfurt now borders France, so moving it there would put it in a potentially dangerous spot. The other alternative would be Luneberg, which is in a safer location and was the traditional home of the Sponheims, although I guess the latter point doesn't matter now that they have a Valois king. I suppose I'd need to show you all a map of the changes I've made, but I haven't done so yet because everything is still tentative and I want to do an update listing all the international events over the past 15 years.

As for Qing, I have actually fixed that already. They did convert over as China, but I created a decision the AI uses as soon as the game starts where they tag swap to the Qing tag the converter provides. As far as I am aware, there should be a way for any of the Chinese states to form China, but I haven't looked too closely at the decision the converter added. So basically the Chinese states should appear as they did in EUIV, although their borders are likely to change soon enough with all those cores lying around. :p))
 
((The German capital can only be Münster. At least they are no longer noculture.:D
As for slaves - I'd guess the slaves in this timeline are simply not in great majority Africans... Our colonial ventures were far nicer to the natives after all.:rolleyes: Perhaps not even bringing smallpox.

About industrialization, my characters have been building it up a bit in some parts of the market, but nothing too big. After all, factories aren't that profitable at the beginning of Victoria II IIRC. Though the arms producer certainly had a part responsibility in Hispania's bankruptcy :D.
About railroads, I'd say we have some smaller tracks lying all around the country. Mostly where they are easy to place, at most perhaps 50 kilometres each. One of them carrying supplies to Valencia.;)

So I guess Lluis could enter the city without any trouble?))
 
((The German capital can only be Münster. At least they are no longer noculture.:D
As for slaves - I'd guess the slaves in this timeline are simply not in great majority Africans... Our colonial ventures were far nicer to the natives after all.:rolleyes: Perhaps not even bringing smallpox.

About industrialization, my characters have been building it up a bit in some parts of the market, but nothing too big. After all, factories aren't that profitable at the beginning of Victoria II IIRC. Though the arms producer certainly had a part responsibility in Hispania's bankruptcy :D.
About railroads, I'd say we have some smaller tracks lying all around the country. Mostly where they are easy to place, at most perhaps 50 kilometres each. One of them carrying supplies to Valencia.;)

So I guess Lluis could enter the city without any trouble?))

((Due to the amount of Afro- cultures, I assume they're from Africa. The area around the American capital is filled with slaves, as well as many in the Caribbean, with some province having more than the white population. I could probably adjust it when I go over the POPs. Not sure what impact this will have, but the UKA has Dixie as their primary culture instead of Yankee. I think it is safe to assume they're big on slavery there. :p

Oh right, I completely overlooked that you'd need a roll to get into the city. The roll was pretty mediocre, so you probably got in but with some difficulty.))
 
((I just had a major breakthrough with the conversion, one that has sped things up considerably. It turns out the cultural mess I thought was caused by the converter was actually the result of our custom religion. Despite converting all the provinces to Catholic before converting, the converter must have picked it up in our history and added POPs for it, but since the converter didn't have that religion it just created POPs without any religion. These POPs were all in the files, but with no religion they weren't showing up in-game. I did a little find & replace to change them all to Catholic and Hispania's population jumped up by 20 million, with the number of Catholics increasing by 20-30%. It seems most of the colonies we set up in Africa and Asia, the ones we didn't conquer, have roughly a third Aragonese population now, which seems about right when you account for native population in the area. Our colonial nations saw a drastic rise in European-based POPs near the coast, but I still want to check things over in the New World. Some places like Nuevos Valencia and Nuevo Leon look pretty good, but others like Nova Hispania are a mess. I suppose the latter should be because of the large number of conquered native nations involved. I'm not quite sure what is going on in the UKA either. Either way, it has become more of a fine-tuning effort than massive overhaul. Just have to fix the Balkans. Apparently the converter doesn't quite agree about the success of Byzantium's ethnic cleansing efforts. I say otherwise. :D))
 
((Don't forget to put a minority of the pops in Navarre as 'Etxeto' to represent my endless heirs))
 
((Did the province names convert over correctly? Just wondering, we've come up with so many endonyms for the areas we colonized. (well definitely everything California did just fine :p)

Also, progress: finished up the reign of Alfons VIII, am currently at 1677.))
 
((Don't forget to put a minority of the pops in Navarre as 'Etxeto' to represent my endless heirs))

((We can assume that Basque = Etxeto at this point. :p))

((Did the province names convert over correctly? Just wondering, we've come up with so many endonyms for the areas we colonized. (well definitely everything California did just fine :p)

Also, progress: finished up the reign of Alfons VIII, am currently at 1677.))

((No, the converter did not include any custom province names, probably because the provinces don't line up exactly. I don't think Vicky 2 lets you set custom names, unless you change the localization or use an event. We'll just have to remember them from EUIV. On the plus side, all the names of our colonial nations did convert, although they got randomly generated flags. I'm too lazy to go about changing every single one to not use the historical Spanish flag in the corner. :D))
 
((The culture change happens as the converter makes use of province history for the POP composition, I think. The longer a province had culture X, the more POPs of that culture are present. So that would explain Nova Hispania and the non-Greek Byzantines.))

One soldier was still circling the train, from time to time muttering that he'd never get used to these marvels of technology, while Lluis Faixòn argued with another one.
"For the tenth time, I am Lluis Faixòn, the son of your supplier, and I am supervising this transport so that it doesn't get into the wrong hands. And I have important business to conclude in the city!"

The guard was still not inclined to let the train pass. "We are not the wrong hands, so your work is done, sir."

Time for plan B. This man was not going to move away. "Look at your rifle. It is very likely from our production. We have a contract with Hispania to supply these weapons just like other military needs, and this contract means we have to respect each other. We have loaded this material as well as food rations for the Exercit. If you don't let me in, then we will just leave. Aren't you in need of supplies in Valencia?"

The man slowly backed down. "Sir, I will need to check with my superiors. It would be better if you just stepped down and let us do the last part."

"I have no time to wait. If you wish that." Faixòn shouted to his men to head back. The guard quickly reacted and gave his permission to enter. The gamble had paid off, though it would be better if his father never heard of it.


Finally arrived in Valencia, Lluis sought out his business partners as well as the most important traders and manufacturers of the city. The experience with his father in mind, he spoke of the guarantees necessary for trade and production. Then also that these guarantees were in danger.
"Uncertainty is deadly for prices. Yet we are in such a situation. Martial law in the capital. People jailed without any trial to determine their guilt in the escalation. What tells us that the government won't just seize our goods in the next step to keep the situation under control? That the riots will stop soon enough without turning themselves against our property first? We should remedy that. I will petition the Regent and Crown Prince to restore our confidence and the importance it has for the market. Restore it through a clear confirmation of these rights. The trials of the people involved in the mob - therefore also clearing the reason for martial law. It is in all our interests to do this as quickly as possible.
To better convey the gravity than if I went there alone, we should best send a delegation representing our interests, with the explicit support of those who aren't part of it. The restoration of the Assembly is the right step, but the faster everything returns to normal, the better for all of us. Hispania needs its economy functioning, not another crisis."
 
((Sorry if I haven't been posting as much. Been steadily working away with the conversion. On the plus side, most of the issues I thought would take the most time have been dealt with or turned out not to be a problem. Fixing the POPs religion already did a lot of work with culture, and I apparently underestimated how quickly assimilation works in the New World because it pretty much fixes itself in the first decade of the game. A similar thing happens with religion, so that's good too. At this point, it's mostly just running the game and seeing if anything odd happens. I've already found a few oddities, either caused by events that usually don't cause problems in vanilla but do here or historical events and decisions that mess things up. For example, there turned out to be some event that lets nations annex spherelings of the same cultural group if they're a union of that culture, so France and Scandinavia kept annexing their colonial nations as a result. I've hopefully fixed that issue, although they found a way to get around it a few times. I also had to edit the USA's Manifest Destiny decision, since I felt it seemed out of place in our timeline for them to just declare that the colonial nations of Europe's three biggest colonizers belongs to them, especially when one is their ally. I've instead split it into separate decisions that lets them only fire it if they are bad terms with a colonial nation and its colonizer, giving them cores on that specific colonial nation. Those targeting the remaining native nations have easier requirements to fill. So the UKA should be a little bit more tactful when it comes to announcing their dominance of the continent than the historical USA. :p

However, these are just some of the things I've found. Apparently it has been some time since I've played Vicky 2 because I do not remember the elections being so one-sided. I have run tests and the issues favoured in the election events almost entirely decide the election most of the time. In the cases where they're more ambiguous, it's the ruling party that comes out on top. And when I say one-side, I mean that almost every election ended with one party getting 90-100% of the vote. Even the reactionaries managed to get up there when I favoured their party issues. I even had a weird situation where I put one party in power and favoured only issues of the other parties and they still managed to keep 100% of the seats for three elections in a row. At this point, the elections are a farce and completely unrealistic. Either I need to find a way to make them more realistic or adjust my rules for elections. At least the upper house is reasonable. I'll probably be working on something regarding all this for the next while.

On another note, I believe I'm done tweaking the map and relations, so I might do an update soon detailing international events that happened during the gap years to explain some of the changes that did not directly impact Hispania. You'll also get to see a map for once. I don't expect it to be a large update, so I'll probably post something in the next few days.

I also think it is time to seek out some extra eyes for the conversion. We're reaching a phase almost like with game development where I need testers to help point out bugs. Basically what I need is anyone willing to just play the converted game and see if anything odd stands out. You'd don't even have to play as Hispania if you want. I've started using Apache for hands-off games since they are isolated and unlikely to be attacked. Anyone with a copy of Vicky 2 and who is willing to just play the converted game for a bit, you can just tell me here or by PM that you're interested. I'll probably post the conversion mod after the update I'll be doing for the rest of the world. Don't want to give away spoilers early. ;)

Oh, and an internet cookie for @wzhang29 for his invaluable help so far in providing me with his Vicky 2 modding knowledge whenever I got stuck. Vicky 2 is certainly a different creature than EUIV and it takes some getting used to the differences, so it's nice to have someone around who knows what they're doing to ask questions. :)))
 
((What are your plans for what large scale landed aristocracy is left?))
 
((I'd be willing to test out the mod.

In addition, what's the status of the IC? Is it done and we're just waiting for the next thread to be set up, or can we continue posting?))
 
((I could test it out if you need another))
 
((What are your plans for what large scale landed aristocracy is left?))

((If we're talking about the decline of their estates, we can assume it's happening in the background. As for their involvement in politics, the Cortz is still dedicated to the nobles. I've adjusted the voting for the Cortz going into Vicky 2 so the nobles with higher ranks have more influence. Anything else directed at them would probably have to be covered by the players.))

((I'd be willing to test out the mod.

In addition, what's the status of the IC? Is it done and we're just waiting for the next thread to be set up, or can we continue posting?))

((The IC event is still going, but I guess we're running out of ideas. :p At the moment, things seem to be leaning towards Joan remaining as Regent but with the Assembly restored and the Crown Prince playing a prominent role in moderating the Regent's policies. I may throw out some more drama of some sort to get things going if necessary, but I'd rather focus on the conversion for the moment.))

((I could test it out if you need another))

((Once I get through the next update, I'll make sure to post the converted file for you and others interested.))
 
((The IC event is still going, but I guess we're running out of ideas. :p At the moment, things seem to be leaning towards Joan remaining as Regent but with the Assembly restored and the Crown Prince playing a prominent role in moderating the Regent's policies. I may throw out some more drama of some sort to get things going if necessary, but I'd rather focus on the conversion for the moment.))
((Well, in case Joan decides to snap again I'm ready to "pay a visit" to the Emperor.:p))