A Venice Divine Wind 5.1 AAR

[diegoami]

I tried that in a test run, and QK is an administrative republic if I release them. But they have a crappy technology, so I probably won't do it. I am now leaning on releasing the Mameluks, if I release them their country is catholic and they don't kill the missionaries who are left.

 

[vasziljevics]

yeah their tech group won't change, only their government... on the other hand the 'gifted government' would be a huge help to the Mamluks who are rather powerful even with their initial tribal despotism - being a republic would greatly increase their potential.

 

[diegoami]

1646-1649 : Candar and The Haasa annexed

In the end, I decided to release the Mameluks, who are now a Catholic Administrative Republic. Infamy is back to 2.9, but overextension stays.

Our doge dies and regrettably we have to replace it. I choose a bureaucrat.

Well, also the other released vassals are ruled by a "Doge". That is Venice's way all over the world !

The Kurils are colonized in February 1647. Next mission will be to diplo-annex Austria, but I will need to improve relations first for that.

Aragon calls us to arms to a phony war with Ethiopia - which means, though, that we won't annex Wien right now. We need diplomats for the last rush to Asia anyway. We declare war on Candar in January 1648, though later we find out that we used a casus belli that should not go away after 1650 and is not Holy war. Oh well.

We end up being at war with Portugal and Granada as well. Granada occupies Andalucia, while we blockade Portugal.

In May 1648, we annex Candar. Not as cheap as we expected, but we still have some room left for more conquests.

We peace Portugal right after that. And then Ethiopia, although our vassals stay at war with them. In July 1648, we declare war on Haasa. Nobody helps them.

In October 1648, we can annex the Haasa.

We would like to take on Japan - but there is no way to declare war on them... What the hell ? How am I supposed to conquer Kyoto ?

In July 1649, we declare war on Ming and Durrani at the same time who are allied. In the mean time, we are also at war with Zaporozhe, they attacked our ally Khiva and we answered their call to arms.

By December 1949, we have occupied several provinces in China...(we just assault)

Durrani we are carpet sieging. Truces with Persia and Bulgaria have just expired, but I am not sure who I will declare war on next. I have 5 diplomats, I am thinking Persia, Bulgaria, Ayuttaboy, Qin and... ? Manchu, Tibet and Pattani may be interesting. Yemen is not possible, we have military access.
This is going to be the last chance for a holy war before the 1650 watershed.

 

[Ricardo Rolo]

Well, you just discovered the wonder and joy that is dealing with Japan in DW I will not lecture you fully on the Japanese mechanics, but for what matters to you the Japanese Daimyo can't be contacted diplomatically by anyone besides themselves and Japan ( that before the unification is just a OPM in Kyoto ) and Japan is the only one that contact the outside. So you will need to discover Kyoto to be able to DoW anyone in Japan ... oh and they all band together to defend eachother.

So , in resume, you need to send a conquistador to Kyoto or wait until Kyoto stops being TI to you. It is not nice, but atleast you are not in a situation where you can get missions to marry Fujiwara or one of the others , like it happens if you play Korea , Manchu or one of the chinese ....

 

[Chieron]

Japan is totally evil, just pretend that there is no CoT in Kyoto, it's all rotten fish anyhow. [Unless Japan unifies itself or is close to doing so with only 2 daimyos left, Japan is simply awful to handle as there is a bug preventing the shogunate to be disbanded when there are 3 or more daimyos - and you cannot annex Japan with an intact shogunate. (also, all provinces will be 4 infamy)]
Else, good progress, you might think of crusading your way to a second indian connection via the Durrani, maybe, before Holy Wars end - making it less likely for rebels to block the connection to Venice.

 

[diegoami]

1650-1652 : War with Ming, Ayutthaya, Persia, Bulgaria, Durrani

Hmmm... Thanks for the feedback, I'll see what I can do with Japan..
A short update.

In the end, I declared war on Persia, Manchu, Bulgaria, Qin and Ayuttaya. Zaporozhe is peaced.
Regrettably, Bulgaria is occupied by our ally Cleves and cannot be annexed.

Persia can be annexed in May 1650

Qin is annexed in August 1650

In the meantime, Kyoto becomes visibile.

Durrani has to cede several provinces in September 1650.

In April 1651 Ming is peaced. They have to cede 5 provinces.

Ayutthaya is peaced and cedes 4 provinces. It is not convenient to get provinces from Manchu, so they are whitepeaced.

I lose some prestige after ignoring Brandenburg's call to arms. Meanwhile, Venice's yearly income has climbed to 24327 ducats a year, also thanks to an advisor who raises tariffs.

But there are not that many spare ships. I have a lot of colonies.

In April 1652, we peace Adal, who had declared war on us. We also peaced the hordes, so we are at peace and can release vassals.

We relase Gondwana, who is fully catholic.

But we have still overextension and high infamy. I am still pondering what to release next.
2 stability hits are planned, one for annexing Austria and one for changing government form to Republican Dictatorship.
But a stability hit costs more than 30k now.

 

[diegoami]

1652-1655 : Wars with Hedjaz, Bihar and Iraq

Overextension goes away in May 1652. Not sure why, but I guess releasing Gondwana was enough

I then proceed to diplo-annex Austria, losing 1 stability. The next mission is build a textile Manufactory in Istria.

... and I change the government to Republican Dictatorship and the Doge becomes a Lord Protector.

Since I want to lower stability cost and go back to business as soon as possible, I release the Haasa - their provinces were new and there were no Venetian cores anyway. But this means two provinces are now discconnected and have no access to the sea - Sanaa and Karbala.

After gaining 1 stability point, we declare war on Hedjaz and Iraq to solve this problem, using our new casus belli "Imperialism"
Using the same casus belli, we declare war on Bihar, who has a COT.

I expected a textile manufactory to cost much more - it costs only 964 ducats, not sure why, and I have already several manufactories ( three textile and one naval supply). I queue a textile manufactory in Istria in September 1653, after taking and repaying a loan which leaves me with 2000 ducats to spare.

I like founding new COTS and I found one in Samarkand, after moving the national focus there. The biggest COT is Kutch and I wanted to "split" it.
The wars are not very interesting, Bihar's army is routed in Gondwana...

Hedjaz is annexed in January 1654 - now Sanaa has access to the sea.

Since manufactories are so cheap I build other two - a weapon manufactory in Trent and a textile manufactory in Verona.

Bihar is annexed in March 1654 - one COT more in our control.

But this means we lose the East Indian Trade Rout modifier. This is huge, 20% less. We will have to get rid of one of the four towns listed : Dadra, Bihar, Sunda or Guagzhou. Right now we are at war with Sibir and colonizing so it will wait a little.

In April 1654, the war with Iraq ends as well. Iraq has to cede Basra and Iraq-i-Arab. Karbala is now also connected.

Venice's income is now at 22k yearly. Technologically we are still in the leading pack.

And before the year 1654 ends, a great event hits us, which gives us 20800 ducats and means we will be able to pay our loan.

By April 1655, a colonist will arrive in Tyunmen and we will finish the war with Sibir...

We will probably get rid of the province Sunda, so we can get back the East Indian Trade Route Modifier.

Two wars are in the air, against Lorraine, who has a COT...

and against Spain, who has founded a lot of colonies in the meantime - in Australia and Eastern Russia among others. And has several colonies all over Africa.

 

[unmerged(140309)]

Can you provide culture/religion maps? In particular, do any Dutch survive in the steppes?

 

[diegoami]

Can you provide culture/religion maps? In particular, do any Dutch survive in the steppes?

In the next update, but as far as I can tell, there are no surviving Dutch in the steppes. Actually, the Netherlands have ceased to exist and have been replaced by Brabant.

 

[diegoami]

1655-1656 : Yet another war with Spain

To get back the East Indian Trade Route Modifier, I will need to release one of those provinces, who also have to have a COT. So Bihar will be released after it is converted to Catholicism. In Febrary 1655, war is declared on Spain using the Colonialism casus belli.

There are many fronts. Two of them are in Eastern Africa.

We also declare war on the Hurons.
We are fighting also in Western Africa.

... and Oceania.

Our Lord Protector dies and regrettably we get one who has low administration skills. Our government type does not allow us to pick a candidate any more.

In Spain, we are advancing from the South, but in the North we get defeated at first.

In June 1655, we get overextension again. In Burgos we obtain a decisive victory.

The Spanish army is then routed in Vizcaya.

The Hurons are also fully occupied.

In July 1655, Venetian Oceania is born, after seizing another Spanish colony.

An embassy is queued in Sanaa. We seize colonies also in Siberia.

In September 1656, our score with Spain is 99%. We therefore expand our sphere of influence and annex the Huron.

Spain has to cede 7 provinces.

Religious map of Europe and Asia in September 1656

World map in September 1656.

Political and cultural maps of Europe.

 

[Ricardo Rolo]

The Reform is actually quite strong in your game. But wasn't France reformed as well ? :/

Are you going to tolerate those Portuguese colonies in Canada? Or do you have bigger fish to fry?

 

[Memento Mori]

Well done about the war, sad that there anr no Dutch cultured provinces in the steppes. By the way, why did you change your government type?

 

[diegoami]

The Reform is actually quite strong in your game. But wasn't France reformed as well ? :/

Are you going to tolerate those Portuguese colonies in Canada? Or do you have bigger fish to fry?

Yes, France was reformed, but I force-converted them in the last war - hoping they would collapse, but they didn't.

I am definitely taking on those Portuguese colonies sooner or later - it may even be my next war.

 

[Chieron]

Well done about the war, sad that there anr no Dutch cultured provinces in the steppes. By the way, why did you change your government type?

For the Imperialism CB, methinks (though without the leader choices for Republican Dictatorship, Absolute Monarchy looks somewhat more interesting. Not a choice for Venice, though.)

 

[diegoami]

Well done about the war, sad that there anr no Dutch cultured provinces in the steppes. By the way, why did you change your government type?

Yes, a little sad. I took Republican Dictatorship because I wanted the Imperialism casus belli - I think it is a pretty standard strategy.

 

[unmerged(425201)]

What happened to the rule to stay slightly tarnished?

 

[diegoami]

What happened to the rule to stay slightly tarnished?

I lifted it . I made it fit into the story - Venice started trading slaves and the Doge had nightmares.

 

[diegoami]

1656-1658 : Loan paid back

In September 1656, I move a slider towards Mercantilism. Centralization would also be a good choice, but because of overextension that will be put off - getting a stability hit would be annoying.

There is no deadline now, so I am not in a hurry to declare wars. In fact, I am planning to stay at peace for a while, to spare money and pay back the loan. I will also colonize the hordes.
I am not planning to release other countries, apart from Bihar and possibly Iraq. I can just wait for infamy to go down - and for the provinces to core.
Cherokee and Songhai declare war on us, but that does not worry us and the wars are soon over.
Meanwhile, Spain has a problem with Castille and Aragon.

Great Britain invades Scotland another time, but this time I am probably not getting involved.

In fact, it is probably France that deserves a beating right now.

In September 1658, we can pay back our loan.

In September 1658, The manufactory in Istria has been built.

Our next mission will be build a naval manufactory in Espirito Santo. For that, I will need to mint a little. Inflation is now around 5.7 %.
The banker is replaced with a diplomat.

Random fact : Reykjavik now belongs to Tunisia - probably conquered from Norway.

In December 1658, a good event makes us lose 3 infamy.

 

[diegoami]

How did Venice become a "Republican Dictatorship" ? It turned out to be a consequence of Venice's many wars. Venice has 700k soldiers and over 500 ships. To cling on to power, a Doge needed to have the army's and the navy's support - if he had that, he could not be removed from power.

The new title, "Lord Protector", or "Duce", was very similar to the old title, "Doge" - both came from the Latin, "dux", and meant "leader". But the new title implied that Venice's leader did not need the people's or the senate's support to stay in power - only the army's support was needed.

In fact, in 1655, it was the Army of Italy who picked their new "Duce", Niccolo Cassano. The Senate also had to confirm this choice, and they were under heavy pressure to do so, as Venice was teeming with soldiers. One Senator, Cesare Renzi, publicly protested the new state of affairs. On the next day, he had disappeared.

After a week, the Duce Niccolo Cassano declared that Venice had become a "Republican Dictatorship". The Duce would rule as a monarch, for his entire life. The soldiers and the people cheered. But it was not clear what would happen when the Duce died.

 

[Malurous]

Funny, I didn't even know that you don't get to pick a candidate in Republican Dictatorship (which makes sense, I guess). I suppose I've never gone the republic route in a game where I wanted to have Imperialism.

Interesting that Pskov is the trading powerhouse minor here, not exactly one of the usual suspects. That trade efficiency is through the roof compared to other nations at this point.