Well it does pay to read the bug reporting board. I tried the fix for the crash caused by trying to load a saved game and it worked. Now on to the glory of the Irish.
Eire
When last we saw our intrepid hero’s of the emerald isle they were babysitting Skane and Jutland. It is 1617 and I’m not doing much so I upgrade the fort in Jutland to level two because Denmark has been on a building spree and has close to 35,000 troops sitting in their capital. I think they still want to recapture Norway.
All is quiet until March 1618 when Pommern decides to declare war against Poland. Sweden, Genoa, Holstein and Eire join in the fun. No one joins Poland. In fact I notice that Poland is practically fighting everyone in that part of the world. Now to add to the confusion The Netherlands declares war against Genoa. All the allies join Genoa while the Netherlands stand alone. I do my bit and march down and capture Friesland but I don’t want to keep it since I think its going to be a pain in the neck because its gong to have a high rebellion risk so when the Netherlands offers me 89 ducats for peace I take the money and run. Meanwhile I’m looking at the province Memel. It’s owned by Poland but is cut off from the rest of Poland by Brandenburg. Brandenburg is becoming one of the real powerhouses in the area. I load up my fleet and sail off the coast of Memel only to see that Spain has just captured it and taken it in a peace settlement. Damn I wanted that province. Now I can’t even reach any Polish provinces. So I sail back to Jutland and start waiting again.
1621 and a white peace is declared with Poland and the Pommern alliance members. I also get a Non Enforcement of ordinances and move +1 to Centralization, which puts it at about three moves away from decentralization. I notice that Friesland is revolting. It feels good to be smug!
In 1622 I keep adding to my fleet and it now has 4 ships and 6 transports. I plan to be ready to move around the Baltic at a moment’s notice. Sweden gets Zeeland and Flandern from the Netherlands for peace. They seem to be doing rather well but let us see if they can hold on to these provinces.
1623 and it seems that Sweden is just not happy being at peace so they declare war against Novgorod. We all join Sweden and Spain and Norway join Novgorod. Ah, another opportunity to capture Memel which is owned by Spain. Oh, and Pommern declares war against Brandenburg. We all join and Saxony and Wurtemberg join Brandenburg. Once again armies are marching everywhere. I load up my army and sail to Memel only to find 33,000 Spanish troops waiting for me. I decide that I don’t really want Memel and sail north and land in Estland, which is owned by Novgorod and besiege it. (Mistake)
In 1624 the Netherlands joins Novgorod and enters the war. Near the end of the year France joins the Novgorod alliance and joins the war. Thankfully Holstein and Pommern act as a defensive shield for me otherwise I would be in big trouble. France and Brandenburg have a lot of soldiers running around.
By 1625 Skane has revolted and the rebels are besieging the city. I finally capture Estland but the cost was high. I march to Ingermanland but it’s just for show. Even as I start the siege two things make me break it off. First Novgorod has an army of 30,000 in the next province who eventually will attack me and the other is because of my manpower limit I won’t be able to keep enough men in the siege to continue it. Another winter and I won’t have enough of an army left to do anything. So I load up my army and sail back to Jutland.
1626 and I move my Defensive/Offensive slider toward defensive. Its still on the offensive side of the slider but one more and it will be in the middle. I march my army from Jutland down to Friesland because the Netherlands keeps demanding a province for peace and I’m finding that irritating. Big mistake. Never get irritated with a computer AI. I march down with 5,000 infantry, 1,000 Calvary and 55 cannon and fight a battle against 5,000 Infantry and 5,000 Calvary and my entire army to the last cannon is destroyed. Luckily Novgorod at that moment offers me 96 ducats for peace which I accept. I was of two minds on this but I don’t think I would have gotten Estland in a peace offer. I just didn’t have enough victory points and I sure as hell wasn’t going through another winter besieging some city up north. Well that and the fact that I no longer had a creditable army influenced my decision.
So at the end of 1625 Sweden, Genoa, Pommern, Holstein and Eire are still at war with Saxony and Brandenburg. Maybe I can still get a piece of the pie!
I didn’t really accomplish much this segment because I made a couple of mistakes. I should never have gone north. I just can’t replace the troops that I lose to attrition. I also became over confidant with the Netherlands and lost my besieging army because of that. I’m rebuilding right now and watching Brandenburg and Saxony for any weakness. Let this be a lesson on what greed can do. I should have just sat back and let everyone else fight while I consolidated my position. But no I had to go up north and throw away a lot of good troops. Sigh.
For those who have had a problem with loading a saved game you can get the answer to the problem in the Bug reporting board. If I remember right you need to open the saved game eug. I think that’s what it’s labeled, with word or notepad. Look in the selectable country list and you’ll notice a lot of duplicate countries. I deleted all the countries but the one I was playing (Eire) and tried reloading the game and it worked!
