"Freedom isn't free"
A tale of Mexico
On September 16th, 1810, Father Miguel Hidalgo declared the independence of Spain's most valuable colony. From that day to this, this nation of Mexico has suffered multiple wars of independence, civil strife, the making and overthrow of an emperor, and the unsteady rise - and now the fall - of the First Republic.
And the turmoil has but just begun. Almost nowhere on Earth is there so stark a contrast between domatic priest and iconoclastic intellectual, privilaged caudillo and ignorant peon, aristocratic officer and rabble-rousing lawyer, the Creole capital and the Indian hinterland. Between anarchy and tyranny in Mexico the line is perilously fine.
Abroad, the situation is equally grim. A great republic rises in the north, with a Manifest Destiny that threatens to strip our northern lands away. The Europeans are even more aggressive, eager to find excuses to intervene and impose their kings upon us.
Darkness at home, shadows abroad. It will be no easy task to forge a Mexico worthy of the Mexicans. Ever and again we will learn anew, as our ancestors learnt so bitter, that terrible truth:
Freedom isn't free.
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Setup:
- Using v1.03c, with VIP 0.4, Very Hard / Furious, with AI Assistance Mod
Goals:
- #1 in exports, #1 in prestige, #1 in industry, and #1 in military.
- Mexican troops must, at one point or another, control Washington, London, Madrid, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, Rome, Saint Petersburg, Moscow, and Tokyo.
- 20 badboy or less.
House Rules:
- Max of 1/2 native-quality troops. No native-quality troops with attachments. Must have ample soldier POPs of the correct culture to absorb all combat losses. A loss has to be a loss.
- No buying, building, or stealing colonial claims, or buying or seizing colonies, or attacking uncivilized nations, anywhere other than in the Americas unless and until Mexico has a Great Power industrial rating, and a Great Power army and navy.
- No seizing, buying, or otherwise acquiring any province in Europe, or any Chinese core territories.
- No building steel mills until the tech "cheap steel" is researched.
Changes:
- Various bonuses given to AI-controlled nations from about 1860 onwards, to compensate for the AI's weakness at using Capitalists, building railroads, and - especially - at mining industrial raw materials.
- Many naval techs given to the AI for free (as it satisfies various prerequisites), to compensate for its weakness in tech trading. Again, mostly has an effect in the second half of a campaign game.
- Some major AI-controlled nations get population growth bonuses to compensate for the AI's tendancy to impose maximal taxation on the poor. France's homeland population will not nosedive.
- AI nations focus a bit more on railroad building.
- Major AI nations cannot be satellited permanantly. Every 180 days, those with either Great Power status or an industrial rating of at least 150 have a 10% chance of regaining full independance. Former satellites continue to have a defensive alliance with the former master, and continue to give it military access.
- Mexico's flag and capital city icon edited some.
- All cases of the word "Mejico" changed to "Mexico".
- Other changes may be made as the story progresses; they will be described.
Story Format:
- Plain and simple diary entries. No novels here.
Overview of the nation:
- Mexico has among the best natural resources in all of Latin America. She is perhaps the only nation in that vast region with good coal reserves, iron is readily available, and in short order some of the world's richest gold mines will open up for exploitation. However, Mexico has no sulphur (in this mod).
- Mexico is short of manpower. Her seven million people are scattered over a wide area; production is low and military potential distinctly limited. Other weaknesses include a low literacy rate, few industries or factory workers, no machine parts, and wide-open frontiers and shores. However, this nation's worst problem will be internal strife (as reflected in the events).
