most likely not however I may put a few screenies in replies not updates to show that I am indeed playing a game of VIcky 2
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
most likely not however I may put a few screenies in replies not updates to show that I am indeed playing a game of VIcky 2
Sweet! Do you actually have the game yet or are you just writing the prolouge until it comes out next Saturday?
No, I'm not a beta tester. I'll be preparing for the launch then Ill learn the game then begin the main writing of the aar.
-Lukas von Boehm | Suum Cuique: History of the German Empire in the 19th Century © 2010
In 1789, the world changed. The French Kingdom, one of Europe’s oldest and most stable monarchy’s fell apart. The French Revolution tore apart the country’s traditional imperial ways. Soon enough the recently established First French Republic found itself at war with a massive coalition of imperial powers. Among them was the Kingdom of Prussia under the new King Frederick Wilhelm III. The First War of Coalition ended in a coalition defeat even though Prussia had not in true actuality seen the likes of war and after the Treaty of Basel in 1795 joined the pro-Napoleonic neutrality pact and after being threatened by Napoleon; was forced to occupy British Hanover. After British Warships occupied Prussian Battleships and the Second War of Coalition ended the Prussian King felt it finally safe to end the peaceful occupation of Hanover. But that sense of peace ended abruptly when Napoleon forced Frederick once again to occupy Hanover in 1806 only months before the Holy Roman Empire was dissolved and the King’s title of Prince-elector was left meaningless. Feeling betrayed Frederick Wilhelm once again took part in the coalition but was dreadfully defeated in the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt. Shortly afterwards the war of Fourth Coalition ended in another French victory resulting in massive territorial losses to the Prussian Kingdom as well as its Polish Partition territories. In light of the Prussian defeat the monarchy temporarily retreated to the city of Memel. The remainder of the Kingdom was occupied by French forces and forced to join the Continental System under Napoleon’s French Empire.
Napoleon's First French Empire
With Napoleon’s armies defeated in Russia in 1812, Prussia rejected the Continental system and for third time declared war on France starting the “Wars of Liberation” in Germany and finally got its revenge forcing Napoleon and his entire French Army out of the former Holy Roman Empire. After the defeat of Napoleon by the Sixth Coalition the proceedings of peace at Vienna gave Prussia back all of its lost provinces as well as another 40% across Germany including much of Saxony, parts of the former Duchy of Warsaw, Danzig and especially the largest part of the Rhineland in Westphalia. When Napoleon returned to France and attempted to wage the War of Seventh Coalition, Prussia played a crucial part in Napoleon’s final defeat at Waterloo by attacking the French forces in the rear at Plancenoit while Napoleon focused on the British soldiers under the Duke of Wellington. With the victory of Marshall Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher, Prussia finally helped secure peace for once and for all in the Napoleonic Wars. However all was not well in the world as Revolutions continued in South America and the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederacy was setup to moderate an emerging German power struggle between the growing Kingdom of Prussia and the resident Austrian Empire. With uneasy peace asserted in Europe and the failure of a “holy alliance”, the European political climate became focused on peace with aggression and at the front of that was the Prussian Kingdom. With the Congress of Vienna; the industrial revolution and the 19th Century had truly been swung into full ignition. However the Rise of Prussia had just begun.
Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia
Nice round up of the Napoleonic era. I assume the next update will be into the game itself .
.
Nice round up of the Napoleonic era. I assume the next update will be into the game itself
thanks, yeh Prussia is a pretty difficult nation to a sum up. They pretty much went back in forth so many times from being neutral, to pro-napoleon, Coalition and back again
The Diet of Erfurt
Many historians differentiate the transition of old Prussia to the modern Kingdom at the 1836 Diet of Erfurt. Disguised as a assembly to gain further Protestant freedom of speech in the Austrian-headed German Confederation, the diet saw the formation of the infamous Protestant League in Germany, a Protestant Pro-Prussian Military Alliance of the North German States to counter the Pro-Austrian Catholic Kingdoms and Grand Duchies to the south such as Bavaria and Baden as well as to assist in the gradual acceptance of Prussian dominance away from the Habsburg domains and its spheres of influence. On the 13th of January, King Friedrich Wilhelm III ordered Karl von Boehm, a Nationale Partei Foreign Minister of the Prussian Upper House to send letters to all the Protestant and North German Duchies, Grand Duchies and City-States to invite them to the Diet. The Assembly was held on February 8th 1836 in the city of Erfurt as instructed and was marked by speeches from all the major Protestant Grand Dukes as well as the elderly King of Prussia, Friedrich Wilhelm. It is also noted in history that the King of Württemberg, Wilhelm I arrived uninvited and sought meeting with the King Friedrich Wilhelm where he offered support for the Protestant League, being the only Lutheran nation in Southern Germany. And so the Protestant League of Germany was formed and King Friedrich Wilhelm III named President by the assembly. While the league did not formally oppose the German Confederation, and existed primarily as a sect of the confederation, it set up the future of the crumbling of the union and the downfall of Austrian Habsburg Dominance.
With North Germany secured in the Prussian supremacy that was the Protestant League, the Kingdom turned its head outwards under the direction of the Legislative Assembly and began to seek friendship in the other great powers in future foreseeable conflicts.
The elected flag of the Protestant League
The Prussian-Portuguese Defence Pact was signed on June 18th 1836 and saw Prussia’s first international alliance. Following the Portuguese, the Prussian Ambassador in Great Britain attempted to sway the United Kingdom in Prussian favor but was instead insulted by the British parliament saying that the League could only hurt the status quo in Europe between the Great Powers. With that the King’s attention pointed elsewhere and King Friedrich Wilhelm III and his representatives began to work towards friendship with their fellow Protestant brothers in the Kingdom of Sweden and Norway as well as the Bear of the East, Russia. In actuality at this point in our history, Prussia and the Empire of Russia under Romanov Emperor Nicholas I held similar political systems apart from the obvious issue of Russian serfdom. Both absolutist monarchies, the King knew that Prussia could only profit from the friendship and power of the Russian Bear.
Not everyone supported the absolute rule of the Prussian King and his new motives thus by the Winter of 1836-37, the streets of Berlin were littered with illegal pamphlets and fliers supporting the newly founded People’s Committee for a Free Prussia demanding that the Kingdom abandon reactionary absolutism and institute a multi-party constitution. The King ordered that the illegal printing presses must be shut down. A raid was carried out by the citizen guard of Pritzwalk, a city north of Berlin, and it was discovered that the Pritzwalk City Printing Presses where behind the fliers. The presses were closed and shut down by the guard.
Also around this time Diesterwig published his guidelines for teachers, aimed at creating conscious responsible citizens in German schooling institutions.
Friedrich Adolph Wilhelm Diesterwig
Heil dir im Siegerkranz
Herrscher des Vaterlands...
You have my absolute and full attention - if these first few posts are anything to go by this will be well worth the read.
Herrscher des Vaterlands...
You have my absolute and full attention - if these first few posts are anything to go by this will be well worth the read.
It is just Prussia and its sphere of influence as opposed to Austrias. The game doesnt model the German Confederation with a Prussian-Austrian Alliance (which is bit off imo) so this is how i represent it.
I'm interested in seeing how you manage your economy. As Prussia in 1852 I've got a decent amount of factories, but my unemployed workers don't seem to want to work there for some reason. Foreign policy wise I've done better, conquered a third of the Netherlands, half of Belgium and the whole Danish peninsula.
the aar will primarily go into historical conflicts, decisions but in the a-historical vicky 2 ai world.
“Herr Reinhardt! Herr Reinhardt!” a soldier suddenly burst through the door of the small 16th Century house. All eyes of the small packed room looked up as General Friedrich Reinhardt stood from the table laid out with orders and paperwork. The 30 or so Prussian soldiers stood up from the chairs and watched as the General paced towards the beckoning messenger. After saluting his superior the soldier lay his musket and began, “General Reinhardt, I have new orders for you from General Erwin zur Lippe, we are to march to Aachen and the Belgian border and defend against intruding Belgian forces!”
“Are you certain? Come and walk with me soldier” Friedrich commanded as he opened the small cottage door. As they walked down the path through the frozen city of Siegburg the messenger explained the situation, “…and you see General Reinhardt, it seems that a number of the farmers on the border with Belgium spotted a bunch of soldiers riding across the border”.
“Rally the troops of the VI. Korps, we march to Aachen!”
The Georg Johannes Incident
On February 14th 1837, Georg Johannes, a Prussian National, was caught spying on the Prussian-Belgian border and was arrested by the Belgian military. While the government did not recognize Johannes as a government informant, it was claimed by the Rheinlander farmers living near the ancient city of Aachen that the arrest culminated in a pitched chase and that Belgian soldiers crossed the border illegally without Prussian allowance and arrested the citizen within the territory of Prussia. King Friedrich Wilhelm and his cabinet demanded a formal apology from the recently crowned Leopold I of Belgium. When the demands were rejected by the government of Belgium, Prussian soldiers mobilized near the Prusso-Belgian border. War was only averted when the United Kingdom stepped in forced Belgium to make a statement while forcing Prussia to withdraw troops from the border. While both sides accepted this, British-Prussian relations were strained and King Friedrich Wilhelm revoked his recognition Belgium and began to back the Netherlands in the conflict. The strain in relations also caused the British to begin an anti-Prussian campaign in the protectorate of Hanover to attempt and discredit the name of Prussia within the union Kingdom.
Minority Building Restrictions
Later in the month of February, King Friedrich Wilhelm and his advisors decided to impose building restrictions on the Polish minority. The act made it illegal for any man of Polish blood to build or own land within the territory of the Prussian Kingdom. While this act assisted in the assimilation of the Poles, it attributed to the growing cultural instability in the region.
South America's Great War
In South America was the beginning of the massive Mato Grosso War, or South America’s Great War as it would later be known, between the French-allied Brazilian Empire and the Dictatorships of Uruguay, Paraguay and Peru. This effected the German states as Prussian general Joachim von Raunch organised a German volunteer cavalry brigade and fought alongside the armies of Uruguay, Paraguay and Peru to fight against "the creation of a French-orientated Empire in the Americas". While not supported by Prussia officially, the general received secret funding from the legislative assembly in Berlin.
Prussian General Joachim von Raunch leads the charge at the battle of Rio Branco infamously hoisting the colours of Red, Black and Yellow. This lead to German flag designs decades later
The Pro-Austrian Sphere
In reaction the strong unity of the Protestant League in Northern Germany, the Emperor of Austria formed his own group of nations within the German Confederation and began to further the split in the German Confederation. Now it seemed certain that the Pro-Prussianist Protestant League and the Pro-Austrianist Grand Duchies of Saxony, Bavaria and Baden would one day be at war. It was only a matter of time in eyes of the German people.
The Anglo-Chinese Wars
In the East, September 27th 1837 saw the eruption of war between the United Kingdom and the Qing Chinese Empire. The Chinese had invaded Northern Burma in the Haka Wars (1836) and annexed the region disregarding the British demands for peace. When the Haka Wars ended the entirety of northern Burma (primarily the Haka region) was ceded to China, the British Empire declared war on China. The War was the climax of Anglo-Chinese tensions that had begun with the Opium Crisis of March in which the Chinese Emperor was forced to continue Opium trade. Thus the Anglo-Chinese War began.
British India Corps attack a Chinese fort in the Haka region of northern Burma
The Schleswig-Holstein Crisis
Throughout the last months of 1837, Prusso-Danish tensions peaked massively after word traveled from Denmark that German peasantry was being treated harshly by the Kingdom of Denmark and its satellite state Holstein. Two Korps of 51,000 Prussian Infantry and Cavalry marched on the border with Holstein under command of the highly decorated Prussian Generals, Joachim von Raunch, who recently returned from the Mato Grosso War, and Albrecht von Oldenberg. As tensions sky-rocketed both Portugal and the King Wilhelm I of Württemberg both denied support for Prussia in the conflict. As a jingoist society, Karl von Boehm and the other aristocratic members of the King’s cabinet demanded that both the territories of Schleswig and Holstein be ceded to the Kingdom of Prussia. The eyes of the world watched and knew that if that the aggression of Prussia could not be satisfied than war would be inevitable within a week.