Hopping around, or how to destroy your previous work

[Sfan]

It’s been quite a long time since I wanted to write an AAR because I like stories and I like explaining things, but I did not feel like I had any legitimacy to do so and to create something unique and interesting. My English is not perfect so I can’t write an history book type AAR, and even if I’m probably better than the average player, I can’t impress you with those insane Very Hard campaigns featuring epic results with terribly bad starting positions. With the release of CoC and patch 1.22, I finally decided to jump into it, and to present you one of the uncommon ways in which I play the game. I've been doing these campaigns since quite some time, and I suddenly realized that if I enjoyed them, some people might enjoy them as well.

As we all know, one of the main issues of strategy games is that after you overcame your initial struggles, you’re usually left with the only challenge of conquering the biggest amount of land in the smallest amount of time. I appreciate the challenge of nearing perfection, minmaxing your run and having to think at multiple things at once without doing mistakes, but the most epic part is definitely the initial struggle when you are surrounded by many bigger foes. That’s why I often like to restrain myself to those early stages of a run.

I start as a random country, I play for about 20 years until the situation is significantly better, and then I reload the save as another random nation and keep hopping between tags. Not only does it prevent me to become too powerful, but it also eliminates the boring part of waiting for manpower to replenish or AE to vanish, and there is a lot of storytelling to be had. You try your best to help a country to survive, you then leave it in the hands of the AI for two decades, and you have this insanely exciting moment when you reload the save where you can check what happened to your previous little baby on the other side of the globe. There is nothing as frustrating as seeing that the AI completely messed up, and nothing as rewarding as seeing them become a major player. I really enjoy doing this, so I thought I could share this peculiar experience.

I’ll do two posts for each nation: one increasingly long post to look at the current state of the world and of our previous nations, and also to introduce my new country, and the second one where I will go through these 10-20 years of gameplay. I do not fix myself an arbitrary time in a nation, it’s about having fun and exploiting opportunities. Some nations are utterly doomed when you pick them, or are locked without any expansion opportunity, so I’ll try to fix the economy and get defensive alliances, and leave them after 8 years if there isn’t anything interesting. Others have plenty of roads to take and stopping will be difficult so I might play for 30 years occasionally. The only real rule is to leave the country in a stable state (so I won't take 20 loans to win 2 impossible wars and look cool, and then let the AI deal with the interest), and in a better shape. The real goal is that the nation I play thrives for the next decades.



No need to describe state of the world here, so let’s instantly see where the game puts me!

That's Kathiawar. The purple stain of India. Like any purple stain, it does not even has connection between the different parts of its country because a core is owned by a filthy Sunni nation.

I'm not even mentioned here, that says a lot about how weak I am.

But how exactly?

Development 3 provinces, 13 development
Income 2,02 (+0,16)
Army 4/1/0 (7 FL)
Tech 3/3/3, no ideas

Ok, that’s not the worst start of the game, but that’s usually one of the first nations to disappear. I have 3 neighbours who are all stronger than me (Sind has 9 FL, Mewar has 11, Gujarat has 14) and I am Hindu so most people in India hate me, especially the major players.I have an atrocious starting ruler even if he is strict, and I am tribal (I have feudalism at least). I can’t afford any advisor and I am in the hardest node to control in India. I sense a lot of fun!

And what about diplomacy?

Mewar and Sind rival me (Gujarat is too big), and I rival them back, they are my only valid targets anyway. Gujarat owns one of my cores, I take the mission to reclaim it. That’s the obvious first goal of the campaign. I improve relations with rivals of my neighbours, if I get an alliance I might go somewhere. I pick Shakti to get the well needed military boosts. And… Let’s unpause!

 

[DERPSTRØM]

Interesting! Hopefully you live

 

[Tom D.]

but I did not feel like I had any legitimacy to do so and to create something unique and interesting. My English is not perfect so I can’t write an history book type AAR, and even if I’m probably better than the average player, I can’t impress you with those insane Very Hard campaigns featuring epic results with terribly bad starting positions.

You absolutely don't need to do a WC or do some very insane stuff to write a very enjoying and entertaining AAR. All you need is an interesting story - or scenario like in your case . I really like the concept, makes me think of the swap-nations when you roll lower than ... AARs. Will definitely be following, welcome to awesome AARland, may you find joy and a good read of course .

 

[Sfan]

I start by fixing trade which pushes me to 2,78 income. I also move to tribal despotism for the RCC, even if that’s stupid because AI will die as soon as I leave the country unless I create some magic (I might even die myself, to be fair). I focus on mil, because with that horrific ruler that’s really needed.

The first alliances start to appear during this time.

Well, at least that makes things clear.

Oh, even better!

I’m still struggling to find alliances because of wrong religion penalty with everyone near me except Vij, and my ridiculously low army size which means that Vij looks at me and laugh.
After one year of improving relations, at last:

I get a 0/1/3 consort to go with my 2/0/1 ruler. These two make a perfect match!
Vij instantly turns friendly and we can get an alliance.

With the big boy of the area on my side, there is no reason to wait any longer:

I can't set Sind as cobelligerant, they are still allied with Delhi and that would be a bit too much, even for the mighty Vijayanagar (I'm... well... a nonfactor).

That's my boy!

That's also my boy! I can't believe that he has 2 more stats than his parents combined. She probably cheated on me, there is no way this child has my genes. On the top, you can spot Vijayanagar trying to lose the war by engaging 14k men with 7k, but hopefully I'm here to do all the job.

How is that only 11%? Really? Well, I should have known, my ruler-general decided to go meditate during the war and is "withdrawn in contemplation". That probably does not help, even if that gives me +2dip.

Despite me doing nothing, the war is won. Ideally, I would want to break Sind with Delhi and to come back in 6 years, but I'm certain that if I do that, Multan, Baluchistan and Mewar will have full annexed them. And I want my Indus estuary! So I take Thatta even if non cobelligerant, and I humiliate and get war reps for good measure. With that terribly bad ruler, an humiliation is not a bad idea after all. Let's hope that Delhi protects them from their neighbours, and I can maybe come back in 15 years if I'm still around.

I forgot to take the screenshot for Gujarat, but that was a 100% peacedeal.

Here is the result. 2 provinces for Vij who is happy, I get another estuary in my tradenode, my core and 2 more provinces, and Gujarat is left with one province and their vasal Khandesh. I piss off the Sunnis, but no coalition. Time to start coring, even if with that ruler, I do not really have many admin points. I don't really have anything, to be fair.

Baluchistan did not want to RM me even with maxed out relations (before I peaced out). Bad idea boy. I rival them and improve relations with their ennemy Multan instead.

I finish my cores and get 1 diprep from my mission. And here it is, with that extra reputation Multan is willing to ally.

I am slowly recovering and getting ready for next wars, when I spot a golden opportunity. Malwa's vassal declared on him with the help of Bahmanis, Mewar jumped as well. Malwa is basically dead.

And his ally Baglana has no other ally. Great!

Poor Malwa. Having a 5/5/6 ruler is not helping you. History will remember my ruler Bhenji Jadeja as the greater man between you two. Totally deserved.

Here goes Baglana. I'll also get Rewakantha from Malwa, but I forgot to take the screen once again. Malwa is down to one province after all these wars.

I wondered if I should stop with these conquests, but that was still early, and not enough to stand the test of time and of the Indian thunderdome. I tried to get opportunities, but they were all risky ones like Bahmanis or Mewar. And why take risky opportunities if you know you can wait for 10 years, build up a strong nation, and have free targets.

Many things happened while I waited. First, I have a big army and I'm rich, or at least that's the start of it all. I allied Hormuz, a rival of Baluchistan so I now have 3 friends to protect me. I feel a LOT better. And then, there were many wars in India, as usual (I like playing in India so much, always tons of opportunities). At some point during a Delhi-Jaunpur war, Mewar attacked Sind and Delhi disonhored. So did Gujarat. That's what I feared and why I secured Thatta earlier. This leaves Sind with one province and one friend, an ex vassal of Timurid who is irrelevant.

Shouldn't be too hard. And it will give me a border with Baluchistan, who allied Gujarat to piss me off.

Easy. Who's the small guy now, hm? I could stop, but the other opportunities are too tempting and I know the AI would not take them.

Baluchistan, Gujarat and Malwa. Always the same names, right? Multan and Hormuz are called in with favors. Less easy, but we have the number advantage.

Give me your money Malwa. I need to build more churches.

Give me everything Gujarat. I don't know what happened between us, but you had one of my cores on game start, so you deserve to die.

I hate you too Baluchistan, you did not want to be my friend early game.



That's what I like to see. Timurids are open and Hormuz is their rival, they would join. My rivals are Mewar, Gondwana, Bahmanis, all of them are potentially interesting targets. I still have Vijayanagar, remember. But it's been 24 years already. I just stabilize the country and build buildings, because if I don't the AI will probably manage to throw. There is quite a lot of unrest everywhere, I conquered Sunni land, I am overextended and I have War exhaustion. The idea is really to give the country in the best possible shape.

We definitely look better, don't we?

It took me longer than I thought to stabilize everything, and I clearly exceeded the 20 years I planned. Oh well that's because that's India. Always too many options in India. Just look at that: Timurids, Sistan, Mewar, Malwa, Gondwana and Bahmanis. I could probably win any of these wars (well maybe not Gondwana, they are allied to both Mewar and Bahmanis). But you need to stop at some point.



Remember that?

Development 3 provinces, 13 development
Income 2,02 (+0,16)
Army 4/1/0 (7 FL)
Tech 3/3/3, no ideas

And now:
Development 17 provinces, 133 development
Income 12,53 (+5,83)
Army 10/4/0 (15 FL)
Tech 4/5/6, no ideas

The income difference is really what's making me happy. We control most of the Indus trade and that's very lucrative, and I put quite a lot of churches with the money I got in the peacedeals. I also managed to do OK on the techfront despite the horribly bad ruler.

So, ready for next one?

 

[Tom D.]

So, ready for next one?

Is that a question or just a confirmation ? Really impressive, I have to do an Indian campaign once again because I too loved the few campaigns I did there, but with CoC (but not with the DLC) I hope to do a Mamluks tall run whenever I find the time. Anyway, I'm always ready for a next one .

 

[parats]

I like those kind of aar. Subbed!

 

[Sfan]

Interesting! Hopefully you live

Well, that was surprisingly easy. I let my allies do everything and nothing bad happened, like Gujarat attacking me before I secured my first alliance, or Bahmanis jumping on Vij and dragging me into a bad war or forcing me to dishonor.

You absolutely don't need to do a WC or do some very insane stuff to write a very enjoying and entertaining AAR. All you need is an interesting story - or scenario like in your case . I really like the concept, makes me think of the swap-nations when you roll lower than ... AARs. Will definitely be following, welcome to awesome AARland, may you find joy and a good read of course .

Oh I know that I don't have to, it's just that I don't see the point of doing an AAR if I don't make something unique or at least rare. And I know I won't do WC as well as others, or write stories as well as others, so I had to find something else. Thank you for your two posts!

I like those kind of aar. Subbed!

Thank you!

I like it when you go to a completely different location, but it seems it won't be the case here. We will cheat a bit and have a look on Kathiawar if anything really interesting happens.

I'm glad I picked a new tag of this patch, however. And it seems I start at war. Good or bad?

Ok, it seems like an easy one.

A very easy one, definitely. It's just a shame that all the border provinces are occupied by Nogai.

That also gives us a first hint at what happened in this new area. Timurids lost all their vassals, two of them are my allies (Afghanistan and Sistan). We see Muscovy at war with Kazan. QQ is also big and strong. And Kathiawar

Development 19 provinces, 140 development
Income 11,91 (-0,88 right now but I'm reinforcing, positive without reinforcing)
Army 13/6/0 (19 FL)
Tech 5/5/6, first idea of Religious (in a full Sunni area, nice pick Transoxiana AI, really clever)

Not the best of rulers, but a very good heir if we decide to ditch Religious for a military group (spoiler, we probably will). Oh, and we have a bit of corruption it seems.

Chagatai and Yarkand are Ming tributaries, that's a no go. Muscovy is creeping towards us, and Timurids are still a bit stronger than us. But the starting situation is still extremely good. We'll try to make the best of it.
No decision before pausing except focusing on mil and fixing estates, I'll start by winning that war.

 

[Sfan]

I decided to go for Defensive. As a player I would have chosen Admin, but I won't have time to use it to the full extent. A military group will ensure that they do well, and Defensive stacks with the rough terrain around here and the morale bonus of my tradition. And it spikes very early with that Morale in second position, so I'll be able to benefit from it myself.

I move to occupy as many provinces as possible and I wait for Nogai to peace out. But as I am sieging Khorasan, the Timurids decide to attack them and offer me a wonderful opportunity to become the major power of the region.

By the way, we can see how well Kathiawar is doing. Really impressive. I hope they will come back and win that war vs Mewar.

Nogai peaces out and... look... Not only do they release Kazakh, but they even give me one of my cores. NiceGai.

That allows me to easily finish that war against Uzbek and Khorasan. I vassalize Khorasan to be able to call all of my allies against the Timurids. Khorasan has tons of cores, that's an excellent vassal anyway.

And I am in control. I just have to peace out Uzbek...

I get a border with all the provinces of Kazakh and I get all of my cores. That's enough, AE will be a precious resource if I want to cripple all my neighbours in 20 years.

And now I can call everyone:

Good bye Timurids

That's the kind of peacedeal I like. And the best part is that Timurids declared a reconquest war, so by giving the occupations to Khorasan and only taking their cores, it counts as a defensive reconquest and only generates 6 AE for all of that.

No time to lose, we have many weak neighbours around.

Kazakh experienced independance, that won't last. Glad to see Kathiawar coming back in their war in the south.

Good bye Kazakh.

Nogai has one of my cores, no ally and 10k men. Begging to be killed.

I'm careful not to get a border with Muscovy yet. Else, it's just taking everything I can.

That also introduces new neighbours, Kazan and the Great Horde. Kazan has a goldmine, the Great Horde hates Kazan, that was a quick decision.

But before that, Qara Qoyunlu and Mushasha are at war and exhausted. That opens an interesting option.

The Timurids are down to 10k men, so the war is easy. I peace out Timurids for money only, they are not a cobelligerant and AE is really starting to boil around here even if I have truces with most of the outraged countries.

Good bye only Shia neighbour. I give their land to Khorasan, I am at my state limit and it is in their tradenode.

Khorasan starts to be quite big. I can manage them, but I'm not certain the AI will, and I think they'll be safer with a strong march.

Things are looking perfect.

Now that this is done, let's go back to the war I had planned.

A lot more balanced than the previous ones, but I will just let them siege the Great Horde and I'll peace out as soon as I have something interesting to get.

Something like that. I have the goldmine. This time I also took a border with Muscovy, I actually noticed that they are not performing and that they have less men than me, even if they have more FL. As a player I would have jumped on them, but I won't have time to stabilize before I leave if I do so. So far I'm really happy with my expansion, and I think we can almost let it here.

It started with a war against Uzbek, it has to end the same way. Except that this time Delhi also wants to taste my steel.

I break their alliance with Delhi, they were a bit of a pain. Not that their army was especially good, but they have so many forts.

I leave it here, I expanded massively and it's 21 years when I finish my cores. I would be a GP if I had Renaissance.

I am the real power of the region, even if most of what I own is very bad land and territories. And my alliance web is solid as well.

It's just a shame that Yarkand has a bigger font, but they are tributary of Ming so I can't do anything about it.

Overall, it was a bit too easy. Not only did I start strong, but everyone around me was collapsing, because most of my neighbours are Hordes (and well, AI Hordes on normal are ). The free early war against the Timurids was all that I needed, and I trust Transoxiana to keep on doing well. Don't die to Muscovy, please! (Who am I kidding, everyone knows they will die to Muscovy)

Development 19 provinces, 140 development
Income 11,91 (-0,88 right now but I'm reinforcing, positive without reinforcing)
Army 13/6/0 (19 FL)
Tech 5/5/6, first idea of Religious (in a full Sunni area, nice pick Transoxiana AI, really clever)

Development 48 provinces, 306 development + 16 provinces, 112 development for Khorasan
Income 16,75 (+6,02)
Army 16/8/0 (24 FL)
Tech 7/6/7, Three ideas of Defensive, Admin selected.

As you see, my expansion made me look big, but it brought little advantage for income and FL. I had to raise autonomy a lot to avoid revolts, and there are these 4 development wool provinces in territories everywhere. But at least that eliminates other threats.

I hope that next one will be more interesting. I only selected the nation and all I can say is that I may well interact with one of the two nations I have played. It's a nation we saw on more than one map since the beginning.

 

[stnylan]

Tag-switching games like this can be rather fun. I look forward to more.

 

[Tom D.]

Yeah Transoxiana is probably one of the strongest vassals the Timurids have so it might indeed be not a very big challenge. Will be interesting to see which nation is next, do you let the game roll the dice to know which nation to play? And what if you get a native American?

 

[Sfan]

I roll the dice, yes. And if there is a native American, I play it for a short period of time at least, that is part of the challenge (unless maybe I roll three in a row). I had quite a blast as a small Incan country in a previous similar run, and Nahuatl/Maya have the potential to pass at least one reform if not two if I roll them early. Natives North American, well... I can migrate and unify an area. That's a start.

 

[awd]

"That's Kathiawar. The purple stain of India. Like any purple stain, it does not even has connection between the different parts of its country because a core is owned by a filthy Sunni nation."

Not impressed. Gujarat is Shia, not Sunni. 30 seconds in and already major flaw. Filthy misinformer

 

[Sfan]

They are Sunni now .

 

[TenshiN]

I really like the concept, so that'd be the first AAR i'm ever gonna monitor. Nice rolls for the first two countries too!
Subscribed.

 

[Sfan]

I really like the concept, so that'd be the first AAR i'm ever gonna monitor. Nice rolls for the first two countries too!
Subscribed.

Thank you for your support. But what do you call nice rolls? Countries with potential? I was reasonably afraid that Gujarat+Sind declared on me before I secured my first alliance with Vij, so there was a real potential to die right away, which would have been very funny for the readers, but quite a failure.

Anyway, here is the next part with a new country. But first, let's take a look at Kathiawar:

From 17 provinces and 133 development, this is an interesting expansion. They crushed Mewar with the help of Multan and got a lot of development for that. They picked religious ideas which is not bad at all. If India has Hindu provinces, they lie at the edge of two worlds and if they expand towards Timurids and Arabia they will need to convert. And there are only 2 major Hindu players so Deus Vult will be really powerful, especially considering Vijayanagar is their ally. Wait, what? Vij is not their ally anymore? And they set them as rival, it seems. Oh well, that's not the best move, but at least you still have Multan and Hormuz. I have faith in you.

Now that this is done, let's see who I play. I teased and said this was interesting, to say the least...
And here is... Muscovy!

Oh god, I swear this is not scripted. I even wondered if I should reroll but... that's the game, right? This could not have fit "how to destroy your previous work" better. Or is it?

Development 38 provinces, 317 development + 12 provinces, 100 development from vassals
Income 20,42 (+5,05). 7 corruption!
Army 16/2/0 (42 FL)
Tech 7/5/7, Eco 2, Offensive 2

Wait... what? Muscovy? What are you doing?
I said when I played Transoxiana that their army size was surprisingly low, but I clearly did not expect that... The 1.23 bug with the vassal integration seemingly completely destroyed them. They have integrated 0 vassal, took no diplomatic ideas, but are only Dip 5. Having all their vassals means no diplo slot, so no ally expect... Odoyev. Nice.
They embraced Renaissance, but it seems it was at the cost of 7 corruption (weird, considering they have a lot of money unused). Their army is extremely small for Muscovy, they build literally nothing, and their tech is closer from Asia than from Europe (which is to be expected from AI Muscovy early on).
Offensive is a good group for Muscovy, Eco seems silly considering they hardly need Religious to convert Sunni land, or Admin because they are already at their state limit. I instantly drop Economic for Admin. That could have been Religious but I prefer admin now because it's not even time to eat the Hordes yet...That brings me to the striking and unexpected thing for AIs in 1494, right there under your nose: Novgowhat? How did you survive for so long?

How did you let that happen... Come on... That's literally the first time I see it happen since a year and a half. And I clearly can't take on PLC+Novgorod right now.

Muscovy has the potential to expand massively as we all know, but here this might not be the case. The AI utterly failed so far, and rooting out corruption, fixing the economy, annexing my vassals, filling my Force Limit, getting back in tech and getting Novgorod is actually probably going to take most of my time. And annexing my vassals, even if not the funniest thing, is really needed, or else the AI will just keep on cancelling it again and again as it always does on 1.23.0. And then I will be ready to focus on Great Horde (Ryazan is their vassal) and their ally Transoxiana. The failures of the AI may prevent me from having to do the real plot twist and ravage the country I just left. But I will try to prepare the perfect setup for Muscovy, so that they can unleash all their power as I leave them and hopefully steamroll the game.

I start rooting out corruption, fixing Estates, improving relations with vassals to prepare integration; I drop eco and focus on mil and... I guess it's time!

 

[stnylan]

Rather than the AAR title of destroying your previous work it seems you are more deperately repairing the AI's shoddy work instead

 

[Sfan]

Rather than the AAR title of destroying your previous work it seems you are more deperately repairing the AI's shoddy work instead

Transoxiana was doing well before I picked them, that's how I expanded that fast. Only Timurids and Ajam had comparable army size in the region, I could expand right from the beginning and that was a pleasant surprise. But Muscovy... You clearly do not expect to see Novogorod chilling there with an alliance with Poland...


Well, I have no doubt we will signigicantly improve the situation. And what better way of doing so than to start eating weak nations:

I have 45 favors with Odoyev, so I might as well call them in all the wars. Uzbek is still a nonfactor from getting trampled repeatedly by Transoxiana. I coop with my former self. Because of that, I can quickly white peace Uzbek, and almost fully annex Kazan.

Definitely looks better.

Then, it's time to wait for things to get better. I start annexing vassals, I keep rooting out corruption, and I keep an eye on what goes on in Poland and Novgorod.

That's an interesting news. Poland at war, Novgorod getting ravaged by rebels.

Oh that's something very interesting! But after thinking about it for a while, I decided against the move. I am still extremely weak, and the war will be costly. And in a few years it will be a very easy war once I fix everything.

I forgot to mention it, but I started in a Queen Regency. My ruler came of age and got a nice son. And as you can see I annexed Rostov and Yaroslavl and I prepare the next annexations. And I am down to 2 corruption. Funny times. Lots of action.

During that time, Poland peaced out against TO, and took too much land. A coalition declares made of many countries including Hungary.

That's what I wanted to see...

Time for war.

Unsurprisingly easy. It's just unfortunate that a border province was occupied by Livonian Order in the coalition war.

I kep on building, now that I have 0 corruption. When news from the West arrive.

None of my concern, really.

What directly concerns me, however, is that I just have Perm and Pskov left as vassals. So I can start thinking about getting new relations.

Welcome, I felt odd with only 2 vassals left.

Not bad at all. And the rebels in Lithuania are an interesting sight.

Better. Now, if you fail with THAT, you're really a disaster Muscovy.

And yes, the rebels were pretenders and they enforced demands. No more Lithuania PU. You can see how common rival helped me to get the alliances with Bohemia and Ottomans. Good job Poland, they managed to peace the coalition war for just war reps in the end. A shame you're pretty much dead.

That's almost over, but I still have buildings to build and a few more things to fix. I need to wait for that annexation of Perm at least, or AI will cancel it.

That's a good way to pass time.

Interesting.

At last. Now I can officially leave the country in the competent hands of the AI.

From 6th GP to 4th GP, that's nice.

That's definitely an improvement. Truce with Novgorod is soon but I trust the AI to take it, especially because they have the mission. Also, interesting stuff going on in Estonia.

Pskov and Odoyev as vassals, I am still coring the last Kazani province.


I think we all expect the real improvement to be here, considering I did almost nothing besides administrating a country in dire need of it.

Development 38 provinces, 317 development + 12 provinces, 100 development from vassals
Income 20,42 (+5,05). 7 corruption!
Army 16/2/0 (42 FL)
Tech 7/5/7, Eco 2, Offensive 2

Development 66 provinces, 529 development + 5 provinces, 40 development from vassals
Income 40,44 (+21,87).
Army 40/8/8 (57 FL)
Tech 8/8/9, Offensive 4, Admin 6

Twice the income, three times the army size, a massive +21 when at 0 maintenance. No more corruption. Caught up in technology. Broke the unholy Polish-Novgorodian alliance and secured alliances of my own.

Rather than the AAR title of destroying your previous work it seems you are more deperately repairing the AI's shoddy work instead

I think we can say so.

 

[Sfan]

Before we check what awaits us, let's see what happened around Kathiawar and Transoxiana. Interesting stuff, I can already say.

Dear lord... I knew the rivalry with Vij was a bad idea. How did you let that happen?
But, other thing of note, truce with Transoxiana and friends. My bet is that Afghanistan attacked Multan and called Transoxiana, and Multan called Kathiawar. They were either forced to cancel alliance, or Multan dishonored as a consequence of the Afghan war.
I'm afraid Kathiawar will not expand any further and that they are now going to decline. Thay had taken a province from Gondwana since last screenshot, at least, to get a maximum extent of 24 provinces and 226 development.

They were at 48 provinces and 306 dev, it seems they won another war against Uzbek in the North. They helped Afghanistan to expand (they are still allied), and they are now fighting Ajam alongside their ally the Great Horde... which is not the best move. Abandon the Great Horde and don't fight their wars, save yourself from Muscovy, fool! They are a monster!
Nothing really interesting, they are almost stuck between their allies, Muscovy, Ming's tributaries and their march so I predict no real expansion either, unless they pull a magical trick.

But now is the real question: who are we playing? Is it Poland to keep on fighting myself? Is it the one province Byzantium in Morea? Is it Ulm?

Welcome to Yucatan:
Development 7 provinces, 60 development
Income 6,48 (-0,38).
Army 10/0/0 (10 FL)
Tech 5/4/6, Eco 3

Once again, we start at war, against the mighty Totomac and their vassals Zapotec and Tlaxcala. And we are alone in this. But at least we declared so I bet we know what we are doing.

Considering Tlaxcala and Zapotec are disloyal, that's totally winnable. But what about tech?

We are the beacon of civilization in Mexico. Understand: we are the only ones with Mil Tech 6. That should do it then. I focus on mil to keep on using that advantage, it's the only relevant tech in the new world anyway.

That's also really needed because of that guy and his 1 military. Oh well.

And what about diplomacy?

That's excellent. Can we look at the other countries in Mexico?

Wait. There are no other countries?

We, Aztec and vassals, Tarascan and vassals, Totomac and vassals, and noone else left in Mexico. That's interesting, we need 20 provinces to pass a reform, and we need to get some from Aztec. But first, let's focus on that war we were fighting.

I'll try to pass at least a reform, I'll see how it goes.

 

[TenshiN]

Wow, such a change from Muscovy Somehow i sense that you'll have to play the Xiu longer than the other tags to leave them in a decent enough shape for the AI not to screw them up Honestly, if that was me, i would've rerolled a new world start since the AI totally cannot play it decently...

 

[Sfan]

I chose a middle ground. No way I spend 50 years passing all the reforms to see them die to a colonizer in the end. But I'd like to try to do something, I enjoy the challenge of accepting what the game gave me. That's another kind of play and I like to experience all regions when doing this. A reform is not that long to pass anyway and getting the +10% infantry CA will help them, even if they are doomed anyway.