I'm amazed there's any population left in the Balkans or Asia Minor after all these wars there.
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How do you get to Bosnia? Do you have access through Albania? If not a quick attack on Albania would work. You may have just enough time to grab Suez from the USA. You have left the Ottomans in a very sorry state. Not aesthetically pleasing borders at all.
So the million dollar question is, will that final greedy land-grab give you the 500 points you need to move up in the ranking? I suspect it will... 
I'm quite sure you're right -- a double catspaw. The French telling the Ottomans what to do at the bidding of the Greeks. As often happens.
A reasonably good plan of action!
Actually, if I conquered Serbia, it would have taken much longer, though it might have gained me much. Freeing people would only hurt the Ottomans. I think it turned out as well as could be expected. Thanks! Ahh, yes -- I'm a little short on winemaking, indeed. Southern France would have been better, but it's hard to break into that monopoly, if you know what I mean.
I still enjoy good relations with the UK, but I'm sure they have a Casus Belli, if they wanted to use it.I'm pretty sure they have had an alliance with the UK since my first war with them. Good Heaven -- it's been so long I almost forgot I'd warred with them once. Just once -- not 20 wars, like in Sforza!
Nice victory
Does it close the gap remaining with France ?
Thanks! I'll show you in the next update.
Last screenshot shows his Great Power ranking as three...
My, Renss you got greedy in that war!
The last remaining question is: is one year left enough to lose all your recent gains?
Thanks! I just get this stubborn streak when my opponents get stubborn. I bull through by brute force of will.
One year to go, and so far to go....I'm hoping to catch up! We'll see...
Yeah, I'm kind of surprised on both counts too. Remember this is still v1.1, so the AI left something to be desired. The Turks were just so powerful, relative to all the other middle powers, that they're still hanging on. I've eaten so much of their empire, and there's so much left! The Russians would be similar, I suspect. You're correct -- there aren't alot of rivals for conquest, other than the other great powers, which have been pretty quiet.
Unfortunately there isn't much time for the AI to pound on the Ottoman's now
Yeah, pretty much over, except for the wrapup!
I wonder if that was fixed in later patches. It does seem odd, yes?
I guess there are plenty of poor POPs and they convert when a vacuum is left.I entered through a small Adriatic port in Montenegro. I considered Albania, but left them alone since they didn't attack me. I could start another war that way, as you suggest, but I want to concentrate on economy in my final year.
So the million dollar question is, will that final greedy land-grab give you the 500 points you need to move up in the ranking? I suspect it will...
The next update shall be fascinating, I'm sure!
Technically, that's possible, but they've staved it off. Unlike in real history, the Turks would have to have lost their government to rebels, as happened in Two Sicilies, for instance. And Greece. But the Young Turks remain a (probably) liberal movement which is unrealized.
I'll try to do an update in the next day or two. I'd promise before Wednesday, but I'm actually going to be watching the Thunderbirds at the Air Force Academy graduation that day -- a friend of mine is becoming a USAF Lieutenant! Come to think of it, I might see the Thunderbirds practicing today as I drive through the mountains on one of my jobs.
Thanks, everybody! See you soon.
Rensslaer
We were also fortunate enough to have captured some intact Factories in the Anatolian province of Kastamonu, in the Bolu region. During the days following the end of the war, we enacted more Social Reforms – an extension on our retirement pensions this time.
Siam, immediately after the war, was still at 3rd place. The Ottoman Empire, though, had dropped to 8th (from 6th before the second-to-the-last war, and 7th before the last one). Siam’s Infamy was a whopping 150! Turkish War Exhaustion was at 4%, which I gather must be pretty high, considering what I’ve seen in this and other games.
In the Great Power game, we’re still struggling to get China and Prussia back into our Sphere. In these closing months, we held off both US and Spanish attempts to get China into their Spheres, but were unable to bring China into ours, having expended our Influence keeping other powers from the summit.
After the war, our war costs went away, and we were able to balance our Budget again. It had become VERY unbalanced during the war, with plummeting Treasury figures. I’m glad we could restore some sanity in the wake of conflict. At least we’ve kept out of debt.
On February 15, after having recently been at rank 3, I noticed we’d finally overtaken France to claim the 2nd Great Power rank!
A closer look shows Siam ahead of France by only 21 points. Wow.
If you compare stats from 1932 vs. 1935 (i.e. before the last war), the Ottomans dropped one rank and lost nearly 300 points. That’s significant, I don’t have to tell you! And I’m sure it’s all our doing (plus, when you think about it, they probably would have added points, so maybe we cost them 500 or 600 all told). Spain added 200, Austria 300, Russia remained stagnant. The USA added 600, over those 3 years. UK gained about 1,500. The Ottomans lost a full 200 Industry points in 3 years – all of it transferred to Siam, or lost to combat damage. They lost Military too, obviously, and we cost them nearly 50 Prestige.
Siam gained 2,450 while France only gained 1,000 – THAT’s where we really caught up to them! France increased about 100 in Prestige, about 600 in Industry, and 300 in Military. Meanwhile, we increased by 200 Prestige, nearly 1,500 Military, and nearly 800 Industry over the same period! Sadly, France is still a whole 1,500 points ahead of us in Industry!
We finally completed our Chilean/Andean colony in South America! This gives us a foothold on our 4th Continent! Our 5th, if you count Borneo or Java or our Pacific island colonies as part of Oceania. We immediately began colonizing part of Patagonia, but there was no hope of finishing before the end of the game. We chose the northernmost of two regions to colonize in order to cut off anybody to the north so they couldn’t colonize.
As usual, competing powers claimed part of the colonized region – we lost this to Chile, but we got the lion’s share.
Sorry for the mismatched sizes of the following screenshots – Photobucket reduces the size sometimes if it gets too long. The next 2 show all of our Factories near the end of the game. We have 30 states, and 27 of them have factories, though Asyut will soon have completed factories to make it 28.
My first Tank Factories are days from coming online. I’ll have to subsidize those, too, in order to produce anything. I’ve got autos and aeroplanes going, already, but they are being subsidized – there’s just not enough demand. I was fine when Siam was the world’s strongest naval power, but trying to become the world’s strongest land power also is proving more complicated.
I’m making plenty of profits in many of my factories – this counteracts the losses from the high-tech items. Most of my most profitable factories are already at maximum expansion, and those that aren’t are generally in construction to reach higher levels. When I captured Bolu (northern Anatolia) I actually got 8 Factories, already there! That high unemployed figure is only because they haven’t had time to get settled – they’ll start producing soon, and we’ll be in good shape.
I wish I had more of those profitable Steel Factories, but I can only place those in states that have Iron, and geographically I’m just not well situated for that. I’d fire my Labor Minister, if I could tell what he’s doing wrong… There are Wine Factories producing tremendous profits in some states, and Wine Factories in other states that are barely hanging on. Not 100% sure why. Same for Fabric and Glass – great profits some places, not others. Fabric was always one of our sure-fire sellers. At least our Steamships are still doing great (partly our doing – still building lots of Cruisers and Dreadnoughts!
Nevertheless, at some point in the spring of 1935, we experienced a form of recession of sorts. Almost an economic crash. Again, I’m not completely sure I can explain it, though I think I have some ideas. The subsidies are one of my suspects, and my efforts to end subsidies threw things into more disarray.
So Siam dropped back down to 3rd place. We’d held 2nd for only about 3 weeks! Gah! In those 3 weeks, France gained about 10 Military, and stayed even on the others. Siam gained 25 Prestige (!), gained about 50 Military (!!), but lost almost 300 Industry points (!!!). Something I did, or the war did, caused massive fluctuations throughout the World Market, and our supply/demand constant must have crashed. I expect there were also disruptions in the population, perhaps caused by my postwar readjustment of the Budget, starting of new factories, reducing of Military Spending, etc., but I can’t finger any one cause.
Worse, we lost the race to get Prussia. Worse still, they went to France!
So, in light of our financial crisis, and my desperate desire to regain those 300 Industry points and thereby the 2nd Great Power rank once more, I began doing some rather heroic things to rescue my economy!
One thing I tried was to reduce Military Spending dramatically, at the risk of losing Military points, in hopes of regaining Industry points. This would, theoretically, have the effect of forcing soldiers into other occupations. I also did the rather extreme “military layoff gambit” – I found soldiers whose home base was where factories couldn’t staff their full production, and disbanded them, sending the soldiers back into the population (it doesn’t happen like that directly, but it contributes to the likelihood of them turning to other jobs).
Thankfully, the UK knocked Prussia out of France’s Sphere of Influence in the late spring, and we were able to capitalize upon this – we grabbed Prussia for ourselves, once more!
Add this to our successful research into Electrical Power Generation (we’ve had electricity for a while, but this particular tech spreads its effect dramatically), which adds 10% to our total productivity (minus the 1 percent farms, which pales by comparison).
We follow that research up with Cheap Iron, which incredibly we can just barely fit in before the end of the game! I wonder if the game will even be able to tally the effect before it ends. I presume we’ll actually achieve the tech a day or week early, so…
Another major discovery in December helps us out – another 5% to total output. You’d think we’d be catching up, right? But, remarkably, we’ve gained 400 Military points (probably due to Dreadnaughts), but we’ve actually LOST another 450 Industry points since March! That’s a total of 750 lost Industry points since the end of the war!!! This is NOT how I’d pictured things happening!
DING! The final bell tolls. And, unfortunately, it tolls for our lost 2nd place ranking. We end the game nearly 300 points behind France. My only comfort is that gains in the other ranking categories made up most of the economic strength we’d lost. We did rally in Industry score in those final 30 days, and increased 100 from where we bottomed out (still 650 below where we were at the end of the war, though!).
Thankfully, the USA has settled into an uneasy realization it’s never likely to catch up to the mighty Siam in its rankings. The Ottomans remain a mere 130 points ahead of Switzerland – its nearest rival for Great Power status – and they also remain well behind Spain, which, frankly, is embarrassing. To their credit, though, Spain is making a bid for 6th place, and given another five years or so might have surpassed the Russians.
The other top 16 powers seem pretty evenly spaced, except for maybe Prussia, which lags Krakow by only 15 points (again – kind of embarrassing, but Prussia never really had a chance in this game, getting some bad breaks early on).
Siam remains comfortably the 2nd most well-respected military power, though I’m sure the French would have grounds to protest their 3rd place ranking on grounds of technology and performance. The USA could be content with their 2nd rank Industrial power. Siam only got 4th there. In the final tally, Siam actually became the #1 most Prestigious power in the whole world – a position Siam had never held before the very final days of the game (and which was only by 22 points, but who’s counting?)! I take that as a very high compliment!
I don’t know why I always rank the comparisons by number of ships instead of number of brigades – it’s slightly possible I’m excluding some more significant land powers because of it, but I doubt it. Above you’ll see how Siam really does rule the waves. Also consider many of the ships in USA, Spain and the UK are actually sailing vessels, still, and you’ll see that Siam probably completely outclasses everybody but France herself.
The UK is just ridiculously powerful – I don’t need to tell you that. I’m glad we never had to come to blows. I’m sure their land techs would have been comparable to France’s, so it would have been embarrassing. Looking at the numbers, I’m wondering how Mexico might have fared in a war with the USA. I don’t remember them actually going to war very often, if at all.
The above chart shows our most profitable states, and the products which placed them there.
The below chart gives you a good impression of why Siam was so outclassed by the UK – this is a shot of the UK’s production, which totally blows Siam away.
And so it goes, and so it goes…
Siam, immediately after the war, was still at 3rd place. The Ottoman Empire, though, had dropped to 8th (from 6th before the second-to-the-last war, and 7th before the last one). Siam’s Infamy was a whopping 150! Turkish War Exhaustion was at 4%, which I gather must be pretty high, considering what I’ve seen in this and other games.
In the Great Power game, we’re still struggling to get China and Prussia back into our Sphere. In these closing months, we held off both US and Spanish attempts to get China into their Spheres, but were unable to bring China into ours, having expended our Influence keeping other powers from the summit.
After the war, our war costs went away, and we were able to balance our Budget again. It had become VERY unbalanced during the war, with plummeting Treasury figures. I’m glad we could restore some sanity in the wake of conflict. At least we’ve kept out of debt.
On February 15, after having recently been at rank 3, I noticed we’d finally overtaken France to claim the 2nd Great Power rank!
A closer look shows Siam ahead of France by only 21 points. Wow.
If you compare stats from 1932 vs. 1935 (i.e. before the last war), the Ottomans dropped one rank and lost nearly 300 points. That’s significant, I don’t have to tell you! And I’m sure it’s all our doing (plus, when you think about it, they probably would have added points, so maybe we cost them 500 or 600 all told). Spain added 200, Austria 300, Russia remained stagnant. The USA added 600, over those 3 years. UK gained about 1,500. The Ottomans lost a full 200 Industry points in 3 years – all of it transferred to Siam, or lost to combat damage. They lost Military too, obviously, and we cost them nearly 50 Prestige.
Siam gained 2,450 while France only gained 1,000 – THAT’s where we really caught up to them! France increased about 100 in Prestige, about 600 in Industry, and 300 in Military. Meanwhile, we increased by 200 Prestige, nearly 1,500 Military, and nearly 800 Industry over the same period! Sadly, France is still a whole 1,500 points ahead of us in Industry!
We finally completed our Chilean/Andean colony in South America! This gives us a foothold on our 4th Continent! Our 5th, if you count Borneo or Java or our Pacific island colonies as part of Oceania. We immediately began colonizing part of Patagonia, but there was no hope of finishing before the end of the game. We chose the northernmost of two regions to colonize in order to cut off anybody to the north so they couldn’t colonize.
As usual, competing powers claimed part of the colonized region – we lost this to Chile, but we got the lion’s share.
Sorry for the mismatched sizes of the following screenshots – Photobucket reduces the size sometimes if it gets too long. The next 2 show all of our Factories near the end of the game. We have 30 states, and 27 of them have factories, though Asyut will soon have completed factories to make it 28.
My first Tank Factories are days from coming online. I’ll have to subsidize those, too, in order to produce anything. I’ve got autos and aeroplanes going, already, but they are being subsidized – there’s just not enough demand. I was fine when Siam was the world’s strongest naval power, but trying to become the world’s strongest land power also is proving more complicated.
I’m making plenty of profits in many of my factories – this counteracts the losses from the high-tech items. Most of my most profitable factories are already at maximum expansion, and those that aren’t are generally in construction to reach higher levels. When I captured Bolu (northern Anatolia) I actually got 8 Factories, already there! That high unemployed figure is only because they haven’t had time to get settled – they’ll start producing soon, and we’ll be in good shape.
I wish I had more of those profitable Steel Factories, but I can only place those in states that have Iron, and geographically I’m just not well situated for that. I’d fire my Labor Minister, if I could tell what he’s doing wrong… There are Wine Factories producing tremendous profits in some states, and Wine Factories in other states that are barely hanging on. Not 100% sure why. Same for Fabric and Glass – great profits some places, not others. Fabric was always one of our sure-fire sellers. At least our Steamships are still doing great (partly our doing – still building lots of Cruisers and Dreadnoughts!
Nevertheless, at some point in the spring of 1935, we experienced a form of recession of sorts. Almost an economic crash. Again, I’m not completely sure I can explain it, though I think I have some ideas. The subsidies are one of my suspects, and my efforts to end subsidies threw things into more disarray.
So Siam dropped back down to 3rd place. We’d held 2nd for only about 3 weeks! Gah! In those 3 weeks, France gained about 10 Military, and stayed even on the others. Siam gained 25 Prestige (!), gained about 50 Military (!!), but lost almost 300 Industry points (!!!). Something I did, or the war did, caused massive fluctuations throughout the World Market, and our supply/demand constant must have crashed. I expect there were also disruptions in the population, perhaps caused by my postwar readjustment of the Budget, starting of new factories, reducing of Military Spending, etc., but I can’t finger any one cause.
Worse, we lost the race to get Prussia. Worse still, they went to France!
So, in light of our financial crisis, and my desperate desire to regain those 300 Industry points and thereby the 2nd Great Power rank once more, I began doing some rather heroic things to rescue my economy!
One thing I tried was to reduce Military Spending dramatically, at the risk of losing Military points, in hopes of regaining Industry points. This would, theoretically, have the effect of forcing soldiers into other occupations. I also did the rather extreme “military layoff gambit” – I found soldiers whose home base was where factories couldn’t staff their full production, and disbanded them, sending the soldiers back into the population (it doesn’t happen like that directly, but it contributes to the likelihood of them turning to other jobs).
Thankfully, the UK knocked Prussia out of France’s Sphere of Influence in the late spring, and we were able to capitalize upon this – we grabbed Prussia for ourselves, once more!
Add this to our successful research into Electrical Power Generation (we’ve had electricity for a while, but this particular tech spreads its effect dramatically), which adds 10% to our total productivity (minus the 1 percent farms, which pales by comparison).
We follow that research up with Cheap Iron, which incredibly we can just barely fit in before the end of the game! I wonder if the game will even be able to tally the effect before it ends. I presume we’ll actually achieve the tech a day or week early, so…
Another major discovery in December helps us out – another 5% to total output. You’d think we’d be catching up, right? But, remarkably, we’ve gained 400 Military points (probably due to Dreadnaughts), but we’ve actually LOST another 450 Industry points since March! That’s a total of 750 lost Industry points since the end of the war!!! This is NOT how I’d pictured things happening!
DING! The final bell tolls. And, unfortunately, it tolls for our lost 2nd place ranking. We end the game nearly 300 points behind France. My only comfort is that gains in the other ranking categories made up most of the economic strength we’d lost. We did rally in Industry score in those final 30 days, and increased 100 from where we bottomed out (still 650 below where we were at the end of the war, though!).
Thankfully, the USA has settled into an uneasy realization it’s never likely to catch up to the mighty Siam in its rankings. The Ottomans remain a mere 130 points ahead of Switzerland – its nearest rival for Great Power status – and they also remain well behind Spain, which, frankly, is embarrassing.
To their credit, though, Spain is making a bid for 6th place, and given another five years or so might have surpassed the Russians.The other top 16 powers seem pretty evenly spaced, except for maybe Prussia, which lags Krakow by only 15 points (again – kind of embarrassing, but Prussia never really had a chance in this game, getting some bad breaks early on).
Siam remains comfortably the 2nd most well-respected military power, though I’m sure the French would have grounds to protest their 3rd place ranking on grounds of technology and performance. The USA could be content with their 2nd rank Industrial power. Siam only got 4th there. In the final tally, Siam actually became the #1 most Prestigious power in the whole world – a position Siam had never held before the very final days of the game (and which was only by 22 points, but who’s counting?)! I take that as a very high compliment!
I don’t know why I always rank the comparisons by number of ships instead of number of brigades – it’s slightly possible I’m excluding some more significant land powers because of it, but I doubt it. Above you’ll see how Siam really does rule the waves. Also consider many of the ships in USA, Spain and the UK are actually sailing vessels, still, and you’ll see that Siam probably completely outclasses everybody but France herself.
The UK is just ridiculously powerful – I don’t need to tell you that. I’m glad we never had to come to blows. I’m sure their land techs would have been comparable to France’s, so it would have been embarrassing. Looking at the numbers, I’m wondering how Mexico might have fared in a war with the USA. I don’t remember them actually going to war very often, if at all.
The above chart shows our most profitable states, and the products which placed them there.
The below chart gives you a good impression of why Siam was so outclassed by the UK – this is a shot of the UK’s production, which totally blows Siam away.
And so it goes, and so it goes…
THE END
Thanks for following!
Thanks for following!
An absolutely fantastic achievement! I'd love to see you do another AAR in Vicky 2 with either 1.3 or the 1.4 beta. My hat is off to you!
brilliant stuff and suitably nail biting end ... so near to #2. Thanks for this, you, and a few others, have effectively taught me V2 from the clarity of AARs. In this case the ride from seeking to be the biggest in SE Asia to looking down on most conventional major powers has been impressive. A final bit of praise, I really like the clarity of the images you pull together in all your AARs.
So you mean to tell me that Siamese troops were camping out in the Balkans for years, unable to return to their homeland? :rofl:
The UK, and to a lesser extent France, are almost impossible to overtake in V2. My friend experimented with weakening the UK. He disbanded their entire army and navy, demolished all their factories, released every possible country that could be released, repeatedly switched ruling parties to get militancy up to 10, and then had other countries declare war on the UK to humiliate them (which he had the UK accept).
Incredibly, within a few years the UK's scores were practically back where they used to be.
We came to the conclusion that British India was the key to their power, The last screenshot shows that all but a few of the top resource-producing provinces are in India. Since the UK can't voluntarily release these provinces, we'll have to have other countries declare war on them for it.
The UK, and to a lesser extent France, are almost impossible to overtake in V2. My friend experimented with weakening the UK. He disbanded their entire army and navy, demolished all their factories, released every possible country that could be released, repeatedly switched ruling parties to get militancy up to 10, and then had other countries declare war on the UK to humiliate them (which he had the UK accept).
Incredibly, within a few years the UK's scores were practically back where they used to be.
We came to the conclusion that British India was the key to their power, The last screenshot shows that all but a few of the top resource-producing provinces are in India. Since the UK can't voluntarily release these provinces, we'll have to have other countries declare war on them for it.
Awesome AAR.
Given the number of achievements you managed, who would blame you for being 300 points behind France ? Not I... you have taken an unciv nation and brought it only less than 300 points behind the second place. Congratulations.
Reading your AAR, it almost seemed easy to do. But we all know different. You succeeded, despite a few hardships, where i have failed even with civ nations.
Last but not least, like loki, i would like to praise you for the clarity of your AAR, the lessons you tought us... or at least tought me, on strategy in the game.
Thank you so much
Given the number of achievements you managed, who would blame you for being 300 points behind France ? Not I... you have taken an unciv nation and brought it only less than 300 points behind the second place. Congratulations.
Reading your AAR, it almost seemed easy to do. But we all know different. You succeeded, despite a few hardships, where i have failed even with civ nations.
Last but not least, like loki, i would like to praise you for the clarity of your AAR, the lessons you tought us... or at least tought me, on strategy in the game.
Thank you so much
Yet another great AAR. I just wish I could play like you I look forward to all your future works.
I look forward to all your future works.
Quoting you from the first page.
Amazing. Absolutely amazing what you did there.
Starting with a minor country not even knowing what to expect and conquering yourself up to rank three only 300 points behind the second is more than an impressive achievement. And this AAR is even more: It helped me to understand VII like no tutorial ever could, congratulations and many thanks for this great work! I can't wait to read your next VII AAR.
Congratulations! Great AAR with plenty to learn from it. The evil-imperialist French AI clearly sabotaged your economy in the last few months, but you are still second in our eyes!
I hope you don't abandon Vicky altogether, though... How much do we have to pay you over and above whatever your HoI readers are paying for you to stay? :rofl:
I hope you don't abandon Vicky altogether, though... How much do we have to pay you over and above whatever your HoI readers are paying for you to stay? :rofl: