January - June 1866: Good Garry returns
So 1866 dawns. Italy is in turmoil (but at least it exists) and the Italian government seems more interested in colonial ventures than in recovering the Po valley. Ah well.
So to the standard reports:
Manufactured goods and other events
As in the table, that more or less completes the rail-net in Italy (apart from Savoy). Ammunition is useful as it sells well and uses inputs that I have lots of, so its quite an effective choice.
I think I’ve missed April from that list, but in effect as I slowly control the dissent, and open new factories, my industry is steadily expanding. I’m doing very little small scale adjustments. Same goes for international trade too, I could possibly optimise things but all my stockpiles are pretty static and I’m meeting the bulk of the (non-luxury) needs of my population.
Non-manufactured
Unhappy persons report
Not too much change here, my goal, if I can is to concentrate on driving up contentment and hope the militancy drains away. I’ve also deployed the
Carabinieri in the worst affected provinces (not sure if this helps but it seems sensible) and made use of the ‘army to suppress unrest’ option. Don’t like using this one too much (the NM hit) but it is quite powerful as you can see militancy dip from 8% to 5%.
Military Matters
Another with not too much going on. I’m content to do little in this respect for the moment and stockpile conscript companies for when I really need them.
And the events and changes
I only discovered this exists after a discussion with Powloon (its really handy having another AAR I can copy). It shows a lot more about progress in terms of prestige than the information I have used so far:
So I am #10 and only need 61,500 more prestige points (ie double the UK) to win. Well its unlikely, but I am going to emphasise prestige gaining options from now on.
And, as promised, Mr Baldi is back … angry and ‘hunting’
His explanation about his evil twin is not very plausible but the reinforcements are rather welcome.
And I am very active in the colonial game. Trying to secure my position around the south end of the Red Sea.
While Djibuti (green on the map as I can build a school there – am I not kind and generous) is my main focus, I’m also building up a presence in Aden and Yemen (other side of the Red Sea). This is outside my colonial zone so I actually lose prestige on this (according to the manual but I haven’t seen this in the actual tooltips), but it suits my emerging long term goal.
I think I can really nail down this region (Ethiopia is the medium term goal) and it gives me a useful extra front in case of war with the Ottomans (which is increasingly becoming my means to expand and gain prestige – or contract and be humiliated).
This is from a bit later, but shows my steadily growing influence in the region. In effect these two will push my CPs up to 30/35 and at that stage I can potentially move onto a full colony status.
This is the summary report. I’ve ignored Libya somewhat recently (only really have the cash and cards for one region at a time). The two numbers I’ve shown at the bottom are the cost of colonial upkeep (0 at the moment), my position in the colonial league table (11) and my regular prestige gain (0) as a result. As we’ll see over the next few years all these numbers will alter.
And of relevance for later, the lamentable state of the Ottoman empire is discussed. Not least, it is becoming clear there is a need for an international humitarian intervention to resolve some of the emerging problems in the Balkans.
And by the end of the period, Belgium has overtaken me again (actually I don’t really understand how this list is ordered or selected) and the Chinese seem to be insanely happy.
I am still #10 and have gained just under 400 prestige since February.
And it seems its not just the Ottomans who have problems with revolting citizens.