Since Spain was placed as the Evil Empire by most of the players, I decided to give it a spin (I also happen to be from Spain LOL). I hope you enjoy the style of writing, even if the first 8 years didn't offer much action. here it goes.....
It is the year of the Lord 1492, and Their royal highnesses the Catholic Majesties rule glorious Spain. Recently joined Castille and Aragon have created the first truly nation-state in Europe. I¡¯m have been recently introduced in court in the role of advisor, but events have trust me into the forefront of my nation¡¯s decision making process. Due to the death of my predecessor, Don Pedro Mier de Burgos, I¡¯m to take the role of First Royal Advisor to the Catholic Majesties.
700 years of Reconquista are coming to an end with our 40k army poised to conquer Granada. We have possessions in France and in the Low Countries and Naples is our, oh so faithful, vassal.
Looking at our situation, I decide that I have a major enemy, France, and a major cleanup process in the Iberian Peninsula with Granada and Navarra in my list.
1492:
January- Our 40k army sieges Granada but the Granada Army gives us the slip and sieges Andalucia, what lowly coward dogs!
In other parts of our possessions, and knowing the French trait of avarice, we fortify the Franche-Comte (since many nations, especially France, believe we store our treasures there- fools, little do they know that we have planted that rumor ourselves) and we build a 4k army in Artois. We also invite Lorraine to our alliance, thereby placing 20k allied troops near the French border
A crazy Italian explorer by the name of Columbus comes to court with stories of nonsense, saying that he can find the Indies by going west, but¡¦. Doesn¡¯t he know he¡¯ll fall off Earth if he sails that way? Anyway their Catholic Majesties give him a 3-ship expedition so that he would shut up and send him on his way.
So far I¡¯m satisfied with the current turn of events, but how little would I know that the next 2 years were going to be a nightmare for my administration and almost lands me a free one way ticket to the closest penal colony.
In February their Catholic Majesties order me to continue the war on the moors and order me to conquer Orania. Don¡¯t they know that we have a war already in our hands! Besides there are news of 2 French armies of 26k and 27k troops going north of France, destination unknown. I conveniently choose to ignore the royal order and go about my business of conquering Granada.
Our siege of Sierra Nevada continues, but we are forced to battle 6k recruits, which we disbanded, but instead of retreating towards their army, they go to Murcia, which isn¡¯t fortified! By the end of March the hardship of the siege has whistle down our army to 33k and we loose Murcia.
Cologne offers us a royal marriage, we accept as we hope to cover our Low Countries provinces with German allies. The princess of Cologne is reputed to be ¡°strong and willed as a mule¡±, and she looks like one too, so our nobles aren¡¯t anxious to meet this fine woman. Since nobody volunteered to marry the daughter of the King of Cologne, I make various nobles to draw the shortest straws to select the happy groom, and the son of the Duke of Medina is ¡°selected¡± to marry Elsa, who looks as if she lifts wheelbarrows for fun. It took 5 royal guards to place him tied and gagged in a carriage and send him to Madrid for the happy ceremony.
In April, we send merchants, in hopes to increase our income, without resorting to war taxes, but our war against Granada has stagnated. Granada troops are still in a siege against Andalucia. It is being called The Race of the Sieges.
To further strengthen our alliance, we invite The Palatinate into our alliance, giving us another 20k friends near the French border. Why do the French give me such funny feeling! Every time I see a Frenchman, I want to reach for my sword!
Austria asks us to accept one of their royal sons into marriage, so we accepted, as we feel we might need all the friends we can get! Since it is a Prince, The Catholic Majesties marry their daughter of to Phillip (The birth of a future Hapsburg dynasty!)
By May our army is down to 23k, there is just no way we can sustain them and the winter was pretty harsh in the Sierra Nevada (not without reason it is called Sierra Nevada- Snowy mountain range). We ship our army 7k reinforcements plus supplies, via Murcia, which we promptly recover.
Meanwhile, the 2 missing French armies have reappeared near Paris; we start to worry about our northern provinces!
In July the siege of Sierra Nevada continues. Our Army is down to 23k and that includes the reinforcements! What hardships those soldiers are going through, I can¡¯t imagine.
Their Majesties confess to me that they are greatly preoccupied about France, so they send a Diplomat to Helvetia and invite them to join our alliance, which they accept! Now we have a total of 65k soldiers, besides our own, surrounding France.
The Grenadine army lifts their siege of Andalucia and decides to attack our army. They heavily outnumber our army, 32k to 23k but we fight them like cornered wolfs. Even if our troops have been on starvation diet for 8 months they cut down the Grenadines to 11k but their strength leaves them and are defeated. Our 14k hungry troops retreat to Murcia.
In September Granada sieges Andalucia again, but after several costly assaults it remains in our hands. We siege Sierra Nevada again to relieve the pressure on Andalucia. In December Columbus, that good for nothing, discovers a new route to the Indies, discovering Tortuga?! Funny name for the Indies, but we still rejoice and I¡¯m forced to reevaluate my opinion about Columbus, so I named him Admiral of the fleet to show him there are no hard feeling.
1493:
In Feb. we are able to build artillery and we immediately order 10 pieces, in hope to break the stalemate with Grenada or else I have been warned to a) start packing or b) never worry about neckties in the future. We reinforce our army to 20k including the 10 guns and send them to Sierra Nevada. In April we wipe out 7k newly recruited troops in Sierra Nevada and we start the siege of the province. 10 days later, disaster strikes, horrible news, Grenada conquers Andalucia, and they send a peace offer requesting Andalucia and our treasure (all 8 ducats). Barely controlling my anger (and fearful of my neck), I tell the grenadine ambassador to stick it where it fits!!
I¡¯m worried, there is a headsman sharpening his axe in the courtyard of the castle, and he is looking at me in a funny way. The other day he asked me if he could draw a dotted line across my neck, but I drew my sword and the knave suddenly mumbled something about cooking and found something else to do.
In may the 28k Grenada army goes to Extremadura, another of our unfortified provinces, which in conquered and then march to Toledo were they start a siege. I can hear the sharpening of the axe again. Grenada sends another peace offer by which they keep Andalucia, but I again tell them to go and rearrange their anatomy in alphabetical order. Hoping that Toledo will hold we assault Sierra Nevada and by Sept. we have conquered the enemy capital. The Grenada army lifts the siege of Toledo, however since we cut them from their supply base their numbers are cut down to 21k.
In July, Columbus returns from the Indies, but he only has one ship left. Since the war looks to be going our way, the catholic majesties decide to build him an additional fleet, and a call is placed throughout the kingdom for adventurous lads to go conquer the Indies.
In October our army, instead of waiting for the Grenada army, is sent to Andalucia, which they take it by storm. While the Granada army is stuck holding the bag, besieging Sierra Nevada, we reconquer Extremadura. The Grenada ambassador arrives to court with a white peace offer. I can barely contain my laughter without hurting myself. Rejecting the white peace offer with great glee, we wait for the inevitable fall of Granada. After an ineffective assault on Sierra Nevada, Grenada sees the writing in the wall and accepts our offer of annexation. Now we gain a new province and the Grenada 25k army becomes ours as a bonus!!
Since the headsman was sad that I saved my neck, I have him the necks of the top Grenadine officers starting with the ambassador, so he could practice. After all the misunderstanding we had earlier, he comes off as a nice guy, his name is Axel (of course!) and he has a simplistic view at the world. The Grenadine king is sent on exile, and after looking at his kingdom for the last time, he cried. His mother said ¡°don¡¯t cry like a woman, what you couldn¡¯t defend like a man¡±. Phew, perhaps he should have sent his mother to fight!
1494:
This year starts like a new dawn for Spain (again!). We are the dominating power in the Iberian Peninsula, which we share with Portugal and insidious Navarra. The last 2 years we have been too caught in our struggle with Granada, but now we can turn our attention to other goals. Leaving the recently acquired grenadine army to guard our border with Portugal, we rush 20k to our border with France at Gerona, were we can also strike Navarra, just in case.
Our strategy is to contain France and if possible to carve it up between our allies and ourselves. In the Iberian Peninsula we want to annex Navarra and cut down Portugal. We also decide to expand our nonexistent presence in the Indies. With those goals in mind we decide to grow our army.
In February we decide to build up our army in Artois to 14k, while the French across the border fortify Paris and further down, they fortify Lyonnaise. I feel this is the calm before the storm.
Looking at the diplomatic stage, I find that there are 3 main alliances in Europe. The first is Spain, Lorraine, England, Palatinate, Milan and Helvetia. The second one is France, Savoy, Papal States, and Navarra. The third alliance is Hanseatic League, Portugal, Poland-Lithuania, Hannover and the Teutonic order.
With these 3 huge alliances everybody is afraid of making the first moves, as it might bring the other 2 alliances against them. I suggest caution to their Catholic Majesties, as the situation is akin to swimming with sharks (of course we are the biggest shark, but even then¡¦.)
In May we invite Hessen into the Alliance, which brings another 35k troops into our camp. Now we have close to 150k troops surrounding France, and we have a buffer zone between the Spanish Low Countries and the Hanseatic League.
In June we send 2 royal cousins to Kleves and Palatinate, to tighten our presence in that area. Since we send them 2 beauties, the German princes have fistfights over them (after looking at Elsa, I can¡¯t blame them).
In July, Naples rejects our proposal of alliance. Lowly bastards! They are our vassals but they won¡¯t join our alliance!! Their majesties are incensed and command me to ship troops to Naples to remind them who is the boss.
By October, what seemed like a peaceful year is almost over, but the Muslims decided to start some festivities with Turkey DOWing the Mameluks. It is over before it started, with Turkey coughing a whooping 18 gold to end the war. Thinking that Turkey was going to be in a protracted war, Moldavia declares war on Turkey. Phew! somebody badly miscalculated that move, and I¡¯m sure they are kicking themselves over there in Moldavia.
1495:
Jan. sees a new Portuguese king- Manuel I (as if we really cared!). Two brave military leaders come to the fore in Spain, General Colonna and Marshall Cordoba (a pompous ass if you ask me). We immediately send them to command two armies, one in Extremadura and the other at Gerona, in the frontier with France and Navarra. In order to fortify our Low Countries presence we build up the defenses in Friesen.
In April we decided to build an expedition force to the Indies so we assemble 4k soldiers and 10 cannon. In June we start to land troops in Naples, pretty soon we increase our presence there to 11k soldiers, 2k Calvary and 20 cannon. Across the border, we see the Papal States in a state of stupor, perhaps the Pope has decided to remove himself from temporal matters and passes his time praying?
1496:
1496 rolls by and still there is an uneasy peace in Europe. I decide to increase our army in Artois to 22k troops and we increase the fortress in the province of Holland.
In April, Moldavia sues for peace, costing them 243 gold ones to buy peace from Turkey. The war minister of Moldavia is given concrete shoes and goes to the sea to feed the lobsters.
1497:
We are still at peace, my military forces are bored to death, but nobody is squeaking anywhere in Europe. At this pace, the merchants are seeing more action than the generals. Elsewhere in Europe, we decide to be nice to Cologne (read $$$) and see if we can get them into the alliance, but no luck yet. I can¡¯t understand Cologne¡¯s attitude, but then again, perhaps the king heard how the groom was selected?
In April the quiet is broken when Venetia DOWs Turkey. Iraq, Hungary and the Mameluks join Venetia, while Crimea joins the Turks. This creates so much commotion in our diplomatic corps that one diplomatic actually wakes up and goes to Venetia to check out the action.
1498:
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
March: Being so bored, I decide to send Columbus to the Indies again to see what he can uncover. Our call for brave lads has gone unanswered, so the conquest of the Indies will have to wait.
In October Columbus discovers a place called Puerto Rico, and we start to get the feeling that we might have not discovered the Indies after all, but maybe something else, hhmmm.
We also hear that Constantinople is being besieged, but we do not know by whom (not that we care!)
In December we establish a trading post in Puerto Rico, and we get our first good look at the natives. Everybody at court comments that they sure look funny for Chinese. Columbus also discovers the Antilles and comes back to Spain.
1499:
All is quiet on the Western Front¡¦¡¦
¡¦¡¦¡¦but further east, the action is heating up (sigh!).
The Mameluks make peace with Turkey, but it costs Turkey Sivas, which goes to the Mameluks.
We also get our first conquistador (Ojeda)!! so he is send packing with Columbus in June to Puerto Rico, were we have our first trading post. The expedition consists of 5k infantry and 10 cannon. Pinzon also appears in Holland, and he is sent to explore the coasts of Africa.
In October we reach an agreement with Portugal in Tordesillas, by which we divide the non- European world between us, to the dismay of other European nations.
It is the year of the Lord 1492, and Their royal highnesses the Catholic Majesties rule glorious Spain. Recently joined Castille and Aragon have created the first truly nation-state in Europe. I¡¯m have been recently introduced in court in the role of advisor, but events have trust me into the forefront of my nation¡¯s decision making process. Due to the death of my predecessor, Don Pedro Mier de Burgos, I¡¯m to take the role of First Royal Advisor to the Catholic Majesties.
700 years of Reconquista are coming to an end with our 40k army poised to conquer Granada. We have possessions in France and in the Low Countries and Naples is our, oh so faithful, vassal.
Looking at our situation, I decide that I have a major enemy, France, and a major cleanup process in the Iberian Peninsula with Granada and Navarra in my list.
1492:
January- Our 40k army sieges Granada but the Granada Army gives us the slip and sieges Andalucia, what lowly coward dogs!
In other parts of our possessions, and knowing the French trait of avarice, we fortify the Franche-Comte (since many nations, especially France, believe we store our treasures there- fools, little do they know that we have planted that rumor ourselves) and we build a 4k army in Artois. We also invite Lorraine to our alliance, thereby placing 20k allied troops near the French border
A crazy Italian explorer by the name of Columbus comes to court with stories of nonsense, saying that he can find the Indies by going west, but¡¦. Doesn¡¯t he know he¡¯ll fall off Earth if he sails that way? Anyway their Catholic Majesties give him a 3-ship expedition so that he would shut up and send him on his way.
So far I¡¯m satisfied with the current turn of events, but how little would I know that the next 2 years were going to be a nightmare for my administration and almost lands me a free one way ticket to the closest penal colony.
In February their Catholic Majesties order me to continue the war on the moors and order me to conquer Orania. Don¡¯t they know that we have a war already in our hands! Besides there are news of 2 French armies of 26k and 27k troops going north of France, destination unknown. I conveniently choose to ignore the royal order and go about my business of conquering Granada.
Our siege of Sierra Nevada continues, but we are forced to battle 6k recruits, which we disbanded, but instead of retreating towards their army, they go to Murcia, which isn¡¯t fortified! By the end of March the hardship of the siege has whistle down our army to 33k and we loose Murcia.
Cologne offers us a royal marriage, we accept as we hope to cover our Low Countries provinces with German allies. The princess of Cologne is reputed to be ¡°strong and willed as a mule¡±, and she looks like one too, so our nobles aren¡¯t anxious to meet this fine woman. Since nobody volunteered to marry the daughter of the King of Cologne, I make various nobles to draw the shortest straws to select the happy groom, and the son of the Duke of Medina is ¡°selected¡± to marry Elsa, who looks as if she lifts wheelbarrows for fun. It took 5 royal guards to place him tied and gagged in a carriage and send him to Madrid for the happy ceremony.
In April, we send merchants, in hopes to increase our income, without resorting to war taxes, but our war against Granada has stagnated. Granada troops are still in a siege against Andalucia. It is being called The Race of the Sieges.
To further strengthen our alliance, we invite The Palatinate into our alliance, giving us another 20k friends near the French border. Why do the French give me such funny feeling! Every time I see a Frenchman, I want to reach for my sword!
Austria asks us to accept one of their royal sons into marriage, so we accepted, as we feel we might need all the friends we can get! Since it is a Prince, The Catholic Majesties marry their daughter of to Phillip (The birth of a future Hapsburg dynasty!)
By May our army is down to 23k, there is just no way we can sustain them and the winter was pretty harsh in the Sierra Nevada (not without reason it is called Sierra Nevada- Snowy mountain range). We ship our army 7k reinforcements plus supplies, via Murcia, which we promptly recover.
Meanwhile, the 2 missing French armies have reappeared near Paris; we start to worry about our northern provinces!
In July the siege of Sierra Nevada continues. Our Army is down to 23k and that includes the reinforcements! What hardships those soldiers are going through, I can¡¯t imagine.
Their Majesties confess to me that they are greatly preoccupied about France, so they send a Diplomat to Helvetia and invite them to join our alliance, which they accept! Now we have a total of 65k soldiers, besides our own, surrounding France.
The Grenadine army lifts their siege of Andalucia and decides to attack our army. They heavily outnumber our army, 32k to 23k but we fight them like cornered wolfs. Even if our troops have been on starvation diet for 8 months they cut down the Grenadines to 11k but their strength leaves them and are defeated. Our 14k hungry troops retreat to Murcia.
In September Granada sieges Andalucia again, but after several costly assaults it remains in our hands. We siege Sierra Nevada again to relieve the pressure on Andalucia. In December Columbus, that good for nothing, discovers a new route to the Indies, discovering Tortuga?! Funny name for the Indies, but we still rejoice and I¡¯m forced to reevaluate my opinion about Columbus, so I named him Admiral of the fleet to show him there are no hard feeling.
1493:
In Feb. we are able to build artillery and we immediately order 10 pieces, in hope to break the stalemate with Grenada or else I have been warned to a) start packing or b) never worry about neckties in the future. We reinforce our army to 20k including the 10 guns and send them to Sierra Nevada. In April we wipe out 7k newly recruited troops in Sierra Nevada and we start the siege of the province. 10 days later, disaster strikes, horrible news, Grenada conquers Andalucia, and they send a peace offer requesting Andalucia and our treasure (all 8 ducats). Barely controlling my anger (and fearful of my neck), I tell the grenadine ambassador to stick it where it fits!!
I¡¯m worried, there is a headsman sharpening his axe in the courtyard of the castle, and he is looking at me in a funny way. The other day he asked me if he could draw a dotted line across my neck, but I drew my sword and the knave suddenly mumbled something about cooking and found something else to do.
In may the 28k Grenada army goes to Extremadura, another of our unfortified provinces, which in conquered and then march to Toledo were they start a siege. I can hear the sharpening of the axe again. Grenada sends another peace offer by which they keep Andalucia, but I again tell them to go and rearrange their anatomy in alphabetical order. Hoping that Toledo will hold we assault Sierra Nevada and by Sept. we have conquered the enemy capital. The Grenada army lifts the siege of Toledo, however since we cut them from their supply base their numbers are cut down to 21k.
In July, Columbus returns from the Indies, but he only has one ship left. Since the war looks to be going our way, the catholic majesties decide to build him an additional fleet, and a call is placed throughout the kingdom for adventurous lads to go conquer the Indies.
In October our army, instead of waiting for the Grenada army, is sent to Andalucia, which they take it by storm. While the Granada army is stuck holding the bag, besieging Sierra Nevada, we reconquer Extremadura. The Grenada ambassador arrives to court with a white peace offer. I can barely contain my laughter without hurting myself. Rejecting the white peace offer with great glee, we wait for the inevitable fall of Granada. After an ineffective assault on Sierra Nevada, Grenada sees the writing in the wall and accepts our offer of annexation. Now we gain a new province and the Grenada 25k army becomes ours as a bonus!!
Since the headsman was sad that I saved my neck, I have him the necks of the top Grenadine officers starting with the ambassador, so he could practice. After all the misunderstanding we had earlier, he comes off as a nice guy, his name is Axel (of course!) and he has a simplistic view at the world. The Grenadine king is sent on exile, and after looking at his kingdom for the last time, he cried. His mother said ¡°don¡¯t cry like a woman, what you couldn¡¯t defend like a man¡±. Phew, perhaps he should have sent his mother to fight!
1494:
This year starts like a new dawn for Spain (again!). We are the dominating power in the Iberian Peninsula, which we share with Portugal and insidious Navarra. The last 2 years we have been too caught in our struggle with Granada, but now we can turn our attention to other goals. Leaving the recently acquired grenadine army to guard our border with Portugal, we rush 20k to our border with France at Gerona, were we can also strike Navarra, just in case.
Our strategy is to contain France and if possible to carve it up between our allies and ourselves. In the Iberian Peninsula we want to annex Navarra and cut down Portugal. We also decide to expand our nonexistent presence in the Indies. With those goals in mind we decide to grow our army.
In February we decide to build up our army in Artois to 14k, while the French across the border fortify Paris and further down, they fortify Lyonnaise. I feel this is the calm before the storm.
Looking at the diplomatic stage, I find that there are 3 main alliances in Europe. The first is Spain, Lorraine, England, Palatinate, Milan and Helvetia. The second one is France, Savoy, Papal States, and Navarra. The third alliance is Hanseatic League, Portugal, Poland-Lithuania, Hannover and the Teutonic order.
With these 3 huge alliances everybody is afraid of making the first moves, as it might bring the other 2 alliances against them. I suggest caution to their Catholic Majesties, as the situation is akin to swimming with sharks (of course we are the biggest shark, but even then¡¦.)
In May we invite Hessen into the Alliance, which brings another 35k troops into our camp. Now we have close to 150k troops surrounding France, and we have a buffer zone between the Spanish Low Countries and the Hanseatic League.
In June we send 2 royal cousins to Kleves and Palatinate, to tighten our presence in that area. Since we send them 2 beauties, the German princes have fistfights over them (after looking at Elsa, I can¡¯t blame them).
In July, Naples rejects our proposal of alliance. Lowly bastards! They are our vassals but they won¡¯t join our alliance!! Their majesties are incensed and command me to ship troops to Naples to remind them who is the boss.
By October, what seemed like a peaceful year is almost over, but the Muslims decided to start some festivities with Turkey DOWing the Mameluks. It is over before it started, with Turkey coughing a whooping 18 gold to end the war. Thinking that Turkey was going to be in a protracted war, Moldavia declares war on Turkey. Phew! somebody badly miscalculated that move, and I¡¯m sure they are kicking themselves over there in Moldavia.
1495:
Jan. sees a new Portuguese king- Manuel I (as if we really cared!). Two brave military leaders come to the fore in Spain, General Colonna and Marshall Cordoba (a pompous ass if you ask me). We immediately send them to command two armies, one in Extremadura and the other at Gerona, in the frontier with France and Navarra. In order to fortify our Low Countries presence we build up the defenses in Friesen.
In April we decided to build an expedition force to the Indies so we assemble 4k soldiers and 10 cannon. In June we start to land troops in Naples, pretty soon we increase our presence there to 11k soldiers, 2k Calvary and 20 cannon. Across the border, we see the Papal States in a state of stupor, perhaps the Pope has decided to remove himself from temporal matters and passes his time praying?
1496:
1496 rolls by and still there is an uneasy peace in Europe. I decide to increase our army in Artois to 22k troops and we increase the fortress in the province of Holland.
In April, Moldavia sues for peace, costing them 243 gold ones to buy peace from Turkey. The war minister of Moldavia is given concrete shoes and goes to the sea to feed the lobsters.
1497:
We are still at peace, my military forces are bored to death, but nobody is squeaking anywhere in Europe. At this pace, the merchants are seeing more action than the generals. Elsewhere in Europe, we decide to be nice to Cologne (read $$$) and see if we can get them into the alliance, but no luck yet. I can¡¯t understand Cologne¡¯s attitude, but then again, perhaps the king heard how the groom was selected?
In April the quiet is broken when Venetia DOWs Turkey. Iraq, Hungary and the Mameluks join Venetia, while Crimea joins the Turks. This creates so much commotion in our diplomatic corps that one diplomatic actually wakes up and goes to Venetia to check out the action.
1498:
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
March: Being so bored, I decide to send Columbus to the Indies again to see what he can uncover. Our call for brave lads has gone unanswered, so the conquest of the Indies will have to wait.
In October Columbus discovers a place called Puerto Rico, and we start to get the feeling that we might have not discovered the Indies after all, but maybe something else, hhmmm.
We also hear that Constantinople is being besieged, but we do not know by whom (not that we care!)
In December we establish a trading post in Puerto Rico, and we get our first good look at the natives. Everybody at court comments that they sure look funny for Chinese. Columbus also discovers the Antilles and comes back to Spain.
1499:
All is quiet on the Western Front¡¦¡¦
¡¦¡¦¡¦but further east, the action is heating up (sigh!).
The Mameluks make peace with Turkey, but it costs Turkey Sivas, which goes to the Mameluks.
We also get our first conquistador (Ojeda)!! so he is send packing with Columbus in June to Puerto Rico, were we have our first trading post. The expedition consists of 5k infantry and 10 cannon. Pinzon also appears in Holland, and he is sent to explore the coasts of Africa.
In October we reach an agreement with Portugal in Tordesillas, by which we divide the non- European world between us, to the dismay of other European nations.
