Empire of Japan - 1936
Could have scored more here, but thought I'd share this for a number of reasons.
Firstly, this might be the highest GB end-of-game score we've seen so far! I ended up SoI-ing China to put a stop to their expansion, which also put a stop to mine, but it was getting difficult to keep Britain from 'Friendly' status and at one point I had to concede defeat to them when they intervened in one of my Chinese wars.
Of note here is that I've hit maximum research points! Having four NFs on clerks for 40 years paid off in the end, as did running 100% education spending for far too long.
Also, I'm basically running an entire empire off the profits of my gold mines, and of that Caozhou in China accounts for around 80%.
I'd like to add that I've been Liberal and Laissez-Faire for the past three decades and it's been pretty good economically. My factories tanked initially when subsidies were withdrawn, but since then the strong have survived with the result that my overall economy's much healthier. Being Liberal has also let me pass all the political reforms except for changes to the voting system (I did get as far as Weighted Wealth and would have got Wealth in 1936).
The Americas
I managed to snag the Panama canal and have pretty much all of South America SoI-ed (except for fiercely-contested Brazil). Apart from the normal oddities of Russian North America, the Manhattan Commune and British-controlled New England that's a fairly successful US (more successful than me in fact as GP #2).
In South America, Argentina went on a conquering spree that only finished when I SoI-ed its neighbours. I'd already SoI-ed Argentina itself, so I think it was just having fun under a bigger boy's protection.
Asia, Europe and Africa
Aside from mega-UK it's been an interesting game. The North German Federation formed late (~1920s) and promptly got itself into another war with France which lost it the just-conquered Rhineland. That wouldn't have been so bad, but Austria opportunisitically declared war too and nabbed two states.
Spain made the mistake of declaring war on Japanese SoI-ed Oman, which ended with me taking Abu Dhabi from them. They then turned round and declared war on Japanese SoI-ed Siam, which ended with me taking Brunei. Net result: three oil producing provinces to Japan and Spain too chastened to try anything else.
Japan's incursion into China came as a result of having war declared on me as soon as I had annexed Korea (in the 1860s). This played out rather like the 20th-century version of the Korean War, with Chinese troops streaming over the Yalu and my forces falling back to the south, abandoning Seoul and the north. Fortunately, I was able to use my naval dominance to enforce a blockade and occupy Hainan and Formosa and win enough battles to get China to cede the latter to me in the peace.
China declared war on me another couple of times, each time losing states until they decided enough was enough. I then tried to take a province off them when they were fighting Britain, only for the Red Devil to annex two states and then declare a status quo war against me.
I might have been able to win if I'd have mobilised, but I didn't have the patience. Instead I conceded them the win, waited five years, jockeyed for position in the SoI game, banned them, dropped them to cordial and took the states I wanted in the first place. Very satisfying.
After that (it was already about 1910) I concentrated on internal affairs. The lost war against GB had allowed me to introduce landed voting and with it Prussian Constitutionalism and I assiduously cultivated a Liberal electorate and began to reform, which neatly did away with the revolts I'd been suffering.
All in all it's been a blast, though perhaps next time I'll drum up the courage to take on Britain.
Could have scored more here, but thought I'd share this for a number of reasons.
Firstly, this might be the highest GB end-of-game score we've seen so far! I ended up SoI-ing China to put a stop to their expansion, which also put a stop to mine, but it was getting difficult to keep Britain from 'Friendly' status and at one point I had to concede defeat to them when they intervened in one of my Chinese wars.
Of note here is that I've hit maximum research points! Having four NFs on clerks for 40 years paid off in the end, as did running 100% education spending for far too long.
Also, I'm basically running an entire empire off the profits of my gold mines, and of that Caozhou in China accounts for around 80%.
I'd like to add that I've been Liberal and Laissez-Faire for the past three decades and it's been pretty good economically. My factories tanked initially when subsidies were withdrawn, but since then the strong have survived with the result that my overall economy's much healthier. Being Liberal has also let me pass all the political reforms except for changes to the voting system (I did get as far as Weighted Wealth and would have got Wealth in 1936).
The Americas
I managed to snag the Panama canal and have pretty much all of South America SoI-ed (except for fiercely-contested Brazil). Apart from the normal oddities of Russian North America, the Manhattan Commune and British-controlled New England that's a fairly successful US (more successful than me in fact as GP #2).
In South America, Argentina went on a conquering spree that only finished when I SoI-ed its neighbours. I'd already SoI-ed Argentina itself, so I think it was just having fun under a bigger boy's protection.
Asia, Europe and Africa
Aside from mega-UK it's been an interesting game. The North German Federation formed late (~1920s) and promptly got itself into another war with France which lost it the just-conquered Rhineland. That wouldn't have been so bad, but Austria opportunisitically declared war too and nabbed two states.
Spain made the mistake of declaring war on Japanese SoI-ed Oman, which ended with me taking Abu Dhabi from them. They then turned round and declared war on Japanese SoI-ed Siam, which ended with me taking Brunei. Net result: three oil producing provinces to Japan and Spain too chastened to try anything else.
Japan's incursion into China came as a result of having war declared on me as soon as I had annexed Korea (in the 1860s). This played out rather like the 20th-century version of the Korean War, with Chinese troops streaming over the Yalu and my forces falling back to the south, abandoning Seoul and the north. Fortunately, I was able to use my naval dominance to enforce a blockade and occupy Hainan and Formosa and win enough battles to get China to cede the latter to me in the peace.
China declared war on me another couple of times, each time losing states until they decided enough was enough. I then tried to take a province off them when they were fighting Britain, only for the Red Devil to annex two states and then declare a status quo war against me.
I might have been able to win if I'd have mobilised, but I didn't have the patience. Instead I conceded them the win, waited five years, jockeyed for position in the SoI game, banned them, dropped them to cordial and took the states I wanted in the first place. Very satisfying.
After that (it was already about 1910) I concentrated on internal affairs. The lost war against GB had allowed me to introduce landed voting and with it Prussian Constitutionalism and I assiduously cultivated a Liberal electorate and began to reform, which neatly did away with the revolts I'd been suffering.
All in all it's been a blast, though perhaps next time I'll drum up the courage to take on Britain.
