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Are you able to wait a few days? I mean until Thursday or Friday or so.
 
I dunno... *cracks whip* ;)

Seems reasonable to me. Carlec could start writing his on word or something (and come back and edit it after seeing G-Klav's AAR if necessary) if he wants to get it over with in the meantime maybe?

Also would kind of be cool having a 'First Impressions' section of the AAR where everyone says what they thought that other rulers had done, how well or badly they thought Poland's shape was, and if they would change direction of leadership from what they think that previous ruler had attempted. Dunno... an idea there maybe. I know I'd be interested to see people's first thoughts of that nation.
 
Bocaj said:
I dunno... *cracks whip* ;)

Seems reasonable to me. Carlec could start writing his on word or something (and come back and edit it after seeing G-Klav's AAR if necessary) if he wants to get it over with in the meantime maybe?

Also would kind of be cool having a 'First Impressions' section of the AAR where everyone says what they thought that other rulers had done, how well or badly they thought Poland's shape was, and if they would change direction of leadership from what they think that previous ruler had attempted. Dunno... an idea there maybe. I know I'd be interested to see people's first thoughts of that nation.

Write it right this second! LOL :D

I took a bunch of notes, so I basically remember what happened and will have no problem writing after G-Klav.

And I fully agree with you Bocaj and planned on doing just that. My first post will be a "new monarch on the throne and what do I think about the state of the nation." Of course as we go further, everyone needs to keep their good spirits about them. If Duke has harsh words for the state of the nation after I was done (I promise, I didn't mean to) :) well, its just a game and I don't have to be angry. I might reply with why I think its that way. See what I mean--I have an opinion about the state of Poland when I start. That's not meant in a harsh way to either of you two guys. And 5 rulers from now, that will still be the story.

Man, this is fun. I can't wait to see G-Klav's story and then tell you guys my part. And I'm so eager to hear from Duke as to how it went with him.
 
Chapter II
Part I
War and Despair: 1459-1469


*Clears throat*

This is my very first participation in any kind of AAR writing, so please be gentle :) .

My goals... I didn't really have goals for this run. I wanted to have fun, mainly.
What's worth to mention is that part of this 'fun' was to defeat Denmark in at least one war.

I had some guidelines though:

To focus on the west, rather than on the east.
To become stronger economically.
To grab some strategical and/or rich provinces.


OK, as Bocaj has posted a quite perfect picture of how Europe politically looked in 1459, I'll just show the alliances and wars of Poland at the start of my reign:



On the 5th of February, I continued Bocaj's policy and increased the centralization. I also shifted the investment from 100% infra to 100% trade, as the trade situation had much potential with the two COT's and all.

The relatively peaceful situation soon got heated up by the tiny duchy of Pskov, who allied with Muscovy, Ryazan and the Teutonic Knights declared war upon Lithuania. Without hesitation, Poland joined the war against the Russian heathens!
Eventually, Crimea would join our side too.



The Polish army situated in Novgorod could hold off the Russian hordes at first, but after the third Muscovian attempt to besiege the fortress, the much weakened army was ordered to besige Yaroslavl (province Moscow) in the late July. A newly recruited force was ordered to besiege Kurland at the same time.

Early September, Crimea had won a war against the Golden Horde, who were forced to secede several provinces. This meant I could pay even less attention to GH than I had done before.
I retreated my forces, or rather tried to reatreat to the south during the winter, but instead a fierce battle was fought at the walls of Moscow (province Tula), which I lost. After the defeat at December 30, I let my troops stay on allied territory, and I set the investment to 100% land, as I couldn't see myself losing battles to Muscovy.

In March, 1460, the attempted conversion in Galizien failed, causing the population to revolt. I immediately started another attempt, and the revolt was crushed later this year.
As an interesting fact, Byzantium converted back to the Orthodox faith in late March (interesting that they were still alive).
Georgia declared war upon Crimea early April, allied with Albania, Trebizond and eventually Theodoros.

In May, I began besieging the only province of Ryazan after a vicious battle which I won, due to them having next to no cavalry. Nice :D
My luck was soon over though, due to the Crimeans having a leder... So in July I moved east to besiege Kursk, a province of the Golden Horde.

The next few months were peaceful, I won a few battles and the fortress in Kurland fell to my armies.

In November 1460, Muscovy offered peace:



After much hesitation, I accepted their offer. My focus wasn't the east anyway, and I had suffered quite big losses.
More importantly: Novgorod was about to fall to the Muscovians, and the cost would have been much higher if I hadn't accepted.

November saw two annexations (on the very same day even, the 17th): Crimea took Ryazan and Lithuania annexed Pskov.

In 1462, Lithuania finally made peace with Muscovy, the Muscovians were forced to pay 130 ducats.

Austria annexed Bohemia on the 29th of April, and they were among the few nations that weren't allied with anyone else.

I began besieging Theodoros in May, but the very next day after I arrived there (it seemed like it, anyway), Crimea accepted peace with Trebizond and with them not being at war anymore, my troops were trapped. They also refused to give me military access, several times. Stupid AI :(

As the Polish population heard about this failure, they got severely unhappy with the leadership of the army and within a few weeks the central regions was in revolt, causing stability to drop low as well.
(I got unhappiness among the peasantry, as you may have understood. It's quite funny how the random events sometimes fit perfectly with what happens in the game).

I ended the war with Georgia & co as soon as I could, Theodoros paid 56 ducats after the fortress had fallen and I made white peace with Trebizond.
After I had made peace with everyone, the troops could safely be moved across the Crimean border in September, 1463. Phew...

At the same time, Golden Horde refused all my attempts to get peace. In January, the astrologists discovered a meteor in the sky, making the population even more upset. I quickly began besieging Bogutjar and not until I had it occupied did the Golden Horde realise that their chances were slim, and in November 1465 they accepted paying 50 ducats.

In January, 1466 Crimea left our alliance to become vassals of the Ottoman Empire and:
In February Galizien was converted to Catholicism! Wohoo! :D


A leader! :D Feb. 17, 1466

Due to my policy, I began entering Royal Marriages with the North German states, and ask for access. The first one was Pomerania in June, 1465 and in early 1466 Brandenburg and Mecklenburg followed. In July, the first insult was sent to Denmark.

Golden Horde allowed the Khanates to splinter off, but due to Crimea's winnings, only Kazan was created.

1467 began with Denmark declaring war upon Bremen.

As Genoa, Leinster, Connaught, Bavaria & England joined against Denmark, I saw this as an excellent opportunity to declar war upon them... But I didn't. My war exhaustion was high, and my stability was already low.
So I was being a coward and turned inwards for a few years, while war raged around me, regaining stability, economical strength and forces.

Connaught was annexed by Denmark, Denmark got allies in Sweden and Norway, and Ulster joined against the Scandinavians late 1467-early 1468.

In July 1468, I bribed Hanover to join my alliance with Lithuania, and that was about all that happened that year.

So, when I look back at this first decade, I was at war a lot except for the last three years. I didn't lose any of the wars I was dragged into, and I didn't start any myself.
The most important thing that happened was probably the convertion of Galizien.

This is it for the first part. So far, so good.
 
Last edited:
Sounds great! So war with Russia, eh? I wondered about that. You obviously handled them well because, well, uh I'll wait till my turn. Can't wait to read the rest!
 
Good start. Great to see Pskov going to Lithuania allowing a more reliable link to Novgorod.

I also forgot to say about my ally's war with GH, I didn't participate in them whatsoever and had forgotten about it. And as for Galizien, great to see it converted, even if it was second time around.

As for Denmark... when I was looking around right at the end I realised I hadn't even looked at their CoT. It was probably just as well that I had forgotten about it or else Poland might've ended up a little differently. :D Interesting to see you got that idea too.

Look forward to hearing more!
 
Please, forgive me for slowing this thing down so much, but here comes the next part.

carlec said:
Sounds great! So war with Russia, eh? I wondered about that. You obviously handled them well because, well, uh I'll wait till my turn. Can't wait to read the rest!

Well this first war went pretty good, I think. In the end, I would've wanted more, but Russia wasn't my focus anyway.

Bocaj said:
Good start. Great to see Pskov going to Lithuania allowing a more reliable link to Novgorod.

I also forgot to say about my ally's war with GH, I didn't participate in them whatsoever and had forgotten about it. And as for Galizien, great to see it converted, even if it was second time around.

As for Denmark... when I was looking around right at the end I realised I hadn't even looked at their CoT. It was probably just as well that I had forgotten about it or else Poland might've ended up a little differently. Interesting to see you got that idea too.

Look forward to hearing more!

I thought that was cool too. It allowed me to have more mobile forces.

Never mind the GH. It was a bit frustrating at the end, that's all.

I always try to get something out of Denmark when I play a Baltic nation. The ideal would be Skåne or Jutland...
A 3 COT Poland? There we have something to think about for the next "10 Kings" game ;)

cthulhu said:

You'll get more, about... now!

Part II
1469-1479

The year 1469 started with a policy change towards centralization. In Europe, Burgundy continued its killing spree in France, at times they had as much as 27 BB.
In March, they declared war upon Bourbonnais, which called upon their allies Dauphiné (would-be France, if the English hadn't held Paris in a firm grip), Savoy, Scotland, Provence and Mecklenburg.

In the Danish war, Bremen became a Swedish vassal, and Navarra entered the war on the same side as England & their allies.

In November, 1470 Savoy got Lyonnais from Burgundy as part of a peace agreement.

On June, 29 in the year of 1471, Lithuania declared war upon Crimea, on which they had a permanent CB. Poland and Hanover joined the war against them and their allies, the Ottoman Empire and Tlemcen.

In November, Muscovy allied with the Teutonic Order and the GH declared war upon Lithuania. Hanover and Poland came to Lithuania's help.

So, I found myself at war on two fronts. I immediately began recruiting armies and I took out war taxes to be able to finance the recruitment.

Crimea entered Podolia, and I began besieging Kurland.
Muscovy did of course attempt to defeat the 10,000 Polish men in Novgorod, but they were beaten.

In March, 1472, England ended their war against Denmark when they agreed to pay 54 ducats. Shortly thereafter, Denmark annexed Norway.

At home, I fought most battles on allied ground, in Pskov and in Podolia. All of these battles were won.
In May, the Muscovians began besieging Novgorod, and in June I began besieging Moscow (Tula).
In August, I began besieging Jedisan, a port town by the Black Sea. In October, the Crimeans ousted me. I retreated to Galizien, where I began recruiting lots of cavalry for the next try.

I didn't move the army in Msocow/Tula south until December, instead I let it stay to crush all Muscovian attempts to free their capital.

In May 1473, Novgorod had fallen to the infidel. In June I moved my army back to Moscow/Tula again (not until then I had more than 10,000 troops in that army, I hate those small fortresses...). Despite several attempts to get rid of them, the Russians couldn't manage to do it.
In the south, Jedisan was once again under besiege, and I was able to defeat the first Crimean attempt to crush me.
During the next few months, a lot of Ottoman and Crimean armies were crushed in that province. Ah, God bless cavalry :D

Soon enough, a second army was ordered to help speeding up the siege in Tula, in vain. In November, facing a long and harsh winter (and a rather big Russian army, which had just beat them up), the two armies sought peace in Welikia (allied territory).
The Russians followed, and we were defeated on February the 2nd, 1474. In the south we had good news, Jedisan was now under our control!

On the 15th of April, the sneaky Muscovians met with the equally sneaky Moldavians, who agreed to give the Muscovians right to pass through the Moldavians' sole province, Moldavia. Not sure what the AI was thinking here, as they actually needed to pass through Poland to get there...

Meanwhile, the army in Jedisan was ordered back to Podolia, a totally unnecessary move, as circumstances required it to get back to Jedisan a few months later. (The Crimeans were defeated again).

During all this time, my stability was above 0, allowing me to try my luck in my 2 COT's. I didn't have much luck though. Despite me having a quite high trade level (only Venice and Portugal had a higher level), my merchants went out of business frequently.

In August, the merged and reinforced army once again entered Welikia. We won the resulting battle, but I let the army stay in Welikia, as winter was on its way already.

In January 1475, I offered the Crimeans peace, as I had one several battles against them, each one resulting in complete disaster for them. They accepted my offer, Jedisan + 50 ducats.
Now Poland had a port in the Black Sea! This euphory however ended when the Ottoman Empire furiously neglected the offer given to them (50 ducats for me), and when I realised I didn't have enough money to build even the tiniest and least powerful Black Sea fleet.

At least I had my back free now, and I had gotten a new leader in Podolia.
The Podolian army was ordered to besiege Kursk, a province of the Golden Horde.
The army in Welikia crushed another Russian attempt to defeat me in late February, and moved on to liberate Novgorod, in April. At the same time I cancelled the siege of Kursk and the Podolian army was ordered to occupy the Russian capital, the siege started in May. The Lithuanians came to my help too and sent 30,000 men there. Nice!

In the south, a Podolian rebellion and a Turkish army in Jedisan forced me to order the Tula army southwards. The Lithuanians could hold off the Russians by themselves now.
In June, something nice happened:



I accepted without hesitation. The Turks and the Russians were enough at the moment.

The land tech increased to level 3 in August. With my goal reached, I changed the investments to 100% trade again.

In November, the Tula army crushed the Podolian rebellion. They were then ordered to launch an attack at the Ottomans, who were now controlling Jedisan.
As expected, the attack was succesful and more good news: In April 1476, Novgorod was once again in Polish hands. The army was ordered south to Tver and defeated the Russian army standing there.
The Lithuanians in Tula stand ground, and the siege went on.



The Russians were no doubt getting exhausted from the war, they offered us peace:



I declined, as I felt I had much more to win and the situation was still under control.

During summer, the Tula army was ordered back to help out in Tula, as the Russian counter-offensives were becoming more frequent and powerful.
Jedisan fell to us in August, which was good: The Ottomans offered us 60 ducats in September, 1476.

In March, 1477 the Muscovians once again defeated me in Tula! Aargh! :mad:
Never, ever give up... The Tula army was ordered to help out in Tver, and together they defeated a Russian force trying to destroy that siege as well.
During the rest of the year, the force in Tver was able to defeat the Muscovians, and the Ltihuanians went back to besiege Tula/Moscow.
In January, the Muscovians finally came up with a deal I could accept:



I released Tver as my vassals on the same day, January 1, 1478.
The peasantry revolted in March, Podlasia and Volyn going up in flames.

In June, Muscovy DOW:ed Tver. :eek: Stupid me, in euphory I had forgotten to invite them to my alliance! The only good thing I could find about this was that I swore, never ever to forget doing that again.



The rest of the year was peaceful, after I had put out the rebellions. The stability had increased to +3 during the war (lowered to -1 by the unhapiness event), which had resulted in lots of spare cash. Together with the peace deals, I had +700 someting. I started a conversion attempt in Podolia on the 1st of January, 1479.
This will end today's episode. Tomorrow, the rest will follow. Until then!
 
You can't deal with the West if you've got the Russians kicking you in the head from behind. Get it over with and beat them down like nobody's business.
 
G-Klav said:
During all this time, my stability was above 0, allowing me to try my luck in my 2 COT's. I didn't have much luck though. Despite me having a quite high trade level (only Venice and Portugal had a higher level), my merchants went out of business frequently.

Yeah I figured that would be the case, thus why I invested in infra. Trade is useless this early with low TEs and lots of minors. Infra 5 (and governors) are much more effective. :)

Funny to see Russia DoW Poland's second vassal and annex them. I hope they are made to pay for these insults!
 
Duke of Wellington said:
Glad to finally be able to read through all this. Its interesting to see where and when Poland got its things. Good AARs too.

Thanks!

SonofWinter said:
You can't deal with the West if you've got the Russians kicking you in the head from behind. Get it over with and beat them down like nobody's business.

Yes, it looks as though I should've done that. You'll understand what I mean after you've read the next part.

Bocaj said:
Yeah I figured that would be the case, thus why I invested in infra. Trade is useless this early with low TEs and lots of minors. Infra 5 (and governors) are much more effective. :)

Funny to see Russia DoW Poland's second vassal and annex them. I hope they are made to pay for these insults!

I've learnt much during these 40 years. The next time I'll go all infra until time is ready.

Well, you'll see what happened...
 
G-Klav said:
I've learnt much during these 40 years. The next time I'll go all infra until time is ready.

Well, you'll see what happened...

Not commenting on it from a "here's what I did" (that is coming), but I'll just say that its not wise to keep on pouring in cash to infra or trade if you are too far ahead. The penalty for that makes your investment a waste. I've always taken a "do one, then the other" approach and its worked super for me. Meaning, do either trade or infra (usually infra; no good reason just what I do), then when I hit a level, switch it all back to the other till that hits the next level.

Anyway, sounds great. There is so much I'd like to say, but again should probably wait till its my turn, then I can reflect from a "here's what I found as I took the throne" point of view. Knowing what you gave me gives me a bit of a secret insight to everyone else, so now more things are becoming clear.

I sure am glad I didn't read the AAR before I played and glad that I took notes of my impressions just from the game. Makes them more honest. :) Reads great! Keep up the good work.
 
Part III
1479-1499

The year 1479 started in prosperity, thanks to the Russian gold. Hehe...
In February I chose to alter my policies towards quality.
Nothing happened during this year.

In September, a landlord in Podolia found out you could use the leftovers from the farming animals to fertilize the crops, thereby increasing the amount of grain you could harvest, causing a agricultural revolution throughout Poland.

In October, Tver was annexed by the foul Muscovians. In the meantime, a small world war raged throughout Europe. Castile, Portugal and Aragon, Sicily and Granada versus England, Venice, Genua, Bavaria, Leinster and Ulster.

In January 1480, the Lithuanians once again decleared war upon Crimea. Getting really tired with their behaviour, I dishonored my alliance with them and Hanover.

Now I was completely neutral. I continued sending insults to Denmark, never allowing our relations to reach higher than -130. I concentrated on fighting the occasional WE rebellions, biding my time.

The World War increased somewhat when Hungary declared war upon Venice on the 12th of May, 1480. The nations allied with Hungary (Brandenburg, Pomerania and the Palatinate), all joined.

On the 14th of May:



I joined without hesitation. Hungary was perhaps THE most powerful nation in Central Europe, having expanded to include Wallachia, Serbia, Bosnia and Kosovo. Their King Mathias Corvinus (The Raven) had done much to increase their technology in all fields.

A few days after my joining, Bavaria followed. Bavaria had taken parts of Bohemia and had expanded quite a lot in Germany. We were now the most powerful alliance in Europe.

I did next to nothing in this war, as I had trouble to see what it could give me. I didn't expect anyone to attack me, but I kept some troops in my two coastal provinces just in case.
And the months went on.
In February 1482, Hungary accepted peace with England, thereby accepting to pay 225 ducats.

Shortly thereafter, England accepted peace with Castile, giving them 186 ducats and Gascogne.
In June, Denmark had "Hans claims Norway". In October, Sweden chose to stall the coronation of King Hans.
During that time, Ulster declared war upon Denmark. Sweden joined the Danish cause. England and the others backed Ulster up.

Lithuania made peace with Crimea in October, Crimea paid 75 ducats. They were still at war against Tlemcen and the Ottomans though.

On the first of April, 1483, Hungary declared war upon Burgundy. Burgundy had been in war at least since the mid 60's, winning all the time but now things went badly for them. I joined.

Due to them being Sunni, Jedisan revolted close to all the time. The rebels also managed to make the city guards revolt, forcing me to besiege the province again and again... I kept a constant force of 16,000 cavalry in the province.

Denmark accepted peace with England, letting them have Connaught back in October. In February 1484, my leader Dunin died, and later that year two good things happened: I got a gift to the state in August and in September:



Awesome! Podolia was now one of my most valuable provinces, increasing my manpower and granting as much income as Poznan (12 or 16 ducats as base, can't remember exactly).
To further celebrate this, the people in Jedisan revolted. This time though, the city guards were still on my side.

Just before the year 1485 was to begin, Aragon was annexed by Castile. This year went by quickly and in December I declared war upon... Denmark! I had been finalizing the setup by asking Hanover for MA, which they accepted. With Brandenburg on my side, this war really couldn't go wrong.
Hungary, Pomerania, Palatinate and Bavaria dishonored the alliance, leaving Brandenburg as the leader. They invited Pomerania (their vassal) and Hungary to it. Both accepted.
Bavaria formed an alliance of their own with the Palatinate.

My troops blitzed through the German countryside (they were in fact already in Mecklenburg as the war was about to start, and in May the situation looked like this, after a couple of battles, in which the Danish were beaten:



Soon after, I got an unexpected invention in Danzig, and Hungary accepted peace with Burgundy:



You can see the German empires of Hungary, brown, and Bavaria, blue.



In October, Austria joined on our side. The fortress in Jylland fell in December. Since I didn't have a fleet, I couldn't get over to Zealand, as the Danish and Swedish fleets blocked the straits.
And when I moved my troops down to Holstein, Brandenburg arrived with 40,000 men and a king, so I was stuck with Jylland.

I took my armies home to defend the manufactory in Danzig from vicious Swedes. Jedisan was being besieged by Danes.

The Swedes defeated me in Danzig, so I took out war taxes and recruited like there was no tomorrow. Jedisan fell to the Danish in March 1487.
Another Swedish army went south to Wielkopolska (I guess they wanted to pillage all my provinces), and the Danes went over the strait and started to besiege Jylland.

In June, Albania annexed the Byzantine Empire. (!) They got an event called "Turkish ambition on Constantinople", which I believe gave Thrace to the Turks, as I can't find anything about Thrace after this in the event history.

The Swedes were defeated in Wielkopolska, and soon enough in Danzig too. I was able to defeat the army in Jylland in October, and a few days after that, Holstein fell to Brandenburg.

I had "Capital Attraction" in March, 1488 - increasing the population in Krakow with a few thousand. 2,000 if I remember correctly.

The war went on with few battles and in 1489 I once again changed my policy towards quality.
Then in February Denmark offered me alone 275 ducats, an offer I accepted.

The others, with Brandenburg in the top were still at war with them though.
In April, Corvinus died and the Hungarian nobles elected the Polish king as the king of Hungary. This meant, Hungary was now my vassal! Nice :D

With the money I started an attempt to convert the heathens in Volyn.

In August, Venice joined the Danish alliance, and when Switzerland in June 1490 declared war upon them, Sweden dishonored and joined the Lithuanian alliance, who were still at war against OE and Tlemcen.

In August, Denmark finally accepted peace with Brandenburg. Brandenburg got Bremen and Holstein, as well as 21 ducats.
In November, the three-year white peace happened to Lithuania and OE. They now got a lot of events concerning Constantnople, giving them their COT, moving their capital and so on.

In January 1491, Lithuania declared war upon Crimea, so once again there was war between OE and Lithuania. In February, Denmark declared war upon Sweden, and in December, Russia declared war upon Lithuania.

In September, I reached trade 3. I switched back the investment to 100% infra.
The years went on, and Lithuania coped quite well.
In October 1492, Hanover annexed Oldenburg by force. (On the 1st of August they declared war upon Sweden, who called upon their allies, Hanover crushed them and the day before they were annexed they joined our alliance). Rather funny.

The trade investment seemed to have been in vain. Whenever I got a monopoly, another nation pulled me back again, and I had to start over.

In November 1494, my conversion attempt in Volyn failed. I crushed the rebels. I started one in Jedisan instead, and then I also restarted the one in Volyn.
In April 1495, Bavaria once again declared war upon Burgundy. Austria left our alliance, and declared war upon Bavaria instead. Somewhere around here, a bug must've happened, because I never got an invitation to the war against the Hapsburg's, I had to DOW them myself, which I did.



In August, Lithuania gave Livland to Denmark. Only two wars were left to fight now.
On the 30th of December, Denmark declared war upon Brandenburg.

In April 1496 I had corruption. I chose to fight it.

The Danes invaded in Danzig and in Jedisan. Danzig was my no.1 priority, since I didn't want to lose my manufactory there. Besides, Jedisan was kind of a death trap to any significant force, the supply value was next to none.

I won a couple of struggles in Danzig throughout the year. It was also during this year, things started to go really badly for Lithuania: See attached screenie. I won the battle in Jedisan with my cavalry superiority... :D



In December, Lithuania accepted the peace offer from the Teutonic Knights, they agreed to pay 50 ducats.
 
The Final part

The year 1497 was kind of eventless, a few battles, which I all won. In April 1498, Brandenburg made peace with Austria before I had even thought of invading them, for 98 ducats.

Later this year:



and



Notice the peace agreement between Lithuania and OE behind the declaration of war by Austria.

I began recruiting armies and I started to besiege Brno (Moravia) in late 1498.

Then it was time to hand over the crown and the sceptre to carlec.

So, while my turn was kind of a failure in the end (lots of land going to Russia and Crimea), I still think that the situation I put carlec in was kind of nice - lots of opportunities to grab some provinces in Bohemia and/or Denmark.

Not to mention, this alliance is a real killer, and Hungary is nice to have as a vassal.

The other stuff are kind of needless to say: Improved trade level, two succesful conversions, a Black Sea Port, a weapons manu...

At least I fulfilled my goal, to have fun :D

Here's the political map in 1499. I used two colours for the border, so it would be easier to see.

 
Initial Report, January 1, 1499

With the loss of our recent leader, G-Klav, the burden of our country feel to me. I thought it appropriate to provide an overview of the situation as I saw it. We are in control of all of our core provinces with the exception of Masovia, currently our vassal. I’m not really sure why they have not been annexed into our nation, but we’ll worry about that later. I am surprised further to discover we are in control of the Center of Trade Novgorod.

Automatically I am now concerned about war with Russia. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but I wonder how that occurred and further, how long I can hold onto such a valuable province? Still, my overall goals for Poland point us toward the north and the Baltic. I see us as the dominant Baltic, northern central European nation. So, perhaps a land connection can be drawn between Novgorod, the Baltic and us.

Upon further look, I note we have land on the Black Sea. This interests me none and should conflict come from the Ottoman Empire (currently not an issue), I will happily give this province (non-core) away. I have no desire at all to be in the Balkans, so lands in that direction mean nothing to me. Perhaps some future leader will wish to extend our lands globally, but I cannot see that far.

Currently, I see nothing but chaos diplomatically. We are in an alliance with Brandenburg, Hungary (our vassal—that is very good) and Bavaria, but we are not the alliance leader. This concerns me greatly as our other vassals, Masovia and Lithuania are alone and potentially a target to other nations. Annexing both nations is also a goal in our future and I certainly do not want to see land lost to our enemies, particularly Russia. I will seek a good opportunity to extricate myself from this alliance in order to become the new leader of an alliance. Our ally Bavaria has grown large. They are at 12.1/40 in BB. Burgundy has also been active, 17.9/40. England seems to be the leader in this however, at 21.3/39. Poland sits at only 7.4/37, so we are fine. This of course seems an opportunity for me that I hope to exploit as I strengthen our position.

However, somehow we are in three wars—an offensive war with Burgundy, a defensive war with Austria and a Defensive war with Denmark. These wars seem to have been ongoing for about 4 years and our military is in dire shape.

initial%20army.jpg

As you can see, our supportable amount is 72,000, but we have only 28,500. Of course three wars will do that to a nation, but this is a critical issue and will demand our immediate funds. Furthermore, though we have a Baltic & Black Sea Port, we have no navy at all. With my focus northward only, I won’t build in the Black, but I will work to get at least a small navy for action in the Baltic. We are at Land 6 and Navy 3 which is right with our neighboring nations.

Economically we are in great shape. G-Klav has done super. Our income is 4th in the world; we are second in Infrastructure, making good progress on Infra 4. Trade is not quite as good, but we are at least in control of our own CoTs. It is not my plan to attempt monopolies. I find that other countries are drawn to that, so I am always quite happy to have 4 or 5 merchants in many places and I will work to accomplish that.

With the Diplomatic Sliders, I see that many choices have already been made.

DP%20initial.jpg

This is not how I like it and I’m not sure what actions to take. I almost always take that slider to defensive to get the jump on sieges. I believe this critical to military success, but we have already moved to Offensive. I know I’ll only get 4 moves and I’m not sure my successor will agree with me, so moving only part way seems dangerous and perhaps setting in motion 80 wasted years as we move the slider back and forth. Of course this idea of being Offensive and yet having a very small army is curious to me. In any case, I decide to not move that slider at all. Instead, I will seek a policy of a Quality army coupled with Free Subjects. Hopefully I will remember to make all the moves I can; I often forget. Sometimes I just wait due to stability issues.

We are at +3 which is wonderful and really helps us economically. We have 348 ducats in the bank which is good for us in the current critical need to build up the army. It is my belief that you must leave the army at full strength all the time; a good offense or threat of it is the best defense. We do have some internal work to get to; neither Jedisan nor Volyn have tax collectors. This we must remedy as quickly as we can.

Well, this is how I saw the nation when I started. Very solid place from which to work, yet 3 wars and a possibly large enemy in Russia. Need to build the army immediately and get us out of war as soon as we can. Moving us out of conflict towards peace will be my first move. Fortunately one of our enemies are the Hapsburgs; while I want to get out of war quickly, I'll certainly see if I can strike at them in the process.
 
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Good briefing, but I see a typo :)

You have 28,500 troops (10,300 + 18,200), not 18,500.

I wonder what your first move will be...
 
Got it. Thanks. MAth was never my strong suit. :) And I checked it 3 times. LOL!
 
Well, good briefing. G-Klav, congrads on your first AAR.

Carlec: Hope you can get the land passage to Novgorod back. It's a bad idea to allow Russia to block Poland's access to the CoT.

P.S.... how was inflation? Curious after seeing war taxes mentioned a handful of times.