<sorry not too many pics overall, none this time>
To be honest, when I first cranked the game up, I sat nervously for about 30 minutes not doing anything. I was very conscious of the strong start of my two predecessors and I was wary of screwing things up. Inflation was on par with the other nations (6.2%), so we weren’t in trouble there and I had no intentions of heavy minting if I could avoid it.
As stated, the military was my first concern—3 wars, no navy, small army. I immediately took our cash reserve and raised armies near Austria. At the same time, I got a white peace with Burgundy who was glad to be rid of one more enemy (I think they were at war with about 15 nations). I tried the same with Denmark, but they would not budge. Trying to wrest Livland from them seemed like an okay idea with a future aim of Lithuania, but sadly Denmark was also at war with other nations and they had the jump on the siege there. With no navy, there simply was no way to concoct a positive war score, so I knew I’d just have to wait on Denmark. Austria however, was a different story.
Austria also was at war with other nations, thus she was preoccupied with not dying.
With my new armies built by February, I sent them crashing into Silesia and Erz and maintained our siege on Moravia that G-Klav had begun. By November 1499, both Silesia and Moravia had fallen and we had sent troops to their capital. They had also lost land to the other wars, thus Austria gladly gave us Moravia. A positive first start. I had stated previously my aims for Poland were to see her as a Great Northern Power. To that end, I believe that eliminating the growing power of the Hapsburgs a necessity, so if we can grow and take out Austria, the better. Obviously our current ally Brandenburg could also pose a problem in the future, but we’ll worry about that later.
I move my first DP slider towards Free Subjects. Yay, more military morale. I also start construction on galleys in the Baltic. With no dreams of ships sailing beyond the Baltic, I have no problem paying for these cheaper ships. There is no telling how large Denmark or Sweden’s navies are, but I’ll bet they are big. It will take some time before we can contend at sea, but we must get there. Any war with any Baltic nation or even defending against an aggressive nation like England will take a navy.
December 1499, Bavaria (who is very aggressive so far), calls for a war with Milan and I see our chance. I decline the invitiation and of course get booted out. I immediately ask Mosavia and Lithuania to join an alliance and now we are off and running. By 1501, I have our army up to 50,000+ and a navy of 5 galleys.
In the meanwhile, Austria (who remained at war with Brandenburg after we pulled out) is really taking it to our northern former ally. I think this is possibly good for us long term. In late 1501, the peace agreement will give Hinterpommern to Austria. This could open the door for another war with Austria, so I am pleased.
November 1501, FINALLY the Danes will accept a white peace. This has come none too late as our war exhaustion is 6% (that was another reason why I rejected the call to war from Bavaria; and I don’t want to be involved in their southern central European wars—the shakedown for provinces there in northern Italy has far to go and we don’t need to be involved there).
We get an exceptional year in 1502—money and lower inflation.
1503, I invite Sweden to our alliance—thinking about any possible confrontation with Russia (who has been thankfully quiet) or Denmark.
The religious conversion that G-Klav started in Volyn was successful (YAY!), but failed in Jedisan (why do we even have that territory?).
I raise tax collectors in both provinces. I believe that is always more important. Its happens quicker, so I can have full tax revenue while I try conversion later.
May 1503, I successfully annex Mosavia.
I think we need to upgrade our defenses, our fort, in our two CoTs but I don’t have the cash for that. I hope Russia does not attack.
October 1504, Crimea annexes the Golden Horde. We now have an even larger enemy on our southern flank. Crimea is allied with the Ottoman Empire, potentially a huge issue for us.
1505, I begin minting and saving for a refinery to go in Moravia. I have gotten tax collectors everywhere, including Moravia and so we are good financially.
We reach Infrastructure 4 February 1507 and I shift all remaining treasury to mint to get the refinery. I will start that build one year later in 1508. After that, all money is shifted back to trade level. I don’t talk about it much, but throughout the game, I consistently send our merchants to various trading centers using the Empty Slot Method and have about 80% success. We I started, we had merchants in 3 CoTs. I will expand our trade out to 8 different locations.
1508, our ally Lithuania attacks the Crimea (yet another reason why I am beginning to feel I must annex Lithuania soon---I don’t want to be drug into costly wars by my allies, particularly not in the south). Now, here is my first experience with the changes to alliances and diplomacy in version 1.09 (which up to now, I have not played). In the summer of 1508, the Ottomans will offer me a peace deal of 30 ducats. Were I really concerned with them, I might hold out for more—they are at war with many others, but I don’t really care, I just want out of this war and I’ll just pray Lithuania can hold on without me. So I accept the peace and PRESTO, the entire war is over. At first I’m shocked and then I remember the changes—since I’m the alliance leader, I can call the shots for the entire alliance. Awesome; yet another reason why being the alliance leader is huge!
October 1508 seems to be the end of the long conflict, probably 100 years or more, between England and France with the islanders being expelled from the Continent.
1509—I build a chief justice in Jedisen in an attempt to help our revolt issues there. I also have increase our tolerance for Muslims (at the start of my turn, the slider was fully to left) and lowered the tolerance for the Orthodox since we hold none of those provinces. But, it seems as if I wasted my time because we got a Conversion of the Heretics event in Jedisen. Woo-Hoo! I was not going to waste resources there trying to convert since our chance was less than 20%, so to get this random event was huge!
So, the first part of my reign had come to a successful close. We ended the wars favorably. We increased our military. We started trading well. We saw the conversion of all provinces. We started a refinery to help with trade and we annexed Masovia, our last core province.