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Support the Goon!

The good Goon Teuton is looking for new friends and allies to come visit his wonderful shantytown. Already, the Goon counts the Gorilla of Turkey and the Aragonese Peacock as his friends, and they are welcome to visit anytime.

You too can join the elect!

Unfortunately, due to the predatory habits of his neighbours and the ineptitude of several international financiers in loaning money to said neighbours beyond their means to repay, the town is burning slightly at the moment.

As such, the Goon issues a call for aid from all who would see the Goon triumphant in peace: "Friends, Romans, and big creatures with nasty teeth that just crawled out from under a rock, the Goon calls upon you to send minor gifts or minor loans with 1% interest and a five year duration for the restoration of the Shantytown."

Remember the words of wisdom:

Never lose faith in the light of the moon,
never eat pizza with your dining spoon,
if life is jolly rotten, let me grant you this boon,
life is funnier, when you support the Goon"

The Goon Looking for Friends
teutonic_knights.jpg



:)
 
SWEDEN 1480-1494

Sweden, the Lion of the north! Sweden had had a marvelous history, it had gone through several great wars under the ruler of A.I. the Great. Jylland, Skåne, Finnmark and Kola had been put under its rule during the past decades. And thus it was put upon me, Kristian af Sommarsom, to guide this great nation through the years to come.

It was agreed between the Great Northern alliance that Jylland should be Danish again, and that Denmark in return would cancel the vassalage it still held over Sweden. A misunderstanding in the communications led to a grieve situation; the court of Sweden expected a Danish envoy to negotiate the matter, but instead a Declaration of war was recieved. A quik "wtf?!?!" message was sent to Denmark, without a reply. Sweden then called its loyal ally Norway, as it seemed Denmark had lost a bolt.

The Danes then (after a while) responded that this was the deal, Danes cut the vassalage and wanted Jylland. Some harsh words were sent from Sweden to the court of Denmark because of the rather quick eager to settle the matter before a deal was signed. Anyway, a common understanding was reached (Norway was the big loser in this as they broke the royal marriage with the Danes to honour the alliance with Sweden; but no fear, Sweden won't forget those who help it at a bad time). A fortification project was started in Kola to strengthen the eastern boundaries.

The Swedish ruler then had some problems with the royal siblings and left the nation to run itself for a couple of years <OOC: My youngest son unplugged the dsl cable...>.

My attention was again brought back in 1487. Denmark fell upon the rule of A.I. the Moron, who refused a call to the alliance and went on DOWing half the world... Not suprisingly Denmark was basically trashed.

Sweden hammered a deal with the Teutonic Order. For the sum of 450d Sweden bought Kexholm and Olonets. As far as it could be seen from Sweden both parties were pleased.

The German country Saxony had fell upon hard times indeed. Only Bohemia was seen helping them with. Rebellers run around, and then Brandenburg declared war on them. Sweden called Saxony to join the alliance together with Norway. Norway acquired access from Austria and sent troops to aid, then Sweden did the same. Sweden also sent a couple of gifts to Saxony to keep it up under its heavy burden of loans (that had been taken by the previous ruler of Saxony).

At this point Sweden took its first loan, as a possibility to build a cathedral was risen, and the Swedish treasury was a meagre 20d short of the cost.

A few facts of Sweden during this period:
Income: 14.6 -> 20.7
Inflation: 0.7 -> 0.3
Manpower: 14 -> 17
Land: 3 -> 3
Naval: 2 -> 2
Trade: 2 -> 2
Infra: 2 -> 3
BB: 13.8 -> 18.4
 
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Code:
Situation 1494

Country	Income	Infl	Manp	
=========================================	
Delhi	217	 5.8	 45	
Shawnee	106	 0.4	  7
Otto's	 84	 5.1	136
China	 64	 6.2	252
Spain	 49	 8.8	 68
Aztecs	 45	 6.6	  8
France	 43	 9.4	 84
Inca	 39	 6.1	 15
Austria	 36	 1.7	 63
Portugal 27	 1.9	 10
Savoy	 27	 0.5	  3
Genoa	 24	16.7	 20
TeutonO. 23	 5.5	 18
Muscowy	 23	 0.8	 66
Venice	 22	20.4	 14
Brittany 22	 5.9	  1
Khazak	 22	 6.2	 25
Chimu	 21	 6.5	 11
Sweden	 21	 0.3	 17
Nippon	 20	 6.2	 32
Astrakh	 19	 6.1	  5
England	 19	13.9	 26
 
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something's wrong with that list of figures, no way that 3-province BRI has more income then England


Britanny, middle to late 15th century

in the beginning there was Chaos , and out of Chaos , Britany wished to create Order . Unfortunately, the warmongering and Chaotic neighbours of Brittanny strived only to achieve POWER, and MIGHT, the two pillars of Chaos .

As it was, Burgundy had, through the work of the forces of Chaos , occupied the entirity of Brittany's lands, and wished only to stop the occupation in exchange for Britanny giving up all lands on which French people dwelled, only the Gaelic people would still resort under the dukes of Britanny.

This unfortunately left the duke without the ability to grant Order to the world, therefor a slow rebuilding process was initiated.. come the eighties Britanny had a reasonable force (OOC: around 14000 total, of which 8000 cavalry) maintaining Order in Britanny, and a small detachment of ships (OOC:20 galleys) to increase mobility of this force. the Duke also decide that for Order to reign supreme, Britanny had to focus more on the wild seas, and less on the land(OOC: DP more towards naval), which was too Chaotic for Britanny to handle now. Also, more efficient ways of gathering the resources of the land and sea were deviced (OOC: infra 3).

in the late eighties of the 15th century, Britanny finally could contribute to the decrease of Chaos , by suppressing the chaotic hordes, labeling themselves rebbels, who wandered freely around France.
Unfortunately, the forces of Chaos struck back, and the duke of Britanny was somehow separated from his loyal and Orderly subjects, and thus could not see to it that Order prospered (OOC: missed the rehost :( ) nor could the proper arrangements with France be made with France to further the cause of Order (OOC: no repayment for rebel suppresion yet)
 
Algiers following "the setback"

Following the overthrow of my father after his disasterous war with the Infidel, the generals that had removed him from power offered me the throne. They had no intention of supplanting the dynasty, only of saving the country from my incompetent father. At first I was reluctant to accept the job. My father had left the country in a state of collapse, and I thought that if I accepted the job I might soon have no country to rule. Inflation ran at over 20%, the armies raised by my father to fight the war could not be paid for--even if the nation's entire income were reserved for that purpose--and foreign armies occupied most of Algerian territory. Despite my reluctance, however, I felt it was my duty to correct the disaster brought on by my father's insane actions.

My father was a very ambitious man. He dreamed of a greater Algeria that stretched across all of North Africa. Ironically, his dream was actually quite possible, despite the seeming weakness of the nation, if only he had the slightest bit of diplomatic and military prudence. His decison to make war on the powers of the Iberian pennisula and his refusal to yield to forces far too powerful to oppose made his dreams of empire impossible. In the end he proved to be a bitter and spiteful man, ruining Algiers for generations to come in a temper tantrum over a failure that was inevitable given his course of action.

The absolute number one priority when I came to power was to remove the invaders. It was clear that our military situation was beyond hopeless and that the country had been damaged by my father's policies to the point that the whole country was more likely to collapse than for our armies to effect any sort of reversal of the situation. To achieve peace, we were forced to cede all land conquered by my father in previous campaigns to the invaders.

Things were very grim, but we did what we could to improve the infrastructure and economy of the nation. My father had left the nation militarily weak, and the humiliating defeat at the hands of Christian armies had soured the nobility and common folk alike on the idea of military adventure for some time. Therefore, I steered Algiers through a lengthy period of peace, and sought to strengthen relations with our neighbors. I normalized relations with Morocco, our enemy in several wars over the last few decades. Eventually a royal marriage was arranged, and the two countries are now enjoying solid relations. To the east we cemented the alliance with our vassal Tunis, and the two countries enjoy cooperation in a number of areas, including shared naval bases and a free trade agreement.

Unfortunately, my accessment of the situation in Algiers is that the policies of the former king have irreparably damaged the country. The inflation is so high that it is truly crippling for a nation of already limited resources, and prospects of attaining the level of economic know-how and infrastructure to fight the inflation are very far over the horizon. Although any role that Algiers could have played in the history of the Mediterranean would have been small, the folly of the previous regime has reduced it to essentially zero.

However, I will not give up on my country. I will continue to do what I can to put the nation on a solid economic foundation, and some day Algiers may even emerge as a model for economic reform in the Muslim world.
 
Venice 1480-1494

By 1480 Venice consisted of a relatively large number of provinces, including Mantua, Krajn, even Schwyz up north, and kept Milan as vassals. Hungary was an ally. At a first glance, it looked fairly comfortable: A modest army, a decent income, and no loans to take care of. Good.

The downside: A very large neighbour to the north, with superior armies and greedy allies, but no Mediterranean harbour. Venice had not made herself popular on the diplomatic scene in latter years. And even if Venice had some income, her ducats seemed to be of less value than those of her neighbours. Inflation had passed 20% by 1480. Hence the main concern of the doge was to sit down and quietly hope for exceptional years, and prepare to make concessions if necessary.

Hungary soon pulled out of our alliance for “security reasons”. It was not hard to share her worries. An ally of Austria (Baden?) declared war on us soon afterwards, and Polish and Lithuanian troops marched into Hungary at about the same time. The army of Venice was smaller and less competent than any of the invading armies, and got entirely annihilated in its first encounter. There was never hope. Baden went for the province of Schwyz to which we had no access while we still had an army. Austria went for Istria and Bavaria for Krajn. As the doge had a hard time figuring out which one of the invaders where in charge of negotiating on behalf of the alliance, he first made separate peace with Austria ceding Istria, and then handed over Schwyz to Baden to end the misery.

Some years of peace followed. Relations between Venice and her Milanese vassal improved to the extent that Venice even dared to ask Milan to join the realm, to which Milan got insulted and broke vassalage, though only for a short period. Tradewise Venice did well at home and expanded abroad.

In the 1490’s the Austrian alliance broke up, and Venice made the stupid mistake to invite Bavaria into her alliance. Bavaria was happy to join. Her former allies of course got upset over this, and declared war on Bavaria, who’s call for assistance was only heard by Milan, whose large army bravely marched into the Austrian alps, leaving Lombardia behind so it would be easy for Baden to annex it.

By 1494 the session ended with a slightly smaller Venetian empire, without neither vassals nor allies. And none of those years proved exceptional.

-Nitram-
 
Welcome to the forums Nitram. :)

Indeed, it was Baden who made the declaration of war. You were lucky that Wurttemburg was their alliance leader at the time, not Austria or Bohemia, since I as Hungary was planning to join that alliance for protection from the Turk.

Milan breaking vassalage when you tried to diploannex was probably due to you not having a big enough army to scare them with.

I thought Hungary was now allied to Venice again, since the Austrian alliance was still AI-led., but could be wrong.
 
1468-1494

As ever from my perspective so there will be mistakes. As ever all countries mentioned were played by someone.

The East

The opening moves left Poland and Lithuania a fraction of the size that they were 50 years ago. Near constant wars of aggression left them exhausted. The beneficiaries were the Teutonic Knights and Muscowy. The Golden Horde had a successful session, ending up much stronger than in over a 100 years.

The introduction of Denmark, Norway and Sweden had little impact. Sweden and the TO made a deal and elements of northern TO were transferred to Sweden. Creating a three way meeting point between Sweden, Muscowy and the TO, which will make for very interesting future play.

The real action was in the HRE but that I will touch on later.

The West

Burgundy won the final war of the 100 years war. Brittany was reduced and Castille forced out of France. Aragon by dropping out of the war retained large segments of southern France.
England battered and bruised from earlier wars spent its time recovering and fighting the locals. Whilst Portugal continued to try and round the cape, somewhat unsuccesfully.

In Italy Venice continued to dominate the region. However, Genoa supplanted Naples as the second main power of the region. A brutal war left Naples back down at the bottom of the peninsular.

Algeria was finally defeated by Portugal leaving Portugal dominate in West Africa.

1480 and all that

In 1480 the Aragonese crown took over the Iberian peninsular, becoming the kingdom of Spain.

To its north, Burgundy was split, a group of French nobles taking power of core France provinces. Whilst Austria inherited the Low country and the Alsace- Lorraine region.

This left Europe with three new powers. Austria, France and Spain.

Within a couple of years Spain voluntarily gave up much of Southern France in exchange for something.

War broke out not much later and it pretty much-dragged in most of Europe. France and Saxony declared war on Austria who was supported by Bohemia. Whilst Brandenberg declared war on most of the world as far as I can tell. The TO, Pommern and the lemmings defeated Brandenberg after a “struggle”. Hungary meanwhile was mauled by a revived Poland and Lithuania.

Meanwhile Saxony, about to go bankrupt, deprived of home provinces was forced out of the war against Austria. The war between Austria and France began to dragged on with inconclusive results but with Austria seeming to have the upper hand. Spain intervened on the side of France, which was kind of different and Austria ceded Artois in return for peace.

Notes

We still have loan abusers amongst us but we only had two incidents of this so a positive sign we are moving ahead.

7thSign is officially banned. I can not stress harder that u stay clear of this idiot. This guy believes its "funny" to cheat.

Sorry for the delay in editing the file, this was no small edit and it surprised all of us, not just in difficulty but in outcome.

I am not sure if play continues this weekend. I will keep people informed.

Mowers
 
Originally posted by Mowers
The East
The Golden Horde had a successful session, ending up much stronger than in over a 100 years.
[/B]

It could have been much more successfull :). After our second war, Muscowy was armyless, leaderless, had 7-9% RR, 2 loans, and was locked in a losing fight against AI Kazan. My plan was to let this war drag on while Muscowy's WE rose, then declare war immediately after the war with Kazan had ended. I think Muscowy would have had serious problems putting up any real resistance. Unfortunately Muscowy was AI controlled next session so I wasn't allowed to attack, and the AI nicely cheated away all Muscowy's problems, leaving them in formidable shape once again.
 
This is pretty irrelevant to the game at large, but I tend to get really into games even when I'm a minor power. So let me have my fun. :D

I don't really think Portugal came out of the Algerian War dominant in West Africa. If anyone did it was the Spanish. But all in all the war seemed like a disasterous enterprise for Algiers and a futile one for the Iberians. Portugal gained nothing in the war, as a result of her refusal to accept the generous peace terms offered her. She retained Tangiers, but losing it was never really a realistic possibility. Aragon (of course later to become Spain) gained Altai Atlas, a level 5 colony at the time with a tax base of 1. This colony, combined with an adjacent Spanish colony and the Canary Islands makes Spain the dominant force in West Africa... for whatever that's worth. Naples gained Cyrenaica, which it lost within 10-20 years. Algiers of course ceased to exist as a viable state, but this was the result if internal policy rather than loss of territory. The territory it lost was insignificant.

Portugal's motives for launching this aggressive war seem perplexing. The entire area is nothing but extremely poor Muslim Arabic provinces, so it seems that a war for purely imperialistic motives would be unlikely. However, there is no other explanation for their actions. It seems their imperial designs in N. Africa were only thwarted by the outbreak of war in Europe. This causes great anxiety about the future intentions of Portugal here in Algiers.
 
A sign of things to come? The Serbian King goes to Norway

After helping the Ethiopian King expanding his realm and trade, we traveled to Aragon. The tale of the traveling King can be read here.

Leaving Aragon after a most pleasent send-off by his most catholic majesty, the King of Aragon, we set sail for a distant country far to the north; Norway.

We, the king of Serbia, did not know much about Norway. They had not figured much in the doings of Europe, but one thing we knew about it: It had left the union it had with Denmark & Sweden. To us that meant that the Norwegians had just as strong a need for freedom as the Serbians have. Thus we came to offer our services to the King of Norway.

One of the last things we heard from our spies in Serbia was that our beloved country was vassalized on Dec. 17, 1469. Woe upon that day, oh woe upon the Ottoman Empire!

After being given the job as aide to the Norwegian King, we set about to look the country over. The first thing we did, was to look at the dp-sliders. They were rather bad to put it bluntly! However, we set to work at them, trying to bring the norwegian frame of mind back where it belong, as a open and easygoing - seafaring trader-nation.

Although we still have a long way to go, we are sure we will be able to present the King of Norway with a dp-slider setting that will be the envy of Europe within the next century or so.

Norway, a mountainious country with it's back towards Sweden and it's soft underbelly towards Denamark.
The 3 kingdoms had been in an union until recently before we, the most Orthodox Serbian King, came to offer our services.
Having seen where the danger might come from, we negotiated an alliance between Norway, Sweden & Denmark. Damocles' England was invited into the alliance, but declined. Englands ongoing disagreement with Scotland over borders, sheep, Whiskey and such might be a reason as Scotland was allied with Sweden already.

Our plan was to cling to Sweden as a limpet, while keeping a watchful eye on England. With the opening of Germany, Sweden were not the only enemy anymore! Denmark on the other hand, we viewed with some degree of disdain.
Denmark had lost all it's provinces but one (Gothland) and depended on it's vassal Sweden for it's economical survival as well as the armies needed to retake the lost provinces.

So we started the "reformation" of Norway with a change in the dp-sliders and then the colonization of Narvik & Iceland was prioritized. Finnmark had been lost to Sweden in a previous war, so we, the Serbian King, has started negotiations with the Swedish king over the possibilities of a puchase of Finnamark.

The Great Nordic Alliance was quite swiftly thrown into small wars where Denmark & Sweden tried to recapture former danish provinces.
Then, in 1478 England declared war on Scotland. Scotland asked for help from her alliance-partners, and after reviewing the plea for a couple of days we left the Great Nordic Alliance. Stab-hits rained in over us as norwegian fishermen went marching in the streets demanding to know what this meant to their fishing-rights off the coast of Scotland.

"Arrrrgh!!! How can this happen!!!" My carefully drafted dismissal of a renewed alliance between Sweden, Denmark, Scotland & Norway has been misplaced! And in it's place, the rather jolly and humourus answer to the crown-prince's stag-party has been sent. We are back in the alliance! The stag-party is off! The crown-prince got the no-thanks letter! There were scantily dressed women there! I missed out on it!!! And now we are at war with England.... oh woe on us.... woe on us... all those women and all that beer we missed out on... and all we have left is a stupid war we never wanted anyway.

The war against England consisted of a stream of diplomats trying to get England to agree to peace, while making sure the homefleet had enough funding to keep the homewaters safe. After sending the brunt of the fleet to Iceland we decided to colonize Eriksfjord in an effort to open up another port in case Iceland fell to the English navy or the armies from the kingdom of Bremen. That army had been on the rampage ever since Denmark declared on Holstein, an ally of Bremen. And they seemed to have a special love for Norway! Well, if this is a sign of things to come, Norway will be visited by german tourists sooner or later. May they leave lots of money in the norwegian coffers!

After the war between Scotland and England was finished, the english king finally granted a white peace to Norway. Denmark however was still being fought over. We, the Serbian King, adviced the Norwegian king to sit this one out and rebuild our coffers instead. Besides, we should try to increase our trade as well as changing the views out the norwegian society. We curbed the rights of the nobles and increased the centralization as well as trading more freely with everyone.

And thus the years passed. We adviced the king on trade and foreign policy, getting travel-passes through countries like Austria and Saxony, where the last of our cavalery armies met a glorious defeat at the hands of several thousand rebels. But what the heck... we never could use cavalery in Norway anyhow.

From now on, educating people on the needs for knowledge, trade and seafaring will be our prime advice to the Norwegian king. With luck, we will then be able to fund the Serbian uprising against the Ottoman opressors!

Serbia will rise again!

The question is when...
 
Is the king of Serbia schizophrenic?



"We, the King of Serbia...."