WCfD Class of 02: The Hannoverian Gambit

[Wyvern]

The Master Plan

Wyvern put his master plan into operation.

Austria was occupied, as was Wurtemburg, and now finally the last Burgundian province had fallen. Would it really work this mad plan of his, well the moment of truth was upon him, it was fair to say Wyvern was somewhat apprehensive.

Truth to tell he’d been hoping to have a couple of years free to rearm before making peace and annexing large chunks of Burgundy and Austria. War exhaustion though was just too high and revolts were starting to break out across the realm, so screwing up his courage he hit the annex button for Wurtemburg.

Wurtemburg is annexed.

Burgundy agrees peace seiding Artois, Luxemburg, Champaign, Lorraine and Franche-Comte.

Austria agrees peace seiding Wurtzburg, Sudeten, Bohemia, Moravia, Ost-March and Saltzburg.

The situation just before the BB wars begin.

The year was June 1520.

The simulation moved on 3 days….

Baden declares war.
Russia declares war.
England with Poland, Austria and Ukraine declares war.


ok well that’s not too bad. The simulation carried on and Wyvern started to breath again. Three more days passed, followed by four, then five. Is that all? Well where’s the challenge in this thought Wyvern? The simulator moved on 2 more days then . . .

Helvetia with Genoa, Burgundy and Sweden declares war.
Brabant declares war.
Scotland with Orleans, Aragon and Papal States declares war.
Portugal with Spain declares war.
Naples declares war.
Corsica with Kleves, Palatinate, and Brittany declares war.
Denmark declares war.

Gulp. A nervous grin started to slip across his face, perhaps this hadn’t been such a good idea after all.

With sweat breaking out across his forehead he gripped the simulator and started directing his armies. Firstly lets get rid of some of these single province minors he thought. Forces still resided in much of Austria so he spread these out to prevent any reinforcements being built whilst directing forces from Normandie to move south and start besieging the English province of Maine.

January 1521….

Venice with the Knights and Lithuania declare war.
Bavaria declares war.
Teutonic Order declares war.

Oh no, not more sighed Wvyern, I thought I was fighting all of Europe already.

But by the end of the year he had had his first piece of good news when the Palatinate were annexed followed shortly by Kleves, providing a new army of 24 thousand much needed infantry and lifting a near successful siege of Luxembourg.

Maine also promptly fell and he moved the army on to Vendee and another army from Flandern to Caux, but elsewhere the news was grim. Poland in the east conquered Wielkopolska and Podlasia, whilst France ran rampant storming Artois, Normandie and Champagne.

Helvetia was to take Franche-comte at the beginning of 1522, and Bavaria Salzburg a few months later, whilst Aragon added further losses in the French region capturing Luxembourg and Lorraine, with France picking up Picardie in June 1522. The fact that Baden was to captured Wurtemburg just days before Wyverns own forces captured the Baden Capital hardly bore mentioning and left Wyvern fuming.

Staring defeat in the face Wyvern knew he had to act and act quickly to remove some of the opposition from the fight. If this meant giving up some territory then he knew he had no choice even if the proposition didn’t exactly please him.

Finally in August of 22 Vendee was captured from the English to add to those of Maine and Caux, and the English agreed to make peace even giving up Caux as part of the settlement. This took Poland and Austria out of the fight and freed up the eastern half of the kingdom.

The only other front that was going well was against Denmark in the north, where Bremen, Vorpommern and Jylland were all captured by the end of 22 and Denmark was forced to give up Vorpommern. Thank god another front was now quiet, thought Wyvern, well except for the occasional Swedish landing that is, but those he could cope with.

January of 1523 and Baden was finally annexed. That’ll teach em he thought. With the Poles no longer a threat in the east, an army was sent to deal with the Russians in Prussia and Kurland. With minimal fortifications and low Russia land tech, both provinces were easily stormed and the Russians agree to give up Prussia in the peace settlement.

July and the Ottomans declare war just before a white peace with Naples, and here Wyvern had been sure he was fighting everyone already.

Well he was starting to feel a little bit more confident now, but was still in about a dozen wars and France and Aragon were consistently wiping out all armies he sent against them, with a sprinkling of help from the Spanish, Portuguese and a most troublesome Brabant. Extravagent bribes were sent to Scotland to try to make peace. 400 ducats, 500, even 600 ducats, but each were refused. Whenever the small navy that Wyvern possessed left port it was promply whooped, so there was no way to reach Scotland and he really didn’t have the land forces available in any case.

Well with Denmark gone from the war, armies were freed up to finally deal with Brabant. Take that, Branant was annexed in February 1524 and a white peace with the Teutons signed in April.

Then out of the blue Scotland offered Wyvern peace if he’d agree to give them Mecklenburg! God, what a decision to have to make. Mecklenburg was one of his centers of trade, could he really afford to surrender it? Well he had no choice really. France and Aragon controlled 6 of his provinces between them with more about to fall, he really had to get them out of the fight. So with a heavy heart he pushed the Accept button and consoled himself by thinking that the province would probably revolt pretty soon and rejoin him.

He knew it had been the right thing to do. One province lost and he’d taken out the most powerful local nations from the war. It was simple now to move in and occupy Burgundy. Heavy cavalry units were used to sweep away the Spanish and Portuguese armies sieging the Netherlands and both would duly accept peace in time following a bribe of 50 ducats. Venice took a little more money to placate, but 225 ducats took them out of the war along with a more troublesome Lithuania.

August of 1525 and he forced Burgundy to give up Nivernais and Savoy, leaving just Helvetia and Bavaria in the war. Bavaria by this time occupied a couple of provinces and was very much the King of the Mountains. Wyvern knew he could probably defeat them in time, but he wanted to be in a more prepared state to fight the next round of wars than he’d been in this time, so he gave in and accepted Bavaria’s demand for Erz. This enabled his remaining forces to smother Helvetia and take Provence and Schwyz from then in March 1527 and so end the first round of BB wars.

With vast relief he saved his position and collapsed back in his chair.

.

[Edit - Oops I clicked submit just a little too soon].

 

[Carolus Rex]

Another good update.

 

[Wyvern]

The next 30 years were slow going for Wyvern [and for me, I appreciate Peters comment now on crawling through the game because of all the revolts!] but rewarding to be sure. Another round of BB wars ended with more gains taken from England and Denmark and various minor nations mainly in the French region, but Wyvern had to give Sweden Gotland (gained from Denmark) and Finnmark to get them to leave him in peace and so end another round of wars. The key was clearly to keep wars to around the 5 to 7 year length, and at least during the early wars to concentrate primarily on the enemy alliances war leader. For much of the time the major alliance was led by England and Wyvern would happily conquer English continental holdings, ignoring the Austrians and Poles in the knowledge that anything they conquered would be lost when he made peace with the English.

He also realised that it was rarely wise to make separate peace deals with members of such alliances as they would just cause the 5 year truce clock to start clicking that much sooner than was absolutely necessary.

He was fascinated with the enemy peace deal process. It seemed he could conquer a province such as Kurland (giving a 20%+ war score) from the Russians and still be unable to force a status-quo peace, but give them 50 ducats and they’d happily wave cheerio and march back home without a whimper. He wondered if perhaps the furious aggression setting was having a bearing on the process. Peace deals certainly seemed harder to come by than at normal aggression levels.

Back at the simulator, what proved to be a major breakthrough occurred when Denmark offered to give up Bergenshus in 1536 as part of a peace deal (despite Wyvern never having conquered it!) and so provided his first proper toe hold on the Scandinavian continent. Ferrying 30 thousand troops over in preparation for hostilities with Sweden, and another 10 thousand into Skane during the war, Wyvern was able to deal a severe blow to Sweden that they would never recover from. Taking Voster-gotland and Ostlandt in the first war and Vasterbotten, Gastrickland, Skane and Smaland in the second, by the start of the 1550’s Scandinavia was no longer a threat to worry about.

Sometime around the middle of the 1530’s the reformed religion broke out across Europe, and Wyvern was forced to lower his religious tolerance to Catholics and Protestants to accommodate the new belief. Apart from one mistaken gain from Lithuania, he had make sure to only conquer Catholic and Protestant provinces and had numerous missionaries attempting to convert his German protestant provinces.

This was quite a bonus really to picking a German state Wyvern thought, as the majority of the Protestant provinces were in Germany giving him a higher chance of converting them to his religion and so removing one troublesome religious slider. He’d toyed with the idea of converting to Protestantism himself, but his aggressive conquest plans had precluded this as an option, and even after 25 years of Bad-Boy wars he wasn’t in a safe enough position to be able to suffer the –3 stability unnecessarily.

His position in Europe was now looking quite healthy. France and Italy were conquered, and the first gains had been made against Spain capturing the lucrative center of trade in Andalusia. For sure he had failed to make any gains against Austria, but then he’d hardly tried, leaving them as a nice buffer against the Turks. Lithuania had similarly been left in the east preventing Russia and the Golden Horde from providing any effective opposition.

His eyes now turned north, to England and Scotland. On two occasions now Scotland had declared war as the leader of a major alliance, and they were proving extremely difficult to force to the peace table. On the first occasion he had had to give up Mecklemburg which still grated, though as predicted it had revolted and declared independence from Scotland, letting Wyvern re-annex it, but again he was back to the same position with them, needing a peace deal shortly and seemingly unable to force them to one. It was time he realised to look at gaining a foothold in England.

The situation in 1550 - [We're still in the middle of a round of wars - those troublesome Scots being the ones prolonging it]

 

[unmerged(4271)]

Hey! Throw the Yellow Card!

First we have Exhibit A:

He noticed that the simulator booths were starting to empty as students began to leave for the night. That jock Heagarty was still there in the adjacent booth fast asleep as usual. He’d picked Micklenburg and after arriving in a drunken stupor that morning singing and carousing apparently because some football team had won a game, had promptly dow’ed Austria and seemingly kicked off a mini world war, despite only controlling a handful of provinces. You had to laugh really

Then you have Exhibit B:

Originally posted by Wyvern
Dear Father,

(SNIP!)
I have hatched a plan that I believe will knock off as many as 50 years of simulation time from my project and will hopefully display a boldness of purpose that will go down well with the examination board. I intend to declare war on Burgundy and then Austria, after manufacturing suitable Casus Belli of course, and then I will proceed to occupy all of their territory and that of any of their allies I am able to. Only when both are fully beaten will I make peace. At that point, rather than simply vassalising them and waiting half a century to diplo-annex, which is what the predictable student would do, I will instead speed things up by demanding most of their territory immediately. Both are of a size where I can take 5 or 6 provinces, and I should be able to take out one or two minors at the same time. This will of course trigger the second stage of the exam – the dreaded Bad Boy wars, but with the extra territory I will have gained, I should have the economic strength and manpower to cope.


Your Obedient son,

Wyvern.

Who's the drunken fool, now?!?

Obviously Mr. T, if you're following the "One Bourbon, etc." thread !!!

Good job anyway, ya plagarizing lizard!

 

[Wyvern]

Wyvern looked up from his simulator at the sound of sniggering coming from an adjacent booth. Damn, his concentration broken he decided to save his position and take a break. He'd been trying to entice the Scots into a peace settlement for the last few months but they just weren't having it and wanted Holstein of all things to make peace. Maybe he’d have to acquiesce.

"He's drunk I tell ya"

"Nah he's just crazy..."

"Off his rocker I'd say" whispered a third voice.

......

So, his fellow students were disparaging his efforts. Well he'd show them. Besides, his plan had worked hadn’t it?

He thought about offering some advice to Heagarty, so obviously in need of it, but figured it was a lost cause. Besides, let him stew in his own juice if he was going to laugh at Wyvern's efforts. Really he was surprised the Professor continued to let Heagarty torture himself when the ending was obvious. [OOC: ]

With his head held high he quit the simulator room, already hatching his next cunning plan.

 

[unmerged(6777)]

Originally posted by heagarty
Hey! Throw the Yellow Card!

<snip>

Who's the drunken fool, now?!?

Obviously Mr. T, if you're following the "One Bourbon, etc." thread !!!

Good job anyway, ya plagarizing lizard!

The drunken FOOL was indeed me. Didn't you know, heagarty, that immitation is the best form of flattery

Good stuff Wyvern. Looks like those classes are starting to pay off.

 

[Wyvern]

Originally posted by MrT


The drunken FOOL was indeed me. Didn't you know, heagarty, that immitation is the best form of flattery

Good stuff Wyvern. Looks like those classes are starting to pay off.

Quite true MrT. Peter Ebbesen has inspired a craze here for a while I think, and being able to play off Heagarty I hope helps keep my story more interesting.

Both should be congratulated. I love reading their posts

[Edit: Oops ]

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

...Not only does he promote Tax Collectors, he also mispronounces his Teacher's Name. That's a bad, bad, attitude to bring to one's examination, I tell you. It reveals a certain lack of self-preservation. Mark my words: Heads will roll, come the end of these exams, like in the good old days, heads will roll.

 

[Wyvern]

Pain… Nausea. Tongues of molten magma pounding at the back of his skull.

The outline of dim grey shapes started to coalesce before his conscience. He seemed to be lying, nay more accurately he was wedged, into some sort of storage cupboard. Brooms and cleaning equipment cluttered the floor and shelves. Reaching up he touched the back of his head and his hand came away sticky with blood.

God, what had happened?

He remembered presenting his weekly update to the Professor that morning, explaining that he now had most of Europe under his sway, and that he would shortly be marching on the Islamic hordes. As the professor had taught he outlined the domestic policies he’d been following. Max serfdom and narrow-mindedness, and a now fully implemented defensive policy, which gave all his armies a siege bonus and meant so far that he’d not had to build any artillery beyond what he got from mercenaries. He’d discussed with the Professor about land policy and aristocracy, both of which he’d also nearly maximised. There was some talk in the dorm about the academy simulators being upgraded and Wyvern had heard worrying rumours that the upgrade could adversely effect his running simulation, so altering the effect of these 2 domestic policies. The Professor had stated that no simulator would be upgraded until exams were over, unless the student in question gave his permission.

But after that, what had he done? He thought he’d left the Professors office, but could he be sure. His thoughts were too hazy and he desperately needed to think.

Surely the Professor wouldn’t have attacked him? Though to be sure he could get a bit violent sometimes. He remembered being scolded for building a tax collector, but that was somewhat expected and even deserved. As his realm expanded and rebellions increased, Wyvern was coming to a whole new appreciation on the need to keep revolt risk absolutely as low as possible and deeply regretted that early lapse.

… of course there had also been that occasion when he’d mangled the Professors name…. But that was a little thing surely? A high minded academic like Professor Ebessen wouldn’t hold that against him, would he?

Trying the handle of the door Wyvern cautiously peeked out.

 

[Wyvern]

OOC

Guys, I've got a question. Now that the UK 1.05 patch has come out, do you think it's a wise idea to upgrade, or would you leave it at 1.04 for this GC. Peter, did you upgrade your Righteous Bastaards game? I remember reading that you were thinking of doing so. If so have you had any problems.

Thanks.

 

[Carolus Rex]

I'd play it safe and stay with the 1.04 patch.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Originally posted by Wyvern
… of course there had also been that occasion when he’d mangled the Professors name…. But that was a little thing surely? A high minded academic like Professor Ebessen wouldn’t hold that against him, would he?

Trying the handle of the door Wyvern cautiously peeked out.

...He even mispronounces my name in this thoughts! Thought the Teacher. Two b's and an s. How hard can it be? That Wyvern sure knows how to push the limit.


I upgraded the TRB game to 1.05 without any problems. While the serfdom production malus is in, you won't notice at all, since max decentralised gives an equivalent bonus (the now famous 1.05 bug) - they cancel each other out. You'll take a slight hit due to the modified aristocracy slider, but nothing really damaging.

I say keep a safe copy of the current save-game, upgrade and see if you run into any problems (of a technical nature, that is). If you do, you can always reinstall and apply the 1.04 patch again. The improvements are well worth running 1.05.

 

[Wyvern]

Originally posted by Peter Ebbesen


...He even mispronounces my name in this thoughts! Thought the Teacher. Two b's and an s. How hard can it be? That Wyvern sure knows how to push the limit.

Bangs his head against a wall. And again. Damn, he would get it right eventually, honest he would .....

 

[unmerged(6777)]

Originally posted by Wyvern


Bangs his head against a wall. And again. Damn, he would get it right eventually, honest he would .....

Well, not too worry. Peter E2b'sesen won't do more than flog you in pulic a few times. Heck, in my Sunday Bourbon/Scotch/Beer (see sig.) binge I discovered that I'd even spelt my own name wrong.

Personally I would give the patch a whirl, but definitely save a copy of the file in case something weird happens.

 

[Wyvern]

Wyvern stumbled down the corridor, wisps of smoke curled through the double doors leading into the simulator room. He spotted a body laying in a heap outside the entrance.

Cautiously approaching Wvyern recognised him for one of the 1st year students, Tue he though his name was. There was a jagged scare across his neck, but Wyvern seemed to remember that was the Professors handywork. Checking for a pulse and finding one he cautiously moved on.

The simulator room was a mess and no two ways about it. It looked like a mini typhoon had come in to play and only recently left. Machines were knocked over, screens smashed, Wyvern noticed his own simulator was a smoking ruin. Quickly surveying the ruins and finding no more casualties he returned to Tue and made sure he was stable. He didn’t appear to be suffering from any serious injuries so leaving him Wyvern moved off in search of help. Klaxons began to blare, about bloody time though Wyvern, someone’s balls were for the chop and no two ways about it.

* * *

The small gathering of students assembled the next morning on the parade ground. Major Zakery surveyed them with disgust.

“I don’t have to tell you how grave a matter this is I hope?”

“Yesterday, person or persons unknown stole into the advanced studies lab and attempted to use the Global World Invasion Device for a bit of post curricula experimentation. Now, as you all know this device is off limits to everyone except post graduates, and even they have to be under the direct supervision of a senior Professor. Yet clearly one of you decided you couldn’t wait that long and just had to give it a try. Was the simulated world conquest we all practice on not exciting enough for you that you had to try your hands at the real thing?” The Major was literally screaming at them now.

Relaxing somewhat he continued. “Now I’m sure Professor Ebbesen will enjoyed sending this idiots butt back home minus some essential body parts... Using the GWID is one thing, but forgetting to lock it down afterwards requires a special kind of vacuity of the mind to accomplish.” His glare took in all the students, pinning them to the spot as though counting each of their brain cells in turn and coming up short.

“In this case the GWID opened up a gateway between Zaphos IX and our world allowing a group of Krulls, the native inhabitants of Zaphos to pass though. As some of you found out, Krulls are very like the fabled Yeti of Earth legend. A mass of fur and muscle but not a brain cell amongst them. Be thankful for that people! Otherwise with their strength they’d have conquered the universe by now. As it is we still use them as shock troops on many world.”

“Now, due to the damage inflicted in the simulator room, many of the machines are going to have to be replaced. The model we’ve been using until now at the Academy is becoming obsolete in any case so all new simulators will be the itanium powered Paradox 1.05. For those of you sitting exams, your positions have been saved to the central mainframe and can be downloaded to your new simulator.”

Whilst the lecture continued Wyvern surveyed the other students, wondering which if any of them was the culprit and feeling slightly in awe that one of them had tried something like this – he’d have given his right arm to command a real world conquest.

The news about the simulators was a blow as his was one of those destroyed. He’d read up on the Paradox 1.05, said to mirror the real world to a 95.7% accuracy compared to the Paradox 1.04's 90% rating. A number of fundamental simulator parameters were also changed apparently, he hoped it wouldn't adversely affect his project. He determined to dig out the models specs before continuing his own paper.

Glancing to the left he noticed Carlos’s head was once more attached and bandaged up. It had been ripped off again following an unfortunate scuffle with one of the Krulls. Heagarty had made good use of it though adapting it into a makeshift hand grenade to disperse a band of the beasts before the campus guards had come in to round up the beasts.

The Majors voice picked up. “I expect all of you to think careful on your position here today and if you have any information that might have a bearing on yesterdays incident to report it immediately to Professor Ebbesen as your senior tutor. Frankly if it was left to me I’d banish the lot of you to Zaphos along with all the Krulls and good riddance, but the Professor here persuades me to be lenient, he says some of you actually might be worth saving.” The Major looked like he could hardly warrant it. “Now dismissed!”



[ OOC and all that just so I can upgrade to version 1.05 ]

 

[Wyvern]

Wyvern sat down to consider what should go in his next report. What would the Professor be interesting in hearing about? Would he want to know about the hundreds of revolts? Nah revolts were just part of being a World Conqueror, and to be used to judge how well you were doing. If you didn’t get 3 or 4 revolts each month even during peacetime you obviously weren’t advancing rapidly enough.

And whilst Wyvern thought the Professor might be interested to hear about how he nearly blew it at one point in the 1570’s when after being at war for 3 years Hanover was hit by a political crises and he’d spent the next 6 or 7 years just hanging on by his fingernails rather than advancing, he decided to leave that bit out. No point telling everyone how he’d let Genoa get a +3 war score against him after which it had proved practically impossible to get them to agree to peace. He hadn’t got out of that round of wars for another 5 years and it still gave him a cold sweat.

Perhaps the Professor would like to know how he financed all his exploits? Yes, best to talk about war taxes in his report. The first two or even three years of any war were a most prosperous time for Hanover, doubling and even nearly tripling the yearly income and giving research an amazing boost. He’d often divert all the treasury to a research field during such times and recover the stability through annexation. He doubted he’d have been able to reach infrastructure tech 5 by 1600 without it and so get rid of inflation, making troops, missionaries and more research much cheaper. And as for paying for missionaries? Well there was just no other way at least in the early years. Of course the longer a war dragged on the more circumspect you had to be. Raising taxes had the simulator make a revolt check on all your provinces and also raised revolt risk by 1%, which could trigger a surprising number of revolts in the later stages of a war. Probably the greatest advantage of raising war taxes though was that it allowed him to raise substantial numbers of troops in provinces that previously would have hardly provided any. A very economical way to get reinforcements to North America or even the Russian front.

No he knew what the Professor would want to hear about. He’d want to know about his strategies and plans. Why he’d done what. Ok, well that was simple. After subduing much of Europe leaving just a few of the eastern Orthodox states plus the two colonial powers of Spain and England he’d decided to halt his advances against the Ottomans following the capture of their Catholic and Orthodox Balkan provinces. Instead he’d geared himself for an invasion of North America.

Why had he done this? Well he still had 6 reformed provinces to convert and wanted at least one religious slider free before starting the conquest of the Muslims. Of course he’d continued to finish off the remnants of the Christian European powers, his plan being to get it down to just the Golden Horde and the Ottoman Empire on his eastern border, both of whom could easily be forced to the peace table whenever he wanted.

So during one of the brief periods when he wasn’t at war with the English or the Spanish he’d launched a cobbled together navy and an army of about 30 thousand troops and set sail for the Americas. The year was 1590 when he forced the Lenape to cede him his first province in the Americas, Manhattan. 30,000 men had proved insufficient to take out the Lenape completely, but had been adequate to force them to surrender the first province. It was a start and would prove more than sufficient. From this humble beginning he had been able to ferry in reinforcements and strike out against the English both at home and now at their colonial possessions. The first war was only to provide a few trading posts due to high fortifications in most of the English colonies and large English armies back at home, but when the Lenape declared war in 1595 he was ready. Forces were in place allowing him to rampage though their remaining provinces and on into the territories of the Iroqouis, Shawnee and Cherokee, so that by 1598 all four Indian nations had been annexed in a swift and painless campaign.

With a recruitment base now available in North America, the English North American colonies could be overwhelmed in a succession of wars covering the next 20 years. Whilst both the English and Spanish were often willing to offer up large chunks of their colonial trading posts he was carefully to force them to agree to his terms. Whilst he could sometimes have gained many provinces for little effort, too often they would include a trading post in the far east that adjoined an Eastern power such as China. Having a war with China every 5 years was something Wyvern could well do without. So however tempting some of the offers were he resolutely stuck to his own plans and gradually forced the Spanish and English to give up their North American possessions whilst he conquering the remaining Indian tribes as soon as he gained territory adjacent to them.

Thirty years to take out North America. At this rate he’d be finished with South American before those damn Reformed provinces were converted.

Europe 1620. [We're back to standard colours follow the 1.05 patch ]

North America 1620

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

....Striking two leftover Krulls with the blow of imminent death, the Teacher abandoned his fun and went to check up on the students. Behind him the Krulls belatedly realised the fact of their death and collapsed. Such is the power of a true master.

And how was the young linguistically challenged Wyvern doing? He wondered. Did he progress apace? Would at least one of the students complete the course this year? It was to be hoped, for parts of the faculty obsessed with grants and student fatality rates had launched a whispering campaign and a covert investigation to undermine his position.

It was not impossible that steps would have to be taken. Fortunately, his support amongst the troops on planet remained strong, and he could count on the aid of a few succesful students from aeons past if needed. Perhaps Melkor could spare a few Balrogs?

But perhaps it would't come to that. Wyvern was coming along well. He did, of course, have the advantage of a strong state culture, and critics would be sure to point that out, but nevertheless. And several of the other students, though lagging behind, might yet make it.

They had better... Or heads would roll.

 

[Wyvern]

Professor Quinton was not a man to take disappointment well, and now he was really, really pissed. Damn that Professor Ebbesen. What did he have to do to get rid of the man? It seemed that student mutilations and decapitations were not enough. Noooo, it’s results that count said the governors and if a little dismemberment helps the student focus, well that’s all well and good.

Results huh? Well now how could his students produce any results if all their simulators were smashed? Oh and during all the confusion why not send Lordo and Hargy the Krull assassins to remove that troublesome Professor once and for all?

..... so how was Quinton to know the incompetent duo only had brawn to matched their brain cell? And why oh why had the powers that be replaced all the ageing smashed up simulators with brand new Itanium powered Paradox 1.05 models so quickly? It was most galling.

Still some amongst the faculty were finally starting to question Ebbesen’s methods… Perhaps a few more well placed rumours would do it, say a tale about a juicy youthful conquest failure or another disaster involving one of his students. Ah yes it was not over yet, Quinton would yet remove that loathsome man and take his place as the Professor of World Conquest for Dummies.

 

[Wyvern]

[The context to this is from the ending of Heagarty’s WCfD thread, if you haven’t read it, it’s well worth a read. The synopsis being that Heagartys dad bribed eight members of the review board to get his son out of the WCfD’s class. The second part of this post is a joint effort between Peter and myself. All the funny bits are by Peter ]

*****

“Professor Quintons office, how can I help?”

“Quinton in? I need to speak to him NOW.”

“Ah right Sir, just one moment, can I say who’s calling?”

“Lord Heagarty Miss, now put me through!”

“Ah Professor, I have Lord Heagarty on line two, he sounds pretty angry. Do you want to take it?”

“Yes yes Synthia, nothing to worry about my dear, just put him through”.

*****

“Heagarty, Heagarty my dear chap, what can I do for you?”

“Cut the crap Professor, you trying to make a laughing stock of me? What in blazes is going on at that infernal academy of yours?”

“Please calm down old chap, nothing to be worried about I assure you, I’ve got it all under control.”

“All under control? That’s what you said last time. I paid you good money to arrange things for my Son, and now look! I get a letter from the Dean informing me that a new review board is to be convened before taking any decision. Another bloody review board? Are you going to suggest I dish out another eight fellowships? Or perhaps you think you can weedle a grant from me?”

“Now Sir please. I’ll be dealing with the situation personally I assure you. I believe I know who’s at the root of both our problems, and once neutralised the Dean will fall into line.”

“You better be right Professor! Goodbye.”

*****


The Duel

The campus was abuzz with the news, eight eminent Professors tragically murdered and the Dean shot, all within a week. Professor Quinton did not need to be a mathematician to put two and two together. Professor Ebbesen so far might not have traced his own connections to the review board and his dealings with Lord Heagarty, but he was not about to take any chances at this stage.

Direct action was called for. If he could but acquire proof as to the veracity of his suspicions, he would become the hero of the day, or, at the very least, he would guarantee his own survival. Blackmail was a dirty word, but the grave was dirtier still, and a man had to have his priorities straight.

He put his plan into operation the next day when he came upon Ebbesen in the staff common room.

"Ah Ebbesen, have you seen this latest gadget from the military? A portable twin simulator duelling module, could prove quite an addition to next years course don't you think? Fancy giving it a whirl, old boy?" ask Quinton innocently.

"Well, the Major informed me that they had arrived, but what with dismantling and grading students, I haven't really had the time to test them, you know how it is, - so testing them out together might prove quite interesting, provided you have kept up to date on recent events", the teacher of world conquest answered.

"I'm completely up to date, don't you worry", replied Quinton, which was very nearly the truth.

Without further ado, the two Professors strapped themselves into the simulator and began. The setting: Earth. The year: 1419. The players: Random European non-minors.

"Fancy a wager to add a little spice to the proceeding?" asked Quinton.

"If you insist. Did you have anything particular in mind?"

"Money? No too ostentatious, a dare? Sounds intriguing. No I have it, how about something a little more interesting, how about the loser just has to answer one question of the winners choosing under the influence of a truth drug. There's something I've been dying to ask you about Miss Starbright", said Quinton, deviously.

Professor Ebbesen frowned, considering the proposition for a few moments then said "So long as it isn't a question of an anatomical nature concerning that delightful woman, you've got a deal!"

"Well, it was worth a try. Not anatomical, you've got my word", replied Quinton.

A series of names began to flash across the screen. Austria, England, France, Aragon. Finally Hungary solidified, followed by Venice.

Venice, Quinton was well pleased, how could Ebbesen beat him, if he could not get at his Islands?

Armies began to march to the sound of thunder. Hungary was allied with Croatia, providing a buffer zone between the two states. Venetian armies were soon besieging the two Croatian provinces as reinforcements from both sides swarmed in. Quinton began to smile as small Hungarian armies were easily vanquished across the frontier, perhaps he wouldn’t even need to use his ace at this rate.

Croatia fell, but he still needed to conquer Krain to give him access to Hungary proper. But where were the Hungarian armies? Suddenly a message flashed across the screen.

Ragusa is annexed by Hungary!

How did that happen? He had been too busy concentrating on the Croatian front to notice Hungary’s declaration of war. With no previous enemy navy to worry about his fleet was out of position. Before he could recall it Hungarian troops were landing in Corfu, and more appeared in Ionia. Ebbesen started to smirk.

Quinton realised he was in trouble. How could Hungary afford military access through Serbia and Turkey and build a fleet so quickly that could beat the Venetian navy?

"Oh, dearie me. My mercenaries have caused state bankrupcy - for the second time. What a shame - it will have far-reaching consequences. I'll just need to take out some more loans", grinned professor Ebbesen.

Well, two can play that game, thought Quinton.

"And I'm afraid I've hired every single mercenary unit in Europe. But don't worry. A new one will be available every month from now on. I wonder who will hire it first?", the world conquest teacher continued.

Actually, Quinton worried quite a bit. Still there was always his own secret weapon... Some would call it cheating, but in a good cause, it was merely...prudent. Surreptitiously he activated his mod. Lets see what he thinks of the Austrian inheritance a century early!

Hungary declares war on Austria

What?

Bohemia joins an alliance with Hungary
Bohemia joins Hungary in the fight against Venice
Bohemia joins Hungary in the fight against Austria
Bohemia joins Hungary in the fight against the Ottoman Empire

What!?

Bohemia agrees to become a Hungarian vassal
Wallachia is annexed by Hungary
The government of the Ottoman Empire collapsed

"Oh, no. Three BB per province. That's 12 extra BB. Fortunately, that frees
up my Eastern armies", smirked Ebbesen.

What? Come on! Inherit! INHERIT! INHERIT!

Hungarian armies continued to siege and more began pouring South into Krain. As Hungarian troops began invading Austria from the East, and other forces marched South through now conquered Ottoman possessions, Quinton began to sweat. Damn it, where was that inheritance event?

"Waiting for something, my dear Quinton?" asked Professor Ebbesen. "You do know that inheritence event won’t activate until Hungarys at peace? Don't you? And it won't activate at all once I've annexed Austria",
Ebbesen was grinning evily. He had plenty of practise.

"And no, I'm not interested in 27 ducats for peace."

"And I won't be satisfied with Crete and Corfu either. You, my friend, are in deep, deep, trouble."

"And keep your hand off the CTD button. I'm afraid somebody carelessly connected it to the power supply causing instant electrocution of anyone unwary enough to touch it.", he added.

FZZZZZZSTT!

"Ah well, too late. What a shame. I'll never get to ask him my question, why he thought he could outsmart me", said professor Ebbesen to himself. But the Academy is better off for his loss, tragic though it may be.

*****

There was a knock at the Professors door. “Yes?”

“Professor, I’m ready to hand in my final report.”

“Very good Wyvern, and mind your step, there’s been a little accident. Still I do like Professor Quintons new hair style.”


[One more post and then over to you Professor.]

 

[Wyvern]

Student Notes from 1620

North America took 30 years to conquer, I was to overrun South America in under 10 with the defeat of the Chimu and Inca nations, destruction of a few Chinese trading posts and expulsion of the Spanish. Most English colonies had now been conquered in the new world baring a handful including one in the middle of India. After scoring a decisive victory in 1629 I decided to vassalise the English instead of taking territory and promptly brought them into my alliance, not that I ever intended to ask them for any help. I wasn’t 100% sure I’d be able to diplo annex them later with a massive bad-boy score but knew I’d have enough time to defeat them at a later stage if they did proved obstinate and this would stop them declaring war on me every five years.

By 1641 I had reduced the number of Reformed provinces held to just two, Limousin and Magyar. England, my vassal unfortunately had another two plus loads of protestant provinces (they’d done most of their colonising as Protestant but also spent a short period as Reformed), so keeping them as vassals for a while made sense.

With the riches of the East beckoning, and patience running out, I plonked a 50k army over Limousin and another over Magyar, set the religious tolerance for Reformed to zero and the rest at a level playing field, and launched a full scale invasion of the Golden Horde and Ottoman Empire. Troops were shipped across from Spain into North Africa to combat their ally Algeria, easily defeating their technologically inferior armies and storming their minimal fortifications. A march down through Africa was to prove no problem at all. For the next 15 years or more conquests were relatively easy and progress was swift. With a massive tech advantage over most nations and little in the way of fortifications to deal with, all fell before our conquering armies until we bumped up against Persia the first Muslim country with both decent land technology and high fortifications. For the first time I found myself having to build artillery to help wear down the enemy defences and also for the first time since the BB wars started I found the AI not declaring war on me on a regular basis. The reason for this was soon apparent, virtually all Indian and Mongol nations were wrapped up in a perpetual war that they didn’t seem to want to get out of. I therefore found myself issuing a succession of war declarations against first Persia, then a small Mughal Empire and finally a very large Delhi Empire.

By 1700, Delhi had been reduced to a rump state, most of South East Asia was under my control, conquered by troops raised from the rich Indian recruiting grounds, rich at least whenever I raised war taxes. In 1698 after 70 years of vassalisation I asked the English to join my realm and they accepted without demur. Delhi was finally annexed in 1702 and we were now only seriously fighting the Chinese in each 5 year round of combat, annexing the other states as and when necessary just to improve stability.

Visions of conquering the world by 1700 had long ago disappeared. With hind sight I regret waiting those 20 years to reduce my number of Reformed provinces to 2, I could easily have coped with a few more and attacked the Muslims much earlier. Well live and learn.

A quick calculation of the number of Chinese provinces remaining, factoring in the 5 year truce and a 2 year war and it was rather depressing to realise this could drag on into the 1730’s or even 40’s. And this is when the real boredom kicked in. When you know you’ve won, but also know you’ve got a fair few hours to go just to mop up, motivation becomes a problem. So taking the Professor as a roll model [is that such a good idea?] I began trying to speed the process up and declaring war on China before the truce period had run out. Anything he can do I can do – I think. (Well perhaps not World Conquest with Tibet).

What can I say, I am in awe of how many times the Professor could bring himself to do this. Rebellions, you cannot imagine! Try. Declaring war without CB and breaking a truce. Minus seven stability. Suddenly your whole screen is covered with rebellion messages. Lets just count them. Just declaring war generated over 30 rebellions. Oh and I pick January the 26th to do it, so 5 days later another 20 rebellions kick in at the start of the next month. Hmm, lets see, 4 months to regain one stability point. This ain't gona be pretty. Oh and did I tell you that the rebels technology has improved? Yep now the rebel armies are often winning these fights especially in rough terrain. And I thought I was bored??? Oh well, all those troops in formerly safe territory needed a bit of exercise. Of course the second time I did this I began to realise that perhaps I might have underestimated how many rebel bashing armies I needed. Finally a use for all those mercenaries. They were taking too long to march to the front line nowadays anyway.

Surprisingly I got no civil war even though I was to repeat this process 3 times in a row, (4 if I count the very final time when China was finally a rump state) and so on March 6th 1721, I marched into the Chinese Capital for the last time and finally brought the world conquest to a close.

At the end, Limousin and Magyar were still unconverted reformed, though I managed to convert the two English reformed provinces. 13 provinces were still protestant so I was never able to reduce tollerance to any other religion than Reformed. Most Pagans were converted, but I'd barely started on any other religion.



[A fun experience, not sure I could face doing it again though.]