What to do about the great powers?

[Lysistrata]

I just got the game yesterday, tried as Greece.

I was actually doing quite well for a while; got out of debt thanks to Johore and my British overlords, and a wildly successful crisis I instigated against the Ottoman Empire saw me retake all my cores in one fell swoop.

Next, I decided to stop relying on great powers and strike it out on my own in warfare (that, and the crisis I was trying to stir up in Crete was being ignored). So I attacked Egypt for Crete, which went well, until Russia intervened, and I was forced into submission by infinite Slavs. This annoyed and confused me because I had max relations with Russia. Egypt wasn't in their sphere, and their relations were only friendly. Since I was kinda annoyed and felt I'd earned it (I had managed to occupy Crete and Alexandria before the Russians interfered) I gave myself Crete with the console anyway.

After spending a good few years at peace, rotating political parties to suit my whim, cultivating industry, research, bureaucracy and education, once I was a secondary power, I took the decision to get out of the UK's sphere, they hadn't bothered with me since I got them to conquer Tunis at the start of the game anyway. I thought I was off the hook when 40 British troops, accompanied by a Portuguese and German stack (30 each) landed across Greece. So I was at war with the largest empire in the world, and I hadn't even been notified. At that point, I ragequit.

I have no idea how to get the great powers to work to my advantage, or at least leave me alone. You'd think a great power would have more to do than be a tyrannical busybody. They stopped working to my advantage, they wouldn't ally with me, they wouldn't let me go. I couldn't join them either, because despite how ostensibly well I was doing for most of the game, my rank fluctuated wildly (but it was never higher than 12 or so anyway). So what should I have done?

 

[PanH]

First : a GP can join a war with someone it has sphered or is friendly. So it's natural that Russia joined the war.

And why would they not oppress you ? Being a GP is oppressing people, it's not a fairy land where they're helping people be free and such. They want your Pops to work for their market.

 

[Owl Raider]

Greece is not an easy country to play and definitely not a good nation to learn the game with. As far as your war with Egypt goes, that's a simple game mechanic that any nation with friendly status with another nation can interfere in a war against said nation as long as said nation didn't add a war goal of its own. This always happens right at the game's start with the Texan war of independence where the USA almost always interferes on Texas' behalf to achieve status quo from Mexico. This is what Russia did to you with Egypt and is something you should be aware of. As a side note, rather than cheating by using the console you should understand why certain things happen as Vicky 2 is a very complex game with some rather non-intuitive mechanics.

 

[The Silent Hero]

I wouldn't throw off the UK as a protector, you get access to easierresources and markets to sell your goods. And no other GP will attack you if you're backed by the UK. I guess the only downside is that Britain usually supports the Ottomans at the expense of Greece.