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« on: February 25, 2010, 01:35:10 pm »
I've been playing a lot of Europa Universalis 3 lately. All expansion packs included. So much so, I wanted to create an LP, but felt that I was not yet competent enough with the game to be successful with what I was attempting to do at all. So I played a series of testing runs to get a feel for how to carry out my plans.
Then, things got severely awesome to my supreme disappointment, as I wasn't keeping track of it.
I decided early on that I would play as the Merchant Republic of Venice, and try my damnedest to become a major world player. Not just economically, mind you, but territorially, militarily, globally. I found it kind of shocking when I managed to pull it off. I'll try to describe in detail as much as I can about the way things happened. Not just the growth and supremacy of Venice, but of the course of world as time went on... Truly Bizarre directions. I will, maybe, continue here where I left off. I'm not even into the 1700's yet, so there's plenty of game still left.
((I was also playing with the Whole World mod that adds several nations and provinces, filling out the Terra Incognita entirely.))
At the beginning of the game, the state of the world was completely historic. The First Doge of Venice is given a mission to conquer Verona. After a few years of hiring mercenaries, recruiting a standing army, and extending the reach of Venetian Merchants across Europe, an invasion is launched, and Most of Milan falls before the weight of Venetian arms. Much of this territory is quickly snapped up by the Doge in the peace accords, at the expense of great Infamy, but it is of little consequence as I do not intend to launch another major war for some time.
Of course, Milan happens to be part of the Holy Roman Empire, as are most of the North Italian states, and the Emperor in Bohemia did attempt to protect Milan. However, Hungary offered me an alliance before the declaration of war, and I accepted for the single reason that doing so would ensure that Hungary would act as a buffer against Bohemia, and quite possibly defeat the Holy Roman Emperor before his armies set foot south of Trent. The strategy worked.
Genoa is what falls into my sights next, though, for one main reason. It's capital, Liguria, is a major center of trade that stands in direct competition to Venice. Attacking at the moment is fairly pointless, though, given that I wouldn't be able to capture it in one go. I bide my time.
Meanwhile, an aggressive and expansionist Kingdom of Aragon launches a war of Conquest against Naples. By the end of the war, Naples is reduced to a pittance of small provinces in the mid Italian Peninsula, between the territories Aragon claimed for itself (South Italy and Sicily), and the Papal States to it's North.
France is a bastard around this time, and decides that the English cannot be tolerated, and declares a war of aggression. The English are backed up by Austria, Aragon, and Castille, and Britanny. and the French are seemingly hosed. But somehow, they manage to pull off a mighty defense and stave off the English, the Brentons, the Austrians, The Spanish, and the Catalans from major incursions, while the other countries begin to fall victim to war exhaustion and revolution. When Peace is finally brokered, France looses only a smattering of northern territory to the English, but it is not a real gain for the English. The War left no men to put down revolution on the Island, and the Kingdom was divided several times over.
Byzantium does not fall to the Ottomans. Huh.
Soon, the Alliance with Hungary falters. Dangerous, as the King of Hungary is soon elected Holy Roman Emperor, and leads massive wars of expansion to the east. Hungary is a superpower, while Austria dwindles due to War Exhaustion fueled revolt. France doesn't even need to lead a war of reconquest against the English, as revolts draw the northern provinces back under the French King's control.
Systematically, I begin to diminish the authority of the Holy Roman emperor by having all Imperial Provinces under my control abandon the HRE, under the pretense that the Emperor cannot keep the HRE stable, one by one, every couple years. Soon, opportunity arises. Savoy, west of Milan, and an Ally of what's left of Milan, is not guaranteed by anyone, nor do they have much power to speak of. A declaration of war is issued. They offer little resistance, and are entirely occupied, but I am only interested in one province; Nice. This is for one reason alone; The year is 1450 something, and it will soon be possible to reach for new land beyond the Mediterranean. We need a strong port as close to the Strait of Gibraltar as possible to launch colonists and supply vessels. It only becomes capable of doing so after it becomes a core province, which takes some 35 years.
We are set for colonialism by 1485.
Around this time, aware that I now share a land border with the French, and have established myself as a minor power among greats, Castille, Aragon, and England all offer me alliances, in a sort of Anti-French Coalition. I accept.
Africa is much closer than the new world. As soon as I can, I adopt the Quest for the New World national idea, and send an explorer to venture along the African Coast, and establish a Colony in Trazra. There is a native tribal kingdom in the area, and I declare war. Everyone of course has to join the party, and the captured territory is divided up between Venice and Castille. While Castillian territory in Africa contains one valuable resource, Slaves, I feel I got the better deal. Gold, grain, and livestock. Before, Venice had to import much of it's grain due to lacking any grain producing provinces, making troops expensive to recruit and maintain. Not so anymore.
With Trarza established, getting it up to shape as quickly as possible is top priority, so that it too can become a launching point for further colonialism. During this time, no real major war is fought that involved Venice. Aragon managed to annex the last of Naples, however, making themselves a major threat. Once my Infamy goes down far enough, I do invade Genoa, and demand that they release Corsica as an independent state, which not only looks good for me, but reduces Genoa to one state, ripe for annexation. I also snap up the Italian Minor of Modena.
This is about where things really start to get interesting. The thing about the North Italian states is that almost all of them come with Universities already built in them, which contribute 5 gold monthly to Government research. Natrually, whomever owns them all makes very fast progress government wise. I happened to own most of them by then. I realized that I could keep it's growth keep pace with the rest of the technology sectors if I cut it's funding and distributed it out to the others. In the end, Venice is taking in more income than any other country in the world, let alone Europe, mostly on the back of Trade. Almost as soon as it is possible, Venice monopolizes the Centers of Trade in Venice, Lübeck, Liguria, Ile-de-France, and Novgorod.
Around 1485, a single Colony is established in the Caribbean island of Barbuda. Explorers complete a map of the land around the Caribbean sea, and Venice takes a quick liking to the place. Reminds them of home, but warmer and less swampy. As soon as Trarza is fit for launching colonists, the territories of modern Haiti are colonized, as well as the province of Maracaibo.
The Caribbean becomes a bit of a Venetian dream. A Venice-In-The-West, one could say. Maracaibo is made the national Focus, and a Center of Trade is established there as soon as it's population reaches 1000, and there's money to pay for it.
To the North, in North America, Castille colonized or conquered a large portion of what we would call New England. (New Spain now, I guess) They also established a trading center of their own in Powhatan. The English bypass North America altogether, and head straight down, and colonize Patagonia, far south in South America. France takes a single Caribbean island, parts of Canada. Er... Sweden colonizes Manhattan island and a few places around it. and Portugal everything between Swedish and French territories
I have better designs though. A new colony is founded on the newly discovered Ascension Island off the coast of east Africa, in order to supply colonization to the east. Peace continues for a while, and the pope snaps up more of the Italian Minors, until it's just Me, Pisa, Mantua, and the Papal States, and Aragon in Italy. Then, something that utterly horrifies me happens.
The Holy Roman Emperor, displeased by his lack of authority, decides after a series of reforms, to centralize the Holy Roman Empire's Government, and bring all of the states under a single banner, turning it from a collection of states into a single Superstate. This worried me greatly. It's one thing to try to fight off. the individual nations of the HRE, but unified, it is unstoppable.
Or so I feared. In truth, the whole thing was a castle of cards. It lasted for a few months, before the constant nationalistic revolutions kicked in. Hungary is the first country to stray from the single banner, followed by a few others that are snapped back in. But the HRE military is outpaced by the number of revolutionary uprisings, and within a matter of months, the empire implodes. The major powers within it are a theocratic Archbishopric of Wurzburg, and the Bishoprich of the Palatine. Bohemia is liberated and becomes a Republic, and establishes extremely friendly relationships with me, and Luxembourg. Yes, LUXEMBOURG, with a nation under it's control equal in size and power to Bohemia. Other minor states crop up as well, and constantly change shape. All in all, Germany is a freaking mess.
By this time, I'm a couple years ahead of my time technology wise, and manage to become the first Administrative Republic in the world. This is a good thing, as it enables further centralization of the government, which in turn means Inflation Reduction for free. For the first time, the inflation rate is negative while I turn an annual income.
The nation of Muscovy took some advantage at this time, and became the Kingdom of Russia, and led a massive series of conquest over the waring and dissolving German states, and around this time I notice that the Ottoman empire completely collapsed and what was left became Turkey. While they were off defending from Russian aggressors around the Black Sea, the Byzantine Emperor saw opportunity and reclaimed much of it's long forgotten territory in the Balkans and Asia Minor.
Why did Istanbul get the works?
That's Nobody's business but the Byzantines.
I guess.
Anyway, getting back on track, after Ascension Island becomes a core, I launch an expedition to the east, and Conquer the Island of Zanzibar from the Zulus. By now, I have the most advanced army in the world as well, and am the first to have a standing army wielding firearms. My explorers head eastward, and soon, it is decided that we simply must be the first to establish a presence in India.
But first, a more pressing issue is at hand. The Pope declares war on Venice. Not just the Pope, either. He brings in Pisa, and Modena. I find this excellent. I conquer Pisa, annex them, and Modena, and annex them. I conquer the pope, taking all but Roma. This does horrific things to my international relations, of course, but nothing comes of it immediately, and I hire several diplomats to smooth things over. They are all extremely highly skilled due to my excessively high cultural tradition.
To the far North, Sweden has been busy. Denmark, and Norway are conquered by the Swedes, and the nation of Scandinavia is born.
Soon, the pope again attempts to launch reconquest against me some 10 years later. He fails, and Rome is Annexed. 35 years after the initial war of Papal aggression, the Italian peninsula can be truly said to be Venetian. A new sort of Nationalism grows from this, and the Republic of Italy is born from the wars. The capital is moved to Rome. The Pope takes up a new residence in the middle of Jerusalem. Given that it's owned by the the Muslims, it doesn't last very long.
Finally, the Conquest of India can begin. At the time, the south end of the Subcontinent is controlled entirely by the Brahmani Sultanate. It's vast, stable, and has many tens of thousands of Soldiers. I make landfall with nine thousand. It's all I need to secure a strong foothold in central India. Another 18,000 men follow, and a large chunk the subcontinent is claimed for Italy. Two centers of trade in India are captured under the banner of the newly formed Italian state, and the Italian Compagnia Dell'Est India is formed. Merchants grow in number throughout the republic, and their exotic wares quickly dominate the markets across the world, in India, Africa, Europe, and the Americas.
Russia is busy during this time. They expand westward further almost every day, consuming the German minors, and the Balkan states. Soon, Russia actually shares a land border with north Italy, and owns ports in the Adriatic Sea. Something has to be done about them, before it's too late.
An Alliance is formed between Italy and the resurgent Byzantine Empire to face the common threat of Russian expansionism, and war is declared. The Italian armies march through Russian Territory, occupying all their territory in the Balkan Peninsula, while the Byzantines march around the Black Sea. A peace is quickly brokered. The Russians were expansive but weak, their armies simply tied up fighting revolution in the distant north east to bother defending. We demand, and are granted, the release of the nations of Croatia, Ragusa, Montenegro, and Albania and Serbia. Yes, they had come that deep. When the peace is established, the new Balkan states stand to resist Russians for a long time. Slowly, the Russian empire recedes under the embarrassing weight of their disastrous defeat. Hungary grows large again, German minors free themselves and expand into Russian territory, Transylvania revolts and declares independence. Russia is reduced to a safely distant nation.
The real threat was closer to home, though. The Coalition against the French had been dissolved in peacetime, and the French took the opportunity to launch a massive invasion of the Iberian Peninsula Castille and Aragon together are unable to resist the might of the French marching in. Castille is broken in two, the Kingdom of Leon is formed out of it's western half, loyal to France. Parts of Aragon are taken into French control, and Southern Castille is taken. Under the embarrassing defeat, Castille suffers revolt after revolt, until finally, the Capital caves in to French sympathizers who'd rather live under a stable government, and Castille is forced to move it's capital. To Powhatan. With the King dead at the hands of the rebles, Castille reforms into a Republic.
Italy takes advantage of the bad situation by launching a reconquest of the territory formerly owned by Naples. Aragon can hardly resist after their massive losses to the French, and the entire Italian Peninsula falls into Italian hands.
Explorers are sent eastward again, seeking new markets to open. Japan is discovered. Not a unified nation, but feudal states. The Empires of Awa, Bungo, and Musashi, standing in opposition to each other, Awa looking to be eventually victorious. Italy ingratiates itself to Awa, as it also controls the local center of trade, and opens the market through diplomacy. The explorer fleet turns north, and finds an island to the north of Japan that is more or less uninhabited. It is colonized before the Japanese can get a hold of it. The Italian Republic stretches at this point from it's furthest western colony in Panama, to Ezochi (Modern Hokkaidō) in the east.
Finally, France becomes intolerable. They make constant threats about how they rightfully own territories in Africa and the Caribbean that haven't seen a French face in all of recorded history. The French King is guilty of much, and must be punished. The French Government is dishonorable scum, and a Punitive war is declared. France is allied with the tiny strip of land bordering north Italy that still dares to call itself the Holy Roman 'Empire'. That much is steamrolled without any effort, and Bern and Schwyz are demanded from the HRE in return for peace. They accept. The war in France lasts longer, but three massive Italian armies push into the South of France, while another marches northwards. Much of eastern and south eastern france are occupied, and as Paris is sieged, Peace is brokered.
Italy takes Provence, Dauphine, Lyonnias, and Franche-Comte as a punitive measure, that will make the next war against France even easier.
And this is where we are left off.
A few details about the Italian Republic. Religious Tolerance is very high. Catholicism is somewhat favored, but Non Catholic Christians and Non Christians are tolerated without negative impact. The government is mostly centralized, but not completely. The primary culture is Venetian, and it is the culture of Roma at this point. The most common type of revolt is Particularist revolts, which consist of people who want a less centralized government. This has calmed down significantly, though. The current Doge has been in office for almost 50 years. I don't know if he's immortal or not, but his stats are too good to stop re-electing him.
If I can find a place to host large, high quality png screen shots, I may start where I am now, and continue with a real LP if support is high enough. Any suggestions?
