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Hm, Vassalizing Tuscany would be nice, but without any CB, and especially with it also leading to a war with Austria, that does not really make sense, you are absolutely correct.
How sad that you guys let our navy suffer so much, during my times we ruled the mediterranean sea, and the venetian navy got completely destroyed during the war. But this also makes a war with Venice completely useless. Venice will never give Athens to you if you are unable to threaten them in any way. Plus they could even land troops whereever our army is not, and occupy half of our lands. In my opinion, any war where we don't have naval superiority would be disastrous. What about Aragons Navy, if they are able to beat the venetians, maybe waiting for them to end their war with Austria would make sense.
Edit: We cannot attack the pope! That is blasphemy. Plus they are such a nice buffer. Everything that attacks from the north will always stop for at least half a year and besiege the papal provinces without actually touching us.
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Then i demand to change the religion so we are allowed to attack the pope in the name of the "one true faith²"! :D.
Hm.. Whenever i play this game i get nervous when my Infamy hits 0, the need for war is dire  .
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After many hours in council, the king finally decided his course of action regarding Athens. If Sicily was to have any chance of enforcing its claim, it would have to construct a grand navy to match that of the Venice-Genoa alliance. He financed this with bank loans. King Martino I wanted his name in history, damn the repercussions. He would rather have his moment of fame, then leave it to his successors to sort out the mess. His heir, Luigi D'Aragó, showed great promise and his introduction to the court had gone well. The king had no doubts in the abilities of his son.
While the Sicilians were building their galleys, there was instability in the north. After a horribly failed Papal visit to Tuscany, the Pope had been so offended he sent his Swiss Guard to war. The war was a decidedly brief and bloody affair with Papal forces quickly riding in and taking control of the entire country. None of Tuscany's allies would take up the sword against God's representative on Earth.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/KmSDz.png)
The Pope was not interested in earthly posessions. He simply sought to instill the fear of God into his neighbors to the north. After a brief period of sieging, peace negotiations were quickly completed. Tuscany was to release the state of Pisa, effectively reducing the country to a third of its size.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/x1it3.png)
At last, the time came for the Sicilians. Their fleet was great, and their coffers empty. They quickly had to capitalize on their strength before the bankers realized the Sicilian coffers were drained by the war preparations.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/hi0bz.png)
Siclian troops embarked for Athens, and as expected a mighty fleet was gathered to repel the invaders.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/XStFe.png)
The Genoese and Venitian alliance, opted for a strategy of counter-attack, landing troops in southern Italy and on Malta. Cyprus had also joined the war on the Venitian side and sent their measly army to Judea, managing to occupy it while Sicily's troops were securing the home provinces. When Italy was secure, Martino ordered the occupation and subsequent annexation of Cyprus, that had foolishly honoured its alliance with Venice. After it was done, Venice had no other choice than to offer peace to Sicily.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/kQlXL.png)
A sigh of relief is heard across the land as it is made known the war is over. Martino had done it. He had added to the glory of the Sicilians. His nation was a regional power, and his fleet was among the biggest in the Mediterranean. The war had been expensive though, and wanting to keep inflation in check, he had financed it through loans. He was an old man now, and with his lust for glory sated, he knew he had to turn his attiontion to his people. His nation was in debt, and his large military was costly. He needed to consolidate and shake off the bad reputation from his annexation of Cyprus.
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I forgot to get a screenshot of the peace deal with Cyprus, phooey. We're pretty broke right now, and my term is almost over, so I'll make one last update probably focusing on what's been going on in the rest of the world, as we'll be paying off loans for a bit.
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Great report, very well written and interesting as well
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During his final years, Martino I didn't really accomplish much of anything. He had grown accustomed to being a powerful Mediterranean king and saw no need to defend his status. Instead, he paid off his loans while drinking the fine wine from latest conquest, Cyprus.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/RjJsy.png)
During the final years of his reign, Martino had decided to disband most of his military, and join in a military alliance with Castille. He had no time or want for swords and glory anymore, prefering to let his neighbours handle it. This turned out to be a pretty bad idea as Castille loved to go on Holy Wars against the heathens, and the Sicilians still held the Holy Land, surrounded by bloodthirsty heathens just looking for an excuse to burn the whole thing down. As he was removing the muslims from the Holy Land, he decided to not honour any future calls of arms from Castille. It just wasn't worth the bother. But then...
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/70skH.png)
Martino I died, and his son ascended to the throne. This marked a change of policy towards his northern neighbors, the Papal State. The Sicilians had been allies of the Pope ever since the glory days of the Queen, but this had to change now. The Pope had become more involved in worldly affairs, when he should concentrate on serving God and the church. King Luigi II only saw one solution: Vassalization. By taking over the Papal State's foreign policy, he could keep the Pope a powerless figurehead of the church, rather than an actual political threat.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/L7GaP.png)
The war was brief and efficient, lasting only few month. When the defenders of Rome finally surrendered, the Pope met with King Luigi II to discuss the terms of peace. Both sides knew what this meant: The Pope's days as a independant power were over. He now had to follow the orders that came from Sicily or live to meet the consequences.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/GsWgf.png)
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My term is now over. Provinces gained were Cyprus and Athens, as well as the vassalization of the Papal State. Our ruler is sick as hell and has a good chance of diplo-annexing it in 10 years if that is what my successor wants. Note there is no alliance with the Papal State yet, as I was actually a few months over time before the war ended. We still have a bit of debt and inflation, nothing too bad.
As requested, the holdings of Sicily anno 1472. My epic paint skills serve to point out our vassals.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/s6VZ5.png)
Here's the save game. Good luck to all successors. Glorious will Sicily be!
http://www.mediafire.com/?dkdvplxyclek85e
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Next in line is Ramong, please claim your spot.
What the hell. Where do we get all these Bad-ass kings? Where are all the inbred 3/3/3 guys? d'Aragó Dynasty is best Dynasty.
Beef 42, yould you please post a screenshot of all we own at the end of your post?
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doesnt diplo map mode show vassles in almost green?  just take the screenshot using that
On November 19 2011 17:27 Simberto wrote:
Next in line is Ramong, please claim your spot.
What the hell. Where do we get all these Bad-ass kings? Where are all the inbred 3/3/3 guys? d'Aragó Dynasty is best Dynasty.
Beef 42, yould you please post a screenshot of all we own at the end of your post?
its not shocking that we get 9/8/9 kings, its shocking that they dont drop dead 3 months into their reign
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On November 19 2011 19:27 turdburgler wrote:doesnt diplo map mode show vassles in almost green? just take the screenshot using that Show nested quote +On November 19 2011 17:27 Simberto wrote:
Next in line is Ramong, please claim your spot.
What the hell. Where do we get all these Bad-ass kings? Where are all the inbred 3/3/3 guys? d'Aragó Dynasty is best Dynasty.
Beef 42, yould you please post a screenshot of all we own at the end of your post?
Who cares, it is scientifically proven that any picture gets about 20% cooler when MS Paint is involved in the creation.
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I couldn't be bothered to load it up again so I just checked my folder and found this one with stab cost mapmode or something. This was not gratuitous Paint, I needed it.
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Save game have been downloading, expect report sometime late tomorrow!
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Great job Beef. Papal states is pretty much the best vassal you can get at this point. Weve been quite lucky with our rulers so far! Im a bit curious as to how france is doing. I suspect theyre huge considering they were reuinited like 50 years ago?
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Not much has changed regarding the shape of France, but they are winning a war against Castille pretty hard at the moment. Sadly, we seem to have lost our alliance with Aragon, who are also in in this war against Castille. Bohemia is snaking eastwards into the GH. There is a surprisingly low amount of OPMs inside the HRE. England has nearly united Great Britain, and is apparently expanding into Scandinavia a bit. The Ottomans seem to be a strong regional power. Yemen is blobbing pretty hard in Asia Minor, and as usual, Vijaynagar has nearly formed Hindustan.
For some reason, there is a CoT in Athens.
I don't really like the NIs we have at the moment, but that might be personal preference. National Banks tends to slow down tech by quite a bit, usually a MoM on his own is enough in my opinion. And Bureaucracy is just overall not very good, National Trade Policy would bring in more money and improve our chances at competition, Battlefield Commisions or Military Drill would make our Army far stronger, and Pressgangs would enable us to actually build a navy able to beat any other nation pretty cheaply. I think a nation so absurdly reliant on Naval Superiority as ours should really have the last one.
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On November 20 2011 00:04 Simberto wrote:
Not much has changed regarding the shape of France, but they are winning a war against Castille pretty hard at the moment. Sadly, we seem to have lost our alliance with Aragon, who are also in in this war against Castille. Bohemia is snaking eastwards into the GH. There is a surprisingly low amount of OPMs inside the HRE. England has nearly united Great Britain, and is apparently expanding into Scandinavia a bit. The Ottomans seem to be a strong regional power. Yemen is blobbing pretty hard in Asia Minor, and as usual, Vijaynagar has nearly formed Hindustan.
For some reason, there is a CoT in Athens.
I don't really like the NIs we have at the moment, but that might be personal preference. National Banks tends to slow down tech by quite a bit, usually a MoM on his own is enough in my opinion. And Bureaucracy is just overall not very good, National Trade Policy would bring in more money and improve our chances at competition, Battlefield Commisions or Military Drill would make our Army far stronger, and Pressgangs would enable us to actually build a navy able to beat any other nation pretty cheaply. I think a nation so absurdly reliant on Naval Superiority as ours should really have the last one.
Military Drill is proboably the strongest tech earlygame, with the except for aspiring naval powers like us. Since were a naval nation really should try keep our focus there I think. National bank is a must if start running your inflation arond 8 to kep it in check Id say. As a first NI its proboably not needed indeed. Its proboably too hard to grab northern italy anymore (even though we really could have used the free univs) so we should proboably go for Pressgans next rather than military drill. Not positive on that though. Im not really used to playing naval powers but I guess pressgangs in combination with military drill would be very powerful for fighting earlygame..
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i usually go trade NI's + military drill for the first half of the game. having a money and therefore tech advantage can give you insane timing attacks just after upgrading troop type :D
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We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards.
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On November 20 2011 00:22 Simberto wrote:
We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards.
People have a really confusing aversion to naval NIs and obsession with Military Drill; I've even seen MP games where none of England, Castille, and Portugal had Press Gangs, and all of them had Military Drill! I guess people don't really understand that given the massive logistical advantage from Press Gangs and Seahawks you can take scattered provinces, which not only makes it nearly impossible for a land power to threaten you but also allows you to take the best provinces without having to take the random crap between them.
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On November 20 2011 08:13 Pewt wrote:Show nested quote +On November 20 2011 00:22 Simberto wrote:
We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards. People have a really confusing aversion to naval NIs and obsession with Military Drill; I've even seen MP games where none of England, Castille, and Portugal had Press Gangs, and all of them had Military Drill! I guess people don't really understand that given the massive logistical advantage from Press Gangs and Seahawks you can take scattered provinces, which not only makes it nearly impossible for a land power to threaten you but also allows you to take the best provinces without having to take the random crap between them.
Imo Military Drill is the most powerful NI for almost all nations in the early stages of the game for any warring. Id even as far as to say its imbalanced. Pressgangs is pretty good for a limited number of naval nations like portugal (if theyre friends with Castille), Venice and possibly Denmark etc. Id say England would lose to Scotland if Scotland went for Military Drill and England for pressgangs. Thats proboably the reason why they go Military Drill first. Thats what I think at least, Im no expert tho 
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On November 20 2011 22:46 Robinsa wrote:Show nested quote +On November 20 2011 08:13 Pewt wrote:On November 20 2011 00:22 Simberto wrote:
We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards. People have a really confusing aversion to naval NIs and obsession with Military Drill; I've even seen MP games where none of England, Castille, and Portugal had Press Gangs, and all of them had Military Drill! I guess people don't really understand that given the massive logistical advantage from Press Gangs and Seahawks you can take scattered provinces, which not only makes it nearly impossible for a land power to threaten you but also allows you to take the best provinces without having to take the random crap between them. Imo Military Drill is the most powerful NI for almost all nations in the early stages of the game for any warring. Id even as far as to say its imbalanced. Pressgangs is pretty good for a limited number of naval nations like portugal (if theyre friends with Castille), Venice and possibly Denmark etc. Id say England would lose to Scotland if Scotland went for Military Drill and England for pressgangs. Thats proboably the reason why they go Military Drill first. Thats what I think at least, Im no expert tho
Having around 40% more morale doesn't help when you can only get to one or two of your opponents' provinces.
Obviously you should take Military Drill as Austria or France, but taking it over Press Gangs as England or Portugal is pretty dumb. Also, whether or not you're friends with Castille shouldn't enter into the equation as Portugal, since Military Drill won't save you from an untimely demise if Castille wants to kill you.
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On November 21 2011 00:09 Pewt wrote:Show nested quote +On November 20 2011 22:46 Robinsa wrote:On November 20 2011 08:13 Pewt wrote:On November 20 2011 00:22 Simberto wrote:
We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards. People have a really confusing aversion to naval NIs and obsession with Military Drill; I've even seen MP games where none of England, Castille, and Portugal had Press Gangs, and all of them had Military Drill! I guess people don't really understand that given the massive logistical advantage from Press Gangs and Seahawks you can take scattered provinces, which not only makes it nearly impossible for a land power to threaten you but also allows you to take the best provinces without having to take the random crap between them. Imo Military Drill is the most powerful NI for almost all nations in the early stages of the game for any warring. Id even as far as to say its imbalanced. Pressgangs is pretty good for a limited number of naval nations like portugal (if theyre friends with Castille), Venice and possibly Denmark etc. Id say England would lose to Scotland if Scotland went for Military Drill and England for pressgangs. Thats proboably the reason why they go Military Drill first. Thats what I think at least, Im no expert tho Having around 40% more morale doesn't help when you can only get to one or two of your opponents' provinces. Obviously you should take Military Drill as Austria or France, but taking it over Press Gangs as England or Portugal is pretty dumb. Also, whether or not you're friends with Castille shouldn't enter into the equation as Portugal, since Military Drill won't save you from an untimely demise if Castille wants to kill you.
Well, as England i actually could accept it. If i remember correctly, the Navy you start the game with is gigantic, and able to beat everyone else for a long time, so you don't immediately need to expand it, while Scotland can be dangerous if you are somehow occupied elsewhere. Plus it allows you to project force onto the continent much easier, as long as you can keep Naval superiority. It also allows you to safe quite some money by turning your maintenance lower in peacetimes, and still have the same amount of moral.
However, our situation is fundamentally different. We need to fight for Naval superiority, and if we ever lose it, we lose the war instantly, no matter whom we fight. Our lands are a bunch of spread out islands, and an army will not defend that.
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On November 21 2011 00:09 Pewt wrote:Show nested quote +On November 20 2011 22:46 Robinsa wrote:On November 20 2011 08:13 Pewt wrote:On November 20 2011 00:22 Simberto wrote:
We don't really do a lot of fair fighting anyways, we just use our navy to lock the enemy army down and besiege stuff they can't even reach, so Military Drill is indeed not that important in my opinion. Actually, i took Pressgangs as our first NI for exactly that reason, but someone has changed it sometime afterwards. People have a really confusing aversion to naval NIs and obsession with Military Drill; I've even seen MP games where none of England, Castille, and Portugal had Press Gangs, and all of them had Military Drill! I guess people don't really understand that given the massive logistical advantage from Press Gangs and Seahawks you can take scattered provinces, which not only makes it nearly impossible for a land power to threaten you but also allows you to take the best provinces without having to take the random crap between them. Imo Military Drill is the most powerful NI for almost all nations in the early stages of the game for any warring. Id even as far as to say its imbalanced. Pressgangs is pretty good for a limited number of naval nations like portugal (if theyre friends with Castille), Venice and possibly Denmark etc. Id say England would lose to Scotland if Scotland went for Military Drill and England for pressgangs. Thats proboably the reason why they go Military Drill first. Thats what I think at least, Im no expert tho Having around 40% more morale doesn't help when you can only get to one or two of your opponents' provinces. Obviously you should take Military Drill as Austria or France, but taking it over Press Gangs as England or Portugal is pretty dumb. Also, whether or not you're friends with Castille shouldn't enter into the equation as Portugal, since Military Drill won't save you from an untimely demise if Castille wants to kill you.
I generally agree with what you say. I was just trying to make an argument as to why a lot of people like Military Drill. That being said, pressgangs is obviously great as well.
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EPT
