This part is why it's good that Frederik is so young, because he should rule for long enough for those hostilities to decay, meaning the union shouldn't be lost.
- 1
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
If you plan to declare on the Ottomans or Timurids anyway, you could always do that while they're still at war (so easily distracted).
What else can you do to get Bohemia's opinion positive? Do you think it will be enough?
What else can you do to get Bohemia's opinion positive? Do you think it will be enough?
Nicely handled. Mission accomplished, good sir.
Being young should give ennough time to flip relations with the freshly acquired subjects.
And with some time to rest, the preemtive strike on the Turks should be on the table all the time
Being young should give ennough time to flip relations with the freshly acquired subjects.
And with some time to rest, the preemtive strike on the Turks should be on the table all the time
THank you all. Glad I took the collective advice. turned out well.
Tincture of time is only treatment for Bohemia and Spain, so yes it is a blessing my ruler is young. Priority right now is to get Humanist Ideas going to get the relations improvement bonus and speed things a bit. There is one more Relations bonus I can get from Government Tier 4 ( Reformed Head of Faith) but it will cost me a diplomat . SO I have not done the switch since I need all the diplomats right now.
For coalition, as members get close to neutral relations, I will send gift/ influence nation to whittle it down. So I need to pay down debt to be able to do Influence Nation
Timurid/Ottomans. I will attack Ottomans the moment they are eligible to join coalition ( currently in truce with me and at war with Timurids).
In general, I am NOT in NEED of expanding . I earn enough ducats to hire high level advisors and can continue to snowball the economy with manufactories and other investments . So I can wait for things to cool off for a while. I do not intend to claim any thrones in near future. But if a PU comes naturally , wonderful. If not, be patient.
- 2
Chapter 14 : The Quiet Decade (1570-1580)
We left the last chapter with Denmark "astride Europe like a Colossus" ( @stnylan ) , having subjugated Bohemia, Poland, Lithuania and Spain. The world reacted with predictable alarm and a coalition had formed. Therefore Emperor Frederik's highest priorities were to maintain the loyalty of the new subjects and work at dismantling the coalition . To that end , the diplomats were assigned to improve relations with the marginal members of the coalition ( those with lowest AE and closest to positive relations). An early success was with small Utrecht , a fellow Reformed nation
But the focus of the diplomatic efforts was mostly in Italy . Meanwhile the truce with the Ottomans expired, but since they were at war with Timurids, Emperor Frederik decided to leave them alone. But just a month later they concluded a white peace with Timurids, and that meant they were eligible to join the coalition. So war was immediately declared.
Denmark called all her allies, except Hungary, for two reasons. First, to make the war easier ( although the Ottomans were no longer a formidable foe- their economic woes led them to dismantle all their forts save Trebizond , so Ankara, Aleppo , Sinope , Diarbakir were all unfortified). Second , and more importantly, Denmark intended to feed her Georgian and Bulgarian allies Ottoman land to make a "fatter" target for future Personal Union. We will not detail the war - there were a few pitched battles, mostly in Arabia where Ottoman armies returning from Timurid war were engaged by Danish forces- but most of the war consisted of the subject and allied swarm carpet occupying Ottoman land. And during the war, the coalition had some changes, with Bregenz leaving but Ruppin, Timurids and Malacca joining.
In the peace, Denmark minimized aggressive expansion by limiting her own conquests. Instead, Bulgaria and Georgia saw their land expand significantly . And Armenia became another independent Christian Kingdom, one that can be potentially turned into a Personal Union of Denmark one day. The only province Denmark kept was Mentese, home to the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus. A rumor had it that the temple was visited in the past by Christian the Great, and many believed he stole his secret to longevity from the Mausoleum. Frederik would later begin renovating the Mausoleum, hoping to re-discover that secret.
One nice side effect of the war was the removal of Antemoro from the coalition since they were allied to Ottomans and participated in the war. Another similar chance to remove more members from the coalition came courtesy of Ethiopia who declared war on Adal, allied with Egypt and Kilwa ( all were members of the coalition). Denmark happily obliged her ally
Denmark did minimal fighting and simply let her subjects - who thanks to the Unified Kalmar Union constitutions had the military benefits of Marches- do the heavy lifting. Meanwhile, Denmark adjusted her government reform concerning State and Religion, switching to "Head of the Reformed Church " from "Maintain Balance of Power" ( the initial reform was passed when Denmark was still Catholic) .
That had the benefit of improving relations even faster , although at the cost of a diplomat. And there was another disadvantage to the switch, and that was an increase in the diplomatic reputation of Denmark . That was a potential problem because it increased the chances of Denmark one day inheriting her Union nations ( even Sweden, with forty provinces, was at risk). And clearly, inheriting those Unions would not be good to the ultimate plan of a European Union.
Meanwhile, Humanist Ideas were finally unlocked in October 1574 when the technology of "Scientific Experimentation " was researched. And although Denmark was still a good ways away from reaping the benefits of Humanist ideas' effect on relations (7th idea), she had an immediate boost to her economic prospects by being able to build plantations in many of her trade company provinces ( Sugar, Cotton, Ivory ) .
On the diplomatic front, the midpoint of the decade saw a few minor nations leave the coalition, a good sign of steady progress.
ANd a year later, more positive news came when Spain's opinion turned positive thanks to the rapid relations improvement and a lucky trade event .
Bohemia followed suit a few months later, and from that point forward worries about a sudden death of the monarch breaking the Unions receded . And in fact , some talk started about a potential abdication of the Emperor in favor of his more energetic young son who would turn 15 in a couple of years ( but it turns out we have to wait 20 years from Frederik I coronation in any case, so not until March 1583, which would be in next Chapter).
The next two years were spent mostly at peace ( except for a short war against Dongola called for by Ethiopia), and the Emperor saw fit to take time to deal with the question of Latgalia's future. Latgalia was initially created to be the designated Baltic Culture group subject. But now with Lithuania in the Kalmar Union, Latgalia's function has become superfluous. In the previous decade relations were improved with them to begin annexation so as to give their land later to Lithuania. But it turned out annexation was going to cost a good bit of Diplomatic power, a power that was in shortage due being over the relations limit.
So instead, the Emperor simply seized provinces from Latgalia and gave them to Lithuania, only stopping when the Latgalians' liberty desire started to rise. He has not decided whether to continue this process in the future, transferring one province at a time, or whether it is better to eventually annex Latgalia fully (the diplomatic power cost has dropped)[see footnote math problem for the nerds]
The beginning of 1578 saw some more minor nations leave the coalition as their opinion of Danish aggressive expansion continued to improve. And Emperor Frederik asked all the other members to re-evaluate their stances [ I loaded a new game session], and that saw Florence leave.
The Emperor considered that a good sign of things to come and decided to finally make a diplomatic move that he had contemplated since the subjugation of Bohemia-Poland-Lithuania. And that was the breakup of the alliance with Hungary
The alliance break was driven by the fact that Hungary held many Polish provinces which were unaccepted culture, and Hungary was the only way Poland could be expanded in size. Poland was only about a dozen provinces, and with a very high diplomatic reputation of Denmark, the chance that Poland would be inherited in the future was significant. To avoid losing that Union, Poland had to grow. And Hungary stood in the way. In addition, Hungary had twice been given a Wittelsbach heir, only to see him replaced with a Csaky ( whether through natural causes or dis-inheritance , we are not sure). So prospects of a Union with Hungary in the next 40 years ( when Poland becomes eligible for inheritance) were low. To give Denmark time to grow Poland in that time frame, the alliance had to be broken soon . And this was a good a time as any, since the coalition had started to soften.
Now the Hungarians had no inkling about this, and were befuddled, thinking it must have been a mistake, and immediately sent a request to resume the alliance.
Despite feeling sorry for them ( they did no wrong, really), the Emperor firmly told them they were on the outs with Denmark and officially broke the royal marriage to boot ( to save a relations slot).
And of course this all means that sometime around 1583 Denmark will be going to war with Hungary for reconquest of the Polish cores , and to open a path for Poland to the Black Sea.
Now in contrast to Poland, tne Unions of Bohemia, Spain and Lithuania were all large nations with a low chance of being inherited.
The remaining 2 years of the decade would have been very quiet except that, for unknown reasons, our colony Atwixia ended up with zero troops , and was promptly declared upon by the Iroquois and the Creek .
Denmark could not afford to see her largest colony get overrun. But instead of Enforcing a White Peace ( which the enemy nations would have accepted), Frederik decided to actually give Atwixia a chance at winning those wars by declaring Denmark's own wars on the natives.
The trickiest part of those wars was getting mercenaries recruited in North America, because Denmark owned no provinces there anymore ( cannot recruit mercenaries in Subject provinces) . So two workarounds were done. First, mercenaries were recruited in the Orinoco Delta province ( that was a province we inherited from Norway when Christian the Great died ) , and mercenaries were also recruited in newly occupied land .
Those troops, together with Subject swarm troops that started arriving ( as well as Vinlander troops) quickly overran the poor natives. By the end of the decade, the enemy armies were decimated and their capitals mostly occupied.
Now , since Atwixia was already at war with those native nations, she was unable to join Denmark in her wars, and so occupation could not be given to Atwixia . But they got plenty of help by having Denmark destroy the enemy armies, and thanks to a generous 350 ducat gift, were able to raise an army again and take the offensive back. How Denmark will wind down those wars and who gets to annex some of the provinces that belong to the natives will be the topic of the next chapter.
And we close the chapter with an overview of Denmark's economy and diplomatic situation
On the economic front, Denmark had been running a healthy budget surplus, and many investments into manufactories coming online will continue to grow this income. Upgrading of some Great Projects had been started, and more can be done going forward
On the diplomatic front, the Coalition has shrunk and many of the remaining members are on the brink [AE under 50, positive relations but less than 50]. It is anticipated that this will disappear in the next decade. The main problem facing Denmark diplomatically, in fact, is too much of a good thing.
The stellar diplomatic reputation of Denmark ( [+12] ) has made many Swedish nobles and subjects consider simply joining the Danish nation once the current ruler dies, instead of continuing as a Personal Union. Given the long term aims of the Wittelsbachs, our Emperor is looking for ways to enlarge Sweden and/or decrease Denmark's diplomatic reputation ( the Religious Diplomats Estate privilege has been revoked for that reason) . In that sense, our heir's trait of Charismatic Influence (+1 dip rep) appears to be the curse of the Monkey Paw coming back.
footnote: Question: is it better to just annex Latgalia and feed it to Lithuania, or wait out the Liberty Desire malus from seize province to decay and continue seizing? Which costs more DIP?
Answer: LD malus decays at about 1.2 per year . Seize province gives a -25% LD per province. So we can seize a province evey 20 years or so. During that time the extra diplo slot costs 240 DIP.
Latgalia has 12 provinces, with total DIplo Annexation cost of about 400 , or 33 per province. So clearly , diplo annexing will save DIP .
BUT Denmark has other means to improve the LD using Prestige and paying debt. So the ideal strategy is to use Prestige and money to crank up LD and then seize land to lower annexation cost, then finally annex the remnant. NOt sure if land can be seized while a vassal is being annexed , because that would be the optimal strategy.
We left the last chapter with Denmark "astride Europe like a Colossus" ( @stnylan ) , having subjugated Bohemia, Poland, Lithuania and Spain. The world reacted with predictable alarm and a coalition had formed. Therefore Emperor Frederik's highest priorities were to maintain the loyalty of the new subjects and work at dismantling the coalition . To that end , the diplomats were assigned to improve relations with the marginal members of the coalition ( those with lowest AE and closest to positive relations). An early success was with small Utrecht , a fellow Reformed nation
But the focus of the diplomatic efforts was mostly in Italy . Meanwhile the truce with the Ottomans expired, but since they were at war with Timurids, Emperor Frederik decided to leave them alone. But just a month later they concluded a white peace with Timurids, and that meant they were eligible to join the coalition. So war was immediately declared.
Denmark called all her allies, except Hungary, for two reasons. First, to make the war easier ( although the Ottomans were no longer a formidable foe- their economic woes led them to dismantle all their forts save Trebizond , so Ankara, Aleppo , Sinope , Diarbakir were all unfortified). Second , and more importantly, Denmark intended to feed her Georgian and Bulgarian allies Ottoman land to make a "fatter" target for future Personal Union. We will not detail the war - there were a few pitched battles, mostly in Arabia where Ottoman armies returning from Timurid war were engaged by Danish forces- but most of the war consisted of the subject and allied swarm carpet occupying Ottoman land. And during the war, the coalition had some changes, with Bregenz leaving but Ruppin, Timurids and Malacca joining.
In the peace, Denmark minimized aggressive expansion by limiting her own conquests. Instead, Bulgaria and Georgia saw their land expand significantly . And Armenia became another independent Christian Kingdom, one that can be potentially turned into a Personal Union of Denmark one day. The only province Denmark kept was Mentese, home to the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus. A rumor had it that the temple was visited in the past by Christian the Great, and many believed he stole his secret to longevity from the Mausoleum. Frederik would later begin renovating the Mausoleum, hoping to re-discover that secret.
One nice side effect of the war was the removal of Antemoro from the coalition since they were allied to Ottomans and participated in the war. Another similar chance to remove more members from the coalition came courtesy of Ethiopia who declared war on Adal, allied with Egypt and Kilwa ( all were members of the coalition). Denmark happily obliged her ally
Denmark did minimal fighting and simply let her subjects - who thanks to the Unified Kalmar Union constitutions had the military benefits of Marches- do the heavy lifting. Meanwhile, Denmark adjusted her government reform concerning State and Religion, switching to "Head of the Reformed Church " from "Maintain Balance of Power" ( the initial reform was passed when Denmark was still Catholic) .
That had the benefit of improving relations even faster , although at the cost of a diplomat. And there was another disadvantage to the switch, and that was an increase in the diplomatic reputation of Denmark . That was a potential problem because it increased the chances of Denmark one day inheriting her Union nations ( even Sweden, with forty provinces, was at risk). And clearly, inheriting those Unions would not be good to the ultimate plan of a European Union.
Meanwhile, Humanist Ideas were finally unlocked in October 1574 when the technology of "Scientific Experimentation " was researched. And although Denmark was still a good ways away from reaping the benefits of Humanist ideas' effect on relations (7th idea), she had an immediate boost to her economic prospects by being able to build plantations in many of her trade company provinces ( Sugar, Cotton, Ivory ) .
On the diplomatic front, the midpoint of the decade saw a few minor nations leave the coalition, a good sign of steady progress.
ANd a year later, more positive news came when Spain's opinion turned positive thanks to the rapid relations improvement and a lucky trade event .
Bohemia followed suit a few months later, and from that point forward worries about a sudden death of the monarch breaking the Unions receded . And in fact , some talk started about a potential abdication of the Emperor in favor of his more energetic young son who would turn 15 in a couple of years ( but it turns out we have to wait 20 years from Frederik I coronation in any case, so not until March 1583, which would be in next Chapter).
The next two years were spent mostly at peace ( except for a short war against Dongola called for by Ethiopia), and the Emperor saw fit to take time to deal with the question of Latgalia's future. Latgalia was initially created to be the designated Baltic Culture group subject. But now with Lithuania in the Kalmar Union, Latgalia's function has become superfluous. In the previous decade relations were improved with them to begin annexation so as to give their land later to Lithuania. But it turned out annexation was going to cost a good bit of Diplomatic power, a power that was in shortage due being over the relations limit.
So instead, the Emperor simply seized provinces from Latgalia and gave them to Lithuania, only stopping when the Latgalians' liberty desire started to rise. He has not decided whether to continue this process in the future, transferring one province at a time, or whether it is better to eventually annex Latgalia fully (the diplomatic power cost has dropped)[see footnote math problem for the nerds]
The beginning of 1578 saw some more minor nations leave the coalition as their opinion of Danish aggressive expansion continued to improve. And Emperor Frederik asked all the other members to re-evaluate their stances [ I loaded a new game session], and that saw Florence leave.
The Emperor considered that a good sign of things to come and decided to finally make a diplomatic move that he had contemplated since the subjugation of Bohemia-Poland-Lithuania. And that was the breakup of the alliance with Hungary
The alliance break was driven by the fact that Hungary held many Polish provinces which were unaccepted culture, and Hungary was the only way Poland could be expanded in size. Poland was only about a dozen provinces, and with a very high diplomatic reputation of Denmark, the chance that Poland would be inherited in the future was significant. To avoid losing that Union, Poland had to grow. And Hungary stood in the way. In addition, Hungary had twice been given a Wittelsbach heir, only to see him replaced with a Csaky ( whether through natural causes or dis-inheritance , we are not sure). So prospects of a Union with Hungary in the next 40 years ( when Poland becomes eligible for inheritance) were low. To give Denmark time to grow Poland in that time frame, the alliance had to be broken soon . And this was a good a time as any, since the coalition had started to soften.
Now the Hungarians had no inkling about this, and were befuddled, thinking it must have been a mistake, and immediately sent a request to resume the alliance.
Despite feeling sorry for them ( they did no wrong, really), the Emperor firmly told them they were on the outs with Denmark and officially broke the royal marriage to boot ( to save a relations slot).
And of course this all means that sometime around 1583 Denmark will be going to war with Hungary for reconquest of the Polish cores , and to open a path for Poland to the Black Sea.
Now in contrast to Poland, tne Unions of Bohemia, Spain and Lithuania were all large nations with a low chance of being inherited.
The remaining 2 years of the decade would have been very quiet except that, for unknown reasons, our colony Atwixia ended up with zero troops , and was promptly declared upon by the Iroquois and the Creek .
Denmark could not afford to see her largest colony get overrun. But instead of Enforcing a White Peace ( which the enemy nations would have accepted), Frederik decided to actually give Atwixia a chance at winning those wars by declaring Denmark's own wars on the natives.
The trickiest part of those wars was getting mercenaries recruited in North America, because Denmark owned no provinces there anymore ( cannot recruit mercenaries in Subject provinces) . So two workarounds were done. First, mercenaries were recruited in the Orinoco Delta province ( that was a province we inherited from Norway when Christian the Great died ) , and mercenaries were also recruited in newly occupied land .
Those troops, together with Subject swarm troops that started arriving ( as well as Vinlander troops) quickly overran the poor natives. By the end of the decade, the enemy armies were decimated and their capitals mostly occupied.
Now , since Atwixia was already at war with those native nations, she was unable to join Denmark in her wars, and so occupation could not be given to Atwixia . But they got plenty of help by having Denmark destroy the enemy armies, and thanks to a generous 350 ducat gift, were able to raise an army again and take the offensive back. How Denmark will wind down those wars and who gets to annex some of the provinces that belong to the natives will be the topic of the next chapter.
And we close the chapter with an overview of Denmark's economy and diplomatic situation
On the economic front, Denmark had been running a healthy budget surplus, and many investments into manufactories coming online will continue to grow this income. Upgrading of some Great Projects had been started, and more can be done going forward
On the diplomatic front, the Coalition has shrunk and many of the remaining members are on the brink [AE under 50, positive relations but less than 50]. It is anticipated that this will disappear in the next decade. The main problem facing Denmark diplomatically, in fact, is too much of a good thing.
The stellar diplomatic reputation of Denmark ( [+12] ) has made many Swedish nobles and subjects consider simply joining the Danish nation once the current ruler dies, instead of continuing as a Personal Union. Given the long term aims of the Wittelsbachs, our Emperor is looking for ways to enlarge Sweden and/or decrease Denmark's diplomatic reputation ( the Religious Diplomats Estate privilege has been revoked for that reason) . In that sense, our heir's trait of Charismatic Influence (+1 dip rep) appears to be the curse of the Monkey Paw coming back.
footnote: Question: is it better to just annex Latgalia and feed it to Lithuania, or wait out the Liberty Desire malus from seize province to decay and continue seizing? Which costs more DIP?
Answer: LD malus decays at about 1.2 per year . Seize province gives a -25% LD per province. So we can seize a province evey 20 years or so. During that time the extra diplo slot costs 240 DIP.
Latgalia has 12 provinces, with total DIplo Annexation cost of about 400 , or 33 per province. So clearly , diplo annexing will save DIP .
BUT Denmark has other means to improve the LD using Prestige and paying debt. So the ideal strategy is to use Prestige and money to crank up LD and then seize land to lower annexation cost, then finally annex the remnant. NOt sure if land can be seized while a vassal is being annexed , because that would be the optimal strategy.
- 1
Of course! Vampires rest in sarcophagus, and that place is a tomb... everything makes sense!
Confirmation biased, but I´m almost sure is the latter, since it happened to me A LOT in the past.
For the ecuation, are we factoring the LD increase per dev? because i think that would affect diplo cost / time. So IMHO you could seize highest dev provinces and annex the rest for quicker/cheaper.
Well do I know the pain of being too respected. People are always saying to me, please, Cora, rule over me as my queen; and I must always, sadly, disappoint them. Tell your Frederik that my heart bleeds for him.
- 1
- 1
Do I need to update my statement to standing astride the Atlantic? Certainly the world's trade looks increasingly sewn up.
- 2
I agree. this is likely best strategy. SPend some prestige to placate , seize a couple more high dev provinces and then annex the rest. I can certainly use the -3 dip rep penalty to lower the Dip Rep and avoid inheriting my unions.
- 1
I remember there is also an event (forget the name of it) if you have two or more subjects with cores/claims on each other's land. It could increase LD even more if it fires.
Maybe they shipped troops to Europe to help and got stackwiped? Might have to turn off siege/offensive focus for them then.
- 1
Good point. I should change the Colonials to defensive stance.
Also I need to remember that trick when my allies call me to a distant war, I should place my vassals on Defensive so they do not ship their troops halfway around the world, when I need them for my next war.
Chapter 15: Refilling the pipeline (1580-1590)
The 1580s were generally a quiet decade for Denmark, as Agressive Expansion was burned off and relations improved with the new Kalmar Union members. It ended with Denmark indirectly defending Atwixia by waging war on native tribes that attacked her. The first 6 months of the new decade saw Denmark make peace with Kipsoko ( a minor inland tribe) for farming prestige, and then peace with the Iroquois tribe.
From the Iroquois, Denmark took three provinces that were given to Sweden. The purpose was to grow Sweden's province count, and avoid an unwanted inheritance. The provinces were split between Colonial America and Colonial Canada, so there was no danger of Sweden making her own Colonial Nation ( Sweden has not taken any Colonial ideas, and she could not get a colonist via her own Colonial Ambitions mission which required them be independent). A couple of provinces were given to Vinland to keep them growing and increase Denmark's economy as a result.
The next month saw Denmark conclude peace with the Creek nation, breaking off several smaller tribes from it to make it an easier target for Atwixia. But the news of that treaty was overshadowed by an unexpected event: the death of Emperor Frederik I the Well Advised.
This took the nation by surprise. He was just 32 years old, and was a very careful person who avoided the military specifically to avoid an early death. The official announcement stated that he died in a freak hunting accident, but everyone knew he was not an avid hunter. Many suspected that something went terribly awry in his attempt at rediscovering the secret to longevity that Christian The Great had. What exactly happened, we leave to our readers' imagination to fill in.
ON a practical level, this was a good occurrence for Denmark as his son was a more capable administrator and diplomat. And fortunately, Sweden remained a personal union and the small chance of inheritance did not materialize [who knows, those 3% points from the last peace may have been the difference!!].
The new Emperor's first actions were to conclude the wars in North America, gaining Denmark, prestige that was used to placate the rulers of Latgalia. In exchange, the Latgalians gave up one more province to Lithuania.
But attempts at taking more from Latgalia were met with resistance, as the price in Liberty Desire became steeper [+40% for the next province]. And so the Emperor began the diplomatic annexation of Latgalia , estimated to end in just over 2 years.
The next order of business for the young Emperor was to renew the Royal Marriages with the allies. And he started with Bulgaria, from who he nabbed the intelligent Sofija 5/3/5 as a consort. (Bulgaria was first because they had a Wittelsbach in the line of succession ).
And internally he enjoyed a nice boost to stability courtesy of the Nobility. Only to see the Clergy destroy it one month later.
After that our young ruler prepared for the planned war on Hungary whose purpose was to make Poland larger. But first there was a minor distraction from ally Portugal, who felt the need to call Denmark and her 11 subjects against the tiny tribe of Tupinamba!!
Fearful that this war would cause his subjects to ship troops to the New World and then be unavailable against Hungary, the Emperor ordered the Grand Company to be recruited in Bahia and to quickly go siege and occupy Tupinamba [this was before I read @jak7139 comment- in hindsight , I should have just set them to Defensive]. The Danish army quickly took the city after an 85 day siege and handed it to Portugal, who went on to annex the native tribe.
During the war two things happened. First, the coalition disintegrated . It appears that coalition members re-evaluate their stance whenever their target goes to war, and having such an easy target in Tupinamba made Denmark look stronger. The second event was the integration of Latgalia. This coincided with the acquisition of Humanist Idea four, which allowed Denmark to promote two more cultures.
As a result, Emperor Frederik II decided to give Latgalia's Lithuanian provinces back to Lithuania ( they had cores on all three, and he did not want to deal with "Rightful Ownership" events) . But he kept the Latvian culture provinces, which were once part of the Livonian order, and promoted Latvian as an accepted culture. Thus the previously disconnected states of Curonia ( Estonian culture) and Riga became joined to Prussia as Danish Baltic.
If one day Denmark annexes the entire North German coast, the currently ugly disjointed map of the nation would become much more appealing. Meanwhile he was preparing for the war with Hungary, but first had to deal with events in North America again. There, Atwixia had lost her war against the Atahachi confederation despite the drubbing the latter received at the hands of Big Daddy Denmark. And it appeared Atwixia was badly losing to the Iroquois as well. So Denmark issued an "Enforce Peace" to the latter, who surprisingly refused!!
Needless to say, the natives had no chance and one year later ended up losing most of their land ( they still survived as isolated provinces in Colonial Canada's interior).
NOw back in Europe, the long awaited war with Hungary began when the truce with them expired in May 1583.
As stated earlier, the aim of the war was to enlarge Poland and get her a port on the Black Sea. As such, all the available allies were called, except Bulgaria to avoid them taking the occupation of Bessarabia.
Now Hungary was allied to Two Sicilies and Mantua, who proved to be a big nuisance as they managed to invade Gallia and occupy Denmark's holdings in South France. But the outcome of the war was never in doubt , despite a valiant stand by the Hungarians.
During the war, Sofija bore Frederik a son, who was renamed Niels (breaking with the Christian-Frederik tradition [ which appears to be a real thing according to Wikipedia!- Danish readers please confirm]).
A month later, more dynastic news came with the ascension of Christian III von Wittelsbach to the Bulgarian throne. As he had no heir at that moment, Emperor Frederik immediately claimed the throne.
BUt before the alliance could be canceled and war declared, the BUlgarian ruler popped an heir ( the suspicious timing raised a lot of eyebrows!), and Frederik lost his claim. But at least he kept the alliance. And since Denmark had secured the key province of Bessarabia, and appeared to be one step closer to getting BUlgaria in a Union, he called upon his cousin to join the war on Hungary
The war with Hungary continued to grind on for a few more years, until Manuta and Two Sicilies could be peaced out. IN that time, notice came that Saxony lacked an heir, and Emperor Frederik helpfully provided another Christian von Wittelsbach for the court in Weimar.
If one thought of the process of getting a personal union as a pipeline of sorts, with countries going from marriage to heir to dynasty to union, then we had several countries at the marriage state, Saxony at the heir stage , Bulgaria at the dynasty stage , and Bohemia and Spain already at the final Union stage . And one can think of Denmark's foreign policy at that time in terms of trying to keep the pipeline full and moving.
Now back to the Hungarian war . After the capture of Napoli, Two Sicilies agreed to leave the war and that led HUngary to sign a comprehensive peace the next day.
Hungary was forced to return to Poland 3 core provinces with Polish culture, and cede several more including Moldavia . With that peace , Poland returned to something resembling her 1444 borders, although without the provinces lost to Bohemia. Hungary also ceded Serbian culture provinces to Bulgaria, which began to look like a union of all South Slavic cultures.
The annexation of land for Poland caused some aggressive expansion for Denmark, but she claimed "Benevolence" - the 7th Humanist idea - to convince the independent Europeans to forget about her expansion. And then without disbanding the mercenaries hired for the HUngarian war, young Emperor Frederik declared war on France who had rivaled Denmark again.
France at the time was fighting East Frisia protected by the very weak HRE ( Luneburg). But even without that distraction, France was an easy target for Denmark, much easier than Hungary. For France, just like the Ottomans, had deleted all her forts ( except Labourd) to save money . And so occupying France was very easy to do with only Paris putting a bit of resistance .
Meanwhile the truce with the Ottomans expired, and the latter took advantage to attack weak Armenia, no longer protected by the Danish guarantee. As Armenia was a Christian Kingdom, and therefore could be put in the Personal Union pipeline, Denmark decided to bail them out. ANd to Denmark's surprise, the mere threat of war was enough to enforce a White Peace on the Ottomans.
The war with France began to wind down in late 1587, when Lorraine signed a separate peace
In a controversial move, Denmark took the city of Metz which caused howls of complaints about aggressive expansion from the German princes ( Lorraine was HRE member and not a co-belligerent). But the young Emperor felt it was worth it to connect the former Platinate lands to Burgundy . And he felt confident that the reputation could be managed thanks to completing Humanist ideas and activating the "Multilingual Diplomats" policy
And after winning the siege of Firenze, he committed another controversial move, when he pillaged the city to grow Zeeland by 3 development ( sorry @alonsom13 , I swear we spared the Malipiero house ).
BUt when it came to peace with France, he was rather circumspect in the acquisition of land.
Denmark took the Norman culture provinces for herself ( these will be turned into the State of Normandy and Norman culture will become accepted ) . This was driven by cultural (Norman=norse men = Danes) and trade factors ( all 3 are Channel node provinces). But the rest of the peace treaty consisted of giving Labourd to ally Gascony, and then releasing Brittany and a bunch of former Appanages as free nations . The idea here was to maximize the number of nations that could enter the Personal Union pipeline, although a marriage and alliance were concluded with Brittany only. The other minor nations will get a marriage proposal if/when they have an old (over 40 ) ruler without an heir.
And even though there were now only 18 months left in the decade, Denmark had time for one more war , this time against the OTtomans.
For that war Georgia, but not BUlgaria, was called in. There was not much South Slavic culture land under Ottomans to give to Bulgaria, and the Greek provinces were earmarked for Pontus in the future. Armenia, Denmark's newest ally in the region, could not be called in due to their truce with Ottomans.
And this was an another easy war for the Danes. SO we will not describe it. Instead we will mark the end of an era, with the completion of Denmark's last colony at Sumbawa in the East Indies.
WIth her second colonist from a mission expiring in 1585, Denmark had no more colonists or explorers. Any expansion in the East would have to be done with conquest now. But luckily other nations have been filling up the uncolonized space in the Moluccas, making Denmark richer in the process . One of these nations was actually Egypt, who managed to get a foothold in the East Indies just in time before Ethiopia turned her into a landlocked nation!
And as the decade ended we find the Ottomans fully occupied by Denmark, who is thinking about peace terms. And we note the nation of Timurids renaming itself Gurkani and acquiring a large part of North India, while France lost her war with East Frisia and was forced to release Nevers, another small Appanage.
The 1580s were generally a quiet decade for Denmark, as Agressive Expansion was burned off and relations improved with the new Kalmar Union members. It ended with Denmark indirectly defending Atwixia by waging war on native tribes that attacked her. The first 6 months of the new decade saw Denmark make peace with Kipsoko ( a minor inland tribe) for farming prestige, and then peace with the Iroquois tribe.
From the Iroquois, Denmark took three provinces that were given to Sweden. The purpose was to grow Sweden's province count, and avoid an unwanted inheritance. The provinces were split between Colonial America and Colonial Canada, so there was no danger of Sweden making her own Colonial Nation ( Sweden has not taken any Colonial ideas, and she could not get a colonist via her own Colonial Ambitions mission which required them be independent). A couple of provinces were given to Vinland to keep them growing and increase Denmark's economy as a result.
The next month saw Denmark conclude peace with the Creek nation, breaking off several smaller tribes from it to make it an easier target for Atwixia. But the news of that treaty was overshadowed by an unexpected event: the death of Emperor Frederik I the Well Advised.
This took the nation by surprise. He was just 32 years old, and was a very careful person who avoided the military specifically to avoid an early death. The official announcement stated that he died in a freak hunting accident, but everyone knew he was not an avid hunter. Many suspected that something went terribly awry in his attempt at rediscovering the secret to longevity that Christian The Great had. What exactly happened, we leave to our readers' imagination to fill in.
ON a practical level, this was a good occurrence for Denmark as his son was a more capable administrator and diplomat. And fortunately, Sweden remained a personal union and the small chance of inheritance did not materialize [who knows, those 3% points from the last peace may have been the difference!!].
The new Emperor's first actions were to conclude the wars in North America, gaining Denmark, prestige that was used to placate the rulers of Latgalia. In exchange, the Latgalians gave up one more province to Lithuania.
But attempts at taking more from Latgalia were met with resistance, as the price in Liberty Desire became steeper [+40% for the next province]. And so the Emperor began the diplomatic annexation of Latgalia , estimated to end in just over 2 years.
The next order of business for the young Emperor was to renew the Royal Marriages with the allies. And he started with Bulgaria, from who he nabbed the intelligent Sofija 5/3/5 as a consort. (Bulgaria was first because they had a Wittelsbach in the line of succession ).
And internally he enjoyed a nice boost to stability courtesy of the Nobility. Only to see the Clergy destroy it one month later.
After that our young ruler prepared for the planned war on Hungary whose purpose was to make Poland larger. But first there was a minor distraction from ally Portugal, who felt the need to call Denmark and her 11 subjects against the tiny tribe of Tupinamba!!
Fearful that this war would cause his subjects to ship troops to the New World and then be unavailable against Hungary, the Emperor ordered the Grand Company to be recruited in Bahia and to quickly go siege and occupy Tupinamba [this was before I read @jak7139 comment- in hindsight , I should have just set them to Defensive]. The Danish army quickly took the city after an 85 day siege and handed it to Portugal, who went on to annex the native tribe.
During the war two things happened. First, the coalition disintegrated . It appears that coalition members re-evaluate their stance whenever their target goes to war, and having such an easy target in Tupinamba made Denmark look stronger. The second event was the integration of Latgalia. This coincided with the acquisition of Humanist Idea four, which allowed Denmark to promote two more cultures.
As a result, Emperor Frederik II decided to give Latgalia's Lithuanian provinces back to Lithuania ( they had cores on all three, and he did not want to deal with "Rightful Ownership" events) . But he kept the Latvian culture provinces, which were once part of the Livonian order, and promoted Latvian as an accepted culture. Thus the previously disconnected states of Curonia ( Estonian culture) and Riga became joined to Prussia as Danish Baltic.
If one day Denmark annexes the entire North German coast, the currently ugly disjointed map of the nation would become much more appealing. Meanwhile he was preparing for the war with Hungary, but first had to deal with events in North America again. There, Atwixia had lost her war against the Atahachi confederation despite the drubbing the latter received at the hands of Big Daddy Denmark. And it appeared Atwixia was badly losing to the Iroquois as well. So Denmark issued an "Enforce Peace" to the latter, who surprisingly refused!!
Needless to say, the natives had no chance and one year later ended up losing most of their land ( they still survived as isolated provinces in Colonial Canada's interior).
NOw back in Europe, the long awaited war with Hungary began when the truce with them expired in May 1583.
As stated earlier, the aim of the war was to enlarge Poland and get her a port on the Black Sea. As such, all the available allies were called, except Bulgaria to avoid them taking the occupation of Bessarabia.
Now Hungary was allied to Two Sicilies and Mantua, who proved to be a big nuisance as they managed to invade Gallia and occupy Denmark's holdings in South France. But the outcome of the war was never in doubt , despite a valiant stand by the Hungarians.
During the war, Sofija bore Frederik a son, who was renamed Niels (breaking with the Christian-Frederik tradition [ which appears to be a real thing according to Wikipedia!- Danish readers please confirm]).
A month later, more dynastic news came with the ascension of Christian III von Wittelsbach to the Bulgarian throne. As he had no heir at that moment, Emperor Frederik immediately claimed the throne.
BUt before the alliance could be canceled and war declared, the BUlgarian ruler popped an heir ( the suspicious timing raised a lot of eyebrows!), and Frederik lost his claim. But at least he kept the alliance. And since Denmark had secured the key province of Bessarabia, and appeared to be one step closer to getting BUlgaria in a Union, he called upon his cousin to join the war on Hungary
The war with Hungary continued to grind on for a few more years, until Manuta and Two Sicilies could be peaced out. IN that time, notice came that Saxony lacked an heir, and Emperor Frederik helpfully provided another Christian von Wittelsbach for the court in Weimar.
If one thought of the process of getting a personal union as a pipeline of sorts, with countries going from marriage to heir to dynasty to union, then we had several countries at the marriage state, Saxony at the heir stage , Bulgaria at the dynasty stage , and Bohemia and Spain already at the final Union stage . And one can think of Denmark's foreign policy at that time in terms of trying to keep the pipeline full and moving.
Now back to the Hungarian war . After the capture of Napoli, Two Sicilies agreed to leave the war and that led HUngary to sign a comprehensive peace the next day.
Hungary was forced to return to Poland 3 core provinces with Polish culture, and cede several more including Moldavia . With that peace , Poland returned to something resembling her 1444 borders, although without the provinces lost to Bohemia. Hungary also ceded Serbian culture provinces to Bulgaria, which began to look like a union of all South Slavic cultures.
The annexation of land for Poland caused some aggressive expansion for Denmark, but she claimed "Benevolence" - the 7th Humanist idea - to convince the independent Europeans to forget about her expansion. And then without disbanding the mercenaries hired for the HUngarian war, young Emperor Frederik declared war on France who had rivaled Denmark again.
France at the time was fighting East Frisia protected by the very weak HRE ( Luneburg). But even without that distraction, France was an easy target for Denmark, much easier than Hungary. For France, just like the Ottomans, had deleted all her forts ( except Labourd) to save money . And so occupying France was very easy to do with only Paris putting a bit of resistance .
Meanwhile the truce with the Ottomans expired, and the latter took advantage to attack weak Armenia, no longer protected by the Danish guarantee. As Armenia was a Christian Kingdom, and therefore could be put in the Personal Union pipeline, Denmark decided to bail them out. ANd to Denmark's surprise, the mere threat of war was enough to enforce a White Peace on the Ottomans.
The war with France began to wind down in late 1587, when Lorraine signed a separate peace
In a controversial move, Denmark took the city of Metz which caused howls of complaints about aggressive expansion from the German princes ( Lorraine was HRE member and not a co-belligerent). But the young Emperor felt it was worth it to connect the former Platinate lands to Burgundy . And he felt confident that the reputation could be managed thanks to completing Humanist ideas and activating the "Multilingual Diplomats" policy
And after winning the siege of Firenze, he committed another controversial move, when he pillaged the city to grow Zeeland by 3 development ( sorry @alonsom13 , I swear we spared the Malipiero house
).
BUt when it came to peace with France, he was rather circumspect in the acquisition of land.
Denmark took the Norman culture provinces for herself ( these will be turned into the State of Normandy and Norman culture will become accepted ) . This was driven by cultural (Norman=norse men = Danes) and trade factors ( all 3 are Channel node provinces). But the rest of the peace treaty consisted of giving Labourd to ally Gascony, and then releasing Brittany and a bunch of former Appanages as free nations . The idea here was to maximize the number of nations that could enter the Personal Union pipeline, although a marriage and alliance were concluded with Brittany only. The other minor nations will get a marriage proposal if/when they have an old (over 40 ) ruler without an heir.
And even though there were now only 18 months left in the decade, Denmark had time for one more war , this time against the OTtomans.
For that war Georgia, but not BUlgaria, was called in. There was not much South Slavic culture land under Ottomans to give to Bulgaria, and the Greek provinces were earmarked for Pontus in the future. Armenia, Denmark's newest ally in the region, could not be called in due to their truce with Ottomans.
And this was an another easy war for the Danes. SO we will not describe it. Instead we will mark the end of an era, with the completion of Denmark's last colony at Sumbawa in the East Indies.
WIth her second colonist from a mission expiring in 1585, Denmark had no more colonists or explorers. Any expansion in the East would have to be done with conquest now. But luckily other nations have been filling up the uncolonized space in the Moluccas, making Denmark richer in the process . One of these nations was actually Egypt, who managed to get a foothold in the East Indies just in time before Ethiopia turned her into a landlocked nation!
And as the decade ended we find the Ottomans fully occupied by Denmark, who is thinking about peace terms. And we note the nation of Timurids renaming itself Gurkani and acquiring a large part of North India, while France lost her war with East Frisia and was forced to release Nevers, another small Appanage.
- 1
I don't even know who'd have the influence to pull off assassinating Frederik I, maybe he was just very unlucky in meeting a particularly aggressive animal.This took the nation by surprise. He was just 32 years old, and was a very careful person who avoided the military specifically to avoid an early death. The official announcement stated that he died in a freak hunting accident, but everyone knew he was not an avid hunter. Many suspected that something went terribly awry in his attempt at rediscovering the secret to longevity that Christian The Great had. What exactly happened, we leave to our readers' imagination to fill in.
Hunting accident? Balderdash. His majesty was obviously discovered in the midst of a dark sacrament to attain the power of eternal life, some foul pagan sacrifice conducted near a sacred grove or something. The good pious barons were thus forced to put the mad king down.
- 1
- 1
I want to add a discussion of what I consider one of the biggest hurdles I may face going forward: the risk of unwanted inheritance of a personal union.
When Frederik I died, there was an 8% chance of Sweden getting inherited. GIven how hard it is go get a PU to that size, that would have been an unmitigated disaster ( I would have had to re-create Sweden as a client state, break vassal, hope for no heir, declare war - lots of stab and AE loss).
Now 8% does not sound like a lot, but sometimes my Dip Rep is very high and the chance can increase . Events can bump it up. Or for example there is a monument in Pegu that gives + 2 Diplomatic relations , which I want, but also gives + 1 Dip Rep which I do no want.
Currently these are my PU province counts and my DIp Rep sources
With a province count around 45, each PU has a 10% of inheritance. This is low when talking about 1 PU, but becomes serious when you have 5 or more at risk . And of course some PU like POland are way below the province count and are at higher risk in the future.
One solution for this is to lower the DIp Rep. But most of the Dip Rep sources I cannot or do not want to get rid of, because the bonus usually improves relations as well . The only way I can consistently tank Dip Rep is to have an OPM vassal that I keep annexing and releasing every 10 years . This costs a diplo slot. If you know another trick to lower Dip Rep, please chime in.
The second solution is to raise the province count of the PUs. This means feeding them land outside Europe, because there is just not enough space in Europe for that size , and I run into the unaccepted culture problem. This is why I gave Sweden 3 provinces in New World in the last chapter. And I plan on giving them more going forward. So we may see some bordergore outside EUrope, where I gerrymander the provinces so as to maximize spread of my PU.
If anyone can think of other solutions to this problem, please chime in.
When Frederik I died, there was an 8% chance of Sweden getting inherited. GIven how hard it is go get a PU to that size, that would have been an unmitigated disaster ( I would have had to re-create Sweden as a client state, break vassal, hope for no heir, declare war - lots of stab and AE loss).
Now 8% does not sound like a lot, but sometimes my Dip Rep is very high and the chance can increase . Events can bump it up. Or for example there is a monument in Pegu that gives + 2 Diplomatic relations , which I want, but also gives + 1 Dip Rep which I do no want.
Currently these are my PU province counts and my DIp Rep sources
With a province count around 45, each PU has a 10% of inheritance. This is low when talking about 1 PU, but becomes serious when you have 5 or more at risk . And of course some PU like POland are way below the province count and are at higher risk in the future.
One solution for this is to lower the DIp Rep. But most of the Dip Rep sources I cannot or do not want to get rid of, because the bonus usually improves relations as well . The only way I can consistently tank Dip Rep is to have an OPM vassal that I keep annexing and releasing every 10 years . This costs a diplo slot. If you know another trick to lower Dip Rep, please chime in.
The second solution is to raise the province count of the PUs. This means feeding them land outside Europe, because there is just not enough space in Europe for that size , and I run into the unaccepted culture problem. This is why I gave Sweden 3 provinces in New World in the last chapter. And I plan on giving them more going forward. So we may see some bordergore outside EUrope, where I gerrymander the provinces so as to maximize spread of my PU.
If anyone can think of other solutions to this problem, please chime in.
Find an OPM vassal in Africa, lower province to 1-1-1 and diplo-annex for -3 diplomatic reputation. Release and repeat for permanent -3 diplomatic reputation?
That will cost you a relations slot though.
Too bad you're not catholic, because you could subjugate the Papacy (-2) and take Rome (-1) for another -3 diplomatic reputation.
And in case of emergencies: lower relations with a subject and let the PU end on monarch death. That gives you a restoration of union CB.
Win the war to give you 50 years of guaranteed no inheriting.
But that's probably a terrible idea, you run the risk of your enemies throwing a support independence their way
Truly you are cursed with an innate nobility and regal aura, standing high above the rest of us.
All while we peasants must live here in squalor and sadness and democracy and voting and healthcare without an enlightened monarch guiding our ways.
Alas, we dissapointed masses!
- 1
- 1
The Pegu great project at full upgrade gives +2 relations and +1 Dip rep, so combine with this I end up with net +1 relations and -2 Dip Rep. Worth pursuing.
There is also another Great Project that gives +2 relations at CHan Chan in Peru. Need to get within coring distance of that province so that if/when I go to war for a Portugal PU , I can snag the province for myself.
In any case, I think it is wise to get every PU to about 50 provinces, which will keep them all safe . Poland will be certainly getting some of that Ottoman clay. Only question is where .
- 2
Overextension also gives negative diplo rep, but you'd have to just sit on the uncored land. Revolts, as long as you're below 100%, should not be much of an issue given your number of armies and subjects.
Or maybe he DID found the secret, and faked his death to enjoy the results.
saw excess of Mil points, another option to decrease the LD is dev subject land to not go too low in prestige.
there´s no kill like overkill
for the sake of your family, i hope you did
re: diplo rep
per the wiki, for lower diplo rep as were mentioned above:
low legitimacy, high OE, whatver you do DONT trade on ivory, and the easiest annex vassal and dishonored alliances
after reading what goes against my principles (ethical, philosophical, religious and moral) I need a shower...
- 1