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England

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At the year of our Lord 1492, the island of Ireland was in turmoil. Nationalistic teachings had spread and the peasants amassed in thousands to break free from the good-willed English hegemony over the island. However, the English army would not stand for this, and swiftly sent over their best general, Norfolk, to deal with the uppity Eires. After two big battles, the rebels had been vanquished and the island was once again secure in English hands. Soon after, the Scottish king, James IV, expressed hostility towards the English, which had done nothing wrong and were only looking after their domains. Soon enough, the Scottish were making raids in English Northumberland, and there were only one possible outcome now. The most noble English army marched, with Norfolk right at the front, towards Edinburgh, after having crushed the Scottish army in Northumberland. A swift offensive towards the Scottish highlands had now brought the Scottish domains under English rule. However, kind as the English are, the Scottish were offered vassalisation, as were the Eires. With all if the islands under English control, other matters could be attended.

The Germans had been involved in wars for many years, and the English saw little use in this, and so he decided to do something about it. It was decided that Brandenburg would be the recipient of English help, and an army was prepared for an attack on Jylland. The resistance Norfolk encountered was pathetic and was swiftly subdued. With the Danish out of the way, the English could concentrate on liberating Berlin and pushing the Pomeranians back. After a fierce battle in Magdeburg, the Pomeranians were finally back within their own borders and the Margrave had gotten enough relief to be able to fight the war on his own. Norfolk was now sent back to London to take part in fancy banquets and parties, and it was during one of these banquets that he got herpes, but that is another story.

With the Germans liberated and the barbarians under a firm grip, the English explorer Cabot could get enough funds to explore new lands, and it was decided that west were the proper way to sail. After the long sail accross the vast ocean that was believed the be the way to India, Cabot discovered a cozy little island on which he established the first English colony, Queenstown. However, brave as he was, he continued to sail down what he believed was the Indian coast. He sailed and sailed and sailed until he and his brave crew got caught in a storm, outside of what was later discovered to be Mexico, and perished.


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John Cabot

As the years passed on, England found itself quite bored and unable to partake in any worldchanging activities, and so, the colony of Queenstown was expanded, a trading post in Bangor was built, and so was one in Rio Grande. The boredom continued, until the long lost brother of Cabot, Cabot Jr, offered his services to the English king. He was immidiately sent out accross the ocean, and soon enough, he had encountered what we today refer to as Native Americans. He wasnt quite prepared on this, and thus he ordered the killing of each and every one of them, as was custom during his days. The English army landed in Delaware, fighting themselves deeper and deeper in to the new lands, eventually being able to annex the lands of the Lenape-indians. However, this was not enough for the greedy English king, and he immidiately ordered the offensive to proceed in to Iroquis lands, but due to some technical difficulties, the offensive had to be halted for a year. As I write this, the Royal Army is pressing on the newly discovered wilderness, fighting savages and killing their babies. England prevails!

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Cabot Jr​

AAR Reward: Money
On Time Reward: 0.5 deflation
Core: Connaught - ID 231
 
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Spain 1512

ontime: deflation
aar: deflation
 
Russia 1492-1512

Russia was not a pleasant land in any sense of the word, harsh winters and harsher lords was the lot for the underclass and the time was ripe for revolution, for the peasantry to make a direct appeal to the young Duke himself.
Backed by the support of every working man in Muscovy the leaders confronted Duke Vassily in his palace.

The result, as any student of Russian history could tell you, was a bloodbath. At a stroke the peasantry was decapitated and put firmly, and irreversibly into the bonds of serfdom. Dissenters were killed or impressed into the Muscovite Army and as there were an awful lot of deserters plans were put into action to put the rest of Europe under the dark shadow of Russian autocracy.

The Teutonic Order, guardian of Catholicism, was overwhelmed by the armies of Poland, Muscovy, Lithunia and Prussia. Despite bureacratic technicalities with regards to rank and overall command Livland and Estland were incorporated into the expanding Duchy.

The islamic despots of the tottering Golden Horde and Kazan were ruthlessly hunted down by bands of cossacks across the steppes after their armies had been vanquished attempting to cross the Volga.

Hot on the heels of the raping and pillaging cossacks came the equally drunken and lecherous priests of Orthodoxy, using methods that had been rejected by the Spanish Inquisition as inhumane the cities of old Kazan took to their overlord's faith like ducks to water.

The petty principalities of Pskov and Ryzan were made into vassal states of Muscovy, in preparation signing away their independence entirely.

Astrakhan and Nogai also felt the wrath of marauding cossacks as rumors of a vast expanse of unclaimed land to the east spread like wildfire across the ruling classes and serfs alike.

Elsewhere Sweden remained passive, protected by their forts of unheard of strength on the finnish border, Poland and Lithunia made further attempts to unite the two realms and the Ottoman Empire annihilated most of its brothers in faith before suffering a defeat to the combined Iberian forces after a daring strike at Lisbon itself.

ontime = 0.5 deflation
aar = -2 bb
cores = nogai somewhere
 
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Ottoman Empire​

By 1492 the Mightiest Crescent of the East was once again ready to take up arms to free vast amount of people from the terror of the false Shi'ite prophets, and from the unfair papal yoke. Of course the Sultan was ready to unify the existing Sunnite tribes under Istambul to ensure their safety. After sending a small token of money to the Sultan's friend in Europe, the nations started mobilizing to crush the Shi'ite oppressors of the peaceful Sunnite people of Egypt. The humble armies of Turkey quickly crushed the puny defense that the Caliph could field, and soon Alexandria was secured for the Ottoman cause.

Soon after the southern war the Ottoman fleet was mobilized against Venice, troops were positioned all along the the border of the Italian – Hungarian alliance a after a couple of years of fighting the Ottomans once again won a decisive victory, obtaining all the C isles like Corfu, Crete and Cyprus, and on the continent, Moldova was brought under the protection of the Sultan. In addition an agreement got signed with the Archduke about the future of Eastern Europe.

Months after the above mentioned actions a devastating war had been fought between Persia and the Ottoman Empire which gained the long wanted Eastern provinces for Istambul. Soon news from the noisy Portuguese merchants reached the ears of the experienced Turkish merchants which led to a risky operation to Lisabon in order to get the maps to the rich Far Eastern lands. Meanwhile a small detachment was sent to Egypt which successfully persuaded the Caliph to hand over his titles to the Sultan. However the strike on Lisabon wasn't this successful, Portugal called their Spanish overlord for help and the Spanish forces managed to drive out the Turkish armies and navies off Iberia before the Turkish forces managed to obtain the valuable maps.

ontime deflation
aar deflation
core : Iraq 489
 
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AAR France 1492-1512

Over the years, France has had its bad times and its good times. The early 15th century had been bad, but under the able leadership of Charles VII the hundred years' war had been won and his son and successor, Louis XI, had managed to overcome the threat the Valois duke of Burgundy posed to France. Of course the Austrian Habsburgs managed to get most of the Burgundian inheritance, so the problems for the French monarchy weren't over yet.

Still, when Louis died in 1483 the future looked good for France. His son, Charles VIII, was still a minor, so a regency of his elder sister and her husband (Pierre II of Bourbon, the most powerful noble in the land) took care of business. In 1491, the then 21 year old Charles finally started reigning himself. He did, however, manage to alienate his sister and her husband and a few years later Pierre II declared his lands independent of France.

This wasn't the only setback in the reign of Charles. In France, indulgence peddlers roamed free, ordinances weren't followed and peasants decided to revolt. And while the French were dealing with this problems (and preparing for imposing their authority on the Bourbonnais), the Austrians had started a campaign to control all of the Netherlands and south and west Germany.

In 1498 Charles suddenly died. France had still not punished the Bourbonnais and was weaker than both the Austrians and the Spanish.

The new ruler, Louis XII, wanted to strenghten France as soon as possible. His first action was to attack Genoa and Tuscany to gain lands in Italy. The evil Austrians saw their chance and soon after the French had sent their army to Genoa they attacked. The French had spent the last 7 or 8 years trying to improve their military, but were no match for the Austrian army. The great general Frundsberg crushed the French and soon Louis had to accept a humiliating treaty, paying a small fortune to the Austrians and signing a peace with the minor Italians lands, who were soon attacked by the Austrian-Spanish alliance.

The next move was the attack on the Bourbonnais, which did succeed. The Savoy was also vassalised at last. These were the only successes for Louis. The gap between the Austrians and France and the Spanish and France has only grown after he took over. His attempts to let France grow in Europe had been crushed by von Frundsberg and his army, but reports from Portugal, Spain en England spoke of new lands reachable by sea. Perhaps France would have success there. Or not.

AAR reward: Cash
On-time reward: Deflation
 
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If John was ontime, -o,5 inflation pls. Otherwise sorry for wasting the forum space. :p

Also does claiming your edits count as an AAR? Some people in this game obviously think it does. ;) :D
 
Poland: Part I

The Most Catholic Nation under God, Poland was quiet. Not much took place in the fair lands of Poland. The continous struggle between the aristocratic and decentralization-backing Sejm of Nobles, and the anti-aristocratic and centralization-backing King of Poland. Who will win, will only time tell.

During the first part of history, Poland managed to claim Kurland in a big war that truly marked the end of the decadent germanic Teutonic Knights.

Meanwhile many efforts was directed into the world of trading with at its hight, gave Poland a dominating status in no more the five Centers of Trade, Danzig, Själland, Moscuwy, Venice and Thrace, but it is not enough, now when other nations is becoming more skilled in trading then the polish merchants. But that will change soon, hopefully. The nation of Poland is biding its time for the future.

What will happen when the russians unify and awaken? What will happen when the germans unify and awaken? Then Poland will awaken and be a beacon of freedom.

Rewards:
Ontime: Deflation (if I was ontime, a bit of bad memory)
AAR: Gold
Free core: Kurland

Thank you.
 
OE 1512-1532

Between 1512 and 1516 peace, not counting a quick war with Persia in which the Empire gained Iraq for example, was reigning over reigning the Empire. However in 1516 Sultan Selim came up with a brilliant plan about annexing Hungary. He would move up leading his army against Buda, capturing every castle on the way, meantime he would sent diplomats to Transylvania about possible autonomy. By late 1516 the master plan was accomplished, Transylvania got autonomy, Ruthenia got given to Poland as part of a deal, while the Archduke received Croatia and Pest. After the Hungarian campaign Selim headed East. He was moving against Persia, but en route he spotted the once allied state of Dulkadir and he thought it would be nice to visit them. Dulkadir got incorporated into the Empire in matter of days, but sadly Selim never reached the Persian border. The great Sultan passed away in 1520. Although one great leader passed away, a new one came , Suleyman took the leadership of the army. he moved to the Persian border, waited out the defeat of the Mameluk rebellion in Egypt, then declared war on Persia. The war ended with Persia accepting the Ottoman Empire as a suzerain.

When Suleyman returned to Iraq he got message about Spanish incursion into North Africa. He quickly moved to his Tunisian client state and saved the save able, he vassalized Algir in order to prevent the Spanish aggressors from gaining more soil on the continent. Suleyman was upset because he way was blocked into Western Africa. However as an alternative solution the Sultan offered Timbuktu to the English who gladly agreed to take it. But as feared, the Iberian hunger for expansion quickly led to an attack against England. The Sultan of course honored the call for help against the warmonger Spanish, and soon France also joined the war. And as thought this made the Austrians join the war against France. This was a hard situation for the Sultan because the Empire had a NaP with the Archduke back then, but after re-reading the agreement many times, Suleyman found a back door and waged war against Austria. The war started with a failed siege in Napoli, led by the Sultan himself. (Note: the only failed assault of him) He then abandoned Italy and sailed up to Istiria where he landed and joined up with the main assault force against Austrian Hungary.

After a few battles it was clear that the start of the war was favoring the Crescent, soon Croatia, and Pest were under control, followed shortly by Oldenburg. After Oldenburg Suleyman marched into Vienna to battle Ferdinand in his capital. Although the battle ended with Ottoman victory, the Sultan didn't commenced an assault against the castle itself, instead of that he moved North and captured Ostmark and Pressburg. He then waited his reinforcements in Pest and moved against the mighty Austrian army protecting Wien. Epic battle was it, Ferdinand was defending with an infantry heavy army of 86,000, while Suleyman was leading a cavalry heavy army of 86,000. Though the cavalry advantage meant nothing, in the forests surrounding Vienna it meant nothing. After days of fierce fightings the Turkish army emerged victorious and while still being drunken by the glorious victory launched an all-out assault against the castle. A marvelous achievement of the attackers showed again, Suleyman himself placed out the Crescent in the highest tower of the Austrian capital.

After the victory the Ottoman armies retreated for a quick reorganization and as a yet last movement of the war Suleyman marched into Krain and captured the fortress there.

Despite all the victories, the war is not yet over, but the demands of Istambul are well known for Ausria.

aar: money
ontime: deflation
core: 508
 
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England

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Ah, time for a new report. As you may remember, the English army bravely killed babies and so on in the New World. Well, this continued for years, with the English army continuously pushing forward in to the depths of this new and exciting continent. The Iroquois were defeated rather fast, and subsequently annexed. Using the former Iroqouis army the English pushed on in to the Shawnee territory, without any significant resistance. Records show of epic battles where a mere 1.000 English soldiers drove back tens of thousand of Shawnee warrriors. Even though the Shawnee fought back with all they had, they could not stop the English onslaught and were forced to accept their new superiors.

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A Shawnee chieftain

With the Indians out of the way, the English could concentrate on more pressing matters. Before Cabot Jr had passed away, he had made a brave attempt to sail around Africa. However, he didnt make it past the coast of Benin, where his ships were attacked by vicious killersharks. There were no survivors. Despite his death, he had discovered a way in to Central Africa. The opening was immidiately secured and an army was prepared to push on in to the desolate wastlelands. War was decleared on Mali and their armies were quickly dispersed and they were forced in to peace. With the sacking of their capital, a new Center of Trade had been discovered in Timbuktu, something that made the English King very happy. The army pushed on in to Songhai and after some reinforcements had been sent in from England, Songhai was forced to give up Timbuktu.

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Timbuktu

The newly acquired Center of Trade did, despite bringin in riches to London, attract jelousy from the silly Spaniards, who had claimed it for themselves. Silly as they are, they could not stand to see Timbuktu in English hands and decleared war on England. What they had not counted with though, was that the English had friends, very mighty friends, who did not hesitate to back them up. Even without the English allies, the Spaniards had troubles subduing English resistance. The English African Army put up a very fierce resistance against the Spanish invadors, defeating them time after time with minimal losses. The great leader, Hernan Cortez, who lead the Spanish in Africa, could not defeat the English cavalry under Brandon, and suffered heavy losses trying to conquer Timbuktu.

Meanwhile, a big Spanish army had been sent to the English islands. Their numbers were almost three times as big as the English army defending the islands. However, the English brilliancy on the battlefield proved to be too much for the Spanish invadors, who were kicked out of the island after only being able to capture Cornwall. Although the English army fought bravely, it would be bad manners not to compliment the French army aiding the English. Without them and their fierce attacks, the defence of England would have been far more complicated. Now, with the first wave of Spaniards beaten back, the English could relax a bit and prepare for new offensives. The clumsy Spanish Armada were unable to stop the English from sending reinforcements around the world and through a very sneaky and brilliant manouver, an English detachement was landed in Bretagne and able to aid the French in kicking the Austrians out of France. Even though the Coalitions successess were brilliant so far, the Spaniards did not give up their attempts to conquer England, and soon enough, another Spanish army numbering around 60.000 soldiers were sent to London. The English and French commanders were outnumbered and outgunned. Luckily enough for their soldiers, they were both brilliant commanders, and so, within a year, the Spanish army had been reduced by around half, with the Coalition troops still numbering more than 20.000 soldiers. The fighting had been spread all over nothern England, but after some brilliant offensives by the Coalition commanders, the Spanish are now contained to the London area. Leading military experts have called the Spanish invasions "complete failures" and "laughable".


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The Spanish army preparing for the night in the battle for York

AAR Reward: Money
On Time Reward: Deflation
Core: Munster (ID 235)
Leaders: Generals
 
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Brandenburg 1512 - 1532

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The disasters of the previous decades left Brandenburg in a difficult spot. The Archduke had wasted little time in expanding his holdings, even up to the North Sea coast. Through scheming, threatening and outright military aggression, the Austrian lands had grown substantially and Brandenburg seemed incapable of resisting the white tide.

Under the capable leadership of Joachim I, however, careful steps were taken to increase Brandenburg’s holdings and overall standing amongst the powers of Europe. The free city of Bremen had already agreed to become a vassal of the Margrave and after a small scale campaign against its erstwhile ally of Saxony, the province of Anhalt was added to the Margrave’s realm. The remaining Saxon lands pledged fealty to Brandenburg. After this, the armies of Brandenburg turned north to Pommeren, from which they took the province of Vorpommeren. Vital for the Margrave’s strategy was the gathering of German lands still free from Habsburg oppression in one alliance. In this he proved quite successful and a solid alliance of Brandenburg, Bremen, Wurzburg and Bavaria pledged to stand tall against the Habsburg behemoth. Not even Brandenburg’s conversion to the Protestant faith proved strong enough to break the alliance apart.

In the late 20s of the 16th century, Spain attacked England. The Ottomans joined their English allies and so did France. This brought Austria into the war as well. Fearing even more Austrian expansion, the Margrave offered his army to the English-French-Ottoman coalition, an offer that, after some deliberations, was accepted. And thus the Margrave’s armies received marching orders to invade Austrian Bohemia and Northern Germany. With Austria being tied up elsewhere, Silesia fell unopposed, after which it was decided to focus on Northern Germany, where Brandenburg’s allies already had made some inroads. However, to the Margrave’s horror, he found that Bavaria had concluded an alliance peace with the Archduke for Silesia! Swearing and cursing, he turned back to Berlin, quite unsatisfied with the outcome of the war…


On-time cookie: -BB
AAR cookie: cash
Core: Saxony (331)
Leaders: Generals
 
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Poland Part II​
The years went by good for Poland. Trade was once more expanded, now, the fourth biggest trader in Europe, much gold was brought in by the masses of polish trades in foreign cities. Though, the polish merchants have yet become better at trading, but, that day will come when the polish traders will be renown.

In the matters of east, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania collapsed under the massive weight of the Duchy of Muscowy, later reformed to the Kingdom of Russia. In the light of the crushing defeat, the Lithuanians couldn't resist joining the protection of Greater Poland, uniting all poles, ruthenians, and almost all lithuanians under one king, the Most Catholic King of Greater Poland.

In the south, the province of Ruthenia was claimed from Siebenbürgen, with the good allowence of the Turks in the south, which truly united Poland and all who follows the grand polish King.

Other then the ever more expansive trading, the war and joining of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania not much happened to Poland. But it all bode well to the Polish nation, and its brave colonists on the Horn of Africa.

Ontime:deflation
AAR: Gold
Free Core: Ukraine (295)

ETA for AAR, ASAP.
 
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Russia

Years flew by in the Russian wastes, the peasants got thinner and more meek whilst Duke Vasily claimed the title of Czar of Russia, with all the expensive knick-knacks one would expect to come from this most prestigious of titles, namely, 3 pickled goats, the Duke of Tver's stamp collection and the secret of gunpowder from a travelling band of gypsies.

The secret was of course that bags of gunpowder could be used as a propellant for small metal objects rather than as a cheap alternative to armour. Such knowledge had to be put to the test immediately as the Lithunians made their bimonthly declaration of war thousands of gunpowder equipped troops advanced through the fearsome December blizzards to take the Lithunian armies by surprise.

Only a madman would mount an attack in the dead of winter and so that is what must be done was the general consensus of Russian HQ, the single Colonel who dared point out the obvious flaw in the plan was assigned to lead the main attack.

Colonel Glinksi proved to be a breed apart from the other commanders on the Lithunian front, deviating from standard Russian doctrine of measuring success (and therefore promotion) in the number of dead Streltsy to the more modern method of counting enemy and friendly dead at the close of battle.

And so within months the Lithunian statelet collapsed, with all occupied Russian lands defaulting to the Czar, Poland sweeping up the remnants with a cunning diplomatic coup.

After such excitement the realm took a breather as heretics were beaten and oppresed in a disgraceful show of barbaric narrowmindedness that was worsened only by its total failure to sway the ignorant serfdom.

Still as Vasily's life draws to a close he can be happy that he controls one of the largest armies in Europe (the less said abot the quality and discipline of said army the better) with a vast pool of recruits ready to be summoned to fight and die for his honour.

Economically speaking all is going well and any evidence to the contrary is western propoganda :mad:

AAR reward: -2BB
Ontime: -0.5 deflation
Core: 466
 
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Spain

aar: deflation
 
AAR France 1512-1532

After the devastating defeat against the Austrians, the French had decided they had to get stronger. The Bourbonnais had been humbled and thanks to the Savoyards the crushing of the Swiss was going very well. Soon the Swiss lands were divided by France and Savoy.

The next goal was to annex the Duchy of Brittany. After some negotiations and the sending of some money this goal was accomplished. Some more money was needed when the English offered to sell their last French lands. The French were happy to pay the taxes needed to remove the last remnant of the 100 years' war. With this possible cause of problems between England and France out of the way, the relations between these mighty nations got even better than it was before.

This was very fortunate for the French when a daring explorer offered his services to the king of France. Being allowed to get supplies from English ports, he managed to quickly find a way the the New World that the Portuguese, Spanish and English had been talking about. Soon the French founded their first trading post on this great unexplored continent.

The rest of Europe had not been quiet while the French had their successes though. The Austrians seemed to want to replace the Holy Roman Empire by the Austrian Archduchy and were quite succesful in eliminating most of the German states. Only the few states that were in the Brandenburgian alliance managed to stay independent for now.

The Spanish had been increasing their lands in Italy, with some help from the Austrians. They had also managed to crush the Inca Empire.

So France was still no match for its neighbours. This did not stop the French form intervening when the Spanish decided that the English city of Timbuktu should become Spanish. The best French general was sent to Britain to help the English stopping the invasion of the Spanish. The rest of the army was needed to protect France from Spanish offensives. And, as soon was discovered, Austrian attacks.

The war in southern France went quite well. Mostly because the Spanish didn´t send many armies there...

The army in Britain had to do a lot more and helped the English withstand the Spanish hordes that kept being sent there. Being cut of from the mainland they weren´t getting any reinforcements, so the French contribution to British defence was ever decreasing.

The main part of the army was sent to protect France from the Austrians. This didn´t go as well as the French high command had hoped, but as the Austrians had their hands full with the Ottomans, they couldn´t send many reinforcements to the French front, giving the French time to recover from a few disastrous battles.

With the French army back at decent strength, the result of the great war still looks unclear...

Aar Reward: Cash
On-time reward: Deflation
Cores: Stadacone (110) and Schwyz (1612) (forgot core last week :eek:o )