Roma Universalis [EU IV LP] [No 56k]

[Borgholio]

plus some Hotels apparently block imgur as a pornographic site. Why, I do not know.

That's...odd. Try using Cyberghost or another VPN software. It will bypass their blocks easily.

[Thanas]

I am terribly sorry for taking so long and not delivering on the promised update yet. I am currently travelling and internet access is spotty, plus some Hotels apparently block imgur as a pornographic site. Why, I do not know.

Can you use a proxy, or will that result in you being tarred, feathered and kicked in the nuts by law enforcement?

I'd rather not be that guy who causes an entire conference being told not to do x on the internet, especially because nobody will buy the excuse of "I just wanted to post some game screenshots, professor, honestly". I mean, I wouldn't buy that one either from one of my students.

[Mr Bean]

I'd rather not be that guy who causes an entire conference being told not to do x on the internet, especially because nobody will buy the excuse of "I just wanted to post some game screenshots, professor, honestly". I mean, I wouldn't buy that one either from one of my students.

From a tech guy I can bet you five thousand Euros that if your in any kind of regular convention center hotel then you'll be just fine proxying. The number of point to point proxy links businessmen need to set up to sell X is likely dozens per day. Proxying is a security requirement IT loves handing out.

But that's something I'd set up ahead of time and not try and set up across the world. I still have flashbacks to a case where I had to send a dozen projects to a doctor in China who had her laptop destroyed by baggage handlers (Laptop bag+drop+sitting in a three inch puddle of water for half an hour followed by a freezing cargo hold for 16 hours... dead) and we had to set up a proxy since her research software was security locked to only allow copying into another instance on the same network. It took two hours, likely fifty bucks in long distances charges and lots of cell phone pictures to walk her through using a new laptop to give me remote access so where I could set up the proxy then install everything. Not to mention her college's computer and nine separate malware programs on it.

[Thanas]

Island invasions


Soon after we had won the last war against the Ming, Japan decided it would like to have a piece of Korea too. And by piece, they meant "all of it".


We meanwhile won a quick war against Vladimir, which saw several territories turned over to us.


Meh. Our empire is so large and our manpower reserves so huge that War exhaustion doesn't really affect us at all.


We grabbed the Shetlands and Faroe Islands in a quick invasion. All of this was just training for the real invasion of England.

But to do so we needed a base.

The Viking kingdom of Yorkshire was an easy target and fell within a year. We now had a supply base from which we could build up and supply our forces from.


Did you know that when this happend in real life, there was a huge discussion about how Coffee would poison the youth? Heck, Bach even wrote a cantata where a father tries to prevent his daughter from drinking the immoral black morass. I kid you not. And one of the best canons in the German songbook from the 18th century goes like this:
"C-a-f-f-e-e, trink nicht so viel Kaffee! Nichts für Kinder ist der Türkentrank, schwächt die Nerven, macht dich blass und krank. Sei doch kein Muselman, der ihn nicht lassen kann!" (Coffee, don't drink so much Coffee. Not for children is the turkish drink, weakens the nerves, makes you white as a sheet and causes illness. Don't be like the muslim who is addicted to it.).

On to serious business:

Aah, another vassal gets annexed.


Meh. Doesn't matter if they like me or not.
Case in point:


Meanwhile, Japan had finished the conquest of Korea:


Well, this just wouldn't do. Korea will be ours to colonize and oppress, not Nippons.



Half the Japanese army tried to attack via the Kurils into North Siberia

but was intercepted and destroyed.

Meanwhile, the invasion of the mainland was a piece of cake.

The armies of the Japanes crumbled under the pikes and rapiers of the Tercios.

Hard to believe this battle started out with them having a 2:1 superiority. So much for the famous Samurai spirit.

Japan soon was ready to capitulate.


We took all of Ainu, the Kurils, Okinawa and all of Korea.
We could have grabbed much more but decided against it due to possible overextension.


Improved irrigation. Hopefully that means we can finally recreate the glorious irrigation system of Roman North Africa.
(sadly the game does not model such things but instead gives you a blanket production bonus. Would be nice to have been able to start specific projects like the above-mentioned irrigation system to turn North Africa into a breadbasket again)

More settlers is always nice.


The Spice trade. The wealth that created the colonial empire of the Netherlands (and countless atrocities that to this day found very little remembrance in the Western world).


Oh my. A lot of new troop types.

First, the new cavalry:

The choices are essentially: Balanced, defensive, offfensive. It would be cool if one could mix troop types, as happened in history, but the game forces you to make a single choice. A shame, because especially in the 17th and 18th century I would have preferred to mix the armies.
We chose the latin hussars (balanced) because our wars in the west often involve offensive battles with us as the attackers, whereas in the east the Chinese hordes usually attack us after we started sieging a city.


Here the choice was Balanced, offensive and defensive. Again, no possibility of mixing, so we took the most balanced forces, the standard Line infantry.


Heh. This bonus - when coupled with advisors and our (overpowered) Roman national ideas means that we will never have a negative reputation ever.

Not even when we do things like attacking the Ming as soon as the peace timer run down.


Again the Ming horde mobilized, attacking with 150k troops against our two legions.


However, this time, not many reinforcements were needed as our line infantry poured volley after volley into the massed Ming formations, breaking them up and winning the fight.

In the South, the Ming allies Khmer surrendered a good chunk of their territory after we occupied them.


The Ming suffered more in the peace treaty, essentially surrending a sixth of their whole country, including the land route to Beijing.

This did put me over 100% overextension, but the Ming rebels which resulted were easy pickings for my massed legions.


Hooray. Everybody smoke. It is good for your health and helps you lose weight. To combat that unnatural weight loss, best you drink a lot of heavily sugared wine (no joke, people used to put sugar into nearly every drink, which led to things like 19th century Russia drinking 400g of sugar per litre of champagne).


This would be more impressive if we would need to build a lot of new ships. Well, I guess our merchants do to facilitate the trade with the new provinces and our new colonies, but not the main fleet.


Oh-ho-hoh. Colonies getting uppity. We'll see what comes of that.


"His attempt to conquer the neighbouring states has so far failed miserably." LOLWHAT? Oh game, you are funny.

Let's just check out how we are doing in the whole conquering department right now:


Yeah, that is a miserable failure indeed.


South America is - except for Eastsaexe increasing their holdings by annexing more indio nations - unchanged.

In North America, Eastsaexe has now founded the colonial nation of California.



Africa remains the same, with the Nubian states being locked into a state of nearly perpetual war now.


A closer look at Asia.


Our efforts in Indonesia have paid fruit, as we shifted most of our colonists here. Malacca however has started colonizing the Philippines and is expanding at a rate that is very impressive for an Asian nation. Ooh, and they already westernized.

(to be continued below)

[Thanas]

(continued from above)


German ingenuity strikes again. Hooray. (Well, the whole thing was just a byproduct of a failed experiment to find Gold, but let's all just gloss over the fact and admire the great Meissen porcelain.)


Perfidious Eastsaxon privateers were again seen in our waters. Ugh.


Hey, Island is a viking country that has no allies and is located near great fish stocks and of strategical importance to the trade with North America.

They were welcomed into our glorious Empire.


This is useful...except that we can already take more provinces than we can handle without suffering overextension. Hmmm.


The nitwit is dead, long live the nitwit's average daughter. I guess not being as dumb as a case of rocks is better than nothing (How, oh how did the house of Thanas, famous for breading genius after genius, fall into such dire times? Probably too much inbreeding. We need a harem to prevent that. More concubines. For eugenics. Why are you looking at me like that?)

The two-province nation of vietnam had fallen into chaos, with peasant rebellions breaking the country.


We provided order and stability for them.


Hey Vlad! Look who's at the door.

The roman legions, that's who.


The allies of the Russians, the Saxons, fought hard and bravely.

Even when outnumbered, they gave as good as they got.

The Russians....not so much.


I don't care where you come from, as long as you are competent.


The Russian and Saxon armies tried to combine and to advance into Sweden. Our Classis blocked the straits and isolated, they were forced to surrender.


Russians cause very little casualties, proving again that they are pussies.

The Saxons proved to be a harder foe.



After five days of fighting, the once 28000 strong Legio I Italica was reduced to mere 12k men. The cavalry especially suffered, for the Saxon artillery tore into them with grapeshot. Of the 8000 cavalrymen, only 1500 survived the battle.

Still, we could count on the great morale and discipline of our legions to suffer even the hardest casualties.


With the battle being decided, we decided to let the Saxons off easy in exchange for two counties in the east that were already surrounded by Pommerania.



The Russians weren't that lucky.



A female general, and a good one at that.
A star that burned so bright. I wish I had her skill with the opera and the sword. Seriously, read her biography, it is the epitome of bohemia and "je ne sais quoi" before it ever existed.
Now she will become the mater castrorum, the leader of legions, vanquisher of Britons, Russians and Chinese.


We will be generous. Once.



We could now build the huge grain depots, evoking the image of the great halls of Maxentius and being the perfect storage for egyptian and German grain to feed our ever expanding metropolis Roma.




From "The reconquest of the British Isles", by Nauarchus Horatius Nelsonius, Londinium 1810:
"The Reconquest of the British Isles had long been planned by Roman rulers ever since the Empire had been reunited, though the Mongol horde had prevented any such operations until now. The Romans had taken many steps to ensure the success of any such operation. The channel ports had been enlarged and reinforced. The Islands of Shetland, Faroe and Islands had been conquered, fortified and now housed squadrons of light ships ready to hunt down potential privateers. And the County of Yorkshire had been taken and turned into a giant Roman marching camp, negating the need for a huge number of large convoys."


"Command of the war was given to Lady Julie d'Aubigny, Legate of the Legio I Lithuania."

"After being reinforced by two more legions transferred from the Saxon front, the forces struck out."

"After half a year of campaigning, the Lothian forces were cornered in Ireland and surrendered promptly after running out of potatoes."

"What can i say about the Saxons that has not already been said? Never was there a more gallant race, always ready to come to the aid of their allies. They paid grievously for it, but gained a reputation for diligence, honesty, discipline and trustfulness that still remains to this present day, even with them being the Roman citizens they are now."


"Rome did not take any provinces in this war, for they preferred to be seen as Liberators. Instead, they ordered the Welsh and the Saxons of Lothians freed, who promptly became Roman vassals."

"Legate d'Aubigny made many improvements to Roman fortifications during these conflicts, which caused the Romans to double their fortification efforts."


The time at the end of this update. We are doing very well. And I think I have gained a huge appreciation for the Saxons and the Saxon AI, for they are really the hardest enemy in this whole game. Everybody else, even Ming, is just a speedbump now, but they fight hard and smart.

[Alferd Packer]

You're always at a disadvantage fighting in Germany; you're either crossing a river, or in a forest, or in mountains--there's always something to give the defender the edge. It's like when France tries to invade the Iberian peninsula--always fight them in the Pyrenees, rotating your armies in and out of the fight. Or just scorch the earth and let them eat that glorious attrition while they try to siege you down.

[Ritterin Sophia]

I just noticed this and read through all of this. Sorry to see you didn't get the bonus events for the provinces of Hibernia, Caledonia,and Germania in CK2, Thanas.

[Thanas]

Smashing old rivals


The first target was Japan, which held a lot of valuable provinces, but their economic development was held back due to Samurai caste system.

Ming was not content with allowing us to attack Japan.
But that was alright, for we were quite content to attack Ming as well an had prepared well for that possibility.

10 legions, 280.000 men in total, were waiting to invade Ming.

And this we did, our aim being a quick knockout blow to Ming.

Ming massed their usual mass army, but our line infantry proved superior again.

We soon made an enticing offer to Ming - no Ming territories were to be surrendered, in exchange for peace and their northern Manchu vassal state of Jianzhou.

They accepted.


In Japan meanwhile, the Samurai had proven more than useless, as expected.

I shall note that this was achieved by using only four legions, as opposed to ten against the Ming.

Soon, all of Japan was conquered and the Tenno had to sign a most humiliating treaty.

This again pushed us over the overextension limit, but again, the rebels weren't much of a threat to us.

While we were busy swatting down asian rebellions, we decided to take the Highlands of Scotland.


This was quickly done.


Some people in our colonies don't like us. Oh no, what will we ever do?

It was time to select a few new policies. We had two slots remaining.


More missionary strength is always good, as are embassies that give us a reputation and trade bonus. I might swap out the later though, as I don't really need it.

After the asian provinces had been cored and rebellions swatted, we decided to say hello to the little Vlad again.


Their allies, the Saxons, fought strong and we only took two provinces from them.

Unlike the Russians. We could have taken more, but it is very important we do not overextend in the west.

Meanwhile, the horrible century for the Ming was continuing:

They were now engaged in a war against the unholy trinity - Malacca, Bengal and Jaunpur. And Ming was losing hard.

During those wars, we increased our tech level:

Woohoo. Threedeckers. Though it is not as if anybody could challenge our Navy already.

Meh. We got so much money that I am already paying 2k a month in subsidies to our colonies and still got something like a 1.3k monthly surplus.

"More mortars for knocking down those pesky Ming fortresses".



We integrated our vassals in England.

The situation in the British Isles was shifting more and more in our favor - so we decided to shift it a bit more.

Oh yeah. Saxons again. I wonder why they do this even when they got no army left after the last war.

We took Ostfriesland, Oldenburg and Anhalt.

Lothian didn't put up much of a fight.


Hibernia was ours. Hooray.

(to be continued below)

[Thanas]

(continued from above)


Of course, as soon as we get rolling, there is a regency.


Ungrateful colonists. They got promptly stomped by a legion.


Of course we will tax North America. What is the worse that could happen?

The dastardly Eastsaxon colonies used our regency to declare war on our colonies.


They apparently want to take Roman panama.
However, they made one giant mistake - there is one very large Colonial nation sitting right next to them. That nation is a giant in its own right. It's name? Roman Mexico.

Eastsaxon Columbia promptly called in Eastsaxon Peru. So now there was a Southamerican war going on between our colonies and the eastsaxon ones. We decided not to intervene for two reasons: a) we couldn't declare war due to regency anyway and b) Why should we care? Our colonies already get subsidies from us, they have to handle their own business.


A GENIUS EMPEROR. The reputation of House Thanas is restored.

What does a young Emperor do to prove his strength and power?

Challenge the son of heaven, of course.

Oh, look, they found some more allies in Japan and Haixi. (For those wondering, Haixi is the remaining Manchu/Mongol state above former Jiazhou).

Too bad for them that their allies weren't worth squat.

Samurai. KATANA. 1111!1.
Japan soon decided to surrender, turning over three provinces.


As did Haixi, who were defeated by a single legion.


From the "Diary of Leon VI", by Leon VI Thanas, Imperator Caesar Augustus, Basileus ton Basileon, König der Deutschen und Pommern, Pater Patriae, Pontifex Maximus, Defensor fidei, Duke of Latium and Thrace, Lord of Roma, Constantinopolis and Beijing et al, Roma 1730:
"It became quite apparent the Augustus that Ming had suffered too much at the hands of Malacca and the Indians. For most fortifications had not even been repaired and the populace did not resist, but suffered our aggression with dull eyes. Gone were the Ming armies of the past, for they only managed to raise a single, pitiful army against us. This army was caught by three legions near Huai'an by the Legio VI Victrix, Legio I Adiutrix and Legio VIII Augusta and completely destroyed."

Next spring, an envoy from the so-called Son of Heaven arrived at Beijing, which had been taken two months earlier. We received him in the traditional audience room of the Ming Emperor.

The treaty involved the surrender of most of the disputed territory and the handover of the city of Beijing. Beijing, the former capital of the Ming Empire, is truly a wondrous city, most deserving of being one of the official palace cities of the Roman Empire."

In response to the great overextension, several things happened. The most striking one was the revolt of some of the cities.

No, you won't get your old rights back, for the modern state will not give seperate jurisdiction to you over your cities.

Why? You think you can conquer all of the Roman Empire with 19k troops? A single legion, dispatched from the Saxon front, was enough to quell the insurrection.

In order to gain new support, we decided to abolish serfdom, thus giving us more loyal (and free) subjects.

And now we just had to wait for several years to finish coring the eastern provinces.


We increased taxes on our colonies.

*grumble grumble* Fine, I'll accept your self-elected Governor. *grumble*

Meanwhile, our colonisation Effort in Australia paid off.

I was sorely tempted to name it STRAYA.

During these years of waiting, we first increased our military technology:

OOOH YEAH, BABY.
There were only two choices as to which troop types we would pick.


LONG LIVE THE ARMY OF FREDERICK THE GREAT.

Then, we dumped a few diplomatic points in changing the culture of captured provinces.
After a few more years, we increased our administrative...

(Meh. Only good thing is the new idea group)

...and diplomatic technology. (Double meh, though the extra settler growth sure is nice)

For a new idea, we picked the innovative group. Rome must always be the leader in technology.

And since we did not have anything better to do due to integrating Ming and putting down rebellions, we formed another colonial nation to compete with Eastsaxe.


And on

years of diplomatic attempts bore fruit.

Pommerania went from being a personal union to a permanent member state of the Roman Empire.

Let us take stock:

The Empire in Europe:

in the east:

(the unholy trinity of Malacca, Bengal and Jainpur looks mighty enticing for being the next huge rival and might actually present a challenge)
STRAYA

Africa:

South America:

(As expected, the colonies had won the war and taken about half of Eastsaxon Colombia)
and North America:

Eastsaxon is heavily colonising the South of the USA and Canada. Hmmm.

TL, DR:
We are on the lookout for new challenges now. Also, we took Beijing and most of Japan. The Empire is massive.

[ray245]

I wonder how the hell would the Imperial administration be able to run such a ridiculously large empire without suffering massive rebellions all the time?

[Thanas]

I wonder how the hell would the Imperial administration be able to run such a ridiculously large empire without suffering massive rebellions all the time?

Presumably the same way they managed to run a similar oversized empire during Roman times. Lots of local rule, with the Empire only serving as the massive integrating feature via citizenship.

[Iroscato]

Poor Ming is on its last legs...and it only took 6 or 7 generations
Any idea what lies in yonder northern Russia?

[koputusx]

out of curiosity, what does make Malacca, Bengal and Jainpur unholy trinity?

[Thanas]

out of curiosity, what does make Malacca, Bengal and Jainpur unholy trinity?

They are allied.

[Thanas]

Poor Ming is on its last legs...and it only took 6 or 7 generations
Any idea what lies in yonder northern Russia?

Missed the question earlier, sorry for that. Wasn't trying to ignore you.

The answer is: nothing - just wasteland.

[Thanas]

The death blow


Yay. We are innovative.

Another country decided to innovate as well:

Well, that is interesting.


Emperor Leon VI Thanas decided to put the Russians out of their misery.

This of course led to war with Saxony, who were still allied to them.


We took Stettin, Hannover and the city of all cities, the magnificent Bremen.


Vladimir was annexed and the Emperor took the title "King of all Rus".


I am on to you game. Seriously, this shit is getting out of hands.
Thankfully, the younger brother of Leon, Bardas, is just as capable, so we will only have to wait 3 years now.

Meanwhile, the conversion of the Chinese into productive Orthodox Roman citizens is proceeding very well.



...what delicacy might that be? I am guessing asian cuisine.


Very cool.

After 2 more years of waiting, Bardas finally acceded to the throne. Hail Bardas.

It was time to end Japan.

As usual, the Japanese army surrendered without much of a fight.

We annexed Japan....

and after a war of three months, Haixi.

This meant that the war against the Mongols, which had started about 500 years ago, was finally over as all Mongol and Manchu territories were now under Roman rule. It was now time to restore the borders of the Empire in the west.



As usual, Saxony was dragged into the fight, but due to suffering bankruptcy, it had almost no forces to speak of.

Which led to a quick victory.

Lothian was fully annexed.


We became more pragmatic in dealing with people.

Speaking of people, let us take a look at the Empire after the recent wars:

There are only three nations remaining in Europe.


The unholy trinity has taken over Mings eastern provinces after winning the war, Bengal now controls all of Burma and a good piece of Yunnan.

Malacca is also expanding heavily in Indonesia, taking over Taiwan, the Philippines and half of Australia...

...as well as expanding into Africa, taking over southeast Madagascar. Yes, those will be worthy foes.

South America is largely unchanged.

As is North America.


However, Ming was large and juicy.

A quick look at the balance of forces:

Yeah, I'd say we are slightly favoured. What is impressive, however, is that Ming can still field a 120k army, despite losing all major wars.

Their allies to the south however sued for peace quickly.

Roman Indochina is looking very well after the recent gains, doesn't it?

In China proper, our forces made a quick attack on the enemy capital


The Chinese Navy valiantly fought against our East Asia Fleet:


Yet the firepower of our ships of the line proved too much as we did not lose a single ship.

From: "War diary of the Legio V Alaudae", Roma 2014:
"On April 2nd. the legion was tasked to siege and take Nanchang. We arrived on April 16 and had surrounded the city by April 20th. On May 5th, scouts reported a massive enemy force approaching from the South. Reports were sent to the other legions in the area and the Legion readied itself for battle. On May 7th, the orders came from the Megas Strategikos Caligula Germanos to hold until relieved."


"The Enemy soon proved to be several times of our number, as it was all of the remaining Ming Army, led by the Emperor himself."

"Despite a valiant and disciplined effort by our troops, the cohorts were soon overwhelmed by the greater Enemy numbers. The legate gave orders for the staff to prepare for combat and the eagle was brought forward into the middle of the square, which at that point largely consisted of the artillery gunners, who had been handed muskets. The legion was ordered to stand to and die."

"When the enemy had reached the last square, trumpets from the North announced the arrival of the IX Hispania, led by Megas Strategikos Germanos himself."

"Although they too were outnumbered, they attacked the enemy with a vigor unmatched. The reason for that vigor soon became clear, for the V Macedonia, the most ancient and decorated of all legions, soon arrived on the battlefield as well."


"The enemy was thrown into chaos and disorder by a determined cavalry assault."

"The enemy army was forced to flee all the way to Canton, where the remains of the army were caught and annihilated by the V Macedonia and IX Hispania. There were no survivors, the Chinese Emperor being among the dead."

With the Chinese ruling class being thrown into chaos and confusion, Emperor Bardas demanded half of the Chinese territory - and received it." [/i]


Now there was nothing for us but to wait and absorb the new territories. During those four years we increased our ideas

and technology

"Yeah, a good public flogging never hurt a sailor. What do you mean, he's dead?"

The ring bayonet. This made all pikes obsolete.

A nationwide tax system was formed, greatly limiting the load on our administration.

The tax assessor, which would later evolve into the finance ministry, was built in Rome.

Meanwhile, the religious factions hated our new, innovative thinking.

Rome is no theocracy and never will be one.


I think the point was made.


More taxes for the colonies.

No, I will not attack India. Yes, I set the policy, not you greedy merchants.


Dynamic court....meh. Our previous courts were dynamic enough, what with La Malinche becoming chief advisor, an afghan poet becoming chief philosopher and an Italian women becoming chief scholar.


In Roman indochina, a nation was present that prevented us from reaching the unholy trinity of Jainpur, Bengal and Malacca over land.
(they are the grey on the map, sorry if it is hard to see)


This was rectified.

The date was:

Everything was ready for a showdown with the Unholy Trinity.

(and trust me, it will be a massive one. Next update though.)

[OmegaChief]

I guess once they're gone the only thing left to do would be to get some revenge against the Eastsaxe colonies at last? I can't really see anything else in the world that can even really challenge you at this point.

Though at what year does time run out in this game? Since I figure the clock is the only thing that can stop total Roman domination at this point

[Iroscato]

I'd say Rome essentially has total domination of the planet already. It easily must make up 2/3 of the human race at this point
This is the best LP I've ever followed

[Borgholio]

Just downloaded the EU-IV demo while waiting for the Steam sale. Tried a couple hours as Portugal and the game already seems huge. Tried setting up a colony on the Ivory coast but the natives ate them. My little kingdom wouldn't even register against Thanas' mighty empire.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I'd say Rome essentially has total domination of the planet already. It easily must make up 2/3 of the human race at this point
This is the best LP I've ever followed

It's the best one I've followed, although the SCRAMming Up! and BARIS ones I participated in have this one beat for batshit craziness. Plus rockets. Never forget rockets.

Seriously though, this is awesome and hilarious.

[Purple]

The only way this could be improved is if we could get Brian Blessed to do the narration.

[Iroscato]

The only way this could be improved is if we could get Brian Blessed to do the narration.

That may be the most sensible thing I've ever seen you post

[Thanas]

The Great War


The date. Keep it in mind.

From "Endless fighting. How Rome became the universal empire", by Rolf Stoll, Hamburg 1950:

"Thanks to the surviving documents of the Imperial War College as well as the victory columns of Roma, we are able to reconstruct a complete and definite campaign history of what was later called the Great War. Roman Strategy was simple. Four legions from Roman China would constitute the naval force. These were to first take Taiwan, then the Philippines and later the surviving Malaccan colony in Indonesia. After that, they were to either support Roman Australia or conquer Malaccan Borneo and Sumatra.

Eight legions were to in effect blockade the Mekong Delta from reinforcements of Malacca, whereas the main body of the Roman Army was to first attack Bengal and Jaunpur. It was hoped that the eight legions would be able to hold the line long enough for the Roman legions to finish of the allies of Malacca.

The land war started with two large battles to prevent the Bengali Southern Army and the Malaccan Northern Army to join up.

The former, reinforced with some Jaunpuri troops, was engaged in Taungoo...

...and beaten back.

The Malaccan Northern Army was likewise engaged by other legions at Sukhotai.


This too ended in a Roman victory, though the jungle made it a costly one.


The four naval legions had landed at Taiwan and destroyed the local garrison.



Not wishing to allow the Northern Malaccan Army time to reform, the legions pursued and beat them in a series of battles raging all the way down the Malay peninsula.



Meanwhile, the invasion of Jaunpur (northern india) went as planned, with the resisting armies being unable to challenge the mighty legions.

In Taiwan

the Romans decided to attack the small fortresses garrisoning the Islands and taking them by storm. Casualties were deemed acceptable as they could be easily replenished from the garrisons of Roman China.

This was done quickly and Taiwan fell. The four legions (I Java, II Java, I Indonesia, II Indonesia) then were loaded on the Eastern Fleet again and set sail for the Philippines.


The Malaccan army once again tried to break out of Malacca, but was repulsed again. Casualties continued to mount for the eight legions that were holding the line though.

The reason for the Malaccans trying to break out became all too clear soon.

The remains of the Bengali Army were annihilated in Eastern Bengal.

In Jaunpur, the combined forces of all the Jaunpuri Armies tried to push back the Roman tide.


This was unsuccessful.


The Philippines were by now almost conquered. A marauding raid fleet by Malacca had been caught and destroyed in Manila Bay, with the Roman Navy not losing a single ship.



On the Peninsula, the situation however grew more and more dire for the eight Roman legions tasked with holding back the entire Malaccan Army. For though they continued to hold the line, each battle grew more and more a close affair.


However, this bought enough time for the Romans to force a peace on Jaunpur, who surrendered all of Nepal and Tibet. Rome quickly took advantage of this second land route to China and built large canals to support the troops.

With a lot of troops now being free of their obligations and duties in Jaunpur, Rome started a full invasion of Bengal.

Then, however, disaster struck.

The Malaccans had, in a surprising show of strength and bravery, made a quick attack against three legions. This attack, carried out by the Bayonet, was so strong that the Roman legions had to concede the field after just five hours of battle to prevent being encircled.

The Malaccans then attacked a single legion guarding the left flank. The main roman Army, five legions in total (having been reinforced by one additional legion in response to the losses taken) moved to intervene.
However, they were to late. The Malaccans had gained the superior position and their larger artillery force had perfect firing conditions on the massed Roman lines.

The result of the battle was a quick rout, the heaviest defeat Rome had suffered in a long time.

The Malaccan Army moved north to try to save the Bengali.

Their first attempt was to lift the siege at Dagan.

However, this time the Romans were ready to bring the full might of the legions to bear. For this was no longer a holding action - this was the main thrust of the campaign.

Five legions marched in support of their defending comrades.

Sandwiched between the two 100k+ armies, the Malaccan army crumbled....

..and were thrown back.
Bengal now had no other option but to surrender. Rome took all the eastern territories they had gained from Ming.


It was time to finish the War. Emperor Bardas III Thanas himself led the armies on an offensive against Malacca.



Near Johor, the Malaccan Battle Fleet tried to oppose the landing of Roman troops in Sumatra.


The Malaccans had the advantage of more battleships.
The Romans had the advantage of 1800 years of experience in Naval Warfare.

In Sumatra, the last Malaccan Army was destroyed in battle.

It was

The war had raged for close to eight years now. It was time to make peace.

The Malaccans had to cede Taiwan, Bangkok, The Philippines and half of Malaccan Australia.

Roma Victrix.

(continued below)

[Thanas]

(continued from above)

The Roman Empire, Liberator of oppressed people everywhere


An interesting offer arrived in the shape of a secret delegation from the Eastsaxon colonies in the New World. Both New Eastsaxe (pictured) and Eastsaxon Columbia wanted to become independent of their overlord. Why, we must of course support such a noble quest. Poor, poor oppressed colonists and all that.

But first we had to integrate Saxony into our empire. Their culture is already accepted by us, so they will make good and useful citizens.

This is not Imperialism. This is liberating the poor German minority from their German overlords. After all, we German-descended Romans are much better rulers. No, definitely not Imperialism. If you disagree, I got a nice trip to the salt mines for you.

This wasn't really even a war. Only 40k dead? Pfft.


Yes, our ministers are awesome.

Based on the experiences in the Great War, we developed new military technologies.


We decided to go for Lancers. After all, they are the superb anti-cavalry troops of their era (just ask the British horse at Waterloo).
We had a harder choice to make at the infantry:


In the end we chose the impulse infantry, for the main danger are not enemy cavalry (LANCERS). So better to invest in snipers and freeshooters to go for the enemy infantry. Besides, their tactic descriptions sounds much like a legion - skirmishers and the main body of infantry to finish them off.

Over the next few years, we improved our diplomatic...

...and admin technologies.

Meh, we got so much money already, so who cares.

Meanwhile, a declaration had been issued.

This of course led to war with Eastsaxe.

The Eastsaxons struck first, attacking our garrisons in Britannia.

But our new troop types proved more than their worth.
It was not even necessary to call in reinforcements as our Army of Britannia and France quickly overran them...



...whereas our Main European Fleet caught their troop convoy in the waters of Africa.


UNLEASH THE POWER OF OUR LINE OF BATTLE.

This'll do, Admiral, this'll do.

Eastsaxe promptly surrendered after that naval battle and granted independence to the USA and Peru. Let us take a look at the world:



The Americas, now with two new major independent powers.

Africa, still unchanged.

One might say our holdings in Asia have grown a bit.

STRAYA, still half Moluccan. (Nobody show this to Tony Abbot, he might croak due to Australia being colonized by boat people).

There are only two nations left in Europe. Soon....

[The Vortex Empire]

I can only imagine how glorious Constantinople and Rome must be by this time, with the wealth and loot of most of the world supporting them. Roma Victrix.