Make the Maldives Great Again #5: The Finale (Europa Universalis IV)
Hello Again Steem folk!
P5ych0path here with the fifth and final installment in my EU4 Maldives campaign. After I finish this, I'll be updating my game to the latest version so I can get the Mandate of Heaven DLC soon.
For the previous entries in this series:
Now, let's wrap this thing up!
Where We Left Off:
When we last left off, we'd allied Ethiopia and continued to keep close ties to our oldest ally, Golkonda. We'd finished the expansion of our colonial nation of Maldivia to its full potential.
In addition, we'd taken on U-Tsang as a vassal, force vassalized Shirvan and Iraq, and designated Shirvan as a march in order to take full advantage of their military potential.
The Highlights:
Seeing Russia occupied with conquering Oirat, we feel the need to try to stop the growth of their influence as their empire is one of our biggest rivals. We ready our troops at their border and go to war. They bring in the mighty one province nation of Estonia, upping their intimidation factor ten fold.
We mobilize all regiments to the north, sieging down forts as we go.
During the war, we finish integrating Sunda into our empire.
At the crux of the war, we decimate their army, taking a minor terrain penalty, but still coming out on top. We take some of their land and stave them off from Oirat for the moment.
Shortly afterwards, we're able to completely fill out our final idea group, giving us a massive boost to the amount of troops we can field, which will work out nicely.
We also begin to integrate U-Tsang, who've proved themselves fairly useless due to the poor lands they own.
Seeing the Ottomans engaged in a massive war with the great powers in Europe, we take advantage of this and bring in our friends in Ethiopia.
With Ethiopia occupying the Ottomans in their home turf, Shirvan and Iraq push into Ottoman lands. We manage to break through their border forts and follow our subjects into the heart of Ottoman territory. The war is tough, but most of the Ottoman army is on the other side of the Mediterranean Sea fighting Europeans. We push hard and fast, crushing every Ottoman regiment we encounter.
We deal a massive blow to the Ottoman empire, forcing them to cede much of their Middle Eastern land to us as well as causing double the casualties to their army. We leave Europe to decide their fate as we have more pressing matters to attend to.
In India, Vijayanagar has grown decadent and we decide its time to help them with that. We declare war and bring in Golkonda, who seem eager to retake their lands.
We meet Vijy's army and quickly crush them.
While we fight on land, our fleet of heavy ships meets Vijy's transport fleet poorly defended and decimate them.
With Golkonda in tow, we push deep into the heart of Vijy's land, laying siege to their capital.
In the midst of war, we integrate U-Tsang into the empire.
As the war comes to a close, we make our final push and take much of Vijy's land, giving Golkonda their rightful provinces as payment for their assistance. As you can see, we've gone well over %100 overextension, causing a massive amount of rebel factions to plague the empire, but with our army at its greatest height, we manage to quash these rebellions one by one.
With the Ottomans engulfed in yet another war with all of Europe, we prepare for an invasion the scale of which we'd yet to imagine. We bring in Ethiopia once more, who want Ottoman blood.
We push into Ottoman land on all fronts while Ethiopia focuses on Mombosa in Africa. This time we won't let them have time to think.
We smash each and every Ottoman regiment we encounter along the way, quickly taking down their forts and readying our armies to assist Ethiopia. As you can see, the rest of the world has seen the Ottoman's weakness and launch full scale wars on them.
As the war comes to a close, we take on Tirhut as a vassal.
In the end, we take a vast amount of Ottoman land and give some to Ethiopia. Seeing that they are no longer a match for us and have embroiled themselves in massive wars that will surely lead to their demise, we leave them to their own devices.
With the campaign coming to a close, we decide to launch an invasion of Oirat, who brings Korea into the fray.
We quickly push toward their capital, sieging down the few forts they have along the way.
Meanwhile, we launch a full scale amphibious assault on Korea, sieging down their capital as well as other forts and crushing their navy and army.
The war doesn't last long and we take all but a small fraction of Oirat's land, vastly expanding our already mighty empire.
With only a few in game days left of our campaign, and not enough time to finish coring our newly acquired lands, we leave off on this note.
Let it be known that, although a casual player might think the Maldives the most useless nation in the game, this is the result of careful plotting and calculation. Never has the Maldives been more powerful, so powerful in fact that we have managed to stay the #1 Great Power in the world for much of the 18th and 19th Centuries.
The final screen with Ironman proof as well as our score, which is well above the other puny empires.
Final map screenshot, showing the vast reaches of the Maldives Empire, who've been made truly great.
Thanks for Reading Along Folks!
This was one of my most proud EU4 campaigns to date and I hope you've enjoyed the ride. Thanks so much for staying tuned.
Expect more AARs in the future as I have time to complete them.
This is P5ych0path, signing off.