[Abe Sargent]

Years of Silence


After the war, I discover that I still have all 5 of my merchants in Venice! That’s pretty good. I only get 2.2 ducats annually now, though, so that dropped.

January 21, 1470 – Corfu is annexed by Venice. Ick.

February 19, 1470 – Trebizond is annexed by the Golden Horde. That’s two one province minors near me that are gone just like that.

May 4, 1470 – I get my first event! Peasants Getting Uppity. As a result, I have to choose either to give them a few freedoms or enforce serfdom. The result moves my slider either one towards serfdom or one towards free subjects.

What difference does this make? Serfdom makes it easier to recruit infantry, cheaper to buy stability, but the army morale, spy weakness, and production hits balance that out. Free subjects has the opposite strengths and weaknesses.

Which is better? I choose better morale for my army, and that’s free subjects. Choosing to side with the Peasants here will move my slider to the exact middle, so there will be no benefits or disadvantages.

There is no stability hit for making this choice as an event, so it’s essentially a free move, albeit not on a scale that I care much about. Now, if it had given me a chance on the quality/quantity scale or the land/naval scale or the innovative/narrowminded scale – that would have been really useful.

June 1, 1470 – Our stability increased

15 February, 1471 – Muscowy has offered us a Royal Marriage. I see no reason not to accept.

20 February, 1471 – Wanting a faster way out of my stability issues, I hire Bariq Abbinen as a court advisor. He costs me 1.2 ducats and 0.1 per month while helping out my investment in stability.

I check Venice and it appears that at some point in time recently I lost a merchant, but I don’t remember when. My purchase of Bariq means that I cannot send a merchant this year. Ah well.

March 1, 1471 – Modena offers us another alliance and I decide to take it again.

24 September, 1471 – Cesare I has taken over in Modena. He an amazing diplomat, and acceptable administrator and a weak war king.

8 October, 1471 – Modena wants to enter into a new royal marriage. I decide to accept.

12 November, 1471 – Milan offers us a royal marriage as well. What’s with all of the marriages all of the sudden this year? After review, I accept.

7 January, 1472 – Now Savoy wants a royal marriage. Again I agree, because it’s another small Italian nation, like Milan and Modena. Still, I have to wonder if something is up.

30 January 1472 – We expand our trade in Venice again. I hire a naval advisor to assist in our researches. His name is Linas Denhoff.

3 June, 1472 – I offer Lithuania a royal marriage and they accept.

1 February, 1473 – Bariq dies.

I don’t know when it happened, but I noticed that our reputation has increased to “slightly tarnished” from tarnished.

Also, Lithuania is experiencing a lot of rebellion in its southern-most provinces. Will this monster last or will it lose provinces as they revolt and defect? Who knows.

30 May, 1473 – Its now officially 20 years into the game.

31 May, 1473 – We sent up a merchant in Ile-de-France

August 1, 1473 – Stability increase

January 20, 1474 – I set up a merchant in Thrace. I figure that each January I’ll spend my money earned by setting up a merchant or two in the COTs that have space. I won’t bother telling you about the failures.

March 2, 1474 – We set up shop in Novgorod.

13 April, 1474 – Some country that’s not on the map and I;ve never even heard of (Funj) wrestled away our merchant in Thrace. Looks like we need to stick to COTs that are further in Europe.

17 July, 1474 – France declared war upon Lorraine. All of her vassals joined her. So did her ally Norway. Lorraine’s all, Cyprus, joined on her side. Now Cyprus is at war with France’s crew.

October 1, 1474 – I have a full slate of diplomats, so let’s send a few out. An alliance with Lithuania, who apparently cleaned up must of her rebel problem? In a war against the Turks, she’d be my best hope. They rejected our proposal.

Aragon and a royal marriage? Get us closer together? Accepted, so we are closer to Aragon.

November 13, 1474 – The Ottomans have finished their last war, this time defeating the Golden Horde. Will they turn their eyes towards Greece now?

10 October, 1475 – I have a diplomat and he is ready to go to Athens. I am going to offer them annexation. What happens now could be a major change in our destiny, or a major stumbling block.