I've mentioned before that I become an epic gamer when I'm doing badly. I'm doing badly so I'm back here again.
Getting back into militaria and Empire: Total War. ETW has a problem in that it needs mod (Darthmod being the obvious one) to make the AI somewhat functional, but said mods also make the naval combat so slow and janky (really, unfun) that you'll run the clock out on one pass. What I finally decided to do was set it up without the timer, and instead this fucks me on defensive battles (since I can't - as is a very legitimate strategy - wait for them, EVERY battle is forced to be offensive).
I've made it about one-third (1730-ish) in to my run as Sweden, my first serious, sustained campaign. I don't know anything but the vaguest sketch of Swedish history in that era. I had an agenda (I'm not playing to the game's objective) that goes like this, nested priorities:
1. BALTIC MARE NOSTRUM
2. PROTESTANT LION OF THE NORTH
3. COLONIAL IRREDENTISM AND OPPORTUNISM
What does this mean? Top priority is eliminating my rivals from the Baltic, making it into a Protestant and friendly lake. To a lesser extent this also means (trying to keep my borders looking nice; there's sets of provinces where if I take one, I want the whole set) driving Russia off of the White Sea too. Of course, as the time period of the Great Northern War, this was the initial focus of my campaign. Attack on Norway kicked everything off, wound up at one point fighting a coalition of Hannover (eventually peaced out, then found themselves caught up in fighting between France and Prussia), Denmark (took a good while before I could get around to capturing Iceland), Polish-Lithuania and Russia. Polish-Lithuania and Russia will never fuck off, it's absolutely tedious and obnoxious as I genuinely don't want to conquer any more of them, I just want to tend what I have. I would trade core territories of them back if they would fuck off for good. So of course Sweden's kind of weak early on, but the advantage is that I have Britain's strength of a Wooden Wall, except even better. Scandinavia may be a peninsula of Europe, but for all practical purposes its geographically isolated, and with rivals that have been driven inland they simply can't threaten my core possessions, whereas the Baltic is a superhighway for new high-quality armies to arrive on the frontline (immediately) and has tons of ports to churn out shit quality ships. I regularly lose provinces against the Russia-and-Poland swarm, but I cap them back eventually. As is I was compelled to take all of Polish-Lithuania (they've actually somehow managed to migrate into the Ottomans and hollow out their Balkans) and have Belarus and Volhynia as well. I don't want to have to penetrate into the steppe/Siberian backcountry of Russia.
Protestant Lion of the North means avoiding conflict/seeking alliance with Protestants (British, Dutch, Americans, Prussians) when possible. If Prussia provokes me I'll take the rest of the Baltic coastline, but I have no quarrel with these. Roleplaying Gustav Adolf (even though it's long past that era).
Lastly, I specifically wanted to control Markland and Vinland (Newfoundland and Labrador), West Africa (for the Danish Gold Coast) and possessions in the Indian trade theater. As far as this goes, the Dutch spectacularly collapsed. I didn't pay attention as it happened, so I don't know how it went down, but they lost a province to the Pirates (WTF?), Guyana to rebels (after having conquered French Guyana), Ceylon to rebels and the homeland to France. So I had the luxury of just auto-resolve island hopping to quickly take over a rich colonial empire that sent my income through the roof.
I'm gambling it on war with France now, though. It was probably stupid and reckless as I hadn't fully built my fleet, but I needed to make sure I went up against them while they're still embroiled in a major war with other powers. Of course, anytime shooting starts the trade routes just collapse (one big ship in a theater killing every little ship in that theater), and France is a bigger naval power than me, but retarded and vulnerable. I took their Caribbean possessions and Newfoundland immediately, and intend to advance on Canada (keep growing Vinland in the New World) alongside my British allies. Also put my Indian deathstack into action against the Marathas (who drove everybody but their French allies out, it's a Mughal-Swedish superpower against a Maratha-French superpower). The problem is that they and the Spanish can always just try to hit back at me from any one of a number of directions.
I really wish this game had a vassal mechanic or even just allowed the straight up release of provinces I don't want.
If I could settle accounts with France right now (and still have my trade theaters) I would have already achieved my goal.
I also bought Fading Afternoon, a 2D cheapo Yakuza game. One of those things where the shtick is basically that they simplified an established game genre down into pixelshit that can run on anything. It's gimmick is that it tries really hard to be cool. You can smoke cigarettes and sit and take your jacket off and comb your hair and wear sunglasses and just generally fuck around with your environment while funky jazz music plays to emphasize that you're a COOL BADASS like those cool badasses in the MOVIES. Well obviously I like that, I eat that shit up, I loved it in RDR2. I spent half my time eating beans out of cans and smoking cigars in RDR2 (and it was a great aggravation to me that Arthur puffs once and throws it away, I'd rather it be something you choose to put out).
Problem is that this thing is jank as hell. I don't know if its the controller or what, but the character has a mind of his own. Also doesn't explain shit about what you're supposed to do. It's artsy-fartsy. But worth playing more of to see where it goes.
I'm also getting back into my "militaria" games, War Thunder, World of Warships, that stuff.
War Thunder is aggravating because I'm attracted like a moth to "realistic," but then realistic isn't really that fun. I can get a kick out of flying joystick (but have no idea what I'm doing) if I listen to music, it's what makes the climb worth putting up with. Arcade feels like a crapshoot, although I am getting more of a feel for it. With tanks, Realistic is an exercise in frustration with getting one-hit-popped the moment I stick my head out while my shells just bounce off no matter what I shoot at.
World of Warships, I finally grinded my way to the submarine. As one of those exploitative (same as War Thunder and Enlisted) free-to-play grinding games, you have to just pick a nation and stick with it, so I had to pick and stick with America. So now I have the fully compliment: mid-tier battleship, cruiser, destroyer, carrier and submarine, all of which I suck at and get killed very quickly in. The one thing that I've been slowly getting drilled into my head that you just don't play aggressively, ever. Charging in just isn't going to work, you're going to get popped. All you can do is skirt around and watch the situation develop and try to be helpful in spurts. Very different from the AI it trains you on in low tiers.
Submarines, this is even more extreme. Carriers and subs are really hard to play but are really fun to TRY to play.
