And done!!
Look at this beautiful Europe
My main objective started being only having russian cultured provinces, but after a few wars with Poland I decided some strategic a nice borders were more important. After that had been achieved I have been working on making an aesthetically nice looking europe.
and religion
The true faith have been spread far and wide into europe. as far as I know only Scandinavia and Switzerland are protestant and Luxemborg is the only reformed nation left.
My nation and vassals
After Europe I have been working on making more of my bordering nations my vassals, Georgia, Oirat horde and Khorasan are newest additions. If the game had been longer I would have made most of the middle-east my vassals as well as making an Ottoman vassal out of Anatolia.
And a world map
Castille is huge and France are somewhat scary. Korea are my ally, though it looks like the french blue. In Venezuela you have Flanders, who have been completely thrown out of Europe. in mexico you have Mexico, a revolter from Portugal and very nice looking, in central americao you have UPCA. And although they are the same colours the middle east is divided between Syria, Persia(Iraq/Iran border) and the Mameluks in Egypt.
What I learned from this game: creating vassals are a bit tricky since they have to be the same culture as yourself. Creating the Netherlands was difficult and took a lot of infamy to do. First I took some provinces from Utrecht, then I had to wait for my truce with Utrecht to end so I could declare again, making them release the Netherlands, then I had to declare war on the Netherlands and take all their provinces to make them small enough to vassalize in the next war
Making your vassals have the same religion as yourself is somewhat important, since they can end up being defender of the faith which means you can end up in a war with you vassal(note it doesnt end the vassalstatus and after the war they are still your vassal you only have to re-ally with them)
Royal marriages with vassals depends on what you want from them: I had no intention of expanding my territory any more so I made no royal marriages with any of them since I could end up inheriting them. Ofcoarse I could release them again, but you are not in complete control over what provinces they might get and that could screw up my pretty borders, or make me lose provinces I would want to lose. In this case Poland still have cores on some of those provinces I have next to them and releasing them would grant them those provinces.
And ofcoarse the game thought I should see a comet two months before the game ended
All in all I'm very proud of seeing this game to the end, and making nice and useful vassals is a good way to introduce a goal in the 1600-1700s where most games seem to be wrapped up.
Speaking of which, I've discovered a simple map program which creates interesting maps based on EU III save-files.
