The Wagadou had expanded southwards a bit, establishing a longer border with the nascent Kwa Confederation, causing a bit of a panic.
(-1 Wagadou thousand)
Tribal warfare had engulfed the Berber lands. The Egyptians used this opportunity to expand at first, but later some other issues came up (see below)...
(-2 Egyptian thousands)
The Nubian efforts to reclaim the desert lands from various Saharan tribes saw little gain, though admittedly for not all that much loss.
(-1 Nubian thousand, -2 Nubian levy thousands)
The Nsigeyan "Kongo march" came to an end as the Nsigeyan army met the Dukunnugeyan one somewhere in the central portion of the river. Before that historic moment, the Nsigeyans had - sometimes sublty and benevolently, sometimes brutally - conquered hundreds of local tribes and several protostates as well. The resistance was heavy, but the Nsigeyans had ofcourse triumphed in the end and now look for more lands to conquer. At the same time, the Dukunnugeyans, who had conquered a few other Kongo states and tribes in the east, were now enabled to exercise an even greater degree of control and influence over Nsigeya, to the concern of a few more "nationalistic" courtiers.
(-6 Nsigeyan thousands, -1 Dukunnugeyan thousand)
The southwestern Bantu tribes gave stalwart resistance to the Nortuguese (who had decided to grab some land near Khoisania), inflicting serious casualties. The Nortuguese had triumphed in the end, but the Bantus did not cease their hit-and-run attacks.
(-5 Nortuguese thousands)
As Phoenicia reached out further and further, and grew richer and richer, it had become pretty much inevitable that many nearby powers would grow... envious. Already, Phoenicia competed commercially and colonially with Dukunnugeya, and to a lesser extent with Nortugal; and at the same time, its intervention in Egypt briefly made a war with Parhae a distinct, if not very likely, possibility. Yet the greatest threat to Phoenicea came from its one-time allies and trade partners. Dacoillyria and Luca were trying to secure their economic hegemony in the Bimarine. And the Phoeniceans, with their trade network and their generally strong economy, stood in the path. Plus, they were all too similar to the hated Carthaginians, only more subtle. They quite clearly maintained ties with many Punic elements, including those in North Africa. And was their intervention in Egypt not essentially a move to grab the Sile Canal? Now that they controlled one way out of the Bimarine, logic demanded that they try and take over the Pillars of Hercules as well, as to secure their routes leading to the extensive colonial empire in the New World. So when the latest Punic conspiracy in North Africa was thwarted and interrogations had revealed that the Phoenicians were funding it, the Lucans and the Dacoillyrians immediately believed it. After finding some more evidence, they presented it to the Phoenicians and declared war. The Phoenicians have been waiting for this for centuries now, and immediately acted to thwart the invasion. The first battle was a naval one, near Tyre. The Lucan invasion fleet was reinforced by the Dacoillyrians, while the Phoenicians had sent away some of their navy on various colonial assigments; thus, the invaders had gained a definite numeric superiority. The Dacoillyrian Juggernauts attacked the Phoenicians head-on, while the smaller vessels either backed up their attack, either attacked the flanks of the Phoenicians. However, they did their best to maneuver out of this would-be encirclement, making good use of their superior mobility, and then soon counterattacked, deploying the Byblos Fire against the numerically-superior enemy. Heavy casualties were inflicted upon the attackers, yet the Phoenicians vacillated at this point, trying to assess the situation and decide to either re-engage or retreat. The decision was made for them; the invaders counterattacked, and in the naval melee that ensued the use of Byblos Fire would have been as dangerous for the users as for their enemies. Still, the Phoenicians used it, as their situation grew desperate. Ultimately most of the main Phoenician fleet was destroyed, with only a few ships fleeing beyond the Sile Canal or to the harbours of Phoenicia Proper. However, the invaders had paid a terrible price in ships and men, and also lost the surprise effect. The Lucan army that soon invaded from Assyria stumbled at Tyre, uncertain as to how they should attack the insular city. The huge army the Lucans had brought in was virtually invincible on the battlefield, but the Phoenicians gave it no battle, and instead harrased it, and attacked its heavily-overstretched supply routes, especially from Tripolis that the Lucans had also failed to capture. Though the Lucans did manage to fully surround the city, the besieged garrison's supply situation remained far superior to that of the siegers, who suffered from plague and famine. The attempted maritime assault was repulsed (the defenders again employed the accursed Byblos Fire), and the causeway the Lucans had tried to build was constantly being sabotaged and due to the consequent security measures progressed very slowly. The Lucans had no choice but to try and take Tripolis first; fortunately, they still held the initiative, so the Siege of Tyre continued just fine. Tripolis was very hard to take, being a proper Phoenicean city and thus by definition one of the greatest fortresses in the world; but it was no Tyre, and eventually, by using a wide variety of siege instruments, the Lucans had cracked it open well enough to take the city and, after slaughtering most of the population, convert it into a supply center. Still, the progress remained painfully slow at Tyre (even though the causeway was finished), and the Lucans had bogged down for good, confounded by the vast scale of Phoenician preparations for this war. Meanwhile, in the south, things had gone noticeably better; the Dacoillyrians had captured Sile and the Canal in a risky assault, and proceeded to take over the rest of Sinai; when Egypt officially declared its intention to honour the alliance with Phoenicia and tried to attack Libya, its army was routed by the smaller Lucan one at Antipyrgus. The Lucans pursued it and in coordination with the Dacoillyrians moved to occupy the Delta. As the Phoenician trade network begun to crumble in the conditions of the naval blockade, it became very clear that despite the Lucan humiliation at Tyre, Phoenicia now risked losing if not its independence, than at least its competitiveness on the global stage. In other words, the country was in crisis (-1 Confidence).
(-10 Dacoillyrian thousands, -17 Dacoillyrian ships, -9 Dacoillyrian Juggernauts, -14 Lucan thousands, -7 Lucan Companion Cavalry thousands, -35 Lucan ships, -11 Phoenician thousands, -2 Phoenician Tyrian Sea Guards, -67 Phoenician ships, -11 Egyptian thousands)
The Onoghurians, the Ugrians and the Tieh had, in a series of well-planned attacks, crushed most of the Turanese insurgent resistance. However, some of it does linger on in the countryside...
(-2 Onoghurian thousands, -4 Tieh thousands, -2 Ugrian thousands)
The Indian War continued, and disaster after disaster struck poor Sindhu...
(see spotlight)
(+40 Dukunnugeyan levy thousands, +1 Dukunnugeyan Navy Quality, +90 Sindhu levy thousands, -2 Sindhu Prestige, +20 Tieh levy thousand, +20 Khmer levy thousands, -1 Sindhu Economy, +1 Khmer banked eco., -1 Sindhu Efficiency)
(-6 Dukunnugeyan thousands, -14 Dukunnugeyan Ekadaahalokumiiyaas, -12 Dukunnugeyan levy thousands, -24 Dukunnugeyan ships, -14 Parhaen thousands, -6 Parhaen Eternal Legions, -12 Parhaen ships, -82 Sindhu thousands, -45 Sindhu levy thousands, -82 Sindhu ships, -19 Sindhu Royal Warships, -15 Tieh thousands, -4 Tieh levy thousands, -12 Khmer thousands, -7 Khmer Imperial Marine thousands, -8 Khmer levy thousands, -15 Khmer ships, -2 Nsigeyan thousands, -2 Lusigeyan thousands)
Random Events:
As the Grandfather grows even older and his control over Tavytera begins to slip, people begin to doubt his ability and authority (-1 Confidence)...
Phoenician harbours are succesfully expanded per local initiative in response to the continued growth of trade (+1 Infrastructure).
Special Bonuses:
Best DoW: Algonquia (+10 thousands).
Most Thorough: Gaul (+1 Confidence).
Best Maps: Dukunnugeya (+1 Education).
Spotlight:
Sindhu Sunset.
"Bad news come in droves."
- Cernorusian proverb.
Already when Parhae and Khmeria declared war upon Aryavarta (later renamed Sindhu), King Anjva I realised what a horrible trap he had fallen into. But things soon got even worse, as Tieh China declared war as well, while all attempts to peacefully extricate Sindhu from the aforementioned horrible trap had failed. Worse still, the campaign in East Africa had stalemated. And the Parhaens redeployed troops from Arabia, now fully subdued. And the Khmers were waiting on the Ganges. And rebels were conspiring in Kalinga... Yet the worst of it all was that the best and the largest parts of the Sindhu military were fighting in Africa and in the southern Indian Ocean, fighting a campaign for which few in Mumbai had much hope left for. And at the same time, their evacuation was also impossible; it would have been very difficult even had the sea been Sindhu-dominated, but as it was the anti-Sindhu Coalition ruled the seas, and did so well, the Khmers having secured all the key islands in the Central Indian Ocean immediately upon jumping into the fray. Basically, the better part of the Sindhu military was trapped and reduced to shaking in powerless rage and lashing out in irrational fury, while in Mumbai, Anjva and his ministers, were in a similar state of mind. The army and the state were cut off from each other, and unable to come to each other's rescue.
As fate and the Coalition landed blow after blow, the Sindhu response grew more and more frantic, panicked and haphazard; coordination also greatly detiriorated, as contact between Mumbai and Africa, to say nothing of the Sindhu southern fleet, was likewise very haphazard. Still, the one thing the Sindhu didn't do, nor intend to do, was surrender - in this case I mean not as much the political sense of the word as the psychological one. Anjva did not resign himself to his fate. He took some measures, and so did all the other Sindhu leaders, even if those measures all too often led to disaster...
Thus disaster after disaster occured in the south. As the casualties to attrition amongst the Sindhu army in Dukunnugeya mounted, the commanders there had had enough and so had the Sindhu admiral Arjun. It was decided to pull out - but just as the Sindhu army was boarding its transports, those parts of it that were still on land came under a massive Dukunnugeyan assault. It was beaten back, but the Sindhu took heavier casualties than their assailants. Still, the fleet had departed, attempting to retreat towards Africa. Initially all had gone seemingly well: even though a Khmero-Dukunnugeyan fleet did pursue the Sindhu, it remained on a considerable distance. This created an illusion of safety that was shattered when it turned out that another Dukunnugeyan fleet was waiting near the Sindhu destination. Arjun was trapped, and it was too late to do anything but to give battle. And battle was given, at Pemba island. The Sindhu fought valorously, and the Royal Warships in particular proved good at inflicting heavy damage upon the Dukunnugeyan fleet. Yet the Khmero-Dukunnugeyans were more numerous; they already boxed in the Sindhu fleet; and even in the sphere of various tactical tricks and innovations, the Coalition mostly led the way. While the fast, maneuverable catamaran ships of Dukunnugeya struck at the Sindhu fleet's flanks and rear, on the front-line it was engaged by the heavy ships of the Khmer Empire, which bombarded it with a wide variety of projectiles. So yes, it was only a matter of time until the main Sindhu fleet was destroyed altogether, along with the survivors of the Dukunnugeyan campaign..
In Africa, things were little better. Although out of the entire Coalition, only Dukunnugeya was to be faced here, the Dukunnugeyans had put their heart into this, rallying hordes of Bantus (both from the various tribes and from the vassals) and inciting major uprisings. As usual, instead of facing the enemy head-on, the Dukunnugeyans commited to a policy of harrasment and raiding, grinding away at the strenght of the Sindhu army in Dukunnugeyan East Africa. As that army tried to round up its gains, its separate parts became subject to sudden Dukunnugeyan attacks. The already-troubled supply routes became the favourite target of the Ekadaahalokumiiyaas, and the Sindhu army's situation became utterly unbearable. But to make things worse, another Hinducushite rebellion erupted, to a large extent thanks to the Dukunnugeyans who had both incited it and assisted it by invading Sindhu East Africa in a large-scale raiding campaign that destabilised the area and allowed such a rebellion to begin amidst the chaos. The Sindhu commanders decided to try and fight their way back north, before that retreat path is completely cut off. This maneuver did succeed, although the Dukunnugeyans had inflicted considerable casualties on the retreaters. On the other hand, once the Sindhu had regroupped, they managed to defeat the rebel army at Deharipura, ensuring that at least the east of the colony remained in Sindhu hands, and skirmished with the Dukunnugeyans near the southern border. Yet what all this meant, in the end, was that the gains of yet another Sindhu campaign had to be abandoned, while the African army had most probably only won itself some more time.
Meanwhile, the Dukunnugeyan fleet had secured several small Sindhu-owned islands, including Zanzibar. Meanwhile, further to the north, off the shores of Soccotra, a Parhaen fleet was engaged by the Sindhu and almost defeated, but the timely arrival of the Khmer reinforcements had turned the tables. This battle confirmed for good the Coalition's grasp on the central Indian Ocean.
And Sindhu's mainland territory too had seen many battles. It wasn't hard to guess that sooner or later it will be attacked, or at least that the periphery would, which was why Anjva ordered a massive levy from all over the realm. Yet these levies were ofcourse not at all sufficient for the difficult task of defending all over the country against a massive assault of its enemies. In Central Asia, a very large Sindhu army was deployed, but not absurdly large - and thus insufficient for the goal of defending it against the incoming enemy hordes. With a combination of diplomacy and coercion, several major local clans and Central Asian tribes were persuaded to revolt behind the defender lines as well. The Sindhu did stop the Parhaen advance in a close-ran battle at Gwadar, but it forced them to concentrate forces too much and thus allowed the Tieh Chinese and their supporters from amongst the local rebels to make impressive gains early on, defeating several weaker Sindhu forces along the way. After another Sindhu army was defeated by the numerically-superior Tieh at Kandahar, the Sindhu were forced to generally pull out of Central Asia towards the Indus, though there they both thwarted a rebellious conspiracy - although this was at least as much an achievement of Anjva himself - and held their ground against another overenthusiastic Parhaen attack, forcing the Sino-Parhaen forces in the west to concentrate on consolidating gains for now. Yet while the Sindhu had more or less held on the Indus, on the Ganges and indeed in the east the story was different. As Kalingans and Bodians rebelled, the Khmers launched a series of distractive destructive raids, though sometimes this resulted in misunderstandings and friction with the rebels (due to some of the destruction taking place in Kalingan parts), and then a main offensive as well. The latter started very impressively, at night, at the same time as a series of terrifying explosions, just a few days after a series of assassinations of important Sindhu officers and officials; the Khmers, though somewhat outnumbered by the defenders, quickly broke them at Jessore before they could properly prepare and advanced into Kalinga to support the local rebels. A Magadhan levied army also attacked the Khmers, but was likewise quickly defeated, and the Khmers, with their rebel allies, were able to advance all the way into the Gangetic Plain. And lastly, the Tieh Chinese forces and the Bod rebels had succesfully expelled the Sindhu defenders from the Himalayas, taking advantage of their low morale and poor supply situation to encourage their withdrawl without any major battles. This meant that the last periphery had fallen, and now Anjva had to fight in India or not fight at all...
All this did have some sort of an unexpected positive sideeffect on the Sindhu, as it rallied the country together, now that pretty much everybody that wanted to rebel had either rebeled (as in Kalinga), either decided not to take the risk and to seek a compromise with Mumbai (as in the Indus). Those who had remained on Anjva's side of the barricades were naturally hated by those who didn't, and vice versa, so if the war is to go on, at least Sindhu still has an extensive and more-or-less reliable social support base. Yet even here, not all was swell; though the various regional leaders and the central government had largely found a common language, the peasants, not always happy about being levied, were harder to control. Several peasant uprisings had occured, though mostly coming from such minorities as the Aryans.
Regardless, this indeed may well be the end of Sindhu. It seemed impossible but a few years ago... but then again, the old hegemons of the world seem to be dying out. Carthage and Olmecia are dead, and if Sindhu follows them, only Khmeria will remain, though now joined by a new generation of world powers such as Nortugal, Dacoillyria, Dukunnugeya, Tieh China and Nihon... Yes, the world has certainly changed. And it will continue changing. And in the meantime, Sindhu was drowning, but not yet drowned.
NPC Diplo:
From: Nadruvia
To: Wenedia
We propose that our alliance is made formal.
OOC:
Dis, your colour is comparatively fine, really. It is the Huanc/Phoenicians that are too similar. And I agree with tossi in that the Phoenicean colour is just right for them. Huancac will have to change... What colour do you want, BirdJaguar?
Btw, I hate blackouts as one can only hate something that destroys hours worth of work. Yes, by the way, that's my excuse-of-the-turn explaining the lateness of this update. Also of the poor state of the spotlight... I had to redo it late, and it shows. Same for the map, really. So, basically, sorry about all and any mistakes.
Sorry, Sheep, the guidelines were too late. I quite empathise with you here, btw. Nothing is more annoying than suffering in, say, NESing for suffering in real life.
they aren't much cause im not at my house and i am on a mac i dont even know how to copy and paste on this thing. 
