The Mongols apparently don't get a stability malus for razing cities. Which means, it is possible to raze every single non-Mongolian city (eventually), leaving Mongolia as the single survivor nation. Civilizations usually don't respawn if their core area is unsettled!
I was eager to win such an ultimate victory as early as possible, especially because the Mongolian main weapon the Keshiks eventually become useless. So, after I dealt with China and the Iran, I raced to the west again and went against the colonizing powers. The strength of my (slowly becoming more and more trained) Keshik hordes were essential in this undertaking.
For example, in 1550 I had just destroyed Italy and France (Rome, Aachen and Paris went to HRE), and Sweden had collapsed on their own. At that point in history, a detachment of Mongolian Keshiks was razing all formerly Swedish cities, a large infantry army was trying to vassalize Persia (unsuccessfully, I had "grown too powerful for them"), and the European main horde was attacking the second-largest civilization, the Moorish Empire and their Spanish and Malinese vassals. I vanquished Spain/razed Cordoba in 1565, then took Lisboa for myself, retraced to Egypt and soon attacked the North African side of the Moor Empire, while my infantry army was already amassed near the Mughal territories.
This is my loyal vassal, the Khanate of Holy Rome.
Even as my other loyal vassals collapsed, namely Poland (all their cities got brutally razed) and China (I retook them, they were pretty profitable), my hordes were drudging along the strongly fortified Moorish coast (they didn't get their high score in my game for nothing), my eastern hordes swept quickly through the Mughal territory. I had spared these buddhists quite long because I would have to take their two huge holy cities as well. But when I teched into the modern era, I was prepared enough to include them. Five other Mughal towns were mercilessly destroyed, ancient wonders or not. Then, the Mughals collapsed mid-turn in 1605, and India and the Tamils reappeared, with one/two cities respectively. Grumble, I couldn't even pawn off Patal and Delhi to the Indians. Well, not by liberation anyway. Instead I just gifted them these money-sinks.
I finished off with Morokko, with Tibet, with the Malinese, with the independent cities of Indonesia, finally with Amsterdam. I also pillaged as much of the countryside as possible, restoring the pristine nature of the land and removing traces of my ruinous warfare. Hey, an army of 56 Keshiks needs to do something! In the same time, I built a fleet of Galleons, to settle Argentina first. There I would find cows and horses in abundance. Muhahahaha.
Of course, my Galleons first had a more noble goal: Invading and razing Japan. England (Great Britain and Andes) was still too far away. For practice, my first Galleons ferried Keshiks to independent Indonesia and burnt everything. Then, I destroyed Japan within three moves from 1655 to 1670. First: Landing between Edo and Tokio from the East with 12 Keshiks and 3 support troops. Second: Move the invasion force one NW to hills, then attack and raze Edo. Third: Move, attack, raze Tokyo. Keshiks are grrrrreat. Naturally, the mopping up process afterwars took two times that long, but I left a cleansed Japan. Win!
During the British-Maratha War (1685), I started my attempt on the Bahmani Sultanate (Tamils) and attacked Portugal in Brazil, while also naval-assaulting their capital Delgada and the Azores with my General Keshiks. Portugal folded after two turns; the Tamils had Ceylon and my fleet was not there just in time for a super quick finish. But of course, they were destroyed. As was India when the British conquered their capital and renamed it to Bombay.
I cleansed as much of Southern India as I could and moved to Persia for the third time. This time there was no pardon. I also prepared my moves on the rest of the colonial empires, namely Britain and the Dutch overseas (Caribbean, New Zealand, Kap Hoorn). For that, I founded two "Ameri Khan" colonies in Argentina, and ferried some Keshik-laden Galleons there. Then, the long-awaited respawn of France happened, and they arrived together with Italy, shrinking my Holy Austrian vassal (good for him: He went from collapsing to stable
.
Mongolian steamer ships ferrying Keshiks back to Liboa Freehaven after the conquest of South America...
France declared war because they wanted my (K)Hanoi as a colony, but they sure were disappointed because my horde from former Iran arrived just in time. The Dutch colonies, meanwhile, collapsed just because I threatened them with Keshiks. Not wanting a respawned Netherlands, I did my best to raze everything quickly. Also, I had done my best to assemble half of my former horse archers in the Argentine colony, now promoted to Cavalry: The war against the English was the first one where I wouldn't solely rely on Keshiks anymore. Still, my invasion force that rolled up the Anden regions was made up of 6 Cavalry, 1 Cannon and 10 Keshiks: The Cavalry (advanced on the cities first with Disengage II) would weaken the defenses, then the well-trained Keshiks (30-50 EXP, the usual promotions: 3 Stars, March, Pinch) would do the rest. My task force for British-India was mainly Keshiks and a few Cannons and Muskets, the latter were nothing but dead weight in the rear.
My mediterranean fleet (ahem, well, two Galleons) was tasked with reinforcing Spain with a horde. Until now, I had relied too much on the land route controlled by HRE. They barely threw back a French assault before I could retaliate and raze Bern. In the Anden theater, my hordes took Uxmal (panama canal!) and I chose to hold onto that place until the Anden region was cleansed. It would be settled by Colombia, anyway. That hub was also good to organize my horde and galleons - some would take the Dutch/French caribbean islands, others would mop up the barbarian/native/independent Mexico, again others would be ferried home to Lisboa and take part in the French/British theater. While the French and Italians were pushovers, the advanced British Empire was another matter. We had some fierce Ironclad-battles in the 1740ies, for example. But after my invasion of the British Isles, they were suddenly thrown back onto their colonies in North America. The year was 1766...
Back at home in Asia and Africa, I had erected a socialist regime (Democracy, Constitution, Egalitarianism, Central Planning, Tolerance, Isolationsm) as well as the Liberty Statue. My laborers were laboring on the Trans-Asian Railway (Lisboa to Seoul; Moskow to Sambia), but that still took more time and was only partly finished around 1800 even though I churned out labourers in the unreliable Chinese cities.
The most powerful nations of 1790 AD:
Kongo is #6.
I conquered New York from the British just in time to be able to refuse a flip, and immediately enter war with the US. That way, I could prevent their expansion into the West, where Washington settles cities with tiny garrisons that any horde can destroy with a strong breath. Turns out that fights between Minutemen and Keshiks are pretty one-sided, but at least the many partisans provided some target exercises. When the liberation war was over, I razed the US east coast completely and evacuated my Keshiks towards Mexico and Columbia which had spawned in the meantime.
On another note, the Turkish Krim State had collapsed and turned out to have been Russian all along. That means, all former Turkish cities flipped to Russia on collapse. My problem was that Saratov and Donezk couldn't be properly razed, so I needed to attempt to espionage-culture-flip and then disband these cities. This strategy
never succeeded, even with 96% cultural dominance exerted from Mongolian Moscow. The Russians wouldn't flip. Though I had them revolt a few times. In a new run, I would be more careful when conquering Russia for the first time.
In 1841, I declared war on Mexiko (won 1844) and Kongo (won 1850), and attacked Colombia (won in 1847). In the year 1900, I invaded and defeated Prussia in one turn, gave all their land to Austria. Austria was my only remaining vassal, and now it was unstable. So I stirred up unrest there and finally got rid of them. Francis' collapse caused Germany to respawn in 1902. Figures. So I razed Germany again which prompted an Austrian respawn... Figures. There were also a Korean, a British and another Chinese respawn, to which I always responded with razing all their cities. On the final turn, I got rid of Austria, then Russia.
