Oh don't worry, I'm definitely reporting this one.
First, the setup...Dtay and Plako have been blockading the merry hell out of us, dropping us indeed into strike lately. Plako has been cautious, conservative almost to a fault...he took Proven Guilty up north early, and ran over the two little island cities northeast, but then stalled himself and carefully began building up to take out The Peninsula. Dtay's been a little more bold, coming directly in the core and snipe/razing a few fillers on the coasts, but he's at least been forced to move with just a single slow doomstack, and he's been spending all his incoming on Kremlin-rushing reserve forces to garrison his conquests heavily. I've been pulling back and consolidating, which had the added benefit of making the most important two cities up north (Ghost Story, the heroic epic/SoZ city and Changes, economy lynchpin) safe from Plako as well. But Plako stole Industialism from someone recently, so tanks have begun appearing, and he's rolling down the Peninsula at last. So we're not much longer for the world.
All that said, the strike economic position means we're in a use-it-or-lose-it bind with regards to the army...and this last turn, Dtay presented an opportunity. His Doom Stack, fat and happy, just waddled up to Fool Moon. Make no mistake, there is absolutely no way, even burning
all these catapults, we could crack this machine-gun and cannon heavy stack. But Fool Moon is in the middle of the mainland...
Seriously holy crap these stack sizes you guys.
Bigfoot In Love, the tiny little near-filler that nevertheless made it to fourth-ring borders and sits on the under-shipped eastern coast, was thus left open. It had a mighty garrison; plenty of machine guns, a few stiff artillery, and several dozen infantry. But nothing so mighty that our elite cannons and rifles and cavalry couldn't crack. So in we go.
Amazingly, almost half the cannon withdraw. Almost none of the cats do, but promoted CR2 the cats can still chip away at already mauled infantry.
The flower of Netherland went in to the holocaust. Many died, but more lived and killed and killed and killed, until the main problem remaining was clean-up; the Fool Moon-based primary army and the Ghost Story-based cavalry army didn't have enough remaining hitters to kill the redlined holdouts. Changes, with a vast but ancient garrison, lent its strength to the endeavor then. Spears and a chariot, even one archer, killed remaining units within Bigfoot. Finally, one of the few precious garrison rifles remaining did the killing blow, and Bigfoot In Love was ours again; dropping the Doom Stack deep into the culture soup once more.
We did take care of those rifles/workers next door, don't worry.
I shuffled the wounded and the doomed and hit end turn, but on the final review of the map I noticed something else interesting...Plako had stripped the garrison of Proven Guilty for his Peninsula campaign, leaving only a handful of machine guns atop rifles and the airships. Ghost Story's garrison was a ton of muskets with a thin cream of rifles and surprisingly many axes and maces, plus a bare handful of cannon. In went the
CR3 Combat 1 cannon, and the machine guns were down to half health. Then, it was almost comical...absurdly well-promoted C3/Pinch/CG1
muskets crashed into yellow-lined
infantry...and prevailed. Maces, axes, and a single silly pike all got in on the action eventually against the rifle fillers.
What we really needed? Another three dozen swords, would have butchered them.
I spent a precious great artist to secure this city, I'd like to get another couple turns of utility from that thank to very much! And so another city was retaken, good for a couple drafts and yet another slowing/dispersion of the ratcheting jaws of death.
Recaptured iron gets a few more cannon for us briefly as well, plus that's now two ports free to trade with the outside world.
Ultimately, it will all be for naught; we're doomed here with our thin and damaged rifle regiments facing the fury of the modern era. But for a moment, we did recoup a bit of territory, and slowed death by another couple turns. Now it'll be a swift collapse inward, with Ghost Story and Changes the last of the mainland cities to fall; may Dtay and Plako fight tensely over those two great prizes. The islands may hold out a little longer, but none of them are fortress-rocks, single-tile hills in the sea. Orderly ranks of yellow or indigo artillery, infantry, and tanks will land beside each city and crush them without breaking a sweat, it is only logistics and politics...who gets the lion's share will be a dicey question settled by bullets, perhaps. But damned if I didn't enjoy making this costly.
There is, in fact, about two centuries' worth of ruin in this country.
Valhalla awaits, but the outgunned and out-teched red ranks of Dutch soldiery will be proceded by a whole host of dead.
And never doubt it. Tokugawa will live on in the nightmares of those who sought to profit from his downfall.
