Terra Australis LP

[warluster]

G'day!

This'll be the home thread for my new Let's Play series for the Paradox Interactive game Crusader Kings 2: Rajas of India. Within the episodic nature of this series, I'll be moving through the highs and lows of medieval Indian politics; war, diplomacy, and all that lovely soap opera stuff which Paradox just nails so inexplicably well. Can we really describe it?

So far I've got two episodes on the road. The first one, released on the 6th April, is my introduction to my new channel Terra Australis, as well as the very game itself. For newbies of the game or veterans of Paradox, I've attempted to go over the basics as well as detailing some cool new stuff Paradox has added this time around. (Elephants! India! Yes!).

If you can forgive my Aussie twang and actually watch it then leave a comment here or there, I'll be updating both as regularly as possible. Oh, two other things! One cool thing, I'll be adding an actual AAR here later in the week for those who like to read instead of watching (Curses!). And secondly, when I need my deserved daily break from the rigours of CK I'll be recording other little 'casual gaming sessions' with the likes of Red Orchestra 2/Rising Storm and Arma 3... though casual might not be the best word. Brief play sessions, maybe?

Either way, come hither or thither, but have a bloody good day, and cheers for reading or watching!

LINKY

[warluster]

G'day all, back again.

Just letting you all know about the small bite-sized casual sessions I released for Red Orchestra 2. The latest goes for only 15 minutes and covers a really good match for Spartanovka, so I'd encourage you to check it out if you want a review on what the channel is like. Episode 3 of CK2 will be going up this afternoon.

Linko ahoy
Cheers!

[warluster]

Chapter I
Episode 1 Episode 2 Episode 3

After much deliberation over as to the style of this after action report, it was settled upon for a player gameplay perspective. While role playing and historical AARs are very enjoyable, and sometimes superior in entertainment, the lack of range and knowledge on my part of Indian early medieval history somewhat limits me from making informative chapters about Rajs and Bengalese and all that. So, well, we're going to walk through this adventure on the same page.

This adventure? Well, this is Terra Australis's playthrough of the new Rajas of India expansion. You'll find the actual episodes linked above, below the chapter title, should you rather the audio/video versions.

But to action!

We launched into the well worn suit of Crusader Kings 2 with ease. Here was that wonderful loading screen (The memories of being so suprised several years ago at Paradox's new evolution are still lingering in my heart), but now, now, as we traversed the usual stomping grounds of Europe and the Middle East, was a small little elephant icon finding its place amongst this 'hall of fame' of DLC icons. Rajas of India. It was exciting. Tears were shed.

I now had to decide where to plant the flag. Where would we, viewers, readers and myself, spend the next few weeks navigating through the excitement of this medieval simulator? I did flitter over Europe. The Hansa may have been considered. But, while I will definitely head their next, in the end we might as well go into the new Indian sub-continent. Now, more problems appeared. It seemed that India, in 867 (Yes, I decided to choose 867 for its novelty), was split into three regions and religions. We have the Maharajas of Pratihara, which was Hindu but mostly nominally Jain, the Ras (A long name my North Aussie accent can not for the life of me pronounce) who are actually Jain, and the Bengals who are Buddhist. All of them are split evenly, it seems, amongst India, with smaller states hanging like barnacles off them.

While the Buddhists and Jain unique, Hindu seemed the most reasonable for their expansion minded attitude. Hand in hand with this, I also desired a duchy/Raj, as they're called in India, to meet my ambitious needs. A county was just too small for now. So that left a handful. Saying this, I also wanted something which wasn't to powerful to make it boring, so a small duchy was needed. And, hence, we arrive at Jangladesh - Bangladesh's poor cousin.

So we jumped in as the Raj of Jangladesh. Bye bye Europe, I cried. I'm into the unknown now.

And was I ever. Soon I was pronouncing Thakura rudely. I was insulting the caste/cast system of India (Scholars above Kings!?) and bumbling around a Islamic/Hindu divide which my little duchy sat right on. Yes, that's right. You see Jangaldesh is up north. I'm not sure how it fits into modern India, but I believe its more to Delhi than Mumbai. Either way, the rapid Islamic offensives eastwards following its inception had obviously recently reached the North Indian border, and tension was rife. That would be a problem.

Another problem? The kingdom of Pratihara was unstable. The king, while officially 'the Great', wasn't so great at keeping peace. We'll see more of that soon.

As for the actual Raj/duchy, we were doing pretty good. Chandraraja, my duke/Raj, was sole count of all three counties/thikiras in my duchy/raj. Seeing that he had abysmal traits, and were over the demense limit, a cleaning up of the Raj was attended to first up. We sectioned off the southern county of Vikrampura to Chand's one and only son/heir, while instituting a number of upgrades within the capital and northern county to speed up some superiority over our friendly neighbours. For the kingdom was autonomous, and very much decentralized. It was obvious quickly that the power was in the hands of the Rajs rather than the Maharaja. We were also surrounded by Rajs of equal strength, so future conquest dictated we expand internally first.

Now to that dastardly decentralization. First, it hit north of us, a Nepal-leaning kingdom found itself harshly plunged into civil war when the Islamic south split off and fought viciously for their own rights. While we eyed these rogue provinces hungrily, the factions within the kingdom were stirring up trouble. The Maharaja himself was conquest bent, and so he immediatly set off, in his old age, to war with both our Indian neighbours of Ras and Bengal. Which was disastrous. The kingdom's army was whittled down by the dual, seperate wars from 3500 to 1000 in vicious southern fighting with the Jains.

Yes, the Jains. Did I mention Pratihara was mostly Jain, but officially Hindu? So, with that, several smaller duchies over on the eastern border asked, and received, freedom from our warmongering leader - without war. This inspired two sudden changes. While Chand and the Jangladeshi countries merrily kept to their internal improvement, the northern Rajs were plotting civil war. Knowing this, it seemed the king had started to favour Chand immensely. Within two years, from 872 - 874, we were granted the position of Steward and then Court Musician - both greatly prestigious titles.

With this splitting of factional loyalty, the northern Rajs now asked for freedom. This time, it was denied. The king angrily denied it and summoned up the Imperial army from the Ras in southern India. 1000 men marched north with haste, while nearly 3000 enemy soliders descended upon our own kinsman up Delhi way. The Ganges was aflame as they attempted to bottleneck down the river, while the king took out the Nepal provinces to the east.

I should mention were waiting patiently, still building during this, plotting to seize our neighbours territory in the meantime, once the civil war was over and we could boast of boosted numbers. Alas, no. The northern duchies lost their leader, and peace was signed concurrently. Due to this quick change of diplomacy, and some snarky plotting on our own part, the provinces to our east and north united under one Raj. This powerful man could soon boast to have over 30% of the kingdom's power in his hands. Nominally, he was the king. He certainly had more power.

So, with this in mind, we turned southwards. Two smaller Rajs existed there who were mostly equal to our strength. This was where we would expand. By claiming these provinces we would be able to equal the massive Raj in central India, and gain more influence under a king who favoured us greatly. Who knows from there where we would head? Either way, great effort was now poured into pumping up our 600 strong military so we could win against these adversaries.

Such was the end of the final episode. To see what happens next, keep watching over at Terra Australis for more videos during the week. Watch the older videos for a better look at the rise of Jangladesh, as well! Hope to see you all there soon.