Hello reality,
I played EU4 for this post and realized that when I play games about past history, I forget reality. Yes, there is a known date, but we have the situation to change and develop it in the virtual environment. I want to talk about EU4. While playing the game, we need to have a holistic view of the world. I mean, for example, let’s say you declared war somewhere and lost. You can’t just say you lost. For example, losing that war will have a bad effect on your economy. In addition, it affects your diplomacy badly. Maybe even disrupt your trade flow. In the game, we become the king of the country we choose. And all the burdens of administration are on our shoulders. For this reason, I think that the most important factor affecting the state of the country is the choice of rival, enemy, and align. In addition to this situation, advisor selection is also very important. Before starting the game, we need to decide what we want to do, have historical knowledge and then create a strategy.
I wanted to be the Byzantine king (queen:”)) in this game adventure. In my research, I learned that the Byzantine state was formed as a result of the division of the Roman Empire into two. For this reason, the people refer to the empire that we call Byzantium as Rome. They even introduce themselves as Romans. The reason I play as Byzantium is that Byzantium has a very small piece of land in the game because the Ottoman is very strong and has already defeated the Byzantines. This made me sad. Because at the time Byzantium was a very powerful state economically, culturally, and militarily. According to my research, it was a country that dominated for about a thousand years until it was defeated by the Ottoman state in 1453. When we look at history, Byzantium dominated the eastern Mediterranean side in the form of a half-moon. The fact that it surrounds the Mediterranean means that this country must be good at naval power. It is written in history that Byzantium was superior in naval forces until the 11th century, but in the following years, Venetian and Genoese took this dominance. Byzantium ruled to protect the lands remaining from Rome. It did not seek to acquire new lands and expand. Some historians say that the life of the Byzantine state in its own realm facilitated the destruction of Byzantium. And finally, the Ottoman state, which took advantage of this situation in Byzantium, ended its domination of Byzantium.
Now let’s come to my struggle against the ottoman in EU4. I started playing on November 11, 1444. The Ottoman state was very strong economically and militarily. Byzantium, on the other hand, had small lands and I can say that it was impossible to see the map without zooming in. Because when I wanted to start the game as Byzantium, I looked for Byzantium on the map a lot. In accordance with the operation of the game, I first determined the estates. Then I chose Rival. I chose Epirus, Genoa, and Tunis. Since this is a strategy game, I had to create a route for myself first. And for this, I did research about the game. During my research, I learned a tactic of the game. If I do not destroy the castle in Morea as Byzantium, the Ottoman artificial intelligence was constantly attacking the castle in Morea. Because I didn’t want that to happen, I destroyed the castle at Morea. I wanted to align with Albania because I thought Albania would help me in this war. Then I attacked Epirus, which I chose as my rival because its lands were between Ottoman and Byzantine territory. Since my aim was to wage war against the Ottomans, I had to take Epirus, which served as a bridge first. As soon as Epirus fell, I made a peace treaty because I didn’t want all of their fleets to be destroyed. Because I wanted to use these navies later. It was an easy war, and I took the land of Epirus. When we look at the history, I said that Byzantium was strong in the navy. Because their lands on the Balkan side were on the Mediterranean coast. Currently, these lands belong to the ottoman in-game, and it would be advantageous for me to have the navy so that I can get these lands back. That’s why I created Ships. My priority was to send ships to the shores of Istanbul and Gallipoli. Because the Ottoman had the right side of the Mediterranean, which is the current border of Türkiye. In addition, he had landed on the left side of the Mediterranean, namely the Balkans. Sending my ships to the shores of Gallipoli and Istanbul would prevent the Ottomans from sending support to the Balkans from the right.
In the meantime, if there were countries that I was aligned with from the Anatolian principalities, the Ottomans could declare war on them. Because the Ottomans would not want the countries that I was aligned with to send soldiers to support me. And to prevent this, he could attack those countries. This situation would be good for me because I would have opened a new business for the Ottomans. They could be distracted and unable to concentrate fully on me. In the game, the Ottomans attacked the Dulkadiroğulları and this caused a smile on my face. I called Albania that I was aligned directly to war and started a war. The reason why I chose Albania was that it was headed by İskender Bey. In the game, the general of Albania was very good and therefore it would be easy for me to beat the ottoman. I sent 20k soldiers to Istanbul. And after the long war, I won the war at Gallipoli. Then gradually I started to attack the other Ottoman lands on the other Mediterranean coast and took all the lands. Of course, I was not successful in my first attempt, and as a result of many attempts, I created a very beautiful Byzantine.
Then I sent a spy to Wallachia. Because it was a state located around the Ottoman lands remaining in the Balkans, and if I took it, it would be easier for me to attack the remaining lands of the Ottoman Empire. I aim to send the Bulgarian rebels, who are in the Mediterranean lands I dominate, to the Ottoman lands. In this way, those rebels would occupy the Ottoman lands and it would be easier for me to take the Ottoman lands. My biggest goal at the moment was to take the remaining Ottoman lands in the Balkans. In order to do this, I had to attack many places in the surrounding area as well. A war-filled game adventure would be very difficult for me, but the fact that I had such a superiority against the Ottomans gave me the confidence that I could continue this situation. But the Ottoman state was still very strong. I think it’s a bit exaggerated that the Ottoman state is so strong in this game. It was a very powerful state when I played Ming. I shook all the authority of the Ming state, but when I tried to play the ottoman, I could not collapse the ottoman. I started attacking Wallachia. While the attack was going on, I came across a place that indicates the spread of the Renaissance. I was quite surprised when I first saw it, but because it was a good situation, I increased the spread of the Renaissance. I know I will learn something new every time I play this game. Because the interface is a very complex game for me. Most of the time I played without knowing why I was doing what I was doing. I learned from the situations that occurred after I did it. Once, I mistakenly chose a country that I had to keep on good terms with, a Rival. After this incident, I learned that choosing a rival is a very important situation that requires a lot of attention. And I can’t forget. After taking the Wallachian lands, I started attacking Bosnia. At this time, the situation that caught my attention was that there were castles all over my country. I don’t know how I did it, but there were castles everywhere. While the war was going on in Bosnia, a strange notification came. And if I’m not mistaken, the ottoman wanted to attack me. I panicked for a moment because I had sent my soldiers to Bosnia except for the navy. If I wanted to withdraw from Bosnia, I would have lost soldiers there. Because if I wanted to shoot them all at once, Bosnia could quickly head toward my land. When I tried to pull out slowly, my soldiers were constantly decreasing and killing my Bosnian soldiers. While trying to catch up with the war of the Ottomans, my land was already entrusted to Allah. All my strategies exploded and I had to close the game:”). After expanding the Byzantine territory, the save file was standing. I started again from this file I saved. Now I understood that I should not attack left and right, ignoring the ottoman. For this reason, I tried to send the rebels directly to the Ottoman lands, but I could not succeed. I had to come up with a new plan. While attacking Wallachia, I thought of not sending all my soldiers and leaving some of them where I thought the Ottomans would attack. Now I wasn’t sure if I could beat Wallachia. Albania was still my ally and I thought of attacking Wallachia together with Albania. Albania agreed and attacked. I think I had to give some land to Albania after the war, so my relationship with Albania should never have been broken. Because it would have been a country with lands inside my lands. And I don’t even want to think about what will happen when we break up. Then we attacked Bosnia again. It progressed and ended nicely in my war with Bosnia. The Ottomans did not attack this time. I thought maybe my going to war with Albania might have scared them. In addition, I already had soldiers on my land. This may be a reason for them not to attack. Now it was Serbia’s turn. But I noticed that the Ottomans were gathering their soldiers. I sent my soldiers directly to Niğbolu. I thought they’d stop fighting that way. And I stopped the game. I think I’m progressing very nicely, and I didn’t want everything to be ruined again.
Finally, I would like to tell you my general game views and my experiences. The biggest advantage of the game was that it allowed me to learn the characteristics of the countries I was the king of. In general, we learn theoretical knowledge in lessons, and I think its application is one of the factors that makes that lesson permanent. The game was the application of this theoretical knowledge for me. For example, when I played as a Castile, I did research in addition to what I learned in the lessons, and I still remember its relationship with Aragon. Likewise, when I played for HRE, I learned how inter-country marriage strengthens relations. In this game, which I played as Byzantium, I learned how important it is to form allies. If I hadn’t researched Byzantine history in the first place, I probably wouldn’t have thought of fighting over the navy. Thanks to the game, I learned information about lived history. Then, based on this information, I determined a strategy and tried to implement it. Apart from that, I learned once again how important economic and trade issues are for a country. But I think these situations are very difficult to control in the game. Because the game has a complex system. I lost a lot and destroyed the economy many times, but thanks to these mistakes, I think my last game was my most successful game. Being able to expand the Byzantine lands this much was the best final for me.
references:
Playing with Past 