Part 16: 1867-1870 : Cutting off the Head

Constant war is throwing the nations into chaos. Pfessöttirg's lack of horses is confusing, given that not only are we offering them for sale on the market, and not only do they have the ability to breed their own, but they don't even seem to be fighting in their war.


Emboldened by their recent defense of the capital city, Yakakkie makes an attack against the mostly undefended province of Moda.


But our brave militia assaults the sole artillery unit, and the rest of their forces flee.


We maintain the upper hand at sea.


Many men are brought into the army, and we don't yet have enough oil to replace the labor lost. Our industry struggles.


A second attack on Moda occurs. The militia men hold them off again, but they take greater losses this time.


Oil is found in the far north of Qak.


We must continue to wear down the enemy. In 1868 another attack occurs. This time the defenders have cavalry at the ready.


We bring more cavalry ourselves, in order to shield our guns. The heavy infantry will also be able to deal with any charges from the fort.


The scouts take losses on their initial charge.


We do blow a hole in the center.


Our forces roll forward; we pull the damaged ones back in a defensive position. The infantry march forward to guard the guns.


We soften up all the units at front line of the fort, and many of them are trapped — unable to retreat, and lacking the strength to make a charge.


The infantry hold the line, but our guns have taken too many losses now.


We destroy or rout all of the first line, and then the second line of enemy troops move out.


Casualties are high on our side; we have few guns that can still keep firing.


Just as our own lines start to break, the cavalry rides out and blows through our right side.


While many of our guns escape safely, some do not make it as the horsemen ride hard at us. The generals only just manage to survive.


This was another defeat, but we inflicted enough casualties to nearly count it a draw.


Yakakkie has moved almost all their troops to their home country.


Lack of factory workers has severely cut down on our armaments production.


We reduce most of our own defensive forces in order to get an attack ready even faster. General Bimis, who has spent years guarding the capital, will take the field as both Visü and Uduk are still wounded.


In 1869 improved armor plating is developed for the navy. This renders our last few Ships of the Line obsolete. It's been fairly obvious from the way naval battles have been going that the age of wooden sailing ships is long over.


Yakakkie has put their efforts into sending out one more big fleet.


Bimis advises that we bring all available units from Faki. If we do not take the capital, we may as well give up. Our guns form up.


Even with our rapid attack, Yakakkie has scraped together a decent defensive force.


We spend most of the morning forming up our forces and digging a tunnel to blow a hole in the walls. Then there is an initial cavalry charge. They are all lost, but they allow the field artillery to move up. We focus entirely on the enemy cannons.


The enemy response is to fire at our own siege guns.


Our second barrage renders them ineffective.


At this point, General Visü orders the artillery to fall back to his position.


The fort walls have been leveled, and all the enemy guns destroyed.


Meanwhile our own position is something like a siege.


The defenders gradually realize that they cannot stay where they are, and must make a charge. We are refusing to fall back this time.


The Yakakkinese have a lot of cavalry that could do a pretty decent amount of damage, but due to a lack of leadership, they fail to act together and the first charge is small and ineffective.


Our guns now work on hitting as many units as they can. We no longer need to eliminate them; we just want them to rout.


A second cavalry charge moves out, and some of them reach our lines.


General Visü rushes over and personally takes command of the Guards infantry who are engaging them.


Meanwhile our guns continue to fire, causing the bulk of the enemy infantry to flee.


A small force, led by the cavalry, continues to push at our lines. They inflict heavy losses on our guns, forcing some to retreat.


In the end we force them out of the city. Yakakkie is ours!


But only if we can hold off one more counterattack. We hastily build defenses along the old fortifications. Our units are greatly reduced and exhausted, however.


The enemy force is several divisions of cavalry and some heavy guns.


They apparently expected a weaker force, and decide to retreat instead of die.

I'd really like to know what would have happened if they'd stayed. Most of our guns could barely shoot, and that's enough cavalry that they could ride up and at least do serious damage backed up by artillery. I don't know that they would have won, but it was worth a shot. Sometimes the AI's caution can be bothersome, as this is a must-win situation for them.


With the Yakakkie colonies undefended, Mone captures Traligian territory.


The treacherous nation of Yakakkie is no more.


With the fall of the government, the nation of Yakakkie falls into anarchy.

Capturing a country's capital eliminates it as a Great Power. Countries in anarchy are automatically at war with every Great Power. They do not lose any military forces and will even attack and take territory as if they were a minor nation. Their colonies are released at peace with everyone.


As our own war draws to a close, we find that Wan is now the second-place nation. Their military is a lot stronger now, although the recent technological advances in naval warfare forced them to abandon a sizable portion of their old fleet.


The Monean war continues; The nations at war now seem almost equally balanced, although Pfessöttirg is practically silent and Yakakkie is of course just a mess.

I would at this point put up a vote for which of Yakakkie's colonies to try for, but the results of Unaraco and Asfah are kind of a foregone conclusion. (Traligi and Kangjung are also on the block, and suprisingly none of them have very good relations with the other powers; we're all roughly equal.)