Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

[Lightcosmo]

4 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Well, I'm not sure if they've aged that well.

• I-III are pure historical curiosities at this point. 
• IV is so basic, if slightly dashing narratively. 
• V has a weak plot, but the class system means its gameplay has aged the best within the first 8 FFs IMO.
• VI could really use a deep remake. The gameplay is nothing special, the story has a few good beats, but more presentation and detail are need to make the ensemble cast pop in the modern world.
• VII being terrible is just your personal bias. Although it could use a remake. I wonder why Square refuses to give it one? The visuals have aged horrendously and Materia ain't that great.

Video games are different from books. Though the materials books are made of has improved over millennia, that has been irrelevant for the experiences they provide; papyrus, parchment, or ebook, it doesn't matter. Video games have technologically improved over decades very quickly, and this has allowed for some indisputable improvements. Presentation and the banishing of game size limits being among the most important changes, these things plagued the 16-bit era, with some carryover into the next generation. Even if a game sticks to a retro styling, it has the means to be a potentially generally superior game to the predecessors whose style it seeks to emulate.

As far as I,II go, i think they are good, just too simple, if you know what i mean.

IV is decent, but considering i've only played the DS version, and the difficulty kinda ruined it for me.

V is... well, it's just the lone wolf of the bunch, imo. 

VI has some good ideas, but not well implemented. and the original translation ruined it for me.

VII is for sure personal bias, though. It's garbage, imo, no questions asked.

I suppose it's simply my tastes that aren't "the norm".

 

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

XIII wasn't so hot, only liked a third of the cast, found the gameplay a bother (oddly enough, XII had a similar impression), the central plot was a mess too. I finished playing it on an airship, like in XII. Though it's saddening I've played more of XIII than XII.

I mean, i know people hate the story (personally, i love it) but the gameplay is widely considered among the best of the series, so that's a surprise, actually.

[Acacia Sgt]

You consider II's system simple?

[Punished Dayni]

24 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Take a guess, heh:

Well that sounds like a reformation nightmare in EUIV.

1 minute ago, lightcosmo said:

I mean, i know people hate the story (personally, i love it) but the gameplay is widely considered among the best of the series, so that's a surprise, actually.

I am going to ask for sources as I hadn't seen much of that talk.

[Lightcosmo]

3 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

You consider II's system simple?

Besides the leveling, it's on par with I's, and once you understand that pounding on your allies is the best way to win, the game's easy peasy.

[Acacia Sgt]

8 minutes ago, Dayni said:

Well that sounds like a reformation nightmare in EUIV.

I eagerly see how that will go, hahaha. Once I'm done with the CK2 playthrough, I'm ready to convert the save file and continue onwards. Most likely.

7 minutes ago, lightcosmo said:

Besides the leveling, it's on par with I's, and once you understand that pounding on your allies is the best way to win, the game's easy peasy.

Sure, easy to exploit once you figure out how it works, but I'd still think it's far from simple.

[Lightcosmo]

3 hours ago, Acacia Sgt said:

Sure, easy to exploit once you figure out how it works, but I'd still think it's far from simple.

Well, yeah, any game's gonna be like that. FFX could be complicated unless you know what your doing, and that game is pretty generous with it's information given.

[Sooks]

I think I scared away that new person from earlier...

1 hour ago, Armagon said:

That's fine,

I think changing the fundamental gameplay (I would use the word genre but I’m not an expert) is a bit too far for a remake, it would become not really an improvement over the original but instead an entirely different beast.

1 hour ago, Armagon said:

the problem is moreso that it's not really a remake. There's taking creative liberties and then there's just completely changing the story, which is what FF7R does.

What?

OOF

1 hour ago, Acacia Sgt said:

After that Maghreb started warring against them in both Holy War and Claimant war. I joined the former, ended up killing his heir, who was also Waldesian, then the King died, his still Catholic grandson inherited, and the Holy War automatically ended.

And you didn’t face any punishment for killing their heir..?

[Punished Dayni]

Just now, Sooks said:

And you didn’t face any punishment for killing their heir..?

It was a holy war.

Of course he didn't.

[Acacia Sgt]

Even their subjects wouldn't mind. They were still ruling over Catholic vassals. If not the Holy War, they would've revolted.

Edited January 26, 2021 by Acacia Sgt

[Sooks]

3 minutes ago, Dayni said:

It was a holy war.

Of course he didn't.

I misread. I thought he killed the heir of the person/people he sided with who’s name I can’t remember. Oops.

At least, assuming I got the right meaning.

Edited January 26, 2021 by Sooks

[Punished Dayni]

2 minutes ago, Sooks said:

I misread. I thought he killed the heir of the person/people he sided with who’s name I can’t remember. Oops.

No, it was the enemy's heir.

[Lightcosmo]

3 hours ago, Sooks said:

What?

OOF

Well alot of the events still tie in with the main story, they just added alot new to it as well. 

I wouldn't go so far as to say they completely changed it, though.

[Shrimpica]

So what did i miss before i start my XB2 imperial all nighter?

[Acacia Sgt]

11 minutes ago, Shrimperor said:

So what did i miss before i start my XB2 imperial all nighter?

Crusade O'Clock

[Shrimpica]

Wraith or Civ?

[Acacia Sgt]

Just now, Shrimperor said:

Wraith or Civ?

Crusader Kings

[Shrimpica]

*looks at pic above*

Oho oho

[Interdimensional Observer]

🤯

200 pages and seven chapters in, the book broke me.

I've still one more chapter before I get to the actual outbreak of the Thirty Years' War. I have been binge-reading, and my excessive note-taking has been exhausting, those haven't helped. The individual events building up the tensions are themselves interesting enough, and although they share most of the same actors in the background treading the same enflaming grounds, the sheer number of intensifying moments, owed to the many little components the Holy Roman Empire is made of, is overwhelming me.

The book is unhappily reminding me of contemporary America too. Although we won't have any Archbishops of Cologne falling in love with nuns and converting to Calvinism.

I think I need to stop reading and play some video games.

 

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

Honestly I'm a pretty big fan of this one.

Challenge wise the version that first came on DS is very solid (Unlike FFIII where I had to grind 10 levels for the final boss because it was that cruel) and I think well worth looking into, the addition of abilities you can pass onto allies is something I've always liked about it.

I skipped the IV remake. I'm opening to trying it out, it seems like it kinda did what a VI Remake should do. Albeit I want, for its own sake and no spite whatsoever as I like IV well enough, for VI Remake to be even better.

 

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

Not much of an argument to make here, just wanting to add it's pretty good on the humour for the time.

Thats true, even the serious Exdeath had something hammy to say to the turtle guardian once.

If it got a full remake treatment (enhanced ports don't count), then I'd like to see V be the Super Unserious Final Fantasy. Not that Final Fantasy is straight-laced all the time (X-2 springs to mind, yet I'd have actually liked it to be something serious and totally different instead), but it has a serious reputation, one mainline remake that blows up that reputation, wouldn't that be nice. -Well, no it wouldn't, I see the need to prevent V from descending into total farce, a sublime mix of the two then. The train moves forward on sobriety, but the passengers sing along crass drinking songs. And how about we make Bartz gay?

 

3 hours ago, Dayni said:

You rejecting FFVIIR on principle? 😛

What is with this blank response? I see nothing!

Speaking of FFVII, I have heard rumors of a sequel. I'd be okay with that if it turned out to be the case. I wouldn't mind if it tried out very new stuff that broke from VII in the gameplay, because it'd be a sequel. 

Edited January 26, 2021 by Interdimensional Observer

[Acacia Sgt]

So Advent Children the video game? Dirge of Cerberus?

[Acacia Sgt]

Ahahahaha!

 

[Punished Dayni]

5 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I skipped the IV remake. I'm opening to trying it out, it seems like it kinda did what a VI Remake should do. Albeit I want, for its own sake and no spite whatsoever as I like IV well enough, for VI Remake to be even better.

No real complaint there, again VI was a favourite too and I would like to see what they would do with characters like Cyan.

If you can fit it in I thought FFIV was worth a spin. I actually opened up a file a year or so ago and enjoyed it for a bit (Though Rainbow Puddings still eluded me, I cannot believe they made that questline and put that part so early in it). I don't like the fonts they've used for the mobile/PC port and that's my excuse to recommend the original.

5 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Speaking of FFVII, I have heard rumors of a sequel. I'd be okay with that if it turned out to be the case. I wouldn't mind if it tried out very new stuff that broke from VII in the gameplay, because it'd be a sequel. 

Wait, we're talking about FFVII needing a sequel?

The game with so much expanded material that I'm pretty sure it's way longer than the original game? The one with sequels people hated on before FFIV After Years?

You'd think they'd be too cautious to try again!

5 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

200 pages and seven chapters in, the book broke me.

I've still one more chapter before I get to the actual outbreak of the Thirty Years' War. I have been binge-reading, and my excessive note-taking has been exhausting, those haven't helped. The individual events building up the tensions are themselves interesting enough, and although they share most of the same actors in the background treading the same enflaming grounds, the sheer number of intensifying moments, owed to the many little components the Holy Roman Empire is made of, is overwhelming me.

The book is unhappily reminding me of contemporary America too. Although we won't have any Archbishops of Cologne falling in love with nuns and converting to Calvinism.

I think I need to stop reading and play some video games.

Ah, there's an update.

That's pretty rough to hear about, but from what you're saying I get it. Any event particularly humourous?

What, you're not counting all the televangelists and their own scandals? Sure a lack of Calvinism, but they've sold out too.

[Sooks]

1 hour ago, lightcosmo said:

Well alot of the events still tie in with the main story, they just added alot new to it as well. 

I wouldn't go so far as to say they completely changed it, though.

Did they actually change what happens or only add in events that coincide with the story?

46 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

🤯

200 pages and seven chapters in, the book broke me.

I've still one more chapter before I get to the actual outbreak of the Thirty Years' War. I have been binge-reading, and my excessive note-taking has been exhausting, those haven't helped.

Why are you note taking?

46 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I think I need to stop reading and play some video games.

Me in school.

[Interdimensional Observer]

36 minutes ago, Dayni said:

What, you're not counting all the televangelists and their own scandals? Sure a lack of Calvinism, but they've sold out too.

The issue is that the Archbishop of Cologne was one of the seven Electors, the people who got to elect the Holy Roman Emperor, a very important political role. Already, all four not-Archbishop secular electors had flipped to Protestantism. 5/7 by the loss of what the Catholics assumed was one of their "secure as f***" (pardon the devil's tongue) electorates was not good. The Archbishop's choice of Calvinism didn't help him one bit, Calvinists were the Protestant minority in the HRE, and Lutherans thought Calvinists too radical.

Amazingly for what you'd think of the time, people often being imagined as super-intolerant, they had actually managed to accommodate Lutherans in charge of Archbishoprics, Bishoprics, and the other geopolitical territories ruled by priests. Since these were elected positions, the assumption was that if one of these usually Catholic territories turned Protestant, the next election could flip it back to Catholic. However, the Lutheran leaders of these church territories didn't take the official title, they were labeled "Administrators", as if the position of Arch/bishop/prelate had been left empty, not usurped by a heretic.

 

36 minutes ago, Dayni said:

Ah, there's an update.

If you see the notes I've been taking...

Spoiler

1. The Spanish Monarchy
   1. Spain’s Many Dominions
      1. 1516-1659: Spain’s Golden Age and era of European predominance.
      2. International perspectives on the 30YW subsume it in a broader series of struggles by other European countries against perceived European hegemony.
      3. It was largely through Spain and its overseas empire that the 30YW was felt around the globe.
      4. Spain’s presence 30YW was a constant factor throughout 30YW, but problems distinct from those of Habsburg Austria.
      5. One commonality on the difficulties of both Habsburg branches- a large empire that proved challenging to manage and sustain.
      6. Portugal
         1. Union of Crowns, 1580
            1. Dom Sebastiao dies young in a military disaster against Morocco in 1578. The Portuguese House of Avis, 1385-1578, dies with him. Portugal’s Golden Age is in the grave.
            2. Philip II of Spain claims the Portuguese throne and sends in an army, no hope of resisting this.
            3. Portuguese do get some benefits- the entire Spanish Empire is now open to them.
            4. Is a personal union- shared monarch, separate everything else.
         2. Portugal brings 1.1 million new subjects under Philip II.
         3. Overseas possessions in Brazil, Africa, Asia, thinly populated.
            1. Brazil ~30000 Europeans, 15000 slaves, 2.4 million indigenous at best, largely unexplored and underexploited.
            2. Africa- a few thousand Portuguese at forts in modern Angola and Mozambique.
            3. Estado da India- ~10000 Portuguese east of the Cape of Good Hope, governed from Goa in western India.
      7. Spanish Populations
         1. ~8.75 inhabitants in Castile and the associated lands of Catalonia, Aragon, Valencia, and the Basque provinces.
         2. Contrary to the trend elsewhere in Europe, Castilian population growth stalled around 1580.
            1. Causes of lack of growth: poor harvests, plague, emigration to the colonies, and above all, the burdens of war and taxation.
            2. 1631- Only 4 million Castilians, about 1 million less than 40 years earlier. Rapid population decline.
            3. (In other readings, France’s and the Dutch Republic’s slowdowns in population growth came around their periods of decline. Pop certainly ain’t everything, but it can matter.)
            4. Spain’s overseas colonies in population decline too. Caused by the physical conquest of the Americas.
               1. Overwork of the enslaved indigenous populations. Old World diseases the indigenous had no resistance to.
               2. Drops from 34 million to 1.5 million by 1620.
            5. Mexico, Caribbean, north and western South America, Manila in the Philippines in Asia: ~175000 European colonists, roughly similar number in African slaves and people of mixed descent.
         3. Spain’s European dominions:
            1. 1.5 million subjects in the southern Netherlands
            2. 1+ million in Milan and Sicily apiece
            3. 3 million in Naples.
      8. Spain’s economy was stagnant, magnifies the dominions’ and colonies’ importance.
      9. Other than re-export of silver, Spain’s main European trade goods were… raw materials and some foodstuffs.
      10. Growth was inhibited by a system of crown-supported cartels with monopolies over particular products. Cartels applied to colonial trade, Seville was the sole port that could legitimately trade with the Americas.
      11. Harvest failure atop the high taxes led people to flee the land to the cities and colonies. Nobles and clerics then encroached on the commons used by the remaining peasants.
      12. Private investors and merchants relied on silver receipts to eat. Because Spain failed to feed itself and needed to import much of its food.
      13. Spain failed to produce useful goods in useful quantities which it could sell in in its colonies. (Something the British “Workshop of the World” would later know how to do.)
      14. ~1600, Dutch and other foreign merchants get special concessions to enter Spain’s colonial trade, which they’re envious of.
          1. Fifty years later, 120000 foreigners in Spain, formed one-tenth of Seville’s population.
   2. Silver: The Lifeblood of the Empire
      1. Although the colonial empire did diversify over time, silver remained Spain’s primary colonial interest.
      2. The New World produced 50000 tons of silver between 1540 and 1700, doubling the existing stock in Europe.
         1. (Remember- gold/silver standard in this era. Matters a whole lot more than today.)
      3. Exports really got underway after the discovery of rich silver veins at Potosi (1545) in modern Bolivia, Zacatecas (1548) in modern Mexico, and with the introduction of German mining techniques using mercury to separate silver from waste.
         1. (Mercury is still used in precious metal mining to this day. Great as an elixir of (after)life, a treatment for syphilis, making you as mad as a hatter, and killing the fishies in the nearest river.)
         2. Zacatecas used mercury imported from Almaden in Spain. Potosi’s silver production soared once it got mercury found relatively closer in mines at Huancavelia, in modern Peru.
      4. Potosi
         1. Relied on forced labor through the mita system, indigenous people were forced to work four months every seven years.
            1. (Mit’a was the name of the Incan Empire’s mandatory public service, nowhere near as deadly.)
         2. Laborers worked six-day shifts at an elevation of 6000 meters, laborers died at a rate of 40 per day.
         3. Indigenous villages increasingly bought exemptions by paying tribute to hire laborers, who constituted over half the workforce by 1600.
         4. The system was controlled by a corrupt local elite that was not against the idea of murdering a government inspector with a cup of poisoned hot chocolate.
         5. Silver was carried down the mountains on the backs of thousands of llamas and mules to Arica on the Pacific coast, where they were traded for food and mercury.
         6. Precious cargo was shipped north to Panama, and carried across the isthmus to be put to sea again to be shipped to Seville.
         7. Attempts by the viceroy to improve equally atrocious conditions at Huancavelia contributed to fluctuating silver production at Potosi from 1591.
            1. Afterwards, a steady decline after 1605, from a peak of 7.7 million pesos in 1592, to 2.95 million in 1650.
         8. Zacatecas silver output increased from 1615 from more available labor. But the need for Spanish mercury left the silver mines vulnerable to disruptions in the sea lanes.
      5. Convoy system established by 1564 saw two fleets sail across the Atlantic in most years.
         1. Galeones (galleons) left Seville in August, headed south-west towards Africa, passed the Canaries, went due west to the Leewards. And then southwest to Cartagena in modern Colombia, or Portobello in Panama.
            1. Journey was 6880km, taking 8 weeks.
            2. Guarded by a squadron of 8 warships, with 2000 soldiers and marines. Merchant ships were also armed.
            3. Loaded with Potosi silver, cochineal, hides, other colonial products, the fleet wintered in Havana and then returned to Seville.
         2. The flota fleet set out from Cadiz in April or May, followed the above route past the Leewards, but turned north-west to Hispaniola, Cuba, Vera Cruz.
            1. Delivered the Almaden mercury and collected the silver from Zacatecas.
            2. Only two warships.
         3. Passing Cuba through the Bahama Channel was the most dangerous part of both trips- reefs and hurricanes.
         4. The galleons set sail 29 times from during the first half of the 1600s, only two silver convoys were lost to enemy action (1628, 1656).
         5. Spanish trade with the Americas was worth ~10 million ducats a year by 1600, roughly twice that of Portugal with the East Indies.
            1. (Book says 1 Spanish Ducat = 2.35 Dutch Florins, or 1.4 German Florins.)
            2. (Book says 7.5-10 Florins (doesn’t specify Dutch or German, I’ll assume German) would buy enough grain to feed a person for an entire year in 1618.)
      6. Portuguese Trading Empire
         1. Convoy system called cafila to protect their portion of the valuable spice trade across the Indian Ocean and around Africa.
         2. Presence at Axim and Elmina on the geographic Gold Coast (modern Ghana), mouth of the Congo River, and Benguela on the Angolan coast south of Luanda (1617) to secure the gold and slave trades.
            1. Communication with Portugal maintained via the islands of Cape Verde and Sao Tome.
            2. Portuguese influence depended on good relations with the local rulers, particularly the king of Ndongo. The Imbangala raided slaves to sell on the coast.
            3. Slave trade was already at 700 per year in the mid-1400s, began shipping them to Brazil in 1535. Slaves cost ~400 pesos, equivalent to 8 months’ wages for an indigenous Brazilian laborer.
            4. 1570s- Brazilian native population had dwindled enough to lead to large slave imports.
            5. Expansion into the Congo region and Angola allowed them to ship 4000 slaves a year by the 1620s.
         3. African slaves had replaced indigenous on Brazilian sugar plantations entirely by the 1620s.
            1. At least 3.65 million slaves had been transported to Brazil by the time the trade was formally suspended in 1850.
            2. Slave labor was irreplaceable when the Brazilian sugar boom began around 1600.
            3. By 1628, 300 ships needed to transport 4 million cruzados worth of sugar. Annual exports tripled to reach 40000 metric tons by 1650. Nine-tenths of Brazilian export earnings.
            4. Took until the 1700s for sugar production in rival Caribbean islands to contest Brazilian sugar.
            5. The Brazilian colony started at Salvador in Bahia, expanded northwards along the coast to Pernambuco, where two-thirds of sugar production was established.
      7. Economy of Spain and Its European Possession
         1. Spain and its European dominions remained the real fiscal basis of the empire.
         2. Despite a stagnant economy and inefficient administration, Spain sent 218 million ducats to maintain the war in the Spanish Netherlands between 1566 and 1654. -American silver receipts in the same period totaled 121 million ducats (total revenue, not how much went to war).
         3. Direct and indirect taxes agreed to with the Castilian Cortes (parliament) produced 6.2 million ducats a year around 1600.
            1. Millones tax- raised 90 million ducats between 1621 and 1639, triple the amount arriving from the Americas in the same period.
         4. Catalonia, Valencia, and Aragon paid virtually nothing as their local assemblies refused regular taxes to the Spanish crown.
            1. (Spain had no unified government, the King had to deal with a separate administration in each major territory.)
         5. The Catholic Church paid the “Three Graces” levies worth about 1.6 million ducats annually.
         6. Spanish Netherlands provided 3.6 million ducats. Milan- 2 million ducats. Naples 4 million ducats. Most of these consumed by local defense spending.
      8. Silver imports provided only 2 million ducats to the crown around 1600, because the monarch received just the surplus from the colonial treasuries, and a percentage of the much larger private shipments in Seville.
      9. American silver’s real value was as a source of credit. Since lenders retained faith in Spain’s ability to pay its spiraling debts with future silver imports.
         1. Creditors received consignaciones -claims on specific revenues-
         2. …or, they they received juros-  government bonds paying fixed interest.
            1. Juros were traded on the international money market through Genoese bankers, who handled most of Spain’s external credit through 1670.
      10. Basic Spanish fiscal pattern firmly established by the mid-1500s.
          1. Only a small portion of current expenditure could be met by ordinary revenue, with a growing share of revenues using silver imports to counteract the debt using silver imports to sustain credit.
          2. Politics replaced economics, as finances became a matter of sustaining public confidence in the monarchy’s ability to repay its burgeoning debt.
          3. Bankruptcies occurred every time the confidence was shaken.
             1. 1559- debt reaches 25 million ducats, bankruptcy.
             2. 1598- Philipp II dies. Bankruptcy at 85 million ducats, ten times the ordinary revenue.
          4. The difficulty in sustaining credit forced the government into expediencies to bridge blockages in cash flow.
             1. Offices and titles were sold were sold in Iberia and the colonies.
             2. Certificates of ordinary nobility were sold, creating 169 new lordships between1625 and 1668, doubling the size of the aristocracy.
             3. Royal rights over 3600 Castilian towns and villages were pawned.
             4. Large parts of the customs services were privatized.
          5. The expedients created a new elite with a vested interest in the silver system, since most got rich from the Atlantic trade.
             1. However, the new elite made it difficult to reform the increasingly dysfunctional system, since that would alienate the crown’s creditors.
             2. The short-term gains also reduced long-term revenue, the tax-exempt nobles reached 10% of the Castilian population.
      11. Spain had built a system that devoured countless African and American lives, ruined its people with taxes, and found itself unable to escape a vicious debt spiral.
   3. Imperial Defense
      1. All economic activity was directed towards perpetuating Spanish imperialism. Military expenditures rose from 7 million ducats in 1574, to 9 million by the early 1590s.
         1. Between 1596 and 1600, Spain sent 3 million ducats a year to fund the Army of Flanders (Spanish Netherlands) alone.
         2. The Dutch War consumed 90 million ducats between 1598 (Phil 2’s death) and the 1609 truce.
         3. Spanish forces numbered 100000 worldwide in 1600. The Army of Flanders with 60000 troops was the largest operational army in Europe.
      2. Spain also became Europe’s leading naval power during the last two decades of the 16th century.
         1. A major role in the victory at Lepanto over the Ottomans in 1571 allowed Spain to downsize its fleet there to 20 galleys with smaller squadrons in Sicily, Naples, and Genoa.
         2. The Armada del Mar Oceano was rebuilt after the failed invasion of England in 1588 demonstrated the need for modern warships.
            1. The millones funded 56000 tons of new construct, much at La Coruna, between 1588 and 1609, creating a fleet of 60 large warships by 1600.
            2. Fleet was divided into three roughly equal squadrons:
               1. One at Lisbon to patrol the Atlantic for the silver convoys.
               2. The second in the Straits of Gibraltar for Mediterranean access.
               3. Third at La Coruna for operations against France and Protestant countries.
            3. 1580 fleet of six ships to protect the silver shipments from Arica to Panama, but no Caribbean squadron despite attempts.
         3. Naval expansion increased personnel demand to 27000 by 1590 at the same time the army needed more recruits and the Castilian population stopped growing.
            1. As volunteers dwindled, established system of issuing officers commissions to recruit units needed to be replaced.
            2. The state retained direct management of the army and navy, but contracted out key aspects of recruitment, logistics, weapons procurement.
            3. Attempts to get local nobles and magistrates to revive defunct militias to provide a measure of security in the hinterlands of outlying provinces like Catalonia, Levante, Andalusia, Galicia.
         4. State monopoly on weapons production in 1562 was dismantled after 1598, all works went into private hand barring a powder mill in Cartagena by 1632.
            1. Privatization did not mean weakness, private shipyards could build warships for 31 ducats a ton in the 1630s, 4 ducats less than royal shipyards, saving 2000 ducats per warship.
            2. But, privatization was unplanned and unwanted, forced upon a monarchy by its inability to master its surging debts.
      3. Only 5.1 million ducats of Spain’s 9.2 million total revenue in 1598 was available for the crown to freely spend. The other 4.1 million was mortgaged to creditors or paid the interest on the juros.
         1. The “free” portion of revenue declined to 1.6 million by 1618, while annual expenditure climbed to 12 million.
         2. Total revenue from 12.9 million in 1598 to 10 million or less by 1621.
         3. Philip III, heir to Phil II, broke from tradition and released a debased coin the year after his succession- the Vellon. Had to retract it in 1608 due to complaints, but reissued it in 1617 and 1621.
            1. Vellon actually hurt the Spanish government in the long run, Spaniards paid taxes in vellon, but soldiers demanded good silver coinage.
         4. Funded juros debt rose from 92 to 112 million ducats across Philip III’s reign, driving annual interest payments up to 5.6 million, half of ordinary revenue.
      4. Se va todo a fondo- “The ship is going down”.
         1. Many Spaniards recognized from the 1590s that Spain was entering the final phase of its natural life- decline and death. Only God could reverse this.
         2. However, there was disagreement over how much humans could do to slow this.
         3. The government received no shortage of proposals, identifying weaknesses and suggesting remedies.
         4. All solutions were concerned with the Spanish monarchy’s reputacion- reputation. Correctly identified as fundamental to sustaining the system of credit.
         5. There was very little concern about the underlying concerns for depopulation, de-industrialization, agrarian depression, and stagnant trade, which historians later emphasized.
         6. “Spanish decline” was not immediately followed by a loss of political influence. Spaniards at the time did not sacrifice themselves at the altar of pessimism.
            1. Sure, bankruptcies affected their hand on the world stage a few times (1609 Dutch truce), but catastrophic collapse did not feel imminent.
            2. For the fortunate few at the top of society, Spain was still wealthy, were life was very good.
               1. The 115 grandees collectively enjoyed an annual income of 5 million ducats, equivalent to half the state’s revenues.
            3. Spain still had a great many experienced soldiers, sailors, administrators, and diplomats with extensive contacts across Europe.
            4. Spain’s rival France was still very weak and would remain so until the mid-1600s.
            5. Spain had built up enough political and economic momentum by 1621 to carry on for two decades after it had run out of fuel.
      5. Emphasis on reputacion related to the Spanish conception of kingship. The king was exalted, specially selected by God to rule, in charge of his own destiny and all his subjects’.
         1. Estates, councils, other advisers that featured in the old traditions of mixed monarchy across Europe still carried some weight, but they were subordinated to a king who made decisions alone.
         2. …Is it any surprise divine pretensions don’t mesh with the reality?
         3. Philip II tried not to single anyone out for particular favor to encourage working together, rivalries went underground instead.
         4. Phil 2 tried to bypass constitution checks by ignoring traditional institutions and creating ad hoc committees- juntas (ready to overthrow a Latin American government near you).
            1. Juntas could provide flexibility, often did naught but add confusion and disputes in the administration.
            2. Conejo de Estado (Council of State) became the main forum for discussing matters and formulating policy.
               1. Created many juntas which became permanent. Including ones for war, finance, crusade (Catholic renewal), the Indies, Castile, Aragon, Italy and Flanders.
         5. The empire remained a composite state, viceroys and local governments had wide powers everyone, and Portugal still had its own government because of local pride.
            1. All governors faced advisory councils of notables and needed to pay attention to provincial interests. Their salaries, government funds, and the garrisons protecting them, relied on local taxes.
      6. The defense took place in grand strategy in the global Spanish Empire. More territory meant more potential enemies- the Dutch Revolt after 1566. Trade monopolies needed protection too.
      7. Spain’s sense of mission arose from the Reconquista, the vanquishing of the Moors in 1492 fused Catholicism into the Spanish national identity. Ottomans, heathens in the New World, Protestants, Spain would protect/save souls and damn the damned!
      8. The Papacy itself became an informal part of the Spanish Empire. A symbiotic relationship where both benefitted, but Spain was dominant.
         1. Pope Alexander VI (the Borgia Pope) was the start of this. Divided the world between Spain and Portugal with the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494.
         2. Spain stayed unflinchingly Catholic amid the Reformation.
            1. Spain sent 7000 ducats and a white horse (why?) a year from Naples to Rome. Fees from vacant sees were remitted to Rome.
            2. Sicilian grain fed Rome, Spanish charity funded churches, hospitals, poor relief.
            3. Spaniards reached a quarter of all inhabitants in Rome by the late 1500s. Playing a central ceremonial and political role.
            4. 70000 ducats a year bought a College of Cardinals majority for Spain.
         3. The Papal States’ defense spending was slashed from over half the budget to less than a fifth with Spanish protection (though there was considerable popular resentment).
         4. Rome provided Spain in-turn with ecclesiastical levies worth 3.68 million ducats a year by 1621, a third of ordinary Spanish revenue.
      9. The two branches of the Habsburg family after Charles V’s death remained close. Spanish warships and troops continued to carry flags with the black double eagle of the Holy Roman Empire.
         1. Spanish writers concocted an origin myth that a son of the Biblical Noah was the first king of Spain. Making it older than the Roman Empire the HRE claimed descent from.
      10. Spain’s enemies saw the empire was eagerly waiting to impose universal monarchy across Europe.
          1. Spain’s rivals had little knowledge of its many internal problems. They thought the American resources unending.
          2. Spain it was feared could start so great a war that soon their meager assets would run out and they’d be doomed.
          3. France felt most acutely encircled. Spain to the south, Spanish-ruled Milan and Franche-Comte to the east, Flanders and Spanish Netherlands to the north, the Spanish Armada in the Atlantic.
          4. Spanish Armada of 1588- the classic image of the Spanish menace to Protestant countries.
   4. Spain and the Empire
      1. Spain generally did not intervene in other countries unless it perceived threats to its core interests. The Council of State usually had a strong body of opinion urging caution and disengagement.
      2. Philip II spent 1548-51 in Germany, knew many princes personally. Emperor Rudolf and his brothers Ernst and Albert stayed in Spain for durations. These developed Spanish-HRE diplomacy.
      3. Perhaps amazingly for Spanish zealotry did not prevent Philip II from building good working relationships with conservative Luthern princes, such as the Saxon Elector and Duke Heinrich Julius of Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel, and leading Catholics like the Duke of Bavaria.
         1. Philip II made efforts to create a pro-Spanish HRE faction around Bavaria and Cologne to block any imperial policies contrary to Spanish interests.
         2. Spanish Catholics were influential in shifting Rudolf II towards Catholic militancy in Bohemia and Hungary after 1598.
      4. Protestants suspected a Spanish-papal conspiracy, but the “Spanish party” in the HRE truly desired to consolidate Austrian influence and cooperated with Madrid when it was in their self-interest.
      5. When Rudolf II died in 1612, the new Emperor Matthias, of the Inner Austrian HRE Habsburg branch, moved his capital back to Vienna. Spanish influenced declined in the HRE.
         1. Bavaria became the main Catholic focus for the Emperor due to Matthias’s wife.
         2. His successor Ferdinand III’s (1619) wife was Spanish, but the cultural influence remained minimal compared to Italy.
         3. The HRE resented Spanish attempts to intervene in its politics.
      6. HRE influence in Spain also declined.
         1. The Austrian Habsburgs stopped sending their sons to Spain for some years of study. Those that were sent, were seen as too Spanish.
         2. Austria had an embassy in Madrid, but it was not permanent as it was in Constantinople.
         3. The death of Philip II’s wife Margaret of Austria limited Austrian influence to Emperor Matthias’s youngest sister Margaret of the Cross- a nun who helped raise the royal children.
      7. Philip III (ascended in 1598) had no personal experience of the HRE. His advisors put a low priority on Germany.
         1. The Protestant princes were too disunited to be a threat, the Austrians incapable of independent action. If Spain left them alone, the Germans would not cause trouble.
         2. Spanish ambassadors portrayed a Germany in moral decline. The Catholics flirted with heterodoxy and failed to pay their share for the Long Turkish War against the evil heathen.
         3. Germans as a whole were backwards, boorish, too busy gorging on fatty foods and guzzling barrels of beer to achieve the heights of Castilian civilization.
         4. Germans lived in a rain-soaked land of dreary forests, muddy roads, and expensive, uncomfortable inns.
      8. Philip III has been called “the laziest ruler Spain has had”, and his own father said “God, who has given me so many kingdoms, had denied me a son capable of ruling them”.
      9. Philip III attended the Council of State almost daily from the age of 15, and had been signing documents already for his aging father by 1597. He retained the final decision on all important matters.
      10. Philip’s historians’ reputation for laziness and abandoning government steams from his interpretation of Spanish absolute monarchy.
          1. His father’s remote, inaccessible, lofty majesty was furthered by physically removing himself from government.
      11. Practical business was devolved to the Duke of Lerma, who dealt directly with the ministries and juntas.
          1. Lerma attached himself to the heir-apparent and made himself indispensable for his rise to power.
          2. A court favorite, who had clients, but rarely friends.
          3. Stressed his own grandeur and told everyone the qualifications that made only him worth of being Philip III’s right hand.
          4. Haughtiness made him susceptible to claims he wanted to eclipse the monarch.
          5. Lerma's influence during 1606-08, when his main allies died, retired or were arrest, one being a scapegoat for the 1607 bankruptcy.
          6. Lerma’s own confessor turned against him when he became royal confessor in 1608. (Leads to his downfall years later.)
          7. Criticism of Lerma mounted with the 1609 Twelve Years’ Truce with the Dutch rebels which he concluded.

...you can see why this would be draining.

I still want to write notes on all the different countries' demographic-financial compositions, and scattered bits of other information that I like. It's the actual events I'm going to have to stop jotting down, or super-duper streamline. One to five sentences at most per major event. Sorry conflict over Julich-Berg-Cleves, you sound so important, but I don't have time. At this point, I should just buy the book instead of loaning it.

There is not a lot more countries/territories to plant down the details of in the book. I really want to copy its description of Denmark at least, which for so small a country, the book had managed to make unexpectedly entertaining. Very rich, yet its domestic economy was primitive, with most of its income stemming from collecting shipping tolls in the Baltic Sea. Kilvas would be more interesting if it had done that instead of piracy (although, Denmark constantly warred with Sweden to maintain full control of the most important sea lanes).

 

Just now, Sooks said:

Why are you note taking?

Library book, it's not mine forever. Besides that, it makes me commits more to memory. Whilst allowing me to quickly reference the tidbits and factoids that fascinate me if I ever wanted to again, digging them up from copious pages of text would make it difficult to find them all again.

[Armagon]

3 hours ago, Lightchao42 said:

I can't believe GvK's Mechagodzilla design leaked.

Type: Electric/Steel

Ability: Shock Absorb

Signature move: Atomic Thunder 

1 hour ago, Shrimperor said:

So what did i miss before i start my XB2 imperial all nighter?

2 minutes ago, Sooks said:

Did they actually change what happens or only add in events that coincide with the story?

To sum it up, there are these time ghosts or whatever that intervene from the plot every time the story starts to deviate from the original path. For example, the part where the plate falls on Sector 7 or whatever, in the remake, the heroes actually almost stopped it from happening....until the ghosts came in and said "no no no, that plate will fall" (but almost the entire town survives anyway, that didn't happen in the original) and it seems the whole goal of the game is to change the storyline.....which on paper is cool but this was not the game to do it with. 

I would not be surprised if Aerith doesn't die in part 2/3.

[Shrimpica]

2 minutes ago, Armagon said:

OOOOH!

Have fun!