I've wanted to try one of these for a while, so here goes. Europa Universalis III is a strategy game, ranging from the year 1399-some time in the 1800s. I'll be playing on normal difficulty, and need your help with strategic decisions, like who to backstab when. I doubt I'll finish, but I intend to keep going as long as there is interest in me continuing.
I'll be playing with both expansion packs and the Whole World mod, which kills some realism for more balanced gameplay. It extends the game to 1919, makes normally inhospitable places like the Sahara and the middle of Australia explorable and colonizable, and equalizes non-European cultures slightly. Normally they get a huge research disadvantage and have generally inferior units at equal tech levels. Basically, this mod makes it so 3000 cavalry can no longer conquer the Americas single-handedly.
I'll start the game in 1453, as France is somewhat weaker at the time. A powerful France isn't something that I want to fight, since I'm lazy. They have a good chance of destroying us if we start as Brandenburg, or seriously annoying us as Scotland.
First, help me choose a nation. I could be anyone, but in the interests of not taking three weeks to decide I'll give four choices, although I'll be a different nation if one is greatly requested. The choices are: Scotland, Brandenburg > Prussia > Germany, Ottoman Empire, and Ming.
From easiest to hardest:
Ming - Large nation in modern day China. We'll have an easy time annexing anything we want, and have plenty of lee-way to do random stupid things. No allies required!
Ottoman Empire - Largish Muslim nation. We can purge Europe of Christianity, or go East.
Scotland - Smallish nation near England. We'll have to go after them early and will have a hard war or two against them, but we'll have a fairly easy time once we conquer them.
Brandenburg - Small nation in the Holy Roman Empire that starts with a mere four provinces. Bigger then most of the nations in the HRE, but we'll have plenty of wars on our hands before we become a real threat. Alliances will be very important to us. Eventually we'll form Prussia and then Germany. Of course, forming them isn't actually required.
Future updates will have smaller images, and I'll explain the interface as I go. Unfortunately the game saves screenshots as .bmp, anyone know of a decent free .jpg converter? MSPaint's .jpg quality is nearly unreadable at half image size.