Bohemia



Current Stats

11 Armies

0 Navies

25 Wealth

26 Prosperity

4 Production

Religion: Christianity (majority)

Stability: Good

Tech: Age of Exploration

Special: Inter-German Trade League (+5 Wealth)

Great German Road (+2 Productivity, +5 Prosperity)

Hanseatic League Capital at Brüssel (+1 Production)

Zürich Caves (???)

Colour on map: Orange

Government
Bohemia is a loose feudalism with elements of confederacy. There are counts, dukes, earls and so on which preside over areas, but they are not counted on for military aid, but rather money. The king is responsible for the common defense, provided the money obtained by the earls. Many times this money is funded back into the feudal underlings to hire local military support, but it is important to note that this is an economic-based feudalism. This ensures a greater degree of centralism than a military-based feudalism; the king has more control, the king can do whatever he wants with the funds he receives.

Zürich
Capital.

Brüssel
Main port.

== Religion==

The Bohemians were granted freedom of religion on a nationwide level, however each of the feudal underlings can proscribe a religion for their region, and many do.

Culture
The culture of Bohemia is predominantly Slavic. The serfs, though somewhat free, are relegated to not possessing much culturedness, although the freedom of religion helps somewhat. Religion, although a major factor overall, does not play an influence, with powerful group split up between many different fiefs as the rulers can dictate what religion their region holds. Legends and oral folklore hold great sway in inspiring the national pride to do great things.

The tale of Ulrich Schöße
It was cold and dark in the cave that peasant Ulrich Schöße decided to explore into. He lived less than five miles from the capital in Zürich, and his efforts helped feed the city every day for the last 23 years of his life. When part of his herd had gone missing, he needed to search for them, and the search led here.

Ulrich felt his bravado leave him as he ventured deeper. He has only his crook to defend himself, and a torch. The balmy summer night outside had filled him with calm as the quiet enveloped the land, but the cave was slowly replacing that with a hopeless fear.

A sheep's cry off to the side; Ulrich couldn't tell from where in the massive cave. Originally sloping down, the cave had opened up into a cavern large enough to fit a castle, and was now suspiciously flat. A stream ran by to the side, and the vast expanse in front of Ulrich ate his light.

Another cry, then a large clank, as though metal was hitting stone. Ulrich could see a dim light in the distance, and actively held his crook as he approached it. "H-hello?" He quavered in his native Bohemian tongue.

When the light went from a pinpoint to a dime in his eye, he stopped and asked again. "Who are you?" he queried to the open air. Nothing more. He waited a minute, his torch tentatively burning. His shoeless feet felt the thick fungus that grew on the floor, cold and wet with the sploshing of the stream.

He quenched his fear and continued toward the light. The light was revealed to be a torch, placed in front of a larger-than-man-sized passageway. Ulrich gulped. He knew not of the things that live in the cave, but this could not have been a good sign. He shook. Putting his ear near the doorway he could hear a distant sound... a grinding? No, some sort of repetitive sound. The shepherd groaned internally at the squishy nature of the sound, then realized the implications of the sound. He had to turn back.

In his fear, Ulrich completely forgot his sense of direction.

Consigning himself to fate, he continued forth, crook in hand. The passageway was long and could easily have fit two of him in height and width. At the end, he could just barely make out in the light, a horrible sight; a massive furry creature, slick and eyeless. It was eating the remains of a sheep, rubbing itself crudely with his fur. Ulrich vomited; this brought the attention of the creature to him. He ran to the left of the passage and the troll followed. The new chamber was indescribably large in size, as he gazed at it, and had a massive underground river running through it.

Ulrich didn't know how to swim. Bohemia had no coastal territory and Ulrich had never seen a lake nor pond in his life. When he had been backed up into a corner between the edge of the river and the cave, he finally panicked. His strong Bohemian spirit perished, when he threw the torch at the creature.

The creature's fur caught on fire immediately. It was as though he had been covered in rum. It too panicked, and no longer was Ulrich afraid. With his crook, he beat the creature with it, and the creature was too startled by the fire to fight back. When the giant creature finally passed out, Ulrich's surge of adrenaline died. The suddenly-heroic man used his crook as a temporary torch to guide himself back to the torched entrance to the passage, then found his way out. All was finished.

When the Kung heard from an advisor of this feat, he disguised himself as a peasant and approached Ulrich secretly, asking for proof. When presented with the proof the Kung was astonished. Revealing himself as the Kung, he ordered that the body be excavated for alchemists and scientists alike to see what they could learn from it. As well, Ulrich was granted independence to live in the Zürich township, where he became a local legend and eventually, defender of the town. After some training, his military skill paired with his ingenuity allowed his legendary status to be with his skills.

Ulrich explores the Zürich Caves
After awhile patrolling the borders with the military, the Kung granted Ulrich Schöße a leave of rest, congratulating him for his efforts in quelling the revolt and disgust of the Bohemian people. Ulrich went back to his home of Zürich and rested, off the back of his gold stores he had accumulated in pay he lived. The sedentary life was good.

However, the sedentary life was also boring. Ulrich grew bored of simply watching his sheep; the spirit of adventure had been bred into him from so many military actions and the former shepherd was tired of herding sheep. He rediscovered the cave which had bought him his legend and decided to spelunk it further; if there were one of those huge beasts, there were probably more.

Stocking himself in town with the finest platemail, crude alchemical and writing supplies, spelunking gear, halberd and of course a bulls-eye lantern, the legendary soldier walked down the path he had once walked in search of his lost sheep. He met once again the cavern large enough to construct a castle, and momentarily thought of doing just that when he pointed his lantern toward the doorway. The torch that he had taken had been replaced.

Halberd in hand he walked through the room and into the massive cavern which had previously nearly led to his death. He took out a quill pen and paper. Over the next ten hours, roughly ten times the time it would have taken him otherwise, Ulrich crudely mapped out the cavern as he explored it. The massive underground river flowed into waterfalls off of a massive cliff, and there were natural-looking stone arches which seemed to perfect and strategic to be natural... Our cartographers report that in the cavens underneath the Bohemian mountains, there seems to be strange race of people dwelling, who are known as dwarves, they are also at constant war with beasts known as trolls, they are huge and strong, but stupid.

Location
Central Germanic region.

Medieval Structure
The armies are informally organized by region, but overall consist mostly of armored and trained peasants, with knights being in the minority. The peasants wield pikes, longbows, longswords and shortswords rarely, axes and maces. The archers are generally armed in studded leather to avoid the weight of the armor curtailing their aim, and the few crossbowmen (as of yet) are armored well.

Some peasants happen to breed horses and ride them into combat while armored in hardened leather. Carrying spears, they are usually the reconnaissance and flanking units, rarely supplementing knight forces in attacks due to the horses non-training to carry lots of weight quickly.

The knights are usually the sons and daughters of the fief owners, and are usually placed in command of groups of peasants. Some knights form their own divisions for tactical handling and functions, on higher levels. The knights fight for the glory of Bohemia and are armored well; their warhorses are also barded. Knights sometimes fight without their horse when the tactics of battle require such. When on horse, knights' weapons can vary from maces to axes to swords to lances to pikes, but when on foot the knights are usually limited to a long sword and a kite shield. Few knights use bow-and-arrow, and fewer still use short swords in combat. These are almost always the graduated peasants, who as serfdom opens up, have proven themselves useful in battle enough to be knights. Knights are very well respected.

Age of Exploration Structure
The Age of Exploration brought on a massive change to the military structure of the region. The easy to use but expensive to waste musket created a demand for highly skilled musketeers that could attack and reload easily in swiftly while in line formation. This enables the Reichsgrenadiers to take on any threat that they meet with relative ease, as horses, infantry and even knights in some cases can be mowed down by a sudden storm of fire. Plate armor is the only defense besides other such gunpowder weapons that is even remotely useful to guard oneself, and the former isn't always as effective as in previous eras.

Combat Alchemists
One important and unique aspect of the Bohemian armies is that of the combat alchemist/scientist. These are alchemists or scientists, usually apprentices, who stay behind the front lines to study conflict. They usually have a great variety of corpses to experiment on. Often, peasants interested in the alchemical or scientific arts will apprentice under a combat alchemist/scientist, fighting in battle by day and studying by night. It is from these efforts that the Bohemian armies hope to gain new technologies and a better hold over their enemies.

Independent Townships
Bohemia is distinct primarily in its support of towns. The few towns made up of freedmen are granted free charters easily, and the towns themselves grow vastly without the burden of heavy taxes. In addition, the current Kung constantly tries to expand the number of towns in his kingdom; he is overall against the serfdom which is common.

He is not at conflict with his feudal underlings though. With the rise of a stable economic feudalism system, they have significant trust that the Kung will keep them rich in the future with some degree of control. It is an unsure trust for sure, but as long as the Kung does not actively act against his proponents there will likely be no problems coming from them.

Apprentice Academy
The Bohemians have formed the Apprentice Academy in hopes of enhancing the production of the towns. The Apprentice Academy is a foundation which aims to gather and organize the businesses of master craftsmen and to encourage them to take on new apprentices so that the overall number of craftsmen can increase, as can their skill. While this is at cost to the Kung, the productivity boost should more than make up for it, and it should increase the power of townships furhter above the power of the various feudal lords.

Royal Scholar Academy
An offshoot of the Apprentice Academy, the Royal Scholar Academy is intended to teach, for the same intents and purposes as the Apprentice Academy teaches craftsmanship, the sciences, alchemy and magickry. It is too funded by the government. Unlike the Apprentice Academy, the Royal Scholar Academy possesses caches of books and relevant equipment on-site, to greater-encourage the pursuit of science and to better educate the masses. Lectures are held here regularly.

Hanseatic League
Main article: Hanseatic League

The Bohemian city Brüssel is the administrative center of the Hanseatic League, a trading league focused around the North and Baltic seas. The Kung founded this league to promote trade and unity between nations of this realm.

Inter-German Trade League
Bohemia, in a miracle productivity frenzy known as the Great Connection, has linked itself to the Great German Road and now participates in trade with Bavaria, Switzerland and Ostland.

Log 1
People rejoice, they love you and almost forgot that it was your wasteful military spending that led to their famine. Also, your research for gunpowder weapons seems to be gaining momentum(redirected last roll from prospection). Special troops: Grenadiers = 31/100

Log 2
We slowly try to advance our knowledge of magic and build more Burgs, but our backwards tech means that we are working a lot slowly in this regard than other nations.

Note: Gunpowder research DOES continue during this period.

Log 3
Kung will be happy to see, that full 2 new armies have been readied for war at your command! We are now the most powerful nation in the Europe in terms of military power! Also, our attempts at research finally pay off(+1 Tech). Overpopulation problem was solved in two ways - some of the peasants left and others decided to revolt agains their 'evil' overlords that leaflets spoke about, so they had to be put down. People aren't very happy with this.

Log 4
Vögelsen was happy about the ball Kung organised, but unfortunately one, two or even three balls like this are not enough to change what whole nation is thinking... And people are getting even angrier that Kung favours people who live at Burgs, while peasants who live dozens of miles away from nearest city can't enjoy his gifts. However there are good news too, a new hero rises in our country, his name is Ulrich and very soon, every peasant, craftsman, artist and soldier will know his name by heart, for he stand for everything that is Bohemia!