I've been playing Empire: Total War again. It's considered one of the weakest Total War game, but for me I like the setting, the slow pace and the lack of micromanaging and have managed to rack up a few hundred hours of playtime.
I began this campaign a couple of weeks back, playing as the Netherlands. They're a maritime trade based nation that's small but spread wide. I was hoping to keep it that way, advancing to the end with no intention of winning the game, just shoring up my economy and culture and next to no expansion except into a couple of pirate owned Caribbean islands.
Empire: Total War can't abide that. The French and Spanish fairly immediately pounced on my fledgling protestant nation, and wouldn't pack it in until I had successfully occupied France, Spain, and almost all their colonies. By the end of the war, Spain's capital had to be relocated to an American flyover state. France was eradicated, along with a few minor Italian nations who got caught in the crossfire. Now their countryside is full of Tulips and windmills.
With an army or two left over, I decided I might as well pick on the Mughals out in India, who only had Bengal left after a long war with the Maratha Confederacy. I successfully invaded Bengal, but before I had a minute to enjoy some delicious ilish, the bloody Maratha's declared war on me and rolled a massive army straight in. Well I couldn't stand for that! I lost Bengal, but took half of India from them and eradicated the Confederate armies in short order. I made peace with them, but they clearly held a grudge because they used their peace time to immediately spam more armies. They undeclared peace and marched on Karnataka. Unfortunately for them, their sub-par line infantry and over indulgence on cavalry made them easy work for my howitzers.
As soon as India was mine, every other major nation immediately took a liking to me. It's puzzling; these major nations have been side-eyeing me and my (totally justified!) expansion for the better part of the century, but now are suddenly my best buds. In the same turn, the Ottomans made an alliance with me, as did the Prussians and Russians, and they cemented further alliances with each other. With a ridiculously high national income generated from several subcontinents, I needed a project, and decided I should now pick on the Ottomans. I broke the alliance and invaded it from three sides. Prussia did the noble thing of not coming to the Ottoman's aid. They instead marched their armies straight into the Baltic states, turning the med a dark blue. The Ottomans were a push over. It seems they were constantly suffering rebellions in their cities, they hadn't the money or the time to develop any technology, and when my elite troops marched in, it was on primitive dirt roads. The Ottomans are almost gone now, which leaves just a few big players left. Sweden and Russia are slugging it out, leaving my sights on the giant blue blob that is the Prussian Europe. My humble project to build a pacifistic nation quickly turned to a power mad empire.
