Ming did the foolish thing of passing first reform and dropping their mandate to 20 while their army was still busy in Solon.
I attacked them for the mandate! First I had to take a detour to deal with Ming's ally Brunei. 2 of their provinces went to my ally Kutai - they might just as well have it if they want them. It didn't take long.
I discovered Ming managed to build a big fleet that could definitely challenge mine. I ended up stronger on seas, but it was far from total domination I was expecting.
On land I invaded Beijing and Canton - and I inflicted a lot of damage, but Ming managed to overwhelm both invasions with sheer numbers. I took Beijing and Canton and some tiny amount of money in the war.
48k peasants and 31 ships were lost on our side - while 102k and 29 ships on theirs. This was most embarassing naval performance.
Kutai called me into some petty war against Makasar, so I sent them some ships for blockading.
Kutai then lost Makasar and 1/2 of provinces I gave them to rebels because AI is awful at dealing with rebels if islands are involved.
My 5/5/6 shoguness even got -10% AE trait. Also +10% construction cost, but it's no big deal.
Age of Reformation started August 1522. And that threw Ming into even deeper crisis.
Ming was still holding it together, but they lost half their army and all their manpower reserves.
1:1 K:D ratio is not a good way to fight Ming
It was my job to give them a big push. I sunk their navy, fully blockaded everything. Armies were not doing too great, but I had secret second army of Ming rebels - Ming can't fight both me and rebels at the same time.
I took just Nanjing area and all their money, which feels like so little, but the goal was mostly to push them deeper into the abyss.
After that I had a detour in Korea. I went so close to clean borders, but I'd go 101% overextension if I connected to Nivkh, so that will have to wait. The whole region will turn into a total bordergore once Ming falls apart anyway.
Ming faced second wave of rebellions, and that really crushed their army, but so far it's holding together as a single country.
The way Mingsplotion typically works is:
- first wave of rebellions, Ming recruits everyone it can, so rebels get crushed, but they end up without any manpower
- 10 year gap due to recent uprising modifier
- second wave of rebellions, Ming throws their armies at rebels, and their army gets smaller and smaller - some rebels even survive that, but they're unable to break the country
- 10 year gap due to recent uprising modifier
- third wave of rebellion, Ming is without manpower, without even a single stack that can take a rebel stack, and there are often some leftover rebels from the second wave. At this point Ming breaks by events - with Shun attacking them for mandate, Yue and Wu turning into disloyal marches, Dali becoming independent tributary
- between Shun war for mandate, Yue/Wu independence wars, further rebel waves every 10 years, and then often Oirats or anyone else joining the pileup, Ming explodes into even more pieces
- then whoever is strongest takes the mandate, and they can't keep it high, so they fall apart as well - without special events
My war was after first wave, but I can see second wave happening and Ming's army is down to 36k with no reserves vs 124k rebels and more coming all the time.
I took exploration, religious, and expansion as my ideas. Not taking administrative and trying to conquer China is maybe not the best combination, but so far I failed to spawn any CNs. Not like CNs would help all that much - my trade network situation is awful, and the only way to fix it is to conquer 2/3 of China.
Hopefully the last picture of Ming in one piece
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