DBWI: What is the centre of this Empire?

Java? Can't figure out the color scheme to save my life, but it seems like the Majapahit became a truly global Thalassocracy, with bases influencing local politics all over the world.
 

Vuu

Banned
Strangely enough, I think that's a state based on the Low Saxon peatland region of the Rhine delta. Simply as that section seems to be the most "cleanly" defined. It could happen with some ancient PoD and a lot of luck, but still pretty out there...
 
OOC: I actually had no idea until I glanced at the Netherlands and was like “ooooooh”

IC: I’d be inclined to agree with TRH; the majapahit seem to be the best candidates for such an empire: they have a long naval tradition, have access to massive amounts of trade, and yet they have competitors all throughout the Indic ocean they might compete with and need to circumvent, hence the colonies. Certainly some backward European fragment couldn’t have pulled such an empire off, let alone remained centered there!
 
Colombo or thereabouts? I think it’s supposed to be Tamils forced to Sri Lanka going thassalocrat. The lack of presence in the Malay peninsula is what’s putting me off Majapahit. Malacca is their heart, there’s no way they’d let anyone else hold one side of the strait.
 

Skallagrim

Banned
It's just a wanked Dutch colonial empire. I assume dark green is the oldest territory, light green is more recently gained, and yellow is claimed territoy (that would explain Belgium being yellow-- it has seceded, but the Dutch still claim it).
 
The outward leaning Chinese must have ended up in Taiwan, first they corralled overseas Chinese in SEA into a ruling class for that region, and then began expanding out to more trading sites.

Everywhere else seems to be control over the mouths of rivers, ideal trading sites but hard to control if you aren't able to outfight the locals.
 
Colombo or thereabouts? I think it’s supposed to be Tamils forced to Sri Lanka going thassalocrat. The lack of presence in the Malay peninsula is what’s putting me off Majapahit. Malacca is their heart, there’s no way they’d let anyone else hold one side of the strait.

Perhaps it exists in the context of a land-based Indochinese hegemon, like the Thai or the Khmer. The Majapahits are unable to overpower them and take the other side, maybe due to bad luck or bad leadership at crucial moments, and so they've reached some diplomatic arrangement to settle the issue while they expand elsewhere. Most of their other possessions are small coastal territories, which might indicate that they still reserve most of their strength close to home to fend off the Thai/Khmer/Burmese/whoever.

It's just a wanked Dutch colonial empire. I assume dark green is the oldest territory, light green is more recently gained, and yellow is claimed territoy (that would explain Belgium being yellow-- it has seceded, but the Dutch still claim it).

I don't see how they'd have the population for this compared to the Asian territories. But we don't have a time frame for this state, so who the hell knows. It might even be some weird alternate future for all we know.

The outward leaning Chinese must have ended up in Taiwan, first they corralled overseas Chinese in SEA into a ruling class for that region, and then began expanding out to more trading sites.

Everywhere else seems to be control over the mouths of rivers, ideal trading sites but hard to control if you aren't able to outfight the locals.

Not every AH is a Sinowank, you know. It would take a long time to establish an empire as far-flung as this one, so are we expected to believe that a tiny Chinese backwater managed this, overpowering much more populous Southeast Asian states in the process, and yet the government in Beijing has done nothing to reassert control in all this time? Even though doing so would be extremely profitable? The Ming/Qing courts were conservative, not brainless.
 
A thalassocratic Lenape confederacy based in the Western Hemisphere? They did get a foothold in Europe for a while.

The Netherlands are much harder to conquer than Ireland however and the Lenape only blockaded it in OTL.
 
This is straight up more successful Dutch Empire. I'm guessing dark green are the areas fully integrated into the Empire, probably settler colonies. Light green is still being fully integrated, or is ruled indirectly by local puppet leaders receiving Dutch support. Yellow appears to be Belgium, which is possibly newly independent and claims these lands as their colonies, or possibly it's a union of crowns thing with one colony being de jure Dutch and the other de jure Belgian but they both de facto ruled by the same government. So the capital is probably Amsterdam/The Hague.
 
I don't see how they'd have the population for this compared to the Asian territories. But we don't have a time frame for this state, so who the hell knows. It might even be some weird alternate future for all we know.
Didn’t the Dutch conquer what is now Indonesia IOTL? And it doesn’t seem like the interior of the islands are totally conquered if @Skallagrim’s theory regarding the color scheme is correct. Perhaps the Dutch only really control the coastlines and the inlands are populated by heretofore unconquered tribes.

Also, one of green dots just above South America seems to correspond with the Dutch Antilles, and the blot around OTL New Jersey seems like an expanded New Amsterdam. I’m pretty sure this is just an expanded Dutch colonial Empire.
 
Didn’t the Dutch conquer what is now Indonesia IOTL? And it doesn’t seem like the interior of the islands are totally conquered if @Skallagrim’s theory regarding the color scheme is correct. Perhaps the Dutch only really control the coastlines and the inlands are populated by heretofore unconquered tribes.

Also, one of green dots just above South America seems to correspond with the Dutch Antilles, and the blot around OTL New Jersey seems like an expanded New Amsterdam. I’m pretty sure this is just an expanded Dutch colonial Empire.

OOC: Given that this is a DBWI, I assumed a perspective wherein the obvious OTL answer doesn't make sense ITTL.
 
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