My claim and other details:

Link to my Claim: http://imgur.com/Pv7AFgT

Nation: The Ganthian States

Leader: Thomas Sormania

Primary Color: Emerald Green (#50C878)

Secondary Color: Midnight Blue (#191970)

National Climate: Highlander

Grand Focus: Expansion

Weekly Focus: Economy

And for flavor, the history and current state of the Ganthian regime (warning: long read!):

The Ganthian people, who originated in the Ganthian Range, are an industrious race and excel in technical acumen. It used to be said that they lacked just one thing – a strong leader to unite the populace. Twenty years ago, that changed when the great and ambitious king Byron Sormania rose to power in the city of Harvis. A small town of about 5,000 inhabitants, notable only for its central location within Ganthia near the source of the Ganthia River, Harvis was transformed when a prospecting group bankrolled by Byron discovered diamonds deep within the Ganthian Range near the town. Using his political acumen, Byron had fended off all competition for the leadership of Harvis, vacant for a time as the last king of Harvis had died without any successors. Byron now stood to become richer than he could have fathomed as a result of the diamond trade. To the south, the wealthy, mercantile Rusnav Federation had heard of the discovery, and trade caravans were sent through the Losan Desert, proffering many gold pieces in turn for each diamond from the new mines of Harvis. With the citizens of Harvis now increasingly wealthy as a result of Byron’s initial generosity in distributing the profits from Harvis’s diamond mines, there was no opposition to Byron’s proclamation of the new Sormanian Dynasty.

However, Byron would not settle for merely ruling Harvis. The king instead set his sights higher, wishing to unite the entirety of Ganthia under his banner. Byron knew he would fail in any attempts to conquer the great cities of Dolmun (a famed trading entrepot of 20,000 located in the south of Ganthia, whose influence stretched into the Losan Desert) and Ricano (at 30,000, the first and most populous city in Ganthia as well as its cultural center). Using the great profits continuing to stream in from the diamond trade, however, Byron found that he could hire a thousand skilled Losan warriors as mercenaries. This added to the conspicuous military training program Byron had initiated a year before, which had resulted in a thousand battle-ready and reasonably armed, if somewhat unskilled, Harvis soldiers at the ready. As the Losan warriors traveled across the desert, Byron realized he could trap Dolmun between the Losan force and the new soldiers of Harvis, which he led on a march towards Dolmun. Finally, on the fourteenth day of the seventh month of the fifteenth year since Byron’s rise to power, Byron’s forces surrounded and attacked Dolmun. The fighting was brutal and resulted in many injuries and deaths, but Dolmun ultimately fell in a matter of days. Following this stunning victory, Byron left a few hundred soldiers to rule Dolmun and, if need be, quash any insurrections. The rest of his forces returned briefly to Harvis before seizing on the momentum of Byron’s previous victory to attack Ricano barely a month after the conquest of Dolmun. Again, Ricano’s resistance led to brutal conflict for Byron’s forces, but in spite of its defensible position, the city fell even quicker than Dolmun had previously. Afterwards, Byron and his forces quickly overran the rest of Ganthia. On the sixth day of the tenth month of the fifteenth year of Byron’s reign, the great king had finally achieved his goal of uniting Ganthia under his rule. The day was subsequently proclaimed a national holiday, to be observed throughout Ganthia. As the Ganthians say, however, a blaze of glory flames out quickly, and Byron was assassinated just a year after his triumph by the reagent of Ricano, still vengeful in light of Byron’s conquest and subsequent oppressive policies.

This tragedy left Byron’s only heir, the sixteen-year-old Thomas Sormania, ruling the entire Ganthian Empire. Where the tall and muscled Byron looked the part, however, Thomas seemed little different from the citizenry of Harvis, and his elopement with a teenage peasant named Haley did not help matters. These factors combined with a weak and bumbling first two years of Thomas’s reign to get the citizenry complaining. Finally, the nobles of Harvis forced Thomas to stand for election just as Byron had before winning the right to rule Harvis. This was a grave insult towards Byron’s only son and rightful heir, but Thomas would otherwise have faced the prospect of being deposed by the dissatisfied nobles of Harvis. During the election period, however, Thomas initiated liberal legislation granting significant powers to the Ganthian citizenry, whom he sympathized with after hearing Haley’s tales of woe under Byron’s heavy-handed rule in the last few years of his reign. Ganthia’s inhabitants then repaid the favor by narrowly electing Thomas to his rightful position, despite the scandalmongering efforts of the Harvis nobles.

As a result of Thomas’s enacted legislation, he then set up Central Assemblies of citizens from each of the three great Ganthian cities, granting them substantial control over local affairs. Thus, Ganthia ceased being a monarchy in the strict sense of the word. While Thomas remained the central ruler of Ganthia and the sole voice behind its national and foreign policies, the Central Assemblies now dictated most details of policy within the specific realms governed by their constituent cities. This configuration has resulted in harmony within the Ganthian realm and respect among the populace for Thomas’s even-handed rule over the past two years. Now, Thomas eyes the prospect of ensuring his legacy by expanding his nation into the fertile lands to the west of Ganthia. With the calm state of domestic affairs, trade and harmony between the Ganthian States and the Rusnav Federation, and only scattered tribes to be found west of Ganthia, the time is right for the Ganthian people to make all the lands north of Zilaneu their own.