Not
strange as such, but I thought I'd post it anyway. This war's been raging a few years now. I started the war, but was woefully ill-prepared. I managed to capture the Austrian Netherlands relatively quickly, and made peace with the Netherlands (Austria's main ally for the first part of the war, and their only ally outside of Germania), thereby securing any gains I'd made.
My armies have been slowly whittled away, thanks to the Empire's superior manpower, as well as Austria's better technology. Their armies will be better.
Which brings me to this...
I have three or four excellent leaders, but the Habsburgs apparently enjoy the best commanders on the planet.
Thankfully, I've destroyed most of their (surprisingly good) navy, which means that at least my fairly large colonial possessions are safe.
The problem is, I'm now at the point where - despite several notable victories and their northern territories under my control - my manpower is basically gone. Any new recruits get massacred quite quickly as the Austrians butcher me in Lorraine and Burgundy (those lands have changed hands numerous times) - and I don't have time to train entire new armies from scratch. I tried this earlier, mustering around 25,000 men in Toulouse (my southern capital, effectively) - but, predictably, those that weren't killed were absorbed into
La Grande Armée (it's about 78,000 at present, but it was just under 130,000 at full capacity - each battle drains its numbers, though
)...
I have plenty of cash with which to try and hold out as long as possible (meaning, I'm not running too high a defecit so as to have to make peace ASAP), primarily from New France. My biggest hope is that Austria gets involved in another major conflict - Russia or the Ottomans, or perhaps even Spain (more unlikely, though) would be useful. IIRC, they were in a two-front war at the beginning, but then someone made peace.
Still, we'll see what happens...