Dismantling HRE

[Stigandr]

Hi,

I tried to search for this, but couldn't use the search facility for some reason.

I'm playing a game as Poland, I inherited Lithuania early on, so have been stomping on the Russian and Tartar principalities for most of the game. However, I've also diplo-annexed Silesia and taken a few Bohemian provinces. The Ottoman Empire isn't a huge threat, because England has set up a miniempire in the Balkans and I've forced Turkey to release Bulgaria, Albania, Candar, etc.

So, my primary goal now is to dismantle the HRE, because the HRE is understandably annoyed at my conquest of most of Bohemia.

My question is: how exactly is this done? It says "Elector X is still independent" - does that mean I need to vassalise every one of the electors? I assume if I annex any of them another elector will just be appointed, right? Also, I need to control the Emperor's capital (Bavaria at the moment). Does that mean I need to have all 7 electors vassalised, and then go to war with Bavaria and occupy Munchen?

Given that having more than two vassals is asking for trouble in MMP, I guess I need to do all this very quickly - eg, go to war with all of Germany, vassalise all 7 electors, and then occupy Munchen? Man that sounds hard!

What do y'all suggest?

Many thanks,
Stigandr.

[Mork]

Having more than two vassals is good in MMP. Highly exploitable (a bit too much in fact).

You have to control all the electors, so DOW them, take their capitals, dismantle.
If they are your vassals, they don't count, nither do your regular allies.

[Stigandr]

Thanks for the answer Mork! Do you mean that if I vassalise (eg) Bohemia, then it won't count and I'll also have to control their capital?

[Creature]

To dismantle the HRE:

All the electors must be either:
1. allied to you,
2. vassalized by you,
3. have their capital controled by you.
(any combination of the above).

Plus, you need to control the Emperor capital.

But! Be aware that MMP punish severly for vassalizing electors.
In regular intervals you will be hit by event forcing you to release your vassal, or taking reputation & stab hit.

[Crabapple]

easiest i would imagine would be to controll all the captials in a single war , doesnt mean it easy

[Szabtom]

I'm not sure what happened in my current game. I started in 1399, it is 1438 now. Austria lost the emperor's crown, Corfu became the emperor. Suddenly the whole HRE is gone, only the elector's remained. Playing as Holland, I fear for my tiny existence now! What happened?

[pac]

I just did this in a Brandenburg->Prussia game.

But! Be aware that MMP punish severly for vassalizing electors.
In regular intervals you will be hit by event forcing you to release your vassal, or taking reputation & stab hit.

I had (Elector) Saxony as a vassal, but no other vassals. While this was a case, I never got this event. Only while I (briefly) had another vassal - non-Elector Holstein - did I get it. But never while I had just one (which I did for decades). I haven't checked the code for this event, but from my experience it either doesn't fire at all or is much less likely to fire if you have only one vassal in total.

Anyway, that meant two Electors (Saxony and myself, Prussia) out of the way, so the others I had to do the hard way (it's the late 17th C). These were: Cologne, Mainz, Palatinate, Salzburg, Bohemia, plus the Emperor, Thuringia. My army is very effective and well-led, but not very large (not much more than 40K). I expect stab and WE to be the problems, not battles. I also have over 3000 d in the bank for contingencies.

First I had a core on one of Cologne's provinces, and they were allied with Mainz and guaranteed, of course, by the Emperor. It was good that the Emperor was a weak country (I'd also reduced the size of the Low Countries demesne by force-releasing countries during earlier wars). My Prussia was pretty strong, but having to deal with an imperial Austria all the way through this series of wars would have been quite difficult all the same.

So, Cologne, Mainz and Thuringia (including the last's Dutch territories) get completely occupied to stop them causing further trouble. I get back up to +3 stab in the process.

Unfortunately, for the rest of the wars I have no CB (originally I had planned to take longer and buy more cores - and possibly even cross my fingers for R&CR - but I realised that was all taking far too long). I looked hard for any third countries that were allied with or guaranteed by more than one Elector, but no luck. First I attack the Palatinate, which brings in Hungary (they are in a PU), but the Hungarians have no border or access so that causes no trouble.

My original plan had been to get back to (or close to) +3 stab again after each declaration, but I now realise that's not going to be possible. Under ideal conditions I can get a stab level in a year, but I notice I have all these 'Resistance to the occupation' modifiers, causing +0.01 WE each. Not much, but they accumulate. My current WE is already slowing stab gain (between this and reduced income it's taking about 2 years) and WE will only increase now even with no battles or attrition.

So I have to take the last two Electors in a blitz. I get back to +1 stab and invade Bohemia (which brings in Poland). After seizing their capital I head straight for Salzburg (with access through Bavaria). Attacking them brings in Austria, but the job is already done before they can mobilise.

The HRE is gone but I'm now at war with practically all of central Europe, my stab is at -3 and WE is ... quite high. Fortunately my army is intact and my enemies can all be bought off. I only gained about three provinces from all the peace deals (couldn't risk gaining too much BB along with everything else), but just getting rid of the empire sets the stage for later expansion*. The next few years are spent desperately getting back to safe stab levels, then consolidating and building up cash reserves again. But we are since well on the way to forming Germany.

Anyway, the main problem, as expected, was managing stab and WE (and thus time). There were no difficult battles, or even, thankfully, large sieges in this particular case.

(*The country to gain most quickly was, in fact, Austria, which conquered large chunks of southern Germany while I was still recovering. There's also been a fair amount of other consolidation wars among the German minors (Hesse has 5 or 6 provinces now, and Hamburg had 3 very nice ones until ... something grey happened to them) - but that just makes it easier for me to unite it while gaining less BB. )


If you were outside the HRE and had no Elector-vassals (or allies), you would need more CBs and/or to find more countries on whom you could declare who had alliances/guarantees from multiple Electors. Good ones include Lubeck and, oddly, Cilli (if still in play). Of course, the problem with such countries is that not just Electors but tonnes of other countries tend to guarantee them too. A good source of free CBs - like Unam Sanctum or R&CR - of course makes things much, much easier.

[Szabtom]

I'm not sure what happened in my current game. I started in 1399, it is 1438 now. Austria lost the emperor's crown, Corfu became the emperor. Suddenly the whole HRE is gone, only the elector's remained. Playing as Holland, I fear for my tiny existence now! What happened?

Shameless bump. Any ideas what happened?

[pac]

Shameless bump. Any ideas what happened?

What version do you have? I seem to remember a couple of versions ago that there was a tendency for really weird countries to become emperor.

[Szabtom]

It is 1.404. Maybe the problem is that Corfu's capital is outside the HRE?

[pac]

It is 1.404. Maybe the problem is that Corfu's capital is outside the HRE?

Yes, but the question is how/why Corfu should be elected in the first place ...

[Featauril]

Yes, but the question is how/why Corfu should be elected in the first place ...

The system does allows out of HRE emperors, it's just unrealistically hard to have them.

[pac]

The system does allows out of HRE emperors, it's just unrealistically hard to have them.

I know it does ... ^^

But there is no way that Corfu should be a potential Emperor less than 50 years after the start of the game! IMO, this is a bug.

[Helius]

It is, but it is a residual vanilla bug we cannot do much about.

[Szabtom]

It is, but it is a residual vanilla bug we cannot do much about.

Thanks for letting us know, Helius. I will restart the campaign.