For the newbies: cavalry gets double the penalty from terrain. That makes them near-useless in mountains. Gela's army was useful for attacking in mountains, but not much else.
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I like how you showed how painful attacking mountains can be. Indeed, terrain plays a very large role in EU3 warfare, ignore this at your own peril!
Some remarks:
- Royal marriages end when your monarch or the monarch of the other country in the royal marriage dies.
- While BootOnFace is right on that cavalry gets double penalties from bad terrain, this does not make them completely useless in bad terrain, as cavalry in general does much more damage than infantry. Still, it's indeed best to attack mountains with infantry or artillery.
- For newbies coming from Victoria or HoI: there is no such thing as a dug-in bonus in EU3.
Some remarks:
- Royal marriages end when your monarch or the monarch of the other country in the royal marriage dies.
- While BootOnFace is right on that cavalry gets double penalties from bad terrain, this does not make them completely useless in bad terrain, as cavalry in general does much more damage than infantry. Still, it's indeed best to attack mountains with infantry or artillery.
- For newbies coming from Victoria or HoI: there is no such thing as a dug-in bonus in EU3.
It's high time there was an up to date AAR for EU3. Thanks for taking the time to write one.
Since I haven't really played Divine Wind I'm looking forward to picking up some tips about the mechanics changes.
Since I haven't really played Divine Wind I'm looking forward to picking up some tips about the mechanics changes.
Lesson III: Mopping the Floor
So, this will be the tale of how Marti d' Arago consistently and surely crushes the inferior rebel scum....
Not really. These rebels are difficult nuts to crack. You see, rebels will often retreat into a neighboring province, let their morale refill just a little, engage you, then retreat again. Essentially, you keep winning against them, but you just can't kill all of them. This is known as ping-ponging since you have to chase the rebels between provinces many, many times.
However, it doesn't have to be this way! Through the use of some generalship we can murder all the rebels in a single battle. My favorite way to do this is to corner them in a province with only one province to retreat to.
As you see in the picture above, France so lovingly blocks the rebels from retreating anywhere except to Girona. If you can't tell, I have just defeated them in Roussillon and would normally be chasing them back to Girona. However, I've left three regiments standing in that province instead of engaging the rebels with my full army. Now when the demoralized rebels come retreating into my waiting stack..
This happens. Military tactics are extremely important when dealing with rebels. If you don't get rid of them as soon as possible, your army will be tied up in the advent of a war.
This was a short lesson as that's the end of the Aragonese screenshots. As you may be able to tell, I'm assuming you know -some- basics about the game, like where to access the menus and such. These are some beginner tactics and explanations that should help consolidate your knowledge. After this, we will be moving on to intermediate lessons, where we'll discussed more advanced mechanics like trade, technology, and national ideas.
If you need help with the basics such as user interface and the like, it's probably a good idea to read the manual or run through the tutorial, then come back here.
So.. who's our next nation?
Holland! We'll be using Holland to explore trade, technology, national ideas, and economy management.
So, this will be the tale of how Marti d' Arago consistently and surely crushes the inferior rebel scum....
Not really. These rebels are difficult nuts to crack. You see, rebels will often retreat into a neighboring province, let their morale refill just a little, engage you, then retreat again. Essentially, you keep winning against them, but you just can't kill all of them. This is known as ping-ponging since you have to chase the rebels between provinces many, many times.
However, it doesn't have to be this way! Through the use of some generalship we can murder all the rebels in a single battle. My favorite way to do this is to corner them in a province with only one province to retreat to.
As you see in the picture above, France so lovingly blocks the rebels from retreating anywhere except to Girona. If you can't tell, I have just defeated them in Roussillon and would normally be chasing them back to Girona. However, I've left three regiments standing in that province instead of engaging the rebels with my full army. Now when the demoralized rebels come retreating into my waiting stack..
This happens. Military tactics are extremely important when dealing with rebels. If you don't get rid of them as soon as possible, your army will be tied up in the advent of a war.
This was a short lesson as that's the end of the Aragonese screenshots. As you may be able to tell, I'm assuming you know -some- basics about the game, like where to access the menus and such. These are some beginner tactics and explanations that should help consolidate your knowledge. After this, we will be moving on to intermediate lessons, where we'll discussed more advanced mechanics like trade, technology, and national ideas.
If you need help with the basics such as user interface and the like, it's probably a good idea to read the manual or run through the tutorial, then come back here.
So.. who's our next nation?
Holland! We'll be using Holland to explore trade, technology, national ideas, and economy management.
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It was AARs like this that taught me how to play back in the old days of IN. I fully support this and recommend all newbies to stick with it.
Trade is probably the weakest part of my game, so I'll be interested in seeing what you have to say.
this is exceptionally well done - its clear as to the essentials without being trivial ... a much needed resource given all the changes in DW from earlier versions of EU3
A fantastic idea, gela, and one I will follow very closely. I've played a bunch of games of EU 3, but there's always something left to learn!
Nice Work, Keep on. Perhaps I'll learn something new in some episodes... :Thumbs up:
Great! I hope I can help!
Indeed. It's such a complex game you learn something every time you play.
That was my thinking when I made it. It seemed that the old tutorial AARs from IN were no longer sufficient.
It took me awhile to get the hang of trade myself. Coincidentally, I figured it out during a Holland game.
Thanks for the endorsement, Boot.
Thanks! I try to make it as enjoyable to read as possible.
Thank you, and great to have you along!
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Next update should be either tonight or tomorrow night, depending on when I feel like it.
Lesson IV: Getting Down to Business
Alright, I'm a tad bit later than I anticipated. But there's an update now, so we shall all rejoice!
Let's take a quick look at what we have to work with. Holland is a two province nation in the Lowlands. Our immediate neighbors are Friesland, Gelre, and Utrecht, whose provinces we need to form the Netherlands (Well, Gelre's isn't). But that's all long-term.
There's a few immediate problems with Holland's situation: small size, small forcelimits, and a highly aggressive neighbor (Burgundy) to the south.
These problems are all out of our control, but we can control one other issue. That issue, of course, is that we are currently the junior partner in a personal union with Hainaut.
A personal union is established through several means, including luck with a royal marriage, claims on thrones, unification wars, and in our case, history. You will hear a lot of different opinions about what to do against Hainaut in the beginning. Some suggest to wait for Burgundy to annex them and hope you don't get caught in the crossfire. Some suggest that you need to lower relations and wait for their king to die (hoping it comes before Burgundy's war).
Personally, I am of the opinion that we should - instead of taking a peaceful, boring route - declare war on them and let them cower in front of our additional.. one province.
To war!
"HOLD IT!" I can already hear some people shouting. "Why are you poisoning these beginners with that thought! What about the all-mighty and powerful Emperor and his death-bringing war machine?"
Well, despite your odd reverence for the Emperor, my dear friend, there is one slight issue with your argument.
The senior partner in a personal union always retains leadership of the war. Although the immediate implications of this may not be apparent, allow me to point them out.
We have already gained our new king, and all we must do now is end our war. Because Hainaut is the leader, all we need to do is kill a single 1k stack and siege a single province, then we win. Seriously. That's all we need to do, and we can often end the war before that because we're aiming for a white peace.
We don't annex Hainaut or vassalize it because Burgundy has a mission to take the province itself. So if we do either of those, we end up in a war with Burgundy. Consider that Burgundy starts the game with the most efficient, deadly fighting force in all of Europe and that they are considerably larger than us. I don't exactly like the prospect of fighting them, because I've only won a Burgundy-Holland war once, and I'd say I was pretty lucky.
So, let's go on down to Hainaut and crush their insignificant little force that dares challenge us! What? That was a little too dramatic? Ah, okay..
Completely obliterated, and we only lost 36 men! I wonder how that battle went, was their entire army asleep or something? You think they would've woken up after they heard the first person screaming from being stabbed in the stomach with a spear....
Regardless, it's time to begin the siege. So we'll leave our army here until Hainaut feels humiliated enough that they'll accept ante bellum.
In the mean time, we'll focus on trade, Holland's main strength. You see, we start at +4 Free Trade, and I used our slider move to max it out at +5. This gives us an awesome competing chance, so let's make it work to our advantage!
I put Lubeck up to green so I don't have to worry about moving it up for monopolies later. You see, Lubeck is arguably the most important center of trade in the world at this time, funded completely by the might of the Hanseatic Trade League. No worries, in a few years all the traders in Lubeck will be speaking Dutch to each other! (Hint: that's because they'll all be Dutch.)
However, red should be used if you only want the trade benefits, and yellow should be used if you don't want to waste merchants on monopolies.
We'll cover the benefits of trade and how to effectively use it next lesson!
Alright, I'm a tad bit later than I anticipated. But there's an update now, so we shall all rejoice!
Let's take a quick look at what we have to work with. Holland is a two province nation in the Lowlands. Our immediate neighbors are Friesland, Gelre, and Utrecht, whose provinces we need to form the Netherlands (Well, Gelre's isn't). But that's all long-term.
There's a few immediate problems with Holland's situation: small size, small forcelimits, and a highly aggressive neighbor (Burgundy) to the south.
These problems are all out of our control, but we can control one other issue. That issue, of course, is that we are currently the junior partner in a personal union with Hainaut.
A personal union is established through several means, including luck with a royal marriage, claims on thrones, unification wars, and in our case, history. You will hear a lot of different opinions about what to do against Hainaut in the beginning. Some suggest to wait for Burgundy to annex them and hope you don't get caught in the crossfire. Some suggest that you need to lower relations and wait for their king to die (hoping it comes before Burgundy's war).
Personally, I am of the opinion that we should - instead of taking a peaceful, boring route - declare war on them and let them cower in front of our additional.. one province.
To war!
"HOLD IT!" I can already hear some people shouting. "Why are you poisoning these beginners with that thought! What about the all-mighty and powerful Emperor and his death-bringing war machine?"
Well, despite your odd reverence for the Emperor, my dear friend, there is one slight issue with your argument.
The senior partner in a personal union always retains leadership of the war. Although the immediate implications of this may not be apparent, allow me to point them out.
We have already gained our new king, and all we must do now is end our war. Because Hainaut is the leader, all we need to do is kill a single 1k stack and siege a single province, then we win. Seriously. That's all we need to do, and we can often end the war before that because we're aiming for a white peace.
We don't annex Hainaut or vassalize it because Burgundy has a mission to take the province itself. So if we do either of those, we end up in a war with Burgundy. Consider that Burgundy starts the game with the most efficient, deadly fighting force in all of Europe and that they are considerably larger than us. I don't exactly like the prospect of fighting them, because I've only won a Burgundy-Holland war once, and I'd say I was pretty lucky.
So, let's go on down to Hainaut and crush their insignificant little force that dares challenge us! What? That was a little too dramatic? Ah, okay..
Completely obliterated, and we only lost 36 men! I wonder how that battle went, was their entire army asleep or something? You think they would've woken up after they heard the first person screaming from being stabbed in the stomach with a spear....
Regardless, it's time to begin the siege. So we'll leave our army here until Hainaut feels humiliated enough that they'll accept ante bellum.
In the mean time, we'll focus on trade, Holland's main strength. You see, we start at +4 Free Trade, and I used our slider move to max it out at +5. This gives us an awesome competing chance, so let's make it work to our advantage!
I put Lubeck up to green so I don't have to worry about moving it up for monopolies later. You see, Lubeck is arguably the most important center of trade in the world at this time, funded completely by the might of the Hanseatic Trade League. No worries, in a few years all the traders in Lubeck will be speaking Dutch to each other! (Hint: that's because they'll all be Dutch.)
However, red should be used if you only want the trade benefits, and yellow should be used if you don't want to waste merchants on monopolies.
We'll cover the benefits of trade and how to effectively use it next lesson!
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This is great! I just started playing EU3, and had no idea about trade and the importance of sliders. I wish I could go back and change what I've already done in my first game as Austria, without restrating it though.
"However, red should be used if you only want the trade benefits" What do you mean by this?
This is great by the way, please continue!
This is great by the way, please continue!
Those really important CoTs like Lubeck get a lot of products traded there, so when you'll have 2 merchants in that CoT you will recieve some modifiers that depend on the good you're importing and have a very wide range of effects
Alternatively you can get these goods in multiple CoTs, so if you trade in 33% of the world supply(you can see that in the trade map if you tip over a province that produces a certain good) you get the modifier
One thing i have to say is that Lubeck will soon be eclipsed by the stupid minors that like to build their own CoTs, only the colonial CoTs(Andalucia, Lisboa and those like Mexico) will be worthy to monopolise
This is probably really embarrassing to say, but I didn't actually know that until just now.
o
As a beginner that has read and re-read the manual and started and stopped numerous games with little-to-no progress, this has been an extremely interesting and useful read.
Will be eagerly following!
Will be eagerly following!
This is probably really embarrassing to say, but I didn't actually know that until just now.
No worries, it's only been like that since 5.1b.
Cabadrin - Glad to hear it! I hope this gets you started on some more fruitful games.
Also, Lama43's explanation about trade benefits is correct. Sorry for not clarifying that.
More detailed feedback will come before the update (whenever it is)