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PrawnStar

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Feb 21, 2007
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I’ve finally decided to try my hand at this AAR business, after a year of lurking and a year in the forums. Now I do have some experience of writing, unfortunately I write errata and update notes for software so don’t expect much in the way of style :eek:

This is a Castile Grand Campaign played in EU3 v1.3 on Very Hard, no mods.

The objective is to spread the Catholic faith. I doubt I will manage to make half the world Catholic but that might just be achievable…

House rules are no cheats, no restarts and no turbo-annexations. If a reader feels a tactic is ‘gamey’ say so, I’d prefer to avoid anything like that. Comments are welcome.


The Plan

Short term​

I’m going to take advantage of the Permanent CB on Granada to quickly conquer as much of Muslim North Africa as I can at low BB and stab cost. I want to diploannex my Christian neighbours.

Medium term​

Diploannex at least one other European major – France/Burgundy/England while adding non Christian provinces in either the Americas or West Africa.

Long term​

BB war fuelled WC (Remember no Turbos) – probably before 1600, maybe 1550.

Of course we all know what happens to plans :)
 
Update 1

Update 1

I could show you a map but if you don’t know what Castile looks like at the start, shame on you!

Juan II is the King, at A/D/M 4/4/5 he’s … suboptimal.

I start with a 5* Theologian, Tomas de Torquemada. I also take a 4* Stab guy and a 4* Diplomat. All should be needed pretty soon. Conversions are expected, as is BB accumulation, which is bad (at the moment) and Stab at +1 before a slider move (to narrowminded) is too low - +3 pays more in census tax so getting there quickly is good. I tend to ignore the tech boost guys, nice to have if there is nothing better but the benefits are small in the scale of the empire I expect to acquire.

Research is focused on Production, Gov’t will research fast enough with neighbour bonus – everyone in the Latin tech group will go for it first.

Religious Tolerance is full for Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims. Pagans will probably be tolerated in place of Orthodox later.

Domestic sliders, I’ll move to full narrowminded as a priority (missionaries) after that the stab cost of a move becomes a concern. I prefer to play at +3 because I’m a tax loving warmonger (Guess that makes me a Blairite :eek: )
 
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Update 2

Update 2

Juan II promptly dies and is replaced with the much funkier Juan III – A/D/M 8/6/8. This King will not be converted into a general even if it means wasting a few thousand manpower.

The Eve of War

EU3_1.jpg


Granada is allied with Morocco.

Juan III also dies very quickly :mad: , to be replaced by Juan IV – A/D/M 4/7/6

Granada is quickly beaten, losing Almeria, Gibraltar and 50 Ducats. War continues against alliance leader Morocco.

Peace

EU3_2.jpg


Portugal captured Tangiers, hence its return to Morocco. I’ll take it next time around. BB is 5.79 reducing at 0.9 a year – I don’t expect any war until the next round with Granada.

I still don’t have my first NI – busy researching Production 1 instead (due July 1464). I’ll take QftNW (Like Portugal, England and Scotland) but serious colonisation will wait until I’ve workshopped up. The diplomatic situation needs working on, neither Navarre nor Portugal have been willing to enter into RMs although relations are good.

20/10/1456 – Navarre accepts vasselisation.

01/07/1458 – Almeria is converted to Catholicism

02/08/1458 – Colony established on Cape Verde

23/04/1459 – Algiers inherits Tunisia, that’s good news as far as I’m concerned – lower BB cost to conquer Tunis.

Portugal accepts vasselisation

EU3_3.jpg


That’s been three years of diplomats and bribes. It’s utterly worthwhile, the sooner I can annex Portugal the better. As I see it there are two problems with Portugal, firstly the longer they have to colonise the harder they are to absorb, secondly they might, just might, go Protestant or Reformed and spread that all over the globe.

02/10/1459 War with Granada and Morocco

05/03/1460 Pernambuco discovered – Brazil is a dream start for a colonial empire, valuable with few aggressive natives or neighbours. Elsewhere, Portugal’s colonies south of Morocco are destroyed by native uprisings, useful if it keeps the BB cost of DAing Portugal down.

25/02/1461 Peace gaining Tangiers, Safi, Ifni, Sus, 100 ducats and some cores. Both Granada and Morocco are now OPMs. BB is 6.62.

Peace again

EU3_4.jpg


The war was boring, careful prepositioning meant I claimed all the sieges, overwhelming troop numbers and endless streams of Portuguese reinforcements won all the battles.

Elsewhere Pernambuco has been colonised and the Brazilian coast is being explored.
 
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Very aggresive start. Conquering granada then Morocco. Vassalising Portugal and then conquering Morocco again! Maybe your BB wars will start sooner than you think.
 
Feedback time

I played a lot of EU2, so I have a chronic aversion to having no BB to burn. The muslim minors will probably be left as OPMs until Big Red Button time at which point they'll die fast.

I need provinces to target for conversion, might as well get busy. BB wars aren't too likely quite yet, I'm losing BB at 0.9 a year.
 
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Swift, brutal and efficient. :) Those North African provinces will drag down your tech speed, but that's the price of empire.

Only piece of advice is - watch France. They're your only real threat.
 
No hanging around.

And congratulations on starting your first AAR.
 
Feedback time

merrick - France has started strongly, by 1465 five of the six vassels have already been absorbed. DV/DA is probably the answer.

spl - Thanks!

Capibara - More than any other Christian power, conversion based goals seem right for Castile.

stnylan - I've been thinking about doing an AAR for quite a while and having a post count over 1000 without writing one seems a bit lazy.

Enewald - WC should be easy with Castile (Not Spain) although the 'no Turbo' rule will also make it boring - I won't be surprised if Samarkand or Cairo has to be taken over 20 times. The best way to think of BB is as a game device to stop you wasting stability and diplomats - 1500 points at game end sounds about right :cool:

The challenge will be in the conversion goal.

Thanks to all who've viewed as well as those who've commented. The next update will probably be tomorrow as it's friday night, beer and strategy don't mix :D
 
EU3 isnt my speciality, but this is good work. An agressive start, though, if there ever was one. Lets hope you can keep this up without agrivating someone like France or England.
 
You look to be doing pretty well, those early wars got you lots of land. Hopefully you won't get too much BB too early.
 
Update 3

Update 3

What is wrong with my Royals? J4 dies 25/08/1462! More joy, there’s a Regency Council A/D/M – 7/4/7. Decent stats but I can’t declare war!

19/02/1463 Gibraltar converts.

01/12/1463 Production 1 – I can now build workshops, it’s something to do while the Regency lasts.

29/01/1465 Sus converts.

The advisor pool is full of artists – I swap my 4* for a 6* - Stab costs are rising rapidly, I’m at +2 and I may lose a point of that as soon as I can move sliders.

21/12/1465 The 5* Missionary’s Great Man event fires – The timing isn’t great, I can only use one of the stab points but I take the +3 stab, at least it’s just before the census tax is due.

05/04/1466 A new King, Juan V A/D/M – 8/4/5

Aragon’s Kings die even faster than mine; by the end of May I’ve had two royal marriages with them – relations at +200 but they are allied to the usual pack of minors so further diplomacy will have to wait a little longer.

Quick stats moment:

BB = 3.12 (declining at 0.6)
Inflation = 1% (Don’t ask :eek:o )
Monthly income = 40.8
Census Tax = 143.9

About half of mainland Spain has workshops and all bar one of the Moroccan provinces are awaiting conversion.

Colonial Intelligence Update:

Portugal – seems to be obsessed with the Coastal strip between Morocco and Mali. Undefended colonies in 5000 strong Aggressiveness 9 Ferocity 4 provinces is a slow business. There’s good and bad here, on one hand I won’t be able to DA some high value colonies, on the other the BB cost of DAing Portugal will stay low.

England – I think they are heading for Northern Canada (That’ll be a series of wars against level three forts and technologically equal enemies in hard winter terrain. Again! The English AI can be so obsessed with getting to Kansas that the only rational observation is they want to colonise Oz).

Scotland – the only Scottish colonist I’ve seen was heading for Patagonia. Scotland tends to be a speed bump on the highway to glory so I’m not too worried – of course if say France was to inherit I might regret that attitude.

04/11/1466 Navarre declines annexation, the chance was ’unlikely’ but if you don’t ask…

26/12/1467 Tangiers is converted.

17/04/1467 Boundary dispute – Gain a core on Marrakech – Yes please!

Decisions, decisions.

My King is diplo 4 – I won’t be sweet talking Navarre or Portugal anytime soon with this guy. Morocco is allied to Granada and Algiers, which has already inherited Tunisia. So should I try and DA my neighbours or go after Muslim provinces. If it’s war what should my goals be?
 
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With a low-diplo King, and low BB, I think you can afford one more round of conquest in North Africa. Portugal doesn't appear to be growing fast, and time and Castilian expansion will make the DA easier. Grab some goodies now, and then colonise, convert and build workshops while waiting for BB to come down and a better King.