Venice

[yndenwal]

Venice is normally a minor country not playable in the Grand Campaign. A little tweak in a file and the Doge can play with the majors…
Venice has 8 provinces in Northern Italy, the Dalmatian coast, plus Corfu, Crete and Cyprus. A powerful navy, some good admirals. Very few generals and armies not so good (and expensive). The Venetian COT is one of the richest, and therefore very competitive.
The strategy is to make powerful alliances because Venice has not so friendly neighbours (Austria, wishing to discover a strange thing called ‘sea’, and Turkey, well you know the trick, expansionist infidels…). Keep the lead in the Ventian COT. Try to get some trading posts/colonies when possible. The aim is more to survive than anything else.
I will not write a detailed timeline here. Just some major achievements. The alliances of Venice will change (overtime, Hansa and Teutonic Order, England, Mameluks and Irak will be allies). An aggressive diplomatic activity tries at least to conclude royal marriage with lots of neighbours to prevent them to go to war. Royal marriage with Austria is a must, but when it expires and cannot be reconducted, it is not long before Austria start marching towards Venice.
Alliances on the other hands brings you into your allies’ wars and sometimes against powerful enemies.
From 1492 to 1620, Venice was directly declared war at on six times. The Italian minors, all allied together, were responsible for four (Papacy twice, Genoa once, Savoie once), Austria once and Turkey once.
Hopefully, Royal marriages with some Italian minors always prevented some members of this alliance to go to war against me. The Venetian navy was nearly always successful to fend off the enemies’ navies. On the other hand, the land war was extremely long and costly, inasmuch as Venice had no leaders. The chance I had was that when the Italian declared war the first time, I had been saving all I could for a few years to build an expensive fine arts academy in Venice. My treasure was full and all the money went into men, horses and cannons (too bad for paintings and nice stuffs). The first war (lasted 5 years, rebellions were appearing always more often and Venice was nearly bankrupt at the end) showed the annexation of two papal provinces and of Savoie. The second, initiated by Rome, very costly, ended with Venice annexing Rome and Tuscany. The last one initiated by Genoa with Portugal was hardly won but allowed the annexation of Genoa. Portugal, although controlling one of my provinces and besieging another one finally sued for a white peace... Most of the time, I was hopefully helped by my allies. However, wars for Venice are terribly costly and long periods of peace are needed to rebuild some strengths.
War declared by Austria was lost and Venice had to pay 250 gold (loan needed to pay) to Austria. They declared war soon after an Italian war and I had only a 6k army against over 50k Austrian.
War declared by Turkey was also lost and Venice lost a province (Albania) previously gained.
I was drawn to war by my allies several times. The trick is to honour the alliance and then do nothing, waiting for peace to come. Unfortunately, enemy armies often come sooner. One of this war (Turkey declared war on my Mameluk allies). Turkey engaged all its armies in Africa and Middle East, leaving Europe undefended. I could besiege and capture four provinces and was offered three (Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia) for peace by Turkey.
Albania, as a muslim province kept revolting (zero tolerance towards Sunnis doesn’t help) but after some bloody sieges to retake the city, the population dropped under 5000 and I was able to send catholic missionaries to convert the province to the One true faith… Just to be recaptured by Turkey a few years after.

During the wars, the Venetian navy fought honourably and this allowed me to steal the maps of foreign countries, giving me some access to new countries (with no explorers and no conquistadors, Venice cannot explore terra incognita before reaching fairly advanced land/naval technology levels, what is still not the case). The maps I got showed a path through the Atlantic to the Antilles, the northern half of the west African coast, the Red Sea and the western coast of India. Africa was not the centre of the colonial interest of other European powers. Only two provinces held trade posts. The Venetian settlers (I got one per year) began sailing past Gibraltar and along the coast. In time, I had 8 trading posts (two of level six in provinces producing ivory) and even one colony in Nigeria. Without conquistadors, the chance of establishing a trade post are not very high, especially when natives are present. The chances for establishing a colony are even lower. Fortunately (?) it seems that some Europeans before me had rampaged these provinces and only one still had natives. With an average 60% chance of creating a trade post, West Africa was Venetian after 20 years of continuous efforts.
Note that African provinces are not very hospitable and colonies cannot survive without a constant flux of colonists. So trade posts are a better solution. However, trade posts cannot supply armies nor navies. That’s why I decided to create just one colony in Nigeria. A navy there can fight pirates and will be the spearhead of future expeditions when my naval tech level will allow me to explore with all navies. Finally, during the wars Venice had to fight, nobody attacked these colonial provinces. Either my enemies were not aware of their existence or they did not represent an interesting enough target.

What next? Well, try to go on this good path. Venice is second in terms of victory points (but far away behind Spain). I’ll try to develop the overseas possessions and if inevitable wars occurs, try to take the best of them (and find a way to protect myself against a powerful Austria, which has Hungary as a vassal).

[Dark Knight]

Why not copy the strategy of Venice in your French GC and ally with Poland against Austria?
Also, what difficulty level are you playing on?

[Jiminov]

YND -
Thanks for this interesting summary of what's possible with Venice. It looks like you really tried to play this game as a builder rather than a pure warrior. I especially like how you converted Albania to Catholicism, a few questions for you:

• How much does the Fine Arts Center Cost, and what are its benefits? Did you feel any effects of inflation as you gathered up all your cash in your treasury to pay for it?
• Did you start any of the wars that you were in? Why the the Italian minors want to attack you so frequently, was it the CoT?
• Did the Turks re-convert Albania to Sunni after they re-captured it from you?

Thanks for the info!

[yndenwal]

Why not copy the strategy of Venice in your French GC and ally with Poland against Austria?

Indeed, why not? Because I have not really tried... ? ?

Also, what difficulty level are you playing on?

Hard, AI aggressiv

Jiminov : when it's first available, the academy costs about 900 ducas. With inflation, it quickly comes near/above 1000.
1000 infantry men cost 14.
With the settings I have, I earn 2 per month and approx. 100 each January. The academy increase the economic value of the province and gives an automatic bonus to stability spendings. It has to be placed in your capital city for maximum effect.

The only war I started (just to see how Venice did) was at the very beginning of the game against Milan (no alliance, smaller army than mine). I nearly lost and it was enough to understand that land war was not a good choice for Venice.
Therefore I did not start any war thereafter. Either I was declared war at directly or drawn into war by my alliances.
Italian minors: I am not sure. I realsie that when your merchants compete away a merchant of another country from the COT, your relation with this country drops. As everybody want a share of Venice (esp. Italian minors) and Venice do not want to let anyone in, the relation must drop rapidly. Moreover, the AI must think in term of alliances (is theirs strong, is mine weak?). I would have lost all wars against them if their full alliance had joined.
The Turks did not reconvert Albania so far. Its population has grown over 5000 again so it is not convertible unless some war or siege make it drop once again under the 5000 barrier.

[Jiminov]

YND - Thanks for the info. I'm looking forward to the next update as well. Despite the loss of Albania, at least you have the consolation of knowing that if you re-take it, it will be easier to hold on to now.

A little bit of follow up on the Fine Arts Academy. It sounds like a wonderful improvement, are there any others like this? Also, does it count as a 'manufactury' type improvement, so building it precudes you from making a brewery or weapons plant or other economic improvements? I'm really interested in this part of the game because I typically follow a strategy of building up my economic base before worrying about conquest.

[yndenwal]

Each province can hold one 'manufactory' type improvement. All increase the economic value of the province they are build in and give special bonus to a type of spending. All are more efficient when build in the right province (often depending on the trade good the province produces).

They are :
-Fine arts academy : increase stability spending. Capital province best.
-Breweries : increase Trade research. Best in provinces with Wine or Sugar
-Naval Equipment manufactory : increase Naval research. Best in provinces with Naval supplies (ie wood) or Fish
-Weapon manufactory : increase Land Tech research. Best in provinces with Iron or copper
-Goods manufactory : increase Infrastructure research. Best in provinces with Cloth, Cotton or Tobacco.

Moreover, maritime provinces can build shipyards (increase production capacity of ships) and the same exist for land army (I have forgotten the name of the improvement though).

All these are extremely expensive but having some is a must. They are only available when given level of Trade/Infrastructure/Naval Tech/Land tech are reached.

Whatever your strategy, trade, colonial expansion, war, economy is the key...

[Kevin]

A quick question on religion: Is it impossible to convert a province with > 5000 or simply much more difficult?

Also, what is the range of populations? How many does a Paris or a Constantinople have?

[yndenwal]

It is impossible to convert a province which pop is above 5000. However events can make the religion of a province change.
Population varies with time of course and Matthew has done a great job to make these numbers historically accurate.
Paris has over 100.000 pop at game start. SOme provinces reach 900.000 in 1792.

[yndenwal]

I'm looking forward to the next update as well.

Unfortunately, a crash while autosaving corrupted my savegame file and the other one I had was 30 years old. As I didn't want at all to replay those 30 years, I dropped this game... (this kind of mess is common with me. My brothers call me 'the gremlin' due to my special ability to make electronic devices fail/crash/misfunction...)

In short, I entered an alliance with England and Netherland which was peacefull. As I had reached the necessary tech level to explore with my navies, I had begun sailing southward along the coast of Africa and to North America. Established some more trade posts in Africa.

[Dragon]

I was really interested how Venice would do in the GC. Thanks

Venice is fascinating to me I look forward to playing it someday myself.

[yndenwal]

I wanted to try it because I too found it fascinating. Well, it's a hard way. Two angry neighbours, powerful on land, that want you no good make playing Venice an interesting challenge but with much reward and opportunity.
The first try I did with Venice saw it receive an explorer ithanks to an event in the early 1500's. It would have changed much I think...

[Dragon]

Well you did Venice proud. Good job

[Warspite]

This is about as old as they come i was still playing reruns of ghengis khan and EU was not even in my vocabulary when this AAR was written.

Enjoy!

[mzalar]

I am currently involved in playing Venice, and have happily fallen into an alliance with Austria, Hungary, and the Papal States (and at one point Milan, before it was annexed by Tuscany, and Tuscany annexed by the Pope). With these protectors around my flanks, I have been able to open up into the seas - virutally ignoring the defence of my Adriatic poperties, and concentrating on the southern Med coast. And since capturing a port in Nile, some of the rich states of the Arabian peninsula.
But the key is certainly the alliance.

Michael