I hadn't much time to play lately, and I'm still busy, so the next update probably won't come before the weekend.
But I decided to at least share my plan on attacking Spain (yes I'll declare war on them very soon, since the game is slowly getting boring and this war will surely bring a new challange into it, probably the last one...)
So I'll most likely end this AAR when (if) I win this war (or series of wars) against Spain. To make it more interesting, I won't go to my full force limits, I'll fight with an army of similar size then Spains, but I have the weaker Eastern units.
So I have to win this one with a good tactic, not with pure mlitary strenght...
The plan:
The majority of our forces is awaiting orders near the Spanish border in North Africa (there is also the whole Milanese army stationed (50.000 soldiers), that is probably the reason why they have been so badly beaten by Austria). They are seperated into around 4 different stacks of varying size (from 12.000 to 14.000) - more are on the way (10.000 soldiers from the Khiva border(there are still enough left) and 14.000 from Thrace). The greatest stack will advance into Africa immediatly after the DOW and capture as many provinces as possible, before they meet any resistance, the other will follow one or two provinces behind (since those lands will be already taken from Spain there won't be much (or any) attrition).
When we'll meet the nearest Spanish armys (they have none on the border) the first stack will attack them if they will be outnumbered. Else we'll wait for them to attack (they probably won't wait if they aren't outnumbered). At the same time the stack, which waits in the nearest province behind will be send to arrive some days later then the Spanish army (is our forst stack seems to do a good job against the enemy morale they'll join the fight, if not the move will be cancelled and the first stack will retreat).
The Spanish will surely follow them and run into the fresh stack (and the retreat will be planned to last long enough to get reinforcements and new morale with the foirst stack - a lvl 5 advisor fopr reinforcement speed has been hired for that reason).
We'll use the same tactic if necesarry all the way back to Arabia and hopefully the Sanish army will be on to low moral to fight on or at least suffer heavy casulties from attrition in the captured provinces and from the battles.
Additional forces will arrive from anatolia and Asia and we'll also train one or two extra stacks, while fighting.
Eventhough that tactic might destroy the Spanish forces we won't rely on it. After the war will be ongoing for a few months 20.000 soldiers from Italy will begin to march toward Spain (Milan is still my ally and france is still giving us military access - from the last war against Spain), if we fight tough enough in Africa Spain will hopefully send most of their forces there and those 20.000 will take as many important citys from theit hearthland as they can.
Before they will arrive at the Spanish North border Gibraltar won't be blocked (our fleet will be just one sea province from it and thus they'll still block their ports and so increase their WE), but our main fleet will block it immeadiatly after they arrive in Spain (yes we outnumber them in ships).
On sea our ships have patrolled the mediterran sea and we weren't surprised to learn that none Spanish ships were there (they probably need them for pirate hunting around America, Africa and Indonesia - where they've also conquered some provinces). So as I already mentioned our main fleet (over 50 ships) will stay one proince away from Gibraltar (the one east of it) and so block many of their ports and also the entrance from the ocean (so Spains fleet will be useless). A smaller fleet (10 big ships, 5 galleys) will therewhile hunt down several small (3-5 ships) patrols we spotted in the Indian ocean (most probably pirate patrols).
We'll also use our huge income to finance spys, to decrease Spains stability.
But I decided to at least share my plan on attacking Spain (yes I'll declare war on them very soon, since the game is slowly getting boring and this war will surely bring a new challange into it, probably the last one...)
So I'll most likely end this AAR when (if) I win this war (or series of wars) against Spain. To make it more interesting, I won't go to my full force limits, I'll fight with an army of similar size then Spains, but I have the weaker Eastern units.
So I have to win this one with a good tactic, not with pure mlitary strenght...
The plan:
The majority of our forces is awaiting orders near the Spanish border in North Africa (there is also the whole Milanese army stationed (50.000 soldiers), that is probably the reason why they have been so badly beaten by Austria). They are seperated into around 4 different stacks of varying size (from 12.000 to 14.000) - more are on the way (10.000 soldiers from the Khiva border(there are still enough left) and 14.000 from Thrace). The greatest stack will advance into Africa immediatly after the DOW and capture as many provinces as possible, before they meet any resistance, the other will follow one or two provinces behind (since those lands will be already taken from Spain there won't be much (or any) attrition).
When we'll meet the nearest Spanish armys (they have none on the border) the first stack will attack them if they will be outnumbered. Else we'll wait for them to attack (they probably won't wait if they aren't outnumbered). At the same time the stack, which waits in the nearest province behind will be send to arrive some days later then the Spanish army (is our forst stack seems to do a good job against the enemy morale they'll join the fight, if not the move will be cancelled and the first stack will retreat).
The Spanish will surely follow them and run into the fresh stack (and the retreat will be planned to last long enough to get reinforcements and new morale with the foirst stack - a lvl 5 advisor fopr reinforcement speed has been hired for that reason).
We'll use the same tactic if necesarry all the way back to Arabia and hopefully the Sanish army will be on to low moral to fight on or at least suffer heavy casulties from attrition in the captured provinces and from the battles.
Additional forces will arrive from anatolia and Asia and we'll also train one or two extra stacks, while fighting.
Eventhough that tactic might destroy the Spanish forces we won't rely on it. After the war will be ongoing for a few months 20.000 soldiers from Italy will begin to march toward Spain (Milan is still my ally and france is still giving us military access - from the last war against Spain), if we fight tough enough in Africa Spain will hopefully send most of their forces there and those 20.000 will take as many important citys from theit hearthland as they can.
Before they will arrive at the Spanish North border Gibraltar won't be blocked (our fleet will be just one sea province from it and thus they'll still block their ports and so increase their WE), but our main fleet will block it immeadiatly after they arrive in Spain (yes we outnumber them in ships).
On sea our ships have patrolled the mediterran sea and we weren't surprised to learn that none Spanish ships were there (they probably need them for pirate hunting around America, Africa and Indonesia - where they've also conquered some provinces). So as I already mentioned our main fleet (over 50 ships) will stay one proince away from Gibraltar (the one east of it) and so block many of their ports and also the entrance from the ocean (so Spains fleet will be useless). A smaller fleet (10 big ships, 5 galleys) will therewhile hunt down several small (3-5 ships) patrols we spotted in the Indian ocean (most probably pirate patrols).
We'll also use our huge income to finance spys, to decrease Spains stability.
)
