How to win the 100 years war as England

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Solution
As some have said you can either get loans and use mercs to beat down France alone with more troops or you can restart until Burgundy, Aragon or castile (or 2-3 of them if you can) are friendly with you and rivalled to France or want their land so you can ally them and call them into the war promising land and giving them nothing. Make sure to improve relations with any nations that may join a coalition while at war and make sure you don't finish the war with France until after the war of the roses event has fired. When this event starts you get a new ruler and will lose the PU if you peace out before it.

Some players will now conquer France as England (rather than forcing the PU) due to enforcing PU's giving higher AE now, but you can...
You need allies. Specifically, Burgundy, Castile, and/or Aragon. Ideally, you'd want two of them at least. Promise them land and then screw them over in the peace deal. You can even let them siege down your ally, while you occupy Paris, etc. There's a bit of luck involved, so you may need a few restarts until you have the allies you need.

I'm sure someone has another method involving tons of loans and mercs, but I think the promise land strategy above is good enough so that you're not too overextended depending on when the War of the Roses triggers.
 
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You need allies. Specifically, Burgundy, Castile, and/or Aragon. Ideally, you'd want two of them at least. Promise them land and then screw them over in the peace deal. You can even let them siege down your ally, while you occupy Paris, etc. There's a bit of luck involved, so you may need a few restarts until you have the allies you need.

I'm sure someone has another method involving tons of loans and mercs, but I think the promise land strategy above is good enough so that you're not too overextended depending on when the War of the Roses triggers.
This is especially effective if you're using nations you plan to betray later, or even better, who won't be an issue later due to falling under PU's in events. This makes specifically Burgundy and Aragon very well suited for such alliances, as they won't begrudge you your win long-term, as they won't exist as independent entities.
 
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This is especially effective if you're using nations you plan to betray later, or even better, who won't be an issue later due to falling under PU's in events. This makes specifically Burgundy and Aragon very well suited for such alliances, as they won't begrudge you your win long-term, as they won't exist as independent entities.
Agreed. And Castile is destined to be a rival either way, so that works well.
 
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Sell Maine to someone else as well as get Allies. I typically sell Maine to Province and rival them to get Humiliate CB. France dumps them as an ally because of desire for Maine and that usually makes the war easy.

I recently played an England game though and had all my allies go Domineering and cancel Alliance (Castile, Burgundy, Leinster, and Portugal all did this) when War of Roses broke out. Seems like something new for update. Can anyone explain?
 
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I recently played an England game though and had all my allies go Domineering and cancel Alliance (Castile, Burgundy, Leinster, and Portugal all did this) when War of Roses broke out. Seems like something new for update. Can anyone explain?
You had royal marriages with them, War of Roses introduces and heir of a different dynasty, eliminating chances of PU for them. Same results as introduce heir button.
 
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Sell Maine to someone else as well as get Allies. I typically sell Maine to Province and rival them to get Humiliate CB. France dumps them as an ally because of desire for Maine and that usually makes the war easy.

I recently played an England game though and had all my allies go Domineering and cancel Alliance (Castile, Burgundy, Leinster, and Portugal all did this) when War of Roses broke out. Seems like something new for update. Can anyone explain?

When I played as GB I had no idea why Portugal suddenly hated me they were 'domineering' despite my fleet and my colonial holdings being much larger then theirs.
 
So basically ally Castile and Burgundy and then throw them under the bus?

Or Aragon and Austria, or any combination thereof. Depends on who rivals who.

Austria is not a reliable ally for the HYW, in my experience. I don't think they want enough French land to make it worth their while.
 
I just restarted until both Burgundy and Aragon where not rivalled to each other or me and both either rivalled France or wanted French land. Allied both of them and called them in with promise of land. In my game France was bugged and their troops just stayed away from me while we wiped their vassals troops and won the war easy.

You can promise land to get them to join but you are unable to give allies land or take land yourself (at least in this war). I don't know it that is a bug or just a new feature where you can't take land when forcing a PU but I also lost no trust with them for not giving them land lol
 
I just restarted until both Burgundy and Aragon where not rivalled to each other or me and both either rivalled France or wanted French land. Allied both of them and called them in with promise of land. In my game France was bugged and their troops just stayed away from me while we wiped their vassals troops and won the war easy.

You can promise land to get them to join but you are unable to give allies land or take land yourself (at least in this war). I don't know it that is a bug or just a new feature where you can't take land when forcing a PU but I also lost no trust with them for not giving them land lol

You can't take or give out land if you do not also enforce the union.
 
You can skip the 100 years war entirely if you sell Maine to Brittany before the event fires. Be sure to exploit manpower from the province before you sell!

A neat trick is to engage a manpower advisor, enact the state bonus for manpower in the provinces you want to exploit for manpower and then exploit development from the continental provinces, this gives you most of the manpower you need for the first English mission, which allows you to fight France on your own terms slightly later than the Surrender of Maine event would otherwise trigger.
 
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You can't take or give out land if you do not also enforce the union.

Enforce the union and the cede provinces if greyed out.



Edit. I used console commands on Austria for the Bohemia and Hungry PU wars. Was able to take land from both while enforcing a PU but multiple times as England I can't. So it only happens for the HYW war to Enforce? Seems its only England not being able to take land during the surrender of Maine war because even ad France offering yourself as a PU to England you can't give them land either. Guessing its because its not a normal enforce union war like the succession wars or PU mission CB's other nations get.
 
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Well with the recent updates to PU AE, good luck even if you score the union. You'll get a huge coalition that could spell doom to your union.

Best way to win the war is to chip away at France's land using Gascony, Champagne, or other vassals you can release for land. Sell Maine, release Gascony, get good allies (Preferably Austria, Castile and/or Burgundy; but for Burgundy, send them a royal marriage and not them to you first for a chance at the inheritance), stockpile money and manpower.
 
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Enforce the union and the cede provinces if greyed out.



Edit. I used console commands on Austria for the Bohemia and Hungry PU wars. Was able to take land from both while enforcing a PU but multiple times as England I can't. So it only happens for the HYW war to Enforce? Seems its only England not being able to take land during the surrender of Maine war because even ad France offering yourself as a PU to England you can't give them land either. Guessing its because its not a normal enforce union war like the succession wars or PU mission CB's other nations get.
Interesting, it's probably the result of Paradox having changed around this CB to work as a reconquest war for France on the other and. I'm only guessing but they've probably created a custom CB and must have disabled/forgot to enable the possibility for the attacker to take land in the war. I'd make a bug report about it, just because other PU CBs allow the attacker to take land, provided you enforce the PU first, and this one doesn't, even if as the others pointed out you get so much AE just from the PU anyways that taking land is counterintuitive and it would aggravate the AE situation. But it cheeses the war if it still allows you to call in allies with a promise of land and they don't get mad because the CB doesn't allow any land to be taken.
 
Well with the recent updates to PU AE, good luck even if you score the union. You'll get a huge coalition that could spell doom to your union.

Its easy to avoid a coalition by just improving relations with anyone that would join one while the war is on going. You'll have plenty of time to do this since you'll want the war of the roses event to fire while still at war with France so as to avoid the PU ending when you get a new ruler from the event.
 
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Its easy to avoid a coalition by just improving relations with anyone that would join one while the war is on going. You'll have plenty of time to do this since you'll want the war of the roses event to fire while still at war with France so as to avoid the PU ending when you get a new ruler from the event.
Will that still fill up your army with rebels to force limit if you are at war?

Seems like a really easy exploit it you can avoid going bankrupt from occupations.