Post your Europa Universalis 4 Empire

[TheMeInTeam]

A rather modest Jihad run. I'm not a big fan of ALL WAR ALL THE TIME, so I started losing steam on the conquest train ~1600 (after I beat down the Ottomans for the first time). Formed Arabia and got Arabian Coffee the moment Jihad fired.

Russia was existentially terrifying this game. It appears to have PU'd and integrated Bohemia at some point; afterwards, it went on a vassalisation spree in the HRE. It had a bottomless pool of manpower – nominally 400k, but it was replenishing faster than I could kill Russian soldiers. Combined with their 350 forcelimit... well, wars against Russia ended in white peace. Ain't nobody got time fo dat.

When fighting crap like that, the approach is to use superiority war, micro carefully to quickly get +40 from battles and ticking war score, assault occupy provinces, then stab hit peace offer them to -3 and force end the war taking 20-30%. Doing so can be a 1-2 year job with a short truce, still worse than other conquests but it obviously gives them a ton of rebels and leaves them in shambles, so future wars get easier quickly.

 

[Clownie]

For reference, the last war with Russia involved me stackwiping about half a million Russians over the course of two decades, in stacks of 8-20 at a time.

I got 13 WS from battles that war.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

For reference, the last war with Russia involved me stackwiping about half a million Russians over the course of two decades, in stacks of 8-20 at a time.

I got 13 WS from battles that war.

Holy war or similar superiority vaults up war score from battles much faster somehow. I'm not sure if it's because it makes lesser battles count more, or something else, but it is trivial to get to +40 in a matter of months in many cases.

 

[Clownie]

Ah, I've noticed the phenomenon, but never did experiments with it and haven't logged it as objective thus far for that reason. I assumed the sheer size of our armies made battles involving fewer than 200k soldiers insignificant in Najd-Russia battles.

Didn't have a superiority war goal on hand in this one, though. Religious on Najd is, um, overkill.

 

[Dromido]

Did a very similar campaign as you in the Extended Timeline Mod starting as Pskov around the same time as you, in the same situation! What are the odds!
Very fun campaign though, I never formed Russia, Pskov looked way more impressive on the map

Yeah my friend kept on bugging me to form Russia but I loved the color of Pskov and the name Russia just seemed to original.

 

[Vendral]

Wanted to go for the Jihad achievement except with Shiite Gazikumukh. I'm a total newb who doesn't take his chances with war though (when Muscovy attacks, just call for Momma Ottomans and white peace out as soon as possible :s), so I'm not exactly any close to accomplishing the goal. I'm rather satisfied with the current borders though Maybe someday...

 

[Krajzen]

Don't worry, your empire is beautiful.

I prefer such obscure countries as Gazikumukh raising to power much more than yet another united Germany

And you have beautiful borders which is the most important thing for me. Your Gazi Empire looks like some historical khanate or Persian empire

About your eu4 niverse, what surprised me:
- Ming losing most of territory but despite that staying in consolidated form till endgame, usually it's binary 'stay united or collapse to 20 minors'
- SUCCESFUL ALODIA!
- Gemoan Ucraine
- RUthenia Potosk and Russia existing next to each other (after annihilating PLC)

 

[Vendral]

-snip-

Thank you! Also not only is Russia co-existing with Ruthenia, they're even allied and just have fought a successful war against the Ottomans! (while Ottos were fighting France with my help, to boot...) I was also surprised to find Oirat as the Asian superpower, it vassalized Manchu(!) and eventually annexed it, usually the balance of power is the other way around in my games. Alodia is often successful in my games, to the point where I was led to believe it was supposed to be some kind of an African major like Mali :S

 

[Apollyonna]

Got the Hessian Mercenaries achievement then turned Hesse into Westphalia. I don't think I have ever seen it myself so why the heck not. I am not yet sure if I will continue playing this and if I would, I would not form Germany.

Denmark, Finland, Silesia, Trier, Milan and Bavaria are my vassals.

Russia, Spain and Sweden are my rivals, France and Commonwealth my allies (France though now has the mission to claim Lombardia so I think that our friendship will be over soon.

I am currently in a war (you can see occupied lands in Netherlands and Spain) but the moment I saw France getting the mission, I started to march troops back home just in case they intend to fulfill that mission and break the alliance.

Coalition ? yes... pretty much everyone else

And for once I am at par with tech with anyone else, including diplo tech

 

[Apollyonna]

The latest to join my list of completed games is my failed Hesse->Westphalia run. The reason I say "failed" is because I initially intended to restrict myself to ethnic borders (i.e. Germanic culture group). It was really fun while I was within ~2/3rds of today's Germany - I had higher forcelimits and standing armies than Russia, France, and the Ottomans solely because all my provinces had been built up to pretty much Tier 4 buildings across the board. The perfect example of a tall empire.
...but then I figured I wanted more trade in Lubeck...
...then I felt the desire to eat some tasty, tasty Bohemia. I hated that stupid foreign-culture blob intruding into my otherwise pretty German lands.
...then my ally France DOWed Britain out of the blue, so it was only natural that I would do all the work, have Scotland released, and proceed to feed them the entirety of the British isles.
...then, after ~150 years of sharing the same dynasty, I finally got the chance to claim the French throne...

Well, y'all know how it goes

Didn't really bother going deep into Russia or Asia minor. Figured the best way to end the game would be to stay true to my country's name and origins: paint a phallic shape in western Europe (god, I love Scandinavia), pointing in Russia's general direction. I'm sure Napoleon would've been proud Well, aside from his client state integrating his homeland, that is. That could potentially create an awkward silence at the family dinner table.

"Not Iberia", as you can probably guess, is my client state, with its capital in Albania. It was basically a single war against the Ottomans at 75% admin efficiency and diplo ideas done. At that point, Russia was still my ally, so I used the chance to clean up their Caucasian borders as well.
The problem was, I didn't expect that area to be so valuable, and also didn't notice Russia was still at admin tech 28. I basically ended up giving them close to 200% overextension
Being a nice neighbour, I helped them kill all their rebels.
Then, while they were still at +7 unrest from OE alone, I DOWed them for the all-important 1-bt province of Kola. Y'know, the tip of Scandinavia

I could've finished eating Italy and proper Iberia, as well as going all Drang Nach Osten on Russia, but just couldn't be arsed. Basically, this ended up being a failed attempt at restricting my expansionist urges, while also failing to grow to an impressive size, as I got greedy too late, and didn't even commit to that properly.
A pretty fun game nonetheless.

Huh, I posted my Westphalia and then went back in the thread only to find your, much larger one. Very impressive

 

[Ibrins]

Huh, I posted my Westphalia and then went back in the thread only to find your, much larger one. Very impressive

Thanks, but you still have 105 years remaining. The increasing administrative efficiency can still help you blob a hell of a lot if you so desired Dear lord, that France looks scary, though. Would make for an awesome war or three The pope's kicking some serious arse as well.

By the way, if you were feeding that Denmark, stop. They always pick local nobility early. If you plan on integrating them, any land you give them in peace deals will cost you double. Get some better vassals there. It's pretty late, so you might as well create a client state, if Sweden and Norway are too big to vassalize.

Oh, and I just noticed your manpower. OUCH

At that point in the game I'm usually wealthy enough to field standing mercenary armies. Really helps with war exhaustion, manpower, fort assaults, and reinforcement.
If you look at my endgame screenshot, you'll notice I have armies of 40k and 60k. The five 40k stacks are my early, regular units consisting of 20INF-4CAV-16ART. The six 60k ones are my mercenary meatshields, comprised of 36 merc INF+24 regular ART. Lategame cavalry is underwhelming, so I usually skip out on it lately. Thought of going for 80-stacks of 44INF-36ART for almost maxed combat width, as well as max siege bonuses on level 5 forts, but couldn't be arsed anymore in that game
Anyway, in my last wars, I didn't even use my regular armies - those were used to siege Tuscany, while I handled the ottomans with my mercs alone. Hesse has some great merc-related ideas, and if you combine it with certain idea groups and build all your mercs in provinces with treasuries, you can easily field huge merc armies. IIRC, my regular INF regiments ended up costing around 0.11 ducats/month/each, while mercs were 0.21 ducats/month.
At the beginning of the game, regular infantry costs, IIRC, 0.24 ducats/month, so you can see those mercs are dirt cheap. Your treasury definitely allows it too

As some wise men have said in these forums, "YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MANY MERCENARIES I HAVE, AND HOW LITTLE I CARE ABOUT THEIR LIVES!"
Use those warm meatbags. Do it!

 

[amine99]

My ethiopian empire so far (1562)

• Achievement :Prester John

 

[Spontaneous1]

My Kilwa game before I was forced to abandon it due to ED.

I also own a large proportion of the silk islands, Ethiopia was my vassal.

 

[Mztr44]

Just fooling around Hungary game. I allied Austria and TO at start, DOW'd Poland before they could get the jump on TO and prevented the Polish PU over Lithuania. Stole vassalization of Moldavia which I annexed and sold to Wallachia. Grabbed Istria and Dalmatia from Venice along with Ragusa in a later war. Austria got uppity and broke alliance over desires for my provinces so I allied France and beat Karnten out of them which I released as Styria and force released Tirol. Later fed most of Austria to Styria and got them down to just Wien and finally wiped them out. Annexed Styria and culture converted it all. Forced Ottomans to give me Silistria so I could sell it to Wallachia and have them form Romania, followed up by force vassalizing and marching them. Released Bulgaria and vassalized+Marched them as well. Later I forcefed northern Germany to the TO to make them rich and then did the same thing to Milan so they could form Italy. I attempted to drop France as an ally and use my super best friends TO and Milan to force them to release their Dutch provinces and then try to forcefeed one of the minors into Netherlands but it backfired when coalition declared on TO and Italy + Myself just weren't strong enough to take France on our own.

Ottomans were really scary in the first 100 years. A tiny OPM Persia had popped out in Eastern Anatiolia which Ottomans vassalized. Then Timmies exploded and that OPM vassal turned into full blown Persia making Ottomans uber rich after annexing them.

 

[Sunspawn]

Just a wee bit more and Ming would've had full Qing borders...

Also, is it just me or is Bukhara more common lately in this thread?

*Ostentatiously ignores the two elephants in the room in the above screenshot.*

 

[Spontaneous1]

Just a wee bit more and Ming would've had full Qing borders...

Also, is it just me or is Bukhara more common lately in this thread?

*Ostentatiously ignores the two elephants in the room in the above screenshot.*

Both Timmy's and Muscovy collapsed/where beaten down, meaning uzbeks usual threats where removed apart from the Oirat horde who they seem to have beaten. With a strong Poland it's not surprising to see the orange of Bukhara slightly more often.

 

[Red John]

Just a wee bit more and Ming would've had full Qing borders...

Also, is it just me or is Bukhara more common lately in this thread?

*Ostentatiously ignores the two elephants in the room in the above screenshot.*

If the Uzbeks survive and thrive, you will likely see Bukhara, if the AI is weighted to form it.

 

[dragoon9105]

Just fooling around Hungary game. I allied Austria and TO at start, DOW'd Poland before they could get the jump on TO and prevented the Polish PU over Lithuania. Stole vassalization of Moldavia which I annexed and sold to Wallachia. Grabbed Istria and Dalmatia from Venice along with Ragusa in a later war. Austria got uppity and broke alliance over desires for my provinces so I allied France and beat Karnten out of them which I released as Styria and force released Tirol. Later fed most of Austria to Styria and got them down to just Wien and finally wiped them out. Annexed Styria and culture converted it all. Forced Ottomans to give me Silistria so I could sell it to Wallachia and have them form Romania, followed up by force vassalizing and marching them. Released Bulgaria and vassalized+Marched them as well. Later I forcefed northern Germany to the TO to make them rich and then did the same thing to Milan so they could form Italy. I attempted to drop France as an ally and use my super best friends TO and Milan to force them to release their Dutch provinces and then try to forcefeed one of the minors into Netherlands but it backfired when coalition declared on TO and Italy + Myself just weren't strong enough to take France on our own.

Ottomans were really scary in the first 100 years. A tiny OPM Persia had popped out in Eastern Anatiolia which Ottomans vassalized. Then Timmies exploded and that OPM vassal turned into full blown Persia making Ottomans uber rich after annexing them.

I love how the Ottomans lost Anatolia and then just Moved into Persia and Egypt instead.

 

[Mztr44]

Just a wee bit more and Ming would've had full Qing borders...

Also, is it just me or is Bukhara more common lately in this thread?

*Ostentatiously ignores the two elephants in the room in the above screenshot.*

I see Bukhara once in a while, but usually they don't grow as large as they did in that game. That's a Westernized Ming too, fielding 250k+ troops.

I love how the Ottomans lost Anatolia and then just Moved into Persia and Egypt instead.

Like I said, Ottomans vassalized an OPM Persia that got popped out of QQ, then Timurids exploded and gave Ottomans a full fledged Persian vassal.

To be honest, I was more intrigued as to why Orissa expanded so far into Indochina. I'm not really sure what happened to Russia. They started out fairly strong, owning all the Russian provinces and then some. Looked over some time later and they were getting gangbanged by the GH, Livonian Order and Finland and never recovered.

 

[Incompetent]

My Kilwa game before I was forced to abandon it due to ED.

Nice. What's your monthly income?

I spread out in a similar way with Kilwa, except I Westernised because I couldn't face life without trade companies. Non-Ironman and looks a bit messy (partly deliberate - in Asia I was going for a trade empire more than a straight-up blob), but I may as well put it up here as I think I will also end up abandoning it due to version changes.

(Not shown: also set up a CN in Australia.)