Austria getting steamrolled

[NoxMortem]

I've looked some strategies up in the internet but i always get steamrolled as austria. If i forge a claim somewhere against venice and go to war against them they call in so many allies that i simply get crushed. I tried to ally with castille but they refused to come to war

Then i tried to defend the HRE provinces against conquest of burgundy and what happened, burgundy crushed me in all my battles altough i got like 30.000 units and they only 11.000. They are on military level 5 and i am not, so the sieges go much faster for them with their cannons. I lost sundgau that way and tried to reconquest it and now a colation of 15 states have formed against me and switzerland is crushing me again. It always looks like my morale drops way faster than those of my enemies and my people start running away.

I thought austria would be "easy" and venice is described as an easy target in the wiki. I don't seem to get it. Ok i am a total noob in EU4 but i can not barely even make it to 1500

Any suggestions?

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

Instead of Castille try to ally France and watch some videos on YouTube.

 

[Clownie]

Cannons are MIL 7, not 5. Staying current in MIL is extremely important as the emperor, though, so set national focus to military if you're struggling with that and have WoN. Military tactics and morale are two very important stats — check your enemy's MIL level, and if they're ahead of you in morale or tactics, try to avoid battle.

I recommend reading about army composition on the wiki (short version: if army size is not a limiter, which it isn't as Austria, get up to combat width in close-range (infantry and cavalry (combat width is 20+n, where n is the combat width displayed in your technology interface)) units, then add some more infantry, then add as much artillery as you can afford. Generally, you want to have 4 cavalry regiments, no more, unless you're muslim tech or a horde or Poland.

If you're still struggling, grab offensive ideas as your first group (but remember that you still need to stay current in MIL). Shock is the only important leader stat early on — a 0/2/0/0 is better at fighting than a 6/0/6/6.

 

[NoxMortem]

Could it be that there changed a lot of stuff with HRE in the later patches or DLC's? If i watch videos on youtube austria usually is like +30 to +100 with all electors but i start iwth -100 to +30

 

[slee]

If you are loosing 30k v 11k battles it sounds like you are figthing on unfavourable terrain. Austria has a lot of mountains and you don't want to attack an enemy stack in such a province.

 

[NoxMortem]

Yeah but how to avoid that. As you said, most of my countries are mountains? Simply wait until they finally attack me?

Again lost a battle on plains.
24809 infanty, 9454 knights vs 16610 infanty 7000 knighs but aragon somehow got a shock 5 leader. Damn this...

-5.64 war score lost 11.384 men while they only also lost around 11.675 man but my morale dorpped to zero again...

Also attrition seems extremly sick... from Kärnten to siena which is just a few provinces away i lost 9.000 men

 

[Mafiabrett]

Yeah but how to avoid that. As you said, most of my countries are mountains? Simply wait until they finally attack me?

Have you ever learned how to bait an enemy? AI in this game very dumb when it comes to baiting.
What you want to do do is take a small part of your army, 4-5k at the least but you can make it bigger depending on how big the enemy army that your trying to bait. It needs to be big enough so when the enemy attacks it can hold out untill your main army reinforces. The whole idea is baiting the enemy to attack with you gaining the favorable terrain (Rivers/mountains, etc)

The AI will almost always attack smaller stacks, especially if your using your bait army and its sieging one of their provinces.

 

[NoxMortem]

Thank you this is quite a nice tip.

What i also do not get is how can it be that bohemia takes 4 of my provinces and i am not able to finish one god damn siege in salzburg at the same time? I have like 20k men there and 14k of them take all my provinces in the same time (no cannons yet, both sides are on mil 4)

In CK2 it was pretty easy to estimate how long a siege will take with enough men here it seems like extremly random with the dice rolls as main factor.

Also is there any way to find out how likely it is for an ally to join war? It is so frustrating to be let down by all your allies and loose just another war without any hope when you thought you would easily win it wwith poland and castille as allies. I mean the AI (last game venice, the game before burgundy) seems to get like a dozen allies and more all to join them or join the war over a coalition and i as austria can not get a single ally to join my wars?

This game feels so frustrating. In CK2 i had at least a clue WHY i fucked up and where. Here it just seems like "yeah. Whatever. Your 30k died here against those 10k because he had a better leader. Couldn't you just had foreseen this. Oh, yeah na, you don't need some allies in these war. You will do fine. Oh, by the way. Those 20 states have now joined a military coalation against you."

 

[Mafiabrett]

Thank you this is quite a nice tip.

What i also do not get is how can it be that bohemia takes 4 of my provinces and i am not able to finish one god damn siege in salzburg at the same time? I have like 20k men there and 14k of them take all my provinces in the same time (no cannons yet, both sides are on mil 4)

In CK2 it was pretty easy to estimate how long a siege will take with enough men here it seems like extremly random with the dice rolls as main factor.

Also is there any way to find out how likely it is for an ally to join war? It is so frustrating to be let down by all your allies and loose just another war without any hope when you thought you would easily win it wwith poland and castille as allies.

When you go Offensive Wars, you should see if your allies are willing to help or not and the determining factors (Debt, Instability, War Exhaustion, etc) They can also apply for a Defensive War, if you have a alliance with a country, open diplomatic relations with them go to alliance tab and hover over the "Call to Arms" if its a big X just put your cursor over it and it should say all the reasons to why they wont join your war. Most of the times its because of debt, distance between borders or a truce they have with a enemy. But if none of those 3 apply they will almost always join you in defensive wars.

As for a reason to why they are sieging you faster, check your war exhaustion. If it is extremely high, then your forts morale will start at half of normal and there for sieges go alot quicker for the enemy. Sieges can be unpredictable to.. sometimes it just comes down to luck. There was one time I tried sieging Ragusa from Venice, it was only Fort level 3 and it took 1,300+ days before I finally captured the province. I had a leader with 0/2/1/1 and a army comp of 8k Infantry, 2k Calvary, and 6k Cannons and it still would not give up lol.. Maybe the siege you were trying to do is just one of those unlucky ones where the defenders just kept getting lucky with rolls.

 

[MeatPirate]

Then i tried to defend the HRE provinces against conquest of burgundy and what happened, burgundy crushed me in all my battles altough i got like 30.000 units and they only 11.000.

Burgundy is a nasty opponent in the early game with their end node. As weird as it seems, you can often ally France before the Inheritance. This will solve your Burgundy problem and, well, most of your other problems as well.

Have you ever learned how to bait an enemy? AI in this game very dumb when it comes to baiting.
What you want to do do is take a small part of your army, 4-5k at the least but you can make it bigger depending on how big the enemy army that your trying to bait. It needs to be big enough so when the enemy attacks it can hold out untill your main army reinforces. The whole idea is baiting the enemy to attack with you gaining the favorable terrain (Rivers/mountains, etc)

The AI will almost always attack smaller stacks, especially if your using your bait army and its sieging one of their provinces.

This was mentioned in the patch notes and I've seen a noticeable improvement to the AI here. It still works, but is not as relaible as it once was.

(Un?)Fortunately the behavior seems to have changed, so that when their stack meets your bait stack on the mountain surrounded by your main force they don't attack (which is good), but instead pile their entire alliance on the next province and wait (for what, exactly?). In a matter of months their manpower is gone. This is an even better result than the mountain battle.

 

[herrmarisa]

Austria is allied to France in my game, so even when I attack France for an imperial reconquest, they come to aid even though they are a part of the HRE. This is how Austria rolls.

 

[NoxMortem]

Thank you guys for all the feedback. Sometimes in Paradox games its just good to hear some different oppinions s.t. one can stop crying and start conquering again

 

[NoxMortem]

I was not able to solve this through the wiki or googling.

When am i able to move my units into the regions of others and when am i not. When do i need military access and when not?

I was able to move my units from austria up the the hanse and when the war was over i was stuck there. Now i am ally in a war and can not move through france, but i can move through all other states in europe.

I am playing as austria if the HRE hase some impact on this

 

[QVarus]

I was able to move my units from austria up the the hanse and when the war was over i was stuck there. Now i am ally in a war and can not move through france, but i can move through all other states in europe.

I am playing as austria if the HRE hase some impact on this

As far as I remember: Any participant of an HRE intern war (both warleaders are members) can walk through all HRE, if one of the warleaders is the Emperor.

 

[dstarsboy]

Austria is the second most powerful nation in the game, there is no reason you should be getting crushed as Austria.

I think one of the keys is getting the Burgundian Inheritance to fire, some people mentioned waiting for Burgundy to attack France then jump in and keep the war going as long as possible until the king dies.

Second, expansion is actually really tricky now that they changed it so that you cannot vassalize electors and be perma-emperor without losing AI constantly. You have to keep relations up the good ol' fashioned way and can't really DoW inside the HRE unless it's for converting religious or releasing nations. Outside the HRE should be fair game as long as you keep your AE down.

 

[Awesomeguy32]

On top of what everyone else is saying, I also remember a discussion from long ago about Burgundy's generally adquate startup. However, that's all it is. A startup.

As everyone has said before, ally France. Usually, an event happens where Burgundy vanishes from the face of the Earth and its pieces are automatically divided between France and Austria. After that, France will likely break off with you and make you a rival- not a really fun moment, since France is the BBB.

However, that could be avoided under extreme circumstances if you work hard enough to keep relations good. In my last game with France, I reconquered French land from England and then unilaterally broke off my rivalry with them because I wanted an ally when I headed off to the New World. England was still hostile to me for a good 50 some odd years, but eventually they got over themselves and became one of my best allies for a good 150 years of gameplay.

Regarding Burgundy though, an alliance with France is best because most likely Burgundy has their hands on Calais at a certain point and France and Burgundy are inevitably rivals. Also, push extreme focus on military. Keeping current in the military is very important for survival, especially since Austria is the nation that spends half the game at war for one reason or another. When you start getting idea groups, my personal thought is to lean towards the defensive idea group. Defensive is nice since the enemy is likely to rush you and if I am correct, there's an idea where your military gets a bonus in seiges.

Also, beware Burgundy's economy. It has a habit of having enough money to spawn mercenaries, which is always annoying to handle.

By the way, when you go into these wars is it pretty much back to back (almost one after the other/at the same time)? Or is it spread out over a period of time? When you go to war back to back your manpower is most likely dipping very quickly, making it harder to hold up against a ton of nations flinging troops at you.

In summation:
1. Ally France
2. Always wait for an opportunity to attack Venice (maybe when they're losing a war/when they have no allies to call upon)
3. Keep your military up to date or even ahead a tech level if possible.
4. Beware the mercenary spawning (assuming that comes up)
5. ?????
6. Profit. And land.

Addenum: Regarding military access, ask nations that don't absolutely hate you. Military access in the HRE is pretty much making a pathway to your destination and then cancelling that access after you reach the destination. Repeat as necessary.