Awkward and involuntary personal union

[EmilAmundsen]

A couple of years into my Portugal campaign I get this event where England suddenly becomes a junior partner in a personal union. France decleares war as part of the event, but my allies win (England just sat there inactive for some reason).

So now the giant England with more provinces than it started with is my pu-subject, with 100% liberty desire. I'm tiny start-out portugal, not even close to colonizing-tech yet. And I'm wondering, what the fck do I do? They have +168 relation to me, does that keep them peaceful? Can I get some kind of benefit out of them before they crush me in a liberty-war? Any way to get out of this mess without taking the -25 prestige hit (it would be disasterous at this point in the game)? Any ideas? Help!

 

[Sfan]

First off, a 25 prestige hit is absolutely meaningless, so you should not be afraid of taking it if you can't keep the union. Nonetheless, there are ways to make England loyal.

Check the modifiers for their liberty desire and what puts them at 100% LD, and tell us which DLC you do have, and there will be options (even if most of them come with DLC, especially Common Sense and Rights of Man). What always works is to boost your army size and not to be behind in diplomatic technology, and also to boost your diplomatic reputation. If you have good allies, you should not really be afraid of them declaring however. I think you should keep England around, that's an excellent opportunity.

 

[Eviota]

To lower LD in a PU subject,

1. Fund the loyalists : quite costly, especially when you are smol Portugal and not yet GLORIOUS EMPIRE !
2. Develop their lands : choose the lowest cost, one dev click = -5% ticking by -0.1 each month and adding up (to 100/200%?)
3. Up your prestige : -1 prestige = +1%LD !

If you are in a truce, you have some time to breath. The bad thing could be France (unlikely because they have mutual cores so low reputation) or one of your rival (Morocco ?!) support England independence.

Another thing : I've noticed that Subjects are less likely to pick Explo/Expansion ideas (some of my runs where Aragon PU'ed Castile quite early and Castile chose other ideas than the railway Exp²). Thus, it won't be a colonial contender, but it also won't help you. Anyways, subjects colonies are still buggy so it's still an advantage for you.

 

[pttaylor]

As long as their opinion of you is positive they won't drop out on monarch death, so only independence wars matter. AFAIK, the AI won't ever declare an independence war whilst the overlord is at war, so staying at war a lot could help. I think they also don't declare at less than 100%, even though they become 'disloyal' at 50%. The previous posters listed most of the modifiers for LD; opinion also matters a lot but +168 is close to maxed. Try to get more dev and a bigger army while you still have a truce. Staying up to date in Dip tech may slow your colonizing game, but if LD is over 100 anyway you might just ignore that.
England will not participate in your wars when their LD is over 50%, which would be why they didn't help when France contested; the AI may not factor that in though, so it'll probably help you avoid eg. Morocco declaring war on you. England won't pick Exploration idea group while a subject nation.

 

[EmilAmundsen]

Thanks for the sage advice guys. I continued for a few months and discovered that it did provide a few perks in the form of great power status and some power projection and pretige. So that's nice

@Sfan England got 100% Liberty desire because of the modifier "Power relative to Portugal: 155%". So I guess growing bigger than England will solve it. I guess with that modifier being so wicked growing is all I can do. I got all DLCs except Third Rome. I'm allied with Castile. I'm already at max army- and fleet size. However England had a revolt soon after the war with France was over and is currently paralyzed. My current dilemma is wether to save them or not. How will the rebels winning change things? The English is just sitting there once again doing nothing, maybe because of the liberty desire(?), which may make saving them impossible if they refuse to help.

@Eviota the truce only lasted a few months. However France is in a bad way. I was able to get quite a few provinces off of them in the initial war, and the truce will last quite a while. I also got the pope by sheer luck and declared holy war upon Morocco right after winning against France. It was a gamble, but one of their allies opted out when I declared war. Granada was then jumped by Castile, and they also invaded Morocco soon after. Morocco aren't done for, but for now they are severely weakened and in a truce. But can then support English independence while still in a truce?

@pttaylor good to know, thanks.

 

[EmilAmundsen]

Well, Cromwell's rebels won in England and that broke the PU without a war for some reason. Problem solved, but I have to admit the idea of trying to hold on to their yoke was growing on me. Ah well

Thanks again XD

 

[Sfan]

A PU means that your king rules England and Portugal as two separate kingdoms. If Cromwell successfully takes power in England, your king is no longer the king of England. That's why pretender rebels make you lose Personal Unions.