Can't send ships into Terra Incognita even when led by an Explorer

[Manwe_Sulimo]

I recommend merging armies / navies instead of attaching. Attaching should only be used for mercenary regiments (as they cannot be merged), or if you want to attach to an ally / vassal army for some reason.

Ottomans are a nation focusing on land conquest for a long part of the game. Going for colonization (exploration/expansion ideas) is not recommended in the beginning. It might be feasible after you reached the Persian gulf (Basra) so you can get to South-East Asia. For a beginner I would even suggest to not do colonization with Ottomans but better focus on conquering your neighbours on land. As Ottomans you are very strong and you are also in the conventient positon to have multiple routes of expansion. I see that you focused most of your conquests on Europe. I suggest that you should conquer land from the Mamluks and Qara Qoyunlu. This is valuable to get more trade = money, especially the Mamluk provinces are of accepted culture and religion, so they are not very rebellious and give you a lot of benefits.

If you want to try out colonisation, Castille is probably the best nation as a beginner. Their position is much better to get to the Americas. Colonizing the Americas is easier than Africa or South East Asia as the natives rebel less and are much weaker. The nations there are also much weaker and easy to conquer. You might also get Cristobal Colon via event as an Explorer with 6 manoeuvre which reduces attrition.

 

[DarknessKicker]

I recommend merging armies / navies instead of attaching. Attaching should only be used for mercenary regiments (as they cannot be merged), or if you want to attach to an ally / vassal army for some reason.

Ottomans are a nation focusing on land conquest for a long part of the game. Going for colonization (exploration/expansion ideas) is not recommended in the beginning. It might be feasible after you reached the Persian gulf (Basra) so you can get to South-East Asia. For a beginner I would even suggest to not do colonization with Ottomans but better focus on conquering your neighbours on land. As Ottomans you are very strong and you are also in the conventient positon to have multiple routes of expansion. I see that you focused most of your conquests on Europe. I suggest that you should conquer land from the Mamluks and Qara Qoyunlu. This is valuable to get more trade = money, especially the Mamluk provinces are of accepted culture and religion, so they are not very rebellious and give you a lot of benefits.

If you want to try out colonisation, Castille is probably the best nation as a beginner. Their position is much better to get to the Americas. Colonizing the Americas is easier than Africa or South East Asia as the natives rebel less and are much weaker. The nations there are also much weaker and easy to conquer. You might also get Cristobal Colon via event as an Explorer with 6 manoeuvre which reduces attrition.

Thank you! This is very helpful. Obviously I made some bad calls about which idea groups to pick, but I'll know better for the rest of the game. I've taken your advice and conquered a bunch of provinces from the Mamluks and Qara Qoyunlu. I'm definitely finding that merging my armies instead of attaching them makes things easier.

This is my first game, and I plan to play it right through to 1841. I'll probably try Castille next. I have had trouble staying solvent and have resorted to the "cash" console command--I still don't fully understand how the trade system works--so it's good to know that Middle East conquests will help with that.

 

[hayseed]

Trade follows the trade routes. Conquer your way to the Persian gulf and then expand that way. malacca to bengal to coromandel to Gujarat to Hormuz to Basra to Aleppo to Constanople. Very high value trade route. Takes 8 merchants and dominance in all of those trade nodes.

 

[Dahrkstar]

Something else I ran into, you need to have sufficient sailors for the mission. This was very hard to figure out until I moused over the 'select mission' button for the fleet.

 

[The Norman Yoke]

Oh, interesting! Thank you. I hadn't thought of that. I'm not sure it's possible with the territories I currently hold, though. I'd have to pretty much completely conquer the Mamluks to get to the point where the Suez Canal is in modern real life. Here's a screenshot.

Ottoman conquest of the Mamluks allowed limited colonisation of the indian ocean, so don't worry

 

[The Norman Yoke]

Something else I ran into, you need to have sufficient sailors for the mission. This was very hard to figure out until I moused over the 'select mission' button for the fleet.

View attachment 756078

That's more you having damaged ships than sailors

 

[bokorthedust]

That's more you having damaged ships than sailors

That's actually a lack of sailors, and ships attritioning when you don't have enough. And it shows up like this, as if the ships were damaged themselves, while the mission doesn't actually start until the ships are all in, well, shipshape.