29th of February 1466
We left off in rebuilding mode, and thus I continued in the begining on this chapter, as manpower and funds increased a fifth Brigade was recruited and marched north to join the Foreign Brigade in the Low Countries.
The peace was going well, Temples were being built and I was trying to focus on Military tech, reaching lvl 4 shortly after starting. I also finally broke Englands hold on the College of Cardinals.
Seeing as my only options forward was Venice I was looking to see how I could pull this off with them being allied to France. I strengthen all my alliances most importantly Castile, and I saved funds and manpower in preparation for war.
I then noticed that France had already been involved in a long running war with Savoy, Switzerland, Venice, Providence etc. Their armies were weakened so I switched to full Military funding in prepartion for a declaration of war.
France became war leader unfortunately, but all my allies joined in (a few I had to invite manually, which they were happy to do).
The war started well, as usual I waited in my defensive positions along the Alps. The enemy went straight for me as I pulled in the four Brigades (32,000 men) in Austria into the fight, but as the enemy poured in from all corners of their alliance, the battle was swinging against me despite the bonuses. This would become a theme of this war, the sheer amount of reinforcements able to join any given battle anywhere in the entire western Europe region.
Thinking about this, I feel it might be something that the game should change, I understand and support a strategy of supporting armies operating independently but within support range of one another (you'll notice I do this alot), but this wars theme was massive long distance reinforcement. There were numerous battles where entire nations forces would travel the length of the western europe to join battles started months ago. Battles should be quicker to prevent this I think, so you actually have to have armies within a reasonable supporting range.
Anyway where was I... Yes the battle of Tirol.
Despite fighting hard in a defensive position, and all my eastern allies joining in, the enemys reinforcements overwhelmed my forces, who as a result of the defeat all retreated in a shattered march north to the Low Countries. Austria proper was empty of friendly forces, with a few large French & Co armies settling in.
Taking some time to recover in the Low Countries, I decided to abandon Austria for the moment and try and get a few quick seiges in on the French homelands, while their forces were all in the east.
But of course this didnt last, and began what I call the desperate battle of northern France. The French marched forces north, I pulled my seiging forces together in repel them.
The first battle was a loss, but more followed as northern France became a playground of large whole alliance block sized battles.
Meanwhile in Austria, the enemy was left unchecked. Bohemia, Hungry and Brandenburg fought as hard as they could, the enemy was concentrating in that area and my allies were being overwhelmed.
As the result of one of the battles of Nemours, I had an advantage after a French defeat, I thought I would try my luck at wiping their armies as they tried to recover. But unfortunately it was not to be, despite their depleted moral, French General Benolts was just too good.
However despite the losses, the war in Northern France was going our way, Castile and Aragon had finally joined in, and even the combined armies of my small vassals and Imperial Princes were formidable. The majority of French forces were shattered up north, and with Castile/Aragon/Imperial Princes armies seemingly in control of the situation. The armies of Austria marched south to relieve their homeland.
Trent was relieved and the remaining Swiss/Venice forces were dealt with, and the army was spread out for seiging.
Hungry first and then shortly after Bohemia exited the war with white peace, it was annoying but theirs forces were depleted so it wasnt a great loss in military capacity.
Success followed the victories in the south, The Swiss were pressured out of the war, Milan too after a final decisive victory, Naples also took my offered provinces (of Aragon) which also made the map look pretty.
This situation had reversed however, success in the south had shifted Frances focus, the north was void of friendly forces as Castile had focused on seiging (and taking a few) French provinces on their borders.
The Venice situation wrapped up, the armies marched north again. The war had raged for 6 years by this point, both sides were operating on less than a 1000 manpower. I had disbanded four of my five regular brigades cause they had absolutely no troops left in them. The economy was in ruins I had taken multiple loans and was operating with around 40,000 mercs, with only one brigade of around 5000 regulars.
With the south secured, and my focus returned to the north, the desparate battle of northern France continued and heated up. The reason I call this one battle, is that despite my focus shifting there was continual battles raging almost constantly around Nemours/Paris/Cambray and the Low Countries. It was never ending destruction.
With the return of my armies, my minors came out to join in in greater numbers, the Castilians also moved north and the battles heated up to a pitched fury.
Battles raged back and forth, my alliance had numbers by now and the war was shifting back into our advantage (after hanging around -30% for most of the war).
I was pleased, the war was drawing close to a decisive victory that would cement French defeat, their armies were being shattered, and if we just held on a little longer we could wipe theirs forces and being the victory seiges.
But it was not to be...
Castile, having made gains on their borders, while the French fought on in the north, took the advantage they had and met French diplomats at the peace table. Upon hearing news of their demands being met, the war swifted quickly back into the French favour. Seeing no end in sight alone, with multiple loans (even loans coming due soon) I quickly took a white peace before the tide turned completely and more damaging demands were inforced.
Shattered, down to 12,000 mercs and 2,000 regulars Austria weeped in its defeat. Even though it was a white peace, nothing was directly gained in the war except that both France and Austria were shattered. In the late stages of the war my only goal (as it was realistic at that point) was for France to cancel its alliance with Venice, but even that was out of reach and Austria returned to peace completely worse off than before the war.
Money was tight, although I was back to a profit, I had multiple loans coming due every year, thankfully some rich family wanted to be come a Bishop, despite annoying the church Austria needed the money.
During the late stages of the war, Denmark also attacked the northern Empire, I had to decline the call to defend, further damaging Imperial Authority and relations, although I could fix the relations, I took the opportunity of a quick liberation war to try gain back some authority.
It was quick and bloodless, the rouge Prince out matched and for the first time in over a decade Austria had something to celebrate, two new vassals and a decisive victory.
But Austria was still shattered, its manpower in ruins, loans that needed to be paid and no end in sight. It would be a long road to recovery this time.
A good healthy profit, but it couldnt keep up with the loans coming due, I'm managing to pay off a few but most are being extended. There is no room for development, manpower is still recoving and the army still stands at 20,000 mostly mercs. At least Military tech increased again, but I'm still a whole level behind France.
8th of Decemeber 1478
And so another chapter comes to a close, a sad chapter. I was soooooo close and then Castile took it all away lol. Fair enough though for them as I probably would have done the same, by the end of the war everyone was on "low", we all had massive manpower issues to the extent that I stopped using regulars altogether and was almost exclusively mercs. I think this is by far the most intense war I have ever been in, in EUIV.
It doesn't look like much but I had to cull a great bunch of the screen shots, the desparate battle of northern France raged the entire war, with many many more battles than what is displayed here, there were probably around 50 or so, many of them massive in size with allies on both sides pouring in all available forces. It was quite ridiculous to be honest, often times the battles raged so long that entire armies would travel from one theater to the other to join in, in a few instances even shattered armies that just lost, would retreat, recover and then march north again and catch the next battle (that start just after they lost) in time. I'm a bit raw lol cause more often than not I was on the bad side of this, usually I would operate my armies in support of each other, and would be engaged and have massive superiority cause all my close by support armies would join. Only for the battle to rage on so long that the numbers would eventually turn against me.
Anyway it was exciting on the edge of the seat action, France is a beast! We were only just hanging on for most of the war, and I never knew that the Swiss/Milianese/Venice etc could raise such massive armies, they were usually rolling around with 20+ which seems extreme cause my manpower as Emperor with the Low Countries is only around 57 ish max I think.
I think I'm just going to avoid outside Empire wars now, I cant get my IA up cause I'm always caught in a massive war when I get my defend the empire call. I might just focus on diplo annexing the minors, I have Wurtemburg, Cleves, Friesland, and Gelre, I'm also working on Baden and Alace.
Any tips and ideas for the future, the next update might be boring cause Austria is too shattered to do much.
Thanks for reading this far if you have
Cheers