English Strategy? What to do next?

[Malefidus]

I'm about to restart and go the traditional colonial route. The initial 0/0/0 King lived until he was 82, although his heir was brilliant, I think that along with constant French rebellion despite every possible diplomatic attempt and maintaining a healthy advantage in manpower and military as a whole has gimped me incredibly.

Essentially, taking the key ports in the English Channel trade node, along with pressuring Castile and Portugal at every opportunity, means you can colonize and get so rich that crushing France mid-game is much easier than trying to keep them under wraps until you can inherit or integrate.

 

[ecrurudesby]

My biggest woe is deciding on what order of Ideas. I normally go diplo, mil, adm due to how the need for MPs goes. I want to play the colonizing game so may go Exploration, Quality then an Admin idea as yet undecided. I'm thinking Humanism for when the reformation hits and to go nicely with England's accepted cultures bonus?

With England I look at all the Dip idea groups and think, yep I could use all these except Espionage!

Any ideas on what order everyone generally goes?

For any nation, I choose a set in a type that my monarch is strong in. If they are all equal I will choose one based on the specific country/situation/aims. First set should probably be Diplo as you say, and for England that has to be Exploration (though as I said in my other post, I went Innovative, because that is good for everyone). Personally I think with England, as soon as you have Exploration and are colonising, the next set to take should be Expansion for obvious reasons.

The Reformation hardly affected me as England, even though bloody Scotland got a Reformed centre and somehow converted more British provinces than my earlier London Protestant one (yay Centre of Attention achievement). If you wait for the zeal to die down (I had no religious revolts), once you flip to Protestant you can convert the Isles incredibly easily with the I think +10% modifier plus Defender of the Faith bonuses. Also the culture bonus is pretty useless in my opinion, Ireland only has four provinces so I just converted them to English when I had no Diplo ideas to get and was ahead of time in tech. Thus I don't think Humanist is essential for England, even though it still has great ideas; I think a slot could be better spent.

Innovative and Expansion for admin
Exploration and Trade for diplo
Because the British Isles have no land connections to other nations, England can afford to not pick a military set probably for the whole game. Obviously that'd be silly; but going admin+diplo for the first four is in my opinion not only fine, but the best choice as England. Quality is obviously good for England, as is Quantity (although they already have a huge naval FL by way of colonies). Offensive for the FL increase, the discipline, and the pips to counter countries like France. Defensive is handy with the military tradition bonus. Naval looks great for England too, apart from the galley and prestige bonuses.

As soon as I realised England would share a trade node with the strong dutch trade provinces I wanted them for myself, but I value Austria as an ally greatly, and even when the Dutch broke away from Austria, they were still a part of the HRE so I couldn't have my cake and eat it like I wanted.

 

[calvinhobbeslik]

I'm about to restart and go the traditional colonial route. The initial 0/0/0 King lived until he was 82

Did you get the achievement?

 

[Malefidus]

For any nation, I choose a set in a type that my monarch is strong in. If they are all equal I will choose one based on the specific country/situation/aims. First set should probably be Diplo as you say, and for England that has to be Exploration (though as I said in my other post, I went Innovative, because that is good for everyone). Personally I think with England, as soon as you have Exploration and are colonising, the next set to take should be Expansion for obvious reasons.

The Reformation hardly affected me as England, even though bloody Scotland got a Reformed centre and somehow converted more British provinces than my earlier London Protestant one (yay Centre of Attention achievement). If you wait for the zeal to die down (I had no religious revolts), once you flip to Protestant you can convert the Isles incredibly easily with the I think +10% modifier plus Defender of the Faith bonuses. Also the culture bonus is pretty useless in my opinion, Ireland only has four provinces so I just converted them to English when I had no Diplo ideas to get and was ahead of time in tech. Thus I don't think Humanist is essential for England, even though it still has great ideas; I think a slot could be better spent.

Innovative and Expansion for admin
Exploration and Trade for diplo
Because the British Isles have no land connections to other nations, England can afford to not pick a military set probably for the whole game. Obviously that'd be silly; but going admin+diplo for the first four is in my opinion not only fine, but the best choice as England. Quality is obviously good for England, as is Quantity (although they already have a huge naval FL by way of colonies). Offensive for the FL increase, the discipline, and the pips to counter countries like France. Defensive is handy with the military tradition bonus. Naval looks great for England too, apart from the galley and prestige bonuses.

As soon as I realised England would share a trade node with the strong dutch trade provinces I wanted them for myself, but I value Austria as an ally greatly, and even when the Dutch broke away from Austria, they were still a part of the HRE so I couldn't have my cake and eat it like I wanted.

Thanks for your input, as it turns out I nearly followed this to the letter. I had a glut of Military MPs so went Quantity first mainly for future policies but may now be regretting it as France stomps all over me. I have Exploration and Expansion at the moment and I am ahead on tech across the board thanks to two great Monarchs and it's set to continue with a 4/3/4 heir.

I've just lost France after 90 years. The final straw was my 43k stack sieging their capital getting routed easily by a 19k stack that had come back from sieging Austria, attacked across a River and literally shredded my army. My one decent ally Austria had just annexed Hungary who they'd had a PU with and the net effect was a much reduced military and then they got attacked by Venice which turned their focus away from me. The French just cut through my 2:1 numbers with their generals and offensive ideas. My goal now in this game is to see the end of France, not matter what! I am going to release Guyenne and slowly feed them in successive wars once I'm better prepared. As Burgundy is still around I'm going to finish off taking the English Channel trade provinces while focusing on the New World.

Is a still a relatively good start, Portugal and Castille have both been really slow to get going and now I'm out of France, I'm going to get some good Naval wars going.

 

[Bijeli Kamen]

I took diplomatic as first Idea Group => Reason: To colonize effectively as non Portugal/Castille, the first Ideagroup is too early. Additionally, if you complete the group, you have instantly -24% Tech cost for diplomatic tech, for the Rest of the game! Then, as I always have a lot of alliances (right now Austria, Aragon, Denmark) and subject nations, the additional Diplomat, the Diplomatic Reputation and the Diploslot come in very handy. Also 20% less war score cost is insane: With claims in burgundy, I got picardie, Holland, antwerpen formyself, returned limousin to guyenne (my march) and I had some warscore left, but the AE was already to high ^^ 33% less war exhaustion reduction cost is not a must have, but, to reduce 6 WE for the usual price of 4 WE is still nice. And last but not least the reduced impact of diplomatic actions is very nice. No CB declaration gives only -1 stabhit and +1 WE. This alone saves again MP. Totaly forgot the 25% BROT

So in general (but this is only my opinion) the Diplomatic Idea Group is perfect as 1st Idea Group for England. Btw I decided to roleplay a bit, even though I had 99% WS agains France in the HYW, I wanted to focus on the balance of Power in europe, to kill all potential colonializers and have Marches in Europe to controll the balance for me. For the Bordeaux Trade node I have Guyenne as March. For the Sevilla Tradenode I started to feed Galicia as my March (and I'll use them as Fleet Bases fo further exploration of africa => cape). The Only thing mandatory for me is to own every province in the English Channel. Scotland and Munster (already owning every province except meath) are vassals, and Norway and the Hansa are most likely the next targets. Second Idea Group is already exploration, and #3 will be expansion. Then I'll see how things will develop.

I have to say, that it is NOT ironman, and that I have the mod the 10th Idea.

But I think with England you hava many choices. Basically you can also completely stay out of the european mainland (btw for this event you can keep calais, which I would still strongly suggest for the decision of the stapleport, especially if you dont have Holland, Antwerpen and Caux!!

 

[Sir Tornado]

I got France in a PU by winning the Hundred years war yesterday, how long will the integration take when it is available?

Why do you want to Integrate? Keep France in PU. Now, no one can invade your island. If you get into any wars on the continent, let the French Army fight it out for you. They will generally do a decent job.

 

[Malefidus]

Why do you want to Integrate? Keep France in PU. Now, no one can invade your island. If you get into any wars on the continent, let the French Army fight it out for you. They will generally do a decent job.

The only problem I find with keeping them in a PU as in my current game is that they declare independence every 20 years. I've read up previously but I settled for a White Peace as the UI removes "Remains in Union Under England" etc. if you make any other demands where is in fact you still keep the Union plus whatever else you take. Knowing that I would have started feeding Guyenne much earlier to eventually wipe France out without ever intergrating.

 

[Pukovnik]

I'm currently playing as England -> Great Britain too. 1597, just reached India.

I never tried to win HYW knowing if I even win it's not even worth all the AE, rebellions and integration cost that causes it. I withdrew all my forces from France to Calais, and waited there for France to occupy my provinces. I gave up, allied with the Emperor and plotted my return to English Normandy and Aquitaine. While I was making claims on Burgundy, they DOW-ed me for Calais, unexpectedly. I had luck having the Emperor at my side, and France DOWing Burgundy at the same time. Took some provinces in the Low Lands, after that France was at war with Castille, DOW-ed them, took Normandy back. Meanwhile, I swallowed Ireland and Scotland (made France to revoke guarantee on Scotland). Coalition. France DOW-es. Lost Normandy. Took more provinces from Burgundy. Took Normandy back. Diplo-vassalized some OPMs in Low Lands and Brittany. DOW France. Repeat. Burgundy Succession never happened, because it got swallowed by me, France and Austria. Reformation starts, didn't had luck, all of the three centers of Protestantism jumped out in Germany, Finland and Sweden (took religious ideas early because of it). Rivaled the Emperor, Austria. Colonization period - started at Canada and later Thirteen Colonies, rather slow (now progressive, having 8-9 colonies at once, what can I say, I'm swimming in money uh-huh). I focused my way to Ivory Coast and Cape, and from there expanded to Madagascar, East Africa and I just reached Ceylon. Oh and yes, I just PUd Brunswick (it's Hannover to me for it's massive size). Rather funny thing happened in HRE, almost all of it went either Protestant or Reformed, and only Austria and OPM Baden & Trier stayed Catholic. Electors voted Baden (all of them hated Austria, so, either Baden or Trier) for the Emperor, I didn't join any of the Leagues, and Protestant League was slightly weaker than Catholic, therefore they never started the actual war and after some period dominant religion in the Empire became Catholic again, without war happening. I knew that Austria would be elected again and I just couldn't stand their meddling in my every HRE war, so I took the chance while the Baden was still Emperor. Naturally, since there were only so few Catholic states in Empire, only Trier stayed elector. I attacked Baden and Trier, occupied them, dissolved the Empire. Hurrah.

http://s22.postimg.org/ar06rkyxb/eu4_8.png Almost forgot, Henry XI is the current King of Great Britain. And yes, Henry VI lived long enough to screw up my early game.

 

[dav77-b]

sending trade ship in the channel is stupid. Own the channel and send trade ships to lubeck

 

[volseraph]

I've just lost France after 90 years. The final straw was my 43k stack sieging their capital getting routed easily by a 19k stack that had come back from sieging Austria, attacked across a River and literally shredded my army.

Just in case you're interested, maybe the easiest way to measure up to the French troops (I did this as Netherlands, but would work equally well for England) is with Defensive + War Reformed. +30% morale has my troops going toe-to-toe with the French, even with worse generals.

 

[Cossack_PL]

I just completed the achievement by integrating PU France in 1515 with no independence wars at all.
HYW was standard, they didn't want to attack me at all, first in Bearn, then in Dauphine/Provence. Finally I managed to lure them to attack me in Auvergne and from that point war result was obvious.
I noticed that France becomes hostile as soon as relations become worse than +200. This is the key to keep them stable in PU. Fortunately Henry VI didn't live to 80 Also it's important to make use of all ways to improve relations. For example by attacking any of France's neighbours and fighting them on French territory you can easily get +20.
With full Influence ideas it costs about 1k diplo to annex them, it took me about 15 years with statesman for most of time.