First time playing EU IV - best tips wanted

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

So, my first game as Castile I ruined it because I tried to conquer too much, too fast, a la HOI. It was about 1460 and my economy broke, had more than 30 loans pending, the interest rate itself was about 20 ducats monthly, no advisors, peasants national disaster. I also have no real army, no merc available, no manpower, overtension 90%. Basicallg I messed up but in the process I learned a lot.

I now started my second playthrough, once again as Castile. This time I was very successful. I started the Reconquista and conquered Granada. I inmediately cored their 3 provinces.

After a few years of rest, my MP was high, I repaid all my loans and overextension was gone. So naturally, I went after Portugal. I quickly destroyed their army and managed to occupy the entire country in Europe. When peace came, I took all their European holdings and Portugal was reduced to a 3 province minor, their provinces left being in Africa and a few islands in the atlantic. As a geopolitical rival of Castile, they were finally eliminated. The year is 1470. I have no war exhaustion, my OE is very low. I'm planning my next war now.

I wanted to go after Aragon to form Spain. At first, I was going to wait for the Iberian Wedding but since Aragon has become the junior partner in a PU with England, my dream of a diplomatic union with them were gone now. Should I just conquer them militarily and form Spain that way? Bear in mind that Aragon will be helped by England and Britanny (I have no navy to challenge them). What is recommended in this situation.

 

[MetalTaberna]

Great job! You've taken care of a potential colonizer!

Let's see. You're right in that the Iberian Wedding is off now, I think. (Don't quote me on this, I've never actually played Spain.) What you must check now is your AE, your aggressive expansion. There's a mapmode for that, it's called the coalition mapmode. Hover over other countries to see how much AE they have with you. It's calculated by culture and religion and maybe distance, so countries near you will be quicker to join a coalition. A country needs 50 AE to join a coalition since 1.13.

Check your rebels. In fact, check your provincial unrest in the province tabs, especially those in Portugal. If it's near 0, the added war exhaustion might tip the scales against you. Again, lower autonomy immediately after conquest.

How is your income? You are Spain, it shouldn't be too bad. If you're ever in trouble, lowering maintenance helps, as does emptying your forts (mil tab). Just remember to get them up and running again a few months before you declare...

In your situation, I wonder if it isn't better to attack France first (if you're not allied with them). You will want a weak France in the future, and in their case it's better to attack now than later. See if you can still get military access through Aragon. Even if you never attack them after you've formed Spain, chances are they'll attack you.

England-Aragon is a bit of a difficult situation, I'm not sure how I would handle that one. England is a pain in that you'll need to spend tons of time and money to build up a navy that can rival theirs. Being an island, you can't not attack them without a navy. Even if you went full force into Aragon alone, the English would soon land their troops on your western shores and you'll have a nasty two-front war.
See if you can ally Venice. They're one of the few naval powers that can rival England in the beginning and might be willing to ally you and join your war (unlike the other option: the Ottomans).

 

[Soranya]

You can try and win wars by occupying Aragon only - and maybe with some access shenanigans even Naples (if they are still in the union)
Ignore Englands fleet and kill off the stacks they land on your mainland.
You wont get a 100% peace deal but with Battles Won + Some Occupations + Wargoal fullfilled you can chew tasty pieces out of Aragon (go for provinces you can acces via land and that have the Centers of Trade/Estuaries if possible - one of those and one or two of the smaller provinces at a time.

With some luck due to loosing battles and the War england will slip to negative Prestige and loose its union sooner or later. If not, just continue slowly till you have eaten all of Mainland aragon. (Be aware of your Agressive Expansion, but with a slowly but steady tactic at the edge of europe you should be fine normaly. - It will tell you in the Peacedeal if a nation could join a Coalition when you make a certain deal - just hover over the AE-tooltip, if its empty or only minor nations (aka not France, Austria Aragon, England) are listed your fine.

Regarding Portugal - when you can try to vassalize them in the next war, preferably before they form a colonial Nation - that way their colonial Power (also hampered due to loosing a lot of income) will become your Colonial Power. Turn them into a March and let them happy as ever colonize around the world. In a few hundred years you can Annex them

 

[horngeek]

When colonising, keep the trade routes in mind- you get some money from tariffs, but the best money from colonisation comes from dominating and steering trade back towards your home node.

So, as Casille, don't colonise north of the Caribbean trade node- you can't steer trade back home from North America.

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

So if I occupy Aragon for five years straight they will surrender and they will be able to get annexed by Castile right?

How much of Aragon do I have to occupy for five years to annex them? Just the capital or every province?

Its 1475 and tiny Portugal, my ally, has declared war on Morocco, dragging me to war just as I was preparing to invade Aragon. I guess it will have to be postponed. Patience goes a long way in EUIV. Im undergoing a huge naval rearmament to rival Morocco's big navy and hopefully invade them in the future.

Should I just seek some lousy peace or should I engage in full blown out war with Morocco? Should I break my alliance with Portugal and conquer what little is left of them to prevent them from dragging me into wars that aren't useful?

 

[Soviet Onion]

So if I occupy Aragon for five years straight they will surrender and they will be able to get annexed by Castile right?

How much of Aragon do I have to occupy for five years to annex them? Just the capital or every province?

If you completely occupy the warleader 5 years after the war started, you get 100% war score and can take whatever you want, as long as it is under 100 warscore.

 

[SandroTLK]

So if I occupy Aragon for five years straight they will surrender and they will be able to get annexed by Castile right?

How much of Aragon do I have to occupy for five years to annex them? Just the capital or every province?

100% warscore only comes after full occupation.

Depending on how much of Aragon is left, you might not be able to annex them. You can never take more than 100% warscore worth of demands in a peace deal, even with full occupation. In general, you'll want to take provinces that will make them annexable in the next war (if possible) and that will make them easier to invade (i.e., take their forts and try to split them in two).

Also, the five-year timer does not start when you completely occupy all the enemy provinces, it starts when the war starts. So if your war starts off badly, say you lose a couple battles and have a couple forts sieged, but you manage to turn it around and seven years later full occupy all remaining parties in the war, you'll get 100% warscore instantly.

 

[Soranya]

As long as Aragon is in a PU the warleader will be the PU leader not Aragon. So not a viable tactic there.
Regarding Morroco, if you can savely land your troops try to go for the Provinces that lie within the Sevilla trade node (Area around Ceuta, check the map), and depending on the size of Morroco provinces on the Mediterranian coast.
The rest is not really worth the trouble that early, thanks to the Berber Traditions of 505 increased coring costs.

Also, as Portugal likely has the mission to conquer said Provicnes you most certainly would have to seperate Peace if you want anything out of the war.

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

As long as Aragon is in a PU the warleader will be the PU leader not Aragon. So not a viable tactic there.
Regarding Morroco, if you can savely land your troops try to go for the Provinces that lie within the Sevilla trade node (Area around Ceuta, check the map), and depending on the size of Morroco provinces on the Mediterranian coast.
The rest is not really worth the trouble that early, thanks to the Berber Traditions of 505 increased coring costs.

Also, as Portugal likely has the mission to conquer said Provicnes you most certainly would have to seperate Peace if you want anything out of the war.

Most of EU IV has been rather easy to learn because Im a hardcore veteran HOI player so I adapted easily to this new paradox game. However, I wasn't expecting what just happened. wow this is so true. I didn't notice the PU and who was the Warleader when I declared war.

I had recruited about 60,000 troops, way over my limit, a mix of mercs and national soldiers to annex Aragon but since they are in a PU as a junior partner with England as Warleader and because they have two more allies, Genoa and Britanny (they got surprisingly big armies too), there's just no way for me to defeat and annex Aragon, not even after five years of full occupation. If I want a high warscore, I have to defeat this 4 country alliance in battles way too many times, much more than what my economy, mercenary pool or manpower can handle. Those four countries united are impossible to beat long term and will only result in a ruined Castilian state. My only ally, France, is weak as hell and has a truce with England for many years. In the beginning, they got owned by many allied nations and I couldn't help them since I could not get to their lands because Aragon would not let me pass through and I didn't have a decent navy to transport them to France by sea, so I had no choice but to watch how France got ganged up by many HRE states, backed by England and Aragon. As of right now in my campaign, 30% of real life France belongs to Burgundy, 40% to actual France and 30% between England, Britanny and other small states. There's just no way for them to help me in war against England and her allies. Even though my warscore is 30% because of my initial victories, I ran out of steam and its going to go downhill from here because I reached my breaking limit as a military and economic power and the enemy alliance has recovered from the initial shock and have regrouped their armies. With this newfound strength, they will roll back any gains I made in Aragon and then occupy my country. So before that happens, I'm going to 'surrender' and call a white peace. England is ready to accept by just a bit and so am I.

The war however, means I took about 6 loans to field such a huge army to fight these four countries. But in the end I got nothing, just a white peace. Humbled by this perceived loss, I'm going to rest for many years of peace, maybe until 1500. I'm not really planning to colonize the new world because it looks kind of hard and confusing (lol what a lame reason). Is colonizing the new world a good option for a source of big money? Will this allow me to field huge armies in Europe? Im trying to focus mostly on Europe, as I want to follow the historical path of Habsburg Spain and dominate Europe for centuries, especially the Netherlands, France and Italy. I also want to pull off the Spanish Armada on the English as revenge.

 

[Yradnegel]

I.
The war however, means I took about 6 loans to field such a huge army to fight these four countries. But in the end I got nothing, just a white peace. Humbled by this perceived loss, I'm going to rest for many years of peace, maybe until 1500. I'm not really planning to colonize the new world because it looks kind of hard and confusing (lol what a lame reason). Is colonizing the new world a good option for a source of big money? Will this allow me to field huge armies in Europe? Im trying to focus mostly on Europe, as I want to follow the historical path of Habsburg Spain and dominate Europe for centuries, especially the Netherlands, France and Italy. I also want to pull off the Spanish Armada on the English as revenge.

Colonizing is actually super easy, and there's no reason not to do it as Castille. This is how you do it:
1. Find some part of Brazil which is within your colonial range (you can check if it is in the colonial range mapmode, diplo tech advancements and ideas can increase it)
2. Send a colonist and a small army (only 1 or 2 divisions) to the province you're colonizing
3. Wait for it to finish, if you have more colonists you can repeat the process, while you do that you can also send explorers to find other places to colonize which will boost your prestige.

Reasons to colonize:
1. It will boost your trade
2. It will boost your income (i had a portugal game where like 80% of my income came from the new world)
3. It will boost your force limit
4. Your colonial nations will help fight your rivals in the new world, boosting your warscore in wars
5. You can get some nice events from the new world
6. It will boost your prestige

Among other things, just make sure you have more than 3 gold a month (you should as castille) when you colonize so you can still make an income as colonies will add to your monthly costs (once they're finished you don't have to pay to maintain them).

Besides the new world, it will also be worth your time to colonize/conquer Africa and Asia as there's lots of money, resources, and manpower to made there, especially in Cape and Malacca. Exploration ideas also boosts your naval force limit, which you'll need to fight England.

One more thing, try to get some sweet African/southern Italian land, just make sure they're armies aren't too strong.

 

[Swami]

When Aragon is a subject of England you can't win by occupying Aragon, because England will become the warleader, so you would have to fully occupy England for 5 years. Also check out Englands allies, as they will also become involved. You will get a pretty nice ticking warscore if you occupy Aragon for 5 years, so you might still be able to peace out for a lot. Good luck

 

[Philadelphus]

I would definitely recommend going for colonization if you can -- it's advantageous for the reasons listed above, it won't really use resources you'd otherwise be using for war (other than a tiny amount of money and soldiers to fight off native atracks), and in my opinion it's a lot of fun. You can colonize and throw your weight atound in Europe at the same time (just like the historical Spain!), and the resources of the New World will make your empire a lot stronger (again, like the real Spain ).

And well done on knowing when to white peace out rather than lose more; everyone starts the occasional war they can't win, and knowing when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em is really good.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

I'm not really planning to colonize the new world because it looks kind of hard and confusing (lol what a lame reason). Is colonizing the new world a good option for a source of big money? Will this allow me to field huge armies in Europe?

Spain is the easiest country to colonize with.

The new world is a cash cow. Spain and Portugal get to start colonizing early and have bonuses to help. Take exploration as the first Idea group when you reach Admin tech 5. The first idea will give you a colonist to work with, the second idea will get you naval explorers and conquistadors which let you explore land you can't see yet. Cristobal Colon will come to you in an event and you can use him to kick off your exploration.

Portugal will colonize too. If you can make Portugal a vassal, it's colonies will help its income too. Your vassals provide a portion of their resources to you.

edit - Yeah, coming from a WW2 game mindset can backfire a bit. You won't see a WW2 modeled game working with any other time period and feel immersive. In history, an empire can conquer lots of land fast, but administrative control would take decades or centuries. EU4 tries to capture that feel by making it possible to expand too fast and have your realm implode as a consequence.

In reality the mid 20th century was a unique time period. No one before had the capability to wage global war at that scale or pace. WW1 was close, but deadly as it was, even that war was more of a test run in comparison. Crossing the English channel is a ten minute flight when you have a Spitfire and good weather, or at least radar (and only the allies had the accurate radar). Plus, landing an army on the beaches of Normandy took 10,000 ships. Never been done before or since.

 

[ponasozis]

how to colonize ?
pick exploration ideas
get to second idea
make an explorer
take 3 light or heavy ships i prefer light because they are faster and cheaper
put an explorer on them
send him on automatic exploration of oceans and coasts of americas with that button where all the buttons are
once you find brasil or caribeans send an explorer there and then send like 3k to 4k army like 2inf 1 cav is good on that province to protect it from natives otherwise the province will get sacked by natives
now wait till province reaches 1k population
bam now you have full controll of that province
once you have few more provinces in one colonial region a colonial nation will spawn and take all your colonies in that region the colonial nation is basiclly your vassal but does not use relationship slot and you can increase decrease tarrifs for it and even change governors and etc
the colonial nation after a while will start to colonise on its own too


army composition
well i found my one to be best like this ratio 10 inf 5 cav 8-10 artilery for western nation
other nations for example muslim you want to have 6 cav
or some nations like hordes you want to have only cav



don t expect to conquer the world
its hard to do without exploiting bugs even with op starting nations

also if i was castile and aragorn would have gotten as junion in pu of england i would just immediately restart because thats some advanced level of unlucky




oh and france castile england portugal are colonisation nations their ideas are tied with colonisation,navy and trade not going colonise as these countries worst idea ever

 

[Swami]

I'm personally using 5-2-3 (inf-cav-artillery) as ratio, most would say more cannons, but they're pretty expensive and I like to have three 3+ advisors and develop + build a lot, eventually when money isn't a problem anymore I take more artillery in my armies. Usually I fill this up with mercs during a war giving me between the 5-2-3 and 8-2-3 ratio, depending on my losses...

 

[whosthebestcop]

Yeah PU's you will always be at war with PU leader.

So if it's England or GB you have to hope for an Irish minor or Norway still having land. You deploy your troops there and invade England.

Naval supremacy will help. Especially if you can trick GB to moving there entire army some place you can cut them off with your navy removing them from the war.

Now if you can't set up landing spot. You will just have to out heavy GB Alliance. 15 more heavies should be good enough.

 

[NetherViking]

My advice:

1) Build up strength by eating up some smaller states.

2) Ally England's rivals.

3) Try to eliminate some of England's allies through proxy wars if possible. Not easy to do from your position but see who Briattny is allied with and try to attack their ally or get involved in a war they might be dragged into. If you can win you can not only claim some land in Brittany but dismantle their alliance with England.

A good proxy war is one that involves an English ally but not England. Ideally you can be war leader but separate peacing to cancel their alliance may be necessary.

4) Watch out for moments when England may be involved in another war as a moment to strike.

5) Set England, its allies and France as countries of interest to closer keep on top of relevant developments. You can do this by looking at one of their provinces and right clicking (and holding?) And you will get 3icons pop up. The bottom one makes then as a nation of interest so you will get alerts relevant to them.

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

Ok so Im doing pretty good now.

My only issue is that Im still using the HOI mindset when it comes to conquering countries. Whenever Im in war, I go all nuts for total war and I try to conquer as much as I can from my enemies, even take out loans if I have to. My goal is to destroy them as much as I can to leave them very weak in the future and take most of their lands, even if OE is high. Currently, I started my 3rd game as Castile because my first went really wrong because I didn't know how to play and my second game keeps crashing so I deleted it. I'm on my third campaign, as Castile again. The year is 1464 and I have conquered all of Granada, half of Portugal, most of Aragon and the northern tip of Morocco, specifically, the three north african provinces that make up the Sevilla trade zone: Melilla, Ceuta and Tangiers. My empire looks great now, I'm at peace and only have about 4 loans pending payment. My OE is really high though at 110% but Im lowering it now by making them cores. This means a lot of rebels are popping up everywhere. My Army is now campaigning all over my lands in Iberian, taking down these insurgents, of which there are many. But apart from that, everything is pretty solid as far as I can tell. I plan to stay at peace for a long time to sort out all my domestic problems.

About loans, how many do you guys take out ? I usually take about 2 or 3 loans per war. Is this wrong?

Also, when does Over Extension gets reslly dangerous? Is OE overated and not that bad long term?

 

[Moridin997]

About loans, how many do you guys take out ? I usually take about 2 or 3 loans per war. Is this wrong?

Also, when does Over Extension gets reslly dangerous? Is OE overated and not that bad long term?

As Castille, 2 or 3 loans is quite alright. You'll be able to repay it in no time and the interest shouldn't be very harmful in the early game.

As for OE, 100% OE serves as a trigger for a LOT of nasty stuff. Not recommended, at all...

 

[Philadelphus]

Overextension gets really dangerous above 100%. Its danger scales up linearly from 0 to 100, but above 100 you get a step function where you'll start to get crazy amounts of rebels. I'll very specifically take less land than I could in a peace deal if it would put me over 100 OE (put your war score to work getting other concessions beside land, in that case).

I don't really have a "usual" number of loans, it all depends on the war and my country's finances. If you have a good flow of money outside of war < ~10 loans should be pretty easily repaid.

Other than that, sounds like you're doing pretty good. I look forward to hearing about your first world conquest.