Gaining a bit of ground as Wallachia early on without noCB-ing?

[Coffer]

Now I'm by no means a veteran player or honestly any good at all - I've barely put any hours into the game and I've not had the easiest time adapting to it, being the first game of its kind that I've played - the furthest I've gotten is about 1517 where, as Lubeck, I've taken Saxe-Lauenburg, Mecklenburg, much of Pomerania, Danzig and the two Danish provinces from ending the Sound Toll even with Sweden still being loyal to them and am perfectly stable (a save I'm planning to continue later), so keep that in mind because there are still quite a few mechanics that I don't know or understand well yet. I've had a few decent starts here and there as various nations, but one that I've always come back to time and again to try and survive with is Wallachia.

After many many recent attempts (probably over a hundred by now), I've not had much luck gaining any ground whatsoever by 1510, which, in my experience, is the absolute latest point by which the Ottomans will come knocking on my door, usually killing me off, and even if that doesn't happen, the run quickly stagnates to a point where the Ottomans get too strong to fend off later and I'm left with no opportunities. I don't mind restarting every now and then with nations that require a bit of early luck and the right circumstances to do well with, but so far I've struggled to gain any ground even in the best of times. What do you reckon I could do in order to improve my chances of at least getting Temes or Vidin early on so that I can expand further and make myself less of an appealing target towards the Ottomans? So far, this is what I'm mostly doing every single time:

• focusing on admin until I get tech 5 and finish off econ ideas (probably not the best idea in the world since I've noticed that both the Ottomans and Hungary easily outpace me mil tech-wise, but for a bit of early income it's been good enough for me so far), then getting quantity ideas (usually don't get far into them before the run stagnates or outright dies - in fact I usually don't get anywhere close to starting them)
  
• allying Poland, Hungary if they're not rivalling me, Bohemia in most cases if Poland doesn't hate them and especially if Hungary does hate me, Serbia and Bosnia if Serbia doesn't hate me, Albania if Serbia does (usually the case) - I've not had much luck getting other relevant allies, especially as Bohemia is already pushing it seeing as they never want to fight the Ottomans
• taking out huge loans just to try and get enough mercs to somehow have a competent stack of my own once a critical war happens

Unfortunately, over the course of my many restarts I've come upon a number of grave problems:

1. Poland and Hungary really seem to love biting off far more than they can chew, trying to fight the Ottomans personally well before they're competent enough to do so and wasting most of the war unsuccessfully trying to take everything Crimea has and acting erratically (stopping sieges on forts, walking around randomly and so on) when the Ottomans start to make their move. Usually once Poland and Hungary give up on their fruitless endeavor (Crimea has never lost in any of my runs), I'm dead because of...
2. The AI is REALLY unenthusiastic about intelligently engaging one of the Ottoman stacks, especially if they still have more than one. I've noticed this in quite a few wars by now, with Poland, Hungary, Bohemia and Venice all suffering from this, often sitting in no-man's land doing absolutely nothing until they inexplicably peace out, leaving myself and usually Albania and/or Serbia&Bosnia for dead.
3. Even in the best of cases, like those where the Ottomans are busy on multiple fronts and actually suffering a tiny bit, far more often than I would like they seem to be allying France, which has caused a tremendous deal of frustration to me as France is seemingly even more unbeatable with any of my potential alliances. On two occasions I've had my run ended because France single-handedly killed off Poland and any of my other allies while the Ottomans were on the brink of defeat, and they NEVER seem to get into any actual difficult wars after the HYW so I've not been able to exploit any opportunities where they're actually weak. So far, the Ottomans allying France has always resulted in an instant restart or a painful death for me.
4. Even when I try to focus on Hungary, they always ally Austria, making it impossible to attack them - in fact, the only time I've seen them not do so is when I allied them. Worse yet, most of the time this happens, they end up in a PU under Austria, further jeopardizing my runs.
5. I was going to assume that this is obvious for Wallachia, but maybe it isn't since I've seen this as a recommendation in other similar runs. Either way, I've never been able to ally Austria. Their requirements are much too ridiculous, as are Muscovy's, and I wouldn't expect them to be useful in fighting any of my two big neighbors (Muscovy is too far away, Austria is too far from the Ottomans and they ally Hungary too often).
6. In the rare cases where I'm able to ally Serbia (and thus Bosnia as well), many of the same issues with the Ottomans and Hungary extend to Venice as well, with their preposterous army destroying all of us even with me taking out huge loans to try and come up with a big enough stack to pose a threat to them before they can annex Bosnia.

I'm probably missing a few of the issues I've noticed since it's still early in the morning and I've not fully woken up yet, but I'm at my wit's end trying to figure out what I could do in order to try and get a better foothold in the area so I can start expanding a bit. If anyone has any suggestions on this, hit me with them. One thing I'd like to avoid is noCB-ing Serbia - I've seen a few cheesy strats involving noCBs for various achievements, but I'd personally rather try and see if I can get the ball rolling without having to resort to that.

 

[Robert de Bruce]

the furthest I've gotten is about 1517 where, as Lubeck

This. And then you want to try Wallachia? It's ok to go for a challenge, but to compare this, if you want to start playing football, you don't start in Europe League, too.
Wallachia is definitely one of the harder starts you can get in the game and you think you don't even know all of the basic mechanics.
EUIV is a very complex game and even people with thousands of hours played can still learn something new. I have 2500+ hours and I didn't try Wallachia yet. Ofcourse there are guides for this, maybe even one for the current patch somewhere. But every guide requires you to know the basic game mechanics entirely and to be able to make good use of it.
I highly recommend for you to gain experience with another country, playing a full campaign at least until 1750, better to 1820. You won't learn much by another 100 Wallachian restarts.
If you want to learn how to play something like Wallachia you need for example experience in bringing down Ottos. For this you can play Poland, Muscovy, Mameluks, Austria or Ethiopia first. It's much easier with them compared to Wallachia, but still a very hard challenge for a beginner.
Another experience you need is to survive with an underdog and bring down your initial threat. But instead of always trying to do this vs Ottos, first aim for an easier target, for example bringing down Muscowy with Novgorod, which is, although much easier compared to Wallachia<->Ottos, often called in these forums to be impossible. Another example is leading Scotland to victory against England or Kuba vs Kongo.
The third experience you need is to rely on big allies to fight your wars. Good tutorials for this is breaking free as vassal/personal union junior partner if you have Art of War DLC to beg for support for independence. Countries for this are Sweden, Naples, Brabant. For playing an ally game with an independent nation you can try out Teutonic Order vs Poland or Morocco vs Castille and Portugal.
And if you want to play in the same region as a minor, Serbia or Moldavia are easier options, especially if you don't want to no-CB. Btw are no-CB wars one of the pro tools the game offers. To choose such a hard start like wallachia as beginner and then to set rules making it even more complicated for you must be some kind of masochism. Sorry.

 

[Coffer]

This. And then you want to try Wallachia? It's ok to go for a challenge, but to compare this, if you want to start playing football, you don't start in Europe League, too.

Frankly, I find smaller starts to be much easier than the big ones, which I've never even touched. It's also part of the reason I've not gone past 1517, as I find managing anything overly big to be next to impossible for me right now and makes learning the mechanics significantly more difficult. Even trying something like Burgundy would quickly lead to suffering, let alone something like France. Portugal in particular has given me my two most deeply unenjoyable singleplayer runs to date simply because them actually being competent early on makes everything much too overwhelming due to the overabundance of options, quickly leading to stagnation. In fact, you pointed out Ethiopia later in your post, which I've tried a few patches ago and ended up being one of my absolute worst starts to date, being significantly less successful than any of my smaller nation runs. Generally in games I like to have a little bit of linearity and knowing, to at least a significant extent, just about what it is that I need to do, as having too many options when I don't already know what I'm supposed to do tends to give me a headache, hence why I'm not yet keen on giving another big power a shot over figuring something like this out.

Wallachia is definitely one of the harder starts you can get in the game and you think you don't even know all of the basic mechanics.
EUIV is a very complex game and even people with thousands of hours played can still learn something new. I have 2500+ hours and I didn't try Wallachia yet. Ofcourse there are guides for this, maybe even one for the current patch somewhere. But every guide requires you to know the basic game mechanics entirely and to be able to make good use of it.
I highly recommend for you to gain experience with another country, playing a full campaign at least until 1750, better to 1820. You won't learn much by another 100 Wallachian restarts.

I'm doing that on and off anyway, and generally especially when I play with a friend of mine I do go with slightly more serious starts. That said, considering what I said earlier about finding big starts to be impossible to manage and absolutely terrible at teaching me anything, I always tend to come back to some of these weaker starts to at least try and figure out some good generic early-game strategies. It's not like they're the only ones I try or anything like that, just that my problems in my Wallachia runs were significant enough that I thought it might be best to ask for some initial advice while also figuring everything else out on my own.

If you want to learn how to play something like Wallachia you need for example experience in bringing down Ottos. For this you can play Poland, Muscovy, Mameluks, Austria or Ethiopia first. It's much easier with them compared to Wallachia, but still a very hard challenge for a beginner.

I'm not convinced that the likes of Poland would actually be that difficult, but then that depends on what counts as being successful since taking it slowly and not taking any major risks whatsoever is something I've grown accustomed to and am mostly happy with, but also something that makes me significantly slower at expanding and whatnot than the average player (possibly even the average rookie), let alone the kind of veterans who would be able to do a WC run with them.

Another experience you need is to survive with an underdog and bring down your initial threat.

This is what I've done in most of my starts in EU4 so far, and generally when I have at least one smaller threat to deal with initially (not the case for Wallachia until you border Serbia unless you noCB them or somehow find a way to turn the tables on Poland and take Moldavia I believe) I have a high success rate now, sufficient enough for me to at least occasionally try some of these more difficult starts.

But instead of always trying to do this vs Ottos, first aim for an easier target, for example bringing down Muscowy with Novgorod, which is, although much easier compared to Wallachia<->Ottos, often called in these forums to be impossible. Another example is leading Scotland to victory against England or Kuba vs Kongo.

That might be a good idea. I'll give one of those a try when I get back. Scotland in particular was one of those that, while big, always seemed appealing enough for me to want to try them.

The third experience you need is to rely on big allies to fight your wars.

Yeah, I've learned that the hard way so far. Problem is, in this particular run that clashes with two of the issues I pointed out earlier, namely Poland and Hungary struggling to show any real competence against the Ottomans despite often being given ample opportunities to at least pose a threat to them, especially in the sillier cases where one of the Ottoman stacks is seemingly bored enough to try and chase my stack through Poland without actually taking anything.

Good tutorials for this is breaking free as vassal/personal union junior partner if you have Art of War DLC to beg for support for independence. Countries for this are Sweden, Naples, Brabant. For playing an ally game with an independent nation you can try out Teutonic Order vs Poland or Morocco vs Castille and Portugal.

I'll keep that in mind. Sweden strikes me as being one of those that might once again be a bit too overwhelming initially even with Denmark ruling over them, but Brabant might be better for that.

And if you want to play in the same region as a minor, Serbia or Moldavia are easier options, especially if you don't want to no-CB. Btw are no-CB wars one of the pro tools the game offers. To choose such a hard start like wallachia as beginner and then to set rules making it even more complicated for you must be some kind of masochism. Sorry.

I get that it's a strong tool, but to me it's one of those cheesy things that I'd rather save for achievement hunting (at least in the cases where you're advised to do it early on like here), as I don't think it would teach me very much at all at this stage of the game and certainly isn't something I'd be too happy to employ even if not doing so makes my runs harder.

 

[Robert de Bruce]

Generally in games I like to have a little bit of linearity and knowing, to at least a significant extent, just about what it is that I need to do, as having too many options when I don't already know what I'm supposed to do tends to give me a headache

Ok, I got your point, although I think EUIV or any Paradox grand strategy title isn't a really fitting game for you. I'm the opposite, I get bored if I have too few options, the more the better.
I think the starts with the most limitations in start are outside of Europe, for example american natives, Kongo area, east Africa with Swahili/Mutapa and Japan.
Interesting could be also countries that are limited at least in one or more directions, for example russian and scandinavian nations, since they can't expand into North.

namely Poland and Hungary struggling to show any real competence

Yeah, I know what you mean. I have done most stuff, but most things I need big allies to win wars for me that I can't win on my own I haven't done. No Byzantium run, no Wallachia, no Serbia etc. So I can't you advise here, sorry. But I guess someone else will. There are also some strategies in going forward and then canceling unit movement, making AI copying this and taking AI army literally out this way. i hate this kind of stuff and I'm way too bored of all this clicking. But I guess you need to do something like this to get Hungary and Poland to do their work.

 

[Coffer]

Ok, I got your point, although I think EUIV or any Paradox grand strategy title isn't a really fitting game for you. I'm the opposite, I get bored if I have too few options, the more the better.

Yeah, I've quit the game on more than one occasion as a result of being frustrated with that, but therein lies the problem since I do like the game a lot but it's exceptionally overwhelming by its very nature.

I think the starts with the most limitations in start are outside of Europe, for example american natives, Kongo area, east Africa with Swahili/Mutapa and Japan.

I've already formed Japan as Shimazu and stabilized by 1495, so I think I've got at least that covered. Unsurprisingly perhaps it was one of the starts that felt the most natural to me.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I have done most stuff, but most things I need big allies to win wars for me that I can't win on my own I haven't done. No Byzantium run, no Wallachia, no Serbia etc. So I can't you advise here, sorry. But I guess someone else will. There are also some strategies in going forward and then canceling unit movement, making AI copying this and taking AI army literally out this way. i hate this kind of stuff and I'm way too bored of all this clicking. But I guess you need to do something like this to get Hungary and Poland to do their work.

I'll try that on my next run and see if it takes me anywhere, since getting them to actually be competent for once is one of the few things stopping me from pulling this off now.

 

[Robert de Bruce]

When did you start playing? I already played EU III alot, which was also complex, but less than EUIV when it came out and a lot less than EUIV today. And since I never stopped playing EUIV I could learn each added new mechanic step for step. Maybe it could help you to play EU III or start with native EUIV, patch 1.1 or maybe 1.4 without DLCs to learn the basic stuff and then add more and more.

 

[Coffer]

When did you start playing? I already played EU III alot, which was also complex, but less than EUIV when it came out and a lot less than EUIV today. And since I never stopped playing EUIV I could learn each added new mechanic step for step. Maybe it could help you to play EU III or start with native EUIV, patch 1.1 or maybe 1.4 without DLCs to learn the basic stuff and then add more and more.

Honestly forgot since I've had the game for a while and have been playing it on and off, with and without DLCs. Now is just about the only time I've really gotten serious about it though, with this period starting about a week or two before the patch. As I said originally, it's the first game of its kind that I've ever played so I don't have anywhere close to that sort of experience.

 

[bbqftw]

Lets calc your options without noCBing

Wallachia + plc vs Hungary, if they didn't ally Austria and ottoman did not warn

I suppose you can also do plc vs ottoman. But this is typically doable if ottoman declare a suicide war e.g. Genoa or albania with strong allies.

I don't see why restarting for good initial conditions is better than no cbing and relying on your own control to win the day.

 

[Coffer]

Lets calc your options without noCBing

Wallachia + plc vs Hungary, if they didn't ally Austria and ottoman did not warn

I suppose you can also do plc vs ottoman. But this is typically doable if ottoman declare a suicide war e.g. Genoa or albania with strong allies.

I don't see why restarting for good initial conditions is better than no cbing and relying on your own control to win the day.

In my experience, the Ottomans never seem to actually warn me anymore, whereas pre-patch they did. In fact, in one run they pretty quickly stopped being hostile, which has never happened before.

In this case, noCBing is much worse both because it's a strat that I'd rather not use here (I know it's legit in spite of my complaints about it feeling too cheesy, as I said before, but I'm treating it as a house rule here for this run in particular) and because it's significantly easier. Serbia and Bosnia are not even close to being as much of a threat to me on my own as the Ottomans (+Crimea, sometimes +France) are to me + the PLC + Hungary + Armenia, or Hungary (+Austria 99% of the time) is to me + the PLC + Bohemia (at best), or Venice and their buddies are to me + Serbia + Bosnia, so it wouldn't feel even remotely satisfying as even with my lack of experience I've dealt with tougher challenges before with ease. I don't think it's out of my reach either, as on two occasions I came very close to breaking the deadlock (just barely lost the final battle with Venice on one attempt, while in another the Ottomans would've been screwed if not for France) and going overboard with loans certainly seems to have helped close that gap.

 

[AnssiA]

In my Romania run, I allied Poland, Serbia/Bosnia (can't remember) and Hungary, waited a long time for 10 favors, declared on Ottomans. After some early successes the Turks were ready to kill us so I peaced out just taking the province west of Wallachia. That gave me access to Serbia, where I fabricated, then released 1-province Bulgaria as vassal (bunch of cores in Otto-land) and then declared on Serbia. From there on out I started expanding into Northern Balkans and Italy. I got coalitioned, which was actually good, because after a long time someone finally occupied whole of Moldavia which I was then able to release from Poland in the peace deal.

 

[Viperswhip]

Pretty much any of the HRE minors are a great place to start because you control your own destiny (focus mil). If you want a small country, that's where you do can have a lot of fun with minimal risk. Almost every other small country is food for its immediate larger neighbors. Still, Florry normally starts as a minor in some far away place, so does Jake, and those are mostly the two I am familiar with and I no longer watch Jake as he's now the Man.

Florry seems to be confined to Twitch right now, so that's where you will find him.

As far as countries in that region, look at all the Byz threads to get an idea of what you might like to try. In fact, if you restart until the Ottos have taken Last Bastion of the Crusaders or whatever there is a good chance you can be the one to take over Byz, now, yes, they are wrong culture but right religion, which lessens the blow, you can also vassalize them because they have a lot of cores to reconquer. Getting Serbia and swallowing Bosnia via Serbia is also valid as Serbia is Orthodox. You can flip to Catholic via Bosnia if you want, and you can also try to join the HRE but you'll probably have to take over Serbia and Bosnia to do that.

I have only played Wallachia once and that was a long time ago, but the run was pretty similar to Byz, just with less good provinces you can get with no revolt risk.

 

[Coffer]

In my Romania run, I allied Poland, Serbia/Bosnia (can't remember) and Hungary, waited a long time for 10 favors, declared on Ottomans. After some early successes the Turks were ready to kill us so I peaced out just taking the province west of Wallachia. That gave me access to Serbia, where I fabricated, then released 1-province Bulgaria as vassal (bunch of cores in Otto-land) and then declared on Serbia. From there on out I started expanding into Northern Balkans and Italy. I got coalitioned, which was actually good, because after a long time someone finally occupied whole of Moldavia which I was then able to release from Poland in the peace deal.

Yep, that's mostly what I'm aiming for right now, but generally I've run into two problems while attempting to do so: either Venice declares war on Serbia and Bosnia very quickly and beats them to a pulp or I never actually manage to get that sort of early success once I save up enough favors to fight the Ottomans because my allies are too busy faffing around in Crimea without actually taking everything, and if the Ottomans have any other vassals or allies, Poland and Hungary really can't handle anything anymore. I'll try it again and maybe go all out on Crimea immediately to see if that makes the AI any more keen on turning the tables against the Ottostacks. It's even worse when Poland decides to declare war on its own as then I can't call in my own allies anymore.

Which ideas did you prioritize in your run?

Pretty much any of the HRE minors are a great place to start because you control your own destiny (focus mil). If you want a small country, that's where you do can have a lot of fun with minimal risk. Almost every other small country is food for its immediate larger neighbors. Still, Florry normally starts as a minor in some far away place, so does Jake, and those are mostly the two I am familiar with and I no longer watch Jake as he's now the Man.

Yeah, I've done a fair few HRE minor starts by now and I feel I can handle them pretty nicely precisely because I have much more control than with, say, Wallachia. They're some of my better ones right now and I might try one of the more competent ones later just to finally have the chance to take a run further than I did my Lubeck one.

As far as countries in that region, look at all the Byz threads to get an idea of what you might like to try. In fact, if you restart until the Ottos have taken Last Bastion of the Crusaders or whatever there is a good chance you can be the one to take over Byz, now, yes, they are wrong culture but right religion, which lessens the blow, you can also vassalize them because they have a lot of cores to reconquer. Getting Serbia and swallowing Bosnia via Serbia is also valid as Serbia is Orthodox. You can flip to Catholic via Bosnia if you want, and you can also try to join the HRE but you'll probably have to take over Serbia and Bosnia to do that.

I have only played Wallachia once and that was a long time ago, but the run was pretty similar to Byz, just with less good provinces you can get with no revolt risk.

As far as I can tell, Byz seems to have better alliance options early on even though they're a bit more endangered, and I'm not too sure whether they have more or fewer options for expanding after fending off the Ottomans the first time. I'll have a look.

 

[Coffer]

Came close once again but still fell short. Poland and Bohemia with their vassals looked like they might have the edge on Hungary, Austria (not the HRE emperor for once), Florence and the Livonian Order, but they wasted too much time annexing the latter and we somehow lost to the rest. There was no real tech disadvantage, just Austria being ridiculous in the field somehow, and that unfortunately led to a full annexation. This does at least seem to be the way to go right now as opposed to fighting the Ottomans, but figuring out how to dismantle Austria really doesn't seem easy at all.

 

[AnssiA]

Yep, that's mostly what I'm aiming for right now, but generally I've run into two problems while attempting to do so: either Venice declares war on Serbia and Bosnia very quickly and beats them to a pulp or I never actually manage to get that sort of early success once I save up enough favors to fight the Ottomans because my allies are too busy faffing around in Crimea without actually taking everything, and if the Ottomans have any other vassals or allies, Poland and Hungary really can't handle anything anymore. I'll try it again and maybe go all out on Crimea immediately to see if that makes the AI any more keen on turning the tables against the Ottostacks. It's even worse when Poland decides to declare war on its own as then I can't call in my own allies anymore.

Which ideas did you prioritize in your run?

As that run wasn't WC and I wanted to create super Romans, I went Economy - Quality - Innovative - Offensive. (Quality/Innovative-policy for 20% infantry combat ability was the main pull for Innovation) Now that I remember, I waited Ottomans to be involved in war with Mamluks before I declared. That let me get some time to take war goal and some war score.

 

[Coffer]

As that run wasn't WC and I wanted to create super Romans, I went Economy - Quality - Innovative - Offensive. (Quality/Innovative-policy for 20% infantry combat ability was the main pull for Innovation) Now that I remember, I waited Ottomans to be involved in war with Mamluks before I declared. That let me get some time to take war goal and some war score.

That sounds pretty close to what I had in mind as well. How long did you have to wait? Generally I've never actually seen them fight the Mamluks before I stopped being in any way relevant, as either I'd fall off and be in grave danger of being attacked by Hungary or the Ottomans themselves or Poland would suicide to the Ottomans on its own. In general, whenever Poland has to deal with one target nearby in one direction and another target far away in another in the same war, it ends up making catastrophic decisions in my experience, which is more than a bit annoying but I have no idea how to prevent it or at least stop it from being a disaster.

 

[AnssiA]

That sounds pretty close to what I had in mind as well. How long did you have to wait? Generally I've never actually seen them fight the Mamluks before I stopped being in any way relevant, as either I'd fall off and be in grave danger of being attacked by Hungary or the Ottomans themselves or Poland would suicide to the Ottomans on its own. In general, whenever Poland has to deal with one target nearby in one direction and another target far away in another in the same war, it ends up making catastrophic decisions in my experience, which is more than a bit annoying but I have no idea how to prevent it or at least stop it from being a disaster.

I think I waited 25-30 years. If my memory serves me, I got Poland to exactly 10 favors while Hungary was something like 8, but I was able to promise him land (which he didn't get, of course, since it was the exact same spot I was after.)

I haven't had much issues with Poland declaring on Ottomans on their own (this was patch 1.22). I think biggest issue with waiting is actually Hungary which might fall under Austrian PU and break the alliance. My logic with stupid allies while being weak myself often is that I send few 1k stacks to take war goal and areas outsize fort ZoC and then keep the remaining with the ally stacks. Another fairly successful solution I've had is make 1k unit and allow friendlies to attach to it. Then you get to directly control that 25k stack and send it fighting and siegeing while keeping your other ~10k units in adjacent province.

 

[Coffer]

I think I waited 25-30 years. If my memory serves me, I got Poland to exactly 10 favors while Hungary was something like 8, but I was able to promise him land (which he didn't get, of course, since it was the exact same spot I was after.)

I haven't had much issues with Poland declaring on Ottomans on their own (this was patch 1.22). I think biggest issue with waiting is actually Hungary which might fall under Austrian PU and break the alliance. My logic with stupid allies while being weak myself often is that I send few 1k stacks to take war goal and areas outsize fort ZoC and then keep the remaining with the ally stacks. Another fairly successful solution I've had is make 1k unit and allow friendlies to attach to it. Then you get to directly control that 25k stack and send it fighting and siegeing while keeping your other ~10k units in adjacent province.

Yeah, it being before the patch may have contributed to that, as I haven't seen the Mamluks and the Ottomans really get into a fistfight much since, not even after 60 years (and usually by then I'm on my way to a quick demise). You're 100% right about the PU, which is easily one of my bigger issues right now regardless of whether I try to focus my efforts on attacking the Ottomans (Austria is nigh impossible to ally so you're stuck with Poland and a bunch of weaker ones) or Hungary themselves (I'm not 100% sure given my inexperience but that should make Austria a cobelligerent, and if they're the emperor you're basically suiciding), so generally if I see it happen I just save myself the effort and restart.

Regarding the 1k stack strategy, the problem with that is that regardless of who I focus on, I still have to deal with more than two enemies - the Ottomans often have Crimea plus another ally or two vassals, while Hungary tends to have Austria (who never seems to get into anything close to a losing position before 1510) and one or two other tiny allies, so splitting them up leaves me open to one of the smaller stacks tearing me in half while the bigger stacks deal with Poland's slightly smaller stacks which I can no longer reinforce properly. I should try and get a bit better at annoying the AI with the way I spread my 1k units out, but that's easier said than done right now when the first war is always make-or-break for my runs. Attaching is also something I used a lot before the same way you did, but I don't know if they've changed something in this patch or anything, but Poland, Hungary and Bohemia all seem really uninterested in attaching their stacks to my units now as I've not been able to do it once since then. I'll try again later just to be sure.

 

[cuendillar]

I'm not sure which DLCs you have, as you haven't any forum icons. Some of this might thus not apply.

There are a few ways to increase your control of what your allies do. Not properly doing that seems to be a fair bit of your issue/frustration.
1. With Art of War, you can click an enemy province during war there is an option to set it as an objective. Click this and pick whatever ally you want and they'll usually go siege it for you - this should do that they won't just screw up in Crimea. As of recently, there'll even be a tiny icon on the map showing where you've given objectives and to who.
Just don't go too overboard with it, as the situation might change and you'd then have to 'un-objective' it again.

2. You can take a 1k stack and click the 'allow AI to attach' option. They'd follow your unit around then, letting you micromanage a lot better. Not sure if this is DLC or not. atwix made a great post about how to get that to work reliably recently, in this thread.

 

[Coffer]

I'm not sure which DLCs you have, as you haven't any forum icons. Some of this might thus not apply.

How would I go about making them appear? I didn't have my Steam account connected to this one but I do now, yet they still haven't appeared, which might be because my profile is private. Either way, I have Rights of Man, Mandate of Heaven, Cossacks, Art of War, Common Sense, Mare Nostrum, Wealth of Nations and Res Publica I believe.

There are a few ways to increase your control of what your allies do. Not properly doing that seems to be a fair bit of your issue/frustration.
1. With Art of War, you can click an enemy province during war there is an option to set it as an objective. Click this and pick whatever ally you want and they'll usually go siege it for you - this should do that they won't just screw up in Crimea. As of recently, there'll even be a tiny icon on the map showing where you've given objectives and to who.
Just don't go too overboard with it, as the situation might change and you'd then have to 'un-objective' it again.

Nice, this might be really useful. I only knew how to set provinces outside of wars as being of interest to me, but that might help with stopping the AI from making a beeline for Crimea. It probably isn't the absolute worst idea in the world since getting them out of the war instantly would definitely be worthwhile (as they're usually just slightly stronger than me), but with the way they faff around without actually taking everything there right now, this seems like the better option right now.

2. You can take a 1k stack and click the 'allow AI to attach' option. They'd follow your unit around then, letting you micromanage a lot better. Not sure if this is DLC or not. atwix made a great post about how to get that to work reliably recently, in this thread.

Yeah, as I mentioned in another post, I was already doing that pre-patch as well as in these runs. For some reason, the AI's willingness to attach to any of my stacks has reduced considerably nowadays to the point where I've literally never seen them do it anymore, both as Wallachia and as just about anyone else. I'll look in the thread and see if I can spot anything that might be stopping it from happening in my case.
EDIT: I think I was doing it too much while in enemy territory, but I've definitely seen it happen in at least two situations where they should've attached just fine: one where Poland kept one of its big stacks in its own territory and refused to attach to my slowly recovering stack after being beaten down (was up to 3k when I tried it, which should be above the threshold), and the Venice situation I mentioned earlier in the thread where they just parked themselves in their own territory and immediately moved to another province when I sent my stack to them, making it impossible to attach since the Venice stack was already on the move (this lasted until they peaced out despite being in a winnable position, ultimately killing me - I believe Poland did something very similar in another attempt I made yesterday).