Game ruined - again- by the Ottomans

[Blk82]

To expand upon what I said earlier, unless you are in or neighboring the Ottoman's "de jure" territory (which in Europe, extends to about Venice-Austria-Poland-Lithuania-Muscovy) you don't need to come into conflict with the Ottomans. Regardless of how good of game the Ottomans are having, the AI really doesn't expand beyond southern Austria and Slovakia, because of missions directing conquests elsewhere and following the Mamluks into the Indian Ocean and the south Pacific.

I think you might be trying to play the "balance of power" too hard. While the Ottomans are the "end boss" (along with nonexploded Ming), they aren't a threat to Western Europe (or even much of Central Europe). In fact, France is probably the Ottoman's favorite ally, behind Tunis and Crimea. You shouldn't come into any natural conflict with the Ottomans during early and mid game, and unless you are blobbing hard, probably not even in the late game. (If the Ottomans follow the Mamluks into the south Pacific, they might start colonizing the west coast of the Americas, which will cause them to desire the land of New World subjects, causing them to hate you forever. But, that won't happen until the 18th century, if at all.)

The best course of action is to ally the Ottomans unironically. The AI tends to do worse when allied to the player even when you don't try to shaft your allies. Short of a specifically anti-Ottoman opening, that is probably the best way to control the Ottomans. They really won't be "contained," the Ottomans will still eat up the near east, but they will be less powerful than they otherwise would have been.

 

[cleansingL1ght]

All you need is a strong alliance. As long as your allies are strong enough and willing to join you in a defense war (keep their opinion on you up), no other nation will attack you. You can have more allies than the limit tells. If you break the limit, you will just have to pay 1 power each month for each ally that you have too much. That can really be worth it in the beginning of the game!

The Ottomans are the strongest nation in the beginning, but the game doesn't always turn out the same way. YOU have a major influence on it. You need to find out when there is a good moment to attack them together with your allies. Grow stronger than them!

If I got you right, then you are a complete beginner, having spent only 100 hours in playing this game, right? Let me quote what I have read a couple of times already in different places, saying it with my own words:
After having played Europa Universalis for 2000 hours you might still be a beginner who is just beginning to understand how to play this game.
This is simply because this is a great complex strategy game. There are lots of interesting methods you will continuously learn to improve your playing.

 

[damnt512]

As France I would go Protestant so the league war would not be a factor, I usually do not fight the ottomans until after 1600 when I have a much larger force and the tech group pips of units are more even.

I do agree however that early game ottoman units are overtunned. Mamuluks start out with more development than Ottomans, but never defeat them.

Because 15th century Ottomans was a genuine powerhouse. They were one of the first nation that used gunpowder en masse. This is why the Mamluks got rolled over in real life within one war, they were utterly defeated because the Ottomans integrated a lot of gunpowder into their army, whilst the Mamluks army was a traditional Turk army with a lot of cavalry. It means their tactic was also a typical medieval tactic that did not put gunpowder into the calculation. The Mamluks was late on realizing the importance of gunpowder, by the time they realized it, it was too late, they've lost too much to the Ottomans already. I'd say the anatolian tech having such a high unit pip during the first age is pretty justified.

 

[swagmeister]

The ottomans gimp themselves every game by allying AQ at the game start to check QQ and mamluk interests in Anatolia. They are much easier to manage than they used to be.

 

[Sergeant Major Gross]

I am really annoyed right now, because I have wasted something like 100 hours of gameplay in the past few weeks.

Dude 100 hours is nothing in this game. Don’t you know you need at least 1444 hours to finish the tutorial? All these problems you’re describing are just issues you personally have because of your inexperience. They’ve already weakened Ottomans a lot. They used to have cores on all of Anatolia.
Play the game some more and learn from your mistakes instead of crying on the forums about it.

 

[RobbieAB]

Im really not interested in some sort of pissing contest about who knows more about the game. I have been playing EU since EU 2, so the "you need thousands of hours"-ppl, yeah, Ive got that. I put in 4000 hours betatesting HoI2 and Vicky. Its not like Im some random new guy just walking in from the street.

The stop sounding like a new guy. If you played so much of both games, you should recognise that HoI2 was a game with relatively simple underlying mechanics which all interact in interesting ways with effective (well, sorta) diminishing returns built in, and as a result has comparatively better AI due to the simpler systems involved.

By comparison EU4 is a vastly more complicated game with a vastly less capable AI as a result. It looks competent until you realise that England invasion is trivial because the AI just lets you do stuff that should trigger an immediate and violent response in setting it up. Ottomans can be defeated by strait blocking in a manner they never should fall for. The current AI is extremely unwilling to actually attack your stacks without overwhelming advantage.

In HoI2 the inherent differences between nations is fairly small, flavour and encouraged doctrine mainly, with the major differences coming from their location and strategic posture. In EU4 the differences between nations are far greater, to the point that some nations are simply playing a different game. Austria is one of the most extreme examples of this. They are not (normally) playing a military game and if they are relying on the strength of their own armies to defeat a major power they have already messed up their diplomatic game!

 

[Soph]

My last 15 or so starts have been as Trebizond or Circassia. I always get to the 1600's before the Ottos come knocking. By then its probably too late anyway.

I made a real rookie error earlier (showing my lack of play in the last year or so) when I got the perfect start with Circassia managing to annex most of Crimea, but then declaring on Genoa thinking the Emperor wouldn't get access to the Caucasus-how wrong i was lol.

To the OP, all the pain will be worth it when it pays off!

Whelp.. keep trying man, you're learning more with every mistake you make than you'll ever will by playing as a great power.

I just finished the Hisn Kayfa run and it was one hell of a ride indeed. With all of the rules mentioned it was quite the stressful endeavor. I actually picked espionage as my first idea group.. to find the secretive hashashin order. Maybe they could help me assassinate some Mamluk or Ottoman leaders. Yeah I love roleplay.. anyhow.. this espionage idea group might have saved my bacon. Keeping one diplomat on counterespionage against the ottomans at all times seemed very effective at preventing claims to form. No claims? No CB! No declaration.

 

[RAID186]

You played 3 of the stronger nations in the game and still lost.

It's not an Ottoman issue, it's a skill issue. We've all been there and you'll improve every time

 

[lordgoof]

My game gets ruined by random PU's which the side that gets the PU is the defender and curb stomps the other large power so cements itself as a super power.

 

[Kapi96]

This is true. They start weakening a lot after some time. I don't remember having struggled with the Ottomans after having fought the League war. Try to rival the Ottoman rivals. Their land usually is quite attractive, and it will grant you a alliance with them. You likely won't have to fight them then, and in return you'll also slow them down a lot.


To me, the Turkish minors (and perhaps Byzantium) need a little buff. Just enough to rarely let them take over instead of the Ottos. But else, I must admit the Ottomans seem to be at the weak side already. The AI focuses too much on Hungary/Poland/Russia for expansion, and leaves the Mameluks as big as ever. The buff for the Ottomans I would like to see is actually a nerf to the Mameluks.

I still regularly see the Ottomans tear the Mamluks apart, I don't think much needs to change for the Mamluks. And while I'm not really opposed to buffing the Turkish minors/Byzantium to make early Ottoman expansion a bit harder/riskier, the problem with that is how you buff them. If it increases development or anything like that then it ends up being an indirect buff to the Ottomans. They'll still likely take that land, and if it's better land than it currently is than they'll be even stronger than they currently are.

 

[wthree]

I think the problem comes from the Ottomans being massively buffed, way more than is historically justified.

Ottoman AI can very completely wipe the floor with a combined AI force of Austria-Hungary-Poland-Lithuania-Venice-Aragon-Naples.

Beating the Ottomans as a human player relies on using a lot of cheese and abusing game mechanics.

 

[Commonblob]

just find another game, you are too bad at this one after thousands of hours. Austria is one of the most op nations in a player's hands rofl.

I think he only has 100 hours in EU4, it's the older games he has thousands of hours in. The problem is that the OP expects skill to be completely transferable between different paradox games.

 

[Hojsimpson]

Just for those complaining:
Spain currently has a more powerful artillery and ships than the Ottomans while the Ottomans in reality had superior artillery.
In this time period both should be equally dominant at least until Gustavus Adolphus.

There also people complaining about Ming because they can't read and play a Horde nation but anyway...

 

[damnt512]

Just for those complaining:
Spain currently has a more powerful artillery and ships than the Ottomans while the Ottomans in reality had superior artillery.
In this time period both should be equally dominant at least until Gustavus Adolphus.

There also people complaining about Ming because they can't read and play a Horde nation but anyway...

After I learned how to play horde, those close to China I find are the easiest nation to play (not just horde nation, but from all nation), especially since the Manchu update.

 

[Battlex]

I think the problem comes from the Ottomans being massively buffed, way more than is historically justified.

Ottoman AI can very completely wipe the floor with a combined AI force of Austria-Hungary-Poland-Lithuania-Venice-Aragon-Naples.

Beating the Ottomans as a human player relies on using a lot of cheese and abusing game mechanics.

I'm sorry what the hell? When have you tried simulating this? The only issue is I see arising I'd that once ottomans have constantinople, they overbuild naval force limit by 30, and aragon and Naples not being able to cross into Austria

 

[Question]

The only time I see Ottos getting very far is when lucky nations is turned on. Without that, they get stopped by hungary or commonwealth and then sit there twiddling their thumbs for the rest of the game.

Without their early anatolian advantage, Ottos are just like any other AI : tech up, get a good advantage via policies and ideas, and zerg their forts down while the AI avoids your stacks. When I played Poland, my war strategy was to rush constantinople/edirne which makes most of the Ottoman army try to take the long way through Crimea which makes it really easy to intercept their armies.

 

[damnt512]

The only time I see Ottos getting very far is when lucky nations is turned on. Without that, they get stopped by hungary or commonwealth and then sit there twiddling their thumbs for the rest of the game.

Without their early anatolian advantage, Ottos are just like any other AI : tech up, get a good advantage via policies and ideas, and zerg their forts down while the AI avoids your stacks. When I played Poland, my war strategy was to rush constantinople/edirne which makes most of the Ottoman army try to take the long way through Crimea which makes it really easy to intercept their armies.

They do expand into the HRE heartland, but it really depends on the emperor. If the emperor and their alliance isn't strong enough then Ottomans will roll them over. Usually this only happens if the emperor are some weak nation or if Austria got beaten hard by other nation or Austria got attacked by several nation including Ottomans in separate war. So it kinda depends on what players do in europe, otherwise it's RNG.

 

[Question]

Its not that the emperor is too strong, its that the AI will go for the easiest targets. This is why you see dumb stuff like England ignoring Sligo or France ignoring Brittany/Provence/Burgundy. The emperor may be weak, but the Ottos AI looks around and sees all those tiny muslim nations around them and decides to go for them instead because they are much weaker.

The closest ive seen Ottos get to Vienna is taking half of Hungary. Then they decided to stop and look elsewhere.

 

[Dell19]

All you need is a strong alliance. As long as your allies are strong enough and willing to join you in a defense war (keep their opinion on you up), no other nation will attack you. You can have more allies than the limit tells. If you break the limit, you will just have to pay 1 power each month for each ally that you have too much. That can really be worth it in the beginning of the game!

That is true however in the current version of the game you have to be careful about AIs betraying you due to having too many loans even though they appear to be doing well. Had a game recently where all three of my allies dishonoured a defensive call due to too much debt even though they all liked me.

 

[cleansingL1ght]

That is true however in the current version of the game you have to be careful about AIs betraying you due to having too many loans even though they appear to be doing well. Had a game recently where all three of my allies dishonoured a defensive call due to too much debt even though they all liked me.

How do you know that your DEPTS were the reason for not supporting you? When planning an offensive war, you can see why your allies would be going to support you - or not - by hovering the mouse over the X / J. As far as I got it, the reasons shown there are the same reasons why they would or wouldn't support you in a defensive war (just that you get a bonus in case of a defensive war), and there I never saw anything considering MY depts - but THEIRS.

Anyway, my experience is that it is best never to have any depts at all, if possible - just in very critical situations, where a small group of mercenaries can decide a war, or to quickly pay the next institution. But having too many depts can ruin the game completely, because due to the ongoing payments you will need more and more whenever you're in a bad situation, and everything will just get worse and worse. In my last game, I didn't want to give some important provinces to an enemy, so I decided to pay a lot of money in the peace contract. After that, one problem led to the next problem, and I would have done a lot better the whole rest of the game if I had just given away those provinces and conquered them again a few years later. I'll never make this mistake again!
Another mistake that I always made in the past was to have an army that I could afford when there was peace, but not during war, because the refilling of the units is so expensive. That always made me end up with new provinces that gave me less income than the costs of the loans! And it took me more than 100 hours of playing to realize that.

But I totally agree that this world is full of opportunistic betrayers that are not worth to be trusted. And the worst of all are ... guess who!? Your neighbours of course! They may greet you friendly and team up with you, but as soon as they have the opportunity to replace their fences into your garden, they might just forget all the milk and the butter you "borrowed" them without asking for anything in exchange!