Help a non noob!

[unmerged(80402)]

Honestly, innovative is not a permanent must for anything.
You can easily enact the decisions and westernize and then go back to narrowminded (i do it a lot), ends up much better in the end.

Likewise, narrowminded also has some...decisions...that give more missionaries and such, that can be very useful.

Oh, Liquor act is another good decision, i'm not feeling like taking a look for other decisions, but whatever.
The point is, if you want x decision, you can easily move your sliders and then go back to your old slider positions.


Infantry cost? No thanks, i'd rather have better morale and more advanced tech than lots of cheap infantry that won't win big wars.

Well actualy you are wrong about one thing. Number might not win a battle. But lot of cheap troops are giving you possibility to easier go over certain number of troops. And when you got more troops, you can much easier fight on more fronts. Aslo, when you lose cheap troops you won't need to care so much about armies, as you will just rebuild them. This just change the wars. Not mean you will lose them. Aslo if you got more manpower, you can fight wars longer. And it might mean, that you might win war just by pure manpower thing. Well it just depend on your playstyle - not like any strategy is worse than other. But cheap troops are good for big countries, that play atrition wars - as if you play atrition wars, your troops are wall, for the enemy, to stop him, not realy to kill him. You want in such war to use the troops, to prevent enemy from assaulting your fortresses, and if he attack your troops, lure him deep into your territory, and kill him off by that, then destroying him. If you got lot of manpower, and cheap troops, loosing some armies will not be a problem, as you will not get so much WE as your enemy, and you will be able to easily rebuild it.

But as you need troops to be cheap, infantry needs to be cheap too, so it just mean you need to go serfdom. If you will go free subjects, you will have much more expensive infantry. This strategy is not good for all countries - aspecialy not for small ones. But if as a big country you go quality, you will gain much more WE from battles when you lost any men than if you got quantity. Also, if you are free subjects, it will be much more expensive, to build the army back. So with those two combined you will have problems if any rebelions occur, as you OR will have much less troops, or you will have much more expensive army - which will mean you invest less into economy. So if you mint anything, you will get less money, so you will get less buildings, so you will be lack in economy, so you will lack in tech. And if you will have smaller army, you will have to face the fact, that western nations, will just kill you easily, even if you will have same quality as them, as they will anyway outtech you - no matter if you westernize - the tech gap may only stop being so big, but during westernization, you will get much slower tech due to stability. And thou, if you don't westernize your troops - you will lose anyway. If you will westernize your troops, you will still have a big gap, caused by stab loss. So, if you will go quality as westernizing nation it don't mean you win, and if you will go free subjects, it will mean you are dead, cause your stabcost is high as hell. And if you even go back to narrowminded, it will not change the fact, you got lost much to invest in tech, that you would not lose, if you would be serfdom. Also, remember that you need a tech gap to be high enough, if you want to westernize. So you got serfdom for this.

For western nation, which got lot of incredably rich provinces, going serfdom is not needed, as they don't have so big territory, but it does not mean they can't - it might work, still it just depend on how you exploit the fact. For example - going serfdom migh be good for land France. If he is going to have mostly infantry armies, it will decrease army cost by a huge amount, letting him to invest the money in building, and not mint, which mean he can invest more in tech. As he don't colo nize, and he don't realy need misionaries (he might be tolerant type of france), he would not get much from going narrowminded. Also, narrowminded give him ability to entact +1 tolerance decision. Well it is quite nice.

About missionaries decisions - they are nice if you need them, but what if you don't? they don't give anything good, only decrease some thing (there is one good, but it needs you to be centralized, not narrowminded). So it is not like that narrowminded decisions mean you gain something except missionaries.

Also liquor act? RLY??? This is not quite the best decison. Increase tax by 3%... and stability cost by 4%. Not best choice if you got problem with stabcost, and not realy great income gain.

 

[Duke of Britain]

When i play a country like Russia i go free subjects and full quality, i've already played with serfdom and quantity, of course, but i wouldn't go back to it ever again.
And with the new patch the WE gains will change...

And if you're concerned about it, most of the WE you'll get in a war will be from atrittion, look at that :

It's on a mod, but that doesn't changes the fact that i had maxed WE for the entire war and it lasted for some time.

Another point is that any important war on MP will usually end up with high or maxed WE for both sides.

And the biggest point, having experienced a lot of times battles with maxed quality and quantity :
full quantity = more deaths = more WE
full quality = less deaths for you = less WE

Also liquor act? RLY??? This is not quite the best decison. Increase tax by 3%... and stability cost by 4%. Not best choice if you got problem with stabcost, and not realy great income gain.

if +4% prod eff is noticeable, do i need to tell you why tax increase is?
It affects not only the monthly income, but the yearly census tax as well.
The increase on stab cost is hardly noticeable with maxed narrowminded.

And converting your provinces is much better than being tolerant, why? Because it frees up a lot of useful NI slots instead of wasting them with something you could avoid.

Granada will emerge catholic, the main prov was converted, the other two are still mulsim. As the emerged Granada can get missionares I'm tempted to give the muslim prov (which I assimilated) back to them to convert.

I'm playing HTTT so I don't think there is a force PU peace option? In which case I should just plan to shread Castile in a series of wars?

If you're playing HttT forget about the PU spy mission...
You'll have to wait to force the PU...

 

[unmerged(80402)]

Well 4% production is more noticeable than 3% tax, as you get just more production than tax, in most countries.

Well, about quantity - it gives you much faster reinforcement, so if you just withdraw from battle, and lure the enemy, into your land, and then cut him from support, you will win, as he will just lose his armies - and it will be hard for him to rebuild the army, as he got much more expensive soliders. As you fight on your territory, you are able to reinforce your armies in few months, while he will only lose more and more as he got quality - so he does not get reinforcement in your provinces. Aspecialy if you got much winter provinces. So this is good strategy for Russia. As you got quantity, if it comes to fighting in his ground, you will still get more reinforcements in his land, than he would, so you will be able to use simmiliar strategy in his country. Also, with very big army, you will just flood his provinces with your armies, when you attack, and let him hunt your stacks - until you will get to a place when you will find suitable to defeat him.

Also, if you got much losses in the war, it is much easier to rebuild if you got cheap troops, and massive manpower, than otherwise. Just need to have much stacks to support other stacks, and use them well if you just need to win a battle (withdrawing them partialy, and bringing new armies into battle). But this needs good organization, so hard for most players... i have admit it is so for me...

Well i am not negating the fact, it is easier to win using the elite, but it does not change the fact, that if very skilled player use attrition war, he may win with, even simmiliary experienced one, player that use just brutal firepower.

Well actualy, people say much things in theory - and they right - but they are unable to do such thing in practics, because they are not good in practics.

For example very good strategy is DAwolf rush in AOE, but only very good players can do it well. War of atrition, is such kind of strategy that if used well, it can be devasting to any player, aspecialy unexperienced one. And it is hard to use attrition in war, if your own troops, are getting too much of it. So to do it well, you need to got lot of good planning (best plan everything BEFORE the game, and just do it when it come to war).

So maybe you just did not managed to use your advantages duke?

 

[Duke of Britain]

Are you even considering situations where you fight large countries or players?
A good player won't go and put all his armies deep into your land for no reason.


Are you considering that the player using the quality sliders actually has brains and will use good tatics to create a stable front on the war (if possible) while destroying your armies? Have you considered that while you wait for his armies to die to atrittion, he may have reserves waiting to continue the push?
My main battle strategy is rotating quality-oriented armies, destroying the enemy army while giving my exhausted troops time to replenish, and if he tries to retreat he'll just get chased out of the front.


I did used my "advantages", if you mean sending my human waves on their armies, my losses were big and i had to deal with the WE, the Ottomans were the war leaders of my alliance and therefore i had to force one of the enemies (Austria or HRE Bohemia) out of the war.
I only did that when i rushed to Prague, taking every province on the way, and rotating the armies a lot of times while the Ottomans dealt with the armies.

Rotating the armies is needed for both quality and quantity, but it will work better with quality-oriented armies as you'll have more time to replenish resting armies. (mostly their morale)

(Keep in mind that in that screenshot the proportions of the war were massive, i alone had 440+ regiments spread over my empire)

 

[unmerged(80402)]

Well, that might be right, that a player may do a stable front. But you got only 440 regiments... with quantity (and with almost 700k MP...). That is not realy big number of armies. Also, keep in mind that while a player do a stable front, you just need to brake it. Attack at certain points, and when enemy army comes, withdraw. Also, you should just stop him in some points, and let him go foward in others. Also, building high level forts in few border provinces, and stacking realy big armies there is a viable strategy. Just stopping enemy in some fronts, and letting him go in others - so your armies can flank his.

Well anyway i am bit more theoretical. Actualy i don't know if i would done it better. Just it is so, that when your soliders are weaker, you got to think more, and make combat only in situations, where you got numerical advantage on your side, or it is just needed to win.

Well problem with being full on quantity, is that when you meet same size armies it is quite hard to win a war. But it is not like it is impossible. But it is almost impossible to win if you got lesser number of men. So quantity, is only good choice if you plan on building VERY large armies - and propably much over your forcelimit.

You should have like 1 milion men forces i mean by that. In that game.

And one question : What was your forcelimit? If you built only to your forcelimit, then there is no wonder, why you got such problems.

EDIT: From only your territory you should have like 300=400K forcelimit, and if you would use cheap soliders, you should have like double or triple the forcelimit.

 

[Duke of Britain]

Exacly, i got 440 with full quantity and no NIs related to it, i could go over the forcelimits, but i had no reason to.

Make combat only in some situations? When waves and waves of Europeans came flooding my Crimean territories i had to fight, there was no escape, it would be either that or my allies (the Ottomans) would continue to get overrun, only with consistent fighting, some retreats and victories was my alliance able to push back the Austrians and Bohemians.

Yes, i had around 450-460 forcelimits, however i had no wish to mint (otherwise i would lose my small tech advantage) or stop my investments...
I had problems, but that was because i kept only a fraction of my forces on the west, i was not stupid to leave the east border unguarded and suffer an invasion from the massive forces of Yuan China or even Deccan (that could invade me with 110k~ average soldiers)
or to leave some regions unprotected against rebels (spies are an annoyance)

Also, the front was small and i had to defend at most 2 or 3 provinces while killing some random armies that left their allies and tried to push futher in Crimea...If i was alone on the war i would need way more soldiers on Crimea, but that would be a different situation.
And...1 million men would be really problematic to sustain on some regions (central Asia, India)
I prefer to increase my armies after i get the atrittion reducing NI.

 

[unmerged(80402)]

Well that is propably why you got such problems. If you go quantity you may only have army not beyond forcelimit during peace or when you fight weaker enemy. If you plan a war, or you see the war coming, you just need to build up the army, so you get it big enough. The economy is not everything - it surely help to have it good, but when the war is coming, you just need to keep stronger army than on peace, otherwise, your economy will give you crap... Could i get stats of this campaighn?

 

[Duke of Britain]

Well that is propably why you got such problems. If you go quantity you may only have army not beyond forcelimit during peace or when you fight weaker enemy. If you plan a war, or you see the war coming, you just need to build up the army, so you get it big enough. The economy is not everything - it surely help to have it good, but when the war is coming, you just need to keep stronger army than on peace, otherwise, your economy will give you crap... Could i get stats of this campaighn?

I was not called on the war start, so when i joined the enemy had taken everything all the way to Edirne...
There are the losses :
Attacking alliance (Ottoman alliance) : 1.917.744
Defending alliance (Austria and Bohemia, lead by Milan) : 2.119.548

Any other stats of interest?

 

[unmerged(80402)]

Well if you saw war, you should build up the army, just in case. Whatever i meant more - size of armies of countries involved... losses are not of so big importance... whatever lots of men lost in this war XD...

 

[-MoRiDin-]

Well here is an update.

I took Madrid, Cadiz, Murcia and caceres as I decided to try the PU route. I also released Granada. I decided to keep Almeria, despite being muslim and a Granadan Core, as I intend to move to narrowminded and thus convert them. Granada did start to misbehave: She broke the alliance with me and keeps insulting me. How she expects to win her prov back I've no idea, but I think I may give it to them just to shut them up.

I then guaranteed Castile to avoid Portugal jumping them. This worked, Portugal instead decided to jump Galacia. It was -5 stab to heed the Portugese call to arms so I heeded the Galacian call to arms. I then took Alentejo and Beira to avoid any problems should Granada revoke military access. Infamy is up to about 12.5 so no more aquistions for awhile, at least not via conquest.

My truce with Castile was up, so I fabricated claims and dowed. However as all her northern Provinces are occupied by Navarra I can't get the war score need to force a pu. So I'm insulting Navarra so I can DoW them for only 2 stability hit.. Gulp then and force them off Castile's land (So I can siege it!). Will prob force vassalise them for a Diploannex much later, or just white peace them? I need them to stop being at war with prostate Castile. Unless there is a better way? Infamy is way too high to just annex them and I need to pull all these little guys together in an alliance system as France looks more and more threatening. I need to make an alliance with Burgundy, the moment I think I'm done campaigning in Iberia. Oh Andulsican rebels took cordoba and it defected to granada.. I think they had supported them in Almeria but I'd kicked them out and they went had happy times in castile, who still hasn't even tried to raise 1 regiment and is sat on stab -3.

So Spain looks an interesting mess...

Granada is also allied with Navarra... interesting...

Any suggestions on how to get Navarra and Castile into a peace?