How do I deal with the HRE?

[ChipiParadox]

So, I'm playing as Holland trying to form the Netherlands, but I'm having trouble dealing with the military coalitions resulting from conquest.

My friend told me, that I should be keeping track of my aggressive expansion and keep it under 50%, but that doesn't seem to work.

Are there any other tips that would help me?

 

[filcat]

So, I'm playing as Holland trying to form the Netherlands

This is one of the most enjoyable runs in the eu4's universum. Kudos, good luck, and have fun.

Before starting, it has to be admitted that the author always played tall, in a way of self-narrated, self-consistent simulation (as opposed to an arcade game), when going for holland to the netherlands run. The following are provided according to this method of play. The player should decide the best route by self.

In short: Vassalise nearby OPMs. Conquer in multiple wars rather than single full annexation. Always, constantly, meticulously assign the diplomats to improve relations; before, during, after wars; with all nearby, neighbouring, and neighbours of neighbouring tags.

but I'm having trouble dealing with the military coalitions resulting from conquest.
My friend told me, that I should be keeping track of my aggressive expansion and keep it under 50%, but that doesn't seem to work.

Aggro-exp in the hre is a notorious side of the game, and one can find ancient texts of legendary runs to post-modern science-fiction novels on this.

The provinces are highly developed (average over 10, and in the lowlands it is even higher). This makes the conquest wars challenging if one gets greedy in peace deals.

On top of this, there is the hre internal-politics: The emperor will demand the lands back to the previous owner, or any former tag that has a core on the province; when the player refuses, then the province will get unlawful territory modifier, and relations within the hre are further damaged (in addition to aggro-exp due to conquest).

In this case, there are two choices:

• Risky route: No alliance with the emperor (usually austria, but it is susceptible to change)
• Safe route: Alliance with the emperor (again, usually austria)

Obviously, safe route is preferable if one does not want to deal with the occasional coalitions, and possible imperial liberation wars declared by the emperor. Allying the emperor tag will save the player a lot of time: The emperor does not make demands of unlawful territory from its allies after conquests.

About conquests, whether with an alliance to emperor or not:

• Hunter mode: Conquering 1, or 2 provinces at a time; even 3 provinces may incur long-lasting damages to the relations in the hre; and it is hre, meaning damaged relations with a lot of tags (including ulm).
• Destroyer mode: Conquer, conquer, conquer. Do not forget to ally with france in this case. It also means, that the emperor-austria will be raging, as the player is hell-bent to destroy the hre.

Needless to say, destroyer mode will carry the player to coalitions, to imperial liberations, near-permanent hatred from nearly all tags that managed to survive before the player, and a lot of rebels, lots of rebels. Rebels are many, rebels are legion. Not to forget about the frequent call to arms from the player's allies; which, in this case, with high probability is france. When the player decides on annihilating the hre, the ally code-france will shift its gear to hyper-drive.

Hunter mode includes careful selection of provinces in the peace deal, managing the expectations from conquests before/after war, hunting down vulnerable tags in long time periods, considering vassalisation instead of conquests, and most notably, improving relations with all tags in the hre.

In the case of holland's run, obviously the natural enemies are gelre, brabant, utrecht, friesland tags. Yes, all the other tags in the lowlands have to go down, even though only utrecht, gelre, breda provinces have to be owned (and one in friesland). In order to get those provinces, one can start with conquering friesland. Ostfriesland - east frisia is an OPM, and would make a nice vassal for a start. Utrecht's provinces need two wars, with lots of relation improvements in between. Breda and gelre are usually vulnerable to ally-belligerent wars, so one should look for good opportunities to snipe them. Flanders is not part of hre, so one should quickly deal with it; but it has too much development, so full annexation in a single war will certainly trigger a coalition.

But, such grand-strategic views are not useful in the general course of a run. It is eu4, and everything depends on pseudo-random number generator. In this case, one should be careful about the idea sets to choose, as that is one of the only mechanics that the player is able to decide on, and carry on with self-confidence, relying on only the player's choices.

• Holland-netherlands run can go standard 3-3-2 combination; preferably 3 sets from mil group; the others adm and diplo can vary.
• Despite the advice of many, one would not benefit from Administrative idea set, just for the sake of core-reduction. It is hre, 25% reduction on cores is nice, but how one can benefit from this when there is an impending coalition and nowhere to expand, is the question. Economic is a must (to combine with Quality); Religious or Humanist depends on entirely the player preference. Holland-netherlands can survive and do well beyond without Expansion, it is not a strict necessity. Innovative can be afforded, it has turbo-policies, but it is holland, so there is no strict need for it.
• It is holland to netherlands; that means Plutocratic set will be available. Offensive is safe to take; Quality is a must (one can not deal with france, spain, great britain by taking Quantity or Defensive). Holland has flexibility to even think about Naval, but that is not a standard choice.
• For the safe route, in hunter mode, one should be constantly improving relations to mitigate the coalitions. This means opening with Diplomatic set. It is not for the bonus for improve relations (it helps a bit though), but the diplomats. There are 71 tags in the hre at the start. May be glogow (bohemia vassal) will not be relevant, but there are at least 20 tags that one has to improve relations with. This requires multiple diplomats, constantly assigned to improve relations.
  • Why is this important? Yes, when other tags have -50 aggro-exp opinion of the player, it means coalition is highly possible, and it is certain at the start (when the player is weak; even ottos can trigger it at the beginning).
  • But when the same tag still has positive opinion of the player after conquest, they will not join a coalition.
  • Coalitions are formed when at least 3 tags have equal or less than -50 opinion of the player (with the aggro-exp modifier). If everyone is happy, then there is no risk of coalition. To keep everyone happy in a short time, the player needs more than the default 2 diplomats.
  • It also helps to have high diplo-rep. Minus diplo-rep means abandoning the ally when a war is declared; when it is a punitive war with a coalition league of 15 members, goodbye to all those powerful allies; they will not think even for a second before abandoning the player. High diplo-rep will prevent most coalitions; even if it is formed, the war may not be triggered if the allies hold on. That requires high diplo-rep, and good relations with the allies.

• Diplomatic idea set is not the most popular one in the forums; on the contrary, one can find many posts against it. It is of course meaningless to make a tier list of ideas, as they are part of the design. When one is not considering to mod them by self, then the player is going to play with the cards that are dealt. It is pointless to advocate for the mighty power or pathetic nature of a set. There are, however, useful sets, and not so useful ones (espionage, of course).
  • Espionage is not a useful one; certainly it gives -20% aggro-exp, that may be beneficial; but the player's loss is: 1 set from diplo group is spent on Espionage.
  • Holland, going for the netherlands, is a coloniser tag. This means the player has to take Exploration.
  • On top this, policies matter. Espionage set provides mostly spy detection policies, a fort defense, and some manpower; they may be beneficial, but again, the loss is other policies from other sets that are significantly useful, especially for holland.
  • With 3-3-2 standard set distribution; Diplomatic, and Exploration sets fill the diplo group, if 2 is the limit in the plan of the player. There is not much flexibility for an hre-coloniser tag in this regard. When the limit is planned as 3, then there is Maritime, or even Influence, much more useful than Espionage for holland. Trade is not needed; it is holland, it has the amsterdam trade node (when playing as holland, no need to call it the channel node; it will be the player's node dammit)

 

[ChipiParadox]

This is one of the most enjoyable runs in the eu4's universum. Kudos, good luck, and have fun.

Before starting, it has to be admitted that the author always played tall, in a way of self-narrated, self-consistent simulation (as opposed to an arcade game), when going for holland to the netherlands run. The following are provided according to this method of play. The player should decide the best route by self.

In short: Vassalise nearby OPMs. Conquer in multiple wars rather than single full annexation. Always, constantly, meticulously assign the diplomats to improve relations; before, during, after wars; with all nearby, neighbouring, and neighbours of neighbouring tags.


Aggro-exp in the hre is a notorious side of the game, and one can find ancient texts of legendary runs to post-modern science-fiction novels on this.

The provinces are highly developed (average over 10, and in the lowlands it is even higher). This makes the conquest wars challenging if one gets greedy in peace deals.

On top of this, there is the hre internal-politics: The emperor will demand the lands back to the previous owner, or any former tag that has a core on the province; when the player refuses, then the province will get unlawful territory modifier, and relations within the hre are further damaged (in addition to aggro-exp due to conquest).

In this case, there are two choices:

• Risky route: No alliance with the emperor (usually austria, but it is susceptible to change)
• Safe route: Alliance with the emperor (again, usually austria)

Obviously, safe route is preferable if one does not want to deal with the occasional coalitions, and possible imperial liberation wars declared by the emperor. Allying the emperor tag will save the player a lot of time: The emperor does not make demands of unlawful territory from its allies after conquests.

About conquests, whether with an alliance to emperor or not:

• Hunter mode: Conquering 1, or 2 provinces at a time; even 3 provinces may incur long-lasting damages to the relations in the hre; and it is hre, meaning damaged relations with a lot of tags (including ulm).
• Destroyer mode: Conquer, conquer, conquer. Do not forget to ally with france in this case. It also means, that the emperor-austria will be raging, as the player is hell-bent to destroy the hre.

Needless to say, destroyer mode will carry the player to coalitions, to imperial liberations, near-permanent hatred from nearly all tags that managed to survive before the player, and a lot of rebels, lots of rebels. Rebels are many, rebels are legion. Not to forget about the frequent call to arms from the player's allies; which, in this case, with high probability is france. When the player decides on annihilating the hre, the ally code-france will shift its gear to hyper-drive.

Hunter mode includes careful selection of provinces in the peace deal, managing the expectations from conquests before/after war, hunting down vulnerable tags in long time periods, considering vassalisation instead of conquests, and most notably, improving relations with all tags in the hre.

In the case of holland's run, obviously the natural enemies are gelre, brabant, utrecht, friesland tags. Yes, all the other tags in the lowlands have to go down, even though only utrecht, gelre, breda provinces have to be owned (and one in friesland). In order to get those provinces, one can start with conquering friesland. Ostfriesland - east frisia is an OPM, and would make a nice vassal for a start. Utrecht's provinces need two wars, with lots of relation improvements in between. Breda and gelre are usually vulnerable to ally-belligerent wars, so one should look for good opportunities to snipe them. Flanders is not part of hre, so one should quickly deal with it; but it has too much development, so full annexation in a single war will certainly trigger a coalition.

But, such grand-strategic views are not useful in the general course of a run. It is eu4, and everything depends on pseudo-random number generator. In this case, one should be careful about the idea sets to choose, as that is one of the only mechanics that the player is able to decide on, and carry on with self-confidence, relying on only the player's choices.

• Holland-netherlands run can go standard 3-3-2 combination; preferably 3 sets from mil group; the others adm and diplo can vary.
• Despite the advice of many, one would not benefit from Administrative idea set, just for the sake of core-reduction. It is hre, 25% reduction on cores is nice, but how one can benefit from this when there is an impending coalition and nowhere to expand, is the question. Economic is a must (to combine with Quality); Religious or Humanist depends on entirely the player preference. Holland-netherlands can survive and do well beyond without Expansion, it is not a strict necessity. Innovative can be afforded, it has turbo-policies, but it is holland, so there is no strict need for it.
• It is holland to netherlands; that means Plutocratic set will be available. Offensive is safe to take; Quality is a must (one can not deal with france, spain, great britain by taking Quantity or Defensive). Holland has flexibility to even think about Naval, but that is not a standard choice.
• For the safe route, in hunter mode, one should be constantly improving relations to mitigate the coalitions. This means opening with Diplomatic set. It is not for the bonus for improve relations (it helps a bit though), but the diplomats. There are 71 tags in the hre at the start. May be glogow (bohemia vassal) will not be relevant, but there are at least 20 tags that one has to improve relations with. This requires multiple diplomats, constantly assigned to improve relations.
  • Why is this important? Yes, when other tags have -50 aggro-exp opinion of the player, it means coalition is highly possible, and it is certain at the start (when the player is weak; even ottos can trigger it at the beginning).
  • But when the same tag still has positive opinion of the player after conquest, they will not join a coalition.
  • Coalitions are formed when at least 3 tags have equal or less than -50 opinion of the player (with the aggro-exp modifier). If everyone is happy, then there is no risk of coalition. To keep everyone happy in a short time, the player needs more than the default 2 diplomats.
  • It also helps to have high diplo-rep. Minus diplo-rep means abandoning the ally when a war is declared; when it is a punitive war with a coalition league of 15 members, goodbye to all those powerful allies; they will not think even for a second before abandoning the player. High diplo-rep will prevent most coalitions; even if it is formed, the war may not be triggered if the allies hold on. That requires high diplo-rep, and good relations with the allies.

• Diplomatic idea set is not the most popular one in the forums; on the contrary, one can find many posts against it. It is of course meaningless to make a tier list of ideas, as they are part of the design. When one is not considering to mod them by self, then the player is going to play with the cards that are dealt. It is pointless to advocate for the mighty power or pathetic nature of a set. There are, however, useful sets, and not so useful ones (espionage, of course).
  • Espionage is not a useful one; certainly it gives -20% aggro-exp, that may be beneficial; but the player's loss is: 1 set from diplo group is spent on Espionage.
  • Holland, going for the netherlands, is a coloniser tag. This means the player has to take Exploration.
  • On top this, policies matter. Espionage set provides mostly spy detection policies, a fort defense, and some manpower; they may be beneficial, but again, the loss is other policies from other sets that are significantly useful, especially for holland.
  • With 3-3-2 standard set distribution; Diplomatic, and Exploration sets fill the diplo group, if 2 is the limit in the plan of the player. There is not much flexibility for an hre-coloniser tag in this regard. When the limit is planned as 3, then there is Maritime, or even Influence, much more useful than Espionage for holland. Trade is not needed; it is holland, it has the amsterdam trade node (when playing as holland, no need to call it the channel node; it will be the player's node dammit)

Thank you so much! Not only did you explain the Holland to Netherlands run beautifully, you’ve also expanded my general knowledge on the game.

I’ll surely be using your tips and tricks in my next try, and again, thank you so much!

 

[Six-Toed Sprocket]

Dont form the netherlands until you have most of the provinces you need in HRE. Vassalise instead of taking land.

 

[Maxxie42]

What I usually do is focus on conquering England, and as soon as I'm powerful enough, I just dismantle the HRE.

 

[diegosimeone]

Dismantle HRE or become emperor. Anything else is plain annoying to deal with

 

[RichardOlcese]

So, I'm playing as Holland trying to form the Netherlands, but I'm having trouble dealing with the military coalitions resulting from conquest.

My friend told me, that I should be keeping track of my aggressive expansion and keep it under 50%, but that doesn't seem to work.

Are there any other tips that would help me?

You should stay in the Hre as long as you want to expand within its borders. And go slowly, take it easy, one province at a time. Also take gold and other sweet sweet thingies beside from provinces, so truces last more. You will need to wait anyway for AE to get down with those neighbours.

 

[Battlex]

So, I'm playing as Holland trying to form the Netherlands, but I'm having trouble dealing with the military coalitions resulting from conquest.

My friend told me, that I should be keeping track of my aggressive expansion and keep it under 50%, but that doesn't seem to work.

Are there any other tips that would help me?

Ideally you would have got French and Austrians to support your independence at game start. Allied brabant to go independent with you. Annexed the necessary provinces off flanders in the independence war. After independence you'll need to pick between keeping the French or Austrian allaince as they're unlikely to let you keep both. I'd suggest France for when you leave the empire later. If Austria is allied they're unlikely to demand unlawful territory, but they may still do, and if you keep France as ally, then you'd be in a defensive war vs Austria and could milk them for ducats.
Once independent wait until you have most of the lowlands under your control before forming Netherlands, as doing so will kick you out the empire unless elector.
Coalitions are easy to avoid. Just improve relations so everyone is above 0 opinion with you once the AE has hit. The peace screen will show you how much AE you'll get by annexing provinces and you can do this from the month you declare war. Once a great power make sure to use influence nation on potential coalition members, as the increase in trust will give them less ae
Vassalising and core reconquest gives less AE, as well as emperor unable to demand unlawful territory. Vassals who have uncored land will send you the unlawful territory demand. But personal unions will decide for themselves whether to handback or not. However if it would release an opm and you still have a claim, you can declare before the end of the month, and recapture the province in 2 siege ticks due to garrison being under 100. Only issue with this is possible ae.
Going protestant in the empire is very dangerous if you don't convert people, as if full harsh stance on the council of Trent, it's very unlikely you'll be able to improve relations enough to stop coalitions.

 

[Livigy]

My recommendation is to use France to do all the heavy lifting.

• Get France to support your independence before war starts over Maine. Take nothing in the independence war aside from money to keep France loyal and not 'betrayed' as you didn't give land in the war.
• Fabricate a claim for Calais, as soon as France's truce with England expires declare and and invite France, don't declare if they will not join. Keep 'Kales' and give France back as much land as you can for favours/loyalty, you shouldn't need to land on mainland England and France will likely march through Iberia and beat up Portugal.
• Now you should have some favours for France and they will answer a call to arms, so Use France to beat up a couple of HRE lowlanders (Utrecht, Friesland, Gelre) so you can vassalize them, whichever two are allied. You can conceivably do this war without France but you want to keep manpower and ducats and it is an easy war for France to deal with, I highly recommend that you pillage the land though.
• Work on getting some age objectives/show strength wars. You will want the half price vassal transfer and 10% ae reduction. So get a city to 30 after the renaissance starts, embrace renaissance, humiliate a rival etc. Also integrate your vassals at the first opportunity - try to time it so they finish on the same month.
• Declare on Burgundy to take Picardie/Artois and give France more land (not in the lowland region). Hopefully they still have Flanders and Brabent, it is a gamble to leave them for the age reward or not but I try to take them on my third war, if you have the half price vassal reward take them early to avoid Burgundian inheritance issues. This can happen if France gets involved in a big war in Iberia or Provence so you have the additional time for the Age reward/AE to tick down. Your main threat is having France declare on Burgundy and you not being able to control the peace deal.
• Declare on England again, this time take no land at all, revoke cores and reconquest cores to France (do not ask England to revoke all claims on France, revoke cores is a different option and will remove England's cores on individual provinces from the land you gave France in the previous war, this will earn favours and slow down Frances expansion). This will restock your favours with France again and should give you another trust boost. If you are having money issues you can lose some favours to take England's trade power which will cripple them. This time you will need a navy and land on their land.
• Depending on how alliances happen you may end up in a war with Brittany. I suggest taking one of their provinces. If England and Portugal are still allied when you go to war with England you can use the Britany province to help you snag Porto from them so you can start your colonisation game.
• Take more land from HRE lowlands depending on how your AE is doing. You should be strong enough to do this without France. don't take too much as you want AE to decay further in preparation for the Burgundian vassal transfer.
• Pray the Burgundian inheritance doesn't fire, pray France dies without an heir for your lineage to end up on their throne/PU. These things you cannot control but will greatly impact your run.
• Once you have almost no AE again, declare on Burgundy for probably the third time to take their vassals with the age objective rewards. You should invite France with favours and not promise land as taking both will leave very little war score available in the peace deal to satisfy France. Unless you have other AE reductions (Espionage/Papal Curia) you may still get a coalition. But the bigger HRE threats are usually too far away in terms of AE going over the threshold (Brandenburg/Austria/Bohemia) so it is typically a collection of minor nations and they won't declare if France will back you. Delay the peace out until end of December and try not to have AE still ticking down. Or make some friends in the HRE like the Palatinate before this war so they won't join the coalition. Always invite France even if you can do this without help, as France will eat what remains of Burgundy (potentially lowlands) so you need to control the peace deal and the truce timers.
• Depending on how England is going you can either start taking their land or keep them as a nice close rival for you to bully for PP/Ducats. You really don't need to conquer them for the trade power as you can just take that in your subsequent wars and embargoes especially if you dev the lowlands and upgrade your centres of trade.

From there you should be able to clean up the rest of the greater lowlands and will likely have avoided any major threats. You shouldn't abuse France too much, let them recover manpower/war exhaustion and actively participate in wars to the best of your ability and take gold in most wars to keep them from going bankrupt. You should also have a mindset that France expanding isn't a bad thing as you will likely PU them or gain enough trust that they shouldn't betray you unless disgusting things happen with the council of Trent. So answer their call to arms and help them eat Brittany and Provence etc. Also keep an eye on them especially when they are drilling, if they stop drilling you know they are about to declare on somebody, so you can pre-empt them with a war of your own if you don't want them attacking Burgundy before you are ready.