How on earth do you deal with the dominant powers?

[unmerged(246495)]

Firstly, I just want to say that the advice I've receieved so far has been amazing and really helped me get over that initial hump and into the game, so thanks everyone! This is more of a general strategy question regarding the dominant continental powers. I always start my games on the Grand Campaign and I'm talking about your France's and Bohemia's.

I'm playing the game of short career so far. As England I've taken Ireland and the mainland Denmark provinces. I've lost some provinces along the way such as Gastogne, Labourd and Calais, but I also managed to vasalise Normandie when they appeared as a sovereign nation. I actually also ended up with a random Lithuanan province from sticking my nose into wars that weren't my business and I've learned never to do that again...

Now I'm justtrucking along, researcing tech. I've got my economy down well, got a thoroughly decent army and i'm contemplating just invading Scotland who keep rejecting my Vassalisation advances. Then suddenly...whack! France declares!

They want Normandie back naturally and I've got an 18 regiment stack sat there. Then I see a 40 regiment stack coming towards me, then a 15, then a 10, then another 22 stack. They have more troops than I have hairs on my head! Of course I get my goolies handed back to me but as a new player I literally cannot conceive how I could deal with something like that. I'm amazed France don't just steamroll the entire map at the start until they run into the equally big balled Bohemia.

So how do people work around this? Conventional sense says to get France on side but that must be a long and expensive issue. I'm thinking it would be better to just sack off being involved in the continent and stay on my little island, but obviously that won't help me in the long term. I have similar issues with the HRE and just how powerful they are, making declarations or alliances against them an almost guarantee of taking massive losses.

 

[hitchens]

England is pretty easy. Just give away/sell your provinces in France to France(in order to avoid costly wars) and annex Scotland and Ireland From there you can do pretty much whatever you want. Before you know it you are forming Great Britain ans invading stuff.

 

[DDRJake]

Once you hit the naval tech that lets you blockade, you can choke France with your superior navy. On any difficulty other than hard/veryhard, that should give them enough War Exhaustion through time (and a little extra income for you) so that they become swarmed in rebels, declared on by other nations and rip for a few armies if your own to strike.

 

[unmerged(80402)]

Well this is one strategy. Second is to find a place when you can kill off france, kill their armies, and quickly carpet siege them. Also, if you lose a battle just withdraw to the sea. And remember to kill of scotland before you are in fight with france (scotland is very dangerous when you fight them - due they get modifires that increase their power when they fight the english).

 

[highsis]

Firstly, I just want to say that the advice I've receieved so far has been amazing and really helped me get over that initial hump and into the game, so thanks everyone! This is more of a general strategy question regarding the dominant continental powers. I always start my games on the Grand Campaign and I'm talking about your France's and Bohemia's.

I'm playing the game of short career so far. As England I've taken Ireland and the mainland Denmark provinces. I've lost some provinces along the way such as Gastogne, Labourd and Calais, but I also managed to vasalise Normandie when they appeared as a sovereign nation. I actually also ended up with a random Lithuanan province from sticking my nose into wars that weren't my business and I've learned never to do that again...

Now I'm justtrucking along, researcing tech. I've got my economy down well, got a thoroughly decent army and i'm contemplating just invading Scotland who keep rejecting my Vassalisation advances. Then suddenly...whack! France declares!

They want Normandie back naturally and I've got an 18 regiment stack sat there. Then I see a 40 regiment stack coming towards me, then a 15, then a 10, then another 22 stack. They have more troops than I have hairs on my head! Of course I get my goolies handed back to me but as a new player I literally cannot conceive how I could deal with something like that. I'm amazed France don't just steamroll the entire map at the start until they run into the equally big balled Bohemia.

So how do people work around this? Conventional sense says to get France on side but that must be a long and expensive issue. I'm thinking it would be better to just sack off being involved in the continent and stay on my little island, but obviously that won't help me in the long term. I have similar issues with the HRE and just how powerful they are, making declarations or alliances against them an almost guarantee of taking massive losses.

-Don't let them land. Confine their little navy force into a province. Or let them land 1,2 stacks and then drive them out.

-Scorch land/wait 1 year/attack.

-AI in this game are not smart. you should exploit what you can. For example, advancing into enemy's army will root them in that province. You can keep doing that and they will wither away by attrition.

-let them spread thin

-lure them using small bait force into a province with defense modifiers and once they engage, use your big stack to join the fight so you can fight in a good position

-once you win a fight, don't stop until you completely killed off that army.

-don't attack rugged provinces. Wait until enemy's stack leaves.

 

[Casiru]

You should really be able to rival France if you build up to force limits and call some friends in. 17 regiments isn't really much, you could expect a rich 2 province country to come up with that many troops.

Fighting France requires you to send every single troop you have. If you beat a stack chase and annihilate it, then don't let them rebuild by sieging every province and make sure to take a large chunk when you win.
As England you should really be taking the lead, declare war on them with ARA and BUR at your back while they are attacking Provence, Naples and Bohemia. If their troops are tied up overseas, attack and kill all their ships leaving the troops unable to defend. BUR/BOH in an epic war? Go stab France.

... To be honest 99% of Englands early game strategy involves stabbing France in the back every time they look away from you. The conquer Paris mission is way too strong to pass up.

 

[tapewormlondon]

I find an easy way to deal with france is at the start of the game sell the main land provinces to austria.........keeps both of them at each others necks much of the game. When you seeAustria depleting Frances army, jump on in.

Also if you are taking them on to take their provincesand sont want to give up your own. Ally with Castille or Aragon - or both. Win the war at any cost - mint if you have to and go over force limits. Then break up france by force releasing them into tiny countrys - the rest is easy!

 

[unmerged(246495)]

Good stuff guys.

it's worth pointing out that this is the game I really got an idea of how far I can push my army and still make money, also understanding that you should shrink the maintenance in peace time and stuff like that, so this has all happened after a number of other events and stuff. If I were to start again i'd definitley do things differently, there was a very long time where I had very low force numbers.

I must say though I still find it a little hard to believe that I can take on France and all of her Vassals! I need to stop playing the combat like I'm on Civ 5....

 

[Rabble159]

If you're very new to the game i'd recommend skipping the 100 years war stuff to be honest. Grab Ireland and Scotland, wait for cores, form the UK, grab Quest for the New World and go colonizing.

 

[Rabble159]

Oh and some general tips that aren't really related to what you were asking:

-Military Drill is a very good choice for your first national idea but grows less and less useful the longer the game goes without you getting it
-Trade is probably overpowered (if you've got good free trade sliders). A nation like Holland can be in the top 5 in income without any expansion at all through trade. Caveat being that infamy murders your compete chance.
-Centralization is hands down better than decentralization
-Always spend your magistrate on "commission tapestry" if you're at 5 magistrates. And if you're at 5 magistrates it probably means you don't know what else to do with them or can't afford the buildings at the moment, so feel free to burn the rest of them on tapestries.
-Masters of Mint are very very good advisers
-Give military access+royal marriages to countries that you don't want to invade you. More important as smaller countries. This means that they would have to instantly go to -3 stability if they wanted to attack you, which they will not want and probably won't do.

 

[Pewt]

I don't really like that most posts in this thread avoid the actual issue that you're having, so I'll try to address it directly.

The amount of troops you can produce is directly related to a few factors, notably:

• The base tax you have (provinces, added CoT base tax, workshops, stock markets).
• Conscription Centre FL bonus.
• Grand Army
• Trading in Grain
• Land vs Naval slider
• Quality vs Quantity slider
• A few decisions and such
• Your economy's ability to build up to and past your forcelimit

France inherently is at an advantage over England on land in that they start biased towards Land whereas England starts at 0. France also has many cores on high-BT provinces, whereas you expanded into relatively low-BT land (ireland and denmark). In addition, it's likely that the AI picked up Grand Army or somesuch, whereas it's doubtful that you did. Finally, the AI can sort of manage their economy plus mints a lot over it for extra money, so unless you have a solid grip on economy in EU3 it's likely that they just have more pocket change.

I suggest you have a look at some of the more powerful players in MP games sometimes, since saves at the end of every session are generally easily available via the game's stats page. It's quite easy to have the potential to raise 300+ men by 1500 if you play your cards right, and that's with other players vying for the same rich land.

 

[unmerged(37198)]

if it was sp I would just dow france on day one unless I get the Ireland mission as the first one, would probably win every time, if it was mp I would consider to wait for france to dow burgundy and then attack

there's really no reason to avoid the war since the stakes are not particularly high, nobody can get past your navy in the early game and in a worst case scenario you would only lose the land you would have sold of otherwise

 

[unmerged(246495)]

I don't really like that most posts in this thread avoid the actual issue that you're having, so I'll try to address it directly.

The amount of troops you can produce is directly related to a few factors, notably:

• The base tax you have (provinces, added CoT base tax, workshops, stock markets).
• Conscription Centre FL bonus.
• Grand Army
• Trading in Grain
• Land vs Naval slider
• Quality vs Quantity slider
• A few decisions and such
• Your economy's ability to build up to and past your forcelimit

France inherently is at an advantage over England on land in that they start biased towards Land whereas England starts at 0. France also has many cores on high-BT provinces, whereas you expanded into relatively low-BT land (ireland and denmark). In addition, it's likely that the AI picked up Grand Army or somesuch, whereas it's doubtful that you did. Finally, the AI can sort of manage their economy plus mints a lot over it for extra money, so unless you have a solid grip on economy in EU3 it's likely that they just have more pocket change.

I suggest you have a look at some of the more powerful players in MP games sometimes, since saves at the end of every session are generally easily available via the game's stats page. It's quite easy to have the potential to raise 300+ men by 1500 if you play your cards right, and that's with other players vying for the same rich land.

Yeah I wasn't really going for a 'how do I beat France from here' type thing, but there's still some really useful info above so thanks everyone!

That makes things a lot more clear. I just couldn't wrap my head around how a country could support an army that strong when I had so little but it never occured to me that the AI pursues completely different economic approaches and slider approaches. Daft of me I know but I've been concetrating so much on what I'm doing and not getting battered straight away that I haven't really been thinking about what they might be doing. Obviously a lack of in depth game knowledge is a major contributor to this as well. I think I might start agame where I keep myself to myself, focus on the GB unification and spread out. It would also let me see more of the game, at the moment every time I learn soemthing new I'm restarting!

 

[unmerged(80402)]

I foundout something very interesting :
If you go :
Full Serfdom
Full Quantity
Full Land
Full Aristocratic
Full Defensive

Your infantry cost is reduced by 97.5%(-92,5% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your cavalry cost is reduced by 55%(-50% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your Artilery cost is reduced by 30%(-25% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
If you are poland and have hussars decision, your cavalry is decreased by 25% so it is 80% cheaper cavalry.

Now, if you add -20% unit cost from barracks, it makes, cavalry being 0 cost, infantry negative, and artilery half cost.

This might be usefull for any country, as having negative infantry cost may come in handy XD (gaining cash from recruiting and army upkeep... plus having infinite infantry numbers... huh... but it also needs having no inflation(or having it quite low))

Now if i am right, it might be new multiplayer and single player strategy...

EDIT: Bah, my calculations are wrong in one point, it is -72,5 not -97,5... but still you can make polish cavalry no-cost XD...

 

[Conch]

I foundout something very interesting :
If you go :
Full Serfdom
Full Quantity
Full Land
Full Aristocratic
Full Defensive

Your infantry cost is reduced by 97.5%(-92,5% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your cavalry cost is reduced by 55%(-50% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your Artilery cost is reduced by 30%(-25% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
If you are poland and have hussars decision, your cavalry is decreased by 25% so it is 80% cheaper cavalry.

Now, if you add -20% unit cost from barracks, it makes, cavalry being 0 cost, infantry negative, and artilery half cost.

This might be usefull for any country, as having negative infantry cost may come in handy XD (gaining cash from recruiting and army upkeep... plus having infinite infantry numbers... huh... but it also needs having no inflation(or having it quite low))

Now if i am right, it might be new multiplayer and single player strategy...

I highly doubt that theory. Isn't the cost reduction for units multiplicative instead of additive? So you could never recruit something "for free" and every next cost reduce you pick up along the way would have a diminishing return.

 

[Pewt]

I foundout something very interesting :
If you go :
Full Serfdom
Full Quantity
Full Land
Full Aristocratic
Full Defensive

Your infantry cost is reduced by 97.5%(-92,5% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your cavalry cost is reduced by 55%(-50% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
Your Artilery cost is reduced by 30%(-25% + -5% unit cost from aristocracy)
If you are poland and have hussars decision, your cavalry is decreased by 25% so it is 80% cheaper cavalry.

Now, if you add -20% unit cost from barracks, it makes, cavalry being 0 cost, infantry negative, and artilery half cost.

This might be usefull for any country, as having negative infantry cost may come in handy XD (gaining cash from recruiting and army upkeep... plus having infinite infantry numbers... huh... but it also needs having no inflation(or having it quite low))

Now if i am right, it might be new multiplayer and single player strategy...

EDIT: Bah, my calculations are wrong in one point, it is -72,5 not -97,5... but still you can make polish cavalry no-cost XD...

This isn't how cost modifiers actually work.

 

[unmerged(80402)]

This isn't how cost modifiers actually work.

Then how do they work, you say?

 

[jdrou]

% modifiers are all added together before multiplying by the base cost so Iwanow is correct there.

However, regardless of modifiers unit recruitment costs never drop below 1 ducat.

 

[unmerged(80402)]

% modifiers are all added together before multiplying by the base cost so Iwanow is correct there.

However, regardless of modifiers unit recruitment costs never drop below 1 ducat.

So... cavalry for 1 ducate...

 

[bobboberts]

Once you hit the naval tech that lets you blockade, you can choke France with your superior navy. On any difficulty other than hard/veryhard, that should give them enough War Exhaustion through time (and a little extra income for you) so that they become swarmed in rebels, declared on by other nations and rip for a few armies if your own to strike.

I'm currently playing on very hard as England and obviously France is a pain at the start, but purely due to the navy you shouldn't have a problem. My tactic is to never keep any troops on the mainland unless I'm intending to launch my main attack, because you'll just lose armies all the time if you try and keep troops stationed there. Before you get Naval Tech 9 and blockades, all you need to do is win the odd naval battle then just sit and wait. France will take your French-holdings, but without being able to land a strike on England you'll be able to get a white peace after a few years. This is at the cost of potentially incurring WE (depends on how many French provinces you hold and your leader's reduction each month). Once you've got blockades, get the advisor that boosts efficiency and just blockade every province they have (once you've destroyed their fleet, that is). You'll get free money whilst also causing them WE.

These are both defensive operations, though; you'll only ever be able to get a white peace out of it, but it can prove invaluable whilst you concentrate on building your own army/conquering 'safer' targets until that time you feel you are ready to strike. Naturally, having powerful allies or seeing France in trouble with other nations changes things.