How to deal with an absurd number of rebels

[Autokrator48]

Such fun game, much pleasure, many thanks Paradox.

Seriously, though, how am I meant to expand as a small nation if I get screwed by rebel no matter what I do? I used +200 ducats to buy mercs to kill one stack of rebels, but, bad luck, they spawned in mountains with a better general and therefore I am bound to lose. And that's only one stack among others. And, of course, they all have my FL in mountains, so fair.

I didn't reduce Local Authonomy, in fact I increased it, yet I still get that. However, I could always accept demands right? No : it would ruin the whole game because, without dynastic naming, I'll be called Karaman without a Karamanolgu on the throne. So fun Paradox. Heck, even the Ottomans broke because three stacks of rebels spawned in GREECE because I sieged ANATOLIA.

This is completely unfair, unfun and stupid.

 

[Xiahou Mao]

It looks like you're just growing too fast. If you're taking lots of provinces that will all spawn the same type of rebels, you can face unrest problems. So you need to raise local autonomy, station troops in troublesome provinces, keep a decent stability level, core everything as quick as you can to keep overextension down, and perhaps take some national ideas that help deal with things (Humanism is great for that, with reduced unrest and nationalism both).

If the rebels actually rise up against you, then it's too late. But once you learn the new system and how to manage rebels, you should be able to set situations up so that the rebels simply never rebel.

 

[CommunistCookie]

Expand slower. It's been a long time since I've had non-event rebels.

 

[Autokrator48]

It looks like you're just growing too fast. If you're taking lots of provinces that will all spawn the same type of rebels, you can face unrest problems. So you need to raise local autonomy, station troops in troublesome provinces, keep a decent stability level, core everything as quick as you can to keep overextension down, and perhaps take some national ideas that help deal with things (Humanism is great for that, with reduced unrest and nationalism both).

If the rebels actually rise up against you, then it's too late. But once you learn the new system and how to manage rebels, you should be able to set situations up so that the rebels simply never rebel.

I took like 13 provinces in 30 years. That's around 1 province every 3 years. It's not much. How do you want me to expand? Like 1 province every 10 years...? That seems a bit ridiculous considering the focus of the game is taking land and there's nothing else to do in it... and with the expansion I can't go as fast on speed 5 anymore. And simply watching a screen doing nothing is quite boring TBH. Besides, I got the noble rebels because of bad luck on succession, no idea how this is linked to taking lands.

And mind you, I raised Local Autonomy, stationned troops in provinces - but obviously can't station troops in 4 different provinces at the same time -, the only thing I don't have is idea groups because my ruler was a 0/0/1.

 

[Freudia]

Vassals. When you're small, conquer like one or two provinces and then take the rest as a vassal. Cleaning up your vassal's rebel problems is a lot easier than cleaning up yours because your vassals will actually help you fight their rebels.

 

[Santoes]

Your legitimacy is giving you like 2 unrest. 13 territories in 2 wars is a lot of over extension. You where bound to get rebels. The best way to expand is to spread out the revolt risk into more culture groups and nations.

 

[cleef]

First AoW game, decided I'd try the ottomans. I expanded faster than I normally would, and I only got 4-5 revolts max, and the biggest had 2 stacks... As others have said, expand slower, pay attention to unrest, etc.

 

[ChildeR]

I took like 13 provinces in 30 years. That's around 1 province every 3 years. It's not much. How do you want me to expand? Like 1 province every 10 years...? That seems a bit ridiculous considering the focus of the game is taking land and there's nothing else to do in it... and with the expansion I can't go as fast on speed 5 anymore. And simply watching a screen doing nothing is quite boring TBH. Besides, I got the noble rebels because of bad luck on succession, no idea how this is linked to taking lands.

And mind you, I raised Local Autonomy, stationned troops in provinces - but obviously can't station troops in 4 different provinces at the same time -, the only thing I don't have is idea groups because my ruler was a 0/0/1.

If you want to expand fast you either need the -unrest modifiers to handle it, which your low legitimacy and zero stability aren't helping, or you need to feed (some of) the land to vassals. One province every three years is slow enough that unrest will never be a problem, but if you took the 13 provinces in one or two large bites, the OE unrest before you can core will stack with your low legitimacy to cause a lot of problems.

It also seems you took most of the land from the Ottomans which means it will be fairly unified in terms of rebel factions. Expanding alternately in different directions would likely give you an easier time with them.

Do you have any ideas that help with unrest? Have you hired a theologian (-3 unrest) to compensate for your low legitimacy? Did you consider harsh treatment when the rebel warning popped up?

 

[Autokrator48]

If you want to expand fast you either need the -unrest modifiers to handle it, which your low legitimacy and zero stability aren't helping, or you need to feed (some of) the land to vassals. One province every three years is slow enough that unrest will never be a problem, but if you took the 13 provinces in one or two large bites, the OE unrest before you can core will stack with your low legitimacy to cause a lot of problems.

It also seems you took most of the land from the Ottomans which means it will be fairly unified in terms of rebel factions. Expanding alternately in different directions would likely give you an easier time with them.

Do you have any ideas that help with unrest? Have you hired a theologian (-3 unrest) to compensate for your low legitimacy? Did you consider harsh treatment when the rebel warning popped up?

Harsh treament is completely out of question : it would cost me something like 200 mil points, which is ridiculous, and I can't afford it. There were no theologians available. And yes I took two large bites out of the Ottomans, but I get cores in like 1 year and they are dirt poor provinces (3-5 BT) - it takes around 14 months to core, it isn't much. And, to be fair, I have no one else to war, I can't afford to take 1-2 provinces off the Ottomans every 5-6 years, I'll become irrelevant compared to them at this pace.

My low legitimacy problems happened during my 2nd war with the Ottomans - my ruler died and his weak heir took over.

 

[ChildeR]

Harsh treament is completely out of question : it would cost me something like 200 mil points, which is ridiculous, and I can't afford it. There were no theologians available. And yes I took two large bites out of the Ottomans, but I get cores in like 1 year and they are dirt poor provinces (3-5 BT) - it takes around 14 months to core, it isn't much. And, to be fair, I have no one else to war, I can't afford to take 1-2 provinces off the Ottomans every 5-6 years, I'll become irrelevant compared to them at this pace.

My low legitimacy problems happened during my 2nd war with the Ottomans - my ruler died and his weak heir took over.

Even if you can core fast, nationalism takes time to go down. You could have attacked east, no? There's also the fact that a war to take a smaller bite out of the Ottomans both takes less time and results in a shorter truce, but really the best way would likely have been to release e.g. Saruhan as a vassal with some of what you took.

For the future, getting that low a legitimacy in the middle of a war, you likely should have bailed out. Made Ottomans release some vassals or pay tribute or whatever and spent the admin on boosting stability to compensate for the low legitimacy.

With regard to harsh treatment, the cost depends on current unrest, so if you look at it immediately after the war it will be much higher than if you core, buy down WE and wait for nationalism to tick out before the faction reaches 95%. 200 mil points means you had 40 unrest, so at that point you were pretty much doomed to face rebellion unless it was mostly from WE and OE which you could buy down quickly, thereby reducing the price of harsh treatment.

 

[Big Blue Blob]

Nobody has mentioned the fact that those rebel armies comprise much of the able male population of Anatolia. Who's going to gather the harvest in? Be careful killing them, or you may have a famine on your hands.

O, no, wait, you won't, because EU4 is a strange world where huge rebel armies form and are slaughtered with no consequences.

Having seen 40,000 Lollards rampaging around England before in my Bretagne game, I say this has gone too far. Rebel numbers must be reduced to levels that make sense, and the consequences on agriculture of mobilising that many peasants must be clear.

 

[Sachko]

Such fun game, much pleasure, many thanks Paradox.

Seriously, though, how am I meant to expand as a small nation if I get screwed by rebel no matter what I do? I used +200 ducats to buy mercs to kill one stack of rebels, but, bad luck, they spawned in mountains with a better general and therefore

I am bound to lose. And that's only one stack among others. And, of course, they all have my FL in mountains, so fair.

I didn't reduce Local Authonomy, in fact I increased it, yet I still get that. However, I could always accept demands right? No : it would ruin the whole game because, without dynastic naming, I'll be called Karaman without a Karamanolgu on the throne. So fun Paradox. Heck, even the Ottomans broke because three stacks of rebels spawned in GREECE because I sieged ANATOLIA.

This is completely unfair, unfun and stupid.

That's what you get for blobing with a random country !
No, seriously ; pretender rebels aren't dangerous. One time as Bohemia, my economy was screwed, my armies destroyed
by a huge pretender army, and a filthy coalition.. Then the pretender won. And what happened ? I had a new king with
brilliant stats, and a new, shiny army ( The old rebels. ) to kick the ass of the invaders !

Rebels aren't always that bad.

 

[Santoes]

Nobody has mentioned the fact that those rebel armies comprise much of the able male population of Anatolia. Who's going to gather the harvest in? Be careful killing them, or you may have a famine on your hands.

O, no, wait, you won't, because EU4 is a strange world where huge rebel armies form and are slaughtered with no consequences.

Having seen 40,000 Lollards rampaging around England before in my Bretagne game, I say this has gone too far. Rebel numbers must be reduced to levels that make sense, and the consequences on agriculture of mobilising that many peasants must be clear.

Welcome to the world of it's a game.

 

[Sachko]

Big Blue Bob made a point.
Even if it's a game, and a rather easy one compared to some other Paradox's franchise, manpower should be revised a bit. At least in a mod or something. Negative effects on production, taxes, negative events.. Maybe even migration issue ?

Let's look at the hussite wars. A little before the 1444 bookmark. Bohemia see herself crowded with heretics rebels, and
that's a huge stab hit for the kingdom. Production and , obviously taxes went down, and Bohemians migrated all over the
SERG.

 

[Santoes]

Big Blue Bob made a point.
Even if it's a game, and a rather easy one compared to some other Paradox's franchise, manpower should be revised a bit. At least in a mod or something. Negative effects on production, taxes, negative events.. Maybe even migration issue ?

Let's look at the hussite wars. A little before the 1444 bookmark. Bohemia see herself crowded with heretics rebels, and
that's a huge stab hit for the kingdom. Production and , obviously taxes went down, and Bohemians migrated all over the
SERG.

After they're done rebelling the rebels go back to there farm. In the meantime you are looted, which is a penalty for 6 months. Maybe add 20 years to the looting and call it to many dead peasants? Actually it doesn't matter to me, I'd rather not play a genocide simulator.

-10% Goods produced
-50% Local tax modifier
+30% Local recruitment time
+30% Local ship building time
+5 Maximum attrition
-10% Supply limit modifier

 

[Sachko]

Good idea !
I'd pass on the 20 years lf looting, but.. Maybe, a negative effect on manpower If you chose to suppress the rebels would be nice.
Suppressing a revolt by force means beating your own plebs to the pulp. The negative effect on manpower would make you think twice, so that there is actualy a choice ; diplomatic solution ( Accept their demands.. ), or sending the army.

 

[Mztr44]

Pretender rebels are a bit of RNG bad luck and have little to do with how quickly you expanded. You expanded into same culture & religion area which is fine, you probably didn't even need to raise autonomy. To clean out the pretenders, since half of that territory is mountains, park your troops in a mountain province and wait for them to walk into you so you get the defending bonus, unsiege the provinces they leave. It might take you 10 or so years to clean everything up and be ready to expand again but you should be able to retain your dynasty.

 

[Sachko]

That's the pro way to do it.

Spoiler

But.. Accepting their demands can be good.. Think of all these free armies.. I'm totaly not the pretender btw.

 

[Denkt]

Use vassals to split rebels groups into smal parts that will never rebel, you can easily feed vassals by changing occupation of provinces to them by pressing the shield above the text occupied by ...

 

[ChildeR]

Use vassals to split rebels groups into smal parts that will never rebel, you can easily feed vassals by changing occupation of provinces to them by pressing the shield above the text occupied by ...

...assuming you have the Art of War DLC.