Austria and Poland never seemed to want to join my wars early on, and by the time I was able to deal with Ottos myself Poland was non-existant and Austria was in a million wars of its own. It tried Lithuania but but they become broken into three seperate territory zones surrounded by Muskovy, later Russia.
I dont argue your points dont work, they should in most cases but in my play they powers we are talking about were more or less broken early.
@Zodium, I agree that Venice must be dowed at some point, but given how the patches changed things, blockading in the early game is not that much of an option, Venice even when at war with the Mams (99%) of the time, will always send a humongus fleet to chace me down and land troops at Greece. You really dont want an early war on two fronts. I prefer to waste income on the hope of rebels to be honest. A war with Venice is more plausible if you have Austria as an ally I think.
@wanderlust king. Unfortunently there is no such thing as defenseless territory due to the Ottos getting military access from anyone now days.
You can't have a two-front war if you have a truce with the one front. What I posted is current as of 1.3, so it should work. It's obviously better if Venice dows you for Albania, but the principle's the same: get warscore from wargoal and battles, peace out as soon as you can get either Corfu or Naxos if things are even remotely difficult.