Muscowy in Divine Wind

[Hakomar]

I thought I'd give Muscowy a go seeing as I hadn't played with them since HttT, and I thought I was doing quite well. I payed my tribute to the Horde, vassalised Tver and annex Ryazan and Yaroslavl per the missions, and had an opportunistic grab at Lithuania whilst they had some rebellion difficulties and managed to take Brjansk for a mission, and broke the truce to take Kursk for a mission. Smolensk and Polotsk broke free; I vassalised Polotsk from a mission and forced Smolensk into a personal union. Around 1430, I got a mission to annex Tver, giving me a core on the province I didn't yet have one on, but before I could finish, disaster struck: the Golden Horde declared war on.
I'm not really sure what to do, or why they declared war on me. I payed my dues for forty years, but I guess I became too powerful. Now fifty thousand Golden Horde troops are in my land besieging 2/3 of my country, and have beated me in every single engagement, even in 15,000 vs 5,000. There's no chance to scorch the land; they just flood the border, and I can't pick off little units because my armies are just awful. Finally, I can't pay tribute because they won't accept it.
What on Earth can I do to stop the tide?

 

[Boon63]

Hope for a Tribal Succession Crisis

 

[andriy.gerasika]

Now fifty thousand Golden Horde troops are in my land besieging 2/3 of my country, and have beated me in every single engagement, even in 15,000 vs 5,000. There's no chance to scorch the land; they just flood the border, and I can't pick off little units because my armies are just awful. Finally, I can't pay tribute because they won't accept it.
What on Earth can I do to stop the tide?

Theoretically you should be 2-3 levels ahead in Land tech, so beating GH should not be a problem. Also, almost always I perform 'upgrade': change my army to Men At Arms/Steppe Cavalry as soon as I get provinces w/ these units. Scan your provinces if you have GH cores on one of them --> at least you will be able to build same troops as GH. Men at Arms will make your army 'invincible': capable of winning GH stack 1:1.

 

[ByeNow]

Wait, golden horde attacked while you were paying a tribute?

 

[grommile]

Um, two obvious possibilities for the horde going to war with you:

1: You went bankrupt, voiding your tribute treaty.

2: You declared war on a country they'd vassalized.

 

[Hakomar]

'fraid not. I had been quite fiscally conservative and had a store of ducats, and I never declared war on a country they'd vassalised. I was at peace, and I got the message that Golden Horde had declared war on us. I had grown exponentially by this point, taking three provinces of Lithuania, vassalising Polotsk, PUing Smolensk and annexing Ryazan, Tver and Yaroslavl, which makes me wonder if the A.I. wanted to weaken me. But then again the A.I. isn't that intelligent.

 

[grommile]

I have... never seen the Golden Horde declare war on me in such way.

Hm. Had they got into a state where they had all of their neighbours either vassalized or paying tribute, perhaps?

 

[Hakomar]

I'm not sure. I started again from an autosave a year before, and replayed what I had done. I didn't have war then, which is strange. I've united Russia and I am trying to cut it off from Austria who is rapidly approaching the Black Sea.

 

[panionios]

Clearly he is not playing 5.2 because the hordes can't handle the new manpower changes and you can walk all over them after 10-15 years since game start.

 

[NoobRage]

The AI declared war on you the old way. After you pay tribute, the horde unlocks a "declare war" button on who is paying it, so the AI was just eyeing your lands or thought you were getting too powerful, thus DoW.

 

[HotHotHot]

Golden Horde can get mission "Attack Muscowy".