Newbie: England: Hundreds Year's War - Help!

[nicksinger7]

Hi

Yes, I know this is probably a topic that has had hundreds of threads, but I have done a search and can't quite find what I need!

I am playing England on easy starting 1399 (patch 5.1, Chronicles). It is now 1407. I have conquered Ireland. I am allied with Castille and Portugal. I have four main armies, split broadly 2:1 infantry to Cavalry. My total troops are about 40K. France has been on the rampage essentially undermining (though not annexing) Brittany and Aragon. France is allied with Scotland and host of other small powers. Burgundy has been having trouble with the 'Germans' and the Dutch, although that seems to have been resolved.

France has just declared war and Castille has jumped in on my behalf.

Can I realistically hold onto Calais and my provinces to the West? What advice would you give? I don't want to retreat away from the mainland because I have played England as empire on many occasions and want to try to make it on the Continent!

Thanks

Nick

 

[Pewt]

Get Military Access from Brittany and Burgundy and use it to strike out of until you whittle France down. If you play it right and wipe their stacks whenever possible you'll win the war.

Basically just standard anti-AI tactics (leave small regiments in border provinces to force them to keep large armies doing nothing, stand 2 provinces away and let them assault then attack, etc).

 

[Magnive]

Try to get a stack of 15-20 cavalry, get a good chock general and use the stack to wipe out France armies

 

[The Blood Eagle]

Here's what I just posted in a thread the other day:

You want your missions in this order: Conquer Ireland, Vassalize Scotland, Occupy Paris. You definitely want conquer Ireland fist because they will all be lonesome minors with no allies at the very start. Take the 8 infamy, vassalize Scotland but don't destroy their army (try to get the bottled up in the western isles so they will work for you later)

At that point you can build your army up to the limits, ask for miltary access from Burgundy, move your stacks to Cambray and quick-siege Paris for something around a dozen free cores in tax-rich land. Congratulations! You now are the sole possessor of the British Isles and can start working to completely dismantle the French. You can usually peace out of the first war and isolate Paris and take their capital on the next war (sometimes I just peace out and immediately DOW them taking the stab hit but getting the job done very quickly)

 

[Pewt]

Note that you only get "occupy paris" while at war, so you'll probably end up with Conquer Ireland -> Vassalize Scotland -> Conquer Normandy -> DoW France -> Cancel Mission -> Occupy Paris.

 

[The Blood Eagle]

Note that you only get "occupy paris" while at war, so you'll probably end up with Conquer Ireland -> Vassalize Scotland -> Conquer Normandy -> DoW France -> Cancel Mission -> Occupy Paris.

True, but a lot of the time they DOW you from the get go and you can just let them dance around Aquitaine whilst going door-to-door evicting Ireland.

 

[unmerged(82381)]

Are you at war with Scotland as well? In that case I would focus all of my forces on defeating them first, at least to the point of getting them out of the war, preferably vassalizing them mission or not.

If this is just a war against France or after Scotland is beaten, if you have a spy to spare, infiltrate administration in Paris to find out where their armies are. Then it depends on the situation. Does France have a land border with Calais? If not they will probably only be able to send troops there if they can land them by ship. Are you the war leader?

If it looks like Castile is holding their own, focus your attack on the North, Normandy, Brittany, Flanders, Ille De France. If Castile is losing but not too badly, I would send troops to help them. If it looks like its only a matter of time before Castile is overrun I would probably send troops to attack as far away from the main French armies as possible.

If you encounter a situation where the French have one of their stacks far away from the others, I'd probably try to destroy it even if it takes my entire army to do so, especially if they already have moderate to high war exhaustion. Also be careful to try an avoid losing any sizable force of your own. It can take a long time to rebuild armies in the middle of a war.

 

[nicksinger7]

France conquered my provinces very quickly, but Castille was very good at keeping the Scots busy at the start. Then Portugal joined the war and landed 15 k on Scottish shores. Managed to defeat Scotland and made a separate peace; as a newbie I didn't realise that states keep their conquered territories so Portugal now is the proud owner of a Southern Scottish province.

I got 3 Scottish provinces, a healthy amount of Ducats and forced Scotland to break ties with France. I could have probably got more out of them but I needed to stop playing!!! Scotland just had a rebellion and cannot deal with it so basically they have been neutralised as a threat; I'll focus on vassalising the rest and on France!

France, btw, agreed to a White Peace.