Playing HRE game as Italy

[makaramus]

is it possible to avoid shadow kingdom? Do AI emperor take decision when possible?
Also I saw that you now no longer need rome itself as part of italy instead 1 province belongs to naples required now... is that true
in that case wich one is best to do this: Venice or naples?

 

[Sfan]

Where have you seen that? Is that a change for next patch?

 

[makaramus]

Where have you seen that? Is that a change for next patch?

it was 7 month old reddit post actually reason they claimed effects of holding rome

 

[ElGranCapitan]

Nope, it was a bug in 1.20 or 1.21, when they changed the areas around and forgot about the decision..it's fixed

Venice has a pretty hard time joining the HRE, you need to restart quite a lot until Austria doesn't hate you.even then, you might need to sell a province or 2

If you don't want to restart several times I'd say Milan is the best, almost as strong as Naples but a) independent, b) owns Milan (the highest dev and thus AE province needed to form Italy) and c) starts in the HRE

Naples is ok, but then, Savoy is stronger, independent and in the HRE..both share the same problem, they own no province needed to form Italy

Powergaming wise Austria is the easiest obviously, get the 2 PUs and the spanish dynasty event, along with the Burgundian Inheritance. But rather than preventing the shadow kingdom conquer the provinces needed to form Italy. Enjoy Italy's insane BROT and CCR with Austria's PUs and Empire vassal swarm

 

[Sfan]

But Austria doesn't take the decision anyway, do they?

Else I'd say the Papal State are in the best position by far. They can always join the Empire on day 1, they can ally Milan, excomunicate Venice, call Milan in against Venice and give their core to Milan and take the rest without a coalition. And they have a strong reason to keep the Empire strong and stay part of it so that they can wipe out the Reformation.

 

[bradles0]

You need the three mainland venetian provinces (NOT brescia, since it's already in the HRE), and all the land the pope owns in 1444 (including Urbino and Rome) to reign in italy.
AI Austria will always reign in italy if they have all the provinces, but Austria will never attack the pope, so it will never happen in ironman. I really feel like reign in Italy should allow you to ally people to reign them in too instead of just conquest, but it doesn't add the allies provinces to the HRE. (So for instance you can conquer venice and add those three provinces to the HRE, and then ally the pope, and it will at least prevent the rest of italy from leaving the HRE), but they would have to change something else because that would be way too easy.

 

[Sfan]

I'm surprised noone mentions this possibility if AI Austria takes the decision. That's a lot easier to prevent SK as an Italian country. Having the possibility to expand within the HRE for longer can be a possibility, especially in the regard of the Pope preventing the Reformation.

 

[oros]

I don't think you need to take the decision. I can't tell you if Austria is doing it, but when I played the Papal States, the Shadow Kingdom never fired, so you can indeed prevent it as the Papal State, and it's not really hard as them. But you can't join HRE day one, you need to improve relations with Austria first.

 

[Sfan]

As the Papal State, you have to join the HRE anyway to be able to expand as early as possible within Italy.