Playing inside the HRE seems much tougher in 1.23

[Dman1791]

Not that this is necessarily bad, but the AI seems a lot more aggressive as of the new patch. Specifically, I've been trying to form Prussia again. However, Poland seems to gobble up the TO even faster than before. Denmark has taken Scotland and Danzig. France has already grown to all of France. Austria has eaten a bunch of HRE states and gotten their PU on Hungary. All of this by 1512. I'm unable to contest the Polish without help from both Bohemia and Austria, but Austria no longer cares for me. I can't go north because of the Danish juggernaut which has managed to keep Sweden. I can't go south because I had to ally Bohemia and Saxony to not be stomped on by Poland (I was emperor for a bit). I can't go east because of Poland. I can't go west due to a Poland-allied Magdeburg and a miniblobbed Lubeck with a very large merchant league. Larger powers seem to start expanding much faster than earlier, and playing a nation like Brandenburg (smaller nation bordered by larger ones) seems far more difficult.

 

[HansBaer]

It was just bad luck. I played one quick Brandenburg start in 1.23... same as always.
Conquer Pom asap, fabricate on TO and grab Danzig, Königsberg and whatever else AE allows and Poland has left for you.
Or if Poland hasn't attacked yet, ally them and promise land.
All done within the first 5 years with everything you need too form Prussia. If the TO allies Hungary or even Denmark I would restart unless you are very good at warfare.

It's easily doable on vh, so unless the TO smashes Poland and allies Russia or Poland cuts you of from Kberg I can't see much room for failure. Even then, thanks to the annexation bug Poland usually has no allies to speak of so you can just ally 1 or 2 of her rivals and eat them directly.

 

[Dman1791]

I can never seem to round up enough forces to beat down Pomerania so early. It seems I'd need to go it alone because by the time I get an alliance to join me in attacking Pomerania's, Poland has already locked down the TO. Is this one of those situations where it's best to merc up and take a ton of loans instead of use allies?

 

[babuchas1]

I think playing in the HRE is easier than ever (and boring) because everyone ignores the "demand unlawful territory". I think you were unlucky in your game.
And if you see an opportunity to get an early advantage that otherwise would be almost impossible then yes, it's worth it to take loans and merc up.

 

[netherlink]

Would definitely wait 'till unlawful territory is fixed. Like the old core-disappearing bug, this kind of breaks the hre...

 

[kgmi]

It was just bad luck. I played one quick Brandenburg start in 1.23... same as always.
Conquer Pom asap, fabricate on TO and grab Danzig, Königsberg and whatever else AE allows and Poland has left for you.
Or if Poland hasn't attacked yet, ally them and promise land.
All done within the first 5 years with everything you need too form Prussia. If the TO allies Hungary or even Denmark I would restart unless you are very good at warfare.

It's easily doable on vh, so unless the TO smashes Poland and allies Russia or Poland cuts you of from Kberg I can't see much room for failure. Even then, thanks to the annexation bug Poland usually has no allies to speak of so you can just ally 1 or 2 of her rivals and eat them directly.

This pretty much sums it up, and as someone who has probably 1k hours on Brandenburg campaigns alone, you can keep playing, play tall, go economic first and dev push all your land to 20+ dev, you have prussian ideas afterall, so you don't need to win the game in the first 50 years. It might be boring I know, sitting there and waiting for monarch points but you can easily punch above your weight once you have +20%ICA unlocked.

In your case I would go economic/innovative - offensive - innovative/economic - quality for OP policies. You can now easly 1v1 Poland or denmark with only starting land.

 

[Bibor]

In my second game in Persia Patch HRE got disbanded. I had nothing to do with it - catholics won, but Austria lost emperorship and went Reformed aftewards. The Emperor (Provance) didn't add any electors and it got gobbled up by France in one war. But even before that, as OP says, everybody just went ham within the Empire. Poland got annihilated by Bohemia which in turn got eaten by Austria. Basically 1600s India in Europe

 

[HansBaer]

Is this one of those situations where it's best to merc up and take a ton of loans instead of use allies?

I usually fight them alone but you could ally Mecklenburg or Lübeck if they desire some land. Problem is, you have to give it to them otherwise Poland won't join against to because you broke a land promise and I like to keep that option. Anyway, build 1 inf in every province you own and fabricate on pom on day one. With luck, you get Neumark and can take the pom mission even before the claim is finished.
Pom is usually allied to eastfr. and one other minor, so just wipe their army and put one inf on every province then deal with the minors.

 

[Maldazar]

Pom is usually allied to eastfr. and one other minor, so just wipe their army and put one inf on every province then deal with the minors.

Yeah, this is exactly how I always do it, you can position your troops right next to his army, the minors will need to get military excess and stuff so they will never be in time to protect his army, once his army is gone (which should be a stack whipe right away or at second fight) it's just a matter of sieging everything quickly and then focusing on the allies, you should be able to beat them easy, since they don't really group up anyway, so it's just 2x 5k stack. You normaly can full annex Pomerania if you have some claims without getting a massive coalition (specialy if you peace out the minors first for max prestige because of reduced agressive expansion impact + your own reduced agressive expansion leader), I never needed mercs, sometimes one loan, but that is more because I like to get all those lvl 1 advisors going right away.. (1 ducat = 1 monarch point? Yes please!)

 

[reaperous]

I'm having my own Brandenburg run too. I'm in 1508, and the scenario is completely different, as I encountered my first juggernaut, a Lithuania-Denmark PU. But my lands stretch from Memel to Friesland, and I'm having one of my fastest expansions into the HRE. Thank you Paradox for the +15% improve relations trade policy. You just had bad luck on this one.

And how you guys ally with Bohemia and go Pomerania first. I have around 15 campaigns as Brandenburg, one of them I wanted an early Bohemia PU so I did a bunch of rerolls. All of them starts the same: Bohemia rivals me, ally Pomerania. The Bohemian rivalry gives me an Alliance with Poland, then to a TO-Mecklenburg war I go in January-February 1445. Never, ever, had a game where Bohemia doesn't rival me and ally Pomerania.

 

[Dman1791]

How are you guys wiping the Pomeranian army? You can only support like 11-12 troops, and Pomerania has 8. Without a god general, that seems impossible? Or is it just a bunch of mercs?

 

[szmik]

12k vs 8k is enough; unless rolls kill you or they get 5 shock general, chances are they will retreat, then you chase, wipe and carpet siege

 

[Sharples88]

I usually go above my forcelimit just to stack wipe. Then delete the extra troops when it happens.