Post your (DW) Empire

[Arcas Cronifer]

Essentially you've completed your targets with a century to spare. I find it hard to come up with a worthwhile target in that sort of situation. You might go for the complete annexation of France, or Mare Nostrum but I find that if there was something more to be done, I'd want to have been working on it earlier.

You got more of Africa than I did playing France recently. A pure blob game, I kept France as a single connected blob and grabbed as much time, no fleet transport, and BB allowed, which wasn't quite everything. Wu and Khmer hung on around the Asia Pacific rim. There were a few unsightly OPMs, and a few stranded capitals in Europe. I took Zimbabwe and Congo, but that was as far south as I made it in Africa. Massive Imperial Liberation exploitation, plus a huge slice of luck in the GH lasting long enough for a blue tendril to reach it in Bohemia.

Ah yes, nothing like a pure blob game with a major country to let off some steam !

I feel for once that Algerian game has been original and satisfying enough for me to be still curious to see what will happen within the next century. Even in case I never get that PU with the Ottomans, I'd be fine with a smaller "Mare Nostrum" in West Mediterranean, connecting my Italian and Iberian possessions together with the conquest of the isles in between, and at least the southern half of France. Or maybe all of it, if I'm given enough time. After all, 1821 is quite close to the date of 1830 when historically France started the conquest of Algeria, and the sarcastic History nerd in me would appreciate that kind of irony. Another point is that having all of Africa literally backing me is oddly comforting. Very often in my EU3 games, when my empire gets too large, I lose interest because I don't know where I belong anymore, there is no more homeland to defend. Here the homeland is a whole continent, and I still have a bunch of powerful rivals to challenge me !

For the moment it turned out the AI thought I was weak, just because I was well below my force limit and didn't have that many troops. Hence the multiple aggressions as soon as I started some minor war. I've taken my time to recruit some 100k extra troops and send them to show up in possible hot spots. I've also hit mil tech level 43 (I hit a new level each year actually) which is roughy 8-10 levels ahead of everyone else, and upgraded my infantry to Blue coats. I'll eventually need a lot of infantry anyway, since 4000 men are required now to successfully siege each province in Europe.

So I think there will be one last post about Algiers soon...

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

And I think this is it...

A close look at the Western part of the Mediterranean, AKA "Bay of Algiers".

I started my wars in 1720 and still got DoWed by other nations, but this time I was well prepared for that. Muscovy for instance got to ponder on their arrogance once they lost 2/3 of their territory by having to release Novgorod. Granada was surprisingly annexable in one shot in spite of their 7 provinces (I also managed to make Scandinavia lose their other PU with Portugal). Toledo remained Castille's isolated capital for quite a long time because they were always at war, but they finally moved to North America and I could kick them out of Europe. France was not so hard to get, but DoF GB wanted to interfere and got significantly reduced - welcome back Scotland, I didn't expect you to have so many cores !

Cyprus was conquered because they had just remained completely idle during 350 years and something had to happen to them one day. Last island to become Algerian was Corsica, who was Orthodox for some reason. I had to beat Bohemia for good but they still managed to get PUs with Novgorod and Ukraine (which I annexed and released as a muslim vassal rather than having Bohemia inherit them) and remained HRE all the time, expect for one short period with 2 Hessian Emperors in a row who both just lasted months.

But the American colonial world is where change happens now.

Louisiana was force released from GB and is still my good ally. Canada, Colombia, Mexico and La Plata (OPM in Argentina, not on the map here) could be more friendly with Algiers, they broke the alliance while owing me at least some part of their freedom. Haïti, Venezuela and Quebec bravely made it on their own quite a long time ago. More founding fathers have appeared such as Chile and Brazil (on my territory, I released them just to see but it was quite disappointing : they don't have so many cores, I should sell them a bunch of extra provinces). Meanwhile, natives have survived somehow, and Inca is my vassal just because they insisted on DoWing me while I was busy elsewehere.

Some more (quite lazy) colonizing around Oceania :

There are some 22 more years to go and 2 or 3 wars with some more conquests and new nations releasing woud be feasible. But there wouldn't be any dramatically different outcome... and honestly, level 4 fort sieges take forever and I'm tired to send my fleet and troops across the oceans. I'll leave it like that now, I'm happy with that empire and it has been a fairly good game.

 

[TheArchMede]

Level 4 shouldn't take that long when you are the tech leader. A few spies, a max tradition general and 16 cannons or 80,000 infantry. Tradition builds up pretty fast when you are knocking over level 4 forts. This is one of the reasons I spam level 5 government buildings in big empires. Not only do they generate the magistrates that pay for the spam, they generate masses of spies for when the forts get built up.

Its a pity Tangiers doesn't get to be a country. Seeing Tangerine Europe on the map would be quite amusing!

 

[TheArchMede]

Here's an unusual sighting.

I haven't seen the Astrakhanate often if at all. And this one is a Catholic Horde! It doesn't have any catholic provinces! The only one that isn't a long way away is that bit of the Ottomans on the SW corner.

I think that must have been force converted by a fanatic that got chased many provinces east, then at some later point spawned an Asian Catholic fanatic unit which was selected to be the boss when the middle of Muscovy revolted. Some unlikely concatenation of events. Per ardua ad Astrakhan.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

Level 4 shouldn't take that long when you are the tech leader. A few spies, a max tradition general and 16 cannons or 80,000 infantry. Tradition builds up pretty fast when you are knocking over level 4 forts. This is one of the reasons I spam level 5 government buildings in big empires. Not only do they generate the magistrates that pay for the spam, they generate masses of spies for when the forts get built up.

Its a pity Tangiers doesn't get to be a country. Seeing Tangerine Europe on the map would be quite amusing!

Thanks for the tips ! I'll try that next time. I'm not so used to this kind of late game aspects since most of my games just stop between 1550-1700 once the exciting challenges are over. And I keep on forgetting that cannons are helpful even for small sieging troops. Besides, the early game's necessary cautiousness about attrition still makes me reluctant to packing 100k men on one single province, and I typically leave 4k infantry alone to do the job , which can take up to 10 years (well this is more the case for level 5 forts, while level 6 ones just never surrender). What I hate the most is when I finally get 100% siege and even a breach, send one big doomstack with a competent siege leader and still fail miserably at storming the fort, losing all my infantry so I have to wait until I get enough reinforcement to attack again and beat the 300 remaining brave men inside...

Well Tangiers doesn't get to be a country, so unfortunately your Tangerine Europe will remain only a Tangerine Dream...

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

Here's an unusual sighting.

View attachment 934884
I haven't seen the Astrakhanate often if at all. And this one is a Catholic Horde! It doesn't have any catholic provinces! The only one that isn't a long way away is that bit of the Ottomans on the SW corner.

I think that must have been force converted by a fanatic that got chased many provinces east, then at some later point spawned an Asian Catholic fanatic unit which was selected to be the boss when the middle of Muscovy revolted. Some unlikely concatenation of events. Per ardua ad Astrakhan.

That's interesting. Like that Orthodox Horde I spotted in the mere province of Genoa in one of my French games. It seems rebels and Horde mechanisms in DW still have some surprises for us.

Also, I guess those Muscovian colonies in Siberia are kind of doomed now, with a little help from your spies... Are those rebels in Perm Siberian patriots ? If they manage to set free from Astrakhan and the Ottomans, and reform Siberia, you'll have to rush in before Scandinavia does through their vassal Novgorod. And how did you manage to vassalize or ally or even just get MA with Kazakhstan ? You're not at war with them and have troops on their territory...

 

[TheArchMede]

You get an extra 1 on the die roll at 1x, 2.5x and 4x the fort level in cannons. My standard armies have 1x cannons, my siege armies 4x, and my assault armies 20x in infantry (in theory, practice is messier). I'll carpet with infantry but by 1700 or so I'll generally have a siege army in theatre to push the sieges along too, particularly for capitals which tend to accumulate extra bonuses as well as high level forts. If you are only getting a siege roll every 5 months, then it needs to have the dice stacked.

The area of Muscovy in shot is ex-horde, you can see the troops lined up along the border, but the spies can only push the sieges along. They massacred the natives in much of Siberia, so spies couldn't do much there either, but Muscovy didn't have anything east of Astrakhan after the peace treaty. Its the last Holy War, so the rest is safe for a while. They used to have all that Khazak territory too, but someone force released it and its not even a horde any more. Same with the Oirats, who are a Horde in Name Only.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

Revisiting the classics... a study of WC premises with the 3 European majors. Started 3 games, paused each one at the same randomly chosen date of 1457, feb 12, to see the progress, common points, advantages and disadvantages of each.

I. Spain (started as Castille, formed 1428 after inheriting Aragon ) :

Allying with Scotland and guaranteeing Connacht granted me two victories against England and Portugal in defensive wars. Vassal Portugal was annexed in 1445. Holy wars were started during the 1430's, as well as Horde colonizing thanks to a Sunni Zaporozhia. I was occupying almost all of Golden Horde territory at some point, but the AI found an unusual trick to force White Peace with everyone : they vassalized OPM Siberia who had rebelled away, then allied and called them to arms, which cancelled all current wars since you can't stay at war against some remote Horde you don't have a common border with. This saved the GH from seeing Lithuania trying to reconquer their territory while it was still possible. Now GH has annexed Siberia back and their trick is over, so war just started again but I have no troops there, since I'm about to invade the Ottomans and Morocco (allied together) after my victory against the Mamluks.

It looks all well advanced and tidy in the East, but I'm concerned about my rivals in Europe. I've lacked CBs against England and France, who have been suspiciously quiet for a long time. France has conquered Savoie and a good chunk of Naples. They're beating Burgundy now but I could possibly be their next target since I took their cores in Aquitaine from England a long time ago. England, for their part, still has got 14 provinces, they had time to recover and even managed to beat France and grab Caux, in a excommunication war I probably should have taken part in. I can clearly foresee them taking QFTNW within the next 20 years, and this is something, along with finding an occasion to beat France, that I really should be working on instead of keeping on with my holy wars. And I should'nt forget to get my core in Canarias before I lose it : it would be a shame to have this unique advanced launchpad to South America and not take advantage of it.


II. France :

This looks a tad more chaotic than with Spain - and it was. Started by guaranteeing Granada to lead the defensive war against Castille, but England and Portugal also attacked me right away. I guess only France can survive this and get the upper hand. Fortunately Scotland and Aragon had accepted my alliance offer, and I kept excellent relations with them until my prestige got higher and Aragon became my PU partner. This is always part of my strategy, and the common point between most of my games in Europe. Aragon provides a solid ally in the Mediterranean ; they get rich, with a decent fleet and aggressive, competent armies. You'd better be their friend than their foe anyway, if your are to beat the other main powers in Western Europe (I even got that PU several times in Byzantine games, that's a huge bodyguard in early wars against the Ottomans or Venice). Inheriting them will eventually provide a bunch of good provinces for no BB, but you can bide your time and use them at will before that : they won't get too big (which would lower the chances of inheritance somehow) because they never take QFTNW and won't colonize unsupervised by you.

The two first wars ended around 1405-1408 with crappy Charles VI trying his best to make the most of the defensive war peace deal : he almost hit his BB limit by taking 3 provinces from Castille and 4 from Portugal, while England was white peaced just in time before they could defeat Scotland (I had no fleet and really couldn't come to their help apart from taking Calais and the two provinces in Aquitaine). Then all I had to do was to wait for truces to expire and BB to cool down, expecting Charles VI would still outlive that heirless Aragon king in spite of leading armies and bumping his head on every fort and rebel army (because yes, you really expect that moron to pass away as fast as possible regardless of the PU aspect ; and his son Louis was a genius). Right before I got the PU in 1409, Aragon had called me to arms in Italy against Genoa, Sienna and the Pope... and Charles VI was excommunicated. When he finally died in 1423, it was a relief. The new king vassalized the Pope, as it was the best way to regain 200 relations with him... and annexed the Genoan province of Kaffa, thus starting the conquest of Horde Territory (the ugly border between me, Lithuania and the Ottomans used to be 3 provinces colonized by... Sicily, which blocked Pol-Lit progression for a while).

France tends to get involved in European affairs a lot more than Spain, who can just rely on their relatively isolated situation on their peninsula. You not only need to get your cores back from England and finish the 100 Year war ; Burgundy has some of your cores in Flanders and Antwerp too, which are not of the same culture group as you, and you want them, with the CoT and the two manufactories, before 1450, otherwise you just lose them as core provinces. That's a big deal because Burgundy is tough and protected by the Emperor, unless they become HRE themselves ; the latter is what happened in my case, and Burgundy was also allied with Switzerland, Bavaria and Austria... Fortunately, I had also gained a random PU with Bohemia, who kept Austria busy while I was kicking Burgundy's ass.

This explains why I still don't have started Holy Wars in the 1450's. But I'm working on it now. One last war against England, and the annexation of my vassal Portugal, will allow me to let Europe alone for a while because there is no other serious colonizer that will rise for the moment. There is one country which needs to be monitored though : Holland. They very often set free from their PU with Hainaut and, if not subjugated or annexed by anyone else, they are very likely to take QFTNW in the late 1400's. I'll also keep an eye on Brittany (who is in a PU with Austria, but that won't last ; I'lll probably get a chance to vassalize them after that).


III. England :

It is notorious that England has the best potential to become the prominent power in Western Europe, and therefore to conquer the whole world. You can see here that I'm already significantly stronger than in the two other games. Unchallenged starting fleet and good missions against your neighbours and rivals explain that. Of course I also started by guaranteeing Granada while conquering Ireland (Prawnstar style) but then again I added the PU with Aragon as my personal touch (this can be considered cheesy, I know). The alliance with Portugal didn't last long (they chose Scotland over me in my vassalization war)... I'll annex them very soon. I had to grab cores from Burgundy too, so after beating France I also had to spend more time in Europe than Spain. Hence my alliance with Bohemia, and the vassalization of Naples. I also had a very long regency between 1426 and 1440 - it's weird how Henry V seems programmed to die young. Holy Wars still started in the late 1440's and are going to move on without major issue. The flaw in this game is elsewhere, and it is obvious : I haven't been able to find an access to the Golden Horde. Poland has been very effective and it's only due to my (scarce) spies' interventions if they haven't gone into space yet. Venice and Aquileia also got some colonies there, but fortunately GH has managed to wipe them away. Muscovy has vanished, Novgorod and Ryazan are still paying tribute, so it's not too late for someone else to become the Horde's nightmare.

But wait... Austria has got out of control (they are HRE of course). I don't even know how they managed to annex OPM Georgia, who not so long ago was bravely fighting against GH. Instant inheritance maybe ? Now they have the inevitable Nationalist rebel army. And their fleet is just one cog. Meanwhile, my new mission is to vassalize Holland... who is not only a HRE member but Austria's direct ally. So, before I start new Holy wars against Algiers and Tunisia, I know what I have to do. This is going to be fun... that Georgian province of Imeretia has no great value in itself, but here it will play a major part in History, for it will grant me a common border with Golden Horde, Kara Qoyunlu, the Ottomans and the Mamluks... I'm not fond of renaming provinces in general, but this time I could definitely change from Imeretia to "the Eastern Door".


So, which one of the 3 games would be the best fit for a World Conquest ? England would come easy, but I also like France's punk style. I guess I'll have to play the 3 games until 1500 and see what becomes of each...

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

3 WC candidates : an update (1500 for those who made it this far).

I. Spain : I feel quite sorry for you. I changed my mind and brought my troops back to Europe : the French king was still excommunicated and I figured I'd better use it as an excuse to scatter this dangerous rival in smaller pieces, so that I can focus more on England later on. But barely one month into that French campaign, this happens...

Of course this is not as bad as it looks. France has just won against Burgundy but for the moment they "only" have some 40K troops while I have a total of 80K. I'm confident I can beat them in a 2-3 years war. On the other front, Morocco being war leader is a good thing ; they're quite isolated and I can expect a 100% victory against them regardless of the potential threat of their allies. Problem is, I need to transport troops and be careful about their fleet which could likely beat mine if combined with the Ottomans' one (naval battles involving many ships can be very long and AI fleets are quite competent at rushing in, since they don't have military access issues offshore)...

All in all, and even I can hope to get the upper hand in all of this, it is going to last several years, which will mean a big loss of time, troops and money, at least in the perspective of a WC. Persia is big and will certainly siege my remote Middle East colonies at will while I'm busy elsewhere. Golden Horde will either try to reclaim their land from be or get beaten and colonized by someone else than me. And when I finally get a peace deal against Morocco, I will only gain a few provinces from them, none from the Ottomans and Persia, and get to wait 10 years more of truce before I can plan my own attack against the Ottomans. Meanwhile, England will be able to thrive, even if they haven't taken QFTNW as their 2nd NI, I'll still have to find a way to prevent them from doing so before 1500. On a sidenote, I haven't done anything about Holland either, and they're independent and dangerously advanced in tech now....

So I'm not saying the situation is desperate, but it's complicated and certainly not as good as expected. And since I have 2 other games to play, which are also quite interesting and time consuming in their own way... let's say goodbye to Spain for the moment.

II. France and England : I present them together since the two are very similar now. New update is 1500, May 12th.

You can tell I've been quite lazy on exploration and colonization in both games, even though England is still some 10 years ahead of France (on the other hand their progress in the Middle East is not as good, as we will see). Strategies and circumstances have differed a bit between the two in terms of Holy War, but both have got through that dangerous phase when the Ottomans still have better troops than you and can win several battles and destroy several of your armies if you're not careful enough. Here again, England's big Navy has been an advantage to blockade the Bosphorus strait and let 40k Turks rage with helplessness on the other side while I carpet sieged Anatolia.

The Ottomans were stronger in the French game though, having taken Constantinople and even conquered a bunch of Christian provinces : Sicily was theirs for a while and the 3 provinces there even converted to Sunnism. That's how I ended up with a Sicilian ally I force released from them (I'll backstab them later), while in another war against Venice the Ottomans had to release the Knights in Malta (so yes, we have a Sunni Sultan of the Knights here - oh, the irony).

Both countries have also managed to deal with the Dutch issue. France DoWed that remote Zaporozhia tribe who was allied wih Holland, so the HRE intervention was avoided, and straight away annexed Holland. Things were more twisted with England, as after my vassalization war against Holland I had just grabbed the -2BB bonus from that mission, and failed to protect my new vassal against Brabant, who had attacked them with a reconquest CB and annexed them. It thought it was just good riddance, but shortly after Brabant was beaten by the Teutonic Order and had to release Holland as a new independent Monk State... A new plan was needed. I had to wait until I was Papal controller again (BTW, don't you hate it when you suddenly lose ALL your cardinals for no reason, just to see some 2PM such as Cologne become the new Papal Controller, with 2 cardinals who even come from the same province and seem to be immortal since they sit in the Curia for years, while you're stupidly waiting with your 100 influence on the Pope ? That's plain AI cheating IMHO). When I finally could excommunicate Holland, they were at war against HRE Bohemia, so nobody came to defend them and I annexed them.

In my French game, Burgundy has kept the HRE throne in spite of being quite weak, and the PU between Austria and Britanny lasted longer than expected. These two facts are linked : Austria had a Queen, Maria Theresa, who reigned for over 50 years...

But let's get back to the big picture : which one of the two is the best fit for a WC now ? Honestly, I was expecting England would be easier. But France's prospect looks better, and here is why :

My truce with the Mamluks will expire soon and I will attack them while they're busy fighting the Ottomans. As for Asia, there has been some consolidation : the balance between several big powers provides some stability in the region, and my future wars shouldn't involve too much diplomacy tricks - basically it'll be taking one big empire at a time. Hordes have resisted quite well too, and hopefully nobody will seriously compete with me on fighting them. That's a LOT of BB free land to take : the Timurids alone still have around 40 provinces. And Persia is a Shia OPM paying tribute to them, with no allies. Arabia is simple as well : 3 countries (the green bit is former OPM Oman inherited by the Ottomans a while ago). I can expect to finish my conquests here while progressing in Africa (Ethiopia is about to get gobbled by Adal and Yemen, BTW) and colonizing Timurid's coastal and border provinces one by one ; by 1530 at the latest I expect to be ready to fight Rajputana.

So France has to get busy and well organized, but WC looks pretty much attainable here. Below is what England's world looks like in comparison :

Here I'll have to deal with that strong Persia before I gan get an access to the Gulf, which France already has in 1500. Meanwhile the Timurids will continue to get destroyed by their neighbours before I can finally reach them, even if I go through Kazakhstan (which is not difficult but just takes forever). The rest of Asia looks more unstable than in France's game. I can't predict how it will look like when I finally arrive there. Of course, at least I can keep my colonists for America here, while France will have to use a significant number of them in Asia ; but colonists are not the main issue in WC - Infamy is.

Well, this is how I see things for the moment. I'm going to play France. What's your opinion, folks ?

 

[jhhowell]

with your 100 influence on the Pope

How do you have any Papal Influence? I don't have a lot of experience with the current version of the game, but from what I've seen if you have more than a couple points of badboy ("Infamy", now ) that will wipe out your Papal Influence.

Very weird seeing Ireland unified, and I don't know who that dark green "Ecosse" is in Scotland. The amount of AI consolidation makes me think the AI aggressiveness setting must be pretty high in these games.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

How do you have any Papal Influence? I don't have a lot of experience with the current version of the game, but from what I've seen if you have more than a couple points of badboy ("Infamy", now ) that will wipe out your Papal Influence.

Very weird seeing Ireland unified, and I don't know who that dark green "Ecosse" is in Scotland. The amount of AI consolidation makes me think the AI aggressiveness setting must be pretty high in these games.

BB is bad for papal influence indeed, but it can be counterbalanced by other aspects such as your relations with the Pope (must be 200 at all times), your Narrowminded slider, the NIs you have (religious ones give you 5 influence points each), the number of Catholic provinces you have and their tax value. So you can have, say, 15 BB and still gain some papal influence each month. Both France and England have between 20 and 30 % chances to get the next cardinal in these games, so I could expect to keep at least some cardinals, not lose them all.

Ireland unites easily and quite early in my games because I tend to occupy England for a long time in order to make the most from the peace deal. And since I generally occupy only the main island (English Navy is so scary I get my troops there beforehand thanks to Military Access in Scotland and let Ireland alone) this gives me time to fund Irish patriots instead, in Meath and other Irish provinces if England has any. They do some mess for a while but once the province defects and England is out of the place, it very often ends up with one of the Irish OPMs prevailing and uniting the country. I'm fine with that as long as England loses some coastal provinces and that doesn't cost me too much BB.

Scotland is green in my games. I did that a very long time ago because I found the similarity between Castille's and Scotland map color very annoying (I also changed the Papal States from white to red and Bohemia from brown to orange). France fought a Reconquest war against former ally Scotland for English provinces, then let them complete their mission to annex Orkney and they took Iceland as well.

 

[TheArchMede]

WC should just be a matter of mopping up for both England and France.
You might have 20 years to spare with England and 30 with France, but both are well up with the rate.
Spain looks like a classic Prawnstar cliffhanger. A list of DoWS, "Oops" and continued with a report on a triumphant demolition job in the next instalment.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

Spain looks like a classic Prawnstar cliffhanger. A list of DoWS, "Oops" and continued with a report on a triumphant demolition job in the next instalment.

That's exactly what I thought ! Alas, I'm not as talented as Prawnstar, neither to successfully play it through nor to report on it in a funny and entertaining way.

It's clearly feasible though. If you managed to get Portugal out of a much more compromised situation and perform a last moment WC, mighty Spain should not be such a big deal. But that fortunate France game was too tempting and I've committed myself to it instead, even if this one is obviously too easy to pose a real challenge and tell good stories about. I have never acomplished any WC, I stopped trying a long time ago, so doing it now still makes sense for me. Actually it's failing with this that would certainly tell a lot about my real playing skills .

I'm almost at 1600 now, so I may post an update soon if there are some interesting points to comment about. But no cliffhanger in sight for the moment, I'm afraid...

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

In the heat of the moment I just forgot to take screenshots for year 1600. Here I am with 1609 instead, which is legit too I guess, since it's basically mid-game with 210 years left to go.

But first a quick look at that sh*t that keeps happening :

Then in the late 16th century it was Austria's turn, when they got bigger again. I've had 3 immortal Austrian cardinals staying there for over a decade, and me struggling just to keep up with 2 (in spite of a very low infamy). Then it was Burgundy's turn, while I was the only one fighting Crusades and converting dozens of provinces to catholicism .

Oh, and a quick flashback to that turning point : 1549, Asian map spread. My first war against Vijaynagar right before that was quite tedious. I wouldn't have fought Ming the same way, wandering through Terra Incognita - Ming was already more challenging than expected, with competent emperors focusing on Land Tech research (they were already at level 16 when I first attacked them during the 1550's !). Fortunately things got significantly easier with a clear map. And in that same year 1549, with my first 2 cores in the Gulf, I could start building my Indian Ocean fleet... and do something about that wild Pirate belt around the Persian Coast and Arabia, that kind of hampered my trade development in the region.

Chagatai Khanate had conquered Tibet, which provided me a short and BB-free route to Ming. Excellent reason to attack Bihar, if I needed one.
Vijaynagar was occupied by me for a very long time and never recovered from it. They lost their fresh conquests in Brunei territory, then fell to rebels on their own land after I took 10 of their Northern provinces. 2PM Maharastra occupied them for years, without ever putting an end to their liberation war for some reason. All I had to do, later on, was to DoW both of them. Vijaynagar had no army and their gigantic fleet was wandering offshore with 0 Morale.

But enough with the flashbacks, here is the present situation :

Asia :

Nothing much to say here, work in progress basically. It's my 3rd war against Ming, I guess that will take 1 or 2 more until I'm done with them. Kudos to that Khmer Kingdom which lasted for a long time for once, instead of getting wiped out by their neighbours at game start as usual. But they're technologically backwards and pretty much doomed now. Brunei and Korea will follow, local minors are just a matter of one war each and can still wait until the 1640's I guess. I'm more concerned about Japan and will focus on them ASAP. I also have started to seriously reduce Horde Territory because I got cores there, and rebellions over long lasting occupations distract me too much from more urgent things. Exploration and colonization can wait, as long as I don't uncover the South African route, opening the region to European competitors.

Africa :

This goes slower than expected, I've been too busy elsewhere, but nevermind. I just Dowed Ashanti and Mutapa (who inherited Benin apparently) so I can access to these uncovered provinces in Cameroon that recently attracted the attention of my PU partner Aragon and an ambitious Tuscany. I can't open the sea route for the moment, otherwise people would just send troops to invade Congo - the complete lack of Military access doesn't prevent AI countries to DoW remote pagans just because they appear to exist. And Aragon and Tuscany rushing here shows me that AI countries are craving for new land to colonize now, so I have to be careful with what gets available to them because I don't have that many spies to ruin their efforts (I used them in the war against Norway on Scottish provinces). Here I have to wait to get a new spy while Tuscany already has sent 2 colons there. That's why I'm dealing with it now, in spite of the extra BB that could have been taken much later otherwise.

Americas :

South America is secured but it won't be long until my European neighbours get some map spreading here, so I guaranteed the Inca, the Aztecs and the Creek because I don't want them to be conquered behind my back by rivals while I'm busy elsewhere. If I "protect" them enough, essentially by annexing their coastal provinces, I can keep them alive until well after 1650, since the cheap BB CB against them doesn't expire. North America is still mostly Terra Incognita and can remain so for some decades, provided I keep an eye on what Europeans are up to...

Europe

Yep, England is born again, as some dirt poor OPM, but still. The wars between Scotland and Norway turned out very badly. Norway even took the Highlands and changed the local culture to theirs ! I got a core on Cornwall and used it as a pretext to DoW Norway and put them in their place. Not that I'm completely unhappy with them having prevailed among Scandinavians, though - better them than Sweden, who has more special features and tends to get even more aggressive and very expansionist. But I don't want them to form Scandinavia - perhaps they would get new ambitions and take QFTNW then. They can't for now, as one required province for Scandinavia (in Denmark) is owned by the Hansa, but I still want to weaken them as much as I can. And in a shorter term I have to do something about that OPM England.

Besides, Sunni Sicily and Knights are still alive and peaceful, Naples has entered in a random PU with me ; I have the "Italian ambition mission" and guess I'll be waiting for their inheritance to get some juicy cores in the region. Burgundy inherited Mantova but Austria finally got a grasp on the HRE crown, and conquered Venice - fine, they will be easier to invade by the coast. The conquest ofr the North of Italy and Croatia are part of my future priorities so that I get a land connexion with the rest of my empire.

 

[TheArchMede]

You should have the spy firepower to deal with England going on an exploration binge, which is what will happen if they aren't wiped out before they take Quest to be the Next Annexation, but it will be tedious. Novgorod will eventually take it too, if they tech far enough. Also you'll need to be at peace to inherit, including against hordes, which can require a lot of luck for the King to die at the right time. Having a PU prevents switching to a republican government which opens you up to nasty consequences from poorly timed deaths and events.

Still looks well ahead of schedule, but the right events could make it interesting. Getting stuck with a long regency and poor DIP. No Swiss vassal to spin out the BB via diploannex when you are unable to declare war either.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

You should have the spy firepower to deal with England going on an exploration binge, which is what will happen if they aren't wiped out before they take Quest to be the Next Annexation, but it will be tedious. Novgorod will eventually take it too, if they tech far enough. Also you'll need to be at peace to inherit, including against hordes, which can require a lot of luck for the King to die at the right time. Having a PU prevents switching to a republican government which opens you up to nasty consequences from poorly timed deaths and events.

Still looks well ahead of schedule, but the right events could make it interesting. Getting stuck with a long regency and poor DIP. No Swiss vassal to spin out the BB via diploannex when you are unable to declare war either.

You've pointed out exactly all the concerns I have in Europe, which could still make that (otherwise steamrolling) game interesting and challenging later on.

England has actually been back since 1545, and I've monitored them carefully ever since, but they haven't seemed to be willing to take QFTNW so far. They are the main reason I'm fighting this war against Norway, though ; I'm just not sure how I'm going to deal with them now. 8 points for full BB annexation would be unwelcome at this point, but that's something I could still consider at worst later on, if I let them live and suddenly see them taking QFTNW. I can also (and it sounds wiser) vassalize them right now and diploannex in 10 years, which would be 5 BB in total.

Or I could let Scotland take care of England, since they have a core on this province, and a short Reconquest war would be the right and easy thing for them to do. That's also why I'm trying to help Scotland retaliate against Norway - I funded these patriot rebels you can see on the map. Problem is, Scotland was recently vassalized by Norway, which means in my peace deal with the latter I should force them to cancel this vassalization first, as well as their alliance with England, then trust AI Scotland to DoW England after their truce expire, which sounds hazardous because you just can't expect AI countries to do the exact logical thing it's in their own interest to do. And forcing AI countries to cut their ties is often pointless, because they tend to reinitiate them as soon as you look away. However, there is still a chance that Norway will let England down : they were allied at first just because it was Norway who force released them from Scotland, but England is Reformed, Norway is Catholic, and if I play well with funding Scottish patriot rebels, they soon won't even have a common border. If England is not guaranteed by Norway anymore, I don't see a reason why Scotland would not try a Reconquest war once they've recovered from their current misery. Last question is : Scotland will eventually get into another war with Norway, who will eventually make them release England again. So I'd rather take care of it myself, right ? Anyway, I think I won't take my core in Cornwall in the peace deal this time. This way I keep the Reconquest CB against Norway and I can rinse and repeat that kind of containment war when necessary.

Novgorod taking QFTNW and actually causing me some trouble with it is more hypothetical, even if I remember it happening in Prawnstar's English WC. They have strong and unfriendly neighbours (including me - I have Unam Sanctam and soon will become an Aboslute Monarchy, so I can DoW them anytime), and could easily lose all their ports long before they can think of it - another reason why I don't need to weaken Norway too much. By the way, I'm curious to see what Austria will do with Poland and Lithuania.

The low chances of inheritance are another concern, and the downside of that BB-free strategy, especially in a WC game where you're supposed to be quite permanently at war. I'm colonizing hordes for this reason too now, because when there's only one OPM horde left, war and peace with them are just a matter of weeks. I'll be careful about that when my king is likely to die within months, either by old age or because he's leading armies, and I have enough BB (but not too much) to be at peace for 2 or 3 years. If I feel I'm not going to make it but have some BB to collect, I could reasonably integrate my PUs before switching to Republican government in the late 18th century. I'm not actually wanting to inherit Bohemia by the way, at least until I'm ready to dismantle the HRE, because I need them as an elector I already dominate for that purpose (and of course I will NOT let Austria make the HRE hereditary )

On a side note, I'm not sure what to do with my French vassals. Diploannexing them looks like a waste of time, stability and BB since I have cores on their provinces. Would you suggest that I cancel their vassalization and DoW them right away ?

 

[jhhowell]

On a side note, I'm not sure what to do with my French vassals. Diploannexing them looks like a waste of time, stability and BB since I have cores on their provinces. Would you suggest that I cancel their vassalization and DoW them right away ?

That seems like the obvious thing to do in the current state of the game. Which suggests a serious flaw in Paradox's game design, but too late now... I wondered if the reason they still exist was some sort of BB-laundering trickery. Release vassal, cancel, insult, DoW, annex - per the wiki that seems like it would reduce your BB by 2. But maybe it's not worth the diplomats (or doesn't work).

Interesting to see what you're up to, and some of the tips & tricks. How common is it for random European countries to end up colonizing just through map spread (Tuscany, in your example)? I don't remember that happening much in previous versions of the game, but my memory is like a ... you know, that thingy with all the holes in it... Or it could be the difference between one colonizer in your game instead of 3-4 in a normal game.

 

[TheArchMede]

That seems like the obvious thing to do in the current state of the game. Which suggests a serious flaw in Paradox's game design, but too late now... I wondered if the reason they still exist was some sort of BB-laundering trickery. Release vassal, cancel, insult, DoW, annex - per the wiki that seems like it would reduce your BB by 2. But maybe it's not worth the diplomats (or doesn't work).

Interesting to see what you're up to, and some of the tips & tricks. How common is it for random European countries to end up colonizing just through map spread (Tuscany, in your example)? I don't remember that happening much in previous versions of the game, but my memory is like a ... you know, that thingy with all the holes in it... Or it could be the difference between one colonizer in your game instead of 3-4 in a normal game.

You now lose cores when you release vassals, so that laundering doesn't work any more. You'll also lose wrong culture cores before you can declare war when you cancel if you've had the vassal for long enough for them to expire in a non-vassal. France has a set of missions to diploannex many of its vassals, but the prestige cost to cancel/conquer is pretty trivial. I've only done it when running out of time to diploannex at the endgame, but thats for style points rather than efficiency.

Countries without QftNW will fill in any colonisation gaps once they have the range to reach them. The default map spread time is more than fast enough for them to see the map before they have the tech for the range. In EU1&2 map spread was by capturing capitals, so minor powers never got the maps.

 

[Arcas Cronifer]

You now lose cores when you release vassals, so that laundering doesn't work any more. You'll also lose wrong culture cores before you can declare war when you cancel if you've had the vassal for long enough for them to expire in a non-vassal. France has a set of missions to diploannex many of its vassals, but the prestige cost to cancel/conquer is pretty trivial. I've only done it when running out of time to diploannex at the endgame, but thats for style points rather than efficiency.

Countries without QftNW will fill in any colonisation gaps once they have the range to reach them. The default map spread time is more than fast enough for them to see the map before they have the tech for the range. In EU1&2 map spread was by capturing capitals, so minor powers never got the maps.

Coorect me if I'm wrong, but I think you lose cores when you release vassals from previously annexed provinces, to be precise. Not sure it applies to France's initial vassals, whose culture is French and thus cannot be lost as core provinces as long as France had not annexed them beforehand and decides to release them for some reason (like cooling down BB when it's too close to the limit).

That said, I don't see it as a flaw in game design. I'm OK with France having to deal with multiple vassals like it's CK. It makes sense historically, at least until the reign of Louis XIV. It also does in the proper game's logic, since France would be way too much overpowered without that slight inconvenience at game start. Same goes with the long-living, absolute moron they made of Charles VI : it's kinda fair to be held back a little by his incompetence in early game.

Rich non-explorer nations such as Aragon, Italian minors, the Hansa or even Brittany are quite prone to colonize provinces you have discovered if you don't pay attention. The West African coast especially seems to act like a magnet to them, in spite of its horrible attrition and native hostility conditions. In the long run, that's how you end up with a New World entirely (albeit belatedly) occupied by nations without QFTNW, when primary explorers happen to have destroyed each other (like in my Iroquois game a while ago).

Speaking of Brittany, I'm not sure what I'm going to do with them. In the early 1500's they got inherited by Austria (yes, when their old queen died). The day after, there was one fierce rebel army in each of their provinces (guess who funded them ?), and like two or three years later, Britanny was back, independent and completely in love with me. We married and allied, I was tempted to diplo-vassalize them but their acceptance is deemed "impossible" apparently. So I left it like that, we're still allied and good friends, but they also have reconnected with their old pal Burgundy...

 

[jhhowell]

That said, I don't see it as a flaw in game design. I'm OK with France having to deal with multiple vassals like it's CK. It makes sense historically, at least until the reign of Louis XIV. It also does in the proper game's logic, since France would be way too much overpowered without that slight inconvenience at game start. Same goes with the long-living, absolute moron they made of Charles VI : it's kinda fair to be held back a little by his incompetence in early game.

France having to deal with a bunch of vassals, and having a moron king, sure. The flaw I was referring to was specifically the HTTT/DW-era situation where it's much faster and easier to cancel vassalization and attack rather than waiting 10+ years and diploannexing. "Hello there Duke of Orleans, your family has been a loyal vassal to the crown for centuries, time to die!"

Not sure exactly what they should have done when they added Reconquest CBs. Maybe make all the French vassals work like Provence, where you don't get the core until the diplo-annex mission completes? Or keep some of the flat BB cost of annexing, even in Reconquest wars.