Recommend me a nation

[Horn and Ivory]

I recently had a game with the Teutonic Order and I love them - not so much the Prussia part where I stomped everyone, but the early bit where everyone wanted my land and I had to fight desparate nailbiting wars against Poland-Lithuania, the Kalmar Union, and an alliance of german states in quick succession. I like the combination of having a huge target painted on me and being weak enough that I have to work to survive; but also having enough strategic depth that I don't feel the need to restart or save scum if the game rolls me a horrible diplomatic position or if I lose a couple of battles in an early war (which I tend to end up doing with really tiny vulnerable nations like Byzantium or the Rassids, even though I feel kinda dissatisfied when I do it). What other nations give you similar just-enough-to-work-with starting conditions?

 

[True_Heir_of_Rome]

Try Naples. Nice, but not overwhelmingly great ideas. Your starting position is fairly weak as you are a junior partner, but you're not so weak that you will lose the game in one bad war. Expansion is initially somewhat challenging and you will soon be sharing sea tiles with the Ottomans so you'll have a constant threat just to the east.

 

[Piotrzeci]

Scotland maybe, or some Tatar horde.

 

[Metz]

Try one of the Arab nations and unify Saudi Arabia.

 

[ParagonSaber]

A few somewhat similar starts are Scotland (there's only one nation that can really harm you, but it's quite the balancing act dealing with them), Tlemcen (sandwiched between two stronger nations that generally don't like you much, but you have diplomatic options), Hungary (you're not weak but you've got a scary PLC to the northeast, an annoying Venice all over the place, and a very scary Ottoman Empire to the south), and Qara Qoynulu/Ajam (simple-ish early expansion, but then you run into the triple wall of the Ottomans, Mamluks, and free-Timurid-vassal-alliance-blob).

 

[Meshed Gear]

One of the Dutch minors, whichever one appeals to you the most. Try to form the Netherlands and survive against France, England, and Austria.
Ethiopia is a good larger choice, starts out relatively easy but gradually have to deal with more powerful enemies.

 

[Thorum]

Ava was lots of fun. Just don't become a tributary

 

[GurenGaaze]

Norway - The weakest in the kalmar union. and also generaly weaker than everyone else who isn't an OPM in europe (That being said, I haven't played them myself because of said reasons.)
Do not expand outside of scandinavia - and eventually Russia is gonna become a great threat.

 

[TenshiN]

Tripura - start as a 1-1-1 dev province OPM on the India-Indochina border and work your way up the food chain
Despite its size, there actually are pretty reliable starting strategies.

 

[puddingkip]

Orissa is fun. Bengal, Jaunpur, Vijay and Bahmanis will all want your land but with some good diplomacy you can play them against each other or just use your god general-king to beat them with 5 shock and a tech advantage

 

[CzechKronner]

Ryazan is fun. Or Lithuania > Release Smolensk (play as). Plenty of things to do, ultimate goal is to create Russia ad dominate Ottomans/Ming.

Holland > Netherlands is always a fun game too.

 

[Shinkuro Yukinari]

Mzab, Ulm, Ryukyu, Dahomey

 

[otaats]

Ethiopia is always my go to rec.

You begin as a strongest regional power, but weaker than the Mamluks. You have to figure out how to quickly expand southwards while beating Mamluks and fending of the Ottomen. Was my favorite campaign so far in my 1400+ hrs.

 

[enKage]

Khmer! Great ideas + constant threat from Ayyuthaya. Early relgious problems, but possible expansion and in some games viable dipllomacy

Nepal - simiar as above but without religius problems

 

[Harfyn]

Similar to the Qara recommendation - if youre looking for more of a challenge, try out Aq Qoyunlu - TONS of options - can form Rum or Persia. There's a ton of big threats around you, but you can almost always ally the ottomans fairly easily, so there's no real terrible risk unless you mess that alliance up.

 

[Snake_Squeezins]

Holland into Netherlands is a great game that requires you to hustle, but which doesn't leave you totally exposed.

Sweden or Naples emerging into independence are also fun.

 

[Horn and Ivory]

By the number of these suggestions that I've played before, it seems I have found something of a niche...

Naples, Tlemcen, Ryazan, one of the Turkomans, or one of the SE Asian Buddhist minors are all a bit different from what I've played recently, so I should be set for games for a while.

Many thanks to all of you!