Remember that screenshot of the 71 year old heirless king? He died, and a Habsburg noble ascended their throne. OHH boy
Are you thinking what I was thinking then??
Slight problem though. Sweden has 100 prestige. 100
So I had to equal that to claim their throne. And I had 92 prestige, since it dropped a little during the breather period. ARGH
I contemplated how to get 10 prestige fast, and did a bit of a drastic move
I declared restraint of appeals (after an insult to the Pope) and gained 10 prestige. I claimed their throne.
I claimed their throne, and planned to start a force Pu war.. Austria really liked Sweden, but they had so much trust in me that they got swayed to help on this claim throne war. I had to break alliance with Sweden, cancel access treaties, and HOPED Sweden wouldn’t get an heir in these months. They didn’t.
What DID happen during these few months, was Sweden declaring on Norway. England came to the defense of Norway, so they couldn’t join my force PU war versus Sweden.
It seems I would have been called into that Swedish war if I didn’t do this force PU war, so.. Its now or never
If I didn't do the war now, I would have been called in by Sweden/England.
Bohemia and Saxony will come to the defense of Sweden, and I made both co-belligerent. That dragged three OPM Hre states in; Ansbach, Augsburg and Holstein.
My plan was to occupy everything in HRE first, to make some separate peaces. I let Austria do the fights, and my army focussed on occupations and chasing routed armies and stack wiping them.
In other news: Ottomans are trying to westernise off ME. The insolence
They got reactionaries and “internal conflicts” as a result. Guess what? Persia did NOT want to re-ally them after the “annul treaty” timer with ottomans was gone.
I started a war versus Qi, and that dragged Shun and Chu in. The real reason I started the war is that rebel stack in Qangzhou, just south of Qi. I forgot an important lesson I learned in 1.7, and had to pay for it
Important tip: If you conquer Asian high base tax provinces as European power, it will spawn huge rebel stacks aswell. Its best to CONVERT these high base tax provinces BEFORE coring them.. Why? If a rebel stack spawns there AFTER you cored it, the rebels will have YOUR tech and YOUR military tactics. And it makes them almost impossible to beat with asian vassal armies.
That’s why converting high tax base provinces FIRST is good idea. The rebel stack will spawn, but since you don’t have a core there, the rebels will take the tech of the former owner. And after that, rebels won’t spawn again due to the -20.00 revolt chance malus.
I’m not 100% sure it works this way, but I’m pretty sure it does.
Anyways, I MADE the mistake of coring it first, and that 32k rebel stack has MY tech.. That is why I declared on YI. My vassal armies would only attach to my 1k stacks IF I wage war in Asia. So, I started a war versus Yi, led my ENTIRE vassal army there, along with every ryukyu stack I had, and tried a desperate attack versus the rebels. I won, barely. It was like 75k versus that 32k rebel stack, and they almost managed to defeat my entire combined Asian force, even though I had crazy good dice rolls.
I made quick work of occupying Shun and Chu.
And whats up with all these +1 stability events? Geez. It made me reach +3 again
Saxony and their minor PU subject Bavaria got occupied. Things were a little messy there, but Karl von Habsburg himself saved me when Bohemia attacked my occupation forces..
Champa finally integrated… Useless vassal begone! This is a scope of the Asian territory Ryukyu controls in 1631. I released U-Tsang as protectorate to get rid of the uncorable provinces at some point.
In other news: Otomo turned catholic and is slaughtering Japan. And Qing formed out of Manchu. Right. Bet you won’t see that happening a lot
Ok, the Hre front is secured
Time to start the invasion of Sweden. One slight problem. Naval Ai. Whatever I tried, I couldn’t budge the Spanish and Portuguese fleet to kill the Swedish fleet near Denmark. Sigh
Remember that province I gave Sweden in the coalition war? I planned ahead for a possible force PU war/Lithuanian war. That one province given created a possible corridor into Sweden through Lithuania. And Lithuania likes me enough to give access. They also gave access to Austria.
The idea now was to lead all 1k stacks with Austrian army attached, towards that corridor and to Invade Sweden from the east. Micromanaging horror. I had to move those stacks through Crimea and Minsk into Lithuania, and then into Sweden. That was the plan. You can see me leading those stacks through Crimea there.
Slight problem: Sweden anticipated my move, and sent troops to Lithuania to repel my attempt
And OH MY GOD these Swedish troops are seriously overpowered
They tried an attack on a stack, and I was lucky some other 1k stacks with Austrian forces were already in vicinity. I routed the Swedes, but not without a serious amount of losses…
The moment I set foot upon Swedish territory, Spain decides to awake from its catharsis and sends its fleet and troops to the Danish territory. I’ll never understand naval AI.. I guess they woke up because I set foot in war target territory, but not sure.
I was also lucky that the Swedish army was split in two. The second Swedish army retreated towards Stockholm, but I catched them in time and led all the stacks south to reinforce that battle. As you can see, only 4k-6k of my own troops are involved in the invasion! My own army had to kill some rebels in Bulgaria. They moved towards Sweden only a couple months later, to start occupations.
Meanwhile, I started a war versus Wu again, to keep my forces in Asia busy. I noticed too late my truce was gone, and that other nations were invading them also…
The Ai really made a dirty move there. I was planning to feed Lan Xang, but Yue fed Ming its cores back, making feeding to Lan Xang impossible. GRRRRR
By the way, you can see here that I fed Lan Xang the old capital of Ming (Nanjing) in the coalition war peace deal. 17 base tax
I had no choice but to retreat. But I sieged up Wu anyways, since I was trapped. The AI almost seemed sentient there and thwarted my plans…
A bit later, I annexed Chu, fed Pegu some Shun provinces, and took one Qi province for myself. Turned out I couldn’t core the Chu province, and I sold it to Lan Xang after these wars.
Swedes attacked from the north again, when I was moving westwards towards finland province. Eeek
Go east again folks
The Swedes fled across the land strait towards Stockholm. I was able to use the same land strait and landed in Stockholm with 40k troops. I had to wait a bit to cross the strait, until I saw the Swedish fleet sailed south to repel a stray Austrian fleet landing troops in Danish territory. Austria blublub, but I landed in Stockholm
Portugal and Spain landed more and more troops in Danish territory. They kept minimal occupation stacks there, and moved north. I guess this is proof that the AI takes into account where your forces are, in deciding how to move your subject forces. Ok brave subjects, If you move north to kill a stack, then I will aswell
I set Stockholm as a province Portugal should siege during the previous battle, and after the fight Portugal occupied Stockholm. Attaboy
I led my army south in pursuit of the main Swedish army.
Needless to say, a stackwipe was the logical result there…
I did a revoke of the restraint of appeals. I got to stay catholic after all, if I ever want to become emperor. So why not going for a revoke. I don’t lose papal influence monthly anymore, and I KEPT the tax bonus decisions. No, that doesn’t get revoked!
All enacted decisions that say 'until 1821' can't ever be revoked no matter what you do.
Important tip: You can enact decisions tied to culture, nation or religion that last until 1821, only to keep these bonuses when you CHANGE your culture, religion or nation tag. You keep these bonuses, and you can enact (possible) new ones if you switch religion, culture etc. They all stay active until 1821.
Sweden gave up. I started to occupy more and more territory. This war is won. But I wanted to make separate peaces in the HRE, so I continued occupying entire Sweden for warscore.
In other news, Otomo is actually eating entire Japan. Wow
I ended the pointless Wu war after I got enough warscore to ask reparations and their ducats.
In other news, Oman is going on a blobbing Spree. Orissa is the main nation in India. Warsangali blobbed in east Africa, but is getting Punished now.
I made separate peaces in HRE. Austria got fed up to 9x% overextension, as thanks for their help in the war.
I ended the union Saxony had over Bavaria. All those HRE states gave me reparations and their gold. Thanks folks. Note that I fed Ansbach and Augsburg to Austria aswell.
I checked opinion of all HRE states after, and it seems they don’t care. HUH? It seems that feeding Austria several Hre princes doesn’t make them hated in HRE anymore, since the league wart mechanic. Another tactic of mine during the foix run that seems to have been nerfed… I am unsure how I can ever become HRE emperor now. Wiping all catholic nations in HRE, I guess. We'll see.
Sweden gave in. It stood completely alone now, and they accepted to become minor PU subject of Ryukyu. VICTORY IS OURS
This is a diplomatic snapshot of my subjects/allies in Europe. Not bad huh. Austria allied and did RM with Poland, Polotsk AND Riga after the war. Who said you can’t expand diplomatically as Austria? They already made Pomerania a vassal diplomatically before this war.
I fed Austria provinces towards Brandenburg, anticipating the peace deal would drag me to war with Brandenburg. It didn’t.
The idea (in the long run) now is to link Swedish territory to the Austria territory, like I did in the Foix run. In the long run, that’s handy, if Austria ever becomes my PU subject.. Linking up all your subjects is needed.
I want to note this: if Milan did NOT become minor PU vassal of Austria, I would have gotten Austria as minor PU subject when their heirless king died during this chapter. But it didn’t work out. Oh well. Not everything works out as I want it to. Benefit of this: I don’t get aggressive expansion for feeding Austria.
Well, these have been a few chaotic decades. But in the end, I gained 3 minor PU subjects
And Austria is starting to grow crazy big
If Austria integrates Milan (or god forbid inherits it
) I might get a chance for a succession war over Austria. But that can’t happen before 1648. We’ll see what happens.
Next up: bashing the Ottomans again.
Hope you enjoyed this (long) chapter!