Start as one city - stay as one city!
No conquests, no subjects - on very hard!
Settings:
Version: 1.28.3
Diff: VH
DLC: All but the last 3 (Rule Britannia, Dharma, Golden Century)
Main goal: Survive until the end of the game, aka reach 03.01.1821
This is the end:
After 4k+ hours (of mindless blobbing) I looked for a different challenge. I my last games I started as a minor on VH and expanded as much as possilbe. After about 150 years I outcompeted everyone including big nations like Ottomans, France etc.
Around 1650 I faced the problem that my empire got out of hand: 3000+ development, 200+ provinces, 20+ armies, several fleets, wars and battles on 3 diffferent continents... I couldn't handle the game anymore with the intensity I would like to. Guess that classifies me as a micro-manager, if not nano-manager.
Since I was a beginner I have never reached the late mid-game or the late-game, like the age of revolution. Military units, modifiers, wars and battles - how is the look and feel of that stage of the game. Unknown to me.
So to reach the late-game I had to order myself some restrictions.
The other source of inspiration was the Civ-Series. In Civ it is possible to win the game with other means than brutal conquest, like a scientific victory. The old Civ2 from the mid 90s had a lot of exploits, so winning on the most difficult level was fairly easy for experienced players via brutal force. So some guys came up with a tougher challenge. Start as one city, don't expand and win by science. They called it "One city challenge", or OCC.
In EU4 it is not possible to win other than conquer the world, so I modified OCC to OCS ("One city survival").
I have seen other players doing something similar or almost the same lately, so I haven't invented the wheel - reinvented it at best.
Before the game I wasn't sure what I was going to expect from the AI so I choose a provice I considered fairly safe and cool to play: Salzburg
Mountain terrain (to get at least +2 if fighting for life), just 2 neighbours (Bavaria and Austria) and Austria traditionaly being friendly, peaceful and protective (because HRE-emperor status at start). Trade good is Salt. Medium-good, but stable price (3 later 3,3 ducats) and +15% defensiveness.
But Salzburg has two disadvantages: No center of trade and +35% development cost.
So the struggle for money (how to feed my army, how to collect the first 200 ducats for the castle) and spending 17,5 M-points extra (later 12,25 with full 30% development efficency after tech27 = 1745) every time I improved my province, was a constant task throughout the campaign.
No AI-nation ever declared war on me in this game.
Also I got no DOW on one of my allies with a desire (yellow strategic interest in the diplo-feedback map-mode) for Salzburg. So no direct threats on me, but still a lot to do defence-wise. Like Ottoman at my door and conquering Wien more than once.
The condition "no conquests" means: I can't take land for myself in a peace deal and keep it.
But I can declare Conquest wars and hand over to my friends whatever I get my hands on. The first one was the Conquest of Landshut and München from Bavaria. Getting the CB (= fabricating claims) is the easy part. But moreover I needed a) Austria's willingness to join my war, b) Austria's yellow or red interest in the provinces and c) the certainty to win the war. And I had to wait a very long time till this happened.
Returning provinces, release nations, all that stuff allowed by my selfmade rules.
In one case I took a province (Glogau) in a peace deal (vs Poland) and sold it to the "rightful original" owner (Silesia). But on the very same day. Netted in 800+ ducats.
1687 was the most important year, it changed everything. Dip tech 23 with "Imperialism" and "Nationalism" - CBs. From that on I got almost as aggressive as in my normal games.
During the campaign, with more and more confidence in my one city, I formulated some
Side goals:
2 and 3 are relative goals.
I had some other temporary side goals, that I gave up because I choose to take the game in a different direction. Like become an elector of the HRE or Curia-Controller.
To 1 - the independence: Salzburg starts as a Bishopic / Theocracy. So no threats to independence. But during the game I changed to a Duchy / Monarchy, made Royal Marriages, my dynasty died out and in 1651 I got the Spanish dynasty (de Trastámara). So for 170 years until the end of the game I was threatend to fall in a PU under Spain everytime I had no heir. Even when a new ruler ascends the throne at the age of 15 ... you never know. My solution of course: Go to war. If necessary chain wars until "the sucession is safe".
To 2 - help for friends: My long time allies were Austria (from beginning to end) and Spain. But even for Brandenburg, Liege and Cologne I had a helping hand in times of our cooperation.
For now let me show you some pictures for Austria and Spain in the end:
To 3 - big city: 136 dev is not bad I think, especially for a mountain province, but with something like Amsterdam (Farmland, cloth, CoT) way bigger cities can be build I suppose.
To 4 - the Fall of Konstantinopel to Salzburg in pics:
To 5 - the dismanteling of the HRE:
I reduced the number of electors by force-converting minors to the "wrong faith", from catholic to protestant. But I did one too many as the HREmperorship went to biggies outside Germany. First Great Britian and then my good buddy Spain. My last chance was the Spanish ruler dying. As you can see Oldenburg would become HRE. In my final war I had all remaining electors occupied up to 12.1820. But Tomás survived ...
... to be continued ...
P.S.: Feedback, comments, questions welcomed
Edit1: Minor text corrections
Addition of "the dismanteling of the HRE:"
Edit2: Addition of the first pic for Austria
Addition of "The first one was the Conquest of Landshut ..."
Restructuring of the fulfillment of the side goals
Addition of "To 1 - the independence"
several smaller additons and corrections
No conquests, no subjects - on very hard!
Settings:
Version: 1.28.3
Diff: VH
DLC: All but the last 3 (Rule Britannia, Dharma, Golden Century)
Main goal: Survive until the end of the game, aka reach 03.01.1821
This is the end:
After 4k+ hours (of mindless blobbing) I looked for a different challenge. I my last games I started as a minor on VH and expanded as much as possilbe. After about 150 years I outcompeted everyone including big nations like Ottomans, France etc.
Around 1650 I faced the problem that my empire got out of hand: 3000+ development, 200+ provinces, 20+ armies, several fleets, wars and battles on 3 diffferent continents... I couldn't handle the game anymore with the intensity I would like to. Guess that classifies me as a micro-manager, if not nano-manager.
Since I was a beginner I have never reached the late mid-game or the late-game, like the age of revolution. Military units, modifiers, wars and battles - how is the look and feel of that stage of the game. Unknown to me.
So to reach the late-game I had to order myself some restrictions.
The other source of inspiration was the Civ-Series. In Civ it is possible to win the game with other means than brutal conquest, like a scientific victory. The old Civ2 from the mid 90s had a lot of exploits, so winning on the most difficult level was fairly easy for experienced players via brutal force. So some guys came up with a tougher challenge. Start as one city, don't expand and win by science. They called it "One city challenge", or OCC.
In EU4 it is not possible to win other than conquer the world, so I modified OCC to OCS ("One city survival").
I have seen other players doing something similar or almost the same lately, so I haven't invented the wheel - reinvented it at best.
Before the game I wasn't sure what I was going to expect from the AI so I choose a provice I considered fairly safe and cool to play: Salzburg
Mountain terrain (to get at least +2 if fighting for life), just 2 neighbours (Bavaria and Austria) and Austria traditionaly being friendly, peaceful and protective (because HRE-emperor status at start). Trade good is Salt. Medium-good, but stable price (3 later 3,3 ducats) and +15% defensiveness.
But Salzburg has two disadvantages: No center of trade and +35% development cost.
So the struggle for money (how to feed my army, how to collect the first 200 ducats for the castle) and spending 17,5 M-points extra (later 12,25 with full 30% development efficency after tech27 = 1745) every time I improved my province, was a constant task throughout the campaign.
No AI-nation ever declared war on me in this game.
Also I got no DOW on one of my allies with a desire (yellow strategic interest in the diplo-feedback map-mode) for Salzburg. So no direct threats on me, but still a lot to do defence-wise. Like Ottoman at my door and conquering Wien more than once.
The condition "no conquests" means: I can't take land for myself in a peace deal and keep it.
But I can declare Conquest wars and hand over to my friends whatever I get my hands on. The first one was the Conquest of Landshut and München from Bavaria. Getting the CB (= fabricating claims) is the easy part. But moreover I needed a) Austria's willingness to join my war, b) Austria's yellow or red interest in the provinces and c) the certainty to win the war. And I had to wait a very long time till this happened.
Returning provinces, release nations, all that stuff allowed by my selfmade rules.
In one case I took a province (Glogau) in a peace deal (vs Poland) and sold it to the "rightful original" owner (Silesia). But on the very same day. Netted in 800+ ducats.
1687 was the most important year, it changed everything. Dip tech 23 with "Imperialism" and "Nationalism" - CBs. From that on I got almost as aggressive as in my normal games.
During the campaign, with more and more confidence in my one city, I formulated some
Side goals:
- stay independent
- help my friends as much as I can
- build a big city
- conquer Konstantionopel
- dismantle the HRE
2 and 3 are relative goals.
I had some other temporary side goals, that I gave up because I choose to take the game in a different direction. Like become an elector of the HRE or Curia-Controller.
To 1 - the independence: Salzburg starts as a Bishopic / Theocracy. So no threats to independence. But during the game I changed to a Duchy / Monarchy, made Royal Marriages, my dynasty died out and in 1651 I got the Spanish dynasty (de Trastámara). So for 170 years until the end of the game I was threatend to fall in a PU under Spain everytime I had no heir. Even when a new ruler ascends the throne at the age of 15 ... you never know. My solution of course: Go to war. If necessary chain wars until "the sucession is safe".
To 2 - help for friends: My long time allies were Austria (from beginning to end) and Spain. But even for Brandenburg, Liege and Cologne I had a helping hand in times of our cooperation.
For now let me show you some pictures for Austria and Spain in the end:
To 3 - big city: 136 dev is not bad I think, especially for a mountain province, but with something like Amsterdam (Farmland, cloth, CoT) way bigger cities can be build I suppose.
To 4 - the Fall of Konstantinopel to Salzburg in pics:
To 5 - the dismanteling of the HRE:
I reduced the number of electors by force-converting minors to the "wrong faith", from catholic to protestant. But I did one too many as the HREmperorship went to biggies outside Germany. First Great Britian and then my good buddy Spain. My last chance was the Spanish ruler dying. As you can see Oldenburg would become HRE. In my final war I had all remaining electors occupied up to 12.1820. But Tomás survived ...
... to be continued ...
P.S.: Feedback, comments, questions welcomed
Edit1: Minor text corrections
Addition of "the dismanteling of the HRE:"
Edit2: Addition of the first pic for Austria
Addition of "The first one was the Conquest of Landshut ..."
Restructuring of the fulfillment of the side goals
Addition of "To 1 - the independence"
several smaller additons and corrections
Last edited:
- 1
