So many questions (Portugal walkthrough)
- Thread starter kmh42
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Easiest way to take on Castille is allying Aragon at the start of the game and attack asap, might want to pursue a French alliance though in case the iberian wedding fires.
I lost the war
Ottomans, England and France weren't enough to beat Castile, Aragon and Venice! France was quickly forced into another war,. England hadn't much troops and the Ottomans only sieged down Venice and decided to move it's troops back and forth do do anything harmfully to Castile and Aragon. My territory got quickly sieged down duo of lack of forts. After Venice was forced out of the war, I thought we win but nothing substantial was gained. One ally after another dropped out and left me with -99% Warscore.
I have enough EUIV for a while. I thank all of you for providing me so much information and knowledge. Next time I play EUIV I know much more and will be a better player, I hope.
I recently bought the game and played (short) games as Denmark, Brandenburg, Thailand, Tidore, Mali, England, Pueblo and Castile. Then I tried Portugal (Ironman) and have now reached almost 1590.
I wanted to add a few notes about my experience playing Portugal.
Firstly, beginning economy: destroyed homeland forts and didn't hire advisors.
Went for Exploration then Expansion.
Built a small number of buildings with maximised value in my high-value provinces.
Built good relations with Papal States and cashed in my Papal Influence for increased taxes and Stability gains as well as a modest chance of becoming Pope myself.
First step: Morocco/Tlemcen: Fabricated a claim on Gibraltar and ended up owning it, with no Castile core on it for some reason. This was helpful in my second war with Morocco, which Spain did not join with me: In my first war I had taken 3 Moroccan/Tlemcen territories, but Morocco's army was still far too strong for me in the second war. He occupied all my Maghrebian provinces but kept trying to cross the straight.This war went on for many, many years, but I gradually beat him in his game of whack-a-mole, moving my smaller army around occupying his lands while his army frequently stalled in Ceuta trying to cross. This was a long, painful and drawn-out process. Eventually I parked in Fez, which he didn't attack because it would have caused him -1 for terrain and -1 for crossing a river. I ran out of Manpower so I had to keep buying mercenaries to keep my army just big enough so he wasn't willing to attack it. Eventually Fez fell and I took it from him in a peace deal.
*** This is why you don't destroy your carracks - you need control of the sea when at war in North Africa
The other lesson from this was that I had to keep a good few 100s of gold in the bank in case of war so I could afford mercenaries.
Second step: Colonisation: I had read up on the treaty of Tortesillas thing and so I was aware that getting a foot in the door in each Colonial area would discourage anybody else from doing so. I suspected that the stronger my relations, the more effective this would be, so I tried to keep Spain, France and England at +100 relation improvement (as well as Papal States), kept an alliance with Spain, and royal marriages with whoever would have me.
I colonised Brazil and Caribbean. Spain started on Colombia. (Colombia suffered a religious revolt and all provinces were force-converted to the native religion).
I colonised Argentina, Mexico and Louisiana. Spain started on Eastern North America, and then Canada.
England has colonised precisely nothing, although they own Iceland.
France decided to colonise down the African Coast, so I took Helena, Ivory Coast, all of South Africa, then colonised Bourbon, Mauritius, Mahe and Diego Garcia so France couldn't get them. France colonised some islands south of Zanzibar, so I went further and colonised Cocos and Christmas Islands. I am now in range of Timor etc...
Meanwhile Spain colonised the Falklands. I didn't like the look of that so I quickly colonised Rapanui and Galapagos and then got my first colony in in California.
As part of the colonial strategy, I fabricated claims and then attacked all the little minors in South America, annexing all those in Brazil and Argentina, as well as the closer ones in North America such as Caddo, Wichita, Osage and took two provinces that adjoined my Louisiana territories. Each peace netted me between 250 and 400 gold, which paid for about 20 manufactories in Portugal and other non-colonial lands.
Took a couple of coastal provinces off Cuzco - was surprised that none of the 4 Peruvian countries I attacked had any decent amount of money to give up to me in wars, so I moved on.
Then I started gobbling up Mexico, taking all but 3 of the East coast territories.
I have just shipped my army back to Europe to have a go at Tunis, and then finish off Morocco.
For my 3rd Idea I went Trade, then 4th I went Naval, because I just needed to use up my massive surplus of Military power.
Interesting events:
- shortly after discovering Kongo, that country changed to Catholic and became quite friendly.
- a while after discovering India, Goa was handed over to Portugal (maybe triggered after colonising Mahe).
So 140 years in, my economy can comfortably sustain 4 active colonies, +2 advisors x2, a 30-unit-strong army, with a 30-gold monthly surplus. My Naval force limit is getting close to 100, although I only have 18 Flytes and 30 Caravels because I am waiting for DIP tech 15 so I can splurge on about 30 Big Ships, at which point I will try to engineer the utter destruction of France and its colonies.
Colonial Brazil, Caribbean and Mexico are all 10+ provinces, so that's 3 extra merchants.
I wanted to add a few notes about my experience playing Portugal.
Firstly, beginning economy: destroyed homeland forts and didn't hire advisors.
Went for Exploration then Expansion.
Built a small number of buildings with maximised value in my high-value provinces.
Built good relations with Papal States and cashed in my Papal Influence for increased taxes and Stability gains as well as a modest chance of becoming Pope myself.
First step: Morocco/Tlemcen: Fabricated a claim on Gibraltar and ended up owning it, with no Castile core on it for some reason. This was helpful in my second war with Morocco, which Spain did not join with me: In my first war I had taken 3 Moroccan/Tlemcen territories, but Morocco's army was still far too strong for me in the second war. He occupied all my Maghrebian provinces but kept trying to cross the straight.This war went on for many, many years, but I gradually beat him in his game of whack-a-mole, moving my smaller army around occupying his lands while his army frequently stalled in Ceuta trying to cross. This was a long, painful and drawn-out process. Eventually I parked in Fez, which he didn't attack because it would have caused him -1 for terrain and -1 for crossing a river. I ran out of Manpower so I had to keep buying mercenaries to keep my army just big enough so he wasn't willing to attack it. Eventually Fez fell and I took it from him in a peace deal.
*** This is why you don't destroy your carracks - you need control of the sea when at war in North Africa
The other lesson from this was that I had to keep a good few 100s of gold in the bank in case of war so I could afford mercenaries.
Second step: Colonisation: I had read up on the treaty of Tortesillas thing and so I was aware that getting a foot in the door in each Colonial area would discourage anybody else from doing so. I suspected that the stronger my relations, the more effective this would be, so I tried to keep Spain, France and England at +100 relation improvement (as well as Papal States), kept an alliance with Spain, and royal marriages with whoever would have me.
I colonised Brazil and Caribbean. Spain started on Colombia. (Colombia suffered a religious revolt and all provinces were force-converted to the native religion).
I colonised Argentina, Mexico and Louisiana. Spain started on Eastern North America, and then Canada.
England has colonised precisely nothing, although they own Iceland.
France decided to colonise down the African Coast, so I took Helena, Ivory Coast, all of South Africa, then colonised Bourbon, Mauritius, Mahe and Diego Garcia so France couldn't get them. France colonised some islands south of Zanzibar, so I went further and colonised Cocos and Christmas Islands. I am now in range of Timor etc...
Meanwhile Spain colonised the Falklands. I didn't like the look of that so I quickly colonised Rapanui and Galapagos and then got my first colony in in California.
As part of the colonial strategy, I fabricated claims and then attacked all the little minors in South America, annexing all those in Brazil and Argentina, as well as the closer ones in North America such as Caddo, Wichita, Osage and took two provinces that adjoined my Louisiana territories. Each peace netted me between 250 and 400 gold, which paid for about 20 manufactories in Portugal and other non-colonial lands.
Took a couple of coastal provinces off Cuzco - was surprised that none of the 4 Peruvian countries I attacked had any decent amount of money to give up to me in wars, so I moved on.
Then I started gobbling up Mexico, taking all but 3 of the East coast territories.
I have just shipped my army back to Europe to have a go at Tunis, and then finish off Morocco.
For my 3rd Idea I went Trade, then 4th I went Naval, because I just needed to use up my massive surplus of Military power.
Interesting events:
- shortly after discovering Kongo, that country changed to Catholic and became quite friendly.
- a while after discovering India, Goa was handed over to Portugal (maybe triggered after colonising Mahe).
So 140 years in, my economy can comfortably sustain 4 active colonies, +2 advisors x2, a 30-unit-strong army, with a 30-gold monthly surplus. My Naval force limit is getting close to 100, although I only have 18 Flytes and 30 Caravels because I am waiting for DIP tech 15 so I can splurge on about 30 Big Ships, at which point I will try to engineer the utter destruction of France and its colonies.
Colonial Brazil, Caribbean and Mexico are all 10+ provinces, so that's 3 extra merchants.
Well, Ironman AI sure is devious.
France obviously guessed that on 14 DIP and with 2,000 gold in the bank I was just waiting for 15 DIP to buy the massive fleet I would use to shut him down, so he declared war on Castille, dragging me in, and I just don't have the ships to take all his colonies let alone blockade him and destroy his economy.
His fleet was pretty much wiped out (which cost me virtually all my small fleet) but he managed to get all his army back to Europe, so Spain is suffering, my capital is occupied, and I've managed to steal just one of his colonies. His remaining 6 big ships have so far been enough to prevent me landing on his african territories and I suspect Spain will soon surrender before I manage to claw my way back into the fight. No doubt France will win 3 more super-rich Flanders provinces from Spain. If only England could join us.....
France obviously guessed that on 14 DIP and with 2,000 gold in the bank I was just waiting for 15 DIP to buy the massive fleet I would use to shut him down, so he declared war on Castille, dragging me in, and I just don't have the ships to take all his colonies let alone blockade him and destroy his economy.
His fleet was pretty much wiped out (which cost me virtually all my small fleet) but he managed to get all his army back to Europe, so Spain is suffering, my capital is occupied, and I've managed to steal just one of his colonies. His remaining 6 big ships have so far been enough to prevent me landing on his african territories and I suspect Spain will soon surrender before I manage to claw my way back into the fight. No doubt France will win 3 more super-rich Flanders provinces from Spain. If only England could join us.....
So...send the light ships on pirate hunting missions and they count for tradepower as well? That is like....insanely useful, and not explained ANYWHERE.
portu is not as simple as you might think, you cant ignore european politics
you are a little spain basicly, you need top notch armies since you arent isolated
get the colonizing going, but then go for military, i think you get an event for india, those land are rich and a little europe without turks or HRE so its right up for grabs
you are a little spain basicly, you need top notch armies since you arent isolated
get the colonizing going, but then go for military, i think you get an event for india, those land are rich and a little europe without turks or HRE so its right up for grabs