The Game of Chins - Habsburg Monarchy AAR

[Layonix]

Hello! It's Layonix again and I bring some bad news. Unfortunately my Portugal save is now gone... Last time I've played I just left the game using alt f4 and playing on normal meant that the autosave was there. But then later on I wanted to try one idea I had for a cool campaign and started a new save. What I didn't think would happen was that the autosave files just overwrite themselves whenever there's a new one created. So 'in return' I am starting a new AAR, where I actually play on ironman, although with mods (Project Austria-Hungary). I hope you enjoy this one and that you guys aren't mad at me .

Some rules for the game :
- Mostly going to stick to historical borders.
- Roleplaying.
- Later on partition Poland with Russia and Brandenburg.
- Battle with the French for influence on Italy.
- Defeat the Turks and become the most influential in the Balkans
- Playing on hard with +33% bonuses to FL, MP and other bonuses to the AI

Chapter 1 : Adding more thrones

So that is our starting position. We're rivaled by the French, Burgundians and the Turks. None of these are an immediate threat to us, but sooner or later we will face the dirty Turkish heathens.
The first goal is going to be to capture the vacant throne of Bohemia. That will immediately secure us an electorate and a pretty large army. We will later try to take on Venice for their mainland holdings.

War report : I've captured Prague, but unfortunately Vienna has been put under siege. I am going to use my forces to kill off the now separated forces.

Bohemia has been subdued. I have almost managed to snag some cash from them. The war was a bit of a pain as the bohemian allies have been running around the entire war theater all the time, but in the end I managed to get enough warscore from occupying half of bohemian lands.

Our alliance offer has been accepted by Poland. I will not help them in their offensive war. The Holy Roman Emperors cannot be bothered with someone elses wars, but I am hoping this 'defensive alliance' will be beneficial to us both.
An austrian pope has been choosen. I hoped that maybe I could excommunicate the Doge of Venice, but apparently they have good relations with the Pope. Other rivals of pope are Provence, Milan and Florence so I cannot really benefit from excomunicating any of these states. I will have to be satisfied with the passive curia bonuses.

The Turks are going ham on our eastern neigbhors - the hungarians, but now that's none of my business. They elected a king from the hunyadi dynasty, ignoring the previous Habsburg heir to their throne and then have announced us as their rivals. So I think they deserve everything that's happening to them right now.
Meanwhile, a HRE reform has been passed allowing construction and development to be 5% cheaper. Nothing major but it's the first step. Even though I will not focus on the Holy Roman Empire. I think I should just leave it as it is for 90% of the game to kind of represent the decline of importance of the title.

Glorious! Due to Hungary's dire situation some of the hungarian nobles have decided that after their king's death at Mohacs the deal between us and them shall be kept. We've inherited the region of Slovakia which has been seeing a lot of immigrants from the Turkish occupied regions. Slovakia will see a massive growth over the next few years.

The diplomatic screen. I don't have any major alliances except Poland, but I am hoping to ally Castille in the near future, hopefully marrying into their dynasty. We've expanded into Slovakia and Bohemia making us one of the strongest states in Europe. We shall soon take advantage of our military and expand into the rich and fertile lands of Italy; more specifically Venice.

Thank you for reading!
I hope you will like this AAR more than the last one.

 

[stnylan]

Shame about the other one.

Not going to try and keep Italy within the Empire?

 

[Layonix]

I could try to but that'd require me to conquer out of he historical borders and annoy the holy father. I could set up some puppet states for us and that could maybe work.

 

[Layonix]

Chapter 3 : Conquest of Venice
Hello! Welcome to chapter 3, this one will be a very short one as there wasn't much happening.

I finally received the Schwaz silver mine event. I was struggling a bit with maintaning the huge army that the HRE can field, but with this and the slovak gold mine I should be able to sustain the armies. What worries me though is the rapidly growing inflation. Two gold mines mean that I can have so hard times if I let inflation be unchecked for a while. I must make sure to have a inflation reduction advisor 24/7.
Now that I have the resources and field a large army I should be able to comfortably take on Venice. They can field a pretty large army ~30k and have a 2 star general. It's an army I cannot underestimate as I will have have to split my forces and send the Kaiserliche Armee into Croatia to capture venetian holdings there.

What also worries me is the lack of heir. Archduke Friedrich is now 50 years old and he still hasn't managed to produce an heir to the throne. I hope that sooner or later I will get an heir. At this point I would even consider taking a bad heir from an event just because I do not want to lose the Emperorship. Also, I will probably be stuck under the Queen Regent which also isn't the best in terms of skills. So we might have some bad times ahead. Unfortunately I cannot hope for the Talented Daughter event as that'd require me to institute the Pragmatic sanction.

War begins. The Habsburgiche Armee is sent to besiege Treviso with support of the Bohemian army, whilst the Kaiserliche Armee is sent to siege down Dalmatia. That might prove dangerous as the Venetians field a pretty large army and a very dangerous fleet that we surely cannot match.

HALLELUJAH! The RNGod has accepted my prayers. Archduke Friedrich finally stopped shooting blanks and has produced an heir! And what an heir Caesar is. Now it will be Holy Very Roman Empire. I am hoping that he will lead the Habsburg domains into the Golden Age. Hopefully Friedrich will live long enough to avoid the regency.

Peace deal has been sent to the Doge. Thankfully due to the Pope coming from Austria the other HRE states won't get too mad. We are taking the Treviso - Venezia state severly crippling the Republic of Venice itself. That doesn't mean we will be able to get into the city of Venezia itself. That is still guarded by one of the biggest and strongest navies of the meditereanan.
I hoped for an easy second war with them, but litteraly day after the peace deal the French have allied the Venetian republic. That might be the cause of a big war between our great nation and the filthy frog eating baguettes.

To the north of our Bohemian Kingdom there's the march of Brandenburg. Previously ruled by the Hohenzollern. Now it is ruled by our great dynasty. That should secure us yet another electoral vote in the Holy Roman Empire. With this cemented alliance we're hoping to spread the influence of the Habsburg dynasty.

Finally managed to embrace the Renaissance. It was quite expensive but I thought I needed it right now. I need to catch up on the techs, especially military, since for a part of the venetian war they actually had better technology than I did.

Thank you for reading!
This chapter is a bit short, but unfortunately I didn't have much time today. I shall put more work into the next chapter that will most likely come out on friday. Feedback is much apprecieated, seeing a comment really makes me wanna write another chapters. Have a good evening!

 

[stnylan]

A very nice heir indeed!

 

[Layonix]

Chapter 3 : War of the Burgundian succesion
Hello, welcome back to my AAR! In this chapter we will focus on war and the results of it.

So before the death of the Duke of Burgundy we've yet had an Austrian clergymen be elected the pope. That's the second time in a row, contacts in the Holy See will surely prove beneficial in the near future, as war with France is inevitable. The burgundian succesion has just raised the already high tension between me and the French. Not only that they wanted Flanders, but now they've allied the Swiss and that blocks me from connecting my newly acquired holdings in the Low Countries. War will have to happen. I want to subdue Switzerland and make them my march and I want to weaken France.

This is my plan for the war. One army will march North and try to defend the Low Countries from the French atleast for some time. If they'd get significantly outnumbered I will try to carve out a path to march them to Franche Comte and reunite with army two that will be occupying Switzerland in the meantime.
What I have to watch out for : The French Army itself with it's famous generals. The treacherous Swiss terrain and a mountain fort in Graubunden. The numerous French allies as I will be calling them into the war as co-beligerent.

Whilst the tension has by sky-rocketing our dynasty has acquired new thrones. Earlier it was Brandenburg, now it is Brunswick AND the Spanish throne! I didn't marry Brunswick on my own and only noticed after some time that our dynasty acquired lands there. I am really happy that I got the spanish throne though. They were ruled by a female 6 6 4 ruler that has un(not really)fortunately died. The spanish are already fighting the French and that's what really made me decide to attack the french earlier. I am really hoping that the war will go smoothly since the french will be tired of war after some years of constant spanish raids into souther france.

Thankfully Friedrich has done his duty and he did NOT die before seeing his little Caesar grow up to be a man. With his ascension to the trone I am looking really forward to the war with the French as our new ruler is also an inspiring leader and he's not bad of a general as well.

That was the enemy side. A month later a couple other states have joined the war. The most notable being : Genoa, Friesland and Munster.

Another throne acquired by the Habsburgs atleast for a while.

The war isn't going well so far. Our forces 25 thousand strong forces have been quickly overran by the Frisian and French soldiers that were well over 60 thousand strong. I hope that I can quickly retreat and march my forces back to Sundgau to maybe besiege Bern quickly and then reconnect my troops. Whilst my Northern forces were being beaten I've managed to secure the mountain fort after a tough battle with the french.

Another battle that I have wanted to show separately is this one. I've won the battle but it is more of a Pyrrhic victory than anything else. Eleven thousand Austrian and German men have been lost in this awful battle. The French on the other hand suffered way lower casualties.

Switzerland finally capitulated to our forces. And while that's good the situation in the Low Countries is terrible. Almost every holding of mine has been occupied and looted. I might have to peace out the French and give them some of the Burgundian land that they've claimed to be rightfully theirs. When the French are out of the war it should be pretty easy to take out the remaining states since the war has already been very long and very bloody. I am already down to 0 manpower but should be able to ask my nobles for a bit more.

Treaty of Sundgau.
The Habsburgs concede Kamerich and Barrois to the French.
The French give up their claims to Flanders and break the alliance with Switzerland.
Switzerland is obliged to swear fealty to the Holy Roman Empire, allowing the Emperor access through their land at any time. The Swiss will become a march and will be required to help in any wars to come, but they have to pay no monetary tribute to the Habsburg dynasty.

This war was an utter disaster for us. We've lost many good men and are now left with no suitable recruits for our army. I will have to stay at peace for quite a while. Not only do I have no resources but also this deal didn't cause any coalition just because I had the popes support. I am hoping to stay at peace with the french for a while and just build up my realm and prepare for the TOTALEN KRIEG to destroy the french nation once and for all.

The Italian states have taken advantage of the long war and emperor's weakness at the moment and have declared independence from the HRE. Whilst that would seem problematic at first it might actually be easier to expand into the Italian states. The duchy of Ferrara is already ready to be vassalized.

New heir.

The duchy of Ferrara has accepted to become my vassal. I will put a von Habsburg on the throne very soon ( part of the RP) and it will surely boost my income from the venetian trade. I am already collecting in the English Channel and that makes me a nice bit of cash, so I won't say no to extra influence in Venice.

The end!
Thank you for reading, hope you enjoyed! Waiting for any kind of feedback in terms of the writing and my next moves

 

[stnylan]

So with Shadow Kingdom firing it is now actually a good time to expand in Italy. If not directly then make a vassal and expand them.

 

[Layonix]

Yep, but not gonna expand over Lombardy, I would like the game to be interesting so I dont wanna get too strong. Hopefully France will do for a good arch-nemesis the entire game. Soon I will probably try to retake the Hungarian heartland and possible turn on Poland to partition with Prussia, what do you think about these ideas?

 

[stnylan]

Yep, but not gonna expand over Lombardy, I would like the game to be interesting so I dont wanna get too strong. Hopefully France will do for a good arch-nemesis the entire game. Soon I will probably try to retake the Hungarian heartland and possible turn on Poland to partition with Prussia, what do you think about these ideas?

Sounds good to me. If you don't want to directly control Lombardy might keep an eye out for a good local ally though.