Too far behind in a True Heir of Timur run?

[Lord Beverage]

Hello forum,

I've been away from the game for a few years so am still learning a lot of the new mechanics, and decided to go for something crazy on my first run. My worry is that I'm far too behind to catch up.

The Timurid ruler just wouldn't die so I had to wait for an available Mamluks for assistance (that just pieced out as soon as possible anyways ) to gain my independence, and getting Delhi to form Mughals was surprisingly easy after that. That 'long' time had me already post-1460 though. In the meantime, not a single Indian large power went to war with each other (and still hasn't now in the 1490s), making it rather difficult to divide and conquer effectively.

A critical mistake I made was during my independence war in forgetting to give Transoxiana its cores, giving me a terrible trust malus not just with them but pretty much all of India. It's been nearly 20 years since clicking the Mughals button to finally start getting alliances with medium sized powers that will go to war with me.

I am optimistic as I see easy paths to start chunking all the majors how, Juanpur and snaking down to Bahmanis as top priorities, with wiping out the Himalayan and other eastern minors as alliances allow - I think Bengal is probably my best long term ally option, but I'm not sure there's enough time left even with perfect play at this point. I have kept the coalition small and managed, and (finally) have a positive income.

Thoughts? Any feedback is appreciated.

Again though - that simple derp of not giving Transoxiana its cores in our independence wars at the start probably should've dictated a restart, but finally all these later I can engage in useful diplomacy again.

Edit: 20-ish years as Mughals and only that border - lots of capital forts to be taken with no cannons, despite 3 seige pip generals, along with victorious initial wars being outnumbered 2:1.

 

[brantodb01]

Yeah, if you were really good at the game you could salvage that but you should probably restart.
From my own experience it takes 50 ish years to 'comfortably'(for a THoT run) eat the Vij-Bah regions

 

[NIborGER]

A bit tricky. If you have diplo and religious ideas finished i think its feasible. Also remember its fine if you share india with 6+ vassals.

For a reset a 2 tips that might help you:
1. Usually its considered easier to go for a transoxiana start and not including asghanistan is the independence war
2. Kill and reform delhi before forming mughals: Feed western delhi to a vassal (not using return core function so dehli keeps it cores) Then reform delhi to get the cores on jaunpur. After that switch cultures again and form mughals before retaking those sweet delhi cores from jaunpur.

 

[Lord Beverage]

Gah. So what ended up happening is that even though I was able to clean up the center of India quite nicely in just a few years, I accidentally truce-blocked myself in all directions, with the only available targets being the coalition which while not that large, was large enough that I would need an ally or two to help out, none of which would join me with the difference being the huge trust malus still in effect.

So okay, I'll hold a year or two (until I could clobber Jaunpur again) to get my economy back on track, but the moment I disbanded some mercs to get positive income Ming warns me out of nowhere. I called it GG then.

I'm in only 1445 in my next run and it already looks like I'll be 10-20 years ahead of the first with an early Shah death and favorable alliances to the east so far. No trust issues with the stupid peace treaties I made early in the previous run. I may want to keep a bit more distance from the Himalayan minors this time, but my thinking in the first run was that less angry minors == less annoying coalitions.

 

[brantodb01]

some random tips:
diplo vassalising is great
the mewar/malwa central indian mission is really important, gives lots of claims
estate privileges are really strong
aim for an improve relations diplo advisor
concentrate development reduces how much it costs to core
Allies get less AE so allying just to stop them getting mad at you is very valid

 

[Lord Beverage]

Apart from forming Delhi (couldn't because Jaunpur ate them then reformed as Delhi themselves very early first), I tried most of the above and am at a similar situation about 20 years earlier now, except my economy isn't shit, I'm not truce-blocked on all sides, and I have very little AE.

There are still problems though.

My punjabi vassal is always skirting the boundary of disloyalty as I was forced to seize one of the Mughal forming provinces from them as in my last war against Jaunpur I was too slow and a Mewar vassal ninja'd the last one while I wasn't looking. I forgot dev'ing could fix that before burning 60 prestige to make them loyal again. It seems I'm blocked on the Sindh mission tree path as I let Punjab have Lahore. That's another 100% loyalty hit if I seize it back.

The rivals/alliances are all messed up too. Bahmanis rivals me, and Vijay rivals Bengal, and I needed to start eating Malwa about 5 years ago. Transox is still there and very handy when some middle Indian power allies Chagatai, which is all the damn time this game. While I still have an alliance with the Mamluks, it's basically worth nothing at this point offensively.

Still, I'm quite happy to be this far much earlier this time. Jaunpur keeps guaranteeing Himalayan minors for easy truce resets also.

 

[necro84]

Can you diplo vassalize Gujarat? This should give you reconquest on some provinces and few claims. The same with Orissa

 

[vaLor-]

Apart from forming Delhi (couldn't because Jaunpur ate them then reformed as Delhi themselves very early first), I tried most of the above and am at a similar situation about 20 years earlier now, except my economy isn't shit, I'm not truce-blocked on all sides, and I have very little AE.

There are still problems though.

My punjabi vassal is always skirting the boundary of disloyalty as I was forced to seize one of the Mughal forming provinces from them as in my last war against Jaunpur I was too slow and a Mewar vassal ninja'd the last one while I wasn't looking. I forgot dev'ing could fix that before burning 60 prestige to make them loyal again. It seems I'm blocked on the Sindh mission tree path as I let Punjab have Lahore. That's another 100% loyalty hit if I seize it back.

The rivals/alliances are all messed up too. Bahmanis rivals me, and Vijay rivals Bengal, and I needed to start eating Malwa about 5 years ago. Transox is still there and very handy when some middle Indian power allies Chagatai, which is all the damn time this game. While I still have an alliance with the Mamluks, it's basically worth nothing at this point offensively.

Still, I'm quite happy to be this far much earlier this time. Jaunpur keeps guaranteeing Himalayan minors for easy truce resets also.

View attachment 826863

View attachment 826865

To me this looks like too many complications to be a comfortable run. Are you ahead on monarch points/techs/crucial idea sets? If not I'd restart. I haven't tried THOT but it would seem to me you need a huge amount of early monarch points (through show strength wars on rivals outside of india, which is only feasible while you are still relatively small), get admin ideas early, and need to be pretty much constantly at war.

Also, anyone can feel free to correct me if I'm wrong for thinking this, but isn't it a really bad idea to full core your indian provinces? Not only does it take a massive amount of ADM power but your income is going to be worse than TC'ing once you get some trade power in good nodes. Only issue is manpower, but none of your wars are all that difficult early game and you should be at max AT. I'd also be very careful about what vassals you choose and what land you give them (if ever). I've played very little in india so I can't help you much in that field.

 

[Lord Beverage]

Thank you both for the feedback.

@vaLor- I'm ahead on all techs right now (but barely on diplo, as I took Diplomatic ideas first), and my longest war pause (except for waiting for the Timurid Shah to die) has been maybe a year. I am full coring everything that I haven't fed to Punjab, but like you mention I'm very wary on taking more vassals as I already have a large one skirting on the edge of disloyalty. (Totally my fault for having to seize something I should have never given them.) Several good release-ables on the Ganges plain it looks like though if I could.

@Necro421 Diplo vassalizing Gurgurat is a great idea I totally missed, and is now under way. I really regret not taking the AE hit now to have snaked myself to the same sea tile. It's a few more years until I can hit Mewar again as the OPMs there are their only allies. Thank you for catching that!

Just found some poor OPM alliance choices to get the last provinces I need to unlock all the central India missions, and more to allow a truce reset on Delhi for some good $$$ too.

A further horizon problem I'm seeing is that my (soon to be only) strong ally Bengal, who keeps chomping more and more of SE Asia whenever not fighting for me, is also allied to my rival Bahmanis (rivalled not by my choice). Perhaps just going after Vijay first could be a solution - no alliance complications there. I'm under the understanding that it can take around 50 years or so to eat both of them without liberal truce-braking.

 

[AvengedK1ng]

Apart from forming Delhi (couldn't because Jaunpur ate them then reformed as Delhi themselves very early first), I tried most of the above and am at a similar situation about 20 years earlier now, except my economy isn't shit, I'm not truce-blocked on all sides, and I have very little AE.

There are still problems though.

My punjabi vassal is always skirting the boundary of disloyalty as I was forced to seize one of the Mughal forming provinces from them as in my last war against Jaunpur I was too slow and a Mewar vassal ninja'd the last one while I wasn't looking. I forgot dev'ing could fix that before burning 60 prestige to make them loyal again. It seems I'm blocked on the Sindh mission tree path as I let Punjab have Lahore. That's another 100% loyalty hit if I seize it back.

The rivals/alliances are all messed up too. Bahmanis rivals me, and Vijay rivals Bengal, and I needed to start eating Malwa about 5 years ago. Transox is still there and very handy when some middle Indian power allies Chagatai, which is all the damn time this game. While I still have an alliance with the Mamluks, it's basically worth nothing at this point offensively.

Still, I'm quite happy to be this far much earlier this time. Jaunpur keeps guaranteeing Himalayan minors for easy truce resets also.

View attachment 826863

View attachment 826865

Huh never thought of vassal dehli or punjab for reconquest. What's your plan on keeping them as vassals over integrating to get the accepted culture bonuses

To me this looks like too many complications to be a comfortable run. Are you ahead on monarch points/techs/crucial idea sets? If not I'd restart. I haven't tried THOT but it would seem to me you need a huge amount of early monarch points (through show strength wars on rivals outside of india, which is only feasible while you are still relatively small), get admin ideas early, and need to be pretty much constantly at war.

Also, anyone can feel free to correct me if I'm wrong for thinking this, but isn't it a really bad idea to full core your indian provinces? Not only does it take a massive amount of ADM power but your income is going to be worse than TC'ing once you get some trade power in good nodes

Admin ideas + mughal traditions can cut cost of coring
Trade company provinces don't benefit goods produced bonus from your companies, so stating areas without centres of trade is worth it, also if you dev a province to hell to give an institution you'll probably want to state it

. Only issue is manpower, but none of your wars are all that difficult early game and you should be at max AT. I'd also be very careful about what vassals you choose and what land you give them (if ever). I've played very little in india so I can't help you much in that field.

India has boat load of minors which will build forts now

 

[necro84]

Just look for other potential reconquests - it's always less warscore. Andhra, Madurai and Orissa are usually good choices. Sometimes Bengal can lose few wars to Orissa and you can use it as a vassal

 

[Lord Beverage]

@necro84 In this run Bengal is stronk, and my only reliable ally anymore. There are the southern minors I'd love to grab, and actually may do so shortly.

Bahmanis has become a far bigger problem as it has now chomped half of Vijay and half of Malwa in the span of less than 10 years, while still allied to my only reliable ally. I don't see any other way to solve this apart from best-CB'ing one of Bahmanis's minors and picking up one of those core-loaded minors and some $$$, but Bahmanis alone matches Bengal on the ground, and the minors together match me. Should be fun.

Truce is just about to end with Delhi first though...

 

[AvengedK1ng]

Just look for other potential reconquests - it's always less warscore. Andhra, Madurai and Orissa are usually good choices. Sometimes Bengal can lose few wars to Orissa and you can use it as a vassal

Bahamani successor states also good

 

[necro84]

Guarantee Vijanagar to block Bahmanis.
Curry favors with Bengal and use 50 favors to break their alliance with Bahmanis before your war - that way you can declare on Bahmanis directly without losing your ally

One weird idea - you can vassalize Khorsan and make it a march. If you ally Transoxiana and Fars or Ajam you can call them into reconquest war vs Timurids and Mazandaran. Don't do anything and just let your allies do the fighting and you take the provinces for subject. Such war doesn't cost you anything and you get strong march. You can take Khorsan's trade power and place merchant in Persia, you will earn a lot more than 0.56 you earn now in Lahore. This isn't required for the achievement but if something can make you stronger and doesn't cost anything why not to try?

 

[NIborGER]

You can keep viji and bahmanis for last. Viji is usually the only hindu left and bahmanis is the only shia nation. Ifyou ate everything else in india you can just trucebreak them in a last sprint and dont even get a lot of AE outside india

 

[Lord Beverage]

Curry favors with Bengal and use 50 favors to break their alliance with Bahmanis before your war - that way you can declare on Bahmanis directly without losing your ally

I didn't know I can do that! I have over 60 favors right now. Still going to be a rough war, but much more manageable now as I can keep out some 3rd party's allies. Will take their northern forts and feed Gugurat back all its cores.

1,600 hours in and still learning new things.

One weird idea - you can vassalize Khorsan and make it a march.

Weird? That sounds great!

Ifyou ate everything else in india you can just trucebreak them in a last sprint and dont even get a lot of AE outside india

I have Bengal in mind as the final end boss as they are just so incredibly useful as an ally right now. They are always waring small minors so are almost always free for calls to arms when I need them. Doing that earlier would have me generating lot of AE in Ming tributaries, whose warning finished off my last run. I don't actually know for sure if their tributary's AE level matters for that though. I do wonder how much of the Ganges plain I can eat up first before they start getting pissed.

Right, so the process now is to finish off the remnants of Malwa immediately while hopefully I can get to 190 to diplo vassalize Gurgurat in the meantime. I am not sure I can get it that high though. I wonder how much returning their cores as an ally can raise that vs. how much more they will resist it for having more development.

 

[necro84]

Weird? That sounds great!

Many people would hate conquest outside of India and consider it waste of resources in this run. You still have 60 years so for me this would make whole run easier. I would only wonder If i should keep Khorsan as a vassal or integrate after the reconquest.

If I were doing this run from the beginning I would wonder should I reform Timurids and take all the cores back before forming Mughals. That's lots of dev in good trade region and it's possible to have much bigger army

 

[NIborGER]

I have Bengal in mind as the final end boss as they are just so incredibly useful as an ally right now. They are always waring small minors so are almost always free for calls to arms when I need them. Doing that earlier would have me generating lot of AE in Ming tributaries, whose warning finished off my last run. I don't actually know for sure if their tributary's AE level matters for that though. I do wonder how much of the Ganges plain I can eat up first before they start getting pissed.

The issue with bengal is that they are sunni. So anything in persia and uzbek region will get a lot of AE when trucebreaking. Unsure if Ottomans and memeluks will get enough AE for a coalition.
Also arent they locking you out of a lot of missions?
Furthermore south india as a last sprint has the advantage of the deccan mission that saves you a lot of coring. So even if you do a hefty sprint, your nation will be very stable afterwards.

 

[Lord Beverage]

Many people would hate conquest outside of India and consider it waste of resources in this run. You still have 60 years so for me this would make whole run easier. I would only wonder If i should keep Khorsan as a vassal or integrate after the reconquest.

Just checked - I have a -3000 malus from both trust (from the independence war), and that I hold two of their cores. Those cores are garbage so I'd be happy to give them back, but conquest against the Timurids and all their allies would be required.

Also arent they locking you out of a lot of missions?

Not yet, but reviewing the mission tree shows that they will very soon become an obstacle to pretty much everything on the east side. (Only 3 provinces needed to continue though). I'll need to be strong enough to have no allies within maybe the next 20 years or so game-time it looks like.

 

[necro84]

I guess you can have trust issues with Fars too and reconquest without allies will consume your resources. It was just an idea and it seems in your situation it doesn't help