Well, out of curiosity, is there a reason you chose Naples to form Italy?
I just did the Italy thing ( a bit bored and it's an easy one) with Venice (had to spice it up at least a little). Forming Italy with Naples would seem, to me anyway, to be one of the more difficult ways of going about it. Easiest, imo, would actually be Genoa. Thee reason is that everyone seems willing to ally with Genoa at the start and you can get France, Austria and Poland as allies, assuming that France and Austria haven't rivaled one another (Austria mainly, France is a bit busy at the start).
Thus, being a member of the HRE you can much more easily grab the HRE provinces and warring on the Papal state and making them a vassal is fairly straightforward and pretty much no one is going to stop you.
I can see doing the Italy achievement with Naples if you are looking for a challenge - but if that's the case, do it with Venice because then you *must* crush Austria to get Italy safely under your belt.
Otherwise, pick someone like Genoa or perhaps Milan to get the achievement as being a member of the HRE makes this far easier and starting with Milan makes it somewhat of a breeze really.
Incidentally, when I created Italy with Venice I kept France and Hungary as allies all the way until I quit (the big unstoppable blob phase gets a bit old I guess) and kept the Commonwealth as an ally until it was both inconvenient and unnecessary.
So in dealing with France, certainly you do get next to them when forming Italy. However, this is manageable. First of all, I make sure to be the one declaring the wars so that I can control what they and I get so as to keep our border friction to a minimum.
Secondly, if there is a province bordering between us that I have which makes their lust for my provinces shoot through the roof, I immediately sell it to someone who isn't my vassal so as to redirect the hatred.
Thirdly, I kept them at or near 200 relations by also being willing to give them outrageous monetary gifts.
What I found is that at a lower level of desire for my provinces, around 50 or so, if I kept them fighting with me in enough wars, feeding them vassals in the HRE and provinces here and there far away from me, they eventually decided they didn't care about my northern italian provinces at all.
So for France, ally them, bulk up fast in money and armies, bribe them, keep them in wars all the time and feed them provinces you don't care about anyway and they're essentially leave you alone long enough to easily form Italy and become a big and brutish Italy at that.
France is, I think, far more manageable in 1.8 than previously, and, in fact, it is France that gave me the provinces I needed to form Italy anyway. Most of the provinces I acquired were actually from France and, at times the Commonwealth, stomping someone and handing me the province.
So just focus on managing France with a country in the HRE and you'll basically get all the provinces you need other than perhaps having to take the Papal state outright.
I just did the Italy thing ( a bit bored and it's an easy one) with Venice (had to spice it up at least a little). Forming Italy with Naples would seem, to me anyway, to be one of the more difficult ways of going about it. Easiest, imo, would actually be Genoa. Thee reason is that everyone seems willing to ally with Genoa at the start and you can get France, Austria and Poland as allies, assuming that France and Austria haven't rivaled one another (Austria mainly, France is a bit busy at the start).
Thus, being a member of the HRE you can much more easily grab the HRE provinces and warring on the Papal state and making them a vassal is fairly straightforward and pretty much no one is going to stop you.
I can see doing the Italy achievement with Naples if you are looking for a challenge - but if that's the case, do it with Venice because then you *must* crush Austria to get Italy safely under your belt.
Otherwise, pick someone like Genoa or perhaps Milan to get the achievement as being a member of the HRE makes this far easier and starting with Milan makes it somewhat of a breeze really.
Incidentally, when I created Italy with Venice I kept France and Hungary as allies all the way until I quit (the big unstoppable blob phase gets a bit old I guess) and kept the Commonwealth as an ally until it was both inconvenient and unnecessary.
So in dealing with France, certainly you do get next to them when forming Italy. However, this is manageable. First of all, I make sure to be the one declaring the wars so that I can control what they and I get so as to keep our border friction to a minimum.
Secondly, if there is a province bordering between us that I have which makes their lust for my provinces shoot through the roof, I immediately sell it to someone who isn't my vassal so as to redirect the hatred.
Thirdly, I kept them at or near 200 relations by also being willing to give them outrageous monetary gifts.
What I found is that at a lower level of desire for my provinces, around 50 or so, if I kept them fighting with me in enough wars, feeding them vassals in the HRE and provinces here and there far away from me, they eventually decided they didn't care about my northern italian provinces at all.
So for France, ally them, bulk up fast in money and armies, bribe them, keep them in wars all the time and feed them provinces you don't care about anyway and they're essentially leave you alone long enough to easily form Italy and become a big and brutish Italy at that.
France is, I think, far more manageable in 1.8 than previously, and, in fact, it is France that gave me the provinces I needed to form Italy anyway. Most of the provinces I acquired were actually from France and, at times the Commonwealth, stomping someone and handing me the province.
So just focus on managing France with a country in the HRE and you'll basically get all the provinces you need other than perhaps having to take the Papal state outright.
