Very Sad Tactician

[unmerged(179713)]

I am in a very frustrating war with Burgundy right now (they want Calais...)

Here is my current position, I would like some recommendations...

Going into the war I was outnumbered in manpower by a small margine (a few regiments). I gained military access from France (Calais is under siege). From a war with one of the Irish minors I gained 3 of Brittany's provinces (all but the capitol), so I have 6 total mainland provinces. My current mission is to retake Normandy, but that doesn't seem to be happening anytime soon.

Every battle it seems that Burgundy has a huge advantage in the battle. I have to outnumber them about 2-1 in order to do more damage it seems. For reference, my Land Tech is 4, theirs is 5, and my military slider is full. My only general is my King, and he's very bad. I have about 10-15% army tradition.

Here are my options:
1) Wait about 10 months for my armies to recuperate, build more armies, potentially taking out a loan or minting a lot, and try to attack Burgundy.
2) Peace out by releasing Scotland (My first mission was to vassalize them) and giving up some ducats.
3) Hope that even though they are occupying Calais, their inability to attack me will lead to an automatic white peace at some point (will this happen? Seems like my best option) They cannot attack me, and my fleet ensures that their fleet remains docked.

Help!

 

[Andy 1984]

Hire a general, hope he does have a decent shock value and send him into battle.

Alternatively, you could initiate raids in Burgundian lands (meaning: land a stronger army in a coastal province, wipe out smaller Burgundian armies and thereby increase Burgundian war exhaustian). Definitly keep their ports blockaded. Once you manage (by accident) to take Vlaanderen or one of the other rich coastal provinces, offer them a white peace or something. The war taxes you have should compensate for the loss in tax income due to war exhaustion on your side.

 

[unmerged(69287)]

Burgundy has very good sliders with full Offensive,high Quality,high Aristocracy,full Free Subjects,and and a focus toward Land:wacko: as well so don't try to fight evenly matched battles as youll lose every time.

 

[unmerged(179713)]

Ah, that explains it then. Well, good news. It seems they had a very high war exhaustion, so they offered me white peace as I was getting ready to seize their provinces! I had stacked my army on their southern borders, forcing them to mobilize their armies, as I was planning to land 14 infantry regiments to blitz their fortresses, but it looks like I get out free this time. Now, on to break work on France's alliance with Castille...

 

[unmerged(45811)]

I just started a game with England tonight to try and learn some of the new features, and had some difficulty with Burgundy myself after successfully retaking Normandy from France. I wanted to link Calais with the rest of my coastal holdings, and the Burgundians were in the way. I had 2 armies of 15,000 cavalry each and another army of 10,000 infantry, and it still took several different strategies to figure out how to break their armies and get the overruns I needed to win the war. In the end I decided to wage the first battle on my own territory, after having scorched the land and waited for the Burgundians to assault. Afterwards I combined all three armies and chased them around a few provinces to wipe them out. Combat in the early game is different now, and I haven't yet figured out the ideal mix of cavalry/infantry in the same stack.

 

[Darkrenown]

Since they're at land tech 5 to your 4 they'll have better infantry than you, try focusing on getting to tech 5 and upgrading before you invade again. Get a general if good shock if you can. Use terrain map and find some hills, even better if BUR will need to cross a river to attack you, fort up there and see if BUR will attack you. Hopefully they will and you beat them, but if not you can siege the province. If attrition is a problem split your army, but make sure you keep an eye out and bring them together if BUR moves against you.

 

[ERA101]

Burgundy have slider that great for Land battle.
Fight them directly is suicide.
I think you should wait until they are at war with another major country (maybe France) before declare war.
For now, I think you should end the war and wait for next opportunity. (Release Scotland if it's necessary.)

I you want to continue the war, you need some luck.

 

[unmerged(179713)]

Unfortunately, it's the other way around. I'm quite content to let Burgundy do whatever, but they've attacked me again! (Reconquest CB on Calais...) And of course France is in no position to start a war (for some reason they attacked me, otherwise I would have waited about 10 years before taking them on).

I'm halfway through a war with France now, beating up on them was a good release after getting thrashed by Burgundy. Sadly, after taking Caux, Burgundy attacked and, obviously, now has a 20k stack just sitting there. I got an event to reduce war exhaustion, so now mine is lower. I'm hoping to race to naval 9 and start blockading them (right now I'm at 6, just before QftNW). Also, on the bright side, even though I've been at war I have more total men (2k) than Burgundy, though their land forces are superior. If I'm smart, I might be able to break them.

So now I have 2 loans, and I have resolved that I will start minting money. I have very high culture, so I should be able to get enough MoM. It will have to wait until the weekend, though. Exam studying to do!

 

[ERA101]

Do you plan on conquering France and Burgundy?
If not, abandon Calais to Burgundy.
And prepare for the new world instead.

 

[King Nothing]

Is Calais the only one of your provinces that Burgundy can reach? If so there is a very simple solution to the problem. Scorch the earth in Calais and get military access from some of Burgundys neighbours so you have easy acces while they don't. That way you could just wait for the burgundian main army to starve while you raid their homeland and kill their smaller armies. You could also try to attack their main army right after an assault and you will have a good chance of defeating it. Depending on how the war goes and the amount of soldiers you have you could also deploy sieges on some/a lot of burgundian provinces while waiting for their main army to shrink.

There is no big deal if they take Calais if they can't advance further. What I would be vary of if I were you is instead the economy.. You don't have to keep an army big enough to win the war in a single battle..

 

[Moogel]

As England i fought france to ground and while doing that took lots of infamy. Its my first game with HttT and didnt have enough culture tradition growth. So i was forced to see burgundy grow larger by picking smaller france states and rest of france. After that burgundys eye turned towards me and i fought defensive war against burgundy. At first i had few good victories but due having more troops and better generals burgundy destroyed two my main armies and took several provinces. At this time burgundy's WE was high and other small European states attacked burgundy and i was able to make peace by money and giving my SoI away. Several years after I started war against burgundy which was even larger at this time but careful planning, by using spies to start revolts in burgundys Switzerland and savoy provinces, helped me obtain great victories. After i destroyed several large armies almost all burgundy's neighbors started to attack that bloated corpse . Now i made my peace, got the goal of my CB and left burgundy to the scavengers. Time passed and i noticed that i gained provinces and remembered those rebels. They had done their part and more, they had a rampage in northern italy, netting me 7 provinces for free, including Liguria with CoT. I would have gotten 9 but bohemia as emperor was taking some sieges back. It was a great war with great finish
ps. Burgundy is ripped apart with few provinces and constant bankrupts :rofl:

 

[unmerged(106498)]

As said by someone else, gain military access to Holland and/or France. Prepare 2 forces heavy on infantry with a couple cav so they don't completely deplete morale on assault. Move one force in position to retake calais, and the other you use to attack him someplace else to force him to withdraw from calais.

Burgone would be ideal as the 'distraction' target. Once his armies start to move, you retake calais as quickly as posible while using your other force to stall him as long as possible. Using 2-3 or even 4 armies this way, you can win a war without doing very much actual 'fighting', ducking back into his friendly (to you) neighbors provences when you need to. Once you do sue for peace, make sure you get him to give up his cores on your territory. Alternatively, you could do as suggested, abandon calais and focus on the new world. If colonization is your main priority, your war targets should be Portugal and Castile before anyone to slow their march towards colonization. You definitely want to beat them to the close range island colonies as quickly as possible, so you'll get range on North and South America once you core the Azores and the others.