Well, 'twas fun while it lasted.
As you probably know, I don't subscribe to Peter's approach to WC, though it does have the demonstrable capacity of doing so. In part, I suppose, a question of style; but IMO Peter's strategy is not suitable for the very tricky German minors and is far more likely to end in annihilation than not. I wouldn't hesitate to employ it in the middle east or far east, but when playing Germans or any other one-province Europeans I find my own approach to be far more likely to succeed - though certainly not a guarantee.
The problems are thus:
1. Far greater number of adjacent countries with high quality/good morale troops.
2. Far more adjoining small nations looking to expand themselves and forming interlocking alliances that can screw you easily.
3. Far more dangerour "big" countries lurking around, looking for an excuse to snuff your lights out.
4. Far stronger local economies.
5. Far more advantageous events for the local majors that can/will disrupt your carefully laid plans.
6. Far fewer scripted events that are likely to help you.
7. Religion is far harder to balance in the first century and a half.
8. Terrain in the region is far harder to handly with force composition.
Thus, when playing German minors, I tend to focus very heavily on my diplomatic strength, milityary quality, and lean-and-mean economy. It is, as often as not, a question of carefully surviving and slowly building up a modest empire until the 1550s and the last of the major religious changes. At that point you take the plunge, go protestant, overcome the upset at that, then go on the diplomatic warpath for a while, and then and only then do I start really pushing for dominance...first regional, and then broaden out from there.
The bonus to this strategy (or perhaps the focus of it) is to make sure that France and/or Austria are considerably worse on the bad-boy scale at the point when you begin to take the plunge into the depths of being hated throughout the world. That diverts attention away from you while you gobble up all of those nations you've spent the last 150 years sucking up to. If you're very lucky, and play almost 250 years of non-stop war, you can conquer the world.
The trick, therefore (and again, this is only IMO) is to exercise extreme patience for those first 150 years. My approach (beyond what I've said above) is...
1419: you've got 5-10 years to annex someone so you're a two-province minor and can't be militarily annexed. Now sit, build, make friends.
1450's-1460's: try to get a couple vassals and maybe take one more province in a defensive war. Then sit.
1480's-1500: Add another vassal or two and sneak another province under your wind in a defensive war. Then sit.
1520-1550: Add another vassal or two and another few provinces by diplo-annexation if possible, or defensive conquest.
At this point you should have 5-7 provinces (maybe as many as 10 if you're very lucky and very careful) and a bunch of vassals - hopefully in a strong alliance but just as likely as not you'll have only one or two vassals and no alliance depending on the way the winds of religion blow... Your BB will be honourable or respectable while the inheritance events will have made France and Austria large, but very bad.
Now change religion, stave off the upset, and set about re-vassalising your smaller neighbours.
1600: Now you challenge the smaller of France or Austria and take as much of their territory as you can. This is the first time I would even think about taking loans.
1610: Now repeat with whichever was larger.
1620: Gobble up anything that's small.
1630: Fight another round against whichever of the remaining uropean nations is the largest that you can handle. Take territory.
1640: Ditto
During those last 20-30 years, diplo-annex the vassals from the late 1500's. Note that by now you should be at infrastructure 9 or 10 and trade 9 or 10. Military tech should be in the high 20's for land and high teens or so for naval.
1650-1700: Take the rest of Europe and most of Poland/Lithuania. You should also have a good foothold in the Americas by now.
1700-1750: Asia Minor and Russia plus anything you can get your hands on in the Americas.
1750-1800: India, the Far East, and the first wars with China...hopefully also fighting to control Northern Africa and as much of the rest of it as you can get. Also take control of the rest of the Americas
1800-1820: Mop up whatever's left and pray that you can do it in time.
I've used (roughly) that strategy with sporadic success (sometimes you simply crash and burn...face it, it's hard to do) about half a dozen times...Gelre, Saxony (admittedly starts with 2 provinces), Hessen, Sienna (admittedly not German), and...er...the Palatinat.
To each his own, though, so get ye hence to your Glutonic Knights and conquer far Cathay would ya!
As you probably know, I don't subscribe to Peter's approach to WC, though it does have the demonstrable capacity of doing so. In part, I suppose, a question of style; but IMO Peter's strategy is not suitable for the very tricky German minors and is far more likely to end in annihilation than not. I wouldn't hesitate to employ it in the middle east or far east, but when playing Germans or any other one-province Europeans I find my own approach to be far more likely to succeed - though certainly not a guarantee.
The problems are thus:
1. Far greater number of adjacent countries with high quality/good morale troops.
2. Far more adjoining small nations looking to expand themselves and forming interlocking alliances that can screw you easily.
3. Far more dangerour "big" countries lurking around, looking for an excuse to snuff your lights out.
4. Far stronger local economies.
5. Far more advantageous events for the local majors that can/will disrupt your carefully laid plans.
6. Far fewer scripted events that are likely to help you.
7. Religion is far harder to balance in the first century and a half.
8. Terrain in the region is far harder to handly with force composition.
Thus, when playing German minors, I tend to focus very heavily on my diplomatic strength, milityary quality, and lean-and-mean economy. It is, as often as not, a question of carefully surviving and slowly building up a modest empire until the 1550s and the last of the major religious changes. At that point you take the plunge, go protestant, overcome the upset at that, then go on the diplomatic warpath for a while, and then and only then do I start really pushing for dominance...first regional, and then broaden out from there.
The bonus to this strategy (or perhaps the focus of it) is to make sure that France and/or Austria are considerably worse on the bad-boy scale at the point when you begin to take the plunge into the depths of being hated throughout the world. That diverts attention away from you while you gobble up all of those nations you've spent the last 150 years sucking up to. If you're very lucky, and play almost 250 years of non-stop war, you can conquer the world.
The trick, therefore (and again, this is only IMO) is to exercise extreme patience for those first 150 years. My approach (beyond what I've said above) is...
1419: you've got 5-10 years to annex someone so you're a two-province minor and can't be militarily annexed. Now sit, build, make friends.
1450's-1460's: try to get a couple vassals and maybe take one more province in a defensive war. Then sit.
1480's-1500: Add another vassal or two and sneak another province under your wind in a defensive war. Then sit.
1520-1550: Add another vassal or two and another few provinces by diplo-annexation if possible, or defensive conquest.
At this point you should have 5-7 provinces (maybe as many as 10 if you're very lucky and very careful) and a bunch of vassals - hopefully in a strong alliance but just as likely as not you'll have only one or two vassals and no alliance depending on the way the winds of religion blow... Your BB will be honourable or respectable while the inheritance events will have made France and Austria large, but very bad.
Now change religion, stave off the upset, and set about re-vassalising your smaller neighbours.
1600: Now you challenge the smaller of France or Austria and take as much of their territory as you can. This is the first time I would even think about taking loans.
1610: Now repeat with whichever was larger.
1620: Gobble up anything that's small.
1630: Fight another round against whichever of the remaining uropean nations is the largest that you can handle. Take territory.
1640: Ditto
During those last 20-30 years, diplo-annex the vassals from the late 1500's. Note that by now you should be at infrastructure 9 or 10 and trade 9 or 10. Military tech should be in the high 20's for land and high teens or so for naval.
1650-1700: Take the rest of Europe and most of Poland/Lithuania. You should also have a good foothold in the Americas by now.
1700-1750: Asia Minor and Russia plus anything you can get your hands on in the Americas.
1750-1800: India, the Far East, and the first wars with China...hopefully also fighting to control Northern Africa and as much of the rest of it as you can get. Also take control of the rest of the Americas
1800-1820: Mop up whatever's left and pray that you can do it in time.
I've used (roughly) that strategy with sporadic success (sometimes you simply crash and burn...face it, it's hard to do) about half a dozen times...Gelre, Saxony (admittedly starts with 2 provinces), Hessen, Sienna (admittedly not German), and...er...the Palatinat.
To each his own, though, so get ye hence to your Glutonic Knights and conquer far Cathay would ya!
