What are the goods strategies to build a large mainland empire

[spaceolivier]

Hello,

I haven't played the game during the last few months and it seems that with the various patches and DLC's many things changed, several times for some aspects of the game.

I bought all DLC's and I am a bit lost about how these changes affect good old stratégies, such as usingvassal feeding to expand.
I want to start a new game with the goal to build a large Mainland empire and not bother too much with colonies.



1 What country do you suggest I should pick ? (Not necessarily in europe)

2 What are the main tricks/stratégies that are effective nowadays for this kind of gameplay ?

 

[wolfing]

1. Ottomans or Muscovy, either one will end up in you going from just east of the HRE all the way to Japan. You won't even need to worry about coalitions as you can alternate conquests east and west while the other side aggressive expansion cools down.
2. You can still (and should) do vassal feeding, it's just that now vassals are more picky on what they would accept from you. Now it's even better as you can go to war over your vassals' cores and claims (I think) owned by other people.

 

[dstarsboy]

Best trick I would recommend is taking Diplomacy as your first idea and burn through those ideas (don't take any Diplo tech at all until all of these ideas are done). This allows you to achieve your NI's slightly faster and the extra diplomat and relation slot help build the empire fairly quickly.

 

[spaceolivier]

Are there any other good or interesting candidates as countries ? I already played ottoman and moscovy games before.

 

[brainstronaut]

Have you tried Ming yet?

 

[IIWW]

France, Poland, Brandenburg (In SP). The latter two can expand in other direction than inside the HRE

 

[spaceolivier]

Is ming really interesting ? I was always Under the impression you already overpowered everyone so much that it would be boring.

 

[Casiru]

If you mean mainland Europe then playing England, forming a union with France and then becoming the HRE is the easiest route.
If you mean mainland Eurasia then Muscovy and Ottomans are both great choices.

 

[spaceolivier]

I am tempted to start an england game and try to win the hundred years war, since I never took that country.

What are the best Ideas, if I chose to not colonise much and concentrate on europe ?

 

[Prom_STar]

If you want to play China, go for a Jurchen tribe (Jianzhou probably the easiest) and form Manchu and then Qing. Manchu ideas were buffed big time and China itself is now appropriately massive in terms of base tax and manpower. A unified, westernized Great Qing is an utter terror.

A trick for Qing when conquering Ming land is that you can safely go over 100% overextension, assuming you have the admin points on hand for the cores and you have administrative ideas. With admin + Manchu ideas + claims, and because all the land is within your culture group, the cores finish so fast that the over extension doesn't have enough time to build up an actual rebellion. You'll have crazy unrest for seven months or so and then it all flushes away.

Vassal feeding still works. There are more countries Ming can spit out now, but it's easiest to just release Shun and transfer sieges to that vassal during the war. Takes a long, long time to annex of course.