What's the best nation for WC in 1.4?

[Jephery]

Austria is a lucky nation so a lot of the time so they can just wipe the floor with you even if you're better on paper.

 

[sturmchef]

Can someone please explain in detail how exactly to make ottomans orthodox and join the HRE? The earlier pointers posted helps but it's not specific so I don't really know what exactly to do to get said results...

 

[unmerged(177849)]

Can someone please explain in detail how exactly to make ottomans orthodox and join the HRE? The earlier pointers posted helps but it's not specific so I don't really know what exactly to do to get said results...

(1) DOW Urbino day one
(2) Take byzantium mission
(3) Siege down all relevant provinces
(4) Annex Urbino, Albania, Constantinople, vassalize Byzantium
(5) Take all 4 Anationalian minors - vassalize 2 (one of which at least must have a militaristic leader), annex the other 2.
(6) Put a missionary on Constantinople.
(7) Start feeding provinces to your vassals - making sure that you have a majority of orthodox provinces. Need to get down to the base tax mentioned above.
(8) Wait for revolt on Constantinople. When they take it, "accept demand" to turn othodox.
(9) Move capital to Urbino.
(10) Get +190 relations with Austria
(11) Add Urbino to HRE.)
(12) Annex vassals (can start this before joining HRE, just make sure you join before annexations are complete).

I finished this by 1471, then failed at the next step.

 

[Marilius]

Edit: Missed the above post while I was typing this, but figured I would still write it all out.

So I'm not the best player. My only completed game is Russia, and everything else has been for Aschievements and the Hall of Fame. I don't know enough about the HRE to know the in's and out's, but is the following pretty much the gist of the opening "best" tactic?

Step 1 (Day 1)​

Release 1-2 vassals to take your Sunni provinces, making Orthodox the dominant religion.
DoW (and take a Stab hit) on Uribino.
Begin religious conversion on high RR Orthodox province to incite rebels.
Take "City of World's Desire" to get CB on Byzantium, then DoW them.
Do normal RM & Alliances​

Step 2​

Win war on Uribino, then annex.
Win war on Byzantium, demand Constantinople, then Vassal Byz.
Let Orthodox Zealots paint your territory until they win capitol. Accept Demands.
With spare diplomat, improve relations with Austria.​

Step 3​

Take option to make Constantinople your capitol (+1 Stab and +Base Tax)
Spend 200 Admin to move capitol to Uribino.
Use enforce peace on electors during wars to get drawn into war.
DoW Austria (with what CB?) to try and take their Vassalized electors.
At war with electors, Force Conversion them.
Begin fabricating claims on Byzantium cores (that aren't your cores)​

Step 4​

If possible, place capitol (Uribino province) in HRE
If can't place in HRE, electors will still vote for you since they're & you're Orthodox?
DoW, win, and return Byz cores
Become emperor!​

Step 5​

Integrate Byz & Day 1 released Vassal(s).
Add all your provinces to HRE (gaining decent amount of IA)
Place Capitol back in Constantinople (Highest Base Tax you have for a bit)
Reclaim cores from those towards Middle East​

Step 6+​

Begin expansion!​

The opening ideas would be...

Diplomatic-->Administrative-->Offensive (or Defensive)-->Expansion (or) Exploration-->Whatever you feel like

This would mean at one point you will have Byz, Athens, +1-2 released Vassals taking Diplo Slots. You would want to Ally Crimea & RM them just for staying power til middle game, and RM Timurids to hope for PU eventually.

Did I miss anything. Is there something I'm not understanding? Isn't it extremely important to immediately work up towards Muscovy/Russia to eventually cut them off and stop their expansion? Won't mid 1550's-1600's be too late for that? What would be the problem with foregoing the HRE, and just conquest/diplo-annex straight away (trying to reach Muscovy as quick as possible)? Do people RM and Ally Granada from the start and eventually Vassalize them?

 

[Jephery]

Defensive isn't very useful since most of the time with this strat you'll be fighting on HRE or vassal territory, so a lot of Defensive's benefits are wasted.

 

[aragonFTW]

Did I miss anything?

You can accept demands with one province lost to rebels. Moving to Istanbul has to happen before you convert to Orthodox as the decision requires Ottomans to still be Sunni. Austria won't have any vassal electors - if the HRE has been reformed that far it's too late. Rather electors who you are at war with thanks to Enforce Peace will accept becoming your vassal to end the war, and vassalised electors always vote for you.

 

[sturmchef]

So am I supposed to release vassals so I have mostly orthodox provinces, or am I supposed to go conquer the minors in anatolia and make em my vassal and feed them?

 

[unmerged(177849)]

So am I supposed to release vassals so I have mostly orthodox provinces, or am I supposed to go conquer the minors in anatolia and make em my vassal and feed them?

Either will work; the latter will leave you with a larger nation once you re-integrate your nation.

Still say that the next step is the harder step, though I may be unlucky or incompetent or impatient.

 

[sturmchef]

The four anatolian minor that I should be after are Candar, Dulkadir, Karaman, Ramazan. Just those four, and not Trebizond as well right?

 

[Schmoekoeksklok]

Too long post to quote

You change capital to Constantinople as soon as religious rebels show up, as after that it will be too late. That's why people try to make religious rebels to show up in Constantinople since they'll convert it right back to Orthodox when they win. Something that would take ages with its massive base tax otherwise.

After trying a few times myself I would suggest not selling any Sunni provinces until your religious rebels appear as that will mainly just increase the rate at which other rebels spawn, as well as reducing your manpower.

You don't bother with Crimea, the Timurids or Granada, since you're not supposed to be muslim for very long. You don't use a diplomatic relation on Athens since you conquer it and sell to Byzantium. You could release a vassal from your lands to eat the sunni provinces, but you have no idea what attitude they'll have. All four of the Anatolian Sunni minors are diplomatically vassalizable at the start, and you can pick based on their attitudes. Contrary to what many people are saying here they don't desperately have to be militaristic, balanced works perfectly as well since all the provinces there are Turkish.

It's not so much that you couldn't plow your way through the HRE, but that would take an awful lot of extra time and effort, probably too much to finish a WC.

So just assume once you've become emperor the entire HRE is yours and you can start barging through all the hordes to Muscovy. If you're really worried about them expanding too quickly just enforce peace your way into a war with them, get the Permian provinces and release it as a vassal. Since they mostly protectorate hordes rather then conquering them they'll be stuck with nowhere to go.

The four anatolian minor that I should be after are Candar, Dulkadir, Karaman, Ramazan. Just those four, and not Trebizond as well right?

Trebizond isn't Sunni, plus you'd have to sell them some of Candar's stuff first to pave a way to your land (which wouldn't be terrible I guess )

Having said all that, it takes me five tries to get one where Aragon doesn't join the war against Urbino and then I don't spawn any religious rebels for 10 years

 

[Alliegorical]

Am I doing it right? :happy:

It's a damn shame the Burgundian ruler couldn't wait for me to take over before dying. It happened in the 1450's, never seen it happen so fast.

 

[Schmoekoeksklok]

Am I doing it right? :happy:

It's a damn shame the Burgundian ruler couldn't wait for me to take over before dying. It happened in the 1450's, never seen it happen so fast.

More succesful then me at least ^^

I don't know if you feel up for it, but you could use the early inheritance to get a Burgundian vassal from Austria and have someone to return cores to in an early war against France. For now your troops should be the best in the world, but it would still be a fun challenge

I mean, you can always go east, south and north, Burgundian cores don't generally last that long.

 

[Alliegorical]

More succesful then me at least ^^

I don't know if you feel up for it, but you could use the early inheritance to get a Burgundian vassal from Austria and have someone to return cores to in an early war against France. For now your troops should be the best in the world, but it would still be a fun challenge

I mean, you can always go east, south and north, Burgundian cores don't generally last that long.

Trouble is, now that I've pretty much guaranteed myself the Emperorship (is that a thing?), I'm feeling a little overwhelmed about my options. Should I just go about the usual HRE diplomacy game, or shall I just start plowing around leaving a trail of HRE vassals in my wake? I'm obviously not to the point where they don't use diplo relations, but maybe that's the fastest way to get there...

 

[Alliegorical]

I don't know if you feel up for it, but you could use the early inheritance to get a Burgundian vassal from Austria and have someone to return cores to in an early war against France. For now your troops should be the best in the world, but it would still be a fun challenge

Challenge accepted.

Thank you so much for the advice. I had no idea early ottomans were that OP. I even fought off an Aragonese invasion at the same time.

 

[Marilius]

Alrighty. I've been able to get decently far, but now I'm a little stuck. Got the Ottomans to join the HRE, have most of my land back from annexing back. How do I go about making the electors vote for me? I never touched the HRE before, and found it a little daunting.

Do I DoW Austria, force convert, and just get bigger than them for electors to vote for me?
Do I DoW without a CB on the electors to vassalize/force convert them?
Which is better, vassalize or force convert?
Do I chase war targets with improve relations to get +100 relations so I can enforce peace and use that as my way into the electors?

What is the best way, spelled out for a newbie to PDS games, to get the catholic electors to vote for the orthodox Ottomans?

 

[Schmoekoeksklok]

Alrighty. I've been able to get decently far, but now I'm a little stuck. Got the Ottomans to join the HRE, have most of my land back from annexing back. How do I go about making the electors vote for me? I never touched the HRE before, and found it a little daunting.

Do I DoW Austria, force convert, and just get bigger than them for electors to vote for me?
Do I DoW without a CB on the electors to vassalize/force convert them?
Which is better, vassalize or force convert?
Do I chase war targets with improve relations to get +100 relations so I can enforce peace and use that as my way into the electors?

What is the best way, spelled out for a newbie to PDS games, to get the catholic electors to vote for the orthodox Ottomans?

The easiest way would be to DoW Austria, but you certainly wouldn't want to convert them (not that you can, but still). You need to be the only big orthodox country in the HRE. They are usually allied to at least three electors though, so Dowing them will let you seperate peace those out with a force convert and annul treaties with Austria, which should be plenty to get them to vote for you.

You can also use enforce peace yes. But you really don't have anything to fear from Austria, so dodging them isn't needed. Once you're done with the electors you can force them to release Styria and end their ambitions for good. Unless they had an inheritance already, in which case you can do what Aaronomus is doing

A no CB DoW would also call in Austria, so then you're better off actually attacking them in the first place.

 

[Alliegorical]

PROTIP: Attack an ally of Austria who is not an elector, and who has no elector allies. After the war, DOW each elector who's allied to Austria. Austria will stay out because of the truce, but the electors will be hella mad anyway. With a bit of luck, you can get by with only two votes using this trick.

 

[darcnyte54]

After you take the emperor, I would say to go straight for Muscovy and blocked it off by Perm, not allowing them to colonize. Then you take Russia for yourself, an Ottoman Empire with russian and HRE lands by 1620s-30s(estimate, I was going for Sultan of Rum achievement and didn't take HRE). The next 200 years should be easy with your vassals and land giving you enough men to fight five wars at the same time. Taking out castile and Portugal early are big factors for WC. There are no natives in south america besides Incas, so having to take a ton of extra land will just make it harder, North America is less important(via GB) because the natives are there already.
Im no pro, but with my sultan of rum play-through I definitely see a possible WC play-through as Otto.
Good Luck.

 

[Marilius]

PROTIP: Attack an ally of Austria who is not an elector, and who has no elector allies. After the war, DOW each elector who's allied to Austria. Austria will stay out because of the truce, but the electors will be hella mad anyway. With a bit of luck, you can get by with only two votes using this trick.

To do that though, you would have to have a CB on said electors or their Allies, or take bad Stab & W.E. hits.

I think the opening move is spelled out perfectly clear now. Being emperor by 1480's should be doable, and by beginning of 1500's, things should be well on their way to stop Muscovy.

 

[Alliegorical]

To do that though, you would have to have a CB on said electors or their Allies, or take bad Stab & W.E. hits.

I think the opening move is spelled out perfectly clear now. Being emperor by 1480's should be doable, and by beginning of 1500's, things should be well on their way to stop Muscovy.

When it's the difference between becoming HRE and not, it's worth 2 stab & WE.