Why are the Ottomans so overpowered?

[Question]

You've completely misread my post. I'm saying that despite a lack of combat modifiers, I've found the Ottomans to be WEAK. Unlike the OP, my troops in that campaign somehow demolish Ottoman armies despite them blobbing for centuries.

For context, my idea choices weren't chosen for their combat modifiers. The purpose of my campaign was to enjoy the new Milanese mission tree and get the A Decent Reserve achievement. It just so happens that Quantity, Exploration, and Aristocratic give +126% national manpower between ideas and policies so I have a meat grinder, fortress Italy. The other ideas were because I got elected HRE so I decided to do a good job of it and fix the Empire.

Again, to reiterate, you got the message in my post wrong. I'm not complaining that the Ottomans are too strong like the OP. I'm saying I find them stupidly weak despite my campaigns having sub-optimal build for combat modifiers. I definitely don't need lucky nations off.

My bad, I thought you were the OP replying.

 

[Travis_Bickle]

It happened again...

 

[Travis_Bickle]

Every single save ruined by the Ottomans.

Can Paradox please just ban me from this forum?

 

[mysticdueler]

It happened again...

Sorry to hear! If you still have it, would you mind posting your savegame file to the thread? Maybe some of us can try out your situation and give some insights?

 

[Travis_Bickle]

Sorry to hear! If you still have it, would you mind posting your savegame file to the thread? Maybe some of us can try out your situation and give some insights?

I deleted it.

But look, if you guys tell me that you can help I'll feel a lot better about it.

It's just 1540, as France I'd already 80% wiped out England, wiped out Aragon, owned 80% of Italy, dismantled the HRE...I'm obviously not a bad player, but then the Ottomans get involved and I'm wrecked because they have 200k men all with 3 star generals.

 

[RobbieAB]

So As France, you basically wreck everyone who might be keeping the Ottomans in check, and compain that they run unchecked?

 

[Travis_Bickle]

So As France, you basically wreck everyone who might be keeping the Ottomans in check, and compain that they run unchecked?

Alternatively, I'm the strongest power in the game and still can't beat the Ottomans with the armies of Spain, the Commonwealth and Qara Qoyunlu on my side.

Their force limit is just too large and somehow they can financially sustain an insane amount of soldiers. No other power, AI or Human, can come close.

I've conquered more land, have more provinces, and more access to trade nodes than they do but somehow they can raise an army 3-4x bigger than mine full of 3 star generals. (This includes me finishing quantity ideas).

 

[iClipse]

As long as you're not posting printscreens or your savegames it's hard to take any say of value. I've only been seeing an underperforming Ottoman the last few games, so I can't really say I relate. Sure, their forces are plentiful, but usually not that strong. They usually complete quantity ideas themselves. With a force limit of +33% in their own ideas it results in big armies, but it's hardly an issue. This game is and stays a sandbox game which is by definition unbalanced. Nation 1 has not the same ideas as nation 2, so you never even start from the same position anyway.

I can only say form my experience that in any world conquest I've done it has never been the ottoman's that's the issue. It has been Spain or Portugal with all their colonies.

Anyway, at this point this thread has been going in circles for a long time, so why not deliver some proof? Show the political map, show the army quality comparison and actually show us what's been going wrong. They can bring as many troops as they like, but if you're filling the combat width with superior quality troops, you should win.

 

[grotaclas]

I've conquered more land, have more provinces, and more access to trade nodes than they do but somehow they can raise an army 3-4x bigger than mine full of 3 star generals. (This includes me finishing quantity ideas).

It is impossible to say without a save game, but I would guess that the Ottomans have a much higher autonomy-modified-development than you and that your trade setup and economic management could be improved.

No other power, AI or Human, can come close.

I'm pretty sure that other Human players can do much better than coming close. After all people have conquered the world in less than 100 years.

 

[mysticdueler]

I deleted it.

But look, if you guys tell me that you can help I'll feel a lot better about it.

It's just 1540, as France I'd already 80% wiped out England, wiped out Aragon, owned 80% of Italy, dismantled the HRE...I'm obviously not a bad player, but then the Ottomans get involved and I'm wrecked because they have 200k men all with 3 star generals.

While a little intimidating, having more troops/3-star generals isn’t automatically a lost war (especially the number of stars on a general - it’s not guaranteed to be a 5/5/2/3; could be a 1/2/6/1). It just means you’ll have do a loooooot more micromanagement when engaging. You’ll have to keep almost your entire army balled together within a couple provinces of each other, and sniping smaller Ottoman stacks, especially when they separate from the rest of the Ottoblob’s forces. Use terrain and river crossings to your advantage.

Let your allies burn while you siege down Otto forts (and especially their capital)

 

[Big Bad France]

I deleted it.

But look, if you guys tell me that you can help I'll feel a lot better about it.

It's just 1540, as France I'd already 80% wiped out England, wiped out Aragon, owned 80% of Italy, dismantled the HRE...I'm obviously not a bad player, but then the Ottomans get involved and I'm wrecked because they have 200k men all with 3 star generals.

How are you going about fighting the war? Are you focusing on sieging down their forts or protecting your own? Who declared the war and what is the goal?

In this patch, assuming you control forts in the Alps, the safest strategy is probably to keep your armies to the west of those forts. Use scorched earth in the provinces around them to lower supply limit and reduce movement speed. Whenever the siege ticks go positive, engage the armies at full stack width and send reinforcements. This lets you control where the battles get fought, with defensive bonuses, and the scorched earth limits their ability to reinforce. You should win easily. Just do that until they run out of manpower and stop coming. This only works if you are fighting an offensive war or if they are attacking you with a CB that puts the war goal west of Italy, though. You will go into the negative on war score for awhile, but not so much that they can enforce peace. Maybe even delete your forts to the east of the alps to prevent them from gaining warscore where you aren't fighting.

 

[csward53]

Tuscany? I don't think I've ever seen the Ottos get so far Central Europe in my 2k hours playing. I will say that with the Austria patch they tend to fight wars with the Mamluks far less often and expand less in Muslim lands, but not always.

 

[Methuen of Melnibone]

Alternatively, I'm the strongest power in the game and still can't beat the Ottomans with the armies of Spain, the Commonwealth and Qara Qoyunlu on my side.

Their force limit is just too large and somehow they can financially sustain an insane amount of soldiers. No other power, AI or Human, can come close.

I've conquered more land, have more provinces, and more access to trade nodes than they do but somehow they can raise an army 3-4x bigger than mine full of 3 star generals. (This includes me finishing quantity ideas).

In my Spain game - I'd completed all of the Spain missions, ruled the world, had just dismantled the HRE - the Ottomans ? 800,000 men in the field, and another 500,000 in reserve. I was trying to organise the world for a big war, but even with my ruling most of North and South America, and with the Brits / Russia / Austria as my PUs, I could scrape together 600k total. Their force size is indeed lunacy, especially since the quality isn't exactly Aztec poor.

Didn't bother in the end, as "lol I have more zeroes than you so I win" isn't fun, it's Warhammer 40k but without the modelling aspect.

 

[Travis_Bickle]

In my Spain game - I'd completed all of the Spain missions, ruled the world, had just dismantled the HRE - the Ottomans ? 800,000 men in the field, and another 500,000 in reserve. I was trying to organise the world for a big war, but even with my ruling most of North and South America, and with the Brits / Russia / Austria as my PUs, I could scrape together 600k total. Their force size is indeed lunacy, especially since the quality isn't exactly Aztec poor.

Didn't bother in the end, as "lol I have more zeroes than you so I win" isn't fun, it's Warhammer 40k but without the modelling aspect.

Precisely this.

Like I mentioned before, when I created a Venice save intentionally just to wreck the Ottomans, they still had a force limit equal to mine despite only having 8 or 10 provinces. I owned the Balkans, most of Anatolia and most of Italy. Switching to the Italian nation didn't help either.

It isn't their size that bothers me, it's the amount of men they can field.

 

[csward53]

I deleted it.

But look, if you guys tell me that you can help I'll feel a lot better about it.

It's just 1540, as France I'd already 80% wiped out England, wiped out Aragon, owned 80% of Italy, dismantled the HRE...I'm obviously not a bad player, but then the Ottomans get involved and I'm wrecked because they have 200k men all with 3 star generals.

Wow If that's true and somehow your aren't the target of a coalition war, I have no idea how you can't beat the Ottomans. If they are at military techs 9, you should avoid them, but the later you go, the easier they are. I can't imagine your aren't trolling. I mean why even fight them as France that early anyway when you can usually ally them? With all your aggressive expansion, you may want their help.

Oh and you happened to delete the save file. Right...

 

[Travis_Bickle]

Wow If that's true and somehow your aren't the target of a coalition war, I have no idea how you can't beat the Ottomans. If they are at military techs 9, you should avoid them, but the later you go, the easier they are. I can't imagine your aren't trolling. I mean why even fight them as France that early anyway when you can usually ally them? With all your aggressive expansion, you may want their help.

Oh and you happened to delete the save file. Right...

No problems with AE. I time truces and improve relations with everything as well as hiring an improve relations advisor.

I'm not trolling. Next save I'll keep the save to share.

 

[RobbieAB]

Alternatively, I'm the strongest power in the game and still can't beat the Ottomans with the armies of Spain, the Commonwealth and Qara Qoyunlu on my side.

The strongest power in the game can beat any other power one-on-one. If they can't, the other power is stronger.

I am seeing a lot of complaining about how powerful the Ottomans are with very little concrete evidence of how powerful you actually are. Like most of those disagreeing with you, my experience is that the Ottomans are a tough fight but not massively challenging if you approach of correctly with one of the major powers.

In terms of Ottoman expansion, my personal experience is that the player power makes a significant difference: Play a power that is going to significantly disrupt any of Austria, Muscovy/Russia, or PLC, and the Ottomans are going to perform very differently to how they will if you play a power that has very little impact in Eastern Europe.

 

[eoncommander]

Alternatively, I'm the strongest power in the game and still can't beat the Ottomans with the armies of Spain, the Commonwealth and Qara Qoyunlu on my side.

Their force limit is just too large and somehow they can financially sustain an insane amount of soldiers. No other power, AI or Human, can come close.

I've conquered more land, have more provinces, and more access to trade nodes than they do but somehow they can raise an army 3-4x bigger than mine full of 3 star generals. (This includes me finishing quantity ideas).

If you've done all you say you've done as France, and can still only field 50k-60k men 100 years into the game, then something has seriously gone wrong in your campaign. France starts with a force limit of 38, plus its vassals. The Ottomans do often have the largest army because of the +33% FL modifier in their ideas, but if you're close to parity their armies are definitely beatable. Again, save games or at least screenshots would help us help you here.

 

[Jomini]

The other thing to remember is that you do not have to defeat their army if you want to win the war. The Ottomans are one of the easiest AIs in the game to defeat via naval power. Bait their main army onto Corfu or any of the other strait Greek islands (you may need to sacrifice some regiments), then park your fleet bottling up their main army on the island.

Or you can run it the other way. Fabricate a claim on some island (e.g. Cyprus or Crete). Declare and take the place for ticking warscore. Have some fully updated forts (and if you want to go all out have them be inside your march Georgia or Switzerland) on the border and then use your navy to move a max speed siege army (full cannon bonus, highest siege general, with a full blockading fleet) to their outdated forts and punch those out before they can come grab your army. Alternatively you can barrage/assault if you have the points and manpower to manage that. This can allow you to demand strategic provinces on the mainland, force them to release states, or put a major dent in their finances by taking max gold, war reps, and trade power/steering with the added bonus that you looted a number of their provinces and sank their fleet. You can keep doing this and rack up decent warscore by just seizing their islands repeatedly and then taking stuff near a lightening siege at the end of the war.

I have beaten Prussia while being down 5:1 with no military ideas of my own by baiting them into Copenhagen and then stranding them there.

Now if your economy cannot support naval supremacy or land supremacy, then I would suggest that something is just a bit off. Particularly as you should be able to jump their major trade fleets before they consolidate down.

 

[Sidolowka]

Late game when I'm tired of dealing with 300k Ottoman stacks lumbering around Central Asia while I'm sieging down their capital, I'll just send 700 light ships to privateer in Constantinople. Not for my fiscal benefits mind you, but because the Ottomans will slowly bleed to death because the AI is too stupid to disband units that are too expensive, nor hunt pirates. Fun stuff. Are the Ottomans overpowered? No. Are they annoying as all fuck to fight? Yes.

(Oman into Third Way, another 250k Ottoman stack just walked through all my forts in the Zagros/Caucasus and stack wiped all of my carpet siege troops in Central Asia. I decided to carpet siege with 60k stacks after that)