Some questions

[Basileios II.]

Dear fellow EUIV players,
an achievement hunter here with some question. First of all, on the "no country for old tercios" it is stated you have to be in control of the capitals of three great powers. Does that mean, one has to conquer their capitals or does one have to be in war against them and occupy there capitals?
Secondly there is the achievement "populist in government". What kind of reforms are they are talking about. Because i did those eleven government reforms multiple times. Also when i played russia i changed my government from monarchy to republic, never fired. So, what is it about?
Another question is about starting as byzantium. I watch red hawks guides and follow them as good as i can. There are points, which came to my eyes, which are quite strange. the Naples becoming free happens for me mostly during the war against epirus, so naples has mostly some allies when i try to take them on and, coz the bad army "privilege" is still active, i really have troubles taking them on. Any tipps from you, mates? Next, i never managed it to make the knights my ally, coz they always raid me, despite me hunting for pirates. How can one prevent them from raiding me? Next, when i am ready to fight the big green goblins around my country and i try to blockade the marmara sea, they simply crush my fleet, despite me being over the fleet limit and having epirus fleet at my side, coz the goblins have around 3 heavies. How to deal with that? Build even more galleries?
So thanks, mates, for your aid and helpful comments in advance.

 

[Dunner]

I can answer the Byz questions:
1. Alfons life span and the ensuing release event are a crapshoot. I often have it fire as late as 10 years into the game by which time I’ve not just conquered Epirus but also won my first Ottoman war and sometimes even one over Venice. Other times he dies in 1445… only advice is to pray to the RNG deities. Ally the Pope as soon as you can and get mil access, as soon as Alfons kicks off get fleet access and move your troops to the Papal States and attack before Naples makes allies. You generally have 2 months between Naples independence and them securing an alliance, but not always. I usually beat them with 18k troops and the deteriorating army privilege intact.
2. I ally the knights in every game, even on very hard. Begin improving immediately, I also will guarantee for extra opinion. The key is you need to watch them closely, their attitude will flip from neutral to threatened just before they begin raiding, it’s at this point you need to ally them and you only have days before they start raiding.
3. Allying The Knights and Trebizond is the key to controlling the straight, both can almost always be allied and both have strong fleets for their size. Set your fleet to allow attach and you’ll have a better chance of doomstacking fleets.

 

[Basileios II.]

ok, thanks a lot, mate. So you prefer allying the knights over serbia? Right? Do you ally serbia at all?

 

[Dunner]

I play Byz with lots of relations, my diplo mana situation sucks in the first 20-30 years. I release Bulgaria on day one so I can take Strong Duchies for the extra diplo slots (and so I can feed them back their cores later).

Most commonly, my initial allies are Serbia, Theodoro, The Knights and Trebizond, they're the only ones willing to ally with the Very Hard difficulty malus. I'll eventually vassalize all three but the Knights. The Knights and Treb have good fleets and will join an offensive war against the Ottomans if you promise land. I never give these two land so usually the knights will break alliance after the war, but Treb will generally stay allied.

After the first Ottoman war, ally the Pope, Muscovy, and Austria. Then support rebels on the knights for a free core and improve on Burgundy. You'll eat up so much land as Byz you're highly likely to win the BI lottery if you can secure a marriage and alliance. Hungary will probably declare on Bosnia and eat a chunk of Serbia while they're at it making Serbia easier for you to vasalize, with luck they'll leave Bosnia as an OPM meaning another easy vassal. Then I like to improve on Ragusa and Albania, they will each likely be attacked by Venice and the Ottomans respectively. Often, it will make sense for you to ally them when they're at war so you can essentially 1v1 venice and/or the ottomans in a defensive war instead of having to fight them with their allies. When allied to Ragusa I'll often make a separate peace against venice to take some islands then throw Ragusa to the wolves. When allied to Albania I usually let them negotiate peace, they always give me piles of land and then are happy to be vassalized.

By this time its probably about 1480-1490 and you'll be the #1 GP or at least close. The last tricky bit of diplo is to do a quick alliance break/re-ally with all your Catholic allies once you have 5 temples and a happy clergy to dump the union of churches privilege (your Catholic vassals Albania and Bosnia are fine though); just make sure your allies have high opinion when you break alliance and you have diplomats ready to ally as soon as the month cooldown wears off.

 

[grotaclas]

First of all, on the "no country for old tercios" it is stated you have to be in control of the capitals of three great powers. Does that mean, one has to conquer their capitals or does one have to be in war against them and occupy there capitals?

You have to occupy the capitals. If you would conquer them, you would control the province, but it would not be their capital anymore, so it won't count.

Secondly there is the achievement "populist in government". What kind of reforms are they are talking about. Because i did those eleven government reforms multiple times. Also when i played russia i changed my government from monarchy to republic, never fired. So, what is it about?

You don't have to complete all reforms. Each government type has a tier on which it has several reforms which allow you to switch to a different type(e.g. tier 6 for monarchies). You have to use one of these reforms to switch to a different government type

 

[Basileios II.]

You have to occupy the capitals. If you would conquer them, you would control the province, but it would not be their capital anymore, so it won't count.


You don't have to complete all reforms. Each government type has a tier on which it has several reforms which allow you to switch to a different type(e.g. tier 6 for monarchies). You have to use one of these reforms to switch to a different government type

Thanks a lot, mate. That makes it clear. So one has to look for a war, where three other great powers are involved in and then occupy their capitals. That's a quite a thing.
I saw those tier 6 reforms, never thought about doing it, 'til now,
Thanks again, mate.

 

[grotaclas]

Thanks a lot, mate. That makes it clear. So one has to look for a war, where three other great powers are involved in and then occupy their capitals. That's a quite a thing.

It doesn't have to be one war. You can fight multiple wars at the same time.

 

[Basileios II.]

So, tried it now and the Ottotards are gone by now. Finally. I sailed trough it, only problem was again to get the knights. As soon as i tried to better their opinion with me, they raided me almost immediately. No change to ally them. So i did it without them. And i tried that multiple times. Did you guys had equal problems with them, or is it only me?

 

[Dunner]

Nope, it's not just you, the knights are fickle. You literally have 1-3 days from the time their opinion changes from neutral to threatened. If their opinion of you is around 70 or higher they'll accept your alliance but you have to be ready to send it the day their opinion changes.

 

[Basileios II.]

For i it changes almost always before i even be able to ally them and i really look into them as soon as i increase their opinion of me. Hardly ever possible.