A guide to an Overpowered Austria in 1.21

[Iayasu]

Hi, so this guide is basically how to get a ridiculously OP Austria by the early 1600s. It used to be that I could almost lay this out step by step, but the AI has gotten a lot better, so I’m going to have to divide this into sections and you can use them without necessarily going in order, although some pieces are always the same. Here’s the diplo map of my most recent run to give you some idea of what we’re shooting for:

Also Power Ranking (but from before I got the Commonwealth PU):

So that’s basically most of Europe under a PU or vassalized and it’s 1610, also I’m sitting on as much dev on my own as the Ottomans, and my subjects have twice that.


So, how to get here, and why would I say that this can be done on a very, very, regular basis? Austria, because of it’s unique opening position and national ideas and events is in a very good spot to get silly numbers of PUs and Unite the HRE. So let’s go through the broad steps and general timeline.


Austria has a relatively predictable set of opening plays through to about 1500. Note that step 5 can be moved up or down a step depending on AE, current manpower, the alliance situation, and timing. The different Northern Italy wars can move around too, but this is generally the order I use.

1. Getting Ready
   
   
2. Union over Bohemia
   
   
3. First war to rein in Northern Italy/Venice
   
   
4. Second war to Rein in Northern Italy/The Papal States
   
   
5. Union over Hungary
   
   
6. Last war over Northern Italy/The Papal States + General strategy until 1500
   
   
7. Dealing with Burgundy

Between 1500 and 1600 you have a few different goals to be managing constantly, you need to be working on all of these at the same time, so don’t just go down the list.

1. Keep lots of princes in the HRE
   
   
2. Stop the religious leagues from forming
   
   
3. Prepare for PU with Poland/Lithuania
   
   
4. Prepare for and maybe get PU over Castille
   
   
5. Avoid wars with or win wars with your real enemies. Also general war advice.
   1. France
      
      
   2. Ottomans
      
      
   3. Russia

Last after 1600, you’re going for the game winning goals you haven’t mopped up on yet:

1. Uniting the HRE
   
   
2. Getting the PU over the Commonwealth.
   
   
3. Getting the PU over Spain

So let’s get started!

If you have any questions, please ask.

 

[Iayasu]

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Getting Ready

1. Check rivals, a rivalry from Poland, Bohemia, or Castille is a restart, if Hungary rivals you it’s annoying, but probably doesn’t matter unless they ally Venice or the pope, still might be a restart depending on how hard you want to work. Set your rivals as Venice + either France, Denmark, or England, depending on who rivaled you. Leave the third rival blank for now.
   
   
2. Marry & Ally:
   1. Hungary
      
      
   2. Poland
      1. Hungary and Poland often rival each other. If it happens, RM Hungary, wait for them to offer an alliance, you now have at least a month to offer Poland an Alliance, after they accept you can accept Hungary’s offer.
   3. Castille
      
      
   4. The Palatinate
      
      
   5. Saxony or Brandenburg (5 total).
3. Marriage Only:
   1. Burgundy, they may take improving relations before they’ll accept, also watch them, because sometimes they’ll cancel the marriage without warning, but you need the marriage to have a shot at the inheritance firing in your favor.
      
      
   2. Bohemia. (2 more)

Yes, you're over your relations limit, that’s okay. Also, that list isn't in order, make sure you get the marriages with interregnum countries ASAP, also it’s worth remembering that ally and royal marriage calculations are different, sometimes you can get one but not the other at first, but the one will usually lead to being able to get the other.

1. Disband your transports. Send your one light ship to privateer the Genoa node. Start building light ships up to your force limit.
   
   
2. Kill your forts, this is SP you need that gold for other crud. Yeah, the AI got better, you have to leave the freaking expensive forts, but at least make sure they’re mothballed if you’re not at war, or they’re not lowering devastation for you. If you conquer land, don’t keep useless forts, only keep them if they’re sitting on terrain with a combat modifier. Don’t keep a lot of forts covering exactly the same territory either.
   

1. Take the mission to improve your Prestige, assuming you have it, but usually you do.
   
   
2. Get the cheap inflation advisor from the Burghers and the cheap diplo rep advisor from the nobles, start farming your estates for monarch points, make sure you get at least 100 from each, getting 150 is nice but not required. If you're going to get the general from the nobility later, don't call a diet, let them be pissed, personally I just go with a poor general, but personal preference. Get a lvl 1 mil advisor, preferably morale, discipline is a second choice, but any lvl 1 advisor will do.
   
   
3. You start with a focus on Admin points, you need to shift to either no focus or Mil points, I usually go no focus, but that's personal preference, don't forget you'll be stuck with it for a while, and you'll be low on points with all three kinds of monarch points for a while with this start.
   
   
4. Lower maintenance on your army to where you're just barely making a penny on the balance sheet, you're going to want to be able to get them to full morale ASAP. Sit them next to Bohemia's border in groups that won't take attrition damage.
   
   
5. Start getting the gold mine in Tirol up to 10 production., get this done ASAP.
   
   
6. Make sure your message settings are set up so you get a pop up for every new ruler that shows up. It's annoying I know, but you need it.
   
   
7. Balance beginning to build relationships with your allies and getting claims on Venice. You need three of their provinces plus returning Brescia to Milan to prevent the shadow kingdom. AE sucks for the first 50 years, if you can get claims on all three it'll be better. Get at least one of the claims you need to prevent the shadow kingdom from the Papal states too. You want to have the CB so you can take advantage of a moment of weakness. Ideally, get claims on all possible needed provinces. From the popeman you need all the Italian provinces.
   
   
8. Sit on speed three or so and watch for pop ups from Bohemia, Hungary, and Poland.
   1. You want Poland to take the event that gives them the PU on Lit, if they choose a local noble that's a restart/alt+f4, if they naturally get an heir it'll probably be from your dynasty, you probably won't have a good opening until at least a 1500 to take advantage, and it weakens one of your better allies, so that's probably a restart/alt+f4 but that's personal preference, I'm going to be writing this assuming they took the PU over Lit though.
      
      
   2. Watch for Hungary, they usually get a scripted heir, Ladislaus the Posthumous. You want this. If they get some random other person from your dynasty that's fine too, but break the alliance immediately if that happens. I haven't seen them get a different heir in a few games but it may happen, if it does you'll want to be ready to force a PU quickly. I'm writing this assuming they have Ladislaus, just for simplicity's sake.
      
      
   3. With Bohemia you're watching for them to get a ruler from your dynasty. They can also get an event that gives them a pretty strong ruler, but you won't be able to force a PU if they get it. If they get the event your choices are to restart/alt+f4 or to wait til 1500 and make sure Bohemia doesn't get above 140 development. Use the ledger to keep an eye on it, if they do, use the unlawful territory CB to force them back down to 100 dev or so. I'd also try to make sure they hang on to their gold mine, it's basically the only reason they're worth this much trouble. After 1500 as long as they have less than 140 dev you can get a mission to force them into a PU. Keep recycling missions until you get it.
9. Keep an eye out for the unlawful territory flag at the top of your screen, use the interaction every time the territory you demand will bring a prince back to life and the prince you’re asking will say yes. Also use it if you need a CB against a prince that’s growing too much, but don’t overdo this, when they answer no, which is how you get the CB, you lose a point of IA, so only get those CBs when you know you’re going to want to go to war soonish.
   
   
10. Final quick note, we’re going to be doing a lot of Personal Unions in this guide, it’s important that you have a basic understanding of how they work. There are other guides that explain this very, very, well, however, here’s a brief guide that will give you a working knowledge. A google search for eu4 PU guide can give you more information.
    1. Forcing unions requires one of these things:
       1. Restoration of Union CB
          • You get this through events or From a subject breaking free, make sure to use it before the cb expires, you won’t get it back.
       2. Claim throne CB
          • You get this after clicking the claim throne button on someone you have a Royal Marriage with and who shares your dynasty, also you have to have more prestige than they do.
            
            
          • This means it takes two steps, the first is getting your dynasty on that throne, which happens either through event or because your dynasty ended up there as the country they had a RM with that had the most developement at the time they gained a king while in interregnum or because your country had the most development of the RM partners when their king died without an heir. As long as you have the most development of the RM Partners other things can happen, but they’re at least as good as this.
       3. Succession War
          • Happens sometimes instead of just getting a dynasty on their throne, as long as you have the most development of the RM partners, you’ll be the defender and start out with the PU
       4. PU on Monarch Death/Inherited Throne
          • Happens sometimes instead of just getting your dynasty on their throne, basically you just saved a step.

 

[Iayasu]

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Personal Union with Bohemia:


Assuming Bohemia got the ruler from your dynasty:

1. Immediately save and raise maintenance on your army. If they get the event for the other ruler now I'd definitely just alt+f4 and go back to this save. If you don’t want to save scum you can replay the first 10 years or so a few times, it won’t take many tries for this to work out. Also immediately go to the diplo screen and claim their throne.
   
   
2. Wait until a first of the month where your armies are either full morale or close to full morale.
   
   
3. Declare Boh as your third rival and immediately declare war using the claim throne CB.
   
   
4. Try to rush Praha to get a stack wipe before their army can recover from being at low maintenance, if you miss it don't worry about it, just be careful while you split up to start sieging them down. If you get it then you don't have to worry. Usually in my games Bohemia doesn't have allies that are too scary, Saxony or Brandenburg is about as annoying as it gets they'll generally agree to peace out if you can get one of their forts sieged down or get a stack wipe, just make sure you keep an eye out for them and don't let them snap up one of your armies by itself. You can sometimes offer Poland land to help you, but you start with the biggest army in the game, you really don't need them 90% of the time and any land you give them hurts the HRE, you also really want to keep them for an ally. So breaking a promise for land is a bad option.
   
   
5. Don't drag this war out, you can force the union at 84% warscore, and Bohemia's army will then be yours, you don't want it weak. When I finished fighting this out now I still had 35k manpower, and that was with no stack wipes and a general that only had one pip in shock, and one in siege.
   
   
6. Last step, immediately improve relations until Bohemia is positive. If your ruler dies while they’re at negative relations the PU break and you have to fight the war all over again.
   
   
7. Declare France your new Third Rival once you’re at peace.

 

[Iayasu]

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Preparing for Venice:

1. You should have completed the mission for prestige after winning the PU war with Bohemia, for the rest of the time until you revoke the priveligia focus on missions that give monarch points or help in the HRE, don't be afraid to recycle missions if nothing is there that you'll complete quickly. Every 10 years or so you'll get a mission to improve relations with one of the electors that doesn't like you, you want to keep cycling missions so you get these as soon as the modifier from the last one runs out, that way you hang on to the extra 10% IA modifier from this. Good missions include anything involving improving relations with someone, getting cash as long as you won’t need loans for a while, conquering a province you wanted anyway. Bad missions are waiting around for manpower, trying to secure the papacy, or fighting for a province or a vassal that you don’t want, which is generally anyone in the HRE. You don’t want the missions screen tied up with something you’re not going to do, if there’s nothing good, take and cancel the mission to recycle them.
   
   
2. Get your army next to Venice's border, again don't go any lower on Maintenance than it takes to stay in positive cash flow.
   
   
3. Go ahead and check the declare war screen and see what the alliance situation looks like. Generally they're in a trade league with OPMs and allied to Genoa. Sometimes it makes sense to offer land to Hungary if Venice lucked into enough alliances that they will be a pain, but again you start with the largest army in the game, you should be okay. Also make sure you check the tech situation, if they or their allies have gotten ahead on mil tech you'll need to wait til you catch up, otherwise you'll blow a lot of extra manpower for no good reason. If everything looks good though, get your fleets home and attack.
   
   
4. The war with Venice should be easier than the war with Boh, pick off the OPM ally armies for easy stack wipes, and siege down their capitals to get them out of the war quick, you want to have the habit of separate peacing all allies for as much gold as you can, also canceling their rivalries gives you a lot of prestige, if any of the allies are in the HRE, look to see if you can release anyone when you peace them out, Gena starts out holding Corsica for example, you should be doing this in every war and extra princes are good for IA gain and don’t cause you any AE. Venice is often distracted trying to conquer Byzantium or Albania about now, giving you time to siege down the fort across from Venetia. Check the ledger but you should be pretty safe to have a couple of sieges going at once, and when you've improved Boh's relations enough to get that LD down, they'll come help too.
   
   
5. You'll probably get to the point you've taken all of Venice that you can walk through, including Dalmatia if you get Mil access through Hungary, but not Venetia. If you built up your navy to your force limit then be patient. The AI tends to be pretty dumb and will take most of their navy off for no good reason. When they do, send your navy to kill the random ships they left behind, and have a big enough army (think overkill here) ready to cross the straight, even with the defensive bonus Venice will get. Once you take Venetia Venice will give you whatever you want.
   
   
6. Peace deal: If you occupied Venice you should be able to take all the land you need for the shadow kingdom and return Brescia to Milan for the same purpose. Mouse over the coalition tooltip, you'll probably get a small coalition from this. If you got Venice, go ahead and take this deal anyway. Pick up all the cash and extras that don't cause AE you want on top. If you promised Hungary land you can ignore it, you should be breaking your alliance soon anyway. If you couldn't take Venice, you're going to be short on time, you’ll need an extra war for dealing with Venice. Don’t take any provinces that aren’t for the shadow kingdom, and take provinces with forts last, they’re good for extra warscore if you can’t get to Venetia again in the next war.
   
   
7. Again for emphasis, in the peace deal, if you don’t already have this habit always watch the tooltip for a possible coalition, if you don’t think they can beat you and your allies, the coalition generally won’t either, and it won’t fire, just be aware, if you have to, sign the peace deal at the end of December so you get the first tick right away to reduce AE. If it’s close keep your army maintenance up, a loan or two from sitting at full maintenance for a couple of years is cheaper then a coalition war.
   
   
8. You’ll be getting close to Ladislaus from Hungary turning 10, break your alliance with them as soon as he does that way you’re not in a truce when it’s time to fight them.

 

[Iayasu]

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The Papal States:

1. The most important thing for this war is to watch the diplo situation. Popeman tends to ally France which will make you miserable. If you take them straight on find a way to get Poland or Castille in to help.
   
   
2. I tend to try to find a way to get at the Papal states without fighting France, although now isn’t a bad time to fight them if you can get Castile or Poland involved, if you do, focus on weakening them, maybe give Castile some of their land. France tends to get in a lot of nasty wars, so watch their WE, you can sometimes declare when they won't join. If you do this, be sure to get to 10 WS ASAP, otherwise the pope might be able to renew the alliance and call them in later. Another way to do this is declare on a weaker Pope ally, your goal then is to break the alliance with France, and do what you can to start eating needed provinces. Check the warscore costs. If you can't get Popeman down to a size where you can grab the necessary provinces this war + next war, you'll have to plan on three wars, which usually makes finding a time when France is busy, or getting a big ally involved a better option.
   
   
3. The actual fight against Popeman is easy, if you have to fight someone scary a good option is to crush the pope fast so you can focus on the nasty threat. If France is the issue, you + Castille is a good bet even against France, particularly if they got the wedding. In that case break them up and knock them down a peg or two.
   
   
4. Peace deal: grab two or more of the required provinces, think about releasing the pope's western territory, France will grab it, but it puts you in a good spot to full annex the pope in the next war, which will clear your negative relations when you release Rome after taking the decision to reign in the Shadow Kingdom. Just a reminder here so I don't forget later MAKE SURE you have taken the decision to reign in the Shadow Kingdom before you release Rome.

 

[Iayasu]

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PU with Hungary:

1. Hopefully when Ladislaus turned 10 you broke your alliance with Hungary, now when he comes of age at 15, Hungary will get an event where they can choose to become a PU under you, which they'll take 1/4 of the time, or get a god king and give you a restoration of union CB. If you want, you can alt+f4 until they choose you. I just kill them when I play. If you've been careful you should still have at least 1/2 your manpower left even though you've been at constant war. Check the declare war screen and see what the alliance situation is like. Often, as soon as I broke my alliance with Hungary they ally France, fortunately, you have Poland or Castille to call in, either of which can offset France.
   
   
2. Keep an eye on the diplomatic situation and on everyone's Mil tech. Again, attack when the timing is right. If you're paying attention to Alliances and mil tech your wars should usually be over before you start.
   
   
3. In the actual war may be to your advantage to control Bohemia, go ahead and stick one infantry in his territory and make sure you've checked the box to allow allies to attach while you have that one infantry selected. In the vassal screen set Bohemia to supportive in the war, after they attach to your one infantry you can control their army. If the feature gets buggy try to stay near their army, and just turn them to no focus or siege focus. Keep their army and yours close together, you and Bohemia can take on Hungary easily, but you'll have trouble if you have to fight Hungary, and a big ally like France in one battle, so keep an eye on them and don’t let them gang up on you without a big ally of your own to jump in.
   
   
4. After the war improve relations with Hungary to get them positive before your king dies.

 

[Iayasu]

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Mopping up the shadow kingdom, ideas, and some general strategy:

1. If you weren't able to get all the land you needed from Venice, now would be a good time for a second war, also start eyeing the Pope to be ready when that truce is up. Both of these should be easier than the first wars just watch the diplo situation, fight when their allies won't join or declare on weaker allies.
   
   
2. When finishing up the pope it’s best to full annex him if he’s your last war for reining in NI. As soon as you do take the decision, don’t core his land, and he’ll ask for Rome back, which you’ll give him.
   
   
3. If you have to fight the Pope, then Venice, in the peace deal take all the Pope’s land, and vassalize him. After you take enough land from Venice for the decision toggle scuttleage back and forth to raise his liberty desire and you can release the Pope once he’s disloyal.
   
   
4. You should be able to finish preventing the shadow kingdom between 1470 and 1480, the last ten years is just extra time to recoup manpower or be a little extra careful about coalitions.

General strategy notes:

1. Idea group order is diplo, next is religious, then influence if you’re not looking at expanding much yet, admin if you are, then whichever of those you hadn’t taken yet.
   
   
2. Always fill out the idea group before taking tech unless it’s a Mil idea group, the ideas generally offer better bonuses, each idea makes tech cheaper, and the tech will get cheaper in the meantime.
   
   
3. If an institution spawns in Europe try not to tech up once the penalty gets over 10% until you’ve embraced, if it spawns outside of Europe and isn’t spreading naturally in Europe it may be worth forcing it to spawn. Rarely comes up.
   
   
4. We’re taking diplo for the diplo rep, the improve relations bonus which means less AE, and the finisher that reduces stab hit from diplomatic actions. That last is especially important because it means you can break RM much more easily and are much more free to try for PUs, it also reduces the stability hit from no cb wars or truce breaks.
   
   
5. We’re taking religious for the casus belli, that means you really need to fill it out quickly, you want the CB before the reformation fires.
   
   
6. We’re taking admin for the reduced coring cost, cheaper mercs, cheaper loans, and increased states. Loans are just ducats you haven’t taken from rebellious HRE princes in return for letting them live yet. As long as you still have positive income once your army slider is back down don’t sweat the loans. But that means that if they’re cheaper it’s nice. On the same note, Mercs are not for use all the time, but if you’re in a fight for your life and you’re trying to preserve manpower, after a battle separate out the infantry and consolidate them, build enough merc infantry to make up the difference and send them back out there. Once the war’s over you can disband all the mercs. Hopefully it doesn’t come up, but some wars are worth it, getting a major PU can take this kind of thing, might as well be cheap about it.
   
   
7. We’re taking influence for even more diplo rep, cheaper subject integration, and less AE, if you’re playing outside of Christendom it’s what you want before diplo, because cheap integration is good, but since we like playing games with royal marriages diplo is the better group.
   
   
8. Don’t integrate your unions, high diplo rep means better chances of inheritance, and you get them for free instead of paying monarch points. Also, inheriting Bohemia gives you their Elector spot and lets you upgrade to a kingdom, it’s one of the only ways you can inside the HRE you might as well hope for it. Although if you do inherit them I’d release them as a vassal ASAP, you don’t have the states to make use of their provinces.
   
   
9. Once diplo is filled out, keep your eye on the disputed heirs tab, small countries aren’t worth it, but big powers like Sweden, Portugal, or Denmark show up, and once your dynasty is on their throne, you’ll get a chance to force a union eventually. Just RM them and wait, even if they’re young, since it only costs 1 prestige to get out of it oh well, and when you get lucky it’s worth it.
   
   
10. Also once diplo is filled out, be sure to develop your subjects gold provinces to 10 production too, that way you’ll get the most out of them.
    
    
11. Austria, and frankly any country, routinely gets some random revolt events. After you see the popup you have two months before it will automatically fire if you didn’t already pick one of the options. Use that time, turn on fort maintenance near where the revolt will occur, turn your army slider back up, get your army near that province. Rebels should not cause you to panic. Along the same lines, when the alert flag shows up that a revolt is about to happen, check how large the army will be and get your army near the appropriate province. Later in the game you can consider just building mercs nearby.
    
    
12. Don’t let huge amounts of gold just sit around, you should be getting lots of gold from that mine and from the wars you have to fight all the time, once your loans are paid off, use it to get temples and workshops and later manufactories.

 

[Iayasu]

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Dealing with Burgundy:


Right now your IA is getting wasted by freaking Burgundy, unless you got kind of lucky and the inheritance fired, you need to start planning on how to deal with that. You can hope for the inheritance to fire, or just go to war to take their stuff / release princes into the HRE.

1. Some notes on the inheritance:
   
   1. It has just as much chance of firing if they’re not at war and have no heir as it does when they’re losing a war, so if you’re waiting for it, don’t declare if they’re at peace with no heir.
      
      
   2. It can’t fire if they’re at war with you and they’ve occupied any of your territory, no matter how badly they’re losing.
      
      
   3. It can fire and give the land to Castile, in which case you need to either alt+f4/save scum or you’re stuck with Castile eating your IA until you force a union on them, and they won’t move their capital to Holland to prevent the revolts, so you’ll have to bail them out from that.
2. Short version is you want to force Burgundy’s territory into the HRE, your goal is to go to war, preferably at a time when France is in debt and won't try to take advantage to snap up bits of Burgundy themselves, in the war you want to take or release as independent nations any provinces that are in the HRE, or sit on them until the inheritance fires or it’s 1500.
   
   
3. You should be used to figuring out whether you're going to win before the war starts by now, but again, check mil tech and the diplomacy situation, also check armies on the ledger. You'll need to use the plain conquest CB, because you may want provinces outside the HRE, the special HRE CB won't let you take them. You’re trying to break up Burgundy as much as you can, and maybe add some land for yourself, because the inheritance is so random, it may make sense not to bother with it, or to make a backup of your save once you have them full occupied and save scum from there.
   
   
4. Also before this war or any other, check and see if their forts are at full maintenance, if they aren’t try and see if you can get an OPM ally nearby to give you mil access. If they’re both your ally and granting access you won’t get black flagged even if they don’t join you in the war. You can break the alliance as soon as the war starts.
   
   
5. If you end up with a big French border keep in mind you’ll want to break France up as you can, split their land up between you and Castile. It’s really good to win a war against them before they get their dang Elán idea.

 

[Iayasu]

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Keeping lots of princes in the HRE


It’s basically 1500, you’re probably strong enough to hold your own against any of your major rivals, but fighting them doesn’t sound like loads of fun either, you definitely have the manpower that it should be doable, somewhere between 40 and 50 troops for yourself, and about that again from Bohemia and Hungary combined. But you can’t count on the AI army so you have to be careful about your wars with the big dogs. Luckily, you’re not trying to fight them.

1. Til about 1520 or so the reformation won’t fire and you’re just keeping princes from eating each other.
   
   
2. Try to always be at war, none of these guys are big enough to mess with your manpower and as long as you’re at war you’re making gold in peace deals and adding princes for IA
   
   
3. Feel free to get the Defender of the faith to keep WE down and prestige up, with your allies you’d probably get called if an issue came up anyway, since you’re basically allied to the borders of Catholicism.
   
   
4. This goes for any time after you've reigned in the Shadow kingdom, including while you gear up for war with Burgundy. You want to stay at war with anyone that starts to blob in the HRE, just keep an eye out for Electors, the same goes for them but use the tooltips on the HRE screen to check that you're not going to lose an election when you're fighting them, while you’re at war they basically will never vote for you. As long as you’re at least tied for the most votes you have the tiebreaker as the emperor.
   
   
5. On top of gold and releasing princes try to take single provinces throughout the HRE that give you borders with princes you didn’t have before, this will help you beat back the reformation, you won’t have to fight as many no cb wars. As emperor you can core any province in the HRE. It also doesn’t hurt IA gain as long as you don’t kill off a prince. Keep in mind that provinces with sea borders can fabricate claims on all other provinces that share a border with that sea tile. Cutting a few provinces from Brandenburg and Saxony can be a good idea right now, as they tend to go protestant, and can be too large to convert in one war.
   
   
6. Also in these wars demand stuff to give you prestige but won’t cost you, like ending rivalries. If you end 1-2 rivalries with every prince you separate peace, that’s easily an extra 20 or so prestige a year, leaving you constantly maxed.
   
   
7. Don’t state worthless territories, if it’s only one or two provinces it probably doesn’t have enough development to be worth getting the state. Use the state mapmode to check how much development you have in that territory before you get the state.
   
   
8. You don’t have to keep your alliances with electors if they’re not useful to you, as you get higher diplo rep electors will vote for you without them. I generally keep the Palatinate for most of the game, there’s a chance to inherit them because they’re small, and two guaranteed votes is enough most of the time, but again, watch that HRE screen, you should be looking at it all the time.
   
   
9. Use the automated diplomats, or turn on popups to let you know when they’re free again. You always want maxed relations with your allies and subjects, and improving relations with outraged countries is a good idea. Don’t let your diplomats sit and not work.
   
   
10. Don’t improve relations with electors that you don’t need, one of the requirements for the mission that gives you IA is that they don’t like you.

 

[Iayasu]

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Stopping the religious leagues:

1. This is really about killing off centers of reformation ASAP, generally I get 3-5 of the 6 inside the HRE. Once you destroy the ones in the HRE the rate that new princes get added slows down by a lot.
   
   
2. If you got the extra single provinces throughout the HRE mentioned above, you should have grown borders with these princes as they pop up, or at least with one of their allies. If they share a border with you, great, just use the religious cb. Otherwise, fab a claim on one of their allies. If you absolutely have to you can no cb them, because of maxed out diplo ideas that isn’t the end of the world.
   
   
3. All the same stuff you did during the wars to keep princes small still applies now, you’ll just need a little bit more warscore to convert them instead of just peacing out for gold and released princes.
   
   
4. The league wars won’t start as long as there isn’t a protestant elector after 1550. This means that after getting rid of Centers of Reformation converting electors is your top priority. If it gets close to 1550, that may even include truce breaking, as long as your AE can survive the hit. The tooltip for coalitions will show up in the declare war screen, so feel free to check it out.
   
   
5. If you’re aggressive about limiting the reformation, by the time 1550 rolls around you should just be mopping up stray princes that occasionally get events to convert or get converted by centers of reformation in England or Sweden.
   
   
6. Religious Peace:
   
   1. I’ve always taken the Peace of Westphalia it’ll fire after the reform that means that your country always inherits the HRE, and it means I can still switch religion later if I want to.
      
      
   2. If you want to be locked as catholic and get the catholic empire modifiers there’s two ways.
      
      1. Let the league wars fire, let the protestants get strong enough they declare, kill them.
         
         
      2. Get the event “Diet of $Capital_City$” This’ll fire if the league wars have been going for at least thirty years, you’re at peace, and you don’t have a truce with the leader of the protestant league. Has a MTTH of 5 years, so be prepared to do nothing for a while.
         
         
      3. Get the same event after 1625 if the wars never fired, still has a MTTH of 5 years and still requires that you be at peace.
         
         
      4. The Capital City Diet doesn’t give you achievements for winning the league war.
7. Keep doing more of the same stuff until you can revoke the Priveligia, also, once you have borders with a lot of the HRE you can warn all the princes and keep warning them to try to encourage peace in the empire, it’s good for a lot more IA gain, I don’t anymore because it’s kind of tedious, but you can revoke faster that way.

 

[Iayasu]

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Preparing for the PU With Poland/Lithuania

1. You get this PU because high diplo rep means you always win the election, after you’ve completed diplo ideas, and maybe gotten the Austrian idea for diplo rep, you should always have the best odds to increase support when you mouse over Poland’s heir.
   
   
2. Don’t leave a diplomat supporting your heir until your chance to increase support is in the the highest of the diplomats working, but once it is, leave it there.
   
   
3. Once you start winning elections you have two ways to get this PU
   
   1. First is to hold onto the dynasty until after 1600 and we’ll cover more later, biggest thing is that any time you have 20 favors stored, use 10 to increase trust, once your trust is above 80 the AI will never rival you. Along the same lines, as long as you don’t give Poland HRE land, it’s okay to give them land in wars to gain some favors and make them stronger. They’re going to be your subject, practically guaranteed.
      
      
   2. The second is a pretty low chance event that gives you a CB to claim their throne, if it happens, which is only every 3-4 games I’d guess, call any ally you can get, because once you have this PU it’s almost game over.

 

[Iayasu]

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Preparing for the Castile PU:

1. This is another event based PU, Castile and Spain have an event the puts a Habsburg in Spain/Castile as long as Spain has no heir and both of you are rivaled to France, and France has rivaled you both back it has a really high chance of firing it only takes 6 months.
   
   
2. Because of geography, the conditions for this event are really common if the Iberian wedding fires, France is one of the only countries left for Spain to rival and vice versa.
   
   
3. Once your heir is on their throne wait until you have over 80 trust or they have a weak claim heir on their throne, after that break the alliance right away. Unless you decide to wait until after you revoke in the HRE.
   
   
4. You’re waiting for 80 trust because they won’t rival you, which makes RM impossible and claiming the throne impossible.
   
   
5. Now you’re angling to claim their throne and go to war to force a PU, no matter what make sure you keep your favors with Poland high, because this will be a tough war that you’ll want to win quickly, to prevent any of the other major powers from hitting you while you’re weak. It’s probably a good idea to have hit France at least once before this war, they’re the most likely to take a shot at you, one good war will weaken them up enough to hesitate. Hitting France is also a good way to gain favors with Castile to use to increase their trust.
   
   
6. Claiming a throne is important enough it can be worth considering breaking a truce to do it. If you’re worried you won’t have the claim throne cb after a truce is over check the coalition tooltip and see how bad it will be, if there’s a decent chance the coalition won’t fire, it may be you want to try for it without waiting out the truce timer.
   
   
7. After you force the PU, make sure all your new subjects get to positive relations ASAP, if your monarch dies before that happens, the PU breaks and you have to start over again.
   
   
8. If you’re worried about this war, feel free to wait to break the alliance and deal with this war after you unite the HRE, just watch what’s going on in Castile, if you see any kind of rebels that will change their house make sure you get over there and help out.

 

[Iayasu]

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Avoid wars with or win wars with your real enemies:

1. As long as you have Poland and Spain as allies, France, the Ottomans, and Russia will be scared to try and take you on, but all three together could be a real problem, they all have better Mil ideas then you do. Your advantage is that your allies are a lot easier to maintain. You’re all the same religion, and closer together.
   
   
2. France is the most isolated of the three, and the weakest early, you want to take them on with Castile before they get Elán, once they do they’re a nightmare, but before then Castile actually has the better starting military and can actually take them one on one, let alone with the help of you, your PUs, and their PUs. Just make sure you can call Castile into your war, feel free to promise them territory. Don’t forget to check the diplo situation and the ledger before you actually declare.
   
   
3. Try not to break France up too much before the Event for a Spanish Habsburg fires, remember, you and Spain both have to have Rivaled France and been rivaled back for it to fire. Get too big and you, Spain, or both won’t be eligible rivals for France anymore.

Now for your real problem, Poland, Poland, oh we love you, and you’re so eager to take the juicy Russian land, and you’re an AI idiot.


Poland has a nasty tendency to start an Austrian death spiral that creates a de facto alliance of your three enemies, even though they aren’t really allied. The death spiral starts when they declare war on Muscovy or the Ottomans, but usually Muscovy and call you in. You don’t have the PU over Castile yet, you haven’t done anything to slow down France yet, and before Mil tech 12 the Ottomans are godlike, even though they fall off really fast after that. This war goes okay, but not great and starts to burn up your manpower a little bit. Then if they declared on the Russians, the Ottomans will declare on them, or vice versa, since they’re declaring on Poland, you still can’t get Castile to come help. This is still winnable, but your manpower is draining fast and things aren’t looking great. Now France will pick this moment to declare on you, either because you let them get Elán, or they waited until the Spain wouldn’t join, anyway you now have three wars to lose and peace out of while losing, and those three will keep tag teaming you for the rest of the dang game. So how to stop it:

1. Always or nearly always stay at war, your allies can’t call you in to offensive wars when you’re at war. If you have to, savescum and go back to before they called you in and declare on some random HRE prince just to take their gold.
   
   
2. Use Castile to beat back France early, and consider trying for the Spanish PU before you revoke, it’ll stop anyone from being able to declare on you, or your allies without taking on all of you.
   
   
3. If you do get called in, throw your all into the war, even if your allies and subjects can handle it. You have to end this war before one of the other powers declare.
   
   
4. Keep your army built up to your force limit, especially early in the game, lots of infantry units are fine and relatively cheap, you don’t necessarily need lots of artillery until you can afford them anyway, and a big army will scare your enemies into considering not attacking.
   
   
5. That being said, keeping a few cannon around makes sieges go much faster, and always have at least one in your siege armies.
   
   
6. Fight smarter, not harder, fight on ground that gives you a terrain bonus. If you have to siege down a fort that has a nasty terrain bonus for the enemy don’t let your whole stack get attrition keep your army nearby to reinforce. Make sure your whole army is nearby so you can handle enemy armies. Consider using the break walls button for forts in the mountains.
   
   
7. Send single infantry units to allied AI sieges, the AI tends to wander off and get distracted, those single units are expendable, but can keep siege progress from getting lost.
   
   
8. Leave single infantry from your own armies if you have to send your siege force to help in a batte.
   
   
9. In a nasty war where you need all the manpower you have, consolidate your infantry regiments after every battle and replace them with mercs. You can disband the mercs after the war, and pay back the loans with gold you steal from HRE princes, some of whom have 1000s of ducats just lying around because you haven’t let them expand. This also gets your morale back faster, because new built units start at half morale instead of flat empty. Don’t do this in every war, but if you know it’s going to be close, do it right from the start, it’ll save WE and put your enemies on a path to running out of manpower before you do. If you really need to you can check the ledger after the war and specifically choose an HRE prince to go plunder just based on how much gold he has lying around.
   
   
10. The just don’t try to take on your enemies to the east until you’ve either revoked in the HRE or you have the Spain PU or Commonwealth PU. Or even just wait til after Mil tech 12 or so, western units catch up a lot to Ottomans by then in their units pips, after mil tech 18 you pull ahead.
    
    
11. When you’re sieging, only have infantry and artillery sitting on the actual fort, and always have at least as many infantry as artillery, even if that’s more then you need for the siege. With that exception, only siege with just enough units for that fort.
    
    1. Cavalry can be sitting one province away and can be detached from your reinforcements to make it back faster if you desire, they’re also more expensive to reinforce attrition damage and don’t do anything to help the siege
       
       
    2. If the besieging army is attacked while its there, any artillery that don’t have an infantry unit with them will deploy in the front line, taking a lot more damage.
       
       
    3. Keeping your army that’s not needed for the siege back a province saves a lot of attrition damage in the long run.
       
       
    4. In the screen for the province you’re besieging you can see both how many total units it will take to make siege province, and mousing over the artillery bonus will tell you how many cannons you need for each level of bonus there. Don’t use any more units to siege a province then you have to, attrition is going to be your number one killer most of the time.
12. I can’t say this enough, but really win a war against france and split 100 warscore worth of stuff between you and Castile before France gets Elán, you can check what ideas they have on their diplo screen.
    
    
13. Early game morale advisors are the best military advisor, make sure you have one in nasty wars before 1600, discipline is better later, but by then you don’t have to worry about it.

 

[Iayasu]

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Finishing up in the HRE / Revoking

1. The most important reform you pass is revoking the priveligia.
   
   
2. You’ll probably get here anytime between 1550 and 1600, depending on how things go.
   
   
3. Before you pass the reform, check the tooltip to make sure all the princes will vote for it.
   
   
4. Any prince that votes against will break out of the HRE
   
   
5. Keep improving relations, giving gifts, waiting for more IA, whatever you need to, until all princes vote for the reform
   
   
6. Your vassal swarm can take on almost any power on their own now, use your armies mostly for sieges or finishing off defeated troops, the swarm can get… distracted.
   
   
7. Leaving the swarm intact for a long time helps you, each of those princes get’s their own monarch points which they can use to core land for you, or develop it, there’s no need to rush the last reform.
   
   
8. Also, the last reform removes all your emperor bonuses from the previous reforms, so you’ll actually tend to be weaker, although more organized, once you pass it.
   
   
9. The last reform give you all your prince’s territory for free, no monarch point cost, so be sure you’ve used them to conquer as much as you can without LD getting too high.
   
   
10. If you have any desire to tag switch do so before the last reform, most tags are disabled after that.
    
    
11. Passing the last reform is just like revoking, and princes that vote against break out, including you losing your overlord status, so make sure to improve relations with princes that will vote against and that they all vote with before you pass it.

 

[Iayasu]

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Late game PU over the Commonwealth

1. After 1600, Poland / the Commonwealth gets an event chain to end the elective Monarchy
   
   
2. You’ll see a bunch of rebels show up in their lands, maybe as many as 60 or 90, they’ll be called something like Polish Magnate rebels.
   
   
3. To end the elective monarchy he has to kill all those rebels, you’re allied and next door, ask for Mill access and then go help him
   
   
4. When all the rebels are gone end the alliance and cancel mil access, keep your RM, please make sure you have trust above 80, or even maxed trust at this point.
   
   
5. You won’t get any popups, but the diplomat you’ve had sitting in his territory for the last 50 years supporting heirs from your dynasty will be kicked out. This means they’re a normal monarchy, and as long as you won the last election they don’t have an heir and have your dynasty, so claim their dang throne.
   
   
6. This is game winning time, winning this war puts an end to all coalitions, break the truce before he gets an heir and your claim throne is useless.
   
   
7. Your vassal swarm can win this war on their own, but go help them, peace out asap, don’t worry about separate peacing allies, you want to have this throne and get your relations with them back up so they don’t break away. Do whatever you have to so that doesn’t happen, including taking loans so you can use your great power influence to improve relations + give them a gift for 50 total relations improvement asap.

 

[Iayasu]

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Late PU over Spain


If you’re going for the Spanish PU after you revoke you really only have a couple thing to worry about. Also, get the late Poland PU before you try for this one.

1. You might not have a Habsburg or be able to get the event for a Habsburg on their throne.

1. 1. Any time you have an heir with under 9 total points, wait until your current ruler is in his 50s and start disinheriting your heir.
      
      
   2. When your ruler dies without an heir, you’ll get the same dynasty as your highest development RM partner. As long as you have any countries under you in a PU it’s impossible for you to fall under one without an ally using the claim or reclaim throne CB/winning a war against you. If Poland is under you in a PU, they start out with you still being RM to them, you may need to break the RM so the Spain will have the highest Development of your RM Partners, don’t break it until you’ve got them to +200 relations so they don’t go negative after breaking the RM.
      
      
   3. Once you switch to the new dynasty, wait for Castile/Spain to have no heir or a weak heir, break your alliance and claim their throne, once you revoked you’ve outgrown coalitions, so break the truce so you can get the dang throne.
2. You never got above 80 trust, they rivaled you so you can’t RM them anymore.
   
   1. Just grow in the other direction until they’re not eligible rivals anymore, then go back to step one.

Congrats, you’ve now got most of Europe as Subjects, and 200+ years to go for WC against enemies that can’t touch you. Have Fun! Be careful to focus against one religion at a time in your conquests, otherwise you might still be able to get a coalition formed on you, you’d probably still win, but why go through the hassle.

 

[kacekov]

loved the guide. tried one time had some caotic time putting down heretic princes cause i didnt prepare well so im rerunning it. hope u make more guides like this.
side note. when do u think its best to activate the golden era buff?

 

[Iayasu]

loved the guide. tried one time had some caotic time putting down heretic princes cause i didnt prepare well so im rerunning it. hope u make more guides like this.
side note. when do u think its best to activate the golden era buff?

When you've already maxed out your absolutism and you're ready to get the 5 more points.

 

[hitchens]

Hello, what map mod is that?

 

[Iayasu]

Hello, what map mod is that?

Theatrum Orbis Terrarum (Add-On: Deep Blue Water)
Translucent Colored Mapmodes
A Rev. Font Mod - Vanilla Gold
A Rev. Borders Addon: Bigger Country Borders
A Revolutionary Borders Mod
Even Better Terra Incognita