HRE XL

I'm working on two German games right now and have had a few failures as the Germans as well, so i'd thought I might contribute my store of experience. Anyone else is welcome to share their knowledge as well.

HRE-Early.

Early is where I have the most experience as it is when I almost always start.

The Empire in early has both good and bad. It is fairly large and has access to potential targets on all sides. Swabian Swordsmen will rip through anything so long as they are not swamped by armor piercing units and do not take the brunt of a cavalry charge, although they do require a bit of teching to get. You have access to both seas, making trade a good goal in lieu of conquest.

On the bad side of things, the size of the Empire makes your borders long and in some cases time-consuming to reinforce, as your troop production centers (such as they are) are Swabia and Burgandy, in the center of your holdings. Targets on all sides means potential enemies on all sides, not to mention that you and everyone around you is Catholic. The Pope will scream bloody murder every time you try to expand, and if you continue on your rampage he will excommunicate you, which will lead to you being a target for everyone else. In a few games more than once i've started beating on one faction, then had everyone else knocking at my doors. With a catapult.

Which is why I suggest you keep fairly low during the first few decades, and build up your production and troop strength, in particular Swabia as it is there that gives you Swabian swordsmen, which should be the backbone of your armies throughout the early period. Get the castle as soon as you can with swordsmiths and armories, and then build nothing but those Swabians. Use your Emperor as your general, but back him up when Prince Conrad comes of age in a few years.

Complete turtling can be rather boring however, which is why I have compiled a list of possible targets:

The Danes.
With only one province right to your north it appears as if the Danes might be easy pickings. Yes and no. While it is true they only have one or two chances to win against you, they also have access to those lovely Norsemen, specifically the Huscarls, Landsmenn, and Carls. These monsters will rip through anything anyone can and will send at them for the first few decades, and the Danes even start out with a few units of them. In contrast all you'll have is a few piddly Urban Militia and some spearmen. The other Danish problem is their king. Apparently the old goat has some viagra in his pocket because he will be pumping out princes with shiny new lances and armor like there is no tomorrow. So if you're going after the Danes, you're going to be very hard-pressed. If you wait too long you'll have fifty little squadrons of royal knights to deal with. If you try to off them right off the bat, you'll have only one or two royal knights, but Viking warriors to deal with. The first time I tried tackling the Danes I simply gathered all units I could spare (I.E every unit except the bare-bone 100 needed in each province to keep order) and marched north with my king. Big mistake. The Danes simply wiped everyone off the map. Literally. I didn't survive that loss and struggled on for a few years until the French snuffed me out. So what do you do? Simple. pump out as many units as you can as fast as you can, and march north with around twice to three times the men the Danes have. Usually they will retreat to the castle if you have enough men, and usually the castle will fall the next turn, owing from lack of supplies. (At least, that has happened to me.) Problem solved, and even though the Pope will yell at you, the Danes will be gone before His Holiness can do anything about it. After the Danes you'll have nothing but rebels in Scandanavia to deal with, but a word of caution. If you don't garrison Scandanavia with a good amount of men you'll have rebellions every day of the week. So only bite what you can digest, so to speak.

The Bohemians
Again, only one province to consider, but easier, MUCH easier, due to the fact that first of all they have no heir, second they only have a few spearmen units, and thirdly you have your king and a few spearmen of your own nearby. If your careful and lucky you should wipe them out with nobody noticing. With Inns you can get the Bohemian Bowmen, a very excellent addition to any armies forces as stop-gaps and skirmishers. They can even hold their own in a fight against the early spears and militia.

Rebel Provinces
All is not lost, however. Prussia and Pomerania are rebel provinces and thus nice targets. If you're playing on GA mode they will help complete both Drang Nack Osten and HRE. Go for them as soon as you are able, and best of all they can form a corridor to the pagans in the east, just waiting for a crusade...

All things considered, your first priority is to consolidate your currant holdings. many of you generals have fairly low loyalty. Hand out those titles to those with the lowest and start building.


After you base is established, you have a few options.
if you manage to get past the Hungarians and Poles everyone to the east will be Pagan or Orthodox. Plenty of pickings due to the many small kingdoms such as the Lithuanians and Cumans. But be prepared to bring along plenty of knights and other horsemen. The plains of eastern Europe are home to some nasty special horses.

If on the other hand you are looking towards the West, you will have to deal with His Holiness first, in fact sooner or later you WILL have to deal with His Holiness, the Pope. But DO NOT under ANY circumstances drive south until your empire is secure, you have those Swabians, and you are powerful enough to at least deter or absorb any attacks brought on by excommunication. Be prepared too for rebellions across the Empire. I suggest doing the battles yourself and simply kill all the prisoners, and if any are left execute them. This will drive your dread rating higher, and make it less likely for people to rebel.

The Venitians have a Citadel in *gasp* Venice. Expect a long seige and/or bloody assault. However you should go for the Pope as quickly as possible. Wipe him out, and when he re-appears torch one small province that he may be re-appearing in (prefferably the Papal States) and let him have that, assassinate him or wait for him to die of old age watching the borders. Leave him be though and make peace with him. As soon as either your Emperor or currant Pope dies you'll be back in the catholic fold again, although perhaps not as in good standing.

From Germany and Rome your goals are up to you.

Viel Gluck!

your the holy Roman Emperor, screw the pope. Conquer all you want, then launch crusades to back on his good side.

That really doesn't work with the HRE. When people say no one likes the HRE, their talking about your own people two. So unless you can handle both rebellions, multiple wars and possibly civil wars at the same time, you are going to be the good little boy and listen to the Pope. When you are strong enough (able to produce Feudal units from 4 provinces at least), then you can tell the pope where to go and/or where to shove it, not before.

I have found that while I have expanded to a sizeable empire, I am at war with everyone and no one will offer a ceasefore or accept my offers. I own most of Iberia, Scandanavia and all of western and central europe up to Volhynia, and down to Constantinople. I have made inroads into the Steppes by taking Lithuania, Estonia Latvia and Novgorod.

I'm content to leave my conquest of the steppes at that for now, knowing that sometime soon the Golden Horde is going to come a knocking, so i'm more focused on defense than attack now, but people won't leave me alone! The damn Castile-Leonese won't leave me be, nor with the turks, and the Russians keep moving menacing looking stacks around my borders. I've managed to get excommunicated and am struggling to hold the empire together. Trade is non existant thanks to all of the wars going on and money is short!

I desperately need to establish a peace, but people seem determined to force me into squashing them completely. I have influence coming out my ears, but how do I get people to accept my ceasefires/marriage offers?

It's highly unlikely that they will make peace with you. Sounds like you're the largest and most powerful empire on the map. As has been said earlier, noone likes the HRE - and especially now everyone is in anit-HRE-mode.

Imho the difficulty is not moderate, rather hard or even very hard (at least in the beginning).

The Empire is huge, there are a lots of enemies around and you have only a few troop production centers at the beginning. But you have quite a big army so you can achieve local numerical superiority against the smaller nations. So an early blitz is a must. In my last game (Early - Expert - Domination) I followed this strategy:

1. Phase - Early blitz, crippling the neighbours

The HRE has got 6 neighbours (Bohemians - 1 province, Danes and Venetians - 2 provinces, Hungary, Poland - 3 provinces, Genoese - 4 provinces, French - 5 provinces), and none of them seems to be friendly in the future. To decrease the number of possibly enemies I gathered my armies into 3 groups and attacked the Bohemians, the Venetians and the Danes. This 3 attack happened almost simultaneuosly.
I managed to kill the Bohemian king, and their army retreated in thei keep and become rebels, so in a few turns i could bribe them.
The Venetians tend to abandon Venice if they face a bigger army, and if an attack happens against Milan in the same turn their King has no place to withdraw, sohe dies.
The Danes can also be beaten in Denmark (hard fight), and if they loose they have onyl Scania with no production facilities in the beginning, so they are no threat further.

By these 3 attacks I managed not only to destroy 2 of my enemies, and cripple the 3rd one, but I aquired 3 troop production centers (Denmark) - which was vital in my expanding Empire.

In the first turns I built Watch Towers, Border Forts and Town Waches everywhere to raise loyalty and my King got the "builder" virtue which increases loyalty further. I tried to ally with the Hungarians, the Poles, the Sweds and the Norwegians, but everyone ignored me. In Swabia iI sarted to build towards Swabian sordsmen.

In Provance and Venice and Denmark I built boats to avoid invasons fom the seas.


2. Phase - Reducing the lenght of the borders and farming

As soon as I had some ships from Provance I attacked the Genoese on the Mainland. My fleet at the Ligurian sea cut off their supplies and prevented them to withdraw to the isles. I destoyed their armies and ransomed their King. So I occupied another production center (Genoa) and pushed them back to Corsica and Sardinia. After killing all of their fleets I removed mine from their shores, so they become neutral.

To the south I had a 2 provinces-border (Tuscany and Venice) to the Papacy, to the north I had only Denmark to defend (fleets on the North sea and Skagerrak protected my northern provinces from the possible invasion of the Sweds and Norwegians), to the east I had 2 growing kingdoms of Poland and Hungary, to the west the French started to gather a massive army.

I decided to go west. The French had 4 provinces next to my border (Flanders, Champagne,Ile de France, and Toulouse). I concentrated ol IdF, so they lost their most developed province and become totally hopeless. In some battles I destroyed theif armies and besieged their castles. My forces stopped in Flanders, IdF, Toulouse facing the English in the west. During my western campign the Huns and the Poles both started to attack Austria and Bohemia, and I could keep then in some very difficult battles.

By this time I got excommed by the Pope killing fellow christians (French), so I decided to get rid of him. I conquered the whole Italian penisula (sorry fof the Byz in Naples), and left a strong army in Rome to deal with the reemerging forces of the Pope.

To boost my economy I built farmlands in my richer provinces (Flanders, Provance, Milan, Venice, Toulouse), and pumped ships like crazy. In Toulouse, Saxony, Franconia, IdF and Bohemia I started to build toward Chiv Knights, in Switzerland, Rome and the Papal States towards Swiss halberdiers and Swiss Armoured Pikemen.

The next step of my western expasion was to chase the British off the Mainland, kill the French in Brittany, and conquer Northern Spain until I got Valencia and Castilie. That was quite easy as I had armies far superior in numbers. In Spain I got got 3 further provinces with iron, and I shared the penisula with the Almos. On the western seas I destroyed every single British fleets and repeated the "neutralization-tactic" like the Genoese before.

3. Phase - War in the Eastern Front

My western borders (Valencia, Castilie) and northern (Denmark) were secure, I had a strong force guarding Rome, and all my shores were well defended by fleets, so I could go offensive in the East. This was a long war, with lots of provines to conquer, but my enemies were no match for my veteran generals and forces from the western wars, so I easily killed the Huns, the Serbs, the Poles, pushed back the Byz, the Cumans and the Kievians. By the time the Horde appeared I was occupying the easily defendable Lihtuania - Kiev - Levidia eastern borders and Constantinople on south-east.

4. Phase - Developing the Empire

After reaching Constantinople, Levidia, Kiev and Lithuania I decided to stop the expansion. And develop my armies. That was a very long and boring project, and lasted until 1400. At Rome, Papal States and Switzerland i built Swiss Armored Pikemen, at IdF Chivarlic Foot Knights (valour bonus + retrained at Castilie for weapon upgrade), at Toulouse Chiv Knights (valour bonus + retrained at Aragon for weapon upgrade), at Saxony Gothic Knignts (valour bonus + retrained at Franconia for weapon upgrade). I still had Bohemia, Hungary, Carpathia and Tuscany for weapon upgrades, so i built Chiv Swordsmen and Sergeants there. Plus pavise arbalesters in some provinces and a lots of Carracks. With my huge trade income (Muslim kingdoms, Britany, Scancinavia, Genoese) and fully maxed farms i could easily suppart this huge army. I had great heirs during the whole game (5-8 stars) so I had about 5-6 generals with 9 sars by 1400.

5. Phase - End Game

By 1400 I hade an insane army (everyone with 4 weapon and armour upgrades) so I went offensive again. I attacked in every front at the same time. My armies poured from Denmark to Scandinavia and later the British Isles, from Valencia and Castilie to southern Spain and later North Africa, from Constantinople to Turkey and later the Middle East and from Lithuania, Kiev and Levidia to the steppes. It was a childplay. I had the best generals, the best troop with the best equipment. Sometimes armies 2-3X bigger retreated from my elite troops. It was still a long campaign to conquer all the remaining teritories, but by 1438 every singe province belonged to the Holy Roman Empire.

Summary:
1. The early blitz is very useful, because the of the fewer enemies and the more troop production centers.
2. You have to fight at least 2 wars at the same time
3. After gaining the dominance in Western and Central Europe everything will be much easier
4. Removing the Pope is a must. First, he is the natural enemy if the HRE, second removing him prevents the constant excommucations while conquering the catholic Europe
5. It's very important to protect the northern coastal provinces by fleets ASAP.

I have found that while I have expanded to a sizeable empire, I am at war with everyone and no one will offer a ceasefore or accept my offers. I own most of Iberia, Scandanavia and all of western and central europe up to Volhynia, and down to Constantinople. I have made inroads into the Steppes by taking Lithuania, Estonia Latvia and Novgorod.

I'm content to leave my conquest of the steppes at that for now, knowing that sometime soon the Golden Horde is going to come a knocking, so i'm more focused on defense than attack now, but people won't leave me alone! The damn Castile-Leonese won't leave me be, nor with the turks, and the Russians keep moving menacing looking stacks around my borders. I've managed to get excommunicated and am struggling to hold the empire together. Trade is non existant thanks to all of the wars going on and money is short!

I desperately need to establish a peace, but people seem determined to force me into squashing them completely. I have influence coming out my ears, but how do I get people to accept my ceasefires/marriage offers?




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It's a really great and fantastic informative post here in his forum about the these guide lines. I appreciate that and like it very much. It's really fulfill the my and other viewers requirements very well.

welcome to the org alexanderjohn, enjoy your stay
:bow:

being as large as you are none will - rightly ;)! - leave you alone. Do the right things for the situation: build happiness buildings starting from the cheap ones, minimise your borders and get rid of what factions you can eliminate assuming the elimination will result in border reduction. try to stabilise as quick as you can, else your new ruler that will start from lower influence may end up with civil wars in his hands. You can, in addition to here, join us in the Main Hall, to discuss XL.

:bow:

Gollum is right. Forget about making peace. Not going to happen.

I suggest you do the stuff Gollum suggested. If you can get some spies, they could help with loyalty problems too. Obviously work on your farms when you can. You should have been putting some money into farming before you rushed all over Europe and got yourself on a shoe string budget, but thats a lesson for next time.

Here is a possible general strategy. Obviously I can't tell if it is workable without seeing your game.

1: Withdraw from the steppes, destroying all buildings except castles. The benefits are as follows: A: an easier to defend boarder around the Volhynia general area. B: A cash infusion from the destoyed buildings. C: With luck those provinces will go rebel before the Russians take them, giving you a buffer between yourself and the Russians. That's why you leave the castles. Let the Russians waste time and troops seiging out those rebels.

2: Hopefully this will take pressure off your northeastern front, freeing you to work on crushing the Castile-Leonese, and maybe whoever else is in Iberia. The benefits of this are: A: Pressure is taken off your western front B: Money spent carefully on the best Iberian farmlands can bring in good money

3: If steps one and two work out just right, you will be freed up to teach the Turks a lesson.

Interesting ideas BB. Of course we dont know how much army you have alexanderjohn. It may be that you have enough to keep it together while at the same time you can free enough cash to build farms and stabilise by happiness buildings. If that's the case then you better stay put. But if not giving up some area to concentrate in something more tangible, economically viable and defensible may be a route to take.

In any case: keep us updated and if you wan/want you can post some screenshots too.