Germany...

[Kadagar_AV]

I've had no problem playing any other faction i've tried so far (egypt, turkish, byzantine, spain, england), but playing as HRE is a real pain...

surrounded by enemies, i have like 10 boarders (sp?) to protect, and cant defend em all and have a fluid economy...

hints/tips?

this is early btw, no SAP or Gothic stuff...

[Oaty]

Never played Germany before but a dirty tacic I thought might work is to save most of your money build a few inns in the provinces that are most noteworthy of keeping while aslo maintainin a bit of a garrison and wait for an invitation to total war. Once you are attacked keep on retreating and wait til that faction gets a nice little present from the pope and turn out a war machine from your inns and the few provinces you upgraded. You then have 10 years to wreak havoc on them. Another thing is if you lose a lot of territory to them and they get excommunicated you might get a nice loyalist rebellion in your favor. I've learned with the harder factions to play all you have to do is let them take the territory remove most of your troops in the next territory and eventually there fast expansion will be there own demise

[rolin]

I like to play the Holy Roman Empire, because it's a really challenge.

My tactics for winning with them is to play offensive in the beginning and shorten my borders as soon as possible by expansion to the Atlantic Ocean, killing the Danes and Poland and keeping always an eye on the Magyars.

I use to upgrade my few iron provinces to build the feudal series, like oaty wrote. In every province with no military complex I use to build an inn and a church. If war starts, you can defend yourself with tons of mercenarys. Crusades against excommunicated enemies are also useful.

[Cazbol]

I'm playing HRE at the moment and have found it fairly easy.

My main fear was the limited loyalty, so try to ensure the your armies are led by fairly loyal generals. Unless there's a better general or a noble available, the last man to enter a stack ususally (although not always) gets to be the general.

Offer alliances to all your immediate neighbours and accept all their alliance proposals. You'll benefit greatly from times of peace to prepare.

Try to spread your troops along the whole border, matching the threat or the strength of the neighbour's troops there. In general, do not tempt your neighbours by offering them weakly defended provinces. You can afford to leave central provinces like Switzerland and Bavaria defended only by cheap peasants to control the population. Focus your main defences on the provinces that surround the central provinces, so you won't have to defend your heartland. You can leave outlying provinces like Provence be a little less defended as its loss would not threaten your heartland.

As suggested, build inns in border provinces, preferably all of them. Should war erupt somewhere, the inns close by should quickly fill up. Try to avoid moving all your defencive forces away from peaceful frontiers to enter a war at another front. This would likely tempt the neigbour at the weakened border to attack you. Use the mercenaries instead.

Should you choose your enemies, start with Denmark and then France, to reduce your borders.

[Jxrc]

Shortening your borders asap is the key according to me but before doing so you need to build enough troops and thus need a few years.

I usually start as follows :

- Round 1 : build watchtowers in all provinces. It gives you the Builder virtue and raise loyalty. Start building any troops available (spearmen in Burgundy, militia in Switzerland, Emissaries in Swabia). Try to conclude alliance with the French (Emissary in Swabia ) and the Polish (Princess in Brandenburg). With VI the offer is usually rejected by the Polish and accepted by the French.

- Round 2 : Raise taxes to very high in every provinces. Build forts in all provinces, spear-workshop in Switzerland and Swabia. Send reinforcement to Lorraine, Burgundy and Bohemia. Try to get an alliance with Hungary and Italy.

After a few turns, if you are Lucky, the Polish should attack the rebels in Moldavia, Prussia, Pomerania or that other province east (forgot the name). Time to seize Poland while their troops are divided and beat them piecemeal ... Hold Poland and they are dead because all their other provinces are so poor that they won't be able to produce anything else than peasants and woodsmen.

Once you have secured Poland (about 1105), you should have enough troops on the western and northern border to check any attempt by the French and Danes. Time to go south and seize those juicy Italian provinces. Though battles ahead since the Italians have better troops than you usual spearmen and militia. Mounted crossbowmen and, if you can afford them, mercenary cavalry are a must. Try to kill as many knights as possible to get rid of the entire faction, otherwise they will withdraw to Corsica and remain able to attack your provinces until you get a few boats.

After that it is usually time for a pause. Try to get a stalemate with the French until you have been able to replace your early units with feudal ones. Once it has been done you have plenty of options : Hungary (but it is usually useful to keep it between yourself and the Byzantines), east and the many rebels or west (French and English - Secure you border but difficult and the Pope will not appreciate ...).

Not a walkthrough of course, merely a few suggestions.

[Praetorian]

Good tactic, thanks jxrc

[Jxrc]

One last thing. Give command to any general with a virtue bootsing morale, otherwise spearmen could run after the first casualties. Once I lost something like 800 men after I had killed ... 23 ...

Moreover that glorious defeat triggered a nasty chain reaction, all provinces revolting at once. Five turns later, I was left with my own little kingdom of Tyrolia and my mighty horde of 400 brave spearmen and archers ... Not a good starting point for world conquest

Ok, it that kind of defeat teaches you humility but it is not the aim of a game designed to make you feel like the mightiest warlord ever, ruler of all ...

[Mount Suribachi]

If you're playing VI, don't forget to build Swabian Swordsmen. They are 60-strong units of Jedi Knights The only infantry I've come across in early than can beat the vaunted AUMs

[Brutal DLX]

Those are all viable strategies, although I would not recommend raising taxes to very high that early. I also hardly use mercenaries, as your regular troops most likely have low loyalty already and adding more mercenaries can do bad things to you instead of good ones.
Basically I upgrade all my provinces, focusing on the innermost ones first, and try to have at least 200 men garrisons in every province. If you build your agriculture, you can upgrade to better troops quickly and thusly keep an edge over the early peasant/hobilar stacks that other nations have raised in the meantime.
I also never initiate a war, but rather react or join the fun once France and England get going at each other. Even if you don't make one single conquest during the first 100 turns, your can still make a good profit and upgrade your provinces considerably.
Of course if you feel safe you could always try to capture the rebel provinces of Pomerania and Prussia, and then get sea trade going.
The only real reasons of concern for you are your ruler's influence (if very low you may have to start a war sooner than you wanted) and thus the loyalty of your troops, and the number of high ranking enemy generals (mostly French and English).

[Quokka]

Haven't played as the HRE yet. I'm a little worried about trying them, they have imploded impressively in all the games I have played so far.

One thing I would like to know more about, is this true?

Quote[/b] ]Unless there's a better general or a noble available, the last man to enter a stack ususally (although not always) gets to be the general.

[Nowake]

kill Poland in one turn and strike France. This is the best strategy, don't bother with other methods.

[Cazbol]

Quote[/b] (Quokka @ Sep. 02 2003,19:11)]One thing I would like to know more about, is this true?

Quote[/b] ]Unless there's a better general or a noble available, the last man to enter a stack ususally (although not always) gets to be the general.

You can easily test this. Find a stack with some troops where noone has any command stars or titles. See who's the current general; pull another unit out of the stack and put it back in. That unit should now be the general. Occasionally this doesn't work, and a certain unit keeps the general status. I'm not entirely sure why, but it seems a bit like a certain type of unit will be preferred as a general to other lesser units. It might also be some V&V they have, but I'm not sure. Most of the time it works though.

[o_loompah_the_delayer]

If all units have no stars commanders, but one of them is a governor, the governor will always lead the stack whichever unit you put in last.

[o_loompah_the_delayer]

Regarding strategy, I agree with pr fire - knock out Poles within the first two years then focus on France. Also keep taxes low b/c of the loyalty problem. And Denmark will invade sooner or later, so what I would do is take them early with the vikings you get in saxony and then take rich, rich sweden

[Cazbol]

Quote[/b] (o_loompah @ Sep. 03 2003,09:23)]If all units have no stars commanders, but one of them is a governor, the governor will always lead the stack whichever unit you put in last.

That is correct. I was referring to them as nobles but should have said governors. There is however still some other reason for some units getting special rights to be generals among equals and I can't really figure out why.

[Aelwyn]

Because there are some units designated to not be good General candidates, I think.

Best strategy I have used is pretty much like pr Fire. I usually attack France first though, get a hold of Flanders. I hollow out the center and leave peasants for garrisons, or urban militia. You should have a province in the Mediterranean, and a few in the north, including Flanders on the English Channel. I'll usually build up a fleet at this point. Make money, maintain a strong border to the east (most of the time Hungary will attack me). Eliminate everyone on the Iberian Penninsula, and by then you're built up enough to basically roll over the others with a pretty large economy and some upgraded troops. Oh and build up farmlands as well. With ships you can get Sweeden before you have to attack the Danes, just in case they have large amounts of Royal Knights and you don't have available units to take them on yet. Build up Sweeden, and they will further your economy with trade.

[ShadesWolf]

HRE on hard is a real challenge.

On the Early era, attack the Italians and quickly wipe them out. When the pope excommunicates you, attack him and eliminate him also.

By this time most of your home provinces will have rebelled, so it is now time to go back and recapture them. This should take about ten year.

The reason why I suggest attacking the pope, is he will not tollerate aggresion towards other Catholic faction, so the best action is to eliminate him to free you up. This will also help in sorting out your rebelling provinces

[Mr Frost]

Quote[/b] (Aelwyn @ Sep. 03 2003,11:19)]Because there are some units designated to not be good General candidates, I think.

Look in CRUSADERS_UNIT_PROD11.TXT in Collum 10 {10th bit info in each unit} and you will see the factor that determins what type of unit a hero {in DEFAULT_HEROES.TXT} is made as {I modded most to be DISCOURAGED so the AI would make their heroes as Knights or Khwarazamaims etc} . I imagine this also can have effect when a general must be chosen in a Province from multiple stacks of 0 star generals and such , but generally the last one in a stack gets it unless outranked by a titleholder or general with higher command .