A few Questions

[putts]

First off, I typically play as the Germans starting in the Early Period.

Let me lay out my usual strategy and get some critiques from you much wiser folks than I.....
Upgrade to 20% Farms in all territories
Continue to upgrade economy in outer provinces.
Turn Switzerland, Bavaria and Swabia into military factories. Archers, Infantry and Knights, respectively.
Turn Burgundy into my "CIA"....turning out ninjas, spies, etc.
Turn Provence and Friesland into Naval provinces
Start taking over Rebel countries (starting with Pomerania and going West) by means of Emissaries. If the bribe fee is too large, I will resort to force.

This is my pretty standard strategy for getting the game going. I usually build my biggest armies along the French, Italian and Hungary borders. Danes usually stay quiet and Poland's forces are usually pretty small.

Do you see any serious problems with that strategy. Is it totally crap? Has major holes? Could be improved?


The second part of my problems comes in once I've finally conquered all the rebel countries that I want (can get my hands on). The ones I usually always try to get are Pomerania, Prussia, Lithuania, Kiev and Livonia. I like the resources in the Western provinces and the access into the western Mediterranean. All usually goes quite well.....armies start to build up nicely, money starts flowing in.....then the first big problem....my King will go and die on me. This cuts my income greatly and usually makes me drop some tax rates to get certain provinces happy again. Is there something I can do to protect against this great downfall? Secondly, the fact that I get so huge so quickly has advantages and disadvantages. The biggest one is that almost no matter which Catholic faction I get involved in war with, I will be the one who gets excommed.....a serious downer.....even if I basically let them take one of my provinces for a couple years (have experimented with this by leaving just 100 or so troops in Tyrolia or Brandenburg and not putting up much of a fight when the enemy comes knocking).

One other annoying factor.....let's say France comes at Lorraine and I defend successfully....BAM...every ally I have (except the good ole English) will ditch me....even though I won the first battle. Anyway around this?


So...that's it,really...
How can I improve my starting strategy?
How do I make my income not so reliant on my Emperor?
How do I avoid always being the bad guy and getting excommed?
How do I keep "friends" during a war?


Thanks for any help. Greatly Appreciated.

[Martok]

So...that's it,really...
How can I improve my starting strategy?
How do I make my income not so reliant on my Emperor?
How do I avoid always being the bad guy and getting excommed?
How do I keep "friends" during a war?


Thanks for any help. Greatly Appreciated.

Welcome to the Org, putts!

I've not played as the Germans very often -- although coincidentally enough, I just started an HRE campaign myself a few days ago -- so I'm maybe not the best person to give you advice for this particular faction. I'll do my best, however....

How can I improve my starting strategy?

I'd say the placement and disposition of your armies is probably pretty good -- at least as good as it can be, considering the HRE is often attacked by multiple factions -- so I won't go into that.

Obviously, money is a big priority for the Germans early on, as their starting lands simply aren't very good income-wise. Given that, here's what I would recommend:

For one thing, I would hold off on upgrading the farmland in every single one of your provinces right away; it's not cost-effective to do so, especially early in the game when your funds are limited. Initially, you should try to only build farmland upgrades in provinces that already have an income of at least 250 florins or more, as that will mean your income *after* the farmland has been improved will be increased by at least 50 florins/year.

Now in your particular case, I'm not sure any German provinces have even that high an income -- except for maybe Provence -- so you'll have to lower your standards a bit, say to provinces with a base income of around 200 florins. Also, you'll probably want to build the 20% farm upgrade in at least one your troop-producing provinces, so that you can then construct the Horse Farmer line of buildings in order to be able to train your cavalry units. (It's unfortunately not very economical to upgrade the land in the 3 provinces listed, but it can't really be helped.)

Otherwise, however, I wouldn't bother to build farmland upgrades anywhere else just yet. Once your economy has improved somewhat and you have more money available, you can then build them where you see fit. If you've not already done so, I would recommend you build mines and trading posts in provinces with metals (excluding iron of course) and/or trade goods.

How do I make my income not so reliant on my Emperor?

This is a phenomenon most MTW players deal with to some extent or another, and unfortunately it's something that can't really be helped very much. If your Emperor had a high Acumen rating, and/or had one of the income-increasing virtues such as "Trader" or "Steward" -- I'm guessing your Emperor had one of the Steward traits since you built all those farm upgrades -- there's not a whole lot that can be done directly to cushion the economic blow from his death.

About the best thing you can do to alleviate the money strain is to just make sure you've appointed decent governors to all your provinces -- preferably generals with 4 acumen or more -- especially to your bigger money-making territories (Austria, Saxony, etc.). Also make sure you bestow the "state" office (Imperial/Grand Chamberlain, etc.) to a general with good Acumen as well.

How do I avoid always being the bad guy and getting excommed? How do I keep "friends" during a war?

LOL! Sorry, I'm not laughing at you; it's just that those are probably the two most frequently-asked questions by people playing the HRE. The unfortunate fact is, that as the Germans, it's extremely difficult -- if not impossible -- to obtain a favorable outcome in either of these two categories.

The empire's sheer size means it almost never has the Pope's favor in any war between it and another Catholic faction, and usually your Emperor's influence isn't high enough to keep many friends during military conflicts, especially early on in the game. And even if you're able to get his Influence to a decent level (6 crowns or higher), it still doesn't guarantee he'll retain more allies than before.



I wish I could give you better advice, putts, but the simple fact is that overall the HRE is one of the hardest factions in the game ("Moderate" difficulty my foot!). A German campaign is going to be challenging at almost every level, especially in the Early period -- you have a large area to defend, generals lacking both ability *and* loyalty, poor lands, enemies on all sides, and the Pope breathing down your neck at almost every turn.

If I discover any strategies that work when playing my HRE campaign, I'll certainly let you know....but I'm probably going to struggle through it just as much as you are now!

[putts]

Thanks for the response.

I'll try your advice tonight....especially the parts concerning making more money.
Do you have any particular strategy that you're looking to use?
I ask because now that I'm sitting back and looking it.....
1. As you mentioned, HRE's lands are too small to provide much in the way of agricultural value
2. Not many of them are "Trade Giants", offering a lot in the way of trade options
3. There's no sea that they will be able to just take full control over and rely on for trade income that way
4. They will not be favored in any war they start with any of the Catholic factions around them
5. There aren't any non-Catholic neighbors immediately available.

That's a whole lot working against them right off the bat.

I really think the best plan is to try to get West and gobble up all those provinces over there that can put out some serious cashflow. Lithuania, Kiev and Livonia (and up to Sweden and Norway if you get the chance) can provide ample trade revenue but means that you have to secure Pomerania and Prussia before Poland can (which, in turn, means that eventually Poland will come after you as they have no other options....so will the Danes if you get Norway and Sweden but that's not a big deal, really). If you go that route, though, you eventually have to plow through Poland.....there's just no way of dealing with them being a pest in your path for too long which brings us back to the problem of always being excommed in a war against a Catholic faction :(

Well, sounds like we're kinda in the same rut at the moment but I will try a few things and will get back to you if I find a good strategy to get going early on.

[seireikhaan]

Welcome to the Org, Putts!

Personally, as the HRE, I try to alleviate the money fix by conqering as quickly as possible. This means blitzing the Italians and Danes ASAP. I don't bother trying to bribe rebel provinces, as they simply aren't going to be worth it given the Empire's economic status. Generally, I try to have invaded the Italians by turn 2. Immediate target is Venice, always Venice first. 1) Its a trade giant, very valuable for the Empire, and 2) It starts with a shipright, enabling shipbuilding quickly to get your income going. If possible, grab Milan as well in the same turn, it will make the rest of the conquests a bit more palatable. More than likely, after grabbing Venice, and possibly Milan, I get a warning from the Pope, and I try to play defensive for 10 years in the South, while I assemble the biggest ad-hoc force I can to attack the Danes in the north, before they get too many royal knights via heirs. If you can somehow take Denmark, then you can take your time(sorta) to take Sweden and Norway. Scandinavia now, along with Venice, makes the Empire very profitable, as well as granting a few shipbuilders. Once the ten years down in Italy are done, try to take the rest of mainland Italy in one fell swoop, so the Pope can't excomm you. Now you've got a lot of trade potential, you've minimized borders(which is critical for the HRE), and knocked out a couple of likely nuisances from the game. From here, God only knows what could happen, but at least the Empire should be in a relatively strong position. Just make sure you NEVER, EVER trust anyone to not attack you. Everyone loves to pick on the HRE, and that includes the Pope.

Also, I agree with Martok about the farm upgrades, your starting provinces, with a couple exceptions, are simply too poor for it. Rather, get some military upgrades so you can spam units for a little bit so you can get the aforementioned blitz to work.

[ArtistofWarfare]

Yeah I just want to throw my 2 pennies in the hat:

The HRE provinces do not churn out big income at all...and your expenses start out quite high.

Of course, you need to expand slightly at first but make sure that you're sending your armies after the most lucrative provinces you can find. If you're going to spend money on an attack, make sure the attack will wind up earning you positive income. Not simply resulting in you taking a province that costs more to garrison than it accrues in income.

Due to the HRE's starting position and circumstances, I find the "dig in" and build a booming economy approach to just not be the most viable. You will of course have to do this at some point, but with the lands you start with it's not going to yield you the kind of results you're looking for.

Set up the best possible economy you can, stabalize the HRE, be prepared to protect yourself on your borders...and then begin forming a large army to expand...early. If you could move south and take some Italian lands, or even southeast into Hungary, you can start building a nice economy soon thereafter.

You just want to make sure that you're not spending time and money pumping out units that are not going to net you any real gain in the end.

p.s.- Just read through a bit more of the thread...considering what Martok is saying too: Indeed, you want to be careful with your farming upgrades early. Look at the time it will take you to begin earning a return on your investment and then calculate how much profit per turn you're looking at past that point.

Example:

Farming upgrade...costs 800 florins, would generate 110 florins per year. So in 7-8 years your entire investment has been returned. Past that point, you'll gain 110 florins per turn above what you were earning from that province before the farming upgrade. You need to decide if this is worth it. This becomes more important past the 20% upgrades to farming, as these are larger, longer term investments. Specifically dealing with the HRE however, your provinces are not going to yield you any large return on investment and will be flat out "not worth it" past the 20% upgrade in almost every province. You'd be talking about 2000+ florin investments, waiting 25-30 years for the return, and then only profiting (in HRE provinces?) an additional 100 florins at best. In other words, the farming production approach would be more viable later on in the game...not at all in the early portion with the HRE. Again- You have a farming income need. Go grab up a province that will fill this gap for you...spend your resources on taking that land, and immediately build the upgrade for farming in there. Now, you have a money maker sitting on the map for you and you can go from there.

[putts]

As promised, I played around with a new campaign tonight using some of the economic suggestions you guys brought up.....

So far, it's a great success.

HRE, Normal difficulty, Early Period

I did the 20% on most of the southern provinces (used 200 Florins as my base req), didn't bother with the Northern provinces since most were below that mark.
I stuck with my typical province setup... Swabia, Switz. and Bavaria as Military factories; Friesland and Provence as Naval capitols
I then proceeded to take Pomerania, Prussia, Lithuania and Kiev with just Emissaries and then finished by grabbing Khazar.

However, instead of just sitting there and building up my new territories, I backed my forces out of Khazar back into Kiev and then grabbed all the forces I had built up in Lithuania, Kiev and Prussia and struck at Poland in full force leaving only enough forces behind to maintain my rule in those provinces. While I was gobbling up these rebel countries in the East, I had built a wall of troops on my Western front as well as built a secondary strike force that hit Poland from Franconia. It took so little time to totally wipe out Poland that I didn't even get excommed.

While I had the army at full tilt I went down and gobbled up Moldavia, Crimea, Hungary and Carpathia. Now I had gobbled up many provinces that are cranking out tons of Florins but also haven't lost any of my original territories.

This is where things slowed down because Italy, Byz and what was left of Hungary kept trying to rip Hungary back away from me. However, while that provence swapped hands about 20 times, I took it upon myself to secure Norway, Sweden and kill off the Danes (again, without being excommed).

When last I saved and closed the game, I had just finally secured Hungary with no immediate threat of losing it. Byz are falling out of power and Sicily is becoming my best friend by helping to wipe them out. Next step will be to wipe out Hungary in 1 turn (they're down to 2 territories).

Annnnnnnnnnnyway, so far, the new strategy is working well.