General Strategies and Other Notes

[Velociryx]

Hey man, and g'morning! Will try to at least hit the high spots on the questions, and give the others a more in-depth treatment when I don't have one foot out the door!

From what I have observed, you're correct. Alliance leader does not necessarily equal Alliance Leader in a particular fight. Seems like the country that gets DoW'd is the "leader" for that particular fight, BUT, as soon as someone signs a separate peace, it's every man for himself. Quick way to "opt out" of having peace dictated to you is to make peace with someone else you're fighting, and then it seems like you've got a blank cheque!

Slider settings: Ya...don't worry about more than the general relationships right now...the rest will come in time (centralization = almost always good//Narrow Minded - Fantastic for any latin tech group country, or anybody who wants to get serious about colonization, OR if you've got lossa off religion, off culture provs (lower stab costs offsets the spike from all those "different" lands and gives more missionaries to convert with)//Aristoc - I find more uses for it in the late game as it improves diplo ability, and this is the one slider I try to keep "in the center"//Nav - if you colonize at all, you need this!//FM....eh...not as hugely important as the others, and one that's seldom a priority, but when I move it, it is moved toward FM//Free Subjects - awesome if you've a fairly homogenous society...if not, take the morale hit and go serfdom!//Quality - Yes Please!//Shock - YES PLEASE!

Army size: Can't always do it, but I TRY not to ever let my military upkeep (at 50%) go above 10% of the overall size of my economy. Any more than that and you'll start to stifle long term growth.

Pillage: you can pillage a prov once every 13 months. One group of guys can pillage one prov per month.

Pillage is accomplished by moving through enemy territory, and ending the month IN a particular prov. Start of the new month, you'll see the graphic change on the map (looks like the city is burning)....that's the pillage graphic. You get ~1/2 the prov's tax value, IIRC, added to whatever you're researching at the moment.

Siege and other tricks:
* Split your forces into all cav/all inf. before you enter enemy territory.

* After the battle, if you wanna move all your cav out, pause the game and order one of your groups to march out of the prov (doesn't matter which). This will "release the siege" (but the game is paused, so not really), allowing you to find your cav stack and give them orders, then order the infantry to resume the siege.

Unpause the game and rock on.

Also....
If you have sent multiple units TO a province to begin a siege, and need to remove some of them....

Right click, and "select all", then issue a "besiege" order.

Result: Leaves enough troops there to continue the siege, and sends the rest to wherever you say.

Cav begins to decrease in importance about the same time you see the first army graphic change (lvl 11) and continues to decline in importance from there. Some would argue that this point actually begins to occur at lvl 7, when artillery becomes available. Too soon, IMO.

Late game, you can easily get by with all inf. stacks. Early game...very dicey, and prolly the reason for your defeat at the hands of the Native American tribes, mentioned earlier.

Wartaxes: Outdated in 1.08...I NEVER use these anymore! Used to cost you a point of stab....not bad....now it raises inflation by 1%...not worth it.

-=Vel=-

[lord of the mark]

Hey man, and g'morning! Will try to at least hit the high spots on the questions, and give the others a more in-depth treatment when I don't have one foot out the door!

Good day, and thanks.

Slider settings: Ya...don't worry about more than the general relationships right now...the rest will come in time (centralization = almost always good//Narrow Minded - Fantastic for any latin tech group country, or anybody who wants to get serious about colonization, OR if you've got lossa off religion, off culture provs (lower stab costs offsets the spike from all those "different" lands and gives more missionaries to convert with)//Aristoc - I find more uses for it in the late game as it improves diplo ability, and this is the one slider I try to keep "in the center"//Nav - if you colonize at all, you need this!//FM....eh...not as hugely important as the others, and one that's seldom a priority, but when I move it, it is moved toward FM//Free Subjects - awesome if you've a fairly homogenous society...if not, take the morale hit and go serfdom!//Quality - Yes Please!//Shock - YES PLEASE!

As Spain Ive focused on trying to keep centralization up. Ive let things "slide" toward narrowminded, though i did take a court painter in an attempt to move a bit more toward innovative - i havent found rebels much of a problem, but then I have huge armies from Aragon and Aztec annexations, and being still at war (against Maya, then Chimu, then Inca) always have them funded at 100%. Havent really messed the others.

Army size: Can't always do it, but I TRY not to ever let my military upkeep (at 50%) go above 10% of the overall size of my economy. Any more than that and you'll start to stifle long term growth.

I try not to go over maintenance penalty amount which I think leads to same result.

Pillage: you can pillage a prov once every 13 months. One group of guys can pillage one prov per month.

Pillage is accomplished by moving through enemy territory, and ending the month IN a particular prov. Start of the new month, you'll see the graphic change on the map (looks like the city is burning)....that's the pillage graphic. You get ~1/2 the prov's tax value, IIRC, added to whatever you're researching at the moment.

Siege and other tricks:
* Split your forces into all cav/all inf. before you enter enemy territory.

* After the battle, if you wanna move all your cav out, pause the game and order one of your groups to march out of the prov (doesn't matter which). This will "release the siege" (but the game is paused, so not really), allowing you to find your cav stack and give them orders, then order the infantry to resume the siege.

Unpause the game and rock on.

Also....
If you have sent multiple units TO a province to begin a siege, and need to remove some of them....

Right click, and "select all", then issue a "besiege" order.

Result: Leaves enough troops there to continue the siege, and sends the rest to wherever you say.

Thanks

Cav begins to decrease in importance about the same time you see the first army graphic change (lvl 11) and continues to decline in importance from there. Some would argue that this point actually begins to occur at lvl 7, when artillery becomes available. Too soon, IMO.

Late game, you can easily get by with all inf. stacks. Early game...very dicey, and prolly the reason for your defeat at the hands of the Native American tribes, mentioned earlier.

Ok, tech 11. I think I have underused cav.

[Heresson]

My strategy: conquer everything on your way.

[lord of the mark]

"Offensively, Diplomacy is also useful in the extreme. You can use it to manufacture CB's to preserve your BB rating by selectively warning neighbors, guaranteeing a small nation's right to exist (especially if said small nation has a high BB....GREAT way to get lots of free CB's!), lay claim to enemy thrones, and peacefully annex your neighbors to grow your Kingdom."


Ok, i think i know how the diplovassalization and diploannexation works, though I havent used them yet, but how does claiming a throne work? When is it best to use that|?

[Heresson]

as for me - never

[Velociryx]

Claiming the throne is ONLY useful if you are interested in preserving your BB rating, and the costs are steep.

You must have a Royal Marriage with a nation to claim their throne.

IF you do, you will lose -2 (-3?) stab AND every other nation you have a RM with will see a dramatic reduction in relational standing.

The upshot: You have a (5 yr, IIRC) CB with the nation so claimed against, which is kinna groovy.

Best uses are when playing a nation good, fast rebounding stab vs. same culture nations (so that the provs absorbed do not burden you with heavy stab costs, allowing you to do it again.... )

-=Vel=-

[lord of the mark]

so all it gives is a CB? you dont actually inherit anything, you still have to fight a normal EU2 war? So its not like diploannexing.

[Oerdin]

All it does is give you an excuse to attaqck someone while losing stability and worsening relations with half the world. Not really worth it.

[Velociryx]

^ for Walker

[Heresson]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
so all it gives is a CB? you dont actually inherit anything, you still have to fight a normal EU2 war? So its not like diploannexing.

Exactly. I was very disappointed when I've tried it. I've never done it since then.

[Qilue]

Some useful things in the guide I can use. But you didn't include anything for the naval aspect of the game. So...

Shipping

The three basic types being Warship, Transport and Galley.

Galleys
These are much cheaper than warships both for initial build cost and ongoing maintainance and if you are playing the GC from 1419, these are a much better short term investment than warships. Prior to naval 11, galleys are superior to warships in combat, about the same at naval 11-18 and inferior at naval 18+. They do suffer much higher attrition in ocean regions so early explorer nations like China and Portugal will still need a few warships.
Each ship can carry 1000 men or 10 cannon.

Warships.
There are expensive to build, expensive to maintain (~0.1d ea) and inferior to galleys before Naval 11. At Naval 9 (when months that are not months become months), they start to become faster than galleys and are superior to galleys in combat from Naval 18+. They do have the ability to cross ocean safely which is very important for ocean exploration (as is Naval 9 .
Each ship can transport 1000 men or 10 cannon.

Transports.
Like warships, they can safely cross ocean, but are inferior in combat to both warships and galleys. I don't ever build them so perhaps someone has some useful strategies?
Each ship can transport 2000 men or 20 cannon.

Pirates. (The eternal pests)
These will appear off your coasts with depressing frequency in the Americas and SE Asia and are particularly common in the Carribean. You then have two choices, exterminate them or leave them. Leaving them means they will siphon off a significant portion of your trade income and disrupt your ship movements.

Another option is preventing their appearance to begin with. Just parking a ship or two in your coastal regions will prevent pirates from appearing which is a good use for all those cheap-to-maintain galleys. Be aware though, that the AI likes to drive their pirates into your coastal regions, and galleys will not survive combat with pirates.

Warscore.
Naval battles also count for warscore, so keeping a strong domestic fleet is advisable. Owning certain provinces will allow you to control key sea regions like the Straits of Gibralter, The English Channel, The Malta Channel and The Sund. You could mass fleets in those sea regions and build a HUGE warscore just by defeating AI fleets trying to pass through.

Exploration.
(There are many different strategies for this, here is mine.)

I send out explorers with a single ship as an explorer with a single ship can stay at sea for about 26 months (they will usually sink on the 27th month). Since naval attrition cause ship losses as a percentage of ship numbers, any percentage of one lost still leaves one ship. I keep a watch on how long a ship has been out and once it reaches between +11 to +13, I send to the nearest 'friendly' port.

Also important is getting military access where you don't intent to colonize. I try to get military access with the following - Portugal, Spain, Benin, Oman, Vijayangar, Malacca, China, Nippon and Incas. With those, I can explore the oceans and I cancel those I no longer need when convenient (stab -3) or when I'm about to war on that nation.

[CerberusIV]

A few other naval related things.

Transports - they do survive combat outside european waters, but not very well. So they will cope with small numbers of ships from less advanced nations you are at war with but it is best to run away if your fleet is largely or exclusively transports.

I use a couple of fleets of around 10-12 transports each later in the game to move armies around the map as a colonial power. They are cheaper to maintain than warships and I use my warship fleets for combat. So the warships clear the seas of enemy vessels and the transports can then freely shift armies around.

If I play a nation that starts with a few transports I will often hang on to them and send my early explorers out with transports instead of warships as I would rather lose the transports. It's fairly safe as pirates only really start to appear in the mid 1500's

Don't bother building warships, or at least not many, early on as Spain, England, Portugal or France as you will get a lot of "free" warships with all those explorers.

Pirates have slightly lower tech than the leading naval nation - so if you are way ahead the AI has more trouble dealing with them.

I tend to explore the way you are meant to. Establish a colony or use a port where you have MA and loop your explorer out to the unexplored sea zones and back. It is still quite quick and minimises attrition losses.

My favourite explorers trick - if you have MA then select your explorer and hover the mouse pointer over the white part of the map. Where the pointer changes to an anchor there is a port that you have access to. So you can send your explorer there and "discover" it.

Blockades speed up sieges as I understand it.

[Micha]

Blockades add an enormous amount of supply to the province for siegers. So when sieging coastal province (they need to have a harbour) sending a few ships there might be a good idea, as you might find yourself with enough supply for 60 to 80 thousand troops instead of a mere 30k.

[Velociryx]

Good stuffs! And yep...I freely admit that in my games, I typically don't worry overly much with navy until after I get myself fully and firmly established, so it takes a bit of a backseat until the mid-game (at least)--and for me, "fully and firmly established" means Inf. 5 and gaining first place in Land Tech...until then, navy is a secondary consideration....good for assisting the army (blockading during a siege, which has been mentioned), ferrying odd troops to hard to reach places, and blocking in general, although I'm not above pouncing on weak or ravage fleets to boost my war score.

I rarely build Galleys when playing a European nation (by the time I get Inf 5 and caught up in land tech, warships are the better investment), although in some cases (Brittany, Eire, and Scotland come to mind), navy is important earlier, rather than later.

With regards to pirates, once my naval tech is on par with the world leaders (or if I'm in the lead), my typical play is to put a squadron of five warships in each coastal waterway adjacent to territory I control (strong enough to defeat the pirates and with naval superiority, strong enough to hold on LONG enough for reinforcements to arrive so that enemy troops can't land against me).

Especially if you're playing a colonial power, you'll find yourself with so many ports and such vast naval capacity (especially after adding a few Royal Shipyards and naval manufactories) that you'll have a sufficiently large fleet size to do this AND maintain 2-3 larger (10-15 Warship) squadrons for offensive actions around the globe. I try to place these in strategic locations with an eye toward ferrying troops to locations I have in mind for conquest, or as disruption forces against potential enemies.

-=Vel=-

[adi321]

Even though warships are better vs galleys one on one, ar large swarm of galleys can still beat navies full of warships untill the later tech levels in my experince.

"quantity is also a quality."

[DarkCloud]

Great advice! How did you manage to get so good at this game!

[lord of the mark]

it seems to me that amount of pirates are largely driven by date? They started getting massive after 1600 or so, and then became few or completely gone after 1700. An attempt to give us the "age of piracy"?

[CerberusIV]

Originally posted by lord of the mark
it seems to me that amount of pirates are largely driven by date? They started getting massive after 1600 or so, and then became few or completely gone after 1700. An attempt to give us the "age of piracy"?

Yes, that is how it works. Which areas they appear in may be date related too. I'm currently playing Spain and after an early burst off the west coast of central america that area has gone quiet but pirates are endemic in the Caribbean right through to 1700 or later.