Lucky nations changes the game no doubt. Playing ironman, I have no choice, but it is interesting seeing how the games go when it's off.

Like look at that Teutonic Order, I never see anything like that in my games. They may even form Prussia. And Lucky Nations off would go some way towards explaining the difference with Ottomans that I mentioned. Thanks for showing the GUI.

Speaking of the Commonwealth, they are a colossus in my game. I'll put a shot or two up soon, but we've just about taken the Baltic coastline, aside from a few Brandenburg and Pomerania provinces, which shouldn't be too hard to get, even with Brandenburg being the Emperor. But it's the 6 or so Commonwealth coastal provinces that are going to prove difficult. I'd really rather not go to war with them, but if I want to complete the ring I have no choice.

The Sweden run is going well. I've started 3 games with Sweden, and the first two didn't go so well, I struggled early with rebels, and civil wars. But this one I was better prepared. Sweden has some good military bonuses, some really nice events and a great geographical position in a strategic sense. Like England for example, there is no enemy at your back, once you take care of Scotland and Norway respectively. I've also had many good rulers, though at one point it was 3 straight Queens, and you can't be Defender of the Faith with a female ruler, which has slowed down my religious conversion with only the single missionary.

The first order of business was to gain Independence. Sweden begins the game under a PU with Denmark. I secured some support and declared on Denmark, won that war, Independence and all but one of the Swedish cores. That was a good start. In subsequent wars we took land from Novgorod, vassalized Norway, then Denmark, and later Pomerania. With Administrative and Influence, we have a -45% cost to diplo-annex and all of those have been integrated. In wars with Russia we took provinces, restored Novgorod as a vassal and fed them more of the Russian lands.

Here is a shot before integrating Novgorod and Pomerania as we were gearing up for the big showdown with Commonwealth.




We were allied to France and Saxony, but Saxony wouldn't join. So much of this game, to me, is being opportunistic. So I staged my armies and waited for the right time. I kept hoping that Commonwealth would get in a war with Ottomans, and when that happened we struck. France was slow to get involved, so we fought all of the early battles to no small cost, but eventually France sent a 45k stack and the rout was on.




Normally I would use this successful war to break my opponent up, but as I was going for the achievement to hold the Baltic coast I took the necessary provinces, along with humiliate and war reps, though I fed some to Pomerania to let them pay for the cores. At this point we managed an alliance with Ottomans, who joined me in the next war against Commonwealth. And this is how it stands now in 1717.




You can't see it in this shot but Ottomans have moved strong to the east, as far as Samarkand. One very interesting thing that happened was that 2-province Holland got a PU over Great Britain, but alas it was not to last long as Brabant swallowed Holland and the PU ended. The HRE has been rather pathetic, no doubt hampered by Swedish shenanigans, but they have failed to pass a single reform, and Protestant is the official religion.

All in all a very successful and fun run as Sweden, and wondering what to do next. Was thinking of invading England. Well it's there and all, innit?

Sweet Sweden! I can't quite tell from the colour, is that the Netherlands controlling the Shetlands or the remnants of Scotland?

As for invading England, I'd say go for it, as Sweden you're the successors to the Vikings, recreate the Norse kingdoms on Britain's north east coast!
Though the Royal Navy might be a problem. My Brabantine navy has been sitting on a more-or-less constant 100 tradition thanks to exploration and constant allied wars. My army is not so lucky, been decades since they besieged a single province. I don't really feel like losing manpower in all the pointless HRE bickering.

That's what's left of Scotland.



That's exactly what I thought too. So I landed 90,000 troops near Glasgow and proceeded to siege down Great Britain. The Royal Navy was strong, but we were stronger. And now there's no Royal Navy. I don't know if you've ever been Reformed, but Fervor system lets the player choose between three bonuses...

-- Trade, for 10% power and steering
-- Stability, for -2 Unrest and +1 Dip Rep
-- War, for +15% army and navy morale

So for any wars that won't be a walkover I choose to run the war bonus. And England had nothing really to boost their army and the land battles were fought with my army at 9 morale and theirs at 4 morale. I can't recall ever having an advantage like that over another western nation.

In the end I took all of the starting Scottish provinces, and if it weren't for Scotland still having that one little island, I would have released them and saved the admin points. I forced England to release Wales and quickly made them my vassal with the aim of feeding English provinces if they will take them. I don't know if there will be time remaining to take the rest of England and Ireland, but we will try.

Last time I played reformed was as Bohemia when the game had first come out, very different back then.

Here's a quick little update. I've occupied England's continental provinces as part of Venice's war with Milan and Austria (who just peaced out) England has enough of an army and some high skill generals to make things uncomfortable for me, fortunately they're stuck on their island since I've routed the Royal Navy. I can't invade either since I lack any transports and I'm slightly over the force limit.

I've had a few decent kings (and a lovely 6/5/5 queen) but I might be looking at a regency soon. Also concerning since I have a PU with Guyenne and don't want to lose it.



The Hansa and Pope are doing very well.

How did that happen to France? Did you bust them up?

Who is the green band diving England?

Your maps are so interesting. Things just don't work out that way in my games.

I made a big mistake. I fired up Shogun 2 for a look last night. Bought it during the Steam sale and just got around to trying it. Might curb my EU IV for a bit. I was a long time TW player before discovering Paradox games. Hadn't played a TW game since picking up CK2 a few years ago.

Other than joining a war or two against France no, that was all AI, early on they were forced to release vassals, lost rich northern provinces and just never fully recoved since they kept getting into and then losing wars, at one point Brittany and Orleans controlled half the country but England has been making inroads lately.
France has played no part in colonisation.

The green band is Northumbria, independent since the end of the Hundred Years War, I've been their long term ally, I think the AI is reluctant to have Brabant, Venice and Portugal pulled into a war over two provinces. Or at least I hope it's that smart and not just broken.

Well, as you said, turning off lucky nations makes a big difference, Spain, Austria, France and the Ottomans all being treated just like any other country. Reduces blobbing since they seem to have not just more difficulty in conquering land but also holding on to it.

I've also finally just worn off the negative AE and 'illegal territory' modifiers. (Annoying that they stack every time you load up the game, at one point I had -90 relations over a single province. Lost a few allies that way.

I should do my next game with LN off just to have it play out differently. Even with it on there is still alot of randomness, or unpredictability, but I'd like to see some other nations lead the way for a change.

AE in this version is tough. In my Sweden game near the end I went to war and took a couple provinces from Magdeburg and vassalized Saxony and ended up with a huge coalition. Not that 20 HRE princes could do much about it, but they were unified in their disdain for expansionist Sweden lol.

Well I said I was done on the continent, turns out I was wrong.

I became very concerned about a lot of sudden blobbing, especially from Britain and decided I needed more provinces. So I started eating up some of the little guys on my Eastern border, things went pretty well, then I attacked two provinces Lorraine, without checking first. Turns out they were the Emperor.

I eventually emerged victorious but it was the Pyrrhic victory to end all Pyrrhic victories. Talking WWI style attrition warfare, all up 250,000+ men died over two lousy provinces and I went into debt. On the plus side I now have 100 army and navy tradition and a pair of three star generals.
Oh yeah and everyone hates me.

I also spent some points on culture converting some of my rich Walloon provinces, I figured the gain from high basetax and manpower provinces would offset the cost in adm points.

Here is the political map



And the religious map



Colonies are coming along well, three colonial nations formed. I cut off Spain and am the only power in Louisiana and Eastern America. Brittany has a chunk of Canada and I'm sharing the Caribbean with England and Spain.

Just wow. that's such a cool map. Western Europe, I've never seen anything quite like it. And the extent to which Protestantism has taken root is amazing. No Reformed at all (that I can see). I wish I could play ironman with LN off to get maps like this.

Scotland and Northern Ireland were the only major reformed states, of course Britain has been busy converting away. There were a few one province Catholic theocracies that held out but the blobs got to them in the last 50 years.

As Brabant that is so nice to have the same religion modifier with all of your neighbors. It seems whenever I flip, I am surrounded by heathens and heretics.

Funnily I keep getting that 'Early adopters of Protestantism' event that gives me +60 relations with England. Too bad they've been my bitter rivals for the last century!

Vassalize 'em!

I wish!

'They will probably not accept' - understatement of the century...

Haha. Perhaps if we built a large wooden badger...


I've been playing Prussia in Empire:TW the past few days, but I'll fire up another EU IV game soon, I wonder who I should play? I think I might give Tunisia another go.

How about one of the Russian minors? If you can survive Muscovy early on there'd be plenty of options.

Or one of the Arab nations, such as Oman? The start is not too difficult but things can get difficult once you want to move out of the peninsula.

Good suggestions. Muscovy>Russia was my last game before Common Sense. I've never played in or around India, maybe Bengal would be a good choice.

Quick update:

Protestantism is really entrenched. I have to laugh, my ally Thuringia has drawn me into no less than six wars against Brandenburg (Emperor), all for the Province of Ruppin. With my help they've convincingly won every one of these wars and yet they JUST WON'T TAKE THE DAMN PROVINCE!?



And here's a shot of my North American colonies.



Edit: I'd like to know what kind of drugs they're on up North...

So I noticed that three electors were small states right next to me with little in the way of allies and thought to myself, hey being the Emperor sounds like a sweet deal.

So after a little *persuasion*





Now we wait for the Brandenburger Emperor to cark it...