Their loss is my gain. I'll come back to EUIV at some point, now I've got all the goodies plus a great deal of eye candy as well!

If you get back to it before I do, I'd like to hear any impressions you have of changes and features introduced after Emperor.

Sure, though I don't know that I'd be a good judge of that. I don't have near the amount of familiarity with the game as you do.

Steam says I haven't fired it up since July of 2020. Not sure when I'll jump back in.

What I need to do is find out if one specific thing has been fixed or changed.

When last I played a few runs, there was a problem with the AI running up huge debts. When allies are in deep debt they won't answer calls for offensive wars, making them virtually useless and meaning the player's left to do conquest solo, or at best a skeleton crew of allies and subjects. I was playing Nevers for an achievement which required kicking France's ass, but how could I expect to do so as tiny Nevers if my powerful allies were so far in the red they would never honor the alliance?

Anyway, if that is fixed I'd be up for another go. I should find this out.

I guess I'll be the first one to get back to it haha.

Picked up three DLC released since I last played in 2020.I bought Lion of the North, Domination and King of Kings.

Had a look at all the new achievements and decided to go for Avar Khaganate, which requires you to reach empire rank and conquer Hungary as Avaria. Avaria is a OPM near Georgia with a beautiful blue map color. Survived the start and had Ottos as allies. But I couldn't get them to join my offensives wars and was just too boxed in by superior alliances to expand so I shelved it by 1550. Need a different plan, or maybe some different breaks.

Then I started a run for the For the Emperor achievement. This one requires you to form Prussia or Germany and have 40,000 marines. Played as Brandenburg. Got off to a really good start, gobbled up the former Pomeranian lands and got Danzig just before both Sweden and Poland did. Poland got bent out of shape over the whole affair. So I allied Russia as a counterweight to PLC. But soon they inherited some nation that Poland contested and I got dragged in. I literally never saw a Russian army the entire war, and got dogpiled by PLC and their friends. I survived but that was enough of that lol. Allies, amirite?

Then I started a run as Denmark for the Brick by Brick achievement. This one requires you start and stay Denmark, enact the Kalmar Monarchy and core all of Scandanavia. Sweden was 100% liberty desire from the start. I managed to keep them in the fold until an event happened, where one of the options is called Stockholm Bloodbath. I chose the other one as "Bloodbath" foretold of bad things. This resulted however in about ten rebel stacks of about 16 regiments each. My single stack at this time was 22 regiments. So I could win a single battle, but then needed to replenish for a couple months. By the time I did three of these Stockholm had been occupied and boom, Sweden was cast free of our union! Well, summab!tch.I immediately used Restore Union the next day and managed to get them back under my rule.

This seemed to take the wind out of Sweden's sails, and their LD dropped to low. From there I diplo-annexed Norway then Sweden in turn, but the achievement did not fire. Had a look and it said I had 57/58. Took a look and saw Kola was still needed. Fabricated on it and declared on Novgorod to trigger the achievement.

I don't have all DLC, but I have nearly all of it including all expansions expect one, Leviathan. The game is in the best shape ever. hard to believe it will soon be ten years I've been playing. Allies are still mostly useless, but the issue with them having perma-debt resulting in never answering offensive calls to arms seems much better. There are a ton of new mechanics, features and flavor since I played last and I'm having a great time with it again. Few games engage my brain in such a compelling way. It's like a drug in a sense.

Now I'm off to Muscovy and see if I can reach the Siberian coast by 1600.

Here's my Denmark just after taking Kola to fulfill the requirements. This can probably be done by 1500 if you get after it. The Lion of the North DLC really livened up the game play this run in Scandanavia.

The Muscovy run came to a crashing halt before it had really gotten started. Big changes in this region. Muscovy for example, start the game paying a tribute to Golden Horde. Every six months or maybe a year, they come for the tribute. 32 ducats. Which is basically more than I managed to save since the last tribute.Got off to a great start, declaring on Novgorod on the first possible day. But the tributes prevent any sort of progress, can't build anything, can't expand your army. A peasant rebellion disaster came and I managed to stave it off with two months to spare by buying up stability. Finally I could breathe and get down to concocting a plan that would free me from the yoke.

Two months later the rebellion was back, would fire in two months and the only way to not get it would be to convert to a monarchy, which I think, is impossible at this stage. Event fired, -6 stability (which I had just spent all admin points to raise months before), massive rebels, war exhaustion. Holy moly. Muscovy used to be a chill start, just be wary of PLC while you eat all the tatars. But now the internal strife is debilitating, and the tribute to the Horde just ices it. I quit that game.

Started a run as Scotland. I've done this a number of times, and failed. There's an achievement called Auld Alliance Reversed. Be Scotland and have France for a vassal. Each time I've tried before, I got an alliance with France, and then when the Maine event fires I hoped I could hold my borders, and also hope that the War of the Roses fires whilst England are at war with me. I cannot match them in the early game on the field of battle, and the AI is just horrible at ever landing troops. You'd think France might land a stack near London and help me out. So England has no reason to cross the Channel and fight for their lands on the continent. And they are free to turn all of their attention on Scotland, which in the first ten years is simply no match. So each time I tried this I got smacked down and eventually quit. The only way I'll come out on top is if my allies land in England, or if I can build an army that outmatches what England can field.

This time I came up with a different plan. The Scottish mission tree grants permanent claims on northern England if Scotland secures an alliance with France. So I improved relations until I could get the alliance, and therefore the permanent claims I need to go to war with England. The next month I cancelled the alliance with France. And honestly they didn't seem to mind at all. I got a 'broken alliance' modifier, but kept the green heart.

So now all I have to do is wait for the Maine event. Since England will have no target on the home isles, they'll ship their armies across the channel. Once they have fought some battles and drained their manpower we would strike. This plan can be fouled because when the Maine event fires, there's a chance the province can be handed over, with no war. But this time France and England went to war. In due time England shipped their armies across and Scotland declared war. While I was invading their border provinces the War of the Roses fired so now England had Scottish armies and pretender rebels sieging down their country while they were in Brittany. It all went perfectly, and as a result it's the best start I've had with Scotland.

But since then, nothing at all has happened. I need England to declare on me, not the other way around. And surprisingly, they have not. The reason is I need it to be an offensive war for England, not defensive, which will shift which nations answer, and which side they will fight on. I think I can count on the AI not being likely to land any troops, just like they never do to help me. But if it happened I'd lose the war.

The Reformation has just dropped, and soon the nations should be taking sides for the Thirty Years war. I'm hoping England is in, and send their troops to fight in central Europe. If they so, I can hit them again. If not, I just need to keep building until I can win on the island in a straight fight.

This is what we had carved out by 1455, with an Irish bridgehead in Ulster. England overran the rest of Ireland before my manpower had recovered. Lightning war. But at least I got Ulster so I cannot be blocked in the strait. 120 years later the rest of the world has changed dramatically. But the balance in the Briitsh Isles has remained unchanged. I play on ironman, with a single auto-save, so there are no second chances. I need to be sure of success if I can. I need the right conditions. If I can win a second war with England I can tip the balance between us, and eventually take the entire thing. Once that is done I would be in a similar power position to France, who are the target of the achievement. Need to beat England first.

Good stuff as always, DB! Love your writeups! Is there any way to goad England into declaring war on you?
It's been a long time since I fired up EUIV, reading your summaries always gives me the itch though - thanks!!

Hey JC, it had been a long time for me too. I've taken two three-year breaks. But then I get to wondering what EU IV has been up to haha. It's in a really good place right now.

To answer your question... maybe? But I couldn't manage to. I put them under a trade embargo, I scornfully insulted them on many occasions, including the classic "Your mother was a hampster and your father smelt of elderberries!", which is actually what it said. But it was not enough to get England to attack. My alliance is too strong I guess.

In the end I waited some 140 years. I did nothing aside from preparing Scotland for the inevitable war. My troops never left the home islands. Didn't declare on anyone else, aside from the unfortunate Ulster. As described above, my plan became to wait for the league war. Of course sometimes the league war never kicks off and ends in the peace of Westphalia, or is it the Diet of Wien? When the council of Trent finished, the nations began aligning and England was in on the Protestant side. The best thing that could happen would be for France to then join the Catholic side, which would break their treaty with England when the war kicked off, but France also joined the Protestants. Scotland stayed out in order to take full advantage.

When the war kicked off I waited for England to send their armies to Europe. They sent a massive stack of 50 regiments, and left England virtually unguarded. This was the opening we needed and Scotland invaded around 1590, taking several more provinces, but fewer than I had hoped due to the high cost. But now Scotland owned the east and west midlands, and the balance in the isles was at least even. From that point I waited out the truces a few times and declared new wars on the day after the truce ended. I'm in a bit of a time crunch it's true, I still need to vassalize France. But I declare quickly because the other nations who fought alongside me also just had their truces end and I must be sure to beat them to the punch and have them fight in my wars, and not the other way around.

One of the reasons I stopped playing in 2020 was the state of allies. They were worse than useless. But I have to say that my allies have been stellar in this Scotland run. They answer, and they get busy. They form big stacks and hunt the enemy, rather than run around with a thousand two-regiment stacks getting wiped, or forming a doomstack and sitting on one fort taking massive attrition while their homelands are carpet-sieged. It's been great to see, and fixes the biggest problem I had with this game.

One nice new change,. and one I had been asking for for years, is there are three new idea groups (Mercenaries, Court and Infrastructure). Many of the idea group bonuses have been changed or reworked too. For this Scotland run I have taken Defensive, Innovative, Maritime, Quantity and Espionage (I rarely take Innovative or Espionage but why the hell not?!)

This shot is a little old now, but I think it's interesting. This is 1631, just after we had taken London. We have since conducted our own Overlord and landed in Normandy. But check out Kazan, Novgorod and Sweden. Denmark is trolling them.

It was the most glorious 90 years in Scotland's history. This is where we stand in 1681. We gained a bridgehead in Normandy and Brittany which we are in the process of exploiting now. My allies are Burgundy, Austria, Scandinavia, Castile and Portugal. Interesting to see Two Sicilies form. This is the strongest 'Italy' I've ever seen the AI form. I recall a few years ago, one of SDE's posts he was playing as them and I asked about it, and he said it required a mod. So maybe Paradox added this as a formable tag? Not sure, but they've done very well (formed by Naples).

Burgundy have been an exceptional ally. Strong, good army, very aggressive and quite successful. I keep beating them to the punch calling them for my French wars, but I throw them a bone in each peace deal. My goal is to reduce France small enough to vassalize, so giving Burgundy some land helps to accomplish this, makes a good ally stronger and splits the cost of conquest between both nations.

The Pope is gone, as you can see. Two Sicilies kicked him out of the game world. Not much left of England, and I hope to vassalize them in our next war and that way I'll control their colonies.

What Ottomans have done is disgusting, and they should get some sort of map-gore penalty.

Auld Alliance Reversed is in the books. We vassalized France in 1752, with their capital in the west Africa outpost of Fernando Po.

A very good run, this. Scotland have a lot going against them at the start. To flip the tables on a nation as powerful as France takes a lot of work. My plan to ally, the cancel at the start was key as it allowed Scotland to survive the perilous start when France and England go to war over Maine. The patience it took to wait it out for 150 years is crazy as you just feel you ought to be doing something. I did eventually get Burgundy under a PU. We sat third on the great powers list at the end. The world started going revolutionary right before I called time, as you can see with Turkey and Commonwealth (among others)

I also got the achievement for hitting 100% mercantilism. I had failed at least four times going for Auld Alliance Reversed, and it's good to have finally done it.

That's quite an Empire you got there, DB! Interesting Spain never seemed to form. And wow - the Turks have been busy, eh?
There's so much story to these games, it's really cool to read your synopsis, thanks for posting them. I don't know how many others read them, but I always do!

I tried to make it happen. For a long time, Two Sicilies owned three provinces around and including Barcelona, which can be seen in the previous shot. Since Castile had to keep answering my calls on the first day after the truce they never got a chance to fight to take them back. So over time I gave them each of those provinces back when I peaced out Two Sicilies. That Spain didn't form might be down to not owning one of the Balearic islands, which you can barely see is held by TS. I bet that's what was missing.

And yeah, this game is a story generator of the first order. It's just so random, variable. Every run is different, alliances are flipped, new nations form, others get eaten. I really dig this side of the game, and I feel like I'm as much a spectator as an actor when I play.

With that run in the books I have started the Brandenburg run for For the Emperor again. Got off to two bad starts and re-rolled it a third time, and that one stayed up. We will see how it goes. The key to this run in the early game is to beat Poland to Konigsberg, since it is required to form Prussia. I got that done straight away, before 1450. The mission tree makes it fast now, since it grants permanent claims.

I've got a Battle Tech career going right now, but I just might load up EUIV and see what's what when that's over. Last I recall there was a bundle on Humble Bundle for most of the DLC I didn't have and I picked it up. I think I'm only missing the most recent stuff.
I don't think I gave it a proper run after doing so, I may just have to do that soon.

I think this current version is peak EU IV. Really good. It's all much more robust then it has ever been. Stuffed with mechanics, and events. This Prussia run has been cool with the new dynastic event chains and that sort of thing.

I have all expansions aside from Leviathan. And most of the immersion packs I think they are called, like Golden Century and Rule Britannia. I have bought nothing cosmetic. I rarely zoom in enough to see the cannon models, or uniform textures, and music is off so none of that either.

There is a DLC subscription now. Haven't looked in to it, but that could be an answer for some.

It's all on sale right now so a good time if you decide to pull the trigger.

My Brandenburg run is going well. I've formed Prussia, which has some interesting new features which I'll talk about later. I've felt like this run I have been hit by more than my fair share of bad RNG and rare bad circumstances. But that's all part of that story, and you never know what sort of challenge this game will throw at you.

Prussia's map color changed, and I liked it the way it was. The new color looks good zoomed out, but is too dark while having black province names.

Looking it over, I have all the expansions save Domination, and about half of the Immersion packs. I think I'll stand pat for now in terms of picking up new stuff, I'll try and figure out how to play again with what I've got!

I hate when they make little QoL changes like that which have annoying unintended consequences. I'm very much in the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" camp.

Sounds good JC. It all works regardless of what you have.


This game, am I right?

I've been playing the hell out of it. I have some time off for the holidays and I've been mainlining EU IV. The Prussia run crashed in spectacular style. I got off to a decent start, grabbing the Pomeranian lands as well as Konigsberg early. Over time I slowly expanded west to include the port of Lubeck, and south in to central Germany. AE in this region is severe, and no other place on the map has so many nations packed in to such a small area. So coalitions in this part of the world are the most powerful by far. Gotta mind your step.

By the 1700s I had a well-developed Prussia (flipping to Protestant went smoothly) and good allies, including Ottomans and Spain, the two most powerful nations on Earth. When conditions were right I declared war on a very powerful PLC. With my allies I knew we could win this war, and I could finally expand my borders to the east. Right after, a very strong France warned me to white peace out or they would join on Poland's side.I ignored it, since it was now or never to take on PLC. But France soon sieged out Spain and Ottomans. Are you kidding me? I got swarmed and put up a valiant defense with my space marines, hoping to white peace out participants on war exhaustion, but not to be and that beautiful run came to a crushing end. Fookin' France, man.

That's twice I've failed in this achievement run. The shame of it is I had been heavily using vassals in this run and had Luneberg and Saxony as big ones, since I kept feeding them the provinces we were taking in our European wars. For the Emperor achievement requires forming Prussia or Germany, having 40,000 marines and being empire rank. The last one requires 1000 dev (and I also had to leave the HRE or you're stuck at duchy). I could have gotten the achievement just by sitting still and integrating Saxony, but I wanted better borders dammit, and paid the price. Fookin' France, man. I think they were paying me back for what I did to them in the Scotland run.

So I changed gears and fired up a run as Castile, looking to get the Trade Hegemon achievement. This one requires starting as a European nation and having cores on Hormuz, Aden and Malacca. Got the Wedding in 1460, though Aragon had cast Naples free prior. I was already at diplomatic relations limit, and this added both Aragon and their PU, Navarra. And then a few days later, Naples fell in to a PU somehow. So in a week I got three PUs. A few years later Naples just said see ya, declared their own king and were free. How the hell do they do that? Shouldn't they need to declare an independence war? What is going on? Anyway, I was stuck at -3 dip points for a while for being over relations limit. Not great when you are looking to go colonial as fast as possible and need those dip points.

Anyway, I mostly played European policeman while going colonial. Malacca is a long way from Spain, and I wanted to get there first. Aden and Hormuz are closer, but that's Ottomans and Timurid territory, so I will have to see what it looks like when I'm ready.

Colonized down the coast of Africa, first Sierra Leone, then Fernando Po. At this point I could see Portugal went for Brazil, so I detoured in to the Caribbean and created a colonial nation, Havana. Havana would eventually own every single province in the Caribbean, but it took two wars with Denmark and Norway of all nations to get all of the little islands. Once that was up and running I had enough colonists to keep working here and continue on around Africa. Eventually I reached the spice islands and took over all of Timor, which gave me a base of operations near Malacca that I would use when that war came. Kept going to California where I created two more CNs, and finally the east coast of Australia for one more CN. I had four colonists working. This was a strong colonial game, good tariffs from these, plus gold fleets from Spanish California and Gubbi-Gubbi, the CN down under. Not to mention the massive trade income, especially out of the Caribbean, but from all over the world too.

By 1600 I was ready to see what I could do about Aden and Hormuz. Ottomans had been surprisingly uninterested in Arabia in this run (and were my allies by now). As a result, both needed provinces were held by Yemen. But Yemen was allied to Timurids. None of my allies aside from Portugal were willing to join, and I wasn't sure we could beat Yemen, Timurids and their minions. But Yemen were also allied to Ethiopia, and were Ethiopia's only ally. By declaring on Ethiopia instead, I might be able to win the war and take the provinces from Yemen, as long as they honored their defensive call, which they should. I had built a big navy, and shipped 40,000 troops to my colony near Madagascar, and then declared war. Portugal answered. I embarked my troops and set sail for the Red Sea. Landed and began sieging. Then Portugal declared their own war on some south American tribe. So they and all their minions are over there, not in Africa. I got the siege to 21% and then used the artillery barrage thing, taking progress to 49%. Next tick could win it depending on the dice roll. Just then, the Ethiopian army appeared out of the jungle led by a three-star, and even with a smaller stack they wiped my army (of course I get a river crossing penalty derp).

Well, sh!t. That hurt. So I sail my big fleet all the way back to Spain and load up another army. I also create a merc army in my africa colony near the horn. I land the main army in Ajuparra or somesuch, where I had asked for access, and then set sail again to go pick up those mercs. Now I'd have two armies to lend mutual support. But while the navy was gone, that three-star and other armies came for my waiting, just-landed stack. Oh sh!t! I immediately asked for access to a bunch of nations strung along the east coast of Africa and my army ran away to the south. The enemy followed, but gave up after a bit. I lost sight of them. Did they return to Ethiopia/Yemen?

So what to do? I'm getting zero help from allies or colonial nations. I have two armies, and last I saw I had drawn my enemies far to the south. So I decided I could use my navy to conduct an end around. I landed both armies in Hormuz, one of my targets and far to the north of where the enemy was. This gave me enough time to occupy Hormuz and a couple neighboring provinces. This gave me territory to raise more mercs and now I had a proper army. We then sieged our way south through Yemen, and occupied Aden. With all of Yemen under our control I did a separate peace and took the two provinces I needed. Nice! Ethiopia then peaced out and became my ally! What a turn of events. From a stack wipe far from home to a sweeping victory and dominant alliance in the region. Mercs won this war. I've played EU IV for nearly 3,600 hours and have ignored mercs nearly entirely. But I am a believer now.

So much so that mercenaries became the backbone of my plans to take the final needed province, Malacca. I took the new Mercenary idea group next. Once my African victors were refit I shipped them to Timor. And just before I was ready to declare, Portugal became allies with Mallaca! Are you freaking kidding me? If I attack, Portugal will answer, and of course that opens up a whole host of problems, not least of which is they are my neighbor in Iberia. My homelands, and all of my colonial nations would be at risk. But you know what? The entire game, Portugal had been pulling me in to their wars with tiny new world tribes. And now they did so again. By being allies in one war, we cannot be enemies in another, so poor Malacca were undone by Portugal's insatiable colonialism. I raised another merc army and took the final province to fire the achievement (after it cored).

Both of these wars were no-CB wars, which I very rarely do. But they were necessary here since there was no way to fabricate, and the Imperialism CB at dip level 24 was still a long way away. Holy War CB can only be used against neighbors.

Idea groups were Exploration, Quantity, Expansion, Maritime, Mercenary (done in 1648)

I got four achievements in this run

Trade Hegemon (as described)
Fine Financials (own eight level 3 centers of trade. You need at least eight merchants to do this)
Cowardly Tactics (have a mountain province that produces livestock with both a fort and a supply depot. Leon is perfect)
The Coin is Stronger than the Sword (charter company off an Indian nation. Cost about 8,000 ducats. Spain is rich)

And that's EU IV for you. One run that crashed and burned in spectacular style, and another that came together in some pretty amazing ways. Achievements are key, as they give me a specific targets. I don't think I could play this game with no goal(s).

Next run was as Lithuania for the Uncommonwealth achievement. Starting dispositions are key. Ideally, you'd want Austria, Bohemia and Teutonic Order all rivalling Poland. To get all three is rare, but a restart or two to get a good mix might be worth it. I tried this achievement a few years ago but didn't manage to pull it off. Now, the mission tree gives a Restore Union CB on Poland, which I used to get them under a PU. One of the reasons I failed before is in order to diplomatically form the Commonwealth, Poland could be no larger than like 31 provinces, which it is not at the start. but they start with two vassals, and if they integrate them it takes them over the limit. In order to push the button to form Commonwealth you have to be Admin level 10. And that is plenty of time for Poland to absorb their vassals, in turn exceeding the province limit and meaning you now have to wait 50 years to start the process. And 50 years to keep them in the union, which would be quite difficult indeed.

Paradox has changed that limit to 40, and that meant I could actually feed them provinces plus they integrated their vassals, and at level 10 I pulled the trigger for the achievement. I had a massive Livonian Order vassal which I had fed half of Russia to. Their mission tree must give a hell of a lot of permanent claims, and I used them to feed LO. Overall it was a super start, as by 1500 I was massive and it could have made for a really good expansion run. But then I bought Leviathan so needed to start a new run. I could just disable it and play the Commonwealth run and maybe I will return to it. Not many setups can get you off to a start quite like that one.

Next run was as Pegu for the Sailor Mon achievement, which requires being Pegu and having 100,000 sailors. And, That's No Mon, which requires being Pegu and having 50 provinces with non-Mon culture. Obviously, if I am to have a lot of sailors, I'll need a lot of coast. How much? I had no idea as who pays attention to sailor limit?

I've played in this region before, but never as Pegu. I was thinking of massive riches given their location astride the routes from the spice islands and India. But what I got was a big struggle with money. Pegu are in the Burma node, which is like the red-headed step-child of trade nodes. Nothing flows to it. All that beautiful money from Phillippines, Molucca and Malacca flow right past but you cannot grab it. So frustrating, and as a result it took a long time to get my economy right.

In order to get the achievements I need to grow, so I made two decisions early on long-term objectives. Take Exploration to colonize coast, and try to expand in to India to fix my economy. If I could get in to the Bengal node I could collect spice island ducats. Plus that land is rich farmland. Indian expansion and colonization was the plan. Most Pegu players expand in Indo-China it seems, but these nations made for great game-long allies as we helped one another in our wars, especially Ayutthaya. They were a perfect partner and we both grew at about the same rate over time.

The Exploration thing went fine at first. Since I was already here I get a big jump on the Europeans, which have to colonize around the cape. But playing in this region I was so far behind on Institutions, this is a big drag on teching up, so it takes longer to get going. Once I did I went for Timor and started colonizing. But that tech drag just kept getting heavier, and at one point I was behind on two institutions at the same time, and actually managed to embrace Global Trade before Printing Press. The upshot is that leveling up has a big premium, and the cost to embrace kept me from making any economy progress. The struggle was real.

Before I was even done in the Java Sea, the Europeans showed up and brought Mamluks with them. Maybe I should have taken Expansion for another colonist. With no hope of making much progress against four foreign colonial nations I abandoned Exploration and took Naval. I could tell my only hope of survival was a navy that could match the Euros. With colonization abandoned I turned to aggression, and went after my neighbors in Java and Sumatra in the east and Bengal in the west. My big navy that I kept up to date at enormous expense was key and I could take on the big fleets from Europe and cause them to peace out their wars as it was too costly to come so far for nothing. This was my favorite part of the run. I really enjoy the whole maritime aspect of EU IV. Building navies and strategically locating naval bases, Building trade routes and protecting them. Amphibious warfare. Even when I play a land-locked nation I am always looking for the fastest way to the ocean.

By 1700 I had expanded in to Bengal and taken all of Java. The first helped to right the economy, and the second to give me a lot of coastal provinces to build manpower and drydocks. I also took every thing that gave a sailor bonus, including the estates privilege and finally hit 100k sailors! Sailor Mon

You should definitely revisit that Lithuania run sometime. Those expansion stomps can be a certain kind of fun all their own!
It's amazing how different the game plays at times, isn't it? Each of your AARs almost sound like the come from a different game. Of course, part of that is your unique style of writing, which I have to admit I rather enjoy!
Keep 'em coming, DB!!

Yeah, it was a strong start. But I like the changes Leviathan brought, especially monuments. I appreciate your comments on these posts. I'd like to comment on yours too if you get the itch.

Having done that Spain run, I decided to go once again for Fanatic Collectivist, which requires owning all institution spawns. That's a neat challenge, because where they spawn is rather random. Renaissance always is in northern Italy, but the rest can be anywhere, but heavily weighted to Europe. In order to be sure I was strong enough to pull this off I chose France. But France starts as fractured as they've ever been in this game, with a full limit of appanages. So the early game is focused on internal centralization, to absorb these vassals and open up dip slots for real allies. Take back your cores from England and then you can look outward.

When I looked to get this achievement before, it was sort of a side gig, see if I could nab them all while doing another objective. But this time, owning all spawns would be my objective. As they popped up, I'd come up with a plan to grab them, if I couldn't get them to spawn in my lands and make it easy haha.

I had to invade Portugal for Colonialism, northern Italy for Renaissance. I got Printing Press and Global Trade to spawn my lands. Global Trade was one I could actively pursue, as it spawns in whichever trade node is the world's most valuable. And with my excellent economy, and invasion of England, I could take over English Channel node, build up the production and trade power, and ensure it was ahead of Lubeck in 1600. Enlightenment and Manufactories both spawned around the starting Polish lands, but now owned by Prussia and Austria.

Somewhere along the way I got Brandenburg in a personal union. But they were a shell. AI Brandenburg struggles to ever get going surrounded as they are by covetous rivals. Often they just get gobbled up. And when they fell under my rule they were maybe a little smaller than their starting size. They had lost a couple western provinces and gained the two Brandenburg get a chance to buy for 100 ducats, including Neumark. Everyone around them had either been the shark or the bait and Brandenburg was on an island. But then I got the idea that my focus would no longer be on expanding French borders, unless a spawn landed nearby. Instead, I would make Brandenburg in to a glorious risen Prussia (and Prussia currently exists, mind). Using the vital interest thing I made sure Brandenburg always had claims on every bordering province, no matter what nation. Then I used alliances, opportunism and chicanery to keep adding an outer layer to Brandenburg's borders, including annexing Prussia so that Brandenburg could form it instead, which they did. Superb.

The burgeoning subject Prussia swept over Enlightenment and Manufactories, but I would need to integrate them in order to own the provinces for the achievement. This was just a blast. I often use vassal and junior partner feeding in this game. But this was on another level, and by the time it was integrated, Prussia had over 300,000 standing space marines with Prussian ideas, and what an attack dog that is. France had 700,000 standing army, including musketeers, which are a special unit they can recruit (+15% fire damage). That's a million strong right there. I had also annexed most of the low countries and released Holland as a vassal there, and fed them too, but not like Prussia. Denmark and later Kalmar Union were my game-long allies and we split up England. they had no designs on Ireland, so I let the OPM's there fight it out and vassalized the winner, Meath. It was cool because England had owned all of Ireland. But when I smacked England down in one war, Holland (before I ate and released them) declared on England's last continent province. England had nothing left to fight with after our war so Holland was able to run up a big war score and forced England to release all of Ireland as OPMs. Holland didn't want the land and what a cool thing for the AI to do. So Ireland got a re-do with no overbearing England monster and it was fun to watch the battle for supremacy on the island play out, with no interference from powerful nations. Meath won, so they had the honor of becoming a French vassal.

Another super cool thing that happened in this run was the fate of the Ottoman Empire. They had a great start and grew to massive power and size. There's an event that can trigger where France and Ottomans can choose to end their rivalry and instead join forces as allies. I said yep. I mean, why not, right?. That could be handy, and anyway, with Ottomans as an ally, no one is going to attack me. But I was already France, so...

Anyway, Ottomans easily took all the Balkans and most of Hungary before heading off to the south and west. But they imploded, Ming-style. I guess it was a janissary event that caused them to have a massive civil rebellion that they could not handle (AI is terrible at this, moving around in big stacks, while lots of little enemy stacks carpet-siege). Then they went revolutionary, the Pope of all people said no to that, and the keg was lit. And they blew apart. Hungary and a number of Balkan nations re-emerged. Some georgian-area nations too. Separatist rebels from all the nations Ottomans had overrun rose up as one and rival neighbors piled on and while they still lived when I called time, it was a dramatic fall, and the sort of stuff this game excels with. It's just so interesting to watch the world around you.

But I would not want that to happen to me! There but for the grace of god go I.

There was one more institution to grab, I just had to wait for it to spawn. Industrialization. Several requirements for it, but you have to have coal and a furnace built. I did and I did. All the other spawns were in my hands (or Prussia's).

Side-track.... twice in this game Russia had fallen under personal unions. The first time was Poland, who were tiny by then, and that didn't last long and Russia were free. But later Austria PU'd them and kept them loyal. Russia grew to massive size, even more then usual. It was nuts, because now you have Austria declaring war on Japan. Austria also got Hungary and Bohemia as PU's and integrated them, so the Austro-Russo union was good for well over a million men, plus as Emperor all his minions. Formidable foe. But I'm France and monster Prussia so it's a good match. They have more boots, but our troops are the finest in the world. At the end of the game I had a dozen stacks of 50k all led by three-stars. France is just so good in EU IV.

I took that little narrative detour because of course of all the places in the world Industrialization could have spawned it was in the far east of fookin' Russia! I'm just being trolled. Now how the hell am I going to get that?! I'm France right? Napoleon made the mistake of invading from the west, and wasn't the last to do so. So I need a better plan. And anyway, Nappy's target was Moscow, not some forest three thousand miles further east. Well, Austria had made rivals of a massive Delhi, so I allied them and asked for navy base rights and military access and shipped 70,000 of France's finest half-way around the world. When the war kicked off and the epicenter was Austria, my expeditionary force would sneak in the back door thousands of miles away and snipe that spawn. Of course it could all go wrong, timing was crucial, because my stack was big, but Russia has a a million men. If they caught on I could fail. So I had to wait until I had all of the enemy's forces by the belt. Get battles raging all along the front line so they have to commit everything, which they mostly did. My Russia army had to fight their way to the objective, I don't even know what it is called, it is the middle of nowhere, but we grabbed it and expanded Prussia even farther into Austria's disgusting blob at the same time.

I then spent thirty years integrating Prussia and with that, Fanatic Collectivist was done. What an amazing run of EU IV. Not just for what I accomplished, but for the superb drama on display from the world around me.

In all, I got five achievements. Collectivist as noted.

We Bled for This -- Win a war with a million dead on both sides. This was the war I said I had to grab them by the belt. We both had that idea haha. Hard to believe I had never gotten this one, as this was a big war, but didn't feel like my biggest ever. Most lethal, though, evidently.
Traditional Player -- Have 90 naval and army tradition at the same time. Another one I'm surprised to never have gotten. But in this run I really focused on French military sharpness. Professionalism, fully-drilled, lots' of forts and military ideas. It really paid off with superior troops to anything the AI could field.
Foul Mouthed -- Scornfully insult ten nations that border you. They have to all have the modifier at the same time, so I waited until I was quitting the run and let all my neighbors have it.
Wonderful -- Have eight monuments at level 3. Monuments are added by leviathan DLC, and are things like Versailles and Stonehenge. Each give local and global bonuses to your nation, and most are top-tier, so these are good to get and upgrade, but it costs a fortune. In my Pegu run I couldn't dream of having the discretionary funds to do this. But as this France, I was clearing 500 ducats a month and could live luxuriously. France, man.

Here's the state of affairs after taking my Russian enclave. Prussia would grow even larger before integration.

I recall the first time I read a comment from a gamer who said they had 'rage quit'. I recall thinking too, that this isn't a thing. I mean, you quit in rage, over a video game?

Fast forward twenty years....

I was playing Ayutthaya in Indonesia. The goal was to own and core all of Burma and Indochina. I played very well and got to the point where all I needed were ten more provinces, which I would be able to take in two wars tops. The finish line was in sight.

But as the Europeans started arriving they got froggy with me and the nations around the region. Spain, or England, or France, or Portugal, or Mamluks would declare war and then just come and blockade. They took no territory, just endless blockade, crashing my economy. My navy was strong, but not strong enough to take on these euro fleets and those of all of their colonial nations (colonizing happens way too fast in the current version, but that's a different post). And after a while we could white peace them out, followed almost immediately by one of the others now taking their turn to blockade me. I mean, my ally was Bahamis. England declared on them, but only blockaded me.

But you know what? I took it on the chin and kept going. But then a chain of events happened that saw me quit in disgust, not rage really.

My ally Sunda was DoW'd, and forced to cancel their alliance with me. I then went to war (by myself since no allies would answer) against Dai Vet and their alliance. It was a nasty war that I edged, but at the end my army was in shreds, no manpower. Bahamis then called me to an offensive war that they had no chance of winning. Ugg. They were my last remaining ally so I couldn't afford to lose them, so reluctantly agreed. You cannot gain a new ally while you are already at war. With three colonial euro wars always going simultaneously I had no opportunity to add more. Once Bahamis was near defeat, one of the nations to my north that had emerged from the Mingsplosion declared on me. Bahamis said nope (bastages) and with that 200k descended on me, stripped off all allies, and it was over.

A few posts ago I talked about how allies were in better shape now than before in EU IV. But it's not actually the case. Situational, rather. They deal with debt better, sure, but they are in the main, entirely unreliable, frustrating and need work.

I'm shelving it again I think. Had a good run over the past few weeks, grabbing a bunch of achievements (now 138). I crossed 3,700 hours in Europa Universalis IV. Crazy.