I just finished my first world conquest and as I had a hard time finding really useful guides, I decided I might share a few tips and ideas. I was always a bit of a historical gamer in EUIV, so a world conquest is something I really had to change my playstyle to do.
Most people will tell you, that a world conquest is easiest to do as the Ottomans, and it was also what I had my first attempts as. The advantages as Ottomans is mainly their reduced coring cost, that will let you core a lot more and faster than most other nations and their early claims on large parts of the middle east, that will let you take huge swathes of land for lower aggressive expansion and diplo-cost.
What counts against them, is in my opinion, that they have a harder time stopping the colonizers than France, so one way or another you will likely have to counquer the Americas too. Most people will tell you that this doesn't matter, since in the endgame you can just annex colonial overlords and then get their colonies, I found out that in reality, this doesn't really hold up. Large colonizers will break free from their overlord, when you have cut them down to size or they will move their capital to the new world, if the largest part of the development is there, so you'll basically have to conquer two extra continents if you choose to play as the Ottomans.
Another drawback to the Ottomans, is that their late game units is weaker than the western counterparts, so generally fighting battles will be tougher and cost you more manpower and time. And since you very quickly fall into a habit of fighting the easier Asian and African nations, and usually neglect military ideas in a WC, it can be quite a shock to suddenly meet western armies with discipline & moral boosts from their national and general ideas.
After a couple of attempts as Ottos, that I gave up in the lategame, I decided to go with France.
The advantages of France, is their strong military ideas, extra diplo slot, ability to stop colonizers and generally being big and badass in the start. Also the chance to get personal unions with other European powers weighs in their favor. My guess is that the strategy for France is very similar to the one for England and Castille, so if you plan to play these nations, there is probably a few tips for you here as well.
General WC tips:
- The main thing to watch out for in a WC, especially in the early game, is aggressive expansion.
In the early game a big coalition will break you. In the mid-game, even though you can win the war, it will usually set you back some years, as you need to move your armies away from your conquest zones to fight defensively. It is a lot better to avoid them.
The general rules of thumb you should have in mind is that you should expand in different directions, consider that taking land from a different religion gives very low AE to followers of other denominations and that using a diplomat will make AE go down faster.
Also, remember that retaking cores for your vassals gives you very low AE, so releasing one province of eg. Syria or Catalonia and then taking the rest as a reconquest, will significantly reduce AE.
Atwix' guide is really good when it comes to AE and coalitions, read it for the finer points of AE-handling and a more thorough guide: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/coalition-handling-guide.956958/
- Money, manpower and corruption are also things you should watch, but are not as vital as AE.
In the lategame you'll be swimming in gold and men, but you'll need to be careful early, by balancing your army with mercenaries and building up your economy with buildings.
Remember, that even though you have 3-400k manpower, your armies will also be larger and burn a lot more men, especially due to attrition, so just watch it, you can easily empty your pool.
A partial goal in a WC is setting up a money machine for your rampaging army. Usually this is a good trade node. As the Ottomans, it is conquering India and sending the trade to Constantinople, as France it is owning the Genoa trade node.
- A World Conquest takes time. A lot of time.
Most part of the game you will play on speed 2, as you will often be managing several wars at a time. I don't know how many hours it take, but a week of intense gaming isn't that off. If you play a few hours every day, a month is probably what it takes, so you'll also have to watch out for things like a new patch coming out and making your savegame obsolete, besides of course angry girlfriends, hungry children etc.
- A World Conquest is mainly a mental challenge.
You will find many people writing about the mental challenge that a World Conquest is, and this is very true, especially on your first run, where you don't really have the feel of how well you're doing and how far you are. You don't have that short term goal, that you have when going for other achievements or playing historically.
It can really feel like a grind to fight a war, waiting for coring to finish, end it, start a new war in the lategame.
- Chaincoring is necessary and actually a good habit, as it makes you keep on pushing.
The greatest brake on lategame conquest is not lack of admin points, it's the time it takes to core your conquest. By chaincoring, you maximize this.
By chaincoring, I mean waiting for making a truce, until your coring from the previous war have finished, then repeating. By roughly 1600 you can start doing this and most def start by 1650.
Also, avoid the temptation to go over 100% overextension, it's really not worth it, except maybe for a month or two.
Also remember, that if you are at war with a country that have cores on a provinces you own, coring on them will be stopped. This is an issue that you should think of esp in india
- A rule of thumb tells that if you have over 1800 development by 1600, you can do a World Conquest, but for your first run, have more than that.
I had roughly 3000 development around 1600 and finished in 1813, but also took it a bit easy at the end. For your first run, try to have at least 2500 development by 1600.
- Some Ideas are optional, some are not.
In my run, I went admin, influence, religious, exploration, humanist, offensive and diplo. The last was aristocratic I think, but that one comes so late that it isn't really important. Of these I consider admin, influence and religious as essential for a WC, unless you want to challenge yourself ofc.
A short rundown of the ideas I took:
Administrative: Reduced coring cost. And you're gonna core a lot of territories my friend. Also the reduces mercenary maintenance and cost really helps.
Influence: Reduced AE and reduced diplo annex cost. Extra diplo rep helps as well and gives a great policy with admin that gives -20 % diplo annexation cost on top of the 25 % that the idea gives. The - 50% unjustified demands also really helps with taking non-claimed land.
Religious: The Deus Vult casus belli just makes it so much easier, by lowering the AE from conquest to 75%, reducing diplo idea cost from taking non-claims to zero and making you able to declare wars on heathens and heretics without making a claim first.
Exploration: Since you'll be conquering the colonizers, you'll need to conquer the Americas yourself. You'll also need a colonist to reach the states in central Africa, like Buganda.
Humanist: One of the most annoying things in a WC is the rebels you'll have to fight all the time. Humanists -10 years separatism and general taking it easy on the conquered territories, really makes the run a lot smoother.
Offensive: Buffs your armies, as most others will have at this point, and gives you +20% siege ability, really helps with those level 8 forts. Would swap it for Aristocracy in a new run, as it gives allround more useful bonuses for a WC.
Diplomatic: The -20% warscore cost will let you take a lot more land in peace and the reduced cost of diplomatic actions makes it possible for you to trucebreak in the late game with a reduced stability hit. Would probably have taken it early if I'd do a rerun.
- Start working on 1000+ dev nations by 1700.
Don't wait too long to take out the big guys. If you start carving up Ming by 1700, you'll be fine, but even though you core a lot faster in the lategame, it will still take time. Also in the lategame, take fortresses when peacing out, as they take so long to siege. It might not make pretty maps, but it makes future wars a lot shorter.
- Vassalfeeding speeds up your expansion
Vassalfeeding means conquering land and giving it to a vassal or a lesser partner in a PU, and letting them core it, instead of coring it yourself. You can do that either in a peace treaty or by granting land through vassal interaction.
Then later, you can integrate your vassals, or, if you are only going for the achievement or a non-onetag WC, just leave them.
The bigger a vassal gets, the more liberty desire it will have. In my experience, around a vassal around 300 development is the maximum for easy integration. Your PUs doesn't have this, so in theory, you can feed them infinite amounts of land.
The vassalfeeding you'll do in a WC is quite large scale and in my experience, it takes some time to learn to get right. If you give land to your vassals in a peace treaty, you take less land than if you take it for yourself, and if you grant land, you need to be at peace.
- Get your Absolutism to max ASAP
Absolutism increases your administrative efficiency by up to 40% and administrative efficiency reduces the cost and time of coring and integrating land, so it's a really important modifier for large scale conquest.
Absolutism is easiest increased by harsh treating rebels and by decreasing autonomy in provinces.
A nice trick to get it up fast - thx @Sfan - is spawning particularist rebels, accepting their demands, resulting in higher autonomy in your provinces and then decreasing the autonomy again to gain absolutism.
Starting out as France:
You'll likely need to start a couple of times until you get a start that feels right and where you've expanded a lot by 1500. This is how I did it, but it's no where near the only way to WC with France. Look further down the thread for more good openings.
The new mission system in 1.25 would probably make me change a few things, but the basics is very much the same.
- Rival England, Aragon and Burgundy.
- Ally Castille, start improving relations with Navarra, send a spy to Provence.
Castille will be your main ally in the early part of the game. You will backstab them later, but they are really good against Burgundy and Aragon.
In all my starts I vassalized Navarra before taking on England. Their 3 units help in the independence war if you tell them to attach to your units and Navarra is a mountainous region, that will often be sieged by the English or Portuguese and is a really good place to win battles. And ofc a province taken without AE.
You should be able to diplomatically vassalize them in June 1445.
Provence will very often be excommunicated by the Pope and attacked by Burgundy and sometimes the Papal states and Bretagne, but mostly, you will be able to conquer two or three of their provinces before they're eaten and that at half AE cost.
Remember to break the alliance with Provence as the next action after sending the spy there.
Build some extra troops for your army and by the time Navarra is vassalized, declare a reconquest war on England. They will usually be allied with Portugal and a few Irish minors, but you should be able to handle them without too much trouble. sometimes they ally Scotland and then it starts to be a bit too much. You can prevent this by checking Scotlands relationship with England and if they are not rivalled to England, ally Scotland.
In the war, first take out Portugal and seize Ceuta. This is important, as it is your bridgehead to North Africa. In the war against England, with 92% warscore, you can take all your cores and The Pale and Calais. Especially The Pale is important here, as it is your bridgehead to expansion on the British Isles.
After the war, you likely need to get your warexhaustion and AE down and your manpower up, so a few years of waiting is ok. Take some land from Provence and make claims on North Africa, maybe diplovassalize Ulster or another Irish minor.
When you have 10 favors with Castille, it is time to take on Aragon. Sometimes they ally Austria, so they can be quite tough, but with Castille, you should have no problem against them. Just take one province, Roussillon from them and humiliate them. You can then release Catalonia and the humiliation will give you more splendor and extra monarch points from.
In the next war, you should have both the reduced AE and transfer subject ability from the Age-objective and you can take Naples as a vassal for reduced AE and diplocost. In the third war reconquer cores for Catalonia and Naples.
One of the most annoying things is if the Iberian Wedding fires early, before you've cut down Aragon. I would restart if it happens before you've taken Naples.
In the north, watch England and Scotland. You can't take all of Scotland in one war, so it actually helps if you let England take a few. The you can force or diplovassalize the rest and then reconquer the provinces back from Enggland for Scotland. Then eat England bite by bite.
When you cut England down, annexed Scotland one way or another, you can fabricate a claim on the Faeroe Islands and take most of Norway in a war with Scandinavia. This is your springboard to Russia and Novgorod. Novgorod will usually be eaten by it's neighbours at this point, so you can take a province, release and then reconquer the rest from Moscovy, also to stop them from forming Russia and colonize Siberia. This usually happens early 1500s.
In North Africa, I usually release Fez as my vassal and feed them Moroccan and Tlemcen land, to prevent the high Berber coring cost. Remember it is still a good idea to fabricate claims on the lands before conquering them, to save the diplo points.
Taking land there doesn't give you much AE, as it different religion, and it is Burgundy, Austria, Savoy, that you mainly have to watch out for. Worst scenario is a coalition of both the Christians and the Berber stated tho, so again, watch your AE.
If you, at any point, can conquer Granada before Castille, it is definitely worthwhile, as it just means fewer territories to take from Castille, when you backstab them.
Take territories from Portugal and Burgundy when opportunities arise, but esp Burgundy, is a bit secondary, as it usually means high AE cost. Bretagne and the Irish minors is not really top priority as well, as not many others will be able to reach them. Just let them sit their and use them as a target of opportunity when your AE is getting low.
When you've fenced in Portugal and stopped them from colonizing, it's time to backstab Castille. Ally with Poland instead and fence them in to stop colonizing. Poland will be very useful against Russia/Moscovy and the Ottomans and often grows big, which will prevent coalitions from attacking you.
At this point in the game, around 1520 or so, start expanding against the Mamluks, maybe release Algeria or Tripoli and feed them, go for the holy cities and give the Ottomans a bloody nose in the first war. Also start fencing in Muscovy and move east in Russia, towards India and Ming.
Basically, your expansion will be two big pincers: One going from Scandinavia, through Moscow and to central Asia and China, the other going from North Africa, to the Middle East, to the Persian Gulf and India, with a offshot down the East African coast They usually link up somewhere around Samarkand.
Around 1600 the game changes character and you start to get into the automated chaincoring grind, where wars aren't really a challenge anymore and you'll start taking as close to 100% overextension in every war. What you mainly should watch out for here is not to slack too much. It's easy to think that coalitions isn't a threat anymore or that you can easily win every war. It's very easy to get a nasty surprise here.
Remember to think of targets of opportunity. In my game I got a succession war with Poland - my ally - over Austria. I won it and even though it slowed me down a few years, it gave me a really strong second throne and the seat of the emperor shortly after for low AE.
Don't despair if you don't feel like you're progressing fast enough in the 1600s. I don't know how many times I thought that I wasn't gonna make it in time, but made it with no sweat in the end. almost got the One Faith achievement as well, just missed two provinces.
Edit: Added parts about vassalfeeding and Absolutism and elaborated minor details. Also added tips from this thread.
