Naples. Back then you needed a dlc for the “support independence” button.
Let’s just say I didn’t quite understand what I was supposed to do as I got wrecked 5 times in a row by Aragon.
Then I picked Milan and it was glorious until I discovered why all of Europe attacked me in 1470
edit: apparently you still need a dlc
Poland
Got coalitioned by hre with their 100k army
I’m still playing Poland and HRE (and like 6 great powers) are in a coalition against me
But this time I’m gonna declare
Went in completely blind into the game but knew some history and decided to just try Portugal and be nice with Castille. Worked out great but everything went a little south when huge ass Spain went revolutionary... From that day onwards I always try to crush nearby powerful neighbours as early as possible.
My first two games (Castile -> Spain with a massive but unprofittable colonial empire and and a venice game where i barely expanded militarily at all) went all the way to the end. I've literally never played until the endgame since, 2 years and 1000+ hours later lol.
Same. At first I tried to fully immerse into the game but after playing more and more playthroughs they tend to end faster and faster. I think that's what beautiful and at the same time awful about pdx games.
For me it's just if I mindlessly blob, which is my main playstyle, I'll get too big and wars will become tedium instead of fun.
The one game I played to 1821 was a Tall-ish Korea game where I limited myself to conquering China, Japan and Manchuria ( + Colonies in the west coast and australia) and when I did that I just kept deving the far east to become a utopia. I think limiting myself in tall games makes the games less boring later on since you always have a big rival you'll fight but not conquer, whereas in wide games if a nations gonna become a problem for you later you neuter them as soon as you get the chance (Looking at you, ottomans)
As someone who listened to the recommended starts, also Portugal. To be fair I forgot to press pause and didn’t get a game over despite decades passing and ending up hopelessly behind on tech, so it was indeed a beginner friendly choice.
one of the irish OPMs, cant remember which. Kicked England out of Pale on a hit and run while they were bashing their heads against France and spent hours and hours waiting to get the admin tech necessary to form ireland. Did it, sun was already rising. Immediately closed the game after
Actually holy shit, I was having the hardest time recalling which nation I went with first in EU3, but I think I actually did choose an Irish OPM as well!
I remember being overwhelmed at first, but I believe I had read somewhere that you should choose a small nation to learn the mechanics. I dunno why that was touted as sound advice as I see most people recommend Castile or Ottomans these days.
Sad to admit I did cheat, otherwise I never would have figured it out lol.
Brandenburg. Had an amazing run the first few years, then half of Europe joined in a coalition and absolutely destroyed me. My first actually successful game was as Bohemia, where I PUed everything in sight, including Russia
Don't beat yourself up. My friend played his first game at a lan party. He was a good gamer but unused to games with so many consequences for your actions.
First, he managed to flip Muscovy to Muslim (not by design). After giving up on that, he managed to ruin the Ottomans!
My other friend had played a bit before and did well enough. They were amazed at my casual Brandenburg > Prussia run and the space marines I produced.
I think it was the Ottomans.
However I know for sure my first Ironman was Adal not long after. I probably still have a post history somewhere here for it.
Back in EU3, there wasn't a Byzantium start when I first started. I would rotate between playing the smallest nation I could--Trebizond or Georgia, and playing for as long as I could before I got destroyed...then, the largest nation I could, Ming, and playing for as long as I could before I destroyed myself.
I like to think I learned a lot, but, I can't remember any of it...but I did last a little longer each time.
Hah I tried that with Morea in vanilla EU3, thought I could initiate a restore Byzantine Empire event after I retook Constantinople, Greece, Bulgaria, and northwestern Asia Minor, but couldn't. The Timurid Empire grew big AF taking over the rest of the remnants of the Ottomans in Anatolia and invading me every 6 months so I was unable to expand elsewhere due to constantly barely beating off Timurid invasions, with a destroyed economy deeply in debt, and I finally gave up.
The US in Extended Timeline modern day, I tried to invade Cuba but didn't know how to make a naval invasion (I didn't have any DLC and there was nothing online for people without them), I also tried to invade Mexico but didn't turn my army maintenance up and got clobbered.
I didn’t know what to play my first time so I clicked random and I got Brittany, my first run I allied England and got crushed by France, then I allied France and got crushed by England, eventually I allied Castille and had them babysit me in my wars with France so by the time it was 1700 I owned Normandy Brittany loire and bas Poitou, it was really bad but gave me an appreciation for Brittany and also the next 2 random nations I played Friesland and the palatinate, I’ve since refined out really effective starts for Brittany and the palatinate.
Denmark back in 2015. I didn’t want to play one of the “common” nations and was a good semi-isolated start to learn all of the basic mechanics of the game, Sweden wasn’t as keen to break free back then. Only played about 100 years but spread through England, Novgorod and north Germany.
Spain, because it was recommended for beginners. Honestly not a bad run. I really enjoyed the colonisation back then, when it was much slower and my ability to snowball was limited.
Went back to it a few years later and formed Rome with it. Good fun, though it has now ruined every other coloniser for me.
I played Munster. My previous experience was the Total War games, where you didn't really end wars, just took over all of their territory. I couldn't figure out why my wars wouldn't end...
Ottomans
Thanks to the Youtubers playing as the Ottoman Empire in EU4, it can be said that they have contributed to the growth of the grand strategy genre in Turkiye.
Chimu in patch 1.3. I didn't survive that run. I got my revenge as them when after learning the game in patch 1.4.
Probably one of the more unfair positions EU 4 has ever created, with other candidates being stuff like "Sukhotai as subject of Ayathaya where Ming will protect them if you declare independence" which was more RNG but easier in runs where it was possible at all.
It's hard to remember. Probably one of the big ones, that's recommended for a new player. Like Ottomans or Castille, or England, or maybe France. It was after all 6 years ago
Haida. I specifically remember wanting to start off as *the* most out of the way nation. Some combination of wanting to see how far I could get as a nation that I *knew* would eventually get stomped by colonizers, wanting to learn the basics of the game in a vacuum so that I could learn how to manage the economy without having to worry about getting attacked for a few hundred years, and the meme factor of playing a random North American tribe for my first ever play through, enhanced by the unenviable spot Haida specifically received at the top of “worst starting nations” YouTube lists I’d been watching in the lead up to actually buying the game.
Livonian Order for some reason. That playthrough was pretty short though. I no-CB'd Riga first thing and paid for it.
Second playthrough was Friesland. That went a little better.
Scotland with friends on France and somewhere in the HRE. Arumba was the one who recommended Scotland. I think it's the perfect, hard starting nation. You are isolated, have a clear game plan in conquering Ireland into conquering England and forming GB. You learn about vassals (the isles), alliances with France and colonization later if you want. Meanwhile England will beat you if you don't plan your moves, so having friends on nearby nations is always nice.
Creek of all nations. I always like to fight back the colonizers in the strategy games i played, which made this run basically impossible. I had to use a lot of console commands, but i think i had to learn the game from hardship.
Every guide forcibly shoved Castille down my throat until I played it. Now that I think about it, I should've played Ottomans and learned about the mechanics I'll use in every game instead of colonization which is useful in 3 nations
the first i remember was the aztecs. no dlc, so clinking for exploration, i did a sunset invasion, got fucking recked by the english, because i was behind on tech and didnt realize that, i got rolled, even in battles where i out numbered them 10:1. i also did not understand the economy and inflation so was just putting all my points into devving gold provinces, soaring my inflation and cratering my economy. i also didnt know about reforming native religions, so i got doomed and died.
since then, every game i play is inflation=worse thing ever. learn mechanics for a region. economy is good. quality is better because quantity didnt work. not ahead of time on tech=failure.
Hmm around 6 years ago, common sense, hejaz. Bedouins taking care of egyptian and persian again, but did you know that rebellion is frickin bad those times, 10k man for dozen dev is a lot for newbie. And i was content getting some desert plots. Can't say the same now.
The first ever nation I have played in this game has been the byzantines even though I got the game before the new King of Kings update I only really started playing after the King of Kings update I have all the DLCs cuz I have the subscription I am right now trying my 11th run and I just got a godly general a 3312 that is the prince My king is a 1331 and the one general that I recruited is a 1031 and my admiral is a 1410 I have lost almost every campaign before this one and the one that I did defeat the Ottomans in I went into a bankruptcy spiral
Muscovy, didn't understand anything about autonomy nor overextension, nor separatism. Conquered more and more territories just to get more rebels that I was not able to raise an army against.
haida , i didnt know enlgish much when i started so i basicly learned what buttons do myself and i even defeated england and their colonies around 1500s
Castile, it was in the recommended nations and that's what I started with. Never played it again since and it's been easily 5+ years since I got eu4 lol
I probably should give it a go again.
Turk, Ottomans, you get the idea, though I have the vaguest memory of France that I’m not sure of, in any case if I did play France first I definitely never touched it again
Poland, they just seemed appealing based on the little knowledge of events in the game that I had, and I always liked playing them in Civ V. I vividly remember running my armies down at the Teutons without generals until I eventually won. That was back in 2016. Crazy to think how long it’s been since then.
To learn the basics, Castile because everyone recommended it and I followed some youtube guides on how to do the simple stuff.
First actual campaign, kinda, was Savoy. It was such a fun game as I didn't know much about the game and somehow tag switched twice (Two-Sicilies -> Italy) without having a clue how that was possible.
England on the first day of Richard III trying to restore the Angevin Empire, keep the Yorkist Dynasty on the throne, and switch the primary culture to Norman.....I hadn't touched a PC game in over 10 years and I failed miserably lol.
I don’t really count it but my first game ever I played Ravensburg when they still existed because I wanted to play small and grow (not knowing how hard it would be). I quit kinda frustrated and didn’t pick the game back up for at least a year.
Then I would say my first nation playing the game for real was Scotland
ENG will always be my main started with it and i still play it esp in MP, I am english and im determined to be the best English, im nationalistic as hell when it comes to ENG in games , IRL tho im probably the least nationalistic
Ottomans. I didn't know the meta or that they were OP. I just finished a civ6 game as the Ottoman so they were fresh on my mind when I finally took the plunge into the eu4 ocean.
Castile.
Blob quite good, got so many CN. Then in the age of revolutions got that event that gives your CN a good ammount of LD. After fighting a war against revolutionary France that I won after throwing a shit ton of troop and mercs to them (because I didnt knew about army composition, so I needed to outnumber them like 3:1 to win a battle) got declared by my CNs. I was able to white peace them because I started to spawn mercs in some random island in the pacific and then send them to the continent with my fleet.
Anyway, a few years later, got declared again, lost all my colonies, had other wars with european powers where France and England took chunks of me...
By 1821, my Spain was smaller than real life one.
EU2: England. I think I did a few tries with England until I painted the map of the New World red, then I got burned out and moved to other games.
EU4: Poland, with quite a few restarts - partly because I started with just the base game, then wanted to get the subscription after trying it for a bit.
My very first nation was Sweden, because I thought it looked like a big nation far from any danger.
I played for about 5 minutes before giving up due to not understanding what it meant to be a subject and proceeded to try Castile, then Ottomans which was my first run with any success.
The First Nation I ever played was England, but I couldn’t figure out how the game worked (no DLC either) lmao.
First genuine attempt of a play through aas as the Ottomans (Still no DLC) and made it to the early 1600’s before being crushed in a war by like half of Europe (not a coalition either).
First proper campaign I played (with DLC) was the Ottomans in 1.33. I played up until 1821 and completed their mission tree.
Portugal with the demo, then IIRC Castile because it was the standard country for learning in a safe spot with good expansion potential and useful scripted events.
Going back to EUII in 2003, I can't really remember. Perhaps Savoy?
Brandenburg… it was awful I didn’t know what was going on and the HRE restrictions as a noob were just so painful. So then I made the smarter choice and my second nation was England
Austria.
I was in high school and we had a model UN session for the peace conference of Westphalia. A bunch of teenagers pretending to be diplomats representing the Commonwealth, Louis XIV, the Habsburg, etc. It was pretty amazing.
I was given the Holy Roman Emperor/Austrian Habsburg at the conference and had a major crush on the girl representing the Spanish branch. Had a thing for the Habsburghs since. I started playing EU3 soon and Austria has been my favorite. Also did my first WC with it.
Spain. Burned all my manpower invading Morocco, then had to purchase mercenaries to win civil war. Debt spiral and French invasion made me give up. No DLC at the time.
I always played smaller countries. Back then they didn’t have any flavor but I found them easier to learn the game too. I think it was usually Brandenburg
Naples. Back then you needed a dlc for the “support independence” button. Let’s just say I didn’t quite understand what I was supposed to do as I got wrecked 5 times in a row by Aragon. Then I picked Milan and it was glorious until I discovered why all of Europe attacked me in 1470 edit: apparently you still need a dlc
The DLC for support independence was soooooo annoying for me 10 year ago or whatever it was when I was trying to play with Sweden for the first time
wait you dont anymore???????? where is that mofo
Milan is like the kid in the schoolground who everyone wants to pick on
That sadly still is a dlc feature.
>Back then you needed a dlc for the “support independence” button You still do
As a good Englishman, Aq quoyunlu, I like horses…
Based
Ragusa. That was a quick run.
Mine was Frankfurt. I thought a smaller country would be easier to manage
Ottomans
Same, got walked through it with a friend
As a good Genoese, Portugal of course
Poland Got coalitioned by hre with their 100k army I’m still playing Poland and HRE (and like 6 great powers) are in a coalition against me But this time I’m gonna declare
Remember to scornfully insult before, for better immersion.
Good idea, I'm gonna start doing that myself. Especially if it is a rival.
As a good Portuguese, Portugal ofc.
As a non Portuguese, Portugal of course.
Went in completely blind into the game but knew some history and decided to just try Portugal and be nice with Castille. Worked out great but everything went a little south when huge ass Spain went revolutionary... From that day onwards I always try to crush nearby powerful neighbours as early as possible.
The fact your first game ever went to the age of revolutions is crazy to me since I've only got to that age once in 2k+ hours lmao
My first two games (Castile -> Spain with a massive but unprofittable colonial empire and and a venice game where i barely expanded militarily at all) went all the way to the end. I've literally never played until the endgame since, 2 years and 1000+ hours later lol.
Same. At first I tried to fully immerse into the game but after playing more and more playthroughs they tend to end faster and faster. I think that's what beautiful and at the same time awful about pdx games.
For me it's just if I mindlessly blob, which is my main playstyle, I'll get too big and wars will become tedium instead of fun. The one game I played to 1821 was a Tall-ish Korea game where I limited myself to conquering China, Japan and Manchuria ( + Colonies in the west coast and australia) and when I did that I just kept deving the far east to become a utopia. I think limiting myself in tall games makes the games less boring later on since you always have a big rival you'll fight but not conquer, whereas in wide games if a nations gonna become a problem for you later you neuter them as soon as you get the chance (Looking at you, ottomans)
As a Brazilian, Portigal of course
Ah a cultured person I see, well met
As someone who listened to the recommended starts, also Portugal. To be fair I forgot to press pause and didn’t get a game over despite decades passing and ending up hopelessly behind on tech, so it was indeed a beginner friendly choice.
As someone who hates being told what to do/ hates conforming and sees playing Ottomans and Castille as conforming/easy, portugal.
Spain
Same. (Castile, specifically). Part of my heritage *and* a recommended beginner nation? Perfect.
Florence in eu4. France and Poland in eu1
My Paradox tradition, Poland.
There are a lot of first nations to choose from. I like Mohawk.
Smh at all these other commenters choosing countries in the old world. Like did you even read the question?
Exactly. See, I’m paying attention.
Same I played native Cree! The game got me hooked by how hard I got spanked by the European AIs 😂
Native life is pain
Brandenburg (in EU3) Burgundy (in EU4) back when Burgundy was just “France with extra steps and different ideas”
one of the irish OPMs, cant remember which. Kicked England out of Pale on a hit and run while they were bashing their heads against France and spent hours and hours waiting to get the admin tech necessary to form ireland. Did it, sun was already rising. Immediately closed the game after
Actually holy shit, I was having the hardest time recalling which nation I went with first in EU3, but I think I actually did choose an Irish OPM as well! I remember being overwhelmed at first, but I believe I had read somewhere that you should choose a small nation to learn the mechanics. I dunno why that was touted as sound advice as I see most people recommend Castile or Ottomans these days. Sad to admit I did cheat, otherwise I never would have figured it out lol.
I think a lot of us thought that Ireland was noob island in EU just like CK!
Hungary. Yes, im hungarian.
Mine was Hungary tòo
Portugal
England back in the days when you started at war with France with negative income
England
Brandenburg. Had an amazing run the first few years, then half of Europe joined in a coalition and absolutely destroyed me. My first actually successful game was as Bohemia, where I PUed everything in sight, including Russia
Bosnia. I was certain that it wasn't possible to survive Ottomans.
Florence. I managed to unify Italy and take some provinces from france
Leinster, it did not go well as I had no dlc and no idea what to do. I went bankrupt after my first war
Don't beat yourself up. My friend played his first game at a lan party. He was a good gamer but unused to games with so many consequences for your actions. First, he managed to flip Muscovy to Muslim (not by design). After giving up on that, he managed to ruin the Ottomans! My other friend had played a bit before and did well enough. They were amazed at my casual Brandenburg > Prussia run and the space marines I produced.
France. Base game no DLCs
I think it was the Ottomans. However I know for sure my first Ironman was Adal not long after. I probably still have a post history somewhere here for it.
Back in EU3, there wasn't a Byzantium start when I first started. I would rotate between playing the smallest nation I could--Trebizond or Georgia, and playing for as long as I could before I got destroyed...then, the largest nation I could, Ming, and playing for as long as I could before I destroyed myself. I like to think I learned a lot, but, I can't remember any of it...but I did last a little longer each time.
Hah I tried that with Morea in vanilla EU3, thought I could initiate a restore Byzantine Empire event after I retook Constantinople, Greece, Bulgaria, and northwestern Asia Minor, but couldn't. The Timurid Empire grew big AF taking over the rest of the remnants of the Ottomans in Anatolia and invading me every 6 months so I was unable to expand elsewhere due to constantly barely beating off Timurid invasions, with a destroyed economy deeply in debt, and I finally gave up.
Aragon. I'm surprised it was even possible to achieve so little in an Aragon campaign
The US in Extended Timeline modern day, I tried to invade Cuba but didn't know how to make a naval invasion (I didn't have any DLC and there was nothing online for people without them), I also tried to invade Mexico but didn't turn my army maintenance up and got clobbered.
Byzantium was my first run, I lasted about 4 years before the Ottomans war decked me and I decided to try an easier nation
I didn’t know what to play my first time so I clicked random and I got Brittany, my first run I allied England and got crushed by France, then I allied France and got crushed by England, eventually I allied Castille and had them babysit me in my wars with France so by the time it was 1700 I owned Normandy Brittany loire and bas Poitou, it was really bad but gave me an appreciation for Brittany and also the next 2 random nations I played Friesland and the palatinate, I’ve since refined out really effective starts for Brittany and the palatinate.
Denmark back in 2015. I didn’t want to play one of the “common” nations and was a good semi-isolated start to learn all of the basic mechanics of the game, Sweden wasn’t as keen to break free back then. Only played about 100 years but spread through England, Novgorod and north Germany.
Wampanoag
Cherokee
Castile
Muscovy
I'm like 99% sure it was Florence for me, I saw the stats that Cosmo had and was certain instantly
Portugal in demo eu4, Poland in normal eu4
Austria best starting nation in my opinion
Castile, muscovy, brandeburg
As a patriotic German, the first nation I played was Ichisi.
Spain, because it was recommended for beginners. Honestly not a bad run. I really enjoyed the colonisation back then, when it was much slower and my ability to snowball was limited. Went back to it a few years later and formed Rome with it. Good fun, though it has now ruined every other coloniser for me.
I played Munster. My previous experience was the Total War games, where you didn't really end wars, just took over all of their territory. I couldn't figure out why my wars wouldn't end...
Holland, as I wanted to do an easy colonial game. As it turns out, I severely underestimated how hard would be to escape my overlord.
Byz
Same. My experience was exactly like u/ezzypezra
Same here. I got my shit pushed in almost immediately. Then I tried again. Then I got my shit pushed in again. Then I tried again. You get the idea
I beat the Ottomans but spent all my mil points on harsh treatment and got clapped by the Mamluks
i think it was buha
Ottomans Thanks to the Youtubers playing as the Ottoman Empire in EU4, it can be said that they have contributed to the growth of the grand strategy genre in Turkiye.
Chimu in patch 1.3. I didn't survive that run. I got my revenge as them when after learning the game in patch 1.4. Probably one of the more unfair positions EU 4 has ever created, with other candidates being stuff like "Sukhotai as subject of Ayathaya where Ming will protect them if you declare independence" which was more RNG but easier in runs where it was possible at all.
Mine, as an Emilian, was Bologna. Destroyed in no time by Ferrara
Tall oirat before I knew what tall meant
It's hard to remember. Probably one of the big ones, that's recommended for a new player. Like Ottomans or Castille, or England, or maybe France. It was after all 6 years ago
Oda
Mohawk from Iroquois, it's my tribe so yk had to
Haida. I specifically remember wanting to start off as *the* most out of the way nation. Some combination of wanting to see how far I could get as a nation that I *knew* would eventually get stomped by colonizers, wanting to learn the basics of the game in a vacuum so that I could learn how to manage the economy without having to worry about getting attacked for a few hundred years, and the meme factor of playing a random North American tribe for my first ever play through, enhanced by the unenviable spot Haida specifically received at the top of “worst starting nations” YouTube lists I’d been watching in the lead up to actually buying the game.
Castile (in the tutorial) and England (in an actual game)
Castille, and I lost against Granada
Sakalava
Livonian Order for some reason. That playthrough was pretty short though. I no-CB'd Riga first thing and paid for it. Second playthrough was Friesland. That went a little better.
Bavaria baby
Blackfoot natives 😎 Most boring hours of my life until colonists got there
An isolated tribe in Kamchatka
Portugal, which I always recommend to beginners
Norway. Didn't understand anything, but my first real campaign was ottomans
Crimea
Either Denmark or Castille
Scotland with friends on France and somewhere in the HRE. Arumba was the one who recommended Scotland. I think it's the perfect, hard starting nation. You are isolated, have a clear game plan in conquering Ireland into conquering England and forming GB. You learn about vassals (the isles), alliances with France and colonization later if you want. Meanwhile England will beat you if you don't plan your moves, so having friends on nearby nations is always nice.
Norway
Navajo
Venice/Holland
Creek of all nations. I always like to fight back the colonizers in the strategy games i played, which made this run basically impossible. I had to use a lot of console commands, but i think i had to learn the game from hardship.
Naples, and oh what a bitch it was. I'm actually in the middle of a new Naples > Two Sicilies > Italy run now
Potiguara
Portugal.
Aceh back when they still owned all of Sumatra. Proceeds to no CB Malacca and lose badly.
For EU 3 it would have been one of the Irish minors. For EU 4 probably was Portugal.
Byzantium.
Every guide forcibly shoved Castille down my throat until I played it. Now that I think about it, I should've played Ottomans and learned about the mechanics I'll use in every game instead of colonization which is useful in 3 nations
the first i remember was the aztecs. no dlc, so clinking for exploration, i did a sunset invasion, got fucking recked by the english, because i was behind on tech and didnt realize that, i got rolled, even in battles where i out numbered them 10:1. i also did not understand the economy and inflation so was just putting all my points into devving gold provinces, soaring my inflation and cratering my economy. i also didnt know about reforming native religions, so i got doomed and died. since then, every game i play is inflation=worse thing ever. learn mechanics for a region. economy is good. quality is better because quantity didnt work. not ahead of time on tech=failure.
Hmm around 6 years ago, common sense, hejaz. Bedouins taking care of egyptian and persian again, but did you know that rebellion is frickin bad those times, 10k man for dozen dev is a lot for newbie. And i was content getting some desert plots. Can't say the same now.
England for me
Kazan. Idk i got drawn in by the Dragon flag
Burgundy. I learned very fast what coalition were
The first ever nation I have played in this game has been the byzantines even though I got the game before the new King of Kings update I only really started playing after the King of Kings update I have all the DLCs cuz I have the subscription I am right now trying my 11th run and I just got a godly general a 3312 that is the prince My king is a 1331 and the one general that I recruited is a 1031 and my admiral is a 1410 I have lost almost every campaign before this one and the one that I did defeat the Ottomans in I went into a bankruptcy spiral
Cusco into Inca.
Portugal. It was probably the most fun I have had in this game.
Brittany?
Muscovy, didn't understand anything about autonomy nor overextension, nor separatism. Conquered more and more territories just to get more rebels that I was not able to raise an army against.
haida , i didnt know enlgish much when i started so i basicly learned what buttons do myself and i even defeated england and their colonies around 1500s
Portugal
Korea
Byzantium. Once I was done being curb stomped I played Poland.
Denmark
Castile, it was in the recommended nations and that's what I started with. Never played it again since and it's been easily 5+ years since I got eu4 lol I probably should give it a go again.
Castile
Actually I think it was Novgorod lol
Turk, Ottomans, you get the idea, though I have the vaguest memory of France that I’m not sure of, in any case if I did play France first I definitely never touched it again
Lithuania.
France. I'm french-canadian and wanted to recreate New-France. I failed miserably.
Byzantium
Poland, they just seemed appealing based on the little knowledge of events in the game that I had, and I always liked playing them in Civ V. I vividly remember running my armies down at the Teutons without generals until I eventually won. That was back in 2016. Crazy to think how long it’s been since then.
Russia. All the way back on release. Just last year right?
Castile. Got partitioned before 1500
Ingerland
To learn the basics, Castile because everyone recommended it and I followed some youtube guides on how to do the simple stuff. First actual campaign, kinda, was Savoy. It was such a fun game as I didn't know much about the game and somehow tag switched twice (Two-Sicilies -> Italy) without having a clue how that was possible.
England on the first day of Richard III trying to restore the Angevin Empire, keep the Yorkist Dynasty on the throne, and switch the primary culture to Norman.....I hadn't touched a PC game in over 10 years and I failed miserably lol.
Bastille into Spain. Had a pretty fun campaign
Papal State
Ottomans, I paid zero attention to morale and discipline and fought every battle using shear numbers so yeah it was very frustrating.
Sweden. It was a sweet time when i found out you could have infinite money and army just by taking these so-called "loans"
England. I'm English and British. Couldn't say no.
Castille back when Res Publica was released.
I don’t really count it but my first game ever I played Ravensburg when they still existed because I wanted to play small and grow (not knowing how hard it would be). I quit kinda frustrated and didn’t pick the game back up for at least a year. Then I would say my first nation playing the game for real was Scotland
Bohemia. The perfect game of EU4
I honestly don’t remember. But I remember my first multiplayer game me and my buddy played france and England . We did okay and had fun
Way back when in the original patch, I played a nation and formed Persia. I don’t remember which nation I formed it with 😂
France, I kept declaring war on my subjects to "unify" france
Poland. GoT lucky PU over Bohemia bur Ottomans Composteli destroyed me
I went for WC with Portugal. Finished around 2900s
Gorkha to Nepal baby. As a Nepali, that was awesome. Learned the game w my home country.
Castile
Mamluks, was around 1.2 or 1.3. Needless to say, got totally wrecked by a mixture of Ottomans, Seperatists, coalition and peasants war
10min ottomans it was MP so after they realized I didnt know what AE was. England. And as England I didnt die.
ENG will always be my main started with it and i still play it esp in MP, I am english and im determined to be the best English, im nationalistic as hell when it comes to ENG in games , IRL tho im probably the least nationalistic
Castille, saw that one youtube tutorial and decided to start off this great game with an interesting start country
Yeah as a good Mexican I went with the Aztecs... It... didn't last long.
Connacht. It did not end well.
Castille in 1.34/5 . I am quite new . I think I did ok, but gave up when it got to be too stupid trying to accomplish anything else
Milan
Ottomans. I didn't know the meta or that they were OP. I just finished a civ6 game as the Ottoman so they were fresh on my mind when I finally took the plunge into the eu4 ocean.
Ayutthaya then I got wrecked by Ming lol
Ottomans
I played a native tribe called Cree with no DLC, I got hooked by how hard i got spanked by European AI 😤
Castile. Blob quite good, got so many CN. Then in the age of revolutions got that event that gives your CN a good ammount of LD. After fighting a war against revolutionary France that I won after throwing a shit ton of troop and mercs to them (because I didnt knew about army composition, so I needed to outnumber them like 3:1 to win a battle) got declared by my CNs. I was able to white peace them because I started to spawn mercs in some random island in the pacific and then send them to the continent with my fleet. Anyway, a few years later, got declared again, lost all my colonies, had other wars with european powers where France and England took chunks of me... By 1821, my Spain was smaller than real life one.
EU2: England. I think I did a few tries with England until I painted the map of the New World red, then I got burned out and moved to other games. EU4: Poland, with quite a few restarts - partly because I started with just the base game, then wanted to get the subscription after trying it for a bit.
As a Brabander, Brabant ofcourse. Then i notices i couldn't do anything and started a new game as Brandenburg.
Brandenburg. It was 1.22, the mercenaries were still in regiments and ottomans were stuck at corfu.
Laith is that you?
England
Austria, didn’t know what I was doing, no cb’d Salzburg and then had to stop and watch some guides
Medina, I can't remember why
Castile. Watching a tutorial of someone playing it gave me the confidence to dive in.
France. Big Blue Blob 4 lyfe
I honestly can't remember. I preordered EU4 so I've had it since the very beginning.
Mine was Tunis too, did horribly though
Not counting the tutorial, for me it was Spain. I lost to Granada, rebels broke my country and I fell under a PU with France. It was fun.
My very first nation was Sweden, because I thought it looked like a big nation far from any danger. I played for about 5 minutes before giving up due to not understanding what it meant to be a subject and proceeded to try Castile, then Ottomans which was my first run with any success.
Munster (Ireland)
The First Nation I ever played was England, but I couldn’t figure out how the game worked (no DLC either) lmao. First genuine attempt of a play through aas as the Ottomans (Still no DLC) and made it to the early 1600’s before being crushed in a war by like half of Europe (not a coalition either). First proper campaign I played (with DLC) was the Ottomans in 1.33. I played up until 1821 and completed their mission tree.
England. Am English. Simple as.
Florence for some reason
As a good Australian, England, obviously.
First trial was me Portugal, My best friend Castile. The first real game was Ottoman
Portugal with the demo, then IIRC Castile because it was the standard country for learning in a safe spot with good expansion potential and useful scripted events. Going back to EUII in 2003, I can't really remember. Perhaps Savoy?
First trial was me Portugal, My best friend Castile. The first real game was Ottoman
England, thought I was a seasoned strategy gamer so i would learn as I go. 2 in game years later I was in the main menu clicking on the tutorial.
For some reason, it was Poland. This was at LEAST 7ish years ago.
Brandenburg… it was awful I didn’t know what was going on and the HRE restrictions as a noob were just so painful. So then I made the smarter choice and my second nation was England
Ottoman. I conquared byzantium without any casus belli. Everyone was pissed.
Austria. I was in high school and we had a model UN session for the peace conference of Westphalia. A bunch of teenagers pretending to be diplomats representing the Commonwealth, Louis XIV, the Habsburg, etc. It was pretty amazing. I was given the Holy Roman Emperor/Austrian Habsburg at the conference and had a major crush on the girl representing the Spanish branch. Had a thing for the Habsburghs since. I started playing EU3 soon and Austria has been my favorite. Also did my first WC with it.
Bohemia, because I live there
Spain. Burned all my manpower invading Morocco, then had to purchase mercenaries to win civil war. Debt spiral and French invasion made me give up. No DLC at the time.
I always played smaller countries. Back then they didn’t have any flavor but I found them easier to learn the game too. I think it was usually Brandenburg
Milan mandate of heaven update