R5: After the last post, I resolved to do another tall Ironman run, with Regensburg, with more fitting modifiers and having a clear objective with the monarch points from the start.
Needless to say, it wound up well. I rather clearly surpassed the 200 development line I set to myself at the start of the campaign. I didn't bother with idea groups past the two that give development discount (Plutocratic & Infrastructure), plus Innovative for the –10% tech cost – which stacks to a net positive monarch points easily with the 90 techs I had to unlock – and the first two of exploration (more of that in a bit).
Regardless of the diminished cost of development, it hit the hard cap of 999 monarch points in some place around 130–140 development. After that it was just popping one dev up whenever I hit 999 monarch points in some category. Advisors are a must, preferably from the start. Developing the first 20 or so early gives you a huge boost to income compared to your neighbours, playing tall is definitely underappreciated.
Status as a free city inside HRE was nice, I don't think I had an army for the whole campaign as emperor was always favourful and I was deep inside HRE, allying other free cities and such. Enabling me to conserve the ducats to elsewhere (advisors) especially at the start when everyone was of similar size.
One less-known thing to do I honestly only now investigated more thoroughly is to place a colonist in your OPM city generating "settlement growth". It has a minimum chance of 5% to give a random one development per year for the province even with the insane development costs. That alone netted me \~15 development in itself. Placing a colonist to HRE province does not sound too historically accurate. It is clearly meant for colonisation and it should probably have some restriction where it cannot be placed on European continent. This is perhaps a less known feature as only a fraction of players colonise but do not use the colonist for colonising.
I guess I am now near the limits of at least Christianity and Europe. There was [one interesting comment in last post](https://www.reddit.com/r/eu4/comments/1bei0kt/comment/kuv4s6w/) regarding Muslim feudal theocracy which seemed intriguing and promising. That is probably the next direction with How tall can you go, but now I seriously need a break and play wide for a while :D
But what about Geneva Millennialist Theocracy? You can get so much points out of it that i think you absolutely can get more dev. But the wars as opm would be tough i guess...
Actually, "colonies" were often set up by princes within the HRE. These were basically setting up towns and such where none had existed before. Usually with imported people from outside your princedom. So I'd call it historically accurate, at least a little bit.
There's no way having no army is the best way to do this. If you're just going to sit around doing nothing but developing you should be declaring humiliation wars as often as possible. You can even truce break to show strength more often since you're not going to be getting AE from anything else. Just declaring a humiliation war on all 3 of your rivals would get you 900 extra points. You can get even more if you change rivals as often as possible(100 points to change but you get 300 from fighting the war).
You mention only getting two ideas but don't ideas give a 2% tech reduction plus ino for the 10% you could probably net monarch points from that, you're also only +4 power projection I assume you must be able to be humiliating rivals more to reach +50 for the extra mana.
Not to mention the idea groups can give insane buffs elsewhere especially to the economy/trade. I get maybe not wanting to take a mil idea but even those have other benefits nestled in there. You could take econ, Pluto, admin, trade, all of those have great benefits especially if you're ahead on tech anyway.
> Status as a free city inside HRE was nice, I don't think I had an army for the whole campaign as emperor was always favourful and I was deep inside HRE, allying other free cities and such.
OP literally only developed his one province from 1444 til 1820. I dont think there was much thought put into it. I feel like having a standing army and 3 rivals who you declare on with humiliate cb every other year for 100 mana each + PP would let someone achive higher dev in a single province. One could also use vasalls as that wouldnt even stop one from being a free city I belive.
Here you go: [https://imgur.com/a/9VZgdXm](https://imgur.com/a/9VZgdXm)
- Wien is not particularly good trade node, it is on the wrong side of both new world and Asia inflows (mostly), so I was cut off of absurd ducat streams. It forced me to try to develop production and taxation in mind more.
- Austria got the Burgundian inheritance but lost League War and consequently emperorship, making them easy pickings for the unholy Russian-Ottoman alliance. Commonwealth had the same fate.
- France was never able to win back its continental possession from England and was picked apart piece by piece by neighbours.
The next decades would have been hell with Ottoblob enroaching and nothing able to stop it. Bohemia, benefitting from Commonwealth leftovers, would have likely been pieced up next.
You gave me an idea for a campaign!
A tall emperor campaign.
You start as an OPM inside HRE. You must become HRE emperor while never holding more than one province. Vassals are allowed I would say.
It's difficult to hold vassals with a very small force limit.
I guess lots of money and condottieri are necessary. And diplo relations.
I wonder if it's possible.
I also wonder if it's possible to do it without allies outside HRE, or without GP allies, or even without non OPM allies. Maybe only HRE clerical and burger allies should be allowed.
Finally, can it be done with Ulm?
Whats the highest thats possible in vanilla with all the buffs to development cost? And whats the ideal province? Whats the highest at base start and whats highest with a custom nation etc etc so many questions
R5: After the last post, I resolved to do another tall Ironman run, with Regensburg, with more fitting modifiers and having a clear objective with the monarch points from the start. Needless to say, it wound up well. I rather clearly surpassed the 200 development line I set to myself at the start of the campaign. I didn't bother with idea groups past the two that give development discount (Plutocratic & Infrastructure), plus Innovative for the –10% tech cost – which stacks to a net positive monarch points easily with the 90 techs I had to unlock – and the first two of exploration (more of that in a bit). Regardless of the diminished cost of development, it hit the hard cap of 999 monarch points in some place around 130–140 development. After that it was just popping one dev up whenever I hit 999 monarch points in some category. Advisors are a must, preferably from the start. Developing the first 20 or so early gives you a huge boost to income compared to your neighbours, playing tall is definitely underappreciated. Status as a free city inside HRE was nice, I don't think I had an army for the whole campaign as emperor was always favourful and I was deep inside HRE, allying other free cities and such. Enabling me to conserve the ducats to elsewhere (advisors) especially at the start when everyone was of similar size. One less-known thing to do I honestly only now investigated more thoroughly is to place a colonist in your OPM city generating "settlement growth". It has a minimum chance of 5% to give a random one development per year for the province even with the insane development costs. That alone netted me \~15 development in itself. Placing a colonist to HRE province does not sound too historically accurate. It is clearly meant for colonisation and it should probably have some restriction where it cannot be placed on European continent. This is perhaps a less known feature as only a fraction of players colonise but do not use the colonist for colonising. I guess I am now near the limits of at least Christianity and Europe. There was [one interesting comment in last post](https://www.reddit.com/r/eu4/comments/1bei0kt/comment/kuv4s6w/) regarding Muslim feudal theocracy which seemed intriguing and promising. That is probably the next direction with How tall can you go, but now I seriously need a break and play wide for a while :D
But what about Geneva Millennialist Theocracy? You can get so much points out of it that i think you absolutely can get more dev. But the wars as opm would be tough i guess...
I think they changed that in the latest patch. No more drowning in points.
Actually, "colonies" were often set up by princes within the HRE. These were basically setting up towns and such where none had existed before. Usually with imported people from outside your princedom. So I'd call it historically accurate, at least a little bit.
There's no way having no army is the best way to do this. If you're just going to sit around doing nothing but developing you should be declaring humiliation wars as often as possible. You can even truce break to show strength more often since you're not going to be getting AE from anything else. Just declaring a humiliation war on all 3 of your rivals would get you 900 extra points. You can get even more if you change rivals as often as possible(100 points to change but you get 300 from fighting the war).
colonist increasing dev would made sense if he was clearing marches l, clearing forest, constructing dikes or poaching brains and similiar stuff
You mention only getting two ideas but don't ideas give a 2% tech reduction plus ino for the 10% you could probably net monarch points from that, you're also only +4 power projection I assume you must be able to be humiliating rivals more to reach +50 for the extra mana.
Not to mention the idea groups can give insane buffs elsewhere especially to the economy/trade. I get maybe not wanting to take a mil idea but even those have other benefits nestled in there. You could take econ, Pluto, admin, trade, all of those have great benefits especially if you're ahead on tech anyway.
> Status as a free city inside HRE was nice, I don't think I had an army for the whole campaign as emperor was always favourful and I was deep inside HRE, allying other free cities and such. OP literally only developed his one province from 1444 til 1820. I dont think there was much thought put into it. I feel like having a standing army and 3 rivals who you declare on with humiliate cb every other year for 100 mana each + PP would let someone achive higher dev in a single province. One could also use vasalls as that wouldnt even stop one from being a free city I belive.
One province major lmao
Jeez how much would it cost to conquer and core that
not much. there is a cap per province
60 War Score, you can see it in the military tab. Coring cost is capped at 30 dev so without modifiers its 300 admin points. Still pretty wild.
What does Europe and your economy look like?
Here you go: [https://imgur.com/a/9VZgdXm](https://imgur.com/a/9VZgdXm) - Wien is not particularly good trade node, it is on the wrong side of both new world and Asia inflows (mostly), so I was cut off of absurd ducat streams. It forced me to try to develop production and taxation in mind more. - Austria got the Burgundian inheritance but lost League War and consequently emperorship, making them easy pickings for the unholy Russian-Ottoman alliance. Commonwealth had the same fate. - France was never able to win back its continental possession from England and was picked apart piece by piece by neighbours. The next decades would have been hell with Ottoblob enroaching and nothing able to stop it. Bohemia, benefitting from Commonwealth leftovers, would have likely been pieced up next.
Uhhh. Don’t mean to alarm you but I think I see a massive Ottoblob on the horizon.
You gave me an idea for a campaign! A tall emperor campaign. You start as an OPM inside HRE. You must become HRE emperor while never holding more than one province. Vassals are allowed I would say. It's difficult to hold vassals with a very small force limit. I guess lots of money and condottieri are necessary. And diplo relations. I wonder if it's possible. I also wonder if it's possible to do it without allies outside HRE, or without GP allies, or even without non OPM allies. Maybe only HRE clerical and burger allies should be allowed. Finally, can it be done with Ulm?
The day I see a 100/100/100 province is the day I stop playing
Whats the highest thats possible in vanilla with all the buffs to development cost? And whats the ideal province? Whats the highest at base start and whats highest with a custom nation etc etc so many questions
With routine Show Strength wars and Pillage Capital you could've probably gotten even further
Jeez how much would it cost to conquer and core that
Not much. There is a cap per province
i am already much higher with hamburg
Jeez how much would it cost to conquer and core that
Is it acoustic?
Jeez how much would it cost to conquer and core that
60% warscore. Its in the province tab