Prussia game, Noble difficulty
Started out at war with Poland, Lithuania, Denmark and Sweden. Completely ignoring the rest, I concentrated all my forces (six knights) on the border to Lithuania. After killing off a wave of Polish/Lithuanian knights, which deprived them both of their offensive capabilities, and after finishing several catapults I started to move south. This was essential as Prussia has no iron, and even Hungary (being my best friend and having lots of excess iron) won´t sell it to me.
Vilnius and Vitebsk (the northern one
) fell quickly, but the Lithuanian iron mine was still in enemy territory. So I had to push further to Minsk. Once that city was secured, peace was concluded. All three remaining foes agreed on peace for one tech each. The reason I bougth me out was that Prussia has "access" to more than 8 barbarian cities but needs to be quick in capturing them, as Russians, Lithuanians, Polish, Hungarians, Bohemians and Swedes are also competing for them.
My knights and catapults captured Narva, Pskov, St.Petersburg, Vyborg, Tver and Smolensk but got beaten to three more by a small margin.
My biggest problem was religion, as the western and southern parts of my empire were catholic, the eastern, southern and northern parts were orthodox while my core (and state) was protestant. Almost half of my cities were constantly unhappy (staying at size one or two) because of the different religions, and it took me quite a century or two to spread the "true faith" into my outer holdings. Civics that give production boosts in exchange for unhappiness are essential for minor powers surrounded by powerhouses, so I had to cope with it. In hindsight I think I´d have fared better with not neglecting liberalism (gives religious tolerance civic -> no religious unhappiness). But back then I was in desperate need of techs to trade for money (so I could run 100% science), and liberalism was already widespread.
Other nations constantly pestered me with "declare war on X, stop trading with Y, give me all your tech for free", which I usually declined (except for HRE and Russia). Since the starting war was declared by me (or so they tell me) I was extremely isolated politically. Only Scots and Hungarians liked me, while the Ottomans kept trading with me for a long time too.
Somehow I managed to stay out of was for a long time, until the Ottomans DOWed me in 1639 out of the blue (well, not quite, I refused to gift them a tech). I didn´t take it too seriously until they showed up with 9 knights and 3 catapults outside Prussian Minsk, but
on Lithuanian soil!!! I couldn´t fight them back because the Liths didn´t want to give me open borders, so I saved my game and declared war on them. Although I managed to take two Lithuanian cities and destroy the Ottoman forces (there were several waves of catapult/crossbowmen/knights combos), I lost most of my army and when HRE and Russia finally DOWed me I gave up.
Aftermath:
Prussia needs iron, so the war on Lithuania is crucial for the start. Then attention needs to be turned east as quickly as possible, taking all of those barbarian cities. Research should go towards liberalism to get religious tolerance fast. This one tech is maybe the most important to Prussia.
Poland should be killed off soon, since it tends to expand into the Russian steppes where it´s literally unreachable. Lithuania, once deprived of their only iron source, is weak and large. I should have taken more land off them by declaring war on them whenever the peace treaties expire. I focussed too much on happiness buildings, saving on the military in the later stages. That was a big mistake (founded on the initial error to not go for religious tolerance).
With that in mind, Prussia is fun to play, with lots of targets and as many threats. Maintaining a strong knight force while ignoring the navy completely is a must for them. Managing the different religions is crucial, as well as getting iron soon. After that you can gradually expand south and east.
AI:
Ottomans are fools, they never managed to take a single Byzantine city. Also the Venetian holdings remained untouched until late game. Lithuania and Russia carved up the steppes, only leaving one city in between for Poland.
HRE and France were in countless wars against each other, but only the Lowlands were affected (cities captured and liberated). Denmark was aggressive but never took a single city, Sweden also focussed on barbarians only. England was warring now and then, taking a French city then loosing it. They ended up having built many colonial wonders.
The Spanish kingdoms did well in score, but nobody ever sailed to north africa. This goes for every nation...
This scenario is great! I spent so many hours already, I even keep thinking about my strategy in bed! Tried the Ottomans today, conquering all of Southern Balkans except for the Islands. The damn Bohemians and Hungarians beat me to some barbarian cities, and culture isn´t working for me in Anatolia (lost a city to Venezia due to the Naxos wonder). Fortunately Sofia revolted against the Hungarians and joined me so that equals it out. I´m now leading in points but am still backwards in research (although selling gunpowder brought me 6 techs and 1000+ gold). This scenario is getting better each day!
) and Henrich VIII. Big states are tech weak(HRE, Lithuana, Russia, Castilia, Ottomans)
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