One big thing - 1 being "Strongly Agree" and 5 being "Strongly Disagree" is super weird to me, had to go back and change all my answers once I noticed it. Consider swapping them?
@@JastwatchingYT IIRC it's illegal to collect data from minors in the UK. There should still be an option though, so Laith would know to disregard the data.
@TheMonkeystick ah I see, I think that UK's law is fair in that regard, but wouldn't it mean that it's harder to figure out the root cause of juvenile crime in the UK?
@@NiceBoaT_98Little question, is Korea in Korean schoolbooks depicted as a whole? I'm from Germany and East Germany wasn't really implemented in most graphics of the country as the FRG didn't recognize it and vice versa.
"If you slip up once..." Cut to my current Navarra game where Marrakesh and Tlemcen obliterated Morocco into a 2 province minor before Portugal erased them.
Milan is really fun as well with their unique government types and mission tree. The ability to get advanced forts super early and waging defensive wars against much larger powers is also quite fun. Playing tall and building a vassal swarm with Riga is also something I highly recommend.
legit surprised that the Japanese Daimyos didn't get at least an honorable mention, since if you become Shogun, you get access to what i think is the most broken vassel type in the game
@@triplesharigan I would say they are less fun longterm, but broken stuff gives great short term fun. Playing the ottomans, shogun, or anything very broken give great dopamine in a short burst. Similar case with that first war with ming as a horde, its hilarious watching the entire nation crumple despite their massive manpower.
Some times as Sirhind you can get an event to change your primary culture to Afghan and BOOM instant Mughals. Your ruler is of Afghan culture. It’s happened both times I’ve played them.
Mine are the ones I always come back to: Morocco, Muscovy, Austria, France, Brandenburg, Mewar, Bahmanis, Timurids, Oirat, Malay, Savoy. And a lot of others that I'm too lazy to think about :)
What no New World love? Both the Aztecs and Cusco to Inca are very fun to play. Aztecs specifically forces you to learn truce juggling so you don't die, and the Inca has no less than 4 gold mines, which once you reform government are powerful
Yeah, but the problem with the Inca is that there isn’t a whole lot to do once you’ve conquered the Pacific coast; you just sit there and wait for the Europeans to arrive, while yourself slowly colonizing the interior. It gets boring real quick
Totally agree with Tunis being a top 10 fun nation. Great positioning in the center of the Mediterranean gives you easy access to expansion in Africa, Asia and/or Europe, it's easy to pick up an early powerful ally in the Ottomans, and you get a dominant navy in inland seas (I feel like playing a naval game is highly underrated, and can be lots of fun), and then of course coastal raiding is a no-brainer. I'm also a big fan of Brunei into Malaya. If you can stand the island hopping (I know a lot of people seem to hate boats in this game), it's an interesting playthrough that will lead to ridiculous amounts of trade income if you focus your conquests westward into India. Good positioning to withdraw from the Bank of Ming regularly as well. It's also good for going colonial. Timurids into Mughals is great fun too. The balancing act you have to do at the beginning once Shah Rukh dies can make for interesting gameplay, and the Mughals are just broken once you get there. You're also essentially straddling Asia and Europe, and are sizable and powerful enough to swallow up all the trade power in the region and keep it, even with the Ottomans right next door. Tricky, but not the toughest game for sure. It's also not like picking a super powerhouse nation either, like Otto's, Austria, France, etc either, so a good mid-level challenge that turns into a stomp once you get the Mughals going. I also like picking the Mamluks and flipping to Coptic ASAP. I really wish there was more flavor for doing so, but there is a little bit at least. You're big and powerful, but the Ottomans are even moreso, and a constant, serious threat since your land is a large part of their historical expansion path. Going Coptic means your allies are mostly on the other side of the Med, and doing it as soon as possible slows down your early expansion and keeps you from getting too powerful too quickly, which helps keep the game interesting.
Good list Laith, I will consider this when I play EU4 again. Honourable mentions should be Oda, Ragusa (hard but fun), Hisn kayfa and maybe Sweden? And yes, Tunis is kinda biased Laith, but its a nice run regardless 😁
@@MaXiMoS54and Kilwa. I'm playing them now and by god are they OP. I'd out teched all my neighbours within the first 30-40 years by a good 2-3 techs that I literally won a war 1v3 and our armies never clashed once. They just kept running away. Kilwa can easily grab the gold mines for an early beast mode economy with loads of buffs to trade. I've got 4 colonists and have completely taken the South African coast by 1500. So I stretch up the coast from the Cape to the Horn. So for the next hundred years or so, spice islands are all mine. I'm even moving towards Argentina at the same time. Kilwa is honestly broken early game. But it gets you up to speed with the rest of the world (Europe) so you don't just get roflstomped. You can actually hold your own and be a real player in the world. Kilwa is TONS of fun!
Some other suggestions: 1. Palembang: - Can reform to Pirate Nation on day 1 - Free and STRONG colonies everywhere around you - Indonesia is a fun region for naval battles as you can alliance networks of 3-4 nations at once, by simply keeping them away from your coasts and let war score handle the rest - If you get a base in Taiwan, you can cause Mingplosions by raiding Chinese coasts. 2. Ajuuran - Easy first wars on your way to become Somalia - Strong trade nation - Has unique estate actions that greatly reduce dev costs in DESERTS which is fantastic in the region you are
i think lubeck is a hidden gem that isnt noticed enough, has the additional benefit that it got a mission tree in the patch for lions of the north without having to buy it so its more accessible for those who are trying eu4 out
Tunis was acctualy my first ever country i played on eu4 without any knowledge about the game, just from this one campaign i gained almost all basic knowledge of the game, forever in my heart !
I am surprised that seemingly no people on youtube have played with the "confirm thassalocracy" desicion and gov.reform, with its own unique subject type is the cherry on top for maritime trade nations, the amount of uniqueness makes the criteria of naval or maritime ideas more than worth it
Holland into Netherlands is a great one as well. It has a bit of everything for everyone, and is a great "beginner" nation without feeling like the game is holding your hand. You start off with a war of independence (and not a terribly hard one at that) which then quickly turns into coalition and alliance management, since you're trying to expand in the most highly-developed portion of the HRE. You've got a nice balance of trade, development, and military gameplay. The mission tree takes you into colonialism, but not the "blob everywhere" version of Castille or England. You have a ton of flavor events, a mostly-unique government that lets you play both a Republic AND a PU game, and is one of the few nations where there are no bad idea groups (you want espionage / Maritime? Netherlands can make it work!) A personal favorite though is Saluzzo. You're an OPM sandwiched between Savoy (which often allies Austria), Provence (which usually is allied with France), and an alpine wasteland tile. You have a weak economy, little military power, and will struggle getting allies. What you DO have though, is +10% Infantry Combat and -15% Aggressive Expansion. Once an opportunity comes to break out through Savoy or Provence, you are going to be able to snowball into Italy. The major downside to Saluzzo is that it is stuck with the Italian Minor mission tree (generic missions plus three) and does not have any unique events. However, the ability to snowball and its idea set make it an excellent nation to form Italy with
Cool Bonobo showed off a cool strat for Jaunpur where you conquer Delhi immediately and take Sirhind as a vassal. Then you just wait a bit to annex them and become Delhi yourself. Obviously you miss out on the S-tier leader but it looks fairly comparable in scaling and it certainly looks cool.
Oman. Become naval hegemon without getting flat out stomped by everybody around you, due to not having any land combat ideas. Bonus points if you dont ally the ottoblob and stop them dead in their tracks once they finally declare.
My favorite run has always been Persia, usually starting as Ajam cause it’s more consistent but you can start as Ardabil for the challenge and achievement (plus HISTORICAL). Ideas are great, neighbors are fairy strong, and Persia has actually good income early. The Persia trade node is unassuming but very strong because it only exits to Aleppo but receives from Hormuz and Samarkand. Zoroastrian memes included. Ottomans and Russia are good endgame bosses as well
Aside from the fact that a lot of the gps that got updated w/ domination (especially France!) are still quite fun, id also mention: -Naples -Majapahit -Any Dutch nation -Aragon -BBurg is still the goat of Germany -any timurid vassal -any japanese daimyo -Mali -Ethiopia
Tunis was the first country I ever did really well with! It's so newbie friendly with so much early easy expansion, and being able to ally the ottomans! I actually formed Andalusia with them, and I really hope northern Africa gets unique missions in a future dlc!
My favourite by far is Mazandaran -> Persia You have a frantic early game and early game boss in Timurids and a late game boss in Ottomans. A rich nation with the funnest loop of any nation
One of my personal favorites is bengal, like the venice of the east. Conquer the area around you and then take expansion and conquer all of the East Indies. Later on you can take on China or try and unify India
One of my perennial faves is Mewar. Similar great start to Sirhind but a bit more of an underdog, with amazing NIs and a great mission tree, plus a gold mine!
my grip with the sirhind pick is that you didn't mention you could go Sikh Punjab as well which imo is a lot more fun then playing Delhi. As well that it starts with one of the most broken states Lahore. 5 farmlands with insanely profitable trade goods (paper/dyes/silk/cloth/gems) so institution spawning with a good starting ruler and space to develop. For a long time my favo nation to play until holy horde became a thing.
I'm suprised no one is bringing up Switzerland. Each mercenary stack having the manpower of an entire other country leads to some major bodies fix the problem wars.
He's 100% right, I just wanna play MY nation, however, as a Transylvanian Romanian... all I have to say is that I - not joking - only formed Romania once and I was in a psych ward at the time. You do have to have a few screws loose to reload so many times and pick the most painful fights, especially for me as a beginner (
My favourite personally is Bengal - great ideas, you can go extra wide conquering whole India fast, you can play tall, or you can build a bit of a trading empire in the Mallacas and indochina (though Bengal is not that good of a node), or do a mix of all. Also some of the best ideas in the Indian continent, sometimes I keep theirs over Hindustan even. Another fun one is Hamburg - I love playing through vassals in the begginging, using my Free City dev bonuses to ply sort of tall and rush ideas/ reforms, then annex all my subjects at once and form Hannover, from where you can blob and play tall simultaneously
Have you considered as playing as Madagascar (or at least that area) The landlocked guys in the middle have really strong ideas and it's actually a really fun campaign Edit: imerina is the country
Advice: Step 1 is to consolidate the island, build heavy ships, and start bullying Kilwa for blockade score. Step 2 is to repeat until they plead for mercy and/or you actually have the means to fight them.
@@Masquerade1200 The fort bonuses combo for Imerina quite well if you take Eastern Plutocracy plus Naval and/or Maritime, you can grab valuable provinces like gold mines and trade centres and then fortify the heckmst out of them so you can just dump marines on their heads whenever they try to steal them. And the Indian is an excellent place to use marines (see Laith's Portugal marines-only video), since there's so many gulfs and small seas, and so much attrition if you try to go by land through all those deserts
You having a massive supply of data from your subscribers must be really nice. Take advantage of this, many people in your position don't have these kinds of resources.
Great video Laith! I've played all of these EU4 nations before and they've been a lot of fun! Filling out the form was easy and took less than 5 minutes guys. Cheers!
I would suggest Riga for one of the most fun tall experiences, it's a unique theocratic merchant republic, and you are heavily geared towards having fewer than 6 provinces. Also, your merchants can spread the reformation with as low as 15% of trade power, which is absolutely broken.
India is my favorite region to play in. I've definitely thought about doing a long game with Sirhind but haven't gotten around to it yet. My favorite I have tried though is Bengal. I took expansion ideas early to colonize and conquer everything in Indonesia and funnel all the trade back to my home node.
With Provence you can even go for the burgundian inheritance if you sell them the land they desire and drop the PU over Lorraine. Which is no problem once you own all of Naples as a power base. Provence is just a hidden gem. One of the nations with the biggest potential in this game.
I did not expect the Timurids to get ignored I think they're so fun having to manage their vassal swarm and then form the mughals with their crazy powerful diwan system that entirely changes how you think for conquest
Personally I think those vassals are more interesting to play, because you have to fight your overlord, its allies, and any loyal vassals to establish yourself, then you have to contend with the other former Timurid vassals, and either the QQ, Hordes, or Indians depending on which region you're in, all while being a minor power, and so you have to actually grow, instead of starting the game as a top 5 great power.
Kilwa is pretty fun, you start with good proximity to gold mines that can bankroll colonies way over limit when taken to snipe the Cape of Good Hope from the Europeans (which also denies access to Indonesia for much longer than usual), expand west or north to take on Kongo or Ethiopia, and/or consolidate the Spice Islands and Australia to make Zanzibar the trade capital of the world. You can even snipe Colonialism from the Euros if you run a ship to South Georgia/Falklands and slap a colony on one of them. Your tech group and access to feudalism gives you an advantage vs most of your smaller neighbors early on and you can snowball into the Horn, Egypt, Arabia, India, China, hell you could even colonize west coast of America. 10/10 imo
Great video, keep up the good work. :) Serbia was my favorite pick for a challenge run in EU2. Surviving being sandwitched between Ottomans and Hungary was hard, but fun. In EU2 Ottoman Empire had permanent casus belli against few dozen countries, allowing you to attack almost everyone in Europe without any consequences. It was a go-to option for casual conquest runs. How good/fun are Ottomans in EU4?
The thing about Morocco is that it has cores all over their vassal, so it's a instant annex. Plus since Morocco can day 1 put Strong dutchie and loyal their vassals through it gov type, it's easy to keep them loyal. Also the one vassal bordering Tlemcen has a core on 1 of their province, meaning in the next month you can go to war and pretty much annex them
For me the most fun Nations are Bohemia for all the shanenigans and being the easiest world conquest with funky mechanics, Holland for playing tall and shifting into world conquest and Japan, japan have a kinda fun and flexible mission tree plus i feel i always have so many stuff to do with them.
"Holy Hand Grenade"... Is that a reference to something? I thought about a fictional weapons in both a Monty Pyton movie and in severals games of the "Worms" series!
For me is Wallachia. I tried the "Dracula's revenge" achievement many times until I finally got it. Easier to do as Moldavia however Wallachian ideas are kinda insane so I decided to stick with them. Sucks that the start is pretty RNG dependant, the ideal start is for Moldavia to choose Hungary instead of Poland but they rarely do that.
Random fun fact: a Serbia with no allies attacked the ottomans in my my most recent ottoman game, and won due to the ottomans being distracted up in Uzbek. They then defended the half of the balkans they stole from ottomans from Venice and Trent with no allies. They then finally fought of the ottomans again after the ottomans attacked Greece, which Serbia had popped out of Venice. Idk why this giga chad Serbia did this and how they did. But they were speedrunning Lazarus lol
As someone with 1K hours and counting, I wouldn't use "fun" and "eu4" in a sentence like that. That soul sucking game is more akin to a bad habit or addiction. 10/10 would recommend.
I'm surprised you didn't mention Dalmatia for venice or serbia. It's such a nice formable, cracked ideas, only formable by minor countries, doesn't interfere with your nation's mission tree. If you form it with venice in particular you can send your reform progress to the moon.
Most fun way to go for world conquest has to be Austria/HRE. World conquest by nature is grindy, but the HRE creates at least one interesting additional stage.
Tbh I disagree, at least as Austria. I find the HRE to be pretty tedious especially with the reformation. Most fun WC nation for me while going for the HRE is honestly hussite Bohemia. It can be tedious to get the right Protestant treaty especially as you can't be the leader but, if you do it right it's a whole lot of fun to convert the whole region while expanding under Austria and gaining control of the electors. Hussite is also quite good for WC as the insane improve relations modifier makes expanding in the HRE really easy.
For some reason with jianzhou/Qing, once I get the mission to refund corruption instead of getting corruption when recruiting banners, I still end up getting corruption
Jaunpur is more fun than Sirhind as you can really get big fast. You can form Delhi before Sirhind declares independence cause Delhi always insults you if you rival them because of their ruler trait. You can then get Sirhind as a casual with cores and Jangladesh too. You need to be in constant wars initially to prevent the Sirhind revolt event until you can instant annex them.
An opinion i have had for a while and one i havent seen from anyone else is that venice is the most broken nation in the game. Yes, the best. They always have highest income UNDER THE AI. And they live for a crazy amount of time (usually) and scale really well. My favorite nation to play and the strongest in my opinion
I guess it depends on how long you play; once the New World and East Indies start getting colonized, the English Channel and Genoa both really pop off and Venice falls down hard. Venice AI does live for a really long time, but that's largely because of their island fort capital, and most AIs being afraid of fighting trade leagues. Usually when Venice collapses to other AI it's because they underestimated Albania's alliance network and Skanderbeg, or ended up in wars against Austria and the ottomans at the same time.
@@TheRusty I agree that Venice falls off in the face of colonialism but that's the case for every nation except maybe ottomans. Venice is just not made to be that powerful for so long and their income is always ridiculous. I've seen them have much more men than me when I'm playing like Prussia or something, when I should be outscaling basically every ai nation. And if a player plays it it's op as hell, its the one nation near the ottomans that is really good (byz for instance just feels like a budget ottomans). But like many nations it can't keep up with colonialism
lol what university considers a self-reporting survey adequate methodology for a Master's degree? I like Ming most just for relaxed playing, though the first century or so is much less so now. I had fun with Onondaga recently, using their ideas to get an advantage at making a mega-federation before finally combining after settlers appeared
cant believe he didnt mention the best route for korean expansion: south (in terms of trade its probably kinda shit but its fun seeing korean provinces in like, borneo
you hadn't played Venice. You mentioned cycling rulers, while Venice government have locked sortition mechanic. So you don't cycle your rulers you can either choose one of 3 rulers for a big price of rt or not to choose. Actually you don't need that much rt as Venice cause you don't spend it that much.
CHAPS! I NEED HELP WITH MY UNI WORK! - forms.gle/4hAufWLuiPJwyuDg9 (My paper is studying YOU GUYS, so get your responses in! Huge thanks!)
Sure thing
One big thing - 1 being "Strongly Agree" and 5 being "Strongly Disagree" is super weird to me, had to go back and change all my answers once I noticed it. Consider swapping them?
I'm below 18, but the forms doesn't have an option for that
@@JastwatchingYT IIRC it's illegal to collect data from minors in the UK. There should still be an option though, so Laith would know to disregard the data.
@TheMonkeystick ah I see, I think that UK's law is fair in that regard, but wouldn't it mean that it's harder to figure out the root cause of juvenile crime in the UK?
When playing korea I'm always going for historical borders and then I usually quit the campaign as I achieved my goals
what are those borders?
@sergiusko4327 the joke is that Korea already has its historical borders in 1444
As Korean this is accurate.
I never make my culture to some wicked things like "Sino-Korean".
unless you are going for 'Goguryeo' and claim all Manchuria
@@NiceBoaT_98Little question, is Korea in Korean schoolbooks depicted as a whole? I'm from Germany and East Germany wasn't really implemented in most graphics of the country as the FRG didn't recognize it and vice versa.
"If you slip up once..." Cut to my current Navarra game where Marrakesh and Tlemcen obliterated Morocco into a 2 province minor before Portugal erased them.
Day 1 of asking Laith to be a Viking Shogun in Rajas of Asia
Norse Shogunate reform leaked1!1!1!1
Good luck man
Milan is really fun as well with their unique government types and mission tree. The ability to get advanced forts super early and waging defensive wars against much larger powers is also quite fun.
Playing tall and building a vassal swarm with Riga is also something I highly recommend.
I second Milan, also they have one of the best flags in the game so already they're winning.
legit surprised that the Japanese Daimyos didn't get at least an honorable mention, since if you become Shogun, you get access to what i think is the most broken vassel type in the game
Maybe it isn't on the list because its broken and therefor less fun kinda like why Ottomans aren't on the list.
@@triplesharigan I would say they are less fun longterm, but broken stuff gives great short term fun.
Playing the ottomans, shogun, or anything very broken give great dopamine in a short burst. Similar case with that first war with ming as a horde, its hilarious watching the entire nation crumple despite their massive manpower.
It’s the benefits of being a vassal, but you’re not bored to death
I’m sure Beloozero is topping this list
Red Hawk: triggered
Some times as Sirhind you can get an event to change your primary culture to Afghan and BOOM instant Mughals. Your ruler is of Afghan culture. It’s happened both times I’ve played them.
Mine are the ones I always come back to: Morocco, Muscovy, Austria, France, Brandenburg, Mewar, Bahmanis, Timurids, Oirat, Malay, Savoy. And a lot of others that I'm too lazy to think about :)
Not Vijayanagar ? I have been playing since last few days and I thought Vijayanagar was the best as it is bigger with coast line .
@@ObsidianSpearheadvj is so fun especially with europa expanded mission tree
What no New World love? Both the Aztecs and Cusco to Inca are very fun to play. Aztecs specifically forces you to learn truce juggling so you don't die, and the Inca has no less than 4 gold mines, which once you reform government are powerful
Yeah, but the problem with the Inca is that there isn’t a whole lot to do once you’ve conquered the Pacific coast; you just sit there and wait for the Europeans to arrive, while yourself slowly colonizing the interior. It gets boring real quick
Unironically one of my most fun games was with Carib, for more reasons that i can type rn
Totemist Aztec with exploration and expansion is way to go!
@@yamameeven967same, but with the Guarani.
Totally agree with Tunis being a top 10 fun nation. Great positioning in the center of the Mediterranean gives you easy access to expansion in Africa, Asia and/or Europe, it's easy to pick up an early powerful ally in the Ottomans, and you get a dominant navy in inland seas (I feel like playing a naval game is highly underrated, and can be lots of fun), and then of course coastal raiding is a no-brainer. I'm also a big fan of Brunei into Malaya. If you can stand the island hopping (I know a lot of people seem to hate boats in this game), it's an interesting playthrough that will lead to ridiculous amounts of trade income if you focus your conquests westward into India. Good positioning to withdraw from the Bank of Ming regularly as well. It's also good for going colonial. Timurids into Mughals is great fun too. The balancing act you have to do at the beginning once Shah Rukh dies can make for interesting gameplay, and the Mughals are just broken once you get there. You're also essentially straddling Asia and Europe, and are sizable and powerful enough to swallow up all the trade power in the region and keep it, even with the Ottomans right next door. Tricky, but not the toughest game for sure. It's also not like picking a super powerhouse nation either, like Otto's, Austria, France, etc either, so a good mid-level challenge that turns into a stomp once you get the Mughals going. I also like picking the Mamluks and flipping to Coptic ASAP. I really wish there was more flavor for doing so, but there is a little bit at least. You're big and powerful, but the Ottomans are even moreso, and a constant, serious threat since your land is a large part of their historical expansion path. Going Coptic means your allies are mostly on the other side of the Med, and doing it as soon as possible slows down your early expansion and keeps you from getting too powerful too quickly, which helps keep the game interesting.
Good list Laith, I will consider this when I play EU4 again. Honourable mentions should be Oda, Ragusa (hard but fun), Hisn kayfa and maybe Sweden?
And yes, Tunis is kinda biased Laith, but its a nice run regardless 😁
I'd put Hormuz in there basically the Venice of the east that can expand to horn of africa, india and or indonesia
@@MaXiMoS54and Kilwa. I'm playing them now and by god are they OP. I'd out teched all my neighbours within the first 30-40 years by a good 2-3 techs that I literally won a war 1v3 and our armies never clashed once. They just kept running away. Kilwa can easily grab the gold mines for an early beast mode economy with loads of buffs to trade. I've got 4 colonists and have completely taken the South African coast by 1500. So I stretch up the coast from the Cape to the Horn. So for the next hundred years or so, spice islands are all mine. I'm even moving towards Argentina at the same time. Kilwa is honestly broken early game. But it gets you up to speed with the rest of the world (Europe) so you don't just get roflstomped. You can actually hold your own and be a real player in the world. Kilwa is TONS of fun!
Some other suggestions:
1. Palembang:
- Can reform to Pirate Nation on day 1
- Free and STRONG colonies everywhere around you
- Indonesia is a fun region for naval battles as you can alliance networks of 3-4 nations at once, by simply keeping them away from your coasts and let war score handle the rest
- If you get a base in Taiwan, you can cause Mingplosions by raiding Chinese coasts.
2. Ajuuran
- Easy first wars on your way to become Somalia
- Strong trade nation
- Has unique estate actions that greatly reduce dev costs in DESERTS which is fantastic in the region you are
i think lubeck is a hidden gem that isnt noticed enough, has the additional benefit that it got a mission tree in the patch for lions of the north without having to buy it so its more accessible for those who are trying eu4 out
Tunis was acctualy my first ever country i played on eu4 without any knowledge about the game, just from this one campaign i gained almost all basic knowledge of the game, forever in my heart !
I am surprised that seemingly no people on youtube have played with the "confirm thassalocracy" desicion and gov.reform, with its own unique subject type is the cherry on top for maritime trade nations, the amount of uniqueness makes the criteria of naval or maritime ideas more than worth it
Holland into Netherlands is a great one as well. It has a bit of everything for everyone, and is a great "beginner" nation without feeling like the game is holding your hand. You start off with a war of independence (and not a terribly hard one at that) which then quickly turns into coalition and alliance management, since you're trying to expand in the most highly-developed portion of the HRE. You've got a nice balance of trade, development, and military gameplay. The mission tree takes you into colonialism, but not the "blob everywhere" version of Castille or England. You have a ton of flavor events, a mostly-unique government that lets you play both a Republic AND a PU game, and is one of the few nations where there are no bad idea groups (you want espionage / Maritime? Netherlands can make it work!)
A personal favorite though is Saluzzo. You're an OPM sandwiched between Savoy (which often allies Austria), Provence (which usually is allied with France), and an alpine wasteland tile. You have a weak economy, little military power, and will struggle getting allies. What you DO have though, is +10% Infantry Combat and -15% Aggressive Expansion. Once an opportunity comes to break out through Savoy or Provence, you are going to be able to snowball into Italy. The major downside to Saluzzo is that it is stuck with the Italian Minor mission tree (generic missions plus three) and does not have any unique events. However, the ability to snowball and its idea set make it an excellent nation to form Italy with
Cool Bonobo showed off a cool strat for Jaunpur where you conquer Delhi immediately and take Sirhind as a vassal. Then you just wait a bit to annex them and become Delhi yourself. Obviously you miss out on the S-tier leader but it looks fairly comparable in scaling and it certainly looks cool.
I've done both Teuton paths and they're crazy fun. Monster armies, lots of cash, they're great
Oman. Become naval hegemon without getting flat out stomped by everybody around you, due to not having any land combat ideas. Bonus points if you dont ally the ottoblob and stop them dead in their tracks once they finally declare.
My favorite run has always been Persia, usually starting as Ajam cause it’s more consistent but you can start as Ardabil for the challenge and achievement (plus HISTORICAL). Ideas are great, neighbors are fairy strong, and Persia has actually good income early. The Persia trade node is unassuming but very strong because it only exits to Aleppo but receives from Hormuz and Samarkand. Zoroastrian memes included. Ottomans and Russia are good endgame bosses as well
Persian node also flows into Astrakhan
Timurid persia ew
Aside from the fact that a lot of the gps that got updated w/ domination (especially France!) are still quite fun, id also mention:
-Naples
-Majapahit
-Any Dutch nation
-Aragon
-BBurg is still the goat of Germany
-any timurid vassal
-any japanese daimyo
-Mali
-Ethiopia
I would say the Teutonic order is now much more fun that Brandenburg.
Have always found myself looking for more tags to play, this is a massive help. Good luck on your Masters, Laith!
Pretty cool idea for a dissertation. Hope it helps
Tunis was the first country I ever did really well with! It's so newbie friendly with so much early easy expansion, and being able to ally the ottomans! I actually formed Andalusia with them, and I really hope northern Africa gets unique missions in a future dlc!
My favourite by far is Mazandaran -> Persia
You have a frantic early game and early game boss in Timurids and a late game boss in Ottomans. A rich nation with the funnest loop of any nation
One of my personal favorites is bengal, like the venice of the east. Conquer the area around you and then take expansion and conquer all of the East Indies. Later on you can take on China or try and unify India
One of my perennial faves is Mewar. Similar great start to Sirhind but a bit more of an underdog, with amazing NIs and a great mission tree, plus a gold mine!
my grip with the sirhind pick is that you didn't mention you could go Sikh Punjab as well which imo is a lot more fun then playing Delhi. As well that it starts with one of the most broken states Lahore. 5 farmlands with insanely profitable trade goods (paper/dyes/silk/cloth/gems) so institution spawning with a good starting ruler and space to develop. For a long time my favo nation to play until holy horde became a thing.
I'm suprised no one is bringing up Switzerland. Each mercenary stack having the manpower of an entire other country leads to some major bodies fix the problem wars.
Took the survey and watched the video at the same time
He's 100% right, I just wanna play MY nation, however, as a Transylvanian Romanian... all I have to say is that I - not joking - only formed Romania once and I was in a psych ward at the time. You do have to have a few screws loose to reload so many times and pick the most painful fights, especially for me as a beginner (
My favourite personally is Bengal - great ideas, you can go extra wide conquering whole India fast, you can play tall, or you can build a bit of a trading empire in the Mallacas and indochina (though Bengal is not that good of a node), or do a mix of all. Also some of the best ideas in the Indian continent, sometimes I keep theirs over Hindustan even. Another fun one is Hamburg - I love playing through vassals in the begginging, using my Free City dev bonuses to ply sort of tall and rush ideas/ reforms, then annex all my subjects at once and form Hannover, from where you can blob and play tall simultaneously
Welp Laith, you said it. Lambda conquest it is for the next video! Can't wait to see that invasion of earth!
Good luck on your educational endeavors! I've said it before, but you are truly inspirational.
Have you considered as playing as Madagascar (or at least that area) The landlocked guys in the middle have really strong ideas and it's actually a really fun campaign
Edit: imerina is the country
Advice: Step 1 is to consolidate the island, build heavy ships, and start bullying Kilwa for blockade score. Step 2 is to repeat until they plead for mercy and/or you actually have the means to fight them.
@@DawnTyrantEo Yeah, then you almost become the UK of africa. But their manpower bonus is just insanely strong
@@Masquerade1200 The fort bonuses combo for Imerina quite well if you take Eastern Plutocracy plus Naval and/or Maritime, you can grab valuable provinces like gold mines and trade centres and then fortify the heckmst out of them so you can just dump marines on their heads whenever they try to steal them. And the Indian is an excellent place to use marines (see Laith's Portugal marines-only video), since there's so many gulfs and small seas, and so much attrition if you try to go by land through all those deserts
You having a massive supply of data from your subscribers must be really nice. Take advantage of this, many people in your position don't have these kinds of resources.
you gave me a 36 minute video and I filled out a form i feel like thats an equal transaction
Great video Laith! I've played all of these EU4 nations before and they've been a lot of fun! Filling out the form was easy and took less than 5 minutes guys. Cheers!
I allways enjoyed playing my Byzantium boiz, tricky start and really cool RP mission tree with just yeeting the Turks out of Anatolia.
Alternative title: Least painful EU4 experiences
I would suggest Riga for one of the most fun tall experiences, it's a unique theocratic merchant republic, and you are heavily geared towards having fewer than 6 provinces. Also, your merchants can spread the reformation with as low as 15% of trade power, which is absolutely broken.
India is my favorite region to play in. I've definitely thought about doing a long game with Sirhind but haven't gotten around to it yet. My favorite I have tried though is Bengal. I took expansion ideas early to colonize and conquer everything in Indonesia and funnel all the trade back to my home node.
My nr 1 is the same. Literally the first nation I played in eu4 and eu3
With Provence you can even go for the burgundian inheritance if you sell them the land they desire and drop the PU over Lorraine. Which is no problem once you own all of Naples as a power base.
Provence is just a hidden gem. One of the nations with the biggest potential in this game.
I did not expect the Timurids to get ignored I think they're so fun having to manage their vassal swarm and then form the mughals with their crazy powerful diwan system that entirely changes how you think for conquest
Personally I think those vassals are more interesting to play, because you have to fight your overlord, its allies, and any loyal vassals to establish yourself, then you have to contend with the other former Timurid vassals, and either the QQ, Hordes, or Indians depending on which region you're in, all while being a minor power, and so you have to actually grow, instead of starting the game as a top 5 great power.
Kilwa is pretty fun, you start with good proximity to gold mines that can bankroll colonies way over limit when taken to snipe the Cape of Good Hope from the Europeans (which also denies access to Indonesia for much longer than usual), expand west or north to take on Kongo or Ethiopia, and/or consolidate the Spice Islands and Australia to make Zanzibar the trade capital of the world. You can even snipe Colonialism from the Euros if you run a ship to South Georgia/Falklands and slap a colony on one of them. Your tech group and access to feudalism gives you an advantage vs most of your smaller neighbors early on and you can snowball into the Horn, Egypt, Arabia, India, China, hell you could even colonize west coast of America. 10/10 imo
16:06 "Why Serbia?"
As a Serbian I ask myself this everyday
Great video, keep up the good work. :)
Serbia was my favorite pick for a challenge run in EU2. Surviving being sandwitched between Ottomans and Hungary was hard, but fun.
In EU2 Ottoman Empire had permanent casus belli against few dozen countries, allowing you to attack almost everyone in Europe without any consequences. It was a go-to option for casual conquest runs. How good/fun are Ottomans in EU4?
The thing about Morocco is that it has cores all over their vassal, so it's a instant annex.
Plus since Morocco can day 1 put Strong dutchie and loyal their vassals through it gov type, it's easy to keep them loyal.
Also the one vassal bordering Tlemcen has a core on 1 of their province, meaning in the next month you can go to war and pretty much annex them
Did "Khaaaaan!" as Mongolia, had a ton of fun with that one. :)
For me the most fun Nations are Bohemia for all the shanenigans and being the easiest world conquest with funky mechanics, Holland for playing tall and shifting into world conquest and Japan, japan have a kinda fun and flexible mission tree plus i feel i always have so many stuff to do with them.
one of my fave campaigns was starting as sirhind and flipping sikh
It's good to see that this list is totally fair and unbia- oh hi Tunis.
Byzantium should be on the list.
Don't you like die immediately to the ottoman's?
@@Wormoperasomehow, even as a noob, not really
Not funny given or you either cheat trapping ottos on a island or die.
"Holy Hand Grenade"... Is that a reference to something? I thought about a fictional weapons in both a Monty Pyton movie and in severals games of the "Worms" series!
thanks for the video! filled out the form, good luck with your degree.
For me is Wallachia. I tried the "Dracula's revenge" achievement many times until I finally got it. Easier to do as Moldavia however Wallachian ideas are kinda insane so I decided to stick with them. Sucks that the start is pretty RNG dependant, the ideal start is for Moldavia to choose Hungary instead of Poland but they rarely do that.
I would personally chose The Hiky Kingsom of Faerghus or Sacae fir Fire Emblem countries. Day 99 play a Fire Emblem Game.
Random fun fact: a Serbia with no allies attacked the ottomans in my my most recent ottoman game, and won due to the ottomans being distracted up in Uzbek. They then defended the half of the balkans they stole from ottomans from Venice and Trent with no allies. They then finally fought of the ottomans again after the ottomans attacked Greece, which Serbia had popped out of Venice. Idk why this giga chad Serbia did this and how they did. But they were speedrunning Lazarus lol
Lübeck not being on here is a travesty
As someone with 1K hours and counting, I wouldn't use "fun" and "eu4" in a sentence like that. That soul sucking game is more akin to a bad habit or addiction.
10/10 would recommend.
I'm surprised you didn't mention Dalmatia for venice or serbia. It's such a nice formable, cracked ideas, only formable by minor countries, doesn't interfere with your nation's mission tree. If you form it with venice in particular you can send your reform progress to the moon.
Most fun way to go for world conquest has to be Austria/HRE. World conquest by nature is grindy, but the HRE creates at least one interesting additional stage.
Tbh I disagree, at least as Austria. I find the HRE to be pretty tedious especially with the reformation.
Most fun WC nation for me while going for the HRE is honestly hussite Bohemia. It can be tedious to get the right Protestant treaty especially as you can't be the leader but, if you do it right it's a whole lot of fun to convert the whole region while expanding under Austria and gaining control of the electors.
Hussite is also quite good for WC as the insane improve relations modifier makes expanding in the HRE really easy.
Lambda isn't doing world conquest in 10 minutes.. He sure can complete in 30 years or so but he analizes every day for like two hours
Hey man, I am a psychologist so I know all about needing data for your papers. Consider it done!
I'm pretty sure you can use banners as oirat nowadays too. I also didn't noticed that they changed it.
most fun I've had with eu4 is by playing So, the pirate daimyo
Good luck with your paper!
Now to watch this while procrastinating on finishing my masters dissertation... 💀
Korea into Manchu into Qing with Celestial Empire is a great Campaign
For some reason with jianzhou/Qing, once I get the mission to refund corruption instead of getting corruption when recruiting banners, I still end up getting corruption
Jaunpur is more fun than Sirhind as you can really get big fast.
You can form Delhi before Sirhind declares independence cause Delhi always insults you if you rival them because of their ruler trait.
You can then get Sirhind as a casual with cores and Jangladesh too.
You need to be in constant wars initially to prevent the Sirhind revolt event until you can instant annex them.
I've played most of them, got achievements, for me holy horde as Tetutons were on different level
I really like the Timurids vassal into Mughul😅
Hey good luck with that masters dagree.
I have played more Teutonic Order than I have any other nation combined. They are like crack cocaine. Im playing them right now
Najd going for the jihad achievement is a good one
I think Ajam have quite an interesting start.
Ok, pledging now: if the Whitecloaks have a prominent and interesting role in Season 2, I'll roleplay them by finally doing Teutonic Order. Happy? 😂
My top 10:
1. Mewar
2. Muscovy
3. Brandenburg
4. Portugal
5. Shimazu/Uesugi/Oda/Tokugawa (For their ideas)
6. Poland
7. Castile
8. Austria
9. Florence
10. Cebu
Best of luck on finishing up school dude!
I love EU4 it makes my dog happy and that makes me happy.
An opinion i have had for a while and one i havent seen from anyone else is that venice is the most broken nation in the game. Yes, the best. They always have highest income UNDER THE AI. And they live for a crazy amount of time (usually) and scale really well. My favorite nation to play and the strongest in my opinion
I guess it depends on how long you play; once the New World and East Indies start getting colonized, the English Channel and Genoa both really pop off and Venice falls down hard. Venice AI does live for a really long time, but that's largely because of their island fort capital, and most AIs being afraid of fighting trade leagues. Usually when Venice collapses to other AI it's because they underestimated Albania's alliance network and Skanderbeg, or ended up in wars against Austria and the ottomans at the same time.
@@TheRusty I agree that Venice falls off in the face of colonialism but that's the case for every nation except maybe ottomans. Venice is just not made to be that powerful for so long and their income is always ridiculous. I've seen them have much more men than me when I'm playing like Prussia or something, when I should be outscaling basically every ai nation. And if a player plays it it's op as hell, its the one nation near the ottomans that is really good (byz for instance just feels like a budget ottomans). But like many nations it can't keep up with colonialism
The Netherlands is a really fun tall (in Europe) campaign, it has a ton of flavor and focuses heavily on colonial expansion so it doesn't get boring.
Provence is the first one i really agree with😅
"None of the Korean expansion routes are easy" nah bro the manchurian ai cant do shit vs korea
Filled out your survey hope it helps!
I;m doing my part!
I’m pretty sure that 1.36 will change this list significantly
Ethiopia is my nr 1 when it comes to most interesting nations to play
Survey done. Hope you do well with your paper
Fill out the form folks!
lol what university considers a self-reporting survey adequate methodology for a Master's degree?
I like Ming most just for relaxed playing, though the first century or so is much less so now. I had fun with Onondaga recently, using their ideas to get an advantage at making a mega-federation before finally combining after settlers appeared
All of them...
Do you know how a research paper is done?
cant believe he didnt mention the best route for korean expansion: south
(in terms of trade its probably kinda shit but its fun seeing korean provinces in like, borneo
you hadn't played Venice. You mentioned cycling rulers, while Venice government have locked sortition mechanic. So you don't cycle your rulers you can either choose one of 3 rulers for a big price of rt or not to choose. Actually you don't need that much rt as Venice cause you don't spend it that much.
Day 123 of asking for an Oranje Free State Playthrough of Vicky 3...It's surprising how long it's been now in retrospect.
Please put Zaporizhie too. These Cossacks are gigachad
I am disappointed that their is no Brandenburg into Prussia and 400% discipline recommendation
Prussia got mentioned. And laughed at. "I push button. I win."
I used to love playing Ethiopia, then the recent civil war happened :/
Can you do one of these videos for the base game without any dlcs?