Ottoman Empire - Tips & Strategies?

[Prince Fortinbras]

To my mind, it seems as thought the Sublime Porte starts out in a pretty terrible position. Half or more of your provinces are Muslim-minority, you have a vast but largely unprofitable territory, you have no good armies stationed anywhere, your early troops are significantly inferior to anything the Europeans can field, and to top it off you're already at war with Russia, a large and tough country, with decent armies poised to take Crimea and Moldavia, which hates signing peace agreements.

So, post any tips or strategies you have for bringing the wrath of the Sultan down upon your enemies and controlling the riches of the Orient.

Considering how no European nation will ever actually invade India, the land connection you have with the Indian theatre makes it look like it could be a promising and enriching target for early expansion, and the Mughals' soldiers are as bad or worse than yours, which would alleviate some of your weaknesses, but there is a very long way (and Persia!) between you and India, and I've yet to actually test this theory.

[MedievalRob]

I'm in 1736 right now in my Ottoman campaign, and I am working my way into India as we speak.

Holding the Russians at bay is pretty easy with the occasional State Gift, actually, I managed to ally with them after a couple years of this. This allowed me to focus on Persia.

Austria has been a thorn in my side the last few years, but mostly just raids, which I am content to suffer until my conquest of India is complete. Then I will turn my attention to Austria and mainland Europe.

[redbosn]

Ottomans actually aren't that bad if you can bribe Russia off. I let them take Crimea, and after a few gifts, made peace with them.
Early on, you want to tax heavily, invest in research and upgrading your economy. By 1720, I was cranking out close to 10k per turn with 2 full size armies to boot. Don't worry about quality of your armies early on; you will overwhelm the enemy with firepower and cavalry. Bring cannons to the fight, and a healthy number of horses. First, you should take Georgia and Dagestan, since they're easy targets, and they will boost your econ/research even more. Then move on to Persia, take them out, and trade their Indian provinces away for cash/tech to an ally (In the meantime, ally one of the Indian factions; whichever one is doing better). Then proceed to invade Morocco, then trade it to the Spaniards or Brits for more tech. At this point your technology should be at least as good as the average European country. Don't worry about a navy; build up a few solid armies and surprise Austria. Advance on Vienna. Take the two provinces before Vienna, and then take Vienna. Once you have, give Vienna back to the Austrians for a peace and cash/tech and whatever else you can get from them.

At this point you have solid territories in Europe, good armies on the field, and a lot of cash, if you played it right. Your BIGGEST problem will be rebellions. If you can somehow stage a successful revolution, you're golden.
After that, it's just a matter of marching through either Russia, Poland or Austria again.

[ckangas]

If you ever wish to induce a revolution...

Demolish all your town buildings in your capital the first turn, and replace them with schools. Withdraw all troops a good distance from your capital. On turn 3-5 you should get a successful revolution. I find it much easier to have a revolution at this early stage than waiting until mid-game.

Religious unrest can still be an issue for the ottomans though...gl getting secular humanism i guess?

[redbosn]

If you ever wish to induce a revolution...

Demolish all your town buildings in your capital the first turn, and replace them with schools. Withdraw all troops a good distance from your capital. On turn 3-5 you should get a successful revolution. I find it much easier to have a revolution at this early stage than waiting until mid-game.

Religious unrest can still be an issue for the ottomans though...gl getting secular humanism i guess?

I dealt with religious problems by converting the entire Syria/Iraq/Egypt region into a giant Imam factory. Worked pretty well. They'd just keep spawning, and I would keep shipping them to Europe. Had about 15 of them running around at any given time

[Tunch Khan]

Go after Persia as early as you can because their provinces are filthy rich, large and all Muslim.

[Marku]

ive taken persia, venice, roma(almost), morea, georgia and neighboring minor faction.

aiming to take italy and then africa then spain.

building the new model army :-)

vaguely = 10 line infantry, 3 grenediers, 4 melee, 2 cavalry and 1 general

before the newm odel army, i relied heavily on melee units cuz it seemed to get the job done very fast :-)

[nodey]

I'm gonna start a new campaign with the priorities in this order:

1. Negoatiate - give regions and money for trade and good relationships.
2. Turtle - trade, research and defence will get my nation up to speed, and eventually ahead. During this time i will try to conquer persia while maintaining good relationship with europe.
3. Attack

[Marku]

i got rebellions in egypt and other parts of my empire. everyone wants a reform. should i stay monarchy or go republic?

[Nuxes]

I'm in 1736 right now in my Ottoman campaign, and I am working my way into India as we speak.

Holding the Russians at bay is pretty easy with the occasional State Gift, actually, I managed to ally with them after a couple years of this. This allowed me to focus on Persia.

Austria has been a thorn in my side the last few years, but mostly just raids, which I am content to suffer until my conquest of India is complete. Then I will turn my attention to Austria and mainland Europe.

My campaign when pretty much like yours, except I didn't have a problem with the Austrians because they were too busy fighting the Poles and Prussians (who were fighting each other as well).

Another tip: use the trading port at Basra (on the Persian gulf) to build trade ships and rush them to east Africa and the East Indies. You can get to those valuable trading slots a coupe turns earlier than the Europeans. The only downside is that your trade ships are tiny and can't defend themselves if attacked by pirates or any Europeans you might have pissed off.

[ckangas]

Go after Persia as early as you can because their provinces are filthy rich, large and all Muslim.

Yeah, you can state gift all the european nations early on. The best part about the ottomans is that they do not receive expansion penalties with european nations from expanding through persia and india.

I found that persia -> india was the easiest way to go. You can maintain "green" colored relations with almost everyone in europe while taking over persia/india. And once you get the massive trade and tax income from india....well then it doesn't really matter who you piss off!

The one thing i do dislike is that the ottomans are hard to induce a revolution like i stated before, since their capitol does not start off with towns. Eventually I got it to turn into a republic, but it isn't like most nations when you can achieve it by turn 5.

[Starvosk]

I have remained Absolute monarchy (1736) and have almost researched all techs? I'm pulling in like an average of 20,000 a turn.

Early on I fought persia and Georgia and then spent many turns investing in economy and schools. Ministers seem to make a HUGE impact on economy, most of mine are 5 stars or thereabouts.

I am fighting Europe after Persia- I destroyed Austria with a combined Prussian/Poland alliance and I am allied with France and Spain. I obliterated Venice, took morocco, and the italian states. The Italians by the way, have tons of cash.

One problem I am running into is that my cities that produce strong units are so far away from my front lines..I'm using military governors to pull out line infantry. Also, European line infantry is like way awesome, 0 experience infantry> my 2 chevron Janissaries.

[Tunch Khan]

I have remained Absolute monarchy (1736) and have almost researched all techs? I'm pulling in like an average of 20,000 a turn.

Early on I fought persia and Georgia and then spent many turns investing in economy and schools. Ministers seem to make a HUGE impact on economy, most of mine are 5 stars or thereabouts.

I am fighting Europe after Persia- I destroyed Austria with a combined Prussian/Poland alliance and I am allied with France and Spain. I obliterated Venice, took morocco, and the italian states. The Italians by the way, have tons of cash.

One problem I am running into is that my cities that produce strong units are so far away from my front lines..I'm using military governors to pull out line infantry. Also, European line infantry is like way awesome, 0 experience infantry> my 2 chevron Janissaries.

What are your battle and campaign difficulty levels?

[boerekovic]

I dont want to advertise, but instead of typing my hands bloody you can easily see my succesful turkish empire in my AAR, found in my signature link.

[Starvosk]

I left them at Normal/Normal.

[Zeratul]

I started out with the Ottoman empire on Normal/Normal and had an extremely difficult time for the first 20-30 turns so much so that I was contemplating giving up.

I didn't research the right technologies, built 2 schools in Anatolia(big mistake haha). Was invaded by the Safavids, Austria and Venice while at war with Russia. I realized it would be almost impossible to take down Russia in a timely manner due to its size, so I made peace with them. I lucked out because Austria was getting attacked by Prussia who captured vienna and so I was able to make peace with them after capturing Transylvania. Venice didn't have much of a land force so I was able to recapture athens and invade Morea as well.

Take out all the minor nations around you. I would recommend pushing through Persia all the way to afghanistan (even if they become independent, take over them) till you reach mughal borders. After that you can concentrate on Europe, take back any lands you lost in the Balkans.

As far as managing your territories make sure you have a good balance of buildings throughout your villages. Micromanage your settlements based on public order, I had a revolt in Anatolia where I lost control of the settlement hampering me from doing anything for a good 5 turns.

The most important structure to construct in mainly christian territories are Madrassa's all the way up to the YussekOkul, this will put down religious unrest and slowly convert the population to Islam in addition to generating imams right where you need them. Any settlement with a school/university should have both a madrassa and turkish bath. (upgrade them as finances allow). I was barely making any money for the first 20 turns of my campaign.

Settlements with 100% Muslim populations dont need madrassa's so build craftshops unless the settlement has a school.

Dont build a navy at first, focus on getting a strong economy by upgrading farms, researching, and industrializing while micromanaging public order by building baths and madrassa's to keep public order high. Leave settlements without garrisons, concentrate all your forces on armies that are attacking and defending. Only keep troops in settlements that are in grave danger of invasion or where you need them to keep the settlement from revolting. This saves a lot of money.

Once you have your economy going and public order stabilized, you can focus on attacking Europe.

Right now I'm at 1743 and have about 30+ regions. I have a decent sized navy, w/ income about 30,000 per turn. Complete control of italy, spain, and morroco. I have about 4 full stack armies, with probably 2 stacks worth of troops spread throughout my territories.

[Chaoticfist]

I am currently try them out as well. I just started and my plan is to fight russia off and ensure they dont get a port in the black sea, and my other plan is to invade persia. I made nice with Austria and poland by giving them 2500 each and a trade agreement.

For now my northern border except near russia is safe. My only real concern is raising cash as the whole bloody empire is poor

[ckangas]

I did my game on VH/VH.

I actually had a rough go for the first 10 turns or so. I gifted the european nations close-by, but Persia and Georgia (along with the other minor nations south of Crimea) caused some major issues. I had to do a second take - the GEORGIANS were invading (the bastards took two regions)!?! After initial setbacks and losses, I got the region under control a bit after 1710. Persia and the afghans were defeated between 1715 and 1720, and by 1730 I had quickly rolled over all of India. I amphibiously invaded maratha confederacy (or whatever they are called) in the south, and eventually rolled north taken over the mughals. I left mysore until the end - they had a full 3 stacks from the begining. Maratha appeared to be the real threat, and sure enough the empire practically rolled over once i was finished with Maratha.

If you can take over India, you'll have all the cash you could ever ask for.

[Gornard]

I had similar trouble early on. The russians were easy enough to deal with, they took crimea and i took it back. They were much more open to peace after that. They seem to be the only european nation with early units as bad as mine.

Then georgia, venice and morocco declared war on me. Venice kept sending pikemen and i kept intercepting them untill they sent a relativly larger force and seiged athens. I basically held on using trenches jammed between the city streets and garissoning everybuilding i could.

Georgia seiged one of my territories (which only had armed civilians to defend it) i held on by the skin of my teeth, again by garrisoning everybuilding. Luckily for me they brought only provincial cavalry and one militia. The militia managed to empty out a few of my buildings but finally routed on the last one. Then it was just a question of waiting them out.

Things seem to be going well now, i'm pushing back against both my enemies (organ guns are awesome) and i'm getting used to combining melee and line infantry.

[ckangas]

I had similar trouble early on. The russians were easy enough to deal with, they took crimea and i took it back. They were much more open to peace after that. They seem to be the only european nation with early units as bad as mine.

Then georgia, venice and morocco declared war on me. Venice kept sending pikemen and i kept intercepting them untill they sent a relativly larger force and seiged athens. I basically held on using trenches jammed between the city streets and garissoning everybuilding i could.

Georgia seiged one of my territories (which only had armed civilians to defend it) i held on by the skin of my teeth, again by garrisoning everybuilding. Luckily for me they brought only provincial cavalry and one militia. The militia managed to empty out a few of my buildings but finally routed on the last one. Then it was just a question of waiting them out.

Things seem to be going well now, i'm pushing back against both my enemies (organ guns are awesome) and i'm getting used to combining melee and line infantry.

The ottoman early units are just plain horrible. Their militia equivalents are...well lets just say not equivalent. The jannisary line infantry is actually quite good - and nearly as good as the credit infantry. But until you get the tech for that, things are rough. You also can get 32 pounders very early, although i wish the 64 lber could use cannister shot - it even says it can in the profile!