Best opening strategy for France (2024)

Honestly, play Burgundy instead.

France sucks.

jdavis86 said:

Dump provence and Scotland, declare reconquest asap, punch Portugal for a bunch of dosh and take Ceuta for your colonial range, take your cores and pale, fabricate in Ireland Scotland, release meath and feed them so you can click the mission for claims in England. Oh and you can restart until burgundy is friendly and be their buddy.

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Burgundy? Friendly? I don't want nor need such friends. Burgundy shall be destroyed!!!

I prefer a start that is a hybrid of your approach and the (probably more common) complete reconquest approach. As France I immediately drop the Scotland guarantee and Provence alliance, ally (ideally) Burgundy and Castile, and then declare a Reconquest war for the Normandy area. In the first war I take all of the Normandy area and Maine, but leave Gascony and Calais for a follow up war; instead I Humiliate England in the first war to get Splendor. Taking Caux early sets up that province to get the Diamond District bonus fairly early if you develop the land just a bit.

I don’t conquer any land in England itself because France is already super-powered, and absorbing England makes that dynamic even more absurd. EU4 gets boring without any rivals and I think France conquering all of England would result in total boredom afterwards and an early re-start to find some actual challenge.

1. Improve relations with Pope - they have a tendency to excommunicate you sometimes.
2. Ally with Burgundy if they haven't rivalled you and rival Austria - this improves your chances for Burgundian Inheritance.
3. Ally Castille/Aragon and declare reconquest war against England. Castille may join you if you promise land (but dont give em any)
4. Reconquer all your cores in one swoop, taking parts of Portugal too for war %.
5. At this point I pretty much ignore England since they will be weakened for while with their events.
6. Now, slowly integrate vassals and clean up Provence and Brittany.
7. Can diplo-vassalize a random Irish minor and snake your way to Scotland with vassal claims. Your navy should be enough to deal with Scotty at least.
8. Deal with Burgundy if their succession didn't fire your way and they remain independent (if you can).
9. Focus on Milan PU if the event fires.
10. Once mainland dominance and objectives are secure, you can work on England by prelanding troops on your Scottish provinces to conquer them.
11. Next, invade Iberia, hopefully allying with Aragon/Castille against the other one, before Iberian wedding fires.
12. [Do whatever until imperialism].
13. Dismantle HRE+Conquer the Germans/Try to be HRE Emperor.

Honestly, by the time you completed #4, the rest of the game is smooth sailing. Sure, you won't be able to exert absolute dominance until around after #8 or so, but nothing is really there to threaten your existence. Usually I ignore colonization and just conquer the colonies mid-late game if I really wanted colonies.

For a colonization heavy game, I wouldn't play France.

fleetothemoon said:

Deal with Burgundy if their succession didn't fire your way and they remain independent (if you can).

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And then Burgundy demands Imperial Entrance and you are screwed.

fleetothemoon said:

Next, invade Iberia, hopefully allying with Aragon/Castille against the other one, before Iberian wedding fires.

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Why would you do this when you can get a PU CB on Castile/Spain via missions?

It's an easy enough war given they'll have half of their men in Mexico most of the time.

Travis_Bickle said:

Why would you do this when you can get a PU CB on Castile/Spain via missions?

It's an easy enough war given they'll have half of their men in Mexico most of the time.

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It's not a bad idea if you don't get the inheritance. Control of the Sevilla and Valencia nodes will make the Genoa node a lot more valuable. Regardless, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense if you have already conquered England. It makes more sense to move your trade capital to London and go after Scandinavia, imo.