Ok, so you've purchased the game and you wish to start playing. There are many approaches to how a newbie should jump into EU3. I'm part of a small community and I've learnt there are a few ways to jump into EU3. So here's a few...

Cheat to learn: In essence you look up the console commands and using the tilde key to bring up the console,you can enter one command codes to cheat your way to security. This has the advantage of trying different strategies/tactics and not really risking much within the game confines.

Trial/Error "Reload": If cheating is not your thing, you can use the save function and simply reload after trying your strategy. This is a common sense tactic that allows players to adapt and understand what strategies work best. It can be tricky tho... because you may spend decades in a war or consecutive wars and finally find yourself in an unfavorable position. Thus you lose all lot of time in general.

Multiplayer Coop: Find one friend and just work together to learn mechanics. For example, one person be France and the other Spain. It will assure security for both of you, so no need to fear other powers. Also, it has the advantage of neither of you will get in the way of the other in terms of expansion as Spain generally colonizes and France can just focus on European expansion. In the end, if you and your coop partner are comfortable enough, you can declare war on each other and this way you both learn from the experience. It's good to have a "sparring" partner in EU3...

Finally, you can mix and match all these things and change the in game difficulty.

Next, you need to ask yourself what KIND of game you want to play. Do you want to be small and a trader? Large and forge a giant empire? Do you want to adopt a theme and play a religious nation? Do you want to be non-european? Generally, the toughest decision for all EU3 players, both new and experienced is "what kind of game do I want to play?"

Some game types and a breif description:

Trader: Trade games often require you to play a small nation with favorable "sliders" (Free Trade/Plutocracy). You'll generally have a weaker military, large navy and small segments of land in far away places. You'll also do some colonizing. Traders don't NEED to colonize, but it can help. Also you will most likely need at least one port in India for the East India Trade Company national decision. The national ideas you'll be looking to adopt are: Shrewd Commerce Practice, National Trade Policy, National Bank. These are the bare minimum to get this game type going. Republic government types are good so you can get an administator/diplomat type to keep your compete chances high and relations with other AI nations high too. Common nation choices for this play style include Venice, Genoa, Hansa, Holland, Aachen, Navarra.

Imperialist: War, war never changes... If you want a game about war, then you're going to have a fairly stressful but rewarding game. The disadvantages of becoming an Imperialist is that generally, your nation is difficult to keep stable because often your empire will encompass all kinds of religions and cultures. You won't be able to trade very well globally, only in Centers of Trade you own. This is because if your infamy is high, it will reduce your trade chance. So, you'll be focusing on buildings that allow you to be stable (temples) and you'll be building lots of military and production buildings as well. Production isn't affected by infamy, so it's a more reliable source of income. You'll also want to burn your infamy quickly so you'll have to hire a Diplomat and take the Cabinet national idea at Government tech 30 and build an embassy. You'll want to build a lot of Weapons Manufactories as well to at least stay ahead in military tech. Generally, the techs that matter to Imperialists are Land and Government. Get a 5-6 star statesman as soon as you can sustain one, then after a few wars, get an Army Reformer. Finally, you're going to want as many Casus Belli's as you can get your hands on. So grabbing Absolute Monarchy at government tech 27 will open up the "Imperialism" CB. Also if you become defender of the faith or take Divine Supremecy you will get "Holy War" on anything that isn't your religion. Finally, Bill of Rights is good for a CB to release nations and Unam Sanctum is useful against heretics and a solid choice for when the Reformation hits.Good choices for this play style are France, Poland, Austria, Brandenburg, Ottomans, Spain. (If you play in Germany, form Germany, not doing so will gimp you long term) National Ideas that Imperialists often take are Military Drill (mandatory), National Conscripts, Glorious Arms and Engineer Corps. Grand Army is optional in my opinion and Battlefield Commissions as well, though I would argue it's more useful than Grand Army.

Colonizer: Colonial Empires can be difficult. They also share some traits with the trader, but also have some traits of the Imperialist. Colonizers don't tend to trade, but can depending on their sliders and decisions. They generally need large navies and armies. The weakness of this play style is you need a lot of patience. You can be killing rebels in Europe, fighting a war in India and repelling an invasion in North Africa, all the while the Holy Roman Emperor is gearing up to bring in his armies to take back land you took a couple wars back. You'll be spread really thin, and you're going to need to manage a lot of relationships. The benefit of the Colonial Empire is tarriffs. Income from you owning overseas colonies/lands. But it can have all the benefits of the Trader and Imperialist. It's just an overall more difficult style of play and really, isn't recommended. Usually in multiplayer, this play style is a deathknell for many players. Typically, once a player colonizes a continent (North America or South America) they then move their capital to that new location. Good choices for this play style are England, Spain, France, Portugal. The key distinction between the Trader and Colonizer is their infamy management, traders don't want infamy. Colonizers don't mind infamy because instead of trade, they focus on tarriffs and their own Centers of Trade.

The best nation for a newbie completely new to the game is England. They have excellent missions, they are relatively safe from the rest of Europe, they can colonize or try European expansion. They don't need to deal with the Holy Roman Emperor (HRE) and generally are just a good pick. Just keep that navy funded and build a ship every year,and you'll be safe from the competition in Europe.

Your next game should be Spain, it's similar to England but there is the added risk of France. Keep relations up with France and Spain is roughly in the same position as England. However you have opportunities in North Africa and Italy.

Many players will say France is the easiest, but France's strength and position can simultaneously be it's weakest link and greatest strength. You're in between Spain and the Holy Roman Empire and the Emperor. You also have provinces that have English cores and a fairly mobile England (via navies) to your north. So while France can win almost any war, the cascading alliances can easily have you fighting 3-6 members of the HRE and England or Spain/Aragon. France is the third choice because it requires you to start managing your diplomatic relationships.

Generally speaking the three nations suggested aren't exactly trade nations. Ideally, I would suggest avoiding trade style games in the begininng. They require a little diplomatic experience, and they require a little more epxerience in terms of the challenges. However, if you want to trade... Holland will be your best bet. It's small, it will last quite a while and be relatively safe. But it's by no means an easy game but Holland has great potential.

So now that we've covered several game styles and I started throwing terms around you'll most likely be confused. Don't worry I'll cover some basics right now. On the top left there is a shield we will go through the purpose of each tab and how it can be usefull.

This is a general overview of your nation. Here you'll find out what nations hate you, which are your rivals, who's embargoed you and it will list your nations "modifiers". The modifiers can come from national deicisions, missions, events and event triggers. Some are permanent and some are temporary. Your rank among nations, government type and ruler name are here too. Also your prestige is listed.

The court shows your ruler and his stats. Administration is for general management of the nation it's important for trade and colonist chance also nifty in reducing war exhaustion. Diplomacy is good for increasing the infamy limit, increases the amount of relation points you get when gifting gold to other nations and also increases your infamy reduction as well. Finally there's military, which affects the morale of your navy and army. All ruler stats give bonuses to techs as well.

Your heir will be shown too. When you have a regency, your new heir will take the throne at 15. Keep an eye on his claim, if it's weak be ready for a lot of royal marriages to get your legitimacy up quickly. (also grab a Grand Marshal Advisor)

Next you'll see three empty boxes where your advisors go. Click a box and choose an advisor. I won't go through the advisor types because that is far beyond the scope of the guide and it really depends on a lot of variables on which advisor to take and when. What I can say is advisors generally require Cultural Tradition which you accumulate using Magistrates in the Culture tab (the one with the paintings) and some of the advisors need either army/navy tradtion as well. (Which is acquired though wars and exploration)

The economy tab gives you a run down of your expenses, how much your taking in, what's going out and so on. In this tab you'll also see several technology sliders. This allows you to modify how big a share of your income will go into that tech. You can also "boost" a tech by clicking the little arrow on the right of the bar to "rush" that income type. You also can lower the maintenance costs of your missionaries/colonists if money becomes tight. Finally, you have the treasurey slider.

Talking about Inflation... The treasurey slider can make or break you. First, you have to know that it's more usefull the larger your economy is. 10% of 100 ducats is not the same as 10% of 12 ducats. So, if you minted and received 10 ducats and you gained 0.1 inflation that might have more of an impact than minting and gaining 0.1 inflation but only getting 1.2 ducats.

In essence if you inflated to purchase a regiment for 9 ducats... with a larger economy, it's less painful than a smaller economy where you can't even afford the regiment. The reason I need to explain this is because, Inflation is permanent unless you actively try to reduce it. So if you're a small nation and you inflated to build a huge army to expand, well now everything is more expensive because of that decision. So, inflate with caution and be ready to deflate as well.

As a rule of thumb, personally, I'm willing to inflate to about 15%, at that point I make a focused effort to deflate. Also, I try to only inflate in times of expansion. If you need to inflate just to keep your head above water... you need to make some cutbacks. Sack that 6 star advisor, or control your colonizing, or reduce the size of your army or lower the maintenance.

You also have a stability slider. This represents the size of the portion of wealth you want to put into making the nation stable. Stability is determined by the number of provinces, the religion in those provinces. the cultures and whether the cultures/religions are accepted or not. Generally, the more "diverse" your empire, the more difficult it is to keep stable.

Finally you have war taxes. In wartime, it increases the amount of taxes you acquire at the cost of war exhaustion. (I'll explain War Exhaustion (WE) in a bit)

This tab allows you to choose your unit types or change them. It shows you your war exhaustion and allows you to change the maintenance cost of your troops. Reducing maintenance reduces morale. Support limits are the total maximum your nation can maintain. Going beyond that lmit will strain your nation so it incurrs additional costs.

Explaining War Exhaustion: It's a fiarly simple concept. When you go to war, people die and the nation is put under strain. This is shown in the War Exhaustion value. So if you lose a battle, lose provinces or lose troops to attrition, then it can increase your war exhaustion. As war exhaustion goes up your nation gets "tired" of war. Recruiting takes longer, your global revolt risk goes up, over time you'll get rebels. War Exhaustion is VERY important. It is your guage during war. It's your nations way of saying "Hey! I can't do this anymore!"

This is fairly simple. You have a bunch of decisions that add modifiers to your nation of a religious nature. Everything from conversion chance, taxes collected, number of missionaries you recieve and much more.

Converting a province to your state religion reduces it's stability cost and thus, allows your nation to be more easily stabilized.

Here is where you make your nation yours. You have National Ideas and your "Sliders" here. Often when you hear other people refer to "sliders" this is usually what they are talking about.You can also change your government type here too. I'll spend more time explaining everything here in a later section it's much too important to give a brief description. It deserves some real explaining. So for now accept what's here.

This tab shows your Army Tradition (acquired while fighting wars and exploring lands) and Naval Tradition (acquired fighting naval battles and exploring naval zones).

Discipline is the measure of additional damage your troops do when fighting. 100% is normal damage. 110% would mean you are dealing 10% more damage than normal. Simple as that. It's a pretty important modifier so be aware of it. Finally you can recruit Admirals/Generals. In essence they get assigned to an army (simply click an army and look for the box that says "No Leader" and click the leaders name. The Conquistador and Explorers are the "explorer" equivalents of the basic leaders. In essence they do everything a leader does except they consume a colonist (normal leaders consume diplomats) when recruited and they uncover Terra Incognita. You can only acquire them with the national idea Quest for the New World (available at Trade Tech 7). They cost 50 ducats and consume Militray/Naval Tradition as well.

You may also convert your ruler to a general. the quality of your ruler as a general is determined by his military stat.

This tab shows your cultural tradition which is raised by spending magistrates in a variety of ways. You can also create "Great Men" (Advisors) here. It's useful to do so because every nation has different needs, so keeping your culture high is a good idea so you can recruit the advisor you need. Also there are many decisions available to help keep your nation stable (by reducing revolt risk). Remember to hire the new advisor in the court tab once you've created him.

This tab shows what missions you have. Missions vary greatly and can give permanent or temporary benefits. You can cancel a decision and get a new one if you don't like it (costs 5 prestige). National Decisions are permant decisions you can pass to improve your nation. Typically you'll see the modifiers on the Overview tab.

Centralization/Decentralization
This is a no brainer. Every single EU3 player I've ever met prefers to Centralize. Couple notes here with Centralizing. First, it's important. Do it. Second, careful with Centralizing on day one in the game... I've seen it on more than one occasion that a revolt event happens in response to the shift and that army crushes the players starting army. I know it sounds silly, but before centralizing, make sure you have some troops ready to stomp revolters.

Aristocracy/Plutocracy
Generally, Aristocracy is better for war and Monarchies. The additional shock helps with war and the diplomats are nice for royal marriages. The reduced cavalry cost is really nice too. Cavalry tend to be expensive.

Plutocracy is all about trade. It's all about merchants and money. It's ideal for a trader style of play.

Serfdom/Free Subjects
This slider can be tricky. Serfdom is all about reducing the costs of troops but increasing the costs of technology and a small hit to morale.

Free Subjects reduces the cost of increasing technology and give a slight morale increase.

*Note: On the surface, it would seem that Serfdom is about war. However the bonus morale and reduced tech cost of Free Subjects seem to suggest it might be a better choice even for a war monger. Considering how big an advantage being more advanced in Land tech can have in battle. Personally, I think Free Subjects is the better choice.

Innovative/Narrowminded
This one can be tricky. Because it really does depend on what you need. If you're a large sprawling empire you might want Narrowminded. The reduced stability cost and colonial growth can really help. Innovative can be a huge help and there are a couple national decisions that need to you to be innovative.

*Note: You MUST a certain level of innovative to Westernize when you play outside Europe.

Merchantilism/Free Trade
I've heard a few debates on whether Merchantilism is actually useful. To date, Free Trade usually dominate most multiplayer games. There is one exception. I've seen a merchantilist land power use it to trade in their own Center of Trade. So there's some precedence. However, if you're going to be a trader, get Free Trade.

Offensive/Defensive
This is pretty simple. Do you want to be more effective charging in or do you prefer to be more effective waiting for them to come. Preference is all yours.

Land/Naval
This is pretty self explanatory. Pick the side of you military you want to be more effective and move the slider in that direction. This will all be dependant on play style.

Quality/Quantity
This one kinda makes me sad. I've always WANTED Quantity to be worth while. But it isn't. Every single player I've played with going Quality. There's one reason and it's a good one: Discipline.

Ok, so national ideas are all about that early game decision you made about the KIND of game you wanted to play. Every choice you make, should be reinforcing that initial decision. If you're going to be a land power smashing your opponents. Then take Military Drill, National Conscripts, Esprit de Corps. Then take ideas to support your army. Like National Bank, Church Attendence Duty or Bill of Right. Be focused in your choices. Don't pick Military Drill, National Conscripts and then Quest for the New World and wonder why you can't defend your colonies properly when a giant English navy shows up and stomps your cog navy. Be aware that certain play styles require certain ideas. In some cases you can make them "work" but when/if you transition to Multiplayer, you're going to need to be focused. Changing your game plan half way will have you losing ground and time. Same goes for sliders, don't choose full navy and then start a campaign to conquer Europe as France. Focus... Just focus and you will succeed.

Government Types
There are many governments but there are two general "types". You have Republics and Monarchies. Republics have the benefit of you being able to choose your rulers strength. You have don't have to worry about legitimacy. Which you normally increase by getting Royal Marriages with nations of the same faith.

Monarchies can use Royal Marriages to form "personal unions" (PU). In essence you claim the throne of another nation and you can wait for their leader and heir to die and hopefully your blodline take the throne. Or, you can invade to force that nation into a personal union.

*Personal Unions: Essentially, they're like a "special" vassal. If your prestige is high and your relations are high, there is a chance the minor partner in the union will automatically intergrate into the major partner. If the subject nations culture is the same as the major partner, all the newly acquired provinces become cored.

A couple additonal notes. There are other nation types. Theocracy and Merchant Republic. Theocracies are nations focused on religion. Merchant Republics are in essence, Republics focused on trade. They do so by having the option to have a state join as members of their Trade League. The Trade League members all trade though the Merchant Republics Center of Trade and the members get an increase in production efficiency. If a member state won't join you can ask for trade rights for specific resources so you can be the only trader of that resource.

All in all. If there is a general message I have share at this point it's that, when you choose a strategy for you game, be sure you compliment it with the choices you make in the Government Tab.

Generally, provinces should reflect your "top level" decisions. So if you choose to be a large land power then you should be purchasing Armories, Training Fields, Barracks, Regimental Camps. Arsenals and Conscription Centers. However it's not THAT straightforward. Generally, you should be focusing on two areas with a large Empire... so the large land empire your building will have several things they need to build. Land buildings, Temples to reduce stability cost for all those different religions and cultures and finally production buildings to get some income to pay for all those boots on the ground.

Now, with that said, you might develope provinces a little differeny if you're a trade nation. If you hover over the "Price" next to the trade good shown on the province menu, you'll see that different buildings will increase the value in different ways. So, for example, Coffee will increase in value if you build many of the Navy buildings.

At the bottom of each province there are "special" building you can build as well. You can build an embassy to increase the amount of infamy you burn off or you can build a Tax Assessor to decrease your inflation. To build them, you'll need to meet certain requirements. Like having a certain level of tech or meeting certain local requirements not the province not being a core.

I think I've mentioned cores a few times now so I think it's about time I take a moment and explain Cores. Cores are modifiers on a province that indicate that you have a claim on that land. That it's "yours". I put "yours" in quotes because provinces that are cores can be held by other nations. Which then gives you a Casus Belli (cause for war) to bring that province into your nation. Cores are acquired in a variety of ways, but generally you need to own a province for 50 years for it to become a core. Conversely you can lose that core if a nation holds one of your cores for 50 years. But there is an exception to this rule, if the core being held by another nation is in the same culture group as your accepted culture group, you will not lose the core.

Cores matter. Get them, you'll be better for it. They increase your income, manpower and cost less stability.

On the bottom you'll see nation shield they will show what nations have a core on that selected province.

Manufactories
As the game progresses and your technology improves you'll get access to manufactories. Certain resources, double the value factories add to the province. So, for example, if you have Wine in a province, a Refinery will give you 12 ducats a year instead of 6. In addition to increasing Trade Tech investment by 5 and pop growth by 1%.

Converting
Converting provinces is pretty simple. Select the province, look for the little face with a pointy hat with "Send" under the face. Click it. There's a % chance every month the province turns to your faith. Provinces that have the state religion have a lower stability cost.

Provincial Decisions
Provincial decisions can vary. So I won't get into specifics but generally provincial decisions have a few requirements and that add modifiers to the province. In most cases the modifiers are temporary.

Finally, provinces allow you to build troops, build ships and recruit mercenaries.

*Mercenaries are just like your troops except they don't take from the national manpower pool, and cost a fortune

Manpower
Manpower is the the number of available troops for war. This value replishes over time and can be increased via Army buildings in provinces, national ideas, national decisions and advisors (although temporary with advisors). If you run out of manpower and your in a war, you should attempt to make peace you can't win a war without soldiers.

*Note on regiment organization. There is very little consensus on how much Cavalry/Infantry you should have. However, in my experience, 4 Cavalry is the minimum for flanking and the rest infantry. Of course, if your reading this and you know for certain there is a better composition, then send me the link to the data. I'll update the guide.

The Empire Strikes Back!
The Holy Roman Empire is an important mechanic and needs some explanation. The HRE is a collection of Germanic nations that are protected by an Emperor who is elected by several electors in the Empire.

Playing as an Elector you have a vote and can choose the Emperor by clicking the two headed hawk on the right of your screen and selecting the shield next to your nations flag.

As the Holy Roman Emperor you have certain responsibilities. You have to defend member states from incursions from outside the empire and from turmoil in the empire. You have to keep order. In return, your Imperial Authority, a value between 0-100 can be spent to pass reforms in the empire. The reforms benefit the Emperor and member states. You'll also get "Imperial Ban" CB on nations that aren't part of the empire who grab territories that belong in the empire.

"It's good to be King!"
Being Emperor has a lot of nice benefits. Your manpower explodes and force limits increase. Your stability will recover quickly as well as you get a bonus modifer to stability.

Generally, becoming Emperor requires you be Catholic, somewhat large, good relations with all the electors and low infamy and high prestige. Most of the time, it's best to just vassalize the electors. As vassals, they will always vote for you.

*Vassals: Vassals are nations that essentially give up their autonomy and fall under your rule. They keep their flag and that's about it. Otherwise they can't do much without you. Domestically, you won't have control of them but in your foreign affairs, they will help. They will defend you in war and charge forth when you crash against your rivals' armies. Make sure once vassalized, you ask for an alliance from your newly vassalized nation.

The Pope is a fairly simple mechanic. The more provinces and papal influence you have the more cardinals you get. The more cardinals you get the higher the chance you have to control the papacy. You can excommunicate Catholics who have poor relationships with the Papal State and you call Crusades on Heathens around the world. If you want to know who the Heathens are just go to your religion tab and look on the right, you'll see your faiths symbol, then the one below, which are heretics and finally the one below that is the heathens. It will list all the religions that can be targetted for Crusades.

*Nations who declare war on the Crusade target get bonuses for war and a small increase in taxes as well.

Rome, Judea and Mecca
Acquiring these provinces will get you additonal prestige. Get them, they're worth it and it's good if you're the role playing type as well.

Defender of the Faith
For a huge chunk cash you can become the Defend of the Faith. It's not a uniquely Christian option. All faiths can have a defender. The defender gets additonal morale, prestige and a global CB on all heathens. You lose the Defender title after 2 years if someone with more prestige purchases it.

On the top of your screen starting from the top left going right you have...

Manpower, Stability (ranging from -3 to +3), your cash (in ducats), Prestige (-100 to +100), Infamy and legitimacy.

A quick word on Infamy. Infamy is acquired by annexing provinces and by enacting some decisions. Going over the infamy limit is not ideal. Event begin to pop-up and revolts begin to envelope your nation. On top of that, when you go over your infamy limit, all nations get "dishonorable scum" CB on you. Every nation in the world could possibly attack you, they may or may not, but you can easily find yourself in a war far larger than you can manage.Your Infamy limit is determined by the form of government you have, the diplomatic skill of your monarch and legitimacy.

Legitimacy is the value that determes how much faith people in your nation have in your monarch. Low legitimacy can result in pretenders to your throne rising up, severe intollerance towards members of the true faith and heathens and heretics, lower infamy limit and an increase in revolt risk.


Merchants are used to increase your trade income. They are sent into Centers of Trade and they can get a portion of the trade there depending on your sliders and national ideas.

*Centers of Trade (CoTs) can be found in certain provinces. The CoT is the economic center of the region it's in. Typically, the provinces will be part of the local geographic region but not always. The value of the CoT is dependant on the value of the provinces linked to that CoT. You can increase the value of that Cot by building Trade buildings in the provinces connected to that CoT. You can easily see the the region of that CoT by simply click on the small box above the map on the bottom right that looks like a stack of coins. (shortcute is "t")

Colonists are used to colonize provinces. Unclaimed land can be settled by simply clickin on the province and clicking the colonist icon. The chance of success can be affected by the geographic region (jungle/artic regions), your rulers administration skill, advisor bonus, production efficiency/tech, national decisions, national ideas or native hostility.

Colonial growth can can be affect by many of the same factors needed to settle the province, with the addition that it can be boosted by using your national focus.

*The National Focus is a modifer that you can apply to a group of provinces you choose. So, it can be used to reduce revolt risk, increase population/colonial growth, and is also a prerequisite for many provincial decisions.

Colonizing requires that you have enough colonial range. Also affect by many of the same factors that affect colonizing, although it relies on your Naval Technology instead of Production. Colonists are also consumed when you purchase an Explorer/Conquistador.

Diplomat
Used for foreign relations. Every time you have an interaction with another nation, you consume a Diplomat. They are also consumed when you a recruit a General/Admiral. Also come cultureal decisions require Diplomats.

Missionary are used to increase papal influence when you're Christian and they are consumed when you attempt to convert a province to your state religion. Also, they are used for some religious decisions.

Spies
Spies are used for espionage. Everything from suporting foreign nationalists, advisor assassination to undermining merchants. One important note on spies. If you use a spy on any province other than the capital of the target nation, it will have fewer options. So keep that in mind.

Magistrates
These guys are the bread and butter of your empire. They are the reason why you will become awesome. They are used to increase culture to buy better advisors, building buildings and used for a variety of decisions both at the national level and provincal. They are important, don't waste them and never sit at 5 magistrates. It's bad mojo, spend them somehow!

Ok, so this section is about money and managing money. There might be some redundencies but I thought it would be important to kind of have a section on the decision making and problem solving when it comes to cash flow.

Ok, so you picked England and you're excited you annexed Ireland and got all those yummy cores. You also finally beat the Scots and managed to vassalize them. But you're going broke. Why?

Well in general there are things to note. Money doesn't magically disapear, so the first thing to note, is that if you initiated War Taxes, it's over now. Which likely means you're fielding a larger army than you need. Remember the support limit is the limit. It may be way higher than what you need, so having 45 thousand men standing around, when not a single nation in the world barely has a navy half the size of your navy. You could easily disband half the troops, be vigilant with your navy and you're already saving cash. If you have several colonies going keep an eye on those, too many underdeveloped colonies can cripple your economy.

So, there's a theme I'm trying to demonstrate. Understand your nations strengths.

Another example is France. You just finished a huge war with Burgundy. No single nation bordering you on your Eastern border is a challenge. But you've been minting. You really like those constables and you get exactly 52 ducats a year minting at 0.25. You also have an enormous standing army, almost 60k.

Here, you could reduce your inflation to 0.15 (it's ok to inflate a bit for economic expansion). You can disband half your army (you're France, you have a ton of vassals to come to your defense, so they can absorb some of the incoming pain from a potential rival. If the Holy Roman Emperor attacks, remember that he has to essentially cross Europe to get to you, so plenty of time for you to rebuild those troops.

Every little bit counts. When reducing inflation some common strategies include reducing the size of your army/navy. You can also reduce the maintenance. You can hire a 5-6 star Master of the Mint and you can innact, at a later date, the Gold Standard National Decision. You can also pick the National Idea, National Bank. Finally don't forget to build a Tax Assessor when you reach the tech level to be able to (31 Gov). Reducing inflation and keeping a stable economy is about planning and learning to manage with less. Also, use your cultural tradition to help you too. Spend your unused magistrates on increasing your cultural tradition (ideally to 100) then create 2-3 advisors and do NOT hire them. After a year, they might be picked up by AI nations and you will get some cash in exhange for their services. So it can be a nice infusion of income when you're just looking to build an extra armory or constable.

It's not simple, but it's about having a dedicated approach. If you find you're inflating, you need to make dififcult decisions. Instead of grabbing Grand Army to demolish the Emperor, you should instead take National Bank. Planning is important. Build economic buildings first, then your next building type. So, Constables before Armories. Ideally, you would build Constables, Docks and finally work on your troops. In early game, especially if your one of the larger nations you can make that sacrifice.

Money matters, and prioritizing your cash flow is important. No money, no empire, simple as that.