Lithuania

Primary culture

Lithuanian (Baltic)

Capital province

Vilnius (272)

Government

Grand Duchy

State religion

Catholic

Technology group

Eastern

Lithuanian ideas

Please help with verifying or updating this infobox. It was last verified for version 1.33.

Traditions:

+15% Manpower recovery speed

+3 Tolerance of heretics

Warlord Dukes

+1 Land leader shock

Auksine Laisve

−10% Stability cost modifier

Magdeburg Laws

+10% National tax modifier

Magnate Estates

+10% Production efficiency

Lithuanian Hussars

+25% Cavalry combat ability

May recruit winged hussars

Statutes of Lithuania

−2 National unrest

Lithuanian Renaissance

−5% Technology cost

Ambition:

+1 Land leader maneuver

Lithuania is a country in Eastern Europe and western Russia. It lies on both sides of the religious frontier between the Catholic and Orthodox churches. It is bordered by Poland and Mazovia to the west, Teutonic Order and Livonian Order to the northwest, and various Russian principalities to the east. With many of its provinces the wrong religion and an aggressive northern neighbour who wants them to stay that way, Lithuania is in dire need of missionaries. Poland is a reliable ally and one of the few friends Lithuania can count on.

Missions

Main article: Lithuanian missions

Lithuania's missions are focused on developing the country, maintaining friendly relations with Poland and the Cossacks, and the subjugation and conquest of Russian territory and Crimea. There are also missions for forming personal unions (PU) with Poland and Muscovy.

Events

Main article: Lithuanian events

Decisions

Lithuania is able to form the Commonwealth, a union between Poland and Lithuania.

id

Form Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Lithuania)

Replace the personal union between Poland and Lithuania with a real union, welding the two countries together into one powerful state, capable of withstanding our enemies.

Potential requirements

The Commonwealth does not exist.
The country:

was never an end-game nation.
has never formed the Commonwealth before
Is not the Holy Roman Empire.
is Lithuania
is not custom nation

Poland:

is controlled by the AI
has never been controlled by a human player
owns less than 32 provinces

Playing with normal or historical nations

Allow

Lithuania:

has an administrative technology of at least 10.
is not a subject nation.
is not at war.
is not a nomad nation.
has 3 stability.
Is the senior partner in a personal union with Poland.
owns its core provinces:
- Vilna (272)
- Minsk (276)
- Kiev (280)
- Turov (1941)

Poland:

has never been controlled by a human player.
owns less than 32 provinces

Mazovia does not exist

Effects

The country:

becomes the Commonwealth
inherits Poland
gains 25 Prestige
gets new missions.
gets "Polish-Lithuanian Union" for as long as "Polish" and "Lithuanian"are the primary culture or an accepted culture, giving:
- +1 max promoted cultures
promotes Polish cultures if is not already
increases rank to kingdom, if it is a duchy
removes all provinces from the Holy Roman Empire, if it is a member and not an elector or the emperor.
gains a permanent claim on:
- Poland (region)
- White Ruthenia area
- Aukstaitija area
- Pripyat area

A random owned province with Lithuanian culture:

gains 1 Base tax

id

Enforce Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

Poland and Lithuania has a common history of close cooperation and through the Union of Vilnius and Radom our respective aristocracies where integrated with one another in 1413. While fate has since then brought us apart our interests remain closely aligned and now that we control both the core of the Lithuanian and Polish lands it is perhaps time we let our old friends become stakeholders in a joint state.

Potential requirements

The Commonwealth does not exist.
The country:

was never an end-game nation.
has never formed the Commonwealth before
Is not the Holy Roman Empire.
is Lithuania or Poland
is not custom nation

Poland and Lithuania are not in a personal union together
If the country is not AI-controlled then:

Lithuania or Poland does not exist

Playing with normal or historical nations

Allow

The country:

has an administrative technology of at least 10.
is not a subject nation other than a tributary state.
is not at war
is not a nomad nation
has 3 stability.
Owns its core provinces:
- Danzig (43)
- Warszawa (257)
- Krakow (262)
- Vilna (272)
- Minsk (276)
- Kiev (280)
- Marienburg (1841)
- Turov (1941)

Mazovia does not exist

Effects

The country:

becomes the Commonwealth
gains 25 Prestige
gets new missions.
gets "Polish-Lithuanian Union" for as long as "Polish" and "Lithuanian"are the primary culture or an accepted culture, giving:
- +1 max promoted cultures
promotes Polish and Lithuanian cultures if are not already
increases rank to kingdom, if it is a duchy
removes all provinces from the Holy Roman Empire, if it is a member and not an elector or the emperor.
gains a permanent claim on:
- Poland (region)
- White Ruthenia area
- Aukstaitija area
- Pripyat area

A random owned province with our primary culture:

gains 1 Base tax

Unlike Poland, Lithuania has no decision to create a personal union between one another. The issue must be forced, and their mission tree provides a Restoration of Union casus belli. Alternatively, they can have a royal marriage with Poland, then claim their throne and declare war for it if they have a family member on Poland's throne. Lithuania can find allies in Denmark, Hungary, and Bohemia to aid them in this.

Strategy

The below is one of many player suggested strategies for Lithuania. Bear in mind, due to the dynamic nature of the game, it may unfold differently for other players.

Ringed by many potentially powerful neighbours, Lithuania can't afford to look inward. As diplomatic and military dispositions of these neighbours change, Lithuania can swing quickly from conditions of apparent prosperity, strength and security to desperate peril, and back again. Lithuanian diplomacy is a continual effort to acquire, befriend, bolster, contain or disarm its various neighbours.

Lithuania's most important neighbour is Poland - as an ally or in personal union, if possible. Help Poland in wars against Teutonic Order/ Pomerania/ Bohemia/ Hungary and grab lands from Livonian Order for Lithuania. A strong Poland means a reliable ally. There is also a chance to form a personal union with Poland and Commonwealth. Austria can be powerful ally as well - mainly in wars against the Ottomans. If Lithuania manages to ally both Poland and Austria without rivalling each other, Lithuania's western borders should be pretty secure and the player can focus on campaigns in the east, Scandinavia, or into the hordes.

The second neighbor to take care of is Muscovy/ Russia, which will make continual efforts to push the frontiers west. There is little to no chance of them ever allying Lithuania, so that should be dismissed straight away. At 1444, Lithuania can take Muscovy on, but not easily. Should the player idle, this will quickly change, and the unstoppable manpower juggernaut that is Russia will eventually surface. The most pressing issue is to smother Muscovy in its crib and cut them off before they snowball; the only thing the player must wait for is an opportune moment to strike. Muscovy soon jumps into war with Novgorod or Kazan, leaving them ripe to be attacked. There is also the potential of waiting for them to finish their war, if they are fighting Novgorod, and then swooping in and vassalizing them. This would allow the player to quickly return Novgorod's cores (and then some), lowering the amount of aggressive expansion needed to conquer Russia, freeing the player to focus on the hordes or simply expanding westwards.

Another possibility is allying with Denmark (if they maintain control over Sweden and Norway) if Muscovy/Russia rivals and wars with the player, Denmark will be strong and share a border with Muscovy with which to attack across and would make a good ally. Finding strong alliances is generally not hard- half of Europe, as far as Aragon even, want to ally Lithuania. The key is to find allies close by and powerful- Denmark, Poland and Austria are good choices (though Lithuania may clash with Denmark eventually).

With an initial religious split between Catholic and Orthodox (Protestants join the mix later), the natural initial choice is to focus on Catholicism to strengthen relationships with Poland and other states to the west. Polish allied troops can be critical when faced with pressure to the south and east, most of all from Muscovy. Converting the eastern provinces to Lithuania's religion and culture will help make them more resistant to Muscovite/Russian pressure and reduce unrest in them. There will be opportunities to go Protestant in the reformation and thereby build alliances with Protestants to the west and in Scandinavia, but whether that is prudent depends on how other countries have gone.

Alternatively, due to the majority of Lithuania's provinces being Orthodox at the start, it might be beneficial to switch religions to Orthodox via accepting Orthodox rebel demands. However, this will end up harming relations with Denmark, which might prevent obtaining an alliance with them which will make the initial wars with Muscovy harder. Orthodox has the upside of +2 missionary strength at 100% patriarch authority, making converting provinces much easier. Orthodox also provides -3 unrest in all Orthodox provinces at 100% patriarch authority alongside +1 tolerance of the true faith and -3 national unrest from the Icon of Eleusa, making rebellions in Orthodox provinces extremely unlikely.

A good first idea would be Religious. Though Lithuania has +3 tolerance to heretics, they should be expanding deeper into the hordes (basically taking up what Russia normally does) taking a vast amount of territory of the wrong religion. A fast way of getting started in this is: Get a claim on Theodoro, using them as a bridging point to Georgia and Circassia- the player should then be close enough to diplo-vassalize them, sneaking around the difficult Sunni hordes. Note: Do not feed whoever is vassalized, as Georgia/Circassia both have +50% coring cost national traditions, which will make things much more expensive when the time comes to diplo-annex them. In any case, this beachhead will allow Lithuania to expand into Qara Qoyunlu if they are sufficiently weakened, or release an early Persia and begin feeding them their lands. This can also help to get to the Ottomans, and stop them from taking too much Mamluk land; the Ottomans are one of the few countries nearby that can cause Lithuania trouble in the future.

An alternative first idea group is Humanist. This lends itself to a more cautious playstyle, where instead of converting newly gained horde territories as quickly as possible, the player rests on high religious unity (+25% from Tolerance) as well as the increase of the tolerance of heretics (from Ecumerism). Since the majority of the starting provinces are orthodox, these two ideas combined mean that any religious revolt can be delayed until later, where it's then dealt with from a position of power.