Is it impossible to beat burgundy early as france?

[VoiD]

Don't really get it, been trying, 6th time already and every time I try to somehow fight them they win, I usually win the first battle but after that it's nothing but defeats, seems like my armies even start with zero morale, they have their bar full but when combat start my bar is almost depleted and theirs is full, even in defensive battles in the middle of rivers I tend to lose all of my morale instantly not to mention they sometimes somehow manage to kill just as many men attacking across a river every tick, france even starts with a lot of military tradition and a great general so I don't know what's going on...

After I depleted my manpower I recruited a bunch of mercs too but it's useless they just keep winning every single battle..
Edit: Yes spent all my points reducing war exhaustion as well.

[Shin]

Burgundy is beatable as France in the first 12 months of game time. Just a matter of getting those general in your armies, watching attrition, watching terrain, destroying their core armies and have don't spend any cash, incase thing get a little dicey, you can always call in the Mercs, at least for the siege part if you're short on manpower.

Your problem with Morale sounds like low maintenance, low morale from not taking defensive or being behind in tech. Also having negative prestige can hurt quite a bit as well.

[VoiD]

Originally posted by Shin:

Burgundy is beatable as France in the first 12 months of game time. Just a matter of getting those general in your armies, watching attrition, watching terrain, destroying their core armies and have don't spend any cash, incase thing get a little dicey, you can always call in the Mercs, at least for the siege part if you're short on manpower.

Your problem with Morale sounds like low maintenance, low morale from not taking defensive or being behind in tech. Also having negative prestige can hurt quite a bit as well.

My upkeep was set to the max too dunno what's up even as a north american native post westernization I didn't have any trouble with armies, in fact nobody could set foot in america and my only concern were the alliances (Didn't really want to fight England+castille+colonies or france+portugal+colonies) but this is just too weird.

Originally posted by wolcen:

Yeah, Military Drill makes Burgundy manageable...and the sooner you cloak their lands in brutal sieges the sooner you cut off their merc supply.

Using "attach to this unit" well is also helpful.

Considering I probably should get the diplomatic idea first that idea would take a long, long time to be researched =/

[Free Luigi M.]

How far exactly are you into the game?
I have a save with France, during the HYW, where I defeated both England and Burgundy at the same time. So yes, it's possible.
However, judging by what you wrote, sounds like Burgundy spent some points on Defensive ideas and has 25% morale bonus. That would explain your constant defeats.

[VoiD]

Yeah they had castille as allies but I was just testing after my first defeat in which they declared war on me and beat me alone, hmm wonder if the defensive bonus is that absurd and if they had it, it's iron man so I couldn't check...

Anyway it happened every time after the HYW, a few years after I had austria maxed on improve relations and was about to start anexing my first vassal, before I researched anything myself.

[VoiD]

Update: Yeah now I can beat them declaring war really early in the game before I win any sieges vs england and using mercs.

Then comes another problem, the coalitions that form after I beat everyone around, I end up fighting every single country around me at the same time, won the first war, 5 years later my manpower reserve was still stuck at the lowest and I couldn't resist the second war.

Seriously never had such trouble with any nations, even the tiny nomads, or north americans, france is the hardest nation I've ever played

Edit: Finally got the ball rolling, got lucky and castille didn't start as a rival so I got him as an ally, so I didn't really have to fight Burgundy and they didn't have the ball to declare war on me, when a succession war triggered between castille and burgundy over Aragon I kicked their ass.