Prestige and Diplomatic power.

[Allan Red]

What can I do to get diplmotatic power (it has a 5 incline per month). Also, how do I get prestige, I'm losing 1.8 per year. What are the things I need to do?

[Nubnut]

When you have positive prestige you'll always have some decay. But you can do various things to combat it, such as investing in Religious ideas to increase your yearly prestige, or Innovative ideas to reduce your prestige decay.

Generally speaking it's not that big of a factor as generally the constant cycle of battles (and potentially colonization) will keep your prestige pretty high if you win most of them.

As for diplo power, you're main ways of increasing diplo power are:
1. Pray for a better ruler
2. Shell out more money for a better diplomatic advisor.
3. Make it your national focus (but this also reduces your administrative and military power).

[Funsize]

DIP is generated by your king and hired advisors. There are also missions that provide DIP as reward. Prestige is mainly gained through battles, ideas, and events.

The wiki is extremely useful for most information, though it gets outdated each new patch/expansion.
http://www.eu4wiki.com/Europa_Universalis_4_Wiki

[Allan Red]

Originally posted by nubnut:

When you have positive prestige you'll always have some decay. But you can do various things to combat it, such as investing in Religious ideas to increase your yearly prestige, or Innovative ideas to reduce your prestige decay.

Generally speaking it's not that big of a factor as generally the constant cycle of battles (and potentially colonization) will keep your prestige pretty high if you win most of them.

As for diplo power, you're main ways of increasing diplo power are:
1. Pray for a better ruler
2. Shell out more money for a better diplomatic advisor.
3. Make it your national focus (but this also reduces your administrative and military power).

So 'Im still on administative idea lvl. 1 and don't have many ways of making money (that I know of) I can't really shell out a lot of money. What can I do for more money.

[Dreamers]

In that case I suggest playing another nation. The ones that start with tech that low aren't very beginner friendly. Mid-sized Nations in Europe, North Africa or Asia(aside from Ming) are better.

[Kagemin]

For the diplomatic points, also note that you can only support a certain number of diplomatic relations "for free".
There are several modifiers to it, but by default you can only have relations with four different nations, for every one above that you have to pay one diplo point per month.
It's similar for military points and leaders.

[Kinakin]

For indepth explenation of how you make money and tips on how to maximize said income look up:
http://www.eu4wiki.com/Income#Income

Quick ways to increase your income is to reduce military spending. This reduces the available morale of your units. But is usually a very good idea during periods of peace as it frees up alot of income. Note that at 0% military funding your troops wont reinforce and wont be able to move.

for full info on maintance effects look up
http://www.eu4wiki.com/Army#Maintenance

Addendum:
A sneaky way to hasten the death of a ruler or an heir is by making them into a military leader(general) in the military tab. Ideally putting them in command of a unit and then just let them sit there. The chance of a military leader dying is alot higher then that of a regular ruler or heir.

[Allan Red]

Originally posted by Chrnno:

In that case I suggest playing another nation. The ones that start with tech that low aren't very beginner friendly. Mid-sized Nations in Europe, North Africa or Asia(aside from Ming) are better.

Im playing as castille. Is that beginner friendly?

[GingerReaper]

Depends, castile can either be really good or horrific. Especially if france decides you look tasty. The Otto-Derps are a generally good start(Ottomans can expand in loads of directions).

Originally posted by Lovefrog:

Originally posted by Chrnno:

In that case I suggest playing another nation. The ones that start with tech that low aren't very beginner friendly. Mid-sized Nations in Europe, North Africa or Asia(aside from Ming) are better.

Im playing as castille. Is that beginner friendly?

[Allan Red]

Originally posted by GingerReaper:

Depends, castile can either be really good or horrific. Especially if france decides you look tasty. The Otto-Derps are a generally good start(Ottomans can expand in loads of directions).

Originally posted by Lovefrog:

Im playing as castille. Is that beginner friendly?

Don't I need the DLC for them?

[Kagemin]

None of the nations are locked behind DLCs, the only thing that comes to mind in that regard is that you need Conquest of Paradise to play Colonial Nations that aren't independent yet.

[Allan Red]

Originally posted by Kageryuu:

None of the nations are locked behind DLCs, the only thing that comes to mind in that regard is that you need Conquest of Paradise to play Colonial Nations that aren't independent yet.

Which are those? Like Mexico and stuff?

[Kagemin]

I don't think Colonial Nations that are still subjects can form any of the New World nations, so no.

When a colonizing nation gets 5 cores in one colonial region a colonial nation will form as a subject nation. If they get pressed for money too much they may declare independence. Depending on the starting date there may also be colonial nations already starting independent.

Without CoP you can only play a colonial nation that's independent, CoP allows you to play one that's still a subject nation.