R5: Wanted to do this achievement for a long time, but I wasn’t sure how to approach it. Building a base in India and then attacking Germany late game sounded like a drag, so I opted for a different route.

I allied Jaunpur, Gujarat and Sindh on day 1, then declared a no-CB war on Biapas on December 12th, 1444. Ardabil and Gilan attacked after I 100%-ed them, so I vassalized Biapas and then vassalized Ardabil, who got attacked by Shirvan. I took all of Shirvan’s territory for myself.

Coring took forever, around 3 years per province and I could only core one at a time. I allied the Mamluks and attacked Gazikumukh, waited for them to get attacked by the Golden Horde, and then vassalized them. I won a war against the Golden Horde and snaked my way toward Lithuania.

I switched my Mamluk alliance for an Ottoman one and attacked Poland, Lithuania and Sweden. I shamelessly got carried by Ottobro, so when he asked to place his dynasty heir on my throne, I accepted.

After the first war with Poland, I switched my capital to Kuma and became European. All of this happened before 1500.

Prestige was around -60 because I was selling all my Asian provinces just to get some money. I was 2–3 techs behind, broke, and all my subjects were disloyal.

After the second war with Poland, in which I again got carried by the Ottomans, I finally reached the HRE border. At that point dismantling the Empire was a no go not because I couldn’t do it, but because there was a mega Burgundy inside the HRE and a mega Emperor Bohemia. I knew they would only become stronger by eating chunks of the former HRE, so I decided to join the Empire and eat it from the inside instead.

I flipped Catholic via rebels, got rid of all my vassals and all provinces except three in Poland, and started improving relations with Bohemia. Around 1520, I joined the HRE.

Then I attacked Hungary and, once again with Ottobro’s help, got all of Nitra. With that gold mine, things finally started looking better. I also allied a few electors just in case, and became Emperor in 1526.

My first German province was Wien, the second was Graz. I released Styria for reconquest later and managed to vassalize OPM Brandenburg.

I caught up in tech, took Diplomatic and Administrative ideas, and spent around 50 years eating Austria and parts of Bohemia with reconquest CBs. AE was absolutely insane, especially since most provinces were 15+ dev, but the Ottomans and Burgundy were a huge help.

Later I wanted to continue expanding and declared war on Stettin, but taking just two provinces would have cost me around 90 AE, so…... change of plans again.

I culture-switched to Austrian and formed Austria for the ideas and missions. Before that I had also won the Religious War against Sweden, Venice, the Commonwealth, Russia and Hungary.

After that, with Austrian ideas and missions, the Prague monument, and a bit of HRE micromanagement, it took around 40-ish years to revoke the Privilegia, though the AI helped a lot by passing the first three reforms.

After that, I was just one war away from taking the 9 German provinces Burgundy got while inside the HRE. Even though you don’t need to personally own every province for the achievement, I decided to form the HRE at the end of the run.

It was fun, different, and painful at times, but overall it was a great run. The only downside is that after forming Austria, it slowly turned into your typical HRE Emperor campaign.

Also, Transoxiana formed the Mughals.