This is an in-depth guide for France. This guide will include unique units and buildings and where to build them, starting position info, recommendations for first targets, tips for research, tips on how to use your agents best, and more.

NOTE: This guide will be taking units added by DLC into consideration.

Starting Year:
1700

Starting Regions:
France - Paris (Capital)
Acadia - Fort Nashwaak
Alsace-Lorraine - Strasbourg
French Guyana - Cayenne
New France - Québec
Newfoundland - Plaissance
Upper Canada - Montréal
Windward Islands - Martinique

Starting Government:
Absolute Monarchy

Religion:
Catholicism

Starting Funds:
10000

Amount of Starting Generals:
3

Amount of Starting Admirals:
2

Amount of Starting Gentlemen:
1

Amount of Starting Rakes:
2

Amount of Starting Missionaries:
2

Victory Conditions:
Capture and hold 30 regions by the end of the year 1799, including the regions shown:
New York (Owned by the 13 Colonies)
Confederation of New England (Owned by the 13 Colonies)
Hindustan (Owned by the Mughal Empire)
Liguria (Owned by Genoa)
France (Already Owned)
Egypt (Owned by the Ottoman Empire)
Cherokee Territory (Owned by the Cherokee Nations)
New France (Already owned)
Michigan Territory (Owned by the Iroquois Confederacy)
Leeward Islands (Owned by Pirates)
Flanders (Owned by Spain)
Corsica (Owned by Genoa)
Savoy (Owned by Savoy)
Orissa & Circars (Owned by the Mughal Empire)
Pennsylvania (Owned by the 13 Colonies)
Algonquin Territory (Iroquois Confederacy)
Carnatica (Owned by the Maratha Confederacy)

Map Position/Starting Stance Strengths: France benefits in Europe by being one large, very rich, and easy to manage region. They also benefit from having a good ally on their west border meaning that they can safely expand east. The east contains easy pickings in Italian minor nations and german minor states to buffer you from Prussia and Austria. In the Americas Quebec can easily be upgraded to recruit good units to fight colonial wars. France also starts as an Absolute Monarch so you have full control of the government.

Map Position/Starting Stance Weaknesses: France can easily get bogged down early on, Austria will always have a succession war early on and Britain and the 13 colonies also like to declare war early on, meaning Canada will need to be defended. The British also gain naval supremacy early and it is something you will have to forfeit to them.

Military Strengths: France has a very strong military with great elite infantry and artillery. You can gain access to your best elite infantry, Swiss Guards, very early in the game by just upgrading the government building in Paris to top tier. you can also get access to another elite infantry unit, Royal Ecossais by annexing your protectorate Louisiana. The French cavalry roster is also good only lacking good light cavalry but this is made up by having access to good missile cavalry. France's navy also gets stat boosts in accuracy

Military Weaknesses: France's unit roster is only really lacking in the light cavalry department and the light infantry is average, the only real downside to their military is that their very good artillery units come pretty late in the tech tree, so if you want to get the most out of French artillery you would have to prioritize your research in the Ordnance section.

The previous section covered the strengths of the French army and navy this section will simply list the full roster of units available to them.

Elite Infantry:
Maison du Roi
Infanterie Petit-Vieux
Infanterie Vieux
Republican Guard (Requires government change to Republic)
Royal Ecossais
Swiss Guards

Line Infantry:
Line Infantry
Bulkeley's Regiment
Régiments Étrangers
Royal Deux-Ponts Regiment

Grenadiers:
Grenadiers

Light Infantry/Skirmishers/Irregulars:
Coureurs de Bois
Chasseurs à Pied
Tirailleurs

Militia:
Militia
Conscripts (requires government change to Republic)

Melee Infantry:
Pikemen

Cavalry:
Gendarmerie

Lancers:
Chevaux-légers

Heavy Cavalry:
Cuirassiers
Garde du Corps

General:
General's Bodyguard

Missile Cavalry:
Carabineers
Chasseurs à Cheval

Fixed Artillery:
Sakers
Demi Cannons
Mortars
Rocket Troop

Foot Artillery:
12-lber Foot Artillery
24-lber Foot Artillery
24-lber Guard Artillery
12-lber Howitzers
24-lber Howitzers
Puckle Guns

Horse Artillery:
3-lber Horse Artillery
6-lber Horse Artillery
18-lber Horse Guard Artillery

Local/Colonial Units:
Colonial Light Infantry (Requires territory in the Americas, India, Middle East, and North Africa with military buildings)
Colonial Line Infantry (Requires territory in the Americas, India, Middle East, and North Africa with military buildings)
Colonial Militia
Colonial Light Cavalry (Requires territory in the Americas, India, Middle East, and North Africa with military buildings)
Colonial Dragoons (Requires territory in the Americas, India, Middle East, and North Africa with military buildings)
Company Infantry (Requires territory in India with military buildings)
Company Cavalry (Requires territory in India with military buildings)
Native Indian Cavalry (Requires territory in India with military buildings)
Native African Infantry (Requires territory in North Africa with military buildings)
Pandours (Requires territory in the Balkans)
Ghoorkas (Requires the Kashmir territory)
Dahomey Amazons (Requires territory in North Africa with military buildings)
Native Musketmen Auxiliary (Requires territory in the Americas)
Native Warrior Auxiliary (Requires territory in the Americas)
Native Bowmen Auxiliary (Requires territory in the Americas)
Mounted Tribal Auxiliary (Requires territory in the Americas)

Naval Warships:
Bomb Ketch
Brig
Sloop
Galley (requires territory in the Baltic Sea or the Mediterranean Sea)
Light Galley (requires territory in the Baltic Sea or the Mediterranean Sea)
Carronade Frigate
Razee
Rocket Ship
Sixth Rate
Fifth Rate (along with an Admiral's flagship variant)
Forth Rate
Third Rate (along with an Admiral's flagship variant)
Second Rate
First Rate (along with an Admiral's flagship variant)
Heavy First Rate
Steamship

Merchant Ships:
Indiaman

France like every other major faction has two unique buildings along with a wide variety of unique units for it's army, this section will detail the effects of these unique assets and where to build them.

Palais Bourbon
Built in your national capital (which should be Paris)
Category: Government
Level: 6
Turns to build: 8
Building cost: 10000
Effects:
+1 Happiness (lower classes)
+1 Happiness (nobility classes)
+5 repression in the region
+15% tax bonus to region tax income
Recruitment capacity (units in training):3
Enhances National Prestige
Recruits basic infantry and cavalry

Arc de Triomphe
Built in your national capital (which should be Paris)
Category: Military
Level: 6
Turns to build: 8
Building cost: 10000
Effects:
+1 Happiness (Nobility)
+1 Happiness (Lower Classes)
Recruitment Capacity: 4
Recruits all French military units

Unique Units:
I mentioned France's entire unit roster in a previous section but here I will explain where to build the more unique/DLC American units and any technology that is required to build them.
Note: Some of the buildings required to build some of these units do have technology requirements.

Tirailleurs

Technology Requirements: Machine Rifling
Building Requirements: Army Board in France

Bulkeley's Regiment

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Imperial Palace in France

Régiments Étrangers

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Army Encampment or Military Governor's Encampment

Royal Deux-Ponts Regiment

Technology Requirements: New Model Bayonet Drill
Building Requirements: Military Governor's Barracks in Alsace-Lorraine

Royal Ecossais

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Royal Palace or Military Academy, though commonly inherited from Louisiana

Infanterie Petit-Vieux

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Army Board in France

Infanterie Vieux

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Army Staff College in France

Swiss Guard

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Palais Bourbon

Chevaux-légers

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Barracks or Military Governor's Barracks

Chasseurs à Cheval

Technology Requirements: Carbines
Building Requirements: Barracks or Military Governor's Barracks

24-lber Guard Artillery

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Engineer School

18-lber Horse Guard Artillery

Technology Requirements: None
Building Requirements: Engineer School

In this Section I will be going over what are think the best first moves while playing as the France. Including first targets, research, agent priorities, and diplomacy moves.

Government

France starts as an Absolute Monarchy, it doesn't have the benefit of not having industrializing penalties of a Constitutional Monarchy or the less penalties from clamor for reform but you have full control of the government and if you manage your ministers right you can still get government approval rates in the late 90%s. If you are willing to micro manage your ministers, firing anyone who gets too many traits/followers that makes the lower classes angry a government change is not really necessary.

Diplomacy

Allying with the catholic german nations is a good route to go to lessen the affects of Austria declaring war on you later in the game. You should also maintain your alliance with Spain, as long as you don't go out of your way to break it the alliance will last until the late game (the 1770s in my last game) but they will eventually declare war on you but by then you should be more than ready to deal with them. The Huron Nations will also take an alliance and it will last the whole game so you don't have to worry about them declaring war on you.

Research

You will be doing a lot of fighting in the Americas and India vs melee based armies so getting canister shot is necessary, it will also be the first step in getting France's good artillery units.

Agents
Agents are pretty straight forward, you get 2 missionaries, the one in Europe should be sent to convert Alsace-Lorraine and the one in the Americas should be sent to convert the Iroquois lands you will be targeting. You also get 2 rakes, the one in Europe should be used to scout Prussian territory and assassinate protestant missionaries. You only get one gentlemen and he should be sent to research, if you get any more and they don't add to the research rate you should send them to steal techs from other nations, the german minors that neighbor you should suffice, the more gentlemen you have trying to steal a tech the bigger the chance you have at getting it.

Army
Your armies in Europe should be divided in 2, the forces near and in Paris should be sent on a fleet to go to India, the target being Carnatica.


The forces in the Southern part of France and the milita in Alsace-Lorraine should be sent to conquer the Italian minor states, starting with Savoy


In North America you want to recruit some troops from Quebec and Montreal then go after the Iroquois


Navies
You are gonna have to surrender naval supremacy to the British at first, they have better naval tech than you and you will need to focus spending on armies at first. Send your European 5th rate to a trade theater to protect indiamen (should make a few of them too) and send the 6th rates to the Mediterranean as the Barbary states will throw galley after galley at your ports and you will need to fend them off. In North America the ships you have in the Caribbean should be sent to blockade the shipyards of the Pirate Islands so they can't make more ships, the ships you have up in Canada need to be positioned around Newfoundland like this screenshot:

The Innuit Nations will eventually declare war on you and there is an invisible land bridge here so you want to put at least one ship there so they can't cross it and take Newfoundland.

A tricky thing with France is that your second move usually comes to you, Britain or the 13 colonies (dragging the other one into it) will declare war on you early and you will need to defend Canada then go on the offensive and take the 13 Colonies. You will also get your mission to annex Louisiana


In Europe, after Savoy you will want to take out Genoa, they usually ally with the Italian States so you will most likely be going after them as well. Genoa controls Corsica and might amass a fleet so you will need to at least draw it away from Corsica so that another ship can ferry an army to the Island and swipe it from them while their fleet is away.

Around 1714 your king will die, resulting in Austria declaring war on you, now succession wars are random however this one with Austria will always happen.

An Alliance with Venice would be ideal here as they make a good buffer state between you and Austria in Italy, if you also allied with your Catholic German neighbors odds are you won't have to deal with Austria much and they will be busy with their Free for all with Prussia and Poland.

In India after Mysore and the Maratha Confederacy are defeated you will want to start grinding away at the Mughal Empire.

One thing about France is that it's victory conditions are close to it's borders like the 13 colonies and Italian minor states and are very easy to acquire in the early to mid game. Egypt is probably the one you will have to reach out the most for but once the Italian minors are annexed you should send your old units like pikemen, milita, and demi cannons to North Africa and eventually get to Egypt.

Thanks for reading, feedback and comments would be greatly appreciate. Leave any questions as well and I'll be happy to answer them.

I plan on writing guides for all the other nations too once I get playthroughs of them done (I'm playing this game after a long time and am playing all the nations again) The other factions that is done is the USA and Great Britain, Austria, and United Provinces here is the links:
https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1735435353
https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2151572392
https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2410842538
https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2425180365

I also have a Multiplayer guide too, the link for that one:
https://psteamcommunity.yuanyoumao.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=624134097