AHC: Germanic Superpower during the Age of Enlightenment

The challenge is simple.

Find a way for there to be a Germanic Superpower on continental Europe, or even a colonial empire spur out of one of "The Germanies". A power that could rival Russia, France, Spain, Britain etc.
 
Centralization of Germany during the Middle Ages is far from impossible; some helpful things would be to prevent the divided inheritance from creating like 300 tiny states, and also to attempt to knock the HRE out of the Italian game early.
 
AFAIK, by 1500, Austria was already a dominant power in the HRE. TBH though, I don't really know enough about this era to give much more than generalities.
 
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