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When I was a student I dreaded taking a test on the Thirty Years War: it was so chaotic and meandering. Kings, rulers , Electors, Emperors, and generals were constantly coming and going, and I knew I'd never keep it all straight. C.V Wedgewood wrote a classic history of it in the 1930's, almost the first thing she ever wrote ( which was pretty amazing). It's out of date now but it has a great little summary that sticks around, still: "Morally subversive, economically destructive, socially degrading, confused in its causes, devious in its course, it is the outstanding example in European history of meaningless conflict."

There was a big cast of characters- Spain, France and all the countries of Northern Europe, coming into the conflict, staying out, or walking off. The Holy Roman Empire was a collection of states, some smaller, some bigger ( Germany was, at that point, the Germanies).

There were countries internally divided by religion- France, coming out of a recent bloody internal religious war had a Catholic king but significant Protestant populations. There were countries externally divided by religion- the Germanies were a mix. Religion was far more central to people's lives than now: for most, differences in belief were disturbing, threatening. For Catholics, heretics and heresy was like a disease that could imperil the life and salvation of the whole Christian community, for Protestants, the Catholic church was equally in error. Ferdinand, the Catholic Holy Roman Emperor who was a major player, felt he was doing God's work in pursuing a bloody war, and Protestant leaders like Gustavus Adolphus felt they were doing the same in resisting. There were economic divisions: the Dutch and the Baltic countries were all Protestant, but economic rivals. There were political differences: France and Spain were both Catholic, but had long been political adversaries. And it's hard to separate these aspects. Religion was also political: rulers were God's representatives on earth. Spain's kings had pledged themselves to redeem Europe to the Catholic Church in the previous century, and they continued to try to do that in the 17th. Politics was economic. Economics were religious. So, there were a very big number of players, a lot of divisions, and no one player was supremely powerful.

Imagine the usual basketball game: there are two teams, alliances of players, competing to win. Eventually, one team wins. Now: imagine the basketball game, but it's every woman for herself- or, she can form an alliance with another woman or two, or maybe three, but because there are real divisions of interest between the players, those alliances are uncertain, difficult, temporary. Sometimes someone is able to dominate for a while, but it's hard to actually count anyone out of the game , even if they lose a play. Anyone on the bench can be dragged into play: anyone can suddenly go sit on the bench. Someone on the bench can send food and water to someone playing. How long would you expect the game to last? Until they are all exhausted, battered, and limping, perhaps? Welcome to the Thirty Years War.

To make it yet more brutal, there's the battleground. Pre-industrial Europe could not easily feed and supply itself, let alone large armies. Those armies necessarily lived off the land. Lodged in a city, soldiers would be billeted with citizens. If they were paid, they paid for food. If they were not paid ( and often they were not), they took it, and maybe looted the town. If they lid siege to a city that resisted long, they might pillage , rape, massacre and burn when it fell ( like Magdeburg). When an area had no more food, they moved to someplace that did. If a general (like Wallenstein) was told to stop campaigning, he might leave his troops, and they would either starve and freeze to death over the winter, or they might pillage the countryside. This is why the War acquired its terrible reputation in Germany, why Berthold Brecht decided to make it the setting of his anti-war play, Mother Courage.

This is an inadequate summary: the narrative of the War is, as I said, very complex, and needs to fill a book. If you want to actually understand it, the best one out there right now is Peter H. Wilson's Europe's Tragedy.