From 1660, he was entrusted with the protection of the Croatian border, part of a series of defensive positions called the Military Frontier, from incursions by the Ottoman Empire on behalf of the order.

That same year, he led a contingent of the Teutonic Knights in the successful Battle of Saint Gotthard against the Ottoman armies, an important victory for the Christian coalition forces which halted Turkish expansion into the fractured realms of Hungary.

The task of the governorship was, among other things, to oversee religious issues (in practice this meant supporting re-Catholicization), to smooth out conflicts between the civilian population and the military, to stabilize the internal affairs situation, and to modernize the public administration.

Ampringen's administration was characterized by a heavy-handed approach, as several public executions of disloyal Hungarian nobles happened at this time in a climate of heavy repression of the Empire's perceived enemies.

His activities as governor greatly contributed to the rise of the so-called kuruc rebel movement opposing the encroachment of the Habsburgs in Hungary, and later still to the outbreak of the uprising led by Imre Thököly.