EU4 Development Diary - 3rd March 2016

[CrisisCauser]

Agreed, lead this confederation AND conquer your neighbors. Only the members need to be one province minors, the leader can get as big, blobby and monstrous as he wants.

Yeah, this will make the leader very strong. You not only guarantee the independence of several OPMs with only 1 diploslot, but they are all in your alliance. Meanwhile you can still war monger around these countries with your usually allies helping you.

 

[guachi]

i find really hard to grasp why a big or even medium sized country would want merchantlism.

Merchantilism as far as i know is useless if you control 100% of a trade node. So a lot of big countrys that dived very deep in merchantlism like spain and england will actually fight to get rid of it. With corruption being a much bigger problem to them.

It is not useless if you control 100% of a trade node. 20% of province trade power propagates to each upstream trade node. Even if you control 100% of the English Channel node you'd still have 20% propagate to each of five trade nodes. In this case, the total power that propagates upstream is equal to the amount of power you have in the English Channel.

Without owning a single province in Champagne, you could suck a reasonable amount of trade value out of the node purely from having strong provincial trade in the English Channel and sticking a merchant in Champagne for an additional 50+ TP. Think of it as waging economic war on your enemies.

 

[guachi]

Also 200 diplo power for 1% mercantilism especially now that it has a downside is just laughable. I'd like to see anyone ever actually click this button, i doubt we'll see that.

People who can do math and figure if 200 for mercantilism is more worth it than, say, increasing production in one province three times will certainly click this button.

Are you capable of doing that math?

 

[grommile]

Spending 200 DIP on Unjustified Claims that further my territorial objectives, or on annexing 12.5 (or more) development worth of subject nation, seems likely to outperform either of those choices.

 

[guachi]

that "promote mercantilism" button might as well read "I'm an idiot"

Like I replied above, if the alternative is spending 200 diplomatic points to raise production three times, then 1% mercantilism might be worth it based on the math.

Can you do the math to figure out if it's worth it? And if you can't does that make you "an idiot"?

 

[CrisisCauser]

It also has a double affect on your Corruption. Increasing Mercantilism directly increases your Corruption, and it makes you more likely to lag in tech which also increases corruption. It will take some take to figure out if there is value in this.

 

[Canadian_95_RTS]

Don't know if anyone has mentioned this yet (too long, didn't read) but I think trade leagues should be tied to development, not number of provinces. It makes a lot more sense, while still letting small nations join and leaving out the large ones.

 

[bbqftw]

Like I replied above, if the alternative is spending 200 diplomatic points to raise production three times, then 1% mercantilism might be worth it based on the math.

Can you do the math to figure out if it's worth it? And if you can't does that make you "an idiot"?

you can raise production 3 times and I can diplo-annex 25-50 development and assign it to burghers, we can see who ends up ahead in this

 

[Incompetent]

I like the idea of trade leagues, although we'll have to see how the concept plays out in practice. Could be pretty fun for Lübeck especially, but a lack of suitable OPMs is likely to be a problem everywhere except the HRE. I guess the best league members are HRE Free Cities, as they tend to develop like crazy and already have an incentive not to expand.

Incidentally, doubled MR production bonus when they are also giving you some of their trade power is potentially extremely strong. Usually, getting the most out of that bonus is a balancing act, because the more you take over provinces to increase your market share, the fewer provinces are left to benefit from the bonus. With league members, you can have your cake and eat it. If you can somehow persuade league members to remain OPMs, a relatively small number of development-bloated members producing decent trade goods could actually earn you quite a bit of income, certainly far more than you'd get from simply annexing those OPMs near the start of the game.

 

[Frederick_Will]

you can raise production 3 times and I can diplo-annex 25-50 development and assign it to burghers, we can see who ends up ahead in this

depending on the time of the game and ideas you could probably raise production 5-10 times on a province. I would rather mass culture convert cheap lands than spend 200 dip for 1% of mercantilism for the money and other benefits.

I can see them knocking it down to 100 or 150 dip points and still thinking that is worth it. i am not sure how someone thought that 200 dip points as a starting point was a good idea. especially when mercantilism gives corruption.

 

[TheDungen]

So no mechanics for centralising the Hansa to a proper nation? =(

 

[rodrigovc]

"Trade league leaders automatically have a trade dispute casus belli on any countries they would be able to generate such a casus belli on via spy action. That Casus Belli has been changed so that it is not possible to take territory, return cores, cancel vassals or release countries when using it."


This makes this CB completely useless. Who goes to war for transfer trade power and this stuff? It even takes a relationship slot. Also I wouldn't pay 200 dip for 1 mercantilism even now with no drawbacks. You are saying that 2/3 mercantilism have the same values as one diplo tech?

How this trade leagues is going to work? Right now 50/70 years in the game there are no OPMs anymore and why would you create a trade league with an OPM if you can just conquer them? 50% trade power vs 100% trade power + taxes + production + manpower

 

[Susanna]

Trade leagues sound cool. Is this a feature of the patch, or of the expansion?

 

[Wilson Ciao]

How this trade leagues is going to work? Right now 50/70 years in the game there are no OPMs anymore and why would you create a trade league with an OPM if you can just conquer them? 50% trade power vs 100% trade power + taxes + production + manpower

Well, for one, you can take their 50% trade power + a small bonus to trade steering and go conquer someone else. Use that AE and admin elsewhere and get back to them if you really feel like they'd be better off inside your country. Plus, wouldn't the production boost they get from being in the trade league also increase the value of the node a little bit?

There's an opportunity cost for everything.

 

[Archduke Von Nicholstien]

this expansion would be a great opportunity to add a small province occupying part of the coast of Zeta, to represent the Albania Veneta concentrated around Cattaro until 1797.

(i know you guys are hesitant to split Albania, and that makes sense considering how soon into the game's timeframe Durazzo was conquered by the Ottos, but as Cattaro remained in Venetian hands until the very end of the Serene Republic, representing it with a province would be a really nice touch.)

I always felt that the balkans were so misrepresented! The provinces are too big, and Carinolia is Slovene! It simply is underdeveloped!

 

[Twoflower]

How this trade leagues is going to work? Right now 50/70 years in the game there are no OPMs anymore and why would you create a trade league with an OPM if you can just conquer them? 50% trade power vs 100% trade power + taxes + production + manpower

One purpose of the trade league feature might be making OPMs more durable I'm not saying I expect it to work, just that this might be the purpose.
As for trade leagues making sense for a player, bear in mind that most potential OPM members are HRE countries. If you are one of the merchant republics in or next to the HRE at the start of the game, I think adding some OPMs to your trade league peacefully might sometimes be better than the AE for expansion within the HRE (or, in the case of Venice, Ragusa and Novgorod, a lot better than having to fight Austria and its allies because you are attacking a HRE member).

Just as an idea, I think would be really nice if there was some way for trade leagues to add the Burgher estate of bigger countries, since this is what actually happened with the Hanseatic cities in larger HRE principalities (Brandenburg, Mecklenburg, Pomerania etc.), in Sweden, Norway and England. The King of Sweden or the Duke of Mecklenburg did not join the Hansa, it was rather some of their more autonomous (i.e., in game terms, cities assigned to the control of the Burgher estate).

 

[bbqftw]

That Casus Belli has been changed so that it is not possible to take territory, return cores, cancel vassals or release countries when using it.

how boring.

 

[aqvamare]

yeah, so big blue blob eats one of my trade league members through selling him low devolpopment province....after this, I try to force him to release my old member with trade league wargoal. Somethink which will happen in Multiplayer games.

But i cannot:
1.) No of my member joins a offensive war, so me is helpless
2.) even if i get other allies and win this war, with trade league wargoal, i cannot force release my old member out of big blue blob

Moral, I still need to blob as merchant republic and have to make sure, that all my OPMs have direct border with me, so that i can help them in bad times.

Add that you can call your trade league into a offensive war, if you have 30-40 favor with your members.

 

[TheDungen]

First of, the trade dispute CB should allow you to release countries.

Secondly, have you considered breakign up trad eideas into mercenttile (mercantilistic) ideas (in adm)and free trade ideas (in dip)?

Thirdly perhaps a hard cap on joinging merchant leagues is not the way to go. After all the teutonic order was part of the hansa and it most certainly wasn't an OPM. Perhaps instead of just OMPS countries can be part of the league if they are smaller than half the development of the merchant league?
Or perhaps a cap isn't the way to go at all, perhaps you could model the benefits in such a way that the benfits only outweigh the penatlies for smaller nations (preferably something with not having to spend money on a fleet of their own).

 

[grommile]

Paradox is trying so hard to punish conquest and make this game a non-blobbing game.

> forthcoming patch makes the -50% coring discount more broadly applicable
> forumite says Paradox are punishing conquest