1.5 set a soft cap to expansion with AE and stability.
However there is still a third mechanic to limit expansion that doesn't quite make a lot of sense without adjustments: war score cost.
Historically borders either changed almost nothing (as a result of skirmishes, etc.) or by huge swaths of land at a time (as a result of big decisive battles).
In the current state of the game we can still get huge swaths of land, but only if we siege down a defensive league of many small countries, annexing them each in seperate peace deals. If we fight a major power, we need many successive wars to annex them, no matter how much we roflstomp them every time.
This doesn't feel right.
From a gameplay perspective I can understand that the big fishes should not be able to be eaten fast, so there's a competitor looming, but in a normal game (lets exclude WC-runs for a moment), there are plenty big fishes left until endgame.
I suggest two changes to make the war score system more sensible:
1. Only allow seperate peace deals if you leave the country that is being peaced out with one province or more.
Why would anyone make a seperate peace deal that involves the full annexation of their land? This doesn't make sense, because this is effectively a total war. Nothing is worse than full annexation, meaning if the aggressor demands this, you have every reason to fight on, just for the off chance that a peace deal with the war leader doesn't end with the end of your country.
Gameplaywise this also makes sense: Seperate peace deals allow for bigger war score total per war. Putting a limitation on it, that you won't have in a peace deal with the war leader, is a fair draw back.
2. Adjust war score cost of a territory by war exhaustion.
Just lowering or increasing war score cost by a certain degree won't achieve any results that would be similar to historical events. This is why I suggest scaling the war score cost of every territory by (15+WE of demanding country) / (10+WE of previous owner).
This would mean that a very uneven war can lead to huge territorial gains. An attacker only suffering 5 WE would only pay two thirds of the current price from a defeated enemy with 20 WE, half if the attacker kept its WE at 0.
However it also means that a defender in a hopeless war can determine the outcome of the peacedeal by a lot, simply by causing as much WE to the other side as possible. A costly war won't see as much land changing hands, than the invasion of a tribe that can't put up any resistance. Just as it should be.
However there is still a third mechanic to limit expansion that doesn't quite make a lot of sense without adjustments: war score cost.
Historically borders either changed almost nothing (as a result of skirmishes, etc.) or by huge swaths of land at a time (as a result of big decisive battles).
In the current state of the game we can still get huge swaths of land, but only if we siege down a defensive league of many small countries, annexing them each in seperate peace deals. If we fight a major power, we need many successive wars to annex them, no matter how much we roflstomp them every time.
This doesn't feel right.
From a gameplay perspective I can understand that the big fishes should not be able to be eaten fast, so there's a competitor looming, but in a normal game (lets exclude WC-runs for a moment), there are plenty big fishes left until endgame.
I suggest two changes to make the war score system more sensible:
1. Only allow seperate peace deals if you leave the country that is being peaced out with one province or more.
Why would anyone make a seperate peace deal that involves the full annexation of their land? This doesn't make sense, because this is effectively a total war. Nothing is worse than full annexation, meaning if the aggressor demands this, you have every reason to fight on, just for the off chance that a peace deal with the war leader doesn't end with the end of your country.
Gameplaywise this also makes sense: Seperate peace deals allow for bigger war score total per war. Putting a limitation on it, that you won't have in a peace deal with the war leader, is a fair draw back.
2. Adjust war score cost of a territory by war exhaustion.
Just lowering or increasing war score cost by a certain degree won't achieve any results that would be similar to historical events. This is why I suggest scaling the war score cost of every territory by (15+WE of demanding country) / (10+WE of previous owner).
This would mean that a very uneven war can lead to huge territorial gains. An attacker only suffering 5 WE would only pay two thirds of the current price from a defeated enemy with 20 WE, half if the attacker kept its WE at 0.
However it also means that a defender in a hopeless war can determine the outcome of the peacedeal by a lot, simply by causing as much WE to the other side as possible. A costly war won't see as much land changing hands, than the invasion of a tribe that can't put up any resistance. Just as it should be.
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