Country Ranking by territory number is a poor system

[Mikhail_Mengsk]

IMHO country ranks (local, regional, major, great power) shouldn't be related to just territory number, that's silly. Number of innovations, pops, ships, legion and levy size should count, too. Client states should add a fraction of those numbers to their overlord's score.

 

[crownsteler]

Yeah it is. IMO country rank should be based on number of POPs with perhaps a minimum territorial size.

 

[Godd_Howard]

Yeah, makes me wish they did a couple of patches before leaving Imperator even more...

 

[Saladin87]

IMHO country ranks (local, regional, major, great power) shouldn't be related to just territory number, that's silly. Number of innovations, pops, ships, legion and levy size should count, too. Client states should add a fraction of those numbers to their overlord's score.

Agreed. Perhaps it can also take into account manpower and income. Would be a welcome purpose for manpower, right now past super early game, manpower means nothing at all.

 

[Ducky251]

Agreed - this always made little sense...

The best example is to compare Etruria with Rome.

The Local/Regional rank cut off is 25 territories; Etruria has 28, Rome has 24, but Rome has 4 vassals, each with 2 territories, so essentially has 32.

Due to a base level of manpower and income, Rome is much, much stronger...plus it has a higher population and a very high proportion of freemen...

The game still believes that Etruria is better

 

[Nostalgium]

Could've used pretty much the same system EU4 has. Power ranking = Pops + half of subject pops / tech level.

 

[Saladin87]

Could've used pretty much the same system EU4 has. Power ranking = Pops + half of subject pops / tech level.

Yeah that would've done it. But I'd suggest including number of innovations in the equation because two nations with same tech level may have quite different number of innovations from breakthroughs.

 

[DukeLeto42]

I think it's worth remembering why this was implemented initially. Unlike EUIV, country rank had (and still has, though to a slightly lesser degree) a huge impact on the kind of relations you have with your neighbors. That means having firm breakpoints, rather than fuzzy boundaries based on a number of factors, is good to know when you are going to hit those marks. Other than colonization, # of territories is fairly static.

Any system that is implemented needs to mark country rank by a feature that won't just change over on a random month - # of pops, for instance, could lead to hard-to-envision growth triggering an increase in rank and all your relationships thrown into chaos.

Agreed - this always made little sense...

The best example is to compare Etruria with Rome.

The Local/Regional rank cut off is 25 territories; Etruria has 28, Rome has 24, but Rome has 4 vassals, each with 2 territories, so essentially has 32.

Due to a base level of manpower and income, Rome is much, much stronger...plus it has a higher population and a very high proportion of freemen...

The game still believes that Etruria is better

This, though, is easy to fix without messing with a system of clear breakpoints - apply the EUIV "half of subject" approach, giving Rome 24 + (2+2+2+2) / 2 = 28. It still leaves Rome registering as on par with Etruria, but at least it's no longer considered an entire rank lower.

 

[Nostalgium]

Yeah that would've done it. But I'd suggest including number of innovations in the equation because two nations with same tech level may have quite different number of innovations from breakthroughs.

Number of innovations was what I meant, yeah - could've been clearer on that.