European colonialism in India is not happening as it should.

[hypertank]

Considering the number of European powers involved one way or another in India (Portugal, The Netherlands, France, England, etc.) the failure of the European AI to expand in India is pretty egregious. This is even more noteworthy since at least half of all games have the Ottomans expanding far into Russia (which historically is far more implausible than European expansion into India). Either India needs a nerf, or European powers need a serious buff.

 

[Incompetent]

I think a good place to start would be some mechanic that would allow Europeans (or whomever is the most advanced around) to seize and/or purchase port cities without having to resort to total war.

Making Threaten War a bit more usable could be one way to do this. Maybe the AI should be more likely to give in to such a threat if it's far behind in mil tech.

Another problem is that Trade Companies don't provide manpower, as Europeans certainly made use of Indian troops within India and other colonies during EU4's timeframe. Some sort of mechanic ought to exist which simulates this, so that trade companies can raise troops unusable outside of trade company regions (perhaps this could be special lower military tech banner troops as I suggested earlier, perhaps it could be something else, but either way trade companies shouldn't have to rely purely on European troops for expansion)

Actually, TCs can provide manpower. The -100% is additive, not multiplicative, and it's partly offset by the fact that you don't take wrong-culture penalties. I mean they're never going to be a *good* source of manpower, but with buildings and/or global manpower boosts such as Quantity, you do get some manpower; almost certainly more than you'd get from bare territories (which have a multiplicative -75% to everything).

As for TCs providing special troops, you could go further and make them semi-autonomous subjects, like CNs without the liberty desire. Certainly the likes of the British East India Company is not well-modelled by direct British rule of India.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

India is mostly an alternate history. Sultanates keep going stronger instead of declining. No Mughals or Maratha. Missing tags like Sur Empire and no colonisers. I don't know how AI decides to prioritise colonisation but if in the present set up one is having a casual easy game as a colonising nation, investing time and money in Americas are more profitable than going to India unless one has sweep over Ivory Coast, Cape, Zanzibar & Aden. Till Zanzibar its manageable but getting highest power in Aden is crucial and can be resource consuming to get adequate benefit from trade companies in India and this doesn't feel very adequate return wise.

My proposition would be to make trade routes in the Indian Ocean more historical where Zanzibar or Cape can directly pull from Ceylon. Alternately create a separate trade region in Madagascar with at least two trade centres ideally one in Mauritius/Ile bourboun or both and let it pull from Ceylon feeding into Cape of Good Hope. Malacca too should feed into Ceylon.

Now the major problem remains a consolidated Sultanate or Vijay. That asks for a rework of Indian sub-continent and Devs are best to decide when though I can throw some light on the Medieval India from a point of view thats generally not talked about very much except in academics. This is with regards to the Zamindari system, rise of regional powers and the downfall of Mughal India.

Spoiler: Medieval India

The regional factors of disintegration were very strong in medieval India. One cannot understand medieval India without taking into consideration the emergence of a new ‘Zamindars’ class into the system and its role into making and breaking of empires.

By thirteenth century the Rai, Rana, and Raut, of the pre-Sultanate aristocracy appear to represent ‘bigger’ chiefs in the rural hierarchy. Barani (c. 1358) comments that they were all Hindus and ‘ride good horses, wear fine clothes, shoot arrows from Persian bows, fight with each other and go out for hunt, and in a good measure, chew betel leaves’. From 1350s onwards for almost six hundred years this emerging Zamindar class occupied the centre stage in rural aristocracy. They were the local rural magnates and ruling class.

Zamindars in Mughal India were socially a heterogeneous group. Their position, rights as well as obligations varied a great deal. There was a latent struggle for land, power and authority among them. Thus attempt of bigger Rajas to bring intermediary zamindars under their control was a continuous feature. The Mughals tried to utilise conflicts between various sections of the zamindars for their own purpose both in terms of hierarchy and caste composition.

The nature of the Mughal empire can also be seen as a highly centralised bureaucratic apparatus that extracted a large proportion of the peasant’s surplus through an elaborate system of revenue taxation. With the emergence of a unified monolithic administrative and economic structure under the Mughals the zamindars also slowly got assimilated into it and both were mutually dependent upon each other in its exploitation of the peasantry. But in the new system, the zamindar’s share was restricted not only by imperial rules and regulations, but there was left little with the peasants to be taken by anyone else. This unrestrained tendency of the Mughal fiscal system to appropriate greater and greater amounts of the peasants’ surplus sparked off a tripolar confrontation between the imperial ruling class, the hereditary land holding classes (the zamindars) and peasants. Since Zamindars also had caste / clan or historical associations with the peasants, where they joined with the cultivators to resist the rapacity of the state, a position of confrontation was created.

Despite this inherent weakness the zamindars as a class constituted a formidable element in medieval Indian society and polity. They were in control of tremendous territorial and revenue resources. According to BabarNama 1/6th of the revenue of Hindustan came from the territory of the zamindars. From the point of view of military resources they were a power to be reckoned with. Abul Fazl (Ain-e-Akbari) in 1595 records that the total strength of the zamindars’ retainers was 384,558 cavalry and 427,057 infantry and 1863 elephants, 4260 canon pieces and 4500 boats.

Though the Mughal army controlled a great amount of military hardware, as a collectivity the local magnates were always a serious military threat, especially considering their strategic location in the countryside. By the eighteenth century the terms of reference between the state and rural magnates, as far as military technology was concerned had equalised because of the concerted upsurge in the countryside. Stewart Gordon has shown how the Marathas were successful in tapping into a vast and heterogeneous military labour market, including the one being provided by Europeans, in the eighteenth century. While access to muskets, cannons and gunpowder strengthened the sinews of imperial power, these were simultaneously used by its more powerful subjects to arm themselves and to resist the intrusion of the state.

The Deccan crisis, and the sustained oppositional movements of the Jats and the Mewatis in the north India, and of the Sikhs in the Punjab and other places, like eastern India, there became greater difficulty into getting adequate tribute as zamindars had been able to use a slack revenue system to their advantage which accentuated the financial problems of the empire. We can infer from the evidence of the Mughal period that the struggle between the imperial administration and the zamindars, breaking out frequently into armed conflict, was an important feature of the political situation of the time. Manucci wrote around 1700 that Mughal governors are in a constant state of quarrel with the zamindars and that usually there is some rebellion of zamindars going on in the Mughal kingdom.

Decline of the Mughal empire was not a sudden collapse of the imperial administrative apparatus, nor an individual ruler could be held responsible for the crisis, but the crisis in imperial structure because of economic and political reasons resulted in a shift of political and military power from the centre to regions. Emergence of successor and other states in the 18th century was the indication of this declining trend of the imperial polity.

Political chaos in Mughal times caused by zamindar rebellions and the connivance of the Mughal officials in the acts of defiance by local magnates. Tensions between monarch, military or service noble (mansabdar), landholder (zamindar) and peasant which when maintained in equilibrium were creative of order and stability but which if allowed to pull free were creative of disorder and impotence. Such a free pull occurred when the Marathas as zamindars forcibly jerked against the bit of Mughal control and resisted domestication with the Mughal system. The efforts of the Mughals to muster the resources in revenue and men to overcome the Marathas led to strains within the nobility and insupportable pressures upon both zamindar and peasant who if they did not revolt actively at least resisted the Mughal revenue collector passively. A combination of over lavish appointments by the emperor and the military success of the Marathas created a shortage of assignments (jagirs) for the nobles. The resources to support the military contingents were rendered inadequate.

Mughals could not maintain the social balance which was the basis of the so called ‘Mughal stability’. The clash of interest between the zamindars and the state and between different sections of the zamindars could not be resolved. These conflicts led to frequent clashes, disturbed law and order and seriously weakened the administrative and military power of the state. After the death of Aurangzeb in 1707 the Mughal administration became too weak to maintain the social equilibrium. The Mughal empire was waning and it was the zamindars who were exerting themselves. Consequently the number and effectiveness of the Mughal forces fell off and the Mughal military machine (which was essentially an instrument for the internal military occupation of India) became progressively incapable of controlling the autochthonous military and rural aristocracy (the zamindars of various degrees) of the subcontinent’.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

It is also interesting to note the Indian Sultanates that paradox has created in EU4. (I know paradox for the last 2 years only so I don't know how older versions were.) They have very high tolerance. I am not sure but it could be serving two functions. First that it may check the AI from mass converting Hindus to Sunni/Shia as case may be (since Devs would like to have a predominantly Hindu population in India just to be more historically correct) and secondly it may be providing stability to a Muslim Sultanate in a predominantly Hindu dominated population. But I am no too sure, otherwise its very ahistorical.

Now this high tolerance gives rise to problems such as higher stability to the Sultanates making them more centralised and less prone to revolts as the game progresses making them stronger. So instead of fragmenting they keep going strong. (I am not saying it should happen all the time but 60% historical and 40% alternate sounds a good variation. I love variety and would vote for 2/10 games without Iberian Wedding. Just to make myself clear).

Now if the two reasons I have guessed for their high tolerance is correct then Devs should work this around differently and remove the tolerance tradition altogether. Sultanate AI could be tweaked where they are reluctant to mass convert religion in all the games. They can be given high tolerance bonus through event which may last for 30-50 years etc.

One of the difficulty that the large sultanates like those of Delhi & Bahamans faced was taming the nobles and their failed effort to curve resulted in the ultimate annihilation of these sultanates. For others like Malwa & Bengal & Jaunpur they had to adjust themselves with incorporating more local chefs (Zamindars) into the system.

Spoiler: Sultanate Conflicts

One political reason for the decline of the Sultanate was the absence of any well- established and universally accepted law of succession. During a succession ambitious nobles found an opportunity to further their own interests. As long as a Sultan was strong and was able to gain the support of some groups of nobles, he could continue with some superficial semblance of dynastic stability. The sultans found it difficult to control the powerful and ambitious nobles even among this limited group, many of whom wanted to carve out their own independent spheres of authority. Sultanate period testifies that consolidation and the decline of the Sultanate were largely the result of constructive and destructive activities of the nobles. The Turkish sultans tried to counter these through the iqta system which served the central authority: its elements of transfer and non-permanence ensured the Sultan's power. But gradually as iqta became hereditary, it slowly dissipated the state's authority giving rise to the emergence of autonomous and, then, independent political centres in different regions as numerous powerful chiefs (Zamindars) who were always ready to rebel when they found any weakness in the Central government. So long as the centre was powerful to retaliate, the rebellions were successfully crushed.

Religion was hardly of help because the main conflict, once the Sultanate had been established, war not between Hindus and Muslims, but between Muslims and Muslims. The slogan of religion was, however, used to justify the plunder of the Hindu rajas, and of the peasantry as a whole.

The recruitment of the army also created a problem. Once the sultans of Delhi had been cut off from West and Central Asia, they could no longer hope to recruit Turkish and other soldiers from that area. They had, therefore, to fall upon (a) Afghans many of whom had settled in India; (b) descendants of Turkish soldiers who had come to India, mainly at the time of occupation; (c) Mongols and Muslims converts; and (d) Hindus belonging to what might be called the martial communities (Rajputs, Jats et c.). Each of these sections had their own problems. Each of these groups were also antagonistic to each other.

Later Afghan sentiments of partnership in the power came into direct conflict with the interest of the Sultan. (Absolutism of Monarchy Vs Democracy of Afghan Tribal culture)

A mechanism for succession crisis would be great. (I had once suggested for Succession War for Non-Christian Nations. Don't know if it was read as intended).
A mechanism for noble faction can also be worked around.

The more centralised Sultanates & Mughals turned into, the more bureaucratic they became giving rise to conflicting interest in the nobility itself. So it can also be worked around like that of bureaucratic Ming used to explode in earlier versions, but in Medieval Indian settings.

The Zamindars that had been emerging ultimately became the foundation for the Princely States in British India. A lot of tags with strong regional tendency to fuse and defuse will also be able to make India more historical.

 

[Canute VII]

A mechanism for succession crisis would be great. (I had once suggested for Succession War for Non-Christian Nations. Don't know if it was read as intended).
A mechanism for noble faction can also be worked around.

Would be a nice thing considering that christians got the PU mechanic. That said you can have a PU over another nation OR you can fall under PU with another nation (or be under PU at game start). Now if non-christians also had a mechanic that gives risks (succession crisis) and rewards (tbd), then I would agree with that.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

I don't know how to find that link in the suggestion for I don't remember the subject line but PU's are not to be involved, just some bonus to the nation who successfully thrones their favourite. Those 'favourites' must have some royal marriage relation with them.

 

[Canute VII]

Seems I found it for you:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...-non-christian-nations.1022485/#post-22828997

 

[SantoshKashyap]

Because Islamic nawabates still held most of the power in the north well into the end of the game with the exception of the Sikhs which is hard to represent since Sikhism isn’t always in the Punjab. Besides, before the Indo-Pakistani split the north was more heavily islamicised than it is today.

I would like to disagree.

It is true that Nawabs were in power in the North & Bengal & Nizams in south but they were puppets in the British hand and except for the few pockets in India at least the 'Hindustan region' was never heavily Islamised.

Even after 400 years of Muslim rule, the total Muslim population of Mughal India during the time of Akbar (in 1600) was 16%. The population in Delhi and around always remained predominantly Hindu despite it being a Capital. Though there is no census data except to believe Ain-e-Akbari and some later chronicles, the population in rural India remained predominantly Hindu with Zamindars influencing central authority. The datas from 1881 onwards (British census) too don't show a different picture. This is also reflected in some exclusive work like that of JRI Cole who has studied (period covered of his study 1722-1859) the society in North-Western Province & Awadh area (most of Jaunpur in 1444 minus Bihar) and the emergence of Shaism there. As per his work total muslim population stands around 13-14% and this is well within the realm of Nawabs.

I am attaching some data figures from 1901 onwards which will show the trends pre partition as well post partition.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

You should step through the dates and see how it got to be that way

He’s not wrong though, in the north there was a solid Muslim presence. State borders don’t show everything.

That said, characterizing the rise of the Marathas as religious unrest is not quite accurate. ...............
India in this era is of a particular interest to me so you can be sure I always read threads like these for ideas

As the rise of Maratha in Deccan or that of Jats & Mewatis in the north should not be given a religions colour, similarly the "solid Muslim presence" in the north too should not given that much importance. The religion in mainland India have always remained predominantly Hindu during Sultanates, Sur, Mughals & Post Mughals. Hindu rajas (rural chiefs & Zamindars) have always been dancing and been made to dance in tango with the nobles. It was necessary and mutually beneficial for the both of them. A close study of Delhi-Jaunpur conflict and cooperation or non-cooperation these these petty local chiefs had actually been deciding a lot of fortunes. They would change their sides at opportune moment. A similar picture also emerges when studying about Malwa-Jaunpur-Gwalior-Rajputana relations. Through out India you can find Hindu and Muslim rulers often helping each other in battles against a common foe and religion mattered little there.

The muslim rule in India has not been exactly as the muslim rule in Europe & the Hindus actually had a lot of freedom. There have a instances of religions intolerance but as long as taxes had been paid, and the Petty chiefs had been presenting their liable tributes, they were not disturbed. The nature of government by Mughals & later Nawabs remained mostly secular. Even in the matter of law muslim clergy were not interfering with the age old rural court based on Hindu traditions except when both the parties were involved.

About the quote of 'solid muslim presence' should only be taken in the sense that the rulers were muslim which is true for the most of the India in that age for the centuries but to assume that the majority of the population had become Muslim and there was a serious religious strife where Hindus wanted to carve out a state on their own will be gross error. (Hinduism being a polytheistic religion has a psychological room & tolerance for the other religion.)

I would like to paste a table showing population of 18th century Doab area (most of Jaunpur in 1444 minus Bihar) where total muslim population is mentioned as 13-14%.

 

[Trin Tragula]

As the rise of Maratha in Deccan or that of Jats & Mewatis in the north should not be given a religions colour, similarly the "solid Muslim presence" in the north too should not given that much importance. The religion in mainland India have always remained predominantly Hindu during Sultanates, Sur, Mughals & Post Mughals. Hindu rajas (rural chiefs & Zamindars) have always been dancing and been made to dance in tango with the nobles. It was necessary and mutually beneficial for the both of them. A close study of Delhi-Jaunpur conflict and cooperation or non-cooperation these these petty local chiefs had actually been deciding a lot of fortunes. They would change their sides at opportune moment. A similar picture also emerges when studying about Malwa-Jaunpur-Gwalior-Rajputana relations. Through out India you can find Hindu and Muslim rulers often helping each other in battles against a common foe and religion mattered little there.

The muslim rule in India has not been exactly as the muslim rule in Europe & the Hindus actually had a lot of freedom. There have a instances of religions intolerance but as long as taxes had been paid, and the Petty chiefs had been presenting their liable tributes, they were not disturbed. The nature of government by Mughals & later Nawabs remained mostly secular. Even in the matter of law muslim clergy were not interfering with the age old rural court based on Hindu traditions except when both the parties were involved.

About the quote of 'solid muslim presence' should only be taken in the sense that the rulers were muslim which is true for the most of the India in that age for the centuries but to assume that the majority of the population had become Muslim and there was a serious religious strife where Hindus wanted to carve out a state on their own will be gross error. (Hinduism being a polytheistic religion has a psychological room & tolerance for the other religion.)

I would like to paste a table showing population of 18th century Doab area (most of Jaunpur in 1444 minus Bihar) where total muslim population is mentioned as 13-14%.

View attachment 320628

Yes I agree with all of this and my post was not intended to say anything else
In fact the point I have wanted to make is that religious zealot revolts as we have them in the game is not really what we should think of when looking at Indian break away states.

Muslims were always in the minority in their own realms in India and part of the problem is making such states viable in game while also leaving room for things like the rise of the Marathas later on.

 

[holyvigil]

Yes I agree with all of this and my post was not intended to say anything else
In fact the point I have wanted to make is that religious zealot revolts as we have them in the game is not really what we should think of when looking at Indian break away states.

Muslims were always in the minority in their own realms in India and part of the problem is making such states viable in game while also leaving room for things like the rise of the Marathas later on.

I personally like it when countries just appear. The African revolt in India and Netherlands are some of the most interesting things to see. And they can both be easily handled by the player. As should the Marathas. Have them automatically form if a non Hindu owns certain provinces that are still Hindu. The simple counter would be to convert those specific provinces the same way one would convert the Netherlands. Or it could be culture based like the Netherlands.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

The British Contest of India should not be seen entirely as a military contest but also as a diplomatic contest when opportunities created by the ineffectiveness of a central authority (mainly Mughals) warranted them success.

In 1612, James I instructed Sir Thomas Roe to visit the Mughal Emperor Jahangir to arrange for a commercial treaty that would give the company exclusive rights to reside and establish factories in India. In return, the company offered to provide the Emperor with goods and rarities from the European market. The company, which benefited from the imperial patronage, soon expanded its commercial trading operations. The company established trading posts in Surat (1619), Madras (1639), Bombay (1668), and Calcutta(1690). By 1647, the company had 23 factories, each under the command of a master merchant and governor, and 90 employees. The major factories became the walled forts of Fort William in Bengal, Fort St. George in Madras, and Bombay Castle. The company's mainstay businesses were by then cotton, silk, indigo, dye saltpetre, and tea.

Around 1670, King Charles II granted the EIC the rights to autonomous territorial acquisitions, to mint money, to command fortresses and troops and form alliances, to make war and peace, and to exercise both civil and criminal jurisdiction over the acquired areas. This was a turning point for the company. After gaining the trading rights in Bengal in 1634 by the Mughal emperor by 1717 they had become a favourite to get their custom duties for their trade completely waived off. This was huge for the company. Now the EIC had monopoly trade in India not only sanctioned by the British Parliament but also granted by the Emperor of India. Moreover they could also maintain troops to safeguard their interest which had the consent of the Emperor.

A series of Carnatic wars (Starting as a succession crisis in Hyderabad - of the two contenders, France aided Muzaffar Jung while England aided Nasir Jung. This soon engulfed Carnatic where in another succession crisis Chanda Sahib was supported by the French while Muhammad Ali was supported by the English.) in the mid 18th century which gave EIC enough confidence to pursue their imperialist ambition should not be seen only as a conflict involving numerous nominally independent rulers and their vassals, struggles for succession and territory in the South India but also as a diplomatic and military struggle between the French East India Company and the British East India Company and as an extension of the War of the Austrian Succession and later the Seven Years of War. This particularly increased the strategic importance of the EIC's Indian footholds, as the EIC was able to call on British naval power and crown troops garrisoned in India besides maintaining a large standing army consisting primarily of Indian mercenary soldiers trained in European military techniques.

EIC’s experience as king maker in the South also replicated at other places. The result of the Battle of Plassey (1757) was pre decided when Mir Zafar had paid R Clive around 1.75 Million rupees for getting the position of Nawab after Siraj-ud-Daula. The Zamindars & big business magnates like the house of Jagat Seth who also had influence over the treasury of Siraj were with the British. Surprisingly French interference can also be seen in the battle. After Plassey, the EIC acquired the right to collect revenues (Bengal, Bihar Orissa) on behalf of the Mughal Emperor.

Technically the Diwani right meant that the EIC was still working as a ‘tributary’ to the Emperor of India. (at least on papers or as pretended.) But such was the situation of the age. The independent political systems (the successive states like Hyderabad, Bengal, Awadh; the newly formed states like Maratha, Sikh, Jat; and semi-independent states like Mysore, Rajputana, Kerala) that emerged in the provinces continued to maintain ties with the Mughal imperial authority. Though the Mughal Emperor lost its earlier control over the provincial administration, its importance as an umbrella over the provincial authority still remained. The newly emerged regional powers acknowledged this importance at least to legitimise their realm. Even rebel chieftains of the Marathas and Sikhs sometimes recognised the Emperor as the supreme authority. By 1761 the Mughal empire was an empire only in name, it could better be described as the state of Delhi. But the prestige of the emperor, the king of kings, was so considerable, that whether it was acquiring territory, a throne or an empire, the sanction of the emperor was sought.

It gives us a slight picture of a polity like that of Ming in the Mandate of Heaven (Edit: or like a weak Shogun) where the overlord is now too weak and the tributaries are trying to make most for themselves. The British and the Maratha fought over possession of the portion of the emperor, hoping to gain legitimacy for their claims to inherit the imperial mantle. Shah AIam II was made a pensioner of the company after the battle of Buxar but he preferred the protection of the Marathas at Delhi.

The third battle of Panipat proved significant in the struggle for mastery over India. The Marathas' ambition of replacing the Mughals as the imperial power was checked at a strategic point by this defeat. The beneficiaries were the British rather than the Afghans. The British got a tremendous opportunity to expand their influence in Bengal and India. Once they had got these footholds there was no looking back. For Marathas after the debacle it seemed as if their fortunes were reviving when Madhav Rao became Peshwa in 1761 and they successfully subdued their old enemies, the Rohilas. the Rajput and Jat Chiefs in the north and Mysore and Hyderabad in the south. But the early demise of the Peshwa in 1772, at the age of 28, perhaps gave them the gravest of the blow. Factional struggle for power ensued, exposing the Maratha power to be finally defeated at the hands of the British. British occupation of Delhi in 1803 finally brought the ‘Emperor’ under British protection. By 1803, at the height of its rule in India, the British East India company had a private army of about 260,000—twice the size of the British Army.


Propositions:

• If possible in the current engine, please rewrite trade companies where they are no longer passive profit centres but active entities as King Charles II would have wanted them to be.
• Alternately, give each coloniser a slot for a tributary to be exclusively filled by their respective East India Company when they get at least one province in India. Since this trade company will be working as some kind of tributary, they can carry expansion on their own or ask the help of their lord or like a colonial nation in Americas.
• Changes in the Indian Ocean Trade Route.
• A massive rework of India.

A bit off - An interesting read on EIC:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/04/east-india-company-original-corporate-raiders

 

[hypertank]

Yes I agree with all of this and my post was not intended to say anything else
In fact the point I have wanted to make is that religious zealot revolts as we have them in the game is not really what we should think of when looking at Indian break away states.

Muslims were always in the minority in their own realms in India and part of the problem is making such states viable in game while also leaving room for things like the rise of the Marathas later on.

I agree that things like the Mararthas should not be represented as religious rebels per se, but as low Religious unity causes general unrest (which can cause non-religious rebels), a mid-game drop in unity (perhaps connected to administrative efficiency, like Colonial liberty desire) could in my opinion pretty fittingly simulate late Mughal social breakdown.

 

[Canute VII]

Some cross-referencing here, since thematically it's very fitting and would allow Europeans a nice way into the indian trade.

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/stepwise-colonization.1060589/

Even the Goa event could be adapted then to give an "outpost/trade post" or "enclave" (instead of the whole province... ).

 

[cristofolmc]

Maybe you can manufacture an event that triggers when playing one of the historical powers in india (UK, ND, Portugal, Spain, France...) that breaks up India?

Or maybe make it more difficult for them to ally. I dont know something. Even for human players it is already quite difficult you have to bring over a deathstack of soldiers as they are all ally among them and just keep expanding. I can see why you can't make the AI do it. If I was England in game with the colonies England historically had when they first reached india, I dont think I could do it myself.

The problem here is how trade companies and trade works in this game. The current system cannot represent the 1600-1700 trade companies in india, wich indeed did not conquer but rather paid off local rulers to give them trading rights and rights to open up factories and forts to protect the trade outposts and factories, from which they made an insane amount of money which they will use one century later to bring in the army now that they could afford it.

This is how trade companies should've worked in EU4, like the merchant republics outposts or something. Instead they are only a bonus to trade power, but you still need to control huge amounts of land to steer some money out of india. It is just impossible the AI can manage to do that. Again, it is already quite difficult if you are human and are playing "historical/tall".

So maybe a DLC to change how trade works. Or at least change how trade comanies work and make them not depend on the "crown land" as it were. This would give a malus on the income you recieve, which would disappear once, as it historically happend, effectively conquer the land for your country. Is something like this doable in the current EU4 and with the current DLC policy @Trin Tragula ?

 

[Metz]

What needs to be revamped is the way trade companies operate.

 

[LeRusé]

One could solve the entire thing by adding a succession crisis crisis.

I envision it thus:

1. Programming multiple heirs for each monarch, with different levels of claim-strength and pregenerated points. Different religions give different differentiation of claim-strength. Polygynic religions will allow multiple strong heirs.


2. Default is always supporting the official heir.
2.1 Trigger a crisis when any of the following happens: negative traits of heir valued at -10, multiple "strong-claim" heirs, female sex of heir - until something like pragmatic sanction has been passed, less then 5p monarch-point total etc.
2.1.1 Effect: All heirs, the consort, estates and the vassals are asked to support one heir. Randomize all heir-supports, with prob. 80% the state-sponsored official heir. Modify support of official her -5% by all factors that hit threshold). This is to happen every time a new factor triggers.
2.1.2 PU:s can under a crisis support different candidates, which will split the union if the PU:s preferred heir rebels, and trigger a unification-war casus belli in the PU leader. Should the PU-supported heir win, the PU will shift to the other country.

2.2 Shifting official government support from one heir to another will raise the new heirs claim-strength, but not reduce the claim-strength of previous heirs. This will thus automatically trigger the type of crises envisioned above.

2.3. If a crisis trigger, set a probability of rebellion at each ruler death (instead of stability loss), where the chance of each supported heir rebelling is something like 10%, increased by strong claim-strength (+10%) and with something like 5% per supporters (other heirs, vassals).
2.3.1 If there is a rebellion, it will spawn with troops at 10% of offical military strength, modified by 10% per supporter; the total is modifies by the would be kings monarch point difference from 9. A 666 will give +90% or nearly double the size of the rebellion.

3. When there is a crisis in any country, allow hostile and threatened nations to support the heir they prefer among those that are supported by other heirs. Factor their support effect of a rebellion at a value of 0.001 of their total army strength in pure percentage. An heir supported by one million ming troops will thus have a 100% chance of rebellion. They can also use the support rebels option to strengthen a faction of rebels. If a crisis happens, the supporting nations will be sent a request for condottieri by the temporary "rebel nation" they support.

4. Peace options should include releasing a vassal tag, to which the rebel heir is set as ruler. This is always wanted by the heir. The tag will then be set to disloyal, and request support from all states who supported its heir.

Effect should be that countries that are muslim or hindu (and thus have multiple strong heirs) will be wrecked somewhat frequently, especially in late game.

since there has been talk of fleshing out the government, after all.

 

[Canute VII]

One could solve the entire thing by adding a succession crisis crisis.

I envision it thus:

1. Programming multiple heirs for each monarch, with different levels of claim-strength and pregenerated points. Different religions give different differentiation of claim-strength. Polygynic religions will allow multiple strong heirs.


2. Default is always supporting the official heir.
2.1 Trigger a crisis when any of the following happens: negative traits of heir valued at -10, multiple "strong-claim" heirs, female sex of heir - until something like pragmatic sanction has been passed, less then 5p monarch-point total etc.
2.1.1 Effect: All heirs, the consort, estates and the vassals are asked to support one heir. Randomize all heir-supports, with prob. 80% the state-sponsored official heir. Modify support of official her -5% by all factors that hit threshold). This is to happen every time a new factor triggers.
2.1.2 PU:s can under a crisis support different candidates, which will split the union if the PU:s preferred heir rebels, and trigger a unification-war casus belli in the PU leader. Should the PU-supported heir win, the PU will shift to the other country.

2.2 Shifting official government support from one heir to another will raise the new heirs claim-strength, but not reduce the claim-strength of previous heirs. This will thus automatically trigger the type of crises envisioned above.

2.3. If a crisis trigger, set a probability of rebellion at each ruler death (instead of stability loss), where the chance of each supported heir rebelling is something like 10%, increased by strong claim-strength (+10%) and with something like 5% per supporters (other heirs, vassals).
2.3.1 If there is a rebellion, it will spawn with troops at 10% of offical military strength, modified by 10% per supporter; the total is modifies by the would be kings monarch point difference from 9. A 666 will give +90% or nearly double the size of the rebellion.

3. When there is a crisis in any country, allow hostile and threatened nations to support the heir they prefer among those that are supported by other heirs. Factor their support effect of a rebellion at a value of 0.001 of their total army strength in pure percentage. An heir supported by one million ming troops will thus have a 100% chance of rebellion. They can also use the support rebels option to strengthen a faction of rebels. If a crisis happens, the supporting nations will be sent a request for condottieri by the temporary "rebel nation" they support.

4. Peace options should include releasing a vassal tag, to which the rebel heir is set as ruler. This is always wanted by the heir. The tag will then be set to disloyal, and request support from all states who supported its heir.

Effect should be that countries that are muslim or hindu (and thus have multiple strong heirs) will be wrecked somewhat frequently, especially in late game.

since there has been talk of fleshing out the government, after all.

...and we should be able to mitigate the negstive effects of a potential succession crisis by creating a vassal and assigning a heir to it as ruler (or assign him to an existing vassal) while the monarch is still alive. That will remove the heir from the immidiate crisis calculation on monarch death. However, not every heir can be asdigned to every vassal. The required size of the vassal depends on the heirs claim strength and /or stats. It should be possible to assign a smaller vassal, but that would lead to higher liberty desire and vice versa. Then we might see situations emerge over the course of the game like we have them for the timurids at game start.

 

[SantoshKashyap]

Assigning a heir to a vassal kingdom also means removing the dynasty of the vassal giving rise to another kind of crisis and succession. This should be saved for another applicability. There are historical parallels to such event (at least in India).

I am not sure if this is do-able but heirs can be assigned to states like we do the edicts. That particular state may get some special events depending on heir personality. We already have events in the game where a heir converts (or influenced by) to another culture and we get some bonus (-3 unrest in that particular culture population.)

If this can be done it will behave like a mansabdari system of the Mughals where different states are under different princes and the blue eyed boy has the one with capital territory. On crisis rebels can spawn depending on the culture & strength of the states and vie for their right. This can be even be used to finally break the large empire in multiple smaller one.

 

[Ninking]

Suggestion:

By enabling those in the indian technology group to have tributes, there are a lot of more small countries left in the region once the europeans get there.

 

[Shadowstrike]

Perhaps more generally, the game doesn't model the collapse of imperial states very well. The nations in the game are unitary and just blob; having border regions break away due to loss of central authority isn't well modeled, which leads to ahistorical outcomes in places where that did happen (West Africa, India, Java, etc.) The one European case of this (the HRE) has to be modeled with autonomous states, projecting a Westphalian sense of sovereignty back onto 1444. Perhaps higher revolt risk might be a real danger for this, and maybe a stability rework (where it is not trivial to just pay a few hundred ADM to keep stability positive, particularly the larger one's state gets) might be a good way to deal with this?