I hope that we can rob 100% of a tag's treasury

[JoshuaFitzgerald]

One of the saddest things about EU4 was the limit of only taking a fixed amount of gold based on the tax base of the country you were invading. I remember my first time looking up the wealthiest nation on the ledger (Lübeck I think) with 25,000 ducats+ and no CBing them in an effort to pay off my deep, deep debts only to find I could take just a few hundred.

I think this is completely unrealistic and also creates an incentive (for you as a player too) to be careful when stockpiling endless amounts of gold in case an economically struggling Ottomans comes knocking. On the flip side, to ensure this isn't overpowered, I do think that the AI should treat existential wars as such, and exhaust their entire treasury (and available debt) to fight off invaders.

 

[Lord Lambert]

I remember my first time looking up the wealthiest nation on the ledger (Lübeck I think) with 25,000 ducats+ and no CBing them in an effort to pay off my deep, deep debts

You just made a solid argument as to why it shouldn't be unlimited.

 

[JoshuaFitzgerald]

You just made a solid argument as to why it shouldn't be unlimited.

I know it's not perfect from a balance perspective, but it is a bit unrealistic for you to get 500 ducats and 24,500 to disappear into thin air, right? I think that either the excess funds should be squirreled away by the estates or you should be able to keep it when doing a full occupation of a small nation (maybe at a cost of 100 war score so you can't take any provinces as a cost). I think if you take the latter option though, as a balance measure, rich nations should actually use their wealth to buy all the mercenaries money can buy to combat your invading force, as such a wildly wealthy nation would do in real life.

 

[Nekoluve]

OK. But plundering so much gold must lead to a lot of ae

 

[SupremTurtle]

Treasury should not be purely abstract; there should be a treasury building that exists on the map that when the province is occupied, the treasury will also be sacked.

To make it interesting, if the treasury is going to be occupied and looted by an invading force, perhaps an army can carry the treasury temporarily away from the treasury during war, into allied land or deeper into the country.
For the invading side, add an option not to sack the treasury, instead gaining some war score for it (land for money).

 

[SAmaster]

I'd argue there should be a sort of 'spillover' that deletes a certain ammount of the treasury as you are looting it- to represent people absconding with the gold before you can get to it. Looters from either end of the war, or loyalists trying to deprive it from your hands.

But I'd argue this should only represent 5-25% of the treasury.

 

[Chieron]

I remember my first time looking up the wealthiest nation on the ledger (Lübeck I think) with 25,000 ducats+ and no CBing them in an effort to pay off my deep, deep debts only to find I could take just a few hundred.

Maybe there also should not be a nation with that amount of wealth in the treasury and obviously no way to spend it all.

That said, the scaling warscore cost of the treasury should probably also depend on the actual amount in there and not just on the basetax (= economy size). A rich country should be ready to spend the money to defend the money.

 

[JoshuaFitzgerald]

Maybe there also should not be a nation with that amount of wealth in the treasury and obviously no way to spend it all.

That said, the scaling warscore cost of the treasury should probably also depend on the actual amount in there and not just on the basetax (= economy size). A rich country should be ready to spend the money to defend the money.

I think we agree with each other perfectly

 

[Briloner]

Treasure hoards. Tada

No seriously, as soon as trouble brews people - as individuals as well as groups - have this neat tech: 1) dig a hole 2) dump your percious 3) fill up the hole & 4) survive and dig it up later.
Step 4 seems to be the hardest - otherwise in the last week in several southern german museums I woud not have seen so many.

In all seriousness. There are few complete balances - most have smaller or larger "hidden" sinks snd sources.
For total plunder I suggest:
- If only plundered, but not completely destroyed and/or conquered, some appears later again, because hidden
- Looter gets some
- PoP (locals, but perhaps even some of the soldiers / levies)
- some is lost in hoards.
If RNG vanishes a lot later there might even be a locsl treasure found event.

 

[Bozkurt]

I think the same. In the game's time period this was a common thing after conquest, maybe there can be plundiring efficiencty and also a law about how plunders will be shared so some of them will go to estates depending on your law (for example if you have noble armies some of it will go to nobility estate) and crown power.

 

[MalcolmZeta]

You just made a solid argument as to why it shouldn't be unlimited.

One of the saddest things about EU4 was the limit of only taking a fixed amount of gold based on the tax base of the country you were invading. I remember my first time looking up the wealthiest nation on the ledger (Lübeck I think) with 25,000 ducats+ and no CBing them in an effort to pay off my deep, deep debts only to find I could take just a few hundred.

I think this is completely unrealistic and also creates an incentive (for you as a player too) to be careful when stockpiling endless amounts of gold in case an economically struggling Ottomans comes knocking. On the flip side, to ensure this isn't overpowered, I do think that the AI should treat existential wars as such, and exhaust their entire treasury (and available debt) to fight off invaders.

Why can't there be treasury buildings that let's say each give you 500 money limit. To have more money stored you build more treasury buildings.

 

[titan.bevel]

I think it'd be better to allow looting of treasury to be more accurately represented, and make it a viable strategy to wage wars purely to gain more money. I'd simply add that the inflation differential should be taken into account as well

 

[Bozkurt]

You just made a solid argument as to why it shouldn't be unlimited.

But it happened in real life when Ottomans conquered Egypt from Mamluks

 

[MaXiMuS-54]

Will anyone actually have that much gold saved up though considering you can invest in other countries?

 

[Fawr]

Maybe there also should not be a nation with that amount of wealth in the treasury and obviously no way to spend it all.

I think this is the core EU4 problem. Saving up decades of tax collection for a future generation is profoundly ahistoric. I hope it's not a problem in EU5, but the silence on this topic means I worry.

 

[Froonk]

But it happened in real life when Ottomans conquered Egypt from Mamluks

Also when Ottomans conquered Cyprus if one argues that Mamlukes were a huge state so should have a huge treasury. Cyprus was a relatively small island but had a significant amount of treasure to plunder. Same goes for Mughals and expanding over Deccan cities and Spanish taking over Mesoamerican treasures though those were represented with missions and events in EU4.

I think just having capitals have a treasury building that hosts certain amount of stockpiled valuables (Gold and gems, basically) would be an interesting mechanic. Other things such as silver coinage, taxes in kind and general cash flow that is represented as "Gold" in the UI might not necessarily be held in treasury. I am not sure how exactly to represent what percentage of this treasury should be gold and precious stones while other should be liquid assets that are simply represented as gold in UI.

Still I think a certain amount of overflow of gold that is not spent immediately needs to accumulate in a treasury building while rest can remain in the "UI" to represent it is just liquid assets that are available but not necessarily physically present anywhere and can't really be plundered by a sacking army (Think payments in cash, tributes, loans, taxes collected in kind and things of that nature.)

 

[Oglesby]

One of the saddest things about EU4 was the limit of only taking a fixed amount of gold based on the tax base of the country you were invading. I remember my first time looking up the wealthiest nation on the ledger (Lübeck I think) with 25,000 ducats+ and no CBing them in an effort to pay off my deep, deep debts only to find I could take just a few hundred.

I think this is completely unrealistic and also creates an incentive (for you as a player too) to be careful when stockpiling endless amounts of gold in case an economically struggling Ottomans comes knocking. On the flip side, to ensure this isn't overpowered, I do think that the AI should treat existential wars as such, and exhaust their entire treasury (and available debt) to fight off invaders.

I never thought that the quantity of 'ducats' listed were actual ducats sitting somewhere. It is just a game currency and abstraction. I don't think that the 'gold' in EUV will be any different.

 

[Dev2150]

You just made a solid argument as to why it shouldn't be unlimited.

no, they literally didn't

 

[Aquila SPQR]

I never thought that the quantity of 'ducats' listed were actual ducats sitting somewhere. It is just a game currency and abstraction. I don't think that the 'gold' in EUV will be any different.

Strange, as I would never imagine it otherwise. To me it was always the amount of gold in the treasury, used to finance everything (or not if there's not enough money). For better immersion it was always more than "gold" or "ducat". In I:R 1 gold = 1 talent of silver and in EUIV 1 ducat = 1000 ducats as it was more immervise to pay 100 000 ducats to construct something than just 100 ducats.

I agree there should be a treasury building which could be looted, but up to a certain % of total enemy treasury (to prevent them from bankrupting and simulating evacuation of majority of treasury). A bit of realism, a bit of satisfaction from capturing enemy treasury and a bit of incentive to defend your own treasury.