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Is Portugal exploring too early?

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Norrefeldt

Norrefeldt

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Aug 1, 2001
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Count Six reported in the bug thread that he thought Portugal played by AI explored too early, basically because it had too many explorers. What are other players experiences on this? Please tell me what you got, playing 1.07 (or beta) EEP 1.4 or 1.4.1.

Originally posted by Count Six
Fix rather than bug for early Portugese exploration:

POR 18003, 18100 & 18101 (Henry’s Captains) adds a plethora of Portugese explorers.

These appear to have been added by Crook's fiat: the discussion in the Por thread amounted to Crook asking if anyone minded if he added more explorers and Issac Brook saying he didn't mind.

However, I suspect that no one really considered the effect of these extras, and IB may not have realised exactly what Crook intended. In any case, the real testing seems to have been done on Barton's original proposal, which was a very abbreviated list of exploreres, with the "big names" meant to represent the lesser guys also. The conclusion of that part of the discussion was general agreement, and having just played Port. myself with both lists and observed both in a hands-off, I feel Barton's list is much more realistic, while Crook's addition create the familiar problem - Port. goes nuts on colonization far too early.

Barton's list was:

Diego de Silves 1427-30
Gil Eanes 1433-36
Nuno Tristao 1441-44
Fernao Po 1469-72
Diogo Cao 1481-83.
Bartolomeu Diaz and onward as designed.

Crook added eight explorers prior to 1480, extended the deathdates on some of Barton's, and collectively added thirty-seven years worth of exploration to Port's assets prior to 1480.

The results are predictable, particularly when played by the AI.

I'd suggest reverting to Barton's list, which was tested widely at the time.
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I've discovered that it's terribly easy to discover the Hudson bay early, and once you get past south-africa, you can explore all of asia easily, so for me Columbus usually goes to explore australia from lack of remaining targets. Offcourse, Columbus already had an insane lifespan for a 6 maneuver explorer ;)
 
Originally posted by Avernite
I've discovered that it's terribly easy to discover the Hudson bay early, and once you get past south-africa, you can explore all of asia easily, so for me Columbus usually goes to explore australia from lack of remaining targets. Offcourse, Columbus already had an insane lifespan for a 6 maneuver explorer ;)
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Are you referring to Portugal with Columbus here or Spain?


mnorrefeldt - Thanks for starting this thread. I'm curious to see if others have had the same results I've seen.
 
Couldn't we control Portugal better by making sure that there AIs are kept on a specific schedule for exploration and colonization? I'll look at this more in depth, but I have as of yet, have yet to see a problem. In fact, I happy, that Portugal has finally started to colonize West Africa, now that the natives aren't as much of a problem.
 
As a human player it's very, very easy. However the AI is generally crap at colonisation, so I don't see it as a big problem. The AI may have explored earlier than is historical, but they don't do very much about it, so it doesn't affect game balance IMO.
 
Originally posted by Cockney
As a human player it's very, very easy. However the AI is generally crap at colonisation, so I don't see it as a big problem. The AI may have explored earlier than is historical, but they don't do very much about it, so it doesn't affect game balance IMO.
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If this is true, which I tend to believe, then perhaps all those 'extra' explorers could be woken in AI only events. That way the player doesn't get extra way un-needed help but the AI does. Of course I think Count Six's complaint was about the AI.

On a different note, Portugal did explore a great portion of Africa, prior to 1480.
 
Rather than ditching explorers I'd prefer to see their lifespans shortened even further. Barton was trying to stop Portugal from discovering China by 1490 - which is the regular occurance with the long lifespans of the Paradox explorers. More shortlived explorers is more like what happened in real life.
 
Originally posted by Count Six
Are you referring to Portugal with Columbus here or Spain?
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I was referring to the Portuguese one here, as were all my other comments about Portugal. Sorry if that wasn't clear.
 
For EEP 1.4.2 I shortened the lifespans of many Portuguese explorers prior to 1500:
Gil Eanes 33-37 -> 33-36
Diogo Cao 81-86 -> 83-86
Nuno Tristao 41-46 -> 41-44
Rui Sequiera 71-75 -> 71-73
Diego Gomez 57-61 -> 59-61
Antao Goncalves 41-47 -> 44-47

All in all removing 12 years. Cannot tell if it's enough, but at least a start.
 
the problem is not the number of explorers, but that they can go where they want.
i think it depends on naval tech; before a certain level you can't cross the Atlantic or the pacific, you can only follow the coasts.
this level shoul be reached at 1480-1490.

4 example you can't use guns in 1420, don't you?;)
 
Originally posted by mnorrefeldt
For EEP 1.4.2 I shortened the lifespans of many Portuguese explorers prior to 1500:
Gil Eanes 33-37 -> 33-36
Diogo Cao 81-86 -> 83-86
Nuno Tristao 41-46 -> 41-44
Rui Sequiera 71-75 -> 71-73
Diego Gomez 57-61 -> 59-61
Antao Goncalves 41-47 -> 44-47

All in all removing 12 years. Cannot tell if it's enough, but at least a start.
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It might be a good idea to factor in the solution to the Azores/Cape Verde problem. If a new tag is used for Portugal, then more explorer-years will be needed to find these places. If Portugal "finds" them by event, fewer explorer-years are warranted. (BTW, where did that thread go, anyway - it was here this morning?)
 
Originally posted by Count Six
It might be a good idea to factor in the solution to the Azores/Cape Verde problem. If a new tag is used for Portugal, then more explorer-years will be needed to find these places. If Portugal "finds" them by event, fewer explorer-years are warranted. (BTW, where did that thread go, anyway - it was here this morning?)
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IMO the Azores / Cape Verde problem should be adressed by letting Portugal start with level 1 colonies and 50 inhabitants in both provinces and removing its knowledge of the sea province surrounding the Azores. That way the AI will colonize the provinces, but there will be some delay since Portugal needs to explore the sea provinces it needs to have a connection with the provinces first.
 
Twoflower - That's a workable solution, but it's not as much fun as doing the work yourself. :)

I guess given the choice of options, I'd say give Por the colonies at the historical time by event, but in that case I'd plunk for removing Diego de Silves and trimming the explorer list further.
 
Originally posted by Twoflower
IMO the Azores / Cape Verde problem should be adressed by letting Portugal start with level 1 colonies and 50 inhabitants in both provinces and removing its knowledge of the sea province surrounding the Azores. That way the AI will colonize the provinces, but there will be some delay since Portugal needs to explore the sea provinces it needs to have a connection with the provinces first.
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I don't think this will work. Are you sure? As I understand it, you don't need to have an explored route to send colonists (at least I don't think so), and I've never seen the Portuguese AI colonize Azores even when it starts at 100 population. Happy to be told I'm wrong if you've tested though :)

edit: Meaning I still think we need a tag.
 
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