Make the White Elephant chain more troll-ish

[Timewalker102]

Historically, white elephants were difficult to maintain and difficult to dispose: this was why the King of Siam sent White Elephants to his enemies, in hopes of ruining their economy. However, in the game, the White Elephant is only represented in an event that gives +1 Stability for the receiver, which isn't really historically accurate. Here's a more historical accurate (and troll-ish) version:

Event for Donor

Spoiler

The White Elephant
Historically, many other Thai kings in Siam used to gift Albino elephants, a very rare and white elephant, to other kingdoms that they despised. This was in the hopes that the elephant, due to being difficult to maintain and to dispose, would be a burden to their economy. Shall we do the same to our enemies?

Trigger conditions

• Has Thai as primary culture
• Owns one Thai culture province
• There is one nation that this nation knows:
  • Is a rival this nation
  • Is an enemy of this nation
  • Is not of Thai culture

Mean time to happen
600 Months

Option: Yes, we must definitely do this.

• Lose 5 prestige
• Lose 50 military power
• Lose 0.5 year's worth of income
• One random country as described in the trigger:
  • Gains the event The White Elephant

Option: We are not a nation that plays silly games.

• Gain 10 prestige

Event for Receiver

Spoiler

The White Elephant (receiver)
A very interesting event has occurred today. One of our most loathed enemies, the #SENDER, has sent us a rare white elephant that can only be found on their lands. Our people and courtiers have rejoiced, as they believe that #SENDER has finally acknowledged their inferiority to our great nation.

Trigger conditions
Only triggered by The White Elephant event.

Option: They have come to their minds.

• Gain 1 stability
• Gain the White Elephant modifier for 15 years:
  • +5% land maintenance
  • +5% naval maintenance
  • +5% mercenary maintenance
  • +5% state maintenance
  • -5% tax modifier
  • -5% production efficiency
  • -5% trade efficiency
  • +0.03 yearly corruption

Option: It's a trap!

• Lose
  
  1 stability

 

[neondt]

Historically, white elephants were difficult to maintain and difficult to dispose: this was why the King of Siam sent White Elephants to his enemies, in hopes of ruining their economy.

Yes. For courtiers. When a white elephant was discovered and brought to the King, it was seen as a symbol of great prestige. It wasn't a burden on the King because the King was inordinately wealthy and had vast royal stables set up specifically for the care of elephants. The city of Ayutthaya experienced and encouraged several large waves of Mon refugees from Burma, and many entered (or were forced into) military service. In particular Mon soldiers were used to maintain the royal elephant stables, and their duties would have included both the care of "prestige" animals such as white elephants, as well as the capture and training of war elephants. Clearly there was ample royal infrastructure in place so that the discovery of a new white elephant could only be a boon to the King. A courtier or noble, however, would not have had anything like this sort of pre-built infrastructure. And it wasn't just a matter of caring for the elephant itself (a difficult enough task), to receive the gift of a white elephant came with additional social responsibilities that were expensive to uphold while providing little in the way of political gain.

I would instead suggest an event that would give Ayutthaya the opportunity to lose prestige (since the King would no longer own the elephant) in exchange for reducing the power of the Noble estate.

(Royal ownership of white elephants was also something that Kings liked to brag about. For example, in a set of notes provided to the Siamese ambassador to Portugal in 1684, the ambassador is instructed to mention the two white elephants held in the royal stables at the time. It is unclear if the Portuguese would have understood this as being prestigious outside of how the maintenance of a menagerie was in Europe.)