Questions on Playing China

[Kovax]

I've done a fair number of V2 campaigns with civilized countries before (mostly abandoned between 1900-1920 due to tedium), but this is my first attempt at an uncivilized nation: China. So far, I've annexed Burma, which hardly made ANY difference in my research points, but now I'm finally getting close to passing my first reform after about a decade of painfully slow point accumulation. Guanxi briefly passed me in rank, due to its massive troop buildup, but I managed to pull back ahead. It's becoming painfully obvious that I don't know what I'm doing, so here I am, asking questions.

Does the research point gain from conquest depend on how far their own research got, or is it a fixed number of points? Do you get points for annexing land short of a complete conquest? Will Guanxi or other sub-states attempt to break free, or is that typically a non-issue? Is there a way to get Fish for the basic needs of my lower class pops (seriously, China has no fishing along its coasts and rivers?)? Is there a way to stop the anti-Manchu pop-up events that happen every few days?

There doesn't seem to be a decent China AAR that isn't either the base game only, or a mod. Nothing I found with the expansions, so the mechanics are different and they're not applicable. Thanks for any advice.

 

[TemporalAnomaly]

As a warning, half of this is half-remembered.

To get any pointy-stick research you need to already have some military reforms.

Sub-states can only break free if they beat you to westernization. This is very unlikely to happen, and even, if it does, you should be strong enough to reabsorb them easily in a single war.

What you really need most is to put the work in to get your literacy up.

I have never had a Qing game, but I have had a lot of fun with a few TPG games.

 

[Bunnytob]

Does the research point gain from conquest depend on how far their own research got, or is it a fixed number of points?

I have absolutely no idea either, but I think it might be, although there is a baseline.

Do you get points for annexing land short of a complete conquest?

Yes.

Will Guanxi or other sub-states attempt to break free, or is that typically a non-issue?

In Vanilla? IIRC they will actually try to break free when they westernize or when you westernize, although this isn't normally an issue. In the vast majority of mods, I don't think they do with the exception of rebels (who I have seen declare independence in the south multiple times) and the scripted Taiping rebellion events (in which Yunnan and Xinjiang both rebel).

Is there a way to get Fish for the basic needs of my lower class pops (seriously, China has no fishing along its coasts and rivers?)?

Doesn't it? In that case, conquer. Or lower tariffs. I'm sure I remember China overproducing fish in Vanilla...

Is there a way to stop the anti-Manchu pop-up events that happen every few days?

IIRC there's a decision for it that comes up... eventually.

 

[Kovax]

Thanks for the replies. Last night I redid the conquest of Burma in late 1836 from an earlier save to check the game mechanics. I got ZERO research points from it. Either you need at least one of the military reforms to get any points at all, or else it no longer applies in the expansions. The Wiki is either wrong or VERY incomplete regarding this topic, and a lot of the V2 wiki appears to be written for the base game only.

I got the one fishing province from Burma, plus I can take the one in Korea. That's not nearly enough Fish to feed the population of China, and I've got over 90% of my Poor pops only getting part of their basic needs as a result. They can well afford it, but there's not enough Fish on the market available to China to put more than a small dent in the demand. The rest of the fish-producing provinces are owned by the UK, Netherlands, or Spain (or uncolonized), and I'm definitely not ready to take on a Western country at this early stage of the game.

Good to know that I don't need to engage in an expensive arms race against Guanxi, because it's on the verge of putting my finances into the red, even with military maintenance cut way back.

With only one Focus Point, raising Literacy is slow and difficult, but I did manage to bring it up from 3.5% to around 4.2% in around a decade. At this point, I'm figuring that my understanding of the uncivilized mechanics led me to several wrong moves, so a restart would be the best course of action.

 

[TemporalAnomaly]

Keep in mind that there is often a huge glut of fish on the market once the big boys get the steamers tech.

 

[TheWorstPro]

I've done a fair number of V2 campaigns with civilized countries before (mostly abandoned between 1900-1920 due to tedium), but this is my first attempt at an uncivilized nation: China. So far, I've annexed Burma, which hardly made ANY difference in my research points, but now I'm finally getting close to passing my first reform after about a decade of painfully slow point accumulation. Guanxi briefly passed me in rank, due to its massive troop buildup, but I managed to pull back ahead. It's becoming painfully obvious that I don't know what I'm doing, so here I am, asking questions.

Does the research point gain from conquest depend on how far their own research got, or is it a fixed number of points? Do you get points for annexing land short of a complete conquest? Will Guanxi or other sub-states attempt to break free, or is that typically a non-issue? Is there a way to get Fish for the basic needs of my lower class pops (seriously, China has no fishing along its coasts and rivers?)? Is there a way to stop the anti-Manchu pop-up events that happen every few days?

There doesn't seem to be a decent China AAR that isn't either the base game only, or a mod. Nothing I found with the expansions, so the mechanics are different and they're not applicable. Thanks for any advice.

Thanks for the replies. Last night I redid the conquest of Burma in late 1836 from an earlier save to check the game mechanics. I got ZERO research points from it. Either you need at least one of the military reforms to get any points at all, or else it no longer applies in the expansions. The Wiki is either wrong or VERY incomplete regarding this topic, and a lot of the V2 wiki appears to be written for the base game only.

I got the one fishing province from Burma, plus I can take the one in Korea. That's not nearly enough Fish to feed the population of China, and I've got over 90% of my Poor pops only getting part of their basic needs as a result. They can well afford it, but there's not enough Fish on the market available to China to put more than a small dent in the demand. The rest of the fish-producing provinces are owned by the UK, Netherlands, or Spain (or uncolonized), and I'm definitely not ready to take on a Western country at this early stage of the game.

Good to know that I don't need to engage in an expensive arms race against Guanxi, because it's on the verge of putting my finances into the red, even with military maintenance cut way back.

With only one Focus Point, raising Literacy is slow and difficult, but I did manage to bring it up from 3.5% to around 4.2% in around a decade. At this point, I'm figuring that my understanding of the uncivilized mechanics led me to several wrong moves, so a restart would be the best course of action.

First to answer your questions (and for this, I'm assuming you're playing on Vanilla):

Research points are gained via conquest only with certain military reforms. You're looking for the ones which say something like "research points bonus when conquering." Not all of them have it so you need to check first. And iirc the amount of points is scaled based on the number of POPs you're conquering (so yes, you don't even need to conquer the whole country), so it's best to go for places like Korea or even Punjab first.

Your puppets will break free if they westernize before you. I can't remember whether they end up breaking free the second they westernize or if they break free after you catch up, but if you're the first to westernize then you will auto-annex them anyways. Mongolia and Manchuria might make things difficult since they might get sphered by Russia (which makes reforms much cheaper for them) so be wary of that. If you're playing with mods, then you might get a different situation altogether. I know a few mods have a warlord event which balkanizes China after they westernize so depending on what you're playing you might expect something different.

Once you westernize if you become a GP and get plenty of prestige you should be able to buy from the world market, but it's pretty tough to handle China's population as a whole (westernization often destroys the global economy, especially if it's early). And again, if you're paying with mods then you might get some events here and there to change RGOs but if you're on vanilla then you'll probably need to conquer something that has fish and encourage immigration there.

Regarding the anti-manchu popups I'm not sure if there is actually any way to stop it, aside from maybe westernization or I think the Taiping Rebellion (which isn't even that consistent to fire). I think they do stop later on though but it's a matter of patience I suppose.

As others have said, literacy is a top priority but as China it's extremely difficult to solve due to the huge number of pops and provinces. Also, once you do westernize you should be wary of rebellions and make sure you're using suppression/reforms plenty often

Spoiler: Revolt

 

[Kovax]

Thanks for the details. I didn't realize that you get NO research points until you pass one of those "+25%" military reforms, until I was already well into a campaign.

I restarted, but this time around, Russia seems to have abandoned Krakow to the Austrians started influencing Manchuria almost immediately, now up to Cordial and still going strong. Meanwhile, the British declared war on Burma and annexed the region with the fish-producing province. This is looking painful already.

[ Update - I waited until I could pass one military reform, then invaded Dai Viet. That gave me somewhere between 8000 and 9000 research points. After I pass the next military reform in a couple of months, I should get at least double those points by taking Korea (hopefully before the US spheres it). The mechanics are a bit ridiculous, since you get NOTHING for annexing territory until you pass that first reform, and then it abruptly turns into a feeding frenzy, only limited by Infamy. ]