Rebalance low-development states

[Shadowstrike]

Splitting my time between European and RotW nations, one jarring thing I notice is how little development many states have in the RotW. There are states with less than 10 development total, and many that have only 10-20 development. This penalizes RotW nations, because the total number of states allowed is the same (thus forcing you to either leave some areas as territories, or spend your precious state slots on low-development areas), but also more subtly, through increased state maintenance (as having more small states means that some are further away, causing the distance penalty to be larger).

Because of the state cap (same number of states, no matter where in the world you are), the range of development values in states shouldn't vary so wildly. Obviously, there are geographic and cultural considerations in defining areas that make it impossible for states to all fit in a very narrow band of development values, but it shouldn't be that some states are worth 5 times as much as others. Remedying this would probably involve combining states together to get rid of states with very low development values (particularly in places like Africa, the Americas and Central Asia), rejiggering the European states in areas with high-development states to make them a little smaller, with a bit of increasing development values in the RotW.

As an alternative, perhaps there could be a bonus number of states allowed, if your average-development-per-state is particularly low. It would need some playtesting to figure out what the correct numbers are here, but it would go some way towards addressing this imbalance.

 

[Dutchman251]

What about developing your low-development states?

There's a reason why it is called the 'developing' world.

 

[Shadowstrike]

With what monarch points? When you're paying 1000 or more MP per tech level instead of the usual 600, good luck sparing MP for development.

 

[Dutchman251]

Good luck not teching up. Reforming gives free techs, so you'd better get tecnology from that.

 

[Gratak]

With what monarch points? When you're paying 1000 or more MP per tech level instead of the usual 600, good luck sparing MP for development.

Good luck not teching up. Reforming gives free techs, so you'd better get tecnology from that.

Around 1000 MP per lvl is mostly India/China. They do not get to reform... And he is not asking for giving them more developement. Just larger areas for fewer states.

 

[Dutchman251]

And I am suggesting him to develop his provinces...

 

[Shadowstrike]

I don't think you understand the problem I'm pointing out. There is a maximum number of states you can have, which depends (mostly) on ADM level. This is the same everywhere in the world. But states have vastly different development values. According to the Wiki, the state around Paris (Seine) has 63 development, while Ogaden (in the Horn of Africa) has 9 development. More problematically, high-development regions are clustered in Europe, while low-development regions are clustered in Africa, Central Asia and the Americas. So if you start in these areas, you have no choice but to take those states, and you end up with vastly less development in your states, simply as a factor of geography. This further punishes RotW starts, simply because of arbitrarily defined states. This problem arises because states everywhere are roughly the same size geographically, when they should really be roughly the same size development-wise. If you just made states larger in areas with low development, it would balance things out better.

The ability to develop provinces has nothing to do with this. Everyone can develop provinces: France can just as well as Kasanje. Better, actually, as France pays much less for tech.

 

[DDRJake]

There is going to be imbalance in this, otherwise some states are going to be obscenely big or unjustifiably overdeveloped in 1444.

Not all states are equal, just as not all starts are equal.

 

[Milith]

Most high development states are actually in Asia.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

And I am suggesting him to develop his provinces...

Suggesting that someone play terribly on purpose when they are making a balance suggestion is non-sequitur and similarly not useful. The simpler conclusion for the player is to prioritize states that are actually worth something, not spam monarch points into land that is double-penalized for development while development is already inferior to expansion.

New world natives get triple penalized relative to decent European starts, but it's still more efficient to develop than it is to tech pre-reform there...sometimes, depending on how slow Europe is to do anything.