Better to unify quickly? or hold on nations for IP usage?

[hottwiz]

i am holding on to a bunch big nations , i have taken over and United the EU, holding onto Germany, UK, Spain, Poland, Italy, Belgium, Ireland, Switzerland and the Eurasian Union. It's 2032.

I'm waiting to unify to build MC and regional space defences, but it better to unify the EU quickly and sort it all out later? i feel like it's a IP waste. With advisers in Germany and Russia i'm getting 137.9 IP from every nation besides the EU it's self.

What;s your guys thoughts?

[gimmethegepgun]

Firstly, as it stands, space defenses are basically useless except for the capital to make sure that they can't suddenly land THERE and conquer the whole country.
As for the rest of it, I generally find it's the best idea to Unify the EU quickly, because doing that reduces the CP cost of you controlling the area so that you can grab more, depriving the other factions of good places to be.
Make sure to get all of France's CPs first though, it'll be a lot harder to kick someone else out once you increase the size of the economy by Unifying.

[hottwiz]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Firstly, as it stands, space defenses are basically useless except for the capital to make sure that they can't suddenly land THERE and conquer the whole country.
As for the rest of it, I generally find it's the best idea to Unify the EU quickly, because doing that reduces the CP cost of you controlling the area so that you can grab more, depriving the other factions of good places to be.
Make sure to get all of France's CPs first though, it'll be a lot harder to kick someone else out once you increase the size of the economy by Unifying.

Okay, thank you. I am going to start absorbing the smaller members i have so that i can start taking over Australia and bringing in it's federation into the UK and then the UK into the EU.
it's a bit of a IP waste but CP is more valuable it seems in the long run.
I do now have all of the EUs CP points, i waited a While to take the last CPs so i could control the rest of Europe and unify the Eurasian union quicker.

[Premu]

It depends...

Maxing out MC at least is typically worth it for smaller nations before including them. For the EU it is typically also worth it to finish some of the half built armies in Germany, Poland, Italy and Spain, and attach a fleet to these if you can.

Because an united EU with maxed out MC is such a beast of a nation which is worth the waiting.

In some cases you might need some free CP right now, of course - in that case speeding up the unification process might be prudent.

[alexander.julian.erhard]

Don´t wait on Space Defenses, but for MC it can be beneficial to unify to wait until those are maxed.
Whether it Is better to do a 100% MC focus (careful when completed it sets your cp to 100% spoils), or 3 pip MC + 1 pip on some of the "distribution bonus" priorities (economy, welfare, knowledge, unity, military), I don´t know.

[Swat__Raptor]

Early game ill leave the countries sperate to max out MC and produce some funding after that.

If you think about it in phases of development it makes more sense, at least to me. Early game you are aiming to get into space but need to develop your earth holdings to allow for further space development (Boost, MC and money). Both MC and funding are produced much faster by small nations compared to unifying them into one, boost is different because it requires a existing space programnin the nation before IP starts increasing boost income, it also is super important very early and then it becomes a secondary concern once the mission to Mars tech is finished. So boost also favors smaller nations but it's only worth investing in if you can get returns early so if the nations already have space programs or if they can finish quickly.

Once Mars is colonized I'll start absorbing the nations once their MC is maxed.