Best county to start a republic?

[stars2heaven]

Just wondering what everyones ideas are. I've been comparing the tradezones of the existing republics to the possible tradezones of others. Venice is easily the best among those. If you own all the tradeposts in the gulf of venice the value of your trade posts goes way up.

But what about potential capitals for a republic? Gotland looks great with three trade zones and almost double the counties bordering them that Venice does. Langin in Ireland and Gwyned in wales look just as good in that regard.

What do you think some of the best possible locations for a republic are?

[Sergent H]

i founded the republic of Scandinavia with Ragnarr Losbrok; was pretty decent
Tons of gold + norse culture + germanic pope is great

[Anarky]

I'm a big fan of having the tribal wales mod and going for a welsh merchant republic.

[Zsrai]

Isle of Man, CM start. It's Welsh, Tribal, 1 province Duchy with a TON of coastal provinces touching it's home zone. There are some decent counties nearby that also fit depending on what your plan is. Dublin is nice if you just want to make a MR as the King of Ireland, for example. Ulster is a good duchy for it too.

Denmark. A lot of base holdings and a ton of coastal provinces in your home zone. Gotland is good for similar reasons. Rostock (Rastoku?) in Mecklenburg is a decent spot with a few holdings and a good home zone.

I'm partial to Kurzeme/Curonia myself. Small duchy but a lot of counties touching your home zone there too.

If you're looking to just roll as a Viking and invade somewhere, I'm not as sure what would be ideal; I mostly look at tribal starts. I think Tangiers is a solid location, and Duchy, if you want to go that route. Also fits as an awesome location RP wise. The Crimea area (Kingdom of Taurica pre-M&M patch) is all coastal and could be a really good location to set up, but you'd be limited trying to get out into the Mediterranean without using a lot of city conquests.

[Weizen1988]

Denmark is pretty good, for the reasons given above. Its what I usually end up doing in my scandinavia games.

[Random]

I also vote Danmark.

The fact you are norse also makes it unlikely that you will be targetted by raiders as a merch republic as you are one, removing a big issue to the early game.

The capital (cant remember the S name of the central duchy) has 6 holding slots, and you can stack a pile of extra cities in it for more gold and holdings for yourself.

[Weizen1988]

sjaelland I think.

[that guy]

IIRC, you earn more money from tradeposts when they're in the same sea zone instead of spread out. So having 10 trade posts in the same sea zone is better than 10 trade posts in 3 connected sea zones, which is much better than having 10 trade posts in 10 distant unconnected sea zones.

So the best locations for a merchant republic is going to be the trade zone around Venice and the one around the Isle of Man. However, they're both single county duchies so you won't get much of a levy bonus from having your capital there, not to mention the Isle of Man only has three holdings.

As others have mentioned, Denmark is a very good place to set up a merchant republic. All your counties are coastal, and you're likely going to be a norse pagan so other norse pagans are unlikely to raid you.

Personally, I prefer the duchy of Holstein, which is part of Saxony or Denmark depending on your start date. It's a 4 county duchy, with a total of 22 holding slots, all coastal. When you're tribal, you'll be basically the strongest high chief around due to the empty holding slots. And even if you become a genius midas touched emperor with max centralization and absolute rule, it's unlikely that you'll be able to control all the holdings in the duchy. Which means that all your holdings will get the benefit of being in your capital duchy.

[Jerubius]

Originally posted by that guy:

IIRC, you earn more money from tradeposts when they're in the same sea zone instead of spread out. So having 10 trade posts in the same sea zone is better than 10 trade posts in 3 connected sea zones, which is much better than having 10 trade posts in 10 distant unconnected sea zones.

Fairly certain that is incorrect. A trade zone is a group of adjacent controlled sea zones, and all trade posts in a trade zone scale income to the size of the trade zone. The reason to have more than one trade post per sea zone is to make sure you have retain control of the sea zone by having the most trade posts in it. If there is no competition for it, you are better off building your next trade post in an adjacent sea zone. In this way, smaller sea zones can be better as they are easier to ensure control over. However, I think the amount you get from a controlled sea zone is based upon every city and trade post built adjacent to it or something.

[Oaks]

Originally posted by JERubius:

Originally posted by that guy:

IIRC, you earn more money from tradeposts when they're in the same sea zone instead of spread out. So having 10 trade posts in the same sea zone is better than 10 trade posts in 3 connected sea zones, which is much better than having 10 trade posts in 10 distant unconnected sea zones.

Fairly certain that is incorrect. A trade zone is a group of adjacent controlled sea zones, and all trade posts in a trade zone scale income to the size of the trade zone. The reason to have more than one trade post per sea zone is to make sure you have retain control of the sea zone by having the most trade posts in it. If there is no competition for it, you are better off building your next trade post in an adjacent sea zone. In this way, smaller sea zones can be better as they are easier to ensure control over. However, I think the amount you get from a controlled sea zone is based upon every city and trade post built adjacent to it or something.

I have read somewhere that it's better to have it in a small area as opposed to spread out :(
Republics are so confusing.

[Merkatz]

Originally posted by oaks2nin:

Originally posted by JERubius:

Fairly certain that is incorrect. A trade zone is a group of adjacent controlled sea zones, and all trade posts in a trade zone scale income to the size of the trade zone. The reason to have more than one trade post per sea zone is to make sure you have retain control of the sea zone by having the most trade posts in it. If there is no competition for it, you are better off building your next trade post in an adjacent sea zone. In this way, smaller sea zones can be better as they are easier to ensure control over. However, I think the amount you get from a controlled sea zone is based upon every city and trade post built adjacent to it or something.

I have read somewhere that it's better to have it in a small area as opposed to spread out :(
Republics are so confusing.

You really want to maintain the connected to capital bonus. It's easy with zones like the one around Venice, but can get weird when you move out to other zones.

Often to maintain it, you have to become a thalassocracy with seemingly random city and/or county holdings in far flung places.

[Saxon]

I have fun playing as the Republic of Flanders based out of Brugge at the earliest start date. I picked them because historically their Burgher class was very powerful. To make it somewhat realistic I started the game as the last remaining Frisian feudal lord on the map. Over the course of two generations I retook all of Frisia and created the kingdom title. Then as soon as the culture flipped to Dutch I gave the baron of Brugge the county as well as the Duchy title. After that I saved and reloaded the game so I could play as the Merchant Republic. It's kinda fun competing against your own former character and his dynasty for a change.

There is no competition from other republics that far north. But the constant infighting between the Franks prevents most counties from prospering and sometimes your posts get sieged when you get dragged into their wars. Another downside is... vikings! OMG do they love to treat me like their piggy bank.

[Fredericks of Cursewood]

Muslim Repbulics are fun. 4 wives and a lot of sons. Good chance to go toe to toe with the Italians.