Anybody else hate the Colonial system?

[Hat8]

The direct control method of Eu3 made for a more interesting colonial game . Previously and historically, the colonies took a massive effort to build up but yielded rewards as long the colonizers guarded them. Now it's basically just set it and forget it, maybe with the occasion bribe or prestige loss.

The entire Spanish Empire only ever had like 10k troops max in it's colonies before Latin Independence happened. In Eu4 you have no choice but to have giant armies guarding the colonies and worse, ahistorically massive fleets.

The inflation from all the colonial gold isn't even a problem in this game.

[chazla20]

Hmm I have experieced the opposite in CNs. Usually I keep a 25k army hanging around to mop up the native empires in the Americas since you can't coquer all of the territory in 1 war. After that I let the CNs fight wars in the Americas against other CNs when I declare war on the overlord in Europe.

The only exception is when a country like the U.K. drops 100k army in Mexico to conquer New Spain. lol

[Rommel]

I hate it too. The game was a lot more fun b4 colonial nations, it punishes you now for getting too many colonies in each area. If you get 90% of the caribean it will already have like 30% liberty desire b4 it even builds its economy...it feels like your colonial nations are bombs waiting to go off instead of an ally.

[Dutchgamer1982]

I disliked in eu3 it took like 300 years for a colony to be of ANY use...
(as it took AGES for the colony to get to 1000 inhabitants)
-once completed all buildings could be build there regardless size, though upkeep was static, meaning that while possible it was not economically viable to build everything everywhere.
it would take about 12 years to build all buildings, with building times 6-12 months

in eu4, with proper tech and such, it can however grow into a city in merely 4 years.
-after that all it takes is a bunch of monarch points and presto, a level 15 settlement
-however the number of building slots is extremely limited, if it's JUST the right type of land, the right bonus, you might be able to fit 3 buildings + a library on your city EVER.
-> even the largets city's in the eu4 world not have all 12 buildings normally, highly unrealistic.
->the 5 years it takes to build a fortress in this game is also unrealistic (it should take shorter to build the less advanced fort-types, but even the most advanced star forts while expensive were irl completed in about 3 years, not 5)

As for whats more realistic.. building wise clearly eu3s model, of alowing all builings but not making them economiclly feasable is more realistic.
Likewise their model of population growth is more realistic, the monarch point thing is stupid.
(it allows small to grow to fast, but if you own a large realm, you are spread out to thin, where population growth would happen everywhere)

however for colonisation, wating like 300 years after your first colonists landed to actually build your first building in your colony is highly unrealistic, so eu4 wins in regard to a more realistic colonisation model.

-I have to adress travel time though... irl it took about 3-4 months to reach the america's, 9 the east indies from europe. In eu4 it takes over 2 years to reach the east indies, and over 1 year to reach the america's.
-eu3 has the same way to long travel time problem.
**in this regard both games have unrealisticly long travel times and it should be reduced considerably.

because eu3 let colony's grow in percentage of present population (just as any city grows).. early growth is really slow.. (boosting a colony in eu3 by sending an extra colonist would shave decades off the time for it to become a city)

-however both games again are stupid in their limit of the number of colonists.

a new colonial city from first fortress to a small town with townhall, church, and other basic facility's would take irl about 20 years.
-a colony ship would take about 3 months to sail to the america's, 9 to the east indies, and carry about 200 new settlers (plus allt he things they needed to get started (carts, cattle, seeds, sapplings, tools, guns, etc)
*a small town would have about 3000-5000 people in it once fully settled and becoming a departure point itself for futher colonisation.

*the mayor limit on colony ships was the ships (aka the materials to build them, the cost to run them, etc).. colonists where there always plenty.

so if I had to make the best kind of mechanic, i would indeed use eu3's colonisation model, but would remove the colonist from the game, and replace it with a ship-unit and cart-unit that you can build only in provinces that have your core, culture and religion.
-each ship or cart unit would lower population of the province where it was build with 1000 (just as in eu3 military units do)
-those units would cost considerable upkeepwhen active, and while suffering artition could not be regrown, unlike military units (or it has to be done like in eu3,where you need military population present in the province you want to re-stock your unit with fresh man, and that restocking actually lowers provincial population)
-you could use those units either to build a new colony (that causes them to disband, build a colony with a fort (with high upkeep costs).. or add their population to a excistin settlement.
-the upkeep for colony comes from it having no economic output yet, but does have a fort with upkeep, you cannot mothball the fort while the colony is still being build, as doing so would mean you "abandon colony" ofcourse after the colony becomesa town, you can destroy or mothball the fort if you so desire.

[Galactic Origins]

yeah, at least EU3 let you keep something in the colonies.... the EU4 system STINKS

[Hat8]

Originally posted by Dutchgamer1982:

I disliked in eu3 it took like 300 years for a colony to be of ANY use...
(as it took AGES for the colony to get to 1000 inhabitants)
-once completed all buildings could be build there regardless size, though upkeep was static, meaning that while possible it was not economically viable to build everything everywhere.
it would take about 12 years to build all buildings, with building times 6-12 months

in eu4, with proper tech and such, it can however grow into a city in merely 4 years.
-after that all it takes is a bunch of monarch points and presto, a level 15 settlement
-however the number of building slots is extremely limited, if it's JUST the right type of land, the right bonus, you might be able to fit 3 buildings + a library on your city EVER.
-> even the largets city's in the eu4 world not have all 12 buildings normally, highly unrealistic.
->the 5 years it takes to build a fortress in this game is also unrealistic (it should take shorter to build the less advanced fort-types, but even the most advanced star forts while expensive were irl completed in about 3 years, not 5)

As for whats more realistic.. building wise clearly eu3s model, of alowing all builings but not making them economiclly feasable is more realistic.
Likewise their model of population growth is more realistic, the monarch point thing is stupid.
(it allows small to grow to fast, but if you own a large realm, you are spread out to thin, where population growth would happen everywhere)

however for colonisation, wating like 300 years after your first colonists landed to actually build your first building in your colony is highly unrealistic, so eu4 wins in regard to a more realistic colonisation model.

-I have to adress travel time though... irl it took about 3-4 months to reach the america's, 9 the east indies from europe. In eu4 it takes over 2 years to reach the east indies, and over 1 year to reach the america's.
-eu3 has the same way to long travel time problem.
**in this regard both games have unrealisticly long travel times and it should be reduced considerably.

because eu3 let colony's grow in percentage of present population (just as any city grows).. early growth is really slow.. (boosting a colony in eu3 by sending an extra colonist would shave decades off the time for it to become a city)

-however both games again are stupid in their limit of the number of colonists.

a new colonial city from first fortress to a small town with townhall, church, and other basic facility's would take irl about 20 years.
-a colony ship would take about 3 months to sail to the america's, 9 to the east indies, and carry about 200 new settlers (plus allt he things they needed to get started (carts, cattle, seeds, sapplings, tools, guns, etc)
*a small town would have about 3000-5000 people in it once fully settled and becoming a departure point itself for futher colonisation.

*the mayor limit on colony ships was the ships (aka the materials to build them, the cost to run them, etc).. colonists where there always plenty.

so if I had to make the best kind of mechanic, i would indeed use eu3's colonisation model, but would remove the colonist from the game, and replace it with a ship-unit and cart-unit that you can build only in provinces that have your core, culture and religion.
-each ship or cart unit would lower population of the province where it was build with 1000 (just as in eu3 military units do)
-those units would cost considerable upkeepwhen active, and while suffering artition could not be regrown, unlike military units (or it has to be done like in eu3,where you need military population present in the province you want to re-stock your unit with fresh man, and that restocking actually lowers provincial population)
-you could use those units either to build a new colony (that causes them to disband, build a colony with a fort (with high upkeep costs).. or add their population to a excistin settlement.
-the upkeep for colony comes from it having no economic output yet, but does have a fort with upkeep, you cannot mothball the fort while the colony is still being build, as doing so would mean you "abandon colony" ofcourse after the colony becomesa town, you can destroy or mothball the fort if you so desire.

Eu3 populations were abstract. Not actual representations of the number of people.

It'd be cool if they were in a later game though. Also, colonization was extremely profitable in Eu3. Especially if you focused on looting and then mineral wealth extraction and finally on commercial crops.

[Ficelle]

Dont really have a problem with CNs

Sure, you are not in direct control of the land you worked for, but

CNs colonise themselves, speeding up the whole america colonisation speed
Build armies and fleets they pay for and it all adds up for quite an amount
Use their provinces as states for the most part instead of territories
Core, convert, culture convert and build with their MP and money
Pay some tariffs and transfer gold via gold fleets + transfer trade power
Add some FL, merchants etc
Wage their own wars and are able to do the mundane jobs (kill rebels etc without you bothering)
Act as allies and their armies number acts as deterrant too
Add in some interactions / events / conflicts / etc...

All in all, it is not that bad at all


You can always play something as Incas or some american natives and see the differences (no CNs at all)

You will have the whole America in direct control
80% of it will be territories, not states, aka worthless crapland
It will take mostly the whole game to not even be able to colonise it all if you dont let other AI / CNs colonise for you before taking them
The total army / fleet will be way lower and quite low given the land mass
Have to core / build / etc all with your own MP and money

So, all in all, direct control doesnt bring a lot at all, apart from map painting the same color

[Hat8]

Originally posted by Ficelle:

Dont really have a problem with CNs

Sure, you are not in direct control of the land you worked for, but

CNs colonise themselves, speeding up the whole america colonisation speed
Build armies and fleets they pay for and it all adds up for quite an amount
Use their provinces as states for the most part instead of territories
Core, convert, culture convert and build with their MP and money
Pay some tariffs and transfer gold via gold fleets + transfer trade power
Add some FL, merchants etc
Wage their own wars and are able to do the mundane jobs (kill rebels etc without you bothering)
Act as allies and their armies number acts as deterrant too
Add in some interactions / events / conflicts / etc...

All in all, it is not that bad at all

Easier game = better?

I don't agree with that at all.

[Ficelle]

If you want a harder game, stop playing normal

Direct control doesnt add any difficulty
After a while, a blob is a blob, being an american blob instead of an european blob is the same difficulty wise

Problem being the same, nothing different
CNs at least add some differences and new stuff

[Dutchgamer1982]

Originally posted by Neko Koneco:

Eu3 populations were abstract. Not actual representations of the number of people.

It'd be cool if they were in a later game though. Also, colonization was extremely profitable in Eu3. Especially if you focused on looting and then mineral wealth extraction and finally on commercial crops.

Well I would love actual representation yes.
with added effects :
-if you take to many soldiers (man) from a region, fertility may drop for a whole
-you can allow "polygamy" to counter that under some religions, but it could create instability/disaproval of the church
-the settler model like I explained above
-a food present vs population (with harvest and storage numbers per province, where you can order every province what to produce foodwise, and set up a distribution net for it.
(for example replacing grain for potato after you discovered the new world, will increase food yields, but will also have a higher risk of bad hardvest)
-control the rations you give your people, bigger means more population growth and production but also more food being eaten
-good harvests will rot away, bad harvests wil go ignored, so you''ll have to adjust some rations and exportroutes yearly..
-buying food from other nations or exporting it for cold hard cash may be a thing
(you can even export for cash during a famine, but logically that will not make you happy amongst your own people)

and than occational effects, like rebellions of certain population groups within your society, do you allow slavery, increased production, but they can rebel..
Likewise if people want larger rations they might rebel too..
-if they rebel, how you respond, do you give in, allow them free reigh or supress them?
freeing all the slaves or giving in to demands will lower production and increase food demand, and cause unappyness and increase civil war risk.
-if you grand them independance, you may either loose population or the entire province... less bad aftereffects but you loss internationally face
-if you flog them, well very effective they in line again, but population is reduced, production is down, but you will have decreased revolt risk in that province for a while

Illness that actually kill off large chunks of your population..
burning your colony (with everybody in it) might be an excelent containment tool, but well if you get discovered for such atrocity's.....
and you might find the need to send armies to force a province to be quarantined...

Models like that I would like..