Exploration or Expansion as Kilwa?

[Server Jester]

Im planning on doing a Kilwa game and im wondering what is the best colonization idea group to take as them?
Is it viable to shoot for getting Colonialism to spawn in Kilwa like I saw in one screenshot? If so, how should I go about that?

[Marquoz]

It's possible for any nation that discovers land provinces in North or South America, owns land or a colonial nation there, and meets the other provincial requirements. If multiple nations are eligible, the game will randomize among them. So sure, you might get lucky and spawn colonialism in Kilwa if you take Exploration as your first idea group. But you might not, and then you'll have to develop a province to force it.

[Server Jester]

Originally posted by Marquoz:

It's possible for any nation that discovers land provinces in North or South America, owns land or a colonial nation there, and meets the other provincial requirements. If multiple nations are eligible, the game will randomize among them. So sure, you might get lucky and spawn colonialism in Kilwa if you take Exploration as your first idea group. But you might not, and then you'll have to develop a province to force it.

So in light of this, which would you take as Kilwa: Exploration or Expansion?
I do definitely plan on pushing into the Great Lakes and Kongo areas since they get trade from Zanzibar

[Marquoz]

If you want to have a chance to spawn Colonialism, you have to take Exploration. "Quest for the New World" is a requirement. Besides, you won't discover and own land provinces in the New World in time if you can't explore very early on.

[bri]

You don't need to own land in the new world to spawn colonialism (unless that's another stupid 1.31 change). You just need to have qftnw and actually discover it. Personally, though, I'd take expansion and just dev spawn it. The overall ideas are far superior and you can use your dip to grow gold mines instead.

[Vetgirig on Linux]

You take Exploration if your goal is to conquer all of south east asia fast and steal all asian trade from the europeans before they show up.

Going for the new world is bad for Kilwa since you has not trade node that benefit from trade from the New world. Your goal should be to go towards SE asia and the spice island/malaysia and india.

[Marquoz]

Originally posted by bri:

You don't need to own land in the new world to spawn colonialism (unless that's another stupid 1.31 change).

Here are the New World requirements to spawn Colonialism according to the wiki (which says it is up to date for 1.31):

Owner has Exploration idea "Quest for the New World"
Owner has discovered a land province in the New World
Owner owns a province in the New World or has a colonial subject in the New World

[Marquoz]

Originally posted by Vetgirig on Linux:

You take Exploration if your goal is to conquer all of south east asia fast and steal all asian trade from the europeans before they show up.

Going for the new world is bad for Kilwa since you has not trade node that benefit from trade from the New world. Your goal should be to go towards SE asia and the spice island/malaysia and india.

I agree. Kilwa's home node makes a great pseudo end node because you can take over Cape easily and then route all the trade from Asia into Zanzibar.

[Server Jester]

So I guess then going for stealing Colonialism from Portugal/Spain aint worth it
So I guess my 2 paths are
1) Expansion for the generally superior ideas but I wont be able to rush down the spice islands
2) Exploration to rush down the spice islands and funnel it into Zanzibar, but Exploration basically becomes worthless after I achieved that (then again, I could just delete Exploration and replace it with Expansion after im done)