Hydrophobia and capital county

[kgptzac]

Let's talk about spreading patterns of plagues.

Currently, it seems counties that border water (major rivers and seas), and other coastal counites, make a lousy location to be a capital. The most logical location of a capital would be as in-land as possible and, if ok with sacrificing development, borders as less other counties as possible. It means as of now, Byzantine emperor should have their capital somewhere in the hills of Anatolia rather than the usual location of Constantinople. This feels silly, and I don't like the mechanics of the game push me doing it.

After the update, those barony-rich counties won't provide plague protections from their buildings, but it's still the most logical location to move realm capitals to, because they still get less infections because plagues are less likely to be spread there.

I don't know what is a good solution for this, and what would the game make me want to have my realm capital near water (as long as I have made sure I won't lose it from successions and stay within my domain).

Currently, larger Counties (with more Baronies) are better at defending against plagues - and that was never our intention, as this is literally the opposite of what happened historically - therefore we’ve shifted the plague resistance granted by buildings from County-wide to Barony-wide. This should encourage an alternative playstyle of having fewer-barony Counties in your domain in order to protect development. This is also much more of a challenge for players than it will be for the AI, evening the playing field a bit.

 

[prismaticmarcus]

Isn't Constantinople the only capital that's encouraged by the game due to that decision? I don't know whether this applies to anywhere else.

 

[Swedishguy05]

Coastal counties being more susceptible to plagues is at least historical. In exchange for wealth, they're more vulnrable to plagues. Perhaps the wealth they give isn't enough to offset the cost, but that's for any future trade updates to fix.

 

[William the Merry]

Let's talk about spreading patterns of plagues.

Currently, it seems counties that border water (major rivers and seas), and other coastal counites, make a lousy location to be a capital. The most logical location of a capital would be as in-land as possible and, if ok with sacrificing development, borders as less other counties as possible. It means as of now, Byzantine emperor should have their capital somewhere in the hills of Anatolia rather than the usual location of Constantinople. This feels silly, and I don't like the mechanics of the game push me doing it.

After the update, those barony-rich counties won't provide plague protections from their buildings, but it's still the most logical location to move realm capitals to, because they still get less infections because plagues are less likely to be spread there.

I don't know what is a good solution for this, and what would the game make me want to have my realm capital near water (as long as I have made sure I won't lose it from successions and stay within my domain).

If your capital is inland you miss out on the wealth that ports will give you

 

[Twentyfists]

Trying to optimize for plague resistance to the exclusion of wealth from ports is exactly the kind of tradeoff that good game design should encourage. This is absolutely not something that needs a "solution".

 

[kawamuratc]

If your capital is inland you miss out on the wealth that ports will give you

And access to the water for purposes of movement.

That’s the sort of thing that’s a real historical trade off. I don’t understand the issue, OP?

 

[kgptzac]

Trying to optimize for plague resistance to the exclusion of wealth from ports is exactly the kind of tradeoff that good game design should encourage. This is absolutely not something that needs a "solution".

Except it's not a balanced tradeoff. I am not talking about giving away coastal counties, I am talking about owning them but moving my capital in-land. Within this context, there is very little reason to have my capital on a coastal county. 1 extra gold in tax and the potential of higher development increase absolutely do not offset the frequent danger of my entire court catching the plague.

So yeah, I'm keeping the wealth anyway, so the coastal counties need some change in this context to make this choice meaningful.

 

[William the Merry]

Except it's not a balanced tradeoff. I am not talking about giving away coastal counties, I am talking about owning them but moving my capital in-land. Within this context, there is very little reason to have my capital on a coastal county. 1 extra gold in tax and the potential of higher development increase absolutely do not offset the frequent danger of my entire court catching the plague.

So yeah, I'm keeping the wealth anyway, so the coastal counties need some change in this context to make this choice meaningful.

Its not frequent if you build hospices or isolate the capital