Broken Colony Mechanics

[DominusNovus]

I'm thinking that the game could stand to have some more differentiation between various levels and modes of governmental organization better, and distinguish between them better. I made a suggestion a month or so ago that Europen tags could really stand to distinguish between more feudal personal states and the more institutional bureacratic states that they evolved into. Similarly, the tribal nations need a bit more distinguishing.

What that looks like, and whether its within the scope of what is left in the development of EU4, I don't know. But I do like the distinction that Vicky3 will have regarding different types of states.

 

[evilcat]

Some walkarounds:

• Focus on caraiben and south america
• focus on Asia Trade or African gold
• Pick Quantity or Offensive (or both) and park some armies in colonial region
• Strike first, and grow your colony on corpses of natives
• Really strike first to set peacetimer with nearby natives. Take gold, war reps, break alliance.
• Set messeger option for pop up when war is declared upon subject
• Use enforce peace to join the war. You can also declare war for reconquest.
• Send subsidies so colonies can colonize, and build them some buildings. Also pay off their debt.

There are ways to play with it. What is working best is focusing on gold from Africa and conquering malaca region as trade company.
Unfortunetly new world colonies are hopeless no matter investment from player side, they are still weak.
Also enforce peace is not working. I have 80k, natives 20k and they resist enforce peace.
Natives are suicidal, no matter the strenght of overlord they will attack colonies.

 

[Marquoz]

Unfortunetly new world colonies are hopeless no matter investment from player side, they are still weak.
Also enforce peace is not working. I have 80k, natives 20k and they resist enforce peace.
Natives are suicidal, no matter the strenght of overlord they will attack colonies.

Which is great. You want them to attack, and you want Enforce Peace to give you leadership of the war, not force a status quo peace. New World colonies are far from "hopeless." If you have any skill at combat, colonizing North America has never been easier. Check out this ironman screenshot from my 1.33 Castile game around 1550:

Every time a tribe or federation attacked, I annexed 15-20 provinces. My colonial nations exploded in size, wealth, and power--and so did I. My map of colonial America is about 200 years ahead of where it should be historically because things are too easy now, not too hard.

 

[MachopPower69]

Does anyone know how CoP causes the natives to be ultrapowerful? How did 1.33 cause natives to only be threatening if you have the certain dlc on? It doesn't feel like the bridges are connected right.

 

[L-Histidine]

Enforce peace seemingly never working* is annoying sometimes, but it's not specific to natives.

*it almost feels intended as a pretext for intervening in someone else's war

 

[MachopPower69]

Enforce peace seemingly never working* is annoying sometimes, but it's not specific to natives.

*it almost feels intended as a pretext for intervening in someone else's war

It also doesn't work when you are at peace with the natives but they aren't with your colonies. 1.34 should carry the truces over when a colony is made.

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

Does anyone know how CoP causes the natives to be ultrapowerful? How did 1.33 cause natives to only be threatening if you have the certain dlc on? It doesn't feel like the bridges are connected right.

Conquest of paradise allows federations.
This basically creates massive alliance chains that can slowly unify into superstates. There is a bug currently that allows them to take possession of any tribal land (even owned by other nations) when unifying.

1.33 tuned up the general aggressiveness of the AI. This caused the natives to jump on many colonial nations (maybe due to their low force limits and lack of alliances)

 

[Republic of Mercury]

Does anyone know how CoP causes the natives to be ultrapowerful? How did 1.33 cause natives to only be threatening if you have the certain dlc on? It doesn't feel like the bridges are connected right.

In addition to what Lykus Cerebros said, there's also the way that the tribal land mechanics let them grow much faster than before with tribal development, and effectively colonise much faster when they settle down.

 

[MachopPower69]

In addition to what Lykus Cerebros said, there's also the way that the tribal land mechanics let them grow much faster than before with tribal development, and effectively colonise much faster when they settle down.

Yeah, I can easily see that issue. Icepyre made a video on how OP tribes are with him conquering all of America as Creek from federation blobbing. Federations shouldn't form more federations and instead disable the feature after forming it. You don't form Rome over and over again, do you?

 

[Republic of Mercury]

You don't form Rome over and over again, do you?

uh

Spoiler

 

[MachopPower69]

uh

Spoiler

View attachment 841040

Serbia and Bulgaria?

 

[Republic of Mercury]

Serbia and Bulgaria?

Bulgaria

The Bulgarian claim, which predated that of Russia, was based on the fact that Simeon 1 of Bulgaria was crowned Byzantine Tsar in 913 AD and was given the title “Emperor and Autocrat of all Bulgarians and Romans”. However, this title was revoked by the succeeding Byzantine government although he did continue to receive some recognition as “Emperor of the Bulgarians”. In the 14th century, as the Byzantine Empire weakened, Tarnovo, the capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire, was claimed as the “Third Rome”, based on its preeminent cultural influence in Eastern Europe. However, by the end of the century the Bulgarian Empire had fallen to the Ottomans.

Between 1345 and 1371, the Serbian monarch was self-titled emperor (tsar). The full title was initially Emperor of the Serbs and Greeks,[a] later Emperor of the Serbs and Greeks and Bulgarianshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emperor_of_the_Serbs#cite_note-2 in Serbian and basileus and autokrator of Serbia and Romania ["the land of the Romans"][c] in Greek.

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

uh

Spoiler

View attachment 841040

That map is clearly fake since it doesnt include Luxembourg xD
As rulers of the HRE they have a good claim.

 

[Putuna]

The funny thing is that players seem to think natives being mostly conquered by 1700 should somehow be the default/expected state without working to accomplish it. In reality, NA natives remained a problem to the colony (and later USA) until well after the game's timeline, with conflicts against them inflicting more casualties than most US conflicts other than civil war + world wars.

The natives did not inflict more casualties on America then the civil war and the world wars, I don't even know where your getting that information from. The reality is these conflicts were actually quite small. The two largest conflicts being the The French and Indian war caused 1,500 "American" casualties from conflict and King Phillips war caused 3000. Fighting natives in North America did not result in large battles involving thousands of men instead they small were quite small skirmishes. The conflicts between the Spanish and Indians in Mexico was different and did involved very large pitched battles. However they go more against your argument as Spain conquered the entire Aztec empire with 800 Spanish soldiers. So if you want to argue historically Europe should be able to send a 1k stack and conquer the entire aztecs empire and take Mexico.

The colonies after being founded were pretty much on their own and used militia forces to beat the Indians in small battles with regular soldiers really only ever coming over when fighting other European powers in the area.
The later Indian wars after Eu4s timeline were even smaller and extremely one sided and irrelevant to eu4.

So from a historical argument the current North America situation is even more unrealistic then prior when while colonizing sometimes the natives attack and burn your colony.......

 

[VectorTheGreat]

Colony AI always being dumb. They sometimes don't expand their regions. They sit AFK or expand to other regions. Likewise, they don't want to create claim their native border countries.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

The natives did not inflict more casualties on America then the civil war and the world wars, I don't even know where your getting that information from.

That's why I noted those wars as exceptions.

The two largest conflicts being the The French and Indian war caused 1,500 "American" casualties from conflict and King Phillips war caused 3000. Fighting natives in North America did not result in large battles involving thousands of men instead they small were quite small skirmishes.

Yes, but there were a large number of said skirmishes over > 100 years, much of which happened after the EU 4 end date. Also a lot of civilian casualties, which other than the civil war wasn't really a thing for most US wars because they were not on US soil.

So from a historical argument the current North America situation is even more unrealistic then prior when while colonizing sometimes the natives attack and burn your colony.......

Earlier patches would see nearly every native gone by early 1700s, so no. It's not consistent to claim that something that didn't happen in history is ahistorical while also claiming that something that didn't happen in history is fine/better. Neither of these outcomes were "plausible".

 

[L-Histidine]

I'll note the paper that Wikipedia cited for the King Philip's War casualties:

"Weltering in their own blood": puritan casualties in King Philip's War​

Recent scholarship has underscored the carnage inflicted by King Philip's War (1675-76). Colonists faced a diverse assortment of Native Americans led by Wampanoag sachem Metacom (whom the colonists referred to as King Philip). In terms of population, King Philip's War was the bloodiest conflict in American history. Fifty-two English towns were attacked, a dozen were destroyed, and more than 2,500 colonists died--perhaps 30% of the English population of New England. At least twice as many Native Americans were killed. Some historians estimate that the combined effects of war, disease, and starvation killed half the Native population of the region.

(for reference, going by the WP infobox figures, 2,500 is about the level of US deaths listed on WP for the entire 2001-21 Afghanistan war, 8.5 times those from the Gulf War, 6.5 times the Spanish–American War, 60% of the Philippine–American war, and 36% of the American Revolutionary War; albeit the figures quoted in this sentence are only battle deaths, with the American revolutionaries apparently having 2.5 times as many disease deaths as KIA)


Re. saying that 800 Spaniards conquered the Aztec Empire: like, aside from the fact that this may be 1/3rd the actual figure and may be lower than the Spanish deaths at La Noche Triste alone, as usual tens and hundreds of thousands of native allies get written out of existence...

 

[Ryagi]

Heya folks, popping into this thread to let you know we hear and appreciate your feedback on this matter.
We'll also continue to monitor this thread, so if you have any additional constructive and respectful feedback do feel free to share.

Thanks all

 

[deretao]

People, i know its easy for human players to conquer NA. What I wanna know is why the AI are not succeding and if this will be fixed in new patches.

Also, american natives were not eliminated by the colonizers. Sure ocurred genocides in whole america but the natives, in diverse government forms, managed to survive. In central america most turned out to be integrated. In south america, some were integrated and some still live isolated in the forests and mountais. In north america some managed to get agreements with US and GB governments.
All history about american natives x colonizers is very rich and interesting. However, i do not expect this game, at least not this version (europa universalis FOUR; maybe in the next generation of this game we may see it) to consider all the variations that history have. What was not common was natives having cannons and using it to conquer capitals and big cities. Sure the native resistance was very stubborn in the vasts interiors of whole americas, and its not like the invaders were eager to kill as many natives as they get contact. What happened in most cases was invaders attacking and killing natives in strategic positions/landmasses (where the important resources, arable lands, coastal lands and borders of the colonies were). In south america, for example, the amazonia jungle was barely touched for centuries, until the 19th, 20th and the 21st centuries, when colonizers of the colonial empires and later colonizers of independent countries started to invade tribes and create new villages.

Before all this changes, it was very unfun to play with native americans. They were simply too dumb and limited. But now, they are getting too powerfull for the AI, and we need to find some middle ground where natives can still have the possibility to grow and beat the colonizers, but most of them should, one way or other, fall to the colonizers.
Its not about history only. Its about playability.

UK and France are having hard times establishing colonial empires. Asia, except the uncolonized lands, is having none or little trouble with dealing the european invaders. The game is lacking some differentiations between all the government forms and all the cultures. By now, all of the countries are ending the game rich, industrialized and with the same techs. Is not just ahistorical, its not fun either.

PDX, i´m starting to miss the Westernization decision. And i hated that mechanic while it existed.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

People, i know its easy for human players to conquer NA. What I wanna know is why the AI are not succeding

AI management of naval logistics is not sufficient to beat another AI of same skill that does not have to manage naval logistics, even if it would otherwise have a large advantage.

The AI also has poor understanding of colony management.

Also, right now there are bugs with federations stealing land w/o war + bug with truces, and the AI can't/doesn't know how play around those bugs. That these should be fixed is uncontroversial, I hope.

if this will be fixed in new patches.

Probably not, they've tried on and off for many patches. It's improved somewhat, but still nowhere near comparable to its ability to march on land.

This is similar to the reason Portugal never makes serious headway against Kilwa, and that Europeans can't press an objectively large advantage against Indian nations even during the windows in the game where those are most meaningful.

But now, they are getting too powerfull for the AI, and we need to find some middle ground where natives can still have the possibility to grow and beat the colonizers, but most of them should, one way or other, fall to the colonizers.

This preference has been stated many times over the years on EU 4 forums, but it has yet to be backed by reasons that make said preference coherent.

Why "should" most of them fall to colonizers? I have yet to hear an answer that does not have bizarre implications on EU 4's rules as a whole and imply forced/shoehorned outcomes generally.

The fact of the matter is that if the Europeans were actually the inept imbeciles that the AI is consistently in EU 4 when it comes to intercontinental logistics, then the western hemisphere would never have been held, same for India and East Indies. While the methods the Spanish used to conquer Mexico/Peru were awful, they were also not something the game could replicate, or even model. A human might ally one Indian nation and get it to betray others to make conquest easier. The AI though?

Its not about history only. Its about playability.

You can say that all you like but without something like machine learning AI (which would outplay you with sufficient training and make the game unwinnable) it's probably not feasible. You'd have to alter the game's rule structure from the ground up, to the point of making a new game.

You'd also have to come up with a way for Asian countries to progress/succeed in a way they did not historically, that still makes sense in the game model. If you can't, you wind up exchanging one set of ahistorical rules for another (because for example the game allows Bharat to hold Spain and culture drift to Spanish, after which their tech restriction just for being "Asian" would be...awkward).