Norrefeldt said:
1. I can agree with your figure for how often OE should take Thrace in time. The only thing I know is that they tend to do this often too. Estabishing how often OE "succeeds" with any kind of statistical accuracy will take a lot of testing.
True, but based on my limited observations, the chances that it's only happening <10% of the time is pretty small. The p value here would be pretty microscopic. I've just seen Egypt or the Sheep or Venice grab Thrace too many times for it to really be working well.
Norrefeldt said:
I don't have the formula for such things but as you know from election polls you need to ask a lot of people to get a 95% certainty (that's standard) for that your presented result is true.
Let's not get too hung up on
poll/election discrepancy there. (Warning: link contains spin.)
Norrefeldt said:
I don't mean we should be that strict, but running five hands-off might give a result thats we can say is true with 80% certainty and if so, within +/- 5%. Establishing a change from 80% outcome to a 90% outcome is even harder, since we would deal with to uncertain results. We should keep this in mind, even if we don't calculate on it.
I'm very (more than 90%) confident we currently do not have a 90+% probablility of capture of Thrace. It's unlikely that would be true if we currently had 80+% capture, although it's possible. But either way, I'm more than 90% sure changes are needed.
Norrefeldt said:
I do think that the main reason for a weak OE is not here, but that they have a better chance if they take it. Clearing out all turkish neighbours and getting Egypt seems to be the big problems.
I agree. My proposed Egypt events will help there. So will weakening the sheep and/or keeping them away from Egypt. So will giving Egypt a more stable starting alliance. So will causing the capture of Constantinople to lower TUR/MAM relations. So will giving the Ottomans an AI that concentrates on Anatolia and the Mamelukes for a while. I have suggested all of these things.
But really, this is apropos of nothing. We're talking about Thrace, and we both agree that it should be captured by the Ottomans in a timely fashion 90+% of the time. So the above is a separate issue.
Norrefeldt said:
2. By forcing stuff we chose a historical probability over another one. Concidering all possible historical circumstances, we can say that an ally of OE would not give up Constantinople in perhaps 10% of the times it happened in the game. (The ally might be stronger than OE, or stubborn etc.) By writing events that cede Thrcae to OE if taken by a vassal we decide that this possibility doesn't matter, thus reducing the game's value IMO a bit. It is better if Thrace can be taken and kept by allies, but most people shouldn't see it happen.
I agree that 10% chance of a Turkish ally holding Constantinople is reasonable. If we gave allys a "C" option as well (perhaps "bribe the Turks to appease their wrath"?) the probability of a choice other than "A" is pretty close to 10%.
Contrast that with the current situation, where an ally capturing Thrace leads to them holding onto it for 50+ years the majority of the time.
Norrefeldt said:
The same thing is true for someone snatching Constantinople, we decide that the possibility for someone recapturing after having lost it temporarily to OE is not worth our conciderations.
If you want to allow for "rapid recapture" during that war using flags, that's fine. Or give the AI a "b" option to continue fighting, that's OK too I guess. My problem is that I feel that in this particular case, it's far too likely for the OE to capture and hold Thrace, but settle for ducats in peace because of a spate of naval losses. This is especially a problem with human players, who can abuse the slow siege of Thrace (medium fort) to rack up warscore in Rumelia, Bulgaria, and Macedonia. This is hardly realistic.
Norrefeldt said:
3.-4. I agree. As usual people are very prone to hitting hard with setting straight things that went wrong, instead of the time consuming and harder way of trying to fix the problem in a smooth way before they happen. Exceptions can be made, but we should never do them unless other, normal, routes have been tried.
To me, "hitting hard" would me more like what was originally suggested - a straight province secession. Or what Daywalker has - forced war combined with a big bonus army for the Turks. I have justified every step I've taken on historical grounds ; your strongest objection seems to be that I haven't allowed for a 10% "out" clause at every step.
Moreover, I feel like I'm the only one proposing any real alternatives, even though I'm the one who's happy with what I wrote. Which is a bit odd, at least.
Norrefeldt said:
I don't think it would be a great hack to have an event for OE establishing it's capital 1500 in Thrace. Some sort of "weak" event can be made here. It would still be a big boost compared to pre-Ottoman times.
So a sort of weakened CoMD event that can trigger later? Sure, that would be fine. It should move the barracks, too. That said, this does not really address my concerns
Norrefeldt said:
"Economic reforms of Mehmed" trigger elsewhere or later sounds worse, I don't suggest it.
Agreed; moreover the revised CoT event takes care of much of the problem.
Norrefeldt said:
doktarr said:
Could these events cause problems for players who were not aware of them (for example, if they are trying to manipulate the interaction between two AI nations)? If so, how often, and would these problems be realistic?
Yes. Many AGCEEP players dont read the event files. Some find them hard to understand, some prefer not to know.
A player assuming normal rules work here (in vanilla you
never lose a province unless you lose it in a war)
Heh. Don't play China much, do you.
Oh, you wanted secession in a war, based on province controls? Note Hungary.
We also have these events all over the place in the AGCEEP, including some places where you are forced to secede a province while at peace, despite having control of it. (Formation of Holland comes to mind).
Yes, these events can surprise someone who does not read the files, in Vanilla as well as in the AGCEEP.
Norrefeldt said:
would probably get pissed off if he loses Constantinople just like that. I think this kind of scripting is pretty horrible, and should really be a last case, since it seems people want to use it.
Are you suggestiong we re-evaluate the Netherlands events, forcing every province to revolt before it is seceded?
Are you suggesting removing all the new Russian events, despite Bash's insistence that Russia fought not one single battle between capturing Kazan and capturing Astrakhan?
Would you suggest removing the Inca events that force them to secede provinces to Spain?
And so on, and so on? There are a LOT of events like this in the mod. I think that every case I mention above passes the tests of the mission statement.
We wrote a mission statement for a reason. If you have a problem with these events, you should address it in the context of how the mission statement was ignored.
Norrefeldt said:
The other events are punishing players that use the stupid AI for getting Thrace. I think the allies events should only happen to nations much smaller than OE, introducing a size trigger. A strong nation should not cede it at once.
But the OE should definitley not remain their allies (at least 85+% of the time). Unfotunately we lack a breakalliance command.
If you want to change the triggers on the "case1" and "case2" events I suggested, so that large allies like AK or Egypt don't give it back, and in stead become Turkish rivals, that would be fine by me. If this is done, giving AK a more stable initial alliance (or reducing their relations with the Ottomans to the regular 125) becomes more important. As it stands, they often become Turkish allies early on.
Norrefeldt said:
I don't think we can make such an AI file, since there is no way the AI can focus on a province, only a nation. We would have to make one AI file for each case: one if Thrace is owned by Karaman, one if it's owned by Venice etc.
According to Toio's new findings, you can influence DoWs by what is in the expansion regions. So if TUR's only expansion region was an area that contained only owned provinces and Thrace, and TUR had nobody (except Byzantium) on their hitlist, and we reduced relations between TUR and the owner of Thrace, then I
think this would cause the Ottomans to go after Thrace pretty regularly. But I'm not sure.
Norrefeldt said:
Having too many exception can scare people away, since we move further and further away from the vanilla game. The changes in HYW (combined with Mongolia and RL) was what made IB not wanting to put down much time in the mod.
But presumably the Dutch revolts are fine in his book
I agree that Mongolia is a joke right now. The problem is that nobody wants to work on it. The haters just want it removed, and the backers want it kept for some later date when the trans-PTI links are added. I really feel like I'm the only person who's looked at the situation as it stands and tried to make it work. I've suggested more changes that help. Perhaps I should submit them.
I agree that the HYW is a bit too forced. We could probably ease off the secessions and still have it work well. It seems to me that Frace succeeds an acceptable percentage of the time, but they tend to succeed too quickly. I've never been involved in that debate. It's worth noting that most of the HYW sequence was brought in from the French forum without a ton of critique.
Norrefeldt said:
doktarr said:
I do think there should be some way to "flag" a submission for additional debate without bringing it up to a HC vote, but currently I don't think there is.
I think this is needed as well. I remember we discussed it for aome other matter, where almoravid finally cut down the submission to something agreed on by all. I have the same problem with Neuro's submission for Ducal Prussia, where I have commented a week ago. Neuro hasn't been here since he submitted it, and hence that submission will not be changed. Sure I can raise a vote for it, but it would be more constructive to just keep it on hold until things are cleared out. But after all, my questions are almost old enough to be submitted as well, as a add-on to Neuros'.
I suggest that a HC member can keep things on hold for one full release, unless another HC member disagrees. In that case it's probably better to vote. Any discussion on this should go into the agenda thread, and I will repost this comment there.
All this sounds fine by me.