A Vassal with -200AE against me: Can I ever annex?

[Hans Lemurson]

So I reduced the Ottomans to a pathetic rump-state over decades of war and conquest, and finally I made them my vassals. The only problem is that they have a -200 Aggressive Expansion penalty against me. By my estimates it will take ~50 years for them to forgive me enough to accept annexation.

Is there any way to speed up the loss of AE points in vassals?

Would I have been better-off annexing then re-releasing them as a fresh country?

 

[IZob]

Yes, you probably would have been better off annexing them.
The AE can be reduced by giving gifts, RM, improving relations, etc...
It is meant to take a long time if the AE is very high.

Would I have been better-off annexing then re-releasing them as a fresh country?

Good question ...

 

[MDEthan]

as far as i know, better relation modifier is the only way to speed up negative opinions recovery.
So if possible, take religion idea tree, hire 30% better relation overtime advisor. a -200 AE will take more than 20 years even if you have all the positive modifier buff.
So... i think ... yeah .... you would have been better off annexing them then release.

 

[Hans Lemurson]

I'm going to savescum and try peace both ways to see what the differing effects are.

 

[Chieron]

Re-releasing probably would have ended in a huge, hard to annex vassal, getting some provinces you already integrated..
200AE take some time to digest, but they'll be gone eventually (unless you continue to add to the pile at the same rate)

 

[Hans Lemurson]

I also just realized that you get major bonus-points for "Returned Province" when you fight a war to give them their cores back, which was the entire POINT of wanting the Ottomans as Vassals in the first place. Still, I'm committed to following through on this research.

 

[mozgriken]

So I reduced the Ottomans to a pathetic rump-state over decades of war and conquest, and finally I made them my vassals. The only problem is that they have a -200 Aggressive Expansion penalty against me. By my estimates it will take ~50 years for them to forgive me enough to accept annexation.

Is there any way to speed up the loss of AE points in vassals?

Would I have been better-off annexing then re-releasing them as a fresh country?

If you have conquered/cored alot of their provinces previously, releasing them as annexed vassal will return the claimed land. In any event, releasing the vassal as the same nation you just conquered still incurs AE. The best way out I've found is to release the previously-nonexistent culture vassals, which will have high relations towards you + your govt & rel type.

Edit - the best way out of the -200 penalty is the advisor who gives better relations over time.

 

[Wolfmaster1979]

I also just realized that you get major bonus-points for "Returned Province" when you fight a war to give them their cores back, which was the entire POINT of wanting the Ottomans as Vassals in the first place. Still, I'm committed to following through on this research.

Please let us know what you find, I am curious

 

[DDRJake]

If you Annex Ottomans, they will lose all cores they have on non-Turkish-cultured lands, meaning you'd probably rather have them vassalised.

 

[hauptman]

prestige at 100 = 100% better relations over time.

advisor can give +30%

Religious idea end bonus, also 100% ROT.

With all 3 modifiers, AE will decay at 7.7 per year. 200, It may be 20 to 30 years before it will be low enough to get 190 relations. That really isnt that long especially if you need a few wars to get all their land back.

Annexing and releasing does not wipe pre existing AE (i've tried).

It's only 2 stab to dow your own vassal... and just annex, that's faster to recover than 30 years of waiting.

Edit to add; yes returning provinces is HUGE but caps at 200, so returning maybe 5 provinces could negate all the ae.

 

[necro_vore]

prestige at 100 = 100% better relations over time.

advisor can give +30%

Religious idea end bonus, also 100% ROT.

With all 3 modifiers, AE will decay at 7.7 per year. 200, It may be 20 to 30 years before it will be low enough to get 190 relations. That really isnt that long especially if you need a few wars to get all their land back.

Annexing and releasing does not wipe pre existing AE (i've tried).

It's only 2 stab to dow your own vassal... and just annex, that's faster to recover than 30 years of waiting.

Edit to add; yes returning provinces is HUGE but caps at 200, so returning maybe 5 provinces could negate all the ae.

Exactly, it's not too hard. I do this fairly often. Oirat Horde had so many provinces that didn't have cores of anyone else that I had no choice but to rack up -200+ AE to cut them down to size. Now I force-vassalized their remaining 4 provinces. You have 10 years anyway until you can begin integrating, so with Religious idea and prestige I lose around 6 AE per year. That's already 60 down, 140 to go. Another -15 for "Have CB" and -25 for "Wrong religion" (or the other way round) and you look at having to overcome -170 negative relations.

Sounds like a lot, but that's easily offset by:
Vassal +50
Returned cores +100 (can go up to 200 but I didn't have enough cores to return)
Gift +25
Improve relations +200 (it goes up to 200 for vassals)
Total +375. Done.