Aztec Fury

[Fishdabaz]

In 1573, all of Europe was overcome by an inexplicably intense hatred of the Aztecs, a barely documented American empire with which no European state had any history of direct diplomatic contact. The kingdoms of western Europe knew that as the primary colonizers and naval powers, the responsibility fell upon their shoulders to deal with this outrageous empire once and for all. Over 85 thousand men from Portugal, Spain, Spanish West Indies, Caraibas, England, Brabant, Newfoundland, and Munster were transported across the Atlantic ocean and the Caribbean Sea in an unprecedented amphibious invasion, the largest since Marathon and unmatched until the Gallipoli campaign of 1915. Their comrades in Europe such as France and Austria of course supported their best buddies wholeheartedly and never exploited the fact that over 50% of their neighbours' military forces were away from home - after all, the Aztecs might have stood a chance if the Europeans hadn't remained uncharacteristically united.

Oddly enough, the Aztec leadership fell apart even before the war had officially been lost: the emperor, in a fit of rage, simply walked away from the battlefield, never to be seen again.

tl;dr I got destroyed in my first game of AoW because of annoying silliness and ended up rage quitting the session. Something needs to be done about the Europeans' abilities to project military power into the New World mainland - it's at a-historically unrealistic levels right now.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Much too slow. Your aiming point for Aztec westernization is still pre-1550, and that's *finishing* it, not starting. This includes a substantial presence in the Caribbean, using the trade to bankroll 15+ heavy ships and lock down the node.

It isn't easy though, I admit.

 

[Fishdabaz]

My playstyle is semi-RP. I try to play as I think my current ruler would (if they also happened to be somewhat lucky).

In pre-emptive defence just in case: though I don't subscribe to the min-max efficient school of play, please don't think that discredits my thread - my points are still just as valid.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

My playstyle is semi-RP. I try to play as I think my current ruler would (if they also happened to be somewhat lucky).

In pre-emptive defence just in case: though I don't subscribe to the min-max efficient school of play, please don't think that discredits my thread - my points are still just as valid.

In the world of role play, the Aztecs didn't make it . You're playing a game that lets a combined European alliance attack you with 50000 soldiers or more. I can tell you what you need to win, but it's up to you to decide what you want to do for fun.

 

[uishax]

My playstyle is semi-RP. I try to play as I think my current ruler would (if they also happened to be somewhat lucky).

In pre-emptive defence just in case: though I don't subscribe to the min-max efficient school of play, please don't think that discredits my thread - my points are still just as valid.

'semi-rp' Are you kidding me? You got exactly what you deserved then, 'roleplaying' as a nation that got annihilated.
The army quantities may be a bit much, but that's compensating for the fact that no plague ravaged you.

The only way for Aztecs to have survived in history is if they have some supreme-genius-unbroken-lineage of god-kings, you better play like one if you want to survive.

 

[Kyoumen]

tl;dr I got destroyed in my first game of AoW because of annoying silliness and ended up rage quitting the session. Something needs to be done about the Europeans' abilities to project military power into the New World mainland - it's at annoyingly unrealistic levels right now.

If you want to complain about that so much, then you should also be asking for the realistic effects of smallpox and other diseases to be hitting your Aztec Empire - that is to say, a series of unavoidable DHEs that destroy your army, manpower, and social structure over decades with absolutely nothing you can do about it. You will lose provinces (which will spontaneously form colonisable empty provinces as everyone dies or flees), your rulers will spontaneously die within months of taking the throne, and since you're the Aztecs, you will also have extremely high revolt risk and all your neighbours attacking you the moment the chance arises.

But realism wouldn't be very fun in that case, so I'm glad the New World isn't realistic in that way.

Playing in the New World just isn't the easiest thing in the game. It's already much, much easier than it would have been for the Aztec Empire to survive in real life. How easy is it supposed to be, exactly?

In any case, if your description is accurate, you had bad luck that it was so unusually late by the time you had contact with Europe - I was westernised and converted to Reformed as Inca by about 1530, and allied with Castille to boot. Bad luck happens sometimes. In a more normal scenario where you encounter Portugal six decades earlier, the same thing won't happen.

Finally, the game engine simply can't handle how European explorers and conquistadors worked in real life. It also can't really handle the vast size of the American continents and their enormous frontier. Because it can't, it is therefore possible to have many more troops there than existed in real life. If you want Paradox to stop that, then you'd better also suggest how Spain should be able to have a good chance of conquering your Aztecs with a tiny handful of troops - like they did to the Aztecs and Incas in real life.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

In any case, if your description is accurate, you had bad luck that it was so unusually late by the time you had contact with Europe - I was westernised and converted to Reformed as Inca by about 1530, and allied with Castille to boot. Bad luck happens sometimes. In a more normal scenario where you encounter Portugal six decades earlier, the same thing won't happen.

To be fair, Inca's ruler is kind of good. Aztec's starting ruler is solid enough but nothing like Inca's and they're cursed by a 0 ADM heir they need to lose in a bad way. Without significant luck Aztec can't tech as quickly as Inca...even with it generally.

Your compensating factor is fast access to the Caribbean, even one province + collect trade there is a difference of several ducats. If you don't want to rely on the luck of the draw of Europe declaring on you, the ability to bankroll early carracks to win at sea is one of your only realistic options.

However, getting there is tight because of the crappy heir. Missions for monarch points + balancing in vassal feeding + annexation (but not waiting so long autonomy stays high when you need the money and naval FL) aren't as easy as you imply; an experienced player can do it easily enough but not someone who's not well-versed in the mechanics and execution.

 

[Fishdabaz]

I'm not saying I expected to triumph - indeed, I expected to lose the first war or few before ultimately westernizing (it makes for a better story that way). But I was expecting to get attacked by Spain or Portugal - worst case scenario both - in numbers and via means that make sense for the era. I certainly wasn't expecting the prequel to D-Day.

I think the game would benefit from mechanics simulating the means by which the actual conquistadors operated. Perhaps conquistador leaders could have an ability to support and boost rebel power in the province they're in? Perhaps conquistadors could have some means of plundering provinces for "gold"?

And honestly, I completely agree that the European plagues should be represented in the game. Could you imagine properly simulated dynamic spread of disease in the game (perhaps with an accompanying disease spread mapmode)? That'd be very interesting to deal with. To avoid pissing off the majority of ROTW players though, I imagine some sort of a-historical ability to acquire immunity (inter-marry everyone in your tribe with Old World peoples to acquire immunity? Hope that by some miracle a member of your tribe spontaneously invents vaccination hundreds of years early?) would have to be included.

 

[uishax]

I'm not saying I expected to triumph - indeed, I expected to lose the first war or few before ultimately westernizing (it makes for a better story that way). But I was expecting to get attacked by Spain or Portugal - worst case scenario both - in numbers and via means that make sense for the era. I certainly wasn't expecting the prequel to D-Day.

I think the game would benefit from mechanics simulating the means by which the actual conquistadors operated. Perhaps conquistador leaders could have an ability to support and boost rebel power in the province they're in? Perhaps conquistadors could have some means of plundering provinces for "gold"?

And honestly, I completely agree that the European plagues should be represented in the game. Could you imagine properly simulated dynamic spread of disease in the game (perhaps with an accompanying disease spread mapmode)? That'd be very interesting to deal with. To avoid pissing off the majority of ROTW players though, I imagine some sort of a-historical ability to acquire immunity (inter-marry everyone in your tribe with Old World peoples to acquire immunity? Hope that by some miracle a member of your tribe spontaneously invents vaccination hundreds of years early?) would have to be included.

'To avoid pissing off the majority of ROTW players though'
Lel? Only the American natives have issues with diseases, Euroasia was long in contact with each other and acquired immunity already, Africa is even tougher than Euroasia. No body is getting pissed off except you.
They are not going to bother designing a separate system for diseases, its not controllable by the players and not fun as well, the difficulty for Americans in the period is pretty well represented by the game, and the abstraction is suitable enough for a insignificant region.

 

[Kyoumen]

I'm not saying I expected to triumph - indeed, I expected to lose the first war or few before ultimately westernizing (it makes for a better story that way). But I was expecting to get attacked by Spain or Portugal - worst case scenario both - in numbers and via means that make sense for the era. I certainly wasn't expecting the prequel to D-Day.

I think the game would benefit from mechanics simulating the means by which the actual conquistadors operated. Perhaps conquistador leaders could have an ability to support and boost rebel power in the province they're in? Perhaps conquistadors could have some means of plundering provinces for "gold"?

Okay, well let's put it this way. Since what actually happened to the Inca and Aztec empires in real life was that they were conquered by freelance Spanish explorers working without any real backing who then handed them over to the Spanish crown, how would you want that to work for a Mesoamerican empire you're playing in the game? How would it happen, what could you do to defend against it, and why would you most likely lose (since that's what happened in real life, so such a mechanic has to work for European Coloniser X at least half of the time)?

I mean, what happened to you in the game sucks, to be sure. But you still outlasted the historical Aztec Empire, and more to the point, what mechanic can replace ahistorical large European amphibious invasions and still have the desired result of it become likely (but not certain) for Europe to conquer Mesoamerica?

And honestly, I completely agree that the European plagues should be represented in the game. Could you imagine properly simulated dynamic spread of disease in the game (perhaps with an accompanying disease spread mapmode)? That'd be very interesting to deal with. To avoid pissing off the majority of ROTW players though, I imagine some sort of a-historical ability to acquire immunity (inter-marry everyone in your tribe with Old World peoples to acquire immunity? Hope that by some miracle a member of your tribe spontaneously invents vaccination hundreds of years early?) would have to be included.

Mostly the problem with that, though, is the unavoidability of it. It would make surviving in the New World as much about luck as anything, and it'd repeatedly cripple even Westernised native empires (barring an ahistorical immunity as you say, but people would rightly complain about the ahistoricalness of it, and demand that the ROTW, including Europe, be able to cure the plague and provide immunity to those events, et cetera).

Also, Paradox tends to avoid the most sordid and awful parts of history, which is why the game doesn't really touch upon the slave trade in any meaningful way.

 

[Thrake]

In 1573, all of Europe was overcome by an inexplicably intense hatred of the Aztecs, a barely documented American empire with which no European state had any history of direct diplomatic contact. The kingdoms of western Europe knew that as the primary colonizers and naval powers, the responsibility fell upon their shoulders to deal with this outrageous empire once and for all. Over 60 thousand men from Portugal, Spain, Spanish West Indies, Caraibas, England, Brabant, Newfoundland, and Munster were transported across the Atlantic ocean and the Caribbean Sea in an unprecedented amphibious invasion, the largest since Marathon and unmatched until the Gallipoli campaign of 1915. Their comrades in Europe such as France and Austria of course supported their best buddies wholeheartedly and never exploited the fact that over 50% of their neighbours' military forces were away from home - after all, the Aztecs might have stood a chance if the Europeans hadn't remained uncharacteristically united.

Oddly enough, the Aztec leadership fell apart even before the war had officially been lost: the emperor, in a fit of rage, simply walked away from the battlefield, never to be seen again.

tl;dr I got destroyed in my first game of AoW because of annoying silliness and ended up rage quitting the session. Something needs to be done about the Europeans' abilities to project military power into the New World mainland - it's at annoyingly unrealistic levels right now.

I sympathize here. Simply put, every tough start relies somehow on luck. If you're Trebizond, you'll have to hope not for an early DOW of the Ottomans before you could get anything,... I also had my share of ragequits as the Aztecs and I still remember long after when somehow the Brits thought I were some evil mastermind lurking in the shadows who needed to be wiped out and how Portugal and Castille both answered its CTA. As pointed above though, westernizing is clearly the way to go, if only for the fact that once you're Christian you can effectively conduct diplomacy with Europe rather than being public ennemy #1.

Otherwise, it's usually just one power against you; sometimes they just do nothing and sit in Europe, or another war in Europe distracts them, or it happens to be a tricky war where you need to try your best to hold them off; it's not easy but I've been white peacing at times, or just giving 1 or 2 provinces. I would suspect though that it's a direct consequence of the improved invasion AI that you're facing and that the golden age of the Aztecs is over until perhaps they finally make Europeans aggressive when Castille mainland is not defended by a single regiment, but rather that everyone has been sent in mission in China.

 

[Fishdabaz]

Since what actually happened to the Inca and Aztec empires in real life was that they were conquered by freelance Spanish explorers working without any real backing who then handed them over to the Spanish crown, how would you want that to work for a Mesoamerican empire you're playing in the game?

Given that trade companies, though for the most part independent in real life, are controlled by the player in the game, I imagine the activities of freelance explorers could similarly be abstracted into being under an attacking European player's control. Perhaps conquistador-led armies could have some sort of limited invisibility, requiring a Mesoamerican player to try to hunt them down by following their trail of destruction and revolt (similar to Montezuma's attempts to track down and bring Cortes to Tenochtitlan on his own terms). There could perhaps be a mechanic for a confrontation between the ruler of the Mesoamerican country and the conquistador as that was a key component of the conquests of both Mexico and Peru. Maybe a special "conquistador" CB that requires the attacking country to kill the ruler of the defender? If the ruler is a general then their army must be defeated - if the ruler is not then the capital must be occupied (presumably with a block on the defender teleporting the ruler away to lead a distant army if there are enemy troops in the capital province).

Mostly the problem with that, though, is the unavoidability of it. It would make surviving in the New World as much about luck as anything, and it'd repeatedly cripple even Westernised native empires (barring an ahistorical immunity as you say, but people would rightly complain about the ahistoricalness of it, and demand that the ROTW, including Europe, be able to cure the plague and provide immunity to those events, et cetera).

Also, Paradox tends to avoid the most sordid and awful parts of history, which is why the game doesn't really touch upon the slave trade in any meaningful way.

You make some good points. Perhaps a middle ground could be struck? Maybe a less punishing disease system similar as what's in Crusader Kings 2 could be implemented and used to simulate the spread of the plague through the Americas? It would be pretty handy too: the same system could be used to handle the spread of plagues in the old world as well as the tropical diseases that Europeans have no immunity for in places like Africa.

 

[Umbosch]

In any case, if your description is accurate, you had bad luck that it was so unusually late by the time you had contact with Europe - I was westernised and converted to Reformed as Inca by about 1530, and allied with Castille to boot. Bad luck happens sometimes. In a more normal scenario where you encounter Portugal six decades earlier, the same thing won't happen.

You have reformed Inca 1530 before or with AoW? First look at Fishdabaz map i see the same prob how in my AoW Huron game. In my game NA nativs, Inca- (Cap Horn not explore) and Aztecregion was 1564 not found from europe.

I have no idea how you will in AoW westernised 1530. In the old games no problem. But in AoW?! Only South America eastcost tribes have a chance to do this. I believe i have in Cananda at 1600 a change of bordercontact. The only way is native colonys at Cuba or Guyana. But how will you colonize without tech this distance? Can you pass the Yuca Channel with colonist? I think the only nativs they can handle this are from the converter.

 

[Gunburned]

Did you try to build a navy to stop them from landing? That works well for me on native american starts

 

[uishax]

You have reformed Inca 1530 before or with AoW? First look at Fishdabaz map i see the same prob how in my AoW Huron game. In my game NA nativs, Inca- (Cap Horn not explore) and Aztecregion was 1564 not found from europe.

I have no idea how you will in AoW westernised 1530. In the old games no problem. But in AoW?! Only South America eastcost tribes have a chance to do this. I believe i have in Cananda at 1600 a change of bordercontact. The only way is native colonys at Cuba or Guyana. But how will you colonize without tech this distance? Can you pass the Yuca Channel with colonist? I think the only nativs they can handle this are from the converter.

???
Colonise a westward facing province in the panamas, the colonise ( or conquer) an adjacent, east coast facing one, then go to carribians, done.

 

[Elgato67]

I fully agree with the topic of this post, what you describe makes sense in a Vicky era when the European nations were all "hey guys, lets go gang bang China-cause we're buds" but doesn't really make since for most of EU; European powers were more likely to use natives as catspaws against each other than to team up against them. I will say it is ridiculously unrealistic that Native American nations don't get hit with "Small Pox- lose 3 stability and thousands of manpower" type events, especially around the time of a tribe's first contact.

 

[FreeSoc]

I fully agree with the topic of this post, what you describe makes sense in a Vicky era when the European nations were all "hey guys, lets go gang bang China-cause we're buds" but doesn't really make since for most of EU; European powers were more likely to use natives as catspaws against each other than to team up against them. I will say it is ridiculously unrealistic that Native American nations don't get hit with "Small Pox- lose 3 stability and thousands of manpower" type events, especially around the time of a tribe's first contact.

As I and others have said previously, having Native Americans get decimated by smallpox on first contact only makes sense if you have Europe periodically ravaged by diseases like the plague, which happened in this time period. Otherwise it's just yet another nerf to Native Americans.

 

[Big Blue Blob]

If you want to complain about that so much, then you should also be asking for the realistic effects of smallpox and other diseases to be hitting your Aztec Empire - that is to say, a series of unavoidable DHEs that destroy your army, manpower, and social structure over decades with absolutely nothing you can do about it. You will lose provinces (which will spontaneously form colonisable empty provinces as everyone dies or flees), your rulers will spontaneously die within months of taking the throne, and since you're the Aztecs, you will also have extremely high revolt risk and all your neighbours attacking you the moment the chance arises.

But realism wouldn't be very fun in that case, so I'm glad the New World isn't realistic in that way.

Playing in the New World just isn't the easiest thing in the game. It's already much, much easier than it would have been for the Aztec Empire to survive in real life. How easy is it supposed to be, exactly?

In any case, if your description is accurate, you had bad luck that it was so unusually late by the time you had contact with Europe - I was westernised and converted to Reformed as Inca by about 1530, and allied with Castille to boot. Bad luck happens sometimes. In a more normal scenario where you encounter Portugal six decades earlier, the same thing won't happen.

Finally, the game engine simply can't handle how European explorers and conquistadors worked in real life. It also can't really handle the vast size of the American continents and their enormous frontier. Because it can't, it is therefore possible to have many more troops there than existed in real life. If you want Paradox to stop that, then you'd better also suggest how Spain should be able to have a good chance of conquering your Aztecs with a tiny handful of troops - like they did to the Aztecs and Incas in real life.

Remember that Spain did not really defeat the Aztecs with a few hundred men. Under Cortes' command were thousands of angry natives who hated the Aztecs.

Allowing Spain to recruit native forces, and simulating the ravages of smallpox, would reduce the alleged "need" for preposterous stacks of Europeans in the Americas. Surviving as the Aztecs should be almost impossible in the long term.

Remember the Dwarf Fortress mantra - "losing is fun".

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You have reformed Inca 1530 before or with AoW? First look at Fishdabaz map i see the same prob how in my AoW Huron game. In my game NA nativs, Inca- (Cap Horn not explore) and Aztecregion was 1564 not found from europe.

I have no idea how you will in AoW westernised 1530. In the old games no problem. But in AoW?! Only South America eastcost tribes have a chance to do this. I believe i have in Cananda at 1600 a change of bordercontact. The only way is native colonys at Cuba or Guyana. But how will you colonize without tech this distance? Can you pass the Yuca Channel with colonist? I think the only nativs they can handle this are from the converter.

Inca can get exploration well before 1500. This means that you can go find a western colony and wreck someone next to it and/or take it directly.

 

[Umbosch]

Inca can get exploration well before 1500. This means that you can go find a western colony and wreck someone next to it and/or take it directly.

Ok. Good to know that Inca and Aztec must run to Panama area for early westernisation. Do you have idea for NA nativs? I don't believe that paradox make a province rollback for the Caribbean that they mains colonize faster to NA.

@ Fishdabaz: I have read that troops come from Newfoundland. Where is the main of this CN and how strong they are? Which from the four start option of 11.11.1444 have you select?