Colonial wars - Is this working as intended ?

[Maxxie42]

For those who don't know, Natives can declare war on colonial nations without calling their overlord in. That's been the case for a long time, and I think it's a good mechanic that gives Natives a decent chance to fight back.

What I didn't know however, is that this isn't limited to Natives - any country with its capital in the new world can do the same. So as any European nation, if you don't want to bother going to war with GB or Spain and their million colonies all over the planet, you can just move your capital to the new world and steal their colonies one by one, without them being able to do anything about it.

(I should also mention that while moving your capital to a different continent used to be heavily restricted in some of the earlier versions of the game, it is currently easier than ever.)

Is there any way to justify this ? My first instinct is to call this very OP, but as someone else pointed out, the recent DLCs seem to have given up on the idea of balance altogether, so maybe it's a feature after all ?

 

[grotaclas]

you can just move your capital to the new world and steal their colonies one by one, without them being able to do anything about it.

There is something which they can do: Enforce peace.

(I should also mention that while moving your capital to a different continent used to be heavily restricted in some of the earlier versions of the game, it is currently easier than ever.)

What do you think makes it "currently easier than ever"? AFAIK the capital movement rules have not changed since version 1.30. And that version just removed the 50% dev restriction which had been added by patch 1.28.

The ability to attack colonial nations without involving the overlord as a country with a capital in a colonial region has been in the game since at least patch 1.21. So it's nothing new either.

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

It's been in for years and while it seems strong in my experience tbe overlord has intervened within a year unless occupied in Europe or elsewhere.

I don't know it seems rather historical to me with communication lines and slow responses.

There should be a pop up though, enforce peace should also work if your CN attacked someone and I feel like you shouldn't require 100 relations to intervene in wars of your colonial nation.

 

[grotaclas]

and I feel like you shouldn't require 100 relations to intervene in wars of your colonial nation.

You don't need 100 relations when enforcing peace on a country which attacked your subject. And truces don't stop you either

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

You don't need 100 relations when enforcing peace on a country which attacked your subject.

Interesting I assumed it was the same as for normal enforce peace.

 

[Maxxie42]

I see, then I suppose that's more okayish if the overlord usually intervenes. I didn't see it happen myself as I would declare war on all colonies and then the overlord within a month of each other, the goal being to take a lot more provinces than I would have been able to if it had all been a single war.

Also @grotaclas I don't know these rules very well, but are you sure it used to be this simple to move your capital to the new world ? I distinctly remember that during my first one tag I had to resort to some shenanigans with releasing vassals, feeding them provinces all around my capital, something like that. Whereas now I just had to hopskip my capital through St Helena and that was it.

 

[grotaclas]

Also @grotaclas I don't know these rules very well, but are you sure it used to be this simple to move your capital to the new world ? I distinctly remember that during my first one tag I had to resort to some shenanigans with releasing vassals, feeding them provinces all around my capital, something like that. Whereas now I just had to hopskip my capital through St Helena and that was it.

Feeding provinces around your capital to a vassal is what you have to do if you don't use an isolated province like St. Helena as an intermediate capital.
I checked old version and the message
"We cannot move our capital to a colonial region, not while we still have a big heartland around it. Only when our capital is the only province in a state on that continent, will it be possible." has been around since patch 1.16 which introduced states. And I did a quick test as Castile in version 1.16.3 and I was able to move my capital from Toledo (219) to St. Helena (1098) and then to Mexico (852).

But I think many people don't know that this is possible. It certainly contributes that the message talks about a "big heartland" without specifying that your capital must not border any of your provinces. And the idea of using an intermediate capital is not obvious for many people. And some people make the mistake of trying to use an intermediate capital on the same continent as their destination(e.g. Bermuda to North America) which won't work, because then you have at least two stated provinces on that continent. It also took me a while to understand all the implications and possibilities.