... Wiz should probably have closed this thread after saying that a major causative factor was being addressed in 1.15 
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Denmark is stille a pathentic state
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The specific bug can certainly put to bed most of the debate on how the game should represent the control of Denmark over Sweden, yes.
However, the question of "What should be reasonable probabilistic outcomes for Denmark?" is still a valid and open question for the community. Is it reasonable that Denmark disappears 90% of the time? Is it reasonable for it to be rock-solid and integrate Norway and Sweden 90% of the time? These sorts of "what its" and probabilities, and, from this, various game mechanics to help bring about such outcomes, are still valid for discussion.
Personally, I believe one of the reasons why Denmark gets eaten up so quickly has to do with its reasonably-cheap province costs, and the relatively low AE compared to expanding into the HRE. There would be less incentive to go after them if there was some sort of coring cost malus.
However, the question of "What should be reasonable probabilistic outcomes for Denmark?" is still a valid and open question for the community. Is it reasonable that Denmark disappears 90% of the time? Is it reasonable for it to be rock-solid and integrate Norway and Sweden 90% of the time? These sorts of "what its" and probabilities, and, from this, various game mechanics to help bring about such outcomes, are still valid for discussion.
Personally, I believe one of the reasons why Denmark gets eaten up so quickly has to do with its reasonably-cheap province costs, and the relatively low AE compared to expanding into the HRE. There would be less incentive to go after them if there was some sort of coring cost malus.
It is a good question though how much of that difference came from needing to differentiate yourselves from both Denmark and Sweden. For instance would there ever have been a focus on the dialects and Nynorsk without a split in 1814? That is a very good question. I don't see Norway as in a much different situation from Jutland and here we just went along with Copenhagen despite all the mistreatment and despite mainly trading with Hamburg---not Copenhagen.
Don't know about that; though if true then there is a question of how much of that dominance was inherent Norwegian strength over Denmark and how much was just opportunity. Going into the navy often was a good idea if you came from some backwater (be it Norway or Jutland) so most people coming from the largest of the backwaters isn't surprising. And just because most people came from there doesn't mean most ships did; pretty sure most ships if not all were build in the wharfs of Copenhagen. We have always had strong wharfs---or rather used to. After Lindø closed a few years ago as the last big one you can't really say that anymore.
Drawing some parallells is okay. Comparing Jutland to Norway on the other hand is too much of a generalization. Norway was a kingdom all through the dano-norwegian era. Might be, it only was in name, but all the kings styled themselves as kings of both Denmark and Norway. On the other hand Norway and norwegians were generally poorer than their danish counterparts. The land with the timber were owned by the king after the reformation, (ceased from the church) and timber and other raw materials were shipped around Europe. Only towards the end of the era, when the king had sold his norwegian possesions to fund wars, the land was owned by the norwegian upper class. Main point being that there are huge differences between Jutland and Norway, both socially and economically and culturally. Norwegian nationalism would maybe look slightly different if it weren't for the split in 1814. On the other hand Norway wasn't the only country with nationalism rising during this time. It was a European movement with Germany and Italy being the most known examples.
Well, I cant find any sources on where the dano-norwegian military navy was built, but it is a fair assumption that it probably was built in Denmark for the greater part of the timeframe of the game. It was probably built with norwegain raw materials though, since it was shipped all over Europe from the 16th century and as i pointed out earlier equipped with mostly norwegian sailors. Norwegian timber was the main souce for the rebuilding of London after the great fire in 1666 and most of Amsterdams buildings are poled by norwegian timber.
Fun fact: The norwegian-dutch timber trade resulted in a lot of dutch people moving to Norway and vice versa. Counts from Amsterdam around 1650 distinguishes 13 000 norwegians living in the city leaving Amsterdam the city with the most norvegian inhabitants at the time!!!
After some further research alot of the European navies where built by norwegian timber and norwegian sailors also served in alot of different navies, not only the dano-norwegian one.
I just tried a Norway game.
a) If you get a claim on a Danish province, an event may fire where he'll fork it over for free. You just need to core it.
b) Sweden and I broke free easily. Norway had four Danish provinces.
c) After a second war, every province except for one was conquered.
d) I just ate up the last blip of Denmark. It's not 1500 yet.
Now, I know this is a player screwing around with the lack of AI savvy. But it was ludicrously easy to knock Denmark over.
a) If you get a claim on a Danish province, an event may fire where he'll fork it over for free. You just need to core it.
b) Sweden and I broke free easily. Norway had four Danish provinces.
c) After a second war, every province except for one was conquered.
d) I just ate up the last blip of Denmark. It's not 1500 yet.
Now, I know this is a player screwing around with the lack of AI savvy. But it was ludicrously easy to knock Denmark over.
That is defeniatly not true. As somebody else said, Denmark had a way larger population that Norway, which also means that it is Danes that would serve mostly. While Norway were to provide some ships it far from the majority. Most of the ships in the navy were also Danish (because Norway mostly had other types of tree than thoes needed.) Entire areas of Denmark were deforested for the fleet. Perhaps afterwards Norway were the target for new timber sources?
I believe that your patriotism blinds you in this case, which your last sentence kinda proves. Norway were a poor "state" or province if you want most of the timeline in the game. Norway were by default much weaker than the Swedish army (but who wasn't) also alot weaker by the Danish army, and also (alot) weaker than the danish navy and also the Swedish.
Don't get me wrong, Norway is a nice country, but it has in no way been strong militarily in any way throughout history.
I never claimed that the norwegian navy was larger in the beginning of the games timeline, only for the latter half. Norway never had a decent army, unless you count our special forces today, which are considered among the best in the world. But an elite force of 20-50 men is nothing against an entire army, so I'll agree to the norwegian army being abysmal. The navy however has proud traditions and the quantity of norwegian sailors cant be contested. I seriously doubt that the timber produced within Denmark could even contest with the amounts found in Norway. Norways area is almost 9 times as large as Denmarks and by rough estimates I would guess a third of the total area is woods. As I mentioned in my second post, the norwegian timber was used in great amounts not only domestic, but abroad in superpowers like Holland and Great Britain.
As I already mentioned in my previous post I am fully aware aware that Norway was merely a province during most of the games timespan. The reason for it being poor and having few people is that its soil is alot worse for growing wheat and other foodproducing wares, and not to forget all its natural resources were owned by the danish king. And yes the norwegian army was never any good, only consisting of peasants. But since the earth didnt provide for all the norwegians alot of them found a profession within sailing. Providing alot of sailors for the combined fleet.
Wrong. In 1709 there were about 15,000 personnel enrolled in the Dano-Norwegian fleet. 10 000 were Norwegian.
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Source? Anybody can pour out numbers, and those seems excessivley exaggerated.
It wasn't larger in the latter either. Remember, Norway didn't have a navy - as they weren't a country. If they were though, they would not have been able to sustain a large navy as they had a poor economy. They did indeed provide many good sailors, but I hardly think that they outnumber the danes serving - most of the danish land forces were German mercs (as it was with most countries). Military service would therefor be in the navy. Remember, even England were scared of the Danish navy. There's really no point in discussing this as there's no way to prove any of this aside of saying that most of evidence that has been put forward would suggest that Denmark would be stronger than the Norwegians even late in the EU4 timeframe.
We are derailing. We are talking about that Denmark should be stronger, and not get eaten by some 1opm Hamburg before 1500.. which is somewhat lame..
From same wiki article which i linked in my original post actually disproves this
The source is already listed several times in this thread but if you want a new link here it is.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Danish_navy
Correction. The dano-norwegian navy. But you have a point. Norway wasnt a country. We were one country. You could check registers of where sailors came from, and where ships were built, to check the actual numbers. And the wikiarticle list the numbers during the Great Nordic War.
I totally agree
I'm just trying to point out that not ALL of Denmarks strength lied within its own border for the latter half of the games timeframe. At the start it most certainly did!
Apparently, atleast quite lacking wikipedia states so. The Danes might have served in the army then.. I don't know, but it would be the guess.
Another forgotten aspect is that Denmark was alot more centralized than Norway. This is guesswork, but I would think that more of the danish populace lived in towns and cities and had useful professions. As previously mentioned army and fleet was usually equipped by peasants. So even though Denmark had a greater populace its not unreasonable to think that Norway had more of a useless general populace that allways stayed at sea as part of the trading fleet.
Like most of Europe the danish army constisted largely of professional soldiers - Mercenaries. Denmark had the means to supply said mercs with food (which often was a part of their contract). Norway has and had much territory which couldn't supply many people, which is why they relied on fishing. Many ofc saw a possible future in the combined fleet.
Perhaps an increased coring cost would make Denmark harder to take.. or maybe not harder, but less worth it? That and some ideas that could boost Mercenaries for Denmark. Historically Denmark relied greatly on mercs, at the moment they can't make great use of them, though as they are too expensive for Denmark. Denmark is precarious country, a monachy, but they don't rely on tax like most of the other lands, but on trade of the Lübeck note which they don't do very well (as they have some weak trade idea) and Denmark relied greatly on trade, which many of the wars waged against Lübeck proved.
Paradox should change Denmarks tradition of +1 legitimacy to +1 prestige to help the AI not loosing PU's on monarch death
If Denmark did manage to keep the PU over Norway as it did historically for most of the period, a buff to Norway would also be a buff to Denmark. It feels alot like it's not just Denmark, but Denmark-Norway which generally under-performs compared to history in the newer versions.
It generally does not lose the Swedish PU to low prestige. Norway, maybe.
Denmark is one of the few historically powerful noble republics (which I guess would be represented by an elective monarchy in this patch?).
Their power comes from a unique willingness to tax nobles who limit their intrigue to supporting "their" candidate for the throne plus control over not one, but three great tolls; the öresund, the riga, and the elbe. In addition, it is an extremely decentralised country, where noble governors acted more like independent vassals then subjects. Even their great civil wars are between rival noble parties. The effect was that almost all of the north-german principalities regarded Denmark as their natural overlords and protectors vis-a-vis the southern and eastern scary states, such as fierce Brandenburg allied to the thieving and dishonourable swedes (and as a swede, i can write that), or the Slavonic poles and the Habsburgian Bohemians. The Sound-toll was not removed until the 1800:s, the others were lost by 1700 (coincidentally, when denmark stops being internationally relevant).
This is, I think, what the current state of affairs fails to reflect. Denmark could almost always count on traitors in every other country's court, and could always count on extra troops and money from their nobles.
I am not sure how to represent it in game, except by removing the requirements for the sound toll (except control over copenhagen), and adding two similar modifiers, one for Holstein (elbe) and one for ösel (russian). I would also suggest changing the mechanics of these, making them "goldfleets" instead of tradebased, with gold provinces being the costal provinces/river provinces relevent. The yearly addition of ca 300 ducats yearly, from start of game, would probably bolster the danes to their natural strength-levels.
2nd suggestion - give Danes noble traitors in other countries courts. Let them fabricate and try to steal neighbouring provinces, through bribing (supporting) noble rebels in these provinces. Naturally nobles will also control them, as estates, when they flip. This should be one of their earlier ideas.
Their power comes from a unique willingness to tax nobles who limit their intrigue to supporting "their" candidate for the throne plus control over not one, but three great tolls; the öresund, the riga, and the elbe. In addition, it is an extremely decentralised country, where noble governors acted more like independent vassals then subjects. Even their great civil wars are between rival noble parties. The effect was that almost all of the north-german principalities regarded Denmark as their natural overlords and protectors vis-a-vis the southern and eastern scary states, such as fierce Brandenburg allied to the thieving and dishonourable swedes (and as a swede, i can write that), or the Slavonic poles and the Habsburgian Bohemians. The Sound-toll was not removed until the 1800:s, the others were lost by 1700 (coincidentally, when denmark stops being internationally relevant).
This is, I think, what the current state of affairs fails to reflect. Denmark could almost always count on traitors in every other country's court, and could always count on extra troops and money from their nobles.
I am not sure how to represent it in game, except by removing the requirements for the sound toll (except control over copenhagen), and adding two similar modifiers, one for Holstein (elbe) and one for ösel (russian). I would also suggest changing the mechanics of these, making them "goldfleets" instead of tradebased, with gold provinces being the costal provinces/river provinces relevent. The yearly addition of ca 300 ducats yearly, from start of game, would probably bolster the danes to their natural strength-levels.
2nd suggestion - give Danes noble traitors in other countries courts. Let them fabricate and try to steal neighbouring provinces, through bribing (supporting) noble rebels in these provinces. Naturally nobles will also control them, as estates, when they flip. This should be one of their earlier ideas.