Doesn't Development end... very unrealistic?

[radiatoren]

If you look at why certain regions "developed" and others didn't, there are a few straightforward, easy-to-implement factors that could solve the issue to everyone's satisfaction (preventing tall megacities in Siberia but allowing them where appropriate).

If you combine the following factors, you would allow highly developed provinces in plausible situations while preventing them elsewhere.


Geography
Easier Development:
+++ river estuary
+ adjacent to river estuary
+ coastal
+ rich farmland
+ along river (even if inland)
Harder Development:
- - - tundra/desert
- mountain

Wealth
+++ trade center
+ adjacent to trade center
++ high province production value (which will be affected by both production tech and buildings constructed)
+ high value of collected trade in node
- - low province production value
- low value of collected trade in node

Stability / Politics
== NO DEVELOPMENT DURING WAR
== Military Devestation - however defined - should either reduce development or result in a long (10-30yr) development timeout. Options to define could range from enemy army presence in territory to successful siege/occupation to razing of crops.
+++ capital (gets cheaper as nation gets larger)
+ adjacent to capital
++ high stability
++ high prestige
- - low stability
- - low prestige

These factors would need to be balanced, but my general sense is that the ideal province for development - for example, Venice in ascendancy, the wealthy capital of a prestigious trade empire blessed by geography - should be at least 3x cheaper to develop than an "average" province and 6x cheaper than a poor, backward, landlocked arctic/desert province.

I agree, and would add further tweaking possibility by tech as a factor to avoid the small non-european nations developing out of control.

When that is said, I am not sure that development as it stands is as much of a problem as the lack of non-conquest ways of combatting it. Essentially smaller countries are not getting that much of a boost out of it compared to the blob eating them! Or in other words, it encourages more warring, while still not making a tall/diplomatic strategy viable, which was a big part of the common sense in the expansion!

 

[Darkath]

OK, I'm going to run my own tests after the vacation but ultimately the whole point of this feature is to let countries that don't expand grow in power so I'm far from convinced there's an actual problem.

What about a small nation ravaged by war every 5 years ?

Being small and powerful is the luxury of a nation that isn't always at war. Looting and conquering provinces should up the development cost for a while.

 

[JasperClay]

If you look at why certain regions "developed" and others didn't, there are a few straightforward, easy-to-implement factors that could solve the issue to everyone's satisfaction (preventing tall megacities in Siberia but allowing them where appropriate).

If you combine the following factors, you would allow highly developed provinces in plausible situations while preventing them elsewhere.


Geography
Easier Development:
+++ river estuary
+ adjacent to river estuary
+ coastal
+ rich farmland
+ along river (even if inland)
Harder Development:
- - - tundra/desert
- mountain

Wealth
+++ trade center
+ adjacent to trade center
++ high province production value (which will be affected by both production tech and buildings constructed)
+ high value of collected trade in node
- - low province production value
- low value of collected trade in node

This.

In addition, reintroduce the linear cost increase per point purchased. It was a good idea, it's just that 5 was a bit much. Try 1, 2, or 3.

Stability / Politics
== NO DEVELOPMENT DURING WAR
== Military Devestation - however defined - should either reduce development or result in a long (10-30yr) development timeout. Options to define could range from enemy army presence in territory to successful siege/occupation to razing of crops.
+++ capital (gets cheaper as nation gets larger)
+ adjacent to capital
++ high stability
++ high prestige
- - low stability
- - low prestige

These factors would need to be balanced, but my general sense is that the ideal province for development - for example, Venice in ascendancy, the wealthy capital of a prestigious trade empire blessed by geography - should be at least 3x cheaper to develop than an "average" province and 6x cheaper than a poor, backward, landlocked arctic/desert province.

This is all interesting, but less spot on. The "adjacent to capital" thing is kind of a non-starter. If you look at the major cities of France, for example, it goes something like Paris -> Marseille -> Bourdeaux before you get back to Paris-area.

Most nations tend to develop regional centers. Venice clustered development around the Terraferma near the capital, sure. But that's because it wasn't really plausible to develop Dalmatia, or Corfu. You'd be better off letting nations of a certain size designate certain provinces as regional centers, which would have a development cost reduction. So, maybe make the capital -15%, the main trade port -5%, and the "regional centers" -10%. You could put a "Regional Center" button next to trade port and capital, and make a similar cost to name a province as one, so that it doesn't become cost positive until you invest ~5-10 points, or something. Every 15 non-overseas core provinces you control, you earn one more regional center.

A year-long plus siege should destroy development. Not a lot, but 1 development per year of siege? 1 development per completed siege? Just something to keep war zones from being utopia's. This, after all, was actually a huge reason England got to grow so nicely. Outside of the civil wars, they didn't get devastated like the continental powers.

I don't think stability and prestige should have an impact. Maybe unrest and autonomy, though. (Like, (10x unrest)%, and (autonomy/10)%.)

EDIT:
Also, the "Luxemborg is bigger than Milan" thing should be taken care of largely by event. Events that expand cities like Glasgow, for example, need to be introduced, while some cities might need two different boosts - Milan could get one in the Renaissance and then one in the enlightenment, for example. Same with Paris and London. Since I'm expecting development to generally be more expensive (like 100 per province, not 50) but to have stronger cost-reduction modifiers as outlined above, that + events should create realistic outcomes.

 

[Kamiran]

A year-long plus siege should destroy development. Not a lot, but 1 development per year of siege? 1 development per completed siege? Just something to keep war zones from being utopia's. This, after all, was actually a huge reason England got to grow so nicely. Outside of the civil wars, they didn't get devastated like the continental powers.

Doesnt change anything for minor nations that are never at war. And these nations are the one we are talking about.
Iam still the opinion, manpower is a much better payment for development than imaginary magic power from a random ruler.
Up to a development of 10, you have to invest 4000 manpower and let them work 4 years. For any development over 10, the necessary manpower is increased by 200 per level. After the 4 years period, you always get 80% of the used manpower back to your pool.
At around 70 development, the necessary manpower reach 16000, which is more than the normal maximum manpower a OPM can reach. Also the time bases component of development leads to a maximum additional development of 94 (377 game time divided through 4). (without any modifiers)

Monarch point based development benefit the western OPM and small nations the most. And for non-western nations development is nearly uninteresting. With manpower as payment, you increase the options to play tall (playing tall means no conquest, which lead to more manpower and the better ability to develop).
You create a softcap for OPM. You make development intresting even for non-western nations. (i would suggest coring cost dont increase by development value, only by 5% for every additional development with the original value as base. 1/1/1 increased to 5/4/4 would have 10 times 5% more = 150% of the original core cost)

 

[Merrivale]

I know @Wiz has already spoken on this, but while I'm generally in the pro-gameplay camp, the mechanic just isn't working from a logical perspective. Forget who "should" and who "shouldn't" have high development and the end and focus more on "where" and "why". @TheSavage01 has it right: there are reasons why some places developed more than others. I just finished a game where Norway, after being kicked off the main continent but surviving until I killed them at the end, had turned Iceland into one of the highest developed places in the entire world. This should not be possible simply due to Iceland's climate, population (or inability to support a large one), and location (it's far too isolated).

I also think it's ridiculous that you are only limited by MP in improving a province and not at all by time. Want to jump a province five full development points? You can do it instantly as long as you have enough MP. I've seen money proposed as a frequent solution to put the breaks on, but really time is more effective. It becomes impossible to boost that same province again and again and again if there is a cool-off period. I get that this somewhat inhibits the "tall" strategy, but EUIV is not supposed to be an equal opportunity game like CIV. The country you pick and the position you start in matters, so being a OPM in Europe versus the middle of the ocean or Asia is a big deal.

There are a lot of good ideas in this thread, I hope the devs are reading. Warfare damage is excellent, although it would require re-balancing all of the province starting points.

 

[mewzle]

I just finished an Ironman game as Mali where Kongo had four of the five most developed provinces in the world, despite never Westernizing.

Needless to say, sometime within the last ten or so years when I suddenly realized this, Kongo was swiftly annexed by Mali.

 

[sterrius]

I liked the idea of the manpower kamiran sugested.

If you limit your maximum manpower with the climate/region. (Mountain regions or desert regions can´t have a million population at the time) you can create a kind of Soft Cap that will work very fine and will work for everyone in the world. Be inside or outside europe.

Also manpower makes logic as you can create big capitals bringing people from other regions.

So while a mountain region alone will have a big problem to go beyond X. With help of other provinces its not that impossible anymore.

Would also be nice to have a mechanic to downgrade a region that can´t sustain itself alone. (lets say france did everything to buff one province and after 1 war it became a 1 province minor, without the other regions to help of course the economy will decay and go back to a level the province can sustain itself).

 

[The-Doc]

Just put a cap on it from the starting level.

 

[Kamiran]

Would also be nice to have a mechanic to downgrade a region that can´t sustain itself alone. (lets say france did everything to buff one province and after 1 war it became a 1 province minor, without the other regions to help of course the economy will decay and go back to a level the province can sustain itself).

A decay of development through economical issues sounds like a very good idea. War driven decrease of development is a bit risky for the game balance. Some big early wars in europe with plenty of minor nations involved and europe will have the same development as bangladesh.
But how can this decrease look like? What will lead to this decrease? Lack in income? Lack in manpower?

 

[Axe99]

A decay of development through economical issues sounds like a very good idea. War driven decrease of development is a bit risky for the game balance. Some big early wars in europe with plenty of minor nations involved and europe will have the same development as bangladesh.
But how can this decrease look like? What will lead to this decrease? Lack in income? Lack in manpower?

A random thought - you could make war damage from development temporary (so a percentage hit that recovers, not unlike the loot bar but over a longer time period, and then have it that you can't increase development while it recovers. That way, you can't 'war someone back to the stone age', but areas that were constantly fought over would suffer and would have a very hard time developing any further.

 

[Kamiran]

A random thought - you could make war damage from development temporary (so a percentage hit that recovers, not unlike the loot bar but over a longer time period, and then have it that you can't increase development while it recovers. That way, you can't 'war someone back to the stone age', but areas that were constantly fought over would suffer and would have a very hard time developing any further.

This is generally a good idea, but still dont solve the problem. You have a lot of minor nations, which never go to war, so any war related game balances for development will never hit this nations.
I would change your suggestion a bit. Instead a long time period needed to recover the full development, you have to repair the "damaged" development with ducats. This would hit small nations and OPMs with no real economic power very hard while bigger nations can compensate it much better (like in reality). This would also lead to more use of loans.

 

[BrokenSky]

This is generally a good idea, but still dont solve the problem. You have a lot of minor nations, which never go to war, so any war related game balances for development will never hit this nations.
I would change your suggestion a bit. Instead a long time period needed to recover the full development, you have to repair the "damaged" development with ducats. This would hit small nations and OPMs with no real economic power very hard while bigger nations can compensate it much better (like in reality). This would also lead to more use of loans.

Make it go down when armies with military access via the enemy having access move though the territory? Or maybe all armies. Make them deplete the loot and economic strength bars.

Or alternatively to the whole system make it so that if the loot bar is empty there is a chance to lose 1 development of a random type (with probability of each type weighted by amount above 1) which would partially refill the loot bar. Development cannot happen while the loot bar is not full. Fort level reduces the probability of losing development in that province (because fort provinces are more likely to have empty loot bars). In this system the province has to have enemies in the province while the loot bar is empty at the end of the month. If the development reduction occur, the loot bar refills to about 1/2 to 2/3 and the rest is given immediately as spoils of war to the countries in the territory.
In addition, armies would loot in provinces of nations that their enemies have military access with, that they don't also have it with?

 

[blallo]

one simple solution is that starting development points do not count to the cost of developing the province.

if rome start with 25 dev points, the first development you buy will cost as much as the first for some place in the new world.
This mean that the best places of Europe will always be better than other places.

Maximum manpower, government rank or something like that should reduce the cost of developing.
So small nation with lots of monarch points will need to use more of them in the few provinces they own.

Development cost, or max development should be related to the tech group, so African nation will not be able to develop as europe.

 

[Kamiran]

Development cost, or max development should be related to the tech group, so African nation will not be able to develop as europe.

This make no real sense. Non-Western nations already lack hard in monarch points. If you increase the price additionaly by tech group, the Common Sense DLC is only for europe nations. And There is no reason why african or asian nations should develop slower then europeans.
Compare military development. The brits were attacking the zulu with 2000 man, while the sulu army was 20000. Military points are already relative useless and so european nations spend them a lot in development, increasing their manpower pool. While non-western nations need to stay up-to-date in military technology and cant spent in military development, which lead to less manpower. But this is the complete opposite, which really happened.

 

[sterrius]

A decay of development through economical issues sounds like a very good idea. War driven decrease of development is a bit risky for the game balance. Some big early wars in europe with plenty of minor nations involved and europe will have the same development as bangladesh.
But how can this decrease look like? What will lead to this decrease? Lack in income? Lack in manpower?

I think manpower is better. Manpower can be used as something to mimic a "workforce".

Not actually being used to increase development but you need some lv of manpower in the region so you can keep increasing one province. (I think its better to use regions instead of national lv, that way you can have 2-3 big citys in a mid sized country). Maybe even then new region mechanic that is coming in the 1.14.

 

[radiatoren]

Anyone thought of combining lootbar, development and attrition? You can make the soldiers above limit hurt the loot in own provinces and reduce manpower contribution of province in addition to the manpower loss. Add unrest lowering available loot (damn rebels stealing money for their futile uprising!) and development cost tied to lootbar, we are getting somewhere. In that way the terrible current attrition calculation can be simplified.

Another more evolved idea would be to tricolour the lootbar to distribution of contribution of the different developments. In that way you can really improve the lootbars influence.

But as said before we need a peaceful way to combat development and while taking manpower and ducats to repair after occupation is an interesting idea, it doesn't encourage tall empires to wage territorial expansion. The combatting of development should be to encourage OPMs to diplomatically annex and otherwise expand peacefully.

 

[JasperClay]

A random thought - you could make war damage from development temporary (so a percentage hit that recovers, not unlike the loot bar but over a longer time period, and then have it that you can't increase development while it recovers. That way, you can't 'war someone back to the stone age', but areas that were constantly fought over would suffer and would have a very hard time developing any further.

Just put a cool down on it. After siege, there's a random chance a province gets a modifier called "Warzone" or "Devastated". Say, a base chance of 50%, modified by supply limit (more supply = lower chance) and development (more development = greater chance). When that modifier is applied, one point of development is randomly removed. The modifier sticks around for 5-10 years, and development can't be destroyed again, until it's done. It could also add something like 10-20% to development costs (materials are scare, etc.) but needing to rebuild after a war shouldn't make rebuilding impossible (i.e., there shouldn't be any kind of ban on developing the province)

 

[Dahou]

Capitals should automatically develop, scaled by the total size of the nation simulating the migration of skilled craftsmen or whatever to the capital.
This way large nations will have naturally developed capitals while small nations only develop by pumping points into it.

Not the whole solution, but imo an improvement.

 

[JasperClay]

Doesnt change anything for minor nations that are never at war. And these nations are the one we are talking about.
Iam still the opinion, manpower is a much better payment for development than imaginary magic power from a random ruler.
Up to a development of 10, you have to invest 4000 manpower and let them work 4 years. For any development over 10, the necessary manpower is increased by 200 per level. After the 4 years period, you always get 80% of the used manpower back to your pool.
At around 70 development, the necessary manpower reach 16000, which is more than the normal maximum manpower a OPM can reach. Also the time bases component of development leads to a maximum additional development of 94 (377 game time divided through 4). (without any modifiers)

Monarch point based development benefit the western OPM and small nations the most. And for non-western nations development is nearly uninteresting. With manpower as payment, you increase the options to play tall (playing tall means no conquest, which lead to more manpower and the better ability to develop)

Kamiran, I really like where you're going with this, but I think I have a slightly better idea. Obviously, using manpower as a payment will punish the countries that are supposed to play tall, and benefit countries that were historically wide. So, it's a non-starter for me, because it makes the mechanic slightly contradictory.

However, using manpower as a modifier would be brilliant!

So, for every 5000 manpower beyond X+10000 development cost in all provinces is reduced by 2% or something, to a maximum of -20-50%. (For every 5000 manpower less than X-10000, development costs are increased by 2%, to a maximum of -20-50%). X = the average maximum manpower of all tags in the game.

 

[BrokenSky]

Kamiran, I really like where you're going with this, but I think I have a slightly better idea. Obviously, using manpower as a payment will punish the countries that are supposed to play tall, and benefit countries that were historically wide. So, it's a non-starter for me, because it makes the mechanic slightly contradictory.

However, using manpower as a modifier would be brilliant!

So, for every 5000 manpower beyond X+10000 development cost in all provinces is reduced by 2% or something, to a maximum of -20-50%. (For every 5000 manpower less than X-10000, development costs are increased by 2%, to a maximum of -20-50%). X = the average manpower of all tags in the game.

That sounds great! it'd also work well because it'd hurt countries abilities to develop while they're recovering from having a large chunk of the population wiped out in a war.