DP sliders strategies rediscussed?

[George LeS]

My experience is 100% SP, & I don't claim to be great even in SP, but FWIW, my preferences are:

? - Centralized - Narrowminded - Free Trade - Naval - Offensive 8 - Quality - Free Subjects.

As even Dr Watson could infer, I am a colonizer to the max. (When I tried China I had provinces in California & S Africa before I quit in the 17th C.)

The one I don't "go" anywhere with, is Plutocracy/Aristocracy. This is the one slider I prefer to keep in the middle -- I almost never touch it, unless it's moving to far to one side. And when events come up, I just take the less painful alternative. This despite the fact that Pluto is clearly more consistent with my other preferences, but the 1st time I tried to go 100% I found the lack of diplomats too much to bear. (Diplomats are the oddest resource in the game -- they so rarely have anything to do that they often just pile up that you take them for granted, but when you need them, you really need them.)

The only other one I have any questions about is Offensive. I used to take the view that you want Off early, when shock is king, & Def late when fire rules & forts are big. But the morale bonus is hard to give up (& applies to naval leaders, too).

For example, my favorite country to play is Portugal, & what I used to do is go Off 8 until Mem de Sa dies (their last leader with a siege bonus), but now that I somewhat randomize leader values, I just keep it at 8. Most of the bennies are with OFF, but I cannot see EVER giving up a siege of 1+, which applies against every size of fort.

 

[Stolen Rutters]

I have never gone Plutocratic because Aristocratic is necessary for me to work off my BB points quicker and keep diplomats coming. The income has never made me want to move the other way though I could see a benefit. Maybe I should hypertech one game just to see how big the benefit gets.

Offensive is the other slider I push full max, or at least +9. That +1 shock has changed my military abililties dramatically. I'm a 9-offensive convert. I had never touched this slider previously.

Narrowminded is good for aggressive expansion, especially if I want to convert provinces (like Pagans) and need the missionaries. I normally let it drift, though, since it tends to stay low. I forgot about the extra free Manufactory events when you go Innovative, though, so that may be an interesting choice later in the game when Manus cost over 5000 ducats each.

Everything else I let drift until later and tailor it to my goals.

edit - single player -endedit

 

[knul]

A recommendation:
As for naval/land: Why would anyone in SP ever go anything but full naval, unless for reasons of role-playing? It isn't like you actually worry about fighting anyone head to head and the added trade income from Naval is just enormous...

Well, I haven't played a German or Italian minor yet, but wouldn't those be candidates for Land? In the begining, morale can realy help, as does reduced army cost.
As far as I can see, in SP you can win with any slider combination, so why go for Naval? It doesn't realy matter, if you look it that way.

 

[Jomini]

Just one question:
Have you ever heard about 1d infantry?
If you havent, set your sliders as follows:
Max Land
Max Offensive
Min Quality (or Max Quantity if you wish)
Max serfdom (or Min Free Subjects)

now how much an infantry costs?
1d!
how much manpower you have?
base*.5*1.5 = 2.25*base

It is no question for me if Im a land-based warmonger, do I want a 1d infantry at average morale or 10d at 0.5 morale more.
Even if I get that +20% more production effic. I still can't offset 10times bigger cost and 9 times (2.25 / (1*0.5*0.5) = 9) more manpower.
Not even talking about fact that stability bonus far outweighs +20% production effic in most cases.

And if discussing such things, one shouldn't talk about SP, because in SP you're fighting against retards.
Only when things come to MP you start to really see what is good and what is not.

The problem with said infantry is that in the large quantities needed to be viable you suffer horrid attrition, which means replacement at war while cheap costs heavily in WE. Also early warfare has this nasty habit of most major wars requiring one to fight on plains which are infantry graveyards early on. With low morale you also become particularly vunerable to wave tactics for morale reinforcement. Amphibious warfare is pretty much dead outright with the 1 ducat strategy. Perhaps I'm missing something, but it would seem to be exceedingly difficult to generate substantial offense using cheap infantry, which whom and against whom do you beleive this strategy best works?

In any event your calculations are showing the difference being full land, max off, full serf, and max quantity; in MP land is quite viable in its own right, offensive I would imagine would either be a given or not touched until later in the game when fortification is important, and quantity can go either way. The big question is does the reduction in price merely from serfdom alone offset the morale damage? Another question is how quickly can you get to 1 ducat infantry early game; how long before morale, particularly in assualts, bites your ass? And lastly is there anything better to spend DP clicks on, personally I'm thinking of inno and centra to get to assualts and a CRT advantage earlier than the guy with 1 ducat infantry?

My MP experience is extremely limited, but I've found it to be far more important to get good tech rolling than to have hordes of cheap infantry. It takes many clicks to get to 1 ducat infantry and those clicks follow a rate of increasing returns ... which means you get little from the first ones.

Do people actually go Narrow-Minded? I always go Innovative as soon as humanly possible. I'm a tech-monster (I get 60-60-10-10 around 1780) so maybe it's just me but I feel like it's common sense to be Innovative.

Virtually always. In SP I'm normally trying to take over the world with some minor that has to constantly beg, borrow, or steal maps. Getting to explore and colonize the African coast, India, Siberia or NA early is normally quite helpful; particularly with regards to manpower. The extra random conversions are nice, but the colonists are simply too good to pass up. For instance when I played Tibet I managed to war China and plunder them for oodles of cash at low inflation; I then colonized up India and actually had a useful base for manpower and income. When playing out of Africa or the Americas those extra colonists are quite necessary colorize the coast and keep the pesky Europeans from setting up shop.

The only other one I have any questions about is Offensive. I used to take the view that you want Off early, when shock is king, & Def late when fire rules & forts are big. But the morale bonus is hard to give up (& applies to naval leaders, too).

The only bad things about early offense is that some good leaders might lose a seige bonus. That is annoying, but if your goal is to minimize your casualties through fighting unfair battles shock is well worth the loss. Def late makes sense if you want the fortifications, otherwise I'd still be tempted to keep the shock and morale. In SP you can simply afford mass cannon late game.

 

[George LeS]

The only bad things about early offense is that some good leaders might lose a seige bonus. That is annoying, but if your goal is to minimize your casualties through fighting unfair battles shock is well worth the loss. Def late makes sense if you want the fortifications, otherwise I'd still be tempted to keep the shock and morale. In SP you can simply afford mass cannon late game.

I'd say the loss of the siege factor is more than "annoying"--again, especially late, when there are max fortresses about, some in very bad terrain. The alternative is massive attrition of very expensive & slow moving Arty. (The slow movement is at issue because you often have to replace the attrition losses it takes during siege.)

 

[DSYoungEsq]

Well, I haven't played a German or Italian minor yet, but wouldn't those be candidates for Land? In the begining, morale can realy help, as does reduced army cost.
As far as I can see, in SP you can win with any slider combination, so why go for Naval? It doesn't realy matter, if you look it that way.

knul, you are quite correct about that, but what most people want to do is "win" by the largest possible margin. This often means accomplishing such goals as "paint the world" or "world conquest." Each of these strategies is highly dependent upon producing massive amounts of cash during the crucial portion of the game, roughly the period 1500 - 1700. To do that, you always want to be Full Naval.

As for a German or any minor, once you have gotten to be two provinces big, you are, or should be, fine. The key to winning this game is to understand that you never fight battles against the AI unless you have a significant advantage from a leader. Instead, you out-siege the enemy. Avoid his armies, take his provinces as fast as you can, usually at least twice as fast as he can take yours, if you are doing it right. Morale is insignificant as a factor, but boy oh boy will you gain money from trade.

Now, of course, if you don't intend to have any overseas colonies, and you don't intend to engage in much trading, then the slider needs to go full land, to get the production efficiency bonus. But goodness, why would you bother to eschew really large amounts of income unless you are role-playing? :wacko:

 

[unmerged(49521)]

Avoid his armies, take his provinces as fast as you can, usually at least twice as fast as he can take yours, if you are doing it right.

And... how to do it right? (I had read the FAQ! - but all I'd found was the artillery bonus).

vint

 

[Jomini]

I'd say the loss of the siege factor is more than "annoying"--again, especially late, when there are max fortresses about, some in very bad terrain. The alternative is massive attrition of very expensive & slow moving Arty. (The slow movement is at issue because you often have to replace the attrition losses it takes during siege.)

Early on? It is perhaps 3 months less per seige for those who have leaders with seige stats early, in SP the attrition, even for winter provinces tends not to be too harsh on covering and reinforcement forces. That could be quite significant in MP, except I think the bigger danger is not being outseiged by you opponent, but by your opponent lifting your seiges or destroying your army.

Late game SP has enough money to eat such losses without issue normally. MP, don't you use massed cannon in order to fight anyways?

Now, of course, if you don't intend to have any overseas colonies, and you don't intend to engage in much trading, then the slider needs to go full land, to get the production efficiency bonus. But goodness, why would you bother to eschew really large amounts of income unless you are role-playing?

The hopelessly backward, poor, and low MP nations of the world can benifit from it. Take Nubia, their tech is terrible and it will be long before they can compete with the Europeans for trade. They face a faster teching hostile Shi'ite power to North and have limited MP. Their provinces are also quite poor. Land helps such nations out because it will be long before they can trade for real cash and their immediate needs of more and better troops are helped along.

 

[unmerged(3931)]

I played my last GC with China and full plutocratic and I got .4 diplomats each year.

The minimum is 1.0 diplomats per year.

EDIT: In AGCEEP there is less than the +1 diplomat per year for Confucianism and Buddhism.

But with full Mercantilism, you could embarge the top 10 traders with no TE loss.

No, the 3% TE penalty for embargoes applies the same to full Mercantilism as it applies to full Free Trade. The "free embargo" only applies to monthly trade tech research.

...I'd go for serfdom, and that's in a situation where you know you are going to face a lot of rebels, for instance you own the Dutch provinces or are playing China. Rebels are always infantry, never cavalry and serfdom worsens infantry morale but doesn't affect cavalry. It therefore becomes a little easier to cut down rebellious peasants with your cavalry if you have high Serfdom.

No, land morale bonuses and penalties apply to the entire army equally. Infantry and cavalry have the same maximum morale as each other regardless of the Serfdom slider.

Cheap fortresses in SP are worthless. So rarely does it matter if the enemy actually takes a province that you can afford to pay penalty. Arty are almost useless for most of the game. The only thing of real value here is the increased siege; but I find increased shock makes fighting with cavalry on plains even more effective.

That is right about the fortresses in SP. I do not even build fortresses in colonies. Whatever the AI takes, just take back.

Artillery is not useless. Artillery is good for quick sieges. The firepower from artillery can be useful in battle, but it is not worth losing expensive artillery in battle when you go towards Offensive. Near Defensive on the other hand, you can build up artillery for quick sieges. Then you can afford to spend the artillery in battle because they are so much cheaper. You really might not want to keep the artillery around anyway because of maintenance costs. You wouldn't want to disband them either. I still would not give up a shock stat to get the +1 siege unless I really needed it to be able to steal sieges for some reason. So, I would not go lower than Defensive two. I prefer Offensive nine myself. I started a Venice GC game, and Venice begins with Defensive three. It is not the most important slider to move unless I could get Offensive nine in a few DP moves. What makes it so that you use artillery less in battle is the high costs of artillery. However, if you are very Defensive, the artillery cost is not so bad; you actually use artillery in battle.

IIRC serfdom slider changed galley costs. At least they should, serfs are needed for galleys.

No, Serfdom does not affect galley costs.

Just one question:
Have you ever heard about 1d infantry?
If you havent, set your sliders as follows:
Max Land
Max Offensive
Min Quality (or Max Quantity if you wish)
Max serfdom (or Min Free Subjects)

now how much an infantry costs?
1d!
how much manpower you have?
base*.5*1.5 = 2.25*base

It is no question for me if Im a land-based warmonger, do I want a 1d infantry at average morale or 10d at 0.5 morale more.
Even if I get that +20% more production effic. I still can't offset 10times bigger cost and 9 times (2.25 / (1*0.5*0.5) = 9) more manpower.
Not even talking about fact that stability bonus far outweighs +20% production effic in most cases.

It is only possible to get 1d infantry at normal difficulty or lower. Lower than normal difficulty, I think it best to keep some Quality to avoid the -1 firepower penalty; the infantry would still cost 1d. At Very Hard difficulty, the infantry would cost 3d. That changes the ratios between minimum and maximum cost. Offensive DP setting has nothing to do with the infantry cost.

I am not sure how you figure your manpower there. You get +25% manpower for full Land and +25% manpower for minimum Quality. So that is +50% manpower. The other extreme is -50% manpower. The maximum difference you can claim is a difference of 1.0 times the base manpower. What is 2.25? What is 9 times?

Quote:
Reasons to go Pluto:
- want to research, want money (+10% trade,effic and even +20% if compared to full aristo really rocks)


I believe the max difference is 10, not 20 (10 steps a 1%). Or is it 11%?

Yes DP sliders affect trade efficiency in steps of 1%. That is a maximum difference of 10% for Aristocracy and a maximum difference of 10% for Land. So that is a maximum of 20% difference in trade efficiency from the DP sliders. Perhaps that is what is meant.

Quote:
Reasons to go Quality:
- aim: small elitary force less susceptible to attrition
- good fortresses (if you have the money to build many of them under maxed out morale - max land, offensive, quality, free subjects, they should be able to withstand clearly superior force of lesser moraled troops)


That is interesting. What I did not know is that there is less attrition when you go quality.
I also presumed that once you start a siege, you shall complete it (time may differ). Apparenty it is not quite as I had imagined, right? So - better morale of defenders makes it harder to successfully complete a siege? Is there any formula on this? Do morale on both sides go down during a siege? Can it be that sieging army may be forced to abandon a siege because of morale

Quality forces have less attrition when you amass a smaller force to do battle. The assumption is that a smaller quality force is equivalent to a larger quantity force. This is a bad assumption. Only in terms of morale might it be true. In terms of casualties, a quality force is going to have just as many losses and is going to inflict fewer losses on the enemy than a larger quantity force would (at least until a firepower bonus can really help kill enemies). The losses of a quality force are more expensive to replace, more than the cost of replacing any additional forces lost to attrition for a larger quantity force. Quantity is the way to go, but not too far; avoid the firepower penalty.

Morale of defenders in a fortress compared to the morale of enemy armies is only relevant in assaults, not sieges.

As for naval/land: Why would anyone in SP ever go anything but full naval, unless for reasons of role-playing? It isn't like you actually worry about fighting anyone head to head and the added trade income from Naval is just enormous...

Pagans should definitely go toward full Land. Pagans get little benefit from trade.

Lower cost troops and improved morale can offset the income benefits of 10% trade efficiency. It of course depends on how much war you expect. If you are doing a WC, full Land can make sense in all cases. More manpower means a higher support limit for troops and less war exhaustion when you need to build troops. The additional morale means you can win battles and assaults even at 50% maintenance. The lower army costs mean you spend less money that is in the treasury on troops. Even if the ratio of difference in troop expense to difference in trade income does not work out exactly, there is still less of a need to mint money to build troops.

The benefit of full Land is mostly seen early in the game when you are most struggling and trade income is low. Once you have conquered most of the world, trade income is becoming an important amount of your income (so long as you are not pagan). Production income improves at full Land, and that helps offset the trade difference as you expand into the whole world. You could take one hundred years and ten stability hits to switch to full Naval for perhaps a small benefit that no longer matters. Or you could just continue with a winning strategy and possibly work on some other DP sliders.

The only other one I have any questions about is Offensive. I used to take the view that you want Off early, when shock is king, & Def late when fire rules & forts are big. But the morale bonus is hard to give up (& applies to naval leaders, too).

The Offensive DP slider only affects land morale. There is no effect on naval morale.

 

[George LeS]

The Offensive DP slider only affects land morale. There is no affect on naval morale.

That was my poor choice of words. I really had the +1 shock, which does apply to naval leaders.

 

[unmerged(3931)]

Ah, yes, I like the high Offensive setting for the +1 to shock for my navy too.

 

[unmerged(37774)]

Maybe the DP slider polls should be recreated for v1.09?

 

[Mork]

It all really depends on play style. And the most important thing is to not go against your sliders (like assaulting fortresses when you are going defensive).

It also depends on the time of the scenario. For example, defensive is clearly weaker at the start, because forts aint that strong yet, and the -1 on shock hurts badly.
Later scenarios, where the forts are huge and the importance of the cavalry has lessened, defensive is at least just as strong as offensive.

Other things to note. Morale is very important. First it comes mostly from your regent and sliders, later technology will take over. This eliminates the need for focussing on morale in the sliders at later, more advanced stages.


From the top:

Arisocrazy vs Pluto.
Aristocrazy is probably best for most people, as the decrease in BB value and the higher diplomacy rating is a huge boon (not so much the increase in diplomats, but the better results of diplomacy).
A land based country also benefits more from cavalry than warships. Also, usually, when you are building many warships, you usually have the economy to take the extra cost. While everybody needs horsies. A huge country, with little opposition can easily go Pluto, but then, whats the pont? Also, a more neutral play style, like building a tech lead before attacking (I call this the "Civ" style), can also benefit from this.

Innovative vs NarrowM.
This is really a question of warmonger/colonial empire vs tech lead. A warmonger will get more different religions under him, and narrowminded is the biggest contributer to colonist. Not to mention the stability cost is nice to get under control as a warmonger.
Noone can dispute the wealth potential of innovative though.

Mercatilism.
I say this is the only no brainer. Unless you are a large country, with plenty of merchats, and still somwhow not interested in colonial power (strange combo), then you will like free markets.

Offensive vs defence.
Like I said earlier, offensive wins at first, hands down (fire is near useless in the first hundred years, thus most battles are decided by shock). It becomes a lot less clear later.

Land vs. naval.
This is also somewhat dependant on time (and location).
At first, your trade income will not be that great, so the bonus for this aint that much. Also, you wont need the extra colonist until somewhat later (unless you are Portugal).
Naval is absolutely nessesary if you plan to get a big colonial empire (and you can take the hit on manpower) the bonus to tax is just great.

Quality vs Quantity.
I almost always go Quality. Some nations can't do that. Mostly because they have very poor culture selection (like, only frisian in AGCEEP. Yikes!). I tend to never play those though.
That being said. It's fun to make the Russian hordes with 1d infantry (or just very, very cheap infantry). AGain, quality wins at early stages of the game (with very, very few exceptions), quantity does get some merit later on, the -1 to fire is a game breaker later. If I would go quantity, I would never go that low.

Serfdom vs. freedom.
Again, a question of warmonger vs not. Serfdom gives you far better control over your stability, which is a must for warmongers. It has become less of a clear choice with the events addad in 1.05 (I think...).

Hmm, I got the distinct feeling that I've missed something, oh well.

 

[knul]

Quote:
Originally Posted by knul (post #7)
I played my last GC with China and full plutocratic and I got .4 diplomats each year.

The minimum is 1.0 diplomats per year.

I'm playing China with 1.09 and AGCEEP 1.37 and it's definitily .4 diplomats/year: 1 diplomat/year from Royal Diplomacy and -.6 from Konfucianism. May be you mean that Royal Diplomacy gives a minimum of 1 diplomat/year?

No, the 3% TE penalty for embargoes applies the same to full Mercantilism as it applies to full Free Trade. The "free embargo" only applies to monthly trade tech research.

You're right, I've checked the Economy FAQ and it confirms it. In that light, Mercantilism is even less good.

Maybe the DP slider polls should be recreated for v1.09?

That's what I asked in the origional post, but other than you no one reacted on that.

 

[binTravkin]

I believe the max difference is 10, not 20 (10 steps a 1%). Or is it 11%?

It's +10% for one maximum, -10% for other, in total 20% difference.

That is interesting. What I did not know is that there is less attrition when you go quality.

No there is not less attrition, you need less troops to do the task, hence you can escape surpassing attrition limit and still be effective.

I also presumed that once you start a siege, you shall complete it (time may differ). Apparenty it is not quite as I had imagined, right? So - better morale of defenders makes it harder to successfully complete a siege? Is there any formula on this? Do morale on both sides go down during a siege? Can it be that sieging army may be forced to abandon a siege because of morale loss?

Siege era is usually over by land tech 5 in MP games.

The problem with said infantry is that in the large quantities needed to be viable you suffer horrid attrition, which means replacement at war while cheap costs heavily in WE.

No.
It needs only a little more amount to be viable.
From around +50% more at the start of the game to as little as +5% more in late game where morale is so high .5 more morale makes much less difference.
Attrition doesn't matter if you can replenish your troops instantly.
Furthermore, after you reach Land5 huge attrition becomes past as with those huge armies you take fortress in an instant effectively raising attrition limit by 10-20.

Costs heavily?
Come on.
If you lose 50k inf which is equal 50 ducats (50*1) while your enemy loses 10k which costs him 100ducats (10*10) you're a grave winner for 2 reasons:
- you've inflicted more than you lost
- you don't bother losing manpower, he does

And Im not even talking about unique fact that a 1d infantry is inflation immune up to 50% inflation where it gets rounded up to 2d.

Also early warfare has this nasty habit of most major wars requiring one to fight on plains which are infantry graveyards early on.

So what? You can make more in an instant.
Plus once you get LT9, you're invincible.

With low morale you also become particularly vunerable to wave tactics for morale reinforcement.

Oh come on. How can one with at least 2 times less troops make more waves than you?

warfare is pretty much dead outright with the 1 ducat strategy.

Sorry, but are you serious?

Perhaps I'm missing something, but it would seem to be exceedingly difficult to generate substantial offense using cheap infantry, which whom and against whom do you beleive this strategy best works?

You are missing.
You should try it, learn to properly execute it and then come back and discuss it.
There are mostly 3 stages in warfare:
- pre-assault stage - here you haven't yet got the reforms in place to get to 1d infantry, so you use it in a mix with cav to alleviate plains problem. Still you outnumber an equal enemy past morale limitations.
- assault, pre-firepower stage - if you haven't 1d infantry here, you use a modification of former, if you have it, you make multiple average stacks of infantry with little cav support, run in, assault fortress, run to next non-plain province etc.
That way even if you meet cavalry, you still have his fortresses done and he can't have them back so quickly if his force is so cavalry based
- firepower stage - 1d infantry rules. So what your enemy has cav, so what he has arty? For each his unit be it inf, cav or arty you have 3-10 yours. As you advance up the tech tree your morale malus becomes less and less important as morale base grows.

The big question is does the reduction in price merely from serfdom alone offset the morale damage?

At first, with this strategy you don't look at each element. You look at this strategy as a combo. Take one part of combo out and it's something vastly different and potentially ineffective.
At second. Does 20% less production can be offset by up to 10 times less infantry cost and 2 times less stability cost??
Absolutely. It does not only offset it, the benefits are uncomparable for a land-based warmongering country.

Another question is how quickly can you get to 1 ducat infantry early game; how long before morale, particularly in assualts, bites your ass? And lastly is there anything better to spend DP clicks on, personally I'm thinking of inno and centra to get to assualts and a CRT advantage earlier than the guy with 1 ducat infantry?

You wouldn't have to ask all those questions if you ever tried it.
Go on now, try it and after that we can talk on equal odds about it..

Virtually always.

See, you just contradicted yourself!
Going inno for CRT advantage is rarely the case in MP games.
If someone does he is likely to be small and weak later on as he can't handle big territories (less missionaries, less random conversions, more stabcost) and does less if any colonisation (less colonists).

The only bad things about early offense is that some good leaders might lose a seige bonus.

What is one siege bonus against possibility to simply steamroll the enemy once LT5 kicks in?

 

[binTravkin]

It is only possible to get 1d infantry at normal difficulty or lower. Lower than normal difficulty, I think it best to keep some Quality to avoid the -1 firepower penalty; the infantry would still cost 1d. At Very Hard difficulty, the infantry would cost 3d. That changes the ratios between minimum and maximum cost.

Okay, it does, but still the ratio is BIG.
Certainly bigger than the effectiveness ration in combat, not even talking about manpower ratio and stability cost reduction.

I am not sure how you figure your manpower there. You get +25% manpower for full Land and +25% manpower for minimum Quality. So that is +50% manpower. The other extreme is -50% manpower. The maximum difference you can claim is a difference of 1.0 times the base manpower. What is 2.25? What is 9 times?

Ahh, okay, sorry, I doubled the change.
So it's
1 + 25% + 25% at full serfdom and max quantity
versus
1 - 25% - 25% at full free subjects and max quality

which is 1.5/0.5 = 3 times bigger manpower.
Is it a small difference?

 

[binTravkin]

Offensive DP setting has nothing to do with the infantry cost.

Do you guys ever think abit what the author thought with that?!
Or you think it's better go Max defensive in such situations?
Then the low-cost infantry would clearly lose half of it's benefits as it would have almost -1 morale compared to high quality one.

I mean yes I know it does not have to do with costs, but if you actually read what I wrote and are at least average at EU2 you'd understand what I meant.

 

[unmerged(3931)]

Originally Posted by Ws2_32
Quote:
Originally Posted by knul (post #7)
>>I played my last GC with China and full plutocratic and I got .4 diplomats each year.

>The minimum is 1.0 diplomats per year.

I'm playing China with 1.09 and AGCEEP 1.37 and it's definitily .4 diplomats/year: 1 diplomat/year from Royal Diplomacy and -.6 from Konfucianism. May be you mean that Royal Diplomacy gives a minimum of 1 diplomat/year?

The diplomats FAQ says Orthodox and non-Christian religions get a +0 modifier for diplomats. The FAQ is specific in stating that there is a minimum of +1 diplomat per year. I did not realize that AGCEEP gave negative modifiers to diplomats for Confucianism and Buddhism.

Okay, it does, but still the ratio is BIG.
Certainly bigger than the effectiveness ration in combat, not even talking about manpower ratio and stability cost reduction.

Still, it is hard to justify going to minimum Quality when the ratios change. I prefer 4d infantry with a 2 firepower stat compared to 3d infantry at a 1 firepower stat. Now if it were the difference of paying twice as much just to get the additional firepower, I would have to consider how much income there was and if I would be able to spend it all on 1d infantry anyway; 2d infantry might do nicely.

Ahh, okay, sorry, I doubled the change.
So it's
1 + 25% + 25% at full serfdom and max quantity
versus
1 - 25% - 25% at full free subjects and max quality

which is 1.5/0.5 = 3 times bigger manpower.
Is it a small difference?

No, it is not a small difference. Even in single player, I am sold on full Land and low Quality. I just do not go below Quality two.

Do you guys ever think abit what the author thought with that?!
Or you think it's better go Max defensive in such situations?
Then the low-cost infantry would clearly lose half of it's benefits as it would have almost -1 morale compared to high quality one.

I mean yes I know it does not have to do with costs, but if you actually read what I wrote and are at least average at EU2 you'd understand what I meant.

I do not go around correcting people because I think it makes me popular or just to jump on people’s cases. I want to prevent misunderstandings before the board gets deep in some strange ideas. Small fires are easier to put out. It is just to be clear for the folks who do not know so well yet.

 

[unmerged(6147)]

Well, I haven't played a German or Italian minor yet, but wouldn't those be candidates for Land? In the begining, morale can realy help, as does reduced army cost.
As far as I can see, in SP you can win with any slider combination, so why go for Naval? It doesn't realy matter, if you look it that way.

Knul,


In the long run income from trade is larger than income from production, for any nation in this game, and thus naval is better than land. Add to that more colonists which means BB free expansion.

In SP the morale and manpower is only relevant the first 100-150 years (well, maybe an isolated pagan nation like the Incas exempted). After that you are king of the game and can do essentially whatever you want. The only constraint in expansion is BB points and that is why in SP you should always go Aristo. That is if you play for becoming as big and rich as possible. If you play for any other reason you must state so before we discuss.

Thus the fact remains: the only question regarding the naval slider is when to start moving it to the left. The normal answer is: not too early. You cannot get explorers/conquistadors early on anyhow (unless you play POR) and thus extra colonists are not of any use and income from trade is rather low early on in the game.

 

[Jomini]

No.
It needs only a little more amount to be viable.
From around +50% more at the start of the game to as little as +5% more in late game where morale is so high .5 more morale makes much less difference.
Attrition doesn't matter if you can replenish your troops instantly.
Furthermore, after you reach Land5 huge attrition becomes past as with those huge armies you take fortress in an instant effectively raising attrition limit by 10-20.

We are talking about early warfare. Down 50% morale, unable to fight well on plains, and having to suffer attrition doesn't seem like a winning combo for the earliest warfare.

Once you get your first fire phase, I'm still not convinced. You are down two points of fire against a quality player and you still can't fight well on the plains.

Between assualts and fire I will grant the strategy looks appealing; as it might later on when morale differences are less.

Costs heavily?

Did something go over your head? I specificly stated WE. Between attrition and the inevitable losing of battle - retreat to plains - get massacred by cavalry I somehow think less warmongering is possible early on.

So what? You can make more in an instant.

Two months actually. Which allows the enemy to penetrate up to 4 provinces into your land. At the very least while your infantry are rebuilding the enemy should be able to get a very nice strategic deployment going.

Plus once you get LT9, you're invincible.

Why? You are down two points of fire and still hefty morale.

Oh come on. How can one with at least 2 times less troops make more waves than you?

Who said more waves? Better waves. Let's say that I have 1 morale and you .5. We both stalemate and take .25 morale hits. We both send in a completely fresh batch of troops equal in size to what we already have there. Your morale is (.5+.25)/2 = .375; mine goes to (1+.75)/2 = .875. Let's assume you pull off the dice rolls for us both to take .25 morale hits again and we both send in another wave: (2*.125+.5)/3 = .25 and (2*.875 + 1)/3 = .917. Even in the completely artificial scenario where your morale doesn't compound by giving lower morale damage, you keep falling further behind. Even if I give you a free extra wave at this point your morale only goes up to .313 - which is still worse than before we began sending waves.

Obviously the later one goes, the less of an issue this is. I just don't see how 3 ducat infantry is better than spending dp clicks on more important sliders early on. My first priority tends to be higher shock, then land, then normally tech/econ. Even I am forced to lose a war at LT 5, I still get to higher trade and infra which eventually mean CRT advantages or other benifits.

At first, with this strategy you don't look at each element. You look at this strategy as a combo. Take one part of combo out and it's something vastly different and potentially ineffective.
At second. Does 20% less production can be offset by up to 10 times less infantry cost and 2 times less stability cost??
Absolutely. It does not only offset it, the benefits are uncomparable for a land-based warmongering country.

First off you aren't getting 10x cheaper infantry, you only get -2 for full quantity and -2 for full serfdom. The -3 from full land is sunk as any early warmonger benifits from land. 3 ducats vs 11 ducats (assuming I did the math right there) means your infantry is just under 4 times cheaper. 1 ducat vs 9 assuming one is playing normal difficult would be 9 times cheaper.

You wouldn't have to ask all those questions if you ever tried it.

I play very little MP. Both because of time constraints and because I do like the pause button.

It seems to me you sacrifice huge amounts of potential before LT 5. You can't assualt your way into better supply and you need more troops to make up for poor morale and your infantry emphasis when infantry are horrid. On plains you yourself say you need cavalry, yet by building an early infantry force you handicap yourself heavily. If you want to invade France as anyone you will be fighting virtually always somewhere on the plains. The Polish and Russian frontiers are likewise riddled with plains. Italy, the Balkans, Portugal, Africa, and the norther borders of the HRE (both German and Dutch) are all plains.

Not to mention that I foresee a very real possibility that you might face a war when down a CRT as you're domestic policy has focused on cheap infantry rather than faster teching.

See, you just contradicted yourself!

I virtually always play SP. In such games military concerns are only an issue for the first 80 years, maybe 150 years if I'm playing from the hinterlands of Africa. Inno in SP is almost useless. You will win the tech race handily, you will not face competition at manu building. On the other hand more colonists are always welcome and missionaries are also nice.

In SP, most of the time I'd advocate a fully naval, aristo, narrow load for expansion purposes; I highly doubt that carries over to MP.

Going inno for CRT advantage is rarely the case in MP games.

Inno is the easiest slider to reverse in the game bar centra, there are multiple random events that lower inno and either do nothing or give stab. Getting to assualts or fire significantly before your enemies is downright lethal. This lets you define more advantageous borders and hobble your enemies.

Again my experience is limited and out of date; but I found that getting a tech advantage as Austria let me maul France for her territory in the Alps and the Ottos for some slavic land. This left me with very nice, highly defensible borders and an easy conquest of Italy minus the islands.