Give me suggestions for my Custom Nation

[Vicar of Christ]

Thinking I'd like to have a bit of fun in a custom new world and do some achievement hunting at the same time.

Here are the achievements I'm targeting:
-Where am I?
-For Odin
-Humble Origins
-Ideas Guy

Based on this I need to start with:
-Tribal government, north american tech group
-Norse religion
-50 points max in custom nation start

The theme I have in mind is Central Algonquin nation who would have adopted with Norse religion from exposure to the vinland settlers.

Now I need help to figure out what tradition, Ideas and Ambition I should buy with my custom nations. With a crap Ruler and north american tech group I'd have about 45 points to play with.

I imagine I'll need bonuses to let me catch up in tech and institution with the rest of the world, but also maybe a little help with money because I'd start in an area without much in the way of ducats. Militarily, I guess I'd have to think about GB nasty fleet which may require some of my own bonus in kind... but probably further down the line Idea-wise. A little help to convert provinces to Norse perhaps?

Or am I having it all wrong and all I need a big reform progress growth modifier to haul ass out of tribal status?

 

[Surimi]

I can see two ways to go.

The high-risk high reward way would be to conquer a bunch of tribal land become settled as fast as possible, build irrigation in all your provinces and generally maximize your tribal development growth. Once the Europeans arrive, wait for a colonial nation to form (sell them land if needed) and then conquer it to get institutions (it is annoyingly difficult to get institutions as a native council, but if you spend tribal development on provinces which have the institutions and lower autonomy there you should be able to push it high enough). The advantage of this method is that you can develop and tech at the same time without needing to care about dev cost penalties, and you will end up with very rich provinces. The disadvantage is that since you can't build a navy the colonizers will attack you. You can let them take land, wait for a colonial nation to form and then declare a reconquest war to annex them, but it is kind of annoying.

The lower risk but lower reward way would be to reform into a horde and develop to get institutions. You can hypothetically get institutions a bit earlier this way so might be able to reach tech parity faster and you'll be able to build a navy to deter the colonizers, but you're going to end up with a lot of dirt poor land at the end of it.

Which ideas are best will depend a bit on which strategy you want to use. In the former case, your big obstacles for much of the game will be money (to buy irrigation) and institutions, so anything that helps that is good. In the latter case, you're probably going to want things like dev cost reduction, although with only 45 points to burn through you're going to struggle to get any kind of good ideas.

 

[Word_Smith]

You’re going to want to sink a lot of points into “Prestige from Naval Battles”, “Rebel Support Efficiency”, “Recruitment Time”, and “Prestige per Development from Missionary”

You can thank me later, fren

 

[Vicar of Christ]

I can see two ways to go.

The high-risk high reward way would be to conquer a bunch of tribal land become settled as fast as possible, build irrigation in all your provinces and generally maximize your tribal development growth. Once the Europeans arrive, wait for a colonial nation to form (sell them land if needed) and then conquer it to get institutions (it is annoyingly difficult to get institutions as a native council, but if you spend tribal development on provinces which have the institutions and lower autonomy there you should be able to push it high enough). The advantage of this method is that you can develop and tech at the same time without needing to care about dev cost penalties, and you will end up with very rich provinces. The disadvantage is that since you can't build a navy the colonizers will attack you. You can let them take land, wait for a colonial nation to form and then declare a reconquest war to annex them, but it is kind of annoying.

The lower risk but lower reward way would be to reform into a horde and develop to get institutions. You can hypothetically get institutions a bit earlier this way so might be able to reach tech parity faster and you'll be able to build a navy to deter the colonizers, but you're going to end up with a lot of dirt poor land at the end of it.

Which ideas are best will depend a bit on which strategy you want to use. In the former case, your big obstacles for much of the game will be money (to buy irrigation) and institutions, so anything that helps that is good. In the latter case, you're probably going to want things like dev cost reduction, although with only 45 points to burn through you're going to struggle to get any kind of good ideas.

Do I have to wait till european arrive since Vinland starts feudal? If I start with my capital next to them, I'll already have my core... would just need the reform progress.

 

[Seaweed and Mayonnaise]

I do this same setup a lot on VH. Besides the obvious mil ones, I like putting the professionalism one first. It’s really cheap and gets you 100% professionalism just in time for the Europeans. Then, you never have to worry about it as you’ll be at constant war anyway. As a NW tech, you’ll need every bit of mil help you can get. Problem is, the better mil ones are more expensive so hard keeping it under that 50 point limit.

the best bang for you buck is the splendor one. Really cheap, and highly useful since it’s difficult to hit the age bonus requirements as a NW nation. although age abilities aren’t that useful for a NW start either so I don’t tend to use it.

I just start as the native monarchy government that lets you dev push institutions. No need to mess around with reform. Not sure if this works with where am I though.

I also wouldn’t worry about naval. Batteries deter AI doom fleets and they always send their transports unguarded. You’ll get enough naval bonuses from quality to easily protect your shores.

 

[jonjowett]

A little help to convert provinces to Norse perhaps?

I did For Odin as a European nation with the full number of points - and converting provinces to Norse was by far the most painful part. And this was even though I threw literally everything at it: religious ideas; and +1 missionary from custom national ideas; and +2% missionary strength vs heathens from custom national ideas; and probably some policies; and an extra +1 missionary from bugged Heddal Stave Church (which has since been fixed).

Spoiler: FYI, the national ideas I used, spending 200 points

+10% land morale
+30% available loot (playing as pirate republic!)
+??? colonial range (for early colonies)
-50% native uprising chance (synergises with explo+expan policy; screenshot above is after I dropped explo)
+??? discipline
+??? siege ability
+??? combat ability off owned coast (ie. Wooden Wall - this was a naval-focused run)
+1 missionary
+2% missionary strength vs heathens (the missionary stuff was expensive, so it had to be near-last)
+20 max absolutism (to partly offset republics' poor absolutism)

Your situation is arguably a lot worse: You're starting in the New World, so the necessary European provinces are likely to be fairly high-dev when you finally manage to conquer them; and a large proportion of them will probably be wrong-culture (unless you culture-shift). You DEFINITELY need to have a plan for religious conversion - but, with very few points available for national ideas, I'm not sure what your best option is. Perhaps you should set up vassals; rely on them to convert their provinces (or, at least, to remove the wrong-culture penalty for your missionaries); and then integrate them once they're finished?

 

[Vicar of Christ]

For the achievement 'Where am I', does the requirement of native governement is just for game start or I need to uncover the new world map *while* having a native government?

 

[Blizzrd33]

For the achievement 'Where am I', does the requirement of native governement is just for game start or I need to uncover the new world map *while* having a native government?

The wiki lists two sets of conditions, one column is requirements that are mandatory at game start and the next column is requirements that are mandatory at completion.

For Where Am I? achievement, the only completion requirement is to have discovered all the New World provinces. All the other requirements only apply at game start.

 

[Vicar of Christ]

Portugese declared war on me, and managed to get them to war rep me. That increased my income by like 50%. But now the former portugese just turn into a colonial nation... Normally as a native I would go under the radar but does that changes things if I reformed out of native government into a monarchy? Can I declare war on it without alarming Portugal?