How to not suck a** as a Republic in the Age of Absolutism: A guide

[Less2]

So, as we all probably well know, Absolutism completely shafts republics. You're looking at -20 to -50 absolutism depending on your government type, and Noble Elite is trash to begin with due to 8 year election terms. You also suffer missing out on +20 from Court and Country and +10 from not having legitimacy. Effectively you are looking at -50 to -80 absolutism, which makes republics horrid the instant the age of Absolutism hits. How do you get around this? Good Question.


Wow, the War of Spanish Succession bookmark looks a lot different from when I last saw it. I think I want to be Moscovite.

This Veche Republic thing looks nice. No absolutism penalty.

Wait, no. Veche Republic sucks, 20 province cap. Let's just go back to Ligurian.

Turns out the best government for Republics is no government. Is this anarchy? It's 4 year elections and no absolutism penalty. Quite nice. Later reforms work fine so you can pick up another +10 absolutism from longer elections or switch to short elections for a 3 year reelection cycle.

This also works for Colonial Nations (just revolt) and the Dutch Republic (change your tag to something other than NED, e.g. form France). EDIT: See a few posts down for a far easier way to do this.

Request for Paradox: Please look into balancing Republics, they've really been left behind over several patches. Suggestions:

- Make Court and Country require a % of maximum absolutism rather than a flat 60, so that countries with a cap below 60 aren't shafted.
- Make republican tradition (and devotion) increase absolutism cap.
- Cap the number of reform points required for later tiers at the Tier 4 or 5 cost, since otherwise its quite impossible to reach the later reforms with any amount of autonomy. Doubly so if you switch to Republic from another government form (which is required if you want to play a republic in most areas of the world given the lack of starting options).
- Change the awful penalty merchant republics suffer from stated provinces to be less onerous in some way.

 

[Reman]

Spicy

 

[tafsiwerd]

Lol nice. Fair warning to PDX's inevitable overreaction: this is the only thing that tempts me to buy Dharma right now.

 

[rimworld inbox]

Now I've found applications to de eligibilizing tier 1 on monarchies but this is insane. Bravo bravo

 

[Less2]

On further testing you don't even need to go for Veche republic. Simply go to republican dictatorship, boost your RT above 50 before the ruler dies, then your republican dictatorship reform invalidates.

Seems this whole government system wasn't tested very well

 

[PhoenixG]

well government system also bugs the old version (non-Dharma one). If you reform your religion you'll also end up with a no government thing. Too bad there are no republic natives.

 

[magni_]

just as a hint, u can combine this with a tagswitch that uncludes a government change and pretender rebels, So u can end up in a best case scenario, where u end up as a Republic (coming from a horde) while still being a horde (with invisible but still existing hord unity, and the ability to raze)

 

[raikaria]

Republics 'sucking' the moment Age of Absolutism comes is rather questionable.

Remember that while Monarchies technically have slightly higher Discipline due to higher Absolutism; Republics get 10% morale that Monarchies cannot access. Also they can ramp up significantly quicker post-Dharma.

Pre-Dharma I'd have agreed, but post? No.

Besides; both get wrecked by Theocracies anyway who get no Absolutism penalty and get the 10% morale.

 

[Vulkandrache]

Im not quite sure what 10% Morale got to do with having a hard time reaching 100 Absolutism?

 

[EmagDrolBot]

What on earth does 10% morale have to do with anything?

For that matter, who on earth cares (much) about the discipline that absolutism gives? That's a side bonus.

Theocracies are worse than both because you have neither disinheriting nor reelections so your rulers will be far far weaker.

 

[dynalon]

I'm not quite sure if it's funny or sad that the best possible reform for republics is "no reform".

--

Unrelated, but zero reform progress on the later start dates feels wrong. Guess it's not as bad as, say, Qing's mandate situation, but still, later start dates feel more and more pointless with the lack of maintenance that they're getting.

 

[rimworld inbox]

On further testing you don't even need to go for Veche republic. Simply go to republican dictatorship, boost your RT above 50 before the ruler dies, then your republican dictatorship reform invalidates.

Seems this whole government system wasn't tested very well

NED -> X reportedly works as well.

 

[holyvigil]

So, as we all probably well know, Absolutism completely shafts republics. You're looking at -20 to -50 absolutism depending on your government type, and Noble Elite is trash to begin with due to 8 year election terms. You also suffer missing out on +20 from Court and Country and +10 from not having legitimacy. Effectively you are looking at -50 to -80 absolutism, which makes republics horrid the instant the age of Absolutism hits. How do you get around this? Good Question.

View attachment 472236
Wow, the War of Spanish Succession bookmark looks a lot different from when I last saw it. I think I want to be Moscovite.
View attachment 472237
This Veche Republic thing looks nice. No absolutism penalty.
View attachment 472238
Wait, no. Veche Republic sucks, 20 province cap. Let's just go back to Ligurian.
View attachment 472239 View attachment 472240
Turns out the best government for Republics is no government. Is this anarchy? It's 4 year elections and no absolutism penalty. Quite nice. Later reforms work fine so you can pick up another +10 absolutism from longer elections or switch to short elections for a 3 year reelection cycle.

This also works for Colonial Nations (just revolt) and the Dutch Republic (change your tag to something other than NED, e.g. form France). EDIT: See a few posts down for a far easier way to do this.

Request for Paradox: Please look into balancing Republics, they've really been left behind over several patches. Suggestions:

- Make Court and Country require a % of maximum absolutism rather than a flat 60, so that countries with a cap below 60 aren't shafted.
- Make republican tradition (and devotion) increase absolutism cap.
- Cap the number of reform points required for later tiers at the Tier 4 or 5 cost, since otherwise its quite impossible to reach the later reforms with any amount of autonomy. Doubly so if you switch to Republic from another government form (which is required if you want to play a republic in most areas of the world given the lack of starting options).
- Change the awful penalty merchant republics suffer from stated provinces to be less onerous in some way.

Really the Court and Country disaster makes no sense for a republic.

For a republic it should be removed and replaced with another disaster or decision.

Perhaps making them more unique by allowing an early Rev. Republic or by giving them a decision to increase presidential power could be possibilities.

As it is now the Court and Country doesn't make much sense.

Neither does republics having low Admin efficiency when the British Empire and later practically every country seem to do just fine with their administration.

 

[DmUa]

Turns out the best government for Republics is no government. Is this anarchy?

- congratulations comrade you just unlocked Communism!

Jokes aside IMHO Absolutism should really be redone as a graded scale with Absolutism on one side and Liberalism on the other and republics having malus to max absolutism while monarchies would have malus to liberalism. OFC bonuses should be revised in that case so high Absolutism would not only provide bonuses but also give some maluses with Liberalism side inverting those.

So something like this: Absolutism - bonus to discipline, admin efficiency ( but lower than current one ), faster core decay; but malus to agressive expansion, morale and revolt risk.

 

[akngn]

revolt risk

Really? I really enjoy when people seriously advise increasing revolt risk. Do you really like fighting rebels so much? They are nothing more than micromanagement nightmare when absolutism is relevant. They can never win, they are just conquest tax. I wish there was a government reform or something that slashes my income and manpower half but reduces rebel risk to 0. I would gladly pick it.

admin efficiency

This is the only thing that matters. If you put this on one side, that side will be overpowered. Tall gameplay concerns are irrelevant for this discussion because you don't need absolutism if you are doing a tall gameplay. And if you want blob as republic it will suck compared to monarchies because of admin efficiency. This liberalism solution I've seen in this forum so much never fixes that. A proper solution should give Republics an alternate way to increase their admin efficiency.

 

[Dasmani]

And if you want blob as republic it will suck compared to monarchies because of admin efficiency.

The administrative efficiency is certainly the most powerful, but it isn't totally necessary. You can finish a world conquest with less than 100 absolutism. I mean, we used to do it with 0 absolutism.

A republic that starts with a -40 max absolutism that takes both of the max absolutism bonuses and enters a golden age will have 65 absolutism, and can trigger Court and Country for another 20 and have 85 absolutism. The difference between 85 and 100 absolutism is only 6% administrative efficiency. I've finished a WC with 30 years to spare at a max of 90 absolutism (I didn't trigger C&C because I was too lazy for rebels and went with a max unrest reduction strategy which was pretty nice and relaxing.)

Personally I've had a lot of fun with some of the unique republic types like Sich Rada and Pirates, and I especially like them for the "Get to tech 32" or "Click the mercantilism button 100 times" type of achievement runs.

 

[DmUa]

Really? I really enjoy when people seriously advise increasing revolt risk. Do you really like fighting rebels so much? They are nothing more than micromanagement nightmare when absolutism is relevant. They can never win, they are just conquest tax. I wish there was a government reform or something that slashes my income and manpower half but reduces rebel risk to 0. I would gladly pick it.

- this is just example of how Absolutism-Liberalism scale could work. As for RR, yeah we all know that revolts never happened during this time, aha aha.

This is the only thing that matters. If you put this on one side, that side will be overpowered. Tall gameplay concerns are irrelevant for this discussion because you don't need absolutism if you are doing a tall gameplay. And if you want blob as republic it will suck compared to monarchies because of admin efficiency. This liberalism solution I've seen in this forum so much never fixes that. A proper solution should give Republics an alternate way to increase their admin efficiency.

- than why bother with this at all? What the point of creating separate ways of getting admin efficiency if admin efficiency is the only way to begin with? Here are no choice with a mindset like this. Here are only two solutions to this problem - either give republics the same bonuses as monarchies, which in the process will make any semblance of choice and diversity disappear or to redo the whole system from scratch. Your solution is not a solution, it is just another patch and crutch to current overall frankensteinish state of the game.

 

[Less2]

The administrative efficiency is certainly the most powerful, but it isn't totally necessary. You can finish a world conquest with less than 100 absolutism. I mean, we used to do it with 0 absolutism.

There is also a lot, lot more development in the world now than there was before absolutism. In fact I think the whole reasoning behind Admin Efficiency in its conception was to add in a counter-balance to the ever increasing development that made WC harder and harder with each patch.

A republic that starts with a -40 max absolutism that takes both of the max absolutism bonuses and enters a golden age will have 65 absolutism, and can trigger Court and Country for another 20 and have 85 absolutism. The difference between 85 and 100 absolutism is only 6% administrative efficiency. I've finished a WC with 30 years to spare at a max of 90 absolutism (I didn't trigger C&C because I was too lazy for rebels and went with a max unrest reduction strategy which was pretty nice and relaxing.)

Some math:

Max reform progress gain at 0% autonomy is 10 points per year. The final reform requires a total of 2700 points accrued. This takes 270 years, or until 1714 (assuming no events hurt nor help you). This is 4 years after the Age of Revolutions generally begins, meaning if you want to play a republic with absolutism it's likely actually quicker to simply play a monarchy and become the revolution target, which is a republic without absolutism penalty and which can use absolutism in all those preceding years.

If you have a more realistic average autonomy of just 20%, you'll instead take until 1781 to get the final reform, meaning only 40 years of time to use it (and 15 or so of those are going to be spent going through court and country). And again it gets even worse if you want to play a republic in the 90% of the world that doesn't have one normally, since switching to republic from a tribe or monarchy entails losing reform progress.

Also, keep in mind that 6% admin efficiency is not just 6% admin efficiency. The difference between 70% admin efficiency and 64% admin efficiency is 20% more land taken. This is on top of not having any relevant absolutism for the first 100-150 years since it unlocks.

 

[Dasmani]

Also, keep in mind that 6% admin efficiency is not just 6% admin efficiency. The difference between 70% admin efficiency and 64% admin efficiency is 20% more land taken.

Yes, but that isn't necessary for a world conquest. The difference between "not enough" and "enough" is astronomically bigger than any differences between "enough" and "more than enough" in terms of actual strategic impact.

In really basic terms, if you have an opponent with 20 hit points, then 21 damage, 312 damage, and 4,117,650 damage are strategically exactly the same number.

Once you have enough administrative efficiency that world conquest is possible, anything above that is just a bonus.

meaning if you want to play a republic with absolutism it's likely actually quicker to simply play a monarchy and become the revolution target

Wait, how else do you get to play as a republic?

But honestly, the differences in max absolutism is not enough to make republics completely non-viable, even for WC.

 

[Xdevo]

- this is just example of how Absolutism-Liberalism scale could work. As for RR, yeah we all know that revolts never happened during this time, aha aha.

- than why bother with this at all? What the point of creating separate ways of getting admin efficiency if admin efficiency is the only way to begin with? Here are no choice with a mindset like this. Here are only two solutions to this problem - either give republics the same bonuses as monarchies, which in the process will make any semblance of choice and diversity disappear or to redo the whole system from scratch. Your solution is not a solution, it is just another patch and crutch to current overall frankensteinish state of the game.

Because gameplay considerations are what make valid choices. Admin Efficiency is an incredibly powerful tool with how EU4 is designed. Not taking it is going to severely negatively impact the viability of a choice unless the counter is incredibly good. Making two near equally powerful choices is a very tall task for a set of developers that have consistently shown that they're out of touch with the game balance state (see: Trade Companies). As it stands, there's already no choice. Monarchies are (for the vast majority of situations) far better choices than republics and will continue to be so as long as one side has associated Admin Efficiency. Making yet another false choice is exactly the thing that caused the current frankensteined state of the game. The game is plagued with false choices already and a Liberalism meter that gives you more money or whatever is just a noob trap or some irrelevant roleplay option for people that never quite understood how republics functioned in the era.

Unless Republics are given something that's very damn close to the power of the 40 AE, there is no real choice being added to the game. Just another in a very long list of false choices.