is innovative better than economic ideas for france?

[Beagá]

i normally take one of those two at the start and pick a military idea as the second option, i like the innovative bonuses (especially - war exhaustion). just curious on other players views on them.

Both are viable, with playstyle needing adjustment.

Economy is better if you want to go for colonies, as ultimatedly the biggest limitation for those is cash. Economy gives more money, so... In particular, cheaper manufactories and special buildings are awesome, making building lots of these much easier.

On the other hand if you want to fight more wars the Innovative is better, as MP savings allow for more stability (less unrest), more coring, more Diplo points to use on vassals to annex. Obviously less army tradition decay makes it even more war oriented.

 

[Korburss]

Innovative is purely better than Economic. -25% Advisor Cost is huge for getting better advisors quick for extra MP, -5% tech will give you thousands of monarch points over the game, Army Tradition decay is great, -0.5 War exhuastion is awesome. I personally always start with it.

Economy. 10% Tax is eh. Build cost is ok but yeah MP sink. Inflation Reduction is decent but not really needed. Land Maintenance is decent. Production efficiency is eh. Personally I usually only get it if I really want more inflation reduction and don't need any thing from another Idea.

 

[Gaamel]

Innovative is purely better than Economic. -25% Advisor Cost is huge for getting better advisors quick for extra MP, -5% tech will give you thousands of monarch points over the game, Army Tradition decay is great, -0.5 War exhuastion is awesome. I personally always start with it.

Economy. 10% Tax is eh. Build cost is ok but yeah MP sink. Inflation Reduction is decent but not really needed. Land Maintenance is decent. Production efficiency is eh. Personally I usually only get it if I really want more inflation reduction and don't need any thing from another Idea.

Economy enables Versailles, a must-have for France :closedeyes:

 

[Incompetent]

Economy is better if you want to go for colonies, as ultimatedly the biggest limitation for those is cash.

Thing is, the single best way to get more cash as a Western European is to sink your claws deeper into Africa/Asia/Americas and churn out light ships, so more of the world's trade money flows into your pockets. Econ doesn't help much with that, and it doesn't boost the money you make from trade (except for the goods produced bonus, I suppose, but you'll get more from generating goods production via trade companies and CNs). The best money ideas at the moment are Exploration, Expansion and Trade.

 

[Beagá]

Exploration sure, Expansion not as much (at least not early game)

When colonizing jungles (hell, even America) you don´t need another colonist that much, you need settler increase AND cash to sustain many colonies at the same time.

Guess who allows the cash more easily? While 10% tax is nothing to a country like, say, Ulm, for France the gain is huge. AND the production bonus (which brings cash per se, considering all the textiles France can get) means the cheap manufactories will give you even more bang for the buck. So it really is about playstyle. It´s not like you will be able to build tons of colonies in the Americas AND use the Expansion CB in India at the same time until at least 1600. Unless you really go for screwing the other colonizers by destroying their colonies, so you have more time to colonize.

 

[ikkiks]

Maybe I'm too much of a warmonger, but I find Economic to be close to the worst idea in the game. Even more so if you're playing a great power, where money shouldn't ever be a problem. Want more money? Well, just conquer more, simple as that.

As France, I'd pick Diplomatic or Influence. You have too many vassals and feeding vassals is a major part of the french strategy. If you must choose an Administrative Idea, pick Innovative or Humanist.

 

[DKinator]

If you feel strapped for cash and want an idea to influence that, go for the trade ideas. They provide a way larger income boost than economy does. Economy is limited by your individual provinces. You get 10% increase to both tax and production, a marginal benefit at best. Trade income modifiers when paired with more trade power and additional merchants has the potential to net one a substantial amount of money. The best part? Trade ideas used diplo points, not the valuable admin points. I'd say trade is probably the best idea to rush now except for landlocked nations (unless that nation can quickly expand to the sea) or nations that benefit greatly from Aristocracy. Really, the amount of money that can be generated by trade has just about trivialized money sinks.

Also, as has been pointed out, Innovative has the potential to save you even more money because of the -25% cost to advisors.

 

[Gaamel]

Maybe I'm too much of a warmonger, but I find Economic to be close to the worst idea in the game. Even more so if you're playing a great power, where money shouldn't ever be a problem. Want more money? Well, just conquer more, simple as that.

As France, I'd pick Diplomatic or Influence. You have too many vassals and feeding vassals is a major part of the french strategy. If you must choose an Administrative Idea, pick Innovative or Humanist.

Diplo is not that useful with France in 1.8. Instead of picking it for the additional diplomat, start with an admin idea and build the embassy asap (money is really a non-factor). Later on, with vassals integrated, 3 diplomats are generally enough for the rest of the game. Diplo and influence are quite similar actually, but the -20% AE from influence is very handful to prevent coalitions.

 

[The-King]

Economy enables Versailles, a must-have for France :closedeyes:

Its not a must-have. Just because you get a unique decision which requires a whole idea group to pass doesn't mean its worth it.

Innovative is best because it can reduce the amount of monarch points required by alot by reducing techs, giving events that further reduce tech costs, lowing the cost of high level advisors significantly, the prestige and tradition decays are amazing, the +1 leader without upkeep is meh but alright, and monthly war exhaustion reduction can help you out a lot without you realizing it which most people take for granted.

Economic is still 'good' just like every idea group is 'good' because they all provide positive bonus'. But you can't look at ideas in a vaccum. Comparisons need to be made and when you compare Innovative to Economic the Innovative ideas seem much better. In regards to France you're already a wealthy nation and what you need to get the edge over other nations is more monarch points and more efficient uses of monarch points. Innovative provides that.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You get more from +1 extra monarch point in a category across 3 years than innovative's -5% tech cost gives you in 13. If you're talking about "saving monarch points", innovative relies extensively on events.

Innovative's draw comes from its assistance to war effort and the -advisor cost combination, with better than average events. In SP it's somewhat junky on France, as is economic, but when you aren't just permawarring with DotF to help with -WE and constantly mowing down opposition for plenty of tradition its bonuses become a lot more attractive. It's hard to picture economic being a strong pick for France in either SP or MP though, religious/admin/inno/humanist are all better. I'm not 100% sure about expansion for WC these days though if you snipe colonizers; DIP 22 gives a lot of time for spamming protectorates.

 

[Riza]

Maybe I'm too much of a warmonger, but I find Economic to be close to the worst idea in the game. Even more so if you're playing a great power, where money shouldn't ever be a problem. Want more money? Well, just conquer more, simple as that.

As France, I'd pick Diplomatic or Influence. You have too many vassals and feeding vassals is a major part of the french strategy. If you must choose an Administrative Idea, pick Innovative or Humanist.

^ pretty much this.
Influence is my first choice as France. I think its OP as s**t.

 

[Denkt]

And still the undisputed admistrative champion of the world:
Expansion

 

[Autoclave]

If you feel strapped for cash and want an idea to influence that, go for the trade ideas. They provide a way larger income boost than economy does. Economy is limited by your individual provinces. You get 10% increase to both tax and production, a marginal benefit at best. Trade income modifiers when paired with more trade power and additional merchants has the potential to net one a substantial amount of money. The best part? Trade ideas used diplo points, not the valuable admin points. I'd say trade is probably the best idea to rush now except for landlocked nations (unless that nation can quickly expand to the sea) or nations that benefit greatly from Aristocracy. Really, the amount of money that can be generated by trade has just about trivialized money sinks.

Also, as has been pointed out, Innovative has the potential to save you even more money because of the -25% cost to advisors.

Trade is amazing in combination with something that gives you naval force limits. As denmark i could dominate the entire world trade thanks to my 1800 light ships. I was steering trade from india -> Ethiopia -> South Africa -> Ivory Coast -> Caribean -> Cheasepeake - > St Lawrence -> North Sea -> Lubeck. 1000 per month duccats by 1700. Better players would do even better than i did.

 

[Denkt]

Trade is amazing in combination with something that gives you naval force limits. As denmark i could dominate the entire world trade thanks to my 1800 light ships. I was steering trade from india -> Ethiopia -> South Africa -> Ivory Coast -> Caribean -> Cheasepeake - > St Lawrence -> North Sea -> Lubeck. 1000 per month duccats by 1700. Better players would do even better than i did.

Another reason why expansion is best admin ide:
Cb for trade post, policies that give Naval force limit and trade efficiency.

 

[Autoclave]

Thing is, the single best way to get more cash as a Western European is to sink your claws deeper into Africa/Asia/Americas and churn out light ships, so more of the world's trade money flows into your pockets. Econ doesn't help much with that, and it doesn't boost the money you make from trade (except for the goods produced bonus, I suppose, but you'll get more from generating goods production via trade companies and CNs). The best money ideas at the moment are Exploration, Expansion and Trade.

I agree but i have also recently discovered Maritime being good as well. Because Maritime = more light ships + Confirm Thalassocracy for extra merchant. Also players underestimate how much trade money is lost because of ship repair time. With maritime you don't have to worry about lightship downtime, especially in places where your repair base is far away.

I was protecting trade in carribean, and for some weird reason my lightships were not repairing at the docks of my CN, despite the fact that they grant fleet basing rights. So every few months or so my caribean fleet wasted time sailing to .. reykjavik for repairs IF i had maritime, this problem would've been solved.

 

[Denkt]

Quality is extreamly important for any decent trade empire because trade-quality policy that give 20% trade efficiency.
Keeping Naval trade high is very important because with that 100% trade steering trade not only go to the place that you wan't but it also is a multiplyer on value increase of steering.

A hidden but very important advantage of trade and expansion is that every merchant over 2 give 5 Naval force limit which can more then double you navy force limit.
Trade companies merchants do the same.

 

[Beagá]

Another reason why expansion is best admin ide:
Cb for trade post, policies that give Naval force limit and trade efficiency.

Who will spend ADM on policies like that? You will want ADM to core stuff...

Only kind of policy that justifies it are the ones that increase settler growth. So using the policies that require DIP points is nice.

Maybe I'm too much of a warmonger, but I find Economic to be close to the worst idea in the game. Even more so if you're playing a great power, where money shouldn't ever be a problem. Want more money? Well, just conquer more, simple as that.

As France, I'd pick Diplomatic or Influence. You have too many vassals and feeding vassals is a major part of the french strategy. If you must choose an Administrative Idea, pick Innovative or Humanist.

Again:

Game is balanced for multiplayer, where conquest is not easy and you have to squeeze more from your provinces. Yes we all know that beating the AI on Normal becomes easy eventually. Go play on Hard then, see what happens.

And naturally any kind of bonus that is % based will suck for small countries, but 10% tax is a lot of extra money for France. You also vastly underestimate how good is having that extra Advisor.

 

[Denkt]

The policies I mentioned use dip points if you are intressted.

 

[Rey]

Ok, Innovative is good. The benefits of having high Prestige and Army Tradition are often overlooked. Let's see:

Spoiler

With maximum 100 prestige, the player gets the following modifier:

Trade power +15% Global trade power
Morale of armies +10% Morale of armies
Morale of navies +10% Morale of navies
National spy defence +10% National spy defense
Mercenary cost -33% Mercenary cost
Legitimacy +1 Yearly legitimacy
Better relations over time +50% Better relations over time
+10% improve relations
Papal influence +1 yearly papal influence
Aggressive expansion impact -10% Aggressive expansion impact

100 Army Tradition gives 100% of the following bonuses.

Morale of armies +25% Morale of armies
Manpower recovery speed +10% Manpower recovery
Land morale recovery +10% Land morale recovery
Siege ability +5% Siege ability

Better than the bonus provided by other specific idea groups. The -5% Tech cost saves you between (for 28 techs, given you have the first 4 already):

Base cost = 600*0.05*28*3 = 2520 mon. points.

Plus the advisor costs. A level 3 advisor costs 5 times more than a level 1 one. With a 25 % reduction, he will only cost 3.75x more.

 

[Denkt]

Which are pretty patetic compared to what expansion can give you, espacially combined with trade and quality.