Is this an exploit? (QftNW)

[unmerged(4444)]

+1 for requiring QftNW in order to send colonists. Please. It just makes sense.

 

[Nimic]

I agree with the idea that you should have to have Quest for the new World to be able to explore. Like someone mentioned, this could also go far in limiting the "strange colonial empires" problem, but without completely stopping it.

 

[unmerged(514)]

As it is presently implemented, QftNW is in itself an exploit.

 

[minority]

Actually if you start as England in 1497 or greater you start with John Cabot without having to select QftNW! Stating even later gives you the other Cabot. The bottom line is that you can explore without QftNW if you take advantage of (exploit) the explorers in the history files by selecting certain countries at the appropriate start dates.

I for one don't like this. A Nation ought to have QftNW to explore even if it has explorers or conquistadors. This would stop this potential exploit.

George

Are there events that may give a country without QftNW explorers?

If there are, then this should be ok.

As long as exploration is made to be harder, then QftNW won't be an exploit IMHO


cheers

 

[KingOfTheIsles]

One solution I could think of for modding, if the current situation isn't changed, is just to have the amount of colonists per year cripplingly low, but QftNW adds them back, to make colonising feasible. That way you could explore, but ould usually need QftNW to colonise. Bear in mind I haven't checked the files to see if this can be done yet, but it could be a feasible way to handle it.

 

[Kuipy]

So you think Russia should need Quest for the New World in order to go east of the Ural ?

 

[KingOfTheIsles]

Yep, already thought of that, shouldn't need it. Like I said, I haven't looked at the files, but I believe each religion gets a certain number of bonus colonists. Give Orthodox higher number of colonists, and voila. This still has potential for player misuse, but it was a suggestion for making AI colonisation more workable. That, or do nothing and accept that every player will find exploits.

 

[frpe02]

And how about the Swedish colonization of Lappland and Österbotten?

 

[Golwar]

I don't get this idea to combine QftNW with the ability to colonise. Any nation with a seaport should have the ability to populate the known world overseas - what should hinder them ? Brandenburg for example made it's own colonisation efforts and surely wasn't a nation that made huge discoveries.

It's the effect of the sliders that shall influence a nations behaviour, not just the national idea to go there where never before anyone has been

 

[Secret Master]

I must disagree with the discussion so far.

While at first it seems that you can exploit Quest for the New World to get some quick exploration, the reality is that by itself, Quest for the New World is not enough to have a great colonial empire.

As Castile, I found myself needing three national ideas to make a truly powerful colonial empire in Central America. First, I needed Quest for the New World just to find the New World. Second, I needed Deus Vult in order to DOW the meso -Americans without need for a CB. Finally, when I owned everything from Nevada to Panama, I had to take Viceroys in order to make the provinces in any way profitable. Furthermore, as leaders began to die off, I needed to continue purchasing conquistadors in order to enforce policy in Latin America through killing natives and planning my next war of conquest against the Incas, so it was not feasible to swap out National Ideas. Stability costs were already fairly high, and a -3 hit to stability would have meant perpetual revolts in Latin America for the next decade.

Think about that for a second. I needed three national ideas to set up and make a colonial empire truly profitable. That means I had to miss out on Conscription (extra manpower), Military Drill (extra morale), and Scientific Revolution (cheaper research), which I would have taken as Austria or Poland. Needless to say, I kept very strong diplomatic and military ties with Portugal and Aragon in order to convince France to leave me alone.

And I needed those three national ideas just to get to the same place Spain did historically (except that I never managed to become Spain for some reason). I don't see this as being too unbalanced.

 

[Jernau Gurgeh]

While at first it seems that you can exploit Quest for the New World to get some quick exploration, the reality is that by itself, Quest for the New World is not enough to have a great colonial empire.

I think the problem is rather more that, once the exploration is done, Quest for the New World isn't needed at all to have a great colonial empire. The exploit would simply be to use QftNW to explore everywhere you want and then swap for another national idea, before you start building your empire and your stability costs increase. This is perfectly doable if all you want is to colonize the Caribbean and part of the American coast, for example.

This is probably related to the fast speed at which exploration occurs in the demo, though, which we know is goiing to be tweaked. Slower exploration likely means this is less of a problem. And note that, even if QftNW is required for overseas colonization, there's nothing to stop you from changing it later on after your colonization is done, and you've built your colonies up to cities.

 

[Alerias]

I think this is a great feature not an exploit.

Taking a huge stab hit for a temporary benefit is a tradeoff, and one that makes much sense, really. Historically, there WERE nations who only briefly flirted with overseas expansionism, and those are generally the very nations who paid a price at home for these adventures, rather than benefitting from them.

I say, great work on this one. Also, keep in mind this is also true for any other national idea. Accepting to deal with -3 stab in exchange for overhauling your repertoire of national ideas is an extremely accurate representation of a radical revolution in philosophy.