Merchant republic with English ideas

[Nobak]

Hello all.

I'm trying to do a game where I focus on Goods Produced bonuses, just to see what kind of results I can get. However, I'm running into issues. The highest bonus you can get from national ideas is 20%, as Pskov and England. The wiki claims Great Britain's ideas are the same as England, but I've formed it (as Scotland) and your ideas don't change, so that's not much use.

I could just start as England, but part of my plan is being a Merchant Republic. As far as I can gather, there's no way to switch out of the english monarchy until the Civil war, and that happens too late for my tastes. According to the wiki, it seems rebels can't help (special government types are protected), and with no Nobility you can't get Aristocratic coup (and that's probably the only reason it doesn't also protect english monarchy).

Don't know if disabling Common Sense would work, but I don't really want to lose an arbitrary set of features just to get rid of one I don't like.

Are there any shenanigans I haven't thought of, or is my only option a much less casual campaign as Pskov?

 

[iquabakaner]

I think released vassals have your own government form (but I can't be sure). Maybe you can try conquering England as a merchant republic and release and play as. Although I'm not sure how long it would take.

But since you can do it as Scotland which you already played once, you might as well give it a try.

 

[Nobak]

An inventive idea. I thought it might work, even, but a quick console test reveals that England still gets released with its unchangeable government

 

[ShoGuL]

English Merchant Republic is indeed glorious. I too am curious to see if it's possible to play earlier

 

[LordPavel]

Custom nation ?
You can have your marchand republic and even some more bonus in trade.

 

[iquabakaner]

What about forming a country that changes government type, but never choose to change your ideas?

Edit: I just checked, the event that allows you to form Dutch republic after you form the Netherlands only blocks Celestial Empire, so you can do it with English Monarchy. You also can choose Administrative Republic or Administrative Monarchy in that event, which allows you to switch to merchant republic more easily than Dutch Republic.

 

[Nobak]

Oh, that's brilliant. And I bet it would have worked even if things had been as complicated as the wiki led me to believe.

In testing your suggestion using the console, I found out that I could change my government type as soon as I formed Netherlands. It turns out the protection of the english monarchy is limited to specific tags, which is not mentioned by the wiki's description of the decision:

OR = {
    NOT = { government = english_monarchy }
    AND = {
        NOT = { tag = ENG }
        NOT = { tag = GBR }
    }
}

So it turns out I just need to tag-change to literally anything that's not GBR. Netherlands is probably the one that most aligns with what I want to do, in any case (dominate the English Channel trade node). Thanks for the suggestion, I would not have found this out without it.

 

[ShoGuL]

Thanks for the hint. Good to know English Merchant Republic is definitely near the top of my favorite brainstorms.

 

[Nobak]

You can probably even form England back once you're a Merchant Republic, if the tag is important to you.

 

[CaptainPolyp]

Oh, that's brilliant. And I bet it would have worked even if things had been as complicated as the wiki led me to believe.

In testing your suggestion using the console, I found out that I could change my government type as soon as I formed Netherlands. It turns out the protection of the english monarchy is limited to specific tags, which is not mentioned by the wiki's description of the decision:

OR = {
    NOT = { government = english_monarchy }
    AND = {
        NOT = { tag = ENG }
        NOT = { tag = GBR }
    }
}

So it turns out I just need to tag-change to literally anything that's not GBR. Netherlands is probably the one that most aligns with what I want to do, in any case (dominate the English Channel trade node). Thanks for the suggestion, I would not have found this out without it.

So what does it means? I'm not sure I understand the details (I'm not a very experienced player).
In order to make a merchant republic with english ideas, you have to start as England, tag switch for another thing (other than GB) and then form Netherland (get administrative republic and switch for MR)? Or can you strait up form Netherland as England?
I guess the first one, since if you do not tag switch, you are England with english monarchy (just need confirmation).

If yes, what would be the easiest path to tag switch? Release a vassal in the Netherland region (after reducing the English tag to an opm to help with the independance war) or something else?
Maybe simply forming Ireland?

 

[ShoGuL]

England can form Netherlands directly. All you have to do is conquer the Lowlands and convert to Dutch culture.

 

[CaptainPolyp]

England can form Netherlands directly. All you have to do is conquer the Lowlands and convert to Dutch culture.

Ok, but then, what are the conditions Nobak is talking about? (i.e., not english monarchy and not England nor GB)

Or Nobak talks about something completely different, which I missed (and which does not apply anyway, if you just tag switch to Netherland)

 

[ShoGuL]

Ok, but then, what are the conditions Nobak is talking about? (i.e., not english monarchy and not England nor GB)

Or Nobak talks about something completely different, which I missed (and which does not apply anyway, if you just tag switch to Netherland)

Pretty sure he's just saying "If you switch away from the tags GBR or ENG, you can switch away from English Monarchy".

 

[iquabakaner]

Ok, but then, what are the conditions Nobak is talking about? (i.e., not english monarchy and not England nor GB)

Or Nobak talks about something completely different, which I missed (and which does not apply anyway, if you just tag switch to Netherland)

It's about the decisions to change government. The ones that allow you to change to either merchant republic, oligarchic republic or theocracy if you have the required ideas. They were unavailable as England/Great Britain with English Monarchy, but once you tag switch the decisions will be available to you, even if you still have English Monarchy.

 

[Hexu]

Actually I did such a campaign a week ago. I played as GB and switch to Netherlands. I get an event to decide to change ideas or stay with GB's. I'm still Administrative Monarchy. I wanted to check if I can switch to Merchant Republic but I don't know if their is a way to turn off that ending screen at 3 January 1821 and I don't have any other saves 'cause of Ironman.

 

[CaptainPolyp]

OK thanks for these explanations @ShoGuL and @iquabakaner

 

[El_Cid_]

Hello all.

I'm trying to do a game where I focus on Goods Produced bonuses, just to see what kind of results I can get. However, I'm running into issues. The highest bonus you can get from national ideas is 20%, as Pskov and England. The wiki claims Great Britain's ideas are the same as England, but I've formed it (as Scotland) and your ideas don't change, so that's not much use.

I could just start as England, but part of my plan is being a Merchant Republic. As far as I can gather, there's no way to switch out of the english monarchy until the Civil war, and that happens too late for my tastes. According to the wiki, it seems rebels can't help (special government types are protected), and with no Nobility you can't get Aristocratic coup (and that's probably the only reason it doesn't also protect english monarchy).

Don't know if disabling Common Sense would work, but I don't really want to lose an arbitrary set of features just to get rid of one I don't like.

Are there any shenanigans I haven't thought of, or is my only option a much less casual campaign as Pskov?

I was doing this EXACT campaign a couple of weeks back

I killed it though when I got to Oman and saw no Ibadi provinces left (extra 10% goods produced)

My plan was to leave going Merchant Republic until the end. I, like you, couldn't come up with any way of getting rid of English Monarchy in the early game.

 

[Nobak]

About the code I pasted: It was part of the conditions you need to fulfill in order to see the decision that switches a monarchy to a merchant republic. The whole conditions go like this:

potential = {
           NOT = { government = merchant_republic }
           NOT = { government = steppe_horde }
           NOT = { government = iqta }
           NOT = { government = feudal_theocracy }
           NOT = { government = mamluk_government }
           NOT = { government = tribal_despotism }
           NOT = { government = tribal_kingdom }
           NOT = { government = tribal_federation }
           NOT = { government = native_council }
           NOT = { government = siberian_native_council }
           OR = {
               NOT = { government = english_monarchy }
               AND = {
                   NOT = { tag = ENG }
                   NOT = { tag = GBR }
               }
           }
           NOT = { government = elective_monarchy }
           NOT = { government = celestial_empire }
           NOT = { government = daimyo }
           NOT = { government = shogunate }
           NOT = { government = revolutionary_empire }
           government = monarchy
           NOT = { num_of_provinces_in_states = 21 }
       }

You must fulfill all those conditions, but the OR here means what others have already explained.

I feel that it's worth mentioning that while I didn't need it in this case, the Netherlands event that changes your government seems like an effective way of getting rid of all these other government types, except celestial empire. This also includes the republic governments from the other decision (although if they have republican tradition, you can probably just tank it and lose them that way):

           [...]
           NOT = { government = tribal_democracy }
           NOT = { government = native_council }
           NOT = { government = siberian_native_council }
           NOT = { government = imperial_city }
           NOT = { government = ambrosian_republic }
           NOT = { government = dutch_republic }
           NOT = { government = colonial_government }
           [...]

I was doing this EXACT campaign a couple of weeks back

I killed it though when I got to Oman and saw no Ibadi provinces left (extra 10% goods produced)

My plan was to leave going Merchant Republic until the end. I, like you, couldn't come up with any way of getting rid of English Monarchy in the early game.

Yeah, I know that's an option but I don't feel like going through the trouble of switching to Ibadi so I'll probably just go Reformed for the trade efficiency.

Fetishist with the Hindu cult is another option, but that's probably even more trouble.


@CaptainPolyp: Yes, I believe Ireland is the most straightforward option.

 

[Mrkew]

ah, I know that's an option but I don't feel like going through the trouble of switching to Ibadi

Do it. No cutting corners. It's not even that difficult, just conquer a big chunk of middle east/persia (51%+ of total provinces), and then let Ibadi zealots do the rest.

 

[Nobak]

Do it. No cutting corners. It's not even that difficult, just conquer a big chunk of middle east/persia (51%+ of total provinces), and then let Ibadi zealots do the rest.

I kind of figured I would have a lot of provinces by then and it'd be a lot of trouble. Also, like you said, possibility of Ibadi being gone. But you're right, I probably won't have anything else to do by then, except controlling trade and actively preventing the decline of the spice trade. Having to go Fetishist would suck because of having to go Animist first.

Edit: It seems like the most direct course of action would be to protect Mzab somehow and eat spanish and portuguese lands, perhaps as a side project while forming the Netherlands. That sounds interesting.