How it looks
My first consideration of Ming was the difference between them and playing a European nation. The key issue that comes to mind is the Chinese technology progress rate. I have 40% efficiency on technology research and therefore must pay two and half times as much for each technology as a western nation. This seems, at first sight, to be an extremely serious penalty and is sufficient to make me extremely nervous.
The second problem is the unit type selections
If you compare this list of Chinese units with the European list then it becomes clear that at higher technology levels the Europeans have a significant advantage even if I keep up in the technology race.
This isn’t as bad as it seems at first glance because the real divergence is at late technology levels. If we look at units available at tech 28 level then we see the following
This lot are superior to my Chinese units (Asian Musketeer and Chinese Dragoon). The infantry situation is obvious as the Europeans score good point advantages across the board. My dragoons are comparable with the French dragoons but unfortunately dragoons are a poor unit choice. A key characteristic for cavalry is shock effect and 2/2 is not good compared with the Swedish Arme Blanche 5/4. I may be able to hold my own in the morale stakes but a very poor casualty ratio is likely. Looking further back I could use Manchu Banner Army cavalry which looks likely to achieve a better casualty ratio but remains slightly inferior. The real weakness is in the infantry but since I am likely to become totally cavalry dominated this may not be such a big issue.
Even further ahead the Europeans pull massive advantages in the later stages. They acquire some very good infantry units at 35 and lots of very powerful units in the few steps from 44 on. Overall this problem looks completely manageable since the real problems will only occur if I am right near the end of the game and still with significant opposition. This suggests that this will only have a major impact if I am failing anyway.
A further issue is the influence of Confucianism. This gives a –20% tax modifier and +20% stability costs. I don’t know why this is the case but this gives me something else that further slows down national progress. Oddly enough these particular penalties are likely to be less relevant in a WC game as will become apparent further along.
In the beginning
The first thing to consider is a basic strategy to follow that will allow massive expansion. The most distinctive issue is immediately apparent after starting the game
Ming apparently doesn’t even know about the Geography of India. This is a rather poor representation of the historical facts about Chinese knowledge but is probably an entirely accurate representation of Chinese attitudes.
This immediately raises the issue that I will absolutely have to take Quest for the new world as the first idea and I need it fairly quickly. The Terra Incognita issue exists all around China and there is now realistic alternative except to stay home and wait for Europeans to come and kick my arse.
The next issue is to have a good look at my slider positions and their consequences. The domestic policy sliders are interesting as their effects can be quite unbalanced.
Sliders at start (after first move to narrow minded)
For example my sliders have an overall +6% adjustment to land morale. Total land morale is 246.4, the slider contribution of 0.06 is added and therefore the impact is rather less than 6%. This adjustment is so small that I would normally consider simply disregarding morale adjustments from policy sliders.
On the other hand production efficiency has been adjusted by a total of +3%. The sliders could have as much as +/-15% impact. This is significant because again this adds on but the base value is 31% efficiency so my slider settings are giving me 10% more production and a full +15% would be quite dramatic. (Note that I am an Administrative Monarchy and therefore have +5% production efficiency from that source)
The slider effects of trade efficiency are less of a concern since bad boy effects will make my trading extremely weak for the foreseeable future. This is one of the major penalties of rapid expension but cannot be avoided.
Aristocracy
This slider brings a mixture of benefits and penalties. I have to admit that the majority don’t bother me one bit. The most significant for me is, oddly enough, the 4% production bonus. At the start production is 42% of my total monthly income and this 4% represents an increase from 30% to 34% efficiency. Therefore the total affect on monthly income is (4/34)x.42 or about 5%. That means a 5% improvement in tech progress. In other circumstances the trade effect might have been important but my trading will be dreadful for the foreseeable future.
Centralisation
Again the big concern is the production and tax bonuses. Currently these represent 73% of monthly revenue and hence the 2% bonus more than balances the technology penalty. The tax benefit is currently 2/80 since I have a Confucianism penalty. Later when I have a permanent +3 stability it will be 2/110 which is less significant. The production element is 2/32. The overall view here is that the effects of these bonuses actually completely neutralise the technology penalty and give a small bonus in annual census tax as well. As time progresses the balance will move the other way but will remain small.
Oddly enough I am not interested in maximum war exhaustion since I find it more profitable to manage war exhaustion and try to keep it low. If I keep it down then adjusting the maximum level is pointless (or does it make a difference to the rate it rises??)
Narrow-minded
The only aspect of this slider I care about is the colonists as you will see from later comments. The other issues are secondary which is disappointing since the 4% technology penalty is not going to help at all. Stability cost reduction is not really useful as my stability costs will become impracticably large quite quickly and hence I will never spend anything on stability.
Mercantilism
Again the primary issue is those colonists. Narrow-minded slider moves change colonists more than mercantilism so this slider has been left where it is. The rest is irrelevant except that later on the lowered merchant cost will be useful. Much later in the game I will own a lot of CoTs giving me very large numbers of merchants. Therefore the –1.6 merchants will not matter but –40% cost will make trading activity yield positive value rather earlier than it would otherwise.
Offensive
The leader shock bonus is useful since leader shock will be the dominant leader characteristic for the foreseeable future. In fact leader fire will only catch up at the end of the game and even then only for infantry dominated armies. Remember, however, leader fire helps protect cavalry from fire effects as well as being a bonus for units with significant fire capability. The 4% morale bonus is completely irrelevant as it is a minor drop in the ocean. I would not be surprised if this changes in later versions.
By the time I buy any artillery money will have lost most of its meaning so the price adjustments is irrelevant. In fact the only question for this slider is which end you really want, +1.25 leader shock or +1.25 leader siege. In truth I would prefer the siege ability but I can’t afford all the moves to get it. The shock bonus is about whether you win a war whereas the siege bonus is about how quickly you win it. I am not expecting any major challenges especially once I am in a position to recruit lots of leaders (which is when this will make any significant difference)
Land
I am never going to hit my force limit or exhaust my manpower, the morale adjustment is piddling, unit cost won’t be important very often. In truth I would like to shift to naval to get production efficiency up. It would also help with income from the East Asian islands I will be collecting.
Does anyone know whether unit cost directly affects maintenance costs?
Quality / Quantity
I’ve used a shift tooltip since the current setting is central and hence neutral. As far as I am concerned the morale effect is so tiny that there is no point in doing anything but shift this all the way to quantity. In this game sliders are pretty much out of bounds since stability is sacrosanct but that would be my policy.
Serfdom
There is no real benefit from this since stability cost reduction is irrelevant and infantry cost is mostly irrelevant in a cavalry dominated army. Again I would love to move the slider all the way across simply to get the production bonus but this is never going to happen.
Having looked at the sliders we return to the Quest for the New World idea. The purpose of this is to explore Terra Incognita. To do this we need to create conquistadors and explorers, and to create them we need colonists and the current combination of sliders and religion leaves me with a grand total of +0 colonists per year. This quite serious, with QftNW I need colonists for leaders that can explore and I have the additional benefit that I can create all my leaders from colonists or diplomats. This economises in the use of diplomats by substituting colonists and also reduces leader costs. The cost of a new leader is based entirely on the number existing at that specific category and for this purpose conquistadors and generals are different types despite being effectively interchangeable.
The only solution to this is to select advisors that create colonists. This is an unusual choice since players are very rarely interested in recruiting such advisors and certainly don’t bother at the start of the game.
Advisors
As you can see I have been extraordinarily lucky with my starting advisors. Not only have I got some good ones but I also have two excellent colonial governors. In truth these two will supply more colonists than I actually need for leaders at this stage of the game so it looks like I may actually be creating some colonies. This is relevant since there are one or two quite attractive locations for colonies. It is a great pity that I will lose these two since later in the game 1.8 explorer/conquistador leaders per year will actually be less than the number I want to generate.
The excellent trade advisor has been selected simply because he is a good advisor.
