Ming took its Vitamins

[Blackmoore]

Dear Lord,

Ming took its vitamins in the patch. Playing Kazan, doing well, it's my favorite Horde. Look over to the East, it's 1485. Ming has completely devoured Oirat, they are down to one province. Uzbeck is its Tributary.

No problem, Ming always gets bored defending its tributaries. Fight the first battle -- even numbers, steppe province. I loose. Check and Ming is up-to-date on Tech. They are never up-to-date on tech so early. After a bit of back and forth, Ming is -28 reason to white peace. Fine, I'll go grab some of their forts and that will take care of them. First fort down quick (I rolled a 4 siege general). Ming is -28 reasons to white peace. Second fort, -28 reasons. Third fort, -28 reasons. Beijing -- surely now, they will just peace out? Nope -28 reasons. Meanwhile, I'm getting sieged across my whole territory. I check mandate -- still +0.25 per month, even though a good bit of their north has been looted.

This is not normal AI behavior. They aren't in a coalition, they don't even dislike me. One fort should have been enough to peace Ming out, let alone four + capital.

 

[Nostalgium]

I've gotta disagree with your assessment here. Ming, in my experience, are strong - fiercely strong - from about 1460-1520. Then they have a moment of weakness until Global Trade, ish. If they survive that, they remain strong into the lategame. Though I know the patch has buffed Celestial Empire slightly, I've encountered some truly terrifying early-game Mings in the past, too. They've been rare, but when they happen, they make me miss the Ottomans.

 

[Lykus Cerebros]

Well the AI certainly has some different outlooks on wars that pretty clear. Problem is teaching it how to evaluate how much effort it puts in.

But honestly in this case and if they are really occupying your entire country why should they peace out? It sounds like they still have the much richer regions of southern China to draw from. Any players that would make peace under similar instances would be laughed at so it's only fair to give the AI the same treatment.

 

[Blackmoore]

Well the AI certainly has some different outlooks on wars that pretty clear. Problem is teaching it how to evaluate how much effort it puts in.

But honestly in this case and if they are really occupying your entire country why should they peace out? It sounds like they still have the much richer regions of southern China to draw from. Any players that would make peace under similar instances would be laughed at so it's only fair to give the AI the same treatment.

I've never seen Ming (or anyone for that matter) engage in a death war over a tributary -- not even an ally. Additionally, Beijing fell long before Moscow and Ming would not have been able to take any of my clay even if I unconditionally surrendered, since they lacked a land bridge. Finally, 3 forts + Beijing didn't even make a dent in their "reasons" -- sure, I lost some non-fort provinces but that shouldn't have balanced out multiple forts and a capital. Tambov is just not that much warscore, right?

I guess that the takeaway is that any strategy to blitz down a war target's ally to get a white peace has to be rethought.

 

[jonjowett]

Had you achieved the wargoal?

I have also recently noticed that my old tactic of ignoring the wargoal and sieging down the allies to knock them out doesn't work any more. Once I took the wargoal, the allies would leave as expected.

 

[Blackmoore]

Hmmm, I'm not sure. I too ignore all that basically until I've cleaned up the war a bit.

 

[GrandEurypterid]

I managed to directly cause a Mingsplosion in a solo Phillipines-versus-Ming brawl yesterday!

By stacking naval superiority early (Naval+Maritime ideas plus naval-focused national ideas plus great starting position), I won an early-game Trade Dispute war pretty easily, blockading their entire coastline, and using Marines and an accompanying transport ship once I had naval dominance to take their strait-island and force their ships out of unfortified harbours whenever they started building up. I took my money and left, amused but not thinking I'd done any long-term damage.

The first thing I noticed was that I'd apparently left Ming utterly traumatised. By the end of the truce their navy had roughly doubled, from close to 50 to over 90, with a good half of those being Heavies. Their naval limit was still a bit under 40. I chortled, shrugged at Ming's presumable massive economy, and wandered off to invade Borneo.

Fast forwards a bit, and I notice Ming is suddenly covered in rebels and the mandate is dropping. They're in massive debt, and it's not long before the North splits off in their civil war event. A while later, they release the South as vassals. A bit more time passes, and Taiwan is colonised by a retreating general, whose country is promptly invaded and annexed by the Phillipines before they can get find any allies, while Central China is split in half by yet more warlords. Ming desperately looks for allies, and finds them in Korea and Lang Xang- briefly, up until the Phillipines walks up to them going "HEY HEY, I NOTICE YOU'VE CUT YOUR NAVAL EXPENDITURE," and takes a Korean island and a large bite out of their coastline near Taiwan in preparation for a future war to claim the most valuable parts of the Canton trade node that leads into the Phillipines. (I also used the glories of Buddhist religious mechanics to cut their country in half for zero bird mana, because Buddhists can make people release and return cores by gaining karma instead of losing diplo points, which is fantastic for playing tall.)

To recap- the Phillipines get about 60% gold from blockading in a trade war they have no chance of winning on land, Ming freaks out and goes on a shipbuilding spree, and the combined weight of the payments to the Phillipines and their ungodly-powerful navy makes them go first into debt and then into pandemonium. Beautiful.

 

[AvengedK1ng]

I managed to directly cause a Mingsplosion in a solo Phillipines-versus-Ming brawl yesterday!

By stacking naval superiority early (Naval+Maritime ideas plus naval-focused national ideas plus great starting position), I won an early-game Trade Dispute war pretty easily, blockading their entire coastline, and using Marines and an accompanying transport ship once I had naval dominance to take their strait-island and force their ships out of unfortified harbours whenever they started building up. I took my money and left, amused but not thinking I'd done any long-term damage.

The first thing I noticed was that I'd apparently left Ming utterly traumatised. By the end of the truce their navy had roughly doubled, from close to 50 to over 90, with a good half of those being Heavies. Their naval limit was still a bit under 40. I chortled, shrugged at Ming's presumable massive economy, and wandered off to invade Borneo.

Fast forwards a bit, and I notice Ming is suddenly covered in rebels and the mandate is dropping. They're in massive debt, and it's not long before the North splits off in their civil war event. A while later, they release the South as vassals. A bit more time passes, and Taiwan is colonised by a retreating general, whose country is promptly invaded and annexed by the Phillipines before they can get find any allies, while Central China is split in half by yet more warlords. Ming desperately looks for allies, and finds them in Korea and Lang Xang- briefly, up until the Phillipines walks up to them going "HEY HEY, I NOTICE YOU'VE CUT YOUR NAVAL EXPENDITURE," and takes a Korean island and a large bite out of their coastline near Taiwan in preparation for a future war to claim the most valuable parts of the Canton trade node that leads into the Phillipines. (I also used the glories of Buddhist religious mechanics to cut their country in half for zero bird mana, because Buddhists can make people release and return cores by gaining karma instead of losing diplo points, which is fantastic for playing tall.)

To recap- the Phillipines get about 60% gold from blockading in a trade war they have no chance of winning on land, Ming freaks out and goes on a shipbuilding spree, and the combined weight of the payments to the Phillipines and their ungodly-powerful navy makes them go first into debt and then into pandemonium. Beautiful.

As France I learnt yesterday how coastal gallies are just so much better than heavies early game and allow more army

Dear Lord,

Ming took its vitamins in the patch. Playing Kazan, doing well, it's my favorite Horde. Look over to the East, it's 1485. Ming has completely devoured Oirat, they are down to one province. Uzbeck is its Tributary.

No problem, Ming always gets bored defending its tributaries. Fight the first battle -- even numbers, steppe province. I loose. Check and Ming is up-to-date on Tech. They are never up-to-date on tech so early. After a bit of back and forth, Ming is -28 reason to white peace. Fine, I'll go grab some of their forts and that will take care of them. First fort down quick (I rolled a 4 siege general). Ming is -28 reasons to white peace. Second fort, -28 reasons. Third fort, -28 reasons. Beijing -- surely now, they will just peace out? Nope -28 reasons. Meanwhile, I'm getting sieged across my whole territory. I check mandate -- still +0.25 per month, even though a good bit of their north has been looted.

This is not normal AI behavior. They aren't in a coalition, they don't even dislike me. One fort should have been enough to peace Ming out, let alone four + capital.

How many forts did they have elsewhere and were any battles ongoing when you tried to make peace?

 

[FocusedHope]

Eh... I figure declaring a land war against a 100k+ army and expecting them to white peace you is somewhat unrealistic. Just let Ming be the juggernaut it is until Crisis of the Ming Dynasty fires; I hear these days it basically never survives that.

 

[GrandEurypterid]

As France I learnt yesterday how coastal gallies are just so much better than heavies early game and allow more army

Ye, galleys are generally a good idea for as long as naval force limit isn't a big concern for you. Afterwards, it's best to prioritise heavies over galleys but to still keep a mix- galleys have enough dakka pound-for-pound to mean it's basically always a good idea to have them in your fleet, but heavies' force-limit efficiency means you can get more light ships and maintain a reasonable quantity of transports if you cut out a few tens of galleys for a couple heavy ships.

 

[Darsara]

I'm not even in Asia (save the Indian Ocean Isles), but Ming ain't doing well in my game:

The rebels include separatists from Liang, Qin and Tsang, plus random peasants. Oddly, despite being at 100% liberty desire for a decade or more now, Dali, Yue and Wu are still peaceful subjects, and most of their neighbours other than Shun, Tang and Ning are still tributaries. They also still have a high mandate. Oh! The Capital is one of the occupied provinces near Tang.

However does seem they were doing well enough to acquire Ming Central Asia during better times.