Terrible historical inaccurate

[Darth Samuri]

I'd just like to point out that in the mid 15th century, when the game begins, Europeans also had cannons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_Constantinople) and arquebuses (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Army_of_Hungary), as well as having experimented with strange mechanisms of their own (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ribauldequin) though not in great numbers. Unless someone cites a source which says Ming China used gunpowder weapons in greater amounts, or they were of greater quality, there doesn't seem to be much to discuss...

I am not sure on quantity, but as far as quality we need to realize that just because they were gunpowder weapons does not automatically make them superweapons. Until about matchlock/flintlock on, bows and crossbows had many advantages over guns, such as rate of fire, reliability, and range.

 

[tjknv]

I'd like to suggest an interpretation for the game's different tech groups.

At the start of the Grand Campaign in 1444, countries in the western tech group have level 3 techs. IIRC the designated year for tech level 32 (without ahead of time penalty ) is 1819. So that averages to one tech level every 12.9 years.

You may think of a 60% increase in cost for the Chinese tech group as countries in this group acquire a new tech level every 12.9 × 160% = 20.6 years. i.e. these countries are at tech level 21-22 in 1820.

One may certainly try to argue against that assessment, but the state of Ming China in 1444 has nothing to do with the "historical accuracy" of the Chinese tech group.

 

[ZomgK3tchup]

As it is nothing prevents Ming from eating any part of Asia it fancies. Which is something that they never did historically.

This is fixable with a tributary system and fleshed out internal politics.

Changing China's tech cost doesn't address the underlying issue that factions and some modifiers aren't sufficient to represent a political entity that boasted a quarter of the world's population and a quarter of its production, among other things.

If not to make China more unique but because so many countries, from Korea and Japan to Holland and Portugal, are effected by how well China is represented in-game. Right now, East Asian trade is poorly represented, and that's, in large part, because the political setup in that part of the world is a mess.

 

[TheBoozehammer]

in this site, there is picture with a quote saying "Ming era matchlock (1368–1644 AD) featuring serpentine levers."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiao_Yu

We are using Wikipedia sources? Fine then, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matchlock
"The matchlock appeared in Europe in the mid-15th century, (The matchlock was obsolete around 1700 in Europe) [7] although the idea of the serpentine appears some 40 years previously in an Austrian manuscript. The first dated illustration of a matchlock mechanism dates to 1475, and by the 16th century they were universally used."
"China is credited with inventing both gunpowder and firearms but the matchlock was introduced to China by the Portuguese. "

 

[zsImmortal]

I'd just like to point out that in the mid 15th century, when the game begins, Europeans also had cannons (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fall_of_Constantinople) and arquebuses (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Army_of_Hungary), as well as having experimented with strange mechanisms of their own (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ribauldequin) though not in great numbers. Unless someone cites a source which says Ming China used gunpowder weapons in greater amounts, or they were of greater quality, there doesn't seem to be much to discuss...

The Ming had one of their three elite divisions dedicated to firearms and gunpowder artillery. They had combined arms tactics (they used combined regiments of 100 or so soldiers including spearmen, gunpowder troops, archers and swordsmen) long before the start date of EU4. At some point (I'm pretty sure it would be after the wars with the Portuguese and Dutch, so 16th century), they also used an alternate form of platoon fire for musketmen (the first line would shoot with the other lines loading a musket to shoot). But that is completely inconsequential as most gunpowder weapons were of comparable quality during the period. Easterners gladly bought them off the Europeans and progress was painfully slow before the industrial era (the 19th century saw changes in weapons used every other decade), so it's not like having integrated firearms earlier actually made them better at employing them than Europeans over the game's period, and it's not like up-to-date weaponry was kept a secret from the world in Europe.

Ming and China are the way they are for both gameplay purposes and for 'historical' railroading. It's just a game, and they do the best they can. To accurately represent historical events and decisions is just beyond game design. It's really hard to make the player have to seriously think between what in hindsight was a bad decision and what the alternative, presumed to be the good decision, is.

 

[qwertzuiop]

That is true but as you said it's hard and time-consuming to check facts, expecting everyone to do research instead of googling things is probably going to end up in disappointment.
It's a moot point anyway, since I have the suspicion that people have an emotional or cultural attatchment to their argument and there just isn't a way to talk them out of it.

That's true, but what I'm criticizing is the habit to follow a certain worldview (this can be about history or about anything in general), take a statement you like, declare it as a "fact" because why not and then treat everyone who disagrees like a stupid person who does not know the obvious truth. This often results in "my source is better than yours" situations. As this thread shows, this works both ways. My impression is that academics aren't immune to this habit either so this might explain why it is so wide-spread.

I wouldn't call it emotional or cultural attachment though but just pure nonsense. (I'm not saying it's nonsense to state an argument simply because you feel it's right, but proceeding in the way I described above is certainly nonsense). It's true that people aren't going to stop like the previous 100 threads related to technology and non-western countries have shown. I have actually participated in one of the older threads and didn't act much better, now I hope that maybe some users reading this thread are going to realize that discussions like these are a lose-lose situation.

 

[Shaaaq]

By far the most repeated myth I encounter on the EU4 forums is how China and India retained technological parity with Western Europe long after they started to fall behind.

Indeed, it is the belief that only after a disastrous event that a nation is falling behind that is to blame.
Like how many regard the Ottoman Empire's pinnacle to be under Suleiman yet his failure to continue conquest isn't the sign of the start of a decline but the effects of such a decline that's been in motion for some time.

 

[hitchens]

The game is "balanced" in a way so certain historical events can take place, such as Swedens rise to power.

 

[zsImmortal]

Indeed, it is the belief that only after a disastrous event that a nation is falling behind that is to blame.
Like how many regard the Ottoman Empire's pinnacle to be under Suleiman yet his failure to continue conquest isn't the sign of the start of a decline but the effects of such a decline that's been in motion for some time.

Talking about it as fact is a very dangerous thing, as it is simply no longer considered as such by modern Ottomanists. You can look up Quataert's work on the very subject as an example (Ottoman History Writing and Changing Attitudes towards the Notion of Decline). The very problem with some notions on modernity and such all lie mostly with myths and outdated perspectives (the same can be said about Austria-Hungary, for example) which are today being slowly revised.

 

[Sun_Wu]

These myths have been thoroughly punctured by now. Angus Madison's research on historical development is stellar about this: http://www.ggdc.net/maddison/oriindex.htm

The difference between Indian, Chinese and European technology was real, and it existed long before 1820 (Victoria's start).

Of course the fact that Europeans began developing a global trade apparatus didn't give them, all by itself, the ability to dominate the world. But the fact that China opted out of these innovations set it on the path to stagnation. The bureaucracy that dominated China had some competitive advantages:

Not everything about Ming's development was bad, it was extraordinarily good at population growth. It had to be given how extremely labor intensive Chinese agriculture was. But the priorities of the Han Ming/Qing bureaucracy were self-interested in stability, which lead them to be resistant to change:

Relative technological stagnation was a characteristic of 17th century India as well. It is somewhat insulting to Indians to refer to the entire subcontinent subjugated by the British by 1819 as "weak and disorderly". They did however have the same kind of trouble the Chinese did replicating European advances:

All of this is very unhelpful for player of an Indian or Chinese Tech nation in EU4. And the relative historical development of China vs Western Europe bears this out:

Truly no one rational would dispute that the West's relative development skyrocketed after 1820, but this should not blind anyone to the western advances in development before 1820 which made that possible. The catalyst being the global trade network that China and Japan neglected:

By far the most repeated myth I encounter on the EU4 forums is how China and India retained technological parity with Western Europe long after they started to fall behind.

That flat part can't possibly be accurate as China underwent two cataclysmic government changes, introduction of new crops the transition of the Yangtze Delta to cotton and then to spinning fabric and that's just scratching the surface. Furthermore considering Western Europe as one entity, China as another and concluding China fell backwards is a little like lumping all of Europe together as one entity, using the Yangtze Delta as an entity and concluding Europe remained a backwards shit hole most of the game.

Without devastatingly effective ranged weaponry I don't think superior tactics would have gotten them very far.

The part where cholera devastating the enemy army wasn't superior weapons. The part where the ships got chained together to allow them to form a battery and devastate the enemy wasn't superior range as the enemy could hit them, it was the temporary armour they added to the ship that mattered. The part where they made the approach to the city nigh impervious to people on foot or hoof wasn't superior technology, that was brilliant tactics.

it appear that people are so believe in European highly technological advanced and get butthurt when someone point out Asian technologies werent behind.

White fragility.

You would be right if the game were set, say, 500 years earlier.
As it is though, the game covers the timeline in which europe stopped being a backward lump of warring kingdoms and turned into the home of the (arguably) most powerful and more technologically advanced empires. It wouldn't be until roughly the XXth century that China, Japan and generally the rest of the world started getting back on it's feet. And even today look at the GDP per capita, the gap between the west and the rotw is still closing.

It wasn't until the mid 18th century that Europe really started getting ahead.

 

[Beagá]

It wasn't until the mid 18th century that Europe really started getting ahead.

Ok, except the "getting ahead" part was so effective it meant China had to bow to countries with vastly smaller populations. And in their home waters...

Your point? It got behind, and got behind BAD, and only reason it didn´t feel it more was because of distance.

The main problems with the game and that will need EU5 to fix are

1- Bad logistical model
2- Lack of simulation of the scientific revolution and how important free thinking and universities were for the XIX progress to happen. The seeds didn´t really produce some real fruit until after 1750, ok, but thing is, the seeds HAD to be created. It´s an illusion to think countries progress equally. They don´t and China is the prime example.

If you want, you can go ahead and compare USA to Brazil, or Spain to England.

 

[hitchens]

That flat part can't possibly be accurate as China underwent two cataclysmic government changes, introduction of new crops the transition of the Yangtze Delta to cotton and then to spinning fabric and that's just scratching the surface. Furthermore considering Western Europe as one entity, China as another and concluding China fell backwards is a little like lumping all of Europe together as one entity, using the Yangtze Delta as an entity and concluding Europe remained a backwards shit hole most of the game.

The part where cholera devastating the enemy army wasn't superior weapons. The part where the ships got chained together to allow them to form a battery and devastate the enemy wasn't superior range as the enemy could hit them, it was the temporary armour they added to the ship that mattered. The part where they made the approach to the city nigh impervious to people on foot or hoof wasn't superior technology, that was brilliant tactics.

White fragility.

It wasn't until the mid 18th century that Europe really started getting ahead.

Both continents had technological development. Some were more clever in implementing it than others., thus China were left behind.

 

[GeneralPetrov]

You clearly haven't played the game if you think Ming/China needs a tech boost. Heck if anything, I'd say they need a nerf since they're almost constantly the world leaders in tech, even in the late game where the Europeans had far surpassed them IRL.

 

[Red_warning]

The part where cholera devastating the enemy army wasn't superior weapons. The part where the ships got chained together to allow them to form a battery and devastate the enemy wasn't superior range as the enemy could hit them, it was the temporary armour they added to the ship that mattered. The part where they made the approach to the city nigh impervious to people on foot or hoof wasn't superior technology, that was brilliant tactics.

Your downplay of european technology is becoming ridiculous. Several thousand combatants were slain in actual fighting, by a few hundred portoguese and hired locals. The portoguese guns out ranged the enemy by such a long distance that they could scatter the onslaught before it even got close enough to do damage.

 

[nukemind2012]

I am not sure on quantity, but as far as quality we need to realize that just because they were gunpowder weapons does not automatically make them superweapons. Until about matchlock/flintlock on, bows and crossbows had many advantages over guns, such as rate of fire, reliability, and range.

Even during the colonization period, Native American bows fired faster and mor accurate than matchlocks and flintlocks. However: Muskets could be mass produced and it was easier to train people to use them.

 

[Sunbro BigBoss]

It wasn't until the mid 18th century that Europe really started getting ahead.

I would put that a century earlier. Anyways the process that culminated in that scenario started centuries before and by the XVIth century the Ming dynasty had already seen better days.

 

[YouMust99]

White fragility.

If you must start going to insults, the mod you're a part of makes the game run terribly.
I suppose you're one of those people who claim that white men have done nothing for the world and that we'd be immortal and colonizing the galaxy if Europe never took over the world.

Now to go to actual facts, things don't happen magically out of the blue. Europe was slowly setting the stage with a better more competitive economic system and it's constant improvements on the gun and bureaucracy due to near constant conflict.

 

[TenshiN]

China had different challenges at the point of the game. It has already finished its period of feuding kingdoms, which, arguably, Europe never finished. It was a single political entity, whose challenges were about effectively managing the huge population and keeping the production growth with the constant population increase, in which they were pretty successful (but with equally huge drawbacks), the policy of isolationism was right from the point of stability, since europeans always brought a ton of disaster (like christianity, which brought nothing, but instability) along with their tradegoods, and everyone can remember a lot of cases of just how brutal the rebellions were in the Middle Kingdom. Its basically the same challenges that western europe would have faced if it ever got unified at some point of time, so i feel that the discussion of the technological "groups" is needless.

Coming to the point of the OP, i'd say no need to give Ming even more power than it has now. IMO, the ideal Ming in EU4 would be a country with and overwhelmingly huge (but weak) army, heavily penalized means of territory expansion (possibly through excessive coring/diploannex costs), with also a massive discount to province development (like 70-80%). So, basically, playing Ming would be developing rapidly while using your army to maintain the power balance in the region, fracturing the conquerors and returning the provinces back to its original owner.

 

[Esben_DRK]

White fragility.

It wasn't until the mid 18th century that Europe really started getting ahead.

These two statements go a long way of discrediting anything else you say, just an FYI.
When Europe started pulling ahead, and when that became readily apparent to anyone who could be bothered to look at the state of the world, are two different years. Yes, European technological superiority became obvious in the mid 18th century, but that was due to a process that had taken more than two centuries of development. China didn't become a failed state and European playground because of the Opium wars, for example, but those wars were broadcasting the disparity in technology and organisation for the whole world to see. A series of developments gradually meant that European states came to dominate most of the world, and that trend was not painfully obvious before the mid 18th century, that is correct.
But the trend was there before, whether you take Portugese colonies and trade in Asia, the slave trade, the conquest and colonisation of America or that even the weak independent European states could set up East Indian companies because they could force their rules unto Indian cities and ports. The British East India Company didn't win dominance in India in The 1757 Great Game of Cards held in a flat in London. European dominance in India didn't originate with the founding of the company in about 1600. The groundwork for European domiance was developing since the 1520ies, with Vasco da Gama being appointed Viceroy to India by the Portugese crown.
It didn't get set in stone by 1520 of course, but it is much more accurate to trace it back to then (And I'm sure you can make the case for an even earlier date), rather than claiming that Europe only started pulling ahead by the mid 18th century, because all the developments, all the luck and work builds up to that European technological superiority.
You can argue that European technological superiority only became a fact by the mid 18th century (1757 is not a bad year for it, IMO). You could even argue that it first became obvious around 1800. Both would be plausible delineations, as are, I'd guess, others that I haven't heard about or can't remember.
But you cannot argue that Europe wasn't ahead before then, because Europe was. Social and state organisation, technology, population changes and international trade were gradually more and more in European favour, and those changes had been going on for more than a century. Like it or not, by the mid 18th century Europe was so far ahead that imperialism was inevitable and it was becoming a question of how and how much, not whether, European countries would dominate the rest of the globe.

To say that is 'white fragility' is dumb on so many levels. It manages to be racist towards the colonised (Who were trod underfoot apparently by their technological equals/inferiors who also had to deal with power projection and logistics?!), racist towards white people (Insofar that fragility is something you ascribe 'whites') and ill informed of history.

 

[Bella Gerant]

The game is "balanced" in a way so certain historical events can take place, such as Swedens rise to power.

Well, there was that part of history where Carolus Rex pretty much stomped Russia, Denmark-Norway, and the PLC (in the end losing because he decided not to finish off Russia while he had the chance and losing far too much to Russian winter, among some other factors). Despite having numerical inferiority, the Swedes had one of the strongest armies in Europe and, had they not lost, could've continued to be a major European power for some time or at least held hegemony over the Baltic Sea.