Why can't vassals understand what most important?

[bbqftw]

As an overlord, if your vassal has this disaster, just don't feed them. Why would you? I mean really, what are you thinking? The land they're given will come with unrest, the overextension will increase coring costs, the coring itself takes stab-raising admin points... you're just piling more problems on. Yeah, as I said, the AI probably needs a look at getting out of this disaster better, but frankly if you're shoving unrest-laden admin-taxing provinces onto a vassal with internal problems, you deserve what happens.

I would be fine if a vassal was at -3 stab and just continued to churn out cores. This was routinely done in pre-Common Sense. Sure, killing 500k rebels in China over trying to feed all of Ming to Mongolia over 30 years is a bit rough but you gotta do what you gotta do.

In this patch I've let a vassal sit 30 years with no additional fed provinces. It still was not able to get out of internal conflicts with admin 4 ruler and even teched adm from 14->15 instead of exiting the disaster. At that point its either annex the vassal as soon as they get the disaster, or feed them despite internal conflicts.

See, you've presented a false choice:
1) let them get out of internal conflicts
2) feed them more land

1 won't happen even if you don't choose 2.

 

[Metz]

What matters is gameplay. Does their sovereignty imply there's a truce? An alliance? What is their obligation? Can they be called into wars? Can they refuse? What's the penalty of them refusing?

A one-liner about their sovereignty doesn't tell us anything.

Tributary state means the country pays money for a non-aggression pact practically. That's it. No alliance, no other obligations. This usually happened to small and weaker fringe states at the borders of other realms like Granada in Iberia who survived up til 1492 by paying tribute to Castile because they made a lot of money in the Sub-Saharan gold trade. Once Portugal got involved in the gold trade, Castile found Granada to be useless and annexed it. Also the small states in Anatolia around the Ottoman Empire for a while were tributary states until the Ottomans started to eat them up.

 

[Metz]

Can you explain what, exactly, would be the difference, for gameplay purposes? I can't see a lot, at least not with the way they currently work.

You don't want to annex a small country because it's not worth the effort of going to war with them, raising your aggressive expansion, the coring is high, they will give you more money than what you can make in the short-mid term, etc.. So you threaten them to becoming a tributary state. This means they will pay you so you don't attack them which creates a indefinite truce until you or they cancel the tributary status.



The higher the tribute, the longer the unbreakable time of the truce can be. Low tribute truce could be 5-10 years of absolute truce and if you break it you suffer prestige and stability for not keeping your word. Medium tribute truce would be 10-15 years. Long tribute truce could be 15-20 years.

 

[doktorstick]

Tributary state means the country pays money for a non-aggression pact practically. That's it. No alliance, no other obligations. This usually happened to small and weaker fringe states at the borders of other realms like Granada in Iberia who survived up til 1492 by paying tribute to Castile because they made a lot of money in the Sub-Saharan gold trade. Once Portugal got involved in the gold trade, Castile found Granada to be useless and annexed it. Also the small states in Anatolia around the Ottoman Empire for a while were tributary states until the Ottomans started to eat them up.

It sounds like--if I had to relate it to current game mechanics--as Transfer Trade Power. It takes a relation slot, you get money from them indirectly via trade, and they have no obligation to you otherwise.

 

[bbqftw]

The priority goes like:

1) If >25% OE, core
2) If <0 stab, get stab
3) If any non cores, core

It should not be possible for AI to prioritize teching etc over coring, and if you've seen this happen I would like a reproducible case with save so I can fix it.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/2ubxnvuys5pua03/justinian is noob v1.7z?dl=0

not sure whether you can pull the teching history but I'm pretty sure Teutonic Order teched admin from 14 to 15 during internal conflicts

 

[Metz]

It sounds like--if I had to relate it to current game mechanics--as Transfer Trade Power. It takes a relation slot, you get money from them indirectly via trade, and they have no obligation to you otherwise.

Transfer trade power cuts their trade income, which may be nothing practically for many countries. The tribute would come directly from their overall income. Suppose they are a African state with a lot of gold but no trade power? Transfer Trade Power would be useless. The more variety and options we get, the more we can do in the game. I don't see why people got to be complacent. The game keeps getting expanded so why not actually request things to be added while they are working on it.

 

[Chaos_TLW]

You don't want to annex a small country because it's not worth the effort of going to war with them, raising your aggressive expansion, the coring is high, they will give you more money than what you can make in the short-mid term, etc.. So you threaten them to becoming a tributary state. This means they will pay you so you don't attack them which creates a indefinite truce until you or they cancel the tributary status.



The higher the tribute, the longer the unbreakable time of the truce can be. Low tribute truce could be 5-10 years of absolute truce and if you break it you suffer prestige and stability for not keeping your word. Medium tribute truce would be 10-15 years. Long tribute truce could be 15-20 years.

That already happens to some extent with the massive penalties to WC and stability when attacking a vassal with scutage, except a vassal can be permanent.

 

[Metz]

That already happens to some extent with the massive penalties to WC and stability when attacking a vassal with scutage, except a vassal can be permanent.

Tributary state is not a vassal state. Tributary states have more room to maneuver diplomatically as well as to grow stronger.

 

[Chaos_TLW]

Tributary state is not a vassal state.

Under current gameplay, I meant. What word is used for it does not matter, mechanically so far what you describe already exists in the game, to an extent.

 

[Metz]

Under current gameplay, I meant. What word is used for it does not matter, mechanically so far what you describe already exists in the game, to an extent.

to an extent.

A small extent.

 

[Hockeystop]

Can we please stay on topic? I would like to hear more about the logic the vassals use and why they refuse to core certain provinces. This has been my experience as well.

 

[doktorstick]

The more variety and options we get, the more we can do in the game.

Needless complexity. I'm not saying this about your suggestion! My only point is that you could have a game so complex that it is indecipherable and unplayable. I would argue that EU4 is already on that end of the spectrum; it takes serious effort to get beyond the busy interface and to learn this game.

 

[Metz]

Needless complexity. I'm not saying this about your suggestion! My only point is that you could have a game so complex that it is indecipherable and unplayable. I would argue that EU4 is already on that end of the spectrum; it takes serious effort to get beyond the busy interface and to learn this game.

This would be a straight forward addition.

 

[Khezef]

What's worse is when you feed a vassal and make it large and strong, it gets really upset and declares an independence war. Happens to me with Poland and Persia a lot.

 

[bbqftw]

I just had a vassal try to Westernize during internal conflicts disaster

I don't even know

 

[ringhloth]

The difference between a vassal and a tributary state is that a tributary state should be free to conquer and declare war on other states. You should be able to also offer tribute as a way to avoid wars, but less important than the former point. It also should be cheaper, perhaps at 25-50% of the warscore and AE cost, while also being easier to break (doesn't automatically trigger war, but gives a CB perhaps). Transfer trade power doesn't really cut it, since it doesn't really provide a lot of money for upstream countries, and also costs a diplo slot for the larger country.

 

[melkor88]

It would be good to see how much ADM our vassals have, so we know if they can afford it before we give them territory. But I always leave a army or two in the land I give to vassals and let them hunt down rebels for them. As that helps to cut down the problems you are describing.