Why is it so easy to colonize?

[IanReSc]

I think the biggest problem is the struggle to maintain some historic accuracy while at the same time trying to make the gameplay work for countries that aren't GP's. Colonization should in theory only be left to the usual suspects, but that wouldn't be fun should you decide to play as any other nation, would it?

Right now, every time I start a new game either one of two things happens. Either nobody colonizes Indonesia, Japan or the Pacific for decades or France, Russia and the UK are all over the place as soon as I unpause the game. Especially Hokkaido never gets to be Japanese with any other major power fighting over it. Sometimes I can even claim the entire region with Dai Nam. There is barely any middle ground.

Claiming colonies doesn't give any infamy and therefor makes it much more useful than waging war and therefor makes for a much better way of expansion. You can't trade land, you can't even really push for other countries claims or liberation unless it is part of a sway which only lets you offer them one county at a time. One part of the game and it's problems tie into another and there are a lot.

 

[Serensius]

I think the main reason why Belgium and Germany were able to establish colonies so far away was because they belonged to western societies. They could learn from the pioneers about colonization, and they could rely somewhat on Britain and France for the infrastructure to maintain their colonies.

Maybe it should simply be locked behind tech. I.e the default is that colonization is only possible at X distance to the nearest owned province. Then around 1880 (tier 4?), introduce a tech that removes this limit. It could still require a minimum navy size for overseas colonies.

 

[mudcrabmerchant]

Why would Ethiopia not colonize Celebes?

1. Great powers, especially the Netherlands, would oppose it, possibly to the point of war.
2. Even without war, any serious attempt would lead to a colonial race with the Netherlands, which the Netherlands would win due to their greater wealth and local power base.
3. For a poor country still trying to play catch up with the major powers, it would be an expensive investment with little chance of paying off.

I think there needs to be something between declared interests and owned/puppets territory. Attempts by outside powers to take parts of Indonesia or Hokkaido should lead to the Netherlands or Japan getting mad, getting a CB, and getting their act together to fully colonize the regions themselves.

 

[Kultakala Siika]

Why would Ethiopia not colonize Celebes?

1. Great powers, especially the Netherlands, would oppose it, possibly to the point of war.
2. Even without war, any serious attempt would lead to a colonial race with the Netherlands, which the Netherlands would win due to their greater wealth and local power base.
3. For a poor country still trying to play catch up with the major powers, it would be an expensive investment with little chance of paying off.

I think there needs to be something between declared interests and owned/puppets territory. Attempts by outside powers to take parts of Indonesia or Hokkaido should lead to the Netherlands or Japan getting mad, getting a CB, and getting their act together to fully colonize the regions themselves.

What about multiple levels of declared interests? Suppose instead of picking two strategic regions, one could spend two levels of interests in a single region (or put one declare on top of an established interest). Multiple levels interests could then modify diplomatic weights:

(1) Multiple levels would make your non-warfare diplomacy spends more efficient in that region. Increasing relations in the region costs slightly less, probability of your bankrolling generating an obligation is modestly increased (but so is the money you spend), your colony growth points are distributed according to the respective interest level.

(2) AI with multiple levels of interest in a region would become more angry at other countries meddling in their high interest areas than AI with a single interest. Simplest way to implement is to weight infamy by region: Suppose Prussia has lots of strategic interest in Europe and none at all of in South America. If you try to conquer Paraguay, their attitude to your infamy generated there is halved; if you try to conquer Mecklenburg or other random German minor, in Prussia's eyes your infamy could be 1.5x, 2x, or more (depending on their interest level).

Not sure how to make same effect happen for the player -- unless we'd have some kind of domestic / foreign policy interaction . (I could see pro-Colonialism/Expansionist IGs get angry when other countries meddle in strategic regions where you have unincorporated states, super angry if you have multiple levels of interest; likewise for pro-Patriot IGs, except they dislike other countries meddling in strategic regions where you have incorporated states.)

(3) You could have "remove a level of strategic interest" as a war goal or offer it to other GPs/MPs as a sway.

Interest change cooldowns should be probably much longer to avoid making it too OP.

Finally, it would help AIs feel different. Some GPs "play wide" (the British Empire has interests everywhere), some are more focused in their immediate neighborhood (stereotypically in a historical play, the US has Monroe doctrine, the Japanese have interests in Korea and Pacific).

 

[Blk82]

I cannot explain why this happened, but most of the colonization of Africa and Asia was done by a very few European countries.
Overseas colonization should not be a way for small countries to rise, but a game for a very limited number of maritime powers only.

Actually, that is not quite true. Egypt, Ethiopia, and Oman/Zanzibar had a pre-scramble in the decades before European colonization. Ethiopia pushed deep into formerly tribal lands, Egypt reached all the way to lake Victoria, and Zanzibar slave traders were in Eastern Congo. If the Europeans were a bit slower and the Oman sultanate didn't suffer partitioned succession, it would be entirely plausible that the Eastern half of the Congo would have been a colony of Oman.