Charismatic might be the worst trait of them all?

I Know, I played Van Der Donck just once, while mercantile seems a solid trait (silver abuse), charismatic didn't resume any profit in my game. I even had the impression that tax rate summed up faster than with other Leaders.
On the other hand, I see tolerant as a very nice trait and libertarian, holding an exponential benefit, to be excels, almost too powerful!!
What are your thoughts?

The trait does work, so your impression about tax growing faster must be just that - impression.

Overall the winning strategies are somewhat limited and hence not allowing the freedom to really choose a very different play-style based on the leaders strength, so i do not have the feeling the traits matter a lot right now.

I played a few games with different leaders (not all yet) and i did'n notice too much of difference from the one or the other trait.

Charismatic is excellent when paired with that one FF who reduces prices in Europe by 25%. Instead of focusing on your colonies producing tools/guns/horses/cannons, you can just spam money items and buy them all. It also makes it easy to transition into the self-sustaining phase because you can easily buy Expert Lumberjacks and Master Carpenters. Most of the money comes in late game after the Factories are built and expert planters/master producers are working. When that happens, would you rather have 60% tax, or 30% tax?

I know what your talking about Ricci,

It does seem some time that the tax rate goes up faster.

What it felt like to me is although the rate hike may not of come as quickly, it felt like the king was more likely to hit me with a 5% increase instead of a 1% or 2% increase.

It is more likely a series of bad luck than a broken mechanic.

SerriaFox said:

I know what your talking about Ricci,

It does seem some time that the tax rate goes up faster.

What it felt like to me is although the rate hike may not of come as quickly, it felt like the king was more likely to hit me with a 5% increase instead of a 1% or 2% increase.

It is more likely a series of bad luck than a broken mechanic.

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Probably Fox. I also had in that game a certain good boycotted by the king for refusing a 4% tax increase and the immediate next turn he was eager again for a new increase of 5%.. Whut??!!

Refar said:

The trait does work, so your impression about tax growing faster must be just that - impression.

Overall the winning strategies are somewhat limited and hence not allowing the freedom to really choose a very different play-style based on the leaders strength, so i do not have the feeling the traits matter a lot right now.

I played a few games with different leaders (not all yet) and i did'n notice too much of difference from the one or the other trait.

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I disagree with this about the winning strategies. I attached one save game of mine just in another thread where victory was achieved with Adams in about 1630, revolutionary difficulty, no deletion exploit used, no factory of any kind nor industry whatsoever other than a blacksmith's shop and an armory.
The fact is that once Adams starts earning LBs for independence it's bonus becomes truly exponentially beneficial Refar. More rebel sentiment makes for more rebel production bonus, which systematically produces more LBs, and you will hit LBs helping FF more quickly than otherwise, beating other colonies as well, so even more LBs to count towards your libertarian bonus. You will be able to declare independence faster with a smaller REF of course, and achieving quickly a higher rebel combat bonus.. well I assume you have already grasp the point of all this some time ago now Refar.

My point was - it will work just the same (well, a bit slower) with San Martin (just for a figure).
You will get less LB Bonus (tho non 25% less - you still get what you have from FF), making you a bit slower and the REF a bit bigger...

But the baseline strategy works just the same.

In the original game I used to mostly play the Dutch to control the volatile price movements (and for their Merchantman). However in Col2 there seems to be little movement in prices throughout the game (except for silver of course). In one game playing as the French I had no access to sugar so didn't trade rum the whole game yet at the end it was the same price as the goods I had been trading heavily (cloth 7, coats 8, rum 9, cigars 9).

dalgo said:

In the original game I used to mostly play the Dutch to control the volatile price movements (and for their Merchantman). However in Col2 there seems to be little movement in prices throughout the game (except for silver of course). In one game playing as the French I had no access to sugar so didn't trade rum the whole game yet at the end it was the same price as the goods I had been trading heavily (cloth 7, coats 8, rum 9, cigars 9).

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Yeah, that's almost one thing I "miss" from the original. I remember when you unloaded 300 cigars in Europe, there was no chance you were walking away from there without the price dropping at least one point. I remember in longer or more productive games, it got to a point where selling cotton or selling cloth would actually be about the same price, since I'd sold so much of it. Now I've probably traded thousands and thousands of cigars, cloth, tobacco, and cotton, and the cigars and cloth have only dropped by a point or 2.

UWHabs said:

Yeah, that's almost one thing I "miss" from the original. I remember when you unloaded 300 cigars in Europe, there was no chance you were walking away from there without the price dropping at least one point. I remember in longer or more productive games, it got to a point where selling cotton or selling cloth would actually be about the same price, since I'd sold so much of it. Now I've probably traded thousands and thousands of cigars, cloth, tobacco, and cotton, and the cigars and cloth have only dropped by a point or 2.

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As you say - I remember trading so many furs in one game the price dropped to 0/1. I actually got zero gold for selling my furs (try and tax that!). You could manipulate prices though. I used to close down my Custom Houses for a few turns before Independence and even buy a galleon load or two of goods to drive the price up, then lock the prices in place with the DOI.

In many ways the original game was a lot tougher on the player - for instance if your warehouse overflowed the excess was immediately dumped with no warning. Col2 is more user-friendly, but perhaps in some areas it takes it too far.