Having said that, I (and a many like me) don't like the, "It's only a game" comment when asking that perhaps things could be tweaked a bit to better simulate the actual conditions.
Well over on the AoDII mod, I pretty much got told that the designer doesn't like 'negative player' actions impacting on the game too much. Well it's his mod and his choice.
For Colonization, I'm seeing three things that I've noticed are missing that really seem to be glaring.
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3. Continuing from 2, what's up with no slavery? It's in Civ IV, it's in many mods and there have been a lot of them that have some very nice systems to show slave revolts that necessitate keeping more troops available to put them down. It was (and is) a barbaric practice, but it helped bring in the money which is why most folks were there in the first place.
Continuing from before.
4, Smuggling. One thing that strikes me is that Colonist can't smuggle goods to other European players. One of the biggest gripes King George had with the colonists was that they were flouting the English Mercantile Acts and doing a lot of trading with England's trade enemies. So I think that when you could sail to the Homeland, there should be an option (and new screen) which would allow you to trade elsewhere in Europe. However, there would be a chance that your ship and cargo would get intercepted by the Navy and the ship would be lost and perhaps a financial fine imposed upon you.
5. Similar to smuggling and the lack of roaming barbarians is the lack of pirates. In the games I've played, the only pirates are those the AI players build. The early part of the game is easily withing the "Golden Age of Piracy" so I'd think there should be pirates running around.
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7. Privateers. The Fall From Heaven modmod Orbis has a neat system where there is a Letter of Marque promotion that allows for a privateer mission. Any ship would this could act privateer for as long as the privateer mission is kept active.
...Like the smuggling mission I mentioned, I think pirates and warships during war should be able to enter the "Homeland" zone and then have an option of "Commerce Raiding" and thus they'd disappear and every so often you'd get a hit and make money or get a notice that your ship has been sunk.
Sorry, don't mean to spam this thread.
However, I was thinking that one aspect of Col2 that sometimes gets me is that the King always is a negative factor. He wants you to kiss his ring to pay off his gambling debts or hike your taxes. As I mentioned in my previous posts, I wish there was a way to tap into the Expeditionary Force during times war.
Yet I noticed that there are never any positive European effects. I've played one game where I managed to go a long time w/o ever not kissing the ring, sacking colonies of England's enemies and generally bringing in the revenue. Yet there is no way the game takes being a 'good' subject into account.
I like your ideas but it may turn off people who do not want too much historical accuracy in a mod.
Whilst I do support your push for a more historic level within Col2, I should remind you that AoD2 has become sort of the defacto method for most people to play the game. And it is fair to say that the historical/gameplay split is about 50:50%. To that end, I would suggest that the historical layer be added via a modmod rather than cutting 50% of the players out by changing the base level.
News on a new version?
Allright, allright... I hate releasing an unpolished version but here it is anyway!
See first post for download link and details.