All independent people treated as one, this is a problem!

[Krajzen]

Ok, I think I have discovered a serious problem.

There are many Independent Peoples who spawn in the middle of continent, blocking movement and expansion of major empires. The problem? Each of them is treated as a one - region city, which means nobody can either conquer or assimilate them, as that would break city cap lol. So you can't do anything.

In fact, this problem also artificially limits conquest of other empires in a very non - immersive way.

So far I find the city cap to be by far the most frustrsting aspect of a game, it is such enormous pain in the ### which is very strict and arbitrary in an abstract way. IRL Achaemenid Empire was capable of maintaining stable yet gigantic empire in the classical era, in this game it is impossible because you hit in the artificial city cap, influence income cap and war demands cap. Yeah I know they can have two more cities IIRC, it's still not very much. I think the base city cap should be significantly higher, early game really feels artificially smothered this way.

By the way, is it bug or are expansionist empires unable to forcibly annex territories of people they are at war with?

Moderator Action: Please note, these posts have been split off the main thread.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Ok, I think I have discovered a serious problem.

There are many Independent Peoples who spawn in the middle of continent, blocking movement and expansion of major empires. The problem? Each of them is treated as a one - region city, which means nobody can either conquer or assimilate them, as that would break city cap lol. So you can't do anything.

In fact, this problem also artificially limits conquest of other empires in a very non - immersive way.

So far I find the city cap to be by far the most frustrsting aspect of a game, it is such enormous pain in the ### which is very strict and arbitrary in an abstract way. IRL Achaemenid Empire was capable of maintaining stable yet gigantic empire in the classical era, in this game it is impossible because you hit in the artificial city cap, influence income cap and war demands cap. Yeah I know they can have two more cities IIRC, it's still not very much. I think the base city cap should be significantly higher, early game really feels artificially smothered this way.

City cap is Not a problem
1. if you go one or two over the cap you lose ~10 to 50 Influence... a penalty, but not terrible
2. You can merge cities together in Medieval Era (and in Ancient you can make Outposts into "mini-Cities" that don't count for the cap by attaching them to a main city.)
3. The city cap goes up
4. Finally For your given issue, you can conquer/assimilate an Independent city... and then ransack the city you have conquered/assimilated... then place an Outpost and attach the territory to your other older cities
Also each "City" in Human Kind is more like a Region with one major city... ie France is the Territories that are part of the City of Paris, etc.

 

[Atlas627]

Ok, I think I have discovered a serious problem.

There are many Independent Peoples who spawn in the middle of continent, blocking movement and expansion of major empires. The problem? Each of them is treated as a one - region city, which means nobody can either conquer or assimilate them, as that would break city cap lol. So you can't do anything.

In fact, this problem also artificially limits conquest of other empires in a very non - immersive way.

So far I find the city cap to be by far the most frustrsting aspect of a game, it is such enormous pain in the ### which is very strict and arbitrary in an abstract way. IRL Achaemenid Empire was capable of maintaining stable yet gigantic empire in the classical era, in this game it is impossible because you hit in the artificial city cap, influence income cap and war demands cap. Yeah I know they can have two more cities IIRC, it's still not very much. I think the base city cap should be significantly higher, early game really feels artificially smothered this way.

Disagree on every count.

1) You can go over the city cap. In fact I've spent most of the game 1 over the city cap, then 2 over the city cap by Early Modern, and I'm sure that trend will continue. The city cap is soft and is more of an Influence tax, which seems fine to me. It is a way to spend Influence on expansion.

2) The Independent Peoples are meant to be interacted with during the Ancient and Classical eras, and if you want to assimilate/annex them so badly then you're going to have Influence losses until you can Merge Cities in Medieval, which really isn't that far into the game.

3) You do realize you can attach territories to fewer cities, right? It costs a lot of Stability, but it is a way to expand that doesn't cost Influence. And you can detach them too, when you later increase your City Cap and decide you'd rather have the Stability so you can plop down more Districts in each of the old city's territories.

 

[Siptah]

@Krajzen you can merge cities (in the medieval era), before that you can raze the former IP cities, found the outpost in the same place and attach them to another city. City cap isn't that problematic imho, also because it is quite a soft cap. It's more something to get used to over a couple of games.

I think its intended that the expansionist ability works only in peace time.

 

[Onii-chan]

@Krajzen
I don't know if it's a bug or not but yes I experienced the same thing with the annexation ability not working in war-time. I guess it could be considered a bit more redundant during war but it still seems weird to limit it like that

As far as the city cap goes, if it was hard capped I'd agree however the city cap is only a soft cap, you can still go over it. In fact going +1 over the limit only costs you 10 influence per turn which is basically nothing, and +2 costs 120 which by the mid-game isn't too much of a problem either, and since you probably want 2-3 regions attached to each city anyway that's about as much as you can realistically fit into your empire as the game proceeds. You can also merge cities eventually if need be. But for the AI on the other hand I could definitely see it be an issue if it's coded to never exceed the city cap if it can avoid it (which I don't know if it is or not)

It would be a bigger problem for conquests if you didn't have to give back half of the things you conquer anyway due to how the post-war negotiations work in this game, which feels more Paradox style

 

[Atlas627]

@Krajzen
I don't know if it's a bug or not but yes I experienced the same thing with the annexation ability not working in war-time. I guess it could be considered a bit more redundant during war but it still seems weird to limit it like that

I would imagine the point of the Expansion ability is to take things *without* war, and the counter to it is that the enemy accrues Trespassing Grievances which they can use to DoW or they can fight you while you're in their own territory. If you were allowed to kill their army first (because you're at war), then there would be no counters to the ability.

If it is a third-party war then I'm not sure what the reasoning is. Maybe it would just suck for someone who lost a territory to it, that they can't get it back if you manage to get it immediately occupied in your other war...?

 

[Elhoim]

Well, everyone already said what I wanted to say. The soft cap is there to slow down expansion a bit, nothing else, and there are lots and lots of way of even avoiding that.