What to do for Europe?

[ianinsane]

Crowqueen: I totally agree with all your points and concerning opinions about EU I am exactly in the same situation.

BUT we have to decide between two alternatives that are both not realistic:

1. Have a more or less divided EU as it is in reality being forced to unite other important states into one civ that are even less working together than EU member states or are even hostile. And it will be difficult for single European nation states to develop their actual political power due to their small size.

2. Have a more or less united EU and thus twist reality in Europe.

I think the solution with one EU civ and 2-3 civs that are Vassals to it is the best compromise. That way you don't splinter Europe too much and both developments are possible (EU growing together or falling apart).
My suggestion:
EU civ: France, Benelux, Germany, Denmark, Austria, Sweden, Finland
Southern Europe: Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece
UK: Great Britain, Ireland
Eastern Europe: Baltic States, Poland, Czech Rep., Slovakia, Slovenia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria

 

[hevehoc]

great but much of eastern europe doesn't belong to the EU.

 

[ianinsane]

great but much of eastern europe doesn't belong to the EU.

the states i mentioned are all eu members. but i agree that eastern europe is not a proper civ name.

 

[hevehoc]

the states i mentioned are all eu members. but i agree that eastern europe is not a proper civ name.

i didn't notice that the nations were the eastern ones that was in the EU whopps .

 

[Lord Wolf]

In the major points i agree with you ianinsane.

Yes the EU is not an international block with an united voice, but it isn't either an unimportant and weak agreement between national states which don't give up anything of their sovereignty.

First I was a strong supporter of mixing the whole EU together to one civ without any further distinction between the states. But good arguments convinced me, that this would be nice, but actually not show in any way the real working of the EU or its status in the world. So I am now a supporter of the 3rd proposition (I already wrote my reasons above). I only want to remind, that a divided Europe without any sort of European Union would be as unrealistic as one European-civ for the whole continent. Neither would show the real situation!

In my opinion there should be vassals representing the most important members ofhe EU and an EU-civ which holds all together (till somebody breaks away - or not).

1) France
2) Germany
3) UK
4) Italy
5) Spain
6) Hungary/Poland??? (an important eastern state)
7) Sweden

8) all other EU-cities which will be set on the continent will form the "EU-civilization"

In this way each big and important member state, respectively the culture area it "represents",would be there and if the EU should break apart, also the EU-civ could loose its cities to them. The other way around, it would be possible to make the EU an important and strong global player in the world, although with many difficulties and an complicated system of diplomatic-relations. Maybe it would even become wiser to let some vassals break away (for example the UK) to form a strong Union, depending on the diplomatic and foreign-politics situation.....

Anyway I think we should try to find a way to represent the EU in this mod!!!
I go along with any other suggestion (fewer vassals or blocs....) as long as the EU will be represented in the mod. I think it would be worth the work!!!!

 

[hevehoc]

we should not forget that some countries like norway isn't a member to the EU, what shall we do with them?

 

[Namst]

I will try to give as objective observations as I can without getting into my own personal world view.

Break up nations however is possible while keeping the number as low as possible (I see coming out with 9, counting Russia) without giving arbitrary names to blocs such as south and north. It would be extremely deflating If you were trying to conquer the world as Spain, had to settle with playing as "south", and ended up winning ("Oh, I just raised the flag of Southern Europe (?) over Quebec... Great...)" Anyways, who would control southern Europe? Italy or Spain? Bad Idea.

Also, having EU be a civ without controlling all Europe would be a mistake (option number 3). Having both the EU and partner countries co-exist would be a little wierd. Imagine; Germany tries to break from EU, but EU and friends re-conquer it. Now the EU directly controls Germany. Perhaps strange situations like that could be prevented through modding, but it seems like a whole lot of work for very little return. Anyways, a separate EU nation would be another nation to throw into the mixture. And arguing the bloc plan here has the same issues as I described in my first argument.

Separate nations seems the way to go, and maybe an EU nation If the mod is REALLY pressed for less nations.

 

[Séamas]

And Ireland isn't in the UK.

 

[sgrig]

I would suggest to keep UK as a separate civ, while the rest of EU as one. This makes sense because UK is not fully integrated into the rest of Europe, and also is a major player in its own right. So to keep things simple, Europe should be represented by:

1) UK
2) EU (possibly including Norway)
3) Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, possibly Azerbaijan, Serbia)
4) Russia (including Belarus, Armenia)

 

[hevehoc]

In the lead, suggestion Nr. 3! tight onto it is Nr. 2! 3rd place Nr. 1! And at the last place Nr. 4.

 

[sheep21]

I can see a way to do this

have the EU as one block, this will represent its huge economic power (2nd largrst economy in the wolrd after USA) but give them a small yet advanced military, the AI would have to build up military quite heavily to equal US\Chinese military power then, it would also reflect the real state of european armed forces, small, with limited power projection capability.
I would keep the UK seperate but in a locked alliance with the EU, this will reflect the ability of the UK to lauch offensive operations abroad (unlike most of the EU, save aybe france) aswell as their world wide commitments and treaty obligations:

Nassau agreement with US
Five Power Defence Arrangements with Australia, New Zealand, Malaysia and Singapore
The ABCA Program with United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
British Military Garrison Brunei
British Forces South Atlantic Islands
British Forces Cyprus
British Forces Germany
British Forces Gibraltar

the treaties can be shown by defensive pacts with the US, NZ, Aus, Can, Singers & Brunei and also with +diplomacy points with all the above nations as standard.

 

[Gooblah]

Hi!

How about an independent United Kingdom? The European Union would be Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Germany, Ireland, the Baltic States, Scandinavia, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria, FYR Macedonia, the Czech Republic, Greece, Croatia, Poland, Cyprus, Romania, Bulgaria, and all the tiny states.

Independent European states (Ukraine, Serbia, Bosnia, Albania (+Kosovo?), Belarus, Switzerland) would be just that-independent.

Theoretically, Albania and Kosovo could be merged, Belarus would be added to Russia, and Serbia and Bosnia merged. Wouldn't be accurate, but sometimes accuracy must come after gameplay. Ukraine should remain independent, IMO.

The UK would have a Defensive Pact and trade routes with Europe.

To make life easier, there should be an extra Civic Category: Globalization

Civics there would be "Limited Entry", "Free Market", "European Union", "MERCOSUR", "ASEAN", "NAFTA" and "African Union". Civilizations with the same civic in the Globalization column would have bonus trade routes with each other. Limited Entry-Civs would have normal trade routes, and Free Market-Civs would have 1 extra trade route.

 

[Maniac]

One civ but with higher war exhaustion.

 

[NikNaks]

I think, building on Gooblah's idea, if it were possible to have a separate civics screen called, say, "International Relations", we could use that as the membership screen for these.
So, there's a "UN" civic group, and the options are:

• Non-member
• Observer
• Candidate
• Member
• Permanent Member

That list goes for every other group. But, you can only see those civic groups that apply to you (only Europeans can have the EU).

Then, we can make it that you can only choose the first 3 options, and that, if you select "Candidate", it goes to a vote with the other members (permanent members have the biggest influence). If it's a yes, you become a member (from which you can only switch to non-member - high relations penalty). Also, it is extremely difficult to become a permanent member.

So, this is my idea. Consider it an extension of Option 2.

 

[hevehoc]

I think, building on Gooblah's idea, if it were possible to have a separate civics screen called, say, "International Relations", we could use that as the membership screen for these.
So, there's a "UN" civic group, and the options are:

• Non-member
• Observer
• Candidate
• Member
• Permanent Member

That list goes for every other group. But, you can only see those civic groups that apply to you (only Europeans can have the EU).

Then, we can make it that you can only choose the first 3 options, and that, if you select "Candidate", it goes to a vote with the other members (permanent members have the biggest influence). If it's a yes, you become a member (from which you can only switch to non-member - high relations penalty). Also, it is extremely difficult to become a permanent member.

So, this is my idea. Consider it an extension of Option 2.

Great idea ! This will go under complicated features right?

 

[NikNaks]

Yes, for sure. It's not going to be easy to do

 

[ewu.7waker]

well for Europe i think we should do the vassal thing. the EU civ i guess can include Belgium Netherlands Luxembourg and Switzerland, whereas the major vassal nations can be France, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Sweden i think, and the UK should be an independent civ. The capital of the EU should be either Geneva, Switzerland or Brussels, Belgium

 

[NikNaks]

Switzerland is not in the EU, and you seem to be ignoring a load of Central and Eastern European civs.

 

[ewu.7waker]

i kno, switzerland is permanently neutral, my thoughts were originally thats load of intergovernmental orginizations have their base in Geneva, including many UN related headquarters, but ya, i guess it should just be independent. and no no, i didnt forget about our central and eastern european counterparts, i just resolved not to touch on them, because 1: I am not familiar on which countries are formally in the EU 2: I don't know much about the area so i couldnt say which countries deserve to be civs, but by all means central and eastern european civs should be in

 

[Bastian-Bux]

About Eire: it IS formally member of the EU, they just didn't agree with the Lisboa compact. Eire does use the Euro though, and is thus more part of economic Europe then UK for example.