Well, IIRC you are advocating for reduced Militancy, which in addition to intentionally retarding the justification for intervening in said places means that the Gylmaryns will be highly displeased by unprovoked wars of aggression targeting the Syffrin powers.
Paths of Civilization II: Paths of Industrialization
- Location
- Queensland, Australia
And for why any war to prevent a Saffryn power colonising somewhere, or 'liberate' one of their colonies would be an unprovoked war of aggression... It's because we currently have no casus belli to defend the uncolonized native nations. And as to gaining a casus belli...
Well, there's a tech branch which has several results but one of which is explicitly being about declaring regions in our sphere and thus anyone trying to colonise them gives us a legitimate Casus Belli against them.
It's called Theory of Empire.
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Wiadi
Uncompromising Radical Leftist
- Location
- Something Clever
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Well, yes, but it won't be unprovoked once we get our "hey guys imperialism is bad and we should stop other people from doing it" social techs. Remember how I mentioned rushing anti-imperialism social techs? This is one reason why.
Tasoli
Life is for Living
- Location
- Behind the Keyboard.
You can rush it only so much without ToE boosts. İf you really want to rush it you need ToE. Otherwise research will just paddle along in the same speed we are going now.
- Location
- Sydney
We are already stuck with "legacies of imperialism" from our Wymn and Kybrian conquests. By using the additional research slots to accelerate social research, we can minimise the harm to ourselves and others.
How will we help defend against colonization?
We are not that more powerful than everyone else, we will be even less able to defend against colonization under your plan. Not researching ToE:RP will result in our allies ( such as Khemetri) adopting worse ToE. We can currently use diplomatic power to pressure our allies into better behaviour, but if we weaken ourselves (relative to the Sketch) that will be much harder/less likely.
The Sketch are already researching a ToE, and are already claiming colonies.
So we rush anti-imperialism social techs and our people now oppose colonialism, but are behind on military tech. We will then face the situation of beginning a war we will lose, or revolt from our people who are angered at our inaction.
- Location
- his hidden lair
Madness is ignoring that our civilization will have a gut reaction of 'fuck those guys'. Seriously, avoiding war when the loss in face was far lower than this hypothetical would have invoked civil war.
Full stop. Getting kicked off the hill and accepting it is going to have consequences liable to be just as terrible as fighting over it. You are willfully ignoring thousands of years of precedent for a civilizations response when it's primacy is denied. It's hard to take you seriously in that light when you can't seem to address the fact that regardless of what the voters want our civilization will have huge problems backing down and swallowing our pride even with high militancy. Just because you don't care about pride or prestige doesn't mean it doesn't matter in setting- the Hung probably had next to no militancy and look how badly having their bubble popping has undermined their society.
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Random Member
Gardener of Human Happiness
- Location
- Behind You
Because surely doubling down on our previous mistakes is the way to go.
Should've joined Faron, there'd be far less shit if he had won. And yes, I'm going to keep complaining about that.
And as we all know, no republic ever engaged in any imperialism.
*Muffled Roman Noises*
What worst legacies? For most imperialist states, imperialism forms a not inconsiderable basis of their wealth today. Belgium took the wealth it murdered 6 million people in the Congo to get and re-invested it, making it still one of the richest countries in the world today. Britain would be unrecognisable without the enormous wealth it gained from working people to death on its sugar islands. The United States still dominates the Pacific because it colonized Hawaii and the Philippines at the end of the 19th Century.
Even today, most former colonies have strong trade links with their former masters (exceptions are places like Vietnam - which is orientated to the US, not France - that were effectively colonized by other powers after the imperial power left).
And, as I've mentioned before, the DC is already an empire. Imperialism isn't somehow "better" when it steamrollers Siberian tribes instead of African tribes.
So how exactly will our people be better off if we follow your ideas?
Also, I'd like to note that the trigger for the scramble for Africa was the Egyptian crisis, where the British (somewhat unwillingly - they tried to get the Ottomans and the French to go in instead, and after that tried to organize a joint Anglo-French mission, which the French pulled out of at the last minute) basically took Egypt over and the other powers in Europe realized that the British could grab all of Africa if they didn't do something about it.
Since not-Egypt is a DC ally, we're already placed to delay the scramble for not-Africa (of course, I am sure AN will find some other event to trigger it).
That would have been a fun path to follow.
But the French revolutionary republic (under the Napoleonic Empire and the empire of the 3rd Republic) was one of the most aggressive imperial powers out there. I don't see how the Faronite path would have led to us avoiding the imperial problem.
________
Part of the issue, for me at least, is the way this game models imperialism. Imperialism wasn't something that was there to be discovered. It was what happened when a bunch of Europeans got such an advantage over the rest of the world that it was hard to stop some goody two shoes or ruthless plunderer or just outright maniac going out and staking a claim to a bunch of clay that governments at home really had no good options for dealing with.
If some well intentioned missionary went and did real good for the people of heathen Voltaland and then was threatened by slavers or warlike natives or whatever, often he'd call home for help. And did the government really want "hospital slaughtered by slavers" in the headlines next day?
If some outright nut went and conquered an area and then called home to say "look ma, I conquered all this land for you, aren't you proud of me?" then the government at home could either say "STFU" and let the conquest fall into chaos as the adventurer went home and other players scrambled to fill the power vacuum, or they could go in and try to clean up after the nut and keep even more murderous war from breaking out. Or worse, some European rival moving into an area that the "heroic blue eyed man of action" (as his fans back home would call him) had carved out for the glory of the fatherland.
The social justifications for empire came after the empires were half-built.
And the European empires faded away very quickly when their temporary advantage faded and as the governments at home were able to exert more control over the adventurers.
fasquardon
Still got well respected statues of Sir Stamford Raffles here. For all that they were just here for the rubber and tin.
- Location
- Illinois
So... nobody?
Because AN has come out and said that no matter what happens, Imperalism is going on full speed ahead.
You are correct that there is no future where the natives will not be robbed, oppressed, and killed.
Like, we literally cannot intervene with our current social techs, and your own plan of reducing militancy means that even if we rushed only social techs until we could(which would have an opportunity cost of impressive proportions, may I add), our people would be unwilling to actually go to war to help them. And supplying the natives is a quick ticket to getting a coalition to form up against us ASAP.
The best non-imperial path gets us is us, personally, not going and doing colonial empire adventures. It still leaves every other major power in the world free to pursue empire, which they will do happily and easily, due to their increasingly large gap between themselves and everyone else in terms of national power and tech.
And can't forget that us not going ToE means Khem picks up a shittier ToE for themselves as well, making things like Protected Markets and National Prestige the norm among empires.
You can totally argue that not taking ToE is the high road for ourselves personally. But we will not save a single man outside our territory with your plan. Imperialism will still be taken up by every other major nation that thinks they can get away with it, natives will be oppressed, discriminated against, and/or have their culture ripped from them and their land taken by their overlords.
Imperialism is the future. We can avoid that future if we go all out, but that will not save anyone else but ourselves.
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- Location
- Staring into the void
Theory of Empire strikes me as very similar to the Trolley Problem.
We can pull the lever by researching Theory of Empire: Romantic Paternalism or leave it, and let the Sketch finish Theory of Empire: Protected Markets.
Edit: This is further complicated by whoever finishes first, keeps the trolley afterwards.
We can pull the lever by researching Theory of Empire: Romantic Paternalism or leave it, and let the Sketch finish Theory of Empire: Protected Markets.
Edit: This is further complicated by whoever finishes first, keeps the trolley afterwards.
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Wiadi
Uncompromising Radical Leftist
- Location
- Something Clever
- Pronouns
- She/Her
No, because we can actively put effort into improving our social tech research speed, for example by raising Consc. Yes, our maximum research speed is faster with ToE, but I've already articulated why I think we should nevertheless delay it at least until we have mitigating techs online.
We won't be able to outright stop all imperialism, but that doesn't mean we won't be able to protect some limited areas from its effects.
That doesn't establish that they are guaranteed to have finished colonizing everywhere by the time we have anti-imperialism techs ready to go.
Considering how far ahead our armies currently are, we will likely not fall so far behind that we cannot contest any potential colonial powers - especially as, due to the nature of research slots, we will still be pursuing some amount of military research in the interim. Lower Militancy will slow the research rate, but the Education boosts this plan demands will increase it somewhat to compensate.
I was responding specifically to Kiba, who had made it fairly clear that he was talking in this case about how he personally (and by extension other voters) felt on the matter, rather than about our populace. For the latter, I will remind you that lowering Militancy is one of the early steps of this plan, and that the civil war risk was an explicit consequence of how high our Militancy was at the time.
Well, considering that it would still be imperialism, I imagine we'd be having the same discussion only with the !FUN! addition of terminology debates.
Material resources would be gained, yes, but the attendant cultural shifts would be deeply detrimental & further exacerbate many of the Gylruv-Ymaryn's worst tendencies. And yes, I am aware that we are already an empire to an extent, but Theory of Empire still entails a specific and significant shift in how we think about and pursue that status. I would frankly be happier if we had left Kyberia well enough alone, but that was an even more doomed cause than this one.
I do not regard AN's quote to indicate that it is impossible for any natives not to experience that process, simply that some will no matter what. Alternatively or additionally, it may be a commentary on the thread's clear intended direction, rather than the overall possibility space. And I suspect that if we fall somewhat from Supreme Power status, other powers will be less eager to form a coalition to go after us if (for the moment) we are only interfering with their rivals. Bear in mind that everyone else will be competing for colonial prospects; preventing one state from colonizing as they desire will only be to the benefit of the others. Not to mention that lower Militancy does not mean we will refuse war even if we have a strong CB, just that our people won't insist on it under such conditions. Once that requirement is met, the need to lower Militancy becomes significantly less urgent.
- Location
- Leeds
Is the rumor mill up yet? I notice the thread mark says not.
Tasoli
Life is for Living
- Location
- Behind the Keyboard.
That begs the question if we don't finish the ToE: Imperial Paternalism will we pick up the Protected Market version as an import? That would suck.
I mean what happens we delay picking it up until anti imperial tech happens but before we do that we get Protected Markets imported to us?
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- Location
- Illinois
How do you think the natives will resist the advances of imperial empires? Because as AN stated, ToE has appeared in large part because it is so ridiculously easy to actually take over other nations at this point that there is less and less reason to not do so. As such, most nations will find it a tad difficult to fight the empires.
Also, it's a pretty big stretch to say that it was commentary on the threads decision, considering he said "no future in which they are not oppressed". If the thread had the ability to change that, he wouldn't have said it like that.
And there's no way that people won't hit us hard if they smell blood in the water. And losing SP would be a lot of blood. 35+ prestige worth of blood in fact. For reference, the nearly deceased Hung Empire has lost 45 Prestige up to this point.
And a openly anti-empire nation arming natives with weapons is not going to be seen as advantageous. It's going to be seen as us fucking with the entire continent. They will happily gang up on us if it will get us to stop screwing over their colonies.
Plus, again, we have no ability to actually intervene in empires without significantly higher social techs. So that's going to be a good, long while before we can do anything other than arm some rebellions against our rival nations that will almost certainly be quickly and brutally put down without our support , support that a non-militant, non-imperial would be willing to provide.
Because let's be honest, there are few rebellions that actually succeed in overthrowing the ruling empires. Not unless you have a powerful nation ready to back you to the hilt at least.
And we would need actual popular will to support a war against a GP, which means you need a population either willing to use violence to accomplish their goals (high militancy) or a reason good enough to convince people that a war is worth fighting.
And Wyllyam Smyth, the average man on the street, is going to be pretty unwilling to support a war against the Sketch Empire, which will crash the economy and possibly get him drafted and killed, to help some tribals out in South Africa.
AN was tired so he didn't have a chance to do it yet. He might get it done eventually, or he might just skip it and wait until after the next chapter so he has more to talk about.
Edit:
Said most nations as they cut military funding to do something more important, only to find out years later that they may have wanted to invest in that new weapon, or maybe to have caught up with that doctrine they had shelved due to expense issues.
History is replete with nations falling behind on military matters suddenly, and while we're good enough to probably avoid being made irrelevant, well, I'll point out the Faronic Wars as an example of being a bit too sure of your own competence in military matters, only to find out that you missed the latest innovation and your armies are now outmatched in nearly every way.
As was said just last update, our people are confident that we're the best military, both in terms of tactics and manufacturing.
They also note that other people are not idiots, and most advantages we hold are very temporary.
Edit 2: also, how the hell will you afford buffing education at the same time as rushing social techs, keeping our allies safe and allied, dealing with internal issues that will arise from all our new social techs, and reducing our nations militancy, in addition to the 'normal' stuff like raising IC, building rails, satisfying our factions, etc...?
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Random Member
Gardener of Human Happiness
- Location
- Behind You
- Location
- a
Does that mean we need to conquer all the potential colonizers to stop imperialism entirely?The solution to the trolley "problem" is obvious.
Well, technically it might work
Wiadi
Uncompromising Radical Leftist
- Location
- Something Clever
- Pronouns
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Hm. Okay, that one I'll admit I don't have an immediate answer for.
@Academia Nut how would that work for us? If other nations develop Theory of Empire while we don't have one yet, would we automatically pick up theirs or would we get a vote? And if the former, are there ways to prevent this from happening?
Realistically speaking, our main ability to prevent colonization will be in our near vicinity, but I believe we have a real chance at making (for example) MAKUG or the Saffron Isles into unappealing or impossible colonial prospects.
As for AN's comment, fine, let's clarify:
@Academia Nut did you mean to indicate that regardless of player choices, no native cultures will possibly be spared the ungentle hand of imperialism?
We can lose Supreme Power status by gradually losing ground as other powers accumulate Prestige more quickly than we do, a process which will occur without necessitating a Hung-style crash and attendant feeding frenzy.
And with us as no longer Supreme Power, I really find it unlikely that all other national rivalries will give way before the overwhelming threat of...us fucking with a few colonies off near our borders. Like, seriously, other countries have priorities outside of responding to player actions. Hell, even in the classic example of the Trelli War - and I think it'd be a fucking stretch to say this would be that bad - we didn't actually eat a war dec from anyone else, they just got kinda pissed off.
The "needing a good reason/popular will to support intervention" is, again, what an appropriate CB-generating social tech is needed for. I'm reasonably confident a Militancy band exists between "must act on strong CBs" and "may act on strong CBs," which would be the target window here.
I agree that our military likely won't remain supreme, I just think we have a lot of room before "weak enough that we can't contest any colonial power, even in lands distant from their core" becomes a thing.
- Location
- Sydney
Colonialism made some individuals extremely wealthy in the short term, at the cost of the long term economy.
European governments used it to paper over internal issues rather than actually solving them. Britain exported it's prisoners from it's over-crowded prisons rather than reform it's legal system. Spain used New World gold to prop up it's economy, instead of reforms (Bourbon reforms were too late and too little) and still suffers today from that mistake.
Belgium's wealth came from it's industrialisation, prior to the Congo atrocities. The Congo Free State made the King (and friends) wealthy but was a (minor) factor in the Belgium economic depression. Belgian workers could not compete with African slaves and so some lost jobs.
The sugar plantations offered no real benefit to Britain. Extremely cheap sugar products were purchased instead of fruit and had negative effects on British health. British trade would have been better (in the long term) invested in industrial products rather than slaves and sugar. Britain's economic gains from sugar were only temporary and delayed the British abolishment of slavery.
Actual increases in GDP are more relevant to economic growth, not increases in the amount of money. Colonialism produced wealth was a source of inflation, not economic growth. The cost in lives and resources were significant and would have been better invested in other areas (guns verses butter dichotomy).
The reasons for the colonial empires were a combination of social and political factors, better alternatives existed but were ignored in favour of the more appealing(to them) colonies.
Completely agree.
The costs are prohibitive, we could easily follow your plan and avoid engaging in colonialism ourselves, but then we will be unable to protect other nations.
Spending diplomacy on Promote Trade instead of our alliances will weaken those relationships.
Spending PW on micromanaging our researchers (forcing them to avoid ToE and research anti-imperial tech) will damage Academic Freedom, potentially slowing research. It will also result in less available PW for anything else.
Reducing Militancy will require cutting our Armies, which will decrease our ability to defend ourselves and make us less able to prevent nations from being colonised.
How will we manage to protect a single area from colonialism?
We (the players/voters) can control our nation, but not the other nations. To force them to not do something they want to do would require winning WW1 single-handedly(us verses every Great power).
They are not "guaranteed to have finished colonizing everywhere" before we finish developing anti-imperialism techs. But with every nation that can (except for us) engaging in colonialism it is highly likely that they will.
When you consider the time it will take to force other nations to stop colonising, then it is "guaranteed to have finished colonizing everywhere". Not only that, the majority of colonies will be under one of the worst ToE and not one of the best.
To stop colonisation we would not have to stop any single colonial power, but all of them. The Sketch will be the main colonial power and are not a neighbouring country. If we attack them to stop them colonising something, then they will use that to convince other colonial powers to join the war on their side.
Our military research will continue but slowed, other nations military research will not be affected so we will drop behind.
You are advocating dropping from Supreme Power and expending PW to research and implement significant social change. We can do that, but we will not then be strong enough to enforce our ideals on the world. It seems an unreasonable expectation to believe we can achieve both anti-imperial social tech and be strong enough to protect some places from ever being colonised.
- Location
- his hidden lair
They... they already are. Conquering the MAKUG would be a naval invasion into a premature Ethiopia equivalent, that just so happened to threaten the industrial heartlands of the greatest army in the world. No one is stupid enough to think we'd allow anyone the foothold- and it's not remotely worth the cost of pissing us off, even the Sketch couldn't justify the cost of holding it in the first place against us.
As for the Saffron Isles... because everyone is so eager to squat on the DM's front lawn in order to seize the Balkanized holy lands, just after any grounds for being defender of the faith became controversial right after the Karivon uprising.
Your extensive, expensive anti-imperialism crusade to seize the higher path... would save the people largely safe by default. This does not fill me with enthusiasm.
Edit: If anything, the massive loss of prestige and SP status would convince anyone even considering it that the DM is weak enough to now make such targets potentially viable. There is literally a chance your proposal only increases the odds someone not us swoops in to conquer them.
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