What if we have to devote war missions to it in the main turn? I can't recall how the support mechanics work for Lords Loyalty but from what I recall the Banners are not sufficient.
My problem with taking Trelli is that it sounds like an action sink when we can't really afford one.
Banners are sufficient. Sometimes. It depends on the force commitment and we've had at least one case where it was explicitly stated that we didn't need to send help but that sending help would be appreciated.
As for devoting war missions, in this case as per the generals, this is the best possible chance to land troops in the city before anyone got their pants on. If we don't manage to grab it this turn the odds of success decreases dramatically and we pull out.
This is the opposite situation from the previous Trelli war, because back then our best chance of success was waiting for the Trelli to break, while now our best chance of success is to take it before order returns.
A lot of those examples are from before the records-keeping, one is by Nomads who are generally bad at the long-term things. Khem one is 100% our fault. Trelli one is nat1 result.
I do not see how any of those (bar maybe Trelli one but "if they die fiplomacy with them stops" is, like, no fucking shit?) apply to the sedentary nation with writing whom we have no reason to attack or break relations with.
And renting mercs is not an alliance either, so, unlike Highlands, we will have mo obligation to protect them.
That's the whole point: we need stability in the strait to trade through it, and we don't need workload of enforcing it ourselves because we are fallung apart at seems as is.
The point being made is that international diplomacy doesn't last. Any plans relying upon a friendly neighbor to keep the Straits open against all their internal pressures are largely futile. It's a strategic control point for the whole Black Sea.
And the point is the Straits make things
more stable. Take our Western holdings for instance. Currently they have the following choices:
-Do what the King says to get what they want
-Just trade through the Straits to get what they want, the merchants won't reject money.
With Trell it becomes:
-Do what the King says to get what they want
-Do without unless they can get Trell to cooperate.
We rolled a 38.
Not a crit, not even a particularly high number. Not even a particularly low number, if someone wants to argue astrology runs in reverse or something. If we roll a crit, then I'm willing to bank on that, and if we roll in the 80-90s then I'm willing to consider it a strong point in someone's favor. But again, I am not assigning any weight to a roll of 38. It could be inaccurate, it could be randomly selected, it could be a trap, it could mean basically whatever.
It is not sufficient justification for any action, let alone military adventurism at the other end of the sea.
I am sorry if I'm being a bit terse and/or not addressing all of your arguments: it is a little late and I don't have much time. I just don't want to see the thread clogged up with endless arguments over what the prophecy really means when we have no way of knowing.
It being average is why we're going in on it.
This is our best IC assessment of the situation:
-The Traders(who DO know the situation past the straits due to recent trade missions) think we can do it.
-The Generals think we can do it.
-The Priests, as per their Divination, think we can do it with an average roll.
As everyone who knows what the hell is going on believes it works,
and we know the priests didn't get a bad roll(only mediocre, so it's not likely to be a trap), we try it.
Finally:
-War with a foreign party raises subordinate loyalty across the board. We've had enough proof to say this for a fact.
-This gives us an outlet for Second Sons pressure and allows us to test out the new model army. We're hitting them with High Tech 28 Martial here on just the Banners.
-This also lets us fully englobe the Black Sea, which is the easiest way to control piracy. Pirates MUST pass through the straits to get out of our reach, which is a powerful control factor in making shipping safer and more reliable.
-This also fully surround Freehills, making us their sole neighbor, and making influencing them easier.
So, why is "Cent higher than 5?" requirement is still grey? Shouldn't it be green or yellow?
It's not met yet, but we now know its less than our maximum and more than 5.
Still, let me say that I find Guild's quest extremely funny. I just imagine a dialog like that if we complete it:
- Man, our king really came through for us with those Ironworks.
- Yeah, he is a pretty cool guy.
- You know, we should build something in his honor, free of charge.
- Wow, that is a good idea! Like what?
- Hmm. Like, I dunno, a giant channel through all of North? Or another Trelli strait?
- Yeah, sounds good. Let's get on with it.
Well I suspect we'd get the Academy or Great Library instead, since it's right up the Guilds alley.
Where did you get this information?
Stat sheet.
For the derived values, math.
Anyway facts:
-Centralization 0 is our actual Yellow Cent floor. We touched it briefly and saw the color.
-Therefore, Base Yellow Centralization is 3, because we have 3 points lowering the floor. It may be 2 instead if I forgot about a recent Palace built between us hitting Cent 0 and now.
-The Centralization base floor(Neutral) is defined to be lower than the Centralization base ceiling(High).
-Therefore Centralization base ceiling is at least 3, but likely higher, as we have, before the reformation, 5 numbers between Centralization base ceiling and Centralization base floor.
-A base of 3 + 5 means the lowest possible max Centralization we have is 8. We are at 6.
Theory:
-Assuming the gap between base floor Centralization and base max Centralization is still 5, then the max would be 15-16(depending on our base floor being accurate).
If we're overflowing 5 stat points per turn into Diplomacy we wouldn't be in this situation
But, our stability would still be affected. We are predicting to exit out of this turn with -1 stability IIRC. That would mean EJ would get used, and it would be best to use it twice, not once. A centralization drop by taking Trelli would be helpful. That way we can continue using [secondary] EJ.
Edit; I'm doubtful of Veekie's 16 centralization cap.
@veekie can you show your work, with examples, on how you got 16 centralization cap?
See above.
As for the rest of the options... I am rather torn on what to choose. On one hand I really want to take trelli. On the other, there is no longer any penalty for ignoring it and we have a lot of other problems to focus on. If we aren't going to claim it ourselves I think assisting Freehills would be the best choice. Not sure what is the best pick for a policy either. So until further notice, this is my vote.
This is what AN said was the best strategy for taking Trell back in the Trell war. Blitzkreig, muster up the Banners and Catamaran them into Trell before the week is out.
It is possible that we outrun the Pirate Hero to Trell, which would be very funny to see. Our War Catamarans are like 4-5 times faster than galleys.
Why are you people trying to take more land when we're already massively overextended and in the middle of multiple crises?
Trelli is not going to stay loyal and will rebel once they recover. Do people think that this is a videogame where painting the map our colour makes them unquestionably loyal? We have so many problems we need to fix and adding so many more is not going to be helpful. Conquering Trelli is going to be no good when we can't hold it. Please just wait, there'll be opportunities to take it when we're not dying. Also, if it was taken with found mercenary company, we'd be over our subordinate cap.
Remember what AN said was the necessary tool to control vassals effectively?
Organized religion and a receptive audience.
Trell just imploded because of rampant greed. In comes priests that tell them that greed will be punished by the gods.
And? We were there, you get prestige in exchange for diplo. Nothing too bad, not for a short time. Plus merc can get us a legacy?
Well, the Trelli had that legacy...oh wait they just exploded...its up for grabs
