How big is too big?

[Radio_Star]

Pretty much as the title says ... what balance are people looking for in initial expansion? How many provinces (understandably, this can vary from nation to nation and era to era) is enough to give you a healthy starting position but not enough make you a target?

My gut says nations that are heavy on early power (heavy 2x,3x, bless) are wanting more ... but still, how big is too big? Is it too situational to find hard and fast rules? Is there some basic guide?


Input is welcome.

[Slobby]

I'd say it's situational, however from a past game experience, I'd say too big is when you're so fast out of the gate focusing strictly on expansion that you don't have enough troops to protect what you've so quickly and easily acquired.

[BigDaddy]

It depends on the number of armies you have and the number of forts and rate of fort construction you can afford. Which also depends on the quality of the provinces themselves as well as teh strength of your scales and dominion. The more forts, money, and armies you have, the more land you can control... and the less magic you have on your pretender, and the lower quality his chassis.

If you aren't taking losses getting them lots of provinces is a good thing, even if you don't really plan on fighting tooth and nail to keep them.

[Trumanator]

The usual yardstick is 15 provs by late winter of year one. More can be nice, but be sure you can defend your territory, as it will probably put you in the sights of everyone trying to keep the leader down.

[Frozen Lama]

I'd say that 90% of the time, you want to expand as quickly as possible. maybe even 95% of the time. it is only with certain uber-bless nations that you need to conciously slow down your expansion.

[Benjamin]

I'd say in depends on who you're playing with. If you are playing with very good people, expect to get murdered if you do something flashy and pick up 30 provinces the first year.

On the other hand, I have absolutely gotten away with taking >30 provinces when my neighbors were new to the game and didn't realize what a problem that was.

If you're playing to win, a big flashy expansion might be a good risk. On the one hand it greatly increases your odds of an early dogpile and death, but on the other hand the times when it doesn't get you dogpiled you are in a much better position to actually win.

[Ink]

36B is about right, anything more is too much

[Burnsaber]

If you are leading the province graph by a wide margin, then you have overexpanded, since you now have that "Gank Me!" sign on your head. It is to be noted that underexpanding is just as lethal. I'd say that it is best to be the second best.

But it also depends on the situation. If many of your neighbours get into early wars/rushes with another parties, they probably won't be there to gank you -> allowing you to expand a bit more freely.

[Meglobob]

I think ideally you want to be 2nd/3rd in the provinces graph early to avoid being ganged up on.

Mid/Late game provinces don't really matter, its research/gem income that show how powerful a nation really is.

[Sombre]

It can be hard to get people to actually gang the leader. Especially in no diplo or team games, or games with many new players.

[Amonchakad]

Am I the only one who barely resisted the urge to reply to this thread with a "That's what she said" joke? Just asking.

[Squirrelloid]

If you can get 30 provinces in year 1 without declaring war on someone, the map is too big or your neighbors suck or both.

Bigger is always better. Be proactive with your diplomacy to avoid getting ganked early.

[DonCorazon]

I agree with Meglobob - if graphs are on and its an open diplomacy game with some skilled players then try to be #2 in provinces, or a close #3. If you are #1 out of the gates, you will almost always be the first one targeted if there are active diplomatic players. Everyone loves to see the mighty fall....

[Makinus]

On a related note: is worth it to attack indy provinces on the 1st turn? Or is it better wait for the 2nd turn when you have info on what type of indies you will face? Assume that you initial expansion party can handle 70% of the type of indies typically found (i.e. you cannot handle knights and some special indies like amazons)

[Squirrelloid]

On a related note: is worth it to attack indy provinces on the 1st turn? Or is it better wait for the 2nd turn when you have info on what type of indies you will face? Assume that you initial expansion party can handle 70% of the type of indies typically found (i.e. you cannot handle knights and some special indies like amazons)

70% is too low. If you can handle 95+% blind, its may be worth it. It worth noting that some types of indies cannot occur on some types of terrain, so if you can't take elephants, for example, its possible to choose appropriate terrain that you won't run into them.

(For example, a Dom 9+ Wyrm with at least A1 (air shield) can handle just about any indie (i've only lost to large groups of jade amazon sacreds) with proper scripting. I'd expand turn 1 with that. As a general rule of thumb, I'd only expand blind with something you can specifically enumerate the list of things it loses to, and that list only contains 1-2 rare indie population types)