Hello Sukhothai!
Why Sukhothai is considered hard:
1. Jungles, inland. It’s in deep Jungles which are harder to development, and not on the coast
2. Vassal of Ayutthaya. Being a vassal of another nation means we cannot wage war against other nearby nations to grow ourselves. We have to secure our independence first, which is very hard because of…
3. Ayutthaya is a Tributary of Ming China. Ming China hates it when people declare war on the folks sending them cash, and they will in them in that war. Thus, in order to secure our independence, we not only have to defeat Ayutthaya, but Ming China as well. That’s not easy.
4. Tropical Wood – Tropical Wood is a weak trade good, and one of our provinces specializes in that, so we don’t have rich production or trade to dip into there. Our capital has Chinaware, which is okay. Although much of SE Asia is richer with provinces with Ivory, Spices, Silks, Gems, and more nearby with a lot more wealth.
5. Troops – We only begin with 3k troops
6. Culture – Our culture, Central Thai, is not accepted by our government, which prefers Northern Thai
7. Negative Balance – I’ve never taken a nation with a negative balance before to start. We pay our vassal lords 0.40 in cash monthly.
8. Location – We are right next to Ayutthaya’s capital, which means we are unlikely not to have their big army be an issue.
9. Location – We are right next to some bigger nations, and will likely look to be good targets of expansion. There are no obvious smaller nations next to us to consider.
Now there are a few good things. Our two holdings have a lot of development, so we aren’t that bad off in terms of development. Most SE Asia holdings are well developed, but ours tend to be a little better. We also have a fun flag and color on the map, so that’s cool as well.