[Micah]

Xietor: Go back and read my edit (which I put up after your post, so I'm not trying to flame you for not reading or anything lame like that, I'm just pointing it out)

Clams themselves aren't the problem, it's the income they generate. I've found that once I hit about 100 provinces there's too much management (micro and macro) and the game starts to be a grind. There's just too much to worry about, too many boosters to shuffle, too many contingencies to plan. Since gold isn't terribly important by that stage of the game the gem items become essentially extra provinces, since they generate income just like them, with the corresponding increase in the amount of summons and whatnot that you have running around that you have to manage. It's just like playing on a bigger map though, and some people are into that.

I just don't personally enjoy the ever-increasing amount of gems that nations gain access to, regardless of territory, as the game wears on. I think a bounded economy is a good thing, generally speaking, and that the game would be better if it was always played with province-based income, not item-based income. So I don't like them, but not because they require excessive intrinsic management. I was playing a much smaller game and had a sizable amount of income from clams (probably a third of my total income) and they didn't really register as any sort of mm-concern. It's just when you add them in on top of administering 100 provinces that it's a problem for me. Maybe that just means I should play smaller maps.

That being said, I play to win and clam-horde like a little *****, cuz it's obviously the way to go.

Edit again: And that's the other reason I don't like them. Mandatory strategies just aren't much fun. If everyone is following the same dominant strategy (especially a passive one like clamming) then everyone's pretty much on an even playing field, so it could just as easily be removed. Obviously some nations benefit from them more by being able to access them easier/earlier, but when it's a worthwhile investment to empower/summon critters just to star clamming it's probably a sign that it's too much of a dominant strat. The main problem that arises is balancing the hit that natural clamming nations would take if they were removed, since it would weaken them significantly. So the issue gets even more complex if we talk about removing them...