EUROPA UNIVERSALIS 4 COLONIAL NATIONS UPDATE

If you have the Common Sense DLC, the best option is to develop them. It's very straightforward to keep your colonial nations under your heel. Point of attention: the colonial nation forms whenever you have 5 provinces fully colonized in a single colonial region. This means that there's no reason to want to prevent them forming on that basis either. You have full fleet and army access to your own colonial nations at all times. Five provinces which were not of great worth to you anyway. That's a LOT of good stuff and you only have to give them 5 provinces for it all to start happening.

EUROPA UNIVERSALIS 4 COLONIAL NATIONS UPDATE

Since the last update they will also ship armies to the European mainland to support you in wars. They transfer 50% of their trade power to you, they start colonizing on their own, thus growing your colony without it costing you anything (might have to subsidize them for a bit to get them going), once they hit 10 provinces they give you an additional merchant and a +5% on your global trade power.

Once a colonial nation forms, tons of good stuff starts happening.

This gives you -75% on tax income, -37,5% trade power and -75% on production income. If the same goes for you, those nice provinces you've colonized at a high cost will always remain at 75% local authority.

I'm personally always out of quota to form new states out of provinces I conquer in Europe.

If for some reason you really want to retain direct control over colonized territories you can always focus on Africa.ДЇor me, the bigger question is, why would you want to keep them yourself? Here's some things to consider: In the Americas and Australia there is no way of preventing a colonial nation from forming.

Europa universalis 4 colonial nations