Wishlist for Europa Universalis IV

[Guillaume HJ]

You are just silly. How should Ottomans develop into major powers when they have to share land with Byzantine?

You just forget the thing, that when you start game and play, game is no longer "historical" but all of actions are at your hands, not hands of historical person.

Which is precisely why the start game should be at a point more relevant to the era the game is supposed to cover: not a point that's almost certain to never result in anything even close to history, even if all you do action-wise is perfectly historical.

1399 is just a horrible start date in every possible way. Europa III is about the early modern era. A game about the early modern era where France and the Ottomans are almost always no-show is not proper design, it's a sad joke created to please anglophiles and byzantophiles.

[Colombo]

Guillaume: ok, so we have possibility to start at ANY date between 1399 and 18xx or so. But because of you, we would restrict it to later date, to make it more historical? What? Restriction?

[ashalia]

Focusing on early modern era should lead us to the fall of Constantinople in 1453 (29th may). I think EU IV should not give the possibility to play before this date and focus and the true "early modern era".

[Jazumir]

Any extenstion of the timeline would require a design that features successive unlocking of game-options and continious change of game-mechanics. Which would be hard to do and balance, but very interesting to play, i guess.

[Tigernekro]

Focusing on early modern era should lead us to the fall of Constantinople in 1453 (29th may). I think EU IV should not give the possibility to play before this date and focus and the true "early modern era".

Why? You are not forced to start 1399.
When you want you can start 1453.
I like the Idea of a Rebirth of Byzantine. But because you dont like that you want to force all other Players to not be able in EUIV to start there? That is ridiculous.

[cortomaltese]

Will an EU4 ever be released?

[George LeS]

I didn't see anything anyone said which implied no one shouldn't be able to start in 1399. I agree with Guilliame HJ that it's a bad start. My preference (for my exploring games) is 1433, which I choose because it's the last year POR hasn't started to discover the W African Seacoast. 1453 works fine, although I prefer 1/1 start dates.

Now, the question of committing P'dox's resources to giving us earlier start dates is another matter. I'd have voted against the expansion back to 1399, and would vote against further expansion back in time. But since it's done, no big deal.

(I must say I cannot understand the view, which I've seen several times, that the ONLY date to start is the earliest possible.)

[Stefanos_P]

(I must say I cannot understand the view, which I've seen several times, that the ONLY date to start is the earliest possible.)

I'm speaking for myself here, but for me selecting the earliest historical date besides the map setup, and or the ruler you get would be the possibility to play for an extended period of time, because when I put a lot of time developing an empire I kinda get attached to it, so the prospect of playing it longer is enticing (which actually never happens 'cause I get bored first and I start a new game)

[George LeS]

I'm speaking for myself here, but for me selecting the earliest historical date besides the map setup, and or the ruler you get would be the possibility to play for an extended period of time, because when I put a lot of time developing an empire I kinda get attached to it, so the prospect of playing it longer is enticing (which actually never happens 'cause I get bored first and I start a new game)

The final part, in (), seems to me an argument for starting at different dates.

If you want a different challenge, try POR, 1.1.1503, with the proviso that you will try your best to keep ALL existing Brazilian colonies. You have the leaders to explode, but an immense drag on your income. Or try the Ming c 1640, when it's all but hopeless.

The single biggest flaw with later dates is the overdevelopment of provinces, which are all built up to the max.

[Guillaume HJ]

Indeed. I'm not saying 1453 is a must; I'm saying 1399 as the default is a particularly horrible choice, leaving France with a horrible ruler and completely splintered up, and the Ottomans in the middle of a collapse phase.

I agree with George that something in the 1400s is probably best. It's not about eliminating Byzantium: it's about finding a starting date where, on average, when left to their own device (eg no player intervention), the Ottomans and France (and England and Castille/Spain) will become major powers. (Note "on average". Not "every game", just many/most of them).

If we can find one where that is possible while still leaving Byzantium on the map (though probably in a thougher position than at a 1399 start), great. Byzantine revival should be a major challenge, more akin to playing RK or Granada than to playing a significant power, though.

[Iwanow]

Well Many things could have happen in real history if some things would not happen. Many things that were very unpropable happened. The main reason why game is flawed, looking from the historical plausibility are Hordes(because they work wrong from the historical way of how should they work), and crushades. After 1399, there were only 2 crushades, both being made against the growing in power ottoman empire. Also, the 1399 year, was the year of crushade against golden horde. Also the defender of the faith mechanism, works in a lol way, making country like castille to enter any war, even against fellow christians, like muscowy, to enter war, no matter what, and why the war was made. The old way, it just gave CB agains those who declared war on christians, now, it give call to arms which is riddiculous, and making such lol situations like castille in russia, ottomans in india(without land border), etc.

Also the whole problem of the game, is it treats all people same(which is wrong, because all civilisations have some trends, and see things in way different), it does not allow your armies to revolt for example. Plus it treat religions in the same way, which is totaly wrong(for example hindu religion is not missionary religion, for example, so allowing it to convert other religions with missionaries is lol), as they differ the way of seing things, and see what is men duty in other way than the others.

[BritNavFan]

I didn't see anything anyone said which implied no one shouldn't be able to start in 1399.

See Ashalia's post #43. "I think EU IV should not give the possibility to play before this [1453] date..."

I haven't played a 1399 game where France didn't become a major power.

I, personally, really like the ability to start at any date, but Paradox did a poll on how people actually played the game, and IIRC most people started at the earliest date and played only part-way through the game. So I can see why Paradox is doing a game in the Napoleonic era rather than an EU3 expansion for the Napoleonic era, although EU3 in the Napoleonic era could use a lot of polishing, fixing, and new features.

[Guillaume HJ]

One thing worth exploring would be a difference between "minimum start date" and "default start date".

For example, in this case, the game would default (and be built) around the idea of a 14XX start date, but allow you to dial back to 1399 if you want to start with Byzantium in a proper position. As a result, game features would be focused on the 14XX period start date, with the earlier start just being there for those who would like to start with a different map situation.

[grommile]

I haven't played a 1399 game where France didn't become a major power.

I've played quite a few 1399 single-player games on normal difficulty and default settings, where I didn't stick my oar into French affairs, where France ended up reduced to a permanently crippled OPM sandwiched between Great Blobtain and Blobgundy, with a fair chunk of the south eaten by the Iberoblob.

[Chamboozer]

The old way, it just gave CB agains those who declared war on christians, now, it give call to arms which is riddiculous, and making such lol situations like castille in russia, ottomans in india(without land border), etc.

This is true, though I think the best way to fix it would be to introduce a land and naval system for logistics. The problem isn't just that countries like Castille/England try to conquer Russia or Anatolia, it's that it's even possible for them to transport and maintain the giant armies overseas that are necessary to do that.

[Wallain]

I would like a greater focus on the difficulties of maintaining a large overseas empire, and even a land empire. I want factions inside my realm to help and work against me. I want to make vice-royalties or suddenly faces an actually organized war of independence in one of my rich colonies. I want the burghers to fight the nobles, the loyalists fight those who vouch for independence. Stuff like that. Oh and better names for colonies and religion+culture converted territories. A Danish Holstein should be 'Holsten' and so on.

[grommile]

I would like a greater focus on the difficulties of maintaining a large overseas empire, and even a land empire. I want factions inside my realm to help and work against me. I want to make vice-royalties or suddenly faces an actually organized war of independence in one of my rich colonies. I want the burghers to fight the nobles, the loyalists fight those who vouch for independence. Stuff like that. Oh and better names for colonies and religion+culture converted territories. A Danish Holstein should be 'Holsten' and so on.

So basically you want EU4 to invert the complexity-ordering of Paradox's game families, so that EU is the most complex instead of the least?

[brifbates]

One thing worth exploring would be a difference between "minimum start date" and "default start date".

For example, in this case, the game would default (and be built) around the idea of a 14XX start date, but allow you to dial back to 1399 if you want to start with Byzantium in a proper position. As a result, game features would be focused on the 14XX period start date, with the earlier start just being there for those who would like to start with a different map situation.

The inherent problem with this approach is obvious. As was noted in another post, the most popular start date is the earliest possible so tuning things around a different date will undoubtedly immediately create issues with the most popular date, resulting in popular outcry to "fix" whatever seems broken about the earlier date. How many changes over the years have there been that benefitted nations that don't exist in the 1453 start due to complaints that they were broken in the 1399 start?

I'm mostly happy with the current state of EU 3 (5.1). The big improvements I would like to see are with the a.i. and its horrible decision making. When a 2pm thinks it's a good idea to DoW a globe-spanning behemoth with more forces stationed at their border than they could hope to raise and a hundred year tech lead there is a problem. A.i. expansion is ridiculously stupid in many cases turning the map into silly looking checkerboards, etc, etc. The horde mechanics also need some improvement and some glaring loopholes in other areas need fixing.

More internal focus would be a good thing as well, I wouldn't mind seeing a faction-type system for all nations although the restrictions put on Ming are a bit OTT, changing the outright restrictions to extremely costly would be a good change for them. It is pretty unrealistic to believe that the people will just blindly follow like lemmings no matter what you do as long as you keep a few troops at home to explode the insignificant revolts that pop up. The game does a pretty poor job modeling this aspect. The complexity of Vic 2 is a bit much (not to mention how broken some aspects of it were last I played but that belongs elsewhere) but there should be more to managing your internal affairs than parking 12k troops in the heartland.

[cotwell]

one thing I agree with the Op about: wasteland. "who's a pretty map, then? Squawk!"

I know, I know, play a mod.....

[ashalia]

Well my idea on the date is, i would rather prefer to see more games with specific periods and better focusing than an expand timeline. It's my opinion and i'm sure Paradox won't follow me on this