Welcome to the second development diary for Europa Universalis 4: El Dorado. Today we’ll only be talking about a single feature, but it’s probably the single biggest feature we’ve added to EU4 since launch: The Nation Designer.


As the name implies, the Nation Designer allows players with the El Dorado expansion to create their own, custom-designed nation to play instead of picking one of the historical nations. The Nation Designer is available for both Single-Player and Multi-Player, and can be used at any start date as long as you are starting a new game.

To make a custom nation, you simply click the new ‘Custom Nation’ button during country selection. This will prompt you to pick a capital province for your custom nation: Choose carefully, as the capital province cannot be changed without cancelling your custom nation entirely! You can start anywhere on the map that isn’t water or wasteland.

Once you have chosen your capital, you will be taken to the Nation Designer interface. From here you can freely add or remove provinces from your new nation, though each point of base tax and base manpower deducts from your 200 point allowance. What does 200 points buy you? A country somewhere between Hungary and Austria in strength in 1444 - a low-end major power. You can’t build France with 200 points, but how many big blue blobs do we need?

This allowance can be changed in the settings (more on that later). If you exceed your points allowance, you will be unable to finalize your custom nation (and thus start the game).

But if EU4 has emphasized anything it’s that there is more to a nation than the land it occupies. You can further customize your nation’s Appearance, Government and Ideas. This is done through the menu on the left-hand side of the screen.

Appearance
The appearance tab is where you configure the name, map color and flag of your nation. A variety of patterns and emblems are available, with the colors taken from the flags of historical nations in the game to keep them stylistically similar. The name and flag are purely aesthetic and do not cost any points from your allowance.

Government
The government tab is where you configure your rulers and how your state is governed. Here you can set the name, dynasty, gender, age and skills of your ruler (and heir if you’re a monarchy), with point costs depending on age and skill so that a 20-year old 6/6/6 will be more expensive than a 60-year old with the same skills, but a 20-year old 0/0/0 actually gives you a decent chunk points back to spend on other things. (Then you can send him off to die in a war or something, I guess.)

In addition to tweaking your rulers you can also set your culture, religion, government, graphical style and technology group. These are taken by default from your starting position, so that if you start your custom nation in England you will start English Catholic with Western tech and graphics. Culture, Religion and graphical style are free of points costs, while certain, more advanced Governments will have a cost. The cost for Technology Group depends on your location - picking Western tech in England costs you nothing, while doing the same in North America is very expensive.

Ideas
The ideas tab is where you configure your custom idea set by picking from over 90 different Administrative, Diplomatic and Military modifiers and setting the level of each. Modifier levels range from 1 to 4, with some modifiers being limited to level 1 or 2 - you can’t start with 4 colonists, for example. Your custom ideas set always consists of two tradition modifiers, seven idea modifiers, and one ambitions modifier.

The first level of most modifiers is free, with an exponentially increasing cost for higher levels, and steep penalties for having more than 50% of your total modifier levels come from a single type - you can’t be all Military unless you’re willing to give up the higher level bonuses. Overall, a strong set of ideas will be quite costly and will likely mean you have to start with a small nation.

Finalizing your Custom Nation
When you’re done setting up the nation of your dreams, you simply hit the green checkmark to finalize your nation and exit the Nation Designer interface. At this point you will be back in the lobby and can start the game if you’re ready to play.

If you realize you forgot something, you can also go back and edit your nation, or create another custom nation somewhere else on the map up to a limit of 32 custom nations in the same game. Just because you created a nation doesn’t mean you have to play it - you can set yourself up with a whole bunch of custom AI rivals if you so desire.


Settings
In addition to the nation designer itself, El Dorado also comes with a bunch of new settings for those who want an even more customized start:

Custom Setup Difficulty
This setting allows you to set the number of points available to all players when making a Custom Nation, ranging from 50 (Very Hard) to 800 (Very Easy). The numbers can also be changed through modding.

Custom Setup Nations
This allows you to change the overall setup of the map in the following ways:
Normal Setup: The map is populated by historical nations, and Custom Nations are available.
Historical Setup: The map is populated by historical nations, and Custom Nations are disabled.
Custom Setup: The map is empty asides from player-designed Custom Nations, and all nations start with a colonist.
Random Setup: The map is empty asides from player-designed Custom Nations in the lobby, but once play is started it is populated with randomly generated states that use the historical tags and names.

Custom Setup Provinces
This allows you to change the base tax and manpower of all provinces in the following ways:
Normal Values: All provinces have their historical tax and manpower values.
Random Values: All provinces have randomized tax and manpower values, weighted by factors such as terrain and climate. Total tax and manpower in the entire world will be the same as the historical provinces.
Flat Values: All provinces have the exact same tax and manpower (4 and 3 respectively).

Client States & Revolutions
As a free bonus, we’ve tweaked the Client State interface to use the new flags from the Nation Designer, replacing the single-color single-icon flags from Art of War.

We’ve also made use of this system in the Revolution mechanics by having each nation generate a dynamic tricolor based on their national colors that will be used as their flag if they become the Revolutionary Target. No more French tricolor for everyone!

That's all for today - join us next Thursday for yet another development diary that will be all about the Americas and Liberty.

+ Here are all videos about the Nation Designer:
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqRhPbyFDQWjpJjylLqRQFNbC_vxoORU1

Europa Universalis IV: El Dorado expansion - Nation Designer Highlights
[video=youtube;WX3XGI4BFes]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX3XGI4BFes[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX3XGI4BFes

EU4: El Dorado - Nation Designer Livestream - Part 1 - Devs play the beta:
[video=youtube;GrwHCojtB8o]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrwHCojtB8o[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrwHCojtB8o

EU4: El Dorado - Nation Designer Livestream - Part 2 - Devs play the beta:
[video=youtube;OMUO1ohXZAY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMUO1ohXZAY[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMUO1ohXZAY

EU4: El Dorado - Nation Designer Livestream - Part 3 - Devs play the beta:
[video=youtube;EIMLSUjzIp8]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIMLSUjzIp8[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIMLSUjzIp8

EU4: El Dorado - Nation Designer Livestream - Part 4 - Devs play the beta:
[video=youtube;XgnxapM4WAI]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgnxapM4WAI[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgnxapM4WAI

EU4: El Dorado - Nation Designer Livestream - Part 5 - Devs play the beta
[video=youtube;H-xqEjSUrEs]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-xqEjSUrEs&index=6&list=PLqRhPbyFDQWjpJjylLqRQFNbC_ vxoORU1[/video]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-xqEjSUrEs

 

[GunthiHrod]

Can you create a Colonize Nation?, Like New Granada, and attached to the Kingdom of Spain?

 

[Mikalos]

I'm talking about bundling, not about the relative merits of each DLC. That is a discussion which, as mentioned, I feel disinclined to have.
I'm also only commenting on this particular bundle. The other bundles are better thematically linked and therefor more logical to bundle together. This bundle consists of two completely seperate products: a more or less stand alone nation designer and the new world game mechanics.




I just want to make clear that my comments aren't aimed at the developers. I fully understand they can't please all, and they need to make what is the best decision for them. I personally feel this should be debundled. That is my opinion, no need to discuss that any further.
My comments are directed at the people saying 'you don't have to use the nation designer if you buy the DLC.'
That is all.

you could just stop whining and not use the feature. clearly your in a minority here and more whining isnt going to remove it

 

[grommile]

Does that go for all country formations? I.e. if I make an event where you can create Denmark (I wouldn't want to continue without Dannebrog; it isn't Denmark without it) and I make sure to mirror everything in the existing country formation events, will my custom ideas then be kept? Or is it hardcoded which countries can keep their custom ideas?

Whether you keep your ideas when you enact a nation-forming decision is entirely determined by whether the decision contains the directive swap_free_idea_group = yes in its effect clause.

Formations in the game which currently change your ideas are:

• In the Americas: Canada, Inca, Mexico, Quebec, USA
• In Europe: Byzantium, Croatia, Kurland, Italy, Netherlands, Prussia, Romania, Ruthenia
• In Africa: Morocco, Algiers, Tunisia, Tripoli, Sokoto
• In Asia: Jerusalem, Manchu, Mughals, Persia, Shan, Tibet

 

[NTGuardian]

You are sooooo close to having improved colonial nations, where colonial nations are almost completely unique if, say, Sweden or Turkey or Greece get colonizing (I'd rather have a Turkish colony not become the USA cuz that's just weird). You got the means to create a nation with a custom flag, ideas, etc., all that it would need is a good way to come up with a name. A naming algorithm should be doable. Some countries could have language support, while other, moe unlikely nations could have an algorithm where the name is "New [province name]" "New [country name]" or "Rulersnameland." That is the ONE feature I am CRAVING, and you are SOOOOO CLOSE!!!

I also hope that, at least through modding, revolutionary nations don't HAVE to have tricolor pattern. What's wrong with a cross or a bunch of American esque stars? I'd also like to see the flag designer itself be modable so that new design elements could be added.

With all that said, this is an extremely exciting feature and I look forward to it.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Haha, wiki still doesn't have any information on forming Sokoto :/.

 

[Cèsar de Quart]

Can you create a Colonize Nation?, Like New Granada, and attached to the Kingdom of Spain?

I wish so hard. But I think it's one of those "so close" things that the devs at Paradox overlooked and won't work on, ever.

 

[Mikalos]

You are sooooo close to having improved colonial nations, where colonial nations are almost completely unique if, say, Sweden or Turkey or Greece get colonizing (I'd rather have a Turkish colony not become the USA cuz that's just weird). You got the means to create a nation with a custom flag, ideas, etc., all that it would need is a good way to come up with a name. A naming algorithm should be doable. Some countries could have language support, while other, moe unlikely nations could have an algorithm where the name is "New [province name]" "New [country name]" or "Rulersnameland." That is the ONE feature I am CRAVING, and you are SOOOOO CLOSE!!!

I also hope that, at least through modding, revolutionary nations don't HAVE to have tricolor pattern. What's wrong with a cross or a bunch of American esque stars? I'd also like to see the flag designer itself be modable so that new design elements could be added.

With all that said, this is an extremely exciting feature and I look forward to it.

i abhore the state of Vexology because of the massive nymber of stars and stripes and horizontol/vertical stripped flags, but i abhore stars flags more, the Us flag is garbage and should only ruin USA

 

[Puritan]

Client States & Revolutions
As a free bonus, we’ve tweaked the Client State interface to use the new flags from the Nation Designer, replacing the single-color single-icon flags from Art of War.

We’ve also made use of this system in the Revolution mechanics by having each nation generate a dynamic tricolor based on their national colors that will be used as their flag if they become the Revolutionary Target. No more French tricolor for everyone!

I'm excited about this the most.

 

[GunthiHrod]

I wish so hard. But I think it's one of those "so close" things that the devs at Paradox overlooked and won't work on, ever.

DOPE (Homer Simpson Sound)

 

[Silversweeeper]

- Can you add a "male rulers only/female rulers only/both allowed" option to the customizer? The example nation of Amazonia shown on Twitch would look odd as soon as there is a male heir...
- Also, what happens to vassals/PUs if you replace the overlord with the customizer?
- Who is the HREmperor if you replace Austria with a custom nation? New Austria? Spain? Instant election on startup?
- Finally, as someone else mentioned, can you add a "historical idea groups" part to the customizer? It would be nice to have that if you want to create custom colonizer nations (and probably other things) but want them to be AI-controlled.

I also think that a "Custom nations only" dev stream would be fun to watch, as someone already said.

 

[grandad1982]

DOPE (Homer Simpson Sound)

I believe it's spelt "doh!"

 

[Don_Quigleone]

What's to stop someone from creating an opm Western tech nation right next to themselves in North America etc and just westernising immediately off that instead of paying for Western tech in the nation designer?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

What's to stop someone from creating an opm Western tech nation right next to themselves in North America etc and just westernising immediately off that instead of paying for Western tech in the nation designer?

The same thing that stops you from setting your spending limit to 800 points.

 

[hashinshin]

The same thing that stops you from setting your spending limit to 800 points.

Pretty much this. You want to abuse the system? Fantastic. Much like Doom though nothing stopped you from typing in IDDQD, it just was not considered to be a real way to play the game.

 

[link777294]

Here's a question, We get to keep our custom ideas should we form a cultural union, but what about Italy? When you form Italy your ideas and government change whether you like it or not. If I make a custom Italian nation and form Italy will I still lose my custom ideas and government?

 

[DominusNovus]

I believe it's spelt "doh!"

Actually, it is "d'oh!"

 

[snakebite528]

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz boring feature....

lol

 

[caintheconfused]

I'm excited. The flat set-up for BT/manpower will hopefully end the debate over whether such a world could make a palatable environment, as I recall some suggesting for years.

The random gen should be interesting, if just to see how the random gen can fill in the space. Not to sound negative, but as anyone over from CK knows, the random New World gen can bring some...interesting results.

I'm loving the fact that the nation designer opened up the door to fixed revolutionary flags for that concept! And glad to see its part of the free features, as it should be. People do a lot of talk about nickel and diming, but the fix for revolutions all sharing the one flag could easily have been flag packs available at 2.99 a pop for different regions, but it's not.

So yeah, thumbs up for what we've seen so far.

 

[BarrosRodrigues]

I especially enjoyed the part where vassals will finally attach and keep attached no matter what when set to supportive and to know that the AI tendency to sleep and trouble with exiled units will be finally fixed. Kudos

 

[GunthiHrod]

I believe it's spelt "doh!"

Dope
Doh
d'oh!

Spoiler

[video=youtube;OCmuATH2yzo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCmuATH2yzo[/video]