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Today is thursday, the day of the God of Thunder, so what is a more appropriate way to celebrate than with a development diary for Europa Univeralis IV. We’ve talked about development and politics the last few weeks, so now its time to talk a bit more about warfare again, before going back to more peacetime-related activities.

All of this mentioned in this development diary will be in the free update accompanying the next expansion.

Fortress Rework
Connecting a bit to the previous reveal of our change to how building works, we have overhauled the fortress system.

There are now four different forts, one available each century, providing 1, 3, 5 and 7 fort-levels each. A newer fort makes the previous obsolete, so you only have 1 fort in each province. Each fortress also provides 5000 garrison per fort level, so besieging a fortress now requires a large investment.

Forts now also require maintenance to be paid each month, which currently costs about 1.5 ducats for a level 1 fort per month in 1444. Luckily, you can mothball a fortress which makes it drop to just 10 men defending it, and won’t cost you anything in upkeep.

Garrison growth for a fort is also a fair amount slower than before, so after you have taken a fort, you may want to stick around to protect it for a bit.

What is most important to know though, is that forts now have a Zone of Control. First of all, they will automatically take control of any adjacent province that does not have any forts that is adjacent and hostile to them. If two fortress compete over the same province, then the one with highest fort-level wins and in case of a tie, control goes to the owner of the province. Secondly, you can not walk past a fortress and its zone of control, as you have to siege down the blocking fort first.

Each capital have a free fort-level, but that fort will not have any ZoC, as most minor nations can not afford a major fortress.

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Looting
As we promised, we have now completely revised how looting works. Now there is a “pile” of possible loot in a province, which is directly tied to have developed the province is.

At the end of each month, all hostile units in a province attempt to loot, and the amount they loot depend on how many regiments you have there, and what types they are, where cavalry is by far the best. Some ideas and governments increase the amount you loot each month, where for example Steppe Hordes gains a nice boost.

A province starts recovering from being looted when 6 months have passed since last loot, and it takes up to a year until it has fully recovered.

Of course, the penalty on a province from being looted is still there until it has fully recovered, but it is scaled on how much have been looted.

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Committed Armies
One of the major complaints we have had on the combat in Eu4, has been the fact that you can fully abort your movement whenever you liked. This have been changed, and now you can’t abort your movement if you have already moved 50% of the way. After all, its just common sense that a unit that have already moved halfway between the centers of two provinces is already in the second one.

Force Limits
We felt that the calculations of forcelimits where far too hidden from the player, Players saw stuff like “+25.87 from Provinces”, which based based on projections of base-tax amongst other things, and sometimes those dropped for no obvious reasons.

Now you will be able to see in each province how much it provides to your forcelimits, and we have cleaned up the logic.

Each level of development gives 0.1 land and naval forcelimit.
Overseas will provide -2 land and -2 naval forcelimit
Inland provinces will not provide any naval forcelimit.
However, a province will never be able to provide negative forcelimits.

A nation also have a base value of +3 land and +2 naval force limit, and there are some other ways to get direct forcelimit increased, that are not just percentage increases.

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Next week, we'll be back and talk more about The Devout.
 
What is most important to know though, is that forts now have a Zone of Control. First of all, they will automatically take control of any adjacent province that does not have any forts that is adjacent and hostile to them.

This worked well in March of the Eagles, but provinces were vastly smaller and more numerous in that game. We'll have to see how well it carries over.
 
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I like the fort change a lot. Now in terms of take control of, do they auto occupy a hostile province or just extend a zone of control over it? Im leaning towards extend their zone of control.

I feel like the new forts will promote some more strategic play in warfare. Also stop the player or AI from just waking around nations without having to deal with anything.
 
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Woah, those are pretty big changes. Can't wait to see how it plays out.
 
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This fort system sounds interesting and potentially good while also having an equal chance of being horrible. If you want something completely realistic, it's great. As expansion will be minimal now. But if you do enjoy map painting, those days are likely going to be gone. Although, this seems to bring up an easy exploit. Does the AI mothball forts? If they do, and if garrison recovery is even slower than before, then it would be easy to just assault fort after with a medium stack. I think this system would work good if fronts were essential like Hearts of Iron. But since fronts are not a part of EUIV, this just seems to be very worrisome...

*edit* I should have read fully before commenting. It appears it is now a frontal system..
 
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Wow. Just wow. This gonna be a totally new game.
One idea - Hordes should be able to walk freely past the fort, without the need to block/capture it first.
Edit: second: slider for fort maintenance also would be a good idea.
 
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Burgundy....... Wooaahhh........
 
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Thanks for the nice patch. I always desire old system improvement more than new features.

Just one question. I like to see the sources of my forcelimits in detail but what if I have too many provinces?
 
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Still waiting to hear what that change to unit movement actually solves, as opposed to shortening the micro hell window in lag. It's odd, ever since the inception of that concept it's been questioned, and yet nobody managed it. It's going to lead to some host defensive advantage, and to the AI either attacking into bad situations via commitment (with faster reinforce time, knowing it's committed you can start marching reinforcements sooner) or being as easily manipulated as it is today where you can just jerk it around by threatening to move and canceling sub-50. How does this make the game better? What purpose does it serve?

The fort level change is enormous and will take some time to digest its implications. No reaction to that one yet for me, it's going to depend on implementation. It can be a serious tactical overhaul though, for sure. Unlike the move commit thing, the potential purpose for forts is really strong.

Looting looks better.
 
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The fortress idea is really intriguing. A lot will depend on how well the economic cost is balanced because if one can easily maintain a large number of these fortresses, I can see it becoming a problem.
 
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Secondly, you can not walk past a fortress and its zone of control, as you have to siege down the blocking fort first.

So do alliances all count as a line? In other words, if you are at war with the entire HRE as say Denmark, does this mean you cannot march troops all the way down to Austria until after you siege everything in between? Or does this only apply when the provinces are owned by the same nation?
 
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Can we please get some paradox streams back soon? I know the guy who ran them is no longer there but the more features you talk about the more I keep thinking, "This could be good or bad I really need to see how it works in practice"
 
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Is fort level avaible tied to tech level (unlocked approximately at each century) or is it like - 1618 bam, fort level 5 for you, you you and you?

And it seems Burgundy is broken into (PU? Vassals? Galore)
 
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Also, does this indicate the removal of the World Conquest achievement? It's already difficult enough, but it would have to be impossible if you can't carpet siege. Because if I understand this correctly, carpet sieges are now a thing of history if you cannot pass a fort without defeating a fort. Going to stink beating back hordes of French mercenaries as you try to siege their border provinces. lol
 
Thanks for the nice patch. I always desire old system improvement more than new features.

Just one question. I like to see the sources of my forcelimits in detail but what if I have too many provinces?

Then you have to click on a province. Its shown in the building area.
 
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Is fort level avaible tied to tech level (unlocked approximately at each century) or is it like - 1618 bam, fort level 5 for you, you you and you?

Military Tech
 
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Garrison growth for a fort is also a fair amount slower than before, so after you have taken a fort, you may want to stick around to protect it for a bit, unless you have

Unless I have what?
 
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Also, does this indicate the removal of the World Conquest achievement? It's already difficult enough, but it would have to be impossible if you can't carpet siege. Because if I understand this correctly, carpet sieges are now a thing of history if you cannot pass a fort without defeating a fort. Going to stink beating back hordes of French mercenaries as you try to siege their border provinces. lol

Why?

provinces without a fort or adjacent to a fort will just fall to anyone passing through.
 
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