I feel sad about Paradox

[kakatua]

I think was in Mare Nostrum I lost my hope on Paradox deliver what promised, but that is not the focus of this thread. The focus is on this new DLC, Mandate of Heaven and how poorly, unpolished and, more important, untested and bugged it is. MoH has some little things to other nations, like Age system, but the BIG THINGS, the things that sold it, are the Shogunate and the, surprise, Mandate of Heaven mechanics.

The problem is: after Ming lose the Mandate of Heaven, usually to Manchu, IT BECOMES STRONGER! Why? Let me say.
1 - It loses the extra damage taken penalty from low Mandate(around 30~50%)
2 - It finishes the disaster of have a big horde(-15% morale, increased Liberty Desire)
3 - The Lost Mandate of Heaven is too soft. Why?
4 - Ming can, after lose Beijing and surrounding area, sustain a 50k MERCENARY army. After the increased costs, so...
5 - Ming has ZERO problems with rebels. Also, the biggest offender for now...
6 - Ming KEEP ALL TRIBUTARIES, resulting in:
6.1 - The new Emperor can't declare "Force Tributary" wars, neither diplo invite them.
6.2 - Ming keeps the immense flow of Monarch Points and some decent recover of manpower
6.3 - As result of 6.1, the new Emperor is stuck with Low Mandate of Heaven, as he can't get tributaries and has a big non-tributary as neighbour, and all penalties involved.
6.4 - Ming comes back stronger than before.

My real problems are with points 3 and 6.

3 - The Chinese Bureaucracy was very inefficient, corrupt, traditionalist and condemned innovation. When Ming lost the Mandate, this problem became even worse, increasing the corruption and unrest, after all, THEY LOST THE DAMN MANDATE! Now the debuff is too light, easier than War of Roses, there is no autonomy or corruption increase. Tributaries never declare independence.

6 - The Ming Emperor suicides in a tree, another dynasty lives in the Forbidden City, Beijing is lost. The fields were ravaged and the dynasty try to gather its power in their new capital in the South. They no longer are "The Blessed" and the new pretender claim to be Emperor of All China, which means, all their possessions, including their heads over their neck. While many people keep their old loyalty, many of their subjects consider to side with the new blessed dynasty, including a big half of their army. The old and new dynasties will now fight to death to decide the destiny of the Dragon Throne.

While some nations may don't recognize the new dynasty as Emperor of China, is an undeniable fact that Ming took a big hit and now are devoting all resources in take the Forbidden City back, so why all this tributaries would give resources to Ming and be their pets if they can't even protect themselves, imagine protect a tributary or punish one that is rebellious.

Suggestions:
1 - Put some autonomy floor(25~30%) and/or corruption on the debuff "Lost Mandate of Heaven"
2 - Make all tributaries be released after a change on the Dragon Throne, after all, just the EMPEROR OF CHINA AND HORDES SHOULD HAVE TRIBUTARIES.

The sad feeling:

Makes me really sad to see a studio that I like so much continue to fail on basic game test. The expansion was focused on only two mechanics and one of them is completely flawed in the moment it happens what they want so much to happen(after all, why all these railroad towards Manchu?). It took me just some hours playing the game to see that things, so there is no "it would take too much time from an employee". Using the console it would be done in less than a hour. IT IS A CORE MECHANIC THAT YOU ARE RELEASING, HALF OF YOUR DLC! TEST IT!

If it was tested, I continue sad because I see now reason to think why someone would say "it is fine". Actually the way to play is conquer China and ask for the Dragon Throne just in 2nd, 3rd or even 5th war, completely unhistorical after so many railroad.

Ps.: It is not a "lack of skill complaining". Be sure of that.

 

[SKOTy]

I've run into similar trouble during my Korea game, I've managed to beat Ming in multiple wars and the wars were quite enjoyable despite endless merc stream coming from Ming. First war was even harder than the one Manchu players enjoy due to no disaster helping me.

In 1st war I've decided to take mandate from Ming, and I was really disappointed - I've expected at least tome event related to change of Mandate.
Even bigger disappointment came afterwards. Ming did not lost their tributaries and thus my mandate was doomed as there were no nations that would become my tributaries (basically the problem described in OP).
When I saw this I've crashed my game as I've realized I will have to face low mandate soon and created new peace deal - MoH CB gives 50% cost and 50% AE for stuff in Chine so I've started to eat whole China (in 3rd war I took 248 development from Ming, before admin efficiency and -20% warscore cost from diplo ideas), simply because of how unfinished mechanics of transfer of Mandate are and in that situation it was much better to take 200 dev from Ming in 1490 than to face penalties from low Mandate (with having nothing to do about it).

On the side note I've already reported 3 bugs during my 1st MoH game and I do not think I am finished.
One of this bugs is related to tributary leaving you once it reaches 100% LD during truce, so if you take Mandate from Ming and manage to find someone who is not Ming's tributary and is not willing to become your tribute voluntarily have fun keeping your Mandate as they break free 2nd day after the peace.

 

[Mortheim]

Meh. In my first game as Muscovy i'm bordering Ming where should be Uzbek in 152ish xDDD

 

[Ironside121]

Agreed, the Mandate loss needs to hit Ming harder. Tributaries should be released depending on Liberty Desire- perhaps via event? AI will always base it off whether or not they are above or below 50% LD.

Those that leave could then be asked by the new Emperor, I see no issue with this at all.

The Claim Mandate CB needs changed too, it shouldn't be used to just cut up the Ming easily with the warscore cost for provinces, you should have to claim the Mandate THEN take provinces, kind of like an Independence war. Purely for balance sake. Otherwise you should just use a Conquest, Re-Conquest etc etc CB's.

 

[DDRJake]

Losing the Mandate of Heaven is going to hit a lot harder in 1.21. It will likely last longer and include the penalties from having 0.00 Mandate.

 

[Muki13]

I think you are a bit too hard on Paradox. I agree with the points you make and they need fixing but this is largely a result of the nature of software developement. It is just a fact of life that you should not really trust any piece of software or code on launch day. Testing everything is stupidly expensive and it is extremely easy to let even major things slip through. At least bugs in EU IV are not causing deaths or ecological disasters costing millions. And Paradox is at least being commited to fixing the mistakes discovered by the users asap and not just igoring them like some other game studios.

 

[Mrakvampire]

Problem is... is that I personally have some doubts that PDX have a dedicated testing department.

 

[Threshold]

Losing the Mandate of Heaven is going to hit a lot harder in 1.21. It will likely last longer and include the penalties from having 0.00 Mandate.

While I (and certainly others) appreciate that this issue (and hopefully others) will be addressed, the mere concept that it may take until 1.21 to do so leaves a very bad taste in my mouth. Quite frankly, the idea that an individual can roll back to a patch that they like is harshly undercut by the recent habit of (at least) every other patch being broken.

I think you are a bit too hard on Paradox. I agree with the points you make and they need fixing but this is largely a result of the nature of software developement.

That, my friend, is a load of you-know-what. The institutions fiasco embodies this; quite clearly, no one looked into all of the things it affects before implementing it.

Problem is... is that I personally have some doubts that PDX have a dedicated testing department.

It seems unlikely, but recent patches certainly support that hypothesis, don't they?

And Paradox is at least being commited to fixing the mistakes discovered by the users asap and not just igoring them like some other game studios.

Funny. I've actually gotten the distinct impression that Paradox is not listening nearly as well as they used to, since at least patch 1.16.

 

[masteriw]

Testing everything is stupidly expensive

1 - It depends on how you test things.
2 - The mandate is the one biggest feature in the whole 20 Euro expansion.
What did they even think was going to be the most interesting way to play in revamped China? Playing as Ming and blobbing all the way to Lisbon? Of course it was to be a minor and overthrow the heavenly empire in some way. This is the one thing that has to work properly before release.

At least bugs in EU IV are not causing deaths or ecological disasters costing millions. And Paradox is at least being commited to fixing the mistakes discovered by the users asap and not just igoring them like some other game studios.

I can't believe I'm reading this, especially the bold part.
About "being commited", that's a given by now since this is the game's TENTH expansion so far. If they want to keep charging us 20 euros every 6 months they have to step up their game a little more, if they instead want to be like some other developer who just releases their games and run away with your money, it's their choice too, but they won't get people to buy 10 expansions if they want to do it that way.

 

[kakatua]

It is just a fact of life that you should not really trust any piece of software or code on launch day. Testing everything is stupidly expensive and it is extremely easy to let even major things slip through.

1 - I hope you can convince my clients that my codes shouldn't be trusted.
2 - I never said to test everything, I said to test the main, prime and biggest mechanic of the expansion.

Losing the Mandate of Heaven is going to hit a lot harder in 1.21. It will likely last longer and include the penalties from having 0.00 Mandate.

Next time at least say that I'm paying to be a beta tester. I remember we had a problem with a patch that broke colonization and we had a easy patch. I can't see why something I can mod in few hours and is core of a 20 euro DLC doesn't require a emergency patch on its own. Also, when 1.21 will come out?

 

[Muki13]

While I (and certainly others) appreciate that this issue (and hopefully others) will be addressed, the mere concept that it may take until 1.21 to do so leaves a very bad taste in my mouth. Quite frankly, the idea that an individual can roll back to a patch that they like is harshly undercut by the recent habit of (at least) every other patch being broken.

That, my friend, is a load of you-know-what. The institutions fiasco embodies this; quite clearly, no one looked into all of the things it affects before implementing it.

Funny. I've actually gotten the distinct impression that Paradox is not listening nearly as well as they used to, since at least patch 1.16.

I would hardly call this patch "being broken" but I have found that I am much more tolerable towards some type of mistakes than most people. I guess it is quite a subjective thing.

What exactly is a load of you-know-what?

I started playing just shortly before RoM came out so I can't really comment if their responsivness has changed or not but compared to my usual experience with game devs then I have to say that the devs here are rather exceptional in listening to the community. I admit that maybe I have managed to always stumble upon the bad apples but I just have had so many negative experience with many well-known game studios treating their fanbase like idiots without memory. Although this description of their customer base can be quite true if looking how their certain games are still selling.

1 - It depends on how you test things.
2 - The mandate is the one biggest feature in the whole 20 Euro expansion.
What did they even think was going to be the most interesting way to play in revamped China? Playing as Ming and blobbing all the way to Lisbon? Of course it was to be a minor and overthrow the heavenly empire in some way. This is the one thing that has to work properly before release.

I can't believe I'm reading this, especially the bold part.
About "being commited", that's a given by now since this is the game's TENTH expansion so far. If they want to keep charging us 20 euros every 6 months they have to step up their game a little more, if they instead want to be like some other developer who just releases their games and run away with your money, it's their choice too, but they won't get people to buy 10 expansions if they want to do it that way.

1. You can improve efficiency but you cannot substitute hundreds and thousands of people putting in the time. Also it is extremely hard to step away from the project you have been involved in and to look at it with fresh eyes.
2. This again is extremely subjective. You can realistically argue that there are 5-6 big features in the dlc. And I bet you that there are plenty of players who think that taking Ming all the way to Lisbon is the most interesting way to play in China. You like a challenge, I kind of like a challenge but plenty of people don't. So it is very possible that someone whose job was to make sure that China makes sense, took a look at how the area plays out and went "yup, this looks good". I am just saying that there are plenty of people who want to take their home country and conquer the world and coincidentally there are also a lot of chinese people in the world.

I am not sure I understand what you don't believe but this was just to say that if companies whose software is responsible for people's health and lives and where bugs can cause millions in real damage often let major errors slip through then what do you really expect from a small project like this? Sure, buying a half-finished product sucks but what is the solution here? Maybe if companies would be honest and would say that "we are releasing our product for you to buy but it may have major flaws and bugs and you can either choose to buy it now and help us improve or wait 2-3 months and buy the more polished version then". However this would need a serious change in the attitudes and behaviour of companies and their customers.

1 - I hope you can convince my clients that my codes shouldn't be trusted.
2 - I never said to test everything, I said to test the main, prime and biggest mechanic of the expansion.

Next time at least say that I'm paying to be a beta tester. I remember we had a problem with a patch that broke colonization and we had a easy patch. I can't see why something I can mod in few hours and is core of a 20 euro DLC doesn't require a emergency patch on its own. Also, when 1.21 will come out?

I can honestly say that in the last 10 years I have not experienced a situation where a game or any other piece of software I have used privately or professionally worked as it should be working on the first day of the release. Most times it is just a minor oversight or annoyance but now and again something bigger slips through.

I completely agree with you there. I think almost everything should come with a disclaimer that people who buy it and use it during the first weeks/months after intial release are beta testers. Companies already presume this anyway. This is why I usually avoid using new releases but I still buy them if I trust the company to fix the mistakes and not leave me with a half finished product.

 

[Roxas15]

i think they just released it buggy because of dead lines. i dont think they didnt know the flaws of it. for example the AE not showing bug in peace tab when u are a daimyo. everyone who plays daimyo first time sees that its buggy as soon as u make peace treaty. they simply couldnt fix it so far. imho

 

[masteriw]

1. You can improve efficiency but you cannot substitute hundreds and thousands of people putting in the time. Also it is extremely hard to step away from the project you have been involved in and to look at it with fresh eyes.
2. This again is extremely subjective. You can realistically argue that there are 5-6 big features in the dlc. And I bet you that there are plenty of players who think that taking Ming all the way to Lisbon is the most interesting way to play in China. You like a challenge, I kind of like a challenge but plenty of people don't. So it is very possible that someone whose job was to make sure that China makes sense, took a look at how the area plays out and went "yup, this looks good". I am just saying that there are plenty of people who want to take their home country and conquer the world and coincidentally there are also a lot of chinese people in the world.

Expanding Ming into Lisbon is meaningless not only because of the lack of challenge involved. It is meaningless because you were always able to do that before the DLC. The new mechanics are there specifically to check Ming's power in a more or less historical manner. To help represent the transition of power from Ming to Qing/Manchu, and to leave the door open for other Asian nations. So the one big thing the new mechanics were made for doesn't really work. Sure, there are a lot of silly buttons and modifiers but if they cannot handle transition of power away from Ming in a remotely sensible manner then they're broken by design.

I am not sure I understand what you don't believe but this was just to say that if companies whose software is responsible for people's health and lives and where bugs can cause millions in real damage often let major errors slip through then what do you really expect from a small project like this? Sure, buying a half-finished product sucks but what is the solution here? Maybe if companies would be honest and would say that "we are releasing our product for you to buy but it may have major flaws and bugs and you can either choose to buy it now and help us improve or wait 2-3 months and buy the more polished version then". However this would need a serious change in the attitudes and behaviour of companies and their customers.

What I don't believe is that you're comparing a computer game to some critical software that often costs millions of dollars. No computer game is ever going to be responsible for people's deaths. However, that didn't stop a lot of games from being heavily criticized.
The "solution" here is to give the company feedback expressing dissatisfaction with the current state of affairs.

 

[Threshold]

I would hardly call this patch "being broken"

Ming roflstomps everything, is stronger when it loses Mandate than when it has it, new subject type tributary introduced and diplomatic aspects of it are completely botched (just look at all the tributary-specific bugs that have been reported)...need I go on? None of this is to say the game is "unplayable", which is probably the more conventional definition of "broken" that I imagine you're used to, but to release features and have them have the opposite of the intended effect is absolutely what I would call "broken".

What exactly is a load of you-know-what?

Considering that I quoted the exact statement you made that I took issue with, you might want to get your reading comprehension checked. To clarify further: Not vetting obvious use cases (as opposed to edge cases), as in the case of tributary diplomacy, as in the case of institution embracement killing Exploration and Expansion finisher CBs, as in the case of absolutism not being capped to 100, is not "largely a result of the nature of software development".

I don't expect things to be perfect day one, but there are some things that honestly should not be able to slip through.

Sure, buying a half-finished product sucks but what is the solution here?

How about, we stop buying things when they're half finished? MoH isn't worth my money right now; the reason I'm complaining is because I want it to be; I want to buy it. But I'm done buying from Paradox on faith alone; I did that with RoM, in hopes the issues would be resolved, and given the state of the game more than four months later, they have lost my faith.

I started playing just shortly before RoM came out so I can't really comment if their responsivness has changed or not

As someone who has been around much longer, let me just say that we older fans have very high expectations of Paradox, due to our history with them being absolutely exceptional, and simply being better than many or any others in these respects is insufficient, when it also represents a decline.

Notice that no one is saying they're mad, no one is saying Paradox is a terrible company, we're just sad (and maybe a little disappointed) that things aren't living up to our expectations anymore.

 

[Muki13]

Considering that I quoted the exact statement you made that I took issue with, you might want to get your reading comprehension checked. To clarify further: Not vetting obvious use cases (as opposed to edge cases), as in the case of tributary diplomacy, as in the case of institution embracement killing Exploration and Expansion finisher CBs, as in the case of absolutism not being capped to 100, is not "largely a result of the nature of software development".

I don't expect things to be perfect day one, but there are some things that honestly should not be able to slip through.

Thank you for claryfying. Yes, some things should not be able to slip through. But we have no idea in what state the game was in when it went into testing. If there were many even more glaring issues then not noticing the less obvious ones can happen more easily. And ofcourse finding a major bug and fixing it close to a release deadline can mean that there is actually a very limited amount of testing afterwards. And even the most straightforward of fixes can have unintended consequences.

How about, we stop buying things when they're half finished? MoH isn't worth my money right now; the reason I'm complaining is because I want it to be; I want to buy it. But I'm done buying from Paradox on faith alone; I did that with RoM, in hopes the issues would be resolved, and given the state of the game more than four months later, they have lost my faith.

I am not convinced that this would work. I am not familiar with the profit margins that the gaming companies are operating with but I doubt they are enough to swallow this. If everyone would stop buying the game on launch because it can have or has issues then the company needs to spend a lot more time testing it and that costs money. I am not sure many are willing to pay higher prices for the games. I think that the current situation is a fair trade-off if it is not abused by releasing completely shoddy products. I am thankful for the people who jump into a game this early and take the time to help to fix and improve stuff. But of course not everyone should do that. Especially if you think that they failed your expectations with previous versions.

As someone who has been around much longer, let me just say that we older fans have very high expectations of Paradox, due to our history with them being absolutely exceptional, and simply being better than many or any others in these respects is insufficient, when it also represents a decline.

This is a fair point and I understand that a decline can be worrying. But I always prefer to have my high exceptions being slightly missed than to have my low expectations slightly exceeded.

Notice that no one is saying they're mad, no one is saying Paradox is a terrible company, we're just sad (and maybe a little disappointed) that things aren't living up to our expectations anymore.

I wasn't thinking that anyone here is mad or calling Paradox a terrible company. The reaction of people is completely understandable because there obviously are issues that need to be fixed before starting in Asia can be as fun as it is supposed to be. But people should also try to understand why this is so. And while I personally like being told when my work is crap because then I can do something to improve it and when I know that it is not actually crap then I just don't care. But over the years I have seen that this not an attitude the majority of people have. Most people are less or more devastated if their work is criticized in a manner like this. From the dev streams I have seen that most devs really seem to put their hart and soul into this game. And I can easily imagine some tester in Paradox to really have a low moment when he reads a comment stating that Paradox does not seem to have a testing department. And a sad developer is not a productive one. People often seem to forget that the employees bringing you a game are probably trying to achieve the best result while juggling a lot of constraints.

I am now off back to my currently very enjoyable Golden Horde run. Loving the ages, devastation, state limit reduction, macrobuilder related improvements and so far the tributary interactions. I have high hopes that the bigger issues will be handled relatively soon. But I promise you that if they are not then I won't be preordering the next dlc.

 

[Greene]

You always have two options:
1) Buy it straight away and take the risk of encountering bugs or
2) Wait another month or so and get it with the balance patch.

Down vote me all you want, but most developers would release a product and update it in time rather than give an absurdly late deadline that would piss people off anyway, and I am not talking strictly about gaming. Paradox gives you the chance to try it as it is now, but they don't force you to. And don't say "but they are selling it as a finished product". You know that after every expansion that adds major features there is a balance patch on the way, so unless this is your first time buying an expansion there's no excuse. I definitely understand why some people are disappointed. I am too. But if you don't like it, go play something else for some time and come back after a month or so when 1.21 is out, lol.

 

[Frank E]

As someone who has been around much longer, let me just say that we older fans have very high expectations of Paradox, due to our history with them being absolutely exceptional, and simply being better than many or any others in these respects is insufficient, when it also represents a decline.

As someone who's been playing Paradox games for a long time, I'll have to disagree with that statement. I used to go out of my way to avoid Paradox games for the first 6 months because you just knew they'd be a buggy mess. They managed to change that about 4 or 5 years ago and started putting out quality games at release. Unfortunately, they seem to be backsliding with their last few releases and especially with this DLC. I'm not talking about how Ming seems ludicrously overpowered, I could write that off as a design decision that I just disagree with. But there's no excuse for buggy and unpolished this release is.

I'm back to waiting a few months post release before I buy. ... which is unfortunate because I really want to check out the Stellaris expansion!

 

[durbal]

Losing the Mandate of Heaven is going to hit a lot harder in 1.21. It will likely last longer and include the penalties from having 0.00 Mandate.

Please alter tributary defense mechanics (overlord prefers to protect them far too much -- stuff like armies marching from Beijing to India in defense of a minor squabble) and make tributaries much less likely to willingly become tributaries (and should ALWAYS decline when no CB is available).

And nerf the Create Tributary CB as well.

Thanks!

 

[FleetingRain]

Losing the Mandate of Heaven is going to hit a lot harder in 1.21. It will likely last longer and include the penalties from having 0.00 Mandate.

Are you planning on any other changes? Such as being more difficult to keep Meritocracy high, the move-capital-to-island exploit, etc?

And will you please add back the 50% autonomy floor to non-MoH Celestial Empire? >__>

 

[Pile_O_Gunz]

Thank you for claryfying. Yes, some things should not be able to slip through. But we have no idea in what state the game was in when it went into testing. If there were many even more glaring issues then not noticing the less obvious ones can happen more easily. And ofcourse finding a major bug and fixing it close to a release deadline can mean that there is actually a very limited amount of testing afterwards. And even the most straightforward of fixes can have unintended consequences.

I am not convinced that this would work. I am not familiar with the profit margins that the gaming companies are operating with but I doubt they are enough to swallow this. If everyone would stop buying the game on launch because it can have or has issues then the company needs to spend a lot more time testing it and that costs money. I am not sure many are willing to pay higher prices for the games. I think that the current situation is a fair trade-off if it is not abused by releasing completely shoddy products. I am thankful for the people who jump into a game this early and take the time to help to fix and improve stuff. But of course not everyone should do that. Especially if you think that they failed your expectations with previous versions.

This is a fair point and I understand that a decline can be worrying. But I always prefer to have my high exceptions being slightly missed than to have my low expectations slightly exceeded.

I wasn't thinking that anyone here is mad or calling Paradox a terrible company. The reaction of people is completely understandable because there obviously are issues that need to be fixed before starting in Asia can be as fun as it is supposed to be. But people should also try to understand why this is so. And while I personally like being told when my work is crap because then I can do something to improve it and when I know that it is not actually crap then I just don't care. But over the years I have seen that this not an attitude the majority of people have. Most people are less or more devastated if their work is criticized in a manner like this. From the dev streams I have seen that most devs really seem to put their hart and soul into this game. And I can easily imagine some tester in Paradox to really have a low moment when he reads a comment stating that Paradox does not seem to have a testing department. And a sad developer is not a productive one. People often seem to forget that the employees bringing you a game are probably trying to achieve the best result while juggling a lot of constraints.

I am now off back to my currently very enjoyable Golden Horde run. Loving the ages, devastation, state limit reduction, macrobuilder related improvements and so far the tributary interactions. I have high hopes that the bigger issues will be handled relatively soon. But I promise you that if they are not then I won't be preordering the next dlc.

Pretty much all the problems OP mentioned are questionable design choices not bugs in the code the devs will not easily spot it as they work at too low level. They need to catch this stuff while discussing the design or during play testing.

Sadly testing tends to be the first place corners are cut when the times running out,