Admin Monarch Points Idea Groups

[Lessing]

You are right, but only partly for the reason you mention. You list all those modifiers, and some people will go "meh" because the values are individually small. But once people start actually using it and see what it means in terms of events (or read ideagroups.txt, which is the relevant event file), they are likely to rate it much higher.

This right here is a glaring problem with the game mechanic. You shouldn't need to read a text file or have already played with innovative in order to make an educated choice on idea group selection.

All information in an idea group should be apparent from its description and the displayed values.

 

[Ethanol]

You are right, but only partly for the reason you mention. You list all those modifiers, and some people will go "meh" because the values are individually small. But once people start actually using it and see what it means in terms of events (or read ideagroups.txt, which is the relevant event file), they are likely to rate it much higher.

Quite true, just looked at the files and the even if the events for innovative ideas are quite balanced, those for taking the economic ideas are really nice (more "good" events then "bad" ones, nice bonuses).

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

This right here is a glaring problem with the game mechanic. You shouldn't need to read a text file or have already played with innovative in order to make an educated choice on idea group selection.

And you don't need to.

There are events connected with every aspect of the game, and this is not something that the game tells you time and time again in tooltips, because it would drown out other information. If you want a country to be innovative, pick the Innovative idea group. If you want to be good at trade, pick Trade. And so on and so forth. This is sufficient information to make a choice.

If you feel you need detailed information on events to make an even more informed choice, consider the implications for a moment. There is a bit more than 1.6 megabyte of events in the game in 129 event files. 40 of these files have events that depend on idea groups. There is no way this mass of information (which incidentally will change frequently with expansions/dlc/mods as events are changed, added, or removed) can be presented to you in-game without crowding out other considerably more relevant information.

Events affect and are affected by every aspect of the game. It is doubtful that there is any tooltip explaining any value in the game that, in case of full disclosure, would not need to mention, "this may be affected by events (somehow)".

I do understand the desire to know all before making a decision, and to know all without trying it out or reading the event files, such that you can calculate to the finest degree just how beneficial a choice can be to you, I really do, but the sheer scope of the game makes this impractical.


I cannot help comparing it to criticizing a library for it being impossible to tell which book in a genre is ideal for you by reading the cover. After all, they shelve several genres and several books in each genre - why should you have to read them all or to ask an expert on a genre to know which suits your tastes best? Why do they merely try to guide on the cover instead of explaining it all? --- The analogy breaks in several places, I know, but it did come to mind and I found it at least somewhat apt.

 

[siis]

On Quills videos the monthly cost of a new lvl 1 advisor went from 1 to ~1.5.

As they age the initial payment to hire actually goes down.

Wasn't this because of high inflation? quill had a lot of loans.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Wasn't this because of high inflation? quill had a lot of loans.

Advisers increase in upkeep cost as a function of the date. Late-game advisers are substantially more expensive in upkeep than early-game.

Advisers decrease in hiring cost as a function of their own age.

 

[Lessing]

And you don't need to.

There are events connected with every aspect of the game, and this is not something that the game tells you time and time again in tooltips, because it would drown out other information. If you want a country to be innovative, pick the Innovative idea group. If you want to be good at trade, pick Trade. And so on and so forth. This is sufficient information to make a choice.

If you feel you need detailed information on events to make an even more informed choice, consider the implications for a moment. There is a bit more than 1.6 megabyte of events in the game in 129 event files. 40 of these files have events that depend on idea groups. There is no way this mass of information (which incidentally will change frequently with expansions/dlc/mods as events are changed, added, or removed) can be presented to you in-game without crowding out other considerably more relevant information.

Events affect and are affected by every aspect of the game. It is doubtful that there is any tooltip explaining any value in the game that, in case of full disclosure, would not need to mention, "this may be affected by events (somehow)".

I do understand the desire to know all before making a decision, and to know all without trying it out or reading the event files, such that you can calculate to the finest degree just how beneficial a choice can be to you, I really do, but the sheer scope of the game makes this impractical.


I cannot help comparing it to criticizing a library for it being impossible to tell which book in a genre is ideal for you by reading the cover. After all, they shelve several genres and several books in each genre - why should you have to read them all or to ask an expert on a genre to know which suits your tastes best? Why do they merely try to guide on the cover instead of explaining it all? --- The analogy breaks in several places, I know, but it did come to mind and I found it at least somewhat apt.

I value your answer, and in parts I agree, but as you can see here in this very thread, people say "take innovative ideas because the events give monarch power". This is a very important information (because MP is so scarce), but it's NOT in the game (in the UI at least).

Thus people are picking national idea groups based on invisible knowledge. Surely not an effect Paradox wanted. After all, they strive to put all relevant information into the UI.

A simple tooltip telling you that idea group X will facilitate events that give money, or MP, or beneficial colonial events, would have been enough for my taste.

But those MP gain events are possibly the best events one can get (from what we now at this point).

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

I value your answer, and in parts I agree, but as you can see here in this very thread, people say "take innovative ideas because the events give monarch power". This is a very important information (because MP is so scarce), but it's NOT in the game (in the UI at least).

Actually, I am the guy who said that, amused that people were ignoring a major game system in the game engine that affects all parts of the game. It is entirely possible that nobody else posting in this thread knew, but the point is, everybody posting in the thread with experience of prior PDS games should know about the importance of events, even if they did not know the specific events for idea groups in EU4. I mean, it is one thing to list a factor and say "I don't know how important it is, so I will concentrate on what I do know", it is quite another to ignore it altogether.

Thus people are picking national idea groups based on invisible knowledge. Surely not an effect Paradox wanted. After all, they strive to put all relevant information into the UI.

People are thinking of picking national groups wishfully in anticipation of release and choosing only to focus on the few bits they are certain of in making their choices. This is an entertaining sport, even as it is done without a full understanding of the ramifications of their choices when we disregard events, and I completely understand it. Once the game is released, a lot of players will be experimenting and many of the more interesting details will become widespread knowledge, based on which a number of very different conclusions will be reached as to what is important, resulting in different schools of thoughts as to which idea groups are the best.

A simple tooltip telling you that idea group X will facilitate events that give money, or MP, or beneficial colonial events, would have been enough for my taste.

Except that that is not all that they do. Were they, I would agree with you, but it is not the case.

Every single idea group is tied to many events, some good, some bad, and having to do with different aspects of the game that are related to the the abstraction that the idea group represents. To cover the important events, you would need something like a tooltip for colonial ideas saying "Colonial ideas allow events that have to do with colonial ideas and how people react to them", "Trade ideas allow events that have to do with trade ideas and how people react to them" and so on and so forth. And that is apart from those 39 event files that are not specifically devoted to idea groups, but in which idea groups are important for one or more events. Or you could choose a few of the events and write a tooltip based on those, but this would not be representative of the events, and might change depending on DLC and mods.

There is no idea group that merely facilitates a certain aspect of the game. Pick idea group X, and you open yourself up to all events that have to do with X.

But, you might say, focus on what is important!

And I quite agree that a simple tooltip would be useful if it could adequately describe the effects, but I just do not see how this can be done when there are so many varied effects, many of which will have different importance to different people. Taking innovative ideas as an example again, being innovative also puts you at risk of losing stability because people are upset over the rapid changes etc. So, what is now the most important thing for you - the possibility of gaining monarch points via events or of losing stability, something that has a substantial cost in AMP (depending on religious unity, religious idea group, and other modifiers)? Writing that "Innovative will facilitate events that grant monarch points" would feel rather awful if you were unlucky enough to mostly get the negative events, as I am sure you will agree.

But those MP gain events are possibly the best events one can get (from what we now at this point).

Innovativeness events are very good general purpose events (everybody needs monarch points), but a realm that e.g. concentrated on trade might well consider some of the beneficial events associated with trade more powerful, and so on and so forth.

 

[Lessing]

Well. It all ends up in "pick this innovative idea group because you have to trust the game will give you innovative events".

I still don't think this is a good way to deal with the player's expectations. Sure, EU4 has tons of events, but the triggers should be more STATE variables like current stab, current money, current war exhaustion, current overextension, current tech lead, etc, and NOT chosen idea groups.

It was the same in EU3 with ideas when people said "pick church attendance and this or that national decision" because both in conjunction gave nice events or suchlike. It's hidden and hostile for beginners to design a game this way. And no player will ever notice what hidden bonuses there are if he never picks the trigger in the first place.

All events should be triggered by stats that every player has. Otherwise choosing becomes so dependent on knowledge that it defeats the strategic purpose.

 

[Letar]

All events should be triggered by stats that every player has. Otherwise choosing becomes so dependent on knowledge that it defeats the strategic purpose.

I don't quite agree with this. If all events were basically available for everyone, that would take away a lot of flavor and replayability away. For me at least, one strong point (of PDS games) is to explore different options (idea groups in this case) to see what comes. Over time, when you play enough, you should know the most common events tied to each group, possibly making you a better player (or, at least, a player with more knowledge of possible outcomes). Of course, if you really want to know all of the possible implications of your choices, then the event mechanism tied to group selection is a bit problematic. But it is the same thing with the common events as well: if you don't read the text files, you don't know the affecting variables thus you really cannot always tell which action you have chosen before made the event more probable or possible.

I think your criticism is better suited towards the whole event system in general, than just against the idea group specific events.

 

[Lessing]

For me at least, one strong point (of PDS games) is to explore different options (idea groups in this case) to see what comes. Over time, when you play enough

Well that's the deal right there. The normal events happen to everybody, and thats fine. You cannot influence that anyway.

But here we're talking about taking a WORSE idea group (worse on paper) with the implicit knowledge that the invisible events tied to the idea group will make the choice worthwhile over another idea group thats BETTER on paper.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Well that's the deal right there. The normal events happen to everybody, and thats fine. You cannot influence that anyway.

No they don't. Some events are country specific, and you affect whether you can be affected by them by the country you choose.

Some events are only valid for certain governments. The game tells you nothing of these. Use another government and you are not eligible for them. You choose your government.

Some events are tied to stability. The game tells you absolutely nothing about this when it tells you the modifiers for stability. You decide what level of stability you will run with no knowledge of these invisible events.

Some events only happen to large nations. It is the user's choice whether he plays a small or a large nation and whether he expands a small nation to a large nation, but he has no way of knowing about all the invisible events that are tied to this choice. He makes the choice of whether to expand or not based on other factors and experiences the results.

The game is full of events that do not happen to everybody, but are tied to your choices, whether tied to religion, government, idea groups, culture, or whatever, and the player has no way of knowing about how these invisible events work or even exist until he experiences them.

You are singling idea groups out for criticism on the basis of something that, in actuality, is a widespread occurrence in many of the game's systems rather than specific to the system you criticize.