Byzantium and Roman Empire needs a revamp

[szmik]

A "Rum" start implying Candar, Karaman, Ramazan is significantly harder than Byz.

With Byz you can just build a few heavy ships and block the strait on normal and hard. If the Ottomans declare on you first, just restart. That isn't challenge to me. On VH it is actually a pretty tough start since you can't just block the strait. Then again, try Candar on VH without no CBing out of Anatolia and you'll be restarting 20 times until the Ottomans are friendly.

somehow in my games ottomans build enough galleys to kill my blocking heavies, that's if I get the fort in the first place, so it isn't all that straight; I tried budgetmonkey strat about 10 times on normal, all failures. It's neither easy, nor straightforward. Stars need to align for this start, just like others you mention. How many elite players are out there? 100? 1000? It's all easy for them.

 

[ETAIPOS]

somehow in my games ottomans build enough galleys to kill my blocking heavies, that's if I get the fort in the first place, so it isn't all that straight; I tried budgetmonkey strat about 10 times on normal, all failures. It's neither easy, nor straightforward. Stars need to align for this start, just like others you mention. How many elite players are out there? 100? 1000? It's all easy for them.

I'm pretty sure there was a change that boosted galleys at some point. I remember 3 heavies being enough to beat a lot of them in my first Byz game. No longer possible now, at least on the seas where galleys are boosted. Also Ottomans do build heavies now (they didn't before).

 

[Ruian]

Migration strats work for the Beyliks

without no CBing out of Anatolia

Not trying to be a jerk, but I specifically mentioned that. Those starts are significantly harder if you don't exodus. So much so that they aren't even comparable in my mind. You can do the same thing as Byz even easier since you have a higher FL+vassal.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Not trying to be a jerk, but I specifically mentioned that. Those starts are significantly harder if you don't exodus. So much so that they aren't even comparable in my mind. You can do the same thing as Byz even easier since you have a higher FL+vassal.

My bad, missed that. I don't disagree though, the Beyliks are worse than BYZ for staying in starting spot unless you luck out (sometimes you can ally Otto ally and get them to drop hostility then cheese favor fish).

 

[j.margenat]

But that is like saying that Athens is harder thant Byzantium, yes we know that most of the 1 province nation have a harder run but that is because they are not meant to be a "playable" nation, i mean most of those nations exists to be blobed unless the player is trying to do a wc with Ulm or Ryuku or some other meme game.

When i talk about hard runs i talk about Irish minors, Byzantium, Aztecs, Granada, Navarre because it is not that you are a one province nations but also that the end goals of those nations are fun, like forming Ireland, Rome, the sunset invasion, Al-Andalus-Umayad Caliphate, etc...

But i guess that many players can do WC with these nations blindfolded so yes, byz-rome run is easy. Come on, we are asking a little flavour for one of the most interesting nations in history.

 

[Alyosha]

Purple Phoenix adds a ton of flavor and lots of free boni. I would rather see effort put into fixing major game-wise issues (I am optimistic after the last couple dev diaries).

That said if there’s some bandwidth left a decision chain to heal the Great Schism could be interesting. Would have to occur in the first two ages and require either faith to conclusively win over the other.

 

[coachjohn]

I just played the ottomans for the first time. I attacked Athens. Byzantine sent 3/4 of their ar,y out to attack me despite me having a 16k and a 14k sitting outside there borders. I dispatched the 14 to dispatch them. And invaded with my best army.

The siege was very quick. Too quick. Just saw 6 part documentary on Netflix about siege. It was great.

Hears my problem -
1) constananople was the strongest castle in the world - why not buff this up to at least a 4. 23 countries seized it and lost before ottomans

2) in the castle - bystantines has a very elite genoa mercenary force lead by a mercenary leader Giuseppe (forgot last name)

3) also there should be some way to simulate the “great chain”. The 15 mile chain that was used to block / open the straits.

4) where is the genoa province of Galatea - sat opposite bystantine and was a factor.

5) Constantine would never send his army out - leaving 2k to defend Constantinople

Over all I was disappointed by the quickness of the siege. Way too easy.

Another question. I’ve seen it on here - the Jazeherri (spelling) (elite ottoman troops) are represented in the game but i don’t have them. Do they come up later?

 

[coachjohn]

Also Bystanine couldn’t call the Catholics? Not realistic.

 

[exZ]

I agree on the part for making Rome more unique and adding flavour for fun but your points regarding Byzantium are almost all completely wrong and ahistorical, i will just name a few.
1) Byzantium was one of the few countries who didnt have a feudal government and even had a standing professional army, so calling them ,,just another feudal monarchy" is obscene.
2) Making them western tech? You do realise they were called the eastern roman empire for a reason
3) What would be the point of adding albanian to the culture group? They have no corelation to thacians or illyirians what so ever aside the land they currently inhabit. I agree they shouldnt be in slavic either but they did it out of convinience sake.
4) If you say Byzantine missions need buffs you haven`t read Byzantine missions...

 

[AlexandruRadu]

If only the start date was 1453 so we didn't get threads like these

If the game started in 1453 the discussion would be would be the exact same, bar Byz also being a formable. (Assuming they don't just make Morea "Byzantium".) And then people in your camp would say the same thing for 1460, 1461 and maybe even 1475. Where there's a rump state, there's a Byzboo to call for an overpowered formable and someone else to argue that pushing the start date up would prevent it.

 

[j.margenat]

Even If you pushed the start date 100 years later it will be the same as people trying to reform the Mongol empire. When you form the Roman Empire you should feel proud and powerfull as you have conquered Europe, beat the revolutions, mend the schism, etc... but overall you should want to play to the end date. And the worst part is that you are not even that powerfull, other tags than can form the roman empire as spain, france and the ottos have better blobing ideas.

And beleive me that starting as the Roman Empire from a converted file from CK2 has been one of the most infuriating runs on EUIV as i was force to battle the worst enemy, the corruption from territories. It made my flourishing roman empire from ck2 stagnant as i couldnt have more than 20-40k of soldiers and of course no forts for me until 1700-1800. So it became spanish campaing 2.0 with worst colonizer potential and making.

It is funny that if you go to vic2 with a totally roman roman empire you became the strongest nation on earth no matter what. And converting from there usually is a mexican standoff in HOI4 between The Roman empire, The URSS and the Japanese/Chinese Sphere in which you are still the strongest nation on earth. I just find it funny how the first 1000 years of gameplay are "hard" and the last 110 are a walk in the park.

 

[Mackus]

I understand that buffing Byzantines is a low priority, so my expectations are far lower than that.

Change their initial reform from feudalism to despotism. Or if we're really lucky, give them unique reform with it's own boni, but no unique mechanic other than having government rank locked to empire.

 

[Vityviktor]

Just let Byzantium die, please.

 

[Sergeant Major Gross]

Another option would be giving cores on all land Byz had 150 years ago with the cores expiring at the appropriate time.

Yes please

 

[Schwarzer Ritter]

I edited the event file for Purple Phoenix and removed all these events that give you or rob you of mana. Actually at most times you gain 50 mana and very rarely do you lose 25 mana. And that's it. It feels like a cheap buff which i dont need, i want more flavor, more inner mechanics and a better way to simulate civil wars which basically ruined byzantium again and again. One good doomstack of pretenders does not a civil war make. I should be losing half my country to a pretender emperor who wants to kick me out. This one doomstack running around is just nothing to worry about. When did this EVER worry you or cause you issues?

 

[Kapi96]

eh, sounds more like you want a mod than anything else. I mean, no offence but while they may be the most interesting countries to you, there's a lot of people who are much more interested in countries that are actually relevant to the time period. Personally I'd much rather the devs spend their time improving countries like England, Spain, France, Austria, Russia, China etc. than a country on the verge of death and one that doesn't even exist during the time period, and I'm sure I'm not alone on that.

 

[j.margenat]

These are the top 23 most played countries in EU4 measured in new starts and saves loaded as that country (not counting duplicate starts/loads on the same day). These stats are not the same ones I mentioned last week. Playing a Custom Nation is still the most popular choice, so these are the top 23 historical nations played.

1) England
2) France
3) Ottomans
4) Castile
5) Brandenburg
6) Austria
7) Muscovy
8) Portugal
9) Poland
10) Great Britain (presumably mostly from continued saves)
11) Sweden
12) Teutonic Order
13) Papal States
14) Byzantium (yes, you made the top 20)
15) Prussia (presumably mostly from continued saves)
16) Spain (presumably mostly from continued saves)
17) Japan
18) Hungary
19) Denmark
20) Ming
21) Netherlands (presumably mostly from continued saves)
22) Commonwealth
23) Burgundy

Wizz 2015.

In april 2019

Paradox has posted interesting chart in todays dev diary:
https://forumcontent.paradoxplaza.com/public/460784/Played%20Nations.jpg

Notice that it shows % of games played daily and top nation is at 6%.

The list is:
1 - France
2 - Custom
3 - Ottos
4 - Byzantium (wth?)
5 - Castile
6 - England
7 - Brandenburg
8 - Austria
9 - Ming
10 - Portugal

Their point was that custom nations are really popular.

Byzantium/Roman empire is popular and we are not saying that devs should go overboard with Byz, but giving the purple phoenix a unique goverment type is not that hard. If Prussia/Ottomans/Russia didnt had its own goverment type people would flip as those werent normal monarchies. If you say that we shouldnt give Rome anything because it was no longer relevant in the time frame then we shouldnt be able to form Italy or Germany as those didnt even exist in the time frame of the game.

My point is, byz/rome is a fun unique nation to play and we are not asking about a buff, we are asking about flavor for one of the most interesting nations in history.

 

[Snopy79797]

But that is like saying that Athens is harder thant Byzantium, yes we know that most of the 1 province nation have a harder run but that is because they are not meant to be a "playable" nation, i mean most of those nations exists to be blobed unless the player is trying to do a wc with Ulm or Ryuku or some other meme game.

When i talk about hard runs i talk about Irish minors, Byzantium, Aztecs, Granada, Navarre because it is not that you are a one province nations but also that the end goals of those nations are fun, like forming Ireland, Rome, the sunset invasion, Al-Andalus-Umayad Caliphate, etc...

But i guess that many players can do WC with these nations blindfolded so yes, byz-rome run is easy. Come on, we are asking a little flavour for one of the most interesting nations in history.

I just read this and I wanna say, last time I tried Athens it was actually easy. The Ottomans hate Byzantium so much that you can get them to support Independence, and post war they are automatically your allies. So long as you keep that alliance and help them in wars for favors, you can basically slither into Italy (same culture group as your primary) and conquer it as you please. Course that was like 5 patches ago so things may have changed.

I don't know, I just feel like even when it'd be a winning war, European nations who have a vested interest in Ottoman failure seem to be awfully complacent (largely due to the favor system). I get that they start just after losing hard to the Ottomans, but after a period of recovery you'd think that if Byzantium stood fast and withstood the tide, they might get thoughts that they can then turn the tide against the Ottomans. That's a problem with the general AI though, they don't seem to care about the balance of power, cause the rival system does not even remotely emulate it well and they rarely use the great power join war action (honestly if they do, I have never once seen it).

Basically I think better AI logic, combined with them having more cores (expiring by game rules based on when they lost the province), and more flavor would be all they need. The first 1 would be a game overall improvement, the second would take very little time, and the third is the one that'd just be nice for a (surprisingly) popular country pick. I get some would prefer major countries of the era to get more attention, but everyone has their own preference on which countries should get the most attention. I assume part of Byz's popularity is the same reason I like them. After seeing the Ottomans dominate Anatolia for the billionth time, seeing some alternative timelines becomes more appealing. I think one of my favorite games ever was when I was Spain and when I finally looked at Eastern Europe Perm was somehow free and smashing Russia to bits. It was different and interesting, and that's what I personally want more of. More opportunities for different and interesting playthroughs. And doing it by playing as the nation is even more fun (again, imo), so flavor is like the topping. Not necessary, but can greatly improve the experience.

 

[Willem IV]

Ultimately though, Byzantium is not weak, it just has a difficult start, that can be almost totally reversed with one good war aganist the Ottomans. It has an expansive mission tree even without purple phoniex, which with the DlC is equal to the ottoman mission tree, if not slightly larger. It has the best religion in the game, and is in one of the best positions to mend the east west schism, thereby eliminating the papalcy. They even get unique unit models with purple phoniex, and will be buffed slightly in the next expansion. I am not sure how much more love they can get. While no one faith run is easy, Byzantium is definitely a contender to do it.

The empire will be nerfed once again in the next patch. The total development goes down from 41 to 38. While the Ottoman will most likely rise.

 

[gasior]

Byzantium got entire mission tree, events, decisions, ideas, multiple unit packs and yet people here talk like they are flavourless. Not to even talk that their events/missions are really, really good(im not even kidding, theme system itself is better than 70% missions in the game) and they are formable, meaning that anyone can get that flavour.
Rome gets special culture, ideas, units while Mongol Empire(that was added when the area really needed some flavour) have.... government and thats it. So comparing ME as the 'flavoured' one sounds really wacky.

I would prefer dev's to dedicate their time to some actual important things. And byzantium difficulty wise is in a good spot(or even too easy).