From what I can gather, there seems to be the big issue, the mother of all annoyances- the combat- that people like to complain about. How many times have you seen the enemy AI come out of nowhere in the back corner of your empire to siege down your provinces and disappear by the time you get your army there? A superior force will refuse to fight you on the open field but they will be ever delighted to take a vacation to the middle of Siberia if a fort is level 2 instead of 6. Something is busted, and I think its caused by three big things:
1. Fort System
2. Military Access
3. How AI treats wars + War Score in General
Number One has been a heated debate since the dawn of time. My only ten cents is this: The only way for your forts to be useful is if you maintain a network of forts along EVERY border you have. Your forts are only as good as your weakest link, and if you have ONE single gap then all of your forts are only good for a free defensive battle. Countries like Hungary who are defined by their professional army and their forts can barely afford to maintain them, and Pest can still be sieged down if your enemy just walks through a one province gap next to Austria- which they will do as I will explain in number two- making your defensiveness useless. There should be a way to modify/expand a fort's zone of control to increase their strategic importance or make them cheaper so you can afford to spam them on your borders. Often times the historical placement of forts are not even useful with this current system and have to be replaced either immediately or as you conquer neighboring provinces.
Number Two is actually the easiest fix and would provide the most benefit. There should be no reason why you should see the Ottomans walk across the HRE to gank France, but because France mothballed the fort in Bourgogne the ai will make a beeline at all costs against logic. Military Access should be precious, rarely given unless payment is provided and a long string of accesses across a continent should be costly and diplomatically taxing. Of course, there's nothing physically stopping the Ottomans from walking across Serbia to BTFO Hungary without a treaty and I would recommend that be an option with opinion maluses for the country and a chance for Serbia to treat that as an act of war. Treaties like enforced military access might have an actual purpose instead of just filler to get prestige. I believe the big hurdle is the AI can't handle naval transport, but i'm curious why they can't just ferry their troops into their allies instead of perpetually doing a Gallipoli against their enemies?
Number Three is a culmination of many issues that make wars unfun. The AI has two modes that they use interchangeably: Total War and Guerilla Tactics. They will abuse Military Access to blitz down your forts and capital to maximize War Score and attempt to 100% siege you down even if they only have one claimed province on you. The Italian Wars should be fought in ITALY (and the relevant fronts like the border between France and Austrian Netherlands) but this just isn't the case as you'll see France in Vienna and Prague vs. Austria in Paris and Bordeaux. There should be considerate amount of weight added to the region that is being contested that the AI should place their forces, with convoluted and lengthy paths that give no strategic utility be given a weight penalty, and the war score should reflect the regional conflict. The reason why France has to siege down Vienna is that is the only way to get the War Score needed to take Burgundy as a pu. Burgundy is the contested region, but if Austria has max amount of allies with Bohemia + Hungary as PU then you would need a lot more than Burgundy to claim victory. This gives a significant disadvantage to tall nations vs wide that shouldn't exist.
There's other issues- like how attrition doesn't allow for actual defensive strategies- and diplomacy in general. But these are three issues needed to be tackled that I feel can be done *reasonably*.
1. Fort System
2. Military Access
3. How AI treats wars + War Score in General
Number One has been a heated debate since the dawn of time. My only ten cents is this: The only way for your forts to be useful is if you maintain a network of forts along EVERY border you have. Your forts are only as good as your weakest link, and if you have ONE single gap then all of your forts are only good for a free defensive battle. Countries like Hungary who are defined by their professional army and their forts can barely afford to maintain them, and Pest can still be sieged down if your enemy just walks through a one province gap next to Austria- which they will do as I will explain in number two- making your defensiveness useless. There should be a way to modify/expand a fort's zone of control to increase their strategic importance or make them cheaper so you can afford to spam them on your borders. Often times the historical placement of forts are not even useful with this current system and have to be replaced either immediately or as you conquer neighboring provinces.
Number Two is actually the easiest fix and would provide the most benefit. There should be no reason why you should see the Ottomans walk across the HRE to gank France, but because France mothballed the fort in Bourgogne the ai will make a beeline at all costs against logic. Military Access should be precious, rarely given unless payment is provided and a long string of accesses across a continent should be costly and diplomatically taxing. Of course, there's nothing physically stopping the Ottomans from walking across Serbia to BTFO Hungary without a treaty and I would recommend that be an option with opinion maluses for the country and a chance for Serbia to treat that as an act of war. Treaties like enforced military access might have an actual purpose instead of just filler to get prestige. I believe the big hurdle is the AI can't handle naval transport, but i'm curious why they can't just ferry their troops into their allies instead of perpetually doing a Gallipoli against their enemies?
Number Three is a culmination of many issues that make wars unfun. The AI has two modes that they use interchangeably: Total War and Guerilla Tactics. They will abuse Military Access to blitz down your forts and capital to maximize War Score and attempt to 100% siege you down even if they only have one claimed province on you. The Italian Wars should be fought in ITALY (and the relevant fronts like the border between France and Austrian Netherlands) but this just isn't the case as you'll see France in Vienna and Prague vs. Austria in Paris and Bordeaux. There should be considerate amount of weight added to the region that is being contested that the AI should place their forces, with convoluted and lengthy paths that give no strategic utility be given a weight penalty, and the war score should reflect the regional conflict. The reason why France has to siege down Vienna is that is the only way to get the War Score needed to take Burgundy as a pu. Burgundy is the contested region, but if Austria has max amount of allies with Bohemia + Hungary as PU then you would need a lot more than Burgundy to claim victory. This gives a significant disadvantage to tall nations vs wide that shouldn't exist.
There's other issues- like how attrition doesn't allow for actual defensive strategies- and diplomacy in general. But these are three issues needed to be tackled that I feel can be done *reasonably*.
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