DDRJake as a Dev?
- Thread starter JQuacker
- Start date
-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
To be fair Wiz, while I understand that, in the past, there have been developer posts (mainly from Johan) which implied that the internal MP games were a major factor in the balance of the game. The most egregious example was with regards the truce time changes back in...1.7 IIRC...where the only explanation we were ever given for such a fundamental change in how the game works was that the longer truces were to protect large nations in multiplayer (I believe the thread it was in has since been deleted). So not only was our SP enjoyment of the game harmed by MP, but it was done soley to help blobs - the last group of countries that needed protection. I hope you can understand why people interpret this in a negative manner.
Now, I certainly don't believe that was the only reason for that change, nor do I believe that MP was the only reason for other major balance changes. But it all comes down to communication. While you're very good at introducing new features via the dev diaries, the EUIV team have a horrible track record of explaning and justifiying major gameplay changes and rebalances. The first we hear of them is in the patchnotes, and at best we later get a single sentance from one the team which completely fails to give any reasonable justification for the change. For example, we still haven't been given a clear explanation on why looting - a historical, interactive, enjoyable mechanic that rewarded good play - has been changed to something that is none of those. Hell, we haven't even been given a proper explanation for the aforementioned truce changes....
It is not the first time it happens. Podcat started as a humble commoner/peasant. Dont know which were his exploits to attain noble status, though.
Still it's not limited to HRE, Japan, manual exploring being removed. There's a lot of really silly things that somehow manage to get through and things that I'm not sure are WaD or exploits. Such as declaring war on someone that you get called to arms against as to make the war goal on your terms rather than being screwed over by the poorly designed war leader system that gives minimal reason to help your allies when they can just go SURPRISE!!! I'm ending the war now and enjoy your 12 year truce as I take bundles of stuff, might give you a pittance if you're lucky.
As much as I hate the balanced for MP argument simply because it's nonsense as good MP leads to good single player, but since Johan said that comment in that now deleted thread 'balanced for multiplayer' makes an easy target for any change certain people don't like rather than rationally explaining their point of view. Still, rather than being a sassy dick who sounds like he still believes that explaining his grand design is like explaining algebra to three year olds you could perhaps go into details as to your thought process and intended results from such changes.
However the other one is a simplified version of what people perceive to be the truth because fun is subjective. Some people found it fun to manually explore with varying goals and win wars in different ways then brute force and instead win a war of economic attrition via looting for example. If you considered those things fun and they were removed, what other conclusion will you come to?
Lastly, an important detail you should keep in mind. You have absolutely no serious competition and many of your customers are 'refugees' from Firaxis who were seriously disappointed with Civ 5. This fact allows you to be far more successful, so keep it in mind, or else those numbers are going nowhere but down when someone else steps up to the plate. Still, this story is one I've seen many times.
Last edited:
refering to what you said about multiplayer: unfortunately Johan said otherwise, and in the game you can kind of tell at times...
So why would Johan say this? It was a well structured sentence so was not a linguistic mix up and isnt he like head of the development studio?
Johan said that we make balance decisions from our MP sessions, which people interpreted as that we never play single player and other equally ridiculous inferences. He also said he didn't care about single player in one specific instance of balance, which people misquoted as though it applied to the entire game. I'm very tired of this dumb conspiracy theory, but people want a single imaginary thing to blame for why the game isn't the precise exact game that they personally would prefer to play and this fits the ticket, I suppose.
To be fair, Johan sometimes IS a walking fountain of wonderfully laconic flamewar-inducing nightmare quotes. And while I don't think anyone would argue that there's a fair share of needless gnawing of teeth that uses "multiplayer is encroaching into single player!" as an excuse to justify distaste with certain aspects of the game, claiming conspiracy theories from the community is not a blanket term that fits all situations, especially considering the way the Strategy genre [of which Grand Strategy is a subset] has interacted, and in certain cases been wounded to death, by Multiplayer in recent years. It leads to a sort of irrational, but not entirely unjustified, panic in people. One cannot forget that honest confusion from just not knowing what prompts certain changes is also a big factor in why the community reacts the way it does, and something as simple as just a post like yours saying "No, multiplayer is not the main balancing factor" for the nth time can calm a lot of worries because while it gets dilluted in the daily stream of posts in the forums, posts like Johan's wonderful "I don't care about multiplayer" have far more staying power.
Hell, I have my reservations about the way the game currently is but it's not like it's my position to claim the dev team is doing everything wrong, basically I just have this mindset that like all Paradox games this one is still essentially in development and I eagerly wait the release of more big, general content expansions that always do a great job of fleshing the game out more [while still having around 1200 hours clocked on Steam alone for it].
Yet you do nothing to remove that stigma, which for what it's worth I agree is ridiculous and I can't blame you for being tired of it. However once again, you ignored my post making a very reasonable request that might, I dunno, stop people thinking so negatively of you and your design process which in turn will reduce the amount of complaining on the forum which in turn will make band wagoners jumping on the 'multiplayer balance' argument look silly without you having to lift a finger on the front.
Every time you ignore a post like that merely reinforces the belief that you cannot defend your points and changes rationally, regardless of whether there is a good reason or not. I might not agree with the reason, but not having one at all looks far worse and just increase the discontent here because people will make their own reasons such as that overused conspiracy theory.
It's not really Martin's job to answer every single inane post on this forum. He has given an unequivocal answer to this several times. If people insist on asking the same thing over and over because they have either missed it or don't accept it I can't see what more can be done. Get over it, it's boring.
You can't really remove a conspiracy theory with facts, people believe in conspiracy theories because they want to believe in them and ignore absolutely any facts to the contrary.
Which particular changes is it that you want explained? Mind you, I'm not going to go in-depth on our whole design process because it is not my job to explain every single decision I take as a project lead.
Exactly. If the game isn't "balanced around MP", how is it balanced? Thats what we don't know. That's why people keep repeating these incorrect claims. The EUIV devs don't explain why they make major changes and they don't explain how they decided on what changes to make.
I'll use looting, as it's the current bugbear.
The previous mechanic:
- Was historical - large amounts of looting by armies did occur during this time period, and it usually did so even without the army being in control of the region it was looting
- Added variety to the gameplay - It gave something to do in wartime other than stackwipe and carpet siege
- Encouraged interactivity - Looting required the player to actively interact with the game, rather than just sitting back and letting his armies siege
- Rewarded good play - To take full advanatge of looting, you had to know what you were doing and play it well
The new system has....none of those things.
So what I, and I suspect many others would like to know is:
- What was wrong with the old mechanics? Did you object to the entire principle? Or was it merely a matter of looting being too powerful?
- If it was the fomer, why, given the points I made above? If it was the latter, why not just reduce the rewards from it rather than completely overhauling the mechanic?
If Wiz, or another team member would actually give even moderately detailed - a couple of paragraphs or so - explanation rather than just saying "it not MP", while I imagine there would still be some complaints, it's the internet after all, but I suspect people would be a lot less prone to overration and incorrect claims. Especially if the explanation was provided before we discover the change in the patch notes on the day of release...
The old looting system had the following issues:
- It was extremely powerful, you could repeatedly 'farm' large countries like Ming for crazy amounts of money.
- It was very poorly understood and explained, most players didn't know how to use it at all (lots of players didn't even know it existed).
- It was very difficult to defend against because all units move at the same speed.
- The AI could not use it (and believe me, if I *had* coded the AI to use it the system would be universally loathed as your entire country would be getting looted in every single war).
- It was a micro-heavy system, and we have been moving away from micro-heavy systems in general.
Calling it historical/realistic is complete bunk, if you think a thousand men stealing the entire tax income of China every six months is historical or realistic then you need to reconsider the meaning of those words.
- It was extremely powerful, you could repeatedly 'farm' large countries like Ming for crazy amounts of money.
- It was very poorly understood and explained, most players didn't know how to use it at all (lots of players didn't even know it existed).
- It was very difficult to defend against because all units move at the same speed.
- The AI could not use it (and believe me, if I *had* coded the AI to use it the system would be universally loathed as your entire country would be getting looted in every single war).
- It was a micro-heavy system, and we have been moving away from micro-heavy systems in general.
Calling it historical/realistic is complete bunk, if you think a thousand men stealing the entire tax income of China every six months is historical or realistic then you need to reconsider the meaning of those words.
Thanks Wiz. I don't really agree with any of your arguments, but I do appreciate that you've taken to time to explain things somewhat.
I guess overall, it seems to me that the looting system needed a rebalance, whereas you've completely removed it and put in a little bonus for sieging provinces. There is less to do in the game, therefore it is less fun. Especially as it's an optional feature - if you don't want to loot, you don't have to - and if a player gets a bit too much money in SP, well, thats not really a major issue given all the other things you can do...
edit: I hope I don't sound too confrontational about this. If I do, I apologise. It's just that, looting a country was fun. Being in a situation where I'm outnumbered and am only able to suvive by micromanaging my troops to avoid the enemy while looting enough for me to be able to replenish my armies with mercenaries was a challenging and enjoyable experience. It tested my skills. It made me interact witht he game far more than wartime generally required. Now thats gone, and all we get is a little bonus when you succesfully siege.
Then reduce the amount of money gained from it.
Then explain it better.
Then tweak it - for example, require the units remain looting for a certain amount of time. Or have a "looting mode" that slows them down. Don't completely remove the feature.
So what? Why should the game be made less fun for players just because the AI can't do something?
Why? There's so little to micromanage in the game, having a few things like looting that do require it makes the game more interesting to play. It makes the game more interactive. It gives the player more to do in wartime than to just watch siege % go up. Surely people who don't enjoy the micromanagement can just...you know...not loot?
All that means is that the rewards - specifically from Ming - need rebalancing. But the actual feature was far more historical in its previous form than it is now, where the only way to gain any money from a province is to completely occupy it. And that is far less historical, even given the excessive income in certain cases.
I guess overall, it seems to me that the looting system needed a rebalance, whereas you've completely removed it and put in a little bonus for sieging provinces. There is less to do in the game, therefore it is less fun. Especially as it's an optional feature - if you don't want to loot, you don't have to - and if a player gets a bit too much money in SP, well, thats not really a major issue given all the other things you can do...
edit: I hope I don't sound too confrontational about this. If I do, I apologise. It's just that, looting a country was fun. Being in a situation where I'm outnumbered and am only able to suvive by micromanaging my troops to avoid the enemy while looting enough for me to be able to replenish my armies with mercenaries was a challenging and enjoyable experience. It tested my skills. It made me interact witht he game far more than wartime generally required. Now thats gone, and all we get is a little bonus when you succesfully siege.
Last edited:
I'm sure its been asked in this thread already but I can't bothered to trawl 8 pages of what is no doubt "heated" debate but how about a CK2 style looting mechanic?
i have found always surprising this: same units have same speed. Why is that? i mean i am genuinely curious about that, as in other game diifferent units have different speed and when you select all together they move at the speed of the slower unit. I realized units in eu4 have the same speed only after dozens of hours.
Wouldn't something like the CK2 system be better? The ridiculous thing about the Bank of Ming is that it regenerated completely every six months - Nanjing would be as prosperous as before after six months, and ready to be pillaged, again, with the same intensity. This is the problem, not that you need to take the city to pillage it. I would have preferred a minor loot by just stopping by (half/a quarter of provincial BT), with the effect removed in one year, and a larger loot, happening when the province falls, that gives the whole basetax (or more!) but burns the province for years. Five? Ten? Maybe more. Maybe it would lower the province's BT altogether (temporarily).
As of now, loot ceased existing. It's irrelevant.
A loot bar counting down while you siege might be an alternative to just getting everything on siege victory. I'll be honest and say that I don't consider looting an important feature though, so it's not high up on my list of priorities.
Wiz made two points ("the AI couldn't do it" and "if it could everyone would loathe the feature") in one sentence there, and you only answered the weaker of the two ("the AI couldn't do it").
Broadly speaking, if a game mechanic is only tolerable because the AI never uses it, then the mechanic is probably broken.