Timurids/Mughals can eaaasily beat the ottoblob. You just needa have a large amount of cav.
Developer Diary - 8th of August 2017
- Thread starter Trin Tragula
- 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.
I say problem with tims are that they got shit ton of rebels coming up and you got to fight them in the Persian mountains which sucks for nomads. where as ottomans got no problem with any sort of big rebellion to start with and their starting king and their military ideas are far superior to that of tims.
Thats why you raise autonomy and debase currency to all hell, then pay it off once you become the Mughals. I didnt even know corruption decreased unrest until I played a good Timurid campaign
Well, historically, the Ottomans were actually ahead of even the date you are worried about, as the first Ottoman siege of Vienna was in 1529.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Vienna
But the Ottomans first reached the gates of Vienna in 1529... if anything the game, typically understates their 15th/early 16th century expansion.
edit: oh someone got it already nevermind.
Someone from Timurids or Persia maybe? Ulug Bey or Shah Ismail or Uzun Hasan etc...
I actually play against the Ottos on Very Hard, its quite enjoyable to face 400+ force limit in 1550, makes me have to scramble for allies (even a 4 province ally can have 20k on Very Hard) release border regions to channel them to my mountain / forest-river forts, etc, it has overall make me enjoy even playing majors like Russia, which even when they are super strong are still challenged by AI Ottos/Ming and their massive armies and their almost negated chance of getting revolts even with 20 war exhaustion. Also, overall the AI is much more aggressive, and on the slightest show of weakness you are DoW'ed by everyone, it keeps you on your toes.
You do have to get used to it though, it could seem impossible for the first few breakthroughs until you learn to deal with the AI on this level.
A player will always pick better Ideas and bonuses, so don't be afraid of the Ottos, just learn to play a better game.
You do have to get used to it though, it could seem impossible for the first few breakthroughs until you learn to deal with the AI on this level.
A player will always pick better Ideas and bonuses, so don't be afraid of the Ottos, just learn to play a better game.
My guess is Shah Jahan or Akbar of the Mughals, or Shah Abbas or Ismail of the Safavids.
You can always start by releasing Khorasan and Persia. Makes it harder (and lengthier) to reach 600 dev, but allows you to get there without massive corruption.
I'm wondering if they also correct the religious situation in the Persian area (having all those shia provinces), and maybe make events drive the formation of Persia instead of just nationalists rebelling? Then again that's skipping the whole Qara-/Aqqoyunlu -phase... and maybe too much railroading for some people.
Liberty desire sucks though.
I'd say corruption is better. It pays for itself to debase at your levels of autonomy.
Shia in Persia is better than Sunni, because the Persians weren't following Sunni Islam like the more orthodox Sunni. That's why they were so 'easily converted' to Shia, because it was not really a full 180 degrees conversion anymore.
This was a fairly fresh new third rome patched game.
I was playing as Novgorod eating Muscovy alive and take their place and do frozen northern trade. So I completely ignored Siberia and basically play very tall relatively.
The ottoman in that game was to put it mildly insane strong. Tooo much strong. I threw roughly 1.5k-ish development + lot of 10% like Streltsy and cossack (I just pretend the penalty didn't matter and most of the time it didn't) + a full doomstack composite of entirely nothing but mercs.
THREE time in a 8 year period. They were not even remotely close to bankruptency. Why? Because they freaking completed both quality + quantity idea group. Which made it painful to watch AI being gobbled up and no one give a damn. I even pushed them into 1500 ducat loan after one of the war and they right away declare war on a 5 province country with 3 allies that had no hope of standing up to them. So I sign an alliance with that country and force them to back off. They still went to war again afterward that. Back to back wars are not fun when you are trying to curb Ottoman expansion ambition on top of double dipping quality + quantity.
I keep seeing stuff like this in lot of games. I much rather give a small nerf to the Harem mechanic and few other downtune to get them to be somewhat more reasonable grow curve. However in nearly majority of the 80% game I play for fun, Ottoman always become the "France BBB" of Eastern Europa and it is to be quite tiresome to deal with them late game especially if you are a small nation or playing tall nation. I would be fine if it was between 40% to 60% but it isn't like that now. As opposite to WC or something other play style.
I'm really excited that Anatolia and the Caucasus are getting upgraded, with new provinces and particularly with new tags, which is really exciting. And even though you've done a lot already, and it's awesome I still want to plead for several further changes in the hopes that this isn't all finalize yet. Most of these have already been mentioned already on this thread (in fact some of them I'm only commenting on because people brought them up) but I think they bear being said again, plus I want to elaborate on some of them. Any rate, going basically clockwise:
I also want to comment on other suggestions other people have made, which I would like to see, but also see problems with, and thus wouldn't have suggested myself. I'd be happy either way.
Also, since @Trin Tragula has been answering questions, I have two more:
- There really should be a pass in the middle of the Caucasus (I think there are actually two, one going towards Tbilisi, one going towards Kutaisi, but I'm not sure if the latter was used militarily), and ideally a tag for the Ossetians (even if you want to keep Circassian culture or give them Georgian culture to avoid one-province cultures), since the Georgian alliance with them was what protected Georgia from the north. (There are also a couple of other mountain wastelands that need passes, but that's another story.)
- It would be nice if Svaneti existed as a province with a fort, controlling access both through Abkhazia and the central pass(es), assuming you manage to unify Georgia.
- It would be nice if Trebizond got more provinces, ideally either Rize with Georgian culture, or Gümüshane (though I'm not sure whether Gümüshane was under Trebizond's control at this point, sounds like you guys would know more about that than I would), or both.
- The location of the wasteland near the Black sea seems a little bit weird, considering the strategic importance of both Gümüshane and Shebinkarahisar, the latter of which was controlled by Ak Qoyunlu, an ally of Trebizond at the time.
- Ramazan really, really seems like it could use more provinces, namely Mersin and Kozan/Sis.
- Bursa (I'm not going to use the overly long Ottoman-era epithet that starts with an "H" because I can never remember how to spell it) really feels like it should be three provinces. You've shrunk it down a bit, but I still feel like Balikesir/Karesi and Iznik were important enough to be represented as their own provinces. OTOH, without adding new provinces to the Balkans, three provinces where Bursa is now would look kind of weird. So maybe keep it in mind for the next Balkans update?
- It would be neat if you added Amasra to represent the Genoese Black Sea Anatolian possessions, and bring Genoa into conflict with the Ottomans earlier. The flip side of this is that in my Candar run with Beyond Typus that did this, it meant that institutions spread like lightening to Anatolia, and the Ottomans already get institutions too fast, so I absolutely understand why you wouldn't do this.
- That size disparity between Lomsia and Guria is really ugly. I know it's a really petty thing, but could you make Guria a bit bigger?
I also want to comment on other suggestions other people have made, which I would like to see, but also see problems with, and thus wouldn't have suggested myself. I'd be happy either way.
- A wasteland in the Taurus Mountains would be nice, but is sort of problematic with how the provinces are configured right now. I know there's one pass near Karaman (which a lot of people have been talking about) and another near Tarsus (I've been over both of these passes by train, and the landscape is beautiful yet completely devoid of people), but even if you added Mersin and didn't include Tarsus in it, that would still be only a one-province gap.
- Alaniye as an OPM vassal of Karaman would certainly be nice, though given that Paradox is already adding a lot of new tags and it's going to get eaten by the Ottomans rather quickly except in the hands of a skilled player, it doesn't feel super-necessary.
- Adding the Knights holding in Petronium would be neat, and I think that with all their coast raiding they could probably afford two forts. And institution spread seems less problematic than with giving Genoa Amasra. On the other hand, Cyprus had a similar mainland fort in Corycus, and I'm not sure either place was very important after they were taken by the Ottomans (even though today Bodrum is a popular tourist resort).
Also, since @Trin Tragula has been answering questions, I have two more:
- Where did you find a map of the Beylik of Bafra at this time? Not related to this game, just curious because I love maps.
- With the addition of Mardin and Hasankeyf, is Assyrian culture going to make an appearance?
I'm neither arguing they aren't expanding nor that they are weak. Both statements would be lies and I don't argue against reality.
But this is really more of a "what are all of you doing?" case than the Ottos being overpowered.
First time I didn't take them out early and let them build a powerbase was when I played Englandwith less dev than them and I mindlessly queued 300 mercs in North Africa and sent them straight into Levant + kept recruiting until I broke through. After the war was over they went bankrupt.
Which is pretty much the laziest way to defeat any nation and it doesn't magically stop working just because it's the Ottoman Empire. I do not understand how you lose to them, but you can show me a save and I'll glance over it.
Quantity and Quality have nothing to do with income aside from an increased MP rec rate and lowered maintenance.
1500 ducats at a point in time where you have 1500 development?
That's a single loan.
You can't expect to cripple any nation just because they have a single loan. No one goes bankrupt from a single loan, why should Ottos be the exception?
The standard complaint is "they are always strong", well yes, they are always strong. But so is Ming. Only difference is people tend to play more in Europe.
So it's not exactly that Ottos are too strong but rather that people don't enjoy having an actual enemy they have to fight because they want to lean back, drink a good glass of Whiskey and recreate Charlemagne's borders or whatever kind of roleplay you are into.
What I don't get is that roleplaying has to include Ottos.
On the other hand if you don't want to roleplay you can switch nations and play a tall or relaxed game in a different region.
Or lower the difficulty. Or tamper with their expansion through indirect nerfs, as I mentioned before.
But "let's cut x boni from them because I'm not good enough to defeat them and I want to defeat everyone on the difficulty I'm playing on with the nation I want to play" is absurd.
And if the main argument is that "every region is close to them, I can't just move" then we're back to nerfs to their combat strength being the most ineffective way to deal with the issue.
That's like saying you hate your neighbour and want him to move so you set his wife on fire.
It works, but is it really the smartest way to achieve your goal?
Because they would still expand in those regions even after nerfs to Janissaries, they'd just be weaker. So you would STILL have to deal with them, only it'd be easier for you to do so (bringing us back to: Just lower the difficulty).
Why not cut off that expansion completely WITHOUT weakening them?
Because as I said before, that's one of the easiest things to pull off.
Last edited:
Early game I allied to Ottoman to gang up on Muscovy. Ottoman was being asinine and rivaled me. I had to deal with them then.
It was just a long complicated campaign to say the least.
They ran out of manpower and was about to start merc hiring spree. The war target was an AI nation. They gave up before I did. Then Ottoman declare war on another AI nation. I step in again. Repeat and rinse.
They had 2500 forcelimit or something insane. They were not even maxing that out. They are literally crippling their own forcelimit bonus by not using it. Then I had defensive and other trade idea groups. So money for me was non-issue (90% of my land had manufactures already done by 1680 or something).
The issue is AI coalition/ganging up on Ottoman not as well. As say MP and a group of players working together.
Ming MoH patch was bad but I seen worse from Ottoman on a constant basis. As opposite to AI being random and might do very well in one and horrible in another.
I don't remember the full detail but that was from a 4 year war. THEY only had one loan and ZERO manpower. They immediate declared war with ZERO manpower on a power block on the oppsite side from Europe. I intervene in that war by signing an alliance with that war target country. That war over with. They STILL declared another third war after that one.
Absolute NOTHING to do with roleplaying. I was super-rich and one of the Great power despite being small and tall. I could afford to bankruptcy myself if I had to. Heck I never had to. Even when I had 3 super-doomstack (36 inf + 4 cal + 40 cannon plus a few extra inf for back up) running around and one was full merc. I did not even have to take a loan. Ottoman did. They just kept going and going like a freaking energized bunny.
Nothing to do with cutting any bonus.
I have over 3200 hours invested into EU 4. I know all kind of tricks but I quit playing because I had to deal with Ottoman over and over and over. Just maybe smaller or stronger depends on early 1444 starts but Ottoman growth is so freaking constant that you might as well eat them alive and ASAP to try cut them off. So you don't have to deal with a nightmare scenario late-game. The same way people in MP eat Byzantine first because of their Bonus.
Also Ottoman could use a downtune ever since the harem were implemented as that is a significant bonus to MP. Almost good as having a Netherlands republic govt (one of the best MP-wise ruler mechanic in-game). I can't recall the last time I actually saw Ottoman falling behind on military tech ever since that harem mechanic has been implemented over a year ago.
In the same sense that Ming on a constant basis always have up to date tech no matter how hard you hit them until you completely eradicate them. It create a game-play problem in where things like Opium Wars is virtually impossible to re-create because whoever has MoH is always up to par with Europe tech. Heck I even suggest a downtune and I haven't seen any change in that direction since MoH first came out.
I know the first Opium wars happen fairly past EU 4 timeframe by 30 years but isn't even remotely reflected that way in-game like at all.
I've commented on the idea of putting Turkish in the Byzantine group before. It is to some degree realistic. While a lot of the similarities between modern Turkish and Greek culture is due to centuries of Turkish rule over Greece, the fact that Turks were mostly converted Greeks means that there was similarity even before that. I've been to many parts of Turkey, and the areas that were conquered after the Battle of Mazinkert feel very European (though also with a propensity religiosity, nationalism, car culture, and shopping malls that feels more like Texas than like England), but crossing from Adana to Antep or Antioch feels like stepping from Europe into the Middle East. Some of this is superficial (Konya and Kayseri both feel very European but are more conservative than many parts of the east), but there are definitely cultural differences between even conservative parts of Anatolia and the Kurdish/formerly Arab/Assyrian/Armenian regions).
However the Turco-Persian tradition was a real cultural tradition, and part of the reason Kurdish nationalism basically didn't exist until Ataturk tried to Turkify the Kurds. I've laid out the gameplay case for Turco-Persian already, and the gameplay case against Turco-Greek is that it makes Greek areas too easy to convert, and in most games half of Greece is already Sunni by the time I take it from the Ottomans.
The Eurasian Avars and the Caucasian Avars are completely unconnected, same as the Caucasian and Balkan Albanians and Caucasian and Peninsular Iberians (unless you buy the Georgian-Basque theory). On the other hand, we already have "Albania or Iberia" and "Georgia on My Mind," so I could totally see that being added. Something like "Dreams of Avarice," maybe? Now I'm gonna go suggest that on this thread.I wonder if there could be an achievment for migrating Avaria back into the Carpathian region???
Depends if the main thrust of the updating also covers South Asia as well. If not, and it's mainly focused on the Middle East, then I expect a Safavid - likely Ismail or Shah Abbas.