The short answer is no.
The DLCs I would argue are more important are the Legacy of Rome (which adds retinues) and Conclave packs, everything is tends to be more or less centered around a different government type or religion.
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DLC Nightmare
- Thread starter mburke78
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The short answer is no.
The DLCs I would argue are more important are the Legacy of Rome (which adds retinues) and Conclave packs, everything is tends to be more or less centered around a different government type or religion.
Honestly the only flaw on DLC policy is that only hard core fans will keep buying them. Now full game with every DLC is 144,99€. Without discount it is rather unlikely a random gamer will buy them all.
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"Swords of Islam", "Rajas of India", "Republic" and "Horse Lords" are not essential. Buy only if you want to play for muslims, Indians, merchants and nomads respectively.
Cosmetic packs like units, music, clothing, dynasty logos, portraits, are just that - cosmetic packs that pretty up the game. Usually they are of good quality so I recommend those.
"Ruler Designer" and "Customization DLC" let you play around a bit with customizing characters and renaming things to your own tastes.
Essential DLCs that I never play without are "Legacy of Rome", "Sons of Abraham" and "The Old". Those introduce some cool features like retinues, additional religious mechanics and adventurers.
"Way of Life" is a nice one to have if you enjoy RPG mechanics and events. Not without its flaws, though.
"Charlemagne" was of poor quality and unneeded, no matter what people may say. 769 start is broken in terms of balance. The only good feature are viceroyalties, but does it justify the price tag? Hardly.
"Sunset Invasion" is ahistorical and closer to fantasy land, so if that's your thing, go for it.
"Conclave" and its patch make or break your game so I advise caution and extensive research before buying it.
"EU4 Converter" is far from ideal.
Cosmetic packs like units, music, clothing, dynasty logos, portraits, are just that - cosmetic packs that pretty up the game. Usually they are of good quality so I recommend those.
"Ruler Designer" and "Customization DLC" let you play around a bit with customizing characters and renaming things to your own tastes.
Essential DLCs that I never play without are "Legacy of Rome", "Sons of Abraham" and "The Old". Those introduce some cool features like retinues, additional religious mechanics and adventurers.
"Way of Life" is a nice one to have if you enjoy RPG mechanics and events. Not without its flaws, though.
"Charlemagne" was of poor quality and unneeded, no matter what people may say. 769 start is broken in terms of balance. The only good feature are viceroyalties, but does it justify the price tag? Hardly.
"Sunset Invasion" is ahistorical and closer to fantasy land, so if that's your thing, go for it.
"Conclave" and its patch make or break your game so I advise caution and extensive research before buying it.
"EU4 Converter" is far from ideal.
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Had gotten vanilla for $10 during the Steam summer sale. Easily worth it. I just bought like $20 worth of DLC a few days ago(half of that was Sword of Islam) and I like how the little DLC adds stuff. I'll probably budget $20 a month for DLC until I get everything. Overall, I like Paradox's DLC model since vanilla itself is so packed in itself, but I'm gonna keep playing and try to discover new things.
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The plan is that you pay for what you want. If you don't particularly want the pretty faces or additional music you don't get them and you aren't charged for them, unlike the old expansion days when they were all lumped in together. I personally don't own any of the face/unit packs because I don't see the point, why should I be forced to pay a couple dollars more for every DLC because the unit/face packs I don't want are included instead of separate?
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The old gods, sons of Abraham and Conclave + the cosmetic stuff. The rest you don't need/want. You could even go entirely without DLC or just get the cosmetic and it's still quite good.
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Yeah, their expansions cost $40, game packs $20 and "stuff packs" $10. Gives you something to think about.
About the whole topic, game having many DLC isn't bad. DLC in itself isn't bad. DLC is good if it has good quality for it's price, which Paradox delivered most of the time.
The main problem is that Steam doesn't make a difference between purely cosmetic DLCs and expansions, so at the first sight it looks frightening.
I also recommed for buying DLCs to always wait for the sale, and Paradox has them quite often.
I played CK2 from the beginning, so for me the DLC list is okay, but I agree it must look terrifying to any new players. The thing is there is a difference i cosmetic dlcs (unit packs, portrait packs, music packs etc.) and expansions.
The expansions are:
Sword of Islam- Muslims become playable
Legacy of Rome- retinues, some more flavoyr to the Byzantines, and some more orthodox stuff
The Republic- make merchant republics/ patrician families playable
Sunset Invasion- Time travelling Aztecs from Dimension X will invade Europe
The Old Gods- add the 867 start and makes pagan religions playable
Sons of Abraham- makes Jewish rulers playable and adds the curia game to catholics
Rajahs of India- Makes Hinduist, Jainist and Buddhist characters playable
Charlemagne- add the 769 start date, not that great
Way of Life- adds the foci, no more will your wife sleep with you, but with everyone else
Horse Lords- makes nomads playable
Conclave- makes your council important, since they now will stop you from doing what you want
Yup, even that list is frightening, but then again the game has been supported since it's release in 2012.
The expansions are:
Sword of Islam- Muslims become playable
Legacy of Rome- retinues, some more flavoyr to the Byzantines, and some more orthodox stuff
The Republic- make merchant republics/ patrician families playable
Sunset Invasion- Time travelling Aztecs from Dimension X will invade Europe
The Old Gods- add the 867 start and makes pagan religions playable
Sons of Abraham- makes Jewish rulers playable and adds the curia game to catholics
Rajahs of India- Makes Hinduist, Jainist and Buddhist characters playable
Charlemagne- add the 769 start date, not that great
Way of Life- adds the foci, no more will your wife sleep with you, but with everyone else
Horse Lords- makes nomads playable
Conclave- makes your council important, since they now will stop you from doing what you want
Yup, even that list is frightening, but then again the game has been supported since it's release in 2012.
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Only thing bad about the Major DLC policy is that they unlock some neat historical features that every realm could use and some definately should. The DLC then become necessary if you want this feature even if the rest of the DLC is uninteresting to you. E.g. Tributes in Horse Lords, Viceroys in Charlemagne, etc.
This is a cheap tactic to get people who have no interest in the theme, buy them.
This is a cheap tactic to get people who have no interest in the theme, buy them.
I agree that for a new player the many DLC's and many changes and features can become quite overwhelming - sometimes I even get a little uncertain if I have forgotten some option or possibility. In the Vanilla beginnings I could begin and set up a new game rather fast - but now it takes a lot of time to go through all menus, tabs and stuff, and actually I sometimes just change my mind and decides not to start a game, at is feels way too complicated - and I have been playing this game since the start...
But, that is just me - I guess many think it is great with SO many possibilities, that perhaps one should look at the game rather as there is not only ONE way to play, but that you can play it the way YOU want. If you want to focus just on your characters, that is ok - wanna use your council more, give the cardinals some attention, or experience warfare and world-conquering you can do that. The game doesn't "break" if you forget something, so that is nice...
The only real problem can perhaps be if you start out as a King or similar - then there is really many things to keep attention too, so my humble advice to a new player would be, start as a minor count/chief and try out the things slowly.
But, that is just me - I guess many think it is great with SO many possibilities, that perhaps one should look at the game rather as there is not only ONE way to play, but that you can play it the way YOU want. If you want to focus just on your characters, that is ok - wanna use your council more, give the cardinals some attention, or experience warfare and world-conquering you can do that. The game doesn't "break" if you forget something, so that is nice...
The only real problem can perhaps be if you start out as a King or similar - then there is really many things to keep attention too, so my humble advice to a new player would be, start as a minor count/chief and try out the things slowly.
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I think one thing that Paradox really should do is start to bundle older DLCs into one purchase, by year released or simply 3 into 1. Realistically if these haven't already made their profit then that's a problem, if on the other hand you start to bundle and offer at a discount you may get some new players in, there are no ongoing production costs so any more sales are just pure profit. I know that some people may already have say two out of three parts of a potential bundle but Steam has already started to offer discounts on bundles to allow you to buy the bits you are missing so there is no reason that couldn't work here.
TLDR: Paradox could make more money by cleaning up their DLC list.
TLDR: Paradox could make more money by cleaning up their DLC list.
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