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Good morning, everyone! This week we’re going back to Southeast Asia to talk about some extra content that we’re making for some of the tags.

Philippines.jpg


Starting with the Philippines, we have decided to focus on two specific tags instead of giving them all some generic missions. First, we have Tondo. Tondo is located in the island of Luzon, in the northern part of the archipelago. Philippine political organization consisted of a type of “city-states” called barangays, which formed groups of families ruled by a datu. Bigger barangays, as Tondo in this case, would integrate several smaller barangays governed by a paramount datu, whose title would vary in each region (lakan in the case of Tondo). This grand barangay was an important center of trade in all Nusantara, since the presence of Chinese migration resulted in Tondo becoming the main center of Chinese goods, trading all across Southeast Asia.

Tondo.jpg


Some highlights from this mission tree include:
  • Growing Strong will reward the existence of level 2 forts in provinces Tondo, Laguna and Mindoro with +25% Defensiveness in each of them.
  • The Queen’s Channel is a reference to the channel that serves as a natural frontier with Manila, in the Pasig River delta. It was not only an important source of water for said barangay, but also its main opportunity of trading. Gaining control over it will give Tondo a huge +50 Trade Power in the Philippines trade node.
  • Both Befriend Majapahit and Abandon the Dragon refer to the importance of democratic relations in Tondo’s polity. The Majapahit Empire was a powerful ally of the Tondo people, so regaining their trust will result in some extra Diplomatic Power and +1 Diplomatic Reputation. At the start of the game, Tondo is a tributary of the Ming dynasty, so dissolving this union will grant Tondo Legitimacy, Administrative Power and some claims in the coast of China.

Next up, we have Madyas. After the Chola invasion of Srivijaya in the beginning of the 11th century, a group of dissident datus from Borneo and Sumatra fled their land and sought refuge in the Visayas islands, where they encountered the native population and, according to the legend, made a trade treaty with the Ati hero Marikudo and his wife, rightfully purchasing the land in Panay. Madyas thus became another grand barangay in the archipelago, with a special focus on maritime trade and warfare.

Madyas.jpg


Some highlights from this mission tree include:
  • All the Ships of Aklan is a reference to the province of Aklan, seat of the first capital of the polity and center of the Confederation mentioned in the Book of Maragtas that we’ll address later. Because of the naval importance we have mentioned before, having an admiral, more than 8 galleys and building to the 90% of the naval Force Limit will be rewarded with a +5% Morale of Navies, -5% Heavy Ship Cost and -10% Light Ship Cost as our first mission.
  • Going Back Home implies the preparation for the return to their original land. Permanent claims on Borneo will be granted after making a show of force by owning at least 10 provinces in the Philippines.
  • The Book of Maragtas is the legendary book that gives an account of the history of the Madyas people and their arrival from Borneo. Owning the northern part of the island will result in 100 Diplomatic Power, 100 Administrative Power, 100 Military Power and +1 Stability.

In addition to these two mission trees, we have prepared 6 unique missions shared by both Tondo and Madyas in slot 2, regarding the conquest of all the archipelago. These missions will require the player to conquer the inhabited land of each of the three main regions: Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, thus granting some morale bonuses and the possibility of immediately conquering unoccupied land in each of these areas, as long as there are two regiments present in each province.

Philippines missions.jpg


Moving on, we have Palembang, one of the pirate nations that can be formed very early on in the game, so we wanted to reflect a bit of the pirate’s life in our missions too! But historically, Palembang was also one of the oldest cities in all Nusantara, once the capital of the powerful Srivijaya empire and main controller of all the maritime trade routes in Southeast Asia. A balance between this major historical moment and the more “modern” piracy was therefore necessary, all of it leading to the restoration of this ancient and powerful realm.

Plb map.jpg
Palembang.png


Some highlights from this mission tree include:
  • Where the Water Leaks is a reference to one possible etymological explanation for the name of this tag, always associated with water. This mission will require the player to build to 100% Naval Force Limit and will grant permanent claims on the Siak and Jambi controlled provinces, thus starting the recovery of their lost land.
  • Orang Laut, Arrival of the Dragonships and Pirate Kings all have the same objective of gaining the best possible allies to continue with the expansion plan. Having the state privilege Orang Laut Privileges and some owned provinces in the northern part will boost your Navy Tradition; dragonships were powerful ships of Chinese origin that will reward your conquests and maximum Navy Force Limit with a Ship Cost reduction and another boost to your Ship Combat Ability (all of them for both light and heavy ships); and having 2 powerful admirals and 4 more provinces in the East will allow access to the admiral Chen (3/3/4/3), a legendary Chinese pirate that ruled over Palembang.
  • Both King Under the Mountain and King’s Court in the second slot focus on the ancient splendor of the Srivijaya Empire, whose Shailendra dynasty came from the neighboring island of Java. Owning some provinces in said location will reduce National Unrest and add a general with 50 Tradition, as well as granting the final cores that will lead to our culminating mission.
  • Restore Srivijaya will require the player to own all of the Sumatra and Java islands, former possessions of the thalassocracy. With the recovered glory of the Empire, Palembang will be rewarded with a permanent Stability Cost Modifier of -10%, +1 Stability and more Diplomatic, Administrative and Military Power.
That’s all for today! Thank you for reading and have a nice week :)
 
Any formables for uniting the tags in the Philippines?

This is the only thing I've been waiting for in the region. Once I've conquered all my regions rivals, I'd like to have a formable, even if it is ahistorical.
 
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As long as there is no native formable named after a Spanish king, I’m good. Also there seems to be some major miscommunication between the content creation teams, as Majapite is suppose to be a fading power at start and by default, making an alliance with them most likely worthless against Ming.
 
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@skingrado This all looks sweet! Since it's going to be forever between now and the next dev diary, though, could we get a sneak peek at whatever's going down in Australia? We've been waiting to see what that new color on the religious mapmode is forever!

Either way, I hope you have a lovely break <3

We'll be addressing Polynesia in our next DD (and Australia a little bit later), but you'll have to wait until next year, though!
Have some nice holidays you all! :)
 
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Just in case you guys are going to focus more in the Philippine archipelago ever again, here are my suggestions and as well the other people in the EU4 community, I mixed them all up and came up with one big thread, that even the forums system reviews it as spam...

 
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While i don't doubt that the new dev team will be as good as the last one ofter some time getting familiar with the code, the community interactions drom Tinto have really been lackluster so far. There was a time where we had monthly dev diaries and still had more information per week. There is noone to stalk on twitter, devs are even more invisible than before in the suggestions subforum and these "dev diaries" are tiny teasers.
It is notable, that the diaries changed structure completely. Before we would always get some content, maybe a few mission trees as well that covered mostly anything new regarding that tag/region. Now dev diaries are like teaser trailers, showing of a little bit, while keeping most stuff hidden.
Frankly said, dev diaries are meant to inform the players about upcoming content but they are treated like a marketing scheme.
If one week couldn't release due to unforseen circumstances the next week should be a double dev diary covering both weeks not just a teaser warmed up and pushing each diary back.

Paradox needs to realize that the people who read these diaries already have purchased eu4 and likely will purchase somewhat decent content as well. Don't treat us like a crowd you want to sell the game to. We don't need teasers, we are a feedback test group. Show us the content and ask us: "do you guys think that this is a good way for us to improve the game", instead of telling us: "look at these three things. You can expect MANY more, when you buy DLCxxx on xx.xx.xxxx".
 
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Polynesia
EU4 - Development Diary - 12th of January 2021

All the new Polynesian tags will recieve brand new mission trees!

We won't reveal what Polynesian tags we're making though, those are for a dev diary three months later.


(As much as I like seeing new content, a two week delay followed up by a... less than satisfactory dev diary that contains two mission trees for a quarter of the nations in a certain region was admittedly not enjoyable. Mission trees are great flavour additions for countries that already have decent mechanical setups – slapping missions on a barren, unreworked region just makes it slightly less unattractive to play.)
 
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We'll be addressing Polynesia in our next DD (and Australia a little bit later), but you'll have to wait until next year, though!
Have some nice holidays you all! :)
I hope you are not adding playable tags in Australia. That would stretch the definition of "state" in EU4 beyond absurd.
 
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i want to see something about the conquest of the area by the Europeans, something about how Portugal monopolized the trade and production of species. the conflicts between Portugal, the Dutch East India Company and others
 
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We'll be addressing Polynesia in our next DD (and Australia a little bit later), but you'll have to wait until next year, though!
Have some nice holidays you all! :)
Looks like 2021 will be starting off on a positive :D Please give Polynesian tags the ability to migrate (and fix some sea borders to allow this more easily)!
 
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Frankly said, dev diaries are meant to inform the players about upcoming content but they are treated like a marketing scheme.

This has been a critique of the dev diaries for a few years now, but it's absolutely gotten worse recently. Using DDs for marketing is completely backwards, because the only people on the forums to read the things are some of the most invested fans of the game. I think this is part of the general frustration that people have had toward Paradox recently. Even the most loyal fans aren't trusted to want to buy the product without a big marketing push
 
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Looks like 2021 will be starting off on a positive :D Please give Polynesian tags the ability to migrate (and fix some sea borders to allow this more easily)!
The current migration system in game is not adequated to represent polynesians migrations during the timeframe of the game.
The polynesians organized enough to become tags were not maritime nomads, they did not arrive on a good island, spent some time on it and then abandoned it to look for another island.
When they discovered a good island, they colonized the island, and some time later a populational excedent would go away searching for new lands. The process is more similar to colonization than to nomad migrations.
But we already knowns that migrations will be reworked next patch, so, who knows.
 
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hope you are not adding playable tags in Australia. That would stretch the definition of "state" in EU4 beyond absurd.
Considering that we have dozens of native councils in North America and next patch we will have 3 tribes in continental SEA with the "stateless society" government type, a few tags in Australia representing the bigger groups is not a stretch when compared to other parts of the game.
 
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Wait, but doesn't the piracy event already give Palembang piratical missions? Will the new ones be added to the piratical ones or will we only enjoy these new missions until we become pirates?
 
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