EU4 fails to recognise the importance of the navy historically.

[Balt]

In the period of EU4 when a country wanted to grow an empire. They used the navy.

The Navy was the best way to show that a country was growing both in economics and power. EU4 fails to capture that in it's entirety.

I believe that Paradox should further their development and focus on the navy for a while. For an entire game you can go without building a single ship. However in real life simply this was unfeasable. The navy is one of the most important aspects of a country's power projection.

At the time the navy has very limited applications. You can protect trade, hunt enemy fleet's (Doesn't work), intercept enemy fleets (Doesn't work).

I have seen various threads on /r/eu4, so I decided to make a post here to see if the devs would by some chance see this.

I'd love to buy a DLC that focuses on the navy and amplifies its importance.

I don't want to see the French army march into England because the English AI is retarded.

Also I'd like to see a similar system to that of the HOI4 naval system. Where you can assign a fleet to an area so as
to stop transports and attack naval fleets. It's way too annoying when the AI lands an army on England when I'm fighting in India fighting against Italy. When I have a 400 fleet ship patrolling the North Atlantic and a fucking 13 fleet ship mostly composed of transport ships slips through and lands an annoying army.

Also I remember transport ships. I think that the heavy ships and light ships should be able to carry troops; as well as galley's. As far as my knowledge goes the only time that ships were soley used for transports were in WW2 for naval invasions and WW1.

 

[Dominion]

I think that the heavy ships and light ships should be able to carry troops; as well as galley's.

Must be some bigass ships to carry other ships around.

Jokes aside, feel free to throw ideas into our suggestion board.

Don't think there's a discussion to be had. Everyone knows ships are worth nothing aside from pirating for PP and transporting units from time to time.

 

[Nyrael]

Navies were important for nations who needed it, be it for colonialism, Trade, Slave-hunting, etc. Austria, Russia and other more landed nations should not be forced to care as much.

Granted, the navies should be buffed in importance where they should matter. Mare Nostrum (and to some extent Wealth of Nations) was supposed to be focused on it, but it didn't really work out.

 

[DarkBlue]

I agree navy should be buffed (this is a consensus among players I guess). Would it be feasible to make blockade worst for trade income & devastation?

 

[Quaade]

Denmark was "exceptionally" well due to their navy and despite lacking in size they managed to outperform the english navy, and have also been the reason Denmarks fleet was attacked in harbor a few times because... let´s be honest... it´s not really their size of army that made Denmark significant in any way and how much do you fear another nations navy when you have to ambush them when they are incapable of fighting back?

That said... makes sense that Denmark and England have naval ideas from the historic pov, but they are rubbish in comparison since navies are non-essential for most parts.

 

[Furleppe]

The thing is, how do you make navies significantly more important while making them fun from gameplay perspective and also making AI capable of making it work. Seems like it's tough to design as we haven't got such a rework yet (Mare Nostrum tried something but it didn't work out I think).

Making navies more important with existing things such as blockades and devastation will just make player exploit AI even more.

 

[Vetgirig]

Also I'd like to see a similar system to that of the HOI4 naval system. Where you can assign a fleet to an area so as
to stop transports and attack naval fleets. It's way too annoying when the AI lands an army on England when I'm fighting in India fighting against Italy. When I have a 400 fleet ship patrolling the North Atlantic and a fucking 13 fleet ship mostly composed of transport ships slips through and lands an annoying army.

That is already available. You can actually assign ships to hunt enemy ships.

 

[DanubianCossak]

Yup this is one thing that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.

Having a large merchant and war navy should be absolutely critical to anyone who wants to become even 50 spots away from being among the top players, let alone be in the top 10.

 

[Dominion]

That is already available. You can actually assign ships to hunt enemy ships.

> Implying it works

You can use hunt ships in minor sea zones, but try using that option as England to "hunt enemy fleets in the North Atlantic" or similar and you'll never catch anything.

Even had the AI sneak past me while having a fleet on that mission.

Doesn't help that they only chase, but never intercept. Button could get removed and I wouldn't even notice.

 

[PrimeYuri]

Would be nice if colonizing and overseas trade would be influenced by the ship power of a nation.

 

[Martynios]

I also think merchant fleets are very poorly simulaties by light ship trade protection; instead of making voyages to far-away lands to trade, they just sail circles between Iberia and Italy.

 

[DarkBlue]

I also think merchant fleets are very poorly simulaties by light ship trade protection; instead of making voyages to far-away lands to trade, they just sail circles between Iberia and Italy.

It has something to do with the barely realistic trade system too.

 

[rothamon81]

The real reason is that the AI is too stupid to use its navy/armies that siege down islands accordingly so instead of improving the AI (which is quite difficult) they just nerfed naval warfare. Future changes, if any, will only be miniscule in EU IV. Probably won't change much in a possibly EU V either.

 

[Dakka]

Navies were important for nations who needed it, be it for colonialism, Trade, Slave-hunting, etc. Austria, Russia and other more landed nations should not be forced to care as much.

Hey, man, everyone feared the mighty 12-Ship Prussian Navy!

 

[Threshold]

Would be nice if colonizing and overseas trade would be influenced by the ship power of a nation.

Yeah, I have to say that I preferred EU III's navy-adjacent-mechanics, where 1) colonial empires needed at least a fleet-in-being for tariff efficiency and 2) random NPC pirates would pop up in areas that were unpatrolled for a while.

Obviously the system needs to be more fleshed out than that, for which unfortunately I don't have any suggestions, but from my perspective, those two steps backwards seem like they'd be going in the right direction.

 

[grommile]

random NPC pirates would pop up in areas that were unpatrolled for a while.

The pirate mechanic turned out to be terrible trivializable trash if you actually engaged with it.

 

[Threshold]

The pirate mechanic turned out to be terrible trivializable trash if you actually engaged with it.

I don't disagree. And yet, I think that was still better than the current system.

 

[RagingMonkey]

IIRC in EU3 they had a thing where if you didn't have ships regularly patrol waters around colonies and overseas holdings, then you'd start to have reduced income from said colonies etc. Things like that might make navies more crucial.

Edit: Already mentioned above, doh.

 

[Powder hound]

I’ve always supported a vastly improved naval game, so easy to say so hard to do. Perhaps one way would be to introduce sea lanes/trade routes the natural highways of the seas, the only provinces ships can actually sail in a little like the hyperlanes in Stellaris, you then have strategic bottle necks your fleets can patrol with greater effect pirate more efficiently, whilst the ocean is vast merchant marines will only use 10%.
Ask yourselves how many naval battles, privateering actions actually took place more than 50 miles from land in the whole period of EUIV.

 

[Holland989]

The pirate mechanic turned out to be terrible trivializable trash if you actually engaged with it.

Oh yeah I remember the 200+ pirate fleet sitting in the Red Sea and the AI just constantly feeding it with their own navy.

Or playing as a native American, not being able to build ships, but still have pirates raiding your coast.

Good times