EUIV - Development Diary - 24th of September 2019

[EarlKonrad]

Since when is power projection useless?

It is useless to those that don't know how to use it. Any mechanic that people think they know how to use but don't will be called "useless" or "antiquated".

That right there informa you about the player experience with the game.

 

[akngn]

Maybe they are useless in a sense that when you grow too big to have rivals your power projection tanks?

Top notch logic though. Growing too big to project power.

 

[maxirage]

Power projection has nothing to do with projecting power. It's a purely gamey mechanic just like corruption, more accurately named "rival points". So of course getting too big would remove it, since its entire existence is to justify the rival system.

 

[EarlKonrad]

Power projection has nothing to do with projecting power. It's a purely gamey mechanic just like corruption, more accurately named "rival points". So of course getting too big would remove it, since its entire existence is to justify the rival system.

Partially agreed. At the very least Power Projection and the Rival system are well implemented with the game and give you a lot of options on how to approach said system. It isn't a bar that you can slid from 0-1. You actually have different ways of approaching the system (granted that they become very straightforward and obvious as you get better at the game).

 

[JeffL0320]

Please give us the option to use the old launcher layout, the new one is ugly and has so much wasted space. Also please go back to the old mod downloading setup because it's beyond frustrating trying to get any of them to work properly now.

 

[s_javora]

There are still outstanding issues which we are tackling as we speak.

You mean like the game not really being playable on Macs at the moment (can't add URL to thread to my post, great...)? In the Known Issues Thread, that is still listed as "unconfirmed" ...

 

[Thucydides7]

I have little comment regarding launchers and shaders, but patch 1.29 Manchu with DLCs plays better than any version of EUIV to date. It is well balanced for small powers. It is well balanced for medium-sized powers. I have not yet tried the major powers, but the game continues to grow harder to exploit.

World conquest (WC) bores me. I dislike games oriented toward WC. I like 1.29 Manchu as it is. EUIV is a much finer game to play than it was when @DDRJake first took charge. Jake and his team have done solid work.

Really, the sum of patches and DLCs during the DDRJake era has just made the game four or five times better a game than it was. For a player like me, the game was marginally playable before. It's a good game now. I like it.

 

[Vulkandrache]

For a player like me

To this day i dont understand what exactly has made the game better for "players like you".
There have been little to no changes that affect games that arent

oriented toward WC

And im still waiting for someone to explain how exactly their enjoyment of the game improved, outside of:
"I like that WC players are having less fun."

Which is btw what your post boils down to aswell.

the game continues to grow harder to exploit.

And lets not forget that the government reforms is one of the most exploitet and made-to-bend-over systems this game has ever seen.

 

[Thucydides7]

To this day i dont understand what exactly has made the game better for "[a player] like you".

I have tried to explain but, apparently, have failed. Sorry about that, sport. Tastes differ. If these devs made the kind of game you prefer then I might not play it much, but that's just me.

I'm a pretty casual player but I have my own ideas about what makes a good game, and @DDRJake implicitly grasps these ideas. Am I supposed to be angry that Jake and his crew have developed a game I like to play?

I tried EUIV during the pre-DDRJake era. It was okay. Didn't hold my interest long. The current game is much better in my opinion. That's all.

If you have a specific question you would like me to answer, I will try, but remember that I am a casual player. My answer my not be very illuminating on your tier.

Regarding government reforms, I don't really have an opinion, but yours is noted.

 

[EarlKonrad]

I have tried to explain but, apparently, have failed. Sorry about that, sport. Tastes differ. If these devs made the kind of game you prefer then I might not play it much, but that's just me.

I'm a pretty casual player but I have my own ideas about what makes a good game, and @DDRJake implicitly grasps these ideas. Am I supposed to be angry that Jake and his crew have developed a game I like to play?

I tried EUIV during the pre-DDRJake era. It was okay. Didn't hold my interest long. The current game is much better in my opinion. That's all.

If you have a specific question you would like me to answer, I will try, but remember that I am a casual player. My answer my not be very illuminating on your tier.

Regarding government reforms, I don't really have an opinion, but yours is noted.

You still failed to define how the game was improved for you, champ

Jokes aside, I'll assume that when you say "I'm a casual" what you are implying is that you have the bare minimum understanding of EU4 mechanics and play at a very relaxed pace, don't follow the meta and to you whatever content they add via DLC + free patches is obviously good because it is more stuff!

If that is the case than I'd say stop thinking that making the game better for you (which I presume is just more content) is inherently good, because it is not. Time and time again, mainly since 1.25, the devs have introduced massive exploits, unbalanced strategies and messed up with the AI to such a degree that it has never been easier to fight against it. EU4 has more content? Heck yeah! But that also comes with the fact that they -- the devs -- have created big problems for the game -- problems that they refuse to address or even recognize as such -- that just makes the experience for everyone above a certain skill level miserable.

So, yeah, if the game is more fun to you, great! Just don't be dismissive of all of the players that voice their concerns about the path that the devs have been laying for the game.

 

[PhoenixG]

World conquest (WC) bores me. I dislike games oriented toward WC. I like 1.29 Manchu as it is. EUIV is a much finer game to play than it was when @DDRJake first took charge. Jake and his team have done solid work.

Pretty much you contradict yourself here. If you dislike games oriented toward WC you should dislike/hate 1.29. As it is 1.29 makes it even easier to WC. While it does give the chinese region more flavour and in turn makes WC a lot heck easier. Even for a lower skilled player.

If you just look at Qing's idea set or Oirat missions, it just scream with full capital bold letters WC with me.

The way I see the difference between pre and post Jake as director is the kind the stuff it developes. Before Jake took the control there where more stuff mechanical stuff developes, while when Jake took control it shifted more to flavour focus. While it still has some mechanical stuff inbetween, it has lesser impact on the game or just putting there to annoy higher skilled players instead immerse/challenge them.

 

[Weink]

The scale of icons and troops and so on in the game is completely wrong since the update. I can not seem to change it. I looked at your instructions on using regular fullscreen mode in launcher and game, but does not affect to look of the game. Right now it is impossible to play since I can barely see the icons in game. How do I change or fix this?

 

[Thucydides7]

Pretty much you contradict yourself here. If you dislike games oriented toward WC you should dislike/hate 1.29. As it is 1.29 makes it even easier to WC. While it does give the chinese region more flavour and in turn makes WC a lot heck easier. Even for a lower skilled player.

Okay. I didn't know that.

I do not speak of any particular forum denizen (certainly not of you) but, for years, each time a patch arrives and someone's old blobbing tactics stop working, I read bitter complaints here. However, when I actually play the game, I like the game better.

Moreover, @DDRJake generally makes a lot of sense to me. He always has, whether before or after Paradox hired him.

If WC with Oirat is easy now, then devs might wish to adjust that sometime.

While it still has some mechanical stuff inbetween, it has lesser impact on the game or just putting there to annoy higher skilled players instead immerse/challenge them.

At your option, if you wish to concisely summarize or briefly overview the mechanics in question, I do not know who else would be interested, but I would be. (Admittedly, I am unlikely to study a 20-page essay, but two pages to introduce the matter would be well received.) Or maybe someone else has already summarized/overviewed and you might link me to that. Or perhaps you will post as OP under a separate heading when you have some time, and ping me?

Are you sure that the annoyance is not mainly that old WC exploits no longer work? Jake used to be the champion of those, as you might recall.

 

[neondt]

If WC with Oirat is easy now, then devs might wish to adjust that sometime.

We don't. I like that Oirat has a high rish high reward opening gambit and if that makes them a favourite for world conquest then that's fine by me.

 

[PhoenixG]

Annoyance isn't about WC. It's about playing the game at your own pace and the region you want to play. If you expand fast, you'll hit with corruption. It just cost money, there is no strategic value in this mechanic and it just annoys you with it. They exclude this rule for trade company land, making those land top priority land. If you want to expand differently you'll get penalized when you hit your state limit. If you start isn't europe you can't make trade company land in your own continent. Which is perfectly fine by me as rule, but you'll lose a lot of potential income for that just because you start isn't europe. Starting in poor area you'll get hit harder than starting in a rich area.
This is just only about the territory corruption. It doesn't stop blobbing, it just make certain area annoying to play, while other places it's hardly hit by it.

About exploit WC, why do you even need to exploit it? You can perfectly doing a WC without exploiting. Streamers just using the exploits just because it's flashy and entertaining to watch. Exploits should be patched, it's fun to do it once or twice. But after that is just getting old.

 

[dynalon]

Intended or not, the capital movement restriction has been a big fat middle finger in the face of any complaints about TerrCorr, OP Trade Company and the railroad towards India that those two have created. The message sent (again - I don't assume that it was the intended message, but it's what I received from it) is somewhere along the lines of "We won't do anything about this, except I hope you didn't like playing as an Asian horde". The gross imbalance between TC land and everything else is still as gross as it was in 1.26, except now you might have to form Greece or do some lose-cap-in-war shenanigans first.

And although I'm repeating myself with this: The complaint again Trade Comp / TerrCorr is not that it made WC (or generally blobby) runs more difficult, because it didn't. The path "establish powerbase --> conquer TC land to get the snowball rolling --> omnomnom" has been the best path to take prior to 1.26, which then both buffed that path (TC investments) and nerfed everything else (TerrCorr, tariff nerfs - not sure exactly which patch did the latter though). It does not achieve the stated design goal that the player is supposed to think what land to take because the answer is always India.

 

[Thucydides7]

We don't. I like that Oirat has a high rish high reward opening gambit and if that makes them a favourite for world conquest then that's fine by me.

Duty on a Saturday? Do they allow you no time off?

 

[CrazyNinja93]

Hello the respected users of this site and Paradox game developers. I don't know if a similar question was asked before, but i want to ask if moving the EU4 game into a 64bit platform with the newest patch will fix the most of bignum problems? like having too much manpower, sailors or ducats causes problems, like countries start to think that the player is too weak to take their guarantees seriously or game crashes, or sailors stop increasing showing: "the maximum is 100 and u gain 5 sailors each month" despite the fact that i gane a few hundreds of thousands of sailors each month, or having a debt more than 2 years which prevents me sending gifts to other countries, even if i gain more than 30000 ducats each month and having maximum treasury limit....? Because in Paradox games i like to have very strong countries and often face such annoying problems. Please answer my question, it would be very helpful for me Thank u very much!

 

[CzechKronner]

Seems like a filler DD.

Any chance of getting a beta (or even an alpha) version of the UI scaling fix?

 

[grotaclas]

The scale of icons and troops and so on in the game is completely wrong since the update. I can not seem to change it. I looked at your instructions on using regular fullscreen mode in launcher and game, but does not affect to look of the game. Right now it is impossible to play since I can barely see the icons in game. How do I change or fix this?

Any chance of getting a beta (or even an alpha) version of the UI scaling fix?

If you want a workaround and you are on Windows 10, you can try to change the scaling option for eu4 by right clicking on eu4.exe, select Properties, select the Compatibility tab and then check "Override high DPI scaling behavior" and try the different values in the select box below. But remember that you made that change, because you probably have to undo it once eu4 gets proper UI scaling. And please tell me which of the values helped you so that I can help others better next time.