Europa Universalis 5

[Systemlord]

just turn Europa Universalis 5 into Universalis 5, where the focus isn't europe anymore. Then make peace time interesting, with reintroducing population and flexible trade.
That's all I ask for to play tall with only a little expansion. I think with 5 the game is advanced enough so it doesn't have to be pure risk anymore and can be played without simple map painting.

 

[thejayroh]

EU5: less about using mana and more interaction with the nation I'm supposed to be building.

Do I want the entire world to say U L M or do I want the actual capital of Ulm to be super badass compared to Paris, London, or Istanbul? Por que no los dos? I don't need resources to make any of this happen! I need mana! I can build 10k troops on a single island in the Pacific if I get enough mana! The game is streamlined to be able to play as any nation and be successful by the use of mana and not money or resources. In EU5 resources should absolutely be an issue IMO.

 

[mechanical_Critter]

Do I want the entire world to say U L M or do I want the actual capital of Ulm to be super badass compared to Paris, London, or Istanbul? Por que no los dos? I don't need resources to make any of this happen! I need mana! I can build 10k troops on a single island in the Pacific if I get enough mana! The game is streamlined to be able to play as any nation and be successful by the use of mana and not money or resources. In EU5 resources should absolutely be an issue IMO.

but mana is precisely a resource…

 

[GamerKG]

Player agency is critical. So long as player choices/actions don't meaningfully alter their access to this particular resource, having so much of your game/progress hinge on RNG is a degenerate mechanic.

In EU 4 terms, there's a weird saddle where the player partially makes decisions like a monarch, but is something greater at the same time. In this context, the original statement of monarch point dependency breaks down. "You didn't put enough points into your luck skill" isn't appropriate in this context.

EU 4 since took many steps to correct this issue, to the point where a huge proportion of your progress isn't contingent on RNG to anywhere near the extent it was originally. I'm sure Pdox saw a lot fewer "game crashes" in their data as a result of this lol.

Player agency comes from what you can do, too. Having multiple monarchs who happen to be good at Military should result in it being more profitable to take Military actions. This is exactly what player agency is: the fact that choosing to take advantage of the tools you're given results in a different outcome from not playing well, or from choosing to take advantage in a different way. You do not need to be able to affect the Monarch strength.

This is a long and large sandbox game. Dealing with the hand you're dealt, repeatedly, is what makes the game replayable and lets you experience different variations on the sandbox. The more the player is in control of their path, the more samey the playthroughs will be. By having the RNG be at the resource level, the player still has all the agency to choose which path to take, but the paths that are viable change from game to game.

That being said, one of the problems with Monarch Power is that it is possible to simply have few options available... which is boring. But that is why not everything works off of Monarch Power. Many things work off of Ducats, which you have more control over. Ducats themselves can be converted back into Monarch Power through Advisors, so you have some limited control over that, too.

I think Monarchs should have an extremely important affect on what your nation can accomplish efficiently. The problem with Monarch Power specifically is that it also constrains what you are allowed to accomplish at all.

 

[Laurent1944]

I think that monarch points are a good indication of what you can do. In history good monarchs were able to do many things while other were more passive.

But rather than to have the MP accumulate to being used in great quantities, I would rather consider them as a "number of actions" doable per period. Example (with the current number of points), if you win 7 MIL points each month, you can give 7 orders per month. If you have 7 DIP points, you can send 7 diplomats or do 7 interactions with your subjects. If you have 7 ADM points, you can do 7 actions in your country.

And tech advance, or institution advance, should be done mostly indenpendently from government. Government actions may slow or accelerate it, but not be the main contributor here.

 

[RealityGuy]

Make a map a globe.

 

[EarlKonrad]

I think that monarch points are a good indication of what you can do. In history good monarchs were able to do many things while other were more passive.

But rather than to have the MP accumulate to being used in great quantities, I would rather consider them as a "number of actions" doable per period. Example (with the current number of points), if you win 7 MIL points each month, you can give 7 orders per month. If you have 7 DIP points, you can send 7 diplomats or do 7 interactions with your subjects. If you have 7 ADM points, you can do 7 actions in your country.

And tech advance, or institution advance, should be done mostly indenpendently from government. Government actions may slow or accelerate it, but not be the main contributor here.

An interesting idea to introduce an action point economy into EU. I think people would complain about it being a straightjacket and that there wouldn't be a thing to do aside from 5 speed when you have a bas ruler even more so than they already do.

How to properly represent the Country leadership is something that the series has historically struggled to do. For example, EU 3 had the leader being rated from 0 to 10 stars in each of the 3 fields that we now have monarch points and each of these stars would give you (basically) a flat +% to many, many things related to that field I.E morale for navies and armies for mil rating, colonizers for diplo, etc. Personally I never really cared for monarchs in EU3 and I like how EU4 makes them much, much more important by tying monarch points to the monarch in a way that you can experience periods of feast or famine. As someone else said in this thread, this helps to make the game more replayable.

 

[alexti]

I think that monarch points are a good indication of what you can do. In history good monarchs were able to do many things while other were more passive.

But rather than to have the MP accumulate to being used in great quantities, I would rather consider them as a "number of actions" doable per period. Example (with the current number of points), if you win 7 MIL points each month, you can give 7 orders per month. If you have 7 DIP points, you can send 7 diplomats or do 7 interactions with your subjects. If you have 7 ADM points, you can do 7 actions in your country.

I think this the right approach to achieve the goal of monarchs being important. In EU4, whatever ruler you get has no effect on your strategy. All that changes is that if you get an unskilled ruler you'll be fast forwarding on speed 5 more. With the ruler skills being a constraint (rather then a source of some cumulative currency, such as mana) more variations in the strategy will appear. For example, you got a ruler with high MIL and ADM skill and you've expanded a lot (offending everyone around you). Then your next ruler has low MIL and ADM, but high DIP. Since your relations with other nations are now poor you can only use DIP skills to work on repairing them instead of taking some advantageous actions (requiring higher relations). Then by the time relations are repaired enough the ruler dies and now you get low-DIP ruler and you can't take any useful DIP actions again.

That means that perhaps during the previous ruler reign it would be better to expand less so that there would be still some diplomatic actions available in case the next ruler is a diplomat. So this can create some non-trivial trade-offs between taking every possible advantage now and limiting your future options or choosing more flexible line of action.

 

[GameBoi]

My personal wishlist is much less mechanical and more aesthetic.

I hope for a much higher map resolution, none of the wonky geography like Siberia stretching off screen (I think this was done to give Japan and China more land on a flat projection) and places like Jan Mayen missing, more map provinces at release compared to when EU4 came out, and, admittedly less feasibly, a river naval combat system like ship combat in the Yangtze, Danube, or Amazon rivers that should be separate from normal sea combat. Only if you have a certain type of ship would you be able to sail into those places etc etc.

The one wish I know would never happen would be spherical Earth projection not unlike Google Earth. That would be quite an overhaul, and I know not many people are for it...

 

[Vulkandrache]

Why would anyone want to play on something like this?

 

[EarlKonrad]

My personal wishlist is much less mechanical and more aesthetic.

I hope for a much higher map resolution, none of the wonky geography like Siberia stretching off screen (I think this was done to give Japan and China more land on a flat projection) and places like Jan Mayen missing, more map provinces at release compared to when EU4 came out, and, admittedly less feasibly, a river naval combat system like ship combat in the Yangtze, Danube, or Amazon rivers that should be separate from normal sea combat. Only if you have a certain type of ship would you be able to sail into those places etc etc.

The one wish I know would never happen would be spherical Earth projection not unlike Google Earth. That would be quite an overhaul, and I know not many people are for it...

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I never understand why people keep asking for more provinces. The game already has over 2K provinces, which is a lot. Why would adding more provinces improve the game and how would tat be the case?

Also, that spherical map is bad. Imagine how bad it would be to select, say, the Americas if you were looking at the middle east. Flat earth allows you to quickly zoom in and out from anywhere on earth.

 

[Laurent1944]

IAlso, that spherical map is bad. Imagine how bad it would be to select, say, the Americas if you were looking at the middle east. Flat earth allows you to quickly zoom in and out from anywhere on earth.

Moving your mouse on a spherical map has the same effect than on a flat map for directions. Up is north, down is south and so on. But distances will be more realistic. Still in this time frame both south and north poles will be huge wastelands... and all northern sea paths north of Russia and Canada should be closed by ice or you will see highly unrealistic moves. So it is worth the effort ? I am not sure.

 

[EarlKonrad]

Moving your mouse on a spherical map has the same effect than on a flat map for directions. Up is north, down is south and so on. But distances will be more realistic. Still in this time frame both south and north poles will be huge wastelands... and all northern sea paths north of Russia and Canada should be closed by ice or you will see highly unrealistic moves. So it is worth the effort ? I am not sure.

I see.

 

[Brainblow]

I want a different map type. Give us something that makes size more proportional, like the map of the new Imperator game. The flat Mercator map just won't cut it, and it severely restricts the level of geographic depth that can be worked into regions besides Europe. Japan in particular is a victim of this.

 

[Daaktard]

As others have said, things to do that dont require wars, a more fluid system for the rise and fall of nations. I know this sounds stupid but the one thing I do not like about EU4 is how wars are the be all end all. Diplomacy and running your country are things that I wish would matter alot more.

Also, the mana system replaced with expanded ruler traits so that who you have as a ruler of a country really matters and gives each ruler more flavor to your country.

 

[Helperman123]

Things to wish for.
Extended timeline: would be prefer 1356
Better trade mechanics: Imperator is right on track but with less mcro
Army: Better army composition, tactics like formations and more specific units types. Janisseries, Varangian Guard , Spanish tercio.
Better ideas, policy and advisor rework. The constant rework of the mechanic is telling enough they should re-hauled entirely. Fix naval, fix espionage, improve the policy with for unique addition like army professionalism and tactics
Custom nation: More ideas and customization able government types
No corruption mechanic. Nuff said, its is worst mechanic in the game.

 

[Vohen]

Now for something completely minor and inconsequential: I'd really like if they just did away with CoAs and went fully with banners.
I myself only play EU4 with the banner mod (and the square flag mod in Vic2 as well btw).
Seeing how their entire current line up is now going to be using flags/banners (Imperator, CK3 and HoI4), there seems to be a trend which I hope a EU5 follows.

I'm not sure how popular of an opinion this is, and I am sure there are a lot of people who just love their CoAs as well, but those are my two cents on this matter in particular.

 

[Kayno]

(Disclaimer: This all will admittedly be subjective)
To build EU5, i would first define what is the core of eu4:
- The ability to start as any nation in the world and improve upon your starting position with war, diplomacy, colonization, ...
- Replayability with different ideagroups and starting nations, alternate paths to world domination (2 different individuals can play the same country and end up in a vastly different spots)

Then i would define what worked well as a mechanic in eu4:
- Ideagroups (The balance can be off but the system as a whole works very well)
- Nations with their different government forms, national ideas, strengths and weaknesses, flavour, ... (For example my favourite nation austria plays vastly different than brandenburg, despite both being in the german culture group and in the hre)

What worked somewhat but should be improved / overhauled:
- Make trade more dynamic (Making your own trade routes, Having more influence with a monopoly on a trade good, ...)
- Technology could be earned passively instead of actively (Would be hard to balance but with the game being built from the ground up its doable)
- I would still keep mana in the game for filling out idea groups, but i would make the aquisition less rng-dependant (There will always be a need for abstract resources in this game)
- Colonization feels bland (I can´t put my finger on why that is, but it feels tedious to do and could be much more enticing)

What didn´t work well and should be scrapped and replaced with something completely new:
- States / Territories
- Corruption (Especially corruption from territores)
- Revolutions and the late game in general (I know that the late game will never be the focus of the game, but the only runs i played to the end in the last year where world conquest runs)
- Rebels (Most uf us take humanist and offensive to not be bothered with them and other pdx games have shown that there are better alternatives to display disloyal provinces)
- Mercenaries (How they are now, we will see how they are in the next patch, but it doesnt look that promising to me)

Many people in this thread proposed farreaching improvements to the internal and peacetime mechanics in EU5. While i agree that it should be made more engaging than it is now, the essence of the EU-Series was never about characters like in ck, or about the economics and simulation of the population like vici.

Most of all i want a polished, working product at the release.

 

[Chazb5046]

I would like to see the transition from very small standing armies/royal household guards with lots of mercenaries to a full standing permanent army late game; and the effects that this would have on one’s economy, manpower, size of state and ability to wage war.

My two cents.


Ps in a proper way not like the rubbish (w/o mods) army drilling/proff mechanic at the moment

 

[Mr.Grizzly]

Now for something completely minor and inconsequential: I'd really like if they just did away with CoAs and went fully with banners.
I myself only play EU4 with the banner mod (and the square flag mod in Vic2 as well btw).
Seeing how their entire current line up is now going to be using flags/banners (Imperator, CK3 and HoI4), there seems to be a trend which I hope a EU5 follows.

I'm not sure how popular of an opinion this is, and I am sure there are a lot of people who just love their CoAs as well, but those are my two cents on this matter in particular.

What if we had the option for both?