Europa Universalis IV: Conquest of Paradise – Dev diary 2: Exploring a new world
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"When storytellers and poets write of tomorrow ... it will be of how England, nay the world, was rocked by the great and mighty empire of Sweden."
Classic. Someone deserves a raise for that.
(... and the moose was a nice touch ...)
Classic. Someone deserves a raise for that.
(... and the moose was a nice touch ...)
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So, to that drinking game initiated some pages earlier: No plate tectonics, god damn! 
The simple plate tectonics based random world generator linked earlier here is pretty awesome though. Understandably using such a system to generate a full random world or random continents would take way too much time and thus is infeasible, but the creator of said program had a pretty good idea of generating a low-definition image with the relevant data (height and such), then scaling it up and letting fractal generation do the rest. That may well work in a way most brilliant and I do hope that PI takes a good look at such a method. I do love the idea of a random generated New World, no matter what kind of randomisation it is, but I still cannot but agree that the maps shown here are not exactly that beautiful or believable. (Though I do like Civ maps at times )
The simple plate tectonics based random world generator linked earlier here is pretty awesome though. Understandably using such a system to generate a full random world or random continents would take way too much time and thus is infeasible, but the creator of said program had a pretty good idea of generating a low-definition image with the relevant data (height and such), then scaling it up and letting fractal generation do the rest. That may well work in a way most brilliant and I do hope that PI takes a good look at such a method. I do love the idea of a random generated New World, no matter what kind of randomisation it is, but I still cannot but agree that the maps shown here are not exactly that beautiful or believable. (Though I do like Civ maps at times )
Terrain looks totally weird. It doesn't have to be perfect but when you look Europe and the generated New World at the same time, it just doesn't look realistic.
I'm not sure playable nomadic nations should be featured. Will they ever be fun to play? If not, all that effort introducing them to the game will not add any value. The development should rather be focused on improving the overall experience of the discovery and colonization gameplay as well as drag the playability of the more "EU4 compatible" Mesoamerican and Andean nations to a mere playable state, at least.
As well as keeping the current "static native tribes", nomadic natives should be represented as non-playable "improved rebels" that at times spawn from native lands as the barbarians did in EU: Rome. If the conditions are right, those "spawned native armies" might form actual nations.
I'm also still curious about how the New World will look before and after contact with the Old World. Primarily diseases but also wars and harsh colonial policies and subjugation of the natives led to the downfall of the traditional economies of the New World and caused a huge drop in population and in places to a complete annihilation of the natives and their culture...
What if for instance the randomised New World is slightly too far away in combination with conditions in Europe (the seafaring nations being entirely occupied by destructive wars in mainland Europe for instance) prevents effective colonization, leading to a largely untouched New World during most of the game: Will disease events still wreak havoc but the traditional structures remain in place due to lack of direct European intervention? How would a never toppled Inca Empire with horses and iron look in the 18th century? It's a gold mine for fascinating what-ifs and rewarding gameplay for both New World nations and colonisers if done right.
As well as keeping the current "static native tribes", nomadic natives should be represented as non-playable "improved rebels" that at times spawn from native lands as the barbarians did in EU: Rome. If the conditions are right, those "spawned native armies" might form actual nations.
I'm also still curious about how the New World will look before and after contact with the Old World. Primarily diseases but also wars and harsh colonial policies and subjugation of the natives led to the downfall of the traditional economies of the New World and caused a huge drop in population and in places to a complete annihilation of the natives and their culture...
What if for instance the randomised New World is slightly too far away in combination with conditions in Europe (the seafaring nations being entirely occupied by destructive wars in mainland Europe for instance) prevents effective colonization, leading to a largely untouched New World during most of the game: Will disease events still wreak havoc but the traditional structures remain in place due to lack of direct European intervention? How would a never toppled Inca Empire with horses and iron look in the 18th century? It's a gold mine for fascinating what-ifs and rewarding gameplay for both New World nations and colonisers if done right.
Will there be a way to turn off the random terrain generation but keep dynamic tribes etc?
Apologies if this has been answered, didn't have time to read whole thread.
Apologies if this has been answered, didn't have time to read whole thread.
I hope it will be compatible with CK II conversion IF you don't activate sunset Invasion ! because if Sunset invasion is off, the natives are vanilla EU IV so I think that makes sense.
Why is this? The other limitations I can understand bu this one seems a bit arbitrary. I guess it might be possible just to copy the info from a CK2 converted game save-game into a randomised New World save game and get around this resitriction, but I don't know why CK2 converted games shouldn't be allowed to have randomised New World.
Let me repeat this because you people are plain ignoring me..
And I can add that simulated tectonics is neither necessary nor sufficient for creating a pleasing, plausible geography.
And I can add that simulated tectonics is neither necessary nor sufficient for creating a pleasing, plausible geography.
A bit harsh, it should be added I agree, but does is it necessary for it be redone completely?
I would honestly wait patiently until it is done right if that must be the case.
Though I will reiterate that I want to see how this develops in the coming weeks, it is still in development after all.
How about the New World does not exist at all? With this, Christopher Columbus could go straight west to Japan and China. (Well, all his ships would sink in the Pacific-Atlantic Ocean.)
I love how people whine about how Paradox didn't get degrees in geology for all their employees and study plate tectonics for years in order to make a fun, entertaining, random DLC for people to enjoy.
Lighten up and stop trying to say everything needs to be rational/scientific to be fun. I couldn't care less about how realistic the continents are so long as they provide a new, unique experience.
Also, if the climates are random, then that makes it more unpredictable...which is the point of the DLC, yes?
Lighten up and stop trying to say everything needs to be rational/scientific to be fun. I couldn't care less about how realistic the continents are so long as they provide a new, unique experience.
Also, if the climates are random, then that makes it more unpredictable...which is the point of the DLC, yes?
or something...
while Paradox mentioned, that they will make changes to the map generator, I'm afraid they don't feel the same embarrassment about the current maps as some of their fans clearly do. Otherwise they would have waited with releasing maps and had chosen to talk about other stuff first. I can see some fine-tuning at best but I wouldn't hold my breath for dramatically better maps.
Obviously, that's no drama because I didn't even expect anything like that or wished for it, although I've to say that I found the idea had promise when I first read about it. However, I just don't understand the judgement here. The problem is that this isn't something that is hidden in complex mechanics. The map is probably the most visible thing in a grand-strategy game and as of now it just screams: amateurish!
I don't think you have to get a degree in geology first to do a better job here. There are nerds out in the world for almost everything. If you make such a fundamental addition to your #1 game, you should hold yourself to higher standards instead of rushing things like that.
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While I'm not sure how long they've been working on it up to this point, I think that over a month is plenty of time for some pretty dramatic improvements. We just need to see the reveal as more of a proof of concept than anything else.
It seems to me that the basic point of randomizing the New World is not to simulate some sort of accurate geological model, but to simulate the lack of knowledge Europeans had, and thusly, the player.
Explorers don't know about plate tectonics. They don't know about weather patterns, desert zones etc... Adding real life rules to creating an 'accurate' model based on present day tectonic plates is just a crutch to give some players 'advance' knowledge of the New World. Knowledge the explorers just did not possess.
If you want to remove some inaccuracy, how about the one where the explorers don't have to return to the home country to show there discoveries? As it is, It doesn't matter if your conquistador/explorer is lost, you still get his discoveries.
Explorers don't know about plate tectonics. They don't know about weather patterns, desert zones etc... Adding real life rules to creating an 'accurate' model based on present day tectonic plates is just a crutch to give some players 'advance' knowledge of the New World. Knowledge the explorers just did not possess.
If you want to remove some inaccuracy, how about the one where the explorers don't have to return to the home country to show there discoveries? As it is, It doesn't matter if your conquistador/explorer is lost, you still get his discoveries.