Europa Universalis IV: Conquest of Paradise – Dev diary 4: American Progression

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Is there a reason you guys didn't just add something like an extra 10 techs or so that were between techs 2 and 3?

Rebalancing being annoying I take it.

Military Tech increased unit effectiveness on a mostly linear scale. Economic tech unlocked new buildings. Cultural tech improved relations effects and country management. Buildings usually increased tax or levies by a absolute amount, with universities and monasteries increasing tech spread by percentages. Pretty simple system if you ask me.

Did this work differently for Pagans and Muslims?

Edit: For perspective. increases in tech in EUIV, can lead to geometric improvements in performance of one's Economy, Navy, or Military. It is a much deeper system IMHO, as the player is constantly forced to make decisions on how to most effectively spend their MPs, and to a lesser extent, ducats.

EU4 system is far more linear as you have only three research fields.
CK2 has two categories, each with 6 sub-groups (all in all, 18 research groups with 8 levels). Since ToG expansion, you accumulate MIL, DIP and CUL research points (increase depending on Monarch skills, Councillor skills, events and battles also ad MIL points) and have to choose which sub-group to level-up. Additionally, cost of level-up depends on neighboring provinces (as each province has its own tech progression), ahead penalty, your spy studying technology in foreign states and event modifiers. There is more strategy involved in CK2 research than EU4 research (which is now practically a simplified version of CK2 system).

As for cultural differences, certain cultures have different start (Norse for example have advanced naval tech and Muslims are generally more advanced) and since SoA Sunni Muslims can choose a school of theology which greatly increases growth of research points. There is not much difference between cultures per-se, but different cultural units and economical position means you may have to choose different groups to focus on leveling depending on playthrough (also, will you ignore certain research sub-groups and accumulate points to level up some other sub-group).
 
EU4 system is far more linear as you have only three research fields.

CK2 has two categories, each with 6 sub-groups (all in all, 18 research groups with 8 levels). Since ToG expansion, you accumulate MIL, DIP and CUL research points (increase depending on Monarch skills, Councillor skills, events and battles also ad MIL points) and have to choose which sub-group to level-up. Additionally, cost of level-up depends on neighboring provinces (as each province has its own tech progression), ahead penalty, your spy studying technology in foreign states and event modifiers. There is more strategy involved in CK2 research than EU4 research (which is now practically a simplified version of CK2 system).

I disagree. In CKII, your research points could only be spent on tech. In EUIV, your "research points" have to be intelligently partitioned between tech, decisions, buildings, generals, and ideas(which for all intents and purposes are other forms of 'tech'). One advance in Mil Tech can win you a war against a major power that significantly outnumbers you. One advance in DIP Tech or Exploration can open up a whole 'New World' to your country. Getting access to a new idea group can totally transform your game. None of this was true in CKII as far as I observed.

Also, you get neighbor bonus and ahead penalty in EUIV, so I don't really see your point here, besides tech progression being by county?(and besides that didn't even apply to cultural tech, which was totally based on tech in your capital county.)

As for cultural differences, certain cultures have different start (Norse for example have advanced naval tech and Muslims are generally more advanced) and since SoA Sunni Muslims can choose a school of theology which greatly increases growth of research points. There is not much difference between cultures per-se, but different cultural units and economical position means you may have to choose different groups to focus on leveling depending on playthrough (also, will you ignore certain research sub-groups and accumulate points to level up some other sub-group).

That's not the point of my question though. My question was if Muslims and Norse get different Tech and Building trees from Christian Europeans?

This is how I'm interpreting the devs: In CKII, your tech increased in increments of .1 and nothing improved until you hit a whole number. In EUIV CoP American Indians are getting a tech system that gives them improvements on every "fractional" increase of tech. Is that a reasonable analogy?
 
I don't have the issue with coalitions, but I totally agree on every other point. I was thinking the same thing about them changing the mechanics of tech and buildings. Specifically "Paradox, are you sure you want to open this can of worms?" I just see so many problems with this. Maybe it will work fine for American Indians...but I can already see the forum drumbeat for unique techs and buildings for every tech/culture/government group now.

There should be unique techs and buildings for every tech/culture/government group. Indeed, unique mechanics for every culture/area of the world.

One thing that annoyed me most about CK2 and less so about EU4 is that every single country in CK2 is the same. There's no difference between being, for example, Frankish and German. None at all. They play completely the same (same building and retinues).

EU4 is great because of unique areas like the HRE, Japan, China, and the Papacy. Things start getting boring pretty fast outside of those places, and as you expand you inevitably run in to them. By contrast every elective empire works the same as the HRE in CK2.

Part of the reason people complain about "shoehorning" native americans is totally valid: the game is designed from the perspective of a European Christian monarchy, with a little bit of extra paid DLC for Muslims and a couple variations for republics. If you're going to have a game where natives and such are supposed to be playable, it's deeply unsatisfying to play it with barebones crappy mechanics that are designed for European Christians.

Ironically I'd actually prefer CK2's approach: make these things not playable until a DLC to flesh them out properly arrives.
 
There should be unique techs and buildings for every tech/culture/government group. Indeed, unique mechanics for every culture/area of the world.

Should be, but is it really feasible in terms of the amount of time/resources Paradox has? It's not that I don't think American Indians North American Tribes don't deserve attention. What bothers me is the priority given to them over others.

One thing that annoyed me most about CK2 and less so about EU4 is that every single country in CK2 is the same. There's no difference between being, for example, Frankish and German. None at all. They play completely the same (same building and retinues).

One of the main reasons I quickly got tired of CKII. Also why I think National Ideas are a major improvement for EUIV over EUIII. I don't want attempts at perfect balance if it sacrifices too much character and attention to history. If I did I would play starcraft. I agree here.

EU4 is great because of unique areas like the HRE, Japan, China, and the Papacy. Things start getting boring pretty fast outside of those places, and as you expand you inevitably run in to them. By contrast every elective empire works the same as the HRE in CK2.

Part of the reason people complain about "shoehorning" native americans is totally valid: the game is designed from the perspective of a European Christian monarchy, with a little bit of extra paid DLC for Muslims and a couple variations for republics. If you're going to have a game where natives and such are supposed to be playable, it's deeply unsatisfying to play it with barebones crappy mechanics that are designed for European Christians.

while I agree, I would pose the question: Is the game really meant to be played as a certain large list of countries, but the ability to play smaller less significant countries is there as icing on the cake. If so, should the devs spend more time on the cake or the icing? I don't really have a defined opinion on that yet, just something that has come to mind when thinking about what direction the developers want to take their game.

Ironically I'd actually prefer CK2's approach: make these things not playable until a DLC to flesh them out properly arrives.

an interesting notion, but too late now.

Edit: meant North American tribes, as I think SA and CA civilizations should have been given more priority. underlined edit
 
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Edit: meant North American tribes, as I think SA and CA civilizations should have been given more priority. underlined edit
I have to agree with you on that. While flavor for the North Americans is nice, the real stars of the New World are the civilizations in Mesoamerica and the Andes, those aren't tribes, those are full on civilizations with well established governments and cities.
 
This looks really interesting guys, thanks. I've never been remotely interested in trying one of those "crappy" nations before, but now they have their own features and flavouring, this sounds really interesting.

Please can you ensure that the new features are fully moddable - and most importantly, please allow it to be defined that any nation can get that Native window enabled and use the native features?

Why? Because that adds a whole new screen that can be an interface for modding features. Right now, the only thing we can mod that the player can actually choose to click on, is Decisions. I am imagining being able to mod this Native screen so that it's a clickable interface for any nation. For example, add low-cost "Native Technologies" which are actually interfaces to new mod features, for example enabling a linear progression feature such as training your king/heir, where you want each button to enable only when the previous one has enabled. That would fit very well into the Native interface you're showing there. Of course it has nothing to do with 'native', but all I'm looking for is stuff I can mod that allows direct interaction with the user.

So it will add a lot of possibilities if you can allow this Native screen to be usable for any nation - like having a flag in the country definition that specifies whther it's enabled or not, rather than hardcoding it. And then allow the technologies and features on the screen to be changed to whatever we want, in the same way that we can already mod normal Technologies.

Thanks, it's looking really good!
 
Ultimately one plays the Red Indians to beat the euro's when they arrive.If they cannot match the tech what is the point?
Unique and interesting gameplay?

PS, "Red Indian" is both inaccurate and insulting; Aboriginal Americans is both quite accurate and inoffensive.
 
A third question. In the current game, there are just two pagan religions, they are spread around the world, and the mechanics that make it possible for Europeans to conquer the Inca quickly apply to all pagans. Is any of that going to change? The Inca were really an exception to the rule. It would be nice for the Oirat Horde to be pagan again, instead of Buddhist for game mechanics reasons.

Funny thing: the Inca (and Aztecs, and Maya) were NOT an exception. Defeat was absolutely swift, of course, but the actual battles, sieges and so on went on for 40 years for the Aztecs, 70 for the Inca and 190 for the Maya.
 
I wonder if the tribes might get their own gui? sort of how like in ck2, pagans and muslims got their own gui. not sure if it is possible in EU4, but tis just a thought.

Yes, same question as mine, above. Just looking for playable factions depending of civilisation areas, a complete list would be something like this:
+ Northern American
+ Central/Southern American
+ Subsaharian
+ Muslim
+ Far-eastern
+ Central Asian.
So, 6 more GUIs. Would be lot of work, I think...

However, I'm not that chocked by these Natives pictures in the classical GUI. The easier improvement, I think, would be to use extensions for the pictures about events and advisors. As examples:
+ The key "CITY_VIEW_eventPicture" could be linked to something like CITY_VIEW_eventPicture_native.dds instead of CITY_VIEW_eventPicture.dds when playing Natives, with tepees instead of a European town.
+ The key "theologian" could be linked to something like theologian_native.dds with a Native sorcerer instead of a European monk as is the case currently with theologian.dds.



P.S. : thanks Novacat for your answer to my first question. Seems I read too fast before going back to work :)
 
Yes, same question as mine, above. Just looking for playable factions depending of civilisation areas, a complete list would be something like this:
+ Northern American
+ Central/Southern American
+ Subsaharian
+ Muslim
+ Far-eastern
+ Central Asian.
So, 6 more GUIs. Would be lot of work, I think...

However, I'm not that chocked by these Natives pictures in the classical GUI. The easier improvement, I think, would be to use extensions for the pictures about events and advisors. As examples:
+ The key "CITY_VIEW_eventPicture" could be linked to something like CITY_VIEW_eventPicture_native.dds instead of CITY_VIEW_eventPicture.dds when playing Natives, with tepees instead of a European town.
+ The key "theologian" could be linked to something like theologian_native.dds with a Native sorcerer instead of a European monk as is the case currently with theologian.dds.



P.S. : thanks Novacat for your answer to my first question. Seems I read too fast before going back to work :)
GUIs for different areas sounds perfect for being (part of) a DLC.
 
Can't wait to transform the Iroquois into a world power! Are there any plans for simulating the effects of Old World disease?
 
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Doesn't look half-bad, but I'm wondering about the said progression from nomadic to sedentary... For many tribes it was the other way around: The population decline due to Old World diseases, encroaching Europeans and/or other native tribes and of course the introduction of the horse meant that previously sedentary tribes became nomadic (and stayed that way up until modern times).

This is a seriously good point. I'm wondering about this, too.
 
Hrm. The screenshot indicates that reforming the government will be something that's possible before the Europeans show up, to say nothing of before Westernizing.

This is pretty tremendous, when I played them I was a good fifty years westernized before Innovative ideas were filled.

I hope that there's some way to adequately prepare for a European invasion. It's important for the Native Americans to not be able to take the Western powers in a straight fight, I understand. But I do constantly feel sorry for the tribes that overwhelmingly won their local conflicts, did everything right... and then I take 20 regiments, stomp them in record time, and vassalize them in one war.