Europa Universalis IV: Wealth of Nations - Dev Diary 10: Balance Changes

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Quite a lot of changes here, all of which looks nice.
 
This all sounds great! A couple questions:
-Can you custom set how many diplo points you spend a month on diplo-annexation, so that say you can set it to your monthly gain-1, or will doing it suck down your pool always at -15 points?
-When you say the new overseas distance is "roughly from Italy to Libya", is that from the closest point to Libya, from Rome to Libya, or from the northernmost point to Libya? Because it would be kinda useless if you needed to put your capital to Syracuse in order to get full base tax from a handful of low base tax northern African provinces.
 
Huh, so if I understand it correctly diplomatically annexing a very small vassal with low base tax is so to speak almost instant now ( maybe even less than a year ). I like the fact that this is a way of spending your diplo points too, since the opportunities to spend them meaningfully are very few.

I love that you can now see what your neighbour desires province-wise - a very good change - makes it much more user friendly.

Overall some very good and great improvements here - keep up the good work!
 
This all sounds great! A couple questions:
-Can you custom set how many diplo points you spend a month on diplo-annexation, so that say you can set it to your monthly gain-1, or will doing it suck down your pool always at -15 points?
-When you say the new overseas distance is "roughly from Italy to Libya", is that from the closest point to Libya, from Rome to Libya, or from the northernmost point to Libya? Because it would be kinda useless if you needed to put your capital to Syracuse in order to get full base tax from a handful of low base tax northern African provinces.

No, it's a fixed amount. As it works right now it'll simply spend up to 15 depending on whether you have that many available.

Southern Italy to Libya. You can still get Tunis as non-overseas from Rome though.
 
Is the AI now more likely to attack provinces with scorched earth? I'm referring, of course, to the single regiment scorched earth cheese tactic that I love so.

And never use, obviously.
 
Yes, everyone gets late-game units now. There was a lot of tweaking done to unit progression in the lower tech groups.

Although I do like the fact units are less on\off than previously, am I simply assuming too much to imagine a scenario where since tech matters less (which of course is not a bad thing to a point) ideas and leader traits combined with superior numbers is only thing that matters, so militarised African horde with highly tailored discipline and steady flow of good leaders (or even army tradition) rolls over the place with no sweat? Or if you setup a colony you find the need to have real stack there to begin?

I am simply wondering how AI would cope in such situation unless I am not assuming too much. :p
 
Although I do like the fact units are less on\off than previously, am I simply assuming too much to imagine a scenario where since tech matters less (which of course is not a bad thing to a point) ideas and leader traits combined with superior numbers is only thing that matters, so militarised African horde with highly tailored discipline and steady flow of good leaders (or even army tradition) rolls over the place with no sweat?

Tech still has a large effect, it's just not the star destroyers vs sticks differences you had before.
 
Quote Originally Posted by Golladan View Post
I'm guessing that's only for provinces in other continents, right? So if I'm playing Castille and I conquer something in Scandinavia I will still get their normal tax, manpower, etc?

Yes, of course.

Wouldn't it be better for distant overseas to always be dependent on this new modifier you have introduced, or somehow linked to diplomatic tech?

Swedes are very different from Spaniards, maybe for climatic reasons...
 
Title:

So the trade gets buffed and conquest nerfed. I like the idea but am concerned that with being able to conquer fewer provinces, there might be time when there's nothing else to do.
But it's a step in a right direction I believe. I wish I could stand a chance against France as 6 province Netherlands.
I really liked to play republics in CK2 where I'd grow without much conquest and become dirty rich so I become a superpower.
 
The neighbour tech discount of 2% still incentivises waiting for them to buy it first, you just don't save as many points.
Wouldn't it be better to offset the discount by 1 tech? So if you are 1 tech behind there is no discount, 2 techs would give 5%, 3 techs 10% (or 2%, 4%) etc.. ?
 
About diplomatic annexation, what about provinces you have core on ? Let's say France, does it have to pay diplo points for provinces it has already cored ?
 
About diplomatic annexation, what about provinces you have core on ? Let's say France, does it have to pay diplo points for provinces it has already cored ?

Yes.
 
We've noticed that the early colonizers such as Castile and Portugal often get a massive advantage just from being early, quickly locking up large parts of the new world before nations like England, the Netherlands or France can reach it. To slow down early colonization and give the later colonizers a chance to compete, we've tied the base settler growth to diplomatic technology. At level 3, this base growth is only +25 (compared to +50 previously), but increases at tech levels 10, 15, 22, 26 and 32 up to a total of +150, allowing for rapid colonization in the later stages of the game.

Another addition to technology is Administrative Efficiency, a new country-wide bonus that is unlocked at administrative technology level 23 and increases at 26 and 29, up to a total of 75%. Administrative Efficiency directly reduces the impact of province base tax on overextension and warscore cost, allowing for much larger territories to be conquered at once. Additionally the scaling of core time from country size has been removed - all nations now core provinces at the same speed regardless of size (but it is still affected by factors such as culture, religion, having a claim and so on). This creates a more interesting late game, as the large nations that have formed by then are now able to score decisive victories over their rivals instead of fighting 10-year wars over a few border provinces.

This is a 24K Gold piece right there. Good job, finally touching the overextension and meaningless war issue.

One question though:

Don't those unit rebalancing changes kinda make westernization obsolete? I mean, units have been balanced now so that Asian Group countries can put up a fight against Europeans, so what's the point in westernizing now? They could make away by simply becoming protectorates, get 50% tech discount, tech up to reach their Western protector, and then declare independece, without needing to spend thousands of MPs to do that.
 
This is a 24K Gold piece right there. Good job, finally touching the overextension and meaningless war issue.

One question though:

Don't those unit rebalancing changes kinda make westernization obsolete? I mean, units have been balanced now so that Asian Group countries can put up a fight against Europeans, so what's the point in westernizing now? They could make away by simply becoming protectorates, get 50% tech discount, tech up to reach their Western protector, and then declare independece, without needing to spend thousands of MPs to do that.

Protectorates do not give 50% tech discount.
 
One question though:

Don't those unit rebalancing changes kinda make westernization obsolete? I mean, units have been balanced now so that Asian Group countries can put up a fight against Europeans, so what's the point in westernizing now? They could make away by simply becoming protectorates, get 50% tech discount, tech up to reach their Western protector, and then declare independece, without needing to spend thousands of MPs to do that.
Getting rid of the tech penalty...
 
Great changes but how will the new units for non western nations look like roughly, all gunpowder units at lvl12 or at sooner levels for tech-groups with a malus?