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BjornB

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Greetings!

Tomorrow Tuesday the 21st of January 2020 we’ll release a patch for EU4 called 1.29.4. As this patch will seemingly do nothing for you except change the version number and checksum we thought we should explain what’s going on.

We are running a few experiments aimed at reducing the threshold for new players to access the full EU4 experience. We are approaching this in a data-driven way, somewhat related to what we did in CK2 a few years back (and that test turned out great when it comes to growing the CK2 family around the globe!); which means that we cannot fully disclose how exactly it will look, as that will interfere with the test. What we can say is that it’s fully and completely optional and does not require you to interact with it in any way.

We hope that these experiments do not negatively impact your game experience, but, since updates have the potential to cause unforeseen effects, it is important that you know what is happening.

Tomorrow’s patch changes nothing that should affect mod compatibility. Mods that worked on 1.29.3 should work with no problems on 1.29.4. However, if a mod has specified 1.29.3 as it’s level of compatibility it will say it is outdated in the launcher, even if in reality it would work as normal. Hopefully your mods already have 1.29.* compatibility specified in which case there should be no effect whatsoever. If they are not though: it should be completely safe to run the mods anyway.


EDIT 18:00CET 2020-01-21 (go to pdx_pdawg's post)
Hi everyone! Pontus, team lead for EU4 marketing supporting Björn real quick. Since “the cat is out of the bag” me and the team wanted to clarify a few things before speculations are running to rampant and are established as truths:


- Yes, we want to test a subscription model for EU4.

We have heard for years from existing and potential new players that the cost of getting the game and all expansions all at once is quite expensive (and might be discouraging for completely new EU4 fans), it's been supported for almost 7 years after all. A subscription model has been suggested to us on many occasions, so we thought we'd run a test to see how popular such a service would be.


- No, we are NOT replacing the current model or changing how anything works now. We are simply adding another option.

Expansions and other DLC's, both existing and upcoming, will still be available for purchase as usual for those who prefer that. We will not remove any content from anyone or make future content exclusive to people with a subscription. Nobody will be forced to pay again for content they have already purchased, and you will get to choose if you want to subscribe to get future DLC or continue purchasing the items individually just as you’ve always done.


- The cost of such a service is one of the things we want to decide based on the test.

This will help us assess how the presentation has performed, and help us determine how we should value any subscription offer in the future (if it ends up being a desired feature). This, unfortunately, is why we were so cagey about this experiment.


In hindsight we might have been a little more open about this process -- we know, as our long-time fans, this model may not be aimed at you (again, none of your existing purchases are going to be charged again). We wanted to try and gather data from people who encountered this new idea without prior bias or discussion (makes for a better experiment). That’s why we were keeping things “on the DL,” as the kids say.


That's pretty much all there is to it at this point. A limited group of people will be receiving this offer, and it's entirely up to these people whether or not they want to jump on the offer or not.


Thanks for your keen interest on this topic. You are of course welcome to share your ideas on what you think of such a service with us.
 
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Is it possible to be a little less cryptic and at least tell us what this'll do? Should we expect yet another drop in performance?
 
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There are no gameplay changes, I'd be very surprised and confused if there were a drop in performance
 
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So uh... What *is* this? You're saying this will reduce thresholds, but with no noticeable changes, so I'm assuming you're not rolling any DLCs into the base game. If telling us anything at all messes with it, does that mean it's some telemetry thing? Can you tell us what it exactly is after the tests are done?

I'm just confused.
 
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So uh... What *is* this? You're saying this will reduce thresholds, but with no noticeable changes, so I'm assuming you're not rolling any DLCs into the base game. If telling us anything at all messes with it, does that mean it's some telemetry thing? Can you tell us what it exactly is after the tests are done?

I'm just confused.

It's not telemetry stuff. We're going to test some stuff, but test results are not reliable if people know exactly what the test is. I'm sorry I can't be more clear what it's all about. This patch is so small that we wouldn't even have mentioned it if it wasn't for the fact that since version number and checksum changed we had to tell you something happened.

For most of you, this should have absolutely no impact whatsoever.
 
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It'll probably introduce tracking to help the devs gather data on user experience and make decisions on how to improve the game in the future so that more people can enjoy it. Fine by me if that is the case but I wonder if the devs are legally required to explicitly disclose that.
Fairly sure that'd fall under telemetry, which they just denied.

It's not telemetry stuff. We're going to test some stuff, but test results are not reliable if people know exactly what the test is. I'm sorry I can't be more clear what it's all about. This patch is so small that we wouldn't even have mentioned it if it wasn't for the fact that since version number and checksum changed we had to tell you something happened.

For most of you, this should have absolutely no impact whatsoever.
Well... Okay then.
 
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"Hello, and thanks for showing your interest in this EU4 patch!

This update will (effectively) change nothing, but if it were to change anything we can't tell you. If we told you that would ruin the intended effect of the patch that changes nothing.

We thought that we'd let you know, because this change that we didn't make could have unforeseen effects. It is important to us that you all know what is happening (aside from what happened to the game with this patch, because that would ruin the experiment)."



Be straight with me - is this some kind of social experiment?
 
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Basically the testing is not taking place in the game at all. We just had to add a small thing to the game to support it unfortunately.
 
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We are running a few experiments aimed at reducing the threshold for new players to access the full EU4 experience. We are approaching this in a data-driven way, somewhat related to what we did in CK2 a few years back (and that test turned out great when it comes to growing the CK2 family around the globe!); which means that we cannot fully disclose how exactly it will look, as that will interfere with the test. What we can say is that it’s fully and completely optional and does not require you to interact with it in any way.

It does make sense that we don't know what the change is about for us to act naturally. Self-posing questions would be:
1. Will You reveal at some point in the future what the change was?
2. If yes, then what that time would be?
It would be really interesting to see, what the results are.
 
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Does this "thing" has something to do with tutorial?

As this is something that has nth to do with gameplay most of us experience but might make game easier to grasp for new players if you were to update it. So I guess it fits into description?
 
There are no gameplay changes, I'd be very surprised and confused if there were a drop in performance
Since 1.29 the game is unplayable, so I wouldn't be surprised. on MacOS the game is 40% slower than on Windows (same hardware)
 
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Maybe they're doing a psychological test to see how many people will report reduced performance in an update that literally changes nothing except the version number.
 
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I'm sure that you will learn what it was all about soon.

Maybe they're doing a psychological test to see how many people will report reduced performance in an update that literally changes nothing except the version number.

This is an idea :)
 
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