Free EU3 Chronicles Keys Tutorial (FAQ)
First of all, good job noticing the announcement up top and/or your email.
1. Get a steam account and the program:
Now that you have your code, you'd need to have a steam account and have steam installed on your computer.
If you don't have steam installed yet, go to http://store.steampowered.com/ and click that giant green "Join Steam" button.
Once the registration is complete, the web page should tell you to install steam. If it doesn't, simply click the "Install Steam" button at the top right corner, and download the program.
2. Register the game:
After the steam app has been installed, open up the steam program, and go to Games -> Activate a Product on Steam. It's the tiny font at the top left corner right above "Library".
Put your code in there, and the game should now be listed on the left side under the "Library" tab.
3. Install the game:
Click the Library tab if it's not highlighted yet, and find the game at the left panel.
Now right click the game "Europa Universalis III" and choose the first option "Install Game..." (or select the game, and click the Install button at the right panel)
If you don't like the default steam folder location, simply open up the drop down and "Create new steam library on drive #" on the Disk Drive you prefer, then go to the folder or create one.
To avoid future hassles, try not to install steam games under Program Files.
The steam app should start the downloading process.
4. Play the game:
Once the game has been installed, the "Install Game..." option from before should turn into Play Game
Note that, the game has two exe files to start the game. One is EU3.exe under the game folder, which starts the game launcher. If you wish to play with mods, you should use that instead.
Otherwise, the steam app will be using eu3game.ext and directly fire up the game.
5. Register the game on the forum:
Here's a common problem that people have been encountering. Thing is, the steam store sells the Chronicles package, not the game. So it'll give you 3 codes, EU3: Complete, HTT, and DW.
To find all three of the code, if you disabled the annoying steam notification on game start, go to the Library, right click the game at the left, and select "View CD Key"
Three keys should show up on screen, and you have to register EU3:Complete at least to have access to the sub forums including tech support, guide, FAQ, and most importantly (to some), mods. You must register DW to get access to the 5.2 beta forum.
To register the games on the forum, you should have a PI forum account, make one if you haven't. (make sure you enable newsletter, because after all, there will be freebies like this code!)
There should be a "My Games" button at the top, click that, and it should bring you to the Manage Games page.
The EU3: Complete key is pretty straight forward. As for HTT and DW, there's no "EU3" at the front, just "Heir to the Throne" and "Divine Wind"
For me, the browser hangs upon hitting submit, so simply re-enter the My Games page, and the game should be displayed as registered.
N. Start the game!
You'll probably notice the screen resolution is really funky on load screen. Go ahead and change that immediately.
You should probably go through the tutorial once, to at least know where the tabs are and some VERY basic gameplay.
Before you start your first game, I recommend turning off inflation, or at least play on very easy/easy difficulty. And make sure you turn off Lucky nation.
As for your nation of choice. The 5 most popular newbie start are Austria, Burgundy, Castile, England, and France.
Austria is in a very safe position where no one is going to initiate attacks, and you have some very rich provinces with high tax, trade value and man power. However, the expansion choice will be more limited due to not having a port, and surrounded by christian nations and HRE members. Most of the times you'd have to expand through diplomatic means.
Burgundy has many, MANY missions against the minors around him, and starts out with a coastal center of trade. It's a good nation to just follow the missions. However, France has claims on you. Meaning that sooner or later, you will be attacked. Hopefully, your HRE comes to your aid, and fight him off. You're in a better position to expand into France, and has a couple of ports, but if you don't kill France early, you're in a heaps of trouble.
Castile also starts out with a power base, a decent navy, and can easily expand into the Muslim nations to the south. Beware of France and Arargon though, as they will backstab you as soon as they see a chance to do so. Just keep in mind that the Muslims can only invade you if their army can land, so keep your navy strong and they can't do much against your home base. Be ware that the North African provinces are VERY poor, and will hinder your tech progress if you don't control yourself.
England starts out with the best navy in the world, and very decent missions, but no center of trade and France always finding opportunity to take back their lands. Conquer Ireland -> Vassalize Scotland are the usual start. Build enough troops and the highlanders shouldn't be much trouble. Use your navy well, and no one can land enough troops to take your homeland. If you're feeling adventurous, you can always invade France and cripple him. If not, sell the provinces on the mainland to France to avoid future troubles, and focus on saving enough money for future colonization. Both routes are viable and fun.
France starts out very fractured and weaker than the rests, but has the potential of being the biggest and baddest land force in Europe. Since you have a tiny navy, you're in no position to invade England. Your first priority is to recover your lands from surrounding minors. Until you're more experienced, I'd hold off on attacking Provence until the Holy Roman Emperor is at war with another nation. Though you can always join the HRE by befriending Bohemia, and enact provincial decision on Nemours/Vermondois -> Ile-de-France. (save/load to not waste magistrates) Just watch out for Burgundy, England, HRE, and Aragon/Castile all ganging up on you. If England invades, just slowly eat away his forces and EVENTUALLY he'll let you have those provinces on the main land.
FAQ:
Q1. I didn't get the code!
A1. http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...estions-regarding-the-free-EU3-Chronicles-key! and http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...ember-out!&p=14288582&viewfull=1#post14288582 has already given out more than sufficient information. If you didn't qualify, you're out of luck for this freebie.
Q2. How come I only got EU3: Complete?
A2. You didn't. The steam chronicles package is what it says it is, a package. It's 3 games, EU3: Complete, Heir to the Throen, and Divine Wind, bundled up together, so it'll provide you with 3 different codes, Complete, HTT, and DW.
Q3. I can't register the game!
A3. The key from the email is only an activation code for steam. It's not used for the game registration on the forum. You'd have to register the game on steam and use the step 5 from above to register your game on the forum.
Q4. I registered the game, but how come achievement is still disabled?
A4. Because PI shut down Paradox Connect a couple months ago, all achievements and achievement tracking are disabled. There's nothing you can do to enable it. You can (safely) ignore the achievement feature and play as is. Although, there's nothing stopping you from going for those goals.
Q5. Can I play previous versions of the game such as NA, IN, HTT?
A5. Sadly, no. The steam version automatically update everything to the newest patch and expansion, and doesn't allow previous expansions to be played. If you wish to do so, you'd have to buy a hard copy or through gamesgate and install them individually.
Q6. How do I play on multiplayer?
A6. http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...savegames-metaserver-chat-and-other-resources should provide you with everything you need to know.
First of all, good job noticing the announcement up top and/or your email.
1. Get a steam account and the program:
Now that you have your code, you'd need to have a steam account and have steam installed on your computer.
If you don't have steam installed yet, go to http://store.steampowered.com/ and click that giant green "Join Steam" button.
Once the registration is complete, the web page should tell you to install steam. If it doesn't, simply click the "Install Steam" button at the top right corner, and download the program.
2. Register the game:
After the steam app has been installed, open up the steam program, and go to Games -> Activate a Product on Steam. It's the tiny font at the top left corner right above "Library".
Put your code in there, and the game should now be listed on the left side under the "Library" tab.
3. Install the game:
Click the Library tab if it's not highlighted yet, and find the game at the left panel.
Now right click the game "Europa Universalis III" and choose the first option "Install Game..." (or select the game, and click the Install button at the right panel)
If you don't like the default steam folder location, simply open up the drop down and "Create new steam library on drive #" on the Disk Drive you prefer, then go to the folder or create one.
To avoid future hassles, try not to install steam games under Program Files.
The steam app should start the downloading process.
4. Play the game:
Once the game has been installed, the "Install Game..." option from before should turn into Play Game
Note that, the game has two exe files to start the game. One is EU3.exe under the game folder, which starts the game launcher. If you wish to play with mods, you should use that instead.
Otherwise, the steam app will be using eu3game.ext and directly fire up the game.
5. Register the game on the forum:
Here's a common problem that people have been encountering. Thing is, the steam store sells the Chronicles package, not the game. So it'll give you 3 codes, EU3: Complete, HTT, and DW.
To find all three of the code, if you disabled the annoying steam notification on game start, go to the Library, right click the game at the left, and select "View CD Key"
Three keys should show up on screen, and you have to register EU3:Complete at least to have access to the sub forums including tech support, guide, FAQ, and most importantly (to some), mods. You must register DW to get access to the 5.2 beta forum.
To register the games on the forum, you should have a PI forum account, make one if you haven't. (make sure you enable newsletter, because after all, there will be freebies like this code!)
There should be a "My Games" button at the top, click that, and it should bring you to the Manage Games page.
The EU3: Complete key is pretty straight forward. As for HTT and DW, there's no "EU3" at the front, just "Heir to the Throne" and "Divine Wind"
For me, the browser hangs upon hitting submit, so simply re-enter the My Games page, and the game should be displayed as registered.
N. Start the game!
You'll probably notice the screen resolution is really funky on load screen. Go ahead and change that immediately.
You should probably go through the tutorial once, to at least know where the tabs are and some VERY basic gameplay.
Before you start your first game, I recommend turning off inflation, or at least play on very easy/easy difficulty. And make sure you turn off Lucky nation.
As for your nation of choice. The 5 most popular newbie start are Austria, Burgundy, Castile, England, and France.
Austria is in a very safe position where no one is going to initiate attacks, and you have some very rich provinces with high tax, trade value and man power. However, the expansion choice will be more limited due to not having a port, and surrounded by christian nations and HRE members. Most of the times you'd have to expand through diplomatic means.
Burgundy has many, MANY missions against the minors around him, and starts out with a coastal center of trade. It's a good nation to just follow the missions. However, France has claims on you. Meaning that sooner or later, you will be attacked. Hopefully, your HRE comes to your aid, and fight him off. You're in a better position to expand into France, and has a couple of ports, but if you don't kill France early, you're in a heaps of trouble.
Castile also starts out with a power base, a decent navy, and can easily expand into the Muslim nations to the south. Beware of France and Arargon though, as they will backstab you as soon as they see a chance to do so. Just keep in mind that the Muslims can only invade you if their army can land, so keep your navy strong and they can't do much against your home base. Be ware that the North African provinces are VERY poor, and will hinder your tech progress if you don't control yourself.
England starts out with the best navy in the world, and very decent missions, but no center of trade and France always finding opportunity to take back their lands. Conquer Ireland -> Vassalize Scotland are the usual start. Build enough troops and the highlanders shouldn't be much trouble. Use your navy well, and no one can land enough troops to take your homeland. If you're feeling adventurous, you can always invade France and cripple him. If not, sell the provinces on the mainland to France to avoid future troubles, and focus on saving enough money for future colonization. Both routes are viable and fun.
France starts out very fractured and weaker than the rests, but has the potential of being the biggest and baddest land force in Europe. Since you have a tiny navy, you're in no position to invade England. Your first priority is to recover your lands from surrounding minors. Until you're more experienced, I'd hold off on attacking Provence until the Holy Roman Emperor is at war with another nation. Though you can always join the HRE by befriending Bohemia, and enact provincial decision on Nemours/Vermondois -> Ile-de-France. (save/load to not waste magistrates) Just watch out for Burgundy, England, HRE, and Aragon/Castile all ganging up on you. If England invades, just slowly eat away his forces and EVENTUALLY he'll let you have those provinces on the main land.
FAQ:
Q1. I didn't get the code!
A1. http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...estions-regarding-the-free-EU3-Chronicles-key! and http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...ember-out!&p=14288582&viewfull=1#post14288582 has already given out more than sufficient information. If you didn't qualify, you're out of luck for this freebie.
Q2. How come I only got EU3: Complete?
A2. You didn't. The steam chronicles package is what it says it is, a package. It's 3 games, EU3: Complete, Heir to the Throen, and Divine Wind, bundled up together, so it'll provide you with 3 different codes, Complete, HTT, and DW.
Q3. I can't register the game!
A3. The key from the email is only an activation code for steam. It's not used for the game registration on the forum. You'd have to register the game on steam and use the step 5 from above to register your game on the forum.
Q4. I registered the game, but how come achievement is still disabled?
A4. Because PI shut down Paradox Connect a couple months ago, all achievements and achievement tracking are disabled. There's nothing you can do to enable it. You can (safely) ignore the achievement feature and play as is. Although, there's nothing stopping you from going for those goals.
Q5. Can I play previous versions of the game such as NA, IN, HTT?
A5. Sadly, no. The steam version automatically update everything to the newest patch and expansion, and doesn't allow previous expansions to be played. If you wish to do so, you'd have to buy a hard copy or through gamesgate and install them individually.
Q6. How do I play on multiplayer?
A6. http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...savegames-metaserver-chat-and-other-resources should provide you with everything you need to know.
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