Hegemons - a completly useless feature
- Thread starter Delpheus
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The Hegemony feature is useless for nearly every player. A better way to handle it would be to let the global #1 in every category (top land military, top navy, top economy) maintain hegemony from day one, so that the status can be fought over for the entirety of the game. If a challenger arises with more power, give the hegemon 3-6 months to consolidate power again, or else lose the status to the challenger. Perhaps also treat it similar to Defender of the Faith in the sense that if you become XX% more powerful than the #2 country in each category, you gain additional hegemony bonuses.
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ah yes
this with PDS's means of measuring strength would be truly amazing /s
have you ever looked into how military/dip/adm scores are actually calculated?
I don't mean the mana scores, which I agree are useless. I mean whatever criteria they used already for hegemons. Like if having the largest number of cannons on your ships is what makes you Naval Hegemon, then it's based on whoever has the actual highest number of cannons from day one. (Rather than hitting a threshold so high that the game is over by the time it happens.) If someone else builds a bigger navy with more cannons, then the clock starts ticking before they take over, and if the current hegemon doesn't either build more or smash the upstart, then the hegemon status/bonus transfers to the upstart.
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I took Naval Hegemon around 1700 in a Portugal playthrough. It was meh.
The diplo hit made me lose most of my allies almost immediately, and 2 subjects immediately became rebellious (why does it apply to colonies and subjects??).
What's worse is that the buffs, which are pretty good, slowly build so you don't even get them immediately. SO you lose all of your allies and don't get any real payback until 15-25 years later.
Luckily, the opinion malus decays overtime, so I had all of my vassals back under control and most of my allies back in few years, but it just all seemed silly.
3/10 - Answers a question no one asked; would not take again.
The diplo hit made me lose most of my allies almost immediately, and 2 subjects immediately became rebellious (why does it apply to colonies and subjects??).
What's worse is that the buffs, which are pretty good, slowly build so you don't even get them immediately. SO you lose all of your allies and don't get any real payback until 15-25 years later.
Luckily, the opinion malus decays overtime, so I had all of my vassals back under control and most of my allies back in few years, but it just all seemed silly.
3/10 - Answers a question no one asked; would not take again.
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It can be a nice little bit late game to speed up the grind in a WC type game.
Of course it’s taking vassals doesn’t help that.
Of course it’s taking vassals doesn’t help that.
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Vassals are annoying anyway, they didn't need another indirect nerf, they're bad enough.
Vassals are awesome. And they have only gotten better this patch.
Occasionally they break and don’t work right, but in general, I have as many vassals as I can support. Compared to you owning the land they get you more money (stealing their trade power), more force limit, more manpower, more governing capacity, more generals, less unrest, less AE, less OE, use less governing capacity. They mean you pay less admin points and can delay paying the diplo points until it is convenient for you. They get you CBs and let you take land you can’t otherwise due to coring range. They suffer horrible devastation and war exhaustion rather than you. A vassal with good defensiveness helps occupies forts hold out longer. They let you get land without fighting a war, it can be a big deal when diplo vassalizing a small tag in the HRE when the emperor is strong. They can let you avoid events/disasters like the Dutch Revolt
That all falls off in importance late game, but they can still be useful even if just for following along carpet sieging while you take the forts.
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Although your whining is lovely (god forbid there is a challenge and not an insta-win button, right?) I do agree that the Hegemony system seems tacked on without actually having really been thought out properly. I wished PDX wouldn't use MP as a benchmark to tweak EU4.
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We had this discussion months ago when the feature was announced. The requirements were less strict on announcement but the forum was in an uproar that it was only going to buff players. So they changed it from 500-600 regiments to 1000 for the mil one. That assures the AI will never get there on its own, even on VH unless they sit there unopposed for the entire game while picking offensive and quantity.
The stated goal was to speed up the end of WCs. It mostly achieves that goal. It could have been a useful and interesting feature. I would have liked to see whoever has the most of whichever category automatically get it. I know that I'm in the extreme minority. Also the dip penalty would ruin the AI in its current form.
To answer the question of 'how early can one get..?' you can probably do pre-1500 for the mil one using tricks. I did it in 1506 to show that it was possible with a less than ideal pick. You could do it naturally in the early 1500s, maybe 1510. The ships/econ one I'm not sure as they don't interest me at all or any of the other speed runners.
The stated goal was to speed up the end of WCs. It mostly achieves that goal. It could have been a useful and interesting feature. I would have liked to see whoever has the most of whichever category automatically get it. I know that I'm in the extreme minority. Also the dip penalty would ruin the AI in its current form.
To answer the question of 'how early can one get..?' you can probably do pre-1500 for the mil one using tricks. I did it in 1506 to show that it was possible with a less than ideal pick. You could do it naturally in the early 1500s, maybe 1510. The ships/econ one I'm not sure as they don't interest me at all or any of the other speed runners.
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In the original dev diary the naval one had a much greater requirement, 1000 heavies, while the army one was substantially lower at 500 infantry. So the Army one was more practical although a huge issue for any cavalry based tags (hordes and Poland) the naval one was completely absurd. Even now, you never have a reason to build 250 heavies but 1000 what possible incentive could anyone have to buil 1000 heavies?
The biggest change between the two dev diaries was in the rewards. In oarticular the direct military bonuses were nerfed to hell with more varied bonuses added. The military one had 20% merc morale,10% discipline and 30% manpower. Replaced with siege ability and reduced attrition. The naval one replaced 20% naval morale and 50% engagement width with 10% morale and artillerydamage on land. And Evonomic has 33% Merc discipline reduced to 10%
But there were also other changes such as adding a the CB against the hegemon
The biggest change between the two dev diaries was in the rewards. In oarticular the direct military bonuses were nerfed to hell with more varied bonuses added. The military one had 20% merc morale,10% discipline and 30% manpower. Replaced with siege ability and reduced attrition. The naval one replaced 20% naval morale and 50% engagement width with 10% morale and artillerydamage on land. And Evonomic has 33% Merc discipline reduced to 10%
But there were also other changes such as adding a the CB against the hegemon
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Again, the issue is the relative ease at which they can also be acquired in MP. "Paradox shouldn't balance anything around MP" is silly. The feature acts as a bonus for WC and it makes it balanced for late game MP.
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Late game WC, I prefer client states over regular vassals anyway. The only diplomacy you need in the last 100 years is the declare war button.
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Alright I'm back and we've done it. 1600 Eco Hegemon
No expansion west of Persia besides a couple of provinces in Aleppo, minimal expansion in SEA and a couple of provinces taken from Ming.
I'd just like to point out there were no cheats used, we were doing some testing around hitting 100k trade income by the end game, decided to break the ironman save(thinking we could reload off a backup) but then the game wouldn't allow any games to be used as Ironman, so the game is no longer ironman *facepalm*
Despite this being mid-game, people could still claim Hegemons are a late game feature making them irrelevant, since many players are done with their campaigns by this time, as it's a boring steamroll past here.
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Good lord... that is the result of the province number bloat. The game is totally imbalanced... I miss 1.0 map, despite all its imperfections.
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Alright I'm back and we've done it. 1600 Eco Hegemon
No expansion west of Persia besides a couple of provinces in Aleppo, minimal expansion in SEA and a couple of provinces taken from Ming.
I'd just like to point out there were no cheats used, we were doing some testing around hitting 100k trade income by the end game, decided to break the ironman save(thinking we could reload off a backup) but then the game wouldn't allow any games to be used as Ironman, so the game is no longer ironman *facepalm*
Despite this being mid-game, people could still claim Hegemons are a late game feature making them irrelevant, since many players are done with their campaigns by this time, as it's a boring steamroll past here.
Ming separatists must mean quite a bit east.
Took up loans to get manufactories quicker?
You said we. Was this a multiplayer games?
Took the Southern part of Ming, trying to get the mission reward "Open China" I think, to maximise profits and get Hegemon, we were a couple of provinces short but still took some of the land.
Yes, the first run ended up taking 123k worth of loans, building everything, and then still ended up making 600 PROFIT after paying a huge amount of interest, and slowly paying the loans off despite high inflation- loaning to get Eco Hegemon seemed worth it- plus we weren't continuing past this point because we just wanted to prove it was possible to hit eco hegemon at this time.
And by "We" I mean my cousin and myself, we live together and tend to try min-max the game and offer support and advice for games etc, so a joint effort. Primarily played by a single person though.
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Theres an even easiesr way to become a economic hegemon.
Note that when you demand money in a peace deal, that money is counted as part of your month's income and it lets you take economic hegemon. So if you demand 1k+ gold, you can instantly take economic hegemon for that month.
Whether or not you can grow the power after that month is another question, but you get to keep the hegemon status.
Note that when you demand money in a peace deal, that money is counted as part of your month's income and it lets you take economic hegemon. So if you demand 1k+ gold, you can instantly take economic hegemon for that month.
Whether or not you can grow the power after that month is another question, but you get to keep the hegemon status.
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The one thing that makes Hegemony not worth it, is even your vassals get a negative relations penalty. This makes it hard to integrate your vassals, or otherwise keep them happy. It is particularly annoying for junior partners because if your monarch dies when they negative relations you lose the PU.
If they would just fix this, it would be great.
If they would just fix this, it would be great.