I don't understand the attitude of this forum

[overthewall]

Above all most troubling is the attitude towards the developers. I don't think there is anyone else who supports or listens their customers like pds. Of course pds does not do this out of kindness only, but still downright insulting the developers for some minor stuff is totally unfair. I wouldn't even check the forum with such harsh/idiotic/nonconstructive comments if I was a pds member.

 

[JagLover]

I think one issue is touched upon in the opening post.

People enjoy starting as smaller nations and making them big.

If coring and diplo annex costs are too high there can be very little to do in the first few decades of the game while you wait to unlock the first idea group. Even a modest conquest could have the same admin point cost as a tech upgrade.

Muscovy is counted as a large nation in your post, but it doesn’t actually start as one. It needs to rapidly consolidate the Russian lands (by 1500 at the very latest) in order to be able to take on the PLC (if it forms). Massive coring costs (with a paltry 10% claim discount and bearing in mind you won’t have unlocked the reduced coring costs in those early decades) and high diplo-annex costs act against the only sensible game strategy (try going tall as Muscovy).

I can understand the wish to avoid thoughtless blobbing. But it should be possible to form countries. Game mechanics to achieve this such as coring discounts with claim + same culture could have easily been brought into 1.12.

I don’t think the penalties to expansion to the small that need to become big were fully thought through. Which is why in many people’s play through’s Muscovy usually doesn’t get big.

 

[JagLover]

I hope you can fix this just as you've fixed superfluous resources from previous versions. Such as prestige, army tradition, garrison growth, reduced revolt risk, etc. In the past most of those were maxed out by the time you were a medium size country or were totally useless for 90% of campaigns.

Oh army tradition has been fixed allright.

After 50 years of near constant warfare as Oirat including twice wiping out Ming's armies in numerous battles I had army tradition below 20.

 

[Phibs]

Oh army tradition has been fixed allright.

After 50 years of near constant warfare as Oirat including twice wiping out Ming's armies in numerous battles I had army tradition below 20.

I notice the same. It may be fixed by tomorrow (1.13).

- Increased army tradition gain from sieges.
- You now get army tradition for each fully maintained non-obsolete fort, up to a maximum of +1. The amount you get depends on how many forts you have compared to your total development level.

 

[artemis667]

Wouldn't mind seeing army tradition from combat become meaningful again.

 

[RobRoy3]

Under the assumption that you're talking about the 50% block:
1) It was commented on when the change was made, that it was primarily about stacking MIL ideas (both in SP and MP)....

Are you still trying to assert that the 50% change addressed some perceived problem with stacking Military Idea Groups, in Single Player, too? If so, it makes your response to that issue seem disingenuous.

There are, undoubtedly people who used to enjoy playing SP that way, but it is simply not required, not particularly helpful, clearly not optimal, and certainly not imbalanced or overpowered. There are also (more) people who enjoyed playing certain starts by stacking Admin or Dip Idea Groups. But the vast majority of people wouldn't, unless they were role-playing, for the simple reason that optimal play already led one to alternating Idea Groups (in SP). The fact that people no longer have access to the alternative paths, though, diminishes their options, needlessly.

While you can make a (debatable) case that stacking Military Idea Groups was (is?) problematic in MP, you can't make a credible case in SP. As someone once said:

just because you imagine something in your mind does not mean it automatically becomes reality...

 

[grommile]

While you can make a (debatable) case that stacking Military Idea Groups was (is?) problematic in MP, you can't make a credible case in SP. As someone once said:

The only reason it isn't (or at least, might not be) a problem in SP is that the bots are incompetent.

 

[maquis196]

Well to help balance all the negativity, I've always enjoyed this game since day 1 release and I'm eternally thankful for the Linux support. Now to WC as Norway and my life will be complete (who cares about job, kids and wealth)

So yeah, thanks Wiz and co.

 

[LastSalian]

It's confusing to me. On the one hand, you seem to enjoy difficulty, to thrive on it even. Your favorite nations are Byzantium, Albania, Yaroslavl and Tabarestan. You ridicule people who choose to play Castile over Navarra, Austria over Nassau, or Muscovy over Tver. I see replies on a regular basis along the lines of "why bother playing a nation where you've won the game from day 1" in response to people playing a game as France, or England. And yet, despite all this thriving on difficulty, almost seeming to enjoy when the game is as hard as possible...

You complain when Paradox makes the game harder. You cry out in sorrow when doing a one-tag WC as Muisca doesn't seem possible anymore. You yell when they make expansion more difficult, despite seeking out the most difficult nations to expand with in the first place. I quite honestly don't get it. Do you want the game to be difficult or not?

Well it makes sense from every point of view. I'm surprised you are confused.

People liked a one-tag Muisca, because it was extremely difficult BUT doable. Now it is impossible or near to impossible, NOT because of the difficulty, which is still the same, BUT because an artificial and impassable barrier called increased coring and diploannexation costs.

France, Castile, Ottomans, Austria and England are still as easier as before. Nothing has changes on that. There are even people that already got a one-tag Ottomans. You would be delusional to say otherwise. Try it by yourself and really tell me if it is more difficulty as before. I doubt you will say so.

To put an example for you and everyone still "confused", this is like in chess, to avoid 2-move and alike checkmates, you would create an rule that your king is immune during the first 100 moves to balance the game towards a precarious AI. Notice how that game becomes more tedious and last longer, BUT the difficulty remains the same.

Hope this solves your confusion.

 

[doktorstick]

This thread is full of strawman arguments, from both sides of the coring cost camp and from players and developers.

 

[grisamentum]

I'm not offended by tired memes, they're just tired memes.

Despite being a meme, it's hard not to notice why it's popular - it's because it's rather true.

That's precisely what I was going to say. Wiz might critique it for being a mere "meme" but it only became popular because it has real salience. It is a powerful implicit critique of monarch points. Instead of writing a 500-word paragraph explaining why monarch points are a bad concept because they are too streamlined/too ubiquitous as a resource/too arbitrary/etc., the reviewer called (jokingly) monarch points "mana" because they fulfill the same mechanical role mana does in a fantasy game: a universal resource required for many/most important game actions, in arbitrary amounts.

 

[grisamentum]

Well to help balance all the negativity, I've always enjoyed this game since day 1 release and I'm eternally thankful for the Linux support. Now to WC as Norway and my life will be complete (who cares about job, kids and wealth)

So yeah, thanks Wiz and co.

I never understood posts like this. Why do you think you should "balance negativity"? If someone has a problem or opinion let them discuss it. If you have something to contribute on the particular point then say it. But if you just feel like something you like is being attacked and you don't like that, you don't have a reason to post.

 

[maquis196]

I never understood posts like this. Why do you think you should "balance negativity"? If someone has a problem or opinion let them discuss it. If you have something to contribute on the particular point then say it. But if you just feel like something you like is being attacked and you don't like that, you don't have a reason to post.

It's more the fact that people with an issue shout loudest, that's why negative reviews on stuff have to be taken with a pinch of salt sometimes, those that are happy don't feel the need to write about it, after reading this thread I wanted to point out what I said, that's all. I'm sure Wiz doesn't need my msg, the statistics and surveys seem to tell them everything they need to know, but still. The Linux support is something I'm extremely happy about and without it I might never had played the game. So lets grab some popcorn and watch everyone else rip into a game they profess to not wanting to play anymore, whilst spending time in it's forum talking about it.

 

[doktorstick]

You complain when Paradox makes the game harder.

Is it though, or is it simply more tedious? Anything that makes the game harder for the player arguably makes it even harder for the AI (assuming no cheating). This, in turn, actually makes the game easier for the player.

Players will snipe cheap provinces to fracture a country, splitting it in half w/ no military access. The AI will not; it'll take one highly developed province and burn its MP. The AI won't grab an un-corable provinces so it can fabricate before feeding to a vassal (which 1.13 removes, IIRC). The player will.

 

[doktorstick]

It's more the fact that people with zealotry shout loudest, that's why positive reviews on stuff have to be taken with a pinch of salt sometimes...

Fixed that there for ya!

 

[Rain Envy]

I've came here to say that the game is good and I'm okay with Paradox robbing me of my money. It only gets better and better. I'm glad they don't make a game then go on to the next... Every expansion has been pretty much quality service. (Conquest of Paradise was a bit rigid though...). The only thing I miss from eu3 was the ability for small nations to tech faster especially if they focused on trade. Perhaps we can do that again, or make money the source of how quick you can tech vs size again. We have so many options to use our monarch points now (development) that this approach might be possible now.

 

[LastSalian]

You're confusing difficulty with speed.

Imagine you're on a road trip, sightseeing from point A to point B, but once you get about 100 miles away from point B you're in your hometown with nothing unfamiliar to check out and you just get bored and finish things up.

A more difficult nation starts at a further point A. There's more to see and more to do because you have further to go.

Paradox nerfing expansion again and again and again? That's not increasing the distance of the trip, it's setting your car to go half the speed limit.

The game would not provide twice the fun if it took twice as long to play. Nerfs to conquest don't add peacetime gameplay.

This is exactly what is happening in the game nowadays. Truly the game is not more difficult, it just more tedious.

In 1.12 frequently you have to fast-forward til you have enough ADM or DIP points to up tech, get ideas, be able to diploannex your vassals or PUs and core your conquered provinces.

Indeed you have to wait 200% more, but it's still the same difficulty.

And agree about the fun. The game is currently a pain in the ass unless you play MP. A comprehensive overhaul would have included more stuff to do in peace time. However, that's far from a reality in 1.12.

If developers have statistics about this, I'm sure nowadays a lot more people than before fast forward the game at +5 speed. I would call that fiasco from a game design perspective.

 

[YuriiH]

Well, we research new guns or we can hire a guy to lead our troops?

'a guy to lead our troops' is an abstraction that implies your military command level (which in real world would consist of hundreds and thousands of officers, colonels and generals), and not one damn person. Can you imagine Great British Empire of the early 19th who has only 4 generals, is it even possible? And, by the way, it is the reason why you may 'teleport' your commanders in three clicks.
So, your statement transforms into “Well, we research new guns or we can improve our military command”, which is much closer to the real life affairs.

With our attention to individual persons in a game, most of the gameplayers forget that all of the game individuals are abstractions or models or simulations used to simplify the complex systems of warfare / trade / science / taxation / collonizing / diplomatics / exploration.
Personalisation of a complex system does not diminish the influence of a leader of a system, as well as its high / middle / lower elements.
It's like arguing about foreign policies: saying Chinese / Baguettes / Americans / Russians / IGIL / Brazilians etc.—we personalise a whole country consisting of several millions of people with various thoughts and desires.
Indeed, it is possible to make more detailed model of the world into the game, but I'm sure most of the people here won't even touch such game due to overcomplexity.
For the game, personalisation is constrained; for real life, it is stupid. Mixing personalisation of the game and that of the real life is like running in the Special Olympics

One more, would it be better to spend 1 MilPower a month to maintain a general on a contract of 5 years?

 

[Jomini]

So if we removed AE and made coring free and instant, the game wouldn't become easier? That's a silly and far too narrow definition of difficulty. If anything, difficulty in games is precisely about the time it takes to do things - Dark Souls is difficult because you have to spend a large amount of time learning and dying to complete its encounters.

But that critique goes both ways. If we made offensive territorial gains impossible (say with +500 AE), the game would become manifestly easier. Just ignore all the ideas that give bonuses to offensive military, coring costs, AE reduction, etc. and maximize diplomatic expansion.

Real difficulty is how many non-trivial decisions you face in a given period. The problem with just raising costs is that at some point it creates hard rate limiting variables - so you either need to do everything to minimize that particularly variable or ignore that mechanism entirely.

The other big problem with "just make the game longer" is that the AI is terrible at dealing with it so I get a much faster relative growth rate. Sure you might drop my expansion rate 30 or 40% with coring or AE, but the AIs drops 50 or 60%. So far the game has gotten far easier for me with the higher costs. France either gets destroyed or remains static. Spain, the PLC, and the Ottos tend to be the last AIs standing and I think that is in large part because these have the easiest shot at expanding for cheap. Yeah, I might get an extra decade or two going from Tver to Russia, but I lose several decades from when I beat the PLC to I can beat the rest of Europe united. The timeframe where I have to be careful and really strategic (rather than just optimizing expansion around simple things like minimizing manpower burn or rebel shennanigans) appears to have contracted of late. There just aren't that many AIs that can present a credible mid-game opponent anymore.

 

[Cryoshakespeare]

Personally, I just love how Wiz referenced Dark Souls for difficulty on the first page of this topic. That's an awesome example to take from.

Wiz, you really seem to know how to handle a community, or at least, how to separate the useful stuff from the whining.