I don't understand the attitude of this forum

[celethiel]

It is very much "like" mana of other games... such as the one this avatar is from...whether it "is" or "is not" mana, is not a debate that i'd enter into.... however the Rate of these various types of points seems... strange, you use a lot more Administrative points than you do Diplo, and More of either one than you actually use of Military...

I can't speak for Wiz, but I find it a tedious meme as well.

Combine that with the fact that more than 90% of posts talking about mana are not in any way constructive criticism about the game, and I tend to just ignore posts that talk about mana instead of MP.

 

[Yevheniya]

Personally, I think Wiz and the team are doing a fantastic job, and I'm not just saying that because they're paying me to.

 

[RobRoy3]

I can't speak for Wiz, but I find it a tedious meme as well.

Sorry if you or Wiz perceive it as a "meme", tiresome or otherwise. To me it's just much quicker, clearer, even more descriptive to use the term mana. MP also refers to manpower or multi-player. In other games, it also has meanings (like movement points, movement path, etc). Can also have meaning in certain chat environments.

Combine that with the fact that more than 90% of posts talking about mana are not in any way constructive criticism about the game, and I tend to just ignore posts that talk about mana instead of MP.

Ignoring criticism, constructive or otherwise, isn't a new phenomena, nor is it restricted to you or Paradox. Generally unwise, though.

 

[TheAtreides84]

Sorry to both double-post and going slightly off-topic, just have thought of something interesting: another good middle-ground game is Civilization series. Its rules are even less realistic and more arbitrary (buying units with religion points! mining cows for food! archers having longer range than tanks!). Yet, people really enjoy these games. Moreover, they pay attention to the "historical" layer of the game: there was a long, epic, and eventually victorious battle fought by my fellow countrymen to add Polish civilization to the game.

So no, you don't only need either chess or painful realism. There is much desire for some in-between approach, and Paradox have decided to fill this particular niche, whether we like it or not. They will continue to make games with some arbitrary mechanics and some evil randomness - and hope that people will buy them. I personally very much like monarch points and random heir stats, though it sometimes makes me mad, and sometimes forces a rage-restart.

You have every right to disagree and express your own needs, as have I. But we are both likely to be overrun by the silent majority of customers.

I would argue that Civilization is a totally arbitrary game. Not abstract like chess, but just as arbitrary. Having, say, a race wonder mechanic is like having a checkmate mechanic. It doesn't make any remote sense from a realistic point of view, it's just a gameplay convention. Concepts, both in chess and in Civ, are realistic, but their application is not. It's not just a matter of loosely resembling history: after all wonders and towers are real life things. But towers don't move in beelines and great monuments aren't protected by copyright. But you know, when I play Civ I know I'm playing a computerized boardgame, not a simulation. Imagine how you would feel if in a serious wargame you were allowed to change your roman equites into medieval lance knights by researching just a tech, without any progress in tactics and organization: that would be really odd. EUIV has lots of realistic concepts or abstraction, but some of them don't work in a historic way. So you're left wondering if you should play by the rules or by realism. This is what I find jarring.

 

[Jamey]

Sorry if you or Wiz perceive it as a "meme", tiresome or otherwise. To me it's just much quicker, clearer, even more descriptive to use the term mana. MP also refers to manpower or multi-player. In other games, it also has meanings (like movement points, movement path, etc). Can also have meaning in certain chat environments.

Ignoring criticism, constructive or otherwise, isn't a new phenomena, nor is it restricted to you or Paradox. Generally unwise, though.

It's a tiresome meme. It's not quicker, clearer, or more descriptive to say "bird mana" than to say DIP. All it does is confuse newcomers.

 

[RobRoy3]

It's a tiresome meme. It's not quicker, clearer, or more descriptive to say "bird mana" than to say DIP. All it does is confuse newcomers.

OK, so now it's DIP you prefer me to use, a term which can also refer to an Idea Group, a set of Idea Groups, one of the three Monarch statistics, a map mode, a fairly significant UI, and a multitude of player actions.

Again, sorry if it offends you. But one can always find something offensive if one looks hard enough. I am pretty confident that nobody is actually trying to offend you, or Wiz. And I guess I have a bit more faith in newcomers' ability to catch on.

 

[Jamey]

OK, so now it's DIP you prefer me to use, a term which can also refer to an Idea Group, a set of Idea Groups, one of the three Monarch statistics, a map mode, a fairly significant UI, and a multitude of player actions.

Again, sorry if it offends you. But one can always find something offensive if one looks hard enough. I am pretty confident that nobody is actually trying to offend you, or Wiz. And I guess I have a bit more faith in newcomers' ability to catch on.

Tiresome and offensive are not actually synonyms. Tiresome involves tediousness, not offensiveness.

 

[RobRoy3]

Tiresome and offensive are not actually synonyms. Tiresome involves tediousness, not offensiveness.

My apologies. I assumed you were speaking euphemistically, since it bothered you enough to object to its usage, multiple times.

I submit that there are merely words. These words happen to resonate fairly well with a large number of the community, for fairly obvious reasons. Should they stop resonating or become less clear or less useful, people will stop using them.

If they don't really bother you or offend you, but merely make you sleepy, sounds like everyone can feel free to continue using them and help ensure you'll get a good night's sleep.

 

[208]

No, it wouldn't be easier or harder. It would simply be faster.

Managing alliances, income, and manpower in the course of conducting wars is the challenge the game provides.

No, it wouldn't become any easier. [...] By changing coring cost, you didn't change how wars are fought, or the difficulty of them, you changed how frequently they are fought.

Game time is also a resource whose scarcity needs to be managed. You have slightly less than 400 game years to achieve what you want to achieve.

 

[Reverend Belial]

'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?

It's really not an abstraction though. Abstractions do not have names and stats. And even if it were, and it referred to a military chain of command than it is still absurd how limited it is. The game states explicitly that armies without a leader function in a far inferior manner than led armies do. To use your example, can you imagine the British Empire only providing a single army a chain of command and leaving all their other ones as just disorganized rabbles? No. The limit, cost, and risk are purely arbitrary no matter if it's an abstract concept or not. Even again if it were a representation of an organized chain of command, to say that you must choose between officers and technological advancement is still absurd.

And no, spending 1 MP a month to contract someone for five years would be nothing more than a more stupid and ridiculous version of what already exists. If the constant drain were not a hindrance to the game then people wouldn't have this kind of argument to begin with. Generals should never provide a hindrance to technology, except possibly in an occasional event where some backwoods idiot whines that the new advancement is unnecessary because what worked for his father worked for him (which is a real event, but happens on a more broad sense rather than someone specific saying it). Never once in history have people had to choose between advancement and leadership. These things go hand-in-hand, and to not reflect that in the game is ridiculous.

 

[grommile]

OK, so now it's DIP you prefer me to use, a term which can also refer to an Idea Group, a set of Idea Groups, one of the three Monarch statistics, a map mode, a fairly significant UI, and a multitude of player actions.

I have never seen anyone use "DIP" (all caps) to refer to anything except monarch power, the monarch statistic that drives that flavour of monarch power, and the family of idea groups that draw on that flavour of monarch power. Furthermore, I have never seen it used in a way that makes it unclear which of those things it's referring to.

 

[hypaspist]

you cant satisfy the pleb who have no idea what realism is (realism in games)









they actually think eu4 can simulate realistically real world. hahahaha. just dont bother with them, let them woof woof

 

[sub-woofer]

I would argue that Civilization is a totally arbitrary game. Not abstract like chess, but just as arbitrary. Having, say, a race wonder mechanic is like having a checkmate mechanic. It doesn't make any remote sense from a realistic point of view, it's just a gameplay convention. Concepts, both in chess and in Civ, are realistic, but their application is not. It's not just a matter of loosely resembling history: after all wonders and towers are real life things. But towers don't move in beelines and great monuments aren't protected by copyright. But you know, when I play Civ I know I'm playing a computerized boardgame, not a simulation. Imagine how you would feel if in a serious wargame you were allowed to change your roman equites into medieval lance knights by researching just a tech, without any progress in tactics and organization: that would be really odd. EUIV has lots of realistic concepts or abstraction, but some of them don't work in a historic way. So you're left wondering if you should play by the rules or by realism. This is what I find jarring.

Right, I think I see what you mean. I'm not bothered by this mix, though. I'd argue that you can't go fully realistic and still make a playable game.

 

[Wizzington]

Mana really is just a very worn out meme. If someone referenced Ulm in every other post I'd be thoroughly sick of that meme as well. I generally just give posts talking about mana a pass, because tired memes and worthwhile reading are rarely found in the same place.

 

[happymix91]

How can a person who can't even know what monarch point, which is one of the most important features in EU4, means and call it a mana say something meaningful for the game?

 

[YuriiH]

It's really not an abstraction though. Abstractions do not have names and stats.

LOL; well, with your words, if it is not an abstraction, then it is something real, isn't it?
Or from the backwards: do YOU (who are definitely real) have stats, similar to those of 'military leaders'? Which are YOUR sige level, shock, fire, maneuver? Or you have Administrative, Diplomatic and Military Powers, don't you?
Oh, yeah! I know! These are only real generals who have those stats of fire/shock/manuever/siege!
/s off

 

[fabbyrob]

While technically true, electing has a ton of problems of its own relating to drop of "legitimacy" and bad events. you also need to re elect a 60 year old guy (usually) at least 3 times for him to enter the "above average" territory.

Simply because of his age this will be rare. Combine that with the fact that you can't always do it because your republican mana drops way too much and you get an average of shit monarchs way above monarchies.

1) The age depends on the kind of republic you are.
2) You should wait for a younger guy before you re-elect him, that's the same reason that we wouldn't elect a 95 year old as president in the US today.
3) You actually only need to re-elect once to get an average ruler (2/2/5 = 9 points!), so anything else is gravy

Plus if you intentionally drop your 6/6/6 into a dictatorship you can sail on one leader who is above average for 30-40 years easily.

 

[Mudcrab]

Burn Jita.

 

[keynes2.0]

Mana really is just a very worn out meme. If someone referenced Ulm in every other post I'd be thoroughly sick of that meme as well. I generally just give posts talking about mana a pass, because tired memes and worthwhile reading are rarely found in the same place.

It gets referenced because it's represents a complain that has existed since like a week after the game came out that the devs have steadfastly ignored. If you want the meme to go away, do something about the complaint.

 

[TheChronoMaster]

It gets referenced because it's represents a complain that has existed since like a week after the game came out that the devs have steadfastly ignored. If you want the meme to go away, do something about the complaint.

The complaint is about a core tenant of the game's entire design, there is nothing that can be done but to redesign the entire game from the ground up, which is a ridiculous proposition for anythiing not named "EUV"