I HATE EU4 !

[Zelius]

Wow! I can't believe the Total War hating that's going on here. It's like those haters have to shout out how super hyper much more better EU4 is in comparison to a strategic AAA game.

But to make some point here:

The Total War series is highly strategical but has its focus on fighting and not on makromanaging an empire. If you would compare the EU4 fighting system instead it is simply a joke compared to the depth of the Total War series. The series is only suffering a bad reputation because it has 2 major weakpoints:

1. Basically there is no limit for troops or armies so you can just win battles by dogpiling an enemy and push some automatic fight buttons.
2. Snowballing ruins the game because there is no game mechanic that's stopping you from doing it. (no AE, no overextension, basically no unrest)


In EU4 you win wars by using diplomacy, placing your troops and waiting for the right moment.
In Total War you win wars by troop placement and personally using your troops in real fights.

I have a few hundred hours in the Total War series games. The last one I even tried to play before an overhaul mod was mad was Rome 1. I tried it again in Rome 2, to my regret.
I'll just assume you aren't talking about vanilla, and are playing a significantly better version. Still, some issues can't be fixed:

- There is basically no strategy. You declare war on your neighbours one at a time and conquer the world.
- The AI is terrible. Once you declare war, good luck signing a meaningful peace. Either you destroy them completely / make them a Client State that is annoyingly useless, or on rare occasion have an actual ceasefire because you're fighting on too many fronts. Also, they will snipe any undefended town instead of engaging your armies, and then when you retake it everyone is super upset on how you conquered them. Yeaaaah.

- The Total War combat system is the actual joke. Start battle -> line up your men -> enemy charges all units into your center -> you flank with cavalry -> oh look, full envelopment with half the men. Slightly different with Napoleon / Empire because all your infantry are ranged units. Unless you give the AI stupid bonuses such that their militia are as good as your professional army units, you will easily be inflicting >3 to 1 losses on the enemy every battle.

The only way I'm finding to have fun is to use somewhat-historical battle tactics, and really I only enjoy seeing the men fighting in battle. There's no real depth, but it's entertaining to watch at least.

 

[IconOfEvi]

We need a lol button. Then again, this is likely a troll in which case 20/10 my good sir.

On the off chance you are not @Mateja , you talk of strategy games but I'm not sure you know the meaning of the word. You sound like you'd have trouble with Command & Conquer - Tiberian Dawn. What's that? Tiberian Dawn isn't an RTS? Okay, if you say so buddy.

 

[Slava Slavyanam]

the funniest part is that there's an event that gives you aragon for free

 

[grandad1982]

To be honest this is first time i am so frustrated and angry at some game that i have to express my frustration on game forum. I have never played game which is so bad. i Recently bought is on Steam discount and started playing right away.

Started with Castille because its friendly starting experience,and i allready played game tutorial. And allthough its easy beating Moors everything after that is unplayable.
I tried few times starting war with Aragon with my allies England and Portugal. Aragon allied with France and pope,and its over for me. After 3 new campaigns and 3 looses i tried something new. Quick Alliance with Navara to vasalize them ,soon they start war with Aragon i have to join,even France join us but 10 other countries join Aragon, including Portugal and we lost again.Its unwinable.

Game is so random and so stupid its unplayable.I played allmost all Total War games and it was really interesting because you can actually win and conquer things. This game is pure randomness. Maybe 1 in 100 games will go in my favor but i dont wanna play game like that. Even worse is man power which is like 0 after every war so you cant recruit new units.

Maybe for someone its interesting to wait 50 years for man power to replenish and start war again only to get owned by AI and do same thing all over again and but not for me especially if game last only till 1821.

All thing consider,im gonna stick to real stategy game like Total war games,where you can, like conquer things or win wars and not feel like game is punishing you for no reason. All in all, worst 20 hours i spent in any game

Ahahahaha. Nice one.

 

[aitaituo]

I know we're all laughing at the OP, but I have to admit when I bought EU3 Complete at a used games store I did pretty much the exact same thing. Picked Castille because it looked easy, smashed Granada, got creamed by Aragon/France. I quit and tried again as Hamburg because I thought being an OPM HRE minor would protect me and give me lots of small targets for expansion. Nope, nope, nope. I didn't end up trying it again for like two years.

Of course my reaction was less rage than this:

 

[Tacticus101]

The Total War series is highly strategical but has its focus on fighting and not on makromanaging an empire. If you would compare the EU4 fighting system instead it is simply a joke compared to the depth of the Total War series. .

Total war games are highly tactical, not highly strategic, they focus on fighting, battles and short term aims, the definition of tactical. Whilst there are plenty of strategic elements (some that work and some that don't), ultimately is has much more of a focus of the tactical side, even if it falls under the general category of "strategy games". Eu4 on the other hand is all about long term planning and strategy, hence why there are so many criticisms of the OPs complete failure to think strategically and his complaint that you are punished for conquering, he is attempting to claim that removing long term planning makes the game more strategic.

 

[TheDungen]

To be honest this is first time i am so frustrated and angry at some game that i have to express my frustration on game forum. I have never played game which is so bad. i Recently bought is on Steam discount and started playing right away.

Started with Castille because its friendly starting experience,and i allready played game tutorial. And allthough its easy beating Moors everything after that is unplayable.
I tried few times starting war with Aragon with my allies England and Portugal. Aragon allied with France and pope,and its over for me. After 3 new campaigns and 3 looses i tried something new. Quick Alliance with Navara to vasalize them ,soon they start war with Aragon i have to join,even France join us but 10 other countries join Aragon, including Portugal and we lost again.Its unwinable.

Game is so random and so stupid its unplayable.I played allmost all Total War games and it was really interesting because you can actually win and conquer things. This game is pure randomness. Maybe 1 in 100 games will go in my favor but i dont wanna play game like that. Even worse is man power which is like 0 after every war so you cant recruit new units.

Maybe for someone its interesting to wait 50 years for man power to replenish and start war again only to get owned by AI and do same thing all over again and but not for me especially if game last only till 1821.

All thing consider,im gonna stick to real stategy game like Total war games,where you can, like conquer things or win wars and not feel like game is punishing you for no reason. All in all, worst 20 hours i spent in any game

You are too impatient. This game is a lot more realistic than the total war games, if you go on the offensive without being ready then you'll lose to even a pretty minor power. The game lasts for almost 400 years day per day, you have plenty of time, don't rush it. What did you think you could conquer the world the first time you tried it. Iäve played a dozen games to the end I still donät tink I could do a world conquest, then again it's not really my style so...
Also watch out for france, they're really nasty, as castile the trick to beating france is colonies, they can generate stupendous amounts of wealth for you and wealth means mercs, mercs in turn means troops that can die without costing you manpower, doesn't matter if france wins every battle if they run out of manpower before you do.
Also don't be afraid of going into debt, in all my playthroughs I've never managed to go bankrupt.

 

[EU3NOOB]

Maybe for someone its interesting to wait 50 years for man power to replenish

It takes 10 years to recover manpower, bro.

 

[Thrake]

Game is so random and so stupid its unplayable.I played allmost all Total War games and it was really interesting because you can actually win and conquer things. This game is pure randomness. Maybe 1 in 100 games will go in my favor but i dont wanna play game like that. Even worse is man power which is like 0 after every war so you cant recruit new units.

When you say almost all total wars, you mean those totally not random games where the AI DOWs you the moment you get a border with them? And rewarding, like how the ennemy general charges at you at the start of the battle (and engages your troops alone, because horses), dies and then his army roots immediately thereafter and then the AI keeps throwing counless leaderless farmer armies at your heavy cav army?

Yeah, that's fitting...

 

[Magnus Imperator Rex]

hahaha this thread gave me a chuckle. aayy

but for real, as a hardcore HOI3 player who has recently tried to play EU4 (15+ hours), I can totally feel the OP's frustration. Im used to a faster game such as Hearts of Iron but EU4 was just too damn slow to my liking. My wars were stupid, my manpower was always low, I always went very close on overextension. Then again, I never played past 1500. I basically wanted to conquer Europe in 10 years as HOI has taught me very well all this time

I will try out EU 5 though

 

[Pigeoncount]

I know we're all laughing at the OP, but I have to admit when I bought EU3 Complete at a used games store I did pretty much the exact same thing. Picked Castille because it looked easy, smashed Granada, got creamed by Aragon/France. I quit and tried again as Hamburg because I thought being an OPM HRE minor would protect me and give me lots of small targets for expansion. Nope, nope, nope. I didn't end up trying it again for like two years.

Of course my reaction was less rage than this:

This has always been my experience with Paradox games. Except Crusader Kings II, oddly, I figured that out pretty much overnight somehow. I remember trying out Victoria II for the first time, and always choosing Ethiopia as my starting nation. I never could figure out why all of my POP would revolt EVERY day, why Egypt and Great Britain were so good at invading me with much larger armies, or how anything worked at all. I then tried Texas, and was really confused why my game ended automatically after the USA helped me.

My first EU4 game was also Castile, and I was also destroyed by Aragon and France while I learned the game. To be fair, the Castile start is a rather unfortunate one if you don't know what you're doing, just so much can go wrong, and you get so many negative events and rulers all in a role.

My next game was the Ottomans, some of the most fun I ever had, now that I understood the mistakes I made with Castile, I could apply that to a stronger starting nation, and enjoy the game properly.

 

[gamert71]

"After 3 new campaigns and 3 looses i tried something new. Quick Alliance with Navara to vasalize them ,soon they start war with Aragon i have to join,even France join us but 10 other countries join Aragon, including Portugal and we lost again.Its unwinable."

I seriously do not mean to offend, as I am not the best player. However I've been playing paradox games for 3 years in total now, and honestly you can not just jump right in and expect to become a god. This is literally a learn to play issue. As castille you get an event to PU Aragon; you also know that Aragon will win said war. So what's the harm in just waiting till the event to PU them and get Navarra later? Furthermore, it's hardly unwinable. As Castille you've two major issues: England and Portugal.

You should be able to ally with France asap. And so long as you maintain relations not much should go sour... Unless you take a province apart of the French Culture group. Then you can do reconquistda and so forth..

"Game is so random and so stupid its unplayable.I played allmost all Total War games and it was really interesting because you can actually win and conquer things. This game is pure randomness. Maybe 1 in 100 games will go in my favor but i dont wanna play game like that. Even worse is man power which is like 0 after every war so you cant recruit new units."
Eu4 isn't total war. In total war you're limited to certain nations on a small timescale. Eu4 is about managing nations and bringing them to world powers/super powers by the age of enlightenment. Total war is literally just that; and due to battles being simulated the experience doesn't carry over.

As far as RNG Goes: I've played 2 campaigns this month. One as England and one as Ulm. Both in ironman mode. The RNG has not really screwed me over at all. And a skilled player can take a nation far pretty easily with a well defined strategy.

"Maybe for someone its interesting to wait 50 years for man power to replenish and start war again only to get own"ed by AI and do same thing all over again and but not for me especially if game last only till 1821"

You can start a war every 5-10 years without getting your neighbors pissed (or you can go on a spree and then wait for AE to cooldown). Manpower shouldn't take you that long to recover. And to be honest, it makes sense for the manpower mechanic anyways. Otherwise tiny trade nations would become unstoppable due to income (see: total war).

"All thing consider,im gonna stick to real stategy game like Total war games,where you can, like conquer things or win wars and not feel like game is punishing you for no reason. All in all, worst 20 hours i spent in any game"

Total war is turn based/rtt not rts. You just are new. Which is fine. But before you throw the game under the bus why not at least try to learn its mechanics first?

 

[spinoza013]

Toys out the pram rant

git gud?

 

[TheDungen]

When you say almost all total wars, you mean those totally not random games where the AI DOWs you the moment you get a border with them? And rewarding, like how the ennemy general charges at you at the start of the battle (and engages your troops alone, because horses), dies and then his army roots immediately thereafter and then the AI keeps throwing counless leaderless farmer armies at your heavy cav army?

Yeah, that's fitting...

Agincourt