I have put over 500 hours into EUIV. While that may pale compared to some players, that is a lot for me. Most games I play are lucky to receive 50 hours of my time. I believe it is time for Paradox to kill EUIV and move on to EUV.
I have seen some make the argument before "would you rather have pay $15 for new DLC or $60 for a new iteration?" Honestly, I would rather pay $60 for a new iteration so long as it's actually new and fresh. Really, the current EUIV is almost unrecognizable compared to the original vanilla version. In a sense, have we already received EUV if you have downloaded the latest patch and added all the DLCs? The answer could be argued as yes. But other than The Art of War, not a single DLC I have purchased (I've bought probably 2/3 of them) has been worth the money. Even at discounted prices. I recently added The Conquest of Paradise when it was on sale, but realized even that was a waste because most of the features were added as parts of other DLCs.
The corruption mechanic is something so radical that maybe it would have been alright in a new iteration, but not as an update to an older game. I honestly have not updated EUIV and probably will not. What makes this game fun for the vast majority of people is expansion. Every time I play, I make it my goal to make a larger empire than before. I've never done World Conquest nor have I ever unlocked the 1,000 province achievement. Those are not my goals and they require too much micromanagement for my play style. But with my playstyle, I do like to try different nations and see what I can do. I've "blobbed" with at least Scotland, England, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Bavaria. I've tried doing it with Brittany which ended in utter failure as I did not have the patience to let AE decline enough. My latest attempt has been with Serbia, but that game is early. For me, that doesn't make it any less fun to start up a new game and see what I can do with a new starting position. That is why I decided to try Serbia. I rarely get the chance to do much damage to the Ottomans and that is the perfect position for Eastern expansion. Often times, the best part of the game is when the end date is upcoming. My last game and my only run as England, I had just lost my last alliance and still had a semi-strong Commonwealth and Ottomans to deal with. Sure I was going to defeat them, but for me, it was still fun.
Now, a continue button has been added for non-ironman games and I am unsure if it is also offered for ironman games (which would cause them to turn into a standard save), but that still doesn't help with the earlier part of the game. Apparently, corruption gets far worse when your technological levels get staggered. Most people use tons of ADM and DIP points on expansion since you are either always coring provinces or annexing vassals. That causes the MIL tech to be far ahead. But that is more of an issue with how the game was made using "mana" for every aspect of the game. It's not the players fault that "mana" became the core to every last thing in this game. That was a decision Paradox made for this particular version of Europa Universalis. Maybe that is why EUIV should be killed and the system replaced in EUV? This is almost a way to force players to build "tall" rather than "wide." I personally have no interest in ever building tall and in my last two playthroughs, I did not build up a single province. If we are going to have the choice between tall or wide, then at least allow the choice to remain in the players hands.
It's a shame, because I think early on in the development cycle, EUIV was headed in the right direction. One of the best changes ever was the present rebel mechanic. The old random system was beyond annoying, though for those saying the game is too easy now, the old system probably provided more of a challenge as it required you to leave full armies in the rear to quell rebellions that could form anywhere. The new system, on the other hand, provides options to prevent rebels and gives you an idea where they will form. But it seems everything since then has been lumpy fluff. Imagine you have a pillow that just doesn't quite have enough cotton in it. The solution is to add more in order to provide your neck and head with more support. But instead of adding cotton, you add bouncing balls making it very lumpy. Sure the pillow now has more support, but a whole new set of problems has arisen. Or you could say it's like trying to force pieces of a puzzle to fit when they just are not the right spot. It simply ruins it.
I am not sure how the sailors mechanic is working, other than a thread where I read it hurts mothballing due to wasting sailor manpower. But is that something anyone on these forums actually asked for? Did anyone ever really say "hey, I know! We need sailor manpower to build our navies with!" I think more people preferred, instead, new naval combat mechanics and an AI that didn't often allow their ships to be annihilated before retreating (though that has been mostly fixed in recent patches).
Speaking of AI, that is where the real improvements need to be to make this game more challenging again. Because as someone else said, the game is not more challenging now, it's simply slower. But if the AI were a little more intelligent, the game would be hard. How many times have you been in the middle of a battle, and this works both ways, with huge stacks. And what do you see? An AI army that could totally change the tide of the battle (and often times that one battle can mean the war), but they sit there for one of three reasons. Either a) they are besieging a province and some progress has been made (in this case, I detach a single unit to maintain progress and send the rest to battle), b) they are an unhappy vassal and don't want to help... even if the battle is right next to their provinces which are likely to come under siege if the battle is lost, or c) God only knows.
I would actually prefer the game to be less focused on sieges and more focused on battled. In other words, battles should be more decisive. If both sides have 90% of their forces engaged in combat, then the loser should be put at a severe disadvantage. This would do two things. 1) It would cause players to think more strategically before engaging in battles. 2) It would make forts more useful because if your army is not powerful enough to win the battle yet, you can hide behind forts until hopefully it is. Unfortunately, this would require a more intelligent AI to implement.
Anyways, I apologize for the long rant and thanks for reading. But I just feel it's time to move on from this game and start over.
I have seen some make the argument before "would you rather have pay $15 for new DLC or $60 for a new iteration?" Honestly, I would rather pay $60 for a new iteration so long as it's actually new and fresh. Really, the current EUIV is almost unrecognizable compared to the original vanilla version. In a sense, have we already received EUV if you have downloaded the latest patch and added all the DLCs? The answer could be argued as yes. But other than The Art of War, not a single DLC I have purchased (I've bought probably 2/3 of them) has been worth the money. Even at discounted prices. I recently added The Conquest of Paradise when it was on sale, but realized even that was a waste because most of the features were added as parts of other DLCs.
The corruption mechanic is something so radical that maybe it would have been alright in a new iteration, but not as an update to an older game. I honestly have not updated EUIV and probably will not. What makes this game fun for the vast majority of people is expansion. Every time I play, I make it my goal to make a larger empire than before. I've never done World Conquest nor have I ever unlocked the 1,000 province achievement. Those are not my goals and they require too much micromanagement for my play style. But with my playstyle, I do like to try different nations and see what I can do. I've "blobbed" with at least Scotland, England, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Bavaria. I've tried doing it with Brittany which ended in utter failure as I did not have the patience to let AE decline enough. My latest attempt has been with Serbia, but that game is early. For me, that doesn't make it any less fun to start up a new game and see what I can do with a new starting position. That is why I decided to try Serbia. I rarely get the chance to do much damage to the Ottomans and that is the perfect position for Eastern expansion. Often times, the best part of the game is when the end date is upcoming. My last game and my only run as England, I had just lost my last alliance and still had a semi-strong Commonwealth and Ottomans to deal with. Sure I was going to defeat them, but for me, it was still fun.
Now, a continue button has been added for non-ironman games and I am unsure if it is also offered for ironman games (which would cause them to turn into a standard save), but that still doesn't help with the earlier part of the game. Apparently, corruption gets far worse when your technological levels get staggered. Most people use tons of ADM and DIP points on expansion since you are either always coring provinces or annexing vassals. That causes the MIL tech to be far ahead. But that is more of an issue with how the game was made using "mana" for every aspect of the game. It's not the players fault that "mana" became the core to every last thing in this game. That was a decision Paradox made for this particular version of Europa Universalis. Maybe that is why EUIV should be killed and the system replaced in EUV? This is almost a way to force players to build "tall" rather than "wide." I personally have no interest in ever building tall and in my last two playthroughs, I did not build up a single province. If we are going to have the choice between tall or wide, then at least allow the choice to remain in the players hands.
It's a shame, because I think early on in the development cycle, EUIV was headed in the right direction. One of the best changes ever was the present rebel mechanic. The old random system was beyond annoying, though for those saying the game is too easy now, the old system probably provided more of a challenge as it required you to leave full armies in the rear to quell rebellions that could form anywhere. The new system, on the other hand, provides options to prevent rebels and gives you an idea where they will form. But it seems everything since then has been lumpy fluff. Imagine you have a pillow that just doesn't quite have enough cotton in it. The solution is to add more in order to provide your neck and head with more support. But instead of adding cotton, you add bouncing balls making it very lumpy. Sure the pillow now has more support, but a whole new set of problems has arisen. Or you could say it's like trying to force pieces of a puzzle to fit when they just are not the right spot. It simply ruins it.
I am not sure how the sailors mechanic is working, other than a thread where I read it hurts mothballing due to wasting sailor manpower. But is that something anyone on these forums actually asked for? Did anyone ever really say "hey, I know! We need sailor manpower to build our navies with!" I think more people preferred, instead, new naval combat mechanics and an AI that didn't often allow their ships to be annihilated before retreating (though that has been mostly fixed in recent patches).
Speaking of AI, that is where the real improvements need to be to make this game more challenging again. Because as someone else said, the game is not more challenging now, it's simply slower. But if the AI were a little more intelligent, the game would be hard. How many times have you been in the middle of a battle, and this works both ways, with huge stacks. And what do you see? An AI army that could totally change the tide of the battle (and often times that one battle can mean the war), but they sit there for one of three reasons. Either a) they are besieging a province and some progress has been made (in this case, I detach a single unit to maintain progress and send the rest to battle), b) they are an unhappy vassal and don't want to help... even if the battle is right next to their provinces which are likely to come under siege if the battle is lost, or c) God only knows.
I would actually prefer the game to be less focused on sieges and more focused on battled. In other words, battles should be more decisive. If both sides have 90% of their forces engaged in combat, then the loser should be put at a severe disadvantage. This would do two things. 1) It would cause players to think more strategically before engaging in battles. 2) It would make forts more useful because if your army is not powerful enough to win the battle yet, you can hide behind forts until hopefully it is. Unfortunately, this would require a more intelligent AI to implement.
Anyways, I apologize for the long rant and thanks for reading. But I just feel it's time to move on from this game and start over.
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