Last stream blob and poor Castile

[Maykievic]

Hi!
Have you seen last stream? Wow that was some serious blobbing , hre always annihilated and castile not surviving even once!
Weren't they trying to tone blobbing down a bit?

 

[Draecesstra]

i saw a documentation in "zdf" second german television, that stream wasnt even about eu4^^

 

[Grif_E]

If you don't let your games proceed to the 19th century then sure those results might seem extraordinary. The community wouldn't abide the changes necessary to actually prevent the kind of blobbing on display.

 

[Arizal]

I was especially sad about the state of the HRE. And I was trying to keep it alive in an Austria game. I lost countless opportunities to expand, but it seems to be a doomed task.

 

[grommile]

Hi!
Have you seen last stream? Wow that was some serious blobbing , hre always annihilated and castile not surviving even once!
Weren't they trying to tone blobbing down a bit?

If they were trying to tone down blobbing, they would not have implemented a feature that lets you get the -50% coring discount almost everywhere instead of just "Distant Overseas".

 

[Dakka]

Yeah I saw it. Castile got wrecked every time. A combination of a terrible heir and terrible disaster right at start plus a hostile stronger Aragon and France that always want to eat you makes the AI die everytime since it just cannot handle it all.

Between all this and how massive relative strength to overlord is between PUs and CNs, Castilian Spain has fallen into the same category as Mughals; only if a player does it

And it's still listed as a "Beginner" Nation

 

[Maykievic]

If they were trying to tone down blobbing, they would not have implemented a feature that lets you get the -50% coring discount almost everywhere instead of just "Distant Overseas".

Yeah , Chaingun said that he was working on blob AI iirc, but it seems only getting worse due to these changes

 

[Mafiabrett]

Until they fix ridiculous aggressive AI blobbing and protection of OPMs or Minor nations.. Ill hold out on buying anymore EU4 Dlcs.

Either introduce blob rebellions or atleast bring back AI vs AI Coalitions

 

[Viperswhip]

Yeah I saw it. Castile got wrecked every time. A combination of a terrible heir and terrible disaster right at start plus a hostile stronger Aragon and France that always want to eat you makes the AI die everytime since it just cannot handle it all.

Between all this and how massive relative strength to overlord is between PUs and CNs, Castilian Spain has fallen into the same category as Mughals; only if a player does it

And it's still listed as a "Beginner" Nation

It is tremendously easy to avoid war with Castile, you ally Portugal, The Pope and someone like Bohemia or Austria. If you do get into war, it will be in your favour. You can easily turtle until colonization. Otherwise, they are a fine nation for destroying Europe that isn't the obvious first choice of France.

The bottom line is that they have fiddled with their AI in such a way that the AI is suffering v itself. Lucky nations have basically no AE, increased troop counts, and tend to be the biggest = blob. Since they have no real AE, they don't suffer coalitions like the players do = Blob. You have to outblob them, it easiest to do this at the beginning of the game to ensure they never blob.

Castile is not the easiest nation to do this with, but not the worst, and it's my favourite nation to play.

 

[grommile]

Until they fix ridiculous aggressive AI blobbing

The AI blobs far less effectively and aggressively than a competent player.

and protection of OPMs or Minor nations.. Ill hold out on buying anymore EU4 Dlcs.

Either introduce blob rebellions or atleast bring back AI vs AI Coalitions

AI vs AI coalitions exist. Briefly.

Then the members' opinion of the target's AE drops back below -50 and they dissolve.

 

[Maykievic]

The AI blobs far less effectively and aggressively than a competent player.

AI vs AI coalitions exist. Briefly.

Then the members' opinion of the target's AE drops back below -50 and they dissolve.

Sure , less than a competent player but still too much if you want to roleplay a bit and have a world with more varied alliances and nations, also like mentioned above lucky nations seems a bit off

 

[Dakka]

It is tremendously easy to avoid war with Castile, you ally Portugal, The Pope and someone like Bohemia or Austria. If you do get into war, it will be in your favour. You can easily turtle until colonization. Otherwise, they are a fine nation for destroying Europe that isn't the obvious first choice of France.

The bottom line is that they have fiddled with their AI in such a way that the AI is suffering v itself. Lucky nations have basically no AE, increased troop counts, and tend to be the biggest = blob. Since they have no real AE, they don't suffer coalitions like the players do = Blob. You have to outblob them, it easiest to do this at the beginning of the game to ensure they never blob.

Castile is not the easiest nation to do this with, but not the worst, and it's my favourite nation to play.

I'm aware that it's possible, what I was referring to was how the AI is completely incompetent at it. Tired of the only three threats being France, Austria, and PLC. Castile should be able to hold it's own instead of turning blue and red every game. If it doesn't get killed from falling behind in tech, disasters, and lack of good allies, it gets destroyed by Aragon declaring independence literally days after Iberian Wedding. If they are going to railroad in a historical event for flavor, that's fine with me, but at least do it so it isn't just a free pass to kill Castile yet again.

As it currently stands, I would never recommend Castile to a new player. There's too much of a rough and precarious start for it if you don't know what your doing and Iberian Wedding is a newbie trap. I honestly feel a lot of it would be fixed if they buffed Castile's development, lowered "Relative Strength to Overlord" so it isn't so bloated, or add a historical friends modifier between Castile and Aragon after the Iberian Wedding fires, similar to the historical rivalry from Swedish Constitution between Denmark and Sweden. Aragon shouldn't want to rip Castile's throat out days after saying "I do". It's stupid.

 

[Freudia]

Sure , less than a competent player but still too much if you want to roleplay a bit and have a world with more varied alliances and nations, also like mentioned above lucky nations seems a bit off

What are you suggesting the AI does instead? Make even more suboptimal plays?

I'm not really of the opinion that the AI should intentionally play worse than it already does.

 

[Arizal]

Maybe if WE did something instead of being wiped out so easily by using dip points, empires would crumble more easily after a big war.

 

[grommile]

Maybe if WE did something instead of being wiped out so easily by using dip points, empires would crumble more easily after a big war.

If WE "did something instead of being wiped out so easily by using dip points", the game would be even easier for the meatbag.

 

[Maykievic]

What are you suggesting the AI does instead? Make even more suboptimal plays?

I'm not really of the opinion that the AI should intentionally play worse than it already does.

I don't know , i dont want them to play worse , just not like a super aggressive player , i know that devs acknowledged this issue and said they would try fixing it in the long term. In fact i'm no programmer so i can't come up with an effiecient solution.
The only thought i had was that major nation could have a sort of army tradition - like value that increases and stays stable only when you have a relation slot occupied in a sort of defensive alliance with a minor. Clearly i can see many problems with this , but seeing that only major blobs remain after a while kinda disappoints me

 

[Freudia]

I don't know , i dont want them to play worse , just not like a super aggressive player , i know that devs acknowledged this issue and said they would try fixing it in the long term. In fact i'm no programmer so i can't come up with an effiecient solution.
The only thought i had was that major nation could have a sort of army tradition - like value that increases and stays stable only when you have a relation slot occupied in a sort of defensive alliance with a minor. Clearly i can see many problems with this , but seeing that only major blobs remain after a while kinda disappoints me

I mean, Europe at the end of the time period was pretty much a handful of blobs and then the very occasional minor like Switzerland.

Regardless, the only way you can make them play like 'not an aggressive player' while not making them play worse is to make other forms of gameplay not terrible, both on a 'is this a strong play' level and a 'is this more fun than watching paint dry' level. The AI doesn't care about the second point, but it's an important point to address in a game where the playerbase blobs because there's nothing else to do.

 

[vfmikey]

So... Is the problem that AI plays better and more like a player would?

 

[Arizal]

So... Is the problem that AI plays better and more like a player would?

If WE "did something instead of being wiped out so easily by using dip points", the game would be even easier for the meatbag.

I think yes, honestly. And I think the part of the solution could be to 1. revamp the revolt mechanic 2. (and especially) make more attractive for the player to release other countries than to take everything for himself. That way, the best way to cripple your adversary would be to make him give some provinces to another and blobs would be less present.

 

[Chaingun]

Yeah , Chaingun said that he was working on blob AI iirc, but it seems only getting worse due to these changes

"Anti-blob programmer" isn't part of my job description, and therefore the work has to be spread out over time as I'm mostly tied up on other stuff. I would also like everything to happen at once so I understand where you're coming from, but in practice it's going to take quite a long time, especially because fundamental gameplay as it is encourages blobbery.