My thoughts on current state of game

[Sfan]

Institutions system is broken, played lithuania kept drowning money into adopting them asap but in the end still got significantly out-teched by china, india and most steppe nomads!?

Oh god the forts, late game every war in a nutshell is sieging a fort for 80% of wars duration while you watch your troops die of attrition, but dont you dare move your troops or it will break the siege and you start over. So what you do Is park your army close by the fort and baby sit.

Very fun

Rather than a fort level being the defining defence of a province why don't they make a fort give a % defence bonus and the real defence comes from the actual development of the province.
Why don't they make assaulting forts a viable option. Maybe in the middle ages they were very costly in lives but surely countries developed more sophisticated techniques to deal with them in time.
Why don't siege general pips affect how well your army assault forts
Why cannons take a million years to do something? Im sure thousands of cannons hammering a star fort everyday for a month would pretty much destroy any fortifications.
Why do forts block adjacent tiles, it can block the tile the fort is in but IRL whats stopping me from completely ignoring forts and just attacking their capital? What they should do is have 50% warscore cap from normal provinces + capital and the rest 50% could be only obtained from sieging down forts.
Fort garrison should suffer attrition if all adjacent provinces are occupied by the enemy. In this case where would they get their supplies from?

Maybe im just talking out of my arse but forts are such a frustrating feature

Not going to answer to everything, but I wouldn't call it on the game if you pay tons of money to embrace institutions but end up behind Steppe Nomads in techs, or at least behind in meaningful techs, and this is what I understand from "signigicantly out-teched". Either you do random stuff with your monarch points like developping provinces over teching, you lack some economical knowledge so you don't get any advisor, or you simply don't minmax teching based on techpenalty and relative importance of every level of tech. I honestly never had the problem of being significantly out-teched by most of the Steppe nomads, more like the opposite, even from starts that are significantly furhter away from institutions spawning points than Lithuania. So, personally, I don't find the system broken. As I stated above, it rewards thoughtful play imo.

As for your point with assaults, I actually find that the situation in game is close to what you would want. As time goes by, an assault is relatively more and more cheap. From a fort that had a double breach, which shouldn't be that long if you have max canons on a level 8 forts, the cost to assault it is around 100 gold worth of merc. Of course you don't want to do this for every fort of the planet, but if this is crucial that you get it, why not?

For your other points they have been discussed a gazillon times, so I won't answer. Not that they do not make sense, or that I don't agree with some of them.

 

[raikaria]

Now look at Germany.

0

0 Events

I get no additional immersion, no event chains, no background story.

That's because Germany didn't historically form during the timeframe. Also almost any tag in the entire game can form Germany [Except Pope; HRE and Rome]. And any non-Theocracy Government type. Theoretically; you could form Germany as Ryukyu. In practise formed Germany as Milan and kept the Ambrosian Republic.

It's the same with Italy as well. Didn't form during the timeframe; so there's no specific events for Italy.

I my veiw; the lategame v earlygame argument boils down to to this:

Most people play an EU4 game with an objective. Once that objective is acheived; why would they commit more time? Even if the game has no real objective; once you have blobbed to #1; it can easily get stale.

Personally I get to lategame by becoming a regional power and focus on internal affairs; allowing the AI to drag me into power struggles but not seeking trouble myself.

 

[SnapperAEG]

I haven't played much, but I find the war system totally broken. The lack of attrition, auto-reinforcement, and ability of countries to keep regenrating mass armies is completely ahistorical, and just makes major wars a huge, dull drag. I think the combat system has gone downhill ever since they introduced the regiments and auto-reinforcement.

If you take 20,000 men into enemy lands, and fight for a year, at least half of them should die from attrition, and no local recruitment should be able to make up those losses.

 

[hitchens]

I would love an earlier starting date.

 

[sirkitchener]

Why isn't the game suited for the Napoleonic wars? I agree that is not suited for the massive industrialisation era, but the Napoleonic wars are the cherry on the EU4 era cake, they are basically the natural direction in which every EU4 game goes, to a lategame slugfest between a few majors and big alliance blocks across Europe. For this, at least, the game is realistic.

That's an interesting thought....after trying and failing to come up with meaningful counterarguments, I have to say I agree.
In fact, since the game already provides the gameplay mechanics (like those you mentioned in your examples) - perhaps Paradox could go the extra mile, and by fleshing out the Revolutions, could give historic context and reason for that slugfest; hell, that would make the perfect epic "endgame content", fitting for EUIV. They could even include a Congress of Vienna-style peace mechanic, specifically for the wrapping up of the Revolutionary Wars..
Right, I might have stepped into dreamland here, but something like this - ending the game by deciding the political future of the whole continent - would definitely increase the appeal of doing a full playthrough for me

 

[grommile]

To get them to form or have their cores show up, requires Mughals to be formed and own atleast one core on a Maratha culture province between 1660 and 1680. They will always spawn as a Empire tier country as well. Kinda ridiculous prerequisites huh? It shouldn't matter who owns those provinces, as long as Maratha isn't their primary culture. Also if its a Islamic nation the MTTH should be higher.

There are two versions of the Maratha revolt: one specifically for MUG, and one for any Islamic ruler.

If you take 20,000 men into enemy lands, and fight for a year, at least half of them should die from attrition, and no local recruitment should be able to make up those losses.

Automatic reinforcement (which has a sizeable ducat cost in EU4; I would say "significant" but EU4 has a serious oversupply of ducats almost as hilarious as late-game EU3 DW) mostly serves to remove a bunch of skullcrushingly dull micromanagement.

 

[Sfan]

Well, if we had something similar to League Wars, as consistent as them, but for revolution, that would be really cooll. The problem is that it is harder to railroad the lategame, as there can be some really weird stuff due to player intervention, like someone having more than 10k dev.


@grommile If EU4 claims to remove the skullcrucshing micromanagement, it kinda fails. A day of playing EU4, especially lategame is an insanely exhausting stuff if you are trying to optimize this. You have to pause all the goddamn time, to remember than on the 6th you will need to check China to see if the ennemies are locked in, and then on the 8th to go back to Europe because you want to know where this Austrian stack will move next, all the while without forgetting that you wanted to start a war in Africa so you need to move troops there and have them ready on the first of a month. Especially now that the AI baits you by saying "I will move. In fact no. I will attack you. In fact yes. In fact no." for 3 months until he says "HAHA, you weren't paying attention to the "a battle is going to happen" little cross anymore becaue you thought I had no brain, but this was all my wonder plan to actually engage you when you have almost finished my mountain fort, and you have cannons in the frontrow.

 

[SnapperAEG]

Automatic reinforcement (which has a sizeable ducat cost in EU4; I would say "significant" but EU4 has a serious oversupply of ducats almost as hilarious as late-game EU3 DW) mostly serves to remove a bunch of skullcrushingly dull micromanagement.

I'm not sure I follow. Why is having to raise new armies and send them to the "front" micromanagement?

 

[Viperswhip]

The game, if anything, has become way more interesting and rewards skill way more now that you use institutions and don't westernize. It used to be a ridiculous strat of tentacle of knowledge towards Crimea no matter your start in Asia, while intentionally falling behind in diplo and admin as fast as possible, and a tentacle towards colonizers elsewhere. Now there is a real reflexion and a real strategy to build around institutions. In some situations you want to develop, but in others you don't want to empower your neighbours. This depends on plenty of factors. You should really give it a try.

Why don't people who like this kind of stuff play the other games Paradox offers? EU has been a fairly simple RISK like game for a long time now, this is the first game that has started bringing in so much complexity, and it says something that I, a fan of the series since EU1, enjoyed the vanilla release more than I do the present state of the game.

 

[Dominion]

That's because Germany didn't historically form during the timeframe.

Great Britain did and they have 0 events too.

I could accept that as an argument if it was only formable nations that didn't exist having no events, but it's all of them with most nations having barely any events after 1600 either.

"Didn't historically form" is not the reason they're not doing it. Ignoring lategame is the reason.

And we are getting events for things that happened before 1444 - the Eu4 starting date and therefor outside the timeframe - too.

Didn't exist during the timeframe is not a valid point. This is purely about early vs late.

 

[Chaingun]

Why isn't the game suited for the Napoleonic wars? I agree that is not suited for the massive industrialisation era, but the Napoleonic wars are the cherry on the EU4 era cake, they are basically the natural direction in which every EU4 game goes, to a lategame slugfest between a few majors and big alliance blocks across Europe. For this, at least, the game is realistic.

I did try to add AI behavior for that in the late game related to the great power feature (and to emulate human end game wars from MP) to 1.18, but couldn't complete it in time (that's why there were "great power frenzy" defines). My reasoning went: AI blobs are often much too docile late game after having accomplished their territorial goals and being evenly matched with each others. Human players would on the other hand try to cut each other down and therefore be much more aggressive with highly dynamic results - so I tried to make it like that with nations trying to climb on great power ranking, with the added requirement huge wars should be somewhat balanced. What happened in that implementation was an unending series of pointless 1v1s because of lack of synchronized war declarations and lack of use of imperialism CB, so countries would make strange seemingly suicidal 1v1 wars without any territorial transfers.

AI work on stuff that does not pay bills and that leads to behavior not all players necessarily want (especially if not very well implemented) tends not to be very popular though in terms of prioritization for obvious reasons, but @Gnivom could pick up on it should he ever have some spare time to deal with this topic. To be fair I think it could be better done too with GUI/gameplay support as having too much implicit AI behavior might be opaque and confusing to player.

 

[Dominion]

I did try to add AI behavior for that in the late game related to the great power feature (and to emulate human end game wars from MP) to 1.18, but couldn't complete it in time (that's why there were "great power frenzy" defines). My reasoning went: AI blobs are often much too docile late game after having accomplished their territorial goals and being evenly matched with each others. Human players would on the other hand try to cut each other down and therefore be much more aggressive with highly dynamic results - so I tried to make it like that with nations trying to climb on great power ranking, with the added requirement huge wars should be somewhat balanced. What happened in that implementation was an unending series of pointless 1v1s because of lack of synchronized war declarations and lack of use of imperialism CB, so countries would make strange seemingly suicidal 1v1 wars without any territorial transfers.

Quick draft: An event based on GP status and development

If 2 european great powers have less development than a bordering third great power combined they initiate a war against foreign dominance and aggression calling in their allies as co-belligerents with 20% reduced WS costs for releasing nations and the AI focusing on doing exactly that, territorial gains second.

The goal is not to have the AI blob as massively as a player could - you can just remove the Mingsplosion completely to have an endboss like that - but rather to give an event one can look forward to.

Right now, in order to get a similar situation, the player has to proactively invade the HRE and spawn a coalition on purpose, but coalition wars are never fun. They are punishing and tedious, just as intended.

As one result amongst various you would have bordering minors again which could be marked as special interest by GPs, become accepted cultures or even have the war result in a "Congress of Vienna"-like situation instead of the reduced WS with defined shifts in development, changes in government and much more.

Again, this is from the top of my head and in no way thought out, but and "endboss event" with a clearly defined goal and event chains certainly would be something to keep players hanging on, similar as to what I have heard about the league wars.

EDIT: Since I'm on the wild track, this could also have an interaction button like merchant republics and the league wars as a buildup or a cooldown in which one would need to gain favors and please invested nations in order to have them sway towards you.

But maybe that's one step too far. Reforms for England already showed that a concept like this either needs a lot of time to feel organic or is better left alone forever.

 

[OnyxShadow]

I can totally understand the strategy behind it, but I'm getting really fed up a lot of the time when the AI just takes his whole army and sits behind his last fort for the entire war and/or runs away whenever my army moves towards it to engage.

 

[Trin Tragula]

To get them to form or have their cores show up, requires Mughals to be formed and own atleast one core on a Maratha culture province between 1660 and 1680.

This isn't how it works at all there's more than one Maratha event and last I looked wiki hasn't been updated in years for them.
The only real requirement is that their home region is controlled by a sultanate when the right days rolls around.
Marathas are a revolter nation which is the biggest reason they rarely show. Empires in eu4 are a lot more stable than in real life and in real life their rise (as well as the rise of the EIC for that matter) had a lot to do with the shattering of the Mughal empire.
India is always on my mind though so you may see something more for the Marathas in the future at some point

 

[Trin Tragula]

Great Britain did and they have 0 events too

Huh?

Edit: Are you saying you think we should restrict the British events so you can't get them unless you form gbr? Great Britain have more events than most countries in the game but you can get them all as England too (Scotland couldn't unless they form GBR though).

 

[Indigo Blue]

Great Britain did and they have 0 events too.

I could accept that as an argument if it was only formable nations that didn't exist having no events, but it's all of them with most nations having barely any events after 1600 either.

"Didn't historically form" is not the reason they're not doing it. Ignoring lategame is the reason.

And we are getting events for things that happened before 1444 - the Eu4 starting date and therefor outside the timeframe - too.

Didn't exist during the timeframe is not a valid point. This is purely about early vs late.

GB has a ton events..because they get all of the English ones, I think.

 

[Dominion]

GB has a ton events..because they get all of the English ones, I think.

?

They have the same events as England. They do not get any additional. I said that.

I am confused.

Huh?

Edit: Are you saying you think we should restrict the British events so you can't get them unless you form gbr? Great Britain have more events than most countries in the game but you can get them all as England too (Scotland couldn't unless they form GBR though).

Nah, my point was that there is no incentive to form nations as nothing comes from it in terms of immersion.

You changed. You have new ideas. Now go out and play.

Before that we even have event chains.

British and English events being the same is nothing additional.

I wasn't making the case for more events for GB but rather giving reasons as to why people dislike lategame.

I like to blob. I like WC. I will always find something to do.

Other people hit speed 5 and don't even get interrupted by popups anymore.


EDIT: A good example are national ideas. You don't even need to fill 3 idea groups to be done with them.

I am not asking for more NIs, god no, but it's showcasing that you get less content the longer you play.

 

[Indigo Blue]

?

They have the same events as England. They do not get any additional. I said that.

I am confused.



Nah, my point was that there is no incentive to form nations as nothing comes from it in terms of immersion.

You changed. You have new ideas. Now go out and play.

Before that we even have event chains.

British and English events being the same is nothing additional.

I wasn't making the case for more events for GB but rather giving reasons as to why people dislike lategame.

I like to blob. I like WC. I will always find something to do.

Other people hit speed 5 and don't even get interrupted by events anymore.

I think initially what you meant is that GB has no unique events - people are interpreting it as GB has no events when they get the English events. And as a note if you go GB as Scotland then that means that you get the 'English' events which make them new for Scotland.

 

[Dominion]

I think initially what you meant is that GB has no unique events - people are interpreting it as GB has no events when they get the English events. And as a note if you go GB as Scotland then that means that you get the 'English' events which make them new for Scotland.

In that case, pardon. Not my intention.

And you are right, the scots do get that. I wasn't looking to increase events for England specifically though (see additional comment above) but rather giving examples of why people don't see the joy in the game after ~1600.

The longer the game goes the less unique things are there to experience.

Not because you've seen it all - or else people wouldn't even play 1444-1445 after a while - but simply because there is nothing to look at.

I've heard many people say it becomes tedious, a chore, micromanagement or whatnot. I feel like that's the game even before they hit late. They just don't realize it and enjoy themselves because of immersion and the ability to roleplay.

Events play a rather big role in this. Aside from missions, which also become ridiculous lategame.

Really? I own all of Africa, America and Europe and _one_ province taken away from Benghal is what my nation wants?
Force me to do something. Penalize me if I don't. It's 1750 and my income is 1000 ducats with a Force Limit of 600. I can afford to get stabbed in the back by a forced mission.

 

[SchwarzerKaiser]

I'd actually like the idea of giving nations like Germany, Italy or Scandinavia made up DHEs and especially missions if they're formed so early for additional flavor. Event chains like a conflict between Germany and the HRE (or alternatively Austria if it's big enough), perhaps a conflict with the Netherlands to reincorporate the "Germans" into the union, a conflict between Italy and the exiled pope or Catholic nations in general if Italy is Protestant/Reformed, a struggle with the Ottomans over East-Mediterranean sovereignty, Scandinavian attempts to claim the Baltic coast and ensuing conflicts with nations like Russia, Poland or north German nations, perhaps an attempt to reclaim old Norse territory, leading to a conflict with England/Scotland/Great Britain over the British Isles. Would give the game something extra if it goes into the direction of having either of these nations forming.