That's something that I wish Paradox would focus on more. The tutorials as they stand don't seem very effective.
The future of EU4 and Paradox games, a schism?
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That's something that I wish Paradox would focus on more. The tutorials as they stand don't seem very effective.
Sure there is, I usually expand to a point where I'm comfortable and then spend the rest of the game messing about.
"Not taking provinces" doesen't mean "not going to war" after all.
Surely it's a design flaw if the content is so lacking that the players resort to 'messing about'?
As much as I like Vicky II. Its not really hard or complex either. It just looks overwhelming and suffers from the same lack of information other PI titles do aswell. Once you grasp the mechanics around POPs its a rather easy game and imo lacks both peacetime play aswell as conquest play. Conquest is far to limited by infamy and peacetime offers no real depth.
Yeah you can watch some graphs and piecharts but ultimatly the majority of decisions have not much of an impact on the level of a few POPs in some regions. Additonally the techtree is very simple with rather railroaded choices as in increased research techs or +3 combat dice modifier techs.
Yeah you can watch some graphs and piecharts but ultimatly the majority of decisions have not much of an impact on the level of a few POPs in some regions. Additonally the techtree is very simple with rather railroaded choices as in increased research techs or +3 combat dice modifier techs.
because sometimes simply softening for future conquest is way better.... same as real life
True, but then again, how interested in this type of game would one be if one can't be arsed to learn what at first glance appear to be complex ?
I would say somewhere along the lines of EU4 and EU3 and expand on those since the UI was a major problem in EU3, basically have the complexity with accessibility. As for HOI I think that overall HOI4 should be better do to reduced micro but I do think it was a far reach for a bigger base. Vicky and CK I think are fine in its level of complexity just devote some time to learn, of course these are huge generalizations of where it should be and opinions will differ. I think any further in Paradox's current direction will result in a to watered down game for the casual MP thus losing quality. I think complexity,realism(to a certain degree)and originality is what made Paradox(EU,CK,HOI,VIC)successful.
I think you get my general point, basically expand on whats good now UI, complexity maybe graphics. The thing is many game franchises go through a peak(which we might be at) and expand their base then like COD start churning half-games to their "fanboy" base that require you to buy the rest of the game.In the end the game loses what one made it great.
I actually vastly prefer EUIV to EUIII by a significant amount. The unfortunate wedding of Naval and Diplo is awkward, personally I feel like warships should have been on the Military tech tree, but in the end that's a quibble really. Everything else works for me a lot better. And it's nice to know that things will work, and usually why (even if I don't like the answer or think it makes sense) rather than magic 8 ball method of diplomacy -- results unclear, ask again.
What I do miss is the ability to found your own trade node. But the new trade system is so very much more intuitive, and monarch points at least make more sense than the "spend a guy" system it replaced. If only they hadn't included buildings in the MP system. That's the part that doesn't work for me.
If I had suggestions for the devs, this is what I'd put forward
1: SEVERELY curtail the role of dice rolls in combat. I'm sorry, there's just got to be a better way. Something based on a three way combat triangle would work a lot better. but the ideal is to allow you to direct the way your army is going to try to fight, in order to achieve objectives that make sense for the enemy you're facing and how you feel you should be trying to beat them.
For example, allowing you to choose tactical options to attack an opponent's Morale, maximize troop damage through attritional tactics, or minimize troop losses, or even fort up and dig in against a particularly aggressive foe, with different terrains and different troop compositions being better for different tactical options, would be a lot more strategic and tactical and would boost immersion. Even better if you COULD queue up orders for your troops, but it would be handled automatically and with some accuracy even if you didn't.
Just as an example, let's take the battle of agincourt. The French commander decided to use his numerical supperiority to rush his outnumbered foe with heavy frontal attacks and shock win on attrition. King Henry chose to fort up with a defensive infantry layout to blunt enemy shock and use his superior infantry fire and the forested terrain, to limit his own casualties and maximize his enemy's. The result is that French morale broke in light of the lopsided casualties and the English army won.
Right now the only way to even come close to emulating that kind of tactical depth is just to say that the Constable rolled a 0 and Henry rolled a 9 and had a few more fire pips. And seriously? I think in 2014 a strategy title can do better than that.
2: Naval combat needs help. Did you know that most naval engagements didn't result in the complete destruction of the enemy fleet? It's true. Furthermore, quality counts in naval battles -- a lot. A lot more than it does in the game at any rate. Look up the battle of Diu sometime. 18 portuguese heavies against 12 Indian tech heavies with about 80 light ships in support. That would have been not only a win for the Indian fleets in EUIV, it would have been a crushing defeat for Portugal with no survivors, even if you assume that the Portuguese fleet somehow did not manage to die of attrition before it even got to India in 1509. In the game being a generation or so back in naval tech is no big deal -- in real life, it meant that 20 ships could take down 200.
How I'd fix it is, ships that are a generation more advanced have a chance to outmaneuver opposing vessels and simply not take any damage at all in the round. That should be managed so that it's a decent chance if you're 1 generation ahead, a very high chance if you're 2 unit upgrades behind, and if you're more than 3 generations behind (not tech levels, generations, like if you have carracks and they have twodeckers) there's just no chance you'll do any real damage at all in any given round.
I'd also increase morale damage on both sides significantly so there's a somewhat better chance that the admiral who knows he's whipped will get his ships out of the fight and limp back to port.
I'd like to also make it possible so that, say, a 6 maneuver admiral could have a chance to get to sea past an enemy's fleet stack and avoid combat with a 1 maneuver admiral or an unled fleet, as long as they're not blockaded into a port. If your navy was free, you could do a lot of damage to a blockade, and bottling up the navy of another maritime power was an extreme undertaking. I wouldn't want to make it guaranteed even with a 5 or 6 pip advantage, but I'd want to make dealing with a maritime foe's primary navy as big a challenge as dealing with a terrestrial foe's primary army.
Blockading straits and short naval runs to unblockaded or neutral territory should take a lot more ships as well compared to blockading a standard coastline. A LOT more. Obvious examples being the English Channel, the strait between Skane and Sjelland, and the Bosporous. Basically if there's another unblockaded territory across a strait that would be considered bordering for the purpose of fabricating a claim, that should create a penalty to blockade efficiency.
Finally, there is such a thing in history as a siege from the sea. It should require Heavy Ships, and maybe even transports with infantry on them, but it should be possible to siege unguarded territory from the coastal waters, using heavies the same way you use artillery on land -- to simulate bombarding a fortress into submission. if your enemy doesn't like it they can drive you off the waters. If you don't want to go as far as being possible to force an outright surrender and transfer of territory, blockading with heavies should weaken the coastal forts above and beyond a standard blockade with other ship classes, so that if a stack does land and siege, it will come to find demoralized defenders and even a chance of broken walls.
3: The ability to meaningfully redirect trade. The upstream penalty is both far too big and far too bogus. it should be something that with the right combination of wits and technology, you can overcome or even reverse. 80% is just way, way too steep for that. Tone that down please, it'll make the trading minigame a great deal more interesting in the long run.
What I do miss is the ability to found your own trade node. But the new trade system is so very much more intuitive, and monarch points at least make more sense than the "spend a guy" system it replaced. If only they hadn't included buildings in the MP system. That's the part that doesn't work for me.
If I had suggestions for the devs, this is what I'd put forward
1: SEVERELY curtail the role of dice rolls in combat. I'm sorry, there's just got to be a better way. Something based on a three way combat triangle would work a lot better. but the ideal is to allow you to direct the way your army is going to try to fight, in order to achieve objectives that make sense for the enemy you're facing and how you feel you should be trying to beat them.
For example, allowing you to choose tactical options to attack an opponent's Morale, maximize troop damage through attritional tactics, or minimize troop losses, or even fort up and dig in against a particularly aggressive foe, with different terrains and different troop compositions being better for different tactical options, would be a lot more strategic and tactical and would boost immersion. Even better if you COULD queue up orders for your troops, but it would be handled automatically and with some accuracy even if you didn't.
Just as an example, let's take the battle of agincourt. The French commander decided to use his numerical supperiority to rush his outnumbered foe with heavy frontal attacks and shock win on attrition. King Henry chose to fort up with a defensive infantry layout to blunt enemy shock and use his superior infantry fire and the forested terrain, to limit his own casualties and maximize his enemy's. The result is that French morale broke in light of the lopsided casualties and the English army won.
Right now the only way to even come close to emulating that kind of tactical depth is just to say that the Constable rolled a 0 and Henry rolled a 9 and had a few more fire pips. And seriously? I think in 2014 a strategy title can do better than that.
2: Naval combat needs help. Did you know that most naval engagements didn't result in the complete destruction of the enemy fleet? It's true. Furthermore, quality counts in naval battles -- a lot. A lot more than it does in the game at any rate. Look up the battle of Diu sometime. 18 portuguese heavies against 12 Indian tech heavies with about 80 light ships in support. That would have been not only a win for the Indian fleets in EUIV, it would have been a crushing defeat for Portugal with no survivors, even if you assume that the Portuguese fleet somehow did not manage to die of attrition before it even got to India in 1509. In the game being a generation or so back in naval tech is no big deal -- in real life, it meant that 20 ships could take down 200.
How I'd fix it is, ships that are a generation more advanced have a chance to outmaneuver opposing vessels and simply not take any damage at all in the round. That should be managed so that it's a decent chance if you're 1 generation ahead, a very high chance if you're 2 unit upgrades behind, and if you're more than 3 generations behind (not tech levels, generations, like if you have carracks and they have twodeckers) there's just no chance you'll do any real damage at all in any given round.
I'd also increase morale damage on both sides significantly so there's a somewhat better chance that the admiral who knows he's whipped will get his ships out of the fight and limp back to port.
I'd like to also make it possible so that, say, a 6 maneuver admiral could have a chance to get to sea past an enemy's fleet stack and avoid combat with a 1 maneuver admiral or an unled fleet, as long as they're not blockaded into a port. If your navy was free, you could do a lot of damage to a blockade, and bottling up the navy of another maritime power was an extreme undertaking. I wouldn't want to make it guaranteed even with a 5 or 6 pip advantage, but I'd want to make dealing with a maritime foe's primary navy as big a challenge as dealing with a terrestrial foe's primary army.
Blockading straits and short naval runs to unblockaded or neutral territory should take a lot more ships as well compared to blockading a standard coastline. A LOT more. Obvious examples being the English Channel, the strait between Skane and Sjelland, and the Bosporous. Basically if there's another unblockaded territory across a strait that would be considered bordering for the purpose of fabricating a claim, that should create a penalty to blockade efficiency.
Finally, there is such a thing in history as a siege from the sea. It should require Heavy Ships, and maybe even transports with infantry on them, but it should be possible to siege unguarded territory from the coastal waters, using heavies the same way you use artillery on land -- to simulate bombarding a fortress into submission. if your enemy doesn't like it they can drive you off the waters. If you don't want to go as far as being possible to force an outright surrender and transfer of territory, blockading with heavies should weaken the coastal forts above and beyond a standard blockade with other ship classes, so that if a stack does land and siege, it will come to find demoralized defenders and even a chance of broken walls.
3: The ability to meaningfully redirect trade. The upstream penalty is both far too big and far too bogus. it should be something that with the right combination of wits and technology, you can overcome or even reverse. 80% is just way, way too steep for that. Tone that down please, it'll make the trading minigame a great deal more interesting in the long run.
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True, but then again, how interested in this type of game would one be if one can't be arsed to learn what at first glance appear to be complex ?
Well who knows, maybe they just like the map counters.
They're pretty sweet counters though.
When it comes to AI and multiplayer I'd say the AI is extremely important also in MP. No contradictions there in a game with houndreds of nations, and only 2-32 of them human controlled in multiplayer games.
We are talking about grand strategy here, not StarCraft.
We are talking about grand strategy here, not StarCraft.
Vicky is certainly somewhat more complex than EUIV. It's not so much that the ideas behind things are complicated - they're not completely straightforward, but nor are they vastly complex - but the way they all interact most definitely is, and the methods for being successful are not at all clear (but, for the most part, unclear in a good way - that is to say, by playing the game you will naturally start learning how it works, as opposed to something like Peasant's War, where the only real way to learn how it works is to look in the game files). Throw in the fact that, unlike EUIV, there isn't a clear cut "best" option for maximising your nation's capabilities (in EUIV, this is "conquer everything"). Of course, PDox certainly didn't go out of their way to make it noob friendly, but I'd say much of that is simply down to the inherent complexity of the underlying systems rather than just having bad user friendliness.
Earlier EU games though, I wouldn't really call any more complex or less dumbed down than IV. They did some things differently, but I wouldn't say that they had any more meaningful complexity.
Wandering away a bit from the post I quoted, while this isn't specifically referring to EU, I've noticed a lot of gamers (well, people who visit gaming forums...) have this idea that "complexity" and "detail" mean the same as "depth", and removing these automatically means "dumbing down". The problem with this is, as TMIT has pointed out regarding UI issues, that a lot of the time, the supposed "complexity" adds nothing to the game, and exists either through simply poor design, or as an attempt to be complex purely for the sake of being complex, even if it doesn't make the game better. Removing features that are unintuitive, obstructive to good gameplay and in some cases downright un-fun is not dumbing down. Removing illusionary options in favour of fewer choices that actually make a difference is not dumbing down. Making a game more accessible to new players is not necessarily dumbing down (it can be if you simultaneously remove depth, but things like having a clear straightforward UI and a good tutorial are definitely not).
This is a post I put up on another gaming forum a while back on unnecessary complexity, and how what is often seen as "dumbing down" is simply removing "features" that add absolutely nothing to the game, and often actually adding depth to the game, despite what "fans" believe. It's about Mass Effect and the changes between the first and second games in that series (specifically someone claiming that the first one's "inventory management" was a good thing), but the basic point applies to a lot of supposedly "dumbed down" games:
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To vanukar:
The two games are set up differently. EU3 took the approach of progress towards one area and concessions towards another. EU4 is kind of different in that you're always kind of progressing, just more slowly in some areas than others. Neither way is really better. I think the monarch points make more sense than arbitrarily moving the quality/quantity slider towards quality, even if my monarch has bad military stat. There's more strategy to me in waiting for the right leader to pick the right ideas I want and developing my country in that direction. It's luck based, but it's not the same every time. There's more immediate decision making instead of just knowing the direction you want to take.
In regards to your other reply, how do you feel that this will be watered down? EU3 was already simple, as you said. I have faith that Paradox will make V3 or HoI4 as complicated as they need to be. Complex isn't better, and neither is simplicity. It's a struggle finding the balance. I think the mechanics of V2 have their place in V2, just as the mechanics of EU4 have their place in EU4. They're different games.
To the last point: Yes, complaints exist and are valid, but there is always a better way than covering the forums in them. People have their complaints and there are lots of people, but it's a minority. I'm telling you I am driven away from posting here because of the negativity surrounding a game I enjoy, so what about others like me? What about all the casuals people keep talking about? They wouldn't even post here in the first place. There are lots and lots of people who consistently enjoy the game with every new piece of content released. These games are massively successful compared to previous Paradox games, so to think otherwise is wrong. Now, don't take that to mean that the fans here have less of an opinion than the rest of the fans. There's no good outlet to say 'I love this game!', but there's always an outlet for complaints.
The two games are set up differently. EU3 took the approach of progress towards one area and concessions towards another. EU4 is kind of different in that you're always kind of progressing, just more slowly in some areas than others. Neither way is really better. I think the monarch points make more sense than arbitrarily moving the quality/quantity slider towards quality, even if my monarch has bad military stat. There's more strategy to me in waiting for the right leader to pick the right ideas I want and developing my country in that direction. It's luck based, but it's not the same every time. There's more immediate decision making instead of just knowing the direction you want to take.
In regards to your other reply, how do you feel that this will be watered down? EU3 was already simple, as you said. I have faith that Paradox will make V3 or HoI4 as complicated as they need to be. Complex isn't better, and neither is simplicity. It's a struggle finding the balance. I think the mechanics of V2 have their place in V2, just as the mechanics of EU4 have their place in EU4. They're different games.
To the last point: Yes, complaints exist and are valid, but there is always a better way than covering the forums in them. People have their complaints and there are lots of people, but it's a minority. I'm telling you I am driven away from posting here because of the negativity surrounding a game I enjoy, so what about others like me? What about all the casuals people keep talking about? They wouldn't even post here in the first place. There are lots and lots of people who consistently enjoy the game with every new piece of content released. These games are massively successful compared to previous Paradox games, so to think otherwise is wrong. Now, don't take that to mean that the fans here have less of an opinion than the rest of the fans. There's no good outlet to say 'I love this game!', but there's always an outlet for complaints.
Nobody at Paradox has ever argued that the AI isn't important. Johan said he didn't care about AI for *one specific issue*, which has then been taken out of context to mean that he doesn't care about the AI at all. As the person he hired specifically because he cared about improving AI, that one is always good for a laugh for me.
Yep. I gotta kick outta reading that too.
Likewise, that was a good post.
I appear to lack the sympathy you have for the instant gratification generation hehe.
I guess nobody could point out flaws in my argument. I mean it isn't that hard to know that in a couple of years Paradox won't be the same, as they want to water down their games to simplistic casual MP games for the sake of profit but at the expense of people who enjoyed Victoria 2, EU3 and Crusader kings 2. That being said i fully enjoy all their current title and i hope they won't move in the disastrous idea of the casualization of Paradox.
Ultimately if making the game easier, casualising it and reducing depth results in a larger player base spending more money then that is the way things will go. What company would intentionally harm their revenue by appealing to the wishes of an opposed minority of its customers?
Yours isn't really an argument. You're just saying something bad will happen to Paradox games because that's what you think. Making broad and sweeping generalizations about a bunch of different games and how they compare to Paradox doesn't warrant your prediction.
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