It's well known throughout the gaming world that DLC never holds the same valuation as a game out of the box. For example, a game like Rockband where you spend as much as $2 to purchase an additional song when you get around 80 out of the box for around $60, plus the game itself.
I think the same holds true for a game like EUIV. In fact, I think the value is even less unless you are a hardcore EUIV player. I have purchased Wealth of Nations, Res Republica, Art of War, and El Dorado now. All of them at full price. Unfortunately, none of them have proven to be worth their value at all for me.
The primary reason I paid for Wealth of Nations was due to privateers (which became a waste of $$$ now that I also bought El Dorado). As someone who does not usually experience with other countries and government mechanics, most of the features have gone unused. Same goes with Res Republica. Never have played as a Republic, so other than National Focus, I have found little value in this patch.
Art of War was a bit different. There were a lot of very useful features for myself and probably most like me. Cancelling idea groups, giving up cores, creating marches (I never do it, but I see the value in it), garrison sorties, transfer of sacked provinces, and quick upgrading as well as mothballing fleets are all great features. Unfortunately, as great and as important as all these features are, most of them should have been included with the game to begin with. EU is not a new series. Many of these things have been issues since EUII (and probably the original EU, but I say EUII since I never played the original EU). For example, I know for a fact I was annoyed way back in EUII when an ally would just beat me to a province I want and one they don't need, and because their army beat me there by a day, they got control when it fell. With coring, that has been an issue since game launch day and is not something that should have been paid for. Sometimes a war leader gives you a province you just don't need and can't core. That should have been fixed within the first patch or two. Anyways, the Art of War was a very good DLC. I don't think too many deny that, but is it 40% of the original game cost in value? Not even close.
So I debated and decided to purchase El Dorado. Not because any of the features sounded that great. They did not unless you wanted to play as a South American nation (to which then, this add-on receives some value). However, the nation builder sounded awesome. Especially when I learned it still works with ironman (only way to keep me from cheating by reloading). So I pay the $15, try to create some nations, only to learn that you can't even save your template for your new nations. Can easily spend a couple hours creating a new world map only to lose it because you made one mistake at the beginning (or balanced the map wrong). No way to edit your errors unless you wrote down everything you did. In other words, it's a neat feature, but it's essentially a broken/incomplete feature unless you are only concerned about carving out a single new nation in the world.
To sum it all up, I paid $50 for the full game and have played 183 hours on it. Full game = amazing value. On the other hand, I paid $50 for a few additional features, many of which don't even apply to me. Horrible value.
The best valued expansions/DLC I've had are ones like in Skyrim which are massive (though still pale in value compared to the base game). Older games when you actually bought expansion packs at the store seemed to hold a lot more value as well. I suppose these expansions are necessary in order for Paradox to maintain support for the game so many years after release. But then again, EUII had patches released for years and I don't remember there being paid DLC or add-ons for that (correct me if I am wrong there). I wish companies would stop nickel and diming us and instead release completed products. Either support it for years or don't. But while not as bad as micro transactions (games like Candy Crush should almost be illegal), the value of these updates is minimal.
I think the same holds true for a game like EUIV. In fact, I think the value is even less unless you are a hardcore EUIV player. I have purchased Wealth of Nations, Res Republica, Art of War, and El Dorado now. All of them at full price. Unfortunately, none of them have proven to be worth their value at all for me.
The primary reason I paid for Wealth of Nations was due to privateers (which became a waste of $$$ now that I also bought El Dorado). As someone who does not usually experience with other countries and government mechanics, most of the features have gone unused. Same goes with Res Republica. Never have played as a Republic, so other than National Focus, I have found little value in this patch.
Art of War was a bit different. There were a lot of very useful features for myself and probably most like me. Cancelling idea groups, giving up cores, creating marches (I never do it, but I see the value in it), garrison sorties, transfer of sacked provinces, and quick upgrading as well as mothballing fleets are all great features. Unfortunately, as great and as important as all these features are, most of them should have been included with the game to begin with. EU is not a new series. Many of these things have been issues since EUII (and probably the original EU, but I say EUII since I never played the original EU). For example, I know for a fact I was annoyed way back in EUII when an ally would just beat me to a province I want and one they don't need, and because their army beat me there by a day, they got control when it fell. With coring, that has been an issue since game launch day and is not something that should have been paid for. Sometimes a war leader gives you a province you just don't need and can't core. That should have been fixed within the first patch or two. Anyways, the Art of War was a very good DLC. I don't think too many deny that, but is it 40% of the original game cost in value? Not even close.
So I debated and decided to purchase El Dorado. Not because any of the features sounded that great. They did not unless you wanted to play as a South American nation (to which then, this add-on receives some value). However, the nation builder sounded awesome. Especially when I learned it still works with ironman (only way to keep me from cheating by reloading). So I pay the $15, try to create some nations, only to learn that you can't even save your template for your new nations. Can easily spend a couple hours creating a new world map only to lose it because you made one mistake at the beginning (or balanced the map wrong). No way to edit your errors unless you wrote down everything you did. In other words, it's a neat feature, but it's essentially a broken/incomplete feature unless you are only concerned about carving out a single new nation in the world.
To sum it all up, I paid $50 for the full game and have played 183 hours on it. Full game = amazing value. On the other hand, I paid $50 for a few additional features, many of which don't even apply to me. Horrible value.
The best valued expansions/DLC I've had are ones like in Skyrim which are massive (though still pale in value compared to the base game). Older games when you actually bought expansion packs at the store seemed to hold a lot more value as well. I suppose these expansions are necessary in order for Paradox to maintain support for the game so many years after release. But then again, EUII had patches released for years and I don't remember there being paid DLC or add-ons for that (correct me if I am wrong there). I wish companies would stop nickel and diming us and instead release completed products. Either support it for years or don't. But while not as bad as micro transactions (games like Candy Crush should almost be illegal), the value of these updates is minimal.
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