Will Art of War hurt computer performance?

[Webstantine]

First off let me announce that my computer is very bad, currently on 5 speed it takes 2-3 seconds to pass a single day. I know I am also relatively alone with this extreme slowness but I have hope that the Paradox team have taken people like myself into consideration.

Naturally when I first saw all the new tags and provinces, although my first thought was how great they were it slowly dawned on me that it mightn't even be possible for me to play them (with large mods with many new provinces ,e.g. MEIOU, not working for me, however I remember reading somewhere that alongside the large increase in tags and provinces the developers have also done a large amount of optimisation; I have also seen evidence of this in the removal of various lag causing areas, namely terrain and trade in the recent Dev Diary 8.

My questions to the Dev team and anyone else with knowledge of the answers are:

1. Have you actually made the game faster or am I hearing rumours?
2. Will AoW run on my computer at an acceptable speed?
3. Has AoW in fact slowed the game down?

I realise that optimisation is of minimal importance considering the majority of EUIV players do not seem to have any problems with lag and all have supercomputers, however it is my hope that the Paradox team will take into account the small minority who may not have the necessary computers for an extreme map overhaul without any actions taken to counter the added demand. Thank you.

 

[zemuzil]

First off let me announce that my computer is very bad, currently on 5 speed it takes 2-3 seconds to pass a single day. I know I am also relatively alone with this extreme slowness but I have hope that the Paradox team have taken people like myself into consideration.

Naturally when I first saw all the new tags and provinces, although my first thought was how great they were it slowly dawned on me that it mightn't even be possible for me to play them (with large mods with many new provinces ,e.g. MEIOU, not working for me, however I remember reading somewhere that alongside the large increase in tags and provinces the developers have also done a large amount of optimisation; I have also seen evidence of this in the removal of various lag causing areas, namely terrain and trade in the recent Dev Diary 8.

My questions to the Dev team and anyone else with knowledge of the answers are:

1. Have you actually made the game faster or am I hearing rumours?
2. Will AoW run on my computer at an acceptable speed?
3. Has AoW in fact slowed the game down?

I realise that optimisation is of minimal importance considering the majority of EUIV players do not seem to have any problems with lag and all have supercomputers, however it is my hope that the Paradox team will take into account the small minority who may not have the necessary computers for an extreme map overhaul without any actions taken to counter the added demand. Thank you.

They said something about optimization of engine

but my guess we will know if that works or not once dlc its out

 

[kitemasaki]

Nothing can help a bad computer and a game studio focusing on the past rather than the next-gen specs will fall behind quickly.

 

[Wizzington]

We've made major optimizations in Art of War, in our tests it is not noticeably slower than before.

 

[Xara]

Supercomputers? Man, my last system's components were collectively ~7 years old and could run speed 4 comfortably without issue or crashes (I got a new system about 2-3 months ago). How old is your system that it's so much worse than that?

 

[Webstantine]

Nothing can help a bad computer and a game studio focusing on the past rather than the next-gen specs will fall behind quickly.

I'm aware and I have no desire to hold back progress but it's still nice to know if I'll still be able to play, please be considerate of the fact "next-gen specs" aren't entirely feasible for everyone.

We've made major optimizations in Art of War, in our tests it is not noticeably slower than before.

Thank you for answering Wiz, it's good to know it will probably still work.

Supercomputers? Man, my last system's components were collectively ~7 years old and could run speed 4 comfortably without issue or crashes (I got a new system about 2-3 months ago). How old is your system that it's so much worse than that?

My computer is 8 years old but at the time I bought it it was only the cheapest thing I could find, I've been saving all my earnings for a while but I'm still a while away from a new computer.

 

[joethepro36]

Games are often as good as the computer they run on. I strongly recommend building expensive quality systems that last over cheaper short term computers. The difference in performance can be astounding. My current computer was £1000, custom built by myself so it runs every game full graphics, no question about it.

8 years is a long time for an upgrade, 5 years is my typical limit. Its enough time to get a good run out of it and if you built a quality system you can still sell it or hand it to family. Quality components will last years longer than cheaper ones. I recommend in particular a good power supply and a basic non-stock cooling system to extend the lifetime of the computer. A good motherboard gives you room for expansion or upgrades and they aren't too expensive. The real point of expense is the graphics card, which will dictate your graphics entirely but a cheap card should run something like Europa without issue.

To cut a long story short, getting quality components while paying a bit extra pays off in the long term.

 

[Webstantine]

Games are often as good as the computer they run on. I strongly recommend building expensive quality systems that last over cheaper short term computers. The difference in performance can be astounding. My current computer was £1000, custom built by myself so it runs every game full graphics, no question about it.

8 years is a long time for an upgrade, 5 years is my typical limit. Its enough time to get a good run out of it and if you built a quality system you can still sell it or hand it to family. Quality components will last years longer than cheaper ones. I recommend in particular a good power supply and a basic non-stock cooling system to extend the lifetime of the computer. A good motherboard gives you room for expansion or upgrades and they aren't too expensive. The real point of expense is the graphics card, which will dictate your graphics entirely but a cheap card should run something like Europa without issue.

To cut a long story short, getting quality components while paying a bit extra pays off in the long term.

I have no idea how to build a computer, I have no experience in engineering. Where can I find all these components? EU IV and other paradox titles are pretty much all the games I own and I don't really have a lot of money to invest in a new computer, but maybe it is time to upgrade.

 

[Xara]

Building your own is more of a hobby / self-pride sort of thing these days. The myth of "you save so much money!" is pretty debunked these days. You'll save a bit, yea, but when you factor in warranty, customer service, and not needing to worry about screwing up something, a pre-built can be just as much value for your buck.

Of course your personal budget is always a concern ... can't advise much without knowing your incoming and limit

My current computer was £1000, custom built by myself so it runs every game full graphics

Yep, without directly comparing specs this seems about right. I spent about $400 more, but that was for a significant video card upgrade. That should blow everything out of the water and last for quite some time.

For much much less you should be quite capable of picking up even a basic system that is more than capable of running things like EU4, if that is your typical type of game.

I mean, I'm basically going to be giving away my old pc for < $100, if even that, and it was comfortably capable of running EU4, it was only struggling heavily against new graphics-heavy things like tomb raider and whatnot. For under $1000 or even $500 you ought to be able to snag something, though I would rather save up and spend more and upgrade less often.

Even if you do none of that now it seems you should be fine for AoW

 

[TheMeInTeam]

If you read between the lines on the functionality of mechanics changes, such as trade goods, the developer assertions of keeping performance decent don't appear to be empty because they appear to be making trade-offs for that purpose. Not just engine optimizations, but practical alterations to the calculations. We'll see if it actually isn't "noticeable" though. 25% longer is noticeable after all.

You'll save a bit, yea, but when you factor in warranty, customer service, and not needing to worry about screwing up something, a pre-built can be just as much value for your buck

It depends if you know what you're doing, but screwing up with the way stuff ships these days is less common with the color coding and ez labeling . Customer service in this regard, for me, is non-value based on past experience . Warranty is legit but the individual parts have them too.

It's a matter of how much time you're willing to spend. That is a valid consideration of value IMO, more so than the other things.

 

[lordelenath]

Building your PC yourself is definitely going to save you money. Here in Germany it's generally something in between 10-20%, which is quite some money if you're spending 1.000,- or more. I've found that especially in the low-end tier of gaming hardware you can improve performance considerably if you're building the machine yourself, because the cheaper PCs tend to have very bad setups if you want to have optimal gaming performance. They regularly have very expensive CPUs and big HDDs while sitting on very bad GPUs. Add to that the fact that they tend to have very cheap and low-quality components for some parts, e.g. the power supply.

I don't know about USA/GB or wherever you're from, but in Germany there is a considerable amount of very good forum communities that give you an exact shopping list based on your budget and the highest possible performance available. You basically go in there telling them: "I have 500 bucks and want to play X, Y and Z. I own Monitor A with QxW resolution." and get a list with the exact hardware you should buy, generally together with a direct link to the cheapest online shop.

You don't even have to build them yourself, there're quite a few online shops that build the PC for you with the desired components for ~20,- or some such. But even building them yourself is pretty easy and compareable to LEGO. Just don't use any force - I have never been doing any kind of crafting or am skilled with these things and I built my first PC three years ago within ~60 minutes and and the help of a Youtube video.