Europa Universalis IV

[Hellraiser]

@oscar does the game throw a ton of bad "backwards assholes resist change" events at you when you try to westernize? I know it drops stability to -3 but that can be taken care of with a stockpile of admin points. God knows that for potatoland any attempt at westernization IRL would be met with a "rokosz" or three.

And yes we all do miss him. He probably went on a quest to prevent Magna Mundi the game from becoming vapourware when he sensed something was wrong, this task possibly took his life

 

[Spectacle]

@oscar does the game throw a ton of bad "backwards assholes resist change" events at you when you try to westernize? I know it drops stability to -3 but that can be taken care of with a stockpile of admin points. God knows that for potatoland any attempt at westernization IRL would be met with a "rokosz" or three.

Westernizing drops all your power points to -100, so stockpiling is not possible. Better wait for a strong admin leader before you westernize.

 

[Hellraiser]

Yeah, I can see how that could be a problem. At least it is not reneging the past from MMU

 

[hoverdog]

Yeah, I can see how that could be a problem. At least it is not reneging the past from MMU

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Alright, I've gone through 350 province files so far. Cultural enrichment is going well. Once I'm done with that, I gotta start restoring cores too (this is one of the more weaksauce aspects of CK2 conversion).

Please share your converted mod when you're done, would be really cool!

Fully intend to. Next thing I need to do is see how the localization files work and make a couple of more localized versions of pre-existing states within Uralica so nationalism rebellions, releases and such can be used to full extent. Ie, Novgorod is going to be recast as Karelia and covers the Karelian cultural sphere within Uralica, while another state with a remotely suitable flag (not interested in fiddling around too much with flags as the first thing) will serve as Livonia which covers the Estonian provinces along the Southern Baltic coastline. After dealing with Uralica I'll need to set up at least five possible divisions within Greater Bavaria based on the existing German ethnic groups there (Greater Bavaria itself is going to have Bavaria and Austria as the sole core region), not to mention Italian core clusterfuck in Burgundy-Italy. I'll also have to see if I can fiddle with the culture files in the mod to better reflect the fact Persia is Zoro land and Adianosid Egypt is Orthodox (Miaphysite).


And then I'll have to figure out how the mighty sultanate of mighty Georgia can be set as a lucky nation.

 

[Hellraiser]

Sultanate of Georgia? Goddamn asians!

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

In my game I think Byzantium came out from rebels. Ottomans got fucked in the ass by Venice pretty hard.

 

[oscar]

@oscar does the game throw a ton of bad "backwards assholes resist change" events at you when you try to westernize? I know it drops stability to -3 but that can be taken care of with a stockpile of admin points. God knows that for potatoland any attempt at westernization IRL would be met with a "rokosz" or three

Yeah you get lots of nasty events that spawn rebels or sap your points/stability. And since you need to claw your stability back into the positives for the westernisation to begin, it's quite the pain in the ass. Especially that (not westernisation related) event that forces you to diplomatically insult your neighbour or lose a point of stability. So unless you have a godly ruler and are in a very secure position I'd avoid westernising or you might sink into a death spiral of rebels and -100 administration and military power.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Sultanate of Georgia? Goddamn asians!

The chief muslim powers in the converted save are Sultanate of Anatolia (Greece plus most of Turkey, Greek culture and Sunni), Sultanate of Georgia (Georgian culture, Sunni), Abbasid Iraq, and Fatimid Syria. Sultanate of Africa is also there, but they're cut off from the rest of the muslim world and have borders with Iberia, Mali Empire, and Egypt.

Most states are pretty unified, very few vassal coalitions. Iberia has a number of vassal states, but the only fractured state is Holy Abyssinian Empire in Ethiopia and Nubia.

EDIT: Also, as a fun group thrown in the mix, Jomsvikings are still around (something I did myself) and holding on to the last Norse provinces in Scandinavia. The gist with them is going full Vinland and eloping Norse arsebuggery to North America through Iceland before the Finns eat them or use them as firewood.

 

[Hellraiser]

The question is though, will they encounter the Dagonl'nu in Vinland?

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

The question is though, will they encounter the Dagonl'nu in Vinland?

I'm not planning on making extensive missions, decisions or events. Currently I'm literally just planning a Vinland formation decision (tentative names are "Flight to Vinland" or "Voyage of Tears") for Jomsvikings that moves their capital and vast majority of their population and base tax to North America while distributing the now barren provines to their neighbours, along with changing the tag to Vinland.

The problem is making the decision generic enough. Population transit should be easy, it can be handled via modifier granted to NA provinces. Base tax transit shouldn't be too hard either, I just gotta figure out the region caps.

 

[Malakal]

The question is though, will they encounter the Dagonl'nu in Vinland?

I'm not planning on making extensive missions, decisions or events. Currently I'm literally just planning a Vinland formation decision (tentative names are "Flight to Vinland" or "Voyage of Tears") for Jomsvikings that moves their capital and vast majority of their population and base tax to North America while distributing the now barren provines to their neighbours, along with changing the tag to Vinland.

The problem is making the decision generic enough. Population transit should be easy, it can be handled via modifier granted to NA provinces. Base tax transit shouldn't be too hard either, I just gotta figure out the region caps.

I wouldnt touch base tax if I were you its meant to represent the economic potential of a province not the population. And it would be impossible to redevelop those lands for their new masters.

 

[Kane]

so, when will the first el grande códice game commence?

 

[Sranchammer]

I say we wait until the monarch point imbalance is cleaned up

 

[Kane]

explain

edit: i also read on the bug forums that hotjoining players have a higher chance to crash. paradox internet 1989-2013

 

[Malakal]

I say we wait until the monarch point imbalance is cleaned up

What imbalance?

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

The question is though, will they encounter the Dagonl'nu in Vinland?

I'm not planning on making extensive missions, decisions or events. Currently I'm literally just planning a Vinland formation decision (tentative names are "Flight to Vinland" or "Voyage of Tears") for Jomsvikings that moves their capital and vast majority of their population and base tax to North America while distributing the now barren provines to their neighbours, along with changing the tag to Vinland.

The problem is making the decision generic enough. Population transit should be easy, it can be handled via modifier granted to NA provinces. Base tax transit shouldn't be too hard either, I just gotta figure out the region caps.

I wouldnt touch base tax if I were you its meant to represent the economic potential of a province not the population. And it would be impossible to redevelop those lands for their new masters.

It was supposed to have a touch of "burn everything to the ground and salt the earth" kind of "FUCK YOU NIGGERS WE'RE OUTTA THIS JOINT" thing to it.

 

[KoolNoodles]

Does anyone know how to disable *just* the sound of the fucking money at the end of the month. It is the WORST. What fucking idiot thought it would be a good idea to keep that in. Obviously I can turn effects off, but I like the sound of clicking on things.

I'm also glad to see they didn't think to change a single fucking thing about the Americas, in 6 years.


:patriot:

 

[Average Manatee]

@oscar does the game throw a ton of bad "backwards assholes resist change" events at you when you try to westernize? I know it drops stability to -3 but that can be taken care of with a stockpile of admin points. God knows that for potatoland any attempt at westernization IRL would be met with a "rokosz" or three.

Westernizing drops all your power points to -100, so stockpiling is not possible. Better wait for a strong admin leader before you westernize.

Leave your missions open. Usually you'll find the "defeat rebels" mission pop up every time rebels spawn. This mission gives +2 stability when you clear all rebels out. You can trigger this multiple times, reaching +3 stability before your admin power even gets above negative. Indeed, I rarely need to boost my stability at all. Never take a mission until you are about to complete it, always be checking if something good has popped up that you can quickly trigger.

Sounds like big blobs are more vulnerable, great incline I say. I think this might be the most important new feature, because it makes the blob majors (mainly England, France, Castille, Ottomans and China, leaner majors like Portugal and Austria can always be fun) fun again rather than "Meh, now I will effortlessely conquer the world with France vast, endless, superior armies."

I think once you play a bit you will find this is not the case, and the game is in fact easier and blobby-er than ever. The fact that rebels are basically non-existent if played properly takes away the main speedbump to blobbing in EU3, that of being forced to chase around rebels with 10% spawn rate in 100 provinces for 50 years until cores come in.

Grorious Nippon has finally toppled Worst Korea and Manchu. Now their mechatentacles turn towards colonial expansion to the north while rebuilding and rearming for the inevitable clash with the Ming dynasty

Just attack them now. Ming is ridiculous paper tiger thanks to some horrible modifiers they get. Your Japanese units are probably 2-3x as strong as theirs pound for pound from the start of the game.

I beat them as the Mongol Khanate with 4 provinces just a few years in to the demo. Forced them to switch religions too, great way to get them to convert their lands ahead of time so I didn't have to.

So. Anything obvious missing (like muslims/pagans/republics in CK2) that's likely slated for inevitable DLC, or is the game pretty much finished now (cosmetic/vanity stuff notwithstanding)? How about bugs - standard Paradox fare?

Well it's basically EU3 + expansions in content, with the changes being an overhaul of game mechanics (some for worse, some for good). So nothing obviously missing. But I'm sure Paradox are still going to milk this thing with DLC. Tons of nations don't have unique ideas or events or decisions, Africa and the Americas could be more fleshed out, etc etc. So I'm still waiting for the 75% off get everything for $20 deal.

 

[Zeriel]

What national idea good for Byzantium?

Browsing through the ideas should make it clear that the majority are bad, there are like 3-4 idea groups that are legitimately boss, the rest kind of just mediocre to useless.

Assuming you are doing a eurocentric playthrough, mind, and not doing something like colonialism. So judging it by that standard is I suppose pretty unfair. But still. Ones to look at: economic, all military ones (quality/quantity, offensive, defensive, etc), maybe religious.

My biggest complaint so far is how dumb missionaries are. Sure, there was always a bit of "I can't convert this shit realistically" in EU3, but at least it generally had a _chance_, and it wasn't necessary for culture. In EU4 you need to convert their religion before dealing with culture, and religion and culture penalties stack for purposes of countering missionary strength. So different culture + different religion = 0% missionary chance until you have literally every missionary strength idea in the game. I suppose I'm just not a fan of binary success/failure states in a game otherwise filled with tons of gradients and number-crunching.

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

Actually, it's a lot better than the random chance of shit happening in EU3. Also, I've converted plenty of provinces with different cultures and have not taken the religion idea group. There is an advisor that boosts missionary strength and also look for some decisions that will do the same.

 

[Sranchammer]

What would you guys think of making invasions a tad more challenging? Perhaps reducing army speed and increasing attrition in foreign provinces so as to give defenders more of an advantage

 

[Zeriel]

My impression of it is that it's either way too easy (all conversion if you can do it, at all, it's just boom done, tiny amount of monarch power I don't give a shit about compared to the protracted process in EU3), or impossible (0% chance). Just really strange. While I like the more active, CK2 advisor-style gameplay they put into EU4, it really feels like they went too far sometimes. A lot of the randomness is just gone, and while you can argue that the randomness in previous EU games was never an intentional good, I'd say that overall it was a huge part of what made the game interesting, never having things under control, always having to worry about nationalism rebel chance that couldn't be countered by anything.

ETA: That was @Flying Spaghetti Monster, incidentally. Figures the one time I don't quote someone replies quickly.

 

[Zeriel]

Also, does anyone else feel like they made combat math a lot more punishing? The difference between a tech level or two feels much more massive early on than in previous games, and of course assaulting fortresses is for some reason not just hugely more inefficient than EU3, but even way worse than CK2. Mind, I haven't gotten into lategame yet, so maybe the whole thing is balanced around having all the siege/idea bonuses.

The thing that immediately leapt out at me was the 10X numerical superiority of enemy -> automatic victory rule being completely gone.

 

[Average Manatee]

Assuming you are doing a eurocentric playthrough, mind, and not doing something like colonialism. So judging it by that standard is I suppose pretty unfair. But still. Ones to look at: economic, all military ones (quality/quantity, offensive, defensive, etc), maybe religious.

Best ideas are Diplomacy and Exploration. Fabricating claims and reduced core cost is the lifeblood of expanding your continental empire, while Colonies are incredibly cheap for the benefit they give. Both ideas also use up Diplomacy points, which is hands-down the most useless tech and the one you can afford to draw points away from.

Sadly Military ideas tend to make you worse at military for not teching. Being a level behind on Military Tactics = You will lose with 2 to 1 odds in your favour, being a level behind on new units = you will lose with 1.5 to 1 odds in your favour. It's not really worth taking them until you are ahead of time in tech.

Economic ideas are a bit of a waste considering everyone has loadsamoney after a short period of play, and unlike EU3 improving your income doesn't really improve tech rate (ridiculously overpriced advisors aside). It just kind of sits there. Unless you want to go massively over the limit in colonialism and colonize 10 places at once.

My biggest complaint so far is how dumb missionaries are. Sure, there was always a bit of "I can't convert this shit realistically" in EU3, but at least it generally had a _chance_, and it wasn't necessary for culture. In EU4 you need to convert their religion before dealing with culture, and religion and culture penalties stack for purposes of countering missionary strength. So different culture + different religion = 0% missionary chance until you have literally every missionary strength idea in the game. I suppose I'm just not a fan of binary success/failure states in a game otherwise filled with tons of gradients and number-crunching.

Paradox can't into math. It's ridiculous to literally have a 0% conversion rate. The penalties should be by percentage, not percentage points. e.g. 1% conversion rate - 50% wrong culture = .5% conversion rate, not 1% conversion rate - 2% wrong culture = -1% fuck you asshole.