Johan is possessed by the idea of abstraction over simulation, which is where most of the core issues of modern paradox games stem from
Ahh not really,the problem is that he has one idea of abstraction and that it is. There is nothing wrong with having a few abstract mechanics here and there. But he is just making the same game over and over again,it is boring.
Abstraction makes sense in some regards – for example, abstracting that a province makes a certain amount of money based on its population and general development, rather than simulating each and every business in the province. But Johan is trying to abstract everything to the point of making the game itself be trivial – he is literally dumbing it down through excess abstraction utilizing mana. Now, obviously, he is possessed by this idea because it is very easy to balance and make work something that is abstracted, yet it is immeasurably more difficult to simulate something and actually have it work, especially when you have a wide array of potential inputs to the simulation – if your model neglects something important, it is likely that your resulting simulation will either break down and stop working under certain circumstances, or that it will start performing too well and provide an exploit.
The thing is, however, simulation is
fun. It is why Victoria 2 is so well-liked, because it actually simulates the economy rather than abstracting it, and it's fun to develop your factory, try cornering the market or secure resources for it through conquest, enact laws and get techs to get your commoners to become workers, all that shit. Of couse you have shit like liquor factory spam, which is the exploit thing I mentioned above, but it is all still fun nevertheless. Now, an abstract approach to economy would be something like "we take province population, we take the literacy amount of your population and laws and local infrastructure, create an equation, and show you the final number of money you get from this province." This is obviously much easier to design and make, but it is so damn dull, there is no fun in it.
Abstraction should be used when there is something that is largely irrelevant to the aim of the game or wouldn't be fun for the player to play with. Johan's problem is that he's striving to abstract everything and simulate nothing, so long as he can avoid it.
