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toasterwarrior posted:- Establish cities on farmland for higher pop capacity Base terrain type isn’t the be-all end-all for pop cap, major rivers* give +50% for example, smaller rivers can give a bonus although not always (it’s pretty arbitrary, you can see in the pop cap tooltip), being coastal, having a port, and climate all affect it too. *Tigris, Euphrates, Indus, Ganges, Nile, Rhine and the tiny one in Macedonia by Pella, I think that’s all of them. The Danube isn’t for some reason. e: As for specialisation, I usually just stick libraries and academies in all my cities (once they're converted and assimilated, if not it's theatres and temples). I find that by the time I'm reasonably big and have cash to spare on buildings I'm rolling in cash and manpower anyway. Plus you get fucktons of slaves by conquering stuff Wafflecopper fucked around with this message at 11:26 on Oct 21, 2019 |
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Oct 21, 2019 11:18
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Ooh, thank you for that, I forgot about climate and coastal/port access. That said, I probably shouldn't get carried away with building cities wherever its conducive to, right? You reckon maybe 2 or 3 cities per province is best?
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Oct 21, 2019 12:11
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Personally I rarely go with more than one in a province because I like to expand quickly and I have lots of other poo poo to spend PP on. I have no idea what's optimal though, maybe I'd be better off building more
Wafflecopper fucked around with this message at 12:26 on Oct 21, 2019 |
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Oct 21, 2019 12:18
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oC20W8u--BY&t=788s Here's an interview with Johan about I:R. At timestamp, he's asked about his plans. One thing I liked is he's talking about his desire to make "content packs" instead of "expansions". He specifically mentions how problematic EU4 turned out to be: "a bunch of features tied out to expansion. And then you can't go back and remove or rework it. Limits design quite a lot." And his first answer is adding flavor. Of course here he talks about what he wants to do, not his plans or project goals, but it sounds good.
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Oct 21, 2019 12:43
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i thought johan came off really well during the pdxcon presentation, positive, humorous and introspective/willing to learn from mistakes and i hope he can make imperator a lot better
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Oct 21, 2019 13:27
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Wafflecopper posted:Personally I rarely go with more than one in a province because I like to expand quickly and I have lots of other poo poo to spend PP on. I have no idea what's optimal though, maybe I'd be better off building more One per province doesn’t seem anywhere near enough to keep research rate competitive. Maybe if you stack aqueducts and use the centralise focus? Greece and the Near East are covered in cities though, so I’d take that as the standard to aspire to. e: This, see this, worrying about urbanisation and centralisation because this sort of fine structure of political geography is core to the whole process of “technological”/economic development is the sort of gameplay I’m here for. Give me a few more inputs and outputs to the system and I’d be as happy as a pig in poo poo. Throw out “civilisation” and key those modifiers off the province’s urbanisation rate imo. KOGAHAZAN!! fucked around with this message at 13:55 on Oct 21, 2019 |
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Oct 21, 2019 13:48
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Research is generally difficult to get up at the moment, don't be surprised if they make it easier to tech in 1.3
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Oct 21, 2019 17:43
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I think one of the problems I'm having getting back in to the game now is that I just don't really have much idea how to develop territory, this happens with most PDX games over time but is really condensed in Imperator due to the vast changes. What should I build and where? I'm drowning in the new choices! I started a game as Syracuse, took Sicily and most of the foot of Italy, then just... died to Rome because I had to fight their armies 2 to 1 to have any chance of winning (ignoring the fact they had 4x my manpower). I can't ally with anybody because nobody exists who can help me, there's no blocks in Gaul or Dalmatia and I've no faith in the Greeks to come help me.
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Oct 21, 2019 18:14
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The very abridged general strategy is: In your territories, build slave estates and farming settlements. In your cities, build stuff that makes you have more citizens and which increase their output. In your really big cities (such as your capital) also build aqueducts, theaters and temples since they will get filled up with foreign slaves which you will need to convert to the right culture and religion. Generally speaking it is optimal to have one gigantic city with as many pops in as you can possibly manage, especially if it's your capital city since the capital gets a bonus to output. You should build up your strongest city in your strongest province first before you start to spread out investment (that includes with province developments and increasing the food output of that province as much as possible) There's tons of ways you can deviate from this but it's a good place to start from.
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Oct 21, 2019 18:41
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I want to say I hate the mercenary mechanics. I'm not going to develop further because 
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Oct 21, 2019 18:53
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Dalael posted:I want to say I hate the mercenary mechanics. I'm not going to develop further because I like when you start a war and they purchase like five merc stacks that are inside your land, walk them out, and then they can immediately turn back and start capping all your poo poo. No wait I don't like it, in fact it's very dumb!!!
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Oct 21, 2019 18:57
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Chomp8645 posted:I like when you start a war and they purchase like five merc stacks that are inside your land, walk them out, and then they can immediately turn back and start capping all your poo poo. Exactly! I fought a war against Macedon, Egypt & Phrygia all at once and even though I took over all of Macedon, I had to keep several armies in just to recap the poo poo that mercenaries popping out of nowhere would cap. It really loving sucks. There has got to be a better mechanic. In the same game, I attacked 3 different countries (allied together) in greece who had a grand total of 6 territories. Not even provinces, territories. They had so much gold in between them, that it took me almost 300 000 manpower to win that war. Mercenary armies would pop out of nowhere all the time. It was loving ridiculous.
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Oct 21, 2019 19:33
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I thought at release that you could only hires mercenaries that were inside your (controlled) territory. Maybe I imagined it but either way it seems more reasonable imo. But yeah also they are too cheap, and too numerous. I think the idea was that you're not just paying the gold cost, but a cost in your military traditions advancement. The problem is that the military traditions just aren't nearly valuable enough to justify passing on mercenaries for. It's like hmm... do I win a war, or should I lose it instead but I'll get +10% to light cavalry defense sooner!!!!
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Oct 21, 2019 19:40
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Chomp8645 posted:I thought at release that you could only hires mercenaries that were inside your (controlled) territory. Maybe I imagined it but either way it seems more reasonable imo. I only care about the 4th tradition in the Heavy Infantry Column. The one that gives roads. The rest is irrelevant imho. So I feel like you nailed it on the head.
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Oct 21, 2019 19:57
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Also, has anybody ever won against Egypt? I just can't... 4 attempts at doing Nostre Mare, all failed because of that one god drat country. The first time, it had over 900 cohorts. That's not a joke. All other times, it has a lot less but no matter how much troop I land in egypt, I get crushed. Last evening I dropped 12 armies of 20 000 troops each. 5k Archers, 10k Heavy Infantry and 5k Equites each. I was annihilated. Egypt managed to beat all these armies in 1 stack. My troops retreated to the territory right next to where the battle happened so Egypt pounced on me a 2nd time and 12 of my best generals are now linguishing in Egypt's dungeons. I am getting really frustrated.
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Oct 21, 2019 20:31
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Dalael posted:Also, has anybody ever won against Egypt? I just can't... Don't go 1on1, wait until they are at war with another country. preferable after they have lost most of their manpower. conquer territory nearby their border, and wait on them to come, attrition kills almost as much men as battles atm. I would say aim for egypt earlier, when they are rivals with phrygia.
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Oct 21, 2019 20:40
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Descar posted:Don't go 1on1, wait until they are at war with another country. preferable after they have lost most of their manpower. The last try (when I lost over 200k troops) Egypt was at war with Phrygia (and was obviously winning) so it was then or never. Turns out, never might have been the better option. I'll start another playthrough again tonight but i think it might be my last attempt.
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Oct 21, 2019 20:49
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Dalael posted:Also, has anybody ever won against Egypt? I just can't... The scaling on large countries gets pretty wacky and out of control, hopefully it's a balance priority for next patch. I suppose with the supply changes it'll be a lot harder to support absurdly huge armies
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Oct 21, 2019 20:49
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Mercs go insane too, I don't think the dynamic merc system is a great idea. Like even disregarding how easy it is to hire/maintain them, there's just too many of the drat things everywhere.
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Oct 21, 2019 21:32
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Unfortunately, I think mercenaries need to be totally rethought and redone to be good. Part of the problem is that they have essentially none of the drawbacks that the use of mercenaries should come with. Currently, mercenaries function exactly like your own soldiers, they just get paid differently and don't use your manpower. They take all your commands, they fight to the death, and they pass all the loot and slaves on to you. From a gameplay perspective this is redundant, and from a historical perspective it's absurd. Mercenaries should have drawbacks that your regular troops don't come with. If mercenaries capture a territory, you should not get slaves. If they capture a city alone, you should not get slaves or loot (if it's a joint venture there should be a split). They should not fight to the death for your cause. If they are taking losses or the war is going badly, they should demand more money or leave. If they start to rival your own soldiers in number, that should be a big problem. If nobody is employing them for long period of time, they should start to cause trouble. Additionally, it should be hard to have access to mercenaries if you don't regularly use them. Historically, Carthage had good access to mercenaries because they used them regularly and maintained relations. They made sure they were paid, sometimes even without an enemy to fight. But in this game, Carthaginians apparently just have "Racial Trait: Contract Negotiators" because they just smooth talk them into taking lower pay. If you don't use them much, they shouldn't be in your lands. Hundreds of thousands of armed men just hanging out around the campfire in the Italian peninsula, just waiting for a job, loyal to no one, is ridiculous. In short I think there are two major changes needed... 1) Mercenaries need to have drawbacks to their use, making them less desirable than your own troops. These drawbacks can be alleviated for places like Carthage that regularly employ them. Other than that, mercenaries should be the resort of the desperate, or the rich. Basically, most nations should not want to use mercenaries if their own troops are available, in most circumstances. 2) Mercenaries should be a thing that you have to deal with as part of governance, beyond just pushing the "hire" button. There shouldn't be multiple groups of 36,000 armed men just hanging around in your land, camped there for years on end for no reason. Maybe you have a way to manage allowing or disallowing them into your land. They should be a thing that you have to court, or spurn. If you court them, then you will have supplies of mercenaries available when you need them. But you will have to pay or otherwise satisfy them in the time between wars, because if nobody is paying them then they should start causing trouble. Unemployed mercenaries should cause events where they demand protection money, or end up raiding villages and causing unrest, that kind of thing. This should become much worse if they outnumber your actual national soldiers. Or you can keep them out of your lands, avoiding these problems and expenses, but then you don't have many to call on when war starts. Well that's my effort post thanks for reading it. Meme Poker Party fucked around with this message at 22:08 on Oct 21, 2019 |
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Oct 21, 2019 22:06
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I like having mercs preexist on map, it fits with imperator's more direct connection to geography, but there should definitely be fewer imo. Agreed that choosing to use them heavily should be a major choice, with the caveat that this was a fairly common arrangement; both the Seleukids and Ptolemies almost exclusively armed themselves with greco-makedonian condottiere because they (quite reasonably) feared the consequences of arming their foreign subject populations
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Oct 22, 2019 00:15
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I honestly have no solutions. Im not even sure i can define the problem well. All i can say is, mercenaries and pirates suck. They're not fun. Pirate arent a threat in any they're just annoying in 2 ways: its an extra pop up and they kill lone boats when you are building a fleet.
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Oct 22, 2019 00:46
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Regarding merc chat: I am glad I am keeping up with this thread because I was tempted to buy the game but I think I'll hold off a while longer because I would find that kind of poo poo infuriating.toasterwarrior posted:Finally got back to this instead of Stellaris since the big patch for that game is coming later this year
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Oct 22, 2019 13:31
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Mercenaries should migrate to regions where folks are spending on mercenaries, and travel there from where they're disbanded. But that seems like a lot of work.
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Oct 22, 2019 13:53
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They also can be treated as non-directly controlled troops. We already have this UI and AI, don't we? Or maybe treat them as allies you can give vague orders like defend this province or siege that fort. Of course, it will make hard historical famous things like Athenian mercenaries landing in Sicily.
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Oct 22, 2019 14:08
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AAAAA! Real Muenster posted:Regarding merc chat: I am glad I am keeping up with this thread because I was tempted to buy the game but I think I'll hold off a while longer because I would find that kind of poo poo infuriating. Okay I would say if you like Paradox games, don't let the mercenaries issue stop you from being it. It's not game breaking, it's just annoying. For example, the playthrough I restarted yesterday, I don't plan on letting the Ai buy mercenaries. Since I always go to war with a dragon's hoard of gold, I'll just buy the mercenaries right before i declare war, denying the PC the opportunity to do so. quote:It's not game breaking, it's just annoying.
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Oct 22, 2019 14:22
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AAAAA! Real Muenster posted:Who the what now? New DLC for Stellaris got announced and they usually come with a rework patch for an aspect of the game, with this one most likely being for diplomacy. I was under the impression it was coming soon, but the official release date for the DLC is still "Later This Year" so I decided to try out Cicero instead.
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Oct 22, 2019 14:31
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AAAAA! Real Muenster posted:Regarding merc chat: I am glad I am keeping up with this thread because I was tempted to buy the game but I think I'll hold off a while longer because I would find that kind of poo poo infuriating. Fwiw I haven't found mercenaries to be annoying at all
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Oct 22, 2019 14:35
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Magissima posted:Fwiw I haven't found mercenaries to be annoying at all Are you sure you're playing the same game I am? Out of curiosity, which country do you play? What I've noticed is Greece is the worst place for mercs. Thats where they bog me down. Too many mercenary units in a small area filled with mountain range is just the worst
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Oct 22, 2019 14:39
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I've been playing in Persia, the merc density might be lower because I don't feel like there are too many. Off the top of my head it's maybe one stack for every two or three provinces? I haven't noticed whether the Seleucids hire a lot of them as they have endless bodies to throw at me either way.
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Oct 22, 2019 19:03
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The one thing I’m really looking forward to, strangely, is better flavor names and description for the techs of other cultures. Always feel a bit weird to research “Patrician Patronage” as Indians and such. Ideally though, not just flavor but also game mechanic differences that reward different plays depending on your culture. On that note: is there a place to see the total sum of the bonuses brought about by the tech research? I usually have a good idea of where I stand, but sometimes I forget the exact amount of “+5% tax rate” I picked.
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Oct 22, 2019 19:39
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Greece is the worst for the merc problem because the tiny states save up money and then you go to war with 4 city states who suddenly hire 100k mercs between them. Also, Egypt sometimes gets involved and they also usually have more money than God (this is historically appropriate though)
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Oct 22, 2019 19:50
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RabidWeasel posted:Greece is the worst for the merc problem because the tiny states save up money and then you go to war with 4 city states who suddenly hire 100k mercs between them. Also, Egypt sometimes gets involved and they also usually have more money than God (this is historically appropriate though) This! Combine it with the mountainous terrain that makes it hard for you to reinforce your own armies unless you have military access (while the AI never seem to have problem getting access from other AI) and those mercenaries can really gently caress up your armies (As stated earlier, went to war with 3 AI which had 6 territories total and it cost me 300 000 manpower. its insane)
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Oct 22, 2019 20:58
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Just making it so that there's good uses of money for small states rather than sitting on a giant money pile would be a good fix imo
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Oct 22, 2019 21:26
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Just noticed this has 'mostly positive' recent reviews on Steam so it seems like people are slowly coming around.
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Oct 23, 2019 05:26
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TOOT BOOT posted:Just noticed this has 'mostly positive' recent reviews on Steam so it seems like people are slowly coming around. Player numbers jumped up after the patch and have stayed up. By which I mean it’s gone from consistently sub-1k to idling around the 1.5k~2k range. So everyone who came back after the patch seems to have liked what they found, but 85% of the people who were playing at launch are still gone.
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Oct 23, 2019 09:15
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Dalael posted:Also, has anybody ever won against Egypt? I just can't... Don't invade by sea, go overland instead and you won't have to worry about stackwipes. Also get bigger before you take them on if you can't match their numbers.  The only trouble Egypt gave me was having to trucebreak to take all their land in a reasonable timeframe, all those pops makes their land cost a ton of warscore. Turns out AE doesn't really matter any more once you reach a critical mass of same-culture territory. Once AE gets high enough you get over 100% AE impact reduction, so if you're stable at ~60-70 AE you can just keep conquering and it won't even go up. Manage your off-culture provinces with provincial policies and assigned armies and it's not too hard to stay under the threshold. I was even trucebreaking vs Egypt and Carthage while already at >50% AE and it was fine. Also declaring on tribal vassals is a good way to get around having to trucebreak. Massylia and Musulamia were both Carthaginian tribal vassals, which don't get called into war when you declare on their overlord. So I did one normal war and one trucebreak war against Carthage itself to get borders with them, then fabricated and declared on one and then the other to pull Carthage into two more wars as the leader without any further trucebreaking penalties. This is possibly a design oversight/exploit, as declaring war against somebody guaranteed by someone you are truced with will pull the guarantor in and count as trucebreaking, so it seems weird than tribal vassals don't work the same way. e: also Dalael posted:Aggressive Expansion is just a number. I never once made a subject 
Wafflecopper fucked around with this message at 14:48 on Oct 23, 2019 |
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Oct 23, 2019 14:02
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The reviews are getting more positive because the game is improving. Whether it's "good" or "not good" on the whole is a personal judgement, but it's undoubtedly much better than release in a relative sense (release was bad). Hope this helps.
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Oct 23, 2019 15:16
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One concerning thing I've noticed though, I have strong hunch that this title is already falling down the classic Paradox "the AI is braindead helpless about every single non-base mechanic". This seems to be standing out with city founding in particular. Specifically, that the AI doesn't do it. This is really pronounced with tribals, since most of them start with few, if any cities. In my last game (as Rome), Averni got a point where they almost completely filled out the borders of what would be considered "Gaul". I didn't go towards them for most of the game, so I wasn't stunting them. In the last quarter of the timeline I started swallowing up their territory. They had no cities. And I mean zero, none, zip, zilch, nada. One of the bigger power blocs in the game and not a city to their name with the game 75% over. Still 0/0/0 tech. They were not only ones exhibiting this behavior. In fact by scanning the map it seems basically every tribal was this way. I was hard pressed to find a city anywhere on the map north of Etruria that I didn't make myself. I have a feeling that since while warring with each other the AI will occasionally burn cities they conquer, but never build them, it endgames with a city-less hellscape, even if they started with cities. As someone who experienced first hand the Stellaris AI being completely unable to do dick nor poo poo with any loving system in the entire game, for years (and still the case as far as I know), this has a really bad taste to it. If you played that game and remember conquering AI planets to find masses of starving pops on undeveloped land, it feels like that all over again. This is probably the most apparent flaw in Imperator. I'd say it is the biggest thing against recommending the game to others at the moment, because Paradox's track record at fixing it is pretty dang bad. Maybe they'll do better this time, but probably not. We can only hope. Meme Poker Party fucked around with this message at 22:18 on Oct 23, 2019 |
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Oct 23, 2019 22:08
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That's a problem with having to majorly overhaul a bunch of mechanics immediately after release because the original implementations weren't very good. Unfortunately a pretty hefty chunk of the playerbase does not appear to give a gently caress about competent AI since they just want to play in their own sandbox and having an AI which might come and bully you is actively detrimental to that.
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Oct 24, 2019 00:02
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