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I need some strategic advice. I'm going for the THIS IS PERSIA achievement and I'm in the following situation:  I am persia, and allied with the Ottomans. Khorasan and Haasa are my vassals and I am integrating Khorasan atm. I am terrified of going to war with the Ottomans at this point, so I am staying the hell away from Mamluk territory. I can try and push east into India, South forcevassalizing Oman and vassal-feeding Haasa/Oman with Yemeni provinces, or north and try to pull Ottomans into a war with Muscovy. What way do I expand into? At the moment my plan is to wait for a destructive war between Ottomans and Austria or Lithouania and then strike them in the back. Also my manpower is GONE after a disastrous war in the Himalayas so next war is probably going to be mercenary-only. I am cautious against going after Sind because somehow they are allied with Delhi, Jaunpur AND Bahmanis. What's a good next move? What I have going for me: I have westernised.
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Oct 1, 2015 22:01
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double nine posted:I need some strategic advice. I'm going for the THIS IS PERSIA achievement and I'm in the following situation: You're in excellent shape for 1553, and should start considering converting your infantry forces into mercenaries permanently. If you're worried about Sind, keep an eye on the political situation in the subcontinent (and what claims Khorasan fabricates) and go kick over Arabia while you wait. India is disgustingly rich. Alternatively, go through Nogai and Uzbek before Muscovy does and open up another available expansion front that isn't reliant on Khorasan having a clue.
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Oct 1, 2015 22:14
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double nine posted:What's a good next move? What I have going for me: I have westernised. What are the Mamluks looking like? It might be worth making a play for Egypt before the Ottomans do. This will put you on a collision course with them but you are on one already and it would cut off their last easy avenue of expansion. It also depends a bit on how much larger you can afford to make Haasa. Nogai might be worth a pickup since they often end up with a lot of cored land you coould reconquer. That would mean going up against Musscovy though when you already have a titan on your doorstep. And yeah, India is disgustingly rich and always well worth going for. In northern India you most likely will want a vassal to do the coring for you since a lot of countries around there end up with both coring cost NIs and Aristocracy. These countries might have gotten kicked to the curb though so just check first. They were a bit of a nasty surprise in my Ottoman game where I was coring nearly everything else for single digit admin costs. Munin fucked around with this message at 22:21 on Oct 1, 2015 |
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Oct 1, 2015 22:16
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Taking Mamluk territory also isn't a guarantee that you'll come into conflict with the Ottomans, I took Cairo, Alexandria, everything east of that, and Suakin in my Tunis game and while they did dip into negative opinion for a while they never broke the alliance that we've had for the whole game, I'm in the 1730s, to give you some context.
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Oct 1, 2015 22:42
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Hell I ninjaed everything from Jerusalem south as loving Genoa one game and the Ottomans didn't lift a finger to take it. If you look scary enough on paper the AI won't realize that it's really scary too.
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Oct 1, 2015 23:36
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double nine posted:I need some strategic advice. I'm going for the THIS IS PERSIA achievement and I'm in the following situation: Get into Egypt now. You can avoid conflict with the Ottomans if you know what you're doing. Mainly this works because the Ottomans can't get the Conquer Egypt mission unless they have a land border with the Mamluks, and own Jerusalem. So your goal now needs to be to declare war on the Mamluks, pull the Ottos in, and take every Mamluk province the borders the Levantine provinces that the Ottomans get claims on as part of the Conquer Levant mission. This can be multiple wars as needed, making sure you give the Ottomans exactly 1 Levantine province per war to keep them happy, and that you give them Jerusalem last. Ultimately you want to own the coasts of Egypt and the Sinai, and hand the Ottomans Jerusalem in the very last war. That's how I took Egypt as Tunis in my Sons of Carthage run, and it worked marvellously.
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Oct 1, 2015 23:39
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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RabidWeasel posted:I don't really see from the dev diary how estates will actually make your life more difficult, but obviously you don't get a proper picture from a short introduction to a game concept. I really hope you can't just keep conquering and handing out new provinces to the estates to keep them happy. If you don't want to play color the map, I don't think EU4 is the right game for you. That is not to say the stuff between wars could be better, but that same stuff actively preventing you from expanding would be awful.
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Oct 1, 2015 23:42
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I really believe estates could be good if you could color a mapmode with them somehow. That's the funnest part of the game
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Oct 1, 2015 23:43
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Pellisworth posted:Keep in mind however Innovative as an idea group is kinda crap, but you probably don't need Econ for cash or anything so it's a decent option. Either Quality or Offensive would be great picks but you can't take a third military idea yet. You're approaching the latter half of the game and the +20% siege ability from Offensive will become extremely valuable against high-level late-game forts. Innovative is one of the greatest pseudo military ideas for large powers and smaller countries. You get insane monarch point efficiency, war exhaustion reduced, more military leaders, and almost every innovative policy is overpowered as hell. With Exploration, +10% Trade and +5% settler bonus chance Quality +20% infantry combat Offensive +1 Leader Siege and +10% Siege Ability Maritime +1 Admiral Manuever and +10% heavy ship combat Defensive +10% fort defense and -10% fort cost Quantity +10% Garrison size and -20% fort cost
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Oct 1, 2015 23:52
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420 Gank Mid posted:Innovative is one of the greatest pseudo military ideas for large powers and smaller countries. You get insane monarch point efficiency, war exhaustion reduced, more military leaders, and almost every innovative policy is overpowered as hell. I'll happily agree it has awesome policies, but I still think the idea set itself is very weak. Where do you see "insane monarch point efficiency" there? The -5% tech cost is nice and long-term is good but let's do a thought experiment. I pick Innovative as my very first idea and thus benefit from the -5% tech cost for the entire game, let's say 25 tech levels worth. 5% * 600 tech cost * 3 tech trees * 25 levels = 2250 points. That's good, but you get the same savings (and faster coring) from Admin ideas after 900 development cored. Or compare it to the -10% Adm/Dip/Mil discounts in Admin, Diplo, and Aristocratic, it's equivalent to -15% discount of one tech tree. It's a significant monarch point savings but I don't see where it's "insane." The War Exhuastion is indeed great, and the leader slot will save you some points. The adviser discount is pretty strong too. It used to be a very strong pseudo-military idea when the tradition decay was there instead of Aristocratic, but most of the time I find Innovative super unappealing. There's really nothing there you can't get elsewhere..
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Oct 2, 2015 00:12
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Pellisworth posted:I'll happily agree it has awesome policies, but I still think the idea set itself is very weak. Where do you see "insane monarch point efficiency" there? The -5% tech cost is nice and long-term is good but let's do a thought experiment. I pick Innovative as my very first idea and thus benefit from the -5% tech cost for the entire game, let's say 25 tech levels worth. 5% * 600 tech cost * 3 tech trees * 25 levels = 2250 points. That's good, but you get the same savings (and faster coring) from Admin ideas after 900 development cored. Or compare it to the -10% Adm/Dip/Mil discounts in Admin, Diplo, and Aristocratic, it's equivalent to -15% discount of one tech tree. It's a significant monarch point savings but I don't see where it's "insane." Yeah I'd really struggle working Innovative in the current mix. Admin and Influence feel basically non optional as admin efficiency basically just offsets the development cost increase as the game goes on, it doesn't really make stuff cheaper the way it used to. You probably need either Humanist or Religious, and a military idea or two, and ... oh look the game's over. In some ways I wish I could splash a little more flavor or customization for my country. I like the ideas, but because some of them have such significant bonuses I have a hard time not picking them, so my countries feel rather similar from an idea standpoint lately. I guess this ties into the "value over time" nature of the game. If Admin is important (and it is) you need to get it earlier to max the discount. If Influence is then the same applies. Presumably you'll need to deal with conversions or unrest at some point by the mid 1500s so that's where a religious policy comes in. You also need to improve your units somehow - defensive / offensive / quantity is probably going to go down. So a lot of these choices feel somewhat pre-determined if I want to expand at a good pace - or if I don't I'm really putting myself at a disadvantage long term. I guess I'd just like to see a bit more flexibility here. Compare the depth you get in the custom nation designer in terms of tweaking ideas and such vs what you can do once the game is running. Maybe I'm off base and people like the current system though. Ham Sandwiches fucked around with this message at 00:21 on Oct 2, 2015 |
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Oct 2, 2015 00:17
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Average Bear posted:I really believe estates could be good if you could color a mapmode with them somehow. That's the funnest part of the game This. There better be an estates mapmode. e: Actually, that reminds me, will we get 4 development mapmodes? MatchaZed fucked around with this message at 00:24 on Oct 2, 2015 |
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Oct 2, 2015 00:22
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Cynic Jester posted:If you don't want to play color the map, I don't think EU4 is the right game for you. That is not to say the stuff between wars could be better, but that same stuff actively preventing you from expanding would be awful. Internal conflicts utterly dominate the period, same as the effect dynastic politics has on the age of CK2. While it shouldn't be something so crude as 'you cannot declare war' a la regencies or EU3 factions, it would be cool if there was more of a game to peace time, rather than just spending monarch points to mitigate the effects of wars.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:26
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Rakthar posted:Yeah I'd really struggle working Innovative in the current mix. Admin and Influence feel basically non optional as admin efficiency basically just offsets the development cost increase as the game goes on, it doesn't really make stuff cheaper the way it used to. You probably need either Humanist or Religious, and a military idea or two, and ... oh look the game's over. I don't even pick Humanist and Religious that often these days. They're plenty good, but conversion is generally easier than pre-CS and the autonomy and new rebel mechanics make revolts much more predictable and manageable. Again that's mostly my playstyle. Most of the time I go Influence, Admin, Defensive, mil pick #2, then its variable based on the situation. Expansion if I'm headed to Asia (maybe take that fourth and swap with second military idea), maybe Economic, Diplomatic, or Trade. The seventh idea slot unlocks in 1745 so... Colonizers I go Exploration, Expansion, Quantity. Basically all the trade and naval-focused stuff tends to be somewhat superfluous, and I personally skip the realm stability and religious ideas when I can get away with it.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:31
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Today I learned that if you hover your mouse over an adviser's age, it tells you their yearly chance to die. My 80 year old Master of Mint only has a 26% chance. What a trooper.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:33
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PittTheElder posted:Internal conflicts utterly dominate the period, same as the effect dynastic politics has on the age of CK2. While it shouldn't be something so crude as 'you cannot declare war' a la regencies or EU3 factions, it would be cool if there was more of a game to peace time, rather than just spending monarch points to mitigate the effects of wars. I'm just getting flashbacks to the old Ming mechanics, and while yes, you could play Ming, I don't you could play Ming and have fun at the same time.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:35
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Pellisworth posted:I don't even pick Humanist and Religious that often these days. They're plenty good, but conversion is generally easier than pre-CS and the autonomy and new rebel mechanics make revolts much more predictable and manageable. Again that's mostly my playstyle. That's a great way of putting it. Accounting for playstyle differences, it's very similar. So let's look at that - you have 4 ideas 'locked up' where you don't make meaningful decisions. You get 1 country specific choice at the 5th idea slot, another optional choice in the 6th, and by the 7th your choices have become meaningless. I do agree that all the trade and naval stuff is superfluous which is also unfortunate because they are not interesting choices. So the sum total is that I feel like this system could be more interesting. Maybe the factions will add the flavor needed but still, I don't find the idea choices that meaningful.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:36
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Pellisworth posted:I'll happily agree it has awesome policies, but I still think the idea set itself is very weak. Where do you see "insane monarch point efficiency" there? The -5% tech cost is nice and long-term is good but let's do a thought experiment. I pick Innovative as my very first idea and thus benefit from the -5% tech cost for the entire game, let's say 25 tech levels worth. 5% * 600 tech cost * 3 tech trees * 25 levels = 2250 points. That's good, but you get the same savings (and faster coring) from Admin ideas after 900 development cored. Or compare it to the -10% Adm/Dip/Mil discounts in Admin, Diplo, and Aristocratic, it's equivalent to -15% discount of one tech tree. It's a significant monarch point savings but I don't see where it's "insane." Cheaper adviser costs so you can afford more expensive ones early. Never have to reduce war exhaustion, leaders without upkeep, and this is an edge case but cheaper inflation reduction if you need that. With the exception of Admin ideas for reduced coring costs and Influence for reduced diplo annex costs, I dont think a single tech tree has as much monarch point saving/earning potential, and none have such a versatile set of them.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:36
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Cynic Jester posted:I'm just getting flashbacks to the old Ming mechanics, and while yes, you could play Ming, I don't you could play Ming and have fun at the same time. Yeah, EU3 Ming is definitely not the model I'd want to shoot for. But there must be some way to do it. CK2 is fun as hell exactly because that system works so well.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:43
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I picked up this game on sale today along with art of war and the two new world centric dlc's. The tutorial explained some things but ultimately I'm floored. Are there any decent guides out there? Preferably not video based?
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Oct 2, 2015 00:48
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Rakthar posted:That's a great way of putting it. Accounting for playstyle differences, it's very similar. So let's look at that - you have 4 ideas 'locked up' where you don't make meaningful decisions. You get 1 country specific choice at the 5th idea slot, another optional choice in the 6th, and by the 7th your choices have become meaningless. I do agree that all the trade and naval stuff is superfluous which is also unfortunate because they are not interesting choices. I think the larger issue is the game at its core is about Maximum Blobbing. There is a huge opportunity cost attached to your idea picks, your first few you'll have all game and so you want those to give you the most Blobbing Efficiency. The last two idea sets might as well not exist because you'll get the benefit of them for a few decades. Army strength, expansion costs (coring, integration, AE), and realm stability are most often the limiting factors on your expansion. Trade income and navy strength rarely so, so related idea sets are kinda "meh." 420 Gank Mid posted:Cheaper adviser costs so you can afford more expensive ones early. Never have to reduce war exhaustion, leaders without upkeep, and this is an edge case but cheaper inflation reduction if you need that. With the exception of Admin ideas for reduced coring costs and Influence for reduced diplo annex costs, I dont think a single tech tree has as much monarch point saving/earning potential, and none have such a versatile set of them. Compare Admin ideas, the coring cost makes it much more focused. By taking it I'm saying I want to core a bunch of poo poo, and I can more efficiently do that. Innovative may save me more points, but Admin specifically saves me ADM points and lets me core faster which means get huger faster. Influence specifically saves me DIP points which are otherwise not valuable so makes a fantastic point dump in integrating vassals. It's just too unfocused.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:49
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Avocados posted:I picked up this game on sale today along with art of war and the two new world centric dlc's. The tutorial explained some things but ultimately I'm floored. Are there any decent guides out there? Preferably not video based? This may not sound very helpful, but just start playing. It's an enormous sandbox game with different nations offering very different experiences, and the learning curve is the Grand Canyon. I would recommend starting out as Portugal. No one will really pick on you, so you're largely free to explore game mechanics and have a strong start. Under options, I suggest turning Lucky Nations to none. Certain AI nations get large bonuses to help things go more historically, and it will make already scary enemies like France and the Ottomans terrifying. You can turn it back on later to up the challenge. When you have questions post here with screenshots, the thread is really fast to respond with good advice.
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Oct 2, 2015 00:52
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Pellisworth posted:I think the larger issue is the game at its core is about Maximum Blobbing. There is a huge opportunity cost attached to your idea picks, your first few you'll have all game and so you want those to give you the most Blobbing Efficiency. The last two idea sets might as well not exist because you'll get the benefit of them for a few decades. At the risk of belaboring it let me agree with you one more time on this. The thing is when the costs of expansion were increased, the effect that Admin and Influence have on the pace of conquest became more pronounced. One fix could be to try changing it so that more idea groups are useful for increased conquest and can be considered sidegrades. Another fix, and one that I'm not a fan of but seems to make sense, is that Admin and Influence could probably lose the discounts - they seem like outliers in that regard.
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Oct 2, 2015 01:03
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Avocados posted:I picked up this game on sale today along with art of war and the two new world centric dlc's. The tutorial explained some things but ultimately I'm floored. Are there any decent guides out there? Preferably not video based? Pause often, read tooltips, have a few test runs where you just experiment. If you run into any sort of particular problems, ask them in this thread so we can figure out if you're doing anything wrong or if it's just RNG fuckery. There's a lot of content and quite a lot of stuff interacts in ways that aren't entirely clear at first.
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Oct 2, 2015 01:07
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Yeah unfortunately for a new player, the game has changed so much that there isn't really a good "Here's everything you need to know when you start" guide afaik. Just playing a game as one of the more passive nations like Portugal or England is probably your best bet. Keep the wiki open as you play for when you inevitably start wondering about how something works, and don't be afraid to ask every dumb question you have in here. Everyone knows how many systems this game has and how hard it can be when you start so no one's going to yell at you for not immediately figuring out things like Trade or development.
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Oct 2, 2015 01:20
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Rakthar posted:At the risk of belaboring it let me agree with you one more time on this. The thing is when the costs of expansion were increased, the effect that Admin and Influence have on the pace of conquest became more pronounced. One fix could be to try changing it so that more idea groups are useful for increased conquest and can be considered sidegrades. Another fix, and one that I'm not a fan of but seems to make sense, is that Admin and Influence could probably lose the discounts - they seem like outliers in that regard. That's a good point re: increased costs of expansion and how that increases the value of Admin and Influence discounts. I don't know that you'd need to remove the discounts entirely, maybe just dole them out to more idea groups so there are sidegrade/alternative options. For example, taking 10% coring cost from Admin (so it would go to -15% coring cost) to Innovative, replacing the godawful -10% inflation reduction cost. Bam presto Innovative is an attractive alternative to Admin.
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Oct 2, 2015 01:21
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It does seem a little weird that non-Western ROTW nations would have burghers/bourgeoisie cities/development dynamic. That almost seems like something that should come with westernization/modernization. Seems like most of the world (all?!) should have a Peasants 'estate' that can't necessarily hold land, and doesn't necessarily grant you bonuses, but will sure as hell make your life difficult if you keep screwing them over on behalf of other estates.
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Oct 2, 2015 02:09
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Would be neat if there's a way to marginalize estates as well, gradually pushing them out of power. Obviously it would hurt in the short run but eventually it wouldn't matter how much they hated you because they don't have any money or manpower to do anything about it. Possibly using that as the way you end up as various republics, theocracies or disasters.
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Oct 2, 2015 02:34
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Anybody know what causes an AI to give up on a mission?
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Oct 2, 2015 02:49
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Cynic Jester posted:I'm just getting flashbacks to the old Ming mechanics, and while yes, you could play Ming, I don't you could play Ming and have fun at the same time. Ming (or any successor dynasty) just needs to be re-imagined as a kind of east asian HRE, where states suck up progressively more to Ming in exchange for Ming intervening in their wars but not taking territory directly.
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Oct 2, 2015 02:52
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Kalos posted:Would be neat if there's a way to marginalize estates as well, gradually pushing them out of power. Obviously it would hurt in the short run but eventually it wouldn't matter how much they hated you because they don't have any money or manpower to do anything about it. Possibly using that as the way you end up as various republics, theocracies or disasters. Yeah I want a way to model Peter the Great disbanding the Patriarchate and absorbing the Orthodox Church into the state, rendering it powerless.
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Oct 2, 2015 02:54
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vyelkin posted:Yeah I want a way to model Peter the Great disbanding the Patriarchate and absorbing the Orthodox Church into the state, rendering it powerless. I'm sure it's moddable enough to DHE it. Similarly, the Revolution should upend the estates a lot, probably through a series of DHEs that let you gently caress with the estates in exchange for land / money / hilarious revolts / etc. E.g. throw out cult of reason and replace it with an event chain concerning the disenfranchisement of the clergy estate and so on.
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Oct 2, 2015 02:56
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Kalos posted:Would be neat if there's a way to marginalize estates as well, gradually pushing them out of power. Obviously it would hurt in the short run but eventually it wouldn't matter how much they hated you because they don't have any money or manpower to do anything about it. Possibly using that as the way you end up as various republics, theocracies or disasters. Combining estate power with government type (ie not being able to transition out of feudal without the nobles sufficiently cowed) would be a fun way to model how absolute France came into being, and you could do all kinds of things with it beyond just that.
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Oct 2, 2015 03:01
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yeah the estate system seems like it could have really far-reaching affects on events, disasters, government types etc. it'll be interesting to see how far they go with it.
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Oct 2, 2015 03:24
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Pellisworth posted:This may not sound very helpful, but just start playing. It's an enormous sandbox game with different nations offering very different experiences, and the learning curve is the Grand Canyon. Yeah I think i'm making the mistake as playing new world native nations because im getting swallowed up pretty easy by forces I have no understanding of.  Ill try Portugal.
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Oct 2, 2015 05:09
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Avocados posted:Yeah I think i'm making the mistake as playing new world native nations because im getting swallowed up pretty easy by forces I have no understanding of. Yeah, New Worlders are right up there for hardest start in the game, don't start there. Pick one of the suggested countries in Europe, and go all imperial over everybody's asses. Once you get a feel for how that works in a few games, then start moving east to ramp up the challenge.
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Oct 2, 2015 06:49
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PittTheElder posted:Yeah, New Worlders are right up there for hardest start in the game, don't start there. Pick one of the suggested countries in Europe, and go all imperial over everybody's asses. Once you get a feel for how that works in a few games, then start moving east to ramp up the challenge. It's also important to keep your goals realistic and limited. Once you're comfortable with the game basics, I recommend trying out Ironman and some of the achievements. You cannot conquer the world except with a very few nations and strategies; you'll need to do a bunch of different campaigns to get all the achievements. Be reasonable with your goals.
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Oct 2, 2015 06:53
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PittTheElder posted:Anybody know what causes an AI to give up on a mission? I'm guessing the nations that are mission heavy (Ottomans, Austria, etc.) just have a time limit for a mission choice. If the AI hasn't completed the mission, it'll wait, and then try a different one if available.
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Oct 2, 2015 06:55
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Barring achievements, I find a good target is just to achieve whatever the real nation achieved in history. Since conquering stuff carries little to no downsides, and there's no internal politics to worry about, it's pretty easy to go well beyond that mark as the average player, and in-reach of brand new players. I'd also encourage you to do as little as possible outside of ironman. Certainly your first 1-3 games should be done with the ability to save and reload as much as you want, but it's way more fun if you have to roll with the losses as well.
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Oct 2, 2015 06:57
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One thing to keep in mind if you're totally new to the game is that it isn't Civ, or like most other strategy games for that matter. Your goal every single game isn't going to be complete world conquest. Don't feel like you're not doing good enough if you spend 50 years without expanding or don't have all of Europe conquered by 1600. In fact whenever you start a new game I recommend giving yourself a short, medium, and long-term goal. If you're playing as Portugal, you can do something like be the first major colonizer in Africa or South America, then gain control of the trade flow into Sevilla, then take over Iberia and become a major power in Europe. Each step will let you focus on and learn some mechanics without getting overwhelmed or losing focus. Trust me when I say that the game's end date isn't nearly as close as it seems when you first start out. 1821 may seem like it's just a few hundreds years away, but it will take you a long rear end time to get there. To put it in perspective, I have over 700 hours played in this game and I can count on one hand the number of games I've completed fully to the enddate because I've usually "won" or achieved my main goal long before then. So just pick some stuff to do that seems fun/interesting/challenging to you and then see if you can do it. e;fb about the whole goals part while I was typing this up.
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Oct 2, 2015 07:02
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