Europa Universalis IV

[warpus]

I've been playing a pretty solid Poland game. I started off by breaking my country into tiny pieces so that I could join the HRE. After joining, I annexed all my vassals, did the same to the teutonic and livonian orders, and after I integrated lithuania I westernized and started pushing east.

I basically built a defensive line of provinces just south of Moskva province, basically touching it, stretching east, so that the newly formed Russia couldn't go south and would have no choice but to expand eastwards only (and as it turns out, a bit westwards as well, into Finland)

I've been slowly conquering everything south of that defensive line of provinces, almost into the Caucasus now. I own all of modern Ukraine now. To the east is an ally of me - a large central asian country the name of which I can't remember now.. They hate Russia, I hate Russia, we get along. Eventually I'm going to conquer them, but for now they're a decent shield against Russian expansion, as long as they stay my allies, so my plan is to drill south into Persia, and then invade Turkey and make inroads into the middle east. If Russia's going to be #1 in terms of score by expanding east, I'm going to continue expanding south and making my country bigger too. I own a lot of the good Russian/Ukrainian provinces, they really only have the decent northern stuff, north of Mosvka.. So I've really weakened them with that strategy I think.

There have been several "World wars", usually involving me and my allies Austria and France vs Russia, Bohemia, Hungary, Denmark, Norway, and others. My coalition always wins.

One of the wars was Russia wanting to get in the way of a Personal Union Austria announced with me (I've been joining all their stupid wars, so they loved me. Poland is also ruled by the Hapburgs).. I whooped their butts and ended up integrating Austria. That's where I'm at now - looking to connect my Polish and Austrian provinces. Bohemia needs to be annexed, as they don't have any allies, but I annexed Moravia once and the HRE emperor (Saxony, not Austria at the time) asked me to give it back.. so I did.

Hungary is allied with Russia, so I haven't been touching them. I'm #2 in the world in terms of score and my military tech is the best in the world.. other techs are a bit behind, due to westernization.. I am catching up though. I also find it amusing that the Hapsburgs rule my country, while the Jagiellonian dynasty is alive, but ruling France.

Really enjoying this playthrough..

 

[Browd]

Thanks for the tips! Yeah it's pretty confusing at first, even after 2 hours, so I wonder if that played a role. Will def have to check out the wiki

Also, the game is changing with each patch, as Paradox tinkers with game balance (there's a version 1.6.1.1 public beta, and 1.6.1.2 is due soon, which apply regardless of whether you have the new Wealth of Nations expansion), so the Wiki isn't always able to keep pace with all of the changes.

Just as with Civ V, I would recommend watching some LPs from players with good commenting/explaining skills. Like Civ games, each LP series can be 20-30+ hours long, so you're probably not going to sit through a full series, but you don't need to in order to learn game mechanics. I particularly enjoy DDR Jake -- his explanations are good (and entertaining) and he reveals exploits and broken game mechanics (which Paradox then patches out, so some of the techniques he shows from, say, version 1.5 are now gone from the game -- still useful, though).

 

[madviking]

my favorite lper on youtube is arumba.

 

[Arakhor]

Arumba does have the all-too-American disease of not being able to pronounce anything remotely foreign or fantastical.

 

[warpus]

This will probably not affect anyone here, but I just ran into a bug in my game. I had been wanting to continue expanding east and southward, when I noticed that I still had the "Royal Struggle" event going.. "Weeeird", I thought to myself.. that was that battle against a couple giant armies, one of which was 92 I think? I definitely destroyed those guys a while ago.. what is this modifier doing there?

So I looked it up and a bunch of Polish people are yelling about this problem in a bunch of places.. Here is a fix, for anyone else going through this before they end up patching it in whichever release. I doubt it's anyone, but who knows.

ctrl-f flavor_pol.3481

 

[Quintillus]

I also ran into a bug in my 1.6.1 game - it's impossible to cancel a transfer of trade power. I demanded a transfer of trade power from Songhai in a peace treaty, expecting it to be like in my 1.5.1 game where it lasts 5 years, and ends with the truce. Instead, it lasts forever, and there's no way to cancel it. You can't even declare war on the country who's transferring trade power to you. It wouldn't be so bad, except that unlike in 1.5.51, it takes 1 diplomatic relation... forever.

I looked it up and found a Reddit thread indicating that there's an action under Access Actions to cancel it, but that must be Wealth of Nations only, as I don't have that option. Hopefully the upcoming 1.6.2 patch fixes is, as I'd consider this a major bug, especially since it's pretty easy to stumble upon if you're used to 1.5.1.

The only good news for me is that, even with the heavily nerfed aggressive expansion (which I hope they at least somewhat un-nerf), Songhai hates my guts, with negative 80-some aggressive expansion penalty. So I plan to declare war on another member of the coalition and annex Songhai to get my diplomatic relation back. But it's still pretty annoying.

I'm hoping they buff aggressive expansion again, too. With the slower AE gain and faster AE reduction, I'd estimate it's reduced by two-thirds in 1.6.1 from 1.5.1, maybe a bit more. I really like that you have to heavily consider the possibility of coalitions in 1.5.1 (and I remember it being that way in 1.1.0 as well). 1.6.1 reminds me of Divine Wind 5.1, before Divine Wind 5.2 reduced manpower regain rates by 80%. It's great for conquering the world, but it basically cancels out the diplomacy innovations in EU4 with the coalitions. I do like that 1.6.1 makes it easier to see provinces with trade bonuses, and tentatively that those bonuses are larger in 1.6.1. So (if the above bug is fixed), I'd favor 1.6.1 for a trading empire game. But for a diplomatically balanced, challenging game, I'd rather play 1.5.1.

Most of the other changes in 1.6.1 I'm more-or-less indifferent to at this point. Power Projection is less exciting than it sounded, at least in my games so far. Constable giving +20% production rather than +20% tax reduces money early, but that may not be a bad thing. Espionage going to diplomatic ideas and expansion to admin makes sense, but isn't a big change. I haven't seen any major changes from idea changes, but my ideas haven't overlapped in 1.5.1 and 1.6.1 yet, either. Nationalism lasting 30 years regardless of core creation makes sense, and it's a bit more severe than in EU3, but I don't think it makes up for the aggressive expansion reduction. I'd favor slightly reduced nationalism, such as 12% at 30 years instead of 15%, and aggressive expansion close to, though not above, 1.5.1 levels. I haven't gotten far enough for policies yet.

Sounds like a good Polish game, warpus. The central Asian nation doesn't happen to be Uzbekistan, does it? They're doing ridiculously well in one of my games. They even have as good of military tech as western Europe in 1515, despite the nomad tech group penalty.

 

[warpus]

Trade is one thing I haven't really mastered in any way yet.. I know which provinces are better to control in terms of trade, and I make sure all my merchants are out working hard, but I don't know anything about directing trade. I suppose that's the next thing I should educate myself about.

 

[Civ'ed]

Arumba does have the all-too-American disease of not being able to pronounce anything remotely foreign or fantastical.

Arumba plays too quickly for me to garner anything useful from it

 

[Quintillus]

I should note that the bug I mentioned about trade power is fixed in the 1.6.1.1 beta. Yay! They also said they, "Restored AE Decay to intended levels." Hopefully that means it's slower decay now.

 

[Civ'ed]

another problem the beta patch fixed for me was the 24 tech gap necessary for westernization, so yay

 

[warpus]

I am nearing the completion of my first full Europa Universalis IV game

(on normal difficulty, only change is lucky nations is turned off)

This screenshot is a bit old, the HRE has formed and the ottomans have expanded a bit since.

Spoiler :

I'm obviously Poland, and my main focus for the majority of the game has obviously been to contain the goddamn Russians.

I began by gifting most of my land to Moldavia, my vassal, leaving me with only 3 provinces, joining the HRE, annexing my vassals, fighting wars against both knight kingdoms, working towards integrating lithuania, then focusing all my attention on expanding east and annexing all the land I could there, cutting off Russia's possible expansion into Ukraine & Crimea. They kept expanding eastwards, and so did I, trying to form a shield so that they couldn't expand south.

A costly and probably foolish strategy, but was it ever fun!

Bukhara was my ally in the first wars agianst Russia, which I've been slowly eating away at (but I've turned on them too so I could expand my shield). I now have Moscow and am close to getting novgorod, so Russia's all dealt with pretty much.

Austria joined in a personal union with me - I was allied with them the entire game and entered all the stupid wars they started.. Poland is ruled by the Habsburgs, the HRE by a bunch of kings with Polish names, and the Jagiellonians were in charge of France for a while (my current long-term ally)

I now have to focus my attention to the Ottomans, who have since this screenshot expanded quite a bit (they weren't an influence in the game at all until the 1750s for some reason), and the HRE which has just kicked me out and solidified under one government.

France, Castille, Norway, Denmark, The Mamluks, and Japan are my allies. I am thinking France will probably want to help me dismantle the HRE. Bohemia has been rubbing me the wrong way, especially when I was annexing Hungary (Russia's long-time European ally that prevented me from acting for a while)... Seems like a good time to make my borders look nicer.

The Ottomans shouldn't be an issue, and the game's almost over anyway..

 

[Quintillus]

Very nice! That's a mighty strong Poland you've formed! I don't doubt that Russia proved a good foil for most of the game. Bukhara looks powerful, too. Oddly similar to one of my games-in-progress, where Uzbekistan recently formed Bukhara. I'm glad I'm not next to them.

You'll also have beaten me to the finish line. I abandoned my first game around 1727, since I had no further ambitions, and haven't gotten that far since (might help if I were playing one game at a time instead of three, though).

 

[warpus]

Very nice! That's a mighty strong Poland you've formed! I don't doubt that Russia proved a good foil for most of the game.

By the time I was even able to focus on Russia it was already looking like a bit of a runaway giant blob.. which scared me very much. They were allied with Denmark and a large Hungary for a long time, but stayed clear of me for the most part due to my focus on military tech and strong allies (I think).

Our first war was one we were both dragged into by other allies.. I ended up getting them to cancel some of their treaties out of that, which allowed me to then attack them and get a couple provinces.. They had large armies, but so did I.. France was my ally through some of this too, which was very helpful.. Once or twice they actually joined in and now that I think of it, Bohemia was Russia's ally too.. Bohemia, the new HRE emperor, after I absorbed Austria.

It's definitely been an interesting game, I wonder what luck I'll have converting the save over to Victoria II

 

[Quintillus]

Sounds like a good game. I do like that allies can very much make the difference in EU4, much more so than in Civ for the most part. I'm keeping a close eye on Muscovy in two of my games, and am somehwhat hoping they do become a runaway, since I'm nowhere close to them .

I have a couple questions. One, is it possible to enforce peace when you are in a regency? I'd like to try to enforce peace on Castile. But I will be in a regency for the next 9.5 years - the only reason I'm not already at war with them, actually. So inconvenient when your monarch dies right as you are raising troops to invade your archenemy. I'm more than willing to go to war should Castile decline an enforcement of peace, I just need to know if I can attempt to enforce it (right now I'm working on improving my relations with their enemies enough to do so).

The other question relates to the casus belli. Aragon declared war on Castile, citing Independence as their casus belli. If I enforce peace successfully, will Aragon still be independent, or will they be in a personal union? As I understand it, enforcing peace results in a white peace, but will that mean the personal union is restored, or that Aragon is independent and gains no territory? That obviously makes a big difference as to whether trying to enforce peace is a good idea (should Castile be willing to accept it).

 

[marlowe221]

I just got this game this past weekend on the Steam Summer Sale.

I am familiar with the (very) general workings of Paradox grand strategy games - I am a long-time CKII player. I thought I would pick it right up, no problem.

Nope!

This game is very different than CKII once you get beyond the look of the game/interface. There are lots of mechanics that don't exist at all in CKII, which makes sense given the historical period(s) in question. All the same, I have no idea what I'm doing!

I went through the tutorials in-game but they were a little too basic. I know how to get around the game and access all the panels, etc. But I don't really understand all the game mechanics/concepts, not to mention differences between CKII and EUIV (apparently prestige is totally different?!).

Any good tutorials out there that anyone would recommend? Youtube Let's Plays that explain a lot about the game?

 

[Quintillus]

I just got this game this past weekend on the Steam Summer Sale.

I am familiar with the (very) general workings of Paradox grand strategy games - I am a long-time CKII player. I thought I would pick it right up, no problem.

Nope!

This game is very different than CKII once you get beyond the look of the game/interface. There are lots of mechanics that don't exist at all in CKII, which makes sense given the historical period(s) in question. All the same, I have no idea what I'm doing!

I went through the tutorials in-game but they were a little too basic. I know how to get around the game and access all the panels, etc. But I don't really understand all the game mechanics/concepts, not to mention differences between CKII and EUIV (apparently prestige is totally different?!).

Any good tutorials out there that anyone would recommend? Youtube Let's Plays that explain a lot about the game?

The EU4 Wiki is an excellent resource. I learned to play EU3 by the EU3Wiki, learned to (sorta) play Vicky2 by the Vicky2 Wiki, reference the EU4 wiki for concepts that are different than in EU3, and still don't really know how to play Hearts of Iron III despite the Hearts of Iron III Wiki. I can't recall using the CKII Wiki much though, for what it's worth, but I've actually probably played it the least out of all the post-2007 Paradox titles I have (though I like it more than Vicky2 and HOI3).

Prestige is different. In CK2, it's basically half of your score (along with piety), and gets added to your score with a ruler's death. In Europa Universalis, prestige is not your score. Rather, it's how you are seen in the eyes of the world - how "prestigious" you are in the traditional sense. And unlike CK2, where it can't go down and is somewhat an accumulation of your dynasty's prestige over time, in EU4 it's the prestige of your country at a moment in time, and can be negative. So historically, the French under Louis XIV would have very high prestige, whereas Britain's prestige would decline after the American War of Independence, but likely still be relatively high. Prestige also constantly decays in EU4 if you aren't doing glorious things.

Sounds like a good game. I do like that allies can very much make the difference in EU4, much more so than in Civ for the most part. I'm keeping a close eye on Muscovy in two of my games, and am somehwhat hoping they do become a runaway, since I'm nowhere close to them .

I have a couple questions. One, is it possible to enforce peace when you are in a regency? I'd like to try to enforce peace on Castile. But I will be in a regency for the next 9.5 years - the only reason I'm not already at war with them, actually. So inconvenient when your monarch dies right as you are raising troops to invade your archenemy. I'm more than willing to go to war should Castile decline an enforcement of peace, I just need to know if I can attempt to enforce it (right now I'm working on improving my relations with their enemies enough to do so).

The other question relates to the casus belli. Aragon declared war on Castile, citing Independence as their casus belli. If I enforce peace successfully, will Aragon still be independent, or will they be in a personal union? As I understand it, enforcing peace results in a white peace, but will that mean the personal union is restored, or that Aragon is independent and gains no territory? That obviously makes a big difference as to whether trying to enforce peace is a good idea (should Castile be willing to accept it).

I can now answer my own questions.

You are able to enforce peace during a regency, and if the enforcement is declined, you do enter the war. I pity the fool who decided to decline my enforcement of peace.

You cannot enforce peace on someone who had a country declare independence from them. In my case, I couldn't enforce peace on Castile, because Aragon had declared independence and thus Aragon was considered the aggressor. Castile would've been smart enough to accept the enforcement, too, but lost the war in the end anyway, so all was good (from my diplomatic standpoint, anyway).

 

[Shabbaman]

White peace in an independence war leads to independence. I can't play since 1.6.1., the game crashes randomly whenever I open a trade node screen. Now I'm a sad panda (but I bought Skyrim in the Steam Summer Sale, so hey, I can wait until 1.6.2.).

 

[Quintillus]

White peace in an independence war leads to independence. I can't play since 1.6.1., the game crashes randomly whenever I open a trade node screen. Now I'm a sad panda (but I bought Skyrim in the Steam Summer Sale, so hey, I can wait until 1.6.2.).

You can right-click on the game in Steam, go to Properties, go to the Betas tab, and go back to 1.5.1. Then you ought to be back in business until 1.6.2 comes out. You could also try the beta 1.6.2 patch (currently 1.6.1.4).

 

[Shabbaman]

There's no fix for this in the beta patchnotes though, although there's little harm in trying those newer versions. I don't want to revert, since I want to play with WoN.

 

[NKVD]

Bought EU4 also this weekend . Never played Paradox games. Wanted to play since I saw Marboriz LP videos on YouTube. Oh i'm now addicted. Playing as Muscovy now russia since I conquered Novgorod. I heard of the invicibility of the Ottomans on other forum so I tested an attack. Got utterly shattered. My stack were bigger and just 1 tech difference between us. Even though they he had river and woods - 1 got beat easily. Morale of Ottomans is unbreakable. I heard prestige played a part in that. Each time I had random events I choose the minus in prestige because I thought it was not important.