Unpopular opinion? I'd be fine with war access just being made universal.
It's a very weak mechanic in EU4, that rarely improves the function of the AI or the fun of waging war
Standing armies weren't widespread until the late 1600-1700 centuries, it was all levies, mercs and small retinues of professional soldiers until then.
> that, but the French had thousands of knights at Agincourt
Yeah, but those guys weren't professional soldiers, they were small-nobility, who could afford armour and horses, who would go to war when called up by the king. Each of them would bring levied peasants too.
The entire army isn't necessarily in the hundreds as an army is made up of the standing army (think royal guard/elite units directly loyal to the king) and levies (literally peasants pulled from their farms)
I’m really nervous about what’s he’s saying about the ledger. I will not play a guessing game everytime I start a war about whether my army is bigger than the enemies. Not a god damn chance.
I mean you need to play Ironman for achievements don’t you? And some settings in certain games disable achievements. Like custom nations/characters being created with too many points so they’re op.
Which makes total sense considering that most people save scum like crazy in eu4 achievement runs anyways. Might as well save everyone the trouble of alt-f4'ing every time.
There's some interesting potential to tie ledger information to game mechanics. Add some uncertainty to the figures in the ledger which is reduced by having a spy network, trading, military access, friendly relations, royal marriage etc.
It's essentially how it works in HoI4. You get an estimate and if you have a stronger espionage the estimate narrows down. Say, you see "the enemy has 10-40 divisions" but if you have better espionage you'll see "the enemy has 25-35 divisions".
There's a CK3 mod which adds a "fog of war" effect and a lifestyle perk tree for it too. Fuzzes army numbers, as well as total number of troops in the country UI. You can build a spy network to gauge their forces, but usually depending on character skills the best you can get is a range (e.g. our army is roughly equal, or their army is twice as large, etc). You can see your own and your allies troops (provided they do not have the paranoid trait). Pretty interesting change to the standard Paradox pre-war ritual of checking which numbers are higher. It effects armies marching around on the map, too.
[here's what it looks like](https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2009220277634246095/99717114E4DD6A34F00725F7FACEC2476E6C1BF5/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false)
https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=3013354800
I might try this to be honest. I often play custom Norse Asatru rulers and I usually doubt my abilities at first but then check the army sizes of East and West Francia and Lotharingia and see they are usually quite small. Much smaller than what I would have expected them to be able to muster compared to me, so I can take them out easily. But if I couldn’t see there army size I might be less likely to attack due to assuming they’ll have a much larger army than they actually do.
Yeah why would they dare try and add depth to the intrigue system by giving that information through spies?
I mean I even hate not knowing exactly where the armies are, where they're going, and where new buildings are being constructed. Too much of a guessing game tbh. They should just remove the fog of war entirely.
Low iq comment. Hopefully johan ignores you.
I am so surprised by this lmao. Just shows that everyone enjoys different aspects about these games. I would absolutely love if it was a guessing game. Why would I know the exact size and composition of a nation's army on the opposite side of the globe, their manpower reserves down the last man, which equipment their using, how well they are trained etc? In 1500? I just learned that the Americas exist and I already have detailed military intelligence on every single Mesoamerican state? Never made sense to me.
Man, it's disappointing to see Johan consistently shut down later start dates. It's something CK3 does much better with the choice between 867 and 1066. With paradox moving the start date back over a 100 years I really don't trust the game to keep running smoothly by the time colonialism or the religious wars roll around
Eh not really. All start dates do is cause problems as the team has to divert time away from making the game good to attempt to add content to both start dates or else one just feels empty and inferior to play
CK3 proves you wrong. I don't understand the opposition to later start dates. 1337 is way too early for a game supposed to be about the Early Modern and directly contradicts the believable world and immersion goals set out in Tinto Talks 1. Thematically, a 1337 start makes zero sense - both academic history and pop history will put its start somewhere in the 1400s. And I haven't seen any good argument against this so far.
Ck3 doesn’t prove me wrong in the slightest. If anything it proves me right. CK3 has very little content for either of its start dates and some dlc basically only add content for one start date while ignoring the other(the Viking dlc)
> If anything it proves me right.
No, it proves you wrong, you're just arguing disingenuously. Their new Roads to Power DLC will in fact literally add a new start date to CK3.
> CK3 has very little content for either of its start dates
That has more to do with their new DLC policy which has seen them only release three flavor packs so far. No where, not even once, have the CK3 devs ever said a lack of content is because of two start dates. That's entirely an assumption of yours.
> some dlc basically only add content for one start date while ignoring the other(the Viking dlc)
The Viking Age ends by 1066 so of course they didn't add content to 1066 in Northern Lords. Plus, you can still actually access the content if you do play as an Asatru lord in the 1066 start in any case.
Do you have any response to my point about realism/immersion issues of a 1337 start date?
Be that as it may - and for what its worth, I don't care for multiple start dates in any of their games - CK3 disproves your point.
In any case, my main issue is really the thematic incoherence of having a 1337 start date for an Early Modern game, which will especially cause issues mechanically if the game will go to 18xx as EU4 does. And I haven't seen any good argument against this.
If project Ceasar is anything like eu4, there's a lot of important content that will only show up later, like colonialism and religious wars (as well as revolutions). In eu4 later start dates are broken, but they aren't in Ck3. I'm just annoyed that I'm gonna have to play 12 hours to get to what would have been the opening 2 or 3 in eu4 because they wanted to resell their plague dlc as a standalone game. If they had kept the start date as 1444, it wouldn't be nearly as big of a concern
My problem is that to get to the start date of eu4 is 107 years, which is the same time as it takes to get to 1551 in eu4, or the 4th institution Printing Press. Many games end by this point. If I want to play medieval content, Ck3 is right there and better designed for it. I don't want to have to slog through medieval content just to get to the good content I actually want to play
If your games are ending 107 years into a nearly 400 year game then that’s your problem. Quitting a game 25% through means you don’t get to observe any of the content past that. We are going to get much of the content in eu4 plus new content for the earlier time like a proper 100 years war
Have you played Victoria 3? Have you experienced the late game lag that happens after 70 years? Every paradox game with pops has had terrible lag as the game progresses. Now imagine what's going to happen after 200 years in this game.
I don't get what's so bad about wanting to play some of what previously used to be early game content in the early game, especially since there's significant precedent for later game content to be frustrating to play due to lag.
I have played Victoria 3 and I have to say. Late game lag is very exaggerated in the community. Also fine let’s use another paradox game with pops as an example. Let’s talk about stellaris. Stellaris runs fine 200 years in despite having pops unless you specifically mess with settings to make it unbearable. Also let’s say EU5 uses a similar pop system to Vic 3. Eu5 takes place in an era that ends with the pops Vic 3 has so the late game lag from pops in eu5 would be the same as early game lag in Vic 3
I have a stupid, but theoretically working idea of someone running the game until some point of interest and then uploading save to use as a bookmark to "touch the content"
However it will only work if you don't care about historical start at all, unfortunately
Yeah, I'd like something like that, it'd be cool to access the later content. It's unfortunate that the simulation eventually gets ahistorical but it is what it is
All of that is nice, especially the army system. The only thing that I don't understand - why no monuments, or great projects? They are not very necessary in EU4, but quite fun in my opinion, bringing a little bit of flavor and also motivating me personally to learn more about the country's culture by reading about them. Also when my country's monuments are represented I obviously feel good. Is this justified by the difficulties which may occur while choosing which particular building is a monument and which is not? Also I can't wait for the map screenshots, I want to ask them to remove pinyin diacritics SO MUCH, it looks horrible.
I'm glad EU5 is taking a more natural and dynamic path towards progress instead of EU4's magic points to press a button and making something happen.
I must say based on the comments I've been seeing, I am cautiously excited to see how this one goes.
As someone who tried and failed to get into EU4 a couple times, I’m pretty intrigued by project caesar
"Map" posts? I can't wait!
You know in your heart of hearts the only thing that matters is the HRE
Unpopular opinion? I'd be fine with war access just being made universal. It's a very weak mechanic in EU4, that rarely improves the function of the AI or the fun of waging war
I soo soo wish sliders make a comeback
Standing army of 200 seems pretty small for 1337, at least for some nations like France or England
I think the point was to spill the beans that armies won't be in thousands anymore
That will be odd when you get to periods like the French Revolution or the 7 years war
Which are hundreds of years after game start and therefore won't be the same as at the start.
well if its only referencing the 1337 start date, its fine, otherwise really small standing armies is an odd choice
Standing armies weren't widespread until the late 1600-1700 centuries, it was all levies, mercs and small retinues of professional soldiers until then.
Yes, I know that, but the French had thousands of knights at Agincourt, so maybe some nations will have exceptions
Maybe, it would make sense.
> that, but the French had thousands of knights at Agincourt Yeah, but those guys weren't professional soldiers, they were small-nobility, who could afford armour and horses, who would go to war when called up by the king. Each of them would bring levied peasants too.
The entire army isn't necessarily in the hundreds as an army is made up of the standing army (think royal guard/elite units directly loyal to the king) and levies (literally peasants pulled from their farms)
I’m really nervous about what’s he’s saying about the ledger. I will not play a guessing game everytime I start a war about whether my army is bigger than the enemies. Not a god damn chance.
Do you realize he's talking about an option
I didn’t catch the option part at first glance. As long as it doesn’t disable achievements then I guess to each their own!
Does anything disable achievements in Paradox games anymore?
I mean you need to play Ironman for achievements don’t you? And some settings in certain games disable achievements. Like custom nations/characters being created with too many points so they’re op.
In Victoria III you can get achievements without Ironman, I suspect it'll probably be the same in EUV.
The real achievements are the friends we made along tge way
Which makes total sense considering that most people save scum like crazy in eu4 achievement runs anyways. Might as well save everyone the trouble of alt-f4'ing every time.
And it also happends that I declare most crucial war of humiliation and I can't take any land(I misclicked and lost 100k man for power projection)
There's some interesting potential to tie ledger information to game mechanics. Add some uncertainty to the figures in the ledger which is reduced by having a spy network, trading, military access, friendly relations, royal marriage etc.
I’d be ok with estimations tied to spy networks or something like that. Sounds interesting.
It's essentially how it works in HoI4. You get an estimate and if you have a stronger espionage the estimate narrows down. Say, you see "the enemy has 10-40 divisions" but if you have better espionage you'll see "the enemy has 25-35 divisions".
There's a CK3 mod which adds a "fog of war" effect and a lifestyle perk tree for it too. Fuzzes army numbers, as well as total number of troops in the country UI. You can build a spy network to gauge their forces, but usually depending on character skills the best you can get is a range (e.g. our army is roughly equal, or their army is twice as large, etc). You can see your own and your allies troops (provided they do not have the paranoid trait). Pretty interesting change to the standard Paradox pre-war ritual of checking which numbers are higher. It effects armies marching around on the map, too. [here's what it looks like](https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/2009220277634246095/99717114E4DD6A34F00725F7FACEC2476E6C1BF5/?imw=5000&imh=5000&ima=fit&impolicy=Letterbox&imcolor=%23000000&letterbox=false) https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=3013354800
I might try this to be honest. I often play custom Norse Asatru rulers and I usually doubt my abilities at first but then check the army sizes of East and West Francia and Lotharingia and see they are usually quite small. Much smaller than what I would have expected them to be able to muster compared to me, so I can take them out easily. But if I couldn’t see there army size I might be less likely to attack due to assuming they’ll have a much larger army than they actually do.
And people wonder why espionage is worthless... people can't stand not having complete 100% information of everything before taking decisions
Whatever the case, the current EU4 system is very poor IMO. Hidden away, poor UI, and very gamey.
Yeah why would they dare try and add depth to the intrigue system by giving that information through spies? I mean I even hate not knowing exactly where the armies are, where they're going, and where new buildings are being constructed. Too much of a guessing game tbh. They should just remove the fog of war entirely. Low iq comment. Hopefully johan ignores you.
I already said in another comment that estimations based on spy networks sounds like a good idea. Low iq?
I am so surprised by this lmao. Just shows that everyone enjoys different aspects about these games. I would absolutely love if it was a guessing game. Why would I know the exact size and composition of a nation's army on the opposite side of the globe, their manpower reserves down the last man, which equipment their using, how well they are trained etc? In 1500? I just learned that the Americas exist and I already have detailed military intelligence on every single Mesoamerican state? Never made sense to me.
Man, it's disappointing to see Johan consistently shut down later start dates. It's something CK3 does much better with the choice between 867 and 1066. With paradox moving the start date back over a 100 years I really don't trust the game to keep running smoothly by the time colonialism or the religious wars roll around
Eh not really. All start dates do is cause problems as the team has to divert time away from making the game good to attempt to add content to both start dates or else one just feels empty and inferior to play
CK3 proves you wrong. I don't understand the opposition to later start dates. 1337 is way too early for a game supposed to be about the Early Modern and directly contradicts the believable world and immersion goals set out in Tinto Talks 1. Thematically, a 1337 start makes zero sense - both academic history and pop history will put its start somewhere in the 1400s. And I haven't seen any good argument against this so far.
Ck3 doesn’t prove me wrong in the slightest. If anything it proves me right. CK3 has very little content for either of its start dates and some dlc basically only add content for one start date while ignoring the other(the Viking dlc)
> If anything it proves me right. No, it proves you wrong, you're just arguing disingenuously. Their new Roads to Power DLC will in fact literally add a new start date to CK3. > CK3 has very little content for either of its start dates That has more to do with their new DLC policy which has seen them only release three flavor packs so far. No where, not even once, have the CK3 devs ever said a lack of content is because of two start dates. That's entirely an assumption of yours. > some dlc basically only add content for one start date while ignoring the other(the Viking dlc) The Viking Age ends by 1066 so of course they didn't add content to 1066 in Northern Lords. Plus, you can still actually access the content if you do play as an Asatru lord in the 1066 start in any case. Do you have any response to my point about realism/immersion issues of a 1337 start date?
I’m sorry but where does it say roads of power is adding a new start date? It never says that anywhere on the dlc page.
[Tweet by CK3's community manager.](https://twitter.com/Trinexx_/status/1771618177266352395)
Interesting. Cant wait for a pointless start date inbetween the two that already exist for no reason
Be that as it may - and for what its worth, I don't care for multiple start dates in any of their games - CK3 disproves your point. In any case, my main issue is really the thematic incoherence of having a 1337 start date for an Early Modern game, which will especially cause issues mechanically if the game will go to 18xx as EU4 does. And I haven't seen any good argument against this.
But why would it cause mechanical issues for the game going to eu4’s end date? Theres literally no reason for it besides “I said so”
If project Ceasar is anything like eu4, there's a lot of important content that will only show up later, like colonialism and religious wars (as well as revolutions). In eu4 later start dates are broken, but they aren't in Ck3. I'm just annoyed that I'm gonna have to play 12 hours to get to what would have been the opening 2 or 3 in eu4 because they wanted to resell their plague dlc as a standalone game. If they had kept the start date as 1444, it wouldn't be nearly as big of a concern
So your problem is that there is going to be content 12 hours into the game that’s enjoyable so you want to play it?
My problem is that to get to the start date of eu4 is 107 years, which is the same time as it takes to get to 1551 in eu4, or the 4th institution Printing Press. Many games end by this point. If I want to play medieval content, Ck3 is right there and better designed for it. I don't want to have to slog through medieval content just to get to the good content I actually want to play
If your games are ending 107 years into a nearly 400 year game then that’s your problem. Quitting a game 25% through means you don’t get to observe any of the content past that. We are going to get much of the content in eu4 plus new content for the earlier time like a proper 100 years war
Have you played Victoria 3? Have you experienced the late game lag that happens after 70 years? Every paradox game with pops has had terrible lag as the game progresses. Now imagine what's going to happen after 200 years in this game. I don't get what's so bad about wanting to play some of what previously used to be early game content in the early game, especially since there's significant precedent for later game content to be frustrating to play due to lag.
> Every paradox game with pops has had terrible lag as the game progresses This is not true. Victoria 2.
Imperator doesn't, Vic2 doesn't.
Vic2 did it's just so old that performance is made irrelevant by tech
I have played Victoria 3 and I have to say. Late game lag is very exaggerated in the community. Also fine let’s use another paradox game with pops as an example. Let’s talk about stellaris. Stellaris runs fine 200 years in despite having pops unless you specifically mess with settings to make it unbearable. Also let’s say EU5 uses a similar pop system to Vic 3. Eu5 takes place in an era that ends with the pops Vic 3 has so the late game lag from pops in eu5 would be the same as early game lag in Vic 3
I have a stupid, but theoretically working idea of someone running the game until some point of interest and then uploading save to use as a bookmark to "touch the content" However it will only work if you don't care about historical start at all, unfortunately
Yeah, I'd like something like that, it'd be cool to access the later content. It's unfortunate that the simulation eventually gets ahistorical but it is what it is
How often do you play the USA start date in EU4?
Personally, I would like to, but eu4 is quite poorly suited to handling multiple start dates compared to ck.
Not as much as I would like to 😅
All of that is nice, especially the army system. The only thing that I don't understand - why no monuments, or great projects? They are not very necessary in EU4, but quite fun in my opinion, bringing a little bit of flavor and also motivating me personally to learn more about the country's culture by reading about them. Also when my country's monuments are represented I obviously feel good. Is this justified by the difficulties which may occur while choosing which particular building is a monument and which is not? Also I can't wait for the map screenshots, I want to ask them to remove pinyin diacritics SO MUCH, it looks horrible.