So what have we done lately? Well, plenty of stuff that will go into 1.14 and the next expansion. Lots of stuff we are not ready to talk about yet, but this week we'll give you information about some new systems.

The first one is the new areas system, which will be a part of the patch.

Areas are a new type of region, usually consisting of between 3-6 provinces, and with no province being in more than one area. A new areas mapmode will show you which provincs are in what areas. This will be used for various mechanics we will explain more next week.

And then we have a feature which will be part of the as of yet unnanounced expansion.. The Victory Cards system. This is a feature that is primarily designed for multiplayer games, as it is introduced to reduce hugboxes and permanent allianceblocks.

At the end of a campaign, the top countries end up with 15-20K in score, so our goal was to create a system that could provide 30-50% more score for those that are willing to go for it.

And thus, we introduce the Victory Cards.

Starting in 1450, and every 100 years after you will be able to get a Victory Card if you have at least 300 development. Of course if you don't qualify for 1 at a given date, you will get 1 as soon as you qualify for it.

A victory card grows in score value every month if you own, control & core every province in its area, and it takes 20 years to grow to its maximum, and 20 years to drop to zero from its maximum.

The area selected is slightly randomised, but average development matter & it must be adjacent or within 1 seazone of any part of your nation or its subjects. Only provinces belonging to potential or current rivals are take into consideration, and you are far more likely to get ones on nations ahead of you in score or belonging to other players.

The first card is worth 1000, second 2000, third 3000 and the final 4000 points.

Here I've loaded up a savegame from 1.13 in our office MP campaign, and in the first 2 months I've gotten 2 victory cards to basically fight my game-long-hugbox-friend France.

 

[loup99]

I don't like this feature and do not want it in any of my games, eventual multiplayer ones included. However, as long as it is not enforced upon me in SP I think it is fair to have some features for the few players who actually do play regular multiplayer games.

 

[PhoenixDown]

also why do we need 300 development? did you guys forget non common sense buyers doesnt have control over it?

Only the host needs the dlc the rest gets it even if they don't have it.

 

[lolada]

I have to admit, it is somewhat impressive how Paradox manages to avoid fan demands sometimes. They've had calls to fix Buddhism, espionage, naval mechanics, peacetime gameplay, multidirectional trade, blob stability, etc., and we get a Dev Diary on... the score.

Partly true, it would be unfair to says they didnt try.. they made some changes and put some efforts into resolving these but they were slow and it is not enough for lots of people. They did a lot for Buddhism thats ok. Naval combat was broken for a long time- they eventually made some important fixes (like not to sink whole fleet always) - but lots of people want more improvements. Espionage was slightly tweaked - still trash group. We got development and new building system for peacetime gameplay, but in reality this area needs more work - development is very restricted and there's not much to do in peace time. Multidirectional tride might not be a thing at all.. lots of people don't care - but there's quite a few suggestion to improve trade. Blob stability - gotta agree, all revolt changes were pretty meh, revolt system needs improvement, overextension handling (>100) is ridicuolus.. end so on.. they should probably focus a bit more on actual problem in the game, if 95% on forums say there's a problem than the problem is probably there.

 

[zamieo]

Areas seems like an interesting concept, looking forward to learning more about it next week.

 

[Orctavius]

Sounds like a good feature for multiplayer. I'm glad its not being factored into single player.

 

[Golladan]

I have to admit, it is somewhat impressive how Paradox manages to avoid fan demands sometimes. They've had calls to fix Buddhism, espionage, naval mechanics, peacetime gameplay, multidirectional trade, blob stability, etc., and we get a Dev Diary on... the score.

Is this the last dev diary? How do you know they're not already working some of that stuff and just aren't ready to talk about them yet?

 

[DC123456789]

Yeah, it looks like they're mostly putting out filler diaries until they get whatever new and interesting features they're working on get done to a presentable state.

 

[CrabHelmet]

Is this the last dev diary? How do you know they're not already working some of that stuff and just aren't ready to talk about them yet?

I mean, I named 6 different issues there. I could probably think of at least 20 different issues more important than score, because nobody cares about score in SP and I'm willing to bet good money less than 1 in 10 MP groups do, which means score changes effect something like 1.28% of EU4 games. Even if they have 10 more dev diaries, I find it really unlikely that they'll have covered all of the material that is more important than score (i.e., basically all of it).

 

[grisamentum]

also why do we need 300 development? did you guys forget non common sense buyers dont have control over it?

Only the host needs the dlc the rest gets it even if they don't have it.

You're missing the point. Even if "only the host" has to have Common Sense, it's still a new feature that requires a different paid DLC to work.

 

[meertn]

also why do we need 300 development? did you guys forget non common sense buyers dont have control over it?

What do you mean, 'have no control'? Even with CS the fastest way to aquire more development is to conquer more land, so I don't really see the problem.

 

[Kwami]

You're missing the point. Even if "only the host" has to have Common Sense, it's still a new feature that requires a different paid DLC to work.

The new feature does not require CS to work. If you don't have CS, then you'll just need more provinces to activate the feature.

 

[grisamentum]

The new feature does not require CS to work. If you don't have CS, then you'll just need more provinces to activate the feature.

I suppose that's true if your definition of "work" is just "function at all" - you can still eventually hit 300 development.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

And then we have a feature which will be part of the as of yet unnanounced expansion.. The Victory Cards system. This is a feature that is primarily designed for multiplayer games, as it is introduced to reduce hugboxes and permanent allianceblocks.

The problem with this theory is the assumption that people in MP will play for score. Let's take any game from any patch 1.4 to now. I have doubts that score is a good representation of relative performance in the game, considering that I can get higher scores with less expansion/army/etc but let's roll with it and say that the "winner" finishes #1 in score.

That has been true since the game's inception. However, player nations in MP right now are hugboxing knowing full well that they can't possibly finish #1 in score unless they were to turn on their ally who is leading the game. That doesn't happen in practice.

As a change, this one doesn't bother me a great deal because it doesn't have the kind of detrimental impact that taking away primitive ships + ADM 5 rule without giving them an alternative means of reliable contact did. At worst, this system will do nothing, and maybe at least some people will get enjoyment out of it. I find it awkward that *this* of all things gets so many downvotes, considering its relatively high-floor in terms of "it's hard to picture this adversely affecting gameplay in practice".

 

[huyderman]

I don't think people get what these dev diaries are about. They are often just a highlight on some random feature they are working on/thinking about. Just because something gets a dev diary, doesn't mean it's a high priority thing or the only thing they're working on; it's just something they felt was interesting to talk about, and are ready to talk about. Since they try to push these out once a week, sometimes minor features or fluff will be the focus (especially between DLC announcements).

 

[Wizzington]

I suppose that's true if your definition of "work" is just "function at all" - you can still eventually hit 300 development.

If you are unable to ever hit 300 development without developing you're probably extremely bad at the game. In these cases I would think score in MP is the absolute least of your worries.

 

[Golladan]

I mean, I named 6 different issues there. I could probably think of at least 20 different issues more important than score, because nobody cares about score in SP and I'm willing to bet good money less than 1 in 10 MP groups do, which means score changes effect something like 1.28% of EU4 games. Even if they have 10 more dev diaries, I find it really unlikely that they'll have covered all of the material that is more important than score (i.e., basically all of it).

Again. Maybe they are working on it and it's not in a state to talk about it yet. Things change greatly during development. Compare the fort sytem talked about in the development diary with the one with ended up getting. If the beta testers could talk freely they would probably tell you about how drastically features changed from introduction to release. They would probably tell you about all the features that they got to play around with that never actually made it into release.

Things take time. Not everything is simple to do. And not everything that some players find as issues are considered issues by the developers.

 

[Wizzington]

Tell you guys what, starting with the next dev diary I'm going to institute a new rule that goes 'stop complaining that the week's dev diary isn't about the precise thing you wanted a dev diary about'. You're of course free to critique the actual contents of the dev diary, but the flurry of 'why isn't the dev diary about X' posts is getting very old.

 

[grisamentum]

If you are unable to ever hit 300 development without developing you're probably extremely bad at the game. In these cases I would think score in MP is the absolute least of your worries.

Score in MP is always the absolute least of anyone's worries.

But seriously, it doesn't seem problematic to you to balance "victory points" around a specific development limit that obviously differs between different levels of DLC investment?

 

[CrabHelmet]

Tell you guys what, starting with the next dev diary I'm going to institute a new rule that goes 'stop complaining that the week's dev diary isn't about the precise thing you wanted a dev diary about'. You're of course free to critique the actual contents of the dev diary, but the flurry of 'why isn't the dev diary about X' posts is getting very old.

Doesn't have to be a precise thing. Being about any thing that more than three people care about would be a nice start.

 

[grisamentum]

The problem with this theory is the assumption that people in MP will play for score. Let's take any game from any patch 1.4 to now. I have doubts that score is a good representation of relative performance in the game, considering that I can get higher scores with less expansion/army/etc but let's roll with it and say that the "winner" finishes #1 in score.

Agreed. Especially since the final score doesn't account for different starts, does it yet?