EU4 - Development Diary - 6th of December 2016

[Johan]

Hi everyone and welcome to another development diary for Europa Universalis IV. We’ve been working on the 1.20 patch and its accompanying unannounced expansion for a while now.

We’ve reworked some internal mechanics so looted and scorched earth are no longer just binary-statuses, but instead they affect something we call devastation.

A provinces’ devastation ranges from 0 to 100%, and it affects local autonomy, supply limits and how much goods are produced in the province. It also reduces the spread of institutions into that province, and increases the development cost of the province.

Each time a province is looted, its devastation is increased by 5%, and a scorched earth increased it by 25%.

Each year devastation is reduced by 1%, and within the zone of control of a fortification, it is reduced by 2% for each fort level each year.

Unrest is also increasing the devastation of a province by the amount of unrest each year.

What does this give you? Well, loot is is no longer just a strong penalty for a short period of time, but continuous conflict zones will grow far worse.


A cool feature for the expansion though is the concept of Prosperity, which is a state-level bonus. Any state that has 0 devastation in all its provinces and the country is at positive stability will have a small counter tick up each month, depending on the abilities of its government. It is a random chance, but when the counter reached 100%, then the state has reached Prosperity.

A state with prosperity gives -10% to development cost, and +25% to goods produced.

Stay tuned, next week we’ll talk about something that will probably be the biggest feature added to the game since we started EU4.

 

[Darkrenown]

This Prosperity thing seems like a great idea

 

[Johan]

This design choice troubles me a bit. It sounds like lowering autonomy is now a non-choice, because a huge 20-year unrest increase will now cripple the province beyond any gains you get from -25% autonomy.

The only way it'd remain worthwhile would be if you could immediately bait the rebels into rising up (for the -100 recent revolt modifier). Will such a mechanic be added (say, pay Mil points to provoke 'em rather than stall them)?

Why?

Forts will block that dramatically.

 

[Johan]

Scorched Earth is so weak you might as well remove it. It's so annoying to me that Scorched Earth disappears when the owner of the province changes.

That will change in 1.20.

 

[Trin Tragula]

Eh. Paradox think that the counties of Sussex and Kent are both (a) flat and (b) well-drained, so go figure

Feel free to bug report any terrain you feel is incorrect (preferably with some sort of reference). Unless manual overrides are added the game autopicks grassland most of the time

 

[Trin Tragula]

So most provinces have their terrain chosen randomly?

Most but not all provinces that aren't very clear have overrides. Otherwise it's picked by the majority terrain within the provinces borders as displayed on the map. The game and the human eye can probably differ at what that might be though
It's never random, it will be the same no matter how many times you restart.

 

[Trin Tragula]

So all the percentages from back when terrain wasn't the same for the entire province still exists and are used for which terrain to choose unless there's an override? If so then what happens when new provinces are made?

Those percentages were always based on the terrain map.
When we add new provinces we add new overrides as necessary generally (and if needed we also modify the displayed terrain on the map as that should match what you expect in the province).
If we don't add overrides then it's taken from the map just as before (but unlike the original system it always picks the same terrain, it's never chance based).

 

[Trin Tragula]

On this topic, where would I post historical inaccuracies? Bug Reports or Suggestions?

Depends on the nature of it. If it's "Tag X should not own province Y in 1444" it's likely a bug but most other things are likely suggestions. Generally any more complicated solution would also be a suggestion as would anything where the situation isn't very clear cut so in general suggestions is the safest bet.

 

[Trin Tragula]

It's regarding an incorrect capital, so I'm guessing it's a bug?

Should be
By now it'd probably have been easier to say it directly though
Please provide good references and we will have a look. If it's not inaccurate by design (this is rare but sometimes happen, often to compensate for when the game and reality functions too differently) it will be changed

 

[Trin Tragula]

The whole of the east midlands is called "Derbyshire", which as you can imagine is a particularly jarring and offensive slight!

I am sure it's a horrible thing to behold but I am sure you realize the need to lump things together lest we end up with a map of tiny, tiny provinces

 

[Trin Tragula]

Both midlands and Mercia (the latter already an area) are too wide names for that little province for my tastes.
By now we are drifting of topic though. If you want to propose province renaming so suggest starting a thread in the suggestions forum

 

[Trin Tragula]

Thanks. I'll look into it on Monday

 

[Trin Tragula]

@otaats I had sen it actually but not commented. Bumping it now. Will see what the future brings