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Europa Universalis IV - Development Diary 21st of June 2022

Welcome to our next Development Diary for Europa Universalis IV! For today we take a look at a fan favorite™ of the Scandinavian region: Scandinavia itself.

Unlike our other Scandinavian kingdoms, the unified country of Scandinavia was never a real country. Yet it is undeniable that Denmark and Sweden tried to unite Scandinavia under their own banner during the history of this region. The Kalmar Union was the closest to a unification of these countries.

As Scandinavia is a formable with little historical ties we decided to make its mission tree into an extension of pre-existing mission trees of Sweden, Denmark and Norway. The newly gained missions are either an expansion on the current playstyle, or are mirroring key missions from the other Scandinavian Kingdoms. So let us go through the different tags and how forming Scandinavia impacts them.

As Sweden already has a very extensive mission tree the formation of Scandinavia expands the mission tree by 13 new missions:
swedish_scandinavian_mission_tree.png
Sweden receives three new branches of their mission tree and two additional missions expanding the Caroleans and Hakkapeliitta even further.

Starting from the left, the missions “Invest in the Workforce”, “Scandes Infrastructure” and “Intensify Metal Production” are newly acquired missions which are available to both Denmark and Sweden when forming Scandinavia. They give you access to the Mountain Expansion privilege as well as the event chains to discover new sources of copper, iron and even silver in Scandinavia. So in other words: they are the development missions of Norway.

The missions started with “Handle the Empire” are Swedish specific as they are a continuation of Gustavus Adolphus’ ambitions in Germany. Either through conquest or diplomacy, the goal of these missions is to dominate the Holy Roman Empire. The great payoff of uniting Germany is the following reward:
hegemon_of_germany.png

Note: keep in mind that at this point you already are the strongest nation anyway, so the payoff is one final “get richer” reward.

The final branch on the right covers the construction of a flagship which should be the pride of Swedish Scandinavia. Of course this whole branch is a reference to the Vasa.
the_first_vasa.png
However, if you had the event “The Sinking of Vasa” before then this event changes slightly:
vasa_ii.png
The missions “Refine the Caroleans” and “Incorporate the Cavalry” revolve around the Carolean and the Hakkapeliitta. With the former mission you need to specialize even further into your military by reaching 20% Discipline OR gain 14 Military Power per month, have 25 Swedish or Finnish provinces with a barracks and at least 75% Army Professionalism. As a reward you get the following effect:
carolean_mission_reward.png

Note: This image of the Carolean buff has been done before we got to rebalance it. Right now, the reward is not set in stone.

Meanwhile, the cavalry requires you to have the Hakkapeliitta in action for 5 years as well as either having 20% Cavalry Combat Ability OR 50 cavalry in total, and having at least 10 Finnish provinces with 10 development and a barracks.
hakkapeliitta_reward.png

hakkapeliitta_mercs.png
You might notice that their names are in green. The reason for that is to showcase that these mercenaries cost no Army Professionalism to hire. They also possess a special tooltip when you hover over them to showcase their special feat:
free_merc.png

These were the Scandinavian missions for Sweden. Two to go!
Next we move on to the Danish version of the Scandinavian missions:
danish_scandinavian_mission_tree.png
As Denmark your missions for the Indian subcontinent get expanded even further. “Rule over West India” and “Dominate North India” give you claims on the vast Indian regions while the “Crown of India” finishes this path of the mission tree with a permanent modifier which increases Trade Steering by 20% and Trade Company Governing Cost by 25%.

Note: We did and still do consider adding the Indian estates as a reward too for the “Crown of India” mission. Due to problems with the UI (the estate window would require a rework to be able to show more than 5 estates + crownland at the same time) as well as the issues of immersion (all the Dharma estate events will assume you are an Indian nation, not a Scandinavian foreign power which happens to own India) we are hesitant to add this reward though.

Additionally to the development missions of Norway, you also get the ones of Sweden, which are about the Sami and the Forest Expansion. These two missions are shared with Norway. You also gain the Swedish missions about dominating the Baltic Sea and conquering the entire coastline of said sea.

Finally, the mission “The Military Question” is the finisher for the mercenaries of Denmark. By having a completed Military idea group, 30% Army Professionalism, 40% Army Tradition and a level 3 Military Advisor you can fulfill this mission and trigger the following event:
merc_event.png

merc_event_second_option.png

That was the Danish Scandinavian missions. Last but not least, let’s see what Norway gets from forming Scandinavia.

Norway gets the biggest addition to its mission tree with 17 new missions from forming Scandinavia.
norwegian_scandinavian_mission_tree.png
As Norwegian Scandiavia your New World ambition gets expanded way beyond North America. Do note that the “Dominate North America” and “Control South America” are not only about colonizing these continents, but also about keeping your rivals and enemies away from there. “Settle in Rio Grande” will give a permanent claim on every province owned by your rival/enemy or by their subjects in North America while “Expand the Frontier” does the same for South American provinces.

The final mission rewards of dominating the entirety of the New World are two permanent modifiers:
new_world_perma_modifiers.png

You will also gain some old world related missions such as new goals in Africa and the Baltic Sea.

The more exciting missions are, however, in the middle. With “Expand the Leidang” you unlock two new estate privileges for the Nobility which mirror the customizability of the Swedish Caroleans - but not it affects your marines.
leidang_privileges.png

Finally the mission “Kingdom of the Sea” gives a permanent 20% Good Produced and the bonus of getting 0.5% Army Professionalism whenever you hire an admiral.

Those were the Scandinavian mission trees for the three kingdoms. Of course you know that Scandinavia is not a formable exclusive to Sweden, Denmark and Norway, so the question arises: what happens if somebody else forms Scandinavia? Don’t worry, we got this case covered!
scandinavian_mission_tree.png
The Scandinavian mission tree was mostly inspired by the Germany mission tree as both formables are late game “what if” nations in EU4. Because of that the mission tree is split into 4 branches:
  • A conquest branch, which is about the conquest of North Germany, the British Isles, the Baltics and Russia. The big reward is a permanent +100 Power Projection.
  • A colonial branch which revolves around the New and the Old World colonialism. The highlight of these missions is a permanent Trade Company Investment cost reduction of 20% and Build Cost reduction of 10%.
  • A branch about absolutism and revolution - Scandinavia is a tag you form with admin tech 20 after all unless you are either Sweden, Denmark or Norway. +20% Max Absolutism, +1 Diplomat and -3 Global Unrest are the rewards for sticking to the late game.
  • A branch about the internal development of your country. Unlike the other branches, this one has the more interesting rewards and requirements. Through “Let the Ducat Roll” you unlock the Mountain and Forest Expansion privileges. “Invest in Finland” unlocks the Hakkapeliitta mercenaries for your country, “Develop the Scandes” fires the Norwegian event chain for the copper and iron in Scandinavia. And “Empire of the North” gives permanently +5% Development Efficiency.

That was it for the Scandinavian content for the DLC. However, I am not done yet with them as there are other changes related to this tag. First thing (and I know this one might not be very popular): Scandinavia is an Endgame Tag, which means you cannot form any other country other than the Roman Empire and the unified HRE.

To compensate this, however, Scandinavia receives its own unique set of ideas which reflects the different aspects of the Northern kingdoms:

Code:
SCA_ideas = {
    start = {
        discipline = 0.05
        ship_durability = 0.1
    }
 
    bonus = {
        manpower_recovery_speed = 0.33
    }
 
    trigger = {
        tag = SCA
    }
    free = yes
 
    sca_connecting_history = {
        stability_cost_modifier = -0.2
    }
    sca_unified_scandinavian = {
        possible_policy = 1
    }
    sca_danish_baltic_fleet = {
        naval_morale = 0.2
    }
    sca_norwegian_marines = {
        allowed_marine_fraction = 0.25
        sailors_recovery_speed = 0.25
    }
    sca_finnish_hakkapeliita = {
        cavalry_fire = 1
        cavalry_power = 0.1
    }
    sca_swedish_carolean = {
        infantry_power = 0.15
    }
    sca_empire_of_the_north = {
        legitimacy = 1
        devotion = 1
        republican_tradition = 0.3
        yearly_absolutism = 0.5
    }
}

Next I want to close the Carolean topic. Our newest unit had a little bit of an identity crisis as their first iteration was one of a special elite unit and the second iteration was the result of a too harsh nerf hammer.

Now we have the third and final iteration of them:
carolean_final_version.png

Note: These three manpower modifiers do NOT stack with each other. So in Sweden’s case it would work like this: Swedish provinces give +33% more Manpower, Finnish provinces (which are accepted by Sweden) give +20% more Manpower, Danish provinces (which are not accepted but are in the same culture group) give +10% more Manpower.
carolean_privileges.png
Additionally, we reduced the number of development required to recruit a Carolean unit. Now you can recruit one regiment of Caroleans for every 10 development of Swedish or Finnish provinces.

The goal is to make the Caroleans more into the standard army of Sweden than a special elite force, but they should still have a significant punch. Maybe this version might be a bit too strong, but that is the one we will stick to until the release of the DLC.

Last week’s development diary showcased the monarchy government reforms and today I want to give an update in that regard.

Many of the new reforms and changes to old reforms adjusted absolutism for monarchies which was not a very popular approach whatsoever. Because of that we have decided to drop this idea entirely. We also did some rebalancing of the tiers. Here is the new update of the monarchy reforms:

Tier 2:
monarchy_reforms_2.png

Tier 3:
monarchy_reforms_3.png

Note: The requirements of the Centralized Bureaucracy reforms scales with the ages. With every age the range of the requirements increases by 10 (for example: Centralized Imperial Bureaucracy would require 35 provinces in the Age of Absolutism to be visible while during the Age of Discovery it would be only 15 provinces).

Tier 5:
monarchy_reforms_5.png

Note: Only the “Dynastic Administration” is new here. The other three reforms are untouched from the current version.

Tier 6:
monarchy_reforms_6.png

Note: Parliamentarism and States General are unchanged.

Tier 8:
monarchy_reforms_8.png


Tier 9:
monarchy_reforms_9.png

Note: L’Etat c’est moi is also part of this tier, but unchanged.

Tier 10:
monarchy_reforms_10.png

Note: Not in picture, “Become a Republic” and “Install Theocratic Government” are also part of this tier, but unchanged.

We also overhauled the republican reforms too. See for yourself!
republican_reforms.png

Tier 2:
republic_reforms_2.png

Tier 3:
republic_reforms_3.png

Note: Merchant republic related reforms will not be touched and are not shown here.

Tier 5:
republic_reforms_5.png

Tier 6:
republic_reforms_6.png

Tier 8:
republic_reforms_8.png

Tier 9:
republic_reforms_9.png

Tier 10:
republic_reforms_10.png

Tier 11 and 12 are currently WIP.

Here is also an update for the shared Tier 4 and 7.

Tier 4:
generic_religious_reforms_4.png

Note: All the different reforms for the religions will be revealed in a later Development Diary.

Tier 7:
generic_economical_reforms_7.png

This was it for this week! Next week we will take a look into a region on the other side of the Baltic Sea. I won’t say which region, but expect for next week to learn to hate your nobles when you play the star of next week’s Development Diary.

Until then I wish you all a nice week!

EDIT: I just noticed that the numbers for the army tradition decay modifiers are off. Of course we mean -0.3% and -0.1% Army Tradition Decay, not -3.0% and -1.0%. This has been fixed internally already.
 
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Really looking forward to trying out the new government reforms, like the increased number of choices available a lot.

Having said that, I am disappointed that the Tier 5 "Nobles of the Robe" reform is unchanged (like the other original Tier 5 options). This bonus has always been the weakest at Tier 5 and I've never played a game where I've reached Tier 5 and wanted to save a few mil points by choosing this reform. Not sure if I'm alone or not here, but it will remain an option that I never use unless it gets buffed in some way.
 
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I propose that the capitol of Scandinavia be made Akershus, it sits on the border of Norway and Sweden, and just across the Kattegat is Denmark, its the most equitable place to put a capitol among the three.
 
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This all sounds great, but a lot of these missions would make more sense if the west african node fed into lübeck as well.
Tradewind-wise it could at least make some sense for the Caribbean to feed into the North Sea, and that would fit somewhat with Danish participation in the Triangle Trade while not making it a gimme
 
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For the new government reforms, I'm quite worried about where this is all taking us. First of all, with all the extra tiers switching government is now locked behind 10 tiers of reforms so it will only be possible well into the late game.
Then I think some of the reforms are too strong and more of them need to be locked behind something (idea groups, having a colony, having a vassal, having a specific reform on a previous tier, or else).
Board of admirals for republics is locked behind having a port city????? Isn't that a little bit too easy? My suggestion would be locking it to having 50% of your provinces be port city. Board of generals could be locked by a certain force limit (200k?) or other military parameter, but probably shouldn't be available by default either.

As another example, the "Union of states" will basically make merchants republics redundant as soon as 1500 or 1550 since every normal republic can now become a merchant republic. While it might not be entirely inaccurate that merchant republics became kinda less special over time, it does take away the fun of playing an actual merchant republic somewhat, or at least they just won't feel as unique anymore. Maybe this one could be locked behind trade ideas?

Don't get me wrong please, I really like the government reform mechanic. It's one of the best additions to EU4 ever. But I think it's important to consider how powerful some of these reforms are, especially when they're totally stackable with other modifiers and having all of these reforms is nice for generic nations but kinda takes the fun out of having unique nations which I think is the strength of this game. Maybe you should consider making more nation-specific reforms (in the style of the expanded mods family maybe).

Another point of critique is that gov reforms that just add a flat modifier aren't really all that fun imo. Just another bonus to stack. The ones you've added that have specific government mechanics are generally much better and I have to compliment the devs for that part. I hope you'll reconsider some of the new republic government reforms as you did with the monarchy tiers.
Are theocracies getting some love too?
 
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Having said that, I am disappointed that the Tier 5 "Nobles of the Robe" reform is unchanged (like the other original Tier 5 options). This bonus has always been the weakest at Tier 5 and I've never played a game where I've reached Tier 5 and wanted to save a few mil points by choosing this reform. Not sure if I'm alone or not here, but it will remain an option that I never use unless it gets buffed in some way.
You’re supposed to use it to spam professionalism and slacken
 
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Tier 8 monarchy reform "Social contract" looks too overpowered ("no penalties from heretics and heathens"). Also "Expand administration cost -100%", really? It should be more balanced, in my opinion.
The way Expand Administration works is that every subsequent "click" will cost more and more and after a few clicks that -100% will be nowhere near as impactful, so it's not free Gov Cap forever, rather it gives you some leeway to expand your administration a few times more easily
 
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Will the government reform "Dynastic rule" give 4/1/1, 1/4/1 and 1/1/4 rulers or it will be based off dynasties, whether local or abroad with different stats?

Will it also give access to the game of thrones mechanic?

There's also a grammatical mistake on the tier 8 republican reform" Extend power of the candidate".

I hope military rulership will get back the 100% army tradition for land battles and board of admirals not required having naval ideas filled up seems great, especially with the new buffs.

I hope the Milanese military dictatorship could also receive some buffs, an easier understanding of monarch points based off general pips and some way to make them resign, same for military rulership and any other government type with a ruler that rules for life that isn't a monarchy, including theocracies.
 
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Next week we will take a look into a region on the other side of the Baltic Sea. I won’t say which region, but expect for next week to learn to hate your nobles when you play the star of next week’s Development Diary.

If it is about PLC - I really hope that You finally separated low nobility estate from high nobility estate; maybe western countries were all about the power struggles between the merchant and noble classes, but in PLC it was always between low noble and aristocracy :)

You could even add a special "hussaria" unit based on the power of the lower noble class... ah, dreams.
 
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If it is about PLC - I really hope that You finally separated low nobility estate from high nobility estate; maybe western countries were all about the power struggles between the merchant and noble classes, but in PLC it was always between low noble and aristocracy :)

You could even add a special "hussaria" unit based on the power of the lower noble class... ah, dreams.
Yeah, Winged Hussars should for SURE become a special unit.

Something like +10% shock damage, -10% morale damage recived, +33% maintenace. Restricted to 1 regiment per 10 polish/lithuanian dev. Only for Poland, Lithuania or PLC.
 
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Hmm - How does the copper mine in Sweden end up, if Sweden is absorbed before doing those missions? Are there still some production boni of some sort, or is that just missed?
 
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Edit. I wanted in EU 4 different Polish Unit. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisowczyks

It was nightmare in 17 century. I think bonus would be 10 % movement speed, Loot 25%, and +1 cavalry shock

Lisowczyks should be mercenary company. And they should devastate everything they touch (they should be a dream team to do Carthago Delenda Est if Commonwealth was allowed to do this achievement). Or have scorch earth for free.

As for Polish hussars, they counted at max 10 000 but they should be able to win with armies 20-25 times of their size. So hussars should be extreme OP but very, very, very limited in numbers. I would do them something like this:
  • Fire damage received -10%
  • Fire damage received -10%
  • Shock damage received -10%
  • Cavalry shock +1 (or maybe +2)
  • Discipline +20%
  • Army drill gain modifier +100%
  • Regiment drill loss -95%
  • Ignoring the stack wipe 10-1 rule
  • regiment cost and regiment maintenance cost and reinforce cost should be 0
  • limited to floor{ [(accepted culture development in flatland provinces)/20] * (nobility loyalty) * (autonomy) } regiments
  • reinforce speed -95%

Hussars should be godlike free troops limited by their low numbers and extremely slow reinforce speed.
 
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