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EU4 - Development Diary - 27th of September 2016

Hello everyone and welcome to another Europa Universalis development diary. This time we’ll take a look at the most important balance changes for 1.18, with a quick explanation on why we did them..

Setup
  • Lucky nations are now down to 8, sorry Poland, Brandenburg & Sweden.
The balance of having 10 lucky nations made the likelihood of a strong Russia too uncommon for us, and especially having those 3 as likely lucky nations was too much for Muscowy.

  • Lots of National Ideas have been changed, but most importantly Knights lost their tolerance for heretics, but can instead do slave raids.
As usual, we keep changing the ideas as we add new functionality, and giving people new abilities. There was a rather large following for giving the Knights access to Slave Raiding, as they were rather fearsome pirates, so they gained that ability.


Navies
  • If you have a port, now you get at least 5 sailors per month.
This was also requested, as some nations with 1 port just could never get any sailors at all.

  • Ships now engage in a priority order from heavy, galley, light to transport, up to a maximum of the engagement width (for which heavies count as 3 rather than 1).
This creates a more interesting naval combat experience, as you’ll all notice on October 11th.


Espionage
  • Reworked foreign spy detection & counter espionage. Counter espionage have less impact on discovery, but both now impact the spy network buildup of the target in your nation.
Basically, being able to defend against spy activities is now possible, even if stopping them entirely might be impossible.

  • Reduced unrest and Republican Tradition impact from Sowing discontent spy action
And many tears have been shed over this ….

  • Spy network bonuses will now apply to the target's subjects.
No more micromanagement and extra hassle! Rejoice!


Subjects
  • Breaking vassalage with a vassal that has over 50% in liberty desire no longer gives a relation penalty.
In the “duh?” category right?

  • Increased Liberty Desire from tariffs, up to 50% LD at 100% tariffs
Tariffs are no longer no-brainers to increase..

  • Colonial nations only lose half the money the overlord is getting in tariffs.
But this makes it so you can’t cripple your colonial nations..

  • Large colonial nations now gives you +5 land force limit each
And now you also want LARGE colonial nations :) ie, buffing Portugal..

  • There is now a scaled penalty to Liberty Desire up to +25% at max Mercantilism.
Aka, the longer the game goes, the more likely subjects get rebellious.

  • Vassals fighting each others (i.e. in Japan) now always accept Enforce Peace requests of overlord, but all vassals except the defending peace target get +10 Liberty Desire.
More power to the Emperor! or.. The Shogun!

  • All subjects now get reduced AE from your actions, not just vassals & marches.
No longer will your union-partners hate you for conquering their cores!

  • Subjects now have land and naval access to other subjects of the same overlord.
No longer will your subjects units get stuck!


Religion
  • Patriarch Authority no longer reduces tax income.
It all belongs to Mother Russia!. Sorry, I meant all orthodox nations..

  • Sanction Commercial Monopoly now costs 50 PI, instead of 100.
And we boost Catholics!

  • Defender of Faith now gives you +10 opinion of all with that religion.
Clearly this was our most important tweak in 1.18.

  • Theocracies, especially the Papal State, have an increased alliance acceptance penalty towards different religions now.
  • When you change religion as a Monastic order, Devotion is now decreased to the resulting Religious unity
These above are in the “this will improve immersion while improving the balance”-category.



Forts
  • If you are enter battle while in an enemy province with a fort, you will be treated as the attacker in battle and incur that province's terrain penalties.
Building forts is now a strategic decision. Where can you stop your enemies the best?

  • Penalty for not occupying forts in an area will no longer apply if the enemy does not control any forts in the area.
This will make it possible to sign a peace that you as a player likes far easier.


Misc
  • There is now an increase in efficiency of embargoes for a nation scaled by its Mercantilism up to +50%.
This is also another change that makes Mercantilism more powerful, while at the same time improving immersion.

  • Trade Companies is now open to all technology groups.
With the new technology changes, this just makes sense. However, you can not have trade-companies on the same continent as your capital.

  • All countries should now have access to at least one skill 2 advisor at start.
Just for you to have a choice!

  • You can no longer move capital to a continent that has less than a third of your total provinces, unless your capital is the last province you own on its continent.
There were a few exploits where you could swap continents back and forth a few times, that this solves.


Technology

We already talked about the changes to technology in a previous development diary, but here is a quick recap!

  • In 1444, all non-tribal nations start without tech penalties.
  • Primitive Status is now tied to starting techgroups.
  • Institutions will appear in certain provinces at key dates and spread from province to province.
  • Once 10% of your development has this Institution present, you can embrace that Institution for a monetary cost scaled on how much that institution has spread throughout your nation
  • If you have not embraced an Institution, you will have a tech penalty. This penalty grows by 1% each year up to a maximum of 50% penalty per non-embraced institution.
  • American Natives reforming their religion gain all the institutions from their advanced neighbour
  • Many existing ideas have been altered to give faster Institution spread and cheaper embracement costs.
  • Increasing development in provinces will also boost institution presence in that province

Culture

Cultures were also mentioned in a previous development diary, but here is a quick recap.
  • Cultures are now promoted manually, and any culture of at least 20 development can be promoted for 100 DIP.
  • All nations can promote 2 cultures in addition to their primary culture, and additional cultures can be promoted from ideas and Diplomatic technology
  • Old modifiers to Accepted culture Threshold now affect number of promoted cultures
  • Promoted cultures can be Demoted. This will give +5 unrest in all provinces of that culture

Stay tuned, next week we’ll show off new achievements and national ideas..
 
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About trade companies only being restricted to other continents, should Asia be considered differently? Because most of the possible companies are there, and let's say I end up with a Japanese empire controlling India, shouldn't I be able to form a Nippon West India Company?
 
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Mortheim said:
Wikipedia states, that they sell ship's crew alongside goods. So, you practically contradicted yourself ;D
Click to expand...
Scroll a little bit up page 3 and you'll see the original comment he was responding to, he just didn't quote it properly for whatever reason.
 
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grommile said:
I mean, Paradox have even effectively admitted that forts are too damned expensive, by exempting the AI from paying maintenance for border and coastal forts... yet somehow they insist that humans should always have to pay full price.
Click to expand...

IIRC, the semi-official excuse when called out on it (according to Chaingun, but admittedly it wasn't his decision) was that the AI can't anticipate ambushes, so it needs to leave its forts un-mothballed all the time, whereas a player can be smarter about mothballing. I'd have bought this explanation if they'd simply made AI fort maintenance half-price and disabled the AI's ability to mothball them. But making border and coastal forts completely maintenance-free is an outright AI cheat with not even an attempt at justification by the devs, as far as I can see. What it tells us is rather that the AI's economy is suffering as a result of making poor building choices in general, with too much emphasis on high-level forts (or failing to demolish excess forts) and not enough on putting manufactories/workshops on high-value goods.

Low-level forts may actually be a decent investment in 1.18, *if* built in mountains and other rough terrain. Whether the AI will actually prioritise building them in the right place remains to be seen.
 
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dulahan said:
Why not just turn off Lucky nations? There's been an option to do that for a very long time... I know I've had it turned off since the moment it was introduced because I find lucky nations to be a stupid thing too.
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Because you can't turn it off in iron man. The question is why lucky nations is still not optional in iron man but in normal. It should be the other way around because lucky nations has a gazillion überpowered mega bonuses which is super OP and results in super boring predictable blobs on the map. Lucky nations need to go. It should be a flavorful option for normal games but nothing more.
 
For trade companys in asia and the example of Japan. Since Japan is a island it dont belong to the contined and so they should be able to have trade companies in India. When i tryed my Korean colonizer run i was able to have a trade company on the philipines after i westernised and they are both in asia but im not sure about inida since both are on the landmass but maybe india count different then east asia.
 
Sandmann said:
lucky nations has a gazillion überpowered mega bonuses which is super OP and results in super boring predictable blobs on the map.
Click to expand...
Non-Lucky nations make really disappointing opponents.
 
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  • Patriarch Authority no longer reduces tax income.
It all belongs to Mother Russia!. Sorry, I meant all orthodox nations..
Click to expand...

Wow; this is an absolutely massive buff to Orthodox. As it was before; to get PA you'd have to forego positive events [Or take a negative] to increase PA... which rewduced your tax as well. A double negative. 9 times out of ten staying at 0 PA was a no-brainer. The 1 time being that one time you're playing Muscovy and going for the 100% PA achievement because no other Orthodox country will likely survive long enough to reach that.

Setup
  • Lucky nations are now down to 8, sorry Poland, Brandenburg & Sweden.
The balance of having 10 lucky nations made the likelihood of a strong Russia too uncommon for us, and especially having those 3 as likely lucky nations was too much for Muscowy.
Click to expand...

Combined with this and Muscovy will almost certainly be a superpower every game now.

  • Ships now engage in a priority order from heavy, galley, light to transport, up to a maximum of the engagement width (for which heavies count as 3 rather than 1).
This creates a more interesting naval combat experience, as you’ll all notice on October 11th.
Click to expand...

AKA: Heavy spam isn't a no-brainer anymore and Heavies will get ripped apart by Gallies inland like they should now since not only do Gallies get their bonus but also outnumber 3 to 1.

  • If you are enter battle while in an enemy province with a fort, you will be treated as the attacker in battle and incur that province's terrain penalties.
Building forts is now a strategic decision. Where can you stop your enemies the best?
Click to expand...

If by 'Strategic' you mean 'Build it where I have the lowest supply limit and heaviest attacker penalty' instead of 'build them on flatlands'. Huge buff for the Swiss :D
 
Metz said:
Brandenburg and the Teutonic Order. Where the Margrave of Brandenburg is elected Hochmeister of the TO and he chooses to secularize the TO therefore creating a PU.
Click to expand...
The first Hohenzollern Duke of Prussia was not the Margrave of Brandenburg. He was the eighth child and third son of the Margrave of Ansbach; at the time of his election (and at the time of the Ordensstaat's secularization, come to that), the Margrave of Brandenburg was his cousin Joachim.

The personal union occurred in 1618, when the death of the last male Hohenzollern in the Prussian ducal line led to the title passing through his daughter Anna to the Brandenburger margravial line in the person of her husband John Sigismund, Elector of Brandenburg. (Who died a year later from his second stroke.)
 
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Ixal said:
I fear that this will make combat between players a WW1 style trench warfare where the one who attacks first loses. Especially in the Alps and northern Italy.
Click to expand...
That is exactly how Switzerland stayed out of war for the most time. Why expand into territory that does not have geographical advantages, if you can sit on your mountain and laugh at your enemy being crushed. They do that once, maybe twice, after that they usually learn not to touch Switzerland ever again.
 
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Incompetent said:
IIRC, the semi-official excuse when called out on it (according to Chaingun, but admittedly it wasn't his decision) was that the AI can't anticipate ambushes, so it needs to leave its forts un-mothballed all the time, whereas a player can be smarter about mothballing. I'd have bought this explanation if they'd simply made AI fort maintenance half-price and disabled the AI's ability to mothball them. But making border and coastal forts completely maintenance-free is an outright AI cheat with not even an attempt at justification by the devs, as far as I can see. What it tells us is rather that the AI's economy is suffering as a result of making poor building choices in general, with too much emphasis on high-level forts (or failing to demolish excess forts) and not enough on putting manufactories/workshops on high-value goods.

Low-level forts may actually be a decent investment in 1.18, *if* built in mountains and other rough terrain. Whether the AI will actually prioritise building them in the right place remains to be seen.
Click to expand...
I would say the inability for AI to demolish buildings is what causes AI to lose. They conquer one province after another and suddenly have 5 forts chained, but don't scrap a single one.
 
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raikaria said:
AKA: Heavy spam isn't a no-brainer anymore and Heavies will get ripped apart by Gallies inland like they should now since not only do Gallies get their bonus but also outnumber 3 to 1.
Click to expand...
That is actually stupid, when you consider someone has heavies and galleys grouped together and galleys shred your heavies, when in inland water galleys should have higher priority. I also think that galleys are too damn cheap, if you can simply wreck heavies which cost more than 10x their upkeep or reduce maintenance for heavies.
 
Phlopsi said:
That is actually stupid, when you consider someone has heavies and galleys grouped together and galleys shred your heavies, when in inland water galleys should have higher priority. I also think that galleys are too damn cheap, if you can simply wreck heavies which cost more than 10x their upkeep or reduce maintenance for heavies.
Click to expand...
But galleys don´t shred heavies in inland waters... They will if they outnumber the heavies... It´s still better to have 2 heavies fight at the front and make up the rest of the "line" with galleys... If you are fighting an equal number of ships and the "line" is full, it´s not best to use galleys
 
Phlopsi said:
I would say the inability for AI to demolish buildings is what causes AI to lose. They conquer one province after another and suddenly have 5 forts chained, but don't scrap a single one.
Click to expand...
The AI does, in fact, demolish forts. I've seen provinces that used to have forts not have forts in them any more.
 
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