My take on the 5 major Paradox Games as a Newbie

[Ghotabaya]

When I say the 5 major Paradox games I mean:
EU4 , HOI 4, CK 2, Vic 2 and Stellaris.
First of all the order I got into them was EU4 - > CK 2 - > HOI 4 - > STELLARIS - > VIC 2.
I first heard of Paradox games few years back (Yeah I am not really a gamer ... Obviously). At the time I only heard of EU4 and it was stated as a better strategy game compared to the stuff I was playing at the time : Age of Wonders, Heroes of Might and Magic , Civilization , Fallen Enchantress etc.... And I completely agree with that assessment ( just my opinion).
Thereafter heard of the other 4 and took them on one at a time. I do not have a lot of game hours behind me but I do play rather rigorously and cautiously when i play. Out of all 5 I was a bit scared to start Victoria 2 as so many people on forums had labeled it as the most difficult out of the 5 and also as the best of the 5. While I do agree that is clearly one of the best I do not think it is actually more difficult compared to the others barring Stellaris.

If I am to compared among the 5 games:
I would say in terms of the most enthralling and sustainable experience throughout the game duration Victoria 2 stands out from the rest. It is such a unique game there is no doubt about it. However some of the other games including EU4 have a lot to offer and actually are "the best" in certain aspects. If I am to elaborate on this:
(keep in mind I am a newbie and obviously the more experienced ones hear will clearly disagree with me)

CK2 : Clearly has the role playing aspect going for it. The fact that you get to interact with such a wide variety of characters are clear pros. The very "random" feel to the game has its pros and cons. I never feel settled in this game no matter how far I go in terms of growth and expansion and while it makes it thrilling in one way it also makes deterministic planning difficult which I do not like. Far too many things are random and sudden.

EU4:For me is clearly the most systematic and complete game out of the 5. It's diplomatic interactions are the best out of the 5 for me. While it is not perfect the amount of diplomatic options available gives lot of room for maneuver. Also it is very deterministic in its structure and if you are like me and do not like to exploit loop holes it actually does allow you to make really long term strategic goals. Which in my mind is the essence of grand strategy. Making moves that will bare fruit decades later. This is possible as the game is extremely well structured. Also the fact that while there are so many features and variables attached to the game the relationships between them are mathematically tractable. However I do agree that late game needs improvement. However the only way to implement this without harming the early game and driving away newbies is to go for a sort of end game dedicated logic. Not exactly stellaris like crisis but something which changes things up.

HOI4: I actually think when it comes to battles this is the best. Of course at it is basically a WWII simulator that kind of has to be the case. But compared to the others I think it has more battle strategy but when it comes to economics , diplomacy etc... it is very limiting comparably)

Vic2: As stated has many things going for it. Mainly relating to Population Mechanic and the Economic simulation. It is such a wonderful concept. Also really love the colonial rush it is such a nail biter. You actually feel the rush when you engage in it. Of course compared to EU4 and CK2 it does have less variety when it comes to starting options. However as it is the oldest game I am really hoping Victoria 3 if it ever comes out will account for these mild weaknesses.

Stellaris: I feel is a bit weaker compared to the other 4. However the concept of Fallen Empires and the End games crises warrants a thumbs up. However it has a lot of time where you are practically not doing much and it is far too easy compared to the other 4.

So in summary I would actually rank them:
1. Vic 2 and EU4 at top. While I think Vic 2 as a concept is better it simply is not a finished product unfortunately. That is the only reason it shares the top spot.

2, HOI4 and CK2 really love them but the randomness in CK2 and limitations in diplomatic options in both games and lack of much battle strategy in CK2 the reason for them ending in 2nd tier.

3. Stellaris

However has to be added that I actually love all 5 games

 

[ecrurudesby]

Great

 

[Ghotabaya]

BTW almost forgot. IMHO Vic2 and EU4 AI (while they have their limitations) are so much better compared to so many other strategy games.
Also like how EU4 allows so much maneuverability in terms of war settlements compared the other 4 games. I also like the AE concept much better than the more generic Threat levels in CK2 and Stellaris and Infamy in Vic 2. WT in HOI4 is not really comparable to the mechanics in the other 4 games.
Love the idea of sphering in Vic 2 however the AI's execution of it is really open for exploitation. The UI in Vic2 is lacking for obvious reasons and at times creates an illusion of difficulty. For example factories can be better optimized if resource flow can be better tracked.
I love the multi step thinking that can be executed in EU4 due to its variety in diplomacy and war deals.

 

[Ninjagreg]

Yeah your opinions here don't really differ to much from the rest of the community but personally I disagree with putting EU4 at the top with Vicky 2, I like EU4 a lot and agree that it feels the most finished but personally CK2 feels much deeper and is much more fun to me

 

[Ghotabaya]

Thanks for the response. Actually ordering them in a linear array does not make much sense. In just had to create a list because that what you do at t end eventhough you know it does not make sense
I do agree with your take that CK2 is really fun and has tons of options. Probably the most out of all 5! I guess what I slightly dislike about CK2 is actually what most people love about it. The fact that all can come crumbling down so fast in CK2 compared to all 4 other games. Also I have to admit it is the game I am least familiar with though I played it 2nd. I caught onto HOI4 and Vic2 and obviously the very easy Stellaris much faster.
I am certain most will agree with you with regard to CK2 > EU4. While I knew that was the popular opinion there is something about the whole long term planning that you do in EU4 which appeals to me much more as grand strategy.

On a different note:

I really like the person traits in CK2. However one thing I like to see there is a bit more dynamism there. Something like diplomacy in EU4 where you can exploit those traits more. :ess generic responses and more interactions based on those traits. Because I think that is such a cool mechanic.
BTW for some weird reason I like to always play as Elective (which creates tons of problems when you are a kingdom or empire) as you have less control over you heir. However strategizing how you can get your favorite on the thrones under Elective is so much fun!

 

[grandadmiralbob]

EU4 doesn't need more exploiting.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

I haven't played more than a brief amount of Vicky 2 and no Stellaris, but unless these titles have core gameplay mechanics that objectively don't work they're ahead of HOI 4.

HOI 4 has some great systems but has been marred since release by wrong-occupation, wrong-capitulation, and trashed peace conferences. Recently the developers introduced a penalty for the same troops attacking the same target for the same amount of time if you right click instead of execute a battle plan, despite the ability to update these battle plans constantly with more inputs to accomplish literally anything right clicking can do.

That's right, knowing the core mechanics of the game don't work by any objective or coherent measure, programming effort was instead put into lowering QoL of user inputs...and it was confirmed in bug reports that this was literally done on purpose.

Unless any of the other games have done something similar, HOI 4 has no place above #5 right now. I hope it gets better, there's fun to be had there if it does, but right now? Just no.

HOI 4 has actively worked its way to the bottom. There are ways up. Maybe it'll take them.

EU still has the most to juggle if trying to expand in optimized fashion out of the titles I've played, though I've heard good things about VIcky. I won't touch Stellaris so I'll leave it out of my opinions.

 

[qwertzuiop]

Hi, I have played all the games you have listed plus EU3, and I would list them as such:

Best game conceptionally - Victoria 2 and EU3. Victoria is obvious, EU3 is because I think it had many good ideas such as the advisor system/cultural tradition, the trade system, the alliance system and the economy. They didn't all work well (EU3 is a bit unpolished in some regards, just like Victoria 2), but there were many good ideas that were changed for EU4.

Most historically immersive game - Victoria 2, then HOI4. Victoria because you get real population and (somewhat) real politics with real inventions and you can play it more like a politics simulator instead of a conquest game if you want. HOI4 because the time period is obviously well known and there are detailed national focuses and real persons, but the game also has a lot of unimmersive moments.

Biggest scope - EU4. (CK2 and EU3 cover a longer time period but there is just so much more to do in EU4)

Most polished game - EU4.

Most complicated game - EU4. There are so many features and modifiers, some of them not necessary, and so many things you have to keep in mind while playing.

Most skill/experience required to do well - EU4. For the same reasons mentioned above.

Most enjoyable scope - Victoria 2. Because other Paradox titles take so many hours to get to the end.

Best internal politics - CK2 and Victoria 2. CK2 because of vassal management, Victoria because of pops and the political system.

Most tactical game - HOI4 (obviously).

Best music - very subjective, but I'd take EU3, Victoria 2, Stellaris and HOI4 in no particular order. CK2 and EU4 are not as good.

Doesn't lag - EU3 and Victoria 2.

 

[szmik]

I haven't played more than a brief amount of Vicky 2 and no Stellaris, but unless these titles have core gameplay mechanics that objectively don't work they're ahead of HOI 4.

They don't have non-working mechanics in the mold of how broken HoI4 is currently. They have their issues, but HoI4 is a disaster in comparison... too bad it's so playable despite them, playable as a map painter that is.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

They don't have non-working mechanics in the mold of how broken HoI4 is currently. They have their issues, but HoI4 is a disaster in comparison... too bad it's so playable despite them, playable as a map painter that is.

Playable in the sense that it won't crash, but not so much in terms of actions --> consequences.

You can have > 10% war contribution (itself a broken + inconsistent mechanic), hold territory, and be incapable of making a single demand in the peace deal. Your first turn only option is "done, you get nothing" in some cases.

That's not functional, even as a map painter. Wrong capitulation and wrong occupation are also serious barriers to playing the game as a map painter, so I'm not convinced HOI 4 even has that down.

The combat design itself is actually nice. Different areas of the world require different consideration and builds, threat of naval invasion can be serious (too bad naval combat isn't so good), front management is a cool concept. Air still needs tuning, but most of the issues lie in core mechanics completely breaking coherent causal relations between player choices and game outcomes. It's this break that lands HOI 4 easily at the bottom.

HOI 4 does have good music...actually Pdox seems pretty consistently good on this front between games. Out of the ones I've played even my least-preferred still has some nice tracks and I'd put it well ahead of most games I play.

 

[szmik]

Well, I play Kaiserreich exclusively since the last patch and it masks broken mechanics somewhat i.e. I never join factions (no incentive anyway) so random occupation and peace conferences don't affect me. It can't mask a turd that naval mechanics are though. Naval game is basically unplayable as is.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

so random occupation and peace conferences don't affect me.

I have demonstrated evidence that wrong capitulation, wrong occupation, and screwed peace conferences all happen regardless of faction alignment, including player being in no faction or a player-created one.

As Bolivar empire in my own faction:

• Allies "occupied a province in my colors" in Germany before a single soldier of mine set foot anywhere in Europe. Taking provinces from this spot then gave me more land.
• I later occupied all of Italy, but the Allies made them a republic and took it in the peace deal before I could even act. In true broken HOI 4 fashion, I was able to continue this game because neither Allies nor Comintern wanted Germany, allowing me to take hundreds of factories at a 10x cost premium. The rare time I'd prefer Italy too since I needed naval dockyards for the achievement .
• Broken didn't stop there. Later I pushed Japan, captured literally the entirety of the Japanese home islands, had > 10% war contribution as my own faction, and got 0 turns in the "peace conference". Allies yet again simply magicked republican Japan into existence then another allied member gave all its territory to that. I didn't even get an opportunity to pass.

And all of this is before we get into scenarios where if you ARE in a faction, a core part of the game's design, land will just randomly flip from yours to someone else's. There's no consistency or coherent reasoning to it.

Staying out of other factions, as fascist Sweden I had all of the victory points in China and superior WC to USA by a margin and China still "capitulated to USA".

HOI 4 is not a working title and by any reasonable standard well-deserves #5 spot on this list. While CK2 has some UI lies and X = not X problems just like EU 4, there's no equivalent to the sheer weight of broken core mechanics in either game.

 

[Brynjar]

As someone with hundreds/thousands of hours in those games (apart from stellaris, which I really struggle to like at 68 hours) I pretty much agree with everything in your summary. The character management can get a bit too repetetive in CK2 for me to enjoy more than 1-2 campaigns each year though.

 

[bbasgen]

Great summary for a noob.

Victoria 2 is a wonderful game (Victoria 1 was quite good too!). Victoria 2 represents the most advanced social, political, and economic aspects of strategy gaming from PI. There is tremendous room for PI to build on that model. Unfortunately, it isn't very popular among Paradox gamers, so it doesn't get much attention from PI.

Good to hear some of the critiques about HoI4. I've been playing HoI since version 1. Version 2 was great, and I came to really enjoy version 3. Version 4 has some great ideas, but the execution has been poor. I think they tried to go arcade game style for HoI4 and lower the barrier of entry. In retrospect, I think WWII strategy gamers are micromanagers. HoI3 struggled to get micromanagement right, and the finished product still had unnecessary tedium, but there are aspects of the micromanagement in HoI3 that are what makes the game enjoyable. As others have said, HoI4 should fall to the bottom of the list.

 

[True_Heir_of_Rome]

For me it's something like:

1: EU4. This game has the best combination of player agency and polish. If you lose it's because you did something wrong, almost certainly. This is probably my all time favorite game, and easily the game I've spent the most hours on. It's biggest draw back is that it loses a lot of its intense decision making once you're at a certain point, and the better you are the quicker you hit that point. Good thing every nation is viable, and there is an entire globe to work with.

2: CK2. This game lacks some polish, looks pretty bad, and player agency takes a huge step back with huge amounts of random elements. Some of the DLCs are required to play nations that absolutely should be available. This is probably the worst example of PDX greed that there is. All that said, the role playing in this game is clearly the best of any PDX title. I've grown attached to many a duke, king or queen in my time playing. Once I had the required DLCs to really open the map up I had a huge amount of fun with this game.

3: Vic2. This game has the most interesting concepts, and the best mechanics behind economy. It would easily take the #2 spot but a lot of it's mechanics are really quite frustrating, and at times even broken. The time period is short. You're entirely likely to see the same 5 events with the same two choices your entire game, and a lot of the time neither choice really does anything. Once you're rolling this game is just kinda auto pilot. Taking new land in a war just doesn't feel impactful. Crises are kinda cool. Planes, woo.

4: Stellaris. I haven't played since the overhaul that I heard about. When I did play it just kinda seemed like there were a lot of options, but there was always one clearly better option. I was pounding the fallen empires by my 3rd playthrough and I let the end game boss grow quite a bit before yawning as I cleaned up. At least the game works, to the best of my knowledge. It's interesting, it's just not that fun. Oh, and it's stupid how space battles happen. EU4 doom stacks have nothing on the absurdity of stellaris killer bee swarms.

5 HOI4. Pros- Hands down the best land combat in the game. Cons- everything else. Economy doesn't exist. There is no feeling of building up your nation, cause the game is over once the main event is done. Planes were a ***** to get running properly. Navies are rather obtuse as well. The AI is crap at the game, and it really easy to trick if you know how they react(I'm talking about creating pockets and getting surrounds.) It sounds like the game has been made even worse. This game at launch had a streamer dominate England as Ireland, because the AI was so terrible they couldn't figure out how to kill him when he was outnumbered and had worse equipment fighting from unfavorable positions. Peace deals are just awful. Worst part is, nations simply will not surrender unless you take a certain amount of capture points. I can use console commands to give myself however many nukes I need, then proceed to turn every square inch or the British isles into glass and they will not surrender. You can't even begin peace talks. "I just nuked London, I have 80'000 more of these, and I'm making more every day. I will nuke you every day until you surrender for the rest of eternity. I don't want your clay, I don't want your extra territories, I simply want you to stop fighting me or I will genocide you" should be an option in the game. I don't care how unethical it is.

 

[maxirage]

I agree that HOI4 is a mess. And the really bad thing is that it's not improving at all -- the current version is just as broken as the one on release, just in different ways. When you comparing it to something like EU4, which has made gigantic improvements over time, it feels like it's being made by a different company.

 

[geckoman1011]

I havent played Vic 2, but I couldnt disagree more with your assessment. CKII allows for the most diverse and unique gameplay. HOI IV has a few issues, but it has a great base and is going in good directions. Stellaris is kind of middling. Its a good change of pace. EU IV is complete garbage. The game play is shallow and its systems are convoluted and ridiculous (Im looking at you, unidirectional "trade")

 

[elektrizikekswerk]

Btw, for anyone who wants to take a look at Victoria I, EU III or HoI III and doesn't already own them on Steam/CD/GoG or whatever:
All these are now "In the Vault", aka they can be freely played if you have Origin access.
https://www.origin.com/deu/en-us/store/origin-access

 

[Zardnaar]

I would rate.

1. Euiv. Slowly dying under the weight of dlc.
2. Stellaris. More or less needs utopia. Leviathan are great. A bit easy.
3. CKII. To much dlc missed a few don't know how to play now it's a different game.
4. Vic II. Never got into it did not grab me.
5. HoI4. Own it never played it. Hard to give up Arsenal of Democracy a Hoi2 mod.

 

[qwertzuiop]

Btw, for anyone who wants to take a look at Victoria I, EU III or HoI III and doesn't already own them on Steam/CD/GoG or whatever:
All these are now "In the Vault", aka they can be freely played if you have Origin access.
https://www.origin.com/deu/en-us/store/origin-access
View attachment 379407

Good to know. Unfortunately the EU3 "Complete" version does not include all the DLC. I believe the real complete version would be called Chronicles or EU3 World Edition.