Paradox Studio Thread

[Breadbassket]

Someone did a in-depth perspective style video on Victoria 1, one of Paradox's older titles which is often forgotten about and overlooked.

 

[Caddo Cobgang]

EU4 is the best Paradox game, but I don't have high hopes for EU5, PDX had a rapid fall from grace, I hope im wrong

 

[East_Clintwood]

EU4 is the best Paradox game, but I don't have high hopes for EU5, PDX had a rapid fall from grace, I hope im wrong

I'm curious if there's a specific thing you're worried about. Yeah, I agree Paradox over the last few years has had major issues but with Tinto Talks they've been extremely transparent about EU5 and to me it looks pretty good. They've also been incredibly good about taking on community feedback (just look at shit like the map threads)

 

[Caddo Cobgang]

I'm curious if there's a specific thing you're worried about. Yeah, I agree Paradox over the last few years has had major issues but with Tinto Talks they've been extremely transparent about EU5 and to me it looks pretty good. They've also been incredibly good about taking on community feedback (just look at shit like the map threads)

maybe they are redeeming themselves, ive only skimmed a couple of the earlier ones and I get a lot of Vic 3 vibes which isn't a good thing but it could just because they use the same engine, my biggest concern is in terms of flavor, im hoping the base game has consistent flavor, were talking a game from the mid 14th century to the early 19th century, like lets say the Protestant Reformation happens for example, id like to see other Protestant religions being represented in game, like the Anabaptists or maybe ahistorical stuff like a reformation happening in Eastern Christianity as well, variety is important in these games

 

[Kane Lives]

I'm curious if there's a specific thing you're worried about. Yeah, I agree Paradox over the last few years has had major issues but with Tinto Talks they've been extremely transparent about EU5 and to me it looks pretty good. They've also been incredibly good about taking on community feedback (just look at shit like the map threads)

I will believe EU5 is good when it's released and playable and not a second before. Paradox doesn't deserve anything more.

 

[Blackstar]

made me laugh out loud

 

[General Emílio Médici]

Given his pagan shit also put him on CKIII

 

[LovisXVI]

Given his pagan shit also put him on CKIII

Eh, he's about as pagan as a Mormon is a Christian.

 

[hawkisnight]

EU4 is the best Paradox game, but I don't have high hopes for EU5, PDX had a rapid fall from grace, I hope im wrong

I also believe EU4 is the best paradox game. I keep returning to it despite it flaws. It's still very fun to map paint despite them ruining the AI some patches ago. I wish they made the AI less afraid of player in the final patch. It's so fucking retarded that AI goes on grand tour of Africa to siege those sahara provinces with salt and fort while I siege their heartland unopposed.
I didn't have high hopes for eu5 either but Johan just keeps pulling me into the hope camp. I ain't buying it on release for sure.

 

[God of Nothing]

such weird ways to spell ck2

 

[thefreshmaker]

such weird ways to spell ck2

Agreed, every time I go back to EU4 I'm immediately reminded why I shelve it for months or years. There's so much bullshit in that game;

1. magically regenerating manpower of the AI
2. occupying the AI for twenty years will do nothing because of their recovery cheats, but you can be permanently crippled and doom spiral
3. one RNG roll determining your country's stability, technology level, economic investment, and speed of conquest for twenty years
4. the AI ganging up on you no matter how far or how involved in a war you are
5. broken countries - eg: Castille 1444 start was broken by DLC despite being a recommended starter country, so you either play exactly correctly against the rebels or risk being in a permanent, unfixable civil war

I could go on. Fact is that EU4 is for autistic people, which is fine, but there's a reason autistic people have products no one else can even fathom a purpose for, such as lego couches and tactile forks.

CK2 has bullshit, Vicky 2 has bullshit, but it's far and away much more hidden and relaxed. CK2 will never hold you back because of shit outside your control - even a king in Ireland with no development can have a large army if he's got enough martial skill from education.

 

[Mound Dweller]

I want to get back into vicky 2 and I know Crimeamod is the default but I don't like the stupid meme changes, is there a non-bloat version of HFM/HFM/HFPMABCDEFG/whatever the fuck is the current "best" mod somewhere?

There's so much bullshit in that game

Sometime between adding estates and making the whole DLC model a mission tree cash grab they changed it from being a strategy war game to being a modifier stacking "gotta collect em all" % booster gacha.
It's a consequence of having so many cooks over the years, can't fuck with the core systems because of the tack-on DLC model and can't add much anyway because the workers are all intern tier codemonkeys anyway, Anbennar had diverging mission trees and dynamic country ideas for years before vanilla did for example.
They realize this with EU5 I think, the modifier stacking is still there but instead of le wacky +3.5% discipline and +15% covefe production in sub-Saharan provinces it's structured logical stuff like population literacy and good tradition autism in the form of gravel roads.

 

[Breadbassket]

A Paradox game Youtuber did a totally not controversial video on slavery and how it is depicted in their games.

 

[thefreshmaker]

Sometime between adding estates and making the whole DLC model a mission tree cash grab they changed it from being a strategy war game to being a modifier stacking "gotta collect em all" % booster gacha.

Every single time I open the game the first thing that comes to mind is this. Can't do anything without it being tied to some shitty modifier, and it's now even worse than Total War because their own devs swallowed the meme and just focus on spreadsheeting now.

 

[hawkisnight]

1. magically regenerating manpower of the AI
2. occupying the AI for twenty years will do nothing because of their recovery cheats, but you can be permanently crippled and doom spiral
3. one RNG roll determining your country's stability, technology level, economic investment, and speed of conquest for twenty years
4. the AI ganging up on you no matter how far or how involved in a war you are
5. broken countries - eg: Castille 1444 start was broken by DLC despite being a recommended starter country, so you either play exactly correctly against the rebels or risk being in a permanent, unfixable civil war

1. You are probably talking about Lucky Nations. Yes that's a huge problem since forever especially with Ottomans. You cannot drain them. Turning off lucky nations is always an option and leads to more interesting maps but AI simply cannot compete with you if you don't give them bonuses. Might be a bit boring.
2. I think it's revanchism in play here. Country gets a huge recovery bonus scaled with peace deal I think. You get it too if AI fucks you up. You really can recover from the pits of hell in this game. So if you want to country ruin somebody you don't take anything after occupying them until call for pizza and declare again after truce is over and do it again.
3. Abdicate/Disinherit heir somewhat fix this but true it's still very much rng.
4. It does feel like AI has bias towards the player but then you have those wars where you accept AI call to arms, roll your eyes, do nothing and nobody even comes to siege you.
5. I haven't played Castile in ages but newbie player country in Iberia was always Portugal to me.

 

[Kane Lives]

5. I haven't played Castile in ages but newbie player country in Iberia was always Portugal to me.

Yeah I thought the same. Castille may start big but you're surrounded by big (and usually lucky) nations that will inevitably rival you and start shit. (Shoutout to France being your eternal French problem until you forcibly partition them or something). Portugal on the other hand can just befriend Castille, keep them as allies and go fuck off to the New World until you're ready to fund your mercenary world conquest army.

 

[Computer God Autism]

Eh, he's about as pagan as a Mormon is a Christian.

Rudy picks and chooses his spiritual beliefs more than the average CK3 player does when making a new religion, between that and all his talk about the incel uprising he'd unironically be a great mascot for CK3.

 

[thefreshmaker]

1. You are probably talking about Lucky Nations. Yes that's a huge problem since forever especially with Ottomans. You cannot drain them. Turning off lucky nations is always an option and leads to more interesting maps but AI simply cannot compete with you if you don't give them bonuses. Might be a bit boring.
2. I think it's revanchism in play here. Country gets a huge recovery bonus scaled with peace deal I think. You get it too if AI fucks you up. You really can recover from the pits of hell in this game. So if you want to country ruin somebody you don't take anything after occupying them until call for pizza and declare again after truce is over and do it again.

You can diminish the effects of it, but it's stylistically designed to be that way.

The game is ultimately designed around making sure the AI blobs and preventing them from collapsing due to poor strategies. Yes, you can turn off certain modifiers, but that just reveals the general incompetence and it becomes easy across the board to demolish the AI. The only solution Paradox have arrived at is ensuring the AI always has modifiers to baby them.

Fortunately, CK 2 and Victoria 2 are varied enough in the gameplay that the AI does not need to be competent or have special modifiers. CK 2 solves this by having the characters push the gameplay where a strong family dynamic is the aim rather than focusing on your mana pools, whilst Victoria 2 gives outlets other than war to succeed.

4. It does feel like AI has bias towards the player but then you have those wars where you accept AI call to arms, roll your eyes, do nothing and nobody even comes to siege you.

Usually that's because they either don't have the capacity to reach you or don't have the capacity to endanger you. If the AI even thinks it has a chance, it will go after you. It's not a problem as France to be called into a war between Venice and Milan, it's a problem when the Commonwealth and Ottomans decide to march all the way to Paris just so Bosnia can take Ragusa.

5. I haven't played Castile in ages but newbie player country in Iberia was always Portugal to me.

Castile is one of the recommended starts for new players, alongside Portugal. It's more a general example to show the lack of care. 1.0 had Castile as recommended, and then years of interns charnelling the code later we have a completely broken start being recommended as an introduction.

I can't imagine anyone getting a good impression after a) seeing the store page, b) being stupid enough to pay for it, and c) choosing Castile because it was recommended and they want to be all Chrissy Colombus. It's a recipe to kill any new interest in the game.

 

[hawkisnight]

The game is ultimately designed around making sure the AI blobs and preventing them from collapsing due to poor strategies. Yes, you can turn off certain modifiers, but that just reveals the general incompetence and it becomes easy across the board to demolish the AI. The only solution Paradox have arrived at is ensuring the AI always has modifiers to baby them.

Fortunately, CK 2 and Victoria 2 are varied enough in the gameplay that the AI does not need to be competent or have special modifiers. CK 2 solves this by having the characters push the gameplay where a strong family dynamic is the aim rather than focusing on your mana pools, whilst Victoria 2 gives outlets other than war to succeed.

AI blobs in EU4 but to really see that you do have to reach the end game which majority of players don't reach. It's just too much of a time investment and first 150 years are more fun. Bonuses make it one of the more challenging AI in paradox games for average player. I mean people to this day complain about getting destroyed by AI Ottomans.

Gameplay in EU4 can be quite varied too that's why I come back to it more often than other paradox titles. Diplomacy web can be fun to solve or go around it. Hordes play different to Kingdoms or Republics. Muslims offer different experience than Christians. Colonization. HRE. Japan. India. China. Africa. They all give different gameplay opportunities to expand. Not to mention different Idea groups. Sure you can dismiss it as just stacking modifiers just like you can dismiss all gameplay elements but I do find that fun. There's really something else about making super soldiers in EU4 flogging AI left and right. You expand bit slower due to your idea choices but nothing brings more join than stack wiping Ottomans pre age of absolutism where decadence hits them and it's not the same.

Don't get me wrong it's a flawed game. I hate many things about it or rather how it changed over the years.

Usually that's because they either don't have the capacity to reach you or don't have the capacity to endanger you. If the AI even thinks it has a chance, it will go after you. It's not a problem as France to be called into a war between Venice and Milan, it's a problem when the Commonwealth and Ottomans decide to march all the way to Paris just so Bosnia can take Ragusa

That's more because AI is afraid of engagement if the odds are less than ideal. It goes against the weakest link in war or the furthest territory to siege. That's why you will see silly things like AI sieging your siberia provinces when the war is in western Europe. That behavior wasn't always the case. I hate it.
We can never know fore sure but there's no proof of AI targets the player and paradox say it doesn't. It may seem like it for a player sometimes(like guaranteed your targets or warning you) but it really doesn't.

 

[thefreshmaker]

AI blobs in EU4 but to really see that you do have to reach the end game which majority of players don't reach.

Bonuses make it one of the more challenging AI in paradox games for average player. I mean people to this day complain about getting destroyed by AI Ottomans.

The blobbing occurs early game too. Usually by 1500-1550 France has covered the Pyrenees and is breaking into Italy and Germany, Russia is forming, and the Ottomans control the Danube and Crimea whilst either battering Mamelukes or outright beginning their control of Egypt proper.

Gameplay in EU4 can be quite varied too that's why I come back to it more often than other paradox titles.

EU4 is the sole PDX game where the most common gameplay criticism is that there's nothing to do when not at war. The gameplay is not varied at all, it's loop is basically about setting yourself up for the next war because if you aren't you fall behind the curve. Only institutions can somewhat mitigate the need to aggressively expand, but that's effectively managed by devving provinces, and most blobbers get ways to boost their development, such as free cores through missions, high minimum mana generation, or really good core cost/admin ideas combined with permanent claims.

Sure you can dismiss it as just stacking modifiers just like you can dismiss all gameplay elements but I do find that fun. There's really something else about making super soldiers in EU4 flogging AI left and right.

I don't begrudge anyone liking the spreadsheeting, God knows this is basically a sandbox excel sheet company, but at the end of the day there's very little skill behind it and just a requirement of knowledge of what modifiers to stack. In many ways it's closer to a card game than a strategy game, but you at least have things like terrain features. EU4, in my mind, will at least be saved on this front if only because it's not as terrible as Victoria 3.

We can never know fore sure but there's no proof of AI targets the player and paradox say it doesn't.

It's one of those things where "I know it when I see it applies", because this isn't just relegated to Paradox, it's in a lot of strategy games and once you start noticing things it's hard not to notice.

I hate many things about it or rather how it changed over the years.

Don't get me wrong either, I used to have a love for this game, and I still have a place in my heart for it, else I wouldn't open it once a month and then ruin my day. I remember Art of War being the first "must have" DLC and really thinking they knew what they were doing to improve QOL in meaningful ways. Whilst they've certainly followed that streak, the mass of DLC is bloated garbage that does not interact with each other and has simply exposed the skeleton beneath as being fundamentally flawed, largely due to the inherent design, in a way that is not true of CK2 after a similar amount of development. Even HoI4, for all of it's problems, has improved with the DLC. It is a straight upgrade from 1.0, despite flaws, rather than a likeable little tinny which turned into a leaky and stinky cruise liner.