1.4 General Gameplay Observations

[Slaists]

And here's a thread for compiling general observations about 1.4. Here's my two cents after 2 hours of gaming today:

1. Is it just me? To me, the cavalry seems to be able to move much smoother (and more coherently) across the battlefield.

2. The main diplo trigger bugs seem to be gone.

3. If you try to blockade a port that has enemy troops in it + try to unload troops nex to that port, your fleet moves a bit and pops up a message "passage blocked". A very nice touch indeed! Congratulations, CA!

4. Missionaries finally matter... A single catholic missonary visiting my Rupert's land converted ALL my protestants and animists to catholic faith in a couple turns... Similarly, my missionary sent back ino the same territory converted it back to protestant faith in 3 turns. I personally like this gameplay adjustment.

In general, so far, I am quite pleasantly surprised...

[peacemaker]

ohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboyohboy

Downloading the patch right now! I'm so excited :D so so far the black kngith AI/lots of DOWs is lessened?

[Fiddling_nero]

I did get several DoW's playing as the Turkish. But part of that I suppose is that I barely had an army at the time and they thought that I was a paper tiger.

DoW List:

Russia (started the campaign with them at war)
Georgia (crushed)
Venice (taken Morae)
Great Britain (they launched a naval invasion of Egypt)
Morocco (attacked Barbary Pirates I came to their aid)

Both Venice and Russia came to me with ceasefire agreements when it looked like the tide was against them. But they wanted territorial concessions from me.

(Russia wanted Bulgaria I renegotiated and gave them Moldavia) and the Russo-Turkish war is now over (having never fired a shot.)

Considering that the Venetians are acting like a mouse that has challenged a Lion they will not last long, and I am not giving them any territory. (they wanted Bosnia)

As for the British after I retook Egypt and crushed the remnants of their army then they sued for peace.

After that I crushed the Georgians retaking Armenia then moving on to Tbilisi. Removing them from the game.

For the moment, I have Disbanded much of my army and am attempting to build up my economy at present and to start building a Navy in earnest. To start challenging the Venetians and the Moroccans on my terms, and to prevent a repeat of the Egypt fiasco.

[Slaists]

It seems, after a port is blockaded, the trade now resets to other trade ports if those are available. I was playing as British and the Swedes blockaded my main trade port. In 1.3, this would have meant losing most of the trade income, not in 1.4... The only trade I lost was the one with UP (and it kind of made sense, UP is straight across the straights).

This is a major gameplay adjustment, in my humble opinion. Bravo, CA!

OK, a couple more observations:

1. City fortifications now can be dismantled. If they can be dismantled, I assume, they can be fixed (after a battle) too... This is GREAT!
2. State gifts now start with +5 to relations, not +100 as they used to (for 2,500). Hey, this was a thing to be fixed too.
3. Cavalry (at least the light variety) seems to be able to ignore fences and similar obstacles, charging at full speed across those. Hmm... I'm not sure I like this "tactical gameplay adjustment"...
4. OK, it seems, AI now is able to kick out port raiders. That part has been fixed. However, now, the AI seems unable to realize it needs to FIX the raider ports...

All in all, there are quite a few major things that have been incorporated into the game that are not mentioned in the patch notes.

[FactionHeir]

City fortifications could always be dismantled you know.

Still witing for fixes to the Arc de Triomphe.

[Slaists]

City fortifications could always be dismantled you know.

Still witing for fixes to the Arc de Triomphe.

LOL, I must have missed that

Anyway, I'm in 1725 as Britain, playing on H campaign difficulty. Here are the campaign highlights:

1. France owns most of the former 13 Colonies, but I am beating them back
2. Portugal took Madrid. I guess, the fact that I was keeping the Spaniards busy from Gibraltar helped them to stay alive and succeed
3. Portugal still owns Goa, UP still owns Ceylon
4. France owns Tunisia, Savoy owns Algeria; I had nothing to do with those land-grabs
5. Morocco allied with Spain and DOW'ed me as soon as I took Gibraltar
6. UP took Paris. I guess, the fact that my fleet was keeping the French navy at bay in the Channel helped the Dutch (by cutting the French cash flow)
7. As soon I landed a force in Morocco and killed their fleets, Morocco sued for peace. I did not want that province so I agreed. We've been at peace (and trading) for some 30 turns now
8. After several naval defeats, Berbery pirates sued for peace. I agreed. We've been trading for about 15 years now
9. AI does kick raiding fleets out of their harbors now. AI's is still kind of slow to fix those damaged harbors though, but they eventually get to it
10. The Ottomans have not lost any of their original provinces and seem quite able to beat back any Polish, Austrian, Russian, Persian invaders
11. The chain-shot rules the seas now. Try it out...

[Sheogorath]

Agents seem to get traits more often and have a higher success rate. My initial rake as Russia had a %46 chance to kill the Ottoman imam in Bulgaria, where before few of them ever had above a %45 chance (although he still got executed on his first attempt :\)
I also had a gentlemen get the 'Industrial Genius' trait out of nowhere, while researching military technology, while my rake got 'good listener' on turn 5 or so.
Generals seem to get traits faster too...I guess that whole system's been tuned up. It doesn't seem to be at MTW2 levels yet, though.

[Beskar]

ROFL, this is a funny story.

I realised I had my first campaign on very easy for this patch, I was thinking "That is weird.. I forgot to set it to VH".

I chose Prussia and I was thinking "Right, I will get a quick saxony, quick west prussia, hold off Poland while I do this and that".

So Basically first turns, I do that, turn 4, I was effectively eliminated.

Austria, Poland-Lith, Courtland, Denmark all declared war on me and Austria emplyed a big army, taking out brandenburg garrison (only had 2 horses, two militia, general and two cannons defending, since I had my mine army in Saxony), Poland-Lithunia, managed to do the same stunt and take out East Prussia. I was left with Saxony province which was red/red and in uprising with a half-a-stack army.

I was screwed over instantly. This AI isn't taking any stick now.

[loony]

ROFL, this is a funny story.

I chose Prussia and I was thinking "Right, I will get a quick saxony, quick west prussia, hold off Poland while I do this and that".

I was screwed over instantly. This AI isn't taking any stick now.

I had a similar experience as Sweden yesterday. Dead in 1705 on VH/VH :)
As before I would make sure someone gets into a few wars and attack them; Lithuania/Poland were attacked by Ottomans, Austrians and Prussia, so I chose them as a target.

I concentrated all my forces in eastern europe (bribed Demnark, got trade agreement, allied with prussia, etc). Attacked and captured Courland, Vilnius and Minsk. Got a Dow from Russia (as expected), killed off their attackers at StPetersburg and moved on towards moscow.
Left a small force in Vilnius to kill off Polish raiders...

Then the BRITISH declare war on me! They land in SWEDEN (my capital region) with 1 full stack and 1 half stack; after letting the troops go, their NAVIES SINK MY NAVY. No way I can get my armies back now :(

Next turn the British capture Stockholm and - amazingly - leave the HALF STACK there and move the full stack back into the ships... and to Finland.... The goddamn AI was blitzing!!!!

Ok it did leave the troops in finland for 1 turn doing nothing, but there was no way I could get there in time...
I must admit I quit the game; hopeless, after 2 stacks of russians showed up near moscow...

[Sheogorath]

A few more observations...

-Military access has definitely been devalued. Before I could offer access for just about anything and automatically get it. It was my main method for stopping Dagistan and Georgia from instaDOWing as Russia, by making them protectorates in exchange for unlimited access.
Now, nobody wants military access from me except the UK, who offered me 714 gold unlimited access.

-The weird territorial deals are back. The UK wanted Karelia for Jamaica and an alliance.



Has anybody tried trading technology yet? I believe they said that it's value had been increased significantly. Hopefully that means that player tech is just as valuable to the AI as it's own tech, 'cause I don't think I ever got it to succesfully give me technology for anything short of 1 tech for 1 (valuable) territory.

[Fisherking]

Has anybody tried trading technology yet? I believe they said that it's value had been increased significantly. Hopefully that means that player tech is just as valuable to the AI as it's own tech, 'cause I don't think I ever got it to succesfully give me technology for anything short of 1 tech for 1 (valuable) territory.

I got offered a tech for alliance and I swapped a few but I was never able to buy one out right or to trade one for one.

[Durallan]

I bought that threshing machine and that secular humanism from the united states for around 55k gold

[Sheogorath]

GUYS.
GUYS.
OMG.
OMG.
OMG.

SOMETHING AMAZING HAPPENED JUST NOW.

Playing as Russia, I've been engaged in a war with Sweden since the start of the game. I snagged St. Petersburg and Finland from them, but they wouldn't accept peace. Finally, I figured I'd take out the last army they had sitting around in Finland. I thrashed them in a Heroic Victory, 1025 casualties to 85. Go Russian artillery!

Having done this, I set my Guards Army to march on Stockholm, but figured it'd be a long trip since I handn't had time to build a navy just yet, what with the two-front Swedish-Ottoman-Russian war going on. I demanded peace from Sweden. A price of a tech (Naval Shore Facilities) and 5000 gold.

They. Accepted.

You read that right, folks. The AI accepted peace on good terms for the person winning the war.

[Discoman]

I haven't had that happen when I was kicking Spain and France's arses. I took over both of their capital regions, and neither will play ball with me.

edit- But, I did almost kill the Iroquois, that was until they offered peace, AND they wanted to become my protectorate.

[Sheogorath]

Taking the capital region doesn't improve things, I've found. In fact, it tends to send the AI into berserker mode.

I did a test with the Ottomans. Declared war, took the Balkans from them and offered peace. They accepted with good terms for me. Reloaded and took Rumelia after thrashing all their armies. AI refused peace on any terms, including 10000 gold and some techs.

[Durallan]

No real suprise when they need their capital region to win the game, however, I took Austria from the Austrians, and they did accept peace so obviously it depends on a few factors.

[A1_Unit]

Light Infantry don't make the trudge sound anymore so they are great stealth troops.

[al Roumi]

I started my first campaign for a long time yesterday, to see what 1.4 is about.

The long brake certainly made me forget some of the old niggles and bugs and I'm really pleased to say that so far i've not noticed any such issues.

What i will be interested to know about (cos I'm sure some of you have got further with 1.4) is what starts to happen mid/late game when in 1.3 and earlier versions, erstwhile allies would starting hating you for no clear reason accessible to the player.

I still haven't forgotten my hatred for that bloody campaign AI bot...

[Zenicetus]

What i will be interested to know about (cos I'm sure some of you have got further with 1.4) is what starts to happen mid/late game when in 1.3 and earlier versions, erstwhile allies would starting hating you for no clear reason accessible to the player.

Yeah, I'm curious about that too, because it goes to the heart of whether a long campaign is enjoyable or not. I think it was established that in previous TW games, there's a "player hate" variable tied to how much of the map you control. It kicks in during the later game if you're doing well, on top of all other relations variables. I'm hoping that if this operates the same way in ETW, it operates separately in each theater, instead of on a whole-world basis. In other words, if you stay small in your homeland but expand in the colonies, you'll only trigger aggression from the factions where you're actually in territorial conflict in the colonies. It would be more realistic for one thing, and a better game instead of just universal aggression from all factions.

Right now I'm still early in a UP campaign where my goal is to hold just two or three core provinces in Europe, and do all my real economic/military expansion in the Americas and India. I don't want to expand in Europe, but I may have to, if I can't juggle diplomacy and threats in the homeland (and I just got attacked by Westphalia for no reason, so it's not encouraging). So we'll see how it goes...

Edit: P.S. I'm playing at Normal/Hard difficult to give diplomacy a chance. If it works at all, it will work at Normal campaign difficulty. It probably shouldn't work at H or VH, for players who like constant warfare and being forced to steamroller the map everywhere.

[Slaists]

Well, as far as I can tell, there is no other "built in" player hatred factor than the expansion penalty. If you expand fast, your expansion penalty sky-rocket. If you take your time, it's negligible.

[Fisherking]

Yeah, I'm curious about that too, because it goes to the heart of whether a long campaign is enjoyable or not. I think it was established that in previous TW games, there's a "player hate" variable tied to how much of the map you control. It kicks in during the later game if you're doing well, on top of all other relations variables. I'm hoping that if this operates the same way in ETW, it operates separately in each theater, instead of on a whole-world basis. In other words, if you stay small in your homeland but expand in the colonies, you'll only trigger aggression from the factions where you're actually in territorial conflict in the colonies. It would be more realistic for one thing, and a better game instead of just universal aggression from all factions.

Right now I'm still early in a UP campaign where my goal is to hold just two or three core provinces in Europe, and do all my real economic/military expansion in the Americas and India. I don't want to expand in Europe, but I may have to, if I can't juggle diplomacy and threats in the homeland (and I just got attacked by Westphalia for no reason, so it's not encouraging). So we'll see how it goes...

Edit: P.S. I'm playing at Normal/Hard difficult to give diplomacy a chance. If it works at all, it will work at Normal campaign difficulty. It probably shouldn't work at H or VH, for players who like constant warfare and being forced to steamroller the map everywhere.

Most everyone loved me up until I switched government types. That was a huge hit.

Starting out get all of the agreements you can. On normal most will hold the agreements, even if it is only trade.

I started one as GB without doing that and ended up with two DoWs on the first turn from tribes. But that was on Hard.

I started one as Austria on normal and got agreements with everyone on my borders and didn’t have a war until 1710. I didn’t try for protectorates starting off to save cash but found later in the game that it is near imposable for a human player to get a protectorate. On the other hand, Hanover and Württemberg have about three or four each.

For just about the first time I have been starting most of my wars. Prussia was the first to declare war and Hanover their ally joined in once I took Saxony, Spain of course declared war when ever a ruler died but most of the time I had to start something and I have likely been at peace as much as I have been at war.

I did have to switch to republic because I could not afford the garrisons and run the economy. Also once you hit bankruptcy it keeps building. on it self... It will wreck your home region!

The Pirates keep all the trade theaters swept clean until you can afford a big enough fleet to keep them at bay.

You will find that it is different.

I have gotten to about 1767 and am finishing off the tech tree but I never had more than 11 Gentlemen and for Rakes and Missionaries not even that.

I am sure there is a lot I have missed and the ins and outs will be different and there will be a whole new learning curve.

Good luck and have fun.

[Marten]

It's 1720 now, in a new campaign, playing GB. No change of government right now. I am at war with spain since 1702, the rest was buisness as usual: Sweden declared war at hannover and russia on first turn. Austria is at war with Prussia, Prussia with the rest of europe ...

I gave Ruperts to the Hurons on turn 3 or so, after that a complete indian-french-spain-colonies war started and is going on right now. Netherlands conquered all 4 smaller islands from France and the Pirates, also New Grenada and New Andalusia. Pueblos took mostly the rest of southern america from Spain. France is at war with all indian tribes, except the Hurons, and they are holding right now just Quebec and Montreal in northern america... rest is gone. Cherokees and Iroquois are allied and steamrolling the europeans, colonies and the newly founded US.

In India it's completely buisness as usual, mughals and maraths are changing constantly provinces. Whole of europe is burning and GB is part of that. I sunk a french invasion fleet on irish coastline, but they were able to land an army. Ireland is now not longer part of the empire ...

The campaign started with known issues, i always had a certain breakpoint after 20 or so turns in all campaigns before. After that mostly no struggling in my plans, really easy going sometimes. I have to say, this time it's completly different. I am playing on normal, as always, with changes on victory conditions and money for every faction. And i did that also in campaigns before - this time it's really different and in some ways a bit weird. But fun!

[Xipe Totec]

I am playing Poland-Lithuania for the first time (N/N). The starting position is very weak because you are surrounded on all sides by stronger major powers, have little income and cannot build many quality units for a while. It looks like a recipe for being partitioned by Prussia, Austria and Russia, not to mention Karl XII to the north, Ottomans and Crimeans to the South and allies Courland and Saxony who will surely drag you into wars or even join in the dismemberment?

Well I have reached 1735, and no-one has declared war on me!

Yes, you read that right. Even the Barbars offered me peace for free.

I let Prussia wade into Saxony, and just waved a piece of paper at the world. As soon as Prussia's Konigsberg army was outmatched by mine in Warsaw I swooped and took East Prussia. Some years later I allied with Austria (which has held for 25 years) and resumed peace and trade with Prussia. Prussia took Silesia off Austria so once my economy was strong enough I launched another war against Prussia and finished them off, netting Brandenburg, Saxony and Silesia. My faithful ally Russia is fully occupied battling my friendly trading partners Crimea and Sweden.

Wow for the first time in an Eastern Europe campaign I am not surrounded by countries that hate me. It may be Empire Total Peace but I like it. With 1.3 I always felt paranoid that my very friendly trading allies would suddenly strike at my unprotected vitals. Because they always did. After patch 1.4 it at least seems to matter what your relations are. Or has anyone has been stabbed in the back by a longstanding loyal ally? Let us know about it!

I did give some finest porcelain plates to Sweden though expecting a sudden shift in public opinion from hate to love as I'm used to. They were hardly moved to tears (+5 to relations). Now that's more realistic isn't it? No-one is fooled by 'Greeks bearing gifts' in international diplomacy, but it can 'tip the scales'.

There is an orange juggernaut moving towards Europe though so some things haven't changed.

[Claudio]

I don't think we're playing the same game to be honest. So far I have played 5 campaigns on Hard/Medium, and one on Medium/Medium. The 6 on H/M were Austria, Great Britain, Sweden, Russia and Prussia, in that order.

As Austria I got DoW's from all my neighbours and they all refused any form of peace settlement, even if I offered them money. I turned it off in 1702 or '03.

As Great Britain the Huron Confederacy declared war on the first turn, and just as it used to be in 1.3, they refused peace when I took their main city. After around 6 turns of inactivity I got them to accept a peace deal, but they broke it again the next turn. So, as with 1.3, the AI was completely unyielding and would have to be destroyed. I turned that one off around 1705.

As Sweden things looked promising at first. There was peace for the first few years. Russia made several demands for territory, and declared war when I refused. Their allies refused to join, but somehow they all stayed allied to Russia, despite the fact that when I refuse to join an ally, the alliance is automatically dissolved. I took Moscow easily. Russia refused peace, even when I offered to give back Moscow. I turned this particular campaign off when they demanded peace, several thousand florins and 4 of my territories, even though I was the one stampeding through their lands, and THEY had gone beyond licking their wounds, and at this point were trying to stitch back on their head, which I had ripped off.

As Russia, Georgia and Dagestan declared war on the first turn. They both consistently refused peace, even when I had defeated their armies and was besieging their only cities, which were guarded by only peasants, and so I had to destroy both. And guess what happened right after? My "very friendly" Persian neighbours declared war on me. I also crushed Sweden's armies and reduced them to their capital, and they would not accept peace. Turned this one off around 1710.

As Prussia, I just got bored to be honest. Took Gdansk from Poland, and pretty much the entire earth declared war on me. Fought a few battles with Austria, who then refused peace outright even though I had beaten them badly each time. Turned that one off.

I'm now playing as Poland on M/M. I gave East Prussia to Prussia on the first turn, got trading rights with EVERY nation surrounding me, refused to go to war when Saxony was invaded, and am getting very, very rich, having never fought a single battle. It's 1714 and nobody has declared war on me. The whole world is "Terrifying, Spectacular", or at the very least "Strong, Rich". Yet, even though there are many nations at war, there seems to be a distinct lack of activity. Prussia declared war on Saxony on the first turn, but in the year 1714, Saxony is still around, and still "Strong, Rich". The UP hasn't been destroyed yet, as happened on turn 3 or 4 in every other campaign I played. I'm going to actually have to start a war to get some action.

For me, not much has really changed. The AI is still dumb as toast, they keep refusing peace when they should be begging for peace, they keep taxing their lands so high that by 1725 population and wealth have declined so much one might think we had entered a new dark age...

I hate being the party pooper but we seem to have gone from one horrible extreme (1.3) to a boring, not quite as horrible OTHER extreme (1.4).

[Durallan]

well if your playing campaign games on hard campaign difficulty, of course theyre going to be declaring war on you, unfortunately CA doesn't make the AI more rutheless or intelligent on higher difficulty levels, it just makes them hate you more.

and I'm sorry but I don't want to EVER go near patch 1.3 again. If wars keep you entertained then by all means start them, but some people like the turtling option or the choice, at least to try and choose some of your enemies ( I don't know why your luck was so rotten, but I was able to be diplomatic with every single nation that did try declaring war on me, and peace was settled in the end.) I found 1.3 myself to be BORING, with the fact I was constantly at war with the world and there was bugger all you could do about it, turned me off it.

As far as my experience goes, the AI while not smart, it is not always suicidal now, one 1.3 campaign, poland declared war with EVERY nation on the earth, until it was wiped out, that was NOT smart.

The AI still needs to learn how to play the game, and how to manage its economy and happiness, right now it doesn't seem like it can very well, but the AI can continue to be improved, I disagree rather strongly that we have gone from one extreme to the other, that is what started the problem in the first place, everyone thought that the AI was too placid in 1.0 so it had to be beefed up, it then became warmongering beyond the point of fanaticism and became suicidal in its attempts to fall at the feet of the player. At least Balance seems to have been restored, I don't know if its your luck but it could also be the way you were playing the normal campaign as poland, did you really want trade agreements with every single nation? the idea is to only give money to friends, not to potential enemies and now that the relationmeter has some effect on what the AI will do to you, making everyone friendly kind of means they won't want kill you.

Now what might be nice is if an alliance of nations built armies and decided your land would be better shared amongst themselves, but the AI can't coordinate anything right now let alone coordinate itself out of a shopping mall, that kind of AI behaviour is what people are looking for and would set this game above others, the AI isn't perfect at the moment and it might be slightly timid, but at least it now garrisons its units, it actually attacks other nations and can win, and sends naval invasions, while its not what most of us want its a superior improvement over 1.3 and we hope they will do much more.

[loony]

I don't think we're playing the same game to be honest. So far I have played 5 campaigns on Hard/Medium, and one on Medium/Medium. The 6 on H/M were Austria, Great Britain, Sweden, Russia and Prussia, in that order.

As Austria I got DoW's from all my neighbours and they all refused any form of peace settlement, even if I offered them money. I turned it off in 1702 or '03.

I hate being the party pooper but we seem to have gone from one horrible extreme (1.3) to a boring, not quite as horrible OTHER extreme (1.4).

My initial enthusiasm after I was beaten as Sweden has been very much destroyed by the latest campaign with Austria (H/H, reduced the diffculty somewhat this time).
Poland, Prussia and the Ottomans declared on me, several turns later Hannover joined them.
I captured brandenburg and two ottoman territories, the polish have no army (after I killed of 2 stacks).
None of them accept peace, for regions, or for techs or for whaterver. A load of .

It is 1711 now. I keep spending 50% of my income recruiting and replenishing and 50% investing.
Most of the time i keep killing off inferior armies (like 5 line 2 cav 1 cannon) with my 3 armies.
And no peace no way. Total crap. So boring I have decided to quit it yesterday.