1881

SO Ironman mode has been a blast. Just passed the 100 year mark. Things have been going well. I’ve been less a conqueror and more a force of nature.

Until I did something really stupid. I declared war on the Timurids. The Timurids were not messing around. Fresh off a series of wars that saw me vassalize most of Italy, take half of Hungary (in same war), take out Muscovy and their Austrian ally, and then swallow half of the Mamlukes, all over the course of about a decade, I figured taking Baghdad from the Timurids would be no big deal.

Wrong.

I made the mistake of underestimating my opponent. Due to rebel control I only transfered what I thought I needed to the front.

It was not enough.

So followed a desperate decade that saw me burn through 1500 ducats in my treasury, deplete my manpower (despite using a ton of mercs), saw revolts popping up in Egypt and Greece, and general pain. It took me 5 years to start sieging in Timurid territory after the full weight of their army pushed mine back. For 5 years it was a series of cat and mouse battles. No sieges were successful for either side. Despite that I was dealing more damage than I took I was losing battles. Usually I’d have to pull back after the initial encounter as eventually their full army would arrive. The warscore was dropping, bottoming out at -30%. Finally I was able to get enough force in one place to defeat their main stack. Once I pushed them back I was able to siege Baghdad and instantly set the warscore to 0. Eventually I was able to push back and eek out a victory. Final tally: 2 provinces and released 2PM vassal.

So I think I’ll go back to an easier target. Like Austria.

But after 103 years my empire spans from Grenada to Baghdad. Mecca to Moscow. Armies can walk from Palermo to everywhere in my empire but Grenada. Had this been a non Ironman game I might have been tempted to back up to right before my war dec and move more forces in first. Don’t know if it would have mattered, since I could never stack wipe them even when I won, their empire is too big. I almost took defeat several times. Honestly it was exhilarating, other than the fact it will take 10 years to recoup.

1882

Get a boatload of caffeine, Craig, you only have tonight to finish your ironman game! :)

1883

What happens once the new patch rolls out? Is it somehow going to mess with my ability to get the achievements? Considering I’ve not done Ironman before I don’t actually know what happens to them at patch day.

1884

Maybe turn off automatic updates for EU IV until your ironman game is done?

1885

I played EU III for close to 50 hours as Portugal (full campaign, haven’t finished) and got bored with it because it seems pretty easy and is getting somewhat repetitious. Should I bother trying to get more mileage out of this game or should I move on to EU IV? The impression I get is EU IV is a huge improvement over EU III, is that correct?

1886

In a word? Yes.

They are a bit different, but I don’t think I could honestly ever go back to 3 now. EU IV is the first game to cross the 200 hour mark for me, though EUIII got close at 180. Many systems received complete overhauls. Trading is much improved over 3. The monarch point system forces some interesting choices on you. The basic idea of the game is still there, but the changes are massive. Tooltips are much improved, events and decisions more interesting. It is a better game in my opinion, and I’ve not really heard much to suggest that many people think otherwise.

1887

I’m on mobile and don’t have a link, but according to a Paradox tweet, Ironman saves won’t work after the patch. Not sure if disabling auto update will still allow for achievements but I think it will let you complete your game.

1888

Move to EU4. It was a substantially better game at release, let alone now after multiple expansions. Lucky for you, with the new DLC being out everything should be 75% off, so it’s a good time to jump in!

1889

Found it.

The good news is they explicitly state that by updating, then going to beta 1.9.2, achievements are still valid. Would have been so frustrating otherwise.

A bit of a kick in the teeth though. My time is fairly limited so I tend to play out a campaign over the course of 6 months or so. Hell it has taken me 3 weeks or so to play even 100 years, and that has been right on the edge of cutting into sleep too much. I get why that happens, but it certainly puts pressure on getting some of the bigger achievements.

1890

Would I be okay getting just the base game (I was playing with EU III and all expansions)? I hate to spend much more than $10 on a PC game unless there are certain must have expansions that I need.

1891

Would I be okay getting just the base game (I was playing with EU III and all expansions)? I hate to spend much more than $10 on a PC game unless there are certain must have expansions that I need.

1892

I was about to ask the very same question just an hour ago. And then I watched myself clicking “Add to Cart” on the EU IV Collection (20 items) on Steam at a 75% discount. I’m so weak… The worst part is, that this collection does not contain the last two expansions, so I will probably also have to get those. I think I’ll try a game without them first though, and see if I can get the expansions on another sale.

1893

Yeah, the base game is fine, since you still get all the patches that have been released since then. If it’s something you enjoy, then go grab the expansions. This won’t be the last 75% off sale.

1894

Found a great deal on Nuuvem, EU IV and the DLC collection for $13.18!

1895

I loaded up my portugal ironman save after the patch yesterday… No monarch points, no money, no armies, no navies. And that’s only I saw on a glance. Made a very fast alt+f4. :-P
I was waiting for an AoW sale since release, then steam sent me a mail about a game on sale from my wishlist (actually, the only game on it :-) ). But just a 25% off :’/, was hoping at least for an 50%.
Anyway, EU4 base is free to play for the next 2 days. If you want to take a look, don’t miss the opportunity.

Btw. What would be your nation of choice for El Dorado? I already played a daimyo, an Italy, an HRE, two colonizer, an Ottoman and a Hungary game. Which horde nation is the most interesting to try out? And which new American religion looks to be the most fun?

1896

Nahuatl is a crazy bloodbath, but holy crap that religion has some awesome bonuses if you can pull it off. My first attempt (as Aztec) was a disaster, but I’ve got 2/5 reforms done on the second game I started, once I got familiarized with the mechanics a bit. The custom nation designer has already led to some fun scenarios as well.

In regards to Ironman, the saves aren’t compatible with 1.10, you need to set it back to 1.92 via Steam if you want to complete it.

1897

You can get Art of War for $8.61 on Nuuvem right now.

-Todd

1898

1.10.1 hotfix is out that seems to have nabbed all the little issues that slip through the crack on a big update like this. Issues like how vassals now have Liberty Desire and will weigh their collective strength against their overlord in determining when to declare a war for independence. Great feature, IMO, but good luck to the poor Holy Roman Emperor after passing the second to last HRE reform, hahaha. Same thing with poor Japan, they basically commit sepukku at the start of the game with the Daimyos.

Here’s the full changelist:

  • Japanese Daimyos no longer start at high liberty desire in 1444.
  • After Privilegia is revoked, Imperial vassals will no longer have hundreds of liberty desire from relative power to liege.
  • AI now gets the correct amount of attrition.
  • Manual exploration is now enabled for everyone.
  • Fixed a bug that was causing countries warning you to be called in even when not declaring war on their neighbours.
  • Europe will now properly get tradegoods in Custom Setup.
  • Fixed some inconsistencies in Aggressive Expansion between tooltip and actual effect.
  • Disabled most nation forming decisions for Custom Nations to prevent player-made AI nations from tag switching.
  • Consolidate Regiments button will correctly enable to let you maximize the number of full strength regiments (as it was before).
1899

“This product is not available for purchase in your region.”
Even tho, address is set in Brazil. :-(

1900

Try using the Hola VPN browser plugin. When you navigate to Nuuvem set your browser location to Brazil (Hola will recommend that automatically). Then proceed with your purchase. You also need to use PayPal. Sometimes you need to turn off Hola VPN to login to Nuuvem but you can turn it back on after you are logged in. I have purchased most of the recent EUIV DLC via Nuuvem and it redeems just fine on my USA based Steam account. Let me know if you have any additional questions or problems.

-Todd