Recent reviews by Talilover

Let's be honest, maybe about 90% of the playerbase really only cares about playing in Europe (It ain't called Africa universalis after-all) and this dlc does a decent job smattering content across the region. I don't really care about the revolution system and hegemonies are just a "win more" type of buff late game but things like the Catholicism and HRE rework are nice, if busted in a powercreep dlc fashion

The only thing that pisses me off is that provoking revolts is again just a simple button you press to make your campaigns better no matter where you are on the world, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ stop tucking away these basic QOL features into 20 dollar dlcs you unreliable scum

I like a lot of the nation specific flavor this adds but Paradox needs to kick a heavy spiked rock for arbitrarily locking the diplomatic macrobuilder behind a 20 dollar dlc, seriously ♥♥♥♥ you

The age/ splendor system is also a huge help for any nation so this is still sadly a dlc you should look into getting no matter who you plan on playing, I personally wouldn't judge you if you got this dlc in some sort of nefarious mean. Maybe something like what wealth of nations added with a privateer system?

The mission tree for Britain is usurped by a later dlc (domination), which is kind of a reoccurring theme with these dlc, so don't get this for that.

The unique religion is there for a flavor and isn't awful, better than Protestantism but if you can stay on the pope's good side not better than Catholicism from a purely gameplay point of view.

Innovativism is...there, ig.

Naval doctrines are a button you press near the start of a game and never look at again, just a small naval buff (naval in of itself being something that's entirely subjective on how much you're really going to care about)

Coal/ Industrialization is a nice increase in income...that comes around at the point of the game where you've long stopped worrying about your income. If you're in the 1700s and still struggling for money you need help this dlc can't give

Knowledge sharing is also kind of just there, maybe nice early game for some of the more annoying institutions to spread before you get to the point you just outright buy institutions asap.

In short, you really don't need to worry about this one, doubly so at full price

You are honest to god just paying 10 bucks for the ability to move your trade capital and to get a decision that gives you another merchant (east india company)

Highly subjective if you really care about those (no, you don't care about things like privateers) but do not get this at full price if you do

For the primarch, Robooty Gulpingmen

Y'know what? I just respect this dlc, I mean I still suck at the game and got my teeth kicked in as the Teutonic order, but I like what this dlc offers in comparison to other eu4 dlc.

If you want to play in Scandinavia/ the Baltic sea region get this dlc, if you don't care about any of those options then don't. There's no "well actually you should still get this dlc even if you're going to play in Japan because it also adds-" in typical paradox bs dlc fashion. It's a rare instance of them showing restraint and I think it should be lauded

I'm still fresh into EU4 from the sale, already having spent 50 dollars to get the game and SOME of the dlc for a game over a decade old, and it's been pretty rough ngl.

I'm coming into this only having "baby hours" in Stellaris and Imperator (Imperator being the one that more closely translates) of about 300 hours so while I can kinda understand what's going on feel like there's so much stuff the game either hides from you or locks behind a dlc. To loosely quote the movie "Goodfellas":

-Want to rip off the band aid of an imminent revolt by triggering it immediately? ♥♥♥♥ you, pay me
-Want to include diplomatic actions in the macrobuilder? ♥♥♥♥ you, pay me
-Want to have any real control over trade/ develop centers? ♥♥♥♥ you, pay me
-Want any real control over vassals or better alliance management? ♥♥♥♥ you, pay me

And so on and so on. It's extra frustrating because a lot of these features which are broadly useful to any nation you play will be buried in a dlc with a bunch of content you don't really care about, like that one south park bit of cable companies locking a channel behind a package of 500 Portuguese channels. I don't care about playing in Indonesia fam, just let me have monuments. Point being integral upgrades or mechanics to the game should just be part of the update and flavor/ expansion of mechanics for specific nations should be dlc...but why tf would paradox do that when people will buy it amirite?

Putting aside the dlc nonsense, and this may just be new player skill issue on my part I admit, when playing any non immediate superpower nation it feels like you are utterly at the mercy of RNG and rerolls to get a better game. If a nation you need to expand into allies some other big nation, just restart. If one of your starting rivals is a nation you need to be an ally, just restart. If straight up dice roll event doesn't go your way, just restart. All of these are just examples from a couple of not so good runs as the Teutonic order, again maybe I just suck, but really what the hell are you supposed to do when Poland allies Bohemia and Hungary hates your guts from the get go?

AE impact and coalitions are possibly the worst example of "You're having too much fun, stop it" I've ever seen in a game. You can fight tooth and nail to fully occupy an enemy, because you pretty much have to to get them to accept peace, and can take maybe 2-3 provinces without shooting your campaign in the head. I'm assuming this is because they wanted to reign in "snowballing" and keep the game interesting for longer, so that means it's better to make one war turn into 5 different wars over the course of decades ig. I imagine this is the part where the thousands of hours group hops down my throats about "ermmm, reduce AE effects, uhmmm conquer different culture groups" as if it excuses the system or does anything to address the fact that none of that is clearly explained in the game. Hell, not like Paradox seems too staunch about coalitions as a system seeing as they were absent in Stellaris and Imperator right?

There's still the skeleton of a fun and immersive grand strategy game here, I'm sure I'll put hundreds of hours into this and throw a little more money at the bloat even, but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ if this isn't one of the most tentative recs I can give.

Update: Yall can see how I've played more hours (and will continue to do so) but nah son, I can't in good conscious recommend this game. Eu4 is not a game, it is a platform to sell dlc in the promise of having a full game. It is an actual ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ scam how many features are tucked away in dlc and I only get more and more agitated as I find out more. You know there's 3 (well, at least 3 from what I've gathered) dlc that piece by piece fleshes out Trade in this game? That's not some small flavorful mechanic, that is going to be the bread and butter of your economy mid to late game and you need to buy 3 different dlcs in order to get the full mechanic.

I'll talk to a friend to try and get advice and the amount of times he's told me to use a mechanic not even realizing it's a dlc feature is amazing. Naval bombardments? Upgrading my advisors? Currying favors? What are you talking about bro? Those buttons just straight up aren't there. Paradox honest to god wants you to pay an additional 10 bucks for each one of their patches, sometimes not even being upfront about the patch (advisor upgrades) while they just tuck them away in some "oh yeah, this is just a Mesopotamia dlc bro...trust" and so on.

Paradox needs to (financially) burn, what a malignant tumor on the gaming industry

yeah yeah yeah, fun with friends next heaping serving of friendslop and all that, you've heard it all before.

Putting aside watching paint dry is fun with friends wanted to say a solo climb here is also pretty fun/ the game works even if just by yourself. It's a simple loop of seeing an ideal path, getting half way up that path before realizing it's actually not so ideal, and doing damage control as you look around as death rapidly encroaches on you because the Roots level is like a shot of battery acid injected directly into your bloodstream.

Picked it up for 5 bucks (default 8 bucks is also just fine) and have had good times with friends and solo, it's just a nice simple game.

My current 11 hours is a result of a few failed attempts to get into the game over the 2 or so years I've had it and my most recent and somewhat successfull attempt to get into it, because as I general rule I'm vehemently against doing ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ homework before playing a game and Paradox games in general don't meld with that idea. I only have extensive playtime on stellaris, which I found fairly intuitive, and will be what a compare this to.

Paradox gameplay can be summarized as looking at a bunch of spreadsheets and making your colored blob bigger than others, and these spreadsheets be spreading and these blobs be blobbing so I guess nothing to complain about on that front. There's a bit more character management here than stellaris but not to degree of crusader kings, I basically just juggle government offices around in a mix of what's actually the best fits and which family is throwing a wahwahboohoo ♥♥♥♥♥♥ fit.

The tutorial, in typical paradox fashion as well, is total dogwater and you're best off just doing a normal game and fumbling about...it'll make some sense at some point (swearsies). Usually you're best off just paying mind to any pop up banners telling you what needs to be done but one thing the game seemingly wants to hide from you is the missions, of which are insanely important for early game expansion and eases the also typical to paradox game mechanic of sitting on some street corner saying "please sir, just a crumb of political influence"

Now similar to another strategy game I play, total war: Rome 2, there is a very loud portion of the playerbase that will swear up and down you NEED to mod this game to make it good and just wanna warn anybody from being strong armed into it. The game is just fine as is and if you are thinking about watching guides to ease into it the invictus mod is going to throw those all out the window, imo just for the sake of being different or having more (not necessarily worthwhile). If you want to play some nobody faction or a faction who was a footnote in somebody else's history than by all means get invictus, if you came to Imperator:Rome to play ROME you'll be fine

It's a paradox game about what is the most beloved ancient empire (and other people, I guess) which is paradoxically also one of the most underutilized themes for games (There's a reason people still play Total War: Rome 2 despite it lowkey being kind of ass afterall). It would have to do a lot to keep me from recommending it

Still really just dipping me feet in but this is honestly just Monster Train, but better.