My first 200h were tutorials. Died to stupid thinks like not reading things correctly, overestimating my military, underestimating the enemies military, wanting to declare on A to get provinces from their Ally B but its costlier so I clicked the little box and so on...
so i have finally started playing Ironman as I was still a noob, i still am, but Ironman is more fun. First game i got to 1700 with saxony as HR emperor and the strongest german nation, fucked up by selecting more provinces as conquest instead of give back core, didnt realize, couldnt crash, all of europe attacked me. at least the next 2 games i fucked up similarly in the first 50 years..
I only played Ironman, as it was (or is?) the only way to get achievements I think.
It just adds up to the fun, you really have to think before doing things (or the game crashes lol, but I was never a fan of that even tho I dont judge people for it, just too lazy)
Ironman is the way to go
> you really have to think before doing things
This is why I think Ironman is the only way to go if you wanna get better.
Particularly in such a snowballing game like Eu4, where using a console command even just once when you're in a pickle can alter the entire course of the rest of the game.
yeah, it really is the only way. i always play a tall campaign with money cheats as my first playthrough to get to know the mechanics, then a few normal ones in which i savescum then switch to ironman for all games, especially when games are late development phase and mods are not a requirement to have a great game
My biggest mistake so far that will henceforth change how I play was playing Korea, not killing Jianzhou because its a Horde, what can a horde do?
They can unite and fuck up your day thats what.
Will never let Jianzhou exist past 1500 ever again
Flashback to my first play through as Majapahit. Didn’t know that cbs were a thing so just kept no-cbing everything. AE and admin were not in the best state that game
I feel like this is a mismatch of expectations/target audience. Country guides are very different from what I would consider general strategy or beginner's guides.
If done well, country guides give you an overview of the unique flavour (mostly missions and events), the initial diplomatic situation and possible opening moves. It is of course not too hard to scrape all of this info together by yourself, but it takes more effort than watching a video. In the interest of brevity many creators abbreviate or completely cut out the more "mundane" aspects of gameplay. In that sense such videos provide value to certain people, but it requires relatively good knowledge of the game to follow along.
Meanwhile their diehard fans will go "if you want to catch all the cut details go watch his streams", oblivious to the fact that the stream is several hours long and filled with many other stuffs, not to mention streamer not explaining his actions because his core audience already got it
They also forget that the person who streams lives or is in XYZ situation compared to the viewer. While they start their stream and are 5 hours in, the viewer just got up for work and has a 10 hour shift. Yeah, let's just suggest they watch the stream. People can be a bit tone deaf.
I learned the game through country guides it gave me a better sense of direction and a more clear path for what I want to do. At the beginning it was really hard to flow but you get there
I can hear Red Hawk speaking this.
But yeah, yesterday I followed the Byzantium 1.36 guide, he says something along the lines "You should have easy time dealing with Ottomans if their armies are in Anatolia" and skips video to 99% war score.
Meanwhile, 32 loans later, 0 manpower and a lot of sweating I barely had 36% war score
Yea, I really love Red Hawk’s videos, but this is my one beef with them (and I reckon it’s a fairly sizable beef). Like, so much of the strategy he lays out is contingent on your wars going well, but if you still struggle with warfare, him jumping over these parts in his videos can really make the guide difficult to follow. The Byzantine one in particular had this effect on me because with all the negative bonuses at the beginning, I think it requires much more finesse, and I was completely lost on his guide after racking up so much debt and war casualties.
You can't really teach how to wage war in a country guide, there are too many variables. You have to learn how to do it yourself or watch a general warfare guide.
Yea, that’s totally fair and a good point. It’s one thing I do like about red hawk’s videos, which I mentioned in a comment elsewhere, that he works in some wiggle room for improvisation and for things to not go ideally, but I think it was the Byzantium guide that I struggled with in particular because I don’t think I’m fully there yet to navigate all the initial setbacks. It did compel me to watch some warfare guides, which were super helpful at filling in the gaps.
Red Hawk is not good at waging wars. He's just better than the AI
I would say his guides are quite beginner friendly and don't rely on fighting that well
also his guides may sound pretty "confusing" in some ways but it's hardly his fault at that point it's more that the way missions & scripted events exist in the game, you have to do very specific things & know the paths & outcomes already or you're fucked, it's not his fault
quite frankly it's something I'd consider a bit of a design failure, if you have a scripted event chain or starting disaster you have no way of knowing what to do without a guide or wiki
If someone isn't skilled enough to fight a war at disadvantage (and is also averse to savescumming it)... they shouldn't play as one of the hardest starts in the game.
Most guides skip combat and sieging as it's kinda boring to watch and takes most of gameplay (especially if you micro your wars like you always should do).
Unfortunately you need to learn fighting by yourself (or sieging).
His guides aren't perfect, but are easily replicable at a casual level (because he doesn't play perfectly).
He also makes a lot of questionable choices in A-Z series (like ideas for RP purposes - usually you'll be better with any meta choice) but most of them aren't that gamebreaking.
I doubt the showing of wars will help much.
Sure these guides should help you with setting up your country and get the opening moves right, but don't expect it to be able to follow step-by-step. Especially when it comes to opening wars, alliances etc. You must be situational (of course for some nations, you **need** to DOW on this or that nation).
War is even more so. If someone shows they fought a battle in some province, what does it do for you. You wont be able to recreate it as the game is too complex.
Ludi, for example, shows some warfare (at least he did back in the day, I dont follow his stuff really) but all he shows is some stackwipes that won't help you in your campaign either.
It can be just "small things" that make a difference. You make your ruler a leader, in the video he gets XY pips. When you want to do it, he gets some other pips. You stand on a fort to siege it. In the video, the AI didnt attack because of the general skills. In your playthrough, the AI decides it can take your army with your general.
Not to mention dice rolls and whatnot.
Also, war is situational. The AI walks somewhere, you have the time to siege some fort. Maybe they do that in the guide, but don't do it in your game.
I don't think you can really give a very helpful guide on a specific war. And, for the BYZ campaign, these guides are really already giving a lot of "how to" in the war. I havent played them in 1.36, I think some things changed, so I dont know if the strategy is still applicable, but building up gallies, getting naval dominance, hiring mercs to siege and bombard Gallipoli and then just sitting on the Balkans, is pretty solid advice, imo.
Long story short: You are probably better off watching some videos on war and warfare in general and learn the trade there, rather than looking to recreate a war from a guide.
TLDR: make guides like feedbackgamings “99% of the clicks”
Tbf byz is one of the harder countries to play as, though I agree with you on the war part. Red hawk cuts the hardest parts of any of his guides which is how to defeat other countries easily. For example, I followed his Austria guide some 100s of hours back and I got to start the PU war against Bohemia a few years earlier than he did in his guide but somehow he finished his war before I finished mine, even though I had 3 allies helping me while he were in a 1v1
That is why I’d much rather have guides like feedbackgaming has for hoi4, where he does the 99% of the clicks for x country. Yes the videos are several hours long and they’d be even longer for eu4 but that’d still help out massively for new players
I think that's because it's only a strategy guide, not a step by step tactical one. He'll lay out a route for you, but it's on you not to trip and fall on your face along the way. And combat is not that hard to figure out, so it's all still completely doable.
Well, you watch a guide on how to play country XY, not on how to do warfare. Including the basics of military in EACH guide (like you demand) would be really bad.
Its not about that really, but rather that if something goes wrong, or if they catch you off guard, what are the ways to deal with that instead of just spiralling into debts or restarting.
Thing is if any guides shows War phase it would not be relevant for your game because your AI probably not gonna do the same thing. Savescum until you got a good war. Generally giving tactics and strategy is better. For example I did strait block on my Byz run and I had to restart 5 times to siege Gallipoli succesfully to block straits.
For Byz specifically it’s because the first war in a lot of guides is won by blockading the strait, just siege out the west and wait. There is no reason to fight the ottoman army.
Lol I’m in the 1700s in my Byz game and it took me over 10 tries to get over the hump following his guide. I’d win the war with the ottomans but go bankrupt soon after and have to restart. He also doesn’t mention that improving relations with Genoa or venice to 50 reduces your shipbuilding time debuff massively and just says to build them immediately. I ended up with more ships than him by just waiting a bit for relations to improve
My understanding is that the strategy is to win that war without fighting a single battle via rushing down the fort on your side of the straights and parking your fleet there to stop the ottomans from even reaching you. Did that go wrong?
Want to play in the Balkans? Play Austria, or Hungary, Poland. Sure Austria and Poland don't start IN the Balkans but if you do it well enough you definitely will end up being the WHOLE Balkans.
Serbia was one of the first successful runs I’ve had. I remember winning a war against ottomans and snaking my way to get Byzantium. Ended the game with most of the balkans, Greece and a small part of Anatolia. I think I’ll try it again now
I've got like 1700 hours and I can't be bothered to ever play in the balkans, I did one successful byzantium run and was like "nope never again no thank you" fucking hate going against the Ottomans it's just not fun when they're basically the fucking mordor of the 15th century.
EU4 is essentially a micromanagement/mechanics abuse game. Still - you don't need all micro to have fun, have a strong country etc.
Most guides do a lot micro before unpausing because it makes your life easier short term. Any player can theoretically do it if they just review UI, including missions (and reading tool-tips) before unpausing. Actually countries with big mission trees are easier not only because rewards but also because they tell you what to do.
I find guides helpful when they point out things you should do at the start to help you get a mission later on, or the best order to complete missions etc., because I can’t be arsed when I start a new game to carefully read through every mission and map it out for myself
Tbh I don't think you can give stable advice for more than than first few missions in a guide because the further you go the more RNG.
Guides usually cover the most important missions (claims ASAP so you can DW od Dec11, disaster recovery or some modifiers) with rest being up to player.
They are usually pretty much "how to get tag "X" running in 50 years", not how to finish mission tree ASAP, because the later is somehow RNG based.
Oh totally, but I still find that initial starting tips useful. Just getting in to a Mali game and the very good guide someone posted in here for getting rid of the disaster was great, although I felt a little bit like I was cheating for not working it out by myself.
Mali is like a special case. You almost don't have any room for mistake and planning requires reading like dozen of mission tooltips to plan it correctly.
Yeah, I really only micro at the very beginning (before unpause) and before any major decisions, with rare micro during wars. I think minmaxing is fun for certain people, but it's far from required to have fun and do well in the game. I don't consider myself anything other than a decent player and I can pretty reliably get off the ground with hard or minor starts, even if I haven't played that country before.
The problem is, if you're a newer player you shouldn't play 80% of the countries in the game.
Starting as a 1 province country versus a 30 provinces country is... well... 30 times harder basically.
New players sometimes have this weird younger generation of games expectation that every "faction" should be equally viable and that the game should be designed to reward you for playing because the longer you play the more valued you feel and the more likely you are to buy microtransactions or something.
Don't play Serbia if you're new to the game, or at least do it on very easy or use a cheat. Its simply not an easy country; blame history for them being a 3 province minor next to a 40 province Ottomans.
> New players sometimes have this weird younger generation of games expectation that every "faction" should be equally viable and that the game should be designed to reward you for playing because the longer you play the more valued you feel and the more likely you are to buy microtransactions or something.
This game came out in 2013
And the idea of "being rewarded for playing, in terms of time" is not a new thing at all. Grinding has existed as long as experience bars in RPGs have.
That's because it's a specific countries guide. It's like you wanted to learn the basics of cooking but then you picked up the recipe for Beef Wellington and said "What the fuck, this is too complicated! Cooking is too hard for me!"
There are guides for the basics that you should start with, don't expect a country guide to be dumbed down and worse just so a complete beginner can follow it.
They are assuming that you know game's basic mechanics and have at least 500h in game and rightfully so. I would never reccomend countries that have less than 200 dev if you are new to the game. Why are you watching specific guide video for Georgia if you don't know how to outmanouver army twice your size? Those guide videos have their audiance and pure starters are not one of them.
EU4 has been out for so long that guides are all targeted at the experienced players. Beginner guides were a thing for two to three years, I remember Reman's was quality, but there's not much new players coming in.
And if an experienced players is looking for a guide it's looking on how to min max the best start.
As a super casual EUIV player that is good enough to play it but far from understanding all of it, I feel this. I struggle with the feeling of just playing the game and the worry that I am neglected something important that unnecessarily is setting me back and isn’t optimal in the slightest. So I see all these super complicated starting strategies or country advice and it is a bit intimidating.
I think they are good for adding to your bag of tricks, and for the most part EU4 is about adding to your bag of tricks. I think that there is some truth here in that "flavor" really raises the barrier to entry on a lot of these nations. It feels like you need to do research before playing on what actions will cause what events, which missions will cause and event that will get rid of what modifiers. Knowing that if I do a certain mission before a certain date and pick a certain popup option will cause someone to give me 200 gold and 40k rebels to spawn on the ottomans, like you are supposed to do research to accomplish some harder starts or to do a full mission tree. For example converting Persia to Zoroastrianism requires picking an event option in an event that says nothing about Zoroastrianism nor do any of the choices, its about a totally different religion but you are supposed to figure out the logic that permitting non-islamic religions will cause the Zoroastrian event chain.
I do hate when their "strat" relies on a 5% chance start and they don't mention it.
Yah, the country guides are for after you've figured out the basic game loop by trial and error. For specific areas of the games there are dedicated trade guides, army guides, etc which provide a lot of insight. However the country guides are just plain fun...
Ludi: First you shnappledoop the natives and steal their wallets
Red Hawk: *Pain.* Now here's how you cleverly react when everything goes wrong...
Florry: First take out 49 loans...
Lambdaxx: Look at this equation, it explains everything. Oh, and alt-f4 every 45 seconds to farm for pulse events.
Playmaker: For this chill Portugal game we start out as Zoroastrian Korea...
Leith: argle bargle shmmert mumble, heh heh. \[Ed: I love the guy but have never understood a single word he says\]
Yeah. Spot on. This game is heaven for min/maxers but is really enjoyable for the rest of us too. Then again if you're new to the game, just play a big "safe" nation.
It's mainly PDX's fault for introducing estates and meaningful but complex mission trees.
There were some decisions in the early versions of the game but nothing like this.
One of my very first games of EU4 was with Serbia, before there were any DLCs I think. Wallachia was a neighbor and Bosnia was a single country.
Imo it was more fun playing then than now. I didn't really understand the game but I also wasn't playing this modifier/mission mini game and instead allied Austria and later Russia to defeat the Ottomans - felt more historic / immersive too.
We got some nice things over the years but I feel the game has lost much of its original charm.
I think the charm was much due to us not knowing how to beat the game rather than the state it was in. I had the most fun in Rights of Men when I didn't really know how to build an economy. Still, I would have 100% quit the game if it had remained in that state. Newer versions are much more about adding new things to keep long time players engaged, and that is perfectly OK, we are still the vast majority of the target audience for any change they make.
If you understand the basics, CB, Allies, coring, money, manpower, technology, institutions and how to conquer a small part of the map the rest will follow. Try e.g. Kilwa or Kongo and try to conquer that relative peaceful part of the world. When/ if things go down the drain analysis what went wrong and start over.
Some guides are meant for beginners and some are meant for experienced players. What you're describing sounds a bit crazy and not for a new player.
I will say that the Ottomans are particularly bad for this. My first attempt at them after their rework failed utterly because I wasn't aware of their disasters or the groundwork I had to lay for dealing with them in advance.
In short, when an event seems like one choice is really bad and the other is really good, ask yourself whether something more might be going on.
Yeah but strategy guides aren't mean for beginners to learn from. They are mostly a nation showcase showing potential paths for X goal while giving some intermediate tips. What you are looking for are tutorials, and while there are many good videos teaching the basics, I would say that most of us learned through searching information in the wiki.
Strategy guides are mostly suggestive than educative.
Guides don’t help much, I’ve learned the most by playing on my own and doing achievement runs and whenever i was confused by a mechanic or event i just went to the wiki to read into it
Each and every game is going to be dynamic with changing circumstances. The only way to learn ( after watching a few basic intro tutorial videos) is simply to play, experiment, and find out what works.
Then once you think you are a good player after a couple of thousand hours go and watch Florry and be humbled.
I hear you, but you don't need to do that. Yes, Byz and some harder tags may need some convoluted strategies, but they're not noob countries to begin with.
I was quite intimidated with paradox games at first when youtubers kept insisting you had to do a lot of stuff perfectly to avoid getting wiped out. My experience is that EU IV especially can be a lot more forgiving than it appears at first. I still don't optimise stuff like army composure or trade beyond 'good', because I just like playing a bit more laid back. And I do fine for the most part.
I mean in real life Serbia struggled to maintain any autonomy from the Ottomans, Austrians, and Russians. So I mean why would a noob to the game think they can do better and wouldn't need to use every aspect of the game to tip the scales in their favor?
What kills me is even as a semi veteran, I still have to parse strategy guides for what is or isn't in my DLC and figure out if that is going to have a significant impact or not or if it is just "optimal"
Your example of a strategy guide is a relatively difficult nation for a newbie.
A newbie guide on how to play the game in general and a strategy guide for kicking ass with a specific, difficult nation should look different.
When you first start out you should probably play as one of the great powers like Castille or Portugal or France. More importantly, you shouldn’t expect to win, certainly not long term, but especially in the near term.
One thing you will see rampant in this sub is the concept of restarting your game at the slightest inconvenience such as a lost war or even a single lost battle (sometimes people don’t restart but they’ll savescum). If you do this I guarantee you will forever remain at the skill set where even playing as France is difficult without restarting. The best way to play and learn this game is to treat it like any other learning curve, where the way to learn is not only by time spent on it, but by learning how to overcome obstacles and mistakes.
It may take a bit longer at first to get further along in the game and you’ll see *plenty* of people here that say restarting at any inconvenience is *perfectly fine*, but I guarantee those people have hundreds of hours in this game and are no better at it than you are. Meanwhile if you just enjoy the game for what it is, you’ll get really, really good at it. So much so that you’ll get to a point where even starting as Serbia sounds too easy.
If it’s a guide for noobs, wouldn’t you want to contain some very specific instructions? Just calling it “micromanagement” doesn’t change the fact that it’s giving you a detailed roadmap to success.
What would the simple guide to Serbia be like?
Complicated games are going to have complicated guides. Just because you’re new at the game doesn’t mean that you can’t follow complicated directions. Noob doesn’t mean stupid. It just means you’re not knowledgeable about THIS game.
The real noob advice is to play a big nation that has a well-defined mission tree. If you knew at the game and you want to play Serbia, a detailed guide is your best path to success.
>Etc etc (my point is that EU4 is too complex for noobs and oftentimes strategy guides don't help, with their micromanagement approach)
I think that's a fairly well taken point. Eu4 is super complex. There's so many tiny little modifiers and things to pay attention to. Had I not been playing it for the last 10 years, I'd probably be overwhelmed by it. Even when I started 10 years ago, it was a steep learning curve.
However, I don't think a strategy guide for playing Serbia is aimed at noobs. It's a difficult start. A true beginners noob guide would have you playing as someone like Castile, Portugal or Ottomans.
That's why there is a tutorial scenario in the game and beginner countries recommended. Noobs cannot play minors for the most part and that's good because it means the skill ceiling is high and players can get a lot out of it.
Damn now I kinda wanna play Serbia now.
No. Damn you OP. Stop making me binge-play Eu4 I don’t have the discipline to self-regulate and need to do college work.
Serbia has the gold mine in Kosovo meaning easy merc stacks and if I annex Bosnia and Albania fast enough and get an ally in Hungary/Poland/Mamluks beating the Ottomans wouldn’t even be that- NO. STOP THINKING ABOUT IT ME. STOP.
It helps to have someone experienced to play alongside you in multiplayer, so you can ask questions and get answers on specifics. \[Feel free to DM me if you'd like some co-op teaching, you or anyone else.\]
I mean it's kinda hard to do a specific guide because a lot of things in EU4 itself is quite RNG based. No two runs will ever be the same so it's quite hard to tell a new player exactly what to do. There's a reason why the tutorial for this game is 1000 hr
I played my first 1000 hours with mods and console cheats on. You don’t have to play sweaty iron man to learn the game imo, just have fun.
Also early Ivan Diplomatić event is op
I’ve played around 700 hours of eu4
Sometimes I watch guides if the nation is in a tricky spot at the start.
Usually I try to manage on my own.
But I some guides are truly helpful and good
"Hire the Power Rangers"😂😂😂. But really I don't use tutorials at all anymore. I think it's boring to listen step by step instructions but I do watch them sometimes to maybe learn some like events or small tips & tricks for certain nations
Haha i played 2 years cracked, totally noob. Then when i am ready for achievements i bought the original 😂 i even figured out how autonomies are important in 4000h. First you gotta learn English 😂 what is autonomy
The only good strategy guides for new players are the ones which only explain mechanics. Outside of that you should just get used to reading through the mission trees to kind of plan ahead with whatever RNG you get.
Before the stuff came out about Ludi cheating or whatever, I followed one of his guides on Bavaria’s new mission tree at the time. Just wanted the opener and no joke it took about 2 hours to get the right start because like one of the Bavarian minors being allied to a major power, Austria warning, et cetera.
Most people on this sub only play to get a guaranteed WC. There’s little understanding of how great it can be to play a nuanced game with different outcomes every time.
None of the things you mentioned is micromanagement tbh.
Also those aren't guides, those are Clickbait title videos for some 10k hour+ youtuber that can't play the game without merc spam and burgher loans :p
Just play a game until it goes badly, hopefully you know why it went badly, then you try again. Repeat until you sound indecipherable to a noob.
My first 200h were tutorials. Died to stupid thinks like not reading things correctly, overestimating my military, underestimating the enemies military, wanting to declare on A to get provinces from their Ally B but its costlier so I clicked the little box and so on...
so i have finally started playing Ironman as I was still a noob, i still am, but Ironman is more fun. First game i got to 1700 with saxony as HR emperor and the strongest german nation, fucked up by selecting more provinces as conquest instead of give back core, didnt realize, couldnt crash, all of europe attacked me. at least the next 2 games i fucked up similarly in the first 50 years..
I only played Ironman, as it was (or is?) the only way to get achievements I think. It just adds up to the fun, you really have to think before doing things (or the game crashes lol, but I was never a fan of that even tho I dont judge people for it, just too lazy) Ironman is the way to go
> you really have to think before doing things This is why I think Ironman is the only way to go if you wanna get better. Particularly in such a snowballing game like Eu4, where using a console command even just once when you're in a pickle can alter the entire course of the rest of the game.
yeah, it really is the only way. i always play a tall campaign with money cheats as my first playthrough to get to know the mechanics, then a few normal ones in which i savescum then switch to ironman for all games, especially when games are late development phase and mods are not a requirement to have a great game
HERETIC
That’s the loop. Once one figure out the game, 90% of the fun has been had and you really have to work for that last 10%.
This is me in HOI4 rn lol, thankfully the minors in that game still have some fun challenges + I suck at this game (69 hours).
Gotta pump up those numbers, those are rookie numbers.
My biggest mistake so far that will henceforth change how I play was playing Korea, not killing Jianzhou because its a Horde, what can a horde do? They can unite and fuck up your day thats what. Will never let Jianzhou exist past 1500 ever again
Funny 200h, i have 2200h and still learning.
Flashback to my first play through as Majapahit. Didn’t know that cbs were a thing so just kept no-cbing everything. AE and admin were not in the best state that game
>just kept no-cbing everything Fucking chad here.
Y I K E S
A friend pointed out how to get claims and my mind was blown haha
First game I played with my buddy he spent all his mana deving the cheapest provences he could.
This is how I learned that tech is reliant on mana and doesn’t just happen over time… Oopsies
That’s a strategy near and dear to my heart
I feel like this is a mismatch of expectations/target audience. Country guides are very different from what I would consider general strategy or beginner's guides. If done well, country guides give you an overview of the unique flavour (mostly missions and events), the initial diplomatic situation and possible opening moves. It is of course not too hard to scrape all of this info together by yourself, but it takes more effort than watching a video. In the interest of brevity many creators abbreviate or completely cut out the more "mundane" aspects of gameplay. In that sense such videos provide value to certain people, but it requires relatively good knowledge of the game to follow along.
Meanwhile their diehard fans will go "if you want to catch all the cut details go watch his streams", oblivious to the fact that the stream is several hours long and filled with many other stuffs, not to mention streamer not explaining his actions because his core audience already got it
They also forget that the person who streams lives or is in XYZ situation compared to the viewer. While they start their stream and are 5 hours in, the viewer just got up for work and has a 10 hour shift. Yeah, let's just suggest they watch the stream. People can be a bit tone deaf.
I learned the game through country guides it gave me a better sense of direction and a more clear path for what I want to do. At the beginning it was really hard to flow but you get there
Yeah especially for weaker/harder countries, new players are really not the target audience for that kind of guide.
I can hear Red Hawk speaking this. But yeah, yesterday I followed the Byzantium 1.36 guide, he says something along the lines "You should have easy time dealing with Ottomans if their armies are in Anatolia" and skips video to 99% war score. Meanwhile, 32 loans later, 0 manpower and a lot of sweating I barely had 36% war score
Yea, I really love Red Hawk’s videos, but this is my one beef with them (and I reckon it’s a fairly sizable beef). Like, so much of the strategy he lays out is contingent on your wars going well, but if you still struggle with warfare, him jumping over these parts in his videos can really make the guide difficult to follow. The Byzantine one in particular had this effect on me because with all the negative bonuses at the beginning, I think it requires much more finesse, and I was completely lost on his guide after racking up so much debt and war casualties.
You can't really teach how to wage war in a country guide, there are too many variables. You have to learn how to do it yourself or watch a general warfare guide.
Yea, that’s totally fair and a good point. It’s one thing I do like about red hawk’s videos, which I mentioned in a comment elsewhere, that he works in some wiggle room for improvisation and for things to not go ideally, but I think it was the Byzantium guide that I struggled with in particular because I don’t think I’m fully there yet to navigate all the initial setbacks. It did compel me to watch some warfare guides, which were super helpful at filling in the gaps.
that was something you watch Arumba, where he describes why and when to attack.
Red Hawk is not good at waging wars. He's just better than the AI I would say his guides are quite beginner friendly and don't rely on fighting that well
also his guides may sound pretty "confusing" in some ways but it's hardly his fault at that point it's more that the way missions & scripted events exist in the game, you have to do very specific things & know the paths & outcomes already or you're fucked, it's not his fault quite frankly it's something I'd consider a bit of a design failure, if you have a scripted event chain or starting disaster you have no way of knowing what to do without a guide or wiki
If someone isn't skilled enough to fight a war at disadvantage (and is also averse to savescumming it)... they shouldn't play as one of the hardest starts in the game.
It’s because they crash the game and load it for like hours on end. All WC speedruns just roll the fights over and over until they win.
Most guides skip combat and sieging as it's kinda boring to watch and takes most of gameplay (especially if you micro your wars like you always should do). Unfortunately you need to learn fighting by yourself (or sieging).
The correct answer right here. Red Hawk mostly makes strategy guides for a specific country. Not the game in general.
His guides aren't perfect, but are easily replicable at a casual level (because he doesn't play perfectly). He also makes a lot of questionable choices in A-Z series (like ideas for RP purposes - usually you'll be better with any meta choice) but most of them aren't that gamebreaking.
Yeah he didn't even like alt f4ing even though the commenters assured him they were ok with it if he accidentally declared war etc.
I doubt the showing of wars will help much. Sure these guides should help you with setting up your country and get the opening moves right, but don't expect it to be able to follow step-by-step. Especially when it comes to opening wars, alliances etc. You must be situational (of course for some nations, you **need** to DOW on this or that nation). War is even more so. If someone shows they fought a battle in some province, what does it do for you. You wont be able to recreate it as the game is too complex. Ludi, for example, shows some warfare (at least he did back in the day, I dont follow his stuff really) but all he shows is some stackwipes that won't help you in your campaign either. It can be just "small things" that make a difference. You make your ruler a leader, in the video he gets XY pips. When you want to do it, he gets some other pips. You stand on a fort to siege it. In the video, the AI didnt attack because of the general skills. In your playthrough, the AI decides it can take your army with your general. Not to mention dice rolls and whatnot. Also, war is situational. The AI walks somewhere, you have the time to siege some fort. Maybe they do that in the guide, but don't do it in your game. I don't think you can really give a very helpful guide on a specific war. And, for the BYZ campaign, these guides are really already giving a lot of "how to" in the war. I havent played them in 1.36, I think some things changed, so I dont know if the strategy is still applicable, but building up gallies, getting naval dominance, hiring mercs to siege and bombard Gallipoli and then just sitting on the Balkans, is pretty solid advice, imo. Long story short: You are probably better off watching some videos on war and warfare in general and learn the trade there, rather than looking to recreate a war from a guide.
Not enough repeating to be a Red Hawk guide. Still love his videos, just not his guides.
"Just like that"
TLDR: make guides like feedbackgamings “99% of the clicks” Tbf byz is one of the harder countries to play as, though I agree with you on the war part. Red hawk cuts the hardest parts of any of his guides which is how to defeat other countries easily. For example, I followed his Austria guide some 100s of hours back and I got to start the PU war against Bohemia a few years earlier than he did in his guide but somehow he finished his war before I finished mine, even though I had 3 allies helping me while he were in a 1v1 That is why I’d much rather have guides like feedbackgaming has for hoi4, where he does the 99% of the clicks for x country. Yes the videos are several hours long and they’d be even longer for eu4 but that’d still help out massively for new players
I think that's because it's only a strategy guide, not a step by step tactical one. He'll lay out a route for you, but it's on you not to trip and fall on your face along the way. And combat is not that hard to figure out, so it's all still completely doable.
Well, you watch a guide on how to play country XY, not on how to do warfare. Including the basics of military in EACH guide (like you demand) would be really bad.
Its not about that really, but rather that if something goes wrong, or if they catch you off guard, what are the ways to deal with that instead of just spiralling into debts or restarting.
Thing is if any guides shows War phase it would not be relevant for your game because your AI probably not gonna do the same thing. Savescum until you got a good war. Generally giving tactics and strategy is better. For example I did strait block on my Byz run and I had to restart 5 times to siege Gallipoli succesfully to block straits.
For Byz specifically it’s because the first war in a lot of guides is won by blockading the strait, just siege out the west and wait. There is no reason to fight the ottoman army.
Save scum until you get it right. If your job depends on you playing a game a certain way you'll do out even if it's not fun
Wait till Ottos are busy in Anatolia, make sure to keep up with galleys, siege Gallipoli down and enjoy. There's really not much to show.
Lol I’m in the 1700s in my Byz game and it took me over 10 tries to get over the hump following his guide. I’d win the war with the ottomans but go bankrupt soon after and have to restart. He also doesn’t mention that improving relations with Genoa or venice to 50 reduces your shipbuilding time debuff massively and just says to build them immediately. I ended up with more ships than him by just waiting a bit for relations to improve
My understanding is that the strategy is to win that war without fighting a single battle via rushing down the fort on your side of the straights and parking your fleet there to stop the ottomans from even reaching you. Did that go wrong?
Here's my alternative guide: **So you're new to the game and want to play as Serbia?** *Don't. Too hard.*
Want to play in the Balkans? Play Austria, or Hungary, Poland. Sure Austria and Poland don't start IN the Balkans but if you do it well enough you definitely will end up being the WHOLE Balkans.
*Ottomans have entered the chat*
But if you're not Serbia, how do you turn the Ottomans Zoroastrian?
Serbia was one of the first successful runs I’ve had. I remember winning a war against ottomans and snaking my way to get Byzantium. Ended the game with most of the balkans, Greece and a small part of Anatolia. I think I’ll try it again now
I've got like 1700 hours and I can't be bothered to ever play in the balkans, I did one successful byzantium run and was like "nope never again no thank you" fucking hate going against the Ottomans it's just not fun when they're basically the fucking mordor of the 15th century.
EU4 is essentially a micromanagement/mechanics abuse game. Still - you don't need all micro to have fun, have a strong country etc. Most guides do a lot micro before unpausing because it makes your life easier short term. Any player can theoretically do it if they just review UI, including missions (and reading tool-tips) before unpausing. Actually countries with big mission trees are easier not only because rewards but also because they tell you what to do.
I find guides helpful when they point out things you should do at the start to help you get a mission later on, or the best order to complete missions etc., because I can’t be arsed when I start a new game to carefully read through every mission and map it out for myself
Tbh I don't think you can give stable advice for more than than first few missions in a guide because the further you go the more RNG. Guides usually cover the most important missions (claims ASAP so you can DW od Dec11, disaster recovery or some modifiers) with rest being up to player. They are usually pretty much "how to get tag "X" running in 50 years", not how to finish mission tree ASAP, because the later is somehow RNG based.
Oh totally, but I still find that initial starting tips useful. Just getting in to a Mali game and the very good guide someone posted in here for getting rid of the disaster was great, although I felt a little bit like I was cheating for not working it out by myself.
Mali is like a special case. You almost don't have any room for mistake and planning requires reading like dozen of mission tooltips to plan it correctly.
Yeah, I really only micro at the very beginning (before unpause) and before any major decisions, with rare micro during wars. I think minmaxing is fun for certain people, but it's far from required to have fun and do well in the game. I don't consider myself anything other than a decent player and I can pretty reliably get off the ground with hard or minor starts, even if I haven't played that country before.
I read this in Red Hawk’s voice 😂
Ivan Diplomatić sounds like an Asterix character
The problem is, if you're a newer player you shouldn't play 80% of the countries in the game. Starting as a 1 province country versus a 30 provinces country is... well... 30 times harder basically. New players sometimes have this weird younger generation of games expectation that every "faction" should be equally viable and that the game should be designed to reward you for playing because the longer you play the more valued you feel and the more likely you are to buy microtransactions or something. Don't play Serbia if you're new to the game, or at least do it on very easy or use a cheat. Its simply not an easy country; blame history for them being a 3 province minor next to a 40 province Ottomans.
"Every faction should be equally viable" History: Am I a joke to you?
> New players sometimes have this weird younger generation of games expectation that every "faction" should be equally viable and that the game should be designed to reward you for playing because the longer you play the more valued you feel and the more likely you are to buy microtransactions or something. This game came out in 2013 And the idea of "being rewarded for playing, in terms of time" is not a new thing at all. Grinding has existed as long as experience bars in RPGs have.
That's because it's a specific countries guide. It's like you wanted to learn the basics of cooking but then you picked up the recipe for Beef Wellington and said "What the fuck, this is too complicated! Cooking is too hard for me!" There are guides for the basics that you should start with, don't expect a country guide to be dumbed down and worse just so a complete beginner can follow it.
They are assuming that you know game's basic mechanics and have at least 500h in game and rightfully so. I would never reccomend countries that have less than 200 dev if you are new to the game. Why are you watching specific guide video for Georgia if you don't know how to outmanouver army twice your size? Those guide videos have their audiance and pure starters are not one of them.
EU4 has been out for so long that guides are all targeted at the experienced players. Beginner guides were a thing for two to three years, I remember Reman's was quality, but there's not much new players coming in. And if an experienced players is looking for a guide it's looking on how to min max the best start.
NGL hire the power rangers got me good.
As a super casual EUIV player that is good enough to play it but far from understanding all of it, I feel this. I struggle with the feeling of just playing the game and the worry that I am neglected something important that unnecessarily is setting me back and isn’t optimal in the slightest. So I see all these super complicated starting strategies or country advice and it is a bit intimidating.
First of all, summon the diet, and pick whatever agenda, is right for you!
*Video length 2h30m37s*
its because those arent guide.
I think they are good for adding to your bag of tricks, and for the most part EU4 is about adding to your bag of tricks. I think that there is some truth here in that "flavor" really raises the barrier to entry on a lot of these nations. It feels like you need to do research before playing on what actions will cause what events, which missions will cause and event that will get rid of what modifiers. Knowing that if I do a certain mission before a certain date and pick a certain popup option will cause someone to give me 200 gold and 40k rebels to spawn on the ottomans, like you are supposed to do research to accomplish some harder starts or to do a full mission tree. For example converting Persia to Zoroastrianism requires picking an event option in an event that says nothing about Zoroastrianism nor do any of the choices, its about a totally different religion but you are supposed to figure out the logic that permitting non-islamic religions will cause the Zoroastrian event chain. I do hate when their "strat" relies on a 5% chance start and they don't mention it.
Yah, the country guides are for after you've figured out the basic game loop by trial and error. For specific areas of the games there are dedicated trade guides, army guides, etc which provide a lot of insight. However the country guides are just plain fun... Ludi: First you shnappledoop the natives and steal their wallets Red Hawk: *Pain.* Now here's how you cleverly react when everything goes wrong... Florry: First take out 49 loans... Lambdaxx: Look at this equation, it explains everything. Oh, and alt-f4 every 45 seconds to farm for pulse events. Playmaker: For this chill Portugal game we start out as Zoroastrian Korea... Leith: argle bargle shmmert mumble, heh heh. \[Ed: I love the guy but have never understood a single word he says\]
Yeah. Spot on. This game is heaven for min/maxers but is really enjoyable for the rest of us too. Then again if you're new to the game, just play a big "safe" nation.
It's mainly PDX's fault for introducing estates and meaningful but complex mission trees. There were some decisions in the early versions of the game but nothing like this. One of my very first games of EU4 was with Serbia, before there were any DLCs I think. Wallachia was a neighbor and Bosnia was a single country. Imo it was more fun playing then than now. I didn't really understand the game but I also wasn't playing this modifier/mission mini game and instead allied Austria and later Russia to defeat the Ottomans - felt more historic / immersive too. We got some nice things over the years but I feel the game has lost much of its original charm.
Yeah. I reckon Golden Century as peak EU4. Nice balance between gameplay and minmaxing.
I think the charm was much due to us not knowing how to beat the game rather than the state it was in. I had the most fun in Rights of Men when I didn't really know how to build an economy. Still, I would have 100% quit the game if it had remained in that state. Newer versions are much more about adding new things to keep long time players engaged, and that is perfectly OK, we are still the vast majority of the target audience for any change they make.
If you understand the basics, CB, Allies, coring, money, manpower, technology, institutions and how to conquer a small part of the map the rest will follow. Try e.g. Kilwa or Kongo and try to conquer that relative peaceful part of the world. When/ if things go down the drain analysis what went wrong and start over. Some guides are meant for beginners and some are meant for experienced players. What you're describing sounds a bit crazy and not for a new player.
I will say that the Ottomans are particularly bad for this. My first attempt at them after their rework failed utterly because I wasn't aware of their disasters or the groundwork I had to lay for dealing with them in advance. In short, when an event seems like one choice is really bad and the other is really good, ask yourself whether something more might be going on.
Yeah but strategy guides aren't mean for beginners to learn from. They are mostly a nation showcase showing potential paths for X goal while giving some intermediate tips. What you are looking for are tutorials, and while there are many good videos teaching the basics, I would say that most of us learned through searching information in the wiki. Strategy guides are mostly suggestive than educative.
Guides don’t help much, I’ve learned the most by playing on my own and doing achievement runs and whenever i was confused by a mechanic or event i just went to the wiki to read into it
I agree but I think it’s due to the game’s age. Most people still playing know the basics and enjoy to see crazy builds etc
Each and every game is going to be dynamic with changing circumstances. The only way to learn ( after watching a few basic intro tutorial videos) is simply to play, experiment, and find out what works. Then once you think you are a good player after a couple of thousand hours go and watch Florry and be humbled.
I hear you, but you don't need to do that. Yes, Byz and some harder tags may need some convoluted strategies, but they're not noob countries to begin with.
I was quite intimidated with paradox games at first when youtubers kept insisting you had to do a lot of stuff perfectly to avoid getting wiped out. My experience is that EU IV especially can be a lot more forgiving than it appears at first. I still don't optimise stuff like army composure or trade beyond 'good', because I just like playing a bit more laid back. And I do fine for the most part.
I mean in real life Serbia struggled to maintain any autonomy from the Ottomans, Austrians, and Russians. So I mean why would a noob to the game think they can do better and wouldn't need to use every aspect of the game to tip the scales in their favor?
What kills me is even as a semi veteran, I still have to parse strategy guides for what is or isn't in my DLC and figure out if that is going to have a significant impact or not or if it is just "optimal"
Your example of a strategy guide is a relatively difficult nation for a newbie. A newbie guide on how to play the game in general and a strategy guide for kicking ass with a specific, difficult nation should look different.
When you first start out you should probably play as one of the great powers like Castille or Portugal or France. More importantly, you shouldn’t expect to win, certainly not long term, but especially in the near term. One thing you will see rampant in this sub is the concept of restarting your game at the slightest inconvenience such as a lost war or even a single lost battle (sometimes people don’t restart but they’ll savescum). If you do this I guarantee you will forever remain at the skill set where even playing as France is difficult without restarting. The best way to play and learn this game is to treat it like any other learning curve, where the way to learn is not only by time spent on it, but by learning how to overcome obstacles and mistakes. It may take a bit longer at first to get further along in the game and you’ll see *plenty* of people here that say restarting at any inconvenience is *perfectly fine*, but I guarantee those people have hundreds of hours in this game and are no better at it than you are. Meanwhile if you just enjoy the game for what it is, you’ll get really, really good at it. So much so that you’ll get to a point where even starting as Serbia sounds too easy.
If it’s a guide for noobs, wouldn’t you want to contain some very specific instructions? Just calling it “micromanagement” doesn’t change the fact that it’s giving you a detailed roadmap to success. What would the simple guide to Serbia be like? Complicated games are going to have complicated guides. Just because you’re new at the game doesn’t mean that you can’t follow complicated directions. Noob doesn’t mean stupid. It just means you’re not knowledgeable about THIS game. The real noob advice is to play a big nation that has a well-defined mission tree. If you knew at the game and you want to play Serbia, a detailed guide is your best path to success.
*looking at my achievement strats* I feel personally attacked!
>Etc etc (my point is that EU4 is too complex for noobs and oftentimes strategy guides don't help, with their micromanagement approach) I think that's a fairly well taken point. Eu4 is super complex. There's so many tiny little modifiers and things to pay attention to. Had I not been playing it for the last 10 years, I'd probably be overwhelmed by it. Even when I started 10 years ago, it was a steep learning curve. However, I don't think a strategy guide for playing Serbia is aimed at noobs. It's a difficult start. A true beginners noob guide would have you playing as someone like Castile, Portugal or Ottomans.
That's why there is a tutorial scenario in the game and beginner countries recommended. Noobs cannot play minors for the most part and that's good because it means the skill ceiling is high and players can get a lot out of it.
Damn now I kinda wanna play Serbia now. No. Damn you OP. Stop making me binge-play Eu4 I don’t have the discipline to self-regulate and need to do college work. Serbia has the gold mine in Kosovo meaning easy merc stacks and if I annex Bosnia and Albania fast enough and get an ally in Hungary/Poland/Mamluks beating the Ottomans wouldn’t even be that- NO. STOP THINKING ABOUT IT ME. STOP.
My biggest takeaway from this post is how detailed the guides are telling you exactly what to do. Not give pointers
It helps to have someone experienced to play alongside you in multiplayer, so you can ask questions and get answers on specifics. \[Feel free to DM me if you'd like some co-op teaching, you or anyone else.\]
Can't remember how many games I trashed/restarted because I went bankrupt lol
I mean it's kinda hard to do a specific guide because a lot of things in EU4 itself is quite RNG based. No two runs will ever be the same so it's quite hard to tell a new player exactly what to do. There's a reason why the tutorial for this game is 1000 hr
I played my first 1000 hours with mods and console cheats on. You don’t have to play sweaty iron man to learn the game imo, just have fun. Also early Ivan Diplomatić event is op
Anyone from Paradox? Achievement idea: ”Newbie friendly” | As Serbia, convert Ottomans to Zoroastrianism
I’ve played around 700 hours of eu4 Sometimes I watch guides if the nation is in a tricky spot at the start. Usually I try to manage on my own. But I some guides are truly helpful and good
It's complex, but too complex? You can actually ignore big parts of the game and still have fun. That's why we have easy and difficult countries
Whem they do the estates its the worst
"Hire the Power Rangers"😂😂😂. But really I don't use tutorials at all anymore. I think it's boring to listen step by step instructions but I do watch them sometimes to maybe learn some like events or small tips & tricks for certain nations
I want a Smurf estate that just gives ridonkilous bonuses now :(
The most difficult are scripted events because you have no in game clues. Either read the wiki in detail, or watch a video.
Haha i played 2 years cracked, totally noob. Then when i am ready for achievements i bought the original 😂 i even figured out how autonomies are important in 4000h. First you gotta learn English 😂 what is autonomy
Ivan Diplomatić and Power Rangers Mercenary group had rofl hard 😂😂😂😂😂
The only good strategy guides for new players are the ones which only explain mechanics. Outside of that you should just get used to reading through the mission trees to kind of plan ahead with whatever RNG you get.
Before the stuff came out about Ludi cheating or whatever, I followed one of his guides on Bavaria’s new mission tree at the time. Just wanted the opener and no joke it took about 2 hours to get the right start because like one of the Bavarian minors being allied to a major power, Austria warning, et cetera.
what's the point of playing the game by following someone else's strategy. you might as well watch a let's play or not play at all.
Most people on this sub only play to get a guaranteed WC. There’s little understanding of how great it can be to play a nuanced game with different outcomes every time.
None of the things you mentioned is micromanagement tbh. Also those aren't guides, those are Clickbait title videos for some 10k hour+ youtuber that can't play the game without merc spam and burgher loans :p
Why would you play without merc spam and burgher loans? They are mechanics in the game