Civ 4 v. EU3

[Scooby_Doo]

Hello all,

I was looking the other day at the (now relatively old) game Europa Universalis III as a possible new purchase. It stuck me from playing the demo that it probably attracts the same people that enjoy Civ so I was wondering what everyone here thought of it in comparison?

By the way, I played the demo and found it to be far and away the most confusing experience of my life. That may be because I didn't have the benefit of a manual though.

[Will9]

The EU3 AI is terrible. I'd play EU3 alot more if I didn't constantly get frustrated with the AI.

[Unimatrix11]

I like EU3 a lot. I wouldnt nesseccarily (i hate that word) call the AI bad - after all paradox is using the same AI roughly for all their games and which each title it gets enhanced (same for the game-engine). It is a great historic game and i would recommend it, if you enjoy looooong games with realistic historical background.

What can be frustrating is peace negotiations. For example, once i occupied all of american burgund, even landed troops in the netherlands - his once mighty fleet was sent to the bottom with the help of my portugeuse allies. There was no way for him to get his american provinces back - and his war weariness was up to the max, causing revolts everywhere in his empire - yet he would not cede a single province to me after 8 years of war. That is the most annoying thing in EU3 and the reason why i´d recommend to play a continental power, which of course kinda contradicts the spirit of the game, expressed in its title...

[Will9]

The EU3 AI can never seem to get its army across water. I've played as Prussia and managed to occupy 1/2 of European Spain with an army about 1/5 the size of Spain's (and no allies). How did I do this? Much of Spain's land was in the Netherlands, Southern Germany, Eastern France, and Italy and the largest navy in world couldn't get the their army from Spain to halfway across the Mediterranean or up into the Netherlands to face my army. On top of that, they couldn't blockade my ports in the Baltic sea since I left my 25 ship fleet in the straits between Sweden and Denmark and they kept sending fleets of 2 or 3 ships to try and break through (their fleet was over 200 ships).

What Unimatrix11 said about the peace AI is definitaly true. In that war, I couldn't even get 1 province in the peace negotiation because Spain thought they were winning the war due to the fact their army was still bigger.

[Unimatrix11]

Yeah - the AI fleet handling does suck - saw things like you describe. too. So... well... uh... it is a great but somewhat broken game... But there is hope that paradox will fix the fleet&peace issues. I am not that much into their community, but i could even imagine some modders working on it...

[Will9]

Originally posted by Unimatrix11
Yeah - the AI fleet handling does suck - saw things like you describe. too. So... well... uh... it is a great but somewhat broken game... But there is hope that paradox will fix the fleet&peace issues. I am not that much into their community, but i could even imagine some modders working on it...

Unlike civ, the AI and many other core game features can't be modded in EU3.

[Unimatrix11]

Oops then - i just thought - cause they do it with other paradox titles like Hearts of Iron II. But then again EU3 is a bit different as it uses other graphics and stuff - so it might be different in that aspect, too.

Well, okay, the more i think about it, the more i realize, that i want EU3 to be a great game, more then it actually is, maybe. Its a case of wishfull thinking - if only it would work the way its supposed to. Cause then it would be awesome - much better than Civ even in my opinion. But as things are, its pretty broken... And EU3 is not the kind of game that you will find many players for multiplayer - just because it takes ages.

What i still do like about it, is its model tho: You have 10 (i think) "civic"-sliders with 10 (i think) possible settings on each. And each one influences a bunch of things at once. Then the diplomacy (and here the AI is okay, i´d say - agree, will ?) is well done and the military side itself is just simple army moving - but why am i telling you this - you played the demo...

[Scooby_Doo]

I'm very glad for the responses, I briefly viewed the official forum and found those exact AI complaints being made there too. I often find though that an official forum can distort the negative aspects of a game and isn't a very useful gauge for a game.

Looks like I'll stick to Civ 4 then!

[Hauptman]

Its still a great game. I enjoyed it for a few months. But no it doesnt have the staying power of civ

[Virulent]

I'm considering giving EU3 a shot as well and I'm wondering if it's worth getting the Napoleon's Ambition expansion pack for it?

[Will9]

Originally posted by Virulent
I'm considering giving EU3 a shot as well and I'm wondering if it's worth getting the Napoleon's Ambition expansion pack for it?

Yes.

The EU3 NA has a bad AI. Regular EU3 has an incredibly bad AI. EU3 NA also runs much faster and has much easier interface.

I'd like to clearify that I'm not calling EU3 bad, just it has alot things to work out.

[Blaupanzer]

Personally, I thot the EU series sucked. Looks great. Especially the big battles. But plays very poorly.