Europa Universalis IV announced

[Octavian]

Tried the demo. Decided to cancel my preorder. Some (minor) issues such as ruler titles and the doge of Venice being elected every four years gave me a strong EU III vibe. This plus the fact that I'm not really into the era at the moment (waiting for Rome 2 :-P) and still haven't really played CK2 old gods made my cancel.

Will pick it up later when mods and patched have emerged (and perhaps a sale).

Map didn't suck.

[JonasSalk]

I like the ultra-zoom feature and the dozen new map modes. Makes things easier than before instead of clicking through a ton of provinces. Also, being able to select "build ship/army" and then click on the provinces you want to build them in, which are conveniently highlighted for you, is very nice. I haven't preordered, but I might. I dunno if the DLC is really worth it, though.

[Drakken]

Been playing around as Portugal. I love the fact that the system forces you to take big decisions on how you spend your power points, and that means you will need to decide whether it is really critical to buy that ubercool technology or it might be delayed somewhat. It forces you to slow down and think.

[Tamas]

Is it really super easy to convert provinces?

[Drakken]

Is it really super easy to convert provinces?

Tried to convert Tangiers with a missionary, estimated to take me a number of years (IIRC 11 as Portugal) or so before result. However I've had two rebellions I had to squash there while I was at war with France as an ally of Castille, so I had to remove my tired expeditionary force to go crush the revolt. Again, decisions, decisions, decisions.

You have a very limited number of missionaries (Portugal starts with 1, and wont't increase without tech), and using them puts all sorts of penalties on that province. I'd agree, however, that converting should take 20-30 years. I've stopped playing before seeing whether there's a chance of converting failing at the end, or not. Will explore further.

[crazy canuck]

Tried the demo. Decided to cancel my preorder. Some (minor) issues such as ruler titles and the doge of Venice being elected every four years gave me a strong EU III vibe.

Map didn't suck.

I have poked around for a few minutes and I have the opposite reaction.  There are enough new things here that it feels like a very different game for me.

I do agree that the map does not suck.

I think I am going to enjoy this one.

[Fireblade]

Realizations:

1. I have no idea how the fuck trade works.
2. Fucking France still always getting up in my allies shit. And not accepting WP.
3. Austria sucks.
4. Sweden is OP

[garbon]

The main thing I don't understand about trade is how do you know where your merchant is pushing trade to? Does he push out trade from a node to all nodes that are capable of receiving trade from there?

[JonasSalk]

Hopefully someone will put out a guide to trade at some point.

[Drakken]

Hopefully someone will put out a guide to trade at some point.

The in-game tutorial for trade is very good to start out.

[jimmy olsen]

"Peter Ebessen reunites the Eastern Empire in like 50 years"

The bolded bit is the most important part here.

[Richard Hakluyt]

Very enjoyable demo, I think we have a winner here. There is a possibility that the game is currently too easy in certain respects but it appears to me that simple modding of text files could cure a lot of this.

In my game as Portugal I really enjoyed the ability to make meaningful decisions. I decided from the start to ignore Morocco and its grotty bits of real estate (apart from keeping and converting and coring Ceuta and Tangier) and concentrate on building a colonial empire to facilitate trade profits. The policy in Europe was to ally with Spain but also to try and be friends with the other European powers. This worked well and I wasn't dragged into any European wars, I assisted Spain twice in their wars with North Africa's muslims though.

I was rather annoyed when the natives sacked and totally destroyed my colony of Luanda with its population of 962 

But by then we had a colony at the Cape and the beginnings of Empire in Brazil  .

Due to the concentration on peaceful development (I was even nice to the natives  ), Portugal in 1520 enjoyed cultural and religious unity, had good infrastructure and advanced tech, and was poised to start investigating the possibilities of diverting at least some of the Indian Ocean's trade our way.

[Solmyr]

I'll be happy to guide you all when the game is released. 

[Tamas]

I'll be happy to guide you all when the game is released. 

I didn't stay out of the beta so you could spoil it for me :p IF you can get Johan add me to the beta TODAY, you will be free to talk

[crazy canuck]

Yeah, I really enjoyed playing this.  Having to make decisions regarding how to spend monarch points is a big improvement and is an elegant design mechanism which addresses a lot of the problems in the former versions of the game. 

I think this is a big improvement and really the game I was hoping EU III would be.

@ Garbon, I am not sure but I think that when you forward trade on it goes to the trade node where you have a presence along the static trade paths.