Is "Defensive" meta?

[Witchdoctor`]

I've only started playing EU4 a couple weeks ago so I might be missing something but it seems like +15% morale boost from defensive ideas is too good to ignore isnt it? You have no chance of winning any early-mid armies if they have this idea, is there any reason NOT pick it every time? ofc if youre not playing tall

[Narrowmind]

I feel like it used to be much stronger. Morale is important earlier on, yes, but I still prefer offensive, depending on who I'm playing. Who are you playing?

[bri]

Certain nations don't need it as they have significant morale boosts in their national ideas fairly early on. Also, in single player you can get away with no military ideas at all even against nations that have it by fighting smart and piling up other sources of morale. I can't really say as far as multi-player because I've never done competitive multi-player.

[Totally Innocent Chatbot]

It's only part of any "meta" in PvP multiplayer groups, and even then typically no sooner than your third idea pick (often later even than that). Morale is nice and all, but especially in the early game a morale advantage can easily be overcome simply by having more troops. You can very easily out-scale the AI and only pick fights with people you outnumber by 50% or more, at which point a minor to moderate difference in army quality makes very little difference.

[Marquoz]

One of the biggest jumps in power I ever made as an EU4 player occurred in 2014, when I stopped taking military ideas in my first six unless an achievement required them. Instead, I spend my military monarch points on a permanent tech lead and rolling lots and lots of generals, which also increases army professionalism. The combination of a tech lead + high army professionalism + great generals + the idea group I take instead of a military one is stronger than taking a military idea group--in single player, anyway.

Instead of military ideas, I take groups that assist in expansion. The Big Three are always Admin (for CCR and GC), Diplomatic (for more and better diplomats to prevent coalitions from ever forming and for lower warscore costs), and Influence (to cheaply integrate the many vassals I will create and then absorb over the course of the game). The order varies--Diplomatic is often my first pick--but the Big Three remain the same.

After that, I pick either Religious or Humanist--one or the other, not both. Religious gives you the best CB in the game prior to imperialism and lots of conversion power, which helps with internal stability and earning papal influence. Humanist also boosts internal stability, and every single one of its ideas is useful, something you can't say about most groups.

To those four, I usually add Expansion and Trade. The order of groups 4-6 varies based on my game situation. Of course, if I'm playing a major colonizer like Castile, Exploration joins my list as the very first pick, and it's generally followed by Expansion as #2. But then I pick the Big Three.

Originally posted by Witchdoctor`:

I've only started playing EU4 a couple weeks ago so I might be missing something but it seems like +15% morale boost from defensive ideas is too good to ignore isnt it? You have no chance of winning any early-mid armies if they have this idea

But you do. By expanding efficiently and building a good alliance web, you swamp your enemies with numbers. And by having a tech lead, high professionalism, and rolling lots of good generals, you win your battles.

[Narrowmind]

What do you think about working on your subject's mission trees? Do you bother very often?

[Marquoz]

Originally posted by Ratlegion:

What do you think about working on your subject's mission trees? Do you bother very often?

This topic's not relevant to the current thread, but I'll answer anyway. No, I don't. In theory, it sometimes makes sense. If a subject mission gives it a bunch of new cores or perma-claims, it could be worthwhile to complete it. But in practice, I don't bother. I create new vassals, grab whatever cores they don't currently own, annex them, and repeat the process.

That may be a flaw in my game.

[bri]

Originally posted by Marquoz:

Originally posted by Ratlegion:

What do you think about working on your subject's mission trees? Do you bother very often?

This topic's not relevant to the current thread, but I'll answer anyway. No, I don't. In theory, it sometimes makes sense. If a subject mission gives it a bunch of new cores or perma-claims, it could be worthwhile to complete it. But in practice, I don't bother. I create new vassals, grab whatever cores they don't currently own, annex them, and repeat the process.

That may be a flaw in my game.

I'll occasionally look if I don't already know the vassal's mission trees but for a lot the simple fact they aren't independent blocks the useful missions. For example if Gascony completes their independent state mission it can eventually get perm claims on most of France but this isn't generally going to be useful to the player because they generally appear by being released as your subject.

[Narrowmind]

Thank you for answering, gentlemen.

Op, I apologize if I've derailed your thread.

[ChaffyExpert]

Not really, offensive gives you discipline, in addition to sieging faster, and sieges are what win wars. Quality and Quantity are also both better than defensive or offensive generally speaking, or just using the MIL points for tech instead of picking defensive ideas.

While defensive is good early game, morale doesn't matter as much later on compared to discipline, and the benefits of defensive become more useless over time, like why do i need fort defense if i destroy the AI's armies and siege their forts?

imo there is only really a few circumstances, such as fighting multiple wars or many strong nations, which, you shouldn't be in that situation. tbh if you need defensive, aside from the 15% morale, then you are probably doing something wrong.

Id say some nations are an exception, like defensive is a must for nations like Switzerland.

I don't play MP much anymore, but when i did, not only was defensive not the meta, but some players said it was actually pretty much trash, which i disagree with somewhat, early game morale is decent, an Austria player that picks defensive, or France, will be very strong early game.

[Keijo]

I like to use the mil points for bombarding forts, you can win wars super fast when you just bombard everything, stack 50-100k troops to each siege and they fall almost instantly.

[ChaffyExpert]

Originally posted by Keijo:

I like to use the mil points for bombarding forts, you can win wars super fast when you just bombard everything, stack 50-100k troops to each siege and they fall almost instantly.

This is exactly why defensive is actually one of the worse MIL ideagroups, although technically not bad, much of defensive's bonuses will never be used, army morale is the only one, if an enemy wants to siege the forts they can do so super quickly anyways with this bombard ability, that most of defensive ideas are basically useless.

Offensive on the other hand, while the MIL could be better spent, it's ideas are at the very least most of them are always at useful, or used in any case.

Like if you pay 400mil for extra defensiveness, but it doesn't matter, then that means you wasted 400 mil points, with several ideas that are basically useless, that means you are wasting 1000+ mil points.

That's alot of bombardment's worth of MIL points.

[Videogame Jukebox]

Its YOUniversalis vs THEMniversalis

[kgmi]

Mil ideas are a meme for meta play,

you only pick Quantity for QoL if you cant be bothered with attrition micro.
Utility idea groups are meta

how much land you can take per war
how much OE it gives
how fast you can core
how much mana you can save
how long you push until coalitionblocks stop your expansion in 1 direction

thats what bottlenecks a meta run
nobody picks mil ideas in an optimal run

[RCMidas]

Originally posted by Marquoz:

Originally posted by Ratlegion:

What do you think about working on your subject's mission trees? Do you bother very often?

This topic's not relevant to the current thread, but I'll answer anyway. No, I don't. In theory, it sometimes makes sense. If a subject mission gives it a bunch of new cores or perma-claims, it could be worthwhile to complete it. But in practice, I don't bother. I create new vassals, grab whatever cores they don't currently own, annex them, and repeat the process.

That may be a flaw in my game.

Any game where I'm in India or the Far East, I always try to grab an eastern Altai-culture vassal; one of Mongol, Khalka, Korchin, or Oirat culture specifically. I can then use their innate missions granting perma-claims over the rest of Asia and Russia to eat their way in that direction whilst I absorb places like Japan, Indonesia, India, Africa, and the Balkans into Germany and western Europe.

This does make them the single most powerful vassal you are ever likely to have, but it is not exactly an unmanageable one.

[ChaffyExpert]

Originally posted by kgmi:

Mil ideas are a meme for meta play,

you only pick Quantity for QoL if you cant be bothered with attrition micro.
Utility idea groups are meta

how much land you can take per war
how much OE it gives
how fast you can core
how much mana you can save
how long you push until coalitionblocks stop your expansion in 1 direction

thats what bottlenecks a meta run
nobody picks mil ideas in an optimal run

Not necessarily, for SP that may be the case, but for MP not so much.