EU5: the obsession with "Status Quo" --- l'eterna ossessione dello "Status Quo"

[AleTrack]

Hi everyone,
I wanted to open a discussion about what I consider the most frustrating flaw in the current AI management and balance of Europa Universalis V, especially after sinking many hours into it and pushing through the late game.
The overwhelming impression is that the game doesn't use complexity to create a genuine strategic challenge; instead, it feels designed to artificially slow down and punish the human player to force a constant status quo. Here are the core issues I find completely unacceptable in the current game design:
• The "Difficult Times" disaster: This mechanic isn't "challenging"—it’s just anti-historical and incredibly tedious. It completely breaks your country out of nowhere, forcing you to spend 15 years of real-world gameplay staring at the screen at maximum speed, unable to do absolutely anything but wait for the timer to run out. It turns a grand strategy game into a boring bureaucracy simulator.
• Western Bias (even with World Randomizer): I’m currently playing a Muscovy campaign. I understand the desire for historical accuracy, but even when setting the world to random in the options, Western nations always maintain an unbreakable economic and structural superiority. Playing in Eastern Europe feels like starting with handcuffs on, dealing with punitive mechanics while the West prospers effortlessly.
• Absurd combat calculations and AI "miracles": Can someone explain how battles are actually calculated? I found myself in clear numerical superiority, fielding an army of professional heavy infantry, fighting an enemy made up almost entirely of light infantry. The result? My entire army was wiped out. The math behind the dice rolls, combat width, and terrain modifiers feels heavily rigged in favor of the AI.
• Lobotomized Vassals and Allies: Managing subject armies is infuriating. Even when setting their stance to "Supportive" (ordering them to stick together and back me up), my vassals' troops constantly split up, getting picked off one regiment at a time. As for Western allies, it’s even worse. In a recent war, our combined forces were more than double the enemy’s size, packed with professional armies. Right at the peak of the war, just one step away from total victory, my AI ally decided to sign a separate white peace just to maintain the status quo.
The entire system feels engineered with a single goal in mind: to stop human expansion by any means necessary, using cowardly allies, brain-dead vassal AI, and punitive economic straitjackets. Trying to develop your cities and colonize the northern tribes becomes pure torture when the game engine actively sabotages your every military or diplomatic effort.
After all this time since release, it’s honestly shocking that the AI management still suffers from such glaring, deep-rooted issues. Are you guys experiencing the same roadblocks with Eastern nations, or is Muscovy just uniquely broken/punitive in this patch?
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Ciao a tutti,
volevo aprire una discussione su quello che ritengo essere il problema più frustrante dell'attuale gestione dell'IA e del bilanciamento in Europa Universalis V, specialmente dopo averci speso parecchie ore e aver superato diverse fasi avanzate.
L’impressione generale è che il gioco non usi la complessità per creare sfida, ma per rallentare artificialmente e punire il giocatore umano, forzando un costante status quo. Vi elenco i punti che trovo sinceramente inconcepibili nel design attuale:
• Il disastro dei "Tempi Difficili": Questa meccanica non è "sfidante", è semplicemente antistorica e noiosa. Ti mette in ginocchio dal nulla e ti costringe a passare 15 anni di gioco reale a fissare lo schermo a velocità massima senza poter fare assolutamente nulla se non aspettare che scada il timer. Trasforma un grand strategy in un simulatore di burocrazia e noia mortale.
• Il favoritismo dell'Occidente (anche con il World Randomizer): Sto giocando una partita con la Moscovia. Capisco il desiderio di rimanere fedeli alla storia, ma anche attivando le opzioni di casualità del mondo nelle impostazioni, i paesi occidentali mantengono sempre una superiorità strutturale ed economica imbattibile. Giocare nell'Est Europa significa partire sempre azzoppati, con meccaniche punitive che ti bloccano mentre l'Europa occidentale prospera senza sforzo.
• I calcoli astrusi e i "miracoli" militari dell'IA: Qualcuno mi spiega come vengono calcolate le battaglie? Mi sono ritrovato in netta superiorità numerica, con un esercito di fanteria pesante professionale, a scontrarmi con un nemico che schierava praticamente solo fanteria leggera. Risultato? Il mio intero esercito è stato piallato. I calcoli dietro i dadi e le modifiche dei terreni sembrano completamente sbilanciati a favore dell'IA.
• Vassalli ed Alleati con la lobotomia: La gestione delle armate dei sudditi è frustrante. Nonostante imposti l'ordine di rimanere uniti e fare "solo appoggio" (Supportive), le truppe dei miei vassalli si separano costantemente andando a farsi distruggere un reggimento alla volta. Per non parlare degli alleati occidentali: in una guerra recente avevamo un esercito complessivo che era più del doppio del nemico, pieno di truppe professionali. Nel momento migliore della guerra, a un passo dalla vittoria totale, l'IA del mio alleato decide di firmare una pace bianca per mantenere lo status quo.
Tutto il sistema sembra progettato con un unico scopo: impedire in ogni modo l'espansione e la crescita del giocatore umano, usando alleati codardi, vassalli con un'IA imbarazzante e modificatori economici punitivi. Sviluppare le città e colonizzare le tribù del nord diventa una tortura se il motore di gioco sabota ogni singolo sforzo bellico o diplomatico.
A distanza di così tanto tempo dall'uscita, trovo assurdo che la gestione dell'IA presenti ancora carenze così macroscopiche. Capita anche a voi con le nazioni dell'Est o è la Moscovia a essere particolarmente buggata/punitiva in questa patch?

[tonypa]

Yes, western Europe has clear advantage in the game, but it is historically accurate. Personally, I enjoyed my Muscovy campaign a lot.

I do not think there is any "anti-human" behaviour from AI nations. They are just dumb. The allies and vassals behave with same amount of stupidity even when they are facing non-human opponents.

Does anyone know how battles really work? No, not really. Some people have theories but there are so many modifiers, mechanics and calculations involved that nobody understands it fully. Short answer is - larger army is better. But you can still lose battles because you picked some government reform or passed some law or added some privilege 300 years ago when the game started.

[Noname]

You are more or less right. Games feel like they made it to punish players that still want to play. Every mechanic that is not going in that direction is changed over time to make it the "right" way. Basically there is a very vocal minority on the Paradox forum that needs the game to be harder, and no matter how hard it is, it's never enough for them. So they push Paradox in that way every day of the year.

Paradox lacks any vision for this game's future. All they do is reactive changes that make this game go 180 every major patch. There is almost nothing left from the game that was at the start. You have a mechanic working one way for a few months that changes to the opposite effect in few next. So they listen to that small player base because they know that it is last part of their player base that is still willing to pay for next DLCs, and offending them means no money for this project.

About other points:
1. Disasters.
Yeah, disasters are a terrible experience right now that make your progression stop in place or straight up punish you for doing something. Looking at it from a historic perspective, there were at least a few such situations in history of different countries that made that country stop or regress. For example, "Time of Troubles" for Russia, religious wars in France (Catholics vs. Huguenots), or the English Civil War (Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell). So there should be such situations, but players should have more tools to avoid them or make them go away faster.

2. Western Bias
From the start of this game the most powerful countries are rulers of China (most of the time Ming, but not always) and the major country of India subcontinent. They are strongest thanks to how much population there is and thanks to their RGOs variaty. Western countries are strong, but for around 400 years (from around 1500 till 1950) of our history, Europe was dealing cards for the whole globe, so it's more or less historically accurate.

3. Combat is bad, most of the time the best solution is to make a cavalry professional army (heavy cavalry mostly), because of modifiers they have. Heavy cav vs. balanced pro army, and cav will win most of the time, even with a lack of bonus for variety. Patch 1.4 will make it even worse because moving from hourly ticks to daily.

4. Yes, AI is still tragic when it comes to splitting it into forces for no reason or making a peace deal in a won war to change the situation by 180. It's not fun at all and can be very frustrating, especially when you are fighting in a war where you are allied to many minor nations fighting one strong country. For example, trying to fight Bohemia as Poland allied to Hungary. Theoretically both sides can have very similar amounts of troops, but Hungary refuses to combine forces, and Bohemia can pick them up without any problem.

Plus, on top of that, the coalitions don't work in this game at all. From a player perspective, it's even easier to use it for expansion when you know what you are doing. Minor countries with 1-2k armies refuse to combine forces and tickle down their manpower vs. one strong opponent.

[ABoxFullOfKittens]

Originally posted by Noname:

Plus, on top of that, the coalitions don't work in this game at all. From a player perspective, it's even easier to use it for expansion when you know what you are doing. Minor countries with 1-2k armies refuse to combine forces and tickle down their manpower vs. one strong opponent.

This is accurate-ish.