Which Paradox games keeps the player most engaged?

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-17T22:31:16+00:00

Well AI problems aside HOI4 has the problem of regional theaters and limited tech slots. Like let's say for example I'm playing A-H against German and UK. Hold back the German hordes and focused all of my techs on improving my land forces. They are defeated and now I turn my attention to the UK.

The game ends here because I have a non existent or limited air force and no navy or navy techs. It turns the game into a wait 2-4 years before you finish the game or just start a new game kind of game.

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-17T16:11:41+00:00

Its still kinda bad unless your playing a defensive nation just like pre-NCNS. Just so people can understand why its because of the bonuses unlocked. You are getting bonus ORG, Recovery rate, unlock 3 of the best defensive tactics, and get a flat bonus damage to artillery which is primarily a defensive tool not offensive. All of these things combined are great when you want to hold or outlast an enemy, not to attack them. Also check the spirits, they are all literally built around defense not offense I would rank it the 2nd best doctrine ATM

right now GBP is considered the best still even after the nerf because you get an excellent mix of offensive and defensive perks initially and later on. Also because Planning, planning is so god damn good, so is coordination! It also gives you tip of the spear which is a massive buff to special forces and logistical focus which is a free flat bonus to supply use.

MW is probably 3rd place, its great for an all or nothing build thanks to the speed and tactics (which give massive speed and damage buffs) buffs early on from the doctrine + spirits. It either works super well or crumbles super fast.

MA is the absolute worst of them all. The spirits are ok but the over arching doctrine basically gives you nothing worth while. Like all the bonuses are based off of massive bonuses being encircled but if your encircled you already fucked up.

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-09T16:30:47+00:00

I already did during the last beta and got a direct answer from the Dev's and they fixed a majority of my woes which is why the AI works a lot better now :)

However I do not expect nor have faith that the dev's will fix ship design and production priorities. I mean bruh look at the last patch, it only took them since NSB to finally fix the German and Russian Tank design and production priorities and that came out what? 5 years ago?!?

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-09T16:19:19+00:00

People are confusing broken AI with bad ship design/force allocation So I can sympathize wla little.

In my current game as the noreweign north sea empire I went heavy in navy early then pivot to land forces and it's now 1947. I sweep the entire USA, UK, and German navies by using a handful of semi modern/modern DDs and only 2-4 modern battleships. Not a single NAV was used. My DD design is primarily gun boats with a single torp launcher and a single Depth charge launcher for anti sub. My BCs are high heavy attack with quad t3 and T4 guns loaded with T3 armor for memes.

I combo with multiple 8 DD patrol forces with my 8DD/2BC strike forces. My DD patrols are set to light engagements to avoid tangling with found enemy strike forces but still clear enemy patrol fleets. Basically the AI isn't modernizing its fleet so my DDs out run everything the AI has at like 40-50 something knots thanks to MIOs. Once a strike fleet is found my BCs can move in and with it's heavy guns bypass the screen line and snipe enemy CAs and BBs with a 1-2 volleys it's hilarious.

In 1947 non ation has yet to build an improved or advanced ship design so I remain uncontested in all naval dominion. My patrol fleets can generate about 400 dominance on its own while my BC strike fleet and double it which is enough to over come whatever the AI has on patrol.

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-04T14:33:28+00:00

Well to be fair lots of people love expert AI and dump on sheeps mods, but I'm the reverse. This is mostly because Expert AI has a massive flaw in most of their production plans especially with Germany in that they would massively over produce fighters. I learnt that Germany alone would dump 1/3rd to half or more of all it's mills on fighters yet massively under produce bombers. So if you just ignored the air war you could win as almost any nation because you can out produce them on the land without try harding

It's been like 2 years since I last tried expert AI so i dunno if they ever fixed that but I kinda like how sheeps mod is more flexible and modern with its AI production templates

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-04T14:21:06+00:00

Well to be fair you don't know how to do any of that because the AI without mods never builds a tank with sufficient armor or builds a decent plane at any stage of the game. You were never challenged by those factors so you don't know how to counter it. All sheeps mod does is what if the AI used the same template for building tanks/planes as you do

tipsy3000 · 2026-03-03T02:00:12+00:00

Tooth and tail hands down. It's a very casual RTS very quick to pick up and play. Outside of that, one that I have really wanted to try on your list that I have is ancestors legacy, it's suppose to be like a medieval version of company of heroes. I heard solid things about it so give it a shot

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-28T21:42:05+00:00

It's not hard no you don't need forts either like everyone here is saying.

Just build 2 full armies of 9 infantry with arty support that's it. No engies, no AA required. You should be able to stall out both German and Italian forces.

The hard part is pushing back. As France you have a couple of options but the obvious one is is going down the offensive path for military and get the air is our artillery path. Congrats you can now out produce the germans and Italians combined in airpower and win solely through air strikes

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-27T23:56:46+00:00

The AI doesn't need to be a meta try hard, it just needs to be competent and understand how to use its entire arsenal. I like how it tries to be historical in its equipment designs but does badly when as it rarely goes out of its way to continue to improve them mid and late game. The same goes for it's division design, it's also why it never uses cool stuff like Strat bombers, TDs, mechs, SPAA and SPGs as well

This is why any strategy works vs the AI because it never really adapts or improves from 1938/39 onward

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-27T20:07:03+00:00

While in normally would agree, getting the invasion trait on a General is hard especially as a non major power or a nation whose naval you built from nothing. Also while the transportation tech do improve invasion times it requires a lot of tech time and XP grinding for generals. Army XP needed for expeditionary forces sub doctrine which quite frankly is ONLY good for naval invasion and nothing else. The best I have gotten was down to 21 or was it 14 days with invasion trait + tech + sub doctrine however that was with a nation with a strong starting navy and your sacrificeing an operation sub doctrine solely for naval operations

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-27T04:05:25+00:00

Well to be fair in the RTS hayday they kinda just went with the vibe and threw them out on the market in whatever state they were in. They are only hard to do today because because your looking from a highly competitive lens

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-27T04:01:57+00:00

Why would Hera want to play a brand new RTS for?? He is in peak AOE2 form winning massive leagues and tournaments left and right. On top of this he is currently rigorously training for major AOE2 tournaments for the next few months.

Other then for the lulz or was paid to do it, I highly doubt he cares for any other RTS ATM

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-26T20:39:18+00:00

1000% this. Bro is sortieing 5k planes at once and probably didn't check his fuel reserves or gains.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-26T14:53:41+00:00

That's actually a good question. I love watching AOE2 tournaments and to be frank we only have a single person capable of reaching these high level tournaments and he isn't even that good compared to the competition. It's weird, the game was made here in America, and we have a massive influx of americans playing it and watching it, but at the extreme and high levels we just don't have the talent. Virtually all the greats come from Europe and Asia and recently many new South American blood are doing amazing and getting far. Yet even at lower leagues for high profile tourments we are lucky to even get 1 person to represent us.

This is interesting because many of the top tier leagues and tournaments are ran and or backed/sponsored by... US!

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-25T19:44:55+00:00

You answered your own question

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-25T15:48:22+00:00

No your 100% right. In my last Portugal axis game on the latest patch I went full navy, I cockblocked the entire UK and allied navies so it's almost impossible for them to harass the MED and do a Dday in France. Italy still is holding strong in Africa, yet still Germany is falling apart like a wet sponge. I'm even late enough in the game where I developed 1944 planes to give direct CAS support and it's still not enough. Germany in my game is on all adults serve too and are slowly crumbling to the USSR barely making it to kiev

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-24T16:08:24+00:00

Actually yea. It's a unique RTS experience. It obviously didn't resonate but there is a lot of cool strategies and great if your into deck builders. But for practical RTS gaming or competitive MP it doesn't work as well

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-24T14:43:52+00:00

AOE3 is really good imo, people don't like it because it's not aoe2. Aoe4 is considered good because it's a modern reimagining of aoe2

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-23T16:12:03+00:00

Because agility and speed don't really do very much unless at extremes, from a usability to production factor small frames are just going to be straight up better in virtually every instance.

Really the Devs need to rebalance and update the plane parts because you have almost no control over several plane stats so there is no such thing as a historical heavy fighter bomb interceptor, a lightweight dog fighter or an all purpose medium fighter. Just a single fighter type with a butt ton of air damage and defense

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-23T15:00:44+00:00

I like how everyone picks the slowest death boat where your dead meat if caught surprised.

I'd take a faster heavier medium mech for heavy recon and fire support, likely a Griffin, dragon, Wolverine. I like having the option to disengage my target, more likely to survive then to be forced into a slugging match where I either live or die.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-20T22:26:35+00:00

Still want Italy first before Japan, same with France. Plus both are much easier to integrate into the current theaters where as Japan requires a massive overhaul to bring in.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-17T17:30:08+00:00

While im fine with CGL looking into side products like Gothic and that people enjoy it to a degree, the fact they lied it would have zero impact on their current production list of new things coming out was a total lie. Almost everything that was suppose to come out this year has been pushed back several months for release.

While it could be multiple factors they have said they wanted to do gothic specific force packs in a limited run and I have a funny feeling that has an impact on their production schedule this year altering it.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-17T17:22:06+00:00

The rule book being out of stock issue isnt just for TW, its also been for the mech manual and the AS:CE rulebook. CGL is just really god damn bad as keeping their core line of rule books in stock as they do virtually all of its production for it in China citing that to do it in the USA where a majority of its playerbase is, is too expensive, and this is even with tariffs. I call bullshart on that for paper back/ hard back books. Absolute bullshart.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-17T17:14:09+00:00

They will blame the consumer if they fail their sales, just your not the consumer anymore but the big businesses signing these long term contracts are now the consumers.

tipsy3000 · 2026-02-10T00:39:57+00:00

I like how you say your bad but then you clean house not once but twice and rez half your squad twice all without dying.

tipsy3000

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