My Honest Opinion on EU4 1.37 Winds of Change 

The Poland, Bohemia and Hungary PU's do make sense, 1 year before the game start they did all have the same king

Literally the start date of eu4 is the time, where the PU king of Hungary Poland and Bohemia died, also the then king of Hungary went and PU d the bohemians, and took Wien.

Iv played a bit of timmie and and use to be "complicated" forming persia but now it easy but there is a whole mission tree and im like yeah why did i form persia its boring done it before but this mission tree off timmie i need to explore .

I don't like mission trees and the mission trees got way to overpowered.

I agree with you completely for once, Austria, France, Spain etc are now way too overpowered after all the latest patches. Then again… I now am on a Trebizond game, and I love the new mission tree. It gives you enough power without handing you anything for free. Conclusion: PDX gives the «big» tags FFA missions to attract new players. Hence why I only play «small» tags like Ardabil, Hisn Kayfa (new missions are cool as well), Novgorod etc. Then you can play longer and with more challenges, to keep it interesting for a while

Overall let's say since Lions of the North I see that Paradox in place of new mechanics instead makes more and more OP MTs and some nations are just absolutely broken to the point it's not even fun.

Still on my Venice campaign, there is this part of the mission tree that requires universities and a colonizing branch that slows you down from forming italy, which is a huge shame as the rewards are pretty good, but the way to get there isn't realy that helpful if you want to form Italy fast. I have yet to try other nations in 1.37 so my opinion on them is more of what I have seen others do rather than my own experience.

Paradox: and when everyone's op, no one will be

1. hungary doesnt need to be a formable. 2. inca changes are cool, the long mission tree makes the wait less boring pre 1500, though high american shouldnt be a thing. aztecs are too op now 3. Austria changes suck, they buffed the strongest nation way too much. 4. They need to give the VOC a mission tree and unique ideas. I played the EIC instead of the VOC because atleast they have unique ideas but still no missions. its a pretty fun start because you dont have to core any of india if you release it with 2k overextension as england. 5. the new dutch mission tree rocks. 6. pre winds of change plc was pu able from bohemia and hungary so thats not new (op but not part of the update) Overall a good dlc but the power creep is noticable and austria is stronger than the ottomans which is saying something.

Regarding Austrian PUs, I'd say the ease of getting Spain is finally historically accurate. Before that we kinda had to PU them on our own while in history, it kinda happened. The PUs on Bohemia and Hungary however should be harder to get and come about later. It's literally reverse

This was the first dlc I bought on launch. I am not saying that I am disappointed but I just finished my first run as Tims and I did not have a good time.

I did a Hungary game and allied Poland the vessel swarmed ottomans

I’m disappointed in the new world changes. I always liked them because they were really challenging early game, but they had some great rewards. Now they just feel too easy.

I haven't played eu4 after this patch came out, but civilised natives always were the same (esp. Maya/Aztecs, they were literally the same, as in you just paint Mesoamerica), you conquer&suffer x5, then Europeans arrive and I, despite never cheesing religions or anything rarely was more than 2 mil techs behind them and even the first war was never unwinnable. I hope they at least fixed Inca because if usual colonisers deside to kick rocks instead you could be stuck as unreformed until late 1500s (my worst one was 1587) while every nation with explo decs you on cooldown 😭

I think they should do the same with byzantium for mesoamericans, a hard but fun mission tree, debuffs and buffs when you overcome the danger facing you(ottos-Europeans) etc.

Mission trees are still far too easy to complete, making them bigger just makes it worse/easier, especially with the currying favours mechanic which in general is trash and should be removed.

Couldn't agree more on the Spain PU. Just raising Trust and opinion gets you all of spain and all of their colonies, for literally no cost besides a few owned provinces in Iberia? Absolutely insane

Although the PU's make a lot of sense for Poland, Bohemia and Hungary. I do agree with the idea that they all feel similar. Also allthough you didn't go into it. I would like to bring up the Dutch mission tree, the government reform that gives you more development cost, however higher autonomy if you own land outside of the historic borders, I love that, it's also another example of giving choice, picking or not picking the government reform.

Just on the germany mission that used to give admin efficiency, i think you can still get it. I read the dev diary and the reward is based on which german culture you are. Some (most?) Of them have a unique option, all of which are underwhelming, but the default option is 5 admin efficiency. I will admit that i havent tested this but i believe if you fiddle around with culture swaps you should be able to get the admin efficiency. Really wierd chenge imo, always felt like that mission was the defining one of the old tree, and most of the new rewards are just inconsequential. Edit: apparently this got changed, rip forming germany

Personally, I'm pretty much over all the mission trees. It was a fun novelty when they introduced them, but now it's just out of control power creep and dumber and dumber shit getting added each patch. Not to mention that they've pretty much become the main feature of every DLC. Before, we got HRE reworks, naval raiding, razing... you know, mechanics. Now it's all just long checklists with infinite buffs to give you dopamine boosts every 5 minutes. Not to mention that they completely trivialise expansion. You just get PU CBs handed for free, claims on half of the world. The worst thing is, most of the missions aren't even that interesting. I roll my eyes every time they want me to dev some random province to 30 or dev some backwater deserts to 10 each and build workshops in all of them. Then the rest are just "Conquer X to get more claims". They're very repetitive, so what do they do? Stack them with wackier and wackier bonuses to make them seem interesting.

Unfortunately I feel like this DLC continues on EU4's trend that has been going on since the introduction of the mission trees: the power creep is so intense that it's not funny to play the game anymore. I agree with your points, and you brought up good examples. However I feel like I have an even stronger opinion that yours: your examples are good because, at this point, Paradox is not even trying: PU with Spain is insane, and the Aztecs are not fun to play anymore; but things were like this also before, in a more subtle way: Netherlands special light ships were (and are still) insane, to the point that you can easily rule the waves in less than 50 years (and now Netherlands can integrate England before 1500); Portugal is capable of creating an eastern colonial empire reaching Tokyo before 1500; Oirat can snowball out of our plane of existence in just some decades; and with almost every other big nation in Europe you can obtain really strong PUs without even trying. Focusing so much on power creep and alternative history has created either a bunch of very strong nations with which you can reach your goals very easily in the spawn of 50-60 years (thanks to their mission trees), or a very large group of minor nations with no real flavour and generic mission trees (which, if you wanted to introduce mission trees in the first place, it's equally bad than having one which makes the game too easy)

cuul vid. don't like mission trees in general i want mechanics, I like the new achievements though, they pretty fun ones I want a Ottoman invasion game option to make them like a super op Stelarus endgame threat or somin, but EU5 soon

I personally like this type of video :) your review of it mission by mission and with you having been grinding through these campaigns the last two weeks gives you a unique and well-educated perspective on this

The thing I really dislike with the Austria tree is that it felt like I just played through the Europa Expanded tree but with flavour removed. Which is upsetting because when they brought those devs on to help those devs decided to just try and shove their op mod into base game.

I appreciate your point of view, but you're on the fringe of the player base lol, most of us are monkeys. *shrugs*

Honestly, every nation that was touched in 1.37 just feels like you're playing on easymode. The trees are overpowered in a way that any half decent player can snowball so fast. I played bohemia and without playing optimally and not trying to rush anything I had a PU over everybody so quickly and didn't have a single difficult war, now there's nothing that can stop me in the game. It just feels like they are letting eu4 come to an end with the focus on their new game so they just let everything be OP. Like what the hell is American frontier lol

In 1.36 AI started stealing my trade. In 1.37 France gave me an enforce peace in my war. If AI starts to destroy shitty building and actually builds manufacturies and regimental camps instead of docks and shipyards it will finally be a challenge in single player. (and also if they stop running around siberia when you occupy their homeland)

Love this kind of content

One issue I have with these new trees is that the "intentional" chain formations seem to be way easier and stronger than they used to be. In my Hisn Kayfa game, without doing a single state-unstate I was able to chain their powerful missions, the Mamluk missions, and Persia. Practically every government reform was unique

I mostly agree with you, but I think I'm even more disappointed by the Germany changes. I agree with what you said about the Kaiserreich mission. That's also the thing I dislike the most. But the rest of the mission tree doesn't really offer much either if you ask me. That whole cultural union/fragmentation thing just seems like a nerf to me. I also don't see how it would make any sense. Why are cultures that were previously part of my empire now unaccepted all of sudden just because the name of my country changed? I know there are some incredible modifiers in that mission tree, but Germany is only formable pretty late into the game. So most of these modifiers are kind of useless, because I really don't need economic buffs that late in the game. But maybe that's just me (I pretty much only play single player). So honestly I prefer the old 'mission tree' if you could call it that, because at least it didn't nerf me and the buffs it provided were actually good.

I think the main issue is that mission trees are inherently flawed, in that they railroad you into doing a certain strategies or certain options. Straying away from this feels sub optimal. Also mission trees are becoming less and less enjoyable as the rewards they give basically win the game for you. Basically every catholic monarchy is just "PU/subjugate all of Europe!".

I was feeling much the same way about this patch until I played the Timurids. Wow are they better now, great mission tree, multiple paths, loads of replayability.

The reason I like the mission trees was it made you want to go for a more historical path and made it easier to do so, now it just feels like a conquor 1/3 of the world with extra steps. I don't even remember the last time I justified a claim myself, the game just tells me which way to go.

I think the devs themselves dont know if they want to balance the game or not it appears like some of them do while others dont. For example when Lions of the north came out Poland could Pu Bohemia, Hungary and Lithuania in the first five years then the devs realised its too strong and changed it so now Poland can only pu Hungary or Bohemia but now 1.37 comes out and both Bohemia and Hungary can get the Bohemia, Poland, Lithuania and Hungary power blop in like a decade again or now Austria which can just get Spain completely for free. The dev would need to sit down and actually figure out if they want to balance the game or not.

about the loyalty mission . is it really that bad? you start with 30 crown land if you dont give out mana privilags you are 40 by 54 so simplifyed it just means you start with - 120( propably more like 150 after you take the time into accoutn that it takes for loyalty to rise to 60 ) and yes you might need to give out some privilages purly for loyalty (free enterprise, Supremacy over the crown, Oversight ) of ever Mana typ obviously it hurts especially early game where mana points are most precious. id say overall mission trees are to strong the problem is ,its a stratagy game ,where i should be rewarded for finding the best strat but usually the best strat is just follow mission tree to get Pus over everyone and that just means you stop thinking about a big plan you just optimize how to get there. feel like the reason they made the HRE so strong is because well we all just played HRE vassal swarm and never interacted with the end game tag.

The Netherlands also gets a very easy PU on England/GB, they really gave PUs in silver platters

I'm playing the forgotten nations of the DLC and i LOVE the OP'nes of the arabic merchant gov reform, I'm in the stage of the game (1500-1550) that with just trade ideias i can get to 51% in ethiopia inland node JUST WITH THE MERCHANT AND THE CHEAPEST REFORM not owning any land in the node, that is definitly the money making machine, that nation is now bulletprof against early bankrupcky.

Mesoamerica is way too strong. I did so many things wrong aa Aztecs like not using tributaries, not unlocking High American tech asap (I thought why unlock it now when a later mission also has it as a reward) and unironically using the Sacrifice Ruler/Heir button. Now it's the Age of Reformation and I'm #1 Great Power... American Frontiers is also extremely busted since it also takes away possible colonisation targets from the Europeans, making them even weaker.

I really don't know how to feel about how Eu4 is ending. There were a lot of missed opportunities here. If I could have it my way, and get one last dlc, I would do the following: Alt-hist Yugoslavia formable with pan-slavic missions similar to that russian branch, and a general balkan rework since only albania is good right now. Formable Madagascar. Better Colonial Nation formables with mission trees and Native paths to westernization. I really thought with there being a "Mexico" tag already in game would mean that Aztecs might get a branching paths option to go "High American" or to "Westernize" akin to how the mamluks can turn western and go Egypt now. The United States could use a mission tree, as could Haiti. I really thought that before the game ended they would give you an option to swap-midgame to play as your newly spawned colonies, so you could live out the fantasy of independence. 13 Colonies mission tree into Independent America would go hard, but they're too focused on giving trees and flavor to tags that exist at game start rather than the ones that organically formed later. I want more Colonial Region Alt-Hist and rebellions, and a general nerf to colonial speed in general. The new world should be a much more dynamic theatre again, like some of the old dev clashes from years ago. Right now they get filled out by 4 colonial powers in less than 200 years after game start. Colonial Nations should not be allowed to gobble up tribal land. I think tribal land should severely slow colonization. And if a war starts and you're fighting a migratory tribe, you should only be able to take the one province they currently own, not all the tribal land getting instantly cored. That land should be simply lose its owned status to the tribe, and allow to be colonized as usual without any debuffs.

They make the game too easy. Last dlc i bought was Domination and even that made the game easier but at least it balanced it somewhat after Leviathan buffed the rest of the world. Ideally, I would have Emperor be the final dlc and only add the monuments from Leviathan. Getting free PUs on major powers with ease is boring.

comparing the nations now to eu4 release is so crazy, every nation that has relatively new MT etc just feels way to op. I play on VH and by 1500 every single game i am steamrolling everything. i force myself to not cheese and play more tall to avoid just blob. this trend worries me going into eu5.

I agree with Aztec being somewhat OP, developmentally they were equivalent to some of the most populated areas of Europe and the only real difference is a lack of guns in Aztec empire which changed quickly due to trade.

I don't like them just making mission trees and no game features it's kinda lazy but I keep buying them cause I'm addicted and I wanna support the development of EU5 hope they don't fuck it up like victoria 3

I feel like that EU4 coming to a close and EU5 being so different has made them lean into some of the worst aspects of late EU4. I can't imagine playing the Aztecs will be easy when they have plagues kill 50% of your pops within ten years of contact with Spain.

What I would comment on for Bohemia is the the fact that they do not tell you that you need Krakow to form Great Silesia only after you PU Poland, so you can get stuck with a huge Poland that you need to annexe in order to form it, if you didn't take it in the PU peace deal. Also, sort of the same with Hungary but luckily, for that they made a decision to take nitra from them, which I never understood why they didn't do the same for Krakow...

Interesting content, give me more and more conversation about theory and choices instead of just telling us what is best (I also watch those tbf)

That's there DLC police at them moment, make the region of the DLC Overpowered, to push content creators.

4:37 I think that simply sending a warning to Burgundy should make them not decale on Provance and allow for both Bohemia and PLC PUs and Burgundy into HRE strat. A warning does like -10 to relations and that's all.

Ottomans are too op early game and too weak end game

If you feel the game is to easy why not up the difficulty?

The „winds“ DLC leaves me a little uneasy. I‘d just started a Austria run and restarted with 1.37 (without the DLC purchase) because I also feel the mission tree making it too easy. Unfortunately there are some gameplay bugs, for example „reign in italy“ only works via positive relations, defeated/pressed nations don‘t count. I feel pushed to buy the DLC, thinking the devs put their energy there…

what other opinion would be worth sharing.

For feedback, I like these kinds of videos, they provide some insight into what a playthrough might look like from a broad, player perspective, rather than having to go through all the minute steps of a full playthrough video. A nitpick is that I feel like you could've skipped over a few missions with Austria rather than caveating that you like them and you like the game and you're not hating etc. As for my own 2 cents it kind of feels a bit disappointing to leave some of these very popular, fun nations even MORE powercrept than they already were (and they were); and not only that but powercreep them at the COST of developing proper missions for other nations that did not get any love almost at all through the entireity of this game's life (Orthodox nations outside of Byz and Muscovy, North America, most of Africa especially the non-muslim, the German and French minors and more). That's a lot of not just nations but whole regions that will never see more of a mission tree than 1 or 2 semi-personalized ones like "Impale the sultan". And again, all that just to overcreep and overfill mission trees of nations that were in _no_ need of it whatsoever. For a DLC called "Winds of Change" it just doesn't feel like much has changed since 1.36

7:55 For Austria I’m pretty okay with everything granted diplo annex is not my thing so I don’t care. The 4 provinces is unbalanced but I’d rather do it the old way of being France rivaled 11:38 For the trio I get why but historically accurate. Also I feel like each tag has its own thing. Bohemia is designed as a HRE tag. Poland as an expansionist crusader. Hungary is non HRE Austria so has wildly different start

Bohemia gets 25% max effects of absolutism, hre gets i think 20 more... Thats 50 admin efficiency counting 5 from ideas... No tag switching or crazy tactics, just forming hre as bohemia

12:50 I a dev blog before they released 1.37 it was noted that if you have none of the german cultures as main you will get the 5% adm efficiency. No idea if thats still the case but it would be really odd that Germany without a german culture is just better.

Also imo a good nerf for Bohemia/Hungary would be to disallow them to PU both Poland and Lithuania by breaking the PU upon end of war with Lithuania and not allowing for Poland to pick Jagellion when it is a junior partner.

First game i tried austria, previous patches i could take most of europe and form hre, with this patch i formed Rome, took all of europe including the british isles, most of asia and all african gold mines. Super easy.

I like Bohemia, I didn't think of them being too op when I did the huss path. But the devs kinda pushed you a bit much on building tall I think. Also I think hordes feels amazing currently. It does feel good. I have not yet played the neatherlands but very hyped about it. I do also feel it's so much more common for Austria to gain the pu over Hungary. Being the one playing against them feels bad but I may have been skill issued. And I will agree, playing Austria does also look less appealing for me

Poland, Bohemia and Hungary PU's make sense since Poland and Hungary did have the same king one day before the start date, so did Bohemia and Hungary at one point, and by the end of 15th century all were ruled by Jagiellonian monarchs. It deffinitely should be more difficult to meet the conditions for getting those unions but them being in the mission trees is fine.

I hate it. I have a problem with that.

This is the most hoi4 like dlc to eu4 we have ever had. It would be ad if it's actually the last dlc. If another one would be the same I would consider switching to mods just like with hoi4.

I like the rant. It’s fun hearing others opinions on this game and its updates/features. Currently I’m playing Venice and having quite a bit of fun

I formed the Holy Roman empire shortly before the dlc released so I'm interested if anything got changed about it

I appreciate your perspective and analysis. I think this kind of discussion is lacking in a lot of the eu4-youtube space, and i found it refreshing

You make some good points.

Ai cheats monarch points

I like that i dont have feel like i gotta hard cheese the game to get satisfying buffs on a nation so the more broken single tags feel better for me. Its nice that i can feel more powerful in not so many convoluted steps ie tag switching save scuming events, ect

I think there is one niche of the old sacrifice ruler button: you can use it if your subject is disloyal. The new button requires them to be loyal.

Great video, love your voice Spain PU in like 2 buttons with no war with Spain? OP

With the game probably not getting anymore content reviewing countries like this would be a fun series before EU5

I do have to agree that the mission trees are too OP. Don't get me wrong, the introduction of mission trees is awesome and provides great content but they differ so much between one another. An old mission tree doesn't stand even close to an updated mission tree. They made many nations, that supposed to be hard, in a game that's supposed to be challenging - easy, too easy. I don't have the data but I'm almost sure most players of EU4 and most of the profit comes from veteran players who love the game for its replayablity and challenges. Also EU4 is a game where most of the player base doesn't go beyond 1650. So why make the early game more OP if it only means that players will drop their campaign earlier. It's awesome that they got so many new ideas along the development of the game (like monuments) but missions aren't very coherent across different regions and it itches me (for a lack of a better word).

have they fixed the bug where a country would dec on a subject of your subject? like, an english CN attacking a CN of your Portugal vassal/PU?

More like Winds of CRINGE

I hate mission trees with a burning passion. This game hasn't been fun since they were added.

Stop getting them to nerf the trees before I’ve had a chance to even play them 😫

Really like these discussion like videos, great to listen to

great comment

banana slamma

Solid Points.

Eu4 has too many modifiers and is only historical in the first day

since you asked for feedback, this was not only the worst video i ever watched on youtube, by far, this was also the biggest disappointment since my son. still watched the whole thing + here's a comment for engagement :) also more stuff in central america with the invasions CB plz

Man can increase his difficulty, but instead he chooses to complain lol

I like this kind of videos