Quote Originally Posted by Driderman View Post
I guess that might work. It's basically why I stopped playing EUIV (for now, at least), I got tired of games either having to revolve around hindering France, or taking place far away from Europe. I don't really like to be forced to worry about how to curtail France from the get-go when I start a game as Tuscany, Pomerania or such, for example.
unfortunately, that's just generally how things go in Paradox games and i think Napoleon proved how dangerous France could be historically too. However, you don't really have to always worry about France. As you metnioned, you could play outside of Europe, even playing a nation such as Russia or The Ottomans tends to be far enough away for me to not really worry about them(unless they get !!ENORMOUSLY MASSIVE!!). I've also had some of my most enjoyable games as Manchu and Ming...With Ming being the most recent.

and currently i'm actually playing a rather successful game as Scotland and have no intentions in curtailing France as they've been my ally from the start. So France isn't really all gloom and doom, but I do agree that they can definitely be a pain unless you're far enough away or best buds with them.


In other news, I really wish there was something you could do with map information. Right now I don't really explore more than i need to to colonize, because i feel like exploring too much speeds up map spread, which of course leads to the AI discovering uncolonized land, which then leads to messy colonial borders. Maybe if you could sell map information? I know that would speed up map spread even further, but it'd at least be some sort of incentive to exploring more than you have to to colonize.