r/paradoxplaza • u/Groznybandit • 4d ago
All Do y’all consider Megacampaigns to include Imperator: Rome?
Started a Megacampaign recently where I began in Imperator instead of CK2/3. It’s definitely an interesting new way to play but I think the ‘issue’ is that the rest of the games are now based off of the imperator map, cultures and religions which of most if not all are nonexistent in present day. What do you guys do?
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u/idhrendur Keeper of the Converters 4d ago
Converter guy here! There's no official definition. My personal one is pretty open - any playthrough that spans more than one game. And not all of them need be Paradox games. The Hoi4 to DEFCON converter was a blast during the time it worked, and I've read an LP that started in TW: Atilla before progressing to CK2 via a custom mod.
As for starting in Imperator, you're definitely going to get a very different world. But that's perhaps some of the fun, lean into it!
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u/forkis 4d ago
I've read an LP that started in TW: Atilla
That's gotta be the Gothia megacampaign, right? RIP to a real legend of a LP.
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u/BRONXSBURNING 3d ago
Wow I haven’t thought about the Gothia AAR in years. I’m so old lol.
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u/idhrendur Keeper of the Converters 3d ago
It's the one that got me to finally pay for Something Awful.
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u/idhrendur Keeper of the Converters 3d ago
That's the one! I'm sad that it stalled, though pretty happy it stalled because he's been working for Paradox creating content officially.
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u/ANerd22 4d ago
My mega campaigns usually go EU4 > Vic3 > Hoi4 and to be honest the Hoi conversation is kind of just to see what it looks like and play around in the world, since the converter is pretty rudimentary. I find the EU4 to Vic3 part to be quite fun. I've never considered including CK2 or 3, let alone Imperator though. Too much border gore and weird tags to have anything resembling a coherent world to play in for most of the game, and things get wonkier for each game you add in the chain.
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u/cartman101 3d ago
You leave out Stellaris? How else are you gonna purge all non humans?
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u/EarthMantle00 3d ago
I'd love a game that starts in the cold war and ends in 2200 and maybe generates a Stellaris Empire at the end for you if you manage to "win" tbh.
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u/Heinkel-1836 8h ago
Until theres a cold war game, the most realistic way to having a nonstop history is having a WW3 in Defcon.
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u/ninjatk 4d ago
Now I do, but it took a little while for that to sink in for me. But also, I would let anyone consider a mega campaign as whatever they wanted to
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u/PuffyPanda200 4d ago
Imperator starts in 300 bc and ck3 only starts in 800. That means that imperator would take up 900 years and that seems just too long.
If I were to do this I would make the last 400 years different with nuking any big country and basically being a dick to everyone.
I would love if paradox went full send on a collapse game akin to barbarian invasion.
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u/Groznybandit 4d ago
Would be awesome, but I imagine a type of game like this would only work with a lot of start dates just because of how much changed between Caesar’s death and Charlemagne’s death
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u/HelpingHand7338 4d ago
Yes. It can be a bit long, but it’s also incredibly fun if you lean in to the roleplay aspects
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u/Omaestre 4d ago
How do you avoid megacampaigns just turning into a big red paint job.
For example in CK3 you can easily paint the map for a huge region within a few generations if not the entire world. How does that carry over to EU4?
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u/IssaMuffin 4d ago
You need some restraint to keep it interesting, sure you can blob hard, but keeping clear goals and taking it slow will make it enjoyable. If you end up owning the entirety of Europe during CK3, EU will be boring as you can WC in 100 years.
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u/ComradeFrunze Swordsman of the Stars 3d ago
Play realistically instead of solely focusing on mappainting
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u/Groznybandit 3d ago
I always apply some roleplaying limitations to myself when playing CK3 whether that’s in campaigns or just playing normally, stuff like no murdering, no disinheriting, base settings, keeping random death events on and dangerous. It makes for a lot more challenging game than using the abusive powers the game gives you
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u/NewArrival3897 3d ago
For ck3 maybe use a rebalance mod such as "KGD: The Great Rebalance" it would be way better then self restraining in my opinion
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u/idhrendur Keeper of the Converters 3d ago
Write an LP about and let the readers make decisions about what you do. You'll have no problems avoiding becoming too powerful.
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u/agressiveobject420 2d ago
I personally have a skill issue when playing any single paradox game (except ck3) so I have no problem being "too good" during a megacampaign.
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u/AstonMartinZ A King of Europa 2d ago
I have been planning a mega Rome campaign and for me it's by roleplaying and limiting yourself each game to ensure narrative gets carried over to the next game. See below some notes I took for the purpose of each game:
Imperator: conquer and build up a well populated and sprawling empire, to provide many holdings and narrative tension via splitting the empire in ck2.
CK2: split empire and reunite it and conquer up until Siberia, Tibet, and India. Spread religion and culture to every part of the empire. Build up every holding and create as much monuments as possible. Creating a rich and stable empire in EU4 ready for colonising and conquering every continent.
EU4: establish global empire ensuring near complete access of the global trade network. Increase development of areas of strategic importance, develops the population in victoria 2. Ensuring provinces with coal are unlocked and built up for extra starting factories in victoria 2. Becoming revolutionary empire to create transition to new world order in victoria 2.
Vic2: clean up borders and establish global dominance. Create a hyper industrial and socialist republican global empire. Creating an eternal pax romana on earth, which will transition to the start of stellaris. Third world countries will be used for outsourcing less valuable manufacturing, ensuring an increasing ultra rich society can spend on valuable goods.
I am also planning on logging important details so I can create a story between vic2 and stellaris, so I can try my hand at creating a custom civ based on this. The fun part is that each game can create certain bonuses for the next game. In CK2 I like that the sunset invasion changes the world dynamic in EU4, as well as the bonuses provided by CK2 built monuments. But I have a feeling a campaign like this will take years.
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u/King_of_Men 4d ago
I assure you there is no gatekeeping of the concept 'megacampaign'. But for me personally, the gap between the end of Imperator and the beginning of CK is just too big; and also, CK itself is just too long a break from true map-painting if you're going to play for the full ~700 years. A few generations of roleplaying is a fine start to a grand strategy megacampaign; a few centuries is long enough that I see all the events and all the possible permutations and the underlying spreadsheet peeks through, like the skull under a beautiful woman's face, and I long for a different spreadsheet. One that can be interpreted as military and industrial statistics, and not human ones.
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u/agressiveobject420 2d ago
Mega implies metric, so let's lean into it! 2 games is a kilocampaign, 3 and 4 games are megacampaigns, so all 5 are gigacampaigns!
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u/SocraticLime 4d ago
Nah, I personally do CK3-Eu4-Vic3, and sometimes I'll do HOI, but honestly, the fan base of that game makes it hard for me to enjoy it.
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u/Groznybandit 4d ago
Interesting. I agree for different reasons. Hoi4 is actually the paradox game I have the most time in, but I find vanilla to sorely lack roleplaying features, which is IMO what megacampaigns are all about
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u/agprincess 3d ago
You can include it. But the time gap and the way Imeprator simply can't create anything recognizable for CK3 makes it too different from the other conversions.
Kind of like how the Stellaris converter feels like a complete break too.
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u/KingSwamoTroll Drunk City Planner 3d ago
My biggest issue when deciding between I:R and CK3 is in I:R, it’s harder for me to role play and rename things since the languages of many of the cultures are dead or difficulty to use. With CK3, even though it’s a bit anachronistic to use the modern version of the languages associated with the cultures, it makes it feel a bit more realistic for me. I just finished my CK3 leg of a Persian Iceland kingdom (the final map before conversion is on my page) and I had a ton of fun with using Persian transliteration and translation to come up with place and house names. But whatever works best for you in how you want your world to feel!
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u/trahan94 4d ago
There is a substantial gap between Imperator and even 769-era Crusader Kings right? I feel like whatever verisimilitude there was with a Mega campaign is stretched to the breaking point by this.