
It's a series that speaks in terms like cassus belli and papal curia, featuring a map crammed full of long-forgotten nations where every last political maneuver is an opportunity to broker a deal that might someday come back to haunt you. As a result, Europa Universalis games tend to be a little, shall we say, complex.

But whereas a typical Civilization game can stretch from the creation of the wheel to the advancement of nanotechnology, Europa Universalis is all about digging deep into one specific era in history: the Age of Discovery. On the surface, the Europa Universalis games bear a strong resemblance to Civilization, that king of the historical strategy genre. How much can I raise taxes before my citizens revolt? Which of my vassals is most likely to stage a rebellion? What in the hell is a Latin Cuirassier? It's questions like these that drive Paradox Development Studio's historical strategy series, in which players are given a broad range of tools to expand their global empire and an equally broad assortment of political responsibilities to manage along the way The penalty will decrease over time, so just be patient.In the world of Europa Universalis, players are often faced with challenging questions. To avoid coalitions, consider spacing out your wars and declare wars in various locations to avoid racking up large opinion penalties. Coalitions can be joined by any nation that has an Aggressive Expansion opinion penalty of at least -50 against you and they may even declare a war to retake the land you won! This is a value that provokes a negative opinion penalty when you start wars and when you take provinces in a peace deal.Ĭountries who are fearful or angry at you will due to these actions will have varying opinion penalties, but if they reach the magic number of -50 they are suddenly able to start a coalition against you. There is, however, a game feature that aims to curb this: Aggressive Expansion.

It is far too easy to get ahead of yourself in this game when you start racking up the victories and expanding your country outwards.

A warning about aggressive expansion and coalitions in when starting a war in Europa Universalis 4
