STOCKHOLM – Apr. 6, 2017 – With one eye on the rising sun and another eye on a glorious future, Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven is available today. Mandate of Heaven is the new expansion to Paradox Development Studio’s flagship franchise about exploration, religious turmoil, economic dominance and conquest. Taking its name from the Chinese belief that their empire was divinely ordained, Mandate of Heaven will bless your ambitions for years to come.

At the center of Mandate of Heaven, players will find the new Historical Ages system and the associated Golden Eras. The four centuries of play are divided into four Historical Ages, each with seven objectives and seven special abilities that can be unlocked. If you accomplish three objectives in an Age, you may choose to initiate a Golden Era, giving your empire 50 years of prosperity and military prowess. But choose your time wisely! You only get one Golden Era per game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmDYzGbNn10

Mandate of Heaven’s other features include:

• Empire of China: The Chinese Emperor has great powers at his disposal, and the efficient bureaucrats keep things running smoothly. But greedy neighbors may seek to take the Mandate of Heaven for themselves.
  
• Ashikaga Shogunate: The Japanese Shogunate has been reworked for more interaction and political considerations among the daimyo. As Shogun, carefully balance the pride of your subjects or compel them to choose and honorable death.
  
• Confucian Harmony: Keep order in your eastern realm or risk short term spiritual disruption in exchange for long term religious harmony.
  
• Shinto Isolation: Will your Japanese kingdom seek benefits in an open society or promote greater unity through closed doors? Major incidents will challenge your aspirations.
  
• Tributaries: Eastern empires can persuade weaker neighbors to pay an annual tribute in gold, manpower or monarch points in this new subject nation format.
  
• Diplomatic Macro Builder: New addition to the left-hand side macrobuilder automates many repeated diplomatic tasks.
  
• And more including Chinese meritocracy and Manchu Banner troops

As usual, Mandate of Heaven launches alongside a major free update to Europa Universalis IV that improves and updates many aspects of the core game experience.

Starting later today, a number of Paradox Interactive titles will go on sale on Steam for the weekend, including the Europa Universalis IV core game. Ambitious rulers who have yet to try their hand at world conquest will have the perfect opportunity to try the latest version of the game alongside its newest expansion. Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven is available now for $19.99.

STOCKHOLM – Apr. 6, 2017 – With one eye on the rising sun and another eye on a glorious future, Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven is available today. Mandate of Heaven is the new expansion to Paradox Development Studio’s flagship franchise about exploration, religious turmoil, economic dominance and conquest. Taking its name from the Chinese belief that their empire was divinely ordained, Mandate of Heaven will bless your ambitions for years to come.

At the center of Mandate of Heaven, players will find the new Historical Ages system and the associated Golden Eras. The four centuries of play are divided into four Historical Ages, each with seven objectives and seven special abilities that can be unlocked. If you accomplish three objectives in an Age, you may choose to initiate a Golden Era, giving your empire 50 years of prosperity and military prowess. But choose your time wisely! You only get one Golden Era per game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmDYzGbNn10

Mandate of Heaven’s other features include:

• Empire of China: The Chinese Emperor has great powers at his disposal, and the efficient bureaucrats keep things running smoothly. But greedy neighbors may seek to take the Mandate of Heaven for themselves.
  
• Ashikaga Shogunate: The Japanese Shogunate has been reworked for more interaction and political considerations among the daimyo. As Shogun, carefully balance the pride of your subjects or compel them to choose and honorable death.
  
• Confucian Harmony: Keep order in your eastern realm or risk short term spiritual disruption in exchange for long term religious harmony.
  
• Shinto Isolation: Will your Japanese kingdom seek benefits in an open society or promote greater unity through closed doors? Major incidents will challenge your aspirations.
  
• Tributaries: Eastern empires can persuade weaker neighbors to pay an annual tribute in gold, manpower or monarch points in this new subject nation format.
  
• Diplomatic Macro Builder: New addition to the left-hand side macrobuilder automates many repeated diplomatic tasks.
  
• And more including Chinese meritocracy and Manchu Banner troops

As usual, Mandate of Heaven launches alongside a major free update to Europa Universalis IV that improves and updates many aspects of the core game experience.

Starting later today, a number of Paradox Interactive titles will go on sale on Steam for the weekend, including the Europa Universalis IV core game. Ambitious rulers who have yet to try their hand at world conquest will have the perfect opportunity to try the latest version of the game alongside its newest expansion. Europa Universalis IV: Mandate of Heaven is available now for $19.99.

(larger image)

The time has finally come for you all to enjoy the fruits of our labor, the release version of our 1.20 Ming Update.

Please do not report any issues with the update in this thread, instead post proper bug reports in our bug report forum.

Thank you!

And as usual, you should not load up any games started in 1.19.x in version 1.20. This will cause issues and unpleasant surprises. Especially if you are achievement hunting in Ironman, this will be a big problem for you. If you wish to finish any ongoing games, then please do so in 1.19.2. You can find instructions on how to play on a previous version here!

Enjoy!

##############################################################
######################### 1.20 ###############################
##############################################################

###################
# Free Features
###################
- Devastation: Provinces now have devastation counter that goes from 0 to 100%. Scorched Earth & looting now increases this value instead of having separate modifiers. Unrest slowly increases it in a province as well.
- Added Statistics button that opens End game/Statistics view to in-game menu.
- The game now has four different ages.
- Removed Absolute Monarchy from the game, and replaced with a scaling mechanic called Absolutim which is valid from Age of Absolutism.
- Moved religious locks from before the year 1650 to be valid from script in Age of Discovery & Age of Reformation only.
- added better and worse comparisons to other players in statistics page.
- [Art of War] Automatic Fleet Transport now docks to pick up and drop off your armies when possible.
- Replaced old Celestial Empire Factions with new ones that better fit history and their respective roles.
- You can now decide to declare bankruptcy on your own if you have loans.
- Units now use retreat animations during shattered retreat.
- Strengthen Government now increases absolutism by +2.

###################
# Gamebalance
###################
- Mercenaries now get priority in entering the battle inside their unit type (e.g. mercenary infantry gets placed in the middle first)
- State Maintenance is no longer 100% free in the capital area, but is instead -50%.
- Capital State now also have +5% Instition Spread.
- Province limit for CAS when forming SPA as ARA increased to 40.
- Tech impact for administrative efficiency is now 0-30% instead of 0-60%, as absolutism impacts it 0-40% as well.
- Events, decisions & other scripts tweaked to use absolutism.
- Spies no longer are sent home when discovered, but instead have a -100% to network buildup during a year.
- Stabhit peaceoffers have now been restored to 50% of the warscore, and only if warscore is at least 50%.
- You can no longer call in allies that have a truce with someone you are attacking.
- Prussian Militarisation is now 50% harder to maintain now.
- Prussian Militarisation is now less impact on maintenance cost and manpower.
- Victory Cards ticking up/down is now 10 years instead of 20 years.
- Japanese Traditions are now 5% discipline instead of +10%.
- Ottoman Millets are now 20% coring cost reduction instead of 33%.
- You now get the final victory cards even if you haven't fullfilled previous ones.
- A fully maxed victory card adds +1 score each month now.
- Mercenaries now cost twice as much to reinforce.
- Mercenary regiments now cost 10 more as base purchase price, for a static 20, 35 & 40 cost per regiment.
- Reduced Liberty desire from development in vassals. 100% liberty desire at 500 development
- Daimyos no longer count towards diplomatic relations for their overlord
- Shogunate given additional diplomat and envoy travel time to compensate for Diplomatic Relations loss
- Ayuthayan events now give 2 mercantilism rather than 7.
- Can now only ask for at most 50% of another country's trade power.
- Reduced Native American Tech 5 infantry unit pips from 6 to 4.
- Reduced counting_coups idea from 15% morale to 10%
- Spynetworks now decay while being discovered.
- Liberalism now depends on Absolutism.
- Non-tributary subjects are now exempt from most disasters.
- Removed Protectorates, they are now all considered vassals instead. You can do divert trade & seize territory from vassals & send officers to marches.
- Bankruptcies now have less impact on morale, unrest and autonomy, and only last 5 years.
- Will now never be possible to form the the same tag more than once for one country.
- Reduced amount of states from government and technology dramatically.
- RNW should no longer generate areas with more than 5 provinces.
- Having done unconditional surrender now impacts autonomy, war exhaustion and institution spread like you are at peace.
- Devastation now slowly decline if you have unconditionally surrendered.
- All owned provinces have 0 unrest while you have surrendered.
- Nations that has unconditionally surrendered can not take loans, nor go below 0 in treasury, and will automatically dismiss all advisors each month.
- Manually increasing development now also decreases devastation.
- Colonies no longer generate unrest.
- No longer possible to increase autoonomy if you don't have authority to lose.
- Cavalry Ratios removed from techgroup, and added to other modifiers. Default is 50%.
- Steppe Horde government now have +25% Cavalry Ratio.
- Winged Hussars Idea gives +10% Cavalry Ratio now.
- Happy Cossacks Estates give +10% Cavalry Ratio now.
- Sunni Religion lost tolerance own, but gained +10% Cavalry Ratio.
- Tengri lost 2 unrest, but gained +25% Cavalry Ratio.
- Tengri now have 20% cheaper regiments, up from 10% cheaper regiments.
- Subjects occupying a province for you will now automatically discover that province for you.
- There is now a +5% bonus to colonising on the same continent as your capital.
- Bankruptcy now adds devastation to provinces, and clears recent uprising flag.
- The Eight Banners idea for Manchu increases the amount of banners you can raise by 25% for those that have MoH.
- Trust gain on start of game is no longer the same for all subject types.
- Trust loss on start of game due to Historical Rival now applies even for non-subjects.
- Cancel Subject now has war score cost capped at 60% if it cancels PU in succession war over target country and 100% otherwise.
- Sharing of maps can now be done when at war.
- Independent Daimyos that become subjects to Shogun or Emperor will again become Daimyo government.
- Nations in debt and running deficits can no longer buy ships. (aka, infinite money MP exploit.)
- Rebel Occupation is now giving the occupied modifier like other occupation.
- Devastation now have a far less impact on development cost.
- Trade Companies no longer gets counted as territory when it comes to autonomy.
- Subjects that count as independent (aka tributaries), no longer contribute to greatpower score.
- In Debt calculations now calculates current interests, not the one at end of last month. (exploit stopper)
- Going bankrupt now destroys all buildings built in the last 5 years.
- Manually removing a province from a trade company now makes it not produce any goods for 5 years.
- Devastation now have a minor impact on friendly and hostile movement speed.
- Spices now reduce devastation monthly by 0.1 instead of increasing core-cost.
- Provincial bonus from Wool is now +10% local movement speed.
- You can now scorch hostile territory, and now scorching only adds a moderate amount of devastation, but also adds a -50% hostile movement penalty for 5 years.
- Removed Colonial Nation penalty to Settler Chance and Colony growth.
- Daimyo subjects no longer increase your forcelimit by 1.
- A country is now considered to be in debt if having loans at more than 2 years of income.
- You can now claim Defender of Faith even when current holder has positive prestige.
- Core creation cost reduction cap changed from 90% to 80% (before admin efficiency and territorial core reductions).
- Core creation time now can't go below 6 months.
- Fixed bug with AI merchant placement.
- Improved initial placement of merchants.
- Colonial Nations can now start war with neighbours of another religion group.
- Removed rule that you couldn't make a separate peace with the holder of the war goal province.
- Deus Vult is now last idea in religous ideas.
- Subject types that allow Embargo Rivals interaction no longer allow Subject to make their own embargoes.

And much more that couldn't fit in a Steam announcement. You can go to our official forum to read the whole thing!

(larger image)

The time has finally come for you all to enjoy the fruits of our labor, the release version of our 1.20 Ming Update.

Please do not report any issues with the update in this thread, instead post proper bug reports in our bug report forum.

Thank you!

And as usual, you should not load up any games started in 1.19.x in version 1.20. This will cause issues and unpleasant surprises. Especially if you are achievement hunting in Ironman, this will be a big problem for you. If you wish to finish any ongoing games, then please do so in 1.19.2. You can find instructions on how to play on a previous version here!

Enjoy!

##############################################################
######################### 1.20 ###############################
##############################################################

###################
# Free Features
###################
- Devastation: Provinces now have devastation counter that goes from 0 to 100%. Scorched Earth & looting now increases this value instead of having separate modifiers. Unrest slowly increases it in a province as well.
- Added Statistics button that opens End game/Statistics view to in-game menu.
- The game now has four different ages.
- Removed Absolute Monarchy from the game, and replaced with a scaling mechanic called Absolutim which is valid from Age of Absolutism.
- Moved religious locks from before the year 1650 to be valid from script in Age of Discovery & Age of Reformation only.
- added better and worse comparisons to other players in statistics page.
- [Art of War] Automatic Fleet Transport now docks to pick up and drop off your armies when possible.
- Replaced old Celestial Empire Factions with new ones that better fit history and their respective roles.
- You can now decide to declare bankruptcy on your own if you have loans.
- Units now use retreat animations during shattered retreat.
- Strengthen Government now increases absolutism by +2.

###################
# Gamebalance
###################
- Mercenaries now get priority in entering the battle inside their unit type (e.g. mercenary infantry gets placed in the middle first)
- State Maintenance is no longer 100% free in the capital area, but is instead -50%.
- Capital State now also have +5% Instition Spread.
- Province limit for CAS when forming SPA as ARA increased to 40.
- Tech impact for administrative efficiency is now 0-30% instead of 0-60%, as absolutism impacts it 0-40% as well.
- Events, decisions & other scripts tweaked to use absolutism.
- Spies no longer are sent home when discovered, but instead have a -100% to network buildup during a year.
- Stabhit peaceoffers have now been restored to 50% of the warscore, and only if warscore is at least 50%.
- You can no longer call in allies that have a truce with someone you are attacking.
- Prussian Militarisation is now 50% harder to maintain now.
- Prussian Militarisation is now less impact on maintenance cost and manpower.
- Victory Cards ticking up/down is now 10 years instead of 20 years.
- Japanese Traditions are now 5% discipline instead of +10%.
- Ottoman Millets are now 20% coring cost reduction instead of 33%.
- You now get the final victory cards even if you haven't fullfilled previous ones.
- A fully maxed victory card adds +1 score each month now.
- Mercenaries now cost twice as much to reinforce.
- Mercenary regiments now cost 10 more as base purchase price, for a static 20, 35 & 40 cost per regiment.
- Reduced Liberty desire from development in vassals. 100% liberty desire at 500 development
- Daimyos no longer count towards diplomatic relations for their overlord
- Shogunate given additional diplomat and envoy travel time to compensate for Diplomatic Relations loss
- Ayuthayan events now give 2 mercantilism rather than 7.
- Can now only ask for at most 50% of another country's trade power.
- Reduced Native American Tech 5 infantry unit pips from 6 to 4.
- Reduced counting_coups idea from 15% morale to 10%
- Spynetworks now decay while being discovered.
- Liberalism now depends on Absolutism.
- Non-tributary subjects are now exempt from most disasters.
- Removed Protectorates, they are now all considered vassals instead. You can do divert trade & seize territory from vassals & send officers to marches.
- Bankruptcies now have less impact on morale, unrest and autonomy, and only last 5 years.
- Will now never be possible to form the the same tag more than once for one country.
- Reduced amount of states from government and technology dramatically.
- RNW should no longer generate areas with more than 5 provinces.
- Having done unconditional surrender now impacts autonomy, war exhaustion and institution spread like you are at peace.
- Devastation now slowly decline if you have unconditionally surrendered.
- All owned provinces have 0 unrest while you have surrendered.
- Nations that has unconditionally surrendered can not take loans, nor go below 0 in treasury, and will automatically dismiss all advisors each month.
- Manually increasing development now also decreases devastation.
- Colonies no longer generate unrest.
- No longer possible to increase autoonomy if you don't have authority to lose.
- Cavalry Ratios removed from techgroup, and added to other modifiers. Default is 50%.
- Steppe Horde government now have +25% Cavalry Ratio.
- Winged Hussars Idea gives +10% Cavalry Ratio now.
- Happy Cossacks Estates give +10% Cavalry Ratio now.
- Sunni Religion lost tolerance own, but gained +10% Cavalry Ratio.
- Tengri lost 2 unrest, but gained +25% Cavalry Ratio.
- Tengri now have 20% cheaper regiments, up from 10% cheaper regiments.
- Subjects occupying a province for you will now automatically discover that province for you.
- There is now a +5% bonus to colonising on the same continent as your capital.
- Bankruptcy now adds devastation to provinces, and clears recent uprising flag.
- The Eight Banners idea for Manchu increases the amount of banners you can raise by 25% for those that have MoH.
- Trust gain on start of game is no longer the same for all subject types.
- Trust loss on start of game due to Historical Rival now applies even for non-subjects.
- Cancel Subject now has war score cost capped at 60% if it cancels PU in succession war over target country and 100% otherwise.
- Sharing of maps can now be done when at war.
- Independent Daimyos that become subjects to Shogun or Emperor will again become Daimyo government.
- Nations in debt and running deficits can no longer buy ships. (aka, infinite money MP exploit.)
- Rebel Occupation is now giving the occupied modifier like other occupation.
- Devastation now have a far less impact on development cost.
- Trade Companies no longer gets counted as territory when it comes to autonomy.
- Subjects that count as independent (aka tributaries), no longer contribute to greatpower score.
- In Debt calculations now calculates current interests, not the one at end of last month. (exploit stopper)
- Going bankrupt now destroys all buildings built in the last 5 years.
- Manually removing a province from a trade company now makes it not produce any goods for 5 years.
- Devastation now have a minor impact on friendly and hostile movement speed.
- Spices now reduce devastation monthly by 0.1 instead of increasing core-cost.
- Provincial bonus from Wool is now +10% local movement speed.
- You can now scorch hostile territory, and now scorching only adds a moderate amount of devastation, but also adds a -50% hostile movement penalty for 5 years.
- Removed Colonial Nation penalty to Settler Chance and Colony growth.
- Daimyo subjects no longer increase your forcelimit by 1.
- A country is now considered to be in debt if having loans at more than 2 years of income.
- You can now claim Defender of Faith even when current holder has positive prestige.
- Core creation cost reduction cap changed from 90% to 80% (before admin efficiency and territorial core reductions).
- Core creation time now can't go below 6 months.
- Fixed bug with AI merchant placement.
- Improved initial placement of merchants.
- Colonial Nations can now start war with neighbours of another religion group.
- Removed rule that you couldn't make a separate peace with the holder of the war goal province.
- Deus Vult is now last idea in religous ideas.
- Subject types that allow Embargo Rivals interaction no longer allow Subject to make their own embargoes.

And much more that couldn't fit in a Steam announcement. You can go to our official forum to read the whole thing!

Hi!

As a heads up, make sure you finish any ongoing games in 1.19.x before updating to 1.20, or you will run into unpleasant surprises!

Hi!

As a heads up, make sure you finish any ongoing games in 1.19.x before updating to 1.20, or you will run into unpleasant surprises!

Hi Everyone!

It's only 2 days until we release Mandate of Heaven (April 6th), and alongside it we'll also give you a rather big free update patch as usual. So let's get straight into the good stuff and check out what the Ming Update (1.20) has in store for us.

(These notes are preliminary, and an updated version will be posted on actual release)

Due to the changelog being too large for a Steam announcement, I must ask you to read the original post

This update should be live some time during the day, or early afternoon on April 6th.

Useful links
Official Website
Europa Universalis IV Wiki
Europa Universalis IV Development Diary Archive

Hi Everyone!

It's only 2 days until we release Mandate of Heaven (April 6th), and alongside it we'll also give you a rather big free update patch as usual. So let's get straight into the good stuff and check out what the Ming Update (1.20) has in store for us.

(These notes are preliminary, and an updated version will be posted on actual release)

Due to the changelog being too large for a Steam announcement, I must ask you to read the original post

This update should be live some time during the day, or early afternoon on April 6th.

Useful links
Official Website
Europa Universalis IV Wiki
Europa Universalis IV Development Diary Archive