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[motorbitch]

sots2 for me. aside of civ2, and bf2, i never had fun for so many hours with any other game.
its true the ui needs some time to get used to - but once understood, it realy works very well.

[Stworca]

There is a reason why CK2 was the biggest success of Paradox, it's the game that gives you the most options.

For being a game of world-scope, EU is rather simple (shallow even). It's still a great game, mind you, but mostly so, because there is no competition that works on similar scope.
Vici - despite everything that I've believed before - is all about managing population, and while it excels at this role (and gives you many more options than EU) still lacks variety.
HoI series have no diplomacy (working one) whatsoever, and economy can be forgotten when playing some countries, it does bring the best military experience from all Paradox games, though. Rolling those panzerbrigades and coordinating encirclements with tactical bombing is something that not only overshadows, but puts to shame combat in EU, Vici and CK put together.

CK2 isn't a game about a country, it's a game about a family. It gives you the most windows to explore and exploit, and a truly rewarding and always fairly challenging experience (in the sense that you can always easily lose). There are no German gods of war, for whom losing HoI is nigh impossible (as player). There are no Pommies from EU, who can safely focus on whatever they want, and will forever remain safe and strong... and finally.. the same Brits, who just CANNOT loose in Viki, as it's simply impossible. You start with most of the known world under control.

In CK2 a random shadowy douchebag from some backwater shed in the middle of nowhere, can decide that it's in his best interest for you to DIE, and you will. There is no world conquest (it' possible, but it wont hold) and the threats come from within, more often than outside. Your own family members. Your fucking butler, even. It's the only game of Paradox that has working and interesting diplomacy, and while i have 100+ hours in every game mentioned above, CK2 takes the cake and eats it.

Just keep in mind, that - just like every paradox game - CK2 is crud without the expansions.

[PanH]

Hoi2 : Darkest Hour, and Hoi3. Hoi3 wasn't really exceptional at start, but it has getting way better (though there's ~20$ of expansions if you want the latest).
I haven't really played other paradox games, except CKII (which is good).

HoI series have no diplomacy (working one) whatsoever, and economy can be forgotten when playing some countries, it does bring the best military experience from all Paradox games, though. Rolling those panzerbrigades and coordinating encirclements with tactical bombing is something that not only overshadows, but puts to shame combat in EU, Vici and CK put together.

While diplomacy is a bit lacking, it's also limited because of historical accuracy. So, the vanilla game doesn't really let you tons of choices for that. Economy can be an important part too, which will have big effects on the war (maybe more for 3 with politics/stuff than 2/Darkest Hour). The only country I see that could nearly ignore it is USA, as they can nearly put every soldier into a tank.
Some mods add really lots of good stuff (Kaiserreich for DH, HPP for 3, etc), which is cool. Of course, the main part of the game is still the military (and building of it).

[Jacob/Lee]

Well, not counting HoI3 and CKII (both of which I own already), the largest chunks seem to go to EUIII and HoI2. I might be getting a free copy of EUIII, courtesy of Vonyx, too!

[Bdthemag]

CK2 if you want an easy casualized grand strategy game with plenty of useless DLC to buy, EU3 if you want a nice intro to these kinds of games with some difficulty, V2: AHD if you want a game that's challenging and is satisfying to play once you get a hang of it, and HOI3 if you want a game that's hard to get into but very enjoyable once you learn all of the mechanics.

HOI2 (Mainly Darkest Hour) gets a mention due to it being a slightly easier to handle than HOI3 and some would argue that it's better. Frankly though, one of the benefits of playing HOI2 is due to the fair amount of high quality mods, Kaiserreich to mention one.

If you're completely new to grand strategy games, and either have a full wallet or torrent client, the general order you should go is CK2>EU3>V2>HOI2>HOI3 to have a nice transition. Since most of the games share some similar mechanics, you'll be learning the simplest ones to start and working your way up to the more difficult ones.

[claes]

I have quite a few games both developed and published by Paradox and I have spent the most time by far on both SOTS I and CKII.  Two very different games (one being space 4X and developed by Kerberos, and the other being grand strategy developed by Paradox).  I recommend both of them.

[Theq629]

Slightly off topic, but Gamersgate has some Paradox games on sale this weekend (including CKII today).

[ChairmanPoo]

The more recent games have a lot of annoying DRM and a lot of annoying DLCness

[Catastrophic lolcats]

The more recent games have a lot of annoying DRM and a lot of annoying DLCness

The Paradox developed games don't use DRM at all. They're some of the few games on Steam that allows you to play them completely without the client (once downloaded). The Gamer's Gate versions are also DRMless. The closest thing to DRM they have is locking the modding forum for people who haven't registered their game.

The change to the DLC model is much better in my opinion. Instead of having mandatory expansion packs there are "feature patches" which adds a whole bunch of important stuff for free and some optional stuff like playable Muslims or retinues. This is often compared to Free2Play games and their methods of monetisation.
There's a whole bunch of unit sprites and facepacks but they can be easily ignored as they're all cosmetic. This model also woks much better for MP games as anyone can play even if they don't have all the DLCs.

One annoying thing about the small DLC model is it seems Paradox doesn't devote enough time to play testing and balancing. Every DLC so far has added something stupidly overpowered and I find the base game impossible to play without mods due to Fatimids owning half the world, Byzantium never falling, Venice owning half of Arabia and finally the HRE and Mongols owning the rest.

[snelg]

The more recent games have a lot of annoying DRM and a lot of annoying DLCness

The only thing close to annoying DRM thing I can recall is the dlc stuff which you have to log in and download or activate in ck2 in-game shop. Is it just for me that the game thinks they're activated even before you download them and then they act really weird? Every time I reinstalled it I had to download them and then restart the game a few times until they started working.

The DLCness in CK2 is actually annoying me a little too, they seem kind of half-assed so far. But the patches keep the game alive I guess and sooner or later things might get balanced. Also, the price tag on CK2 with all the dlc stuff is pretty nasty compared to their other games.

[Yannanth]

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