Victoria 3
- Thread starter cloistered scholar
- Start date
Victoria 3 is probably the game I waited the longest for and I Was pretty hyped when it was announced. But by now I am not. Some of the Design decisions seem iffy to me. Stuck in my mind most are the Unification mechanism and land warfare.
The former seems gamey and flavourless in the dev diary and I have my doubts the AI will be able to handle it.
For the latter I actually approve of the basic idea of limiting micromanagment. But the way its done leaves you completely at the hands of a potentially moronic AI. At least one should be able to set strategic goals. It also seems to me that the way describes sort of works to represent say WW1 or the ACW if in an annoying way. But for a more limited war like the Austro-Prussian War, which was decided by neutralizing a single army it seems very unsuited. Not to mention colonial warfare, where the described system looks just wrong.
Of course there are plenty of things I like (e.g. naval warfare looks potentially like a very good idea that could be adaptable for HOI, where naval warfare always is a chore) and I will still buy the game. But not with the anticipation I expected.
The former seems gamey and flavourless in the dev diary and I have my doubts the AI will be able to handle it.
For the latter I actually approve of the basic idea of limiting micromanagment. But the way its done leaves you completely at the hands of a potentially moronic AI. At least one should be able to set strategic goals. It also seems to me that the way describes sort of works to represent say WW1 or the ACW if in an annoying way. But for a more limited war like the Austro-Prussian War, which was decided by neutralizing a single army it seems very unsuited. Not to mention colonial warfare, where the described system looks just wrong.
Of course there are plenty of things I like (e.g. naval warfare looks potentially like a very good idea that could be adaptable for HOI, where naval warfare always is a chore) and I will still buy the game. But not with the anticipation I expected.
Crazymachines
Banned
Oregon is rightful polish clay apparently
it's like 60% polish
and its under Britain
Washington is around 40% pole
My thoughts so far:
Understanding the economy is going to take me a long long time.
Starting to figure out how the army works, it's still a bit weird and complicated, but I'm getting there.
The North German Confederation is really easy to form.
Germany is not easy to form.
Denmark shall burn in hell (no I will not elaborate)
AI really enjoys taking Treaty Ports everywhere in the world except China.
Tech spread is a nice concept, but happens way too fast. Nearly finished the entire Social tree by 1860.
I like not needing Ironman for achievements.
Outside of all that, I hopefully have a MP game coming up on the weekend so I'll be looking forward to that chaos.
Understanding the economy is going to take me a long long time.
Starting to figure out how the army works, it's still a bit weird and complicated, but I'm getting there.
The North German Confederation is really easy to form.
Germany is not easy to form.
Denmark shall burn in hell (no I will not elaborate)
AI really enjoys taking Treaty Ports everywhere in the world except China.
Tech spread is a nice concept, but happens way too fast. Nearly finished the entire Social tree by 1860.
I like not needing Ironman for achievements.
Outside of all that, I hopefully have a MP game coming up on the weekend so I'll be looking forward to that chaos.
My impressions after a few hours: the core is good, perhaps better than II, but it needs fixing ASAP.
What I liked:
The concept of non-centralized states/tribal polities;
The dynamic party system;
Technology diffusion concept;
The global market isn't an exclusive shop for the British customers;
Bigger accent on peaceful development and policies than in any Paradox game so far, Vicky and Vicky II.
What I didn't like:
The AI acts weird unless it's outright lethargic. Ahistorical colonial expansion paths (like Russia that keeps claiming a foothold on Hokkaido), Brazil sitting on its hands and ignoring the Piratini rebels, the Civil War never triggering, etc. ;
Immortal rulers. I'm pretty sure there's some randomly triggered death event, with the percentage influenced by the ruler's health, but that random chance is either way too low or doesn't trigger at all because of a bug;
No or almost no flavor events (I'm positive that they will be the staple of the DLCs, watching the path Paradox has taken starting with EU IV and CK II);
No way to transfer states between the greater power and its vassal - or at least the AI doesn't do that. It all leads to weird setups where New Zealand gets divided between Australia and Great Britain, while Australia is still the crown colony.
I still hope that the game gets proper attention from Paradox and doesn't get quietly abandoned like Imperator.
What I liked:
The concept of non-centralized states/tribal polities;
The dynamic party system;
Technology diffusion concept;
The global market isn't an exclusive shop for the British customers;
Bigger accent on peaceful development and policies than in any Paradox game so far, Vicky and Vicky II.
What I didn't like:
The AI acts weird unless it's outright lethargic. Ahistorical colonial expansion paths (like Russia that keeps claiming a foothold on Hokkaido), Brazil sitting on its hands and ignoring the Piratini rebels, the Civil War never triggering, etc. ;
Immortal rulers. I'm pretty sure there's some randomly triggered death event, with the percentage influenced by the ruler's health, but that random chance is either way too low or doesn't trigger at all because of a bug;
No or almost no flavor events (I'm positive that they will be the staple of the DLCs, watching the path Paradox has taken starting with EU IV and CK II);
No way to transfer states between the greater power and its vassal - or at least the AI doesn't do that. It all leads to weird setups where New Zealand gets divided between Australia and Great Britain, while Australia is still the crown colony.
I still hope that the game gets proper attention from Paradox and doesn't get quietly abandoned like Imperator.
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After having played around thirty hours, I'm honestly surprised at how bad it is. Whether it is the immigration mechanics (for immigration dependent nations), the warfare mechanics or even the economic mechanics, everything comes across as poorly implemented or poorly planned. I'm afraid that what I've bought amounts to little more than a shell that Paradox is going to try and fill with paid DLC. I'm sure it will get better with time, but as a released product?
Paradox sure is milking the DLCs lately - that said, there's different teams for different games, Stellaris has been doing great for example. IMO, they should do what they've been doing with Stellaris, improving the game's various sides with free patches, and cut down on the DLCs (even those of Stellaris) unless they're aesthetic ones that don't impact gameplay at all, or Sunset Invasion-esque weird shit that's just as optional.
Grey Eminence looks like it could be an ambitious competitor, too - right now, Paradox has a monopoly on grand strategy games, so they've gotten lazy, if Grey Eminence does well it could shake things up.
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Well, the game requires AVX support, despite the engine not needing it. So I guess I’ll never be able to play the sequel to one of my top five favorite games.
Keep an eye on Anbeeld's Revision of AI, then.
I'm afraid it's too ambitious for its own good, what with covering the tail end of CK and the whole span of EU, Vicky, and HoI. Each of them has its own set of core mechanics for a reason, and if you try to extend the timeline too much you either end with bland, generic core gameplay or with a lot of anachronistic mechanics.
Stellaris seems to have a pretty good model going--each patch is like "OK we revised something/fixed something annoying, plus added a new thing", and the DLC is more "here's more of the new thing if you liked that".
They do need to be better about releasing games that at least FEEL complete, though.
The thing about the kind of games Paradox makes, it's that they're very complex - IMO, rather than work on five different games at once, they should devote several years to just a couple of them, then focus on another couple games, and so on. Otherwise, they end up being wide, but shallow.
Exactly.
Make the best Imperator game. Then the best Crusader Kings. Then the best Europa Universalis. Then the best Victoria. Then the best Hearts of Iron. Then the best Cold War game. Then the best modern/early Space Age sim. Then the best Stellaris.
Do a whole freaking grand campaign. Start as some early Iron Age/Diadochi era tribe, fight all the way to the present day and beyond. Converters all the way!
Oh My God what the hell is going on with Vicky 3?
What happened to the Westernisation system?
Why do African Countries have access to the same tech as European ones straight away?
What happened to the Economic system?
What the hell is going on here?
What happened to the Westernisation system?
Why do African Countries have access to the same tech as European ones straight away?
What happened to the Economic system?
What the hell is going on here?
So I dropped it for the moment after my last game, which embodies the major problems I have with it as it is perfectly:
My first two campaign attempts this weekend seemed kind of shallow, so I challenged myself to be successful with Prussia while using as little of the game systems as possible. By 1850 I stopped after I had a perfectly happy NGF. I had looked at the journal, built up various factories, chosen some techs, opened and ended trade routes only when prompted by reports on shortages or inefficent trade routes, clicked in the diplomatic menu on improve relations with German minors and reacted to events with the default choice.
So yeah. My main complaint (next to the bad UI) is that the various game systems don't really interact with each other, they largely just run side by side.
The only one that truly matters seems to be the economic one. Which has two main aspects: an okayish city builder and the trade routes. The latter get a decent result if you cling closely to the prompts. But if you actually want to refine that, it quickly becomes the most annoying micro in any Paradox game (mainly because the informations are displayed so badly). Like Stack hunting, but in lists, not on the map. Overall the economic intervention is too direct for the time period IMO, but it is the one system that actually works and produces a game loop.
The political systems are fine in principle, but not so much in practice. It seems too easy to get a progressive society and the changes do not in fact matter all that much. Whether absolute monarchy or liberal democracy, politics handle the same, free market or communist, the economy handles the same. Nor do the political interests really impact the other parts of the games. No landowners demanding protective tarriffs, no liberals pushing for German unification, no indusrialists arguing for colonial markets. If you keep the various groups sort of content (where economic success alone seems to go a long way) nothing they do really matters.
Diplomacy is fairly bland. Not just because the political reality in involved countries plays little role, or their economic needs. The AI also does not really seems to know what its interests are. None of the German minors has an interest to preserve its independence - or at least demands politicial considerations. Attempts to unify Germany are ignored even by Austria. But a minor colonial war produces a world war, because suddenly Russia and the US take an interest what Sweden was doing in Africa. Add the limited actions one can take and what should be the core mechanic imo lacks in the fun department.
Surprisingly the army system did not bother me as much as I expected. I'd still like more control than the fronts give me (not least because the AI of your own armies sometimes self immolates), but I can now see where just managing different armies could be fun. If the game actually would let me, say through an army Organisator. But instead we get these feudal mobs following their Generals.
Then again , it may have helped my estimate of the war system that I had little interest in going for a war, because the diplomatic actions around it were so much of a chore with the unpredictable
AI.
I can see a lot of potential in this game, but seeing what could be done with it does not suffice to motivate me to keep playing what is there.
My first two campaign attempts this weekend seemed kind of shallow, so I challenged myself to be successful with Prussia while using as little of the game systems as possible. By 1850 I stopped after I had a perfectly happy NGF. I had looked at the journal, built up various factories, chosen some techs, opened and ended trade routes only when prompted by reports on shortages or inefficent trade routes, clicked in the diplomatic menu on improve relations with German minors and reacted to events with the default choice.
So yeah. My main complaint (next to the bad UI) is that the various game systems don't really interact with each other, they largely just run side by side.
The only one that truly matters seems to be the economic one. Which has two main aspects: an okayish city builder and the trade routes. The latter get a decent result if you cling closely to the prompts. But if you actually want to refine that, it quickly becomes the most annoying micro in any Paradox game (mainly because the informations are displayed so badly). Like Stack hunting, but in lists, not on the map. Overall the economic intervention is too direct for the time period IMO, but it is the one system that actually works and produces a game loop.
The political systems are fine in principle, but not so much in practice. It seems too easy to get a progressive society and the changes do not in fact matter all that much. Whether absolute monarchy or liberal democracy, politics handle the same, free market or communist, the economy handles the same. Nor do the political interests really impact the other parts of the games. No landowners demanding protective tarriffs, no liberals pushing for German unification, no indusrialists arguing for colonial markets. If you keep the various groups sort of content (where economic success alone seems to go a long way) nothing they do really matters.
Diplomacy is fairly bland. Not just because the political reality in involved countries plays little role, or their economic needs. The AI also does not really seems to know what its interests are. None of the German minors has an interest to preserve its independence - or at least demands politicial considerations. Attempts to unify Germany are ignored even by Austria. But a minor colonial war produces a world war, because suddenly Russia and the US take an interest what Sweden was doing in Africa. Add the limited actions one can take and what should be the core mechanic imo lacks in the fun department.
Surprisingly the army system did not bother me as much as I expected. I'd still like more control than the fronts give me (not least because the AI of your own armies sometimes self immolates), but I can now see where just managing different armies could be fun. If the game actually would let me, say through an army Organisator. But instead we get these feudal mobs following their Generals.
Then again , it may have helped my estimate of the war system that I had little interest in going for a war, because the diplomatic actions around it were so much of a chore with the unpredictable
AI.
I can see a lot of potential in this game, but seeing what could be done with it does not suffice to motivate me to keep playing what is there.
As people are dropping by to post how their game is going, I thought to do the same.
In my first game as Belgium it is only December 1855 (I did not yet had the time to play it a lot).
In my first game as Belgium it is only December 1855 (I did not yet had the time to play it a lot).
- I suspect it is too easy to raise literacy (or at least if you are a small country), my country's literacy rate is the highest in the world with 76.4% (up from a starting rate of 45%), I only had a level 4 education institution and 'Promote Social Mobility' decrees. Belgium also has the world's fourth highest GDP per capita and second highest standard of living.
- Level 4 health care institution seems overpowered, I have annual pop growth of 1.46% with no international migration. As far as I am aware no other country even reaches 1%.
- The Philippines had somehow ended up with a literacy rate (59.8%) higher than their Colonial Overlord (43.4%), and even Prussia (53.4%). (Are even level 2 education institutions overpowered?)
- The Dutch East Indies had joined a diplomatic play between Prussia and Austria, leading to them being at war with Prussia whilst their colonial overlord remained neutral.
- The British and Spanish had waged war against France and Morocco over an attempt to force Morocco to ban slavery. Spain and France had made separate peaces before the war ended when part of their countries had been occupied. As of now Dunkirk is a British treaty port and Morocco still has slavery...
If I remember correctly, Paradox had mentioned in the Development Diaries that they would ditch that for giving those countries worse technologies, laws, and institutions and the 'unrecognized' diplomatic status. As for whether it was a good idea, I do not know...