Paradox Grand Strategy: Tim Cook? How many divisions has he got?

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Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Yeah, I like the actual terrain generated by RNW, but sometimes the trade routes get really bad. Ultimately, the problem's more with the trade system than the RNW itself, but it's frustrating when you're playing as, say, Scotland, and the only trade route between the new world and Europe goes to Sevilla, because that completely fucks your colonial ambitions, even if there's some land that intuitively should trade into to the North Sea node instead. It'd be a lot better if trade nodes could shift or change their paths, but I think Paradox has said before that presents a massive technical challenge.

# ¿ Mar 25, 2018 05:47

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 02:20

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Has there ever been a Paradox game including China in which China isn't incredibly broken in some way, either far too strong or far too weak?

# ¿ Mar 29, 2018 02:39

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

The Deleter posted:

So I downloaded this, opened it up, looked at the screen and then closed the game again. I have absolutely no idea what my first moves even are, let alone what my end goals should be. How do I even interact with anything? And I'm coming off of Stellaris so I understand the open-ended nature of these kinds of games, but the tutorial pop ups don't even walk you through basic interactions. What do I do? What are the good beginner's guides for this kind of thing?

https://lparchive.org/Crusader-Kings-2/
The game's had a ton of updates since this LP so some of the exact features will be different, but it should give you some ideas about what's possible and what you should be doing. I'd also recommend starting in Ireland in 1066 like in this LP, we call it "Tutorial Island" for a reason. After that maybe try playing as the Duke of Apulia (Southern Italy, 1066) for a more advanced but still not too difficult start.

# ¿ Apr 7, 2018 21:24

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Vicky gives you something no other Paradox game does, and that's a detailed view of the regular people of your country. In other games, you only get very basic indications of how your people are doing based on things like revolt risk and province prosperity. Other Paradox games are all about leveraging the resources of the state to accomplish your goals (though CK2 gets points for the personal interactions with courtiers expanding the scope beyond that), and the people of your country are just means to that end. In Vicky, however, you actually get to see how your people live their lives, what their needs are, and you can take measures to provide that for them. The game is all about your people, not your borders. The addition of human capital is what elevates Victoria 2 to the level of the best Paradox game.

# ¿ May 1, 2018 16:39

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

In order of how excited I'll be:

1. Victoria 3
2. A Cold War game based on politics and diplomacy and proxy wars and not open warfare
3. Rome 2
4. Dark Ages game
5. Any other mapgame
6. Any non-mapgame

Pakled fucked around with this message at 19:27 on May 11, 2018

# ¿ May 11, 2018 19:24

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Red Bones posted:

I just want a game with interesting internal stuff to do, I don't really mind if that comes as a sequel to Victoria II or adding more mechanics into CK3, or some new IP. It would be nice to have a paradox game where I'm given a bunch of meaningful challenges to overcome that don't involve annexing something.

I'd love a city builder though, I'm not gonna lie. The world needs more city builders.

Cities: Skylines still has DLC coming out so I think a typical modern-era SimCity style city builder is unlikely. And they also just released Surviving Mars, so I'd figure a sci-fi one is unlikely too. Maybe a city builder set in some other historical era?

# ¿ May 11, 2018 20:32

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

TheMcD posted:

Yep, can't forget those wonderful religious stances. Quoting from issues.txt from V2's game files here, which describes the effects of party issues:
code:
religious_policy = {
		pro_atheism = {
			#no effect
		}
		secularized = {
			#no effect
		}
		pluralism = {
			#no effect
		}
		moralism = {
			#no effect
		}
	}

It didn't have a direct affect on the country, but it did have an affect on immigration. If the ruling party is moralist, minority religions are more likely to emigrate, and pops are more likely to choose provinces that share their religion as migration targets.

# ¿ May 16, 2018 18:38

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Mantis42 posted:

The game is called Rome 2 but is actually Victoria 3.

Paradox announces Rome 2

colon: Garibaldi's Dream

# ¿ May 16, 2018 18:48

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I just want a game with loving pops, okay, pops with needs and ideals and promotion and demotion

# ¿ May 17, 2018 16:21

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

JerikTelorian posted:

I'm fairly new to Paradox (my first PDox game was CK2). Can anyone explain to me the deal with Vicky 3? The Op for this thread makes Victoria 2 sound like a so-so game, but the buzz around/for V3 it is insane. Is it just a meme thing at this point like HL3, or is there really that much genuine interest in it?

Vicky and Vicky 2 are the only games in the Paradox lineup where you can track the welfare of your population. In other Paradox games, your population is much more abstracted and you can't see with much detail the way your policies affect the lives of your people. But with POPs, you can see everything. This simulation of people, rather than just the government or just the handful of nobles at the top of society, is incredibly exciting. The problem is Victoria 2 is old and mired by a bunch of bad systems and design decisions that modern-day Paradox wouldn't replicate.

# ¿ May 18, 2018 14:11

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Mantis42 posted:

There was an old DOS game like that. You played a latin American country after overthrowing a dictator and had to balance your reforms so as to not piss off one group of people too much. It was pretty hard to not be assassinated or overthrown by the US.

Hidden Agenda. I've gotten through it without becoming a US Satellite or getting overthrown before, by implementing moderate land reform and conscription. I survived two US-backed coup attempts and in the end, the US was embargoing me, but I stayed independent and never got any help from Cuba or the USSR either.

In fact, it's playable in your browser here

# ¿ May 18, 2018 17:42

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I wonder if the places that appear as empty space in those screenshots are empty, colonizable land, or if it's fog of war/discoverable land with tribes already existing there. I hope it's the latter.

# ¿ May 19, 2018 16:34

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

People trying to find this thread 10 years from now are going to have a tough time.

# ¿ May 21, 2018 21:26

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Maybe the early spread of Christianity will be added in a DLC that also pushes the end date back.

# ¿ May 25, 2018 07:23

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Obfuscation posted:

Just procedurally generate some monotheistic religions

Historically plausible messiahs everywhere

They may have to do something like that, I mean, so much of what made Christianity what it was was the social conditions in Judea under Roman rule. If Rome (or some other massive empire) doesn't control Judea around 30AD, then Christianity as we know it doesn't come into existence.

# ¿ May 25, 2018 07:41

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

A dynamic Jesus system would own. Conditions in Judea and Galilee in the early 1st century and the decisions of whoever controls the area affecting Jesus's actions. You could have a Jesus that attains temporal power. A Jesus that lives to his 80's preaching all around the Eastern Mediterranean. A Jesus that sets out to spread his word in Persia, all resulting in radically different Christianities.

I don't know if Paradox would want that kind of heat though :v:

# ¿ May 25, 2018 17:10

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Tomn posted:

I'd love to see a Paradox-style game one day that explicitly puts you in the role of a troubleshooter - guide a nation to greatness, and then the player goes to sleep and the simulation runs on autopilot until something goes horribly wrong and the player is woken up again to take command of the nation in crisis. And after the problem is fixed, back to sleep the player goes until the next alarm.

They should call it Cincinnatus Mode.

# ¿ May 25, 2018 18:42

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I can't wait to conquer the barbarians on my border to bring security to my heartland, only to end up bordering more & worse barbarians, who I then have to conquer for the sake of security, only to reveal even more barbarians, etc etc

# ¿ May 26, 2018 07:49

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Dr. Video Games 0031 posted:

https://twitter.com/producerjohan/status/1000655329493962752

Looks like Hispania's already been filled in since the pdxcon build.

What's up with the name of the Baltic Sea? The Sarmatians didn't live that far north, did they?

# ¿ May 27, 2018 16:47

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Pirate Radar posted:

What�s the Crete LP people keep mentioning?

Perhaps the most ambitious Paradox LP on these forums

https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3257534&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1

Run by now-Paradox dev Wiz, it had audience participation in the form of extremely convoluted politics

# ¿ May 28, 2018 08:07

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I liked CK1 in its time. But even vanilla 1.0 CK2 is better in every conceivable way so there's no reason to play it anymore.

# ¿ May 30, 2018 16:26

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I can still hear it in my dreams

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQ-5RvOzCfc

e: this video doesnt get it across but that horn is like twice as loud as any other sound in the game

# ¿ May 30, 2018 20:59

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

BenRGamer posted:

Isn't there already a space mod for CK2?

Yes, Crisis of the Confederation, but it hasn't been updated in years and doesn't work with the current version of the game.

# ¿ Jun 7, 2018 04:49

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

StashAugustine posted:

i dont give a poo poo about playing assembly line manager, i just want a game about 1848

Strategy game where you control the masses of revolutionaries and set up barricades in the streets of period-accurate major European cities to hold off the soldiers and force kings to abdicate

# ¿ Jun 8, 2018 08:03

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Prav posted:

if having a monopoly on alcohol doesn't let you rule the world i don't know what would

+50% influence on non-Muslim countries

# ¿ Jun 8, 2018 19:34

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Fister Roboto posted:

Because gold and money are concrete things that exist in the real world, while administrative power and gravitas are not.

I always saw monarch points in EU4 as like, a representation of gathering the political will and human capital it takes to reform and make and enforce new laws. The things that gold doesn't really cover. That may be abstract, but it's a real consideration.

# ¿ Jun 11, 2018 17:04

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Kaza42 posted:

Monarch points are a fine abstraction, although EU4 definitely suffers from having too many points/bars/etc that are tied into specific siloed systems. I think it's legitimate to be concerned if Imperator starts off with too many points/bars to fill

Deltasquid posted:

I think monarch points are perfectly acceptable abstractions of the time and effort necessary to draft laws or rules, push them through the administration/military hierarchy/diplomatic service and the necessary everyday wheeling and dealing to ensure they are applied. EU4 does suffer from having too many meters to fill up though.

Yeah, monarch points alone are totally fine with me, EU4 just kinda went off-the-rails adding new currency/points systems in every DLC that only tie in to one system and are neglected in every future DLC. The game would probably be better if they took a more holistic approach to DLC content. But then that would make the game way more impenetrable to new players once it's a couple years old and has a dozen DLCs, so it probably doesn't make business sense. I dunno what the solution is to that.

# ¿ Jun 11, 2018 17:46

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

SlothfulCobra posted:

Is Victoria 1 worth giving a go at all? I was thinking of picking up V2 in GoG's sale, but they only have the first one.

I feel like there's nothing Vicky 1 does better than Vicky 2. V2 improves on basically every system, adds a bunch more, and only really does away with two systems I can think of (trading provinces/technology between countries and manual upgrading of pops) but both of those systems are really not that interesting and just add a lot of micromanagement (though the trading provinces system could be exploited hilariously because the AI was dumb).

# ¿ Jun 17, 2018 06:43

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Stairmaster posted:

Have time stop while combat resolves. Give us a log of events like march of the eagles.

That'd be bad for multiplayer.

# ¿ Jun 19, 2018 18:14

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I don't mind mana. What I don't like is the approach to mana Paradox took in EU4 DLC. They want all the DLC to be modular because they don't want you to have to buy ALL the DLC to enjoy the game, so they don't hook all the systems together too tightly. But the result of this is a thousand different point pools that only do one thing each and barely interact with each other.

# ¿ Jun 25, 2018 23:28

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Beamed posted:

Darkest Hour Kaiserreich remains uncontested as the best HoI.

# ¿ Jul 9, 2018 03:07

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Jackie D posted:

So uh moving on from What a Name Means chat, I really hope the states are a decent size, because having to manage trade/pops/government/etc is going to be worse than Stellaris tiles if there's less than like 5 or 6 of those provinces to a state

According to a previous dev diary

quote:

A province is usually about 10 to 12 cities, and this is the entity you interact with to control trade and assign governors to.

# ¿ Jul 23, 2018 23:41

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

CK2 also significantly improved its performance in post-India patches, plus Imperator, from what we can tell, isn't quite as character-heavy a game to begin with, so I doubt there'll be as many checks going on every game-day to slow down the game.

# ¿ Jul 24, 2018 05:38

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Don Gato posted:

Wasn't the post 1300 slowdown because every Greek culture character was constantly checking if they could castrate every other character in the game, regardless of whether or not they were alive? I remember the patch notes saying the AI was going to be less castration happy.

It was the biggest single source of slowdown, but there have been many more they've optimized over the years.

# ¿ Jul 24, 2018 06:02

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Drone posted:

I want a proper Paradox take on Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

Honestly, I think the Spring and Autumn and/or Warring States periods might make for a better game.

# ¿ Jul 24, 2018 15:15

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Someone on Reddit analyzed Vicky 2's economy and discovered that sphere markets don't work the way we think they work and resources are getting duped a lot in the process

quote:

I've been working on an application to analyze Victoria 2 save games to give a better view of the economy and hopefully solve some mysteries about how parts of it work. While working on this I found many things about the amount produced and amount sold didn't add up. After analyzing several save games, as well as comparing values in a running game, I have reached the conclusion that every explanation I've heard about how sphere markets work is wrong.

One common explanation is that countries and pops first buy from their country market, then from the sphere market, then from the world. Any leftover from the country market is sold on the sphere market and any left over there is sold on the world market. This is wrong.

Another explanation is that when you are in a sphere you don't have a national market and are instead buying and selling from the sphere market and then the world market. This is closer to the truth but also wrong.

In actuality sphere markets work like this: First, each country calculates their sphere pool by contributing 100% of their production and a % of production from all other sphere members, sphere leaders always contribute 100%, secondary powers and civilized nations contribute 50% and 75% respectively plus a modifier that I haven't sourced yet, uncivilized are unknown but are probably 100%. Next, each country then buys from their individual sphere pool with their producers receiving income based on the amount sold and percentage of the sphere pool they produced (eg if your country produces 90 out of 100 available on the sphere market and 50 get sold to your country then your producers will be paid for selling 45 of that good).

The first important part of this explanation is the individual sphere pool part. Each sphere member buys from their own separate pool which is sized based on the production of all sphere members. This allows goods to be bought more than once in a sphere and can even result in total sold worldwide exceeding total produced. For example, suppose you are a sphere leader and have 3 sphere members, 2 are uncivilized and 1 is a secondary power. Now suppose that you and each sphere member produce 10 of some good, this will result in 35 of that good being available for you (the sphere leader) and each of the uncivilized countries while the secondary power has 40 available. This means there is 145 available (35 + 35 + 35 + 40) out of 40 total produced. In other words sphere markets are matter replicators.

The other important part of this explanation is that the producers in your country only get paid based on how much is sold in your country's sphere market (plus any sold on the world market). Your producers don't get paid for anything sold in the sphere markets of other sphere members. Currently I can't say with certainty where the money spent on goods produced by other sphere members goes but I think it's likely that it disappears into the ether. This could be an explanation of the late game liquidity crisis.

I believe this explains why sphering China causes the economy to crash: by sphering China the output of China's producers is replicated and sold multiple times while simultaneously only paying those producers for the amount sold in China. To see how this has a negative impact suppose you produce 100 of some good and buy 200 of it (100 from your country and 100 from the world market). You then sphere China who produces 300 of that good and also buys 200 of it. There is now 400 of this good available to both you and China and 200 is sold in both your country and China. Out of this 400 total sold your producers get paid for 50 and China's producers get paid for 150 and the money for the remaining 200 disappears. In addition some/all of the 400 remaining (200 remaining in China and 200 remaining in your country) gets put on the world market further saturating the market. This makes everyone producing this good worse off.

TL;DR Sphere markets allow goods to be sold multiple times, in some cases resulting in total sold exceeding total produced. The producers in your country don't get paid for goods sold in the sphere market of other sphere members. This explains why sphering China breaks the economy.

# ¿ Jul 25, 2018 06:38

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Minenfeld! posted:

Why does everyone want to play a game that they can't understand so badly?

Dehumanize yourself and face to POPs

# ¿ Jul 26, 2018 01:32

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

Seriously, though, Victoria 2 is cool because it offers you a look at the regular people of your country moreso than any other Paradox game. CK2 may have deep characters, but it only represents the elite of your country. The only interaction you have with anyone who isn't part of the ruling class comes from random events. In EU4 and HoI4, you're basically painting a map, and your people are kind of a means to that end. Vicky 2 is different, though. In Vicky 2, you paint the map for the sake of your people, not the other way around. You can see exactly how your policies affect the day-to-day lives of your people. Your population has their own ideologies and complex reasons for following them. I love Vicky 2 despite it being a janky, broken mess because The People are the most important part of the game, not the state. This degree of simulation tickles the little megalomaniacal part of my brain better than any other Paradox game.

# ¿ Jul 26, 2018 01:41

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 02:20

Pakled: Aug 6, 2011; WE ARE SMART

I feel like the absolute earliest you could push back Vicky's start date would be post-Waterloo, and even that's a bit of a stretch.

# ¿ Jul 26, 2018 15:18

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