How is your Victoria Game going?

Been playing the Victoria Ultimate Mod because lul. Austria uber alles.

My EU4 game has transitioned into a Vicky 2 game. The top 8 powers at the end of EU4, in approximate order, were Italy (myself), Great Britain, Castile (my junior partner in EU4, but independent in Vicky 2), Russia, Lorraine, the Holy Roman Empire, Portugal, and France. A decade in, west Asia/Europe look like this:



The colonial nations got absorbed with the Vicky 2 converter, but they've been being released as puppets consistently, outside of Britain, likely due to being way over the colonial power limit (whatever effect that has). Borders haven't changed a whole lot except everyone eating away at Bohemia-Moravia, Bengal taking a lot of Vijayanagar, Poland-Lithuania becoming independent and a new neighbor of Poland and Lithuania, and Japan conquering Ryukyu.

Sphere-wise, I started with Jolof and Ethiopia, and have added Hedjaz and Persia peacefully. I went to war to "convince" Delhi to join my sphere, and won a Pyrrhic victory, with 100,000 troops (or 1/4 of my soldier pops) lost, primarily due to attrition. I'd hoped to initially do the same with Vijayanagar and Ming, but with another victory like that I'd be ruined, so it's off the tables for now. Vijanagar might happen since Persia is allied with me and is more powerful than them, but Ming is definitely safe.

Industrially, my Reactionary Absolute Monarchy led the way to an early lead with heavy factory construction, but most of my factories are sitting idle now at 5-10% capacity. Only in Clipper production am I really dominant, and that industry is going to hit a wall in the near future. The problem seems to be that consciousness is low enough that there isn't much interest in factories, despite them being profit machines. So I'm increasing tariffs and lowering taxes in hopes of stimulating domestic consumption. I have six times as many factories as Britain, the industry leader, but they have twice as many craftsmen, so I'm pretty sure it's a workforce problem and not an industrial capital one.

The converter set all nations to have no social reforms, and thus far the only one in the world is trinket pensions in Lithuania. Italy itself is staunchly reactionary, and has no political reforms either save the Appointed upper house and Jefferson method non-elections it started with. Castille and Russia also are in the vanguard of reactionary absolute monarchies. The weakling Holy Romans have transitioned to a Prussian Constitutionalism, despite just having unified the Empire a few decades prior. Alliance-wise, however, we chose Lorraine, a constitutional monarchy, over Russia when they went to war both due to prudence - the huge shared border - as well as having been allied for 350 years, through thick and thin. Will the reactionary governments and the Lorrainian friendship survive another 90 years? The King hopes so, but it may or may not be.

It's actually been a lot more fun than I usually have in Victoria.

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Edit: 4.5 years later, and the status quo has mostly remained, at least in Italy. Castille proved to be weaklings and instituted a Prussian Constitutionalism. There was a war between Holy Rome and myself, resulting in British Normandie becoming Italian Normandie, achieving the great Italian ambition of forcing Britain off the Continent. Things could have been pushed to free Saxony or Newfoundland, but war was continuing to have a deleterious effect on my number of soldiers, though much less than the misadventure in Delhi, and I deemed it best not to push it. Italy and Britain currently enjoy a duopoly on steamer production. Egyptian rebels rose, but not in force, and they were crushed. An army reorganization is underway with the dual goals of ensuring equal-strength armies, and that no area is too heavily garrisoned with troops of one nationality.

Britain continues to lead the way in industry, although percentage-wise the gap in craftsmen in narrowing ever-so-slowly.

There is a growing reform movement seeking public political meetings, which will likely have to be dealt with some time during the 1850s. Oh, the joys of being a reactionary monarchy that's simultaneously striving to be the most advanced industrial country in the world!

I am thinking about getting this or one of the other Paradox games. If I get Victoria 2, do I want to get both expensions and all the DLC? Same question for the other Paradox games. If I get one, I probably will wait for a sale. thanks

You want V2 + A House Divided + Heart of Darkness. The rest of the DLC is just cosmetics and useless.

And are you suggesting V2 over HoI3?

shmily_dana said:

And are you suggesting V2 over HoI3?

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I would suggest V2 over HOI3. As far as Hearts of Iron goes I mainly play Darkest Hour, which is much cheaper (on sale its $2.50) and has the support of some really good mods like Kaiserreich.

I would suggest Vicky2 over Hearts of Iron III. IMO, it's more fun. It's still really hard to understand, but it isn't as tedious as Hearts of Iron III can be.

Although I'd recommend CKII or EU4 over either one (despite having probably played CKII the least).

Quintillus said:

I would suggest Vicky2 over Hearts of Iron III. IMO, it's more fun. It's still really hard to understand, but it isn't as tedious as Hearts of Iron III can be.

Although I'd recommend CKII or EU4 over either one (despite having probably played CKII the least).

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If you haven't played a Paradox game before, I'd suggest going with EU4 or CK2 as they're easier to pick up. Vicky and HOI3 are more complicated and can build upon knowledge gained in those two (particularly EU4, which serves more or less as the "base" Paradox game). Hearts of Iron expands on the formula with a far more detailed combat system, while Victoria has a much deeper economy based on very small population subgroups (of 1 family each) with their own jobs, needs, and funds. Both also have a deeper political system.

If you have, then I'd still recommend Victoria II. Once you have a grasp of EU's mechanics you should be able to pick up a working knowledge of what's different in Vicky somewhat quickly.

Victoria 2 is by far the best Paradox game, despite it's obvious (and much less obvious) flaws. It is also the best 19th century grand game strategy game out there and one of the few games that actually uses a detailed population model in an economic AND political context.

HOI3 isn't a terrible game anymore (like it was on release), but I still prefer Arsenal of Democracy (a HOI2 standalone 3rd party game) over it. HOI3 has one funny feature: You can automate almost everything if you want. Sometimes it can be really cool to just build stuff, hand it over to the AI and then see if it can take on Russia with that. Apart from that it is certainly weaker than V2, EU4 or CK2.

Thanks all. I got the Eu4 demo. If I have comments/questions about that game, I will post in that thread. I plan to try the Victoria 2 demo. Any comments on that?

check steam (and similar sites) for sales. paradox games are often bundled and sold pretty cheaply.

So is anyone else still playing Vicky II? I started a game recently, which is my first non-EU4-conversion "real" Heart of Darkness game - "real" as in playing a country that actually has options, rather than Abu Dhabi. The new features combined with increased knowledge of how things work from reading the wiki mean I'm actually enjoying it quite a bit more than I used to, and feel more in control (yet not too much so).

This time I'm playing as Russia, with goals of having a high score, led by prestige but also trying to catch up in industrialization, while keeping the Tsar in power. The calendar just turned over to 1900, and it's been an interesting, and so far mostly successful game:

- Prussia never formed North German Federation / Germany. I think it's because I sphered Denmark early, and France took the Rheinland from them in early-mid game (back when I was still helping Prussia, one of the few clear losses, which in this case wound up helping me).
- Mostly a fan of the crisis system. Had several crises in Poland, but won them all. Have backed my whole-game ally of Austria in all of their crises, and despite a few wars, have won all of those. Backed the Ottomans early against Greece, and so far Greece has not won a single crisis (although now Greece is an ally and sphere member). In other words, keeping up the status quo!
- No reforms so far, but support in the House just surpassed 50% for social reforms. Millions of people are clamoring for public schools, so it's likely in the near future. Militancy is slowly rising! 47% literacy and climbing.
- Prussia went Communist before I declared on them; since then Jacobins have taken over. Italy has Communists soon to take over Rome, and Bavaria recently had a Communist revolution as well. No such happenings in Russia though!
- In the 1890s, I fought Communist Prussia and Italy for Ostpreußen, not calling in Austria as I didn't want it to blow up into the Great War. After I'd beat the best of Prussia's army, Austria declared on the same two, and called in The Netherlands, to make it a super-easy Great War. Prussia and Italy have now been stuck in multi-rebel-no-army-no-money land for a few years.
- The Socialist Party has won the presidency in the USA at least once.
- I've pursued a low tax strategy and have not had income taxes for 15-20 years, instead subsisting solely on tariffs. Perhaps not an optimal strategy, but it was effective at keeping militancy low until hundreds of thousands of people started joining reform movements.

The Great Powers are:

1. Great Britain (first in industry)
2. France (first in military)
3. Russian Empire (first in prestige)
4. United States
5. Austrian Empire
6. Guangxi (former substate of China)
7. Chinese Empire
8. Netherlands

Secondary powers, in order, are Japan, the Ottomans (who I had sphered for awhile), Italy (who has 0 military power and was a Great Power until recently), Switzerland, Communist Bavaria, Prussia (who had dropped from Great Power to 20th place just a few years ago), Saxony, and Sweden. Also noteworthy is Mexico, who is 14th in industry and is part of the Russian sphere. I don't know why the USA didn't try to stop me, but I'm not complaining.

All in all I could see this being the first game of Vicky II I see through all the way to the end.

I'm still playing Victoria 1 Revolutions which makes a great combo paired with Hearts of Iron 2. Imported my Chinese campaign into HOI2 DD and am upto around 1950 currently.
Haven't played from Crusader Kings 1 to For The Glory (EU2) into Victoria.
I don't use sprites as counters graphically don't look dated and are also more informative.

The time period that both Victoria games cover isn't explored that much which is a shame

How far does HOI2 DD last? I only have HOI3 in that series, which without mods ends in 1948. Thinking of picking up HOI4 at some point, but probably after Stellaris (never got that into HOI3).

I've covered another 16 months into May, 1901. The Communists rose up in force, but were not a match for my military. Passed the Basic Schooling reform which lowered militancy, but it will likely be back up in a couple years. I sense the next decade or two could get... interesting. A third of my people remain Conservative but that falls every year, and Liberal and Socialist already have a greater presence in the Upper House. I'm not sure I'll outlast Nicholas II.

HOI2 DD goes up to 1964. Gives playing in Victoria a sense of urgency. China failed to modernise in the 19th century with the many opium wars the west gave me. So importing the game into Hoi2 1936 start I was basically a 3rd world country. At the time of 1950 I've doubled my industrial Capacity and have finally received a third research slot. No Communist China to deal with. Communist Russia never happened but Imperial Russia was annexed by Nazi Germany who is Independent. So who is the head of the Axis powers in this alternative history? France who are facing up against the allies headed by the British Empire. The USA is independent.

I got HOI3 this summer with all the expansions and it's good but not so sandbox as either Hoi2 or HOI4. Definitely checkout Darkest Hour if you are interested

I suppose the #1 thing that I didn't like in HOI3 was that there was no middle ground between micromanaging all the units, and giving the AI control of entire theaters. The former was too tedious for my taste; the latter left me feeling like I set the plans once, and they either work or don't. I think I would've liked it more with some better abilities to control units at a moderate level of abstraction (i.e. try to encircle this area, but I don't have to direct every province), and I also like the sounds of the industrial changes in HOI4 versus the can-upgrade-everything-and-build-anything-anywhere of HOI3. Less railroaded diplomacy would also be nice; there were a lot of hard-coded but not-in-the-UI restrictions on alliance-joining in HOI3. Not sure how much Darkest Hour would fit into those preferences.

I'm now in 1909; militancy has actually fallen to 1.3 from 1.5, although a decent part of that is failed uprisings. The Jacobins rose up with half a million in 1903, and 1904 - 1906 also saw at least a revolt per year, but none came close to succeeding. Now 20% of the population is clamoring for Acceptable Schooling; for now I'd rather let them focus on that than voting, but I'll give it to them in a few years before they start revolting over it.

On the world scene, Austria has sphered every country in Germany except Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, where the Communists recently took over, including Prussia, and has surpassed the U.S. in industry, and nearly equaled them overall. They make us old-time monarchists proud. Meanwhile, Japan supplanted the Netherlands as a Great Power. The Ottomans lost part of Macedonia to Greece in a crisis, but declared war to take it back, and only Serbia and Montenegro cared to fight them over it, so it was a cakewalk. My main policy is to always side with Austria in crises, and they'd sided with Greece in that one, so I did as well.

Edit: Well, made it to 1920. The Teens were a decade of war; I was at war nearly the whole decade. What do I have to show for it? Greece as a puppet and India (an OPM, released by France) in my sphere, slightly higher prestige, lower prestige for France and Britain, and a continuing strong alliance with the Austrians.

Militancy hit a several-decades low of 0.74, but has climbed to a bit over three, and now that the schools are maxed out, voting is the next hot-button issue. The Ottoman Empire has instituted limited voting; Austria and Russia remain as the last two absolute monarchies in Europe. However, 90% of my Conservatives support political reform, which seems rather high. But I've already outlasted the monarchy in real life; the Communist revolt of 1919 did not succeed in my timeline.

Communism has indeed mostly run its course. Yes, Greece is Communist now, but Fascism is the new ideology on the upswing; Fascists have already been voted into power in Romania, and are polling well in Prussia and Italy.

Looking forward to the next decade of crises and non-perma-war. Still plan to stick with the Austria-and-the-status-quo strategy. I've climbed to 2nd overall now; if I can continue to build my burgeoning industry, I may catch Britain yet. Austria is in 4th, with the USA 3rd, France 5th, and the others so far back they hardly count as "great" powers.

I guess there's no better place to ask this but:
How to get gud at legit vicky? I know that the research points techs are most important, but that's the extent that of my knowledge.

(1) Promote Bureaucrats until you have 100% admin efficiency (to max tax income), keep spending at least at 50% to keep your % stable.
(2) Promote Clergymen to 2% (to get max research points), up to 4% if you are a low-literacy country, keep spending at 100% until you are at 90% literacy.
(3) Max your tariffs and taxes during the early game unless you are one of the advanced industrial nations (e.g. England, Belgium, Sweden) - this way you will generate enough income to pay your pops. Once you make a decent surplus, slowly lower tariffs.
(4) Early game key techs: Freedom of Trade (huge income boost), all Philosophy techs (research points), Ideological Thought (extra NF and pluralism), Medicine (pop growth, prevents bad events)
(5) Mid game key techs: Biologism (huge literacy boost), Machine Guns (allows you to get a headstart in the scramble for africa), Time-Saving Measures (massive economy boost), Nationalism & Imperialism (influence boost, scramble for africa, excavation decisions), Electricity (big economy boost, unlocks late game factories)
(6) If you want to play peacefully focus on Culture techs (particularly Aesthetics) - by grabbing enough prestige you can easily become a secondary power (or even a GP if you play a medium-sized nation). Your rank will later be useful to get higher in the buyorder, allowing your factories to buy goods before lower rank nations.
(7) If you play an expansive nation focus on getting Tropical Wood provinces under your control (either via conquest or via sphering) - Tropical Wood is in high demand throughout the game and will later turn into rubber, the most important late game ressource.
(8) It is okay to forgo industrializing early on, especially as a low-literacy nation. The key turning point is 1880, when you get access to all the late game factories (electric gear, cars, planes and later radios) - these are HUGE money makers, especially if you can get up factories before other countries.
(9) It is usually a good idea to subside factories to prevent unemployment - this is less efficient in terms of income, but makes sure your pops get paid (which will prevent MIL from lack of life needs). If your subsides are getting out of hand, you can stop them for a week or two - this will reshuffle workers to profitable factories. Upgrade all factories near the limit (SHIFT+LMB on the [+] icon) to make sure the efficient ones get expanded to allow more workers in them. Do this "cleanup" once or twice a year and you will have a healthy economy without too much micrormanagement.
(10) To kickstart your economy, make sure you either build factories yourself (State Captialism/Planned Economy) or by supporting your pop projects (SHIFT+LMB to max invest in all projects). Remember that only capitalists can start state projects.

Upgrade all factories near the limit (SHIFT+LMB on the [+] icon)

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Nifty shortcut I didn't know about, thanks! I definitely had to put the brakes on factory subsidies in my game - it was up around 1000 pounds per day, which at the time was a decent chunk of change. It was still early though so there weren't factories to reshuffle to; instead I dealt with a bit of unemployment while waiting for new factories to get online.

What are your thoughts on factory destruction? In the early 1900s I went through and destroyed all my bankrupt factories, which cleared up slots for new ones, which seemed to really help the economy and industrial ranking once they were built. Some provinces had 5 bankrupt factories!

The late industries really are a goldmine. Awadh became a semi-noticeable country in my game simply from being the first country to manufacture lots of telephones. Electric gear is my current bread and butter, being my top export. Though it's only slightly ahead of vodka and other liquor.

I'd say remove unprofitable factories if you have better replacements. But try to do so early, since it will take *A LONG TIME* to replace a lvl 30+ factory. Later on it's okay to have an unprofitable factory if that means your pops are employed.