Victoria 3 - Dev Diary #6 - Interest Groups

[Baneslave]

It’d be optional flavor for monarchs not a game defining thing

I would prefer for devs to put more effort on features that are not optional flavor features, really.

 

[grommile]

It’d be optional flavor for monarchs not a game defining thing

If it matters, is it truly optional?

 

[Axe99]

It’s strange that people dislike dynasty management in a game called Victoria 3 no one expects it to be on the level of ck3 ofc but it’d be fun to be able to cause a ww1 family feud thing.

I'm not going one way or the other with the dynasty management thing (I don't think I'd be in favour of it in this game but I'd want to think it through before having a firm view) but iirc WW1 wasn't really a family feud - it had far more profound causes than that. If there had been different relationships between the various monarchs/dynasties and all else was equal, I expect it would have still happened.

 

[nikkythegreat]

It’d be optional flavor for monarchs not a game defining thing

It will be if you add it, plus it does not fit the theme of the game.

 

[wilcoxchar]

It’s strange that people dislike dynasty management in a game called Victoria 3 no one expects it to be on the level of ck3 ofc but it’d be fun to be able to cause a ww1 family feud thing.

It's not strange at all that people don't want a feature that does not fit the theme of the game. The Victoria series is the single Paradox game with the greatest focus on the actions of the masses and that attempts to avoid the great man theory of history that permeates so many strategy games. Adding a marriage and dynasty management mechanic, and something that is already a core mechanic of another Paradox game, would be both bad theming and bad design.

I've been seeing this kind of thing a lot in here lately. People will make suggestions that ultimately amount to ripping the core design of another Paradox game and trying to shoehorn it into Victoria. Some people really don't seem to understand that each of Paradox's games has a very different focus, whether it be the dynasty and RPG focus of Crusader Kings, the economic and societal management focus of Victoria, or the military management focus of Hearts of Iron. There's a reason they're separate - because they're each the core focus of their own games - and trying to put one game's focus in another game is a really bad idea in terms of design and good gameplay.

Victoria is not Crusader Kings or Hearts of Iron and should not try to be either of those games. It is it's own game and people really need to realize that.

 

[Lorehead]

There was one nod to this in earlier Vicky games: the Kingdom of Hanover started out as a dependency of the United Kingdom, because it had been in a personal union since the end of the Napoleonic Wars. When Queen Victoria inherited the British throne in 1837, she did not inherit the throne of Hanover, so the game was scripted to release it.

 

[grommile]

There was one nod to this in earlier Vicky games: the Kingdom of Hanover started out as a dependency of the United Kingdom, because it had been in a personal union since the end of the Napoleonic Wars.

Longer than that

The Kingdom of Hannover was the continuation of the Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg (a.k.a. Electorate of Hannover), which entered personal union with Great Britain when Queen Anne died in 1714.

 

[Lorehead]

Longer than that

The Kingdom of Hannover was the continuation of the Electorate of Brunswick-Lüneburg (a.k.a. Electorate of Hannover), which entered personal union with Great Britain when Queen Anne died in 1714.

Until Napoleon conquered it. It re-entered personal union under George III (who by then had developed dementia) and his next two successors. In any case, the game did nod to that bit of dynastic history.

 

[GigaBread]

Public Schools causing increased attraction for government Interest Group is a neat idea, thanks!

I like this, but I’d say that Teachers would have to be their own thing as there are times when teachers will decide they don’t like their rulers and begin teaching the kids against the current ideologies.

 

[SignedName]

I like this, but I’d say that Teachers would have to be their own thing as there are times when teachers will decide they don’t like their rulers and begin teaching the kids against the current ideologies.

Public schools increasing attraction to the IGs Academics follow would make sense, if censorship laws aren't in place.

 

[Lapoleon]

Public schools increasing attraction to the IGs Academics follow would make sense, if censorship laws aren't in place.

I would suggest the following:
Religious education: increase attraction to whatever the Pious IG want.
Public schools: increase attraction to whatever the Intelligentsia want.
Public schools with State propaganda: increase attraction to ruling ideology

 

[Bounced Godzilla]

Hello Victoria 3 dev team! Sorry if this is a relatively late response, but I have formulated a suggestion for how political parties could be implemented.
Political parties in my suggestion would be independent of interest groups with their own leaders (sometimes these are the leaders of interest groups, sometimes not, sometimes it's a council, etc. ). A political party has a 'party agenda' that lists reforms it SAYS it will carry out (the player or ai can not do this and lie to its voting base, but this is surefire to cause the party to collapse at the ballot, unless using, say, unorthodox methods on the campaign trail... ). The individual agendas will align with what some interest groups want. One party could have abolition as one of its agendas, which coincides with several interest groups who want abolition. An interest group will back a party. They tend to choose the party with the agenda that fulfills their wants, however, they can sometimes follow a party based on its or the leader's clout (a great figure, operating in a party that might not support the interest group but who is highly charismatic and respective, say Bismark )Thus, votes from interest group pops will go to this party, with a margin of error to represent dissident votes.
Party agenda changes over time. If one agenda is accomplished, say increasing workers' rights, then a new agenda takes its place, say protecting workers' rights. Another way parties change agendas is if their leaders change personalities. A socialist party leader could be more communist inclined and the party will adopt several of his ideas as agenda, while his successor could be more anarchist oriented and the party will change from more Communist agendas to anarchist agendas. It is highly unlikely for the successor of the the communist inclined leader to be a liberal minded man, though, and somewhat impossible for him to be a conservative's friend. The last way a party could change agendas is from their interest groups. Basically, once an interest group backs a party, it will start to influence it. Take a socialist party. The workers back this party over the liberal, conservative and other available parties. However, the worker interest group backing the socialist party doesn't meet what the workers really want. Over time, if they continue to back them, the party will be influenced and adopt more worker oriented agendas. This rate is influenced by relative clout of backing interest groups. So if the farmers back the socialist party later and they have a higher clout than the workers interest group, the party will begin to adopt more farmer oriented agendas while shedding some worker oriented agendas. Maybe the workers get fed up with this and drop backing this party and find another.
Parties can also change complete political ideology over time, like the Republican and Democrat parties of America. Parties should appear organically and cater to their first leader's goals. A template system could be formed to facilitate this. Thus a liberal party could be formed and will have something in the range of the liberal template for that region or culture. Again, parties change over time, and thus over the course of a decade or two the liberal party could become conservative while a conservative party could become liberal.
The great thing about separating parties from interest groups, in my opinion, is that laws could change how parties are. Parties could be banned, and thus interest groups are represented in government alone. Some states, like communist ones, could only allow certain parties with certain party agendas to form, say socialist parties, and if their agendas stray from ideological lines they could get banned, while maybe a slow drift over time loosens the communist state back to a democratic state that allows liberal and maybe even conservative parties to run. These "normal" republics could also ban communist or fascist parties and only allow centrist parties. This could greatly effect how one plays a democratic state. The state could also be a one party state with no parties allowed, like the USSR. Thus, only the party controls the agenda and can change only through leader change or interest group backings, not by any election.
Finally, coalitions and even party fusion could be handled by coinciding agendas. Say the liberal party wins a plurality in congress. It can't pass reforms by itself, in that case, though it can run the government. However, the longer it runs a minority cabinet, the more likely snap elections will be called, if legal in the country. Thus, the liberal party is inclined to seek another party who would be willing to go into coalition. A party is likely to wish to join a coalition based on its ideological position (conservatives to conservatives, liberal to liberals, liberal to socialists, etc.), leader personality and perhaps most importantly shared agenda. Even though a party may share a similar agenda, its leader might not like our liberal party or it might be conservative and thus may not want to be in a coalition. The more the agenda matches up, the more likely leader difference and ideological difference will be overcome, while the farther the parties are ideologically or the more different the party leaders are, the less likely the party will accept the liberal parties offer of coalition. When the liberal party finds a coalition partner, it will add on a new agenda. The coalition partner must not be angered by passing to many laws against its agenda or it will leave the coalition. The extent of this is determined by relative size of the partners (bigger parties can bully smaller ones). Different laws may require different levels of votes in congress to pass. Thus, sometimes coalitions need to be ad-hoc expanded. A party can be kicked from the coalition, but this will put an animosity malus until the next election that'll prevent the party from accepting another coalition invite. The same occurs if a party voluntarily leaves the coalition over grievances.
A coalition can be extended any time in the game. If, after a recent election, the coalition still has a majority, it will reign still, though the dominant partner may change. If it is a plurality, opposition parties may form a new coalition to usurp it. This would require an automization of coalition making for ai controlled parties. This could also allow the player to back a specific party with the hope of making a working coalition, even if he loses the majority of votes to the opposition party. This also will represent the differences between two-party and multi-party systems.
Maybe also consider the player and ai to create parties based on their current leaders, to make custom parties that are pro-government. Obviously this would be constrained by leader personality traits (no communist party with a conservative leader), type of government (no communist party with a monarchist leader), etc. This was not unheard of and could be used to simulate military coups (a party from the leader, not a leader from the party), or the introduction of political parties such as in Meiji Japan and the birth of the Rikken Seiyūkai and other parties, which were created by different Genrō to make certain pro-government parties to carry their interest to the new parliamentary institution.
Sorry for the long read, and keep up the good work! I hope this could be of some use to you in your work.

 

[grommile]

paragraphs, fam.

 

[Bounced Godzilla]

Sorry for the lack of paragraphs, my bad.

 

[Axe99]

Sorry for the lack of paragraphs, my bad.

It's totally up to you, but if you went back into the post with the edit button, it would make it a lot more readable, which would make it easier for the devs to get to the information you've provided .

 

[MTGian]

Sorry for the lack of paragraphs, my bad.

As a helpful suggestion, I am not reading it without paragraphs. I assume the same is true for the vast majority of forum members.

 

[scriptkiddy]

It’s strange that people dislike dynasty management in a game called Victoria 3 no one expects it to be on the level of ck3 ofc but it’d be fun to be able to cause a ww1 family feud thing.

Victoria is a economy simulation with grand strategy elements. I prefer we keep it this way in Vic3 too.

 

[Nikolai]

As a helpful suggestion, I am not reading it without paragraphs. I assume the same is true for the vast majority of forum members.

Same here. I need to be very convinced it will be good if I am to read that.

 

[gurufabbes]

I think the interest groups are a good idea. I love political parties and elections, and having these all intersect may be the best way to go.

It may sound petty to some, but keeping the parties and elections is one of my big concerns so far. What I am seeing in terms of Vic3's other features is really great and I imagine I will be investing quite a bit of time and money in it. Vic2 is one of the best strategy games I have ever played.

 

[Duditsfireguy]

It's not strange at all that people don't want a feature that does not fit the theme of the game. The Victoria series is the single Paradox game with the greatest focus on the actions of the masses and that attempts to avoid the great man theory of history that permeates so many strategy games. Adding a marriage and dynasty management mechanic, and something that is already a core mechanic of another Paradox game, would be both bad theming and bad design.

I've been seeing this kind of thing a lot in here lately. People will make suggestions that ultimately amount to ripping the core design of another Paradox game and trying to shoehorn it into Victoria. Some people really don't seem to understand that each of Paradox's games has a very different focus, whether it be the dynasty and RPG focus of Crusader Kings, the economic and societal management focus of Victoria, or the military management focus of Hearts of Iron. There's a reason they're separate - because they're each the core focus of their own games - and trying to put one game's focus in another game is a really bad idea in terms of design and good gameplay.

Victoria is not Crusader Kings or Hearts of Iron and should not try to be either of those games. It is it's own game and people really need to realize that.

So warfare or economic building shouldn’t be in another game since it was in a previous title? That’s what you’re saying sounds like - dynasties have existed in all eras it’s not just a ck thing this isn’t Victoria 2 it’s 3 it shouldn’t be an hd remake. There’s a number of monarchies in the game start date we might as well remove them if their features are going to be crippled for the sake of “features not overlapping in games” instead of historical accuracy so again I urge the creators to pursue making a sequel not hd remake. Even the Inperator Rome Victoria mod will include flavor for monarchies it’d be immensely disappointing if it’s just a reskin of republic gameplay with a fancy new title as king or emperor instead of president. The characters should actually do something not just be there to be there.