Can we finally have the Power Blocs removed, please?

[Hopciu]

It's like the worst concept ever implemented by Paradox in any of their GSGs.
It represents nothing, that has ever existed in real life.
It is mostly redundant with Great Power tier.
It breaks GPs interactions, making them go at each other's throats, with Relation maluses it provides. This causes GPs to perform worse than before PBs implementation, as they don't cooperate with each other.
It lays less historical results overall - for example, Germany and Italy forms less often.
It creates immersion breaking, ahistorical entities, with silly names and weird flags.
The whole concept of Mandates - it has EU4's modifier hoarding vibes, gives gamey and illogical bonuses. It breaks the Vic3's heavily simulational approach.
The Power Bloc Monuments are completely nonsensical (let's build a big-ass building for our Zollverein, it will give us more Prestige and <rolls dice> migration bonus!), and, honestly, feel like some mobile game feature.
Leverage - it has issues. It is poorly communicated to the player what impacts it, and it encourages spamming unnecessary diplomatic interactions just for the sake of increasing it. Still, it is the only remotely interesting and useful mechanic related to PBs. Luckily, it could easily be integrated into Great Power (maybe also Major Power) tier.

The system provides no positive value to the game. It only serves to consume player's attention, confuse the AI, burden the performance. I don't know, if there's a single player, that truly enjoys the concept and it's implementation. Let's just admit, that it was misguided conception, and remove it altogether.

 

[Timewalker102]

I don't think it should be removed entirely - spheres of influence were an important part of Victoria 2, and in a general sense Paradox would never "roll back" a DLC. But I agree that it occasionally feels a bit game-y in a way that V2's sphere of influence didn't (even with its extremely janky market economics lol).

I think a lot of this is AI diplomacy issues, as it doesn't feel like there's true interbloc competition. AIs don't aggressively try to strengthen their bloc and so gameplay is just "click a few buttons and get X country in your sphere". If the Great Powers actually saw their power blocs as important parts of their power projection and jostled for control over regions rather than just invading countries willy nilly, it would feel more fulfilling.

 

[Galadredid]

I know Paradox will not just delete DLC content but what we can hope for is that the system is completely reworked within the a few content cycles.

I'm hoping that if they do a World War 1 DLC they'll realize how bad it is to have the systems all play the same and be completely exclusive to one idea like religion, the military, trade, ideology or just 'the empire'.

According to the game, Austrian influence over Italy was a union of conservative groups as tight as the Comintern, and trying to unify Italy is therefore just like trying to take Egypt from the British Empire in the 1900s.

Ideally there'd be sovereign empire mechanics you can spend diplo points in, and then different systems for trade blocs and military alliances (which should be alliances and not work like some early form of Nato). Ideological unions I'd want to be completely different and come with a politics rework. I don't know what even to suggest for the religious blocs other than removing them though.

 

[David29]

I disagree - especially to say that it doesn't represent anything that ever existed in real life. Great Britain is the obvious example, as it exerted influence over many countries without either directly or indirectly controlling them (China, Argentina, and Uruguay being examples - as well as Egypt for a period from 1882 when it was de jure under the control of the Ottomans but a de facto British protectorate).

Another example - albeit slightly outside the time frame of the game - was the Continental System. Granted, it failed in its objectives, but it was a clear case of a Great Power (France) using it's influence to force countries to adopt a joint economic policy.

From a gameplay perspective, I think it's a great feature and I enjoy it. It allows the player (as a Great Power) to manipulate smaller countries and gain leverage over them. I like that the game gives you options as the direction you want to go with it, whether that be using your influence to peacefully subjugate them, or to simply expand your economic growth into other countries and increase their dependency on you.

 

[Hopciu]

I don't think it should be removed entirely - spheres of influence were an important part of Victoria 2, and in a general sense Paradox would never "roll back" a DLC. But I agree that it occasionally feels a bit game-y in a way that V2's sphere of influence didn't (even with its extremely janky market economics lol).

I think a lot of this is AI diplomacy issues, as it doesn't feel like there's true interbloc competition. AIs don't aggressively try to strengthen their bloc and so gameplay is just "click a few buttons and get X country in your sphere". If the Great Powers actually saw their power blocs as important parts of their power projection and jostled for control over regions rather than just invading countries willy nilly, it would feel more fulfilling.

But why would we neeed a separate entity for it? Why does Russian Empire need a Power Bloc called Russian Empire (but in Russian) to have all of these? Why do GB, Russia, Prussia, Austria, Turkey have their spheres of influence at game start, while USA and France do not? Were they less important players? Why does France need to found some weird, implausible, silly named political being, to start putting pressure on minor powers, and compete for Leverage with other GPs?

None of it makes sense history-wise, gameplay-wise, or balance-wise.

 

[banbonbanbon]

I agree to some extent.

It seems to me that by fixing the inconveniences of VIC2's Influence and adjusting it to suit the VIC3 system, we were able to create a system that is sufficiently historical and immersive.

I don't completely reject the idea of porting the Stellaris federation, but the optimization involved is clearly lacking.
Didn't Paradox know that VIC3's political system is more susceptible to change than Stellaris? What on earth is the anarchist Sovereign Empire?


Also, principles, Power Bloc Statue, and Religious Convocation are too unhistorical and game-like for a historical simulation game.

It's not a bad thing to flexibly switch development policies depending on the situation.
However, there is currently a problem in that the fundamental aspects that Paradox aims for with VIC3 are wavering.
Historical simulation or dynamic electronic board game? Paradox should "clearly" decide which path to take.

 

[Fatherlorris]

Also, principles, Power Bloc Statue, and Religious Convocation are too unhistorical and game-like for a historical simulation game.

Are you telling me the British empire wasn't a WoW guild that nations asked to join so they could build statues of an octopus in a top hat in every state?

 

[Hopciu]

I disagree - especially to say that it doesn't represent anything that ever existed in real life. Great Britain is the obvious example, as it exerted influence over many countries without either directly or indirectly controlling them (China, Argentina, and Uruguay being examples - as well as Egypt for a period from 1882 when it was de jure under the control of the Ottomans but a de facto British protectorate).

Another example - albeit slightly outside the time frame of the game - was the Continental System. Granted, it failed in its objectives, but it was a clear case of a Great Power (France) using it's influence to force countries to adopt a joint economic policy.

Both of these examples could easily be portrayed by tying Leverage mechanic directly to Great Powers - unless Netherlands and Kingdom of Italy used to build monuments to the glory of Continental System, that magically made the people more willing to migrate there, but, as far as I know, this is not the case.

 

[TitaniumMan91]

Both of these examples could easily be portrayed by tying Leverage mechanic directly to Great Powers - unless Netherlands and Kingdom of Italy used to build monuments to the glory of Continental System, that magically made the people more willing to migrate there, but, as far as I know, this is not the case.

If you're just transferring the mechanics, then you're not even advocating for it's removal, you just don't like how it's structured.

 

[Hopciu]

If you're just transferring the mechanics, then you're not even advocating for it's removal, you just don't like how it's structured.

Yes. You're partially right. I'm for removal of Mandates, Monuments, names, coats of arms etc., and for transerring the Leverage directly to Great Powers, possibly to Major Powers too.

 

[FranklyJustNess]

Yes. You're partially right. I'm for removal of Mandates, Monuments, names, coats of arms etc., and for transerring the Leverage directly to Great Powers, possibly to Major Powers too.

Then what does it do.

 

[Fatherlorris]

I don't really like how Vic 2's spheres work.

It's impressive that Vic 3 made something 10x worse.

 

[yurcick]

Then what does it do.

Create CUs and/or "migration unions", for example.
Ability to influence certain laws in a bloc's country (or, if we remove the blocs, in a country you have the highest leverage over) also sounds reasonable.

 

[Desseabar]

I think it needs a major rebalancing, not a removal.

The -30 relations modifier never seems like it was properly balanced, and too many of the mandates are straight bonuses with no trade-offs.
Some of the mandates have interesting tradeoffs (e.g., defensive ones that drag you into wars, exploitation of members), but those are overwhelmed by the straight bonus ones. I'd like to see all of them have some degree of tradeoff.

Otherwise, I think leverage is an excellent mechanic that is completely underutilized. I'd love to see leverage used more, or even removing obligations in exchange for making leverage a kind of currency, or making power blocs a moving modifier (i.e., instead of a binary, you could have 20% impact from the British Power Bloc and 50% from the German one or something like that).

 

[NATOaster]

I mean just a start would be removing the bizarre opinion malus from creating a bloc, why do France and the US have to tank a -30 relations penalty (enough to drop a tier and thereby trigger the arbitrary lobby formation/ relations dropping) every time the game starts? It's not even like either country can reasonably join a power bloc, you need to REALLY try your best to get into a power bloc as the US, but as France I'm gna call it actually impossible bc of ur population leverage resistance.

 

[NATOaster]

ALSO !! It feels like religious convocation was added completely arbitrarily, the feature doesn't even work properly. If you swap someone's state religion to yours then their devout IG stay the same, even though there's code in-game for swapping our a devout IG in Japan's State Shinto decision. The IG doesn't even react to their religion being dropped in any meaningful capacity, the leader of the IG even immediately converts but nothing else changes.

 

[TalTal]

Spheres of influence in the form of power blocs are extremely inflexible due to their limitation to central identities. In fact, I have never used the principles of religious assembly and ideological union. If you play as a great power, then your initial sphere of influence and its central identity are predetermined. If I suddenly want to change the central identity to a trade league or something else, then I have to disband the current sovereign empire bloc, lose the bloc members and start all over again.

I am not even talking about fairy-tale modifiers that only give positive bonuses for the mandate, as if it is not enough that you are a recognized great power.

Instead of power bloc statues, we could build a power bloc embassy in the capital of the target country instead of spamming statues in all the states of your country and in the countries of your bloc. On the 3D map, it would look like a regular building with the flag of your power bloc hanging on it.

 

[Prob32]

It's like the worst concept ever implemented by Paradox in any of their GSGs.
It represents nothing, that has ever existed in real life.
It is mostly redundant with Great Power tier.
It breaks GPs interactions, making them go at each other's throats, with Relation maluses it provides. This causes GPs to perform worse than before PBs implementation, as they don't cooperate with each other.
It lays less historical results overall - for example, Germany and Italy forms less often.
It creates immersion breaking, ahistorical entities, with silly names and weird flags.
The whole concept of Mandates - it has EU4's modifier hoarding vibes, gives gamey and illogical bonuses. It breaks the Vic3's heavily simulational approach.
The Power Bloc Monuments are completely nonsensical (let's build a big-ass building for our Zollverein, it will give us more Prestige and <rolls dice> migration bonus!), and, honestly, feel like some mobile game feature.
Leverage - it has issues. It is poorly communicated to the player what impacts it, and it encourages spamming unnecessary diplomatic interactions just for the sake of increasing it. Still, it is the only remotely interesting and useful mechanic related to PBs. Luckily, it could easily be integrated into Great Power (maybe also Major Power) tier.

The system provides no positive value to the game. It only serves to consume player's attention, confuse the AI, burden the performance. I don't know, if there's a single player, that truly enjoys the concept and it's implementation. Let's just admit, that it was misguided conception, and remove it altogether.

The system actually plays very well from the multiplayer perspective. I don't mind the principle modifiers although I do wish they had systems behind them. I do trust PDX to build out systems that each principle can plug into which will help increase realism. They've done this for agitators only making the feature more relevant despite its lack luster launch content

 

[Fatherlorris]

They've done this for agitators only making the feature more relevant despite its lack luster launch content

Going to the agitator shop to import John Socialism because he is an accepted culture, making him lead a interest group so all my pops suddenly become communists.

I've never felt so immersed in history.

 

[FranklyJustNess]

My main issue with them, is that they are kinda weirdly pointless. Why do you want to add countries to your Power Bloc?

There are two obvious answers

1. To make them part of your Market - since this opens all their pops to freely consume all the goods you produce, and contribute all their production to the Market. It also means migration is allowed. It's a big way to spread your economic influence, and grow your economy, by increasing demand, and introducing more resource supply.
2. Because you are the Sovereign Empire, and will eventually make them into subjects. It's crazy how great this Power Bloc type is, and it's also the only way to peacefully subjugate countries.

That's basically it. If you are a high rank country, then Mandate generation is pretty useless, since you'll finish the Power Bloc very soon either way. So you'll have all your bonuses without really trying.

Being a Trade League is a nice way to play as an okayish power, that doesn't aim for top spots. Otherwise you want to be a Sovereign Empire. There's essentially never a reason to be the other three. You also can't change the central pillar. Personally I would disband Zollverein the moment I form NGF, to make a Sovereign Empire, and the Austrian one goes away day 1, because it's never going to be useful. Since you lose all your progress, and all your members by removing a Power Bloc, and it takes a fair bit of time to get all the Mandates and members in, then you'll want to do it as soon as possible. This goes heavily against the changing nature of your state - no Ideological socialist bloc, because it's too late for that, Austrian bloc suddenly is all about enligtened liberal republic, and you were a religious bloc and eventually passed total seperation? I goes it goes completely into the bin. Game massively needs some way to say "okay, lose me a bunch of Mandate progress, but let me change the central pillar".

They are also pretty dreadful at representing anything outside a great power influence over states. You can't have a smaller independent defensive cooperation, or a common market of South American states, because despite a big number of different Mandates and several pillars, it always assumes it's some hegemony, that you hold with an iron grip. This introduces quite a lot of clashing between the core idea of a Power Bloc and Mandates, and hugely limits the uses of them.

And that's kinda the main issue I have - there's a lot there, that has a simple answer - you can do your own thing, get creative, chase own goals, it doesn't need to be great and objectively best, whatever works best for you in your specific game!
But at the same time, you can't ever change the main pillar, even if your game changes. You can't possibly handle a Power Bloc, which isn't led by a really powerful country. You can't have countries join it, because they want to, but only because they were pressured into it with leverage and good relations, regardless of Mandates.