Paradox Grand Strategy: From the Carnival of Lust to the Enlightened Times

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Paradox Grand Strategy: From the Carnival of Lust to the Enlightened Times

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Kavak: Aug 23, 2009

Drone posted:

I wanna know what percentage of people who love Paradox games go on to study history/become historians. I mean I won't say it was a deciding factor for me or anything, but I played Vicky/Ricky for a couple years before I started a bachelor's degree in history.

I've always been interested in history, but I think getting into Paradox's stuff kicked me into gear and made me single out my major. Wish I'd found them a year earlier instead of dicking around with classes I hated for my Freshman year.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 21:10

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# ? May 14, 2024 07:30

Ofaloaf: Feb 15, 2013

Drone posted:

I wanna know what percentage of people who love Paradox games go on to study history/become historians. I mean I won't say it was a deciding factor for me or anything, but I played Vicky/Ricky for a couple years before I started a bachelor's degree in history.

I was in high school when I started playing Paradox games, and it did help fire my interest into something more serious. Of course, then I ended up interested in the one period Paradox hasn't touched, and now I'm always frustrated when the next new project doesn't end up being a Early Middle Ages/Dark Ages game.

Kavak posted:

I've always been interested in history, but I think getting into Paradox's stuff kicked me into gear and made me single out my major. Wish I'd found them a year earlier instead of dicking around with classes I hated for my Freshman year.

Trying to be an engineering student Freshman year for me was definitely a mistake.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 21:40

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Patter Song posted:

That's sort of the point, though. The Radicals were explicitly not aristocrats, and dismantling the relics of "feudalism" that benefited old landowners is one of the key parts of their agenda (see the campaign against the Corn Laws). Voting Reforms etc. at this point are not really targeted at benefiting the poor, they're being used as weapons to destroy the political power of the landed aristocracy. Note how the Conservatives fight back by trying to undermine the Liberals by appealing to the newly-ensuffraged at every step: the Factory Act that bans child labor is pushed by Richard Oastler, a Tory of the highest distinction, in an attempt to undermine the clout of those tacky new-money capitalists, or how the Tories of Disraeli's time campaigned on the idea that the Liberal idea of Free Trade=Freedom was a road to popular impoverishment and how anti-imperial Liberal activists were "Little Englanders" who weren't in touch with the glorious spirit of empire. Both sides, the wealthy capitalists and the blue-blooded aristocrats, had vested interests in pandering to the mob to fight each other.

What would the new upper class (capitalists in this case) have to gain from granting rights to the working class, when their interests are now diametrically opposed? As you say, they're only interested in granting those rights to destroy the old order, but if they have a successful revolution then that goal has been accomplished. Sure, they might still grant rights to the working class, alongside much more useful rights for themselves to cancel those out, such as the aforementioned voting rights for corporations. That's probably best simulated by limited political rights within the context of Vicky II.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 22:05

Farecoal: Oct 15, 2011; There he go

Drone posted:

I wanna know what percentage of people who love Paradox games go on to study history/become historians. I mean I won't say it was a deciding factor for me or anything, but I played Vicky/Ricky for a couple years before I started a bachelor's degree in history.

Not so much history (I was interested in that before hand), but Paradox games helped immensely with my geographical knowledge.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 22:58

Tahirovic: Feb 25, 2009; Fun Shoe

Yeah you can learn a lot about history from EU3, I now know that Jewish Genoa colonized South America, and Vikings from Norway really were the first in North America, or at least they colonized it around the 15th century.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 23:11

Punished Chuck: Dec 27, 2010

Drone posted:

I wanna know what percentage of people who love Paradox games go on to study history/become historians. I mean I won't say it was a deciding factor for me or anything, but I played Vicky/Ricky for a couple years before I started a bachelor's degree in history.

It was the other way around for me; while I'm not a history major or historian anything, I've always been interested in history as a hobby, and I picked up Victoria II because I especially love the colonial period. And then I loved Vicky 2 so much that I went on to buy all the other PI games.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 23:28

Dr. Video Games 0031: Jul 17, 2004

Tahirovic posted:

and Vikings from Norway really were the first in North America

This is actual fact, though (assuming you meant first europeans) and it happened long before the game's start date. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinland

# ? Mar 23, 2013 23:33

burnishedfume: Mar 8, 2011; You really are a louse...

I'm trying to mod in a NF in Victoria 2 to encourage assimilation but it doesn't seem to be doing anything.

code:

assimilate =
	{
		assimilation_rate = .2
		icon = 35
		limit = {
			civilized = yes
			citizenship_policy = full_citizenship
		}
	}

Can you not use assimilation_rate like that? The mouseover text for assimilate says nothing so and I left my game running for a while and I still see no assimilation going on and pops I mouseover don't seem to be assimilating into anything.

# ? Mar 23, 2013 23:52

Darkrenown: Jul 18, 2012; please give me anything to talk about besides the fact that democrats are allowing millions of americans to be evicted from their homes

Wolfgang Pauli posted:

I'm not sure if we have another HoD dev diary coming, everything that's been hinted at has had its diary AFAIK.

Industrial changes next week!

# ? Mar 23, 2013 23:58

NEED TOILET PAPER: Mar 22, 2013; by XyloJW

Drone posted:

I wanna know what percentage of people who love Paradox games go on to study history/become historians. I mean I won't say it was a deciding factor for me or anything, but I played Vicky/Ricky for a couple years before I started a bachelor's degree in history.

Oddly enough, I was dead-set on majoring in history before I discovered Paradox games (my first one was Vicky2, which fits since the late 19th century/pre-WWI era is my favorite) and I adore them. OTOH, games like EU3 made me want to learn more about the time periods they were set in. I know I would know fuckall about the Thirty Years' War if it weren't for the HRE turning into a religious patchwork every playthrough. All in all, I'd say that for me some Pdox games are an extension of preexisting interests while others affected me the same as other posters here.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 00:37

Dr. Video Games 0031: Jul 17, 2004

Considering how insanely anemic my local school system's european history lessons were, I didn't even know what the Holy Roman Empire was until I played EU2. I always had a passing interest in history but it took Paradox's games to actually ignite that into something bigger.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 00:40

Drone: Aug 22, 2003; Incredible machine

Dr. Video Games 0031 posted:

Considering how insanely anemic my local school system's european history lessons were, I didn't even know what the Holy Roman Empire was until I played EU2.

I have a feeling this is the case with most American Paradox players. Probably 90% of my public school history education K-12 was Civil War, local (Ohio) history, more Civil War, World Wars, then in like 1960 history just stopped.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 00:44

DrSunshine: Mar 23, 2009; Did I just say that out loud~~?!!!

Isn't that generally the case with history education in most every country? Public school social studies is for the glorification of the State and the indoctrination of the citizens, not a means of educating children about the history of the world.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 00:58

A Tartan Tory: Mar 26, 2010; You call that a shotgun?!

Another thing Paradox games have encouraged my to do is to be entirely OCD about colours and borders, just looking at Kaliningrad on maps now is incredibly annoying!

# ? Mar 24, 2013 01:13

Jabarto: Apr 7, 2007; I could do with your...assistance.

Farecoal posted:

Not so much history (I was interested in that before hand), but Paradox games helped immensely with my geographical knowledge.

Ditto. I made up my mind to pursue a history degree long before I'd ever heard of EU3 (my first, and so far, only Paradox game), but playing it taught me a lot of things about geography; "Whoa, Brunei is Muslim?", and, "Aleppo? Hey, I know where that is from my Mamluks game!".

I do have to admit, though, that EU3 is the only reason I know who Charles the Bold is, and he's since became one of my favorite historical figures.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 01:18

Crameltonian: Mar 27, 2010

Most history classes do focus on the history of the country they're being taught in and honestly history isn't a priority for most schools so you have to pick and choose what to teach- at one point I was getting an hour's worth of history a week so it's hardly surprising they focused on stuff like the World Wars.

I was interested in history well before I got into Paradox games, EU2 definitely got me to look into a lot more world history than I had before. I had a vague idea that Germany and Italy hadn't always been united for example but knew gently caress all about them otherwise, I got really into Indian history too after playing an Indian game.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 01:19

Vegetable: Oct 22, 2010

I think EU3 was the best introduction I could get for geopolitics. Why is England so protected from continental attacks? Why does Russia get so big? And why did Portugal of all countries get to colonise so much of America? Some things just aren't that obvious until you've literally played a few centuries in their shoes :v:

# ? Mar 24, 2013 01:29

NEED TOILET PAPER: Mar 22, 2013; by XyloJW

Drone posted:

I have a feeling this is the case with most American Paradox players. Probably 90% of my public school history education K-12 was Civil War, local (Ohio) history, more Civil War, World Wars, then in like 1960 history just stopped.

Oh my God, this. I remember in fifth grade we had a history class. Don't remember much from it, but what I do remember is that it covered World War II. I also remember that it had a really detailed diagram of the Normandy invasion, detailing how many infantry, airplanes, tanks, and ships each side had. About the Eastern Front as a whole? Nothing :eng99:

# ? Mar 24, 2013 02:00

Wolfgang Pauli: Mar 26, 2008; One Three Seven

Drone posted:

I have a feeling this is the case with most American Paradox players. Probably 90% of my public school history education K-12 was Civil War, local (Ohio) history, more Civil War, World Wars, then in like 1960 history just stopped.

After 1960 you're mostly learning about world history from your lit class. I started down the road to knowing as much as I do about postcolonial Africa because of a unit on Achebe. I don't even know how I learned so much about Nigerian literature, it just kind of happened. It's not like my Postcolonial Lit class in college covered more than the same Achebe book I had already read, and never even mentioned Wole Soyinka or the Biafran War.

DrSunshine posted:

Isn't that generally the case with history education in most every country? Public school social studies is for the glorification of the State and the indoctrination of the citizens, not a means of educating children about the history of the world.

True of middle school, but my high school World Studies class was basically a doddering old lady teaching straight out of Guns, Germs, and Steel. That was kind of neat.

Also, I had no idea what the Holy Roman Empire was before Crusader Kings and EU3. It basically disappears from American history classes after Charlemagne.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 02:18

Tomn: Aug 23, 2007; And the angel said unto him
"Stop hitting yourself. Stop hitting yourself."
But lo he could not. For the angel was hitting him with his own hands

Vegetable posted:

I think EU3 was the best introduction I could get for geopolitics. Why is England so protected from continental attacks? Why does Russia get so big? And why did Portugal of all countries get to colonise so much of America? Some things just aren't that obvious until you've literally played a few centuries in their shoes

I remember playing as Muscovy helped me realize why Russian governments are typically considered a touch paranoid and expansionist - everybody IS out to get you, and the only way to survive is to get them first and then get bigger and bigger until nobody can get you.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 02:18

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

My interest in history was sparked too late (thanks in no small part to Paradox games!) to have been able to study History as a course, but now I wish I did :smith:

I just read a lot of books on various subjects instead. I don't think I've picked up a fictional work going on 2 years now.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 03:19

Koesj: Aug 3, 2003

For me it was the other way around, I got hooked on Pdox games after I started studying history. And after specializing in post-WWII economic and social stuff, I really want to see East & West working properly :shobon:

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:00

wukkar: Nov 27, 2009

This book, on how US schools (fail to) teach history (and exactly why they deliberately do it) might be of interest to Paradox players.
http://www.amazon.com/Lies-My-Teacher-Told-Everything/dp/0743296281

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:23

Trujillo: Jul 10, 2007

Did anyone elses high school still have the soviet union, czechoslovakia and the rest still on all the maps 20 years after they were gone or just mine? I don't think I knew who the countries under the USSR were until releasing them in hoi2.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:28

Hot Dog Day #82: Jul 5, 2003; Soiled Meat

Trujillo posted:

Did anyone elses high school still have the soviet union, czechoslovakia and the rest still on all the maps 20 years after they were gone or just mine? I don't think I knew who the countries under the USSR were until releasing them in hoi2.

I graduated from high school in 2001 and, according to my school maps and text books, the Warsaw Pact was alive and well.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:41

Fader Movitz: Sep 25, 2012; Snus, snaps och saltlakrits

I have always been in to history and games like paradox and total war were probably a part of that. At first I thought I was going to study history but I ended up in politics, actually, a lot of politics students play paradox games. Probably 'cause we can't get enough of the scheming, diplomacy and backstabbing. :unsmigghh:

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:50

Dibujante: Jul 27, 2004

Darkrenown posted:

Sure, but it was Europe that really drove the development of handheld firearms beyond the earliest parts of the EU period. The tech groups are just abstractions of the the general results of technological advancement because we can't accurately simulate everything that happened in history that resulted in European domination and colonisation.

Wolfgang Pauli posted:

Plus it was the Renaissance/Neo-Classical interest in the Romans that lead to massed formations of musketeers.

Not entirely. Europeans pulled somewhat ahead in firearms technology by the 1500s, but once they marketed those firearms around in east asia, they were a big hit and east asia reached parity again. East asians also adopted massed formations and volley fire - those are inevitable inventions once you have reliable firearms. Firearms became so important during Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea that generals wrote back to the mainland to request that only firearm-bearing soldiers be sent over.

In terms of most developmental metrics, the Chinese civilizational group was about on par with the European one in terms of population, economy, literacy, and military power into the 1700s, and then experienced a fairly abrupt stagnation. Europeans didn't push China around in the 1600s primarily because it would have been impossible, not because they hadn't gotten around to it.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 04:53

Fister Roboto: Feb 21, 2008

DrSunshine posted:

Isn't that generally the case with history education in most every country? Public school social studies is for the glorification of the State and the indoctrination of the citizens, not a means of educating children about the history of the world.

When I lived in France as a kid, we pretty much learned nothing but French history and geography. It's definitely not just an American thing.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 05:29

Defeatist Elitist: Jun 17, 2012; I've got a carbon fixation.

WeaponGradeSadness posted:

It was the other way around for me; while I'm not a history major or historian anything, I've always been interested in history as a hobby, and I picked up Victoria II because I especially love the colonial period. And then I loved Vicky 2 so much that I went on to buy all the other PI games.

It was this exact same thing for me. I really really love history, even though I'm pursuing a Biology degree, and that interest meant I loving loved playing Vicky 2 at a friends place, leading me to buy a ton of Paradox games.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 07:15

burnishedfume: Mar 8, 2011; You really are a louse...

I think this is an issue in APD because I've never seen it in vanilla or NNM, but the slave trade in the USA just took an interesting turn.

As far as I can tell, Romanian slaves from Wallachia and Moldavia are somehow immigrating to the USA and they're staying slaves. So now .2% of slaves in the USA are Romanians.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 08:20

WhitemageofDOOM: Sep 13, 2010; ... It's magic. I ain't gotta explain shit.

DrProsek posted:

I think this is an issue in APD because I've never seen it in vanilla or NNM, but the slave trade in the USA just took an interesting turn.

As far as I can tell, Romanian slaves from Wallachia and Moldavia are somehow immigrating to the USA and they're staying slaves. So now .2% of slaves in the USA are Romanians.

If i remember right they removed the "Is slave" tag which prevents them from collecting a salary, but also prevents them from voting and migrating.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 08:43

GenderSelectScreen: Mar 7, 2010; I DON'T KNOW EITHER DON'T ASK ME; College Slice

DrSunshine posted:

Isn't that generally the case with history education in most every country? Public school social studies is for the glorification of the State and the indoctrination of the citizens, not a means of educating children about the history of the world.

Oh my god, once I learned what really happened to the Native Americans during colonial times I began to hate American history. I feel like I was completely and utterly lied to my entire life. Doesn't help that I'm also part Native American as well.

Paradox games did get me super interested in Irish history, but not well enough for me to switch from a Film major to a History one. Especially in my senior year.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 08:53

Darkrenown: Jul 18, 2012; please give me anything to talk about besides the fact that democrats are allowing millions of americans to be evicted from their homes

Dibujante posted:

Not entirely. Europeans pulled somewhat ahead in firearms technology by the 1500s, but once they marketed those firearms around in east asia, they were a big hit and east asia reached parity again. East asians also adopted massed formations and volley fire - those are inevitable inventions once you have reliable firearms. Firearms became so important during Hideyoshi's invasion of Korea that generals wrote back to the mainland to request that only firearm-bearing soldiers be sent over.

Were there any interesting new developments of firearms in east Asia after that though? All the improved firing mechanisms and better methods for producing more and higher quality gunpowder, the things that made guns a viable primary weapon rather than a support, seems to have come from Europe.

DrProsek posted:

I think this is an issue in APD because I've never seen it in vanilla or NNM, but the slave trade in the USA just took an interesting turn.

As far as I can tell, Romanian slaves from Wallachia and Moldavia are somehow immigrating to the USA and they're staying slaves. So now .2% of slaves in the USA are Romanians.

I don't know if APD does anything else that would affect it, but in vanilla rich pops can bring some slaves with them when migrating from one slave-holding area to another.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 09:03

Beamed: Nov 26, 2010; Then you have a responsibility that no man has ever faced. You have your fear which could become reality, and you have Godzilla, which is reality.

Darkrenown posted:

Were there any interesting new developments of firearms in east Asia after that though? All the improved firing mechanisms and better methods for producing more and higher quality gunpowder, the things that made guns a viable primary weapon rather than a support, seems to have come from Europe.

Regardless, I would rather it take until the 1600s for Asia to fall noticeably behind, rather than 1500, as it is now.

Of course if balance is your concern it's all under your discretion.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 09:35

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

Darkrenown posted:

Were there any interesting new developments of firearms in east Asia after that though? All the improved firing mechanisms and better methods for producing more and higher quality gunpowder, the things that made guns a viable primary weapon rather than a support, seems to have come from Europe.

Does it matter who invented a technology, as long as you have the know-how to adopt it? Because otherwise there are plenty of European states that should lag behind immensely as well. As far as I know, us Danes didn't make an innovation in firearms till around 1900, didn't mean we were stuck with muskets until then. Artificially limiting the spread of technology to countries within Europe, when by the very same mechanisms the technology was spread in Asia as well, just seems silly to me.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 10:46

Wolfgang Pauli: Mar 26, 2008; One Three Seven

JGBeagle posted:

Oh my god, once I learned what really happened to the Native Americans during colonial times I began to hate American history. I feel like I was completely and utterly lied to my entire life. Doesn't help that I'm also part Native American as well.

I still really want to write a Brechtian Thanksgiving play about King Philip's War. Like the kind elementary schools put on (or at least we did. I lived in Plymouth, so Thanksgiving and Pilgrims were kind of a Big Deal).

Darkrenown posted:

I don't know if APD does anything else that would affect it, but in vanilla rich pops can bring some slaves with them when migrating from one slave-holding area to another.

Has this ever been legal during the time period when migrating from one slave country to another? I can't imagine Romanian slaves would be allowed in America. Especially since it would basically be importing slaves, which was illegal even if slaveowning wasn't. Maybe just give slave owner POPs some cash when moving out of the country, to represent selling their slaves and estate?

# ? Mar 24, 2013 11:40

WhitemageofDOOM: Sep 13, 2010; ... It's magic. I ain't gotta explain shit.

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Does it matter who invented a technology, as long as you have the know-how to adopt it? Because otherwise there are plenty of European states that should lag behind immensely as well. As far as I know, us Danes didn't make an innovation in firearms till around 1900, didn't mean we were stuck with muskets until then. Artificially limiting the spread of technology to countries within Europe, when by the very same mechanisms the technology was spread in Asia as well, just seems silly to me.

The new tech system doesn't have spread of technology, it's all based on monarch points.
Unless you are really arguing everyone should be equally advanced except based on random monarch luck.

WhitemageofDOOM fucked around with this message at 11:58 on Mar 24, 2013

# ? Mar 24, 2013 11:53

A Buttery Pastry: Sep 4, 2011; Delicious and Informative!

WhitemageofDOOM posted:

The new tech system doesn't have spread of technology, it's all based on monarch points.
Unless you are really arguing everyone should be equally advanced except based on random monarch luck.

Yeah, but Paradox was the ones who made that system in the first place. There's no reason why another one couldn't have been chosen.

# ? Mar 24, 2013 13:31

Pimpmust: Oct 1, 2008

Plus, even EU3 had the distinction between Internal Tech Innovation Speed, Tech Spread, Tech Levels and actual Units (partially based on tech, but also culture).
In other words, it's possible to have a system with more innovative countries (i.e, certain parts of Europe), good units that take advantage of that tech and also have tech that can spread to countries which lacks institutions to develop their own tech / formations.

Bake in some sort of system for them to advance on the Unit type front, and/or internal innovation and voila. It should allow rather "even" distribution of tech (by X decades), but not result in even military *might* from that tech (i.e, units, national ideas etc). Throw in the March of the Eagles ideas of gaining tech (or innovation desire) from military defeats and there could be quite the workable system without having to necessarily include a button that says "Westernize".

# ? Mar 24, 2013 14:10

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# ? May 14, 2024 07:30

Darkrenown: Jul 18, 2012; please give me anything to talk about besides the fact that democrats are allowing millions of americans to be evicted from their homes

Beamed posted:

Regardless, I would rather it take until the 1600s for Asia to fall noticeably behind, rather than 1500, as it is now.

Of course if balance is your concern it's all under your discretion.

I wasn't really talking about the game(s) there, we had a little history aside about guns.

A Buttery Pastry posted:

Does it matter who invented a technology, as long as you have the know-how to adopt it? Because otherwise there are plenty of European states that should lag behind immensely as well. As far as I know, us Danes didn't make an innovation in firearms till around 1900, didn't mean we were stuck with muskets until then. Artificially limiting the spread of technology to countries within Europe, when by the very same mechanisms the technology was spread in Asia as well, just seems silly to me.

Well again, my reply to an aside about how gunpowder was invented in China rather than the game's tech system.

But to answer you: No, not really. But it does matter that you have access to generally the same level of know-how, have access to similar resources, and are close enough to where <thing> was invented to see it in action (because people and even more so rulers and organisations like armies tend to be conservative and won't adopt a new idea just because someone tells them it's awesome, you need the "HOLY poo poo! France has something called a Flintlock and they're winning battles left and right, we need this before they invade us!" effect). Perhaps Denmark doesn't invent any new guns, but they can see how it affects the armies of their neighbours and pay some gunsmiths a bunch of money to come out and start an armoury. That's a huge simplification, of course, but that's kind of what the tech groups represent, even if you're not inventing new things yourself it's easy enough to adopt them from your neighbours.

EU doesn't model any of the things that make adopting new inventions difficult, if you have the tech you can build as many units wielding them as you can afford, so instead we make it harder for some areas to get the techs. It's certainly not the only possible way to do it, but if we used a different system it would still need to be be balanced so that Europe tended to come out ahead, because we want EU to follow the broad historical pattern of emerging European dominance, rather than, say, the Aztecs invading Spain (At least until we do Sunset Invasion II: Quetzalcoatl's revenge).

# ? Mar 24, 2013 17:15

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Paradox Grand Strategy: From the Carnival of Lust to the Enlightened Times

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