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Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

It almost can't be overstated how bad post-Bismarck Imperial Germany was at diplomacy.

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Edgar Allen Ho
Apr 3, 2017

by sebmojo
I'm sorry for going off but I also hate how the generic anglo Great War story is plucky tommies going "oy yeah these huns seem like right fine chaps, why are we even having a war? This business is so crazy!"

Of course they say that, they aren't the ones whose home is half-occupied by an enormous army of autocrats. The actual reality of the Great War was the Kaiserreich invading foreign countries with conquest on the mind.

There's a reason the poilus mutinied and the russian revolution happened, I'm not stanning those regimes. But Germany was the aggressor. Germany started the war and it intended to.

Edgar Allen Ho fucked around with this message at 14:30 on Jun 5, 2021

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

There's a reason the poilus mutinied and the russian revolution happened, I'm not stanning those regimes. But Germany was the aggressor. Germany started the war and it intended to.

IIRC studies of the French mutinies mostly show that they were closer to labor strikes with clear goals and grievances rather than outright revolutionary action against the French regime. This is also borne home from the fact that the mutinies calmed down and morale improved when the French military leadership, most notably represented by Pétain, actually made an effort to meet alot of the demands put forth by the soldiers, putting a hold to large ambitious offensives until the Americans were ready to act in force and waiting for new equipment like tanks, while also insituting new regulations regarding leave and unit rotation and many changes like that.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 14:43 on Jun 5, 2021

CharlestheHammer
Jun 26, 2011

YOU SAY MY POSTS ARE THE RAVINGS OF THE DUMBEST PERSON ON GOD'S GREEN EARTH BUT YOU YOURSELF ARE READING THEM. CURIOUS!
I think the unrest was more the military of basically every major power didn’t give a single poo poo about the soldiers. Which was acceptable when it just kind of sucked but then you add a poo poo ton of deaths for no gain and it exploding was inevitable

karmicknight
Aug 21, 2011
Yeah, when the job is lovely, it's just a lovely job. But when the job is lovely and also it leads to a poo poo load of your coworkers dying. That really breaks down soldiering into more than just a lovely job into an existential nightmare.

Magissima
Apr 15, 2013

I'd like to introduce you to some of the most special of our rocks and minerals.
Soiled Meat

Randarkman posted:

Just going to throw out here that when people talk about "secret" diplomacy and alliances, it's not the existence of the alliances that are secret, it's the exact terms of those alliances.

So basically the same as regular alliances with AI countries

A Buttery Pastry
Sep 4, 2011

Delicious and Informative!
:3:

Randarkman posted:

Just going to throw out here that when people talk about "secret" diplomacy and alliances, it's not the existence of the alliances that are secret, it's the exact terms of those alliances.
That part should at least be somewhat easy to include, it's not really that different in terms of outcomes from what happens in EU4 wars. It's not predetermined, but if you have to countries that are allied and both see you as a rival, then you can basically treat it as if their secret terms are that they're gonna go all-in on kicking your rear end and trying to reduce your strength. If pops can have negative reactions to fighting with/against certain countries, then leaving the hit until you're actually fighting the war would basically be all that's required to really make it obvious that the people in charge aren't asking the populace for permission.

That said, being able to establish an alliance against specific countries with promises of in the vein of "If we end up in a war, we'll fight for these war goals" would be neat. Actually, how common were functionally universal alliances in the period?

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/victoria-3-wont-sugar-coat-colonialism-but-itll-give-you-the-chance-to-resist-it

trapped mouse
May 25, 2008

by Azathoth

Lol at them using a screenshot from the HPM mod because regular Victoria 2 represented a lot of Borneo as completely blank white space.

dead gay comedy forums
Oct 21, 2011


Edgar Allen Ho posted:

Germany started the war and it intended to

and that's not incompatible to German soldiers having a totally sack of poo poo situation on their hands as well and a large part of German leadership not getting the full picture

all they knew is that they had to fight the UK eventually to settle the domination score because imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

dead gay comedy forums posted:

all they knew is that they had to fight the UK eventually to settle the domination score because imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism

That's looking at it incredibly simplistically (even aside from tying imperialism exclusively to capitalism). World War I was far from inevitable, Britain fighting Germany was far from inevitable and the Great Powers who had the most colonial and imperial friction between them, Britain, France and Russia all ended up fighting on the same side.

dead gay comedy forums
Oct 21, 2011


Randarkman posted:

That's looking at it incredibly simplistically

oh yeah, totally; I was talking about the feel the guys in the boardroom had more than anything else

that war was the dismal war because it was completely loving unnecessary

dead gay comedy forums
Oct 21, 2011


dead gay comedy forums posted:

oh yeah, totally; I was talking about the feel the guys in the boardroom had more than anything else

that war was the dismal war because it was completely loving unnecessary

explaining the average tom, hans, ivan, jean, johnny, ali and giuseppe that this war was a consequence of a massive geopolitical shift happening in decades, with a diplomatic configuration that became increasingly more complex and messy each and every passing year as some 20km² of Africa or Asia that none of them even heard about became a matter of life or death for King (or Prez) and Country: ONE LAST WAR TO END THEM ALL, FOREVER AND EVER

one of them asks: "how, tho"

*gets carried out, court-martialed, shot*

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

I guess you can also note that the German leadership, for the most part, especially the military, were much more concerned with Russia than they were with Britain. Competing with Britain was only really an obsession of Wilhelm II and the more militant parts of the navy and various civilian groups that supported the fleet and overseas colonies, and Wilhelm II was only really a supporter of this when he was together with those who supported it because Wilhelm was the type of person who agreed with the last person he'd talked to who seemed like him and want his approval (Wilhelm was super insecure and desperate to be liked).

Russia was the big fear, and what largely motivated the "if there is to be a war, better to have it now rather than in five years". Because Russia at this time was the fastest growing economy in Europe, with industrialization and investment in armaments and strategic railways having begun to gather pace in the years leading up to WW1 (these processes being far from complete when the war came is largely the factor to blame for Russia's eventual collapse as Russia simply could not simultaneously replace their material losses, transport troops to the front and keep the civilian population fed, particularly in the cities). This was largely enabled through extensive access to French capital when Franco-Russian relations got ever closer after they formed their alliance, France unlike Germany, had alot of excess capital not tied up in domestic development, which made them a very valuable economic partner for Russia on top of the military-imperial benefits (it should also be noted that there was little direct colonial friction between Russia and France, but both were in competition with the British, so that's an important factor for the developing close relationship as well).

Edgar Allen Ho
Apr 3, 2017

by sebmojo

dead gay comedy forums posted:

and that's not incompatible to German soldiers having a totally sack of poo poo situation on their hands as well and a large part of German leadership not getting the full picture

all they knew is that they had to fight the UK eventually to settle the domination score because imperialism is the highest stage of capitalism

I'm starting to think this capitalism system was a mistake!!

wisconsingreg
Jan 13, 2019
wrong thread

wisconsingreg fucked around with this message at 15:10 on Jun 6, 2021

Vivian Darkbloom
Jul 14, 2004


trapped mouse
May 25, 2008

by Azathoth

Sounds interesting, if they are able to pull it off. However it seems difficult to imagine the situation ending peacefully given the state of the USA in 1856, 20 years after game start. And I get that this game can be alt-history, but I feel like you would need to abolish slavery nationwide quite close to the start date for it to be realistically done without war. Furthermore it seems hard to picture that slavery would be able to continue in parts of the USA all the way into 1936. I feel like you should really need to make some harsh sacrifices in your playthrough in order to avoid the ACW.

Also, I remember abolishing slavery super early as the USA in Victoria 2, and it completely messed up the migration westward, I never even got to turn most of my territories into states. That was honestly enough motivation to kick Confederate rear end instead.

AnEdgelord
Dec 12, 2016
Yeah avoiding the Civil War should be an appropriately arduous undertaking that may not even be worth it compared to just ripping off the bandaid and going through with the war but it should be an option on the table so long as it has a baseline historical plausibility to it.

Cease to Hope
Dec 12, 2011

trapped mouse posted:

Furthermore it seems hard to picture that slavery would be able to continue in parts of the USA all the way into 1936.

The practice of leasing convicts lasted until the 1920s and forced prison labor continues to this day.

The example was people who are not technically in the states, and it's easy to imagine some sort of fig leaf reform or legal loophole that makes slavery not technically slavery in the minds of most people. Abolishing it in the states but not the territories seems like a plausible one.

Raenir Salazar
Nov 5, 2010

"According to Wikipedia" there is a black hole that emits zionist hawking radiation where my brain should have been

I really should just shut the fuck up and stop posting forever
College Slice

AnEdgelord posted:

Yeah avoiding the Civil War should be an appropriately arduous undertaking that may not even be worth it compared to just ripping off the bandaid and going through with the war but it should be an option on the table so long as it has a baseline historical plausibility to it.

I feel that in addition to being arduous it's more that its gotta be something they think long and hard about, because trying to stamp it out too early could disintegrate the US at a time before the US was economically powerful enough and diplomatically ready for the undertaking. Consider that maybe in the 1850's the UK and France might not have been so inclined to be neutral when they see their shot to split the US for basically free.

Vivian Darkbloom
Jul 14, 2004


One of the Vicky 1 mods (I think) had a mechanic where if you consistently made decisions favoring the slaveholders, New England would secede without a war. Maybe they could develop something like that into a more interesting alternate conflict.

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010

trapped mouse posted:

Sounds interesting, if they are able to pull it off. However it seems difficult to imagine the situation ending peacefully given the state of the USA in 1856, 20 years after game start. And I get that this game can be alt-history, but I feel like you would need to abolish slavery nationwide quite close to the start date for it to be realistically done without war. Furthermore it seems hard to picture that slavery would be able to continue in parts of the USA all the way into 1936. I feel like you should really need to make some harsh sacrifices in your playthrough in order to avoid the ACW.

Also, I remember abolishing slavery super early as the USA in Victoria 2, and it completely messed up the migration westward, I never even got to turn most of my territories into states. That was honestly enough motivation to kick Confederate rear end instead.
The 1831-32 debate on slavery in Virginia's legislature was the last chance to steer the US from Civil War over slavery. Just another reason to start the game earlier.

Crazycryodude
Aug 15, 2015

Lets get our X tons of Duranium back!

....Is that still a valid thing to jingoistically blow out of proportion?


Vivian Darkbloom posted:

One of the Vicky 1 mods (I think) had a mechanic where if you consistently made decisions favoring the slaveholders, New England would secede without a war. Maybe they could develop something like that into a more interesting alternate conflict.

That's integrated into Victoria 2 (presumably in A Housed Divided?), it just never happens unless the player intentionally threads the needle just right to make them pop up. I think I've seen the Free States come out of an AI USA maybe twice in the hundreds of games I've played.

Dr. Video Games 0031
Jul 17, 2004

AnEdgelord posted:

Yeah avoiding the Civil War should be an appropriately arduous undertaking that may not even be worth it compared to just ripping off the bandaid and going through with the war but it should be an option on the table so long as it has a baseline historical plausibility to it.

Civil War should also come with some benefits after the fact to balance out how devastating it would be to the population and your economy. For example, perhaps they could make it so winning the Civil War allows you to enact a radical reconstruction plan that completely disempowers the entrenched ruling class in the South, and thus making equal civil rights before the end of the campaign more viable. And if you go the peaceful route, you avoid the wartime devastation, but in exchange the entrenched ruling class remains and you end up having to further compromise with them on matters such as voting rights, segregation, etc, even more than we did in history.

The Narrator
Aug 11, 2011

bernie would have won
Yeah, I feel like the feeling that needs to be captured is that any decision - even status quo - is pissing off a lot of people, and the Civil War should be threatening/damaging enough that the player is incentivised to walk the line because the status quo is at least not outright war. Otherwise it turns into the Vicky2 gamey thing of "how can I piss off the South quickly enough to pop the war and get the issue out of the way"

(I'm not saying the war should be tedious/frustrating to play... I'm just trying to get at a system that replicates the concerns on leaders of the time.)

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010
Vicky 2 economy was bonkers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cyhfG6zeUQ

trapped mouse
May 25, 2008

by Azathoth

Dr. Video Games 0031 posted:

Civil War should also come with some benefits after the fact to balance out how devastating it would be to the population and your economy.

I think HPM gave you the option to make African-Americans an accepted culture soon after the war, which was a very powerful incentive, but also somewhat unrealistic.

Mans
Sep 14, 2011

by Jeffrey of YOSPOS
I really want to play vic3

Charlz Guybon
Nov 16, 2010

Mans posted:

I really want to play vic3

Do we have a release date?

ilitarist
Apr 26, 2016

illiterate and militarist
No.

AnoHito
May 8, 2014

Vicky 3 When?

dead gay comedy forums
Oct 21, 2011



I am the hearts instead of eyes emoji, beholding material conditions

AnEdgelord posted:

Yeah avoiding the Civil War should be an appropriately arduous undertaking that may not even be worth it compared to just ripping off the bandaid and going through with the war but it should be an option on the table so long as it has a baseline historical plausibility to it.

look, if this game doesn't gimme the option to get lincoln to lay low in the white house for a while, the implementation of the secret service a good deal earlier and the grant/sherman extraordinary comission for a "Ultra-Turbo-Reconstruction", I can't even

Enjoy
Apr 18, 2009
Authority: -200 (Road Maintenance in Atlanta)

dead gay comedy forums
Oct 21, 2011


Enjoy posted:

Authority: -200 ("brb dealing with racism in Savannah" - Sherman)

Edgar Allen Ho
Apr 3, 2017

by sebmojo

Raenir Salazar posted:

I feel that in addition to being arduous it's more that its gotta be something they think long and hard about, because trying to stamp it out too early could disintegrate the US at a time before the US was economically powerful enough and diplomatically ready for the undertaking. Consider that maybe in the 1850's the UK and France might not have been so inclined to be neutral when they see their shot to split the US for basically free.

Louis Napoléon's France wasn't neutral but aggressively pro-confederate. It was basically waiting for the UK to say it was ok, and Max von Habsburg's failing Second Mexican Empire even tried to sell Tamaulipas, Nuevo Léon, and Coahuila to the CSA for military aid at one point.

e: V3 better let me install one of my rival nations' idiot failson princes as emperor of a third nation

Edgar Allen Ho fucked around with this message at 15:06 on Jun 8, 2021

Mantis42
Jul 26, 2010

Sherman's March on Paris is a pretty kickass alt history scenario ngl

DaysBefore
Jan 24, 2019


Better check to see if Harry Turtledove has written that book yet

Jazerus
May 24, 2011


Mantis42 posted:

Sherman's March on Paris is a pretty kickass alt history scenario ngl

at that point in time paris would have thrown open the gates and invited him to help them do a revolution

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AnoHito
May 8, 2014

Jazerus posted:

at that point in time paris would have thrown open the gates and invited him to help them do a revolution

Somehow making this alt history own even more

William Sherman: Commander in Chief of the Paris Commune

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