Advantages to Totalitarianism?

No, not really. Proletarian Dictatorship isn't suppose to reflect the stable Soviet Union but the coup de'tat brought about by Lenin's vanguard.


Reactionaries and Communist Parties have the option to remove voting rights as a democracy. This is what allows them to run a state like the Soviet Union, which technically had a parliament of sorts (Duma), and registered political parties (controlled opposition like farmer's organization) even though none of that truly mattered in the end.

So what's the USSR's type of government in game terms? So yeah, at the very beginning we've got instability and rebels (who cannot see the true way of historical development of human society), but later we gain control and can quickly develop industry at the expense of nationalization of bourgeois property.

Its not in the game, i think the communist government, prol-dict is a generic cover all for all communist systems not just the USSR's which really isnt totalitarian until so far near the end of the game time its irrelevant.

The stable USSR dictatorship would be reflected by Communist party in lower-house and conservatives in upper-house. That would reflect that all the reforms were done and the elites (voting rights are away) are content or too afraid to rock the boat.

It is so much more then just a political tool and that is why I fell in love with this concept right away

It's not irrelevant at all. The later game from 1890s onwards should for an industrial country be an uphill struggle against rising consciousness and militancy of the working classes. Presumably almost every country if going to go into this struggle as a conservative monarchy or a bourgeois democracy.

The game has Liberal-Progressive Democracy as a viable and stable system of government for those who wish to reform their nation to cope with the challenge from the working classes. (Full suffrage, social reforms, etc.) And it has the Reactionary Monarchy as a counter-model which you can try to play well into the 1900s and contain the working class by Secret Police, limited pro-bourgeois reforms and otherwise relying on the Cossacks.

But the whole struggle needs to have a form of government which poses the counter-model to these two: The full blown proletarian dictatorship. Not as a dysfunctional state of perpetual anarchy, but as a dictatorship with the Communist Party in full top-down control, implementing the sweeping revolution of the economic and social conditions which your hard left POPs wanted. It will not be a utopia but the player who wishes so should (if he's skilled enough) have the option to go the whole way and build a strong power, backed of his loyal commie POPs, and capable of thoroughly scaring the bourgeois nations in his world

You could mod it so that certain policy options for prol.dictatorships (such as Secret Police, Totalitarian policies, fusion of state and party organs etc) would only become available once some late game social techs have been researched. IIRC Vic:Revolutions had something like this, in the early 1900s reactionary and communist dictatorships would get inventions like "Secret Police" which would give them a one-time blanket -3 militancy effect, thus making it a lot easier to establish a lasting rule.

But still... if there is no counter-model to Democracy and the Reactionary Monarchy, then what is the point of the whole class struggle mechanism?

Sid Meier said:

In Ricky there was very little incentive I felt to letting Communists win and forming the equivilent of the Soviet Union as I was always plagued by massive uprisings of rebels *everywhere* this made no sense to me and broke immersion, didn't they have the Cheka or NKVD? Where's the all encompasing security operatus that keeps revolts from taking place?

I feel that if your a totalitarian government and your willing to foot the bill for your police state revolt risk should tumble like a rock to the low 1 digits.

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Well the game should let allow you to eventually establish a stable, functioning dictatorship, but before you get there, you would suffer years of revolt as your officers, capitalists and clerks throw one revolt after another. The Cheka and NKVD were born out of the life-or-death struggle of the Civil War, and the USSR only really became a stable country because everyone who dissented had been killed or purged in the early 1920s.

You should not be able to become a prol.dict. on January 1 and have a working secret police up and running by January 3rd... more like this:

1) bolshevik revolution, government overthrown, new regime assumes dictatorial powers

2) attempts at counter-revolution begin (aristocrat and capitalist POPs, also reactionary and radical liberal POPs rise in revolt)

3) bolsheviks establish workers militias (-2 MIL for craftsmen and workers), struggle with counter-revolutionary forces, defeat them militarily

4) bolsheviks implement radical economic policies

5) Civil war erupts in the cities: Basically every liberal POP and every craftsmen, clerk and artisan who is not Communist rises in revolt

6) Bolsheviks establish Secret Police (-3 MIL for large groups of POPs), Bolsheviks mobilize the rural masses (farmers with less than 50% satisfaction of everyday demands become communists)

7) Bolsheviks implement implement radical social reforms (all POP savings are wiped out, aristocrats are forcibly demoted to farmers etc)

8) Everyone who is not Bolshevik and hasn't rebelled already, rises in revolt at this point, also foreign intervention may happen at this point

9) Civil war is fought out

10) Bolsheviks implement full blown totalitarian policies, shut down connections with all foreign non-communist nations, events give -MIL to most POPs eventually, revolts end eventually

11) Communist party rules absolutely, totalitarian control has been established. Peace has been won. Onwards to fulfill the goals of the five-year plan!

I think it's quite realistic considering it's what actually happened
I mean, they didn't call it the Russian Civil War for nothing...The Soviet Union was hard won.

Communard said:

I think it's quite realistic considering it's what actually happened
I mean, they didn't call it the Russian Civil War for nothing...The Soviet Union was hard won.

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Exactly. From the point of revolution until more or less end of Victoria time-period there were constant revolts and uprisings in Soviet-Russia/Soviet Union. Bolsheviks didn't stop revolts from occurring, they just fought against them quick and hard with a massive army.

What´s about the totalitarian systems like "normal" dictatorship, nazi and fascist regimes there were a lot of totalitarian systems that worked quite well in terms of "silence the people" . What are the benefits of such regimes in-game

I agree with Leviathan07, except for the seeming tendency to imply that something like 75%-90% of the population would need to be liquidated for it to be successful

Clergymen in Victoria II will limit consciousness and the developers mention they are staying in.


In Victoria that was the best way of creating a Communist state was to reduce consciousness enough and get the POPs issues to match yours and doing so meant everyone (except for 5%) became a Communist.

MTJ said:

Clergymen in Victoria II will limit consciousness and the developers mention they are staying in.

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Not in Atheistic state though.

Well, you should remember that it wasn't just a rebellion of aristocrats and capitalists VS communist party (big type) which suddenly came to power. There was civil war with several sides and chaotic warfare, quake deathmatch-style. And remember there was foreign help for some sides. And at the beginning there was a WWI to fight. And many problems of implementing new society rules (war communism, dunno if there's special term in English) and developing new system of control. I can't imagine how could it be illustrated realistically in game.

Baneslave said:

Not in Atheistic state though.

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Even in atheist state. They compose from more then just pastors and such. It led to a big debate about changing name. Luckily they didn't buckled and it stayed

telesien said:

Even in atheist state. They compose from more then just pastors and such. It led to a big debate about changing name. Luckily they didn't buckled and it stayed

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Well, King isn't perfectly clear here, but I assume that no:

King said:

Now, in Victoria Clergy had this role of reducing CON, by keeping the superstitious masses backward by peddling yet more superstition. We have decided to keep that but the Clergy’s role evolves a bit according to your government religious policy. If you are an atheist state, essentially the Clergy fulfil the role of the modern schoolteacher.

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King said:

Citizenship policy affects the vote weight of POPs not of your primary culture while religious policy influences how effective the Clergy are at keeping the ignorant and superstitious, ignorant and superstitious.

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Baneslave said:

Well, King isn't perfectly clear here, but I assume that no:

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OK, another thing I wasn't able to remember. Maybe my gf is right and I'm really getting old...

telesien said:

The stable USSR dictatorship would be reflected by Communist party in lower-house and conservatives in upper-house. That would reflect that all the reforms were done and the elites (voting rights are away) are content or too afraid to rock the boat.

It is so much more then just a political tool and that is why I fell in love with this concept right away

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That isn't what a conservative upper house should mean in V2. It might have been conservative in the most literal sense but that's it.

Earl Uhtred said:

That isn't what a conservative upper house should mean in V2. It might have been conservative in the most literal sense but that's it.

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Conservative in V2 means content with current status quo, no matter what this status is. That is what I ment. When proletarian dictatorship settles and elites are happy to keep it that way, I would call it stable. Also that is how I would describe real SU in late 1960- early 1980. No more revolution or ideology, just stable dictatorship.

I appreciate dev diaries have talked about conservatives as being 'content with the status quo', but assumed that it meant a nice steady refinement of the established social order along sound Burkean lines - not whatever status quo the citizens of a radical dictatorship find themselves in. It would make no sense at all to have Russian moderates shoring up the Commies in office or ex-CEDA sympathisers forming the backbone of a Spanish Communist dictatorship. Conservatism is an ideology in its own right.