Directly controlled investment pool needed to go

[Aliquam]

It's a good thing that pdx will remove this mechanic and I am glad they didn't chicken out before those few players who prefer to play with obsolete and vastly overpowered mechanics. New dev diary looks very promising and I am glad the devs are not held back.

 

[arctus]

I predict this will end in disaster as the ai is not able to build in places the stuff that makes sense.

 

[Mezlabor]

Im uninstalling. I'm done with this game.

 

[arctus]

This was kind of unexpected news and its the last straw for me. I get the most fun out of this game when i can organize my buildings in a way that makes sense, the ai is not capable of that. And i am not willing to outsource the most fun part of this game to an incompetent ai. Thats it then for me at least.

 

[Aliquam]

Im uninstalling. I'm done with this game.

And I'm buying the next DLC. I regained interest with this game.

 

[Don_Quigleone]

For what it's worth, given that you can construct buildings, and then privatize them, and the funds used to purchase those privatized buildings comes from the investment pool, then I think if you aggressively build buildings and then privatize you'll be able to roughly approximate Directly Controlled Investment Pool to a degree you cannot with current mechanics.

If you build buildings faster then the investment pool accumulates you should be able to outstrip the investment pool and have almost all of it's money end up being used to purchase the buildings you've constructed and choose to privatize.

 

[A Pink Duck]

Once it's released I'm probably going to see if I can make a mod where the private construction queue doesn't have any points so they can't actually build anything.

On the whole I was excited about the patch until I read the part about removing direct investment, which basically is an "I don't want to play at all" level of change for me. I don't necessarily care about the investment pool funds per se but I really don't want the ai controlling construction in any way.

 

[Mezlabor]

Once it's released I'm probably going to see if I can make a mod where the private construction queue doesn't have any points so they can't actually build anything.

On the whole I was excited about the patch until I read the part about removing direct investment, which basically is an "I don't want to play at all" level of change for me. I don't necessarily care about the investment pool funds per se but I really don't want the ai controlling construction in any way.

Yea this is where I'm at as well. But I dont want to continue messing with more mods to make the game playable for me.

 

[xGhost4000x]

This was kind of unexpected news and its the last straw for me. I get the most fun out of this game when i can organize my buildings in a way that makes sense, the ai is not capable of that. And i am not willing to outsource the most fun part of this game to an incompetent ai. Thats it then for me at least.

Just stick to laws that give you control over construction.

 

[Doldenberg]

Personally, I also played with State-controlled Investment until now, and I'm cautiously optimistic that it will work out somehow.

That said, the problem to me was never about not controlling the money, but about the AI behaving stupidly while leeching off my construction capacity. Maybe it would help if construction from the Investment pool didn't use construction capacity? So you could always use your full capacity, still limited by cost, while the AI can do whatever it wants with its money.

Also, I hope that nationalization cost is based on profitability - or that AI will at least close down unprofitable business levels by themselves. It would be stupid to have to buy completely empty buildings at a high price just to close them, rewarding your capitalists for their failure.

 

[Madzai]

For what it's worth, given that you can construct buildings, and then privatize them, and the funds used to purchase those privatized buildings comes from the investment pool, then I think if you aggressively build buildings and then privatize you'll be able to roughly approximate Directly Controlled Investment Pool to a degree you cannot with current mechanics.

If you build buildings faster then the investment pool accumulates you should be able to outstrip the investment pool and have almost all of it's money end up being used to purchase the buildings you've constructed and choose to privatize.

Yeah, it seems all the "cheaty" way to abuse LF are still there. Plus you now get foreign investments.

 

[Aliquam]

Paradox: removes most OP way to play in a game where the AI is already mostly braindead and you can rise to #2 great power as Kraków by 1880
Forumites: now I can't stack 51 levels of factories in my well catered to central industrial states with edict as laissez-faire nation?? Literally unplayable!

 

[Madzai]

Paradox: removes most OP way to play in a game where the AI is already mostly braindead

Do you realize that people switched to that method exactly because AI was braindead with his decisions in building?

Forumites: now I can't stack 51 levels of factories in my well catered to central industrial states with edict as laissez-faire nation?? Literally unplayable!

Pfff. People i watched did that without direct-controlled investment pool. It's just harder. People mostly did direct control to learn the game and because AI building decision gave them mental suffering.

 

[47pik]

100% agree. It had to go. You cannot try and represent public and private construction and ownership if you're letting the player be God. It upsets some players? So what. Player autocracy is boring, having fleshed out mechanics is far preferable.

I do not understand the mindframe of wanting to play these games like a painter. This is not a game about painting a pretty picture, or building up your perfect little country. This is a game about dynamic economics and geopolitics. It needs to be dynamic.

Everyone cries about the game being a construction queue simulator. Well, here you go. Now we're entering some real strategy territory where you need to manage on a more macro scale. Use supply and demand to incentivize private investment. Far more exciting than queuing up all your perfect little buildings. Why are you playing a game about simulating markets, when you don't want any autonomous actors doing stuff in the market? It's unoptimized and a bit ugly? Good. That's what markets are.

"Braindead" AI? Look, it has some problems, but not building all your favorite buildings is not one of them. They should be doing what they think will be profitable for them, not what's best for your geopolitics. Awww, did you lose out on your construction capacity for what you wanted because of private enterprise building something else? Welcome to the free market.

I love it. This kind of decision gives me huge confidence in the future of the game.

 

[Sbrubbles]

I hate that people play the game differently than me so I'm happy to see the directly controlled investment pool option gone

 

[A Pink Duck]

I don't particularly care about the "correct building meta". I tend to spread things out to share the wealth anyway. And if I want to make the game easier there's plenty of actual cheat mods that would do it way better.

My objection is more philosophical, managing construction is practically the only interaction the player actually has with the game on a regular basis. If you outsource that to the ai what's even left? "Oh no! I have a shortage! That might increase radicals or hurt my war effort. Never mind, the ai already solved it for me". Such gameplay...

But it's also worth mentioning that having a bunch of level 1 buildings everywhere is offensive my aesthetic senses. If the auto build queue only built in multiples of 5 per state I'd have fewer complaints.

 

[47pik]

I hate that people play the game differently than me so I'm happy to see the directly controlled investment pool option gone

Unironically, yes I do, if them wanting to play the game in their own special way is compromising the design of the game. Killing player autocracy is a necessary step to making the game more interesting and less of a construction queue simulator. There's no way to do both.

 

[Sbrubbles]

Unironically, yes I do, if them wanting to play the game in their own special way is compromising the design of the game. Killing player autocracy is a necessary step to making the game more interesting and less of a construction queue simulator. There's no way to do both.

Then we agree. The way other people play the video game is a problem that needs to be solved and our personal enjoyment of the game will be compromised until it is.

 

[Madzai]

Everyone cries about the game being a construction queue simulator. Well, here you go. Now we're entering some real strategy territory where you need to manage on a more macro scale. Use supply and demand to incentivize private investment.

And how we do it? By using our personal construction to create supply and demand. How else? Nothing really changes. You still know the optimal numbers for "construction economy" and can still pursue them. Now with possible investment in other countries to outsource "bad buildings" and help from foreign investors. Don't want some type of building in your country? Import stuff until it's not profitable for investors to build it. If they still do it - when this is exactly bad AI people are talking about.

 

[FranklyJustNess]

It's really sad to read how people feel about it. I loved the initial implementation of Investment Pool on launch, but also used the game option to bring it back only on one playthrough after it got changed. I don't cry, that it's gone, and agree with the DevDiary, that it really wasn't easy to support anymore, and that it would only get worse over time - it's good that they don't try to keep it an option now, arguably maybe it shouldn't have been a game option after the Private one was introduced, as it was always going to end being quite hard to have both systems possible.

But I also really respect that system. Coming from Vic2 where Capitalists would toss money at random buildings, that had no way of ever being profitable, and State Capitalism was so nice (at least for smaller countries), because you actually could decide to build something reasonable... Directly Controlled Investment pool was the best of both worlds. It let the player make the smart choices, but also you would build stuff that makes pops the most money, as it would mean more investment pool in the future. It had you build what you wanted, but also that aligned with what pops could have built on their own.

It's okay that the system ended up being changed, it's okay that it gets retired and won't be in the game anymore... but it's also good to remember, that it was a pretty damn well designed system. It saddens me quite a lot to see the OP treat it as obsolete or bad, or how people who preferred it are not seen as playing "the right way".

It reminds me of the FTL change for Stellaris, which on launch had you choose which of three differently working FTL systems you wanted to start with. It's not that it was bad, but rather for the future development of the game it needed to be reverted and changed.