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Victoria 3 - Dev Diary #20 - Diplomatic Actions

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Hello and welcome to yet another Victoria 3 dev diary! Today we’ll be continuing to talk about Diplomacy, specifically on the topic of Diplomatic Actions, which are the means by which countries in Victoria 3 conduct diplomacy, build (or tear down) relations, and sign various kinds of agreements with each other.

Diplomatic Actions and how they work should be pretty familiar to anyone who’s played pretty much any other Paradox Grand Strategy game. In short, a Diplomatic Action is a type of interaction that is carried out by one country towards another, and which sometimes (but not always) requires the agreement of the other party.

As the exact requirements and effects of a Diplomatic Action are unique to each type of action, this Dev Diary will mostly just be going over which actions currently exist in the game, but before I get into that I want to briefly explain about the three distinct categories that all actions fall into and how they differ:
  • Instant Actions: These are actions that are carried out immediately upon use and/or acceptance (if acceptance is needed). They do not cost any Influence capacity as they do not require maintenance.
  • Ongoing Actions: These are unilateral actions that are carried out over time by one party towards the other, and can only be cancelled by the first party. They can have an Influence maintenance cost, in which case only the first party is the one to pay it.
  • Pacts: These are bilateral actions that are carried out over time as an agreement between two parties. If there is a maintenance cost, both parties have to pay it unless the agreement has a clear senior and junior partner (such as Subject relationships). Both parties can break the pact off, though in some cases it may require the agreement of the other party.
A look at some of the actions and pacts available between two independent countries
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If you’re still a bit unclear on the difference between these three, don’t worry! It should hopefully become clearer once we start going into examples. So with no further ado, let’s talk about what actions there currently are available in the game. Please note that, as always, the game is still under active development so what’s in here may not exactly match what we have for release.

Instant Actions (not necessarily an exhaustive list):
  • Expel Diplomats: This is an action that immediately lowers Relations with the target country, stops any ongoing attempt by them to Improve Relations with you, and blocks further Improve Relations attempts for a period of 5 years. Using Expel Diplomats also gives the acting country some Infamy, and prevents them from using Expel Diplomats on the same country for 5 years.
  • Take on Debt: This is an action that allows one country to take on the debt of another in exchange for being owed an Obligation (more on this in later dev diaries).
  • Redeem Obligation: This is an action that forgives an Obligation owed to the acting country in exchange for a large boost in Relations.
  • Violate Sovereignty: This is an action that allows the acting country to violate the neutrality of another country through whom they need military access, creating a Diplomatic Incident and potentially bringing new countries into the conflict. We’ll go more into under what conditions you can use this and exactly how it works at a later time.

Russia’s unexpected attempt to build stronger relations with the Ottomans is not being received well at the Sublime Porte
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Ongoing Actions (not necessarily an exhaustive list):
  • Improve Relations: This is an ongoing action that slowly raises relations up to a maximum value of 50 (out of 100). Costs Influence to maintain, with the cost increasing if the target has a high Rank
  • Damage Relations: This is an ongoing action that slowly lowers relations down to a minimum value of -50 (out of -100). Costs Influence to maintain, with the cost increasing if the target has a high Rank
  • Bankroll: This is an ongoing action where one country pays a part of its monetary income to another each week as direct subsidies to their state treasury.

The contest between Siam and Dai Nam for control of Cambodia led to a longstanding regional rivalry that sparked several wars in the early 19th century
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Non-Subject Pacts (not necessarily an exhaustive list):
  • Alliance: This is a diplomatic pact that allows two countries to help each other when attacked in a Diplomatic Play, even if they do not have an Interest in the relevant area (more on this next week). Costs Influence to maintain, with the cost increasing if the other part has a high Rank.
  • Customs Union: This is a diplomatic pact where there is a senior and a junior partner, and makes the junior partner part of the senior partner’s national market instead of having their own market. Costs Influence to maintain for the senior partner only, with the cost increasing if the other part has a high Rank.
  • Trade Agreement: This is a diplomatic pact which gives both countries competitive advantages when establishing trade routes in the market of the other country. Costs Influence to maintain, with the cost increasing if the other part has a high Rank.

A trade agreement between Russia and Prussia would let the latter tap even more deeply into the former’s timber exports and improve Russia’s access to German-made tools
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Subject Pacts (not necessarily an exhaustive list):
  • Protectorate: This is a type of non-colonial subject relationship where the subject is very autonomous, the only restriction placed on them being that they are not able to have a fully independent foreign policy. Can be turned into a Puppet by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
  • Puppet: This is a type of non-colonial subject relationship where the subject has no diplomatic autonomy, pays part of their income to their overlord and is part of the overlord’s national market. Can be annexed by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
  • Dominion: This is a type of colonial subject relationship where the subject has extensive diplomatic autonomy and can have their own subjects, though they’re still required to be part of their overlord’s market. Can be turned into a Territory by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
  • Territory: This is a type of colonial subject relationship where the subject has limited diplomatic autonomy, pays part of their income to their overlord and is part of the overlord’s national market. Can be annexed by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
  • Tributary: This is a special subject relationship only available to Unrecognized Powers where the subject has extensive diplomatic autonomy and can have their own subjects, though they’re required to pay part of their income to their overlord. Can be turned into a Vassal by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
  • Vassal: This is a special subject relationship only available to Unrecognized Powers where the subject has no diplomatic autonomy, pays part of their income to their overlord and is part of the overlord’s national market. Can be annexed by their overlord through a Diplomatic Play.
Afghanistan has no intention of becoming a Persian tributary peacefully, and Persia will have to resort to a threat of force if they intend to press the matter further
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Before I leave off, I also just want to briefly mention that as with many of our systems, the Diplomatic Action system is built to be completely moddable, up to and including adding new forms of Subjects or entirely new Pacts with completely custom effects. We’re quite excited to see how you all take advantage of all this moddability once the game is finally out!

Well then, that’s it! This has of course been something of a brief overview, and we’ve left out a bunch of details regarding a number of the interactions that we’ll come back to later, but it should give you a good idea of the limits of diplomacy in Victoria 3… that is, unless you’re willing to get a bit more bold, in which case you should check back next week, as we talk about Diplomatic Plays and how they will let you shatter those limits!
 
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I hope that the player calling favors with the AI just gives the AI more reasons to accept instead of overriding their logic completely, because the latter is very easily exploitable and can cause countries to cripple themselves for no good reason.
 
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I have a small conceptual question whether when asking for something, could we offer something in return? I think this would make things amazingly more interesting and historical, for example: I ama GP and I offer to an unrecognized nation to pay their debts IN EXCHANGE for them becoming part of my customs union? That would be just great and a breakthrough in diplomacy in Paradox games.
I would assume that this is what the mentioned "obligations" would cover, allowing you to bypass acceptance when asking for something from them. And paying of their debts is currently the only mentioned way of getting an obligation so far, so I think your scenario is very likely to be possible.
 
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Love the idea of there being a continuous upkeep involved in diplomatic relations.

I sphering minigame of Vic2 was incredibly tedious, but also exploitable, which made it feel like you had to micro it, because it was the optimal way to play the game.
Just because the game lets you do something doesn't mean you have to. When I played ftf "rules lawyers" wore out their welcome rather swiftly.
 
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So we know Dominions can be turned into Territories but can Territories be turned into Dominions? Can Dominions become Protectorates if they stop being colonies? I'm just thinking about the increasing autonomy Britain gave to many of its colonial subjects such as Canada, Australia, and New Zealand over the course of the mid-to-late 19th century and early 20th century until they became de facto independent in almost all matters except foreign affairs.
 
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I just realized that there is no Guarantee Independence diplomatic action like in EU4 which is... concerning. There are historical examples of this in the nineteenth century, most important being the guarantee of neutrality for Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. In fact, the guarantee of Belgian neutrality via Treaty of London, 1839, played an important role in Britain's entry into World War I, as it was a signatory to that treaty as did Prussia, whose successor state German Empire violated it in invasion of Belgium.

Though, one issue with Guarantee Independence as a diplomatic action, as implemented in EU4, in application to treaties with respect to EU4 is that it could be easily revoked and almost instantly. I'm not sure if that would make any sense, though any countries could, by the nature of their own sovereignty, renounce or denounce a treaty that they had signed, though not always without consequences, especially the immediate kind.
 
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Before I leave off, I also just want to briefly mention that as with many of our systems, the Diplomatic Action system is built to be completely moddable, up to and including adding new forms of Subjects or entirely new Pacts with completely custom effects. We’re quite excited to see how you all take advantage of all this moddability once the game is finally out!

This is good to hear. I wonder if it would be possible through modding to create a multi-nation alliance a la NATO and Warsaw Pact during the Cold War? One of the annoying things about Victoria 2 mods set in the Cold War and modern day was that, due to the game's set up, alliances were only on a nation-to-nation basis and had to be frequently renewed to maintain something approaching an alliance like NATO.
 
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How will the Zollverein be handled? Having to pay upkeep for a dozen minors when apparently 25 is the minimum would cripple prussias diplomacy without having special rules/cases for that.
Edit: Even during the Bruderkrieg (prussia vs austria) the Zollverein continued as before, because it was so profitable for all members that nobody had any interest of stoping it.
Costs can vary and as always numbers are not final. The intent is for sure not for Prussia to have to use up all its Influence maintaining the Zollverein over all the Saxe-somethings.
 
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it says here that tributaries and vassals are restricted to unrecognized powers, what happens if a nation becomes recognized and they have vassals or tributaries?
If a country changes country type, its subjects are automatically converted to new appropriate types of subjects (so a vassal would become a territory for instance).
 
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Will there be some sort of tab when we hover over the "They would not accept this proposal" message, telling us why it's still a no - and so making it clear what we can do to change their minds?
Yes.
 
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Will the country that was tribute to two countries like Ryukyu be represented?

And I think there are some countries that were a protectorate of great powers but made tribute to the Qing dynasty.
 
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I am a bit confused: why are protectorates classified as 'non-colonial' relationships? Weren't protectorates some of the more common form of colonial relationships? What exactly do you guys define as 'colonial relationship'?
As there was no standardization of what different type of client states were called, we can't really map every type of subject name to every historical relationship. We chose to use Protectorate for the more generic subject type to due its widespread usage in the era.
 
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I saw “favor” in one of the pictures. Is it part of the obligation mechanics?

Why signing a trade agreement would means a favor? and who owe who?
Favors and Obligations are the same thing, they're being renamed from the former to the latter.
 
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I just realized that there is no Guarantee Independence diplomatic action like in EU4 which is... concerning. There are historical examples of this in the nineteenth century, most important being the guarantee of neutrality for Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. In fact, the guarantee of Belgian neutrality via Treaty of London, 1839, played an important role in Britain's entry into World War I, as it was a signatory to that treaty as did Prussia, whose successor state German Empire violated it in invasion of Belgium.

Though, one issue with Guarantee Independence as a diplomatic action, as implemented in EU4, in application to treaties with respect to EU4 is that it could be easily revoked and almost instantly. I'm not sure if that would make any sense, though any countries could, by the nature of their own sovereignty, renounce or denounce a treaty that they had signed, though not always without consequences, especially the immediate kind.
As mentioned, the list here is not an exhaustive one and Guarantee Independence in some form on my todolist to implement, I'd just like to make sure that it's a little more than just something the guarantor can revoke at will though.
 
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So we know Dominions can be turned into Territories but can Territories be turned into Dominions? Can Dominions become Protectorates if they stop being colonies? I'm just thinking about the increasing autonomy Britain gave to many of its colonial subjects such as Canada, Australia, and New Zealand over the course of the mid-to-late 19th century and early 20th century until they became de facto independent in almost all matters except foreign affairs.
Subjects can start plays to get more autonomy or gain independence, and more autonomous subjects can even try to expand at the expense of other subjects of the same overlord (with the overlord able to take sides or stay out of it).
 
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What's up with the flags? A lot of them so far seem like they were made up by some artist that only "took some inspiration" instead of using the real ones.
 
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Will the country that was tribute to two countries like Ryukyu be represented?

And I think there are some countries that were a protectorate of great powers but made tribute to the Qing dynasty.
There are currently no mechanics for dual overlords, no.
 
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The screenshot says "take on debt", while the DD says "bankroll". Are those the same thing, too?
No, they are two different actions, as outlined in the dev diary.
 
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