Isn’t Vienna the farthest Austrian land from Bavaria? Sure, Habsburgs had other countries within their empire, but if Bavaria took all the territory all the way to Vienna, isn’t it all of proper Austria?
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AAR Thread
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Looks about right, yeah. I think that bit of white to the east of Wurttembergian Tyrol is still austria proper, but that's about it.
Holding the multicultural AH empire together was hard enough with an Austrian minority, now let's see how they fare with just Klaus the Alpine farmer and his extended family.
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No, Upper Austria (not sure if that's exactly how it's named) I believe is a single state, so the state Vienna is in does border Bavaria. The three states in modern day Austria seem to be Upper Austria, Tirol, and Styria. After Wurttemberg took Tirol it was mentioned that they only had Styria left in modern day Austria.
Ignoring the specific situation from the AAR (it is a test build with a hyper aggressive AI), should it be possible to take another country's capital in a war?
I have definitely played a previous Paradox game where it was not possible and it led to some frustration. I was fighting somebody and their capital was the only province that bordered my country and I was forced to take provinces that did not border my country in the peace deal, then fight a second war to take the capital and make my country contiguous again.
I did not like that.
As far as this specific situation, I am not familiar with Austria in the 19th century. So, the situation may be way different than I am imagining. However, in EU (which I have played a lot), the state containing Vienna is a huge portion of Austria's economy. Austria would be crippled by losing Vienna. There would be no "vengeance war" where Austria is hell bent on getting Vienna back. Austria would be dead and its remaining land divided up amongst the surrounding countries as quickly as those countries could declare war.
That makes losing Vienna seem like a bit of a big deal. So, I can understand why people are worked up about it.
However, in the hypothetical case where Washington falls to the Confederates (which doesn't seem completely mad with the borders so close), the USA would just move the capital to New York City. You could even make an argument that New York City should be the capital anyway as the economic heart of the country. So, losing Washington seem like not that big of a deal.
So, I am back and forth. If there is a plausible alternative and the capital state is not that economically important, then it doesn't seem like that big of a deal to allow a conqueror to take it.
Edit: Ninja'd by Baneslave who said it in 1/5 the number of words.
I have definitely played a previous Paradox game where it was not possible and it led to some frustration. I was fighting somebody and their capital was the only province that bordered my country and I was forced to take provinces that did not border my country in the peace deal, then fight a second war to take the capital and make my country contiguous again.
I did not like that.
As far as this specific situation, I am not familiar with Austria in the 19th century. So, the situation may be way different than I am imagining. However, in EU (which I have played a lot), the state containing Vienna is a huge portion of Austria's economy. Austria would be crippled by losing Vienna. There would be no "vengeance war" where Austria is hell bent on getting Vienna back. Austria would be dead and its remaining land divided up amongst the surrounding countries as quickly as those countries could declare war.
That makes losing Vienna seem like a bit of a big deal. So, I can understand why people are worked up about it.
However, in the hypothetical case where Washington falls to the Confederates (which doesn't seem completely mad with the borders so close), the USA would just move the capital to New York City. You could even make an argument that New York City should be the capital anyway as the economic heart of the country. So, losing Washington seem like not that big of a deal.
So, I am back and forth. If there is a plausible alternative and the capital state is not that economically important, then it doesn't seem like that big of a deal to allow a conqueror to take it.
Edit: Ninja'd by Baneslave who said it in 1/5 the number of words.
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Interesting, do you know if Styria in game matches with the actual state or also includes Salzbourg and Carinthia?
I should stop posting and read the rest of the AAR already
Sounds like it already is. It's not like they would make it possible to conquer capitals just as a lark. And yeah I agree that it should be possible.
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I think you're thinking of Vicky 2. IIRC You'd only have the "Take state" CB that shows non-capital states. Only when all other states were gone would the big 22 infamy "Conquer" CB show up for their capital.
Could be, but I didn't play Vicky 2 that much. I have mostly played EU. Maybe EU2? In any case, it doesn't really matter.
Another question for the thread: Rather than think in terms of whether Austria could survive without Vienna or what would be the most satisfying for the player, what about historical examples? How often have capitals been taken in a war before less important territory?
Okay, but I worded the question a little differently, to elicit exactly why the capital should be sacrosanct. Do you think the punishment should be more severe for taking London than for taking East Anglia? Or instead, should there be equally crippling infamy and huge unrest for taking any core-type region? For example, why would the capital be subject to more unrest than an equally core-type region? What's the underlying principle we are following to distinguish the outcomes for taking a capital versus a similarly-sized but non-capital region, specifically including global perceptions of the aggressor (i.e. "infamy")?
I prefer to think in terms of principles rather than historical examples, but to add to the examples above, the loss of Constantinople by the Ottomans is easy to imagine in the event of a serious loss to its neighbours, as would be the loss of Peking to European aggressors.
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There are plenty of realistic hypothetical examples that could happen during the game. The Confederates taking Washington DC from the US before other states, Spain taking Lisbon from Portugal before the Portuguese colonies, Greece or a great power taking Constantinople from the Ottomans before taking Iraq, Russia losing Saint Petersburg to someone before Moscow, Argentina losing Buenos Aires before say Cordoba, whichever minor founding Italy or Germany losing their capital before other parts of Italy or Germany, a Denmark-formed Scandinavia losing Copenhagen before losing Finnmark...
There are so many examples that you really do need to have the ability to take a country's capital state for the game to be realistic.
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Right and those are good hypothetical examples. I was just curious whether there are actual examples where it did happen.
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You don't need to be offered something to join a side, you can just join a side if you wish. Prussia is a non-negotiating party in this AAR example because it's doesn't have wargoals for or against it.
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The Austrian Empire in 1836 is a lot bigger than the Duchy of Austria in 1444. A lot of that land isn’t German, sure, and while I would expect the Italian parts to break away pretty quickly (and in fact Lombardy did end up breaking free in the AAR) I don’t know if the whole Habsburg Empire would instantly fracture along ethnic lines. There might be a chance to take back Upper Austria, especially if Bavaria gets dragged into its own insane death war caused by suicidally aggressive AI.
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Can you rule the Austrian Empire from a non-Austrian city? Is there an Austrian city left that would be able to serve as a replacement? I think the point that people are making who are unhappy is that the answer to those two questions is no and no.
I found this link that contains the population of Austrian Empire cities in 1850:
Assuming non-Austrian cities are out, then the new capital would be Graz, right? With a population of 55,000. Could Graz serve as the capital to the Austrian Empire?
That said, I think it is important to recognize that Austria is a bit unusual. Its multicultural nature makes it the GP/major power that would be the most devastated by losing its capital. Most GP/major powers have large homelands with cities that were important and could serve as an alternative capital. So, Austria is an outlier.
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Losing the capital would be crippling to any advanced nation though. Capitals host a great part of governmental infrastructure, many officials, military headquarters, national archives, important museums. Moving all those things would be very difficult, not to mention the psychological blow to the population. I can see any nation conceding large amounts of territory before surrendering their capital. This should be acknowledged somehow in the game otherwise there would be a lot of immersion breaking moments related to war and diplomacy.
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Why not? I’d imagine the capital would go to Prague. Whether the Empire survives long term without Vienna is another question, though.
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I was imagining that the capital would stay within the country/empire's cultural homeland. I would think an Austrian Empire would need to be ruled from Austria. But I am just making a guess without any real foundation. Just as good (if not better) a counter would be "Why couldn't the Empire be ruled from Graz?" The USA built a capital in Washington. The Russians built a capital in St. Petersburg. Countries have historically built new capitals.
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That's true. If there is some kind of Homeland limit on where the capital can be, it will probably be Graz.
However, the Habsburg dynasty had in the past used Prague as a capital. Granted, that was under the Holy Roman Empire and before the rise of nationalism (though in 1836 Czech nationalism is not really all that strong)
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Interesting! I did not know that.
Here is a cool nugget from the wiki on Graz:
"In the 14th century, Graz became the city of residence of the Inner Austrian line of the Habsburgs. The royalty lived in the Schlossberg castle and from there ruled Styria, Carinthia, most of today's Slovenia, and parts of Italy (Carniola, Gorizia and Gradisca, Trieste)."
What was the Inner Austrian line, you ask?
"Inner Austria (German: Innerösterreich; Slovene: Notranja Avstrija; Italian: Austria Interiore) was a term used from the late 14th to the early 17th century for the Habsburg hereditary lands south of the Semmering Pass, referring to the Imperial duchies of Styria, Carinthia and Carniola and the lands of the Austrian Littoral. The residence of the Inner Austrian archdukes and stadtholders was at the Burg castle complex in Graz."
I just thought that was neat. Graz does have some significance to the Habsburgs. It isn't just any city in Austria.
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yes, the different Habsburg lines had a rivalry culminating in the Bruderzwist in the 17th century, where they fought for control; there wasn't primogeniture succession in the dynasty so there was a battle to unify the Habsburg realms under one heir. You wouldn't know that from playing EU4 though where the entire conflict is ignored in favor of making Austria ahistorically unified.
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