Africa, or, the Beige Continent

[birdboy2000]

I agree with the overwhelming majority of this post. Sadly, it seems the "dark continent" mythology of Africa has a bigger place in the popular consciousness than its actual history.

But then again, that's what mods are for.

 

[brycef]

Well perhaps the game would be better with more fleshing out of the colonization method, however to me its good enough for now. Though I do agree with some of Phalanxia's points, I don't see much change of this system either. In the end, it still was just a matter of only having enough power projection and logistical transport to colonize. 40,000 spear wielding natives against a couple hundred troops or adventurers with bolt action rifles and machineguns isn't really something that I would be especially interested in playing out in V2 anyway. As I see it there's enough detailed work to do while playing the game and for me the current system does the job without going into more micro-management detail than is needed. Just my opinion but I would be interested in seeing if anything comes of your suggestions.

 

[Matrim_Cauthon]

Africa in Europa Universalis III is more detailed than in Victoria II. In EU3 you can play as Kongo and try to westernize if the Portuguese make a colony near you, for example (as actually kind of happened. Only in Magna Mundi, though, could you convert to christianity unless defeated in a war).

So I think the people of Paradox do know about the African states, but for some reason didn't put them in Vicky 2. Also, it must be remembered that while the Kingdom of Kongo the Portuguese encountered in the 15th century was highly centralized and organized, the one that existed in the 19th century was incredibly chaotic and exised basically in name only. Several civil and relgious wars over centuries had made the place a complete wreck. If Kongo should be put into the game, it should be facing severe problems by the start.

 

[Kyoumen]

Africa in Europa Universalis III is more detailed than in Victoria II. In EU3 you can play as Kongo and try to westernize if the Portuguese make a colony near you, for example (as actually kind of happened. Only in Magna Mundi, though, could you convert to christianity unless defeated in a war).

Uh, just so you know, you can't convert to Christianity as Kongo (or any other pagan country, or indeed any non-christian country) by being defeated in a war in EUIII. There is a ludicrously rare event that can switch state religion of an Animist/Pagan country to one of the three Christian faiths if they border a nation with one of those faiths as state religion, but otherwise the only way is via the OPM-bankruptcy trick.

That aside, I generally agree with the OP. The great thing about the new way Paradox is doing modular, smaller, focused expansions is that it makes the idea of an Africa-focused add-on to VII (or any similar area of interest that is unlikely to carry a full expansion) actually possible.

 

[KPJ]

I agree that the points in the OP are extremely valid, and have every best intention.

At the same time, the model of Victoria (2, in this case) is one of the industrializing European nation-state, at some path on their journey between feudal or despotic regimes to modern ones (be they capitalist or otherwise). The system also enjoys success amongst other Western-oriented states such as USA and (to a lesser extent) South America.

Thus the system, the period, the mechanics, and the interface are built to make an enjoyable experience for these types of nations.

China, Japan, and Persia have always needed unusual decisions, mechanics, and interfaces to be plausibly represented in the game. To some degree these have been done successfully, while other issues with these nations will be addressed in AHD.

To address the numerous issues around representing Ashanti, Mali, etc. (even the Boers and Portuguese don't seem quite right in our current incarnation) would require so many new things as to warrant a new game, or at least a very ambitious expansion to model the issues, solutions, and outcomes of the various conflicts outside of Europe (particularly regional vs. centralized authority, in how it pertains to dominant internal factions trading national legal and economic control in exchange for the wealth to maintain political power within their own highly fragmented nations) effectively.

I would definitely buy it, though!

 

[Phalanxia]

I agree that the points in the OP are extremely valid, and have every best intention.

At the same time, the model of Victoria (2, in this case) is one of the industrializing European nation-state, at some path on their journey between feudal or despotic regimes to modern ones (be they capitalist or otherwise). The system also enjoys success amongst other Western-oriented states such as USA and (to a lesser extent) South America.

Thus the system, the period, the mechanics, and the interface are built to make an enjoyable experience for these types of nations.

I completely agree. This is a game about the zenith of European power, and as such the focus and the game mechanics should be geared towards modelling the 19th Century Weberian Bureaucratic State. However, there is still scope for increasing the detail of places outside of Europe and the Americas without any detriment to the play of Western states.

China, Japan, and Persia have always needed unusual decisions, mechanics, and interfaces to be plausibly represented in the game. To some degree these have been done successfully, while other issues with these nations will be addressed in AHD.

Again, I agree. Nations on the cusp of modernisation need more of a boost than those which never really stood a chance.

To address the numerous issues around representing Ashanti, Mali, etc. (even the Boers and Portuguese don't seem quite right in our current incarnation) would require so many new things as to warrant a new game, or at least a very ambitious expansion to model the issues, solutions, and outcomes of the various conflicts outside of Europe (particularly regional vs. centralized authority, in how it pertains to dominant internal factions trading national legal and economic control in exchange for the wealth to maintain political power within their own highly fragmented nations) effectively.

Sure, and I'm pretty sure that what I'm proposing goes well beyond the scope of AHD. I bought Pride of Nations on Gamersgate on sale (For less than £2

), so I'll have a look around to see how colonisation is modelled in that game and compare it to Vicky II.

 

[Hibernian]

Firstly Phalanxia, I must say that I very much agree with your points and have been arguing them myself for some time. Africa in VIC2 is extremely poorly represented, it's like the Devs were going to make more countries but just made Sokoto and gave up (resulting in it literally just sitting there on it's own for the entire game, until getting conquered). I've pointed out the problems to the Devs several times, but they seem to be uninterested in doing anything (i.e. like when I pointed out that Africa doesn't have enough Population, though I just fixed that one myself).

I, along with several other people, have just decided to mod Africa into a historical state and made many African kingdoms for New Nations Mod and POP Demand Mod, and we've tried to come up with game mechanics which allow them to be represented in a historically plausible way (which is often not easy within the game's constraints). We took a somewhat different approach to Mod Tribal Afrique, in that we started from the position that only African kingdoms which practiced Agriculture and had an organised state structure (usually a Feudal structure with a King and Aristocracy, etc) would be represented as countries (so no disunited tribes like the Maasai, or hunter-gathers, etc).

The current version of NNM has 36 new African countries existing at the start and several more existing as cores. I recently created 9 new countries for NNM/PDM (mostly from breaking Ethiopia up into its constituent minor kingdoms), though they haven't been integrated yet you can download them yourselves (the posts about them start here). The current version of PDM has (I think) 21 new African countries at the start, but the next version will add 3 more and I think Rylock intends to gradually add all the NNM ones before AHD is released. So in the end PDM will have a very good representation of Africa.

Here's what Africa will hopefully look like with all the new starting countries added: (link to full sized image)


There're 45 new kingdoms existing at the start in that picture and maybe another 5 or so, existing as cores, though I do have long-term plans to create at least one core for every province on the continent, to represent all the smaller cultures who exist as POPs but never had states. This setup still has about half of Africa as still "blank" and the normal colonisation mechanics are still used there, which I think is appropriated since there were no organised states in those areas (that I know of). I've also recently started doing little write ups about each of the new African countries on the PDM Wiki, so players can get familiarised with these, totally historical, but obscure kingdoms (for example Ashanti, Dahomey, Kongo).

I'm glad that people are talking about this issue as I think the Devs think that no one cares, so if people continue to raise it they might eventually listen, but for the moment Modding is the way to go if you want to experience 19th century Africa.

 

[NapoleonComple]

I agree with the OP; leaving the African nations such as the Ashanti out leaves something of a hole to be filled. I can understand why (considering the resources and the nature of game development) they didn't add those states, but I think it should at least be a target of attentions for Vicky III, if an African expansion cannot be brought out.

 

[flame7926]

An Africa DLC would be good, not just adding the nations though, but changing the way the colonization/annexation of Africa happens, and the governments of the african countries.

 

[DisgruntledLemming]

Hm... That map intrigues me... Would it be possible to, as them, conquer all of the African natives before Europeans get to you?

 

[murlocmancer]

Well to the map i would say ethiopia should still be unified, and angola was more in control then represented in the region through what I have read about african colonazation. But more attention to africa could be a good thing. This could add some flavor, but you also need something where britian can't annex Wadia in 1850 as that wouldn't be reasonable. This would take some new mechanics to truly make it plausable. But I don't think this is in great need, and can take a backseat to other issues. Although AHD is fixing alot of things, so Africa could be a reasonable improvement in the game in maybe a year or so.

 

[Anony1200]

The way I saw it, African States are kind of a tricky thing to maneuver around, but the problem in that being, as the volk above mentioned, the vast majority shed no resistance to a foriegn power, and some even went willingly (For example, the kingdom of Zanzibar asked Germany to annex it for their own people's protection in this very time period). However, that's not to say that there wasn't ANY opposition.

The best way I could think to handle it is have some of the more important countries start out with cores on the region. The cored-lands can pop up revolts while colonizing to attempt to stop it, but not as a strictly nationalist thing- Remember, most tribes in Africa in the period was mostly in the Tribal mentality of having different conquerers scrabbling among small tribes, so they'd definitly not have much in the matter of a professional military- That kind of thing was left more to the biggest people in the area, see also the Ashanti, the Sokotans, the Zulus, and so on.

However, once they're colonized, then the threat is appearant: They're putting up their flag all over the place, messing with customs and such, and there's suddenly guards all over the place, at that point the threat is realized and it goes from "Making the Europeans go home" to "Restoring independance", see things like the (Very long-lasting) Anglo-Zanzibar war, the 1st Italian-Ethiopian War, and the organized rebellions when France knocked down Africa's door.

Truly, Africa really is more well-potrayed by "A big land without much to it" than "Confederations and trees and branches of microstates", because, as mentioned, the African peoples didn't really see much of a threat from Europe until it was too late...

 

[Hibernian]

Almost none of that is correct, there were at least 50 or 60 well established Kingdoms in Africa, all of which had organised armies and they did resist the Europeans from the very beginning (the 15th or 16th century). The reason that the Europeans managed to conquer these states in the late 19th century is not because they didn't resist, it's because the Europeans had invented military technology which was so much more advanced that they were defeated. And that can be simulated in the game with African countries (at least to an extent).

 

[unmerged(410387)]

I disagree with your historical interpretation. Especially this:

Those few African states that are present in the game are always, always smashed to bits within a few months of war breaking out. This is partly due to the nature of the game's military system - only conventional battles are modelled in-game, and this places non-Westernised armies at a distinct disadvantage. However, there are examples of Europeans being defeated in pitched battles - Adowa and Isandalwana particularly come to mind, but there are others.

I do not know where you hail from, but I am a Spaniard, and we had to study imperialism very extensively even though we only had one colony and some enclaves in Africa that were established when we were the dominant power in the 16th/17th centuries. The idea that Africans put up a hell of a fight and could repel the Europeans is just absurd. The game realistically portrays the Africans as being beaten easily when you send your armies there. Sure in many cases African armies fought back against the Europeans and repelled them. Ethiopia is really the only one that made it though. Sure, they may have beaten the Europeans in a battle here and there, but once the Europeans came back with greater force (or the same force) , they were done for (save ethiopia, which imported western advisers prior to the scramble for africa and had westernized fighting techniques). Of course Liberia too, since the US wouldn't let the Europeans touch it. But that doesn't count. I hope you understand my view. Africans in the 15th/16th century were the ones who fueled the slave tradE by selling their own people to the Portuguese for example so they weren't so resistant to Europe as you'd think. The map of Africa above doesn't look right to me. There were many Portuguese enclaves as well as a few Spanish ones that are not represented there. I see Gibraltar is British which happened in the 18th century so no way that map is accurate if it is excluding all the enclaves.

I do agree with you that the way to just hit "colonize" and it becomes yours is totally ridiculous, innacurate, and offensive to Africans though. But the actual fighting and easily beating them I agree with the game maker.

 

[DisgruntledLemming]

It shouldn't be a "we last a couple hundred men out of a single brigade whilst we wipe out their entire army" type situation though. Natives resisted through guerilla warfare, the best way to portray the conquest of Africa is attrition tbqh.

 

[Anony1200]

Almost none of that is correct, there were at least 50 or 60 well established Kingdoms in Africa, all of which had organised armies and they did resist the Europeans from the very beginning (the 15th or 16th century). The reason that the Europeans managed to conquer these states in the late 19th century is not because they didn't resist, it's because the Europeans had invented military technology which was so much more advanced that they were defeated. And that can be simulated in the game with African countries (at least to an extent).

I'm not saying they didn't resist, I'm saying that what resistance they did get was small enough that it'd be more properly represented by rebellions in colonial territory that reverse your progress. There were major wars- And indeed, some of the major powers could afford to be more represented- But essentially the rule of thumb throughout the area was "Kick down the door and win".

As I mentioned, the rebellions were few and far between during colonization, which as mentioned is more in the kin of the actual leader rising against you in a rebellion more than anything (The amount of nations needed to fill the whole of africa would be simply absurd and it'd absolutly kill your infamy) ...

 

[Gaius Marius I]

Its fairly obvious why the african nations that are in the game, well, are in the game.... These are the exact same tags that were present in Victoria: Revolutions. The only additions made are the 4 introduced in 1.2 (Rhodesia, Byz, Israel, and Babylon).

 

[DesertSnow]

AFAIK, in Victoria I you had a concept called "colonial war", which could change borders in colonial areas without battles in Europe.

 

[Kyoumen]

I do not know where you hail from, but I am a Spaniard, and we had to study imperialism very extensively even though we only had one colony and some enclaves in Africa that were established when we were the dominant power in the 16th/17th centuries. The idea that Africans put up a hell of a fight and could repel the Europeans is just absurd.

I hate to be cheeky, but considering the Battle of Annual (where about 3000 North Africans destroyed a Spanish army of 23,000, 5000 of them Spanish regulars) happened in 1921, that's an odd argument for a Spaniard to make.

It took nine wars for the English (the greatest military and economic power in the world by a large margin in the 19th century) to subdue the Xhosa, and four to subdue the Ashanti. The Zulus, though they eventually lost, also famously annihilated an English expeditionary force. Whether you think it is absurd or not, it actually historically happened that Africans put up a hell of a fight and could repel Europeans - no, not all the time or even most of the time, but it did happen. In the game, however, the chances of an African country not being completely annexed by Great Britain in a war are essentially zilch unless the AI does not actually land troops.

Of course, this is more a matter of the game not having logistics worth mentioning, and that it is easier to occupy an area of Africa the size of Germany than it is to occupy one single province within Germany, than it is because (most) African polities could stand up to Europeans in a straight fight (though it was only a decade before game start that the Ashanti had with considerable success engaged in pitched battles with English troops until the English brought rocket artillery). However, since the game does not and is unlikely to in future model the reasons why native polities were difficult to subdue, it would be appropriate and realistic to actually make them harder to subdue when fighting on home turf. Along the same lines outside of Africa, it took fourty years and 37,000 dead troops for the Netherlands to beat Aceh... how often does that happen in game?

As it stands, there is no way to actually have the historical defeat Italy suffered fighting Ethiopia (who only had a very small amount of "western-style" troops, and would in game terms have had an army primarily composed of irregulars). No European country can seriously expect defeat or even significant difficulty fighting an unciv other than possibly China (it's a common strategy for minor European powers like Italian minors and Portugal to rip chunks out of Morocco or annex Tunisia, which would at the very least have been a close run thing in reality), and that's simply unhistorical.

 

[KPJ]

I think another issue with Africa in V2 is the maintenance of colonies does not seem to be represented as a cost to the state.

Almost all of the settler colonies (Kenya, South Africa, Algiers, French West Africa, etc.) ran at a loss, at least for the first few years, while infrastructure was developed. Congo was unusual for running at a profit in the first three years, and this was because of brutal use of force by the Belgian crown, which suffered significant infamy and loss of prestige when the Congo rubber-gathering processes were publicized.

Another significant issue, in my opinion, that is not covered in the game are European policies towards the natives. The British, for example, in Nigeria used local rulers to enforce their rule, a sort of vassal relationship. In other regions, like Kenya, they encouraged Europeans to become landowners there. The French, on the other hand, used the assimilation system, and theoretically made (the majority of) their African possessions actual French provinces with representation in parliament-- they had unusual testing systems wherein they determined if Africans were 'French' enough to be French citizens.

I'm not even sure what the German model was, but I do know there was a genocide in Namibia under their rule (German Southwest Africa was how it was written in what I've read).

So, the economic models could be divided into at least 4 categories: brutal repression (German Southwest Africa, Belgian Congo under Leopold, Dutch spice islands), assimilation (French Algiers, West Africa), settler colony (Kenya, Cape colonies), or local rulership (Nigerian sultans)

Do these categories make sense? How could they be translated into game terms?