Capacities: Victoria 3 Expert Discussion (Spudgun)

[Kekistanium]

This reminds me of a quote from Yahtzee from his Zero Punctuation Review for the Sim City reboot, you know, the one that misguidedly focused on MP features while it is a singleplayer game?

"Can I suggest that perhaps you only ever hear from people who like online features because such people are extroverts"

Link:

anti-piracy always online DRM isn't a multiplayer feature

 

[Ferrous Will]

anti-piracy always online DRM isn't a multiplayer feature

That's not the only thing they did to simcity to force it to be multiplayer though, they twisted the design to make it seem legit. But in so doing kinda ruined the game.

 

[Rhazzaz0r]

I couldn't disagree with you more. The vast audience for these games are single players, & any game should be based around them. The problem is the multiplayer crowd are very vocal & the developers, who themselves love multiplayer, listen to them, & which leads to games going downhill. EU4 a perfect example.

I love statements like this. Any example on how eu4 mp community is vocal and listened to? I am a big mp player in eu4 and I cant remember the last time any balance changes or smiliar was done for mp. If anything it gets worse every patch with more manpoer and dev cost creep beeing introduced.
Also the disagreement here is not that singleplayer balance should take the back seat because thats not the case. Single Player balance should be the priority but saying people who play primarly mp shouldn't have an opinion on things like this is utter crap. Im well aware of the differences between mp and sp, if anything I'd argue and know even more because I actually play both ways

 

[cdub8d]

Generally people that play a ton of MP on average are much better players. Reasons are they can test things and discuss with the group they are playing with. Naturally this accelerates the skill of the group. So a MP group can find balance issues and exploits really well. And because of these discussions, they likely have a deeper understanding of the game. To say something like playing MP should discount your opinion because most play SP is pretty ridiculous. Nobody is denying the game needs to play really well in SP. MP in Paradox games only increases the lifespan of the game and discounting it entirely is absurd.

Also spoiler alert... good players are generally pretty good and finding potential issues in games faster than your average player. I have seen this with several games in the past couple years. Average player base says something along the lines of, "we need to play it first before forming an opinion" or something along those lines. But the better players figured out issues by reading about the mechanics and pretty quickly found issues that turned out to be major issues.

So is this case one of those cases? IDK yet because I don't really consider myself an expert player in Paradox games. I will say I am slightly skeptical of capacities but waiting for more info.

 

[Paghalay]

To say something like playing MP should discount your opinion because most play SP is pretty ridiculous.

Yes but at the same time, often multiplayer balance and single player balance don't always align, and I think in those cases the single player balance should take prevalence.

 

[jju_57]

@SanicK why the dislike within minutes of me posting a discussion video that, at the time of me posting this thread, is still live and has gone on for more than an hour and will go on for up to 3?

Because you are posting something that they don't want to even hear or recognize. No matter how factual if you post something that some people don't want to hear that they offense and hit that X. X's are just people that can't actually debate a point.

 

[Aeroclub]

I am yet to meet one person in my entire life who was an actual expert after proclaiming themselves to be an expert.

 

[cdub8d]

Yes but at the same time, often multiplayer balance and single player balance don't always align, and I think in those cases the single player balance should take prevalence.

Yea and that is up to the devs to figure out. It isn't SP vs MP. But both "modes" should work and be fun to play.

 

[qer]

Generally people that play a ton of MP on average are much better players. Reasons are they can test things and discuss with the group they are playing with. Naturally this accelerates the skill of the group. So a MP group can find balance issues and exploits really well. And because of these discussions, they likely have a deeper understanding of the game. To say something like playing MP should discount your opinion because most play SP is pretty ridiculous. Nobody is denying the game needs to play really well in SP. MP in Paradox games only increases the lifespan of the game and discounting it entirely is absurd.

Also spoiler alert... good players are generally pretty good and finding potential issues in games faster than your average player. I have seen this with several games in the past couple years. Average player base says something along the lines of, "we need to play it first before forming an opinion" or something along those lines. But the better players figured out issues by reading about the mechanics and pretty quickly found issues that turned out to be major issues.

So is this case one of those cases? IDK yet because I don't really consider myself an expert player in Paradox games. I will say I am slightly skeptical of capacities but waiting for more info.

This is actually a really good point: we can infere from what we see what type of game we are going to get. Imperator is a good example as we got a pretty clear picture of what the game was going to be on release.

 

[cdub8d]

This is actually a really good point: we can infere from what we see what type of game we are going to get. Imperator is a good example as we got a pretty clear picture of what the game was going to be on release.

And I think it is important to also point out is people can still be wrong! Maybe we get more information later that really changes how we look at things. But the first couple dev diaries are going to be really really telling of how the overall games is going to be.

 

[Plastic_Duke]

I've seen this video pop up in my Youtube feed. I clicked on it. And then, just before pressing play, I thought: what could I possibly learn from a two hours long video from some random YT commentors about a game we know so few about, when I have most probably read every little bit of information made public myself already? What could this video possibly contain to last this long? Probably a long stream of useless rambling formed around a lot of baseless assumptions, that's what I quickly concluded. And then I closed the tab. And from what I can gather here, it seems I wasn't completely wrong.

I don't want to sound rude to those people that made this video, really. I mean, I wasn't even thinking these would be "doomers" assumptions. In good faith, even if these were optimistic assumptions, these would still be of no use to me. I collect every piece of information I can directly from the devs, what they say to us or game journalists, since it's the only source we have, until the game is available and we can judge from ourselves. At this stage, I don't think anyone outside of the dev team can make an informed opinion about what the game is gonna be like. You can have hopes, you can have doubts, you can have fears, even. You can also have an opinion. There's just no way it's gonna be a solid one, a trustful one.

That's why, from the get go, this kind of video seems extremely premature to me. And I don't think there is a point to it. Not yet, at least.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Perhaps because Victoria 2 multiplayer is so unstable to begin with and thus it's hard to find the communities and get into them.

In contrast the most popular map game to date, HOI4, has a pretty active multiplayer community to my knowledge.

That's not the reason at all. There was a pretty active multiplayer community for Victoria 2 back in the day. I should know, I was part of it for a while. There isn't an active Victoria 2 community now for the simple reason that it's a decade old game and is a grand strategy games, so is therefore by nature going to attract most people who want to play single player. That's all.

The simple fact is that Victoria is not CS:GO or COD or PUBG. If you want a primarily multiplayer game, those are out there for you. Victoria and all Paradox games are not those and their focus should be fully placed in creating the best single player game they can because that is how a vast, vast majority of people playing their games are going to play.

 

[zorkman]

I love statements like this. Any example on how eu4 mp community is vocal and listened to? I am a big mp player in eu4 and I cant remember the last time any balance changes or smiliar was done for mp. If anything it gets worse every patch with more manpoer and dev cost creep beeing introduced.
Also the disagreement here is not that singleplayer balance should take the back seat because thats not the case. Single Player balance should be the priority but saying people who play primarly mp shouldn't have an opinion on things like this is utter crap. Im well aware of the differences between mp and sp, if anything I'd argue and know even more because I actually play both ways

EU4 is a great case in point. The game started very well, was improved over the next couple of years, was very European based, hence the name, popularity of those countries, & the fact Europe was very dominant in the world for this period. Some people were not happy about this, mainly multiplayer community as well as individuals, who wanted to be able to take any tribe however small into some sort of superpower. Nothing wrong with this, but the problem was it slowly started the decline of the main game, which has been going downhill for years now. Coinciding with this was bringing DDRJAKE to head development of EU4. His main claim to fame being taking some tiny island on a WC with gamey tactics. What could go wrong?

So, yes the vocal muliplayer crowd did make a big difference to this game at least, whether you noticed it or not. Just don't want this to happen to V3.

 

[cdub8d]

EU4 is a great case in point. The game started very well, was improved over the next couple of years, was very European based, hence the name, popularity of those countries, & the fact Europe was very dominant in the world for this period. Some people were not happy about this, mainly multiplayer community as well as individuals, who wanted to be able to take any tribe however small into some sort of superpower. Nothing wrong with this, but the problem was it slowly started the decline of the main game, which has been going downhill for years now. Coinciding with this was bringing DDRJAKE to head development of EU4. His main claim to fame being taking some tiny island on a WC with gamey tactics. What could go wrong?

So, yes the vocal muliplayer crowd did make a big difference to this game at least, whether you noticed it or not. Just don't want this to happen to V3.

Yea and that is up to the devs to figure out. It isn't SP vs MP. But both "modes" should work and be fun to play.

 

[Rhazzaz0r]

EU4 is a great case in point. The game started very well, was improved over the next couple of years, was very European based, hence the name, popularity of those countries, & the fact Europe was very dominant in the world for this period. Some people were not happy about this, mainly multiplayer community as well as individuals, who wanted to be able to take any tribe however small into some sort of superpower. Nothing wrong with this, but the problem was it slowly started the decline of the main game, which has been going downhill for years now. Coinciding with this was bringing DDRJAKE to head development of EU4. His main claim to fame being taking some tiny island on a WC with gamey tactics. What could go wrong?

So, yes the vocal muliplayer crowd did make a big difference to this game at least, whether you noticed it or not. Just don't want this to happen to V3.

What does this have to do with the mp community? The three mountains as you sorta mentioned was in the game from the very beginning so it was always intended to be possible. Other nations getting the spotlight is an issue of new mechanics beeing added and powercreep, new stuff has to be exciting. This is why we have the whole hordes fiasco and why Russia and Moghuls are so op.
I also don't want vicky to go down this path but considering that a WC even as Britain is at least very hard or should be impossible according to the devs, I doubt you'll have an easy time colonizing Europe as Sokoto. Becoming a recognized nation and fend off colonizers maybe even become a great power ( especially considering there can be more then 8 ) should be the goals here.

 

[Alfred Dreyfus]

For context I have watched Spudgun's 3 videos he has done with same group before the original post on this thread was made.

I think it is a mistake to post this particular groups reaction videos here for a couple of reasons.

First of all most people on the forum are more informed about the development of Victoria 3 than these guys are. Of the 5 chaps in the video linked only 1 had read the the dev diary and the dev responses. Given this video was live streamed 5 DAYS after the dev diary, the guys in the video had just chosen not inform themselves about the topic. The last video is nothing but a bunch of hot takes made 5 days after the dev diary. What is baffling is they have time to make a 2-3 hour video on the topic but don't have 20 minutes to read the dev diary and the dev comments beforehand!? Many have clearly not watch the PDXCON videos. They also don't know the names of the people on the dev team and there roles. They frequently pontificate on questions already answered. Most of us have eaten up as much information as we can about Vicky 3, so watching people who are not nearly as engaged with the process as the people on this forum here are can be frustrating.

Of course they have a right to go about chatting about these dev diaries and reddit posts with little preparation they like. I am not the boss of them. But as I mentioned, most of us here on the forum are looking for every bit of information we can get about the development. You will get no insights to the development of this game from Spudgun's videos for the reasons I have mentioned above.
This quote leads me into my second point. Verbatim, "doomer" is exactly what the chaps in this video called themselves. No one on these forums gave them this title, they gave it to themselves. And this isn't something they gave themselves at the end of the 3rd video either. It is at the beginning of the first video. They are clearly cynical or pessimistic about PDX's ability to deliver a good game. It is hard to know if they are looking to confirm their own cynical take on the company or they are genuinely concerned about issues that experienced Vicky 2 players see. Overall the videos are extremely negative. Think of these forums as you will, but they are significantly more upbeat than these videos.

In the end, my points are, that the videos are a collection of guys who know less about the Vicky 3 development than most of us and they are by there own admission "doomers" in regards to this game. I understand they have a wealth of knowledge when it comes to Vicky 2 (which is why I have watched them) but they are not going to add anything to the discussion of the development in the context of these forums. As you can already see, the thread in regards to this video is less than savory. I think it would just be best if we didn't see another video here.

Maybe they are not following Vic3’s dev diaries with the same passion as people on the forum, but you can’t deny they are good at analyzing the information. I mean, just by taking a look at the few images we have from the game they’ve been able to extract a lot of information.

Also them being in the sceptical train rather than the hype train (like most of us on the forums are), lets them make a more cold and rationale observation of the information.

For example: I was very hyped (or I still am, I don’t know) imagining that the economic and POP system was gonna be even more detailed and deep than the Vic2 one, but these guys have made me realize that it actually looks a much more simplified system.

From what we’ve seen we can extract some really bad things: those flat arbitrary values (“+100, +150, -200”) in the capacities tab, Sweden getting 1/4 of their entire diplomatic power (mana) from a ruler trait, tax and spending 0-100% sliders being replaced by 5 buttons loosing all the granularity, economic theories no longer being applied organically by the player instead now you just press a button to magically change your economic system, capitalists no longer build their own business by their own making economic systems like laissez-faire impossible and destroying part of economic simulation spirit Vic2 had, POPs no longer belong to specific provinces now they just belong to big size states (so in the state of California you can’t tell what POPs live in San Francisco or in the desert), and so on..

Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure Vic3 is going to be better in every other aspect of the game (diplomacy, war, graphics, etc), BUT Vic2 fans like me are disappointed by how Vic3 is taking a more EU4/Stellaris path in how the base game works, because we want Vic3 to maintain that “economic organic simulation” feeling Vic2 had, that made the game’s world feel so alive, and that is exactly what made Vic2 a cult game, because although it may be worst in almost every aspect in comparison to nowadays Pdx games, it had this special soul, that let you apply economic theories (socialism, laissez faire, etc) to your country and watch the results in a very organic and natural way. Also, in Vic2, POPs felt a lot like real organic population, while in Vic3 it seems that POPs are going to be mainly things you need to max your buildings production, it seems like the focus of the game will be the buildings your country has, rather than the people.

We still have very few information on how Vic3 works, and it looks promising in many aspects, but I think it is much better to show criticism and scepticism to the devs now that they are still making the same, than this whole hype train thing were no matter what devs say they get all this unconditional support and likes and agrees etc.

 

[Cymsdale]

I say this from the perspective of someone who has never played multiplayer and has no interest in multiplayer...

I'm not sure I've seen many good examples of this 'MP ruining SP balance' that people claim. A lot of the time, such complaints come from the faction of the player base (or I suppose we should call them Interest Groups) who believe that fixing any kind of balance or exploit in a single player game is bad and wrong. An attitude that I can only "respectfully disagree" with so many times.

 

[Paghalay]

cold and rationale observation of the information

Cold, absolutely, rationale, not guaranteed just because you're not on a "hype" train. You can be just as irrational if you're on the opposite of a hype train too

 

[Cymsdale]

From what we’ve seen we can extract some really bad things: those flat arbitrary values (“+100, +150, -200”) in the capacities tab, Sweden getting 1/4 of their entire diplomatic power (mana) from a ruler trait,

I think Wiz should learn a lesson here. It apparently always needs saying. Every time; bolded and underlined too perhaps.

 

[IndigoRage]

it would be a lot more easier if they included ALL the information in the dev diary, as opposed to, yknow,having people forum dive. This issue is also brought up in the stream itself and they also look at the dev comments.

It's a total non-issue as there's literally a button to only see dev replies exactly for this situation.