The Yugoslavia Fix

[Chary_]

I think the Yugoslavia change, as a whole, was an entirely needed and really great inclusion in the latest update/dlc, and would like to first and foremost complement the team behind it on their great work. That being said, I do think the communist tree leaves a little to be desired (Which, according to the dev-diary, the just the result of not knowing how much they'd be allowed to add when developing the tree). While, yes, the Stalinist tree is completely useless and there is no reason to pick it instead of Yugoslav-Path, I find it kinda silly that Tito, the guy who wanted a Balkan Federation, can't form a united Balkan Federation but Bulgaria (who pulled out of the idea as soon as the Tito/Stalin Split occurred) can. I was expecting some ability to puppet the nations after you flip them (especially considering the nations changing colours to match Yugoslavia's dark-blue/purple scheme) but after a playthrough it seems like that isn't the case.

In addition, there is also the added level of fascist Yugoslavia not getting a claim on Thrace (I mean if you're going to claim C-Macedonia for the slavs, and also claim Bulgarians, you're gonna want to grab Thrace which was an object of Bulgarian desire). Maybe just renaming claims on Macedonia to claims on Northern Greece? This is a pretty small thing though, and I think the real problem is just Yugoslavian Communism being even worse now that the Western Path is so fleshed out and interesting.

 

[Iskulya]

Indeed, the communist path feels very lackluster and boring, and as you mentioned, there's no reason to ever take the Stalinist path. I always do the same thing. Take the Yugoslav Path to Communism because that's the only way to get rid of some of your crippling penalties, immediately disband my faction, and join the Comintern anyway.

A lot of people have rightfully critiqued it, in my view, for not including anything relating to the partisan struggle and the struggle for power between the Chetniks and communists. It seems like a missed opportunity because we now finally have mechanics in the game that allow partisan movements to be represented in a better way with the new resistance and compliance system.

I'm glad they did this rework though, and I hope they revisit some of the others like Hungary which desperately needs some more fleshing out of its non-fascist focuses especially. I think the Bulgarian focus tree took the right approach in given every political path some way, potentially, of restoring Greater Bulgaria. The Democratic way was the least reliable, but it was a possibility if your neighbors joined an opposing faction. I definitely think Communist and Democratic Hungary should have some way of eventually forming Greater Hungary if they get the land, not that it should be easy for them.

Also it'd be interesting if they fleshed it out by making a separate path for the return of Bela Kun vs a Stalinist path with Rakosi, but that's just me.

Canada, India, and Australia could definitely use some kind of lightweight rework like this too(in that order, I'd say). Canada would benefit from more depth, but especially they just need to take out this utterly nonsensical and unfun dichotomy between ending the Great Depression OR ending the conscription crisis. It's like... wut? These things have no relation to each other. Why would ending one preclude you from doing the other? It's not cool, and it's not fun. I don't think it's balanced either especially how there's been definite power creep with newer countries. I don't think Canada's ~10 million population makes them too poised to be insanely OP. They might benefit from a few more resource prospecting decisions or something of that nature too.