Yes this is an economic game but that shouldn’t mean characters should just be completely reduced to a portrait and nothing else.

[wilcoxchar]

If you can just completely ignore the fact that the leader of a nation was a staunch conservative and just go full liberal without any hindrance,

Except you can't do that. Even if the Tsar was never directly represented in the game you wouldn't be able to do that. Because Russia at the start will have staunch conservative interest groups in power affecting what direction you can immediately take the country. If liberal interest groups gain enough clout and political strength to have power to liberalize the country, then sure you could do that. But you would have to work toward that and certainly wouldn't be able to do it without hindrance in the form of the conservative interest groups presenting a roadblock. So your assertion that Tsar Nicholas is necessary as a character to stop this is just wrong.

 

[Palna Thoke]

Given what we actually know about "personality", deterministic views of personality being the same even 1 year into a different history is suspect. This is especially true when leaders at the time with similar personalities came to vastly different conclusions about very similar events.

Well we can look at how people behaved in reality and make them behave in similar ways irl. If you think someone like Nikolai should change to become a liberal 1 year in to the game.. okay sure, I just find that improbable to say the least, considering it's the same guy with same childhood experiences etc. Idk what realization he could've made in 1 year to make a complete 180 on his political compass.

"Breaks the immersion" is a meaningless standard here. This is a dumb slippery slope argument that deserves nothing more than dismissal and a laugh.

What do you mean it is meaningless? Immersion is essential to the game, I don't see how it's "meaningless".
Your comment deserves nothing more than dismissal and a laugh because it's just an arbitrary statement with no argument

Then why is the player passing reforms in an autocratic state? Why is the player doing literally any of the actions that a government does in an autocratic state? Why doesn't an autocratic leader do any of a great number of things that they unilaterally did historically without player input?

I guess it's a mix. There has to gameplay otherwise you would just be watching a simulation wouldn't you. It also isn't really the player who decides which reforms "pass". It's the parliament (and maybe the leader will have some say). The player just get the magic push to say which ones are considered (and sometimes the pops will force their will as well).
The devs have literally said themselves that the player isn't playing as the government.

The reason you can support a faction that overthrows you is because you are the Government of the nation, not a Government. It doesn't matter if its the Russian Monarchy or a Russian Parliament or the Soviet Union; they're still the current Government of the nation you're playing.

You can argue that this all should change, but that's a huge departure from Victoria's history (and every other PDS game except for a brief portion of a CK2 DLC). There are already blocks on quickly and immediately liberalizing a nation (interest groups, popular vote, nobles / upper house depending on the government type or game) including rebels that get mad if you reform too quickly.

What do you mean by government of the nation instead of a government. What's the difference? If you are playing as the conservative government Russia, why in hell would you support soviets to overthrow you from your power and murder your families?

 

[Baneslave]

Head of state completely blocking player from doing things sounds extreme unfun mechanic to me. Player being stopped from building factories for 40 years because the randomly created heir happened to be luddite is just... meh.

The devs have literally said themselves that the player isn't playing as the government.

...then why would head of state opposing certain political views stop player from enacting those political views?

 

[Palna Thoke]

Except you can't do that. Even if the Tsar was never directly represented in the game you wouldn't be able to do that. Because Russia at the start will have staunch conservative interest groups in power affecting what direction you can immediately take the country. If liberal interest groups gain enough clout and political strength to have power to liberalize the country, then sure you could do that. But you would have to work toward that and certainly wouldn't be able to do it without hindrance in the form of the conservative interest groups presenting a roadblock. So your assertion that Tsar Nicholas is necessary as a character to stop this is just wrong.

That is not at all my point. Yes powerful conservative interest groups will also make liberalizing your country more difficult. But does that mean that we should just completely ignore the opinions of the absolute ruler just because an interest group can be used to "represent" his opinions.
Let's imagine Tsar Nikolai was radical liberal instead. But there was a clear majority in favor of traditionalism among the interest groups. What represents the absolute rulers opinions then?

 

[wilcoxchar]

That is not at all my point. Yes powerful conservative interest groups will also make liberalizing your country more difficult. But does that mean that we should just completely ignore the opinions of the absolute ruler just because an interest group can be used to "represent" his opinions.
Let's imagine Tsar Nikolai was radical liberal instead. But there was a clear majority in favor of traditionalism among the interest groups. What represents the absolute rulers opinions then?

The interest groups that form the autocratic government being liberal ones while having a minority of clout and political strength, while having an autocratic government form would give the government more authority capacity with which to suppress the majority interest groups and promote its own. It would be a government that might have extreme difficulty passing laws if the opposing interest groups aren't suppressed enough and would be ripe for a revolution by the conservative groups, especially since even liberal groups would oppose their own autocratic measures and would be supporting reform.

 

[Xdevo]

Well we can look at how people behaved in reality and make them behave in similar ways irl. If you think someone like Nikolai should change to become a liberal 1 year in to the game.. okay sure, I just find that improbable to say the least, considering it's the same guy with same childhood experiences etc. Idk what realization he could've made in 1 year to make a complete 180 on his political compass.

Austrian, Prussian, Spanish, and Dutch rulers had extremely fast changes of mind on topics when it allowed them to save a fraction of their power in the face of a lot of pressure.

What do you mean it is meaningless? Immersion is essential to the game, I don't see how it's "meaningless".
Your comment deserves nothing more than dismissal and a laugh because it's just an arbitrary statement with no argument

None of this is in Victoria 2. Does Victoria 2 allow you to use dragons as Russia? No. Do people find Victoria 2 immersive? Obviously. There's a large degree of logical distinction between the two things you're attempting to compare.

You used a blatant fallacy (slippery slope). That's why your argument is laughable.

Its meaningless because immersion is arbitrary. Everyone is immersed by different things and something you find immersive may active harm immersion for other players. I would actively be unimmersed if there's some shadow government that cannot be interacted with behind me doing nothing except for telling me that I can't do something.

If you want to roleplay as an authoritarian, please feel free to do so. I hope this game does a much better job of portraying why the government form worked for as long as it did and why it was so effective in a variety of forms.

I guess it's a mix. There has to gameplay otherwise you would just be watching a simulation wouldn't you. It also isn't really the player who decides which reforms "pass". It's the parliament (and maybe the leader will have some say). The player just get the magic push to say which ones are considered (and sometimes the pops will force their will as well).
The devs have literally said themselves that the player isn't playing as the government.

(In Vic2) The player has total control over which (if any) get passed. Parliament just gives the player permission on one of two lists. The player is completely able to ignore the reform button for the entire game if they wish, it'll just make the people very upset. The player doesn't have to confer with any body when it declares war, and there no body that's declaring war without the player's input.
The fact that one of the options for parliament is "appointed" and the fact that the player is the one that appoints the majority party in the upper house incontrovertibly demonstrates that the player has absorbed the role of the head of state (and other roles too).

The lines are obviously blurry as to exactly "who" the player is, but their role absolutely includes the head of state.

What do you mean by government of the nation instead of a government. What's the difference? If you are playing as the conservative government Russia, why in hell would you support soviets to overthrow you from your power and murder your families?

You're not playing as "the conservative government of Russia" you are playing as "the government of Russia". It doesn't matter if that government is conservatives, liberals, or pseudo-communists. When the peasants overthrow the government, you're just playing as the new one. If the government is one person, you're that person. If the military holds a coup, you're the new military government. Its not that much different than already existent government reforms (its just you choose to do one) or national formation.

 

[alexti]

I wouldn't want characters to define gameplay in Vic3, but having some characters appear in the newspaper articles (assuming Vic3 will still have them) can be a good option. Something like "Latest from Olympics: Prince Olav wins a gold medal!" would be a good kind of flavor.

 

[Blindbohemian]

Yes this is an economic game but that shouldn’t mean characters should just be completely reduced to a portrait and nothing else.​

Honestly, it kind of does.

Everyone is coming here saying Victoria 3 needs to have complex characters, Victoria 3 needs to have political parties, judicial systems, gun laws, HOI3-style army setups, Imperator-style this, EUIV-style that, Stellaris the next thing. Between all the characters and ship designers and custom nation converters and “I know it’s an economy game but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need an amazing groundbreaking combat system” pretty quickly people are designing-by-committee a game that just isn’t Victoria.

Victoria being an economic game about national gardening does mean that characters can be reduced to a portrait and nothing else. Games can only be about so many things; they can only have so many things in them. All this “I know Victoria is X but it also needs to be A, B and C” is exactly how we ended up with the incoherent alphabet soup that is modern EUIV.

 

[wilcoxchar]

Honestly, it kind of does.

Everyone is coming here saying Victoria 3 needs to have complex characters, Victoria 3 needs to have political parties, judicial systems, gun laws, HOI3-style army setups, Imperator-style this, EUIV-style that, Stellaris the next thing. Between all the characters and ship designers and custom nation converters and “I know it’s an economy game but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need an amazing groundbreaking combat system” pretty quickly people are designing-by-committee a game that just isn’t Victoria.

Victoria being an economic game about national gardening does mean that characters can be reduced to a portrait and nothing else. Games can only be about so many things; they can only have so many things in them. All this “I know Victoria is X but it also needs to be A, B and C” is exactly how we ended up with the incoherent alphabet soup that is modern EUIV.

I agree with everything you said except the part about political parties. Because Victoria is an economic game and a game about internal social and political change, and for that, especially in the 19th century when the formation of modern political parties was a huge part of liberalization and democratization in the period, you need formal political parties to be represented in the gameplay.

 

[Blindbohemian]

I agree with everything you said except the part about political parties. Because Victoria is an economic game and a game about internal social and political change, and for that, especially in the 19th century when the formation of modern political parties was a huge part of liberalization and democratization in the period, you need formal political parties to be represented in the gameplay.

That was a bit of an easter egg. Sometimes things do need to be added (or abstracted in some other way), but it’s important that they support what the game is.

I’m not totally convinced that political parties would be a good thing, by the way. I would really, really, really, really hate for Victoria to end up with the EUIV problem where you have stability, autonomy, rebels, factions, parliaments, estates, statists-vs-orangists, etc etc etc all representing basically the same thing in subtly different ways. The outcome of that approach is a nonsensical hodgepodge of crumminess (read: EUIV). If IGs work better than political parties would, I think we should just have the one thing. If they usefully complement each other then I’m on board 100%.

 

[Masterdindin]

Its no more unrealistic than 80 years of a nearly completely different history resulting in people that have exactly the same personality and aims as they did in the real world.

Ultimately the question of this is who the player is representing within the government for an authoritarian nation. It makes little sense to me if the player is playing as the government leadership that their hands are tied by the government leadership.

The idea is that the player represents the "spirit" of the nation rather than a certain individual or faction in government, as in other games. Though that has been the intent with EU4, HOI4 and Imperator, as opposed to CK, which is dynasty focused. Although important individuals and leaders and groups should have a notable role - as should be the case - putting "Victoria" in "Victoria 3" - the focus should remain on nation management. As someone else mentioned, tying important them to an interest group or party could be the way to do this.

It should be that the characterization of individuals is integrated into the focus of nation-building aspect of the game, and I am under the impression that is what the devs desire as well. That said, I would hope there's more characterization than something like EU4 or HOI4 which is just a name or portraits with a few numbers besides them. Make them feel like people who have vested interests in their nations, whatever their status. That is not antithetical to the idea behind the game.

Now, I'm not too sure to what extent the OP hopes for characterization, besides that characters should have more meaning than portraits and a few numbers, but he and everyone else should keep in mind the idea behind Victoria games. As important as the roles were that they had, the widespread changes during this time period went far beyond the just individuals themselves.

 

[Lapoleon]

If you're playing as tsarist Russia how unrealistic would it you could just go completely reformist with Tsar Nikolai as your absolute leader. It would make absolutely no sense from a historical standpoint. There should definitely be some character involvement especially in very authoritarian countries.
However, I agree characters should never be the core focus of the game.

Nikolai II was a tsar who absolutely believed in his divine right to rule. This did not really help him in 1918. You can also bet that if the Menscheviks had come out on top and pushed for a constitutional monarchy that he would have had to listen.

An absolute monarch is only as absolute as his power base allows him to be. What you could do is something like "monarchical obstruction: -10% chance each month to the chance of passing a Liberal law.". Or use your absolutism to give a boost to the repeal of Liberal laws.

 

[Will Steel]

Characters could've been a really fun idea had they not set a precedent of badly botching it with Imperator Rome, where they somehow actually made character system worse over time with the patches even though the game as a whole finally became really good.

If a Victoria game gets detailed character system, its safe to assume the same would happen again - it will get less or no focus in updates compared to the rest of the system, features will be entirely removed to streamline them and adhere to the "grand strategy/civilization builder" theme, until its a bland oversimplified mess incapable of generating any interesting stories or roleplay compared to CK.

I'd rather prefer the current way over that happening again - characters exist, have traits and personalities and affect things to a certain degree, represent ruling dynasties by bearing certain surnames, and little more.

This is not really a character focused game, even though its a fun idea.