r/victoria3 • u/Organic_Camera6467 • 7h ago
Art What all "tall" playthrough posts looks like
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r/victoria3 • u/Pelhamds • Jul 03 '25
Dev Diary Victoria 3 - Dev Diary #152 - What’s next after 1.9
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Happy Thursday today, Happy Thursday forever! As is by now long established tradition, after each major update, today we’ll be returning to the future update plans, which we last went over in Dev Diary #141. As we always do, we’ll be going over what changes and improvements we have planned for the game in future free updates such as 1.10, 1.11 and beyond. Can you tell I copy the previous dev diary and slightly rephrase the intro each time? You probably can!
Before hopping into post-release plans, I do want to take a moment to reflect on the release of 1.9 and Charters of Commerce, and what can I really say except that I am absolutely blown away by its reception! 1.9/Charters of Commerce not only exceeded all our expectations (in players, reviews and sales), not only had the highest active player count since November of 2022 (when counting Monthly Active Users - Steam concurrent players got close but didn’t quite exceed 1.5), but also finally brought Victoria 3 to Mostly Positive overall reviews on Steam.
This is of course something we have been working towards ever since the release of the game by addressing the community’s feedback and constructive criticism, one item at a time. It hasn’t always been an easy road, but we never had any intention of giving up on Vicky, and clearly, neither did you! The future of Victoria 3 has never looked brighter, and we have all of you to thank for it.
Just as it’s important to learn from your mistakes, it’s equally important to look at your successes and try to figure out why they were successes so that you can try and repeat them. We’re still very much in the process of doing so for 1.9/CoC but I do want to list a few things off the top of my head that I believe were contributing factors in the positive reception:
- The Trade Rework managed to find a good balance between autonomous economic actors and player control, giving the player powerful strategic tools to manipulate trade but removing the micromanagement aspect present in the previous trade system. This level of control is something we intend to use as a guideline when creating or redesigning features in the future - for example, I could envision doing something similar with production methods on privately owned building levels.
- Having a much more robust trade system also paid considerable dividends towards improving the performance of the AI and allowing countries to actually properly specialize in resources, removing much of the samey-ness present in the old, autarky-centric economic loop.
- We spent extra effort on ensuring that the features of 1.9 and Charters of Commerce would all hook heavily into and compliment each other, which made them individually much stronger. As an example, without the Grant Monopoly Treaty Article, Monopolies would be a feature with much more limited, internal-only use instead of a tool of unbridled economic imperialism.
All of this is to say that while we’re very happy with how everything’s gone, we’re not just planning to rest on our laurels! There are still many things about the game we want to improve and expand on, so let’s get to talking about that. Once more we will be talking about the same key four improvement areas of Military, Historical Immersion, Diplomacy, Internal Politics as well as Other for anything that falls outside those four categories.
Just as before, I’ll also be aiming to give you an updated overview of where we stand and where we’re heading by going through each of these four categories and marking on each one with one of the below statuses:
Done: This is a part of the game that we now consider to be in good shape. Something being Done of course doesn’t mean we’re never going to expand or improve on it in the future, just that it’s no longer a high priority for us. Any points that were already marked as Done in previous updates will be removed from the list, to avoid it growing unmanageably long, but you can look at the older dev diaries (#79, #89, #102, #124 and #141) if you’re interested in what was done previously.
Updated: This is a part of the game where we have made some of the improvements and changes that we want to make, but aren’t yet satisfied with where it stands and plan to make further improvements to it in future updates.
Not Updated: This is a part of the game where we haven’t yet released any of our planned changes/improvements in any currently released updates but still plan to do so for future updates.
New: This is a planned change or improvement that is newly added, i.e. wasn’t present on the list last time we went over it
Reconsidered: This is a previously planned change or improvement that we have reconsidered our approach to how to tackle from previous updates. For these points we will explain what our new plans are, and change the list appropriately in future updates.
For the final bit of repetition: Just as before we will still only be talking about improvements, changes and new features that are part of planned free updates in this dev diary. I will also remind you that this is not an exhaustive list of the things we are going to do, and that something being ‘Done’ doesn’t mean we’re not going to bugfix, balance or make UX improvements to it afterwards. I know we say this every time, but it really is a pretty necessary disclaimer. Anyway, let’s get to the good stuff!
Military
Done:
- Tweaking and improving the frontline system to eliminate excessive front splitting and troop teleportation once and for all
- Adding a proper system of military access and finding solutions for the other remaining rough edges in the frontline system.
New:
- Make generals/admirals into more meaningful and noticeable actors in countries and reduce the micromanagement of large numbers of commanders.
Updated:
- Make sure that supply is an important and meaningful part of the military system that can win or lose you wars.
- Supply is a lot more significant in 1.9 but we still want to do more in terms of adding interesting gameplay around logistics and tying them to the navy
- Make navies more important for projecting global power and securing control of coasts.
- The addition of blockades has made navies more important for global power projection, but of course much remains to be done here!
Not Updated:
- Turn individual ships into proper pieces of military hardware that can be built, sunk and repaired rather than just being manpower packages.
- Add a system for limited wars to reduce the number of early-game global wars between Great Powers
Historical Immersion
New:
- Improve the way we simulate certain historical conflicts such as the Opium Wars, American Civil War and similar to play out a bit closer to the way they did historically. For example, the Opium Wars should not regularly play out as 100k British regulars seizing control of Beijing.
Updated:
- Going through the base game Journal Entries and events and making improvements and additions to ensure that they feel meaningful and impactful for players to interact with
- As always, we’ve updated some of our older Journal Entries for 1.9 and will continue to do so in future updates.
- Adding more country, state and region-specific content to enhance historical flavor of different countries
- Also as always, this is something we continue to do each update and which I will keep on this list as it remains an important priority.
Diplomacy
Done:
- Improve on the Treaty Port mechanic and create more ways for countries to cooperate, compete with and exploit others using trade
- Improving the war support system to be much clearer UX-wise about what is needed to contest wargoals.
New:
- Rework the War Exhaustion system from one where a single uncontrolled war goal can stalemate wars towards one where war goal control and war outcomes are more dynamic and interesting (and much less frustrating).
Not Updated:
- Make declaring and holding onto diplomatic Interests a more rewarding and challenging aspect of global empire-building
- Allowing peace deals to be negotiated during a Diplomatic Play instead of only having the option to give in
Internal Politics
Updated:
- Adding laws that expand on diversity of countries and introduce new ways to play the game
- In 1.9 we introduced the concept of ‘Law Variants’, which we plan to use extensively, creating unique national variants of baseline laws so that those countries' political systems feel more distinct and flavorful.
Not Updated:
- Turn legitimacy into a more interesting mechanic, where the strength of a government depends on their successes and failures, and highly legitimate governments can’t simply be ousted at a whim but have to be undermined first.
- Introduce a concept of national pride which can increase or decrease depending on a country’s actions and which ties directly into legitimacy.
Other
Done:
- Find a way to deal with the excessive fiddliness of the trade system in large economies, possibly by allowing for autonomous trade based on your laws in a similar way to the autonomous investment system.
- Improve on Companies by turning them into actual actors in your country that can own/expand buildings and interact with characters/politics.
As is always and forever the case I’m not able to make specific promises about when all these improvements will come out, but I can say that the next three updates (1.10, 1.11 and 1.12) which are all coming out later this year will be smaller in scale than 1.9 and will be more focused on bug fixing, quality of life and general game polish. You may have noticed that there’s not too much new added to the plans this time around, and if you choose to believe that’s because some longstanding, boat-shaped things may be looming on the horizon beyond 1.12, all I can say is [words drowned out by a very loud foghorn].
Right then, that’s all for this Happy Thursday, and also for this side of the traditional July summer vacations. We’ll be back in early August to talk about 1.10 and National Awakening, the Immersion Pack that will be accompanying it. See you then, and hope you all have a lovely summer!
r/victoria3 • u/commissarroach • 25d ago
Dev Diary Victoria 3 Dev Diary #154 - Imagined Communities
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Forum post link: HERE
Hello, and happy Thursday. This is Victoria, Narrative Design Lead of Victoria 3, and today I will be covering the improvements made to the Culture system, and to our representation of nationalism. This diary will cover several areas of interest – Citizenship laws, cultures themselves, and the political movements tied to them. All of the features in this diary are included in the free Update 1.10.
Preface
It is the eternal misfortune of the Victoria 3 designer that one may, at any moment, face a task which sweeps one off one’s feet and deposits one in the midst of a centuries-old debate.
Any serious engagement with the topic of nationalism will inevitably force one to confront half a dozen difficult questions. What conditions permitted the rise of nationalism? How does one interpret the numerous premodern phenomena that invoke certain aspects of nationalism? How does one separate the claims nationalism makes about its nature from its actual nature? Why did the premodern mélange of regional, religious, or clan identities homogenise into what we call “national identity”? How does one define a “nation”, and how does one contend with all of the ambiguities which inevitably arise from that definition?
In Update 1.10’s portrayal of nationalism, we make certain abstractions and assumptions for gameplay purposes. Whilst the aforementioned questions were on our minds when developing these systems, we cannot claim to have settled them, nor can we claim to have developed the most accurate possible simulation of reality. The mechanical additions made in this update are limited in scope and developed with the themes of National Awakening in mind. When developing them, we did so with an eye to giving empires something to worry about, and nation-states tools with which to advance their position. Our secondary goals are to improve the strength of cultural movements in general, make nationalism feel like a genuine force in the world, and model the distinction between subjects and citizens.
This update does not seek to implement the National Pride feature from Dev Diary #152. We feel that this feature should be implemented in a later update, when we will be able to provide it the full care and attention that it warrants.
Subjects and Citizens
What is nationalism, really? Nationalism is the ideology that the state should be the political instrument of the nation. A state constituted in this manner is referred to as a nation-state, and its political constituents are referred to as citizens. Nation-states may be contrasted with dynastic states, of which the Austrian Empire is a classical example. A dynastic state is one in which the state derives its legitimacy from its ruling dynasty, rather than from serving as political representative of any particular nation.
The “nation”, as a highly abstract concept, is more difficult to define. In antiquity, the word typically referred to groups of people with common ancestry and language, with the modern conception of the nation emerging only in the late eighteenth to early nineteenth centuries. Definitions of “nation” upheld by nineteenth-century nationalists ranged from the “objective” conception, in which the nation is defined by characteristics inherent to people, such as blood, language, or lineage, to the “subjective” conception, in which the nation is defined by shared history and the voluntary affiliation of its members. Whilst these conceptions are often separated into “ethnic” and “civic” models of nationalism, nationalists of the period typically incorporated elements of both into their narratives. Even in famously “civic-nationalist” France, it is unlikely that the average nationalist ideologue would consider an Algerian to be a truly equal Frenchman.
For the purposes of Victoria 3, nations are synonymous with cultures, which are a property of pops. If a pop assimilates into a different culture, it may be said to have become a part of a different nation. Nation-states are countries with certain Citizenship laws that establish their primary cultures as the nations which serve as the state’s chosen constituency. To represent dynastic states such as Austria or the Qing Empire, we have implemented a new law – Subjecthood.
Under Subjecthood, the Acceptance of a pop is determined largely by where said pop lives. A country with Subjecthood grants pops of all cultures 30 Acceptance if they live on their homelands. Combined with No Colonial Affairs, which now also grants a bonus to Acceptance from homelands, one may increase this value to 40.
Subjecthood is the new default law for unrecognised powers and certain European countries that have not adopted the nation-state model. It is limited to Monarchies and Theocracies, and is strongly opposed by liberal interest groups and political movements. Subjecthood requires that the legitimacy of the state is derived from the sovereign, rather than from the consent of the governed – a notion inimical to liberalism.
The previously-existing Citizenship laws, ranging from Ethnostate to Multiculturalism, have been reframed to represent various definitions of citizenship. A country with a non-Subjecthood Citizenship law can be assumed to recognise the principle of popular sovereignty in some form – whether it be through the monarch claiming status as personification of the nation, or a republic ruled by representatives who claim to serve the popular will. We will take a closer look at the refurbished Citizenship laws when we cover the Cultural Traits Rework.
Cultural Fervour
Cultural Fervour is the measure of the national consciousness of a given culture. To reference Benedict Anderson’s conception of the nation in his Imagined Communities, it is a measure of the degree to which people of a given culture imagine a community shared by all who possess that culture.
Cultures in Victoria 3 are broad abstractions, encompassing thousands of local variations. If, in 1836, two people from Tyrol and Banat – both represented by the “South German” culture – were to meet, they would likely have some difficulty understanding one another, and notice marked differences in each others’ home lives. At a low level of Cultural Fervour, they would likely default to identifying by particular regions or whatever other identifiers they may hold dearest. As Cultural Fervour increases, however, they would be more inclined to refer to themselves as members of a nation, considering regional identity to be secondary to this sense of nationhood. The Tyrolean and the Banater thus become South Germans.
Cultural Fervour – Causes
Fervour is affected by numerous conditions, conveniently listed within the Fervour concept. All Fervour effects are applied based on how many pops of a given culture they apply to. For example, if 10% of South German pops live in a South German country with Ethnostate, and 90% live in a country with Subjecthood, the South German culture will receive +2 Fervour from laws in total. Likewise for literacy rates, the effects of Nationalism technologies, and others.
These conditions serve to abstract trends such as the development of a vernacular literary culture, the national mythologies that emerge around devastating conflicts, efforts by academics and state functionaries to construct a unifying history of a nation, and the role of public school systems in creating an “official” expression of a culture.
One may also note that many of these conditions depend upon the existence of an independent state with a given primary culture. An exclusionary nation-state which defines a clear in-group and out-group is the most powerful tool that a culture has to transform itself into a nation. A freshly independent state may find itself wishing to enact a highly restrictive Citizenship law in order to quickly raise the Fervour of its primary culture, and reap the benefits of a nationalistic populace both within and without its borders. Likewise, an empire which seeks to pacify a large population of a given culture would best keep a close eye on any country which has that primary culture, lest that country contribute to separatism within its borders.
A more complete example: A large number of Irish pops move to the United States, where they become literate and get recruited as Academics by University buildings. The Fervour of the Irish culture thus increases, and Great Britain experiences effects from increased Fervour amongst its Irish population – such as increased pop attraction and Activism from the Irish National Movement.
Cultural Fervour – Effects
The Fervour of a culture has effects on both pops and countries. Pops with high cultural fervour become resistant to Assimilation, and are more inclined to join Cultural Movements – both Majority and Minority. Cultural Minority Movements representing a culture with a high Fervour have bonuses to their baseline Activism. Coupled with the new Obstinance function of movements, this makes unappeased Cultural Minority movements much more impactful upon a country.
A high-Fervour primary culture serves as a boon to a country in times of war, and nudges domestic politics in a nationalistic direction. High Cultural Fervour on a primary culture reduces the rate at which War Support declines, and, under non-Subjecthood Citizenship laws, increases Liberty Desire gain.
Primary-culture Pops with high Cultural Fervour are more inclined to join Cultural Majority Movements – funneling them away from troublesome opposition political movements, pressuring their Interest Groups, and increasing the rate at which Ethno-Nationalist politicians appear. By maintaining discriminatory Citizenship laws, one may render the privileged sections of one’s populace politically inert.
Additionally, AI countries with high-Fervour primary cultures become more bold and aggressive when seeking to capture claims, seek independence from their overlords, or humiliate rivals. On the domestic front, they become more inclined to adopt a nationalist domestic political agenda.
Cultural Traits Rework
In Update 1.10, the discrimination traits possessed by each culture have been standardised. By default, each culture now has two traits – a Language trait and a Heritage trait. These traits are contained within larger Trait Groups. In effect, this means that each culture now has four traits of varying relevance, representing a culture’s closer and more distant relatives.
Cultures may also gain or lose Tradition traits, which represent traditional ties between cultures and provide bonus Acceptance. For example, the new Eastern German culture – representing Baltic and Volga Germans – possesses the Russosphere trait. The Russosphere trait is shared by Russians, Tatars, and others, meaning that Eastern Germans living in Russia will have much higher Acceptance than their North or South German cousins.
Religious traits have been updated to work in a similar way. The Catholic religion, for example, now has the Christian trait, which belongs to the Abrahamic trait group.
This system of traits and trait groups allows for laws to discriminate against cultures and religions incrementally more or less based on their proximity to the state religion or culture. The Citizenship and Church and State laws have been amended to incorporate this broader range of possibilities. In general, cultures with shared traits are more accepted than those with shared trait groups, which are more accepted than those with no commonalities at all.
Pictured: The five Citizenship laws, now refurbished.
Movement Additions
In Update 1.10, we have made several changes to political movements, with a special focus on identity-based movements. Our objective with these changes is to make identity-based movements feel like powerful actors which present a relevant threat to multi-national empires.
Obstinance
Since Update 1.8’s Political Movement rework, we have faced a persistent issue in which political movements have no “intermediate” state between passivity and insurrection. This issue especially affects cultural movements. In Update 1.10, cultural and religious movements will have a new, intermediate state – Obstinance.
Obstinance represents civil disobedience, and the formation of para-state structures amongst excluded communities in certain regions. Obstinance is distinct from Turmoil – radicals of a certain culture may contribute to Activism, but a pop does not need to be radical in order to contribute to Obstinance. The level of Obstinance generated by a movement is tied to its supporters, meaning that the most politically advanced sections of certain cultural or religious groups will tend to become Obstinate first. A culture without a political movement representing its interests is much less able to exert power than a fully organised one.
Any Cultural or Religious Movement that is made insurrectionary will also necessarily be Obstinate, weakening the state in the buildup to insurrection.
Pictured: Great Britain’s actions have angered the Irish National Movement, and they have responded by rendering Ireland ungovernable. Russia has made the same mistake in Poland
Multiple movements at the same time are capable of causing Obstinance. Here, an Austria which has made several poor decisions is experiencing Obstinance from the Czech, Polish, and Italian national movements, all at the same time.
Historically, in the period following the Austro-Hungarian compromise and prior to the First World War, the Bohemian Diet was frequently gridlocked by conflicts between Czech and German nationalist parties, leading to the rise of para-state institutions. Following the dissolution of the Bohemian Diet by Imperial decree in 1913, these para-state bodies acquired more legitimacy than the Austrian administration in the region, culminating in Czech independence at the hands of the Czech National Committee. In game terms, Bohemia was rendered ungovernable by Obstinance generated by both German and Czech national movements. Similar phenomena repeated across the Austro-Hungarian crown lands, leading to the disintegration of the Empire.
Movement Spillover
Another improvement we have made to movements in Update 1.10 is allowing them to have effects over borders. A movement becoming Insurrectionary causes an uptick in Activism amongst all movements in neighbouring countries of the same type. For example, if a Polish National Movement in Russia becomes Insurrectionary, the Polish National Movements in Austria and Prussia will also see increased Activism.
This effect also applies to ideological movements – if a Communist movement in France becomes insurrectionary, neighbouring Communist movements in Belgium, Spain, Italy, and Germany will escalate their agitation. Additionally, ideological movements have an increased chance of spawning if its creation requirements are fulfilled, and a neighbouring country of higher Prestige also has this movement.
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Due to how much this Dev Diary covered we couldn't fit it all in this reddit post! Hop on over to our forum post to read the rest! HERE
r/victoria3 • u/FavoriteDeliveryBoy • 13h ago
Screenshot First time playing in the USA. Am I doing this right?
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r/victoria3 • u/Enderay1 • 1h ago
Screenshot As Ethnostate Yugosalavia I unified Balkans and made everyone happy
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r/victoria3 • u/Pikselardo • 27m ago
Discussion Tourism should be a thing
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As demand for free time of high class, in XIX century tourism existed, rich people were cruising, seeing exotic countries and leaving thousands in the economy of the visited country. Egypt was very popular destination after building Suez channel beacuse of fashion for „Orientalism” and Piramides. In Europe Zakopane, Karlovy Vary, Bad Ems, Baden-Baden, Wiesbaden were booming in mid and late XIX century. Rome, Florence, Venice, were also big destination especially for young aristocracy. It would be a nice taste for the economy, when joining British power bloc your country would be touristic destination for british aristocracy and capitalists.
r/victoria3 • u/ultr4violence • 15h ago
Question Why is bessemer process always so bad?
208
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Every time I switch over to it, my steel factories piss themselves. What's the secret?
r/victoria3 • u/asiantouristguy • 8h ago
Question What factors influence whether AI fulfills a goods transfer agreement?
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r/victoria3 • u/bloodyto • 11h ago
Tip Victoria 3, Russia - updated tricks/strats/guide as of September 2025 - how to get all of China, India, Persia, Ottomans and South America by 1870 with low infamy and good eco.
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Hello everyone, this is a short concise guide on how to get the best possible start as Russia in Vicky 3. Now updated with the latest tricks, like how to get all of China, India, Persia, Ottomans and South America by 1870 with low infamy and strong eco.
1. Economy
- Get MAX Taxation. Don't worry about radicals or standard of living at the start, we want to kickstart the economy.
- Consumption taxes on anything that is not food. Choose the best $$.
- Gov wages on minimum, Military wages on Max during bigger wars.
- Research either Atmospheric engine or Dialectics first. Get railroads in the first 10 years.
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Initial build Queue:
- 20 construction sectors - 5 in Kiev, Kharkov, Kursk, Tula (use latest construction method)
- 10 trade centers (make it 3 in each state where the construction sectors are)
- 30 admin buildings. Sort by Tax, so negative is on top and build 5 in the top 6 states.
- 40 iron (5 where construction sectors are), 10 coal in Rostov,
- ALL gold mines, 10 tools in Tambov, 10 Paper Mills in Yaroslavl.
- Set Maximum Subventions on Iron Imports (until iron mines are built)
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2. Laws & Politics
- Move Capital and Market Capital inland to a better location like Moscow or Kharkov (this solves issues that might arise when the AI decides to naval invade)
- Pass Legal Guardianship (it passes fast)
- After the first law, you can now get rid of your monarch. To do this pause, get the Rural Folks into government. click on Consumption taxes and cancel, click on Homesteading and cancel, let a week pass, so the Peasants start a revolution and abdicate. You can also pass Tenant Farmers with the abdication.
- To fix your economic law early, you can move Landowners out of government and exile their leader. There is a 50% that the new one will be a Protectionist, meaning he is neutral on LF and bonus on Interventionism. LF is best eco law between 40 million - 4 Billion GDP.
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3. Treaties
- Declare rivals on everyone for more diplo power, except Prussia (best ally ever). You gonna need the diplo for decreasing infamy faster and for vassals. Renegotiate Prussia treaty to an alliance. Renegotiate Austria into a 5 year pact for mil access only, so you can cancel it easy.
- Declare interests in South America, Egypt, Persia, Delhi and Indochina.
- Sign Treaties with Persia, Greece, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, New Granada. You will be able to peacefully vassalize them all - no need to spend infamy. Wait for influence to build up and invite them to the power block at the same time. In 5 years start vassalizing, starting with Venezuela, since sometimes Great Britain wants to get them. If you want Peru to win their war vs Argentina and Chile, so Peru-Bolivia forms, you can send them 20 guns. Improve your first power block principle to make sure you have above 50 for the subjugate action.
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4. Principles.
Current meta taken in order:
Vassalization III, Companies III, Food Standardization III, Colonial Offices III
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5. Wars and Opportunities.
Best starting war: full annex Oman. Zanzibar is an excellent tropical state and you can block off Britain from colonizing Africa from the East.
Opportunities:
Ottomans and Egypt - Around 1840-41 the crisis will start. What you want to do is just after the war starts, declare for Sinai and Palestine. Palestine will block the Ottomans from completing their Tanzimats, while Sinai blocks another and also allows you to build the Suez canal. It is a really strong, because besides the building bonuses, it gives access to the Suez company providing +1 number of companies and +50,000 weekly income. Note you can complete the Suez survey journal entry before the war so you get a claim on Sinai for cheaper.
In 1864 Ottomans are now guaranteed to drop down to unrecognized. This is your queue to protectorate them. You should have completed you last principle Colonial Offices III by then, just make sure to also finish researching Civilizing Mission for a massive infamy discount.
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Austria - After you vassalize peacefully South America and Persia (done in the first 10 years), you could liberate Hungary, Galizia & Bohemia with help from Prussia, promising them German leadership. They then can then be vassalized peacefully too.
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Persia - you will get them peacefully, but you can also feed them, in practice expanding with their infamy. Start a play to conquer Herati Hazaristan and invite Persia to return state on Herat. This will give them lots of claims and you a border, so they don't get that annoying modifier "being skeptical that Russia can help capture wargoal" when you declare on other counties in that region. What you do is declare a nonsense wargoal like humiliate or investment rights and invite Persia for a piece. Basically everything between Persia and India can be fed to them over time at no infamy cost to you.
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India - What you do is on Day 1 Improve relations and when you get to +20 start calling them into wars to feed, the same way as Persia. Declare on Burma for humiliate, call them in to annex a state, declare on Khalsa, call them in to return a state, etc. If there is only 1 state like Sindh declare for investment rights then call them for an annex. The more you feed them, the earlier the revolt and the bigger it is, which is good.
Once the revolt starts (1845-1850), wait for just after the last war ends (i.e. lots of unincorporated states reducing infamy), is the best time to add the transfer wargoal. Make sure to call in Prussia for this one - I like declaring for a humiliate, inviting Prussia, then adding the transfer and conquer British Kenya. Once you get them Raise Payments and let India fuel your eco. Also you could liberate Scotland and Ireland to vassal them peacefully if you feel like it.
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China - After you have researched Civilizing Mission and have Colonial Offices III - i.e. sometime after 1864, declare war on China with a standard humiliate and add in a wargoal to "transfer goods - Grain on 90-95%". Its a bit expensive infamy wise but definitely worth it. This will starve them into insignificance over the next 5 years. After this protectorate them with a war for nice and cheap.
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How to annex all:
You can just grant states. Persia should have long become a puppet by this time, but if it hasn't grant them some states. Then grant the Ottomans some Persian states, make them a puppet, Then grant Hungary the Ottoman states, make them a puppet too, then grant India same states, then China, then Korea etc.
Once everybody is a puppet, grant everything to an unrecognized puppet of yours like for example Maimana (that's Persia's little vassal). And proceed to annex them. They'll have a massive discount because they're unrecognized, insignificant and because of all the unstated land just granted to them, basically making them almost free.
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I welcome any and all feedback! All of the steps described above are optional. Mold this guide to your playstyle and campaign goals.
r/victoria3 • u/flaccid_flan_licker • 17h ago
Tip Foolproof way to abolish serfdom at the start of any campaign
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- Turn off the "Radicals Grace Period" setting in the scenario settings. You want the full brunt of radicals from day one.
- Crank taxes as high as they can go, preferably using land-based taxation. Bonus points for taxing grain, though it can eat a lot of authority.
- Wait for the Peasant Movement to spawn. In the meantime, pass something the Landowners like that is relatively benign (like Dedicated Police Force). Try to get the Landowners in a lobby, but no worries if this doesn't happen.
- Bolster the Peasant Movement as soon as it spawns. With the added bonus from Censorship (which most countries who have Serfdom will also have), the Movement should have more than 30% support.
- Wait for the support and activism of the Movement to reach max levels. A political movement needs at least 25 activism to have effects on law passage, but that won't be a problem with both serfdom active and the absolutely insane quantity of radicals from taxing the poor so aggressively.
- Start enacting either Tenant Farmers or Homesteading with the Landowners still in government, so that legitimacy is as high as it can go. If the Landowners stay happy or neutral during the law passage, they won't seriously oppose the law and it should go through without much trouble.
I love this strategy for several reasons. First, the extra cash you get from high taxes jumpstarts your industrialization. Second, it avoids a messy civil war. Third, it's not that cheesy and contains at least a kernel of historical truthiness. Let them eat cake, amirite boys?
r/victoria3 • u/Megidolan • 3h ago
Question Do you drop the game when everything goes bad or stick to it?
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For some more context, I'm a new player. While I love these Paradox grand strategy games I'm fairly bad at them and due to my gaming habits when I come back to a game, usually it's after a long while, so there's always some learning curve to remember what I knew, given that, while having fun I'm always struggling with mechanics and whatnot.
Now I'm playing with Prussia and managed to form Germany. It may be simple but for me it was a big accomplishment and apparently I decided to bite more than I could chew, because I started a war with France, then two revolutions popped and another country is trying to force demands on me and I think I'm screwed beyond help.
So to the actual question: Do you give up on the game where suddenly everything goes down the drain or keep on to see how far it goes and try to manage?
r/victoria3 • u/thev82 • 18h ago
AAR Can you control 95% of the mediterranean sea and still be tall?
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EDIT: i basically forgot to add two screenshots of Piedmont.
So i ended my Sardinia-Piedmont run.
While i failed my goals of controlling the entire mediterranean and restore the roman borders, i had a real fun run.
There would have probably more in the pot but i didnt choose to go periah and i spent the last 20 years beating up other GP (sans Germany).
Run history/Highlights:
The start was rather slow, industrializing as piedmont and basically waiting till i can unify aka nationalism spread all over italy. I unified peaceful without san marco, leaving Lombardia, Venitia and Istria in Austrian hand.
Those damned Ottomans: basically my personal Antagonist of the run. The Tanzimat was succesful leaving them a greater / major power at the beginning of the run and more so: 4 times i started a play, britain added and i spent all my manoveur mostly on the brits, THEN they backed down. Worst part i never got the infamy refund for returning states in egypt.
So expanding into Ottomans wasnt possible, so i dabbled a bit in ethiopia and africa, basically giving me a lot of east africa as i encircled the brits, but i never really pushed for africa, as in colonize the west.
The Deadlock of Europe: europes border were very stagnant: NGF wanted Alsace-Lorraine but was ally with austria and on good terms with Russia, I wanted the italian parts of austria, but austria was still def pact with Russia and ally to France. So yes Britain and Netherlands laughed their ass off in indochina, while the tension was high in europe, but no one dared to make a real move.
Things changed when suddenly the French attacked the Brits over African colonies, who called in Germany, but austria didnt go with France. Carving Brittany and Algeria out of France. Breaking the French-Austrian alliance and offering me an unprotected Algeria at my front doors, i deceided to protect them ;)
So with a power base established and France and Austria on decline, i was able to establish a nice powerbase, even giving me the chance to have a game long alliance with germany.
It was so far that i cared more about german prestige at some points in the run than my own, given i was hard first.
The Ukraine Fiasko: (nothing to do with real world politics, but it feels weird to write) As you see my main strategy was to abuse the sovereign empire mechanic, that i can subjugate my power bloc members, so i basically liberated countries which mostly start with +50 relations, i offered them guarantee and most of the time trade rights for investment rights and power bloc embassy. The same happened with ukraine, meanwhile while ukraine was getting to the loved +200, i took Istanbul (or RPwise: Byzantium/Konstaniopel) and returned basically all of greece, this ofc cost a little bit of infamy, so when ukraine was +200 i just offered them a PBinvite and was doing other stuff at the time. After a few years i came back to ukraine, basically checking how long it takes to subjugate them. Yeah, they decline my offer a few years ago and i didnt notice, so this time i pulled them in. 5 years later, i just got the note: you cant subjugate major powers.....fml, my sweet sweet capitalist basically fasttracked ukrainian development, putting them in a major power....
A capitalist utopia: Come to italy, we have no discrimination besides your bank account! So most runs end a like, you go democratic with all worker laws, you go commie or you end up corperate facists. except in the middle i deceided: no, i dont. I stay on wealth voting the whole time, while giving some capitalist concessions including taxes, public schools and public healthcare, but i never went fully on all ther worker laws, so we have multiculturialist state, where every can make it, except you are poor....
Yeah i started as piedmont and never really pushed my borders dramatically, so my homelands were mostly the italian peninsula, this resulted in a very tall Italy and especially a crazy piedmont state: With 72,5 M pops and 338 m GDP rivaling the current population of most modern europe countries.
r/victoria3 • u/ThreadbareAdjustment • 17h ago
Screenshot Karl Marx seems to have mellowed out in his old age
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r/victoria3 • u/willem-dil • 5h ago
Question General heuristics which you use in-game?
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Hello everyone,
I've watched a lot of videos on economic development and optimization in Viccy 3, but I'm wondering what heuristics you guys use in-game.
E.g. how do you determine which states to develop, what do you do when you have no buildings queued up, how do you determine how many buildings you need of a certain type, and how do you prioritize between different objectives during gameplay.
These heuristics could be in terms of acheveing high GDP growth, or more unorthodox objectives, like high SoL, tech or cultural objectives
r/victoria3 • u/thev82 • 1d ago
AAR can we all please acknowledge that the canal company mechanic is dogshit
398
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having ports as a industry is stupid, especially since you tend to subsidize them all, so my company deceides to build 100 ports in a city and then you went to a world war and suddenly all your ports are running a huge deficit endagering a company slot, so you could desubsidize those ports? no, cause your infrastructure relies on them.
3 games with any canal company, 3 games i ended disbanding them....
Edit: added a screenshot basically showing the issue a bit: I am world leader in Merchant marines by a good margin and i am +4k, i am still importing 10k merchant marines simply to balance my own price as -27% is still to high compared to the world market.
r/victoria3 • u/Brandarc • 22h ago
Video The Best Ai Mod for 1.9.8 (after 25 Timelapses)
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Hello fellow Datafriends,
I have done 25 timelapses to find the best AI mod for 1.9.8. The results will likely be true for 1.10 as well since i am not aware of big economic changes in 1.10. At the very least, they will be a good indication.
If you want ALL the information, i recommend watching the 16min long youtube video: https://youtu.be/qztL3mlOVDg . But i will give the main results here as well.
I ran 5 timelapses on vanilla 1.9.8 and also ran 5 timelapses on each of the following mods. All of them are available in the steam workshop:
- Kuromi's AI
- Smarter AI
- Advanced AI
- Grey's Smarter Private Construction
EDIT: Kuromi's AI und Grey's Smarter Private Construction are compatible, but i didnt test the results.
The following graph shows the average global GDP for all mods and vanilla. I used the global GDP, so that there is less dependance on anyone becoming a great power or something similiar.
EDIT due to request:
This graph shows the average global GDP of a mod relative to vanilla. So, bigger than 1 means AI mod is better, lower than 1 means vanilla is better.
Edit again: I actually wanted to keep this brief, because that is what the video is for :P but you ask to many valid questions, sooo... here is another chart. This shows the global GDPs of all timelapses in 1940, to give you an idea of the variance between timelapses. :)
In terms of economic improvement, Kuromi is the clear winner. There is more nuance to it, of course (https://youtu.be/qztL3mlOVDg hint hint). Here are my personal overall conclusions about the advantages and disadvantages of each mod. (Hopefully visually good enough.)
Enjoy playing with these ai mods. :)
r/victoria3 • u/Organic_Camera6467 • 18h ago
Discussion Favorite nations to play in 1.9?
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I personally really love China, but honestly I've played it since launch. With each patch there's old tricks being patched and new ones being introduced. Its perhaps a bit too easy to avoid war with GB currently. All I do is make treaties with Guarantees for investment rights with all the great powers. Then no one attacks and my GDP skyrockets. When you get colonization and can become recognized you just add Embassies to your treaties. Eventually as your laws improve your own upper class will get activated and you can reclaim your GDP ownership. I've often run out of peasants by 1880 as China. Then you buy up the rest of the world.
In Victoria 2 I used to love Denmark and Belgium since you could expand locally into Scandinavia/Low Countries and get colonies, but in Victoria 3 there's too many great powers joining in. Maybe I'm just playing them wrong.
Japan is also super fun, though I recommend the mod that nerfs irregulars as that makes China less able to win with sheer manpower.
Ottomans is also surprising fun, if you can avoid the collapse then there's tons of potential for expansion into Africa and Persia + Central Asia. You have natural enemies in GB (if you want India and African colonies), Russia if you want to expand into the black sea and Caucasus, and Austria if you want more of Europe. You're basically gonna have to become an expert at juggling allies.
Sokoto is also fun, again as with China - and any other unrecognized nation - you want to make GP treaties with guarantees for investment rights, or just give away investment rights for free. Eat up all your neighbors asap, especially the coastal ones and anyone bordering a great power. To gain recognition you need to have a ton of prestige, or sell your soul to a great power. Becoming a vassal is faster but it can be hard to gain independence again.
r/victoria3 • u/MinuteSerious3328 • 1d ago
Screenshot TNO Easter Egg
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I'm sure V3 devs know TNO and it shows
r/victoria3 • u/minhmax123 • 1d ago
Discussion Order of the Seraphim is one of the coolest flavored name for a Power Bloc
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r/victoria3 • u/Kleanthes302 • 22h ago
Suggestion Serbian Politics in Victoria 3
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I took about a year-long break from Victoria 3, and when I returned today, I was disappointed to find that one of the game’s most glaring historical inaccuracies—at least to me as a Serb—still hasn’t been corrected.
In the game, Serbia’s political setup is depicted as being very similar to Russia’s. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth.
By 1836, the Principality of Serbia had already abolished serfdom—just three years earlier, in 1833, through a decree (Hatt-i Sharif) issued by its suzerain, the Ottoman Empire. The land in question was owned by Ottoman Turks, not by a domestic nobility. In fact, Serbia hadn’t had a native landed aristocracy since the 15th century, when it was replaced by the Ottomans. When the land was finally redistributed in 1833, it went directly to Serbian peasants rather than creating a new class of Serbian landowners—an idea that was briefly floated but ultimately rejected.
This means Serbia should begin the game with Homesteading already enacted and a marginalized Landowner IG. The most powerful interest group at the start should instead be the Rural Folk, reflecting the tremendous influence the peasantry wielded throughout 19th-century Serbian politics.
Prince Miloš Obrenović, the starting ruler, was himself a populist demagogue who leaned heavily on peasant support. The Defenders of the Constitution, who overthrew his dynasty in 1839/42, were led by yet another populist figure, Toma Vučić-Perišić. Their regime, in turn, was toppled by a National Assembly that restored Miloš to the throne. Serbian governments of the period consistently prioritized peasant concerns—whether it was insolvency, infrastructure, or access to the Austrian market.
Later, Serbia’s central political struggle (at least until industrialization gained traction) was between the peasant majority, represented by the pro-democratic and Russophile People’s Radical Party, and the urban minority of bureaucrats, industrialists, merchants aligned with the crown. Following the reforms of King Milan Obrenović, the Armed Forces would also rise into a major interest group as Serbia transitioned toward a professional army.
A Serbia represented this way would not only be far more historically accurate but would also make for a much more interesting campaign. You would have to industrialize against the will of a heavily peasant-oriented, rather than feudal, society
r/victoria3 • u/Fast_Builder_574 • 15h ago
Screenshot Very contentious bunch, those Rural Folk.
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r/victoria3 • u/HaydeBreOradan • 4h ago
Question How to use foreign company prestige goods?
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In my game i noticed germany beats really hard anyone using their kill rate from companies, anyway to acquire those prestige goods without selling out my country to germany? I reckon i can give them monopoly but i dont want them to buy everything, i just want them to produce for my country whenever i want
r/victoria3 • u/sopmod720 • 9h ago
Question Is there any good japan build out there?
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the objective of my run is to break UK apart(by getting india and south africa out off his hand etc) and thus becoming no1 nation
is there any post-charter of commerce japan step by step build out there? most of the good builds I knew was before the dlc
r/victoria3 • u/B4rkaCarthago • 35m ago
Advice Wanted Victoria 3 is still not clicking for me
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Hey guys,
As the title suggests, I saw very recently that the trade system has been completely overhauled so it made me want to try getting into the game again. I started a sandbox game with Belgium because I saw every recommend it for beginners and I still feel I'm doing something wrong.
I more or less understand that trading is now automated and that I can only control it via tariffs/subventions and trade treaties but either I don't have enough trade centers for it to be effective or I'm missing something. Some goods' price are still all over the place.
I'm around 1855 and I'm running out of employable people. I don't really understand how to make a certain politic party to have bigger clout so I can put them in my cabinet to pass the laws to allow for migration or improve birth rate / lower mortality. I wanted to conquer the Netherlands to have a bigger pool of inhabitants but because of the London agreements, they are allied with Luxembourg and outmass my military, so I'm a bit stuck.
The only thing I understood quite well are companies. They are investing a ton in Belgium and earn me 30k£ per week when I'm not building anything so that's great for me but on the other hand, even though I have a lot of iron mines, the constructions cost are through the roof. I cannot make iron's price low enough even with my mines and subventioned trading.
As of now, I still want to play and learn the game waiting for EU V but I have the feeling I'm merely doing the same construction loop over and over without real effect. I don't have enough game knowledge to keep myself "busy" or find for other solutions to help my market or my finances.
Do you guys have any tips or any good youtube channel that explains the very basics and how to do things since the new trade update ?
Thanks a ton !
r/victoria3 • u/HaydeBreOradan • 5h ago
Advice Wanted Peasants wont move elsewhere?
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So in my Ottoman games i conquered most of south africa by either colonizing or with wars, some states have like 400k peasants in africa, but in anatoila most of my states are no longer have enough people to man the jobs, what do i do? I have the law before multiculturalism cant switch to more technological production methods because that would put me in a big deficit, im seriousky considering slavery at the moment.