In this Dev Diary, we ask the question “Why is it that some states are more successful than others?” and explore the idea of using a state-based economy in Victoria 3.
Victoria 3 is a turn-based strategy game being developed by Paradox Interactive. In this dev diary, the developers talk about the state system and why they’re doing it.
Another week brings more information about the forthcoming strategy game Victoria 3, and dev diary 16 is all about States, their significance, and some of the characteristics we’ll need to watch out for while dealing with them.
States, as opposed to State Regions, are Victoria 3’s primary political-geographical entity. The former is governed by a single nation and has dynamic boundaries that change during the game, while the latter may include one or more States but has static borders.
“For example, the State Region of Rhineland is a predetermined set of provinces on the French border that, in 1836, contains two States: Prussian Rhineland (actually just called Rhineland because it contains more than half of the region’s land) and Bavarian Rhineland (called Bavarian Rhineland to distinguish it from the Prussian parts), a concept that we call a Split State,” according to dev diary 16.
“The precise provinces that make up the State Region of Rhineland will never change throughout the game, but the States may. If France conquered the Prussian Rhineland, it would become a French Rhineland, and if Prussia conquered the Bavarian Rhineland, the whole State Region would be united into a single Prussian State.”
States also have an Incorporation Status, which has an impact on their population and economy. An incorporated state is a “completely integrated political entity” that “incurs all administrative expenses, pays all kinds of government-mandated taxes, and benefits from all national institutions.”
Their unincorporated competitors do not have to worry about administrative expenses and just pay a little amount of tax, but they also do not get advantages from national institutions and have less infrastructure. Finally, Colonial States operate similarly to unincorporated states, but with more immigration and even less infrastructure.
The resource limitations for Victoria 3 are set at the State Region level and “dynamically distributed among the States in the region depending on the size of the share each State owns.” Furthermore, State Regions will have discoverable resources such as oil, gold, and rubber that cannot be accessed or utilized at first. That, however, alters as the game progresses.
“Certain technologies will have an impact on both the kind of resources that may be found and the likelihood of those resources being discovered. All of this works in a weighted random manner, so although a Klondike gold rush is likely to occur at some time throughout the game, it is unlikely to occur on the exact same day as it did historically.”
Interest groups, infrastructure, and national markets have all been discussed in previous developer diaries.
Victoria 3 will be released on PC, but no date has been set.
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