Victoria 2

[Barrister]

That seems silly to me too; but there is a substantial number of loyal fans who want that; Paradox, through King, just told that group of people to go fuck off, regardless of how many of their games they had bought previously.  I have no idea about programming of a game but would it really be that hard to add a trigger to allow events to fire on a certain day?

I'm no programmer, but I imagine it's harder than you or I would think.  First any time you go mucking around with code you run the risk of adding new bugs or errors.  Second they're in the midst of a time crunch trying to get the damn game finished.  Features are more likely cut during this phrase, not added.  They're trying to get the basic game functional, not addoddball features that a small minority of customers would even know existed.

[sbr]

That seems silly to me too; but there is a substantial number of loyal fans who want that; Paradox, through King, just told that group of people to go fuck off, regardless of how many of their games they had bought previously.  I have no idea about programming of a game but would it really be that hard to add a trigger to allow events to fire on a certain day?

I'm no programmer, but I imagine it's harder than you or I would think.  First any time you go mucking around with code you run the risk of adding new bugs or errors.  Second they're in the midst of a time crunch trying to get the damn game finished.  Features are more likely cut during this phrase, not added.  They're trying to get the basic game functional, not addoddball features that a small minority of customers would even know existed.

True it should not be something they work on for Victoria 2 at this point, but they should have already done it.  It would be a change in the Clauswitz game engine itself and should have been part of one of the 4 EU2 expansions, or the 13 EU3 patches, or HOI3 or it's 3 patches.  Once it is done for one game, I would assume it would port over to all of the others.

[Maladict]

EU3 has the day trigger, but it has been broken from the start.

[The Brain]

EU3 has the day trigger, but it has been broken from the start.

Yes, but is that related to the trigger?

[Maladict]

Dunno, I don't play EU3 anymore. It's not a bad game at all, but for some reason I never got into it.
HoI3 was worse, I stopped playing the demo after about 10 minutes. Couldn't even tell if the game was any good, it just didn't do anything for me. It was boring. And ugly.
I'm afraid V2 will turn out the same, a good game (eventually) that will be thoroughly uninspiring.

[garbon]

Second they're in the midst of a time crunch trying to get the damn game finished.  Features are more likely cut during this phrase, not added.  They're trying to get the basic game functional, not addoddball features that a small minority of customers would even know existed.

True. Any delays would force them to deviate from the expansion release schedule.

[Josephus]

Second they're in the midst of a time crunch trying to get the damn game finished.  Features are more likely cut during this phrase, not added.  They're trying to get the basic game functional, not addoddball features that a small minority of customers would even know existed.

True. Any delays would force them to deviate from the expansion release schedule.

In which, after saying they never will, they add historical events.

[dps]

Dunno, I don't play EU3 anymore. It's not a bad game at all, but for some reason I never got into it.
HoI3 was worse, I stopped playing the demo after about 10 minutes. Couldn't even tell if the game was any good, it just didn't do anything for me. It was boring. And ugly.
I'm afraid V2 will turn out the same, a good game (eventually) that will be thoroughly uninspiring.

Rome was the same way.  It was probably the most stable, bug-free thing Paradox has even released, but it was completely boring.

You know, thinking about it, I'm not even sure that I want them to make a CK2.  Crusader Kings was stuffed full of neat ideas that weren't really implemented, had tons of bugs, and crashed all the time--but if you can get past that, it can be a lot of fun.  If they ever do CK2, it'll prbably be stable but bland as hell.  Plus, the map will suck big time.

[Barrister]

I don't quite know what you're talking about, because EU3 at least is fantastic.

[Sheilbh]

I don't quite know what you're talking about, because EU3 at least is fantastic.

I agree.  Admittedly two expansions after it was first released.  But it's wonderful fun.

[Maladict]

I don't quite know what you're talking about, because EU3 at least is fantastic.

I know, it's really annoying to me. I can see that it's a really good game and in many ways a superior successor, I just can't enjoy it like EU2 (and now FtG).

[Zanza]

Well after last weeks rather short effort let's go for something with a little meat in it. The Victoria economic system was very good at simulating large-scale capitalism but there was no small scale manufacturing or pre industrial economies. Our solution is the Artisan.

The Artisan POP acts a bit like a factory; it buys goods of the market and makes things to sell. However, unlike a factory the Artisan is not tied into making a single good, instead every month it will pick a good to make, if last month's good made money it will be more likely to make the same good again. The Artisan can always make a small number of goods but after that it is limited by your technology, so if you don't have the radio, the Artisan won't make one. However Artisans do not gain efficiency via technology, so on a long enough time line factories will always be more competitive and if supply rises fast enough they will force Artisans out of that niche. As a final point Artisans who do very well will consider becoming capitalists, while Artisans who lose lots of money start becoming labourers and craftsmen.

Sounds all rather simple, however here are some neat consequences; firstly we can give any country a manufacturing capacity without giving them factories. If we take a country like China, in 1830 it had something like 30% of the global manufacturing capacity, but it was very inefficient and what should happen is factories in more advanced part of the world should gradually force these guys out of business. Thus we can simulate the de-industrialisation of Asia during the period.

The second thing Artisans supply is bridging in the world market, if there are not enough factories producing an item to meet demand the Artisans can step in to top up production making sure that there is enough of a good available for people to buy. This allows the market to function more effectively and efficiently and also make it much more responsive to POP's demands.

However my favourite effect that Artisans have is when a new invention appears. Back in Victoria Revolutions you then had to sit around for years for a Capitalist to get round to building a new factory. Well no longer, now the Artisans can step up to the breach straight away. Producing small numbers until the Capitalists get round to starting mass production. This for me adds two cool effects; obviously we have the Artisan bridging effect, which I mentioned in the previous paragraph. However, the best effect for me is that it adds more realism to the economic system. With the invention of the Motor Car, Henry Ford didn't suddenly hit on the idea of let's build a huge factory in Detroit. Cars were first produced in small workshops, a market was created and then the factories started to appear.

Politically Artisans have a certain attraction to fascism. In our vision of the game they are the classic losers in the game of Capitalism. The Capitalists are steadily putting them out of business and the benefits like minimum wages that the lower classes win do not apply to them as they are working for themselves. The Ideology of fascism with its simple answers will appeal to them more strongly. Countries than manage to keep a strong artisan class will therefore be more susceptible to fascism.

So there we have the Artisan class. It improves the world market functionality and adds something to the politics, while adding greater realism in economic development. No developer dairy next week as we have a press event on, so keep an eye on the game sites for news about Victoria 2.

That sounds like a good addition to Victoria's economic system.

[KRonn]

That sounds like a good addition to Victoria's economic system.

Agreed. 

[Habbaku]

That sounds like a good addition to Victoria's economic system.

Agreed. 

[Solmyr]

I had no idea that Italy and Germany were full of Artisans.