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Genre: Simulator, Strategy

Victoria 3

Victoria 3 play for free!

Victoria 3: Hotfix 1.5.8 is now LIVE!

Hotfix 1.5.8 is now live! Please do not use this thread to report any new issues you discover - but rather file any bug reports in the bug reporting forum, thank you!

Bugfixes:

  • Fixed a crash in CCombatUnit::GetModifierValueImpl
  • Fixed a crash in the military formations manager
  • Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause Transfer Subject war goals to not resolve as promised when a peace is signed or when a party gives in during a Diplomatic Play
  • Imposing laws on your subjects now forces them to start enactment of that law as intended
  • The Country panel's Domestic tab UI will no longer break when that country is in the process of enacting a law
  • Fixed bug that prevented Quechua and South Andean subjects from being annexed
  • Fixed a bug where military flags weren't visible if the Voice of The People DLC was not enabled


Interface:

  • Added a player-configurable toggle for which Workforce number to show in the Expand Building Map Interaction (Jobseekers / Peasants / Unemployed)


Modding:

  • Added a start_enactment effect
  • Added an on_action for on_impose_law that will be overridden by on_impose if specified on the law type

Dev Diary #101 - 1.5 Post-release Update



Hello Victorians! It has been a few days since the release of 1.5 and the Colossus of the South region pack.

First of all, we would like to thank you all for the response to both 1.5 and Colossus of the South. The appreciation for the art, narrative content, UX changes, mechanics and more have been very much received.

We're also, as always, very appreciative for the feedback you've provided since release! Today we're releasing hotfix 1.5.8, which contains a few fixes and improvements including:

Bugfixes:

  • Fixed a crash in CCombatUnit::GetModifierValueImpl
  • Fixed a crash in the military formations manager
  • Fixed a bug that would sometimes cause Transfer Subject war goals to not resolve as promised when a peace is signed or when a party gives in during a Diplomatic Play
  • Imposing laws on your subjects now forces them to start enactment of that law as intended
  • The Country panel's Domestic tab UI will no longer break when that country is in the process of enacting a law
  • Fixed bug that prevented Quechua and South Andean subjects from being annexed
  • Fixed a bug where military flags weren't visible if the Voice of The People DLC was not enabled


Interface:

  • Added a player-configurable toggle for which Workforce number to show in the Expand Building Map Interaction (Jobseekers / Peasants / Unemployed)




Modding:

  • Added a start_enactment effect
  • Added an on_action for on_impose_law that will be overridden by on_impose if specified on the law type


This hotfix might already be in your hands by the time you read this! If not, it should be there within an hour or two.

We are currently working to address feedback we received at the tail of the Open Beta and after the full release. These changes will be coming in a future patch tentatively numerated 1.5.9, which will be compatible with current 1.5 saves. We're aiming to get this patch in your hands before the end of November, focusing on the following improvements:

UX, AI, and balance



We're working on several improvements in these areas, mostly pertaining to military matters. A few things you can expect on the UI front in 1.5.9 includes:

Added a new Mobilization Tab to the Military Panel. It gives you an overview of the Mobilization Options for all of your Formations, and allows you to customize them.


We're also improving the signaling of how many units are currently "Under Recruitment" for a specific Formation in several places of the UI.






Convoy Raiding and Defense


The naval warfare systems were revised in 1.5 to account for Fleet formations and precise locations. In most cases we have seen usability improvements from these reworks, but the convoy raiding rework resulted in a bit of a hodge-podge where legacy design goals involving uncertainty and risk-taking conflicted with the new precise locations and visualizations. As a result the convoy raiding system is quite hard to understand, and can also create notification spam sometimes. For 1.5.9 we're working on a revision that should be less chance-based, more easily understood, and revolving more around a push-and-pull in particular sea nodes than guesswork.

Borrowed Troops


In the old system, generals on the same side on the same front would often "borrow" troops from each other for both offensive and defensive operations to ensure battles weren't too lopsided, particularly when one side had many and one side had few generals. Various aspects of the new system, such as formations pooling troops between different generals as well as multiple battles, make this behavior unnecessary and sometimes problematic for offensive operations, so it was removed (but retained for defensive purposes, since losing a front is bad for all involved parties). However, as some of you have noted, this can lead to situations where your AI-controlled allies perform reckless attacks against far superior foes, or where a player-controlled small army with a powerful ally has little agency.

To address this we're working on adding player-togglable support for troop borrowing / lending between formations on an army-by-army basis. In addition to fixing the reckless AI issues, this will let you more easily manage wars where you just want to supply your ally with some extra manpower or revoke access to your troops and go it alone if your ally sends their most bumbling fool of a politically appointed general to lead their charge.

Job Satisfaction / Jobseekers


We introduced a new pop mechanic in 1.5.5 (Open Beta build) where pops will now evaluate how well they like their professional lot in life, based on a number of factors such as wage competitiveness, qualifications for other jobs, expected standard of living, and so on. The intent of this mechanic is two-fold: it gives you more information about where your pops are most keen to get access to new, high-paying jobs which can be used to inform construction decisions, and it acts as a filter on the employment mechanics for performance purposes so not every pop will need to be evaluated for all available jobs. We also intend on building further on this mechanic in the future, for example to inform the revised Migration system (which we launched alongside Job Satisfaction in Open Beta, but reverted for the 1.5.7 launch since it needed a bit more time in the oven).

We've discovered a few balancing and UX issues with Job Satisfaction since launch, which can in some situations make the mechanic quite frustrating and difficult to understand. Polishing away some of the rough edges in this system is a priority for the 1.5.9 patch.

Military Good Shortages


In the military system used in 1.4 and prior, where your military was fully managed through buildings such as barracks, naval bases, and conscription centers, good shortages suffered by military buildings would translate directly into penalties to the combat units supported by those buildings. In 1.5.7, shortages have no direct effect on combat units' ability to fight, since they are now managed by formations rather than buildings and formations don't care about shortages.

While it's already the case that running a military on goods you have a problem supplying results in very high costs, we don't feel this is sufficient. For 1.5.9 we're looking to implement a system where formations "inherit" the shortages from their units' buildings, which will impact the Supply value of formations and thereby limit the Morale that units in those formations will recover. You will also be blocked from building unit types that require goods your market has no access to.

Bugs


With a whole lot of content added in both Update 1.5 and Colossus of the South, a number of edge cases and non-game-breaking but still annoying bugs have been identified since launch. We're working our way down this list also.

Flamethrowers


No commentary necessary.



We also have some other news today!

From later today the Victoria 3 base game is free to play for the weekend, from the 16th - 20th of November!

So, we hope you help out your fellow Victorians when they have questions about the game, direct them to game resources/knowledge and share the spirit of camaraderie around the Victorian age!

Our Discord server has a set of helpers on hand to help new players and our resources on YouTube, the forums and Steam to explain mechanics.

We will see you next time in the next dev diary, arriving in two weeks time on the 30th of November, with Martin talking about the past year and some of what is next post 1.5!

Update 1.5 and Colossus of the South now available!



Enjoy the changes spread across warfare, politics, economy and more! As well as experiencing Brazil during a key era in history!

Read the Patchnotes: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/victoria-3-update-1-5-and-colossus-of-the-south-region-pack-now-available.1609767/

Victorians, 1.5 and Colossus of the South have released and are now available!



Enjoy the changes spread across warfare, politics, economy and more! As well as experiencing Brazil during a key era in history!

Read the Patchnotes: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/victoria-3-update-1-5-and-colossus-of-the-south-region-pack-now-available.1609767/

Dev Diary #100 - Anniversary Update Changelog



Hello Victorians and welcome to our centennial dev diary, which appropriately will be for the biggest free update Victoria 3 has ever received, with particular emphasis on the military mechanics! Alongside this update we will also make our new Region Pack Colossus of the South available for purchase, or for free to Grand Edition or Expansion Pass holders. You can read more about Colossus of the South in our previous dev diary.

Update 1.5 "Chimarrão" will be available on November 14, which also - not entirely by coincidence, I must admit - marks the 20th anniversary of the Victoria series!


Victoria: An Empire Under the Sun was released on November 14, 2003 and marked the beginning of an era of economy-focused, population-simulating Grand Strategy games. All of us in the Vicky dev team are humbled and honored to be able to carry on and elevate its legacy two decades later, proving our fantastic player community continues to demand deep, complex, immersive society simulators and (alt-)history gameplay. We hope you will love what we have transformed Victoria 3 into for its Anniversary Update, and here's to two more decades!


A very quick overview of the main features of Update 1.5 "Chimarrão" above - if you want a lot more details, read on!

First let's cover the adventures you can expect in Colossus of the South.


Major Features in Colossus of the South


DLC owners only:

  • 19 new Journal Entries, including:
  • Reign of Pedro II: Historical actions highlighting the reforms and ambitions of Brazil’s Emperor Pedro the Magnanimous, including the abolition of slavery and the modernization of Brazil’s economy.
  • The Old Republic: The power of Brazilian landowners and the emergence of the Positivist revolution against the monarchy.
  • Populism: Challenges to the agrarian oligarchy in Brazil from anti-government bandits and the populist Integralist movement.
  • National Awareness: Development of a unique and diverse Brazilian culture, as well as expansionist goals in Paraguay, South American unification from Gran Colombia, and Pan-National movements of the Federation of the Andes and Rio de la Plata.
  • Amazonian Riches: Exploit the riches of the Amazon while avoiding international conflict and national disorder.
  • Over 100 new events, including 20 new events for national unifications
  • Over 200 new historical characters (rulers, commanders, politicians, and agitators) from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, and Venezuela
  • 11 new South American Companies
  • New Gaucho outfits
  • New Brazilian Interest Groups
  • 5 new Achievements
  • New event illustrations and a new state illustration, plus 3 new event audio stingers
  • Christ the Redeemer monument
  • New formable nation: Federation of the Andes/Americas
  • New loading screen


Additional content available to everyone:

  • 8 new or reworked Journal Entries
  • 48 new events
  • 38 new historical characters
  • New map setup for Peru and Bolivia
  • New formable nation: Rio de la Plata
  • New Ideology: Despotic Utopian
  • New cultures: Sulista, Nordestino, Paulista, Amazonic, Ecuadorian, Venezuelan, Colombian, Argentine, Chilean, Uruguayan, Paraguayan


For the rest of the changelog please head over to our forums were the full Dev Dairy has been posted.

Dev Diary #99 - Colossus of the South



Hello. This is Victoria, and today I have two very important reveals to share with you.

First off, the long-awaited Update 1.5 “Chimarrão”, which has been in Open Beta since September, will be released on November 14.

Second, it is my pleasure to announce our new Region Pack Colossus of the South, focusing on the Amazonas region of South America. Colossus will be released alongside Update 1.5, and will be free to all Grand Edition or Expansion Pass owners. The price of the standalone pack will be $5.99.





Region Packs are a new type of product for Victoria, and will contain detailed content regarding a certain region or political sphere. They differ from Immersion Packs through a heavier focus on narrative content, and a lighter focus on art and mechanical systems. Whilst Region Packs do include some 3D and 2D art assets, such as clothing and event images, they do not include features such as new UI skins or building sets.

Infographics


For those who would like a quick reference, we have these excellent infographics to help summarise the content.





For more details and information on Colossus of the South please head over to our forums were the full Dev Dairy has been posted.

Victoria 3 | Open Beta Update 2 Hotfix / 1.5.5 Updated 20/10/23



Hello Victorians!

This hotfix resolves the issue of AI using a lot of 0-sized Armies and Fleets on 1.5.4.

For those unaware, the issue was:

The AI wants to create a new formation but does it in the wrong HQ, thus it goes 'oh I need a new formation in Poland' (makes one in Prussia). Next tick: 'oh I need a new formation in Poland' and so on, creating the towering 1 unit formation stacks.



As always, please provide feedback and bug reports for the Open Beta on our Discord server! I shall see you there!

Dev Diary #98 - Open Beta hotfix, Update 1.5 Achievements and Additions



Hello everyone! Today we will cover the upcoming hotfix coming to the Open Beta plus a further set of improvements coming in the free Update 1.5 release (tentative release date: sometime in November).

With the latest release of the Open Beta (Update 2) we introduced a few new mechanics which, it turned out, weren't quite ready for release. Being a beta build that is perhaps understandable (and you've all been very understanding!) but nevertheless we feel the issues are too game-breaking to leave in their current state. As a result we will be releasing a hotfix imminently (if it hasn't been released already, as I'm writing this in the past) that will contain fixes for the following issues:

Cannot change language in the Settings menu unless game was started in English
This could be worked around by setting the language in the Launcher before starting the game, but should nevertheless be fixed now.

Occupying a state may remove fronts from the war
Winning the last bit of a state, causing fronts to move, may remove that front from the war temporarily. In most cases the front re-emerges again after some time, but this causes you to have to redeploy formations to the front again. This should no longer happen.

Crash to desktop in some cases when a front is destroyed, or when reloading the game
Seemingly random crash related to repositioning of armies when their current front is no longer valid and they are forced to travel elsewhere, or sometimes when recalculating cached data upon reloading a game. The game should no longer crash under these conditions.

Trade Route Caravans not visible
This applies to all "caravans" traveling the network except for armies and fleets - horse buggies, trains, zeppelins, trading vessels, etc. They are now visible again, alongside armies and fleets.

Occupation texture not visible on the paper map
Sometimes partial occupation won in a state would be shown correctly and sometimes it would not, leading to some confusion over who won certain battles. Partial occupation should now always be properly displayed again.

AI <3 Infantry
The AI refuses to build any unit type other than Infantry or Light Ships. This issue has now been patched up - the AI is still not the greatest at evaluating which unit types to build for different purposes, but at least it's open for a bit of experimentation now.

This job sucks
A balance issue in the new Job Satisfaction + Migration system caused especially rich strata pops to be incredibly hard to hire and retain. In practice this looked like these job openings were just incredibly hard to fill or pops were "bouncing around", but the reason for this turned out to be as follows:

  • A lower-strata pop is given a new job opportunity, for example a Clerk becomes a Capitalist
  • The Clerk, having been promoted from a much lower Wealth level (Wealth 13, for example) suddenly finds themselves a Capitalist and starts comparing themselves to everyone around them
  • Realizing that other Capitalists in their state and/or market has a much higher Wealth than they do, they become incredibly and instantly dissatisfied with their new lot in life
  • Due to having such low Job Satisfaction, they decide they better seek their fortunes elsewhere, and join a migration wave to another state on the following week - effectively blinking out of existence as soon as they popped in
  • Next week the building realizes they need replacement Capitalists and starts hiring more Clerks into that position
  • Rinse and repeat

While funny and at least semi-logical, this is not working as intended. We have now added an additional factor to Job Satisfaction such that pops who have not yet been paid in their new jobs will wait with migrating or taking on other jobs until they get a chance to see how well compensated they will be, and also apply a large positive Job Satisfaction factor to pops whose Standard of Living is currently on the rise. This should serve to keep those former Clerks in place long enough to understand that being rich is good, actually.

Reversed Migration
Speaking of migration, the revised internal migration system had a few issues. It calculated migration correctly between states, but in the end instead of sending them to the place they should go to, it sent them back to the state they came from. This meant no migration was happening and confused the UI making it think pops that should be arriving were actually leaving. We have now fixed this as well as tweaked the migration values so they’re a bit lower.

These fixes should hopefully already be live on the Open Beta branch when you read this, or should be there shortly! With that, I leave the floor to Victoria who will guide us through the aforementioned new additions to the upcoming free Update 1.5, as well as a major enhancement to Voice of the People.

Note that the section below will now feature content that will not be available in the current Open Beta build.



Hello. This is Victoria, and today we will be going over the long-awaited improvements to the Paris Commune content made in 1.5, as well as some miscellaneous improvements and content additions that did not make it into the previous dev diary.

First, however, here are the six new achievements added in patch 1.5.

Not Yet Lost: As Krakow, form Poland-Lithuania and complete the Expanding the Commonwealth Journal Entry.

Viva la Confederación!: As Bolivia, successfully form the Peru-Bolivian Confederation

Deșteaptă-te, Române!: As a Romanian nation, form Romania and directly own all Romanian homeland states.

Stonks: Have three companies at max prosperity at the same time.

Banana Republic: As a Yankee or Dixie nation, achieve maximum prosperity with the United Fruit Company and have at least 75 Banana Plantations.

SPQR: As the Papal States, become the Roman Republic and then form Italy.

With a teaser for some of the art of these achievements!




The Paris Commune



Joining the improvements to Divided Monarchists and other Voice of the People content given a rework in Patch 1.3.4, the Paris Commune journal entry has received significant improvements in 1.5. Rather than the player playing both sides in the crisis, making decisions for both the Commune and the Versailles government, the player will be invited to pick one side in the beginning, with the AI making decisions suiting the other side. This adversarial system creates a race between player and AI to advance their respective causes, and bring the Commune either to ruin or triumph.



Rather than harmlessly withering away, the Paris Commune, for as long as it exists, will now serve as a leech on the French economy, siphoning away at your treasury to keep itself afloat. Instead of facing a bankrupt Commune in the event of a civil war, it will now be fully functional, having preserved arms and gold reserves with which to strike back against the Versailles Government.



Additionally, more foreign interaction with the Paris Commune has been added. When the Commune emerges, foreign nations that are either left-wing in character or simply very, very opposed to France may be willing to recognise the Commune as the legitimate government of France, providing a bonus to the speed of its advancement.





New code features have been added to fix bugs related to the Commune, as well. The new set_immune_to_revolutions effect can be used to temporarily disable revolutions in nations that one wishes to treat as civil war countries, ensuring that a scripted war will not be interrupted by the sudden emergence of a Communard Peasant Revolt. Likewise, bugs involving France losing its journal entries in the case of the Communards successfully marching on Versailles have been fixed. Instead of France losing every character it has, characters whose interest groups are not in the government will be spared, creating a mix of new Communard characters and old characters who managed to avoid the trials of the reactionary forces.

These improvements should ensure that the Paris Commune is less of an outside context problem, and more of an organic and smooth component of the French gameplay experience. The French Commune rework will be available to owners of the Voice of the People DLC.

Miscellaneous Additions



1.5 also includes many free miscellaneous historical content changes to make small aspects of the game slightly more interesting. This section of the diary will give a brief overview of a selection of this content.

Frontier Colonisation



First and foremost is the addition of the new Frontier Colonisation law, a law that will primarily be used for New World countries at game start, as well as colonial administrations. This law functions similarly to Colonial Resettlement, but restricts colonisation to territories bordering your already existing states. All Rural Folk interest groups will now support Frontier Colonisation by default, as a part of the Isolationist ideology.



In the United States, the American Rural Folk have been given flavour, along with a new ideology that reflects their unique heritage as smallholding colonial settlers. The Jeffersonian ideology makes the Rural Folk support universal suffrage by default, along with making them more resistant towards agricultural collectivisation. This addition will make it much more difficult to reduce the American franchise from what it is at game start.



The Red Scare



Historically, the rise of socialist states has not come without a shockwave being sent around the world. The 1.5 Patch includes new content for the Red Scare, triggered by a diplomatically relevant nation adopting the Council Republic law.





The Red Scare journal entry will periodically fire events dealing with the reaction to the international communist movement within your nation, stirring mistrust against progressive interest groups. The player may choose to side with the reactionaries and sacrifice the strength of the Trade Unions in return for domestic tranquility, or they may choose to stand for progress, angering the upper class in exchange for the continued power of the lower.





Whilst the Red Scare will always fizzle out eventually, the decisions that were made during this tumultuous period are certain to haunt the nation’s politics for years to come.

As a bonus, AI communist countries have been given three new strategies that they may choose from, which will change their attitude towards the outside world - including one of the most aggressively interventionist strategies in the game so far.



Clothing Additions



With the reworked war system in 1.5 has also come some additions to uniforms, with Russia, Brazil, the Ottoman Empire, and modernised Japan joining the ranks of countries with unique uniforms for their generals. Now, as any of these nations, you may enjoy all of your generals having stylish matching uniforms.






As mentioned earlier, all non-Devout Japanese characters will now adopt Westernised clothing following the Meiji Restoration.



Brazil, the Ottoman Empire, and modernised Japan, as well, have new soldiers’ uniforms, which will display for Soldier and Officer pops in the details screen.



The Romanov Family



As a free bonus, Patch 1.5 includes every credible Romanov claimant as a character for Russia, along with some events pertaining to their fates, and events for the beginnings of their reigns.

Pictured: The end of the beginning…


Pictured: …and the beginning of the end.


Each Tsar will start their reign off with a bonus to the political strength of a certain social class - and, in some cases, will encourage the appearance of advisors that are compatible with their specific ideology.



Potential candidates for the throne include Alexander II, Alexander III, Alexander II’s son Nicholas Alexandrovich, Nicholas II, Georgy Romanov, Mikhail Romanov and Alexei II.

Pictured: Alexei lives!


The Age of Caudillos



Currently, all South American countries’ Armed Forces begin with the Caudillismo ideology, representing the trend of military strongmen dominating the region’s politics throughout the early nineteenth century. Patch 1.5 expands on this with the addition of the Age of Caudillos journal entry, allowing South American players to either embrace Caudillismo or attempt to combat it.





As you play, the progress bar will be depleted or filled by the fulfilment of certain conditions, ticking towards either a military or civilian-leaning conclusion.



The Age of Caudillos journal entry will provide the temptations of military support for politics, potentially sponsoring needed reforms for the price of making the state ever more accountable to their whims. However, if one can resist the temptations of absolute rule, the age of Caudillos can come to an end, and the South American militaries may be brought firmly under civilian control.



And that is all. Thank you for reading.



While the Open Beta continues strong and we make any last-minute additions, bug fixes, and balance tweaks you're suggesting on the Discord prior to the 1.5 release, we have one more surprise in store for you. Next week's dev diary will be released on Wednesday October 25 at 18:00 CEST rather than on our regular schedule, and will contain the exact release date of the update, among other information! Until then, Victorians!

Victoria 3 | Open Beta Update 2 Hotfix / 1.5.4 Updated 19/10/23



Hello Victorians!

Today we have released a hotfix for the 1.5 Open Beta, which includes fixes for:

  • Cannot change language in the Settings menu unless game was started in English
  • Occupying a state may remove fronts from the war
  • Crash to desktop in some cases when a front is destroyed, or when reloading the game
  • Trade Route Caravans not visible
  • Occupation texture not being visible on the paper map
  • AI having a tendency to only build Infantry or light ships
  • Job Satisfaction causing buildings to find it hard to hire pops, particularly rich pops
  • Migration is reversed


Remember to join our Discord server to submit feedback and Open Beta Bugs!