The New Victoria Manual And Strategy Guide

Second Edition

By Memnon

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1The MapThe Terrain, Political, Economic, Infrastructure, and Revoltrisk views; map organization

Chapter 2POPsThe Different POP types and their uses; merging, splitting, migration, and efficiency

Chapter 3The BudgetDescription of the screen; the functions and effects of the various sliders

Chapter 4IndustrializationConstruction of factories; the implementation of POPs; POP efficiency; railroads

Chapter 5TradePros and cons of the auto-trade system; stockpiles; the international aspect of trade

Chapter 6PoliticsGovernment types; economic, religious, minority, trade, and military policies

Chapter 7ReformsPolitical reforms and their effects; social reforms and their effects

Chapter 8DiplomacyDiplomatic points; diplomatic actions in peace; trading techs; buying land and claims

Chapter 9The ArmyManpower, leadership, and generals; the various units and their modifiers; attachments

Chapter 10..The NavyThe various units and their modifiers; attachments; naval power as used in the game

Chapter 11..Mobilization and the ReservesHow to form and use mobilized troops and reserves; pros and cons of mobilization

Chapter 12..LeadersBackgrounds; personality traits; default leaders; how to create leaders

Chapter 13..WarCombat modifiers; occupying provinces; reinforcement; attrition; peace negotiations

Chapter 14..The Big ThreePlurality; Consciousness; Militancy

Chapter 15..Other ConceptsPrestige; badboy; national cultures; war score; war exhaustion

Chapter 16..Research and TechnologiesAn introduction to research in the game; research points; intellectual establishments

Chapter 17..ColoniesThe various claim buildings; how to claim a colony; benefits of a colonial empire

Chapter 18..Very Frequently Asked QuestionsThe Unification of Italy; the Unification of Germany; how to become civilized; whichcountry to play; purchases off the world market; the American Civil War; the LiberalRevolution; granting statehood to colonies; the ledger and its uses

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Introduction

I would give no thought of what the world might say of me, if I could only transmit to posterity thereputation of an honest man.-Sam Houston

I have had the distinct pleasure of being a member of the Victoria forums for a little while now, and yeteven in my relatively brief time there, I have found that there is a severe lack of knowledge about theworkings of the game. There have been many attempts to correct this, and valiant efforts put forth byseveral dedicated members have indeed produced results. These answers, however, tend to be scatteredaround the forums, and even when they are found, they are mixed in with discussion threads so thatdistilling the legitimate information is often difficult. More importantly, there is hardly ever a definitiveanswer given to the more difficult questions. That is why I undertook to write this manualso that therewould be one place where players with questions could go to find the answers they sought.

There have been many negative comments made about the original manual. I, for one, believe that giventhe constraints on space the writers had, as well as the complexity of the game itself, they actually did anexcellent job summarizing some of the more difficult concepts. Therefore, it is not my intent to replace thecurrent manualonly to supplement it. This document assumes a prior understanding of where certainscreens are, as well as what the buttons do. I do not bother to delve into installation instructions, nor intohow to load or save a game.

My hope is that this effort of mine helps clear up some of the more pressing problems that result in severalrepeated threads being posted in the forums. I also hope that this manual will give even experiencedplayers a new understanding of the game, at least in certain areas. This manual is, to the best of my ability,1.03 compliant.

I do not profess to know everything about this gamequite the contrary, in factand if there is anythingwrong with this manual, please do not hesitate to contact me at once. I can be reached via the open forumsor by private message if you wish.

I want to thank Rafiki for all the time he put into correcting the drafts of this second edition. Rafikiswebpage (http://victoria.nsen.ch) is where you should go for all the tables that this manual leaves out, aswell as for a bevy of other information. I also want to thank Darkrenown for his extensive commentary, aswell as always being available to answer my questions on the forums. Thanks also to Derek Pullem forreviewing the first draft of this document and correcting my many errors. I also want to thank aprof forallowing me the use of his leadership modifier chart, and Carligula for his superb essay on Plurality andConsciousness, which I reference. Thanks also to Johan for reading this over and approving its release.

Last but certainly not least, I want to thank the members of the forums for patiently and consistentlyanswering my questions. This manual is, in reality, a reflection not of my own knowledge but of yours, formost of the facts contained herein I learned from you.

Regards,Memnon--

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Chapter 1 The Map

BOUNDARY, n. In political geography, an imaginary line between two nations, separating theimaginary rights of one from the imaginary rights of the other.-Ambrose Bierce

There are five ways to view the map, each with a different use. The buttons activating each of these viewsare on the bottom left of the main task window, beside the minimap.

Terrain: This is the first map mode. It is the default form you see when loading the game. This map willshow you the kind of topography of the provincemountains, hills, grassland, forests, etc. It also showswhere the major rivers are. These factors are important to keep in mind when conducting a war, as terrainacts as a combat modifier. The types of terrain are described in the fold out sheet packaged with the game.

Political: The Political map is perhaps the most frequently used mode. This shows you clearly the bordersbetween all countries, as well as the demarcation of provinces. It also shows the location of capitals byplacing a city icon in the province where the capital is located.

Economic: The economic mode shows what resource is produced by each province. This resource isrepresented by the icon in the center of the province. Each province produces only one kind of resource,but certain in-game events can change the type of resource produced in the province.

Infrastructure: The infrastructure map shows the layout of the railroads and factories of a country.Railroads appear as dark, straight lines connecting provinces with one another, whereas factories arerepresented as small factory icons. Provinces where railroads may be built are shown in green. Fullydeveloped provinces are show in white. Although the icons appear in a particular province, factories areorganized not by province but by the state (see below).

Revoltrisk: This mode shows in red those provinces that are in danger of revolting. No red means norevolts and the greener the better. This map also shows, through the placement of small icons, the varioustypes of crime in each province. Provinces can only have one form of crime at a time.

The map is organized into three levels.

The highest level is that of the nation. These are clearly shown in their own color on the political map.Each nation is sovereign over its own territory and (unless it is a satellite or a dominion) has control overits international relations. Taxes and tariffs and literacy are examples of factors determined at the nationallevel.

The lowest level is that of the province. These are also clearly illustrated on the mapthey are the smallerterritorial demarcations within a country. Battles, railroads, resources, crime, revolts, and POPmanagement are all handled by the province. Provinces also have an individual life rating which showshow hospitable the province is to human habitation. The better the life rating, the more people will want tomove there and the lower the penalties suffered by invading armies.

Between the province and the nation is the state. States are visible as the highlighted region on the terrainmap after only one click, or as the slightly darkened region on the political map after only one click(clicking again selects a specific province).

The state is merely a collection of provinces, geographically related. It is at the state level that factories aremanaged. The factories are spread across the entire state, even though the icon appears in a specificprovince. POPs in any province in the state can be assigned to work in a factory within that state. Factories

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can only be built in states that have been granted statehood in your country. Statehood can be granted onlywhen the majority population of at least one of the provinces in the state is your national culture. Keep inmind that all territory conquered or purchased from civilized countries, regardless of its population, is astate.

States are unique in Victoria in that they are the only demarcation of land that transcends nationalboundaries. Land allocation in treaties is done by the province, not by the state, meaning that states can besplit up among two or more nations. Examples of this at the outset of the 1836 scenario include the state ofAzerbaijan, which is divided between Russia and Persia, and the state of Maine, which is divided betweenthe United States and Great Britain.

States divided between nations can still have factories built in them, but only those POPs inside yourcountry can be assigned to work in them. When an entire state is conquered, all factories in that state aretransferred as well, but keep in mind that as long as even one of the provinces in a state remains in thehands of the other country, all the factories will remain in that other country.--

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Chapter 2 POPs

The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.-Karl Marx

What is a POP anyway? POPs are the basic population units in Victoria. They are in every country andevery populated province. They are the basis for your entire economy. In fact, they are your economy.POPs come in various sizes, from 1 to 100,000.

POPs come in ten flavors: Officers, Aristocrats, Capitalists, Clergymen, Clerks, Craftsmen, Farmers,Laborers, Soldiers, and Slaves. Each contributes in different ways to your economy. Most POPs areconvertible by you, the player, assuming they are at the right level already and you have the resources topromote them to the next.

What do the different POPs do?

Aristocrats: These are the wealthy landowners in your country. They basically sit at home all day andconsume things. They do provide a bonus to RGOs, but besides that, theyre useful for little more thanbeing taxed.

Officers: These are the more experienced and highly trained solders in your army. The number of Officersyou have contributes directly to the number of leadership points you develop. The more Officers you have,the more leadership points you earn.

Clergymen: These are the religious figures in your country. They work to your benefit by reducing theConsciousness of your POPs (see section The Big Three), making them better citizens of autocraticgovernments, but worse citizens of democratic governments. They also, by extension, reduce the Militancyof some strata of your population, making them less likely to revolt against your rule. They do, however,raise consciousness for Aristocrats, Capitalists, and Officers. Clergymen also add to your research pointsuntil the discovery of Darwinism makes the obsolete.

Capitalists: These are the entrepreneurs of your economy. They boost your industrial output and are alsovery good for taxing.

Clerks: These are the educated working class of your population. They work in factories alongsideCraftsmen (see below), and they improve the efficiency of the factory itself. Importantly, Clerks add toyour research points, so the more Clerks you have, the more research points you acquire. Unlike mostother POPs, the size of a Clerk POP does have a direct effect on your research output. An 80,000 personClerk POP does produce more research points than a 1200 person Clerk POP, so a common tactic hasbecome to convert the largest POPs in an industrialized province to Clerks.

Craftsmen: These represent the lower-educated skilled workers. They work in factories, but they do notadd to the efficiency of the factory the way Clerks do, nor do they yield research points the way Clerks do.

Farmers: These are the agricultural workers in your country. They work the land and produce goods.Farmers work in RGOs (Resource Gathering Operations), of which every province has one. But they willonly work in RGOs that produce grain, fish, cattle, fruit, or wool.

Laborers: These do the hard physical work of your economy. These are the coal miners, the lumberjacks,the hard-working men who develop the raw resources that drive your industry. They, like Farmers, alsowork in RGOs, but they do not share space with Farmers. Instead, the fill the ranks in the other RGOs,such as iron, coal, sulfur, timber, etc.

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Soldiers: These are the basic fighting unit of your country. The number of soldiers you have adds directlyto your manpower pool. The more soldiers you have, the higher the manpower.

Slaves: These are at the bottom rung of the economic ladder. Not actually considered citizens, they cannotbe taxed, nor can they be converted to any other kind of POP. Slaves work, like Farmers and Laborers, inRGOs. Only a few countries in Victoria have Slaves, and these include the United States, Denmark, Texas,and eventually the Confederacy as well. Many of these countries have events that allow their slaves to beemancipated and converted into laborers.

Note that any and all POPs that give a bonus of some sort (ie. Clerks granting research points) must be ofyour National Culture (see section Other Concepts) for you to receive that bonus.

Aristocrats and Capitalists are considered Rich; Officers, Clergymen, and Clerks are considered MiddleClass; and Craftsmen, Farmers, Laborers, and Soldiers are considered Poor. This is important to keepin mind when deciding how much to tax each class of your citizenry. Slaves, as mentioned earlier, are nottaxable.

POP merging is one of the more controversial concepts of the POP system. Merging, under the 1.03 patchtakes place between POPs which are less than 10,000 in size, and essentially keeps there from beingdozens of small, hundred or thousand person POPs in a province. An under-10,000 POP can merge with alarger POP as long as the resulting POP is not larger than 100,000. When any two POPs whose culture,religion, and type (i.e. Clerk, Craftsman, Farmer) are the same are located in the same province, they willmerge and form a single, larger POP, as long as one is less than 10,000 in size/.

The direct effect of POP merging is that industrialization is easier in multi-ethnic empires, as the smallPOPs of different cultural groups will not merge, thus creating more available POPs to place in factories.Since a 500 person POP is just as efficient in the factory as a 19,999 person POP, this kind of multi-ethnicindustrialization can make a big difference in production.

POPs not only merge but split as well. When a POP grows to be 100,000 in size, it will split into one75,000 person POP and one 25,000 person POP, each of which will continue to grow as separate entities,eventually splitting themselves once they reach 100,000. This is how the game simulates populationgrowth.

POPs can also degrade. If a specific POP is taxed above fifty percent of its income, it may degrade itselfinto a lower class. Thus it is wise to never tax your upper and especially your middle class above forty-nine percent except in cases of emergencies.

How do POPs produce? POPs add to your production output by working directly in either factories or inRGOs. Neither will produce goods without POPs to work them. When choosing which POPs to assign to aparticular factory, you must keep in mind the POPs size. Different sizes of POPs produce more thanothers (see section Industrialization). Every factory can accommodate only five POPs per level,regardless of their size.

Another factor to keep in mind is that there is a specific ratio of clerks to craftsmen2:3that producesthe most efficient factories. If possible, you should always try to aim for this ratio when assigning clerksand craftsmen to factories.

POPs will not remain forever in one province. If they are unemployed, they will emigrate and seek workelsewhere. All POPs migrating are programmed to seek jobs within your country first, then in yourcountrys colonies, and lastly in other countries. This way, if you have open factory positions in one state

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and unemployed Clerks and Craftsmen in another, they may migrate to the open jobs. Keep in mind thatthis processas in real lifeis not perfect and many POPs will not always go where you want them to.

POP migration is also affected by the life ratings of your provinces (the little thermometers), which showhow good they are for human habitation. The better the life rating of the province, the more people willwant to move there.

All individual POPs come with individual thoughts and issues. Each POP will tell you what their specificissues of concern are, what chance they have to revolt, and how politically conscious they are ofthemselves. Each POP type also comes with its own demands for specific goods. These are in threegroups: life needs, everyday needs, and luxuries. The more of each they get, the less likely they are torevolt. The specific goods that fall into each class can very by POP type. For example, Farmers, unlike allother POP types, have fertilizer set as a luxury good.--

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Chapter 3 The Budget

The worth of the state, in the long run, is the worth of the individuals composing it.-John Stewart Mill

Managing your budget is key to any successful game, and knowing what the various sliders mean helpstremendously.

Taxes: There are three tax sliders, one each for the poor, middle, and rich classes. The first thing toremember is that POPs dont like being taxed above a third of their income, but theyll stomach it for awhile. The worst thing you can do is consistently tax the middle and upper classes above fifty percent, asthis will probably lead to devolvement among the POPs (see section POPs). If this happens, your Clerks,the driving force behind your research, can fall back into farmers or laborers because of tax-imposedpoverty. High taxes will also lead to high levels of emigration. But of course, it also leads to lots and lotsof money, so do your own balancing.

There is a second idea related heretax efficiency. This is the rate at which your collectors are actuallyable to impose your tax legislation on the people. There is an overall tax efficiency as well as a class-specific efficiency. To see how much of your POPs money youre actually getting, you have to multiplythe tax rate by the tax efficiency by the class-specific efficiency.

State Bonds: Though not actually a slider, bonds represent your populations investment in the governmentof your country. Remember the reasoning behind this: the more of a financial stake a population has in itsgovernment, the more likely they are to rally to its support in time of crisis (by the way, for all you historybuffs and econ majors, this was part of Alexander Hamiltons financial plan back in the Washingtonadministration, and was the original reason the United States federal government developed a permanentsystem of national debt). Though the citizens rallying to the flag in a crisis to save their money is notactually represented in the game, your income from selling bonds is.

Citizens will buy bonds if they have extra capital left over after purchasing at least all their everydayneeds. Even if your government is in debt, your citizens can still purchase state bonds.

Education: This slider determines how much your government spends on raising the literacy rate and onfunding research and technological development. Holding spending at fifty percent keeps the currentliteracy rate steady. Put the slider above fifty percent, and literacy gradually increases; put it below and itgradually decreases. The amount of spending also determines how many research points you earn.Spending minimally on education yields few points, regardless of the number of Clerks or Clergymen youhave. Spending a great deal can compensate for a small population.

Crime Fighting: This determines how much money your government spends fighting corruption and illegalactivity in the country. Reducing crime helps reduce militancy, directly affects the revolt risk, and can helpremove issues like immoral business practices which can lead to a collapse of your economy. There isalways crime developing in your country, but the higher the slider the more quickly the government movesto stamp it out. Each month the computer runs a check on the amount of crime in you country, anddepending on how much you have invested, a crime building (such as immoral business or machinepolitics) may appear or disappear. At zero percent funding, Revoltrisk is doubled; at one hundred percentfunding, it is halved.

Social Spending: This determines how much your government spends supporting its various socialreforms. In order to gain the benefits of your reforms, you must spend at least fifty percent of the slider.Funding below reduces the benefits, whereas funding above leads to Trust in Government (see sectionReforms).

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Defense Spending: This is where you decide how much you put into national defense. The amount ofmoney you allocate here determines your rate of increase in manpower and leadership points, as well asthe maximum of each that you can have. When you convert a POP into a Soldier or Officer, the currentlevel of defense spending determines how much manpower or leadership you get for that particularconversion (this number will not be constant, but dependent on the size of the converted POP. However,overall, the higher the defense spending of your country, the more effective conversion to Soldiers orOfficers is in increasing you manpower and leadership). High defense spending also increases prestige tohave high defense spending.

Army Maintenance: This determines how much money you give to the upkeep of your army. Thiscanand sometimes mustbe low due to the expensive nature of industrialization early in the game.Funding Army Maintenance at one hundred percent means your divisions can be at full strengthtenthousand men. Placing the slider below one hundred percent reduces the number of men per division,although the divisions themselves can never disappear, even at the lowest Army Maintenance possible.The lowest number of men a division can have, even if its maintenance is as low as possible, is 1,900 men;a fully maintained division has 10,000 men (or 12,000 if it has a brigade attached).

Once you have lowered the slider, those men have disappeared. They will not automatically return whenyou increase the slider again. The only way to bring the divisions back to full strength is throughreinforcement (see section The Army).

Navy Maintenance: This influences your individual ships the same way Army Maintenance influencesindividual divisions. Lower it below one hundred percent and the strength of your ships declines. Unlikewith divisions, the strength of your ships will return at no cost to you when their funding is brought backup. The only requirement is that they be in a port, and, given enough time, they will come back to fullstrength. Note that ships take considerably loger to regain full strength than land units.

Loans and Interest Payments: Whenever your country spends more then it has in its treasury, it doesntshoot you into negative territory. Rather, you take out a loan, the amount of which is located in this box.This loan will stay out until you yourself repay it. Repayment is not automatic.

Alongside this number is the interest rate. Not only do you have to repay the loan, but you also must paydaily interest on it. This number is usually only a few pounds a day at most, unless you are a very recklessspender.

The interest rate can be reduced through discovering several technologies in the Commerce area ofresearch. These include things like Ad Hoc Money Bill Printing and any other techs that make capital flowmore freely in an economy.

One thing to keep in mind: if your country goes too far into debt, you will be forced to declare bankruptcy.If this happens, not only do you lose a tremendous amount of prestige, but, as of the 1.03 patch, you loseall your stockpiles of goods and some of your factories as well. Having gone bankrupt once makes youmore likely to go bankrupt again, and sooner as well, as the trust bankers put in your government goesdown with each successive declaration. Suffice it to say, bankruptcy is a bad thing.

Tariffs: Tariffs were one of the most hotly debated issues in the Victorian time period, and, similarly, theyare one of the more powerfuland potentially destructivetools you can use to manage your economy.Tariffs are taxes on imported goods, which, for the purposes of the games mechanics (see sectionTrade) means that youre putting a tax on every item your POPs buy.

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The larger your population, the higher your tariff income should be. Tariff incomes are also higher forcountries whose POPs are more advanced (i.e. Clerks, Capitalists, Officers, Clergymen, and Aristocratsover Craftsmen, Laborers, Farmers, and Slaves). This is because well developed POPs demand moregoods and more expensive goods, thus raising your tariff revenue. But tariffs also make the goods yourPOPs seek to buy more expensive, and thus, potentially out of their reach. One of the modifiers ofMilitancy is how many of their desired goods POPs are able to purchase, so leaving high tariffs forindefinite periods of time can be quite harmful to your domestic tranquility.

One other thing that can be done with the tariff slider is moving it below the spot where you break even.This puts a subsidy, rather than a tax, on the goods your POPs purchase, making the cheaper, and thusmore accessible, reducing Militancy.

There is a certain balance to keep in mind when imposing tariffs and constructing factories. If you producean item domestically in any quantity, your POPs will try to buy it from your own sources first. Eventhough they will buy it through the world market system, there will not be a tariff imposed because theproduct was created domestically. For this reason, producing at least a little of all your POPs desiredgoods within your nation will benefit them by reducing the cost of those goods (as there will be no tariffon them) but it will kill your tariff income.

Keep this in mind in the early game, particularly for players of countries with one one or more liquorfactories. As Russia, closing your liquor distilleries on day one of the game can lead to a very largeincrease in tariff income for the early game with very few if any immediate repercussions.

Remember, though you may make changes to the sliders in this window, none will take effect until youhave actually exited the window.--

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Chapter 4 Industrialization

Red-hot iron, white-hot iron, cold-black iron; an iron taste and iron smell, and a Babel of iron sounds.-Charles Dickens

Industrialization is the key to the Victorian economic system. Though its possible to survive on anagrarian economic system, your country will go nowhere. All players seeking to achieve or keep GreatPower status must industrialize.

There are three aspects to successful industrialization.

The first aspect is the construction of factories. As mentioned previously (see section The Map), this isdone at the state, not provincial level. To construct a factory, open the particular states informationscreen. At the bottom, there will be a button allowing you to build a new factory. Factories cost a certainamount of raw material to build. Many nations start out with a certain amount of these rawmaterialslumber, cement, and steeland with a small stockpile of machine parts. Use them wisely,especially the machine parts. Many nations do not begin the game with machine parts.

When choosing what factories you wish to build, try to keep in mind the various prices and uses of theproducts you are considering making. For example, in the early game, steel is a well-priced commodityconsidering how cheap it is to produce. Keeping this process in mind can help you quickly amass enoughcash to continue industrialization.

Also keep in mind the system of vertical production. By this I mean the way that one factory uses theproducts produced by another. For example, lets say you take timber and turn it into lumber in a LumberMill. You can then take that lumber and use it in a Furniture Factory to make furniture, a generally highly-priced good. That furniture can then be used to manufacture luxury furniture in a Luxury FurnitureFactory. Luxury furniture, situated as it is at the top of a long vertical production chain, tends to be veryhighly priced and thus very valuable to sell. As a rule, remember that the longer the production chain, thehigher-priced the goods towards the top tend to be.

Most factories are able to be built once the technology Freedom of Trade has been discovered, althoughthere are some that cannot be built until later (Telephone and Automobile factories, for instance) and somethat can be built before (Liquor Distilleries, Wineries, and Glass Factories). Note that most uncivilizednations start the game without having discovered Freedom of Trade.

Once you have built your factories, you want to ensure that they actually produce things that you can sell.This brings us to the second aspect of successful industrializationPOPs.

You need POPs to run your factories for you. They are the labor that runs the machines, the strengthbehind your economy. There are two kinds of POPs that work in factoriesCraftsmen and Clerks.Craftsmen do not need Clerks with them in a factory; they can run it on their own. Clerks, on the otherhand, cannot run a factory on their own, and, in fact, there are a limited number of Clerks you can put intoa factory. You must have at least one Craftsman for each Clerk in a factory; there cannot be more Clerksthan Craftsmen in any particular factory at any time.

Unemployed Clerks and Craftsmen will automatically be placed into newly constructed factories as soonas they are complete, but eventually, you will run out of unemployed workers and will have to convertmore. You should take these new workers from the ranks of the Farmers and Laborers of the state. Toconvert another type of POP into a Craftsman or a Clerk (or, in fact, into most other kinds of POPs),simply click on their specific box and then click the button that says Convert to [insert POP type of your

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choice here]. If you have enough of the required goods in stock, the POP will be converted immediatelyand will be auto-assigned to a factory at once.

But not all POPs are equal when it comes to factory assignment. As you will recall, all POPs come in sizesbetween 1 and 100,000. Obviously, a thirteen man POP is not as good in a factory as an eighty-fivethousand man POP, but the differences are slightly more esoteric than that. Rather than having a set valueincrease in proportion to the size of the POP, there is instead a system based around several POP sizethresholds.

Before you can understand this concept you must understand the idea of production efficiency. Factoriesdo not start out running at maximum possible capacity. There are, in fact, several discoveries that increasethe output of the factories using their efficiency as a modifier. POPs also have efficiencies for productionbased on their sizes:

1 499: 33% efficiency 20,000 49,999: 75% efficiency500 19,999: 50% efficiency 50,000 100,000: 100% efficiency

So a fifty-thousand person POP produces exactly as much as a hundred-thousand person POP, which isthree times the amount of a three-hundred person POP. Note also that POPs of non-National Cultures arehalf as efficient than those of your National Culture(s).

Managing POP sizes is not the only way to improve factory efficiency. This brings us to the third aspect ofsuccessful industrializationrailroads.

Railroads are the last link to gaining the highest possible factory efficiency because, unlike POPs, theirefficiency increases over time with new technologies. There are several levels of railroad in the game, andeach successive level further improves the efficiency of your factories. To build a railroad, simply go tothe information screen of the province in which you wish to build the railroad and click on the buttonbeneath the picture of the current transportation type (for almost all nations in the start of the game thisshould be a horse-and-carriage). Assuming you have the requisite materials in stock, the railroad willimmediately begin construction.

In order to receive the benefits of railroads, they must cover one province in the state in which the factoryis situated. Otherwise, they will not be effective. The average railroad efficiency of the state is calculatedand usd for factory purposes; the more railroads you have in the state, the higher the efficiency. Neverforget the importance of railroads in improving factory efficiency; it can make all the difference in theworld in the later game. Besides, railroads are always a good investment because they also allow yourtroops to move across your territory much more quickly than they otherwise could.--

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Chapter 5 Trade

Free trade is not a principle, it is an expedient.-Benjamin Disraeli

The last remaining issue with the economic system is trade. Understand trade, and you will be able tomake a quick fortune.

There are many, many products you can make, buy, and sell in Victoria, and all of them are available fortrade on the world market. All commodities start the game being auto-traded by the computer. A word ofadvice: turn this feature off. History has shown that the computer will purchase items you need, but inquantities and at intervals not usually suited to your budget constraints. To turn off this feature, you mustgo through and unclick all the little boxes on the left of the screen that have Xs through them. An Xsignifies that the computer is trading the commodity for you.

In a normal game, however, it is usually safe to leave some basic raw materials auto-traded. These includecotton, wool, coal, sulfur, and timber. But check your economic map first. If you country is short on any ofthese goods, it is better to leave them under your control.

You should rarely leave your higher-end goods under computer control. Allowing the game to auto-tradeluxury clothing has lead to several second-year bankruptcies among new players. To set the orders forbuying and selling manually, click on the box for the particular commodity. That commodity should thenappear at the bottom of the trade window. Click the box to the left to indicate whether you want the gameto buy or sell, and then move the slider to the amount desired. Remember to click Confirm Trade or elsethe order will not take effect.

Victorias economy is an open one, meaning that, like all open economies, the price of goods isdetermined by supply and demand. As mentioned earlier, all types of POPs have different demands. Thegame keeps track of how much of each good (furniture, clothing, precious metal, automobiles, etc.) isproduced on the market, as well as how many POPs are demanding them. Based on the amount of demandfor goods, and their relative scarcity, the game will churn out a number for the price of that item. Thisnumber is found in the standard, humdrum, Econ 101 supply-and-demand graph.

Because of the games reliance on this system to calculate price, you can, of course, manipulate it. To dothis, you simply have to understand the way supply and demand systems work. If the demand goes down,the price drops, but if the demand goes up, so does the price. Similarly, if the supply drops, the proce ofthe remaining items will rise as well. Therefore, if you are a large producer of a certain itempreciousmetals, for exampleand are unsatisfied with the price per unit you are receiving, all you have to do isstop selling the good for a little while. As required by the system, the price will rise. Once the cost of thegood has reached a satisfactory level, you can sell your stockpile and reap enormous cash benefits. Ofcourse, flooding the market that way will drop the price back down to a more reasonable level. Becautious, though, for messing around with the supply of certain items can increase your POPs militancy,because they, along with everyone else, will have trouble getting them.

It is always good to have stockpiles of certain essential goods. Steel, lumber, and cement, for instance, arenecessary for building almost every type of building in the game, including railroads. Products like paper,furniture, and regular clothing are necessary in order to convert POPs into Craftsmen and Clerks, so it isalso good to have a small stockpile of these on hand, though it should not be your first priority. Youshould also try to have at least fifty small arms and fifty canned food in stockpile if you can, as this is thecost of increasing mobilization.

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Trade in Victoria is always international. There is always a domestic market for the goods you produce inyour factories, but the fact is that the system makes the POPs buy their desired goods from the worldmarket. This means that if, for example, you are the worlds only producer of furniture and you dont offeryour stockpile onto the world market, then your POPs wont ever get any of it. This situation, recall,increases their Militancy.

This means that stockpiling your goods can be a very, very bad thing. Though you may be tempted to keepthe other countries from industrializing by not providing them with the materials to convert their POPs(such as furniture and clothing), you will also be robbing your POPs of goods they need to live a happylife. Remember, free trade is a good thing in Victoria.

It is, however, fine to stockpile certain goods. War materiel, for example, is not demanded by any POPsand is generally a good thing to stockpile as you do not want to be supplying the armies of your enemies.Clippers and Steamers are very well priced, but they are also good to keep off the world market if you canafford it, as it will stymie the attempts of other countries to build up their navies. Of course, you canalways utilize the commodities in your stockpiles whenever you want.

Trade also adds to your income. Any products you sell puts money directly into the pockets of your POPs,money which is then taxable. Your trade balance is clearly visible on the main task window inside theTrade box.--

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Chapter 6 Politics

The Empress is Legitimist, my cousin is Republican, Morny is Orleanist, I am a socialist; the onlyBonapartist is Persigny, and he is mad.-Napoleon III

Victorian politics is an incredible complicated business. There are several factors to keep in mind, fromnational ideology to the specific ideals of political parties to the types of political and social reforms yougrant.

Every country has a specific government type. These are: Monarchy, Constitutional Monarchy,Democracy, Presidential Dictatorship, or Proletarian Dictatorship. The vast majority of countries in thegame will start and end as monarchies, although there is a great deal of transfer to constitutional monarchyand democracy by the end. Presidential and proletarian dictatorships are few and far between, and can onlybe arrived at through revolution. You cannot purposefully achieve either through a combination ofpolitical reforms (see Reforms).

Every country also has an Executive Designation, which is directly related to what form of governmentyou have. Laws by Decree reflects a monarchy, presidential, or proletarian dictatorship; HMSGovernment, a Constitutional Monarchy; Parliamentarism, a Democracy.

Each nation also has specific party system which determines how elections are run. In a One-Party state,the ruling party will continuously hold power and be reelected. In a Two-Party system, there exist thirdparties, but they receive a large penalty when votes are counted. In a Multi-party system, all parties have achance at the election.

Countries come with a National Value. This represents the sentiment of the majority of the population,regardless of their political actions. This is the way the game reflects certain cultural determinants, such asthe British and American aversions to despotism, or the German and Russian desires for a strong, centralgovernment. This is not to say that National Value does not change, but it tends to do so more throughrevolution than through political reforms. National Values come in three flavors: Order, Liberty, andEquality. Countries that value order will have more efficient crime fighting and military research.Societies upholding liberty will speed up non-military research, and societies valuing Equality will makesocial spending more effective at reducing militancy.

Each country also has files representing the political parties that can come into power, and each has itsown qualities. But there are universal ideals that are combined in various ways among the parties:

Economic Policies:

Laissez-Faire: This means little or no government intervention in the private sector. A party with this kindof belief will not allow you to ever tax any class above fifty percent of its income, nor will it allow you togrant social reforms or spend more than fifty percent of the social budget.

Interventionism: Interventionist parties allow all types of social reforms, and social spending is allowedbetween ten and eighty percent of the budget.

State Capitalism: This is the essence of a socialist government. You cannot remove social reforms, onlyadd them, and you cannot tax your population below twenty percent of their income.

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Planned Economy: This is Victorias equivalent of a communist economic policy. Planned economyparties do not allow the taxing of classes at below fifty percent, and social reform spending can only bethirty percent at a minimum. In Planned economies, you can add social reforms, but not remove them.

The effect of these policies, obviously, is directly related to your ability to raise and spend money as youwish.

Religious Policies:

Pluralism: Pluralist parties allow all religions in a country.

Moralism: One religion is dominant, and, while others may be allowed, they suffer for lack of funds orstate support.

Secularized: There is freedom of religion in the country, but the dominant mood is one of secularizationand non-religion as people are accustoming themselves to the ideas of modern science.

Atheism: Religion is forbidden in the country.

These policies have a great effect on your citizens. Religion is one of the strongest motivators people have,and a party that attempts to crush religion in a very religious country (or one that seeks to promote it in anatheist country) will suffer revolts galore.

Minority Policies:

Full Citizenship: In full Citizenship governments, all people have the same rights, regardless of race,creed, or color. Minorities can vote only in this kind of government.

Limited Citizenship: These kinds of governments distribute rights unequally, but the bottom-most classcan still do everything but vote.

Residence: Residence governments allow foreigners or other ethnic groups to work in the country butallow them few liberties.

Slavery: Governments of this type put the less favored classes into forced bondage.

The type of minority policy your government has effects how content your minorities are to be livingthere. A strongly xenophobic party will virtually eliminate immigration and encourage emigration,whereas an open government can draw hordes of foreign workers to your shores, thus giving you freelabor and costing your rivals.

Trade Policies:

Free Trade: Free Trade governments impose maximum limits on tariffs.

Protectionism: Protectionist governments limit how much you can subsidize your population.

These policies have an effect on the happiness of your POPs. Since a part of their happiness is determinedby their access to goods, if the cost of those good is beyond their reach, they will be unhappy. Free Tradegovernments may limit how much of a tariff you can impose, but Protectionist governments are potentiallymore dangerous: subsidizing expansive good for your POPs keeps them happy, and not being able to dothis can lead to revolts later in the game.

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Military Policies:

Pacifism: A pacifist government does not allow defense spending above fifty percent.

Anti-Military: These governments do not allow defense spending to go above eighty percent.

Pro-Military: These governments do not allow defense spending to fall below ten percent.

Jingoism: Jingoistic governments do not allow defense spending to be below thirty percent.

These policies determine how much you can spend on national defense, which is directly related to howmuch manpower and leadership points you accumulate. With low stockpiles of either, it is difficult to fighta successful war, especially a prolonged one.--

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Chapter 7 Reforms

The more is given the less the people will work for themselves, and the less they work the more theirpoverty will increase.-Leo Tolstoy

Once you understand how the political system in Victoria works, you can consider granting reforms. Thereare two types of reforms: political and social. These work in different ways. Political reforms extend rightsto your population. These include such things as public meetings and the right to form unions. Socialreforms, on the other hand, involve the state shelling out cash to provide services to the people. Suchservices include health care, pension funds, and minimum wages. Both kinds of reforms reduce themilitancy of your population, but neither is freemonetarily or otherwise.

Political Reforms:

Voting Rights: This is perhaps the most important political reform, as it can determine what kind ofgovernment your country takes as a whole. There are several levels of voting rights. First, there is theNone option. This is pretty self-explanatory, so well leave it at that. Second is the Landowners onlychoice. This means that you will be allowing your Aristocrats and Capitalists to vote, but no one else.Wealth means that suffrage is extended through the middle class, enveloping Clergymen, Officers, andClerks. And finally, Universal Suffrage means everyone can vote (note: this does not include womenuntil late in the game, if at all).

The people allowed to vote determine what kinds of governments are elected. The upper classes tend to bequite conservativeeven reactionaryin their leanings, so with very restrictive voting rights, those arethe kinds of parties you will see elected. The lower classes tend to be more liberaland later,socialistand granting them voting rights may get those kinds of parties elected. Before extending votingrights, look at the parties that can currently be elected and make sure you understand what kinds ofrestrictions they could put on your government.

The type of voting right you have also tends to determine your overall form of government. Many stateswith no voting rights, when granted suffrage of any sort, become Constitutional Monarchies. Extendingthis to Universal Suffrage tends to shift the government to a democracy, though with the moreconservative nations of Central and Eastern Europe they will stay Constitutional Monarchies.

The classes that are newly allowed to vote are happy to be able to do so and generally receive a decrease inmilitancy, but understand that those who can already vote are unhappy to see the privileges extended, andwill be unhappy.

Public Meetings: This is where you choose whether to allow public meetings, one of the staples of populargovernment. Prohibiting them will make your liberal classes angry, but it will reduce your crime fightingcosts as everyone (including criminals and political protestors) can no longer congregate without breakingthe law. Allowing them will keep your crime fighting costs up, but it will mollify your more liberal POPs.

Press Rights: This is how you choose how much of a license the press in your country gets. Providing theState Press option puts the newspapers in the control of the government. Make no mistake, people arenot fooled by this, and though it helps keep people in control, they can get unhappy. Censored Pressmeans that the newspapers have some freedom, but they are being watched by government censors. Thisallows for a reduction in militancy among the population without suffering the burdens of a truly freepress, and seems to be a balance point with which many players are comfortable. Free Press means thatyou remove all restrictions on your newspapers, allowing them to print whatever they want. You will find

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that this can often include government criticism, which can itself lead to an increase in Consciousness andMilitancy for a segment of your population.

Political Parties: This is where you choose what kind of power you will have over the parties in yourcountry. The first choice No Political Parties is self-explanatory. The second is Right to Ban.Selecting this means that you are allowing elections, but that the monarch retains the right to dissolve agovernment with which he is unsatisfied. This allows you to expel a party from power if it has imposedrestrictions on you with which you are unhappy. All Allowed means that you agree to allow whateverparty gets elected into office, and agree to go along with that they legislate. Banning a party or expelling itfrom power creates a tremendous amount of unrest among the adherents to that party within your citizenry.

As with press rights, the more freedom there is the lower the militancy of the majority of your population,but remember that allowing all parties can lead to the election of Pacifist or Socialist parties that restricthow you can manage your military or economy.

Trade Unions: Here you select what kind of collective bargaining rights you assign. You can of courseselect the No Trade Unions choice. Besides that, you can select the Non-Socialist choice, whichmakes your liberal POPs happy but angers your conservative POPs. Choosing Only Socialist makes thesocialist POPs happy while angering all the rest. All Allowed means that all trade unions, whatever theirideology, are free do form. This makes socialist POPs happy, but angers all the rest.

All political reforms will reduce the Militancy of one or more strata of your population, but they willincrease the Militancy and Consciousness of others. A good rule of thumb to follow: whoever benefitsfrom the political reforms will be happier, but whoever loses political power will be unhappy. Forexample, if you extend voting rights from landed to wealth, you will include Clerks. These will be happy,while the Aristocrats and Capitalists will be upset. Furthermore, if you then extend voting rights touniversal suffrage, the Clerks, who will have less power after the next reform than before, will be upset byit.

Social Reforms:

All social reforms are a good way to reduce militancy, but they cost a great amount of money. As you cansee, the social reforms come at several levels, from trinkets to good. The higher the rate, the moremoney it costs to run. There is both an establishment cost and a daily cost that comes out of your budget.

Minimum Wages: This sets how much of a minimum wage your workers get.

Maximum Workhours: This sets a limit on how long employers can force their employees to work.Reducing the number of workhours also reduces the efficiency of your workers, as they have less time toproduce.

Safety Regulations: These set how much safety your workers should be provided. This, again, reducesefficiency as it leads to slightly slower rates of production.

Health Care: This establishes a national health care system for your POPs. Unlike the previous reforms,this one counts both employed and unemployed POPs. On the positive side, though, it leads to an increasein population growth as well as the typical decrease in militancy.

Unemployment Subsidies: These provide an allowance for your unemployed citizens. Recall how it wasmentioned that all POPs have desired goods. Unemployed POPs, since they do not have a salary, willquickly run out of cash, lose the ability to purchase their desired goods, and become unhappy, leading to

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revolts or emigration. Unemployment subsidies reduce this by giving those without a job some money sothat they can still purchase goods.

Pension Funds: Although there are no retired POPs in Victoria, pension funds are also a good way toreduce militancy overall, for, like health care, it is calculated for all POPs, employed or unemployed.

The cost of social reforms depends on the size of your population as a whole, not on who is actually usingit. For example, even if you have no actually unemployed POPs in your nation, you will still have to payfor unemployment subsidies. Furthermore, if you fund your social reforms more than fifty percent, youincrease their effects. In other words, they will reduce Consciousness, and through it, Militancy (seesection The Big Three).

Note that all social reforms will reduce the militancy of one or more strata of your population, but most ofthem raise the Militancy and Consciousness of rich POPs. --

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Chapter 8 Diplomacy

The secret of politics? Make a good treaty with Russia.-Otto von Bismarck

Good diplomacy is a key to victory in Victoria. Setting up alliances can mean the difference between along slog of a war and a quick, overwhelming victory. Considering the way the Badboy system functions(see section Other Concepts), and especially in the later patches, diplomacy can allow your empire tocontinue expanding its borders and influence even after conquest is no longer a worthwhile means offurthering the national interest.

In order to make treaties with other nations, you must first have diplomatic points. These represent thenumber of diplomatic missions you can send to other countries. The rate at which you accumulatediplomatic points is based on your prestige. The more prestige you have, the more diplomatic points youget.

A country gets a basic allowance of one diplomatic point per year, standard. If the country is considered aGreat Power (i.e. if it is one of the eight most powerful nations in the world) it will get a second point peryear. If the nation is a war, it will receive a third point per year. Beyond this, the number you receivedepends on prestige:

Once twenty-five prestige points have been attained, you will receive a quarter more points per year. Atone hundred prestige points, you will receive a further quarter of a point. You will get another quarter atfive hundred and twenty-five hundred prestige points as well. There are no more thresholds beyond this. Itis possible to build up a supply of diplomatic points, but be aware that your stock cannot go above ten.

The number of diplomatic points you get can also be changed through certain events, such as Aristocracyvs. Bureaucracy. Aristocracy increases your rate of gain by twenty percent, whereas Bureaucracy reducesit by twenty percent.

Once you have your diplomatic points, there are several diplomatic actions you can take in Victoria. Notethat some actions require cash as well as that you have positive prestige.

Declaring War: This is perhaps the most simple to comprehend of all the diplomatic actions. When youdeclare war on another country, you announce your intention to send your soldiers into their territory andtake from them either land, money, access rights, or prestige, depending on what you ask for in the peacetreaty. Declaring war can cause a chain reaction wherein you call on your allies to join on your side, andyour enemy calls on theirs.

Declaring Colonial War: This is a special kind of war. Colonial wars can only be declared if bothbelligerent powers have claimed colonies (Claimed, not just have claim buildings). In colonial wars, nostates of either country can be invaded, only the colonies. For example, in a colonial war between Franceand the United Kingdom, the UK could not land troops in Normandy, nor the French in Dover, but theFrench could take Australia and India and the British could attack the French holdings in the Caribbean orNorth Africa. Colonial wars are good for seizing another countrys colonies without bringing yourhomelandor, in fact, your national existenceinto jeopardy. Colonial wars are also the only kind of warthat can be declared against an uncivilized country. In this situation, a colonial war will allow you toinvade the uncivilized countrys homeland, and it also does not require that the uncivilized country haveclaimed colonies.

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Colonial wars cannot be expanded to full wars, so declaring a preemptive colonial war can be a good tacticto keep someone from declaring a full war on you. This is especially true as the war will not end until youaccept peace, and because your homeland is safe in this kind of war.

Offer Alliance: This is how you propose to another country that you formally unite your interests. Thereare two forms of alliances: defensive and full. Defensive alliances come into effect when either side isattacked, but not when one of the countries initiated the war. Full alliances (known in the game as MilitaryAlliances) are for all circumstances, including when one ally declares the war. In both instances, there isthe ability to make one exception to the alliance. For example, Prussia can form a full military alliancewith the Russians except in the case of Austria, meaning that Prussia will be required to come to Russiasaid if it declares war on anyone except on Austria. Alliances do not come into effect when a country entersinto a colonial war.

Dissolve Alliance: This is how you break your existing alliance with someone. Keep in mind that alliances(except for those among the German states or between satellites and their home countries) dissolve ontheir own every five years and must be renewed or allowed to expire.

Improve Relations: This is the way to increase the friendliness between you and another country. Theminimum they can increase is ten points, but if youre lucky, they can increase much more than that. Thebetter your relations with another country, the more receptive they are likely to be to deals you offer. Bearin mind that relations between all countries naturally erode at one per month.

Send Expeditionary Force: This is the way you send one of your countrys military units to aid a friend inwar. You dont have to be allied to do it, either. Your troops will be put under the direct control of theother nation, but you can take them back at any point. Remember that the enemy will make no distinctionbetween your troops and the countrys with which they are at war, so there is a risk you will lose thedivision you send.

The hosting country pays for the upkeep and maintenance of the troops they are sent, so sendingexpeditionary forces to secure allies can, in some instances, be a tricky way of avoiding high armymaintenance costs in peacetime.

Ask for Military Access: This is the way you secure permission to move your troops across anothercountrys land. You already have the ability to do this with allies, but this allows you to move acrossanother countrys territory if they are not your ally. This is useful when trying to enter a war with acountry with which you have no border or for opening a second front in the war (for example, if the USgets military access through Great Britain, it can attack Mexico from the north as well as from Belize, aBritish holding.

Ask for Naval Access: This is similar to asking form military access. When naval access is granted, youcan dock your ships in another countrys port. Keep in mind that while you have naval or military accesswith another country, you cannot declare war on them. Since ships in Victoria have unlimited range, thisfeature is useful only if you want your ships to have a port to retreat into so they can avoid combat.

Demand Cessation of Colonialism: This is the way you get a country to stop constructing colonial claimbuildings. In a sense, you are threatening them if they do not stop. When making this demand, you mustspecify the continent on which they must stop. Making this demand naturally lowers your relation with theother country.

Guarantee Independence: This is the way you establish a measure of protection over another country. Notquite an alliance, a country whose independence you have guaranteed will come to you for help if war isdeclared on it, but it will not come to your aid of war is declared on you. If you are a powerful country,

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your guarantee of independence acts as a deterrent to any other country declaring war on the country youhave guaranteed.

Open Negotiations: This is the way you begin the more complicated dealings of the diplomacy function ofVictoria. This is the place to trade technology, provinces, cash, and claims.

Trading Technologies:

Remember that technology is not free. Under the 1.03 patch, any technology you give to another countrythat is not matched by a corresponding province, claim, or other technology costs you ten prestige points.This was done to prevent the selling of technologies for huge amounts of cash.

Also keep in mind that each technology you receive costs ten research points to make up. If you havenegative research points, your current research does not advance (unless it already has the maximum tenpoints invested). This penalty is meant to represent the retro-engineering your scientists will have to do tocatch up with the new technology, although you can utilize the benefits of the technology immediately.You only lose research points for techs in trades initiated by you, however. If the computer offers you atrade which includes giving you techs, you will lose no research points for it.

Also as a result of the 1.03 patch, cultural technologies are no longer exchangeable.

Purchasing land:

Purchasing land in Victoria requires attention to several factors:

First, make sure you have good relations with the country from which you intend to buy. Only countrieswith which you have positive relations will even consider making the deal, and the better the relations, thecheaper the cost to you.

Second, make sure you havent racked up too many badboy points. Nations will hesitate to make tradeswith you if youre seen as an aggressor (this goes for all trades, not just land).

Third, be sure to pick the right provinces. There are two things to look at here. The first is the populationof the province. Every nation has one or more national cultures (you can see what they are in the gamefiles, or you can open up a new game and play as the country from which you want to buy. The nationalcultures are the names listed at the bottom of the Population button on the task screen). No nation will eversell you a province whose majority population is one of their national cultures, no matter how much youoffer. The second thing to look at is the diplomacy map. Once there, click on the country from which youwant to buy. Every nation has provinces it will never sell, regardless of the offer or population. Theseprovinces are represented by little dots on the diplomacy screen when that country is selected. You cannotpurchase these in diplomatic deals.

Fourth, remember that a little bit of money can go a long way. A country might give only a sixty percentacceptance chance to an offer of one tech for one province of land, but load them up with a couple ofthousands pounds and their mind can change quite quickly. It need not be a lot, but cash can take youplaces.

The price of a province depends, at least somewhat, on the overall population of the province (ie.Bangladesh will cost more than Chad) and on the sellers cash store at the time of the deal (the more moneythey already have, the more theyll require to sell it).

Asking for claims:

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Getting other countries to cede you their claims is notoriously difficult, mostly because not only are theygiving up the claims, but also the potential prestige that could come with claiming the colony. Countriesdo tend to be receptive to offers for claims when the offers themselves include claims the other countrymight find useful. Otherwise, trading claims works just like trading land, except that no claims are unableto be traded.

Note that all successful diplomatic missions, be they for any cause, lead to a positive increase in relationsbetween you and the other country.

One last diplomatic act you can do as a country is creating satellites. If you have the land of a possiblecountry within your borders, you can release that satellite, thus granting it independence. Of course, this isonly a false independence. The new country, though it has control over its domestic affairs, has none of itsown international policy. They cannot conduct any diplomatic activities on their own. Basically, theirgovernments are puppets of yours.

Satellites automatically have a defensive pact with their home countries and can be called into a war.Dominions have a full military alliance with their home countries. Satellites can also be created as a resultof warfare (see section entitled War). What exactly it is that distinguishes a dominion from a satellite isnot yet clearly understood, but it seems, at least for now, that certain countries have been hard coded to bedominions, whereas others have been hard coded to be satellites. But this is just the theory-of-the-day.

Satellites are useful as buffers between you and aggressive neighbors. For example, Prussia can releasePoland as a satellite. Poland absorbs most of Prussias border with Russia. If Russia declares on Prussia,Prussia can decide not to call on Poland to enter the war, and thus the Russians cannot enter Prussia, butthe Prussian army can still cross Poland and attack into Russia at will.

One more tip for exercising efficient diplomatic overtures: when offering money, holding down the Ctrlkey will increase the rate of money offering, and holding down Shift and Ctrl at the same time willincrease it even further. This is a great time saver for when you have to make those massive payments ofcash to purchase an essential province.--

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Chapter 9 The Army

Some talk of Alexander, and some of Hercules;Of Hector, and Lysander, and such great names as these;But of all the worlds brave heroes, theres none that can compareWith a tow, row, row, row, row for the British Grenadier.-The British Grenadiers

Running the military is an important aspect of a successful game of Victoria. Given the aggressiveness ofthe contest between Great Powers, the military can often mean the difference between a successful gameand one of total annihilation.

When looking to build a strong standing army, several variables have to be kept in mind:

Manpower: This is the amount of men you have available to be converted into soldiers. This numberdepends on the number of soldier POPs you have in your country, their rate of growth, and the level ofdefense spending you have. The higher the defense spending, the faster your manpower rises and thehigher the maximum level becomes. There is always a maximum manpower, but never a minimum. Infact, many countries start the game with negative manpower.

Leadership: Leadership points represent the strength of your countrys officer corps. The more OfficerPOPs you have, the higher your leadership points. These are useful for two things: colonizing (see sectionColonies) and producing generals. Defense spending influences leadership points in much the same wayas it affects manpower points.

Generals: One of the most under recognized tools in the military arsenal by new players, generals canmake or break an army. For more information, see section Leaders.

To build a new military unit, click first on the cannon icon in the top right hand corner of the task bar. Thistakes you to the military management screen Here you can train new generals, commission new ships, orrecruit new divisions. To build a ship, click on the Commission new ship/flotilla button; to recruit anew division, click on the Setup a new division button.

In the recruitment of divisions, you will have various choices to make regarding their composition. Thefirst is the type of unit. In Victoria, there are four types of units:

Irregulars: These are troops that represent pre-modern forms of military technology. These cannot be builtby civilized countries, but for many uncivilized countries they will be the only troops you can build at theoutset. The weaknesses of irregulars are many. It is not unknown to see twenty thousand well-equippedRegular troops defeat upwards of a hundred thousand irregulars.

Infantry: These are the basic, gun-wielding ranks of men who march into battle. These are the staple ofevery modern army and should form the backbone of every substantial military force in Victoria.

Cavalry: These are the men who ride on horseback, useful for breaking lines, scouting operations, or quickmaneuvers behind enemy lines. Cavalry are noted for their speed, which is their greatest asset.

Dragoons: These are a type of soldier trained to fight both mounted and on foot. These move faster thaninfantry, but not as fast as cavalry. They are good supporting units for clearing up the partisans thatdevelop after an army has occupied enemy territory.

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Once you have selected the type of unit you wish to build, you must select whether it will have anyattachments. Attachments modify the variables of the division itself. For example, divisions withengineering brigades attached will be able to dig in more substantially. Divisions with artillery brigadesattached will receive a bonus in offense and in defense. Of course, these divisions tend to move moreslowly, but they also add two thousand more men to the total count of the division. For a complete list ofattachments and their modifiers, see below.

Next, you must choose the quality of the unit. There are four quality levels in Victoria:

Regular: These soldiers are the standard, well-trained troops produced by civilized countries.

Colonial: These are the troops raised from the colonies of a given country. The men come from the stockof your national culture in that colony, and are based there as well. If the colony has already been grantedstatehood, these soldiers will be of Regular quality.

Reserve: These are troops coming from the conscription and mobilization (see below) programs ofcivilized countries.

Native: These troops are the result of native populations being trained by trained, civilized professionalsoldiers. As of patch 1.03, these soldiers are equal in quality to Regular quality troops except for a penaltyof negative two towards reliability (see below).

For most military production, you will not be able to select the type of quality. Rather, it will be assignedto the unit based on its home province and the culture from which it was recruited (see below).

Next, you must choose the culture of the men forming the division. Recall how in the POPs section, itwas described that each POP has a specific culture attached to it. The game records how many of each ofyour soldier POPs pertain to particular cultures, and reflects those numbers in your ability to build troops.

Each division, recall, is ten thousand men. Recall also that you have a limited number of solider POPs,each of a given size. Each time you build a division you use up a certain number of these soldiers in theprocess. There is, therefore, a limit on how many divisions of that culture you can build at any time. Thelimit reflects the amount of soldiers in your country (note: actual soldiers, not soldier POPs. The larger thesoldier POP, the more soldiers it contains). If you cannot build any more divisions of a particular culture,that culture will not be selectable from the dropdown menu.

Nevertheless, there is a way to get around this restriction. If you can build any soldiers of a particularculture at all, you can avoid the restriction. To do this, amass a large amount of manpower and resourcesto build divisions. Once you have built up large enough stockpiles, enter the military screen and go aboutthe process of building a new unit. As long as you can build even one division of the culture you want, youwill be able to select that culture from the dropdown menu. Once it has been selected, simply increase thenumber of divisions as high as you can afford. Even though you may not have the proper amount ofsoldier POPs to pull this off, the game still allows all the divisions to be built. Though this is an exploit, itis a way around a rather restrictive part of the game. As far as is know, it is useful for any amount ofdivisions as long as you can build at least one division of the culture.

Finally, you must choose the home province of the unit you are building. The game not only keeps track ofthe cultures of the various soldier POPs, but also their home provinces, and you must select the one fromwhich the men will be recruited. This is important because if you sell or lose in war the province fromwhich the men are recruited, the men themselves, as well as the divisions they constitute, will disappear.For example, if Great Britain recruited most of its army from Ireland, and then granted Ireland

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independence, Great Britain would lose all the troops it had recruited from Ireland, as they would now becitizens of another country.

Similarly, if the province from which the army is recruited revolts, the units from that province can jointhe rebels. For example, any Irish military units Great Britain may have recruited could throw down theUnion jack and pick up the Irish flag if their homeland rebelled.

Lastly when creating a military unit, you can examine the specific traits it has. These come in as qualities:

Strength: This is the amount of damage the unit can take before it is destroyed.

Organization: This represents the efficiency of the units use in battle, as well as haw fast its moraleregenerates. Note that, unlike in previous patches, 1.03 has removed the bonus to province occupation timefor high organization armies. Instead, there is now a bonus given to armies which share the same culture asthe province they are occupying.

Morale: This determines how resolute the troops are. This is important because a units morale decreasesas a battle drags on, and if it runs out of morale it will retreat, even if it has not yet been destroyed.

Reliability: This determines the likelihood that the unit will desert or mutiny in the field.

Fire Attack: This is the strength of the unit in terms of actual damage-inflicting power. This representshow strong the units offensive capabilities are in doing damage to the enemys Strength modifier.

Shock Attack: This represents the units ability to destroy the morale of the enemy.

Defense: This shows, quite literally, how well the unit can defend itself.

Maximum Speed: This shows how quickly the unit can move across the map. Speed has no meaning in abattle situation.

Supply Consumption: This determines the cost of the unit, calculate yearly, which is fed into your overallMilitary Spending budget slider.

As mentioned above, you can select brigades to attach to a military division:

Regulars: These are brigades of higher-trained standard soldiers. They give a bonus in the areas of fire andshock attack.

Guards: These are brigades made up of the largest soldiers, and they are highly trained. These give goodorganization and morale benefits, as well as the same bonuses to shock and fire attack as regulars.

Engineers: These brigades allowed their divisions to fortify themselves by digging into the surroundingearth. Engineer brigades give a high morale and organization bonus, as well as a modest defensive bonus.

Artillery: Artillery units were used to pummel enemies into submission from a distance. These give a highfire attack and modest shock attack bonus, but they also take a modest speed hit. On top of the bonus theygive to the division itself as an attachment, artillery also give a combat bonus to any army that has it.

Hussars: Fast-moving light cavalry divisions, Hussars give a high morale boost and a modest speed bonusto a cavalry division.

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Cuirassiers: Known for their strength and ability to break through enemy lines, these heavy cavalry givegood morale and organization boosts, as well as a decent shock attack bonus, to cavalry divisions.

Headquarters: Field headquarters for officer staff, these provide their divisions with a hefty organizationalbonus.

Barrels: Named for the tanks in a series of alternate history books by Harry Turtledove, barrels were usefulfor breaking through heavily fortified enemy positions. Divisions with these attached receive an extremelylarge shock attack bonus, but also take a good sized hit in speed. They are also supposed to have anadvantage against entrenched troops, but, as of 1.03, the feature is still inactive.

Heres a tried and tested little trick for those whove managed to read this far:

The combined strength of your army and navy are the factors that determine your overall military score,visible at the top of the main task bar to the right of your flag. This number is visible to all, and it helpsyou determine if you will defeat a county you are thinking of declaring war on. Now, when you build anew military unit, that new unit gets added to the calculation for your military scorebut only after youdeploy it. In multiplayer games, you can lull your human opponents into a false sense of security bybuilding huge numbers of military units, but leaving them undeployed and in limbo. Then, just when youropponent thinks hes got you over a barrel, deploy those three hundred divisions youve amassed andcrush him before he knows what hit him. This has been tested and still works under patch 1.03.--

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Chapter 10 The Navy

There is a homely old adage which runs: Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far. If theAmerican Nation will speak softly, and yet build, and keep at pitch of the highest training, a thoroughlyefficient navy, the Monroe Doctrine will go far.-Theodore Roosevelt

Building a navy is similar to building an army. You go to the same screen and go through the sameprocess. Even though they are ships, they still require manpower to run, and you still must choose a culturefor the men as well as a home province. There are many different classes of ships in Victoria,

Frigates: These are the small sail ships that represent quick mobility on the seas at the start of the game.Given their lack of firepower, that is pretty much their only advantage. Frigates become obsolete veryquickly.

Men-o-War: The large capital ships of the age of sail, Men-o-War would be the backbone of a modernnavy at the outset of the game. These ships remain competitive for a little while, but by the time Ironcladscome about, their days are numbered.

Clipper Transports: These are your first transport units. Using these you can make amphibious invasions,and unlike the other sail ships, they have no hindrances (except, perhaps, for their speed), which makethem obsolete. Clippers are still often as useful in 1915 as they were in 1840.

Commerce Raiders: Representing the first incorporation of steam engines onto combat ships, CommerceRaiders are quick, efficient combat ships.

Steamer Transports: Replacing Clipper Transports with steam engines, these ships are just fastertransports, though they have better defense and lower visibility as well. They can still do all that Clippersdid, and they can still only hold one division per ship.

Ironclads: These were wooden ships that had iron plates bolted to their hulls, making them more resistantto cannon shots than wooden-sided ships. These can do a great deal of damage to old wooden ships, andtheir arrival signals the true end of the age of sail.

Monitors: Unlike Ironclads, Monitors were made entirely of metal, but as a result, they tended to remain incoastal waters as they were difficult to navigate and manage and tended to fill up with smoke from theirboilers. In many important areas, Monitors are weaker than Ironclads even though they are higher up thedevelopment tree.

Cruisers: Cruisers represent a successful implementation of Monitor technology to a high-seas ship. Theyremain as powerful as Ironclads except in one areaspeed. Cruisers can move twice as fast as Ironclads.Cruisers are the first ships that can launch torpedo attacks. Beginning now, all combat ships will remaineffective at least to a certain extent until the end of the game.

Battleships: These ships represent large developments in defense and in gun attack strengths. They are notas fast as Cruisers, though. Countries building large amounts of Battleships should begin consideringscrapping their Ironclads and Monitors. Unlike the ships around them, Battleships cannot launch torpedoattacks.

Heavy Cruisers: These seek to combine the speed of Cruisers with the strength of Battleships, and succeedin finding a happy medium between the two. These, like Cruisers, can also launch torpedo attacks.

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Dreadnoughts: These ships represent the culmination of capital ship technology in the game. Far outpacingHeavy Cruisers and Battleships in defense and gun attack strengths, Dreadnoughts rule the waves. UnlikeHeavy Cruisers, though, they cannot launch torpedo attacks.

Submarines: These seem almost an afterthought in the process of naval design. Indeed, their strength incombat is low compared to Battleships and especially to Dreadnoughts. Their one advantage is theirtorpedo attack strength. At four, it is twice that of a Cruiser and four times that of a Heavy Cruiser. Agroup of submarines, used effectively, can make life hard on a Dreadnought-based navy, but withoutsurface support, a submarine-based navy will never rule the waves.

When building ships, you must keep in mind that there are five ship classes in Victoria:1) Men-o-War and Frigates2) Commerce Raiders3) Monitors and Ironclads4) Cruisers and Battleships (I assume submarines go in this class as well, though I was unable to

confirm this before the release of this edition).5) Dreadnoughts and Battle Cruisers

Each class is progressively more powerful, and can defeat any ship in the class below it. This is importantto keep in mind because, by looking at its stats, you would think that a Commerce Raider would bedefeated by a Man-o-War. This is not the case; a Commerce Raiser would actually defeat a Man-o-Warbecause it is in a higher ship class. This has the effect of rendering ship stats effective for comparisonsonly with other ships of the same class. Note: Clipper Transports and Steamer Transports are not includedin the ship class system as they cannot actually attack.

The stats for naval combat are also different than those for the army:

Strength: This represents how much damage the ship can take before it sinks.

Organization: This represents how well the ships are used in attacks, as well as the rate at which its moraleregenerated.

Gun Attack: This represents the early means of defeating your enemys strength factor. It causes lowstrength damage.

Torpedo Attack: This represents a more modern means of reducing your enemys strength factor, causinghigh damage.

Shore Bombardment: This shows how well the ship can bombard enemy land units in coastal provinceswhen combined with an assault from land.

Sea Defense: This represents how well the ship can defend itself from attack while at sea.

Maximum Speed: This shows how quickly the ship can traverse the seas and oceans of the world.

Supply Consumption: This shows how costly the ship is to maintaina figure added to your overall navalmaintenance costs in the budget window.

Sea Detection Capability: This shows how good the ship is at locating enemy ships while at sea.

Visibility: This shows how easy it is for the ship itself to be found at sea by the enemy.

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Note that capital ships also have one more aspect to them: prestige. For each capital ship you build, youreceive a certain amount of prestige. As of the newer patches, disbanding those ships casts no prestige, buthaving them sunk in battle does.

As with land units, you can assign brigades to naval squadrons as well:

Corvettes: These give small boosts to detection and gun attack, as well high bonuses in morale andorganization. They also give a speed bonus.

Torpedo Boats: These give their squadrons a torpedo attack bonus of two, on top of morale, organizationand detection bonuses.

Destroyers: These give a hefty gun attack detection bonus, along with substantial morale and organizationbonuses. They also give a slight advantage in gun attack, speed, and torpedo attack.

Minelayers: These give small bonuses to detection, morale, and organization, but they take a hit on speedin order to do it.

Minesweepers: These, like Minelayers, give small bonuses to detection, morale, and organization, but takea speed reduction in the process.

Note: in regards to Minelayers and Minesweepers, you cannot actually lay mines. These are justrepresentative additions to the battle fleets.

As with the army, you can assign Admirals to run your navy. Like generals, admirals cost twentyleadership points to train and will be killed in battle eventually. These men can modify your shipsmodifiers just like generals can modify those of their armies.

There is a widely held belief that navies in Victoria are underpowered. Those making the argument saythat it is possible to run a huge empire without any naval strength at all. To a certain extent they arecorrect, but it all depends on geography. Russia, for example, should be able to succeed without acorrespondingly large navy, as should a conquest-oriented Prussia/Germany, but for island nations suchand the United Kingdom or for countries that wish to leave the balance-of-power in Europe stable, naviescontinue to be an important facet of force projection.--

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Chapter 11 Mobilization and the Reserves

The people will save their government, if the government itself will allow them.-Abraham Lincoln

Mobilization is the ace-up-the-sleeve of every country in Victoria. Mobilization is the process of takinglarge numbers of POPs and conscripting them to serve in the armed forces.

Every country can create a mobilization pool. To do this, open up the military screen and look at thebottom right. There you should see three buttons:

Increase Mobilization: This increases by five the number of divisions you can mobilize.

Mobilize: This calls all your marked POPs for draft duty. Mobilization takes a full two months from theday the button is pressed, so plan ahead.

Decrease Mobilization: This reduces by five the number of divisions you can mobilize. This can beimportant to do if you find that youre spending way too much money on military costs, but it is a rarebutton to find yourself in need of pressing.

The cost for creating five new mobilization divisions is only fifty small arms and fifty canned foodmuchless then the cost of recruiting a division for your standing army. Most importantly, it costs no cash ormanpower, meaning that you can build up huge mobilizations pools to use if someone ever becomes brashenough to try to invade you.

There are a maximum number of divisions that any country can