Infrastructure

[Emelio Lizardo]

Presently the only means to increase infrastructure is building railroads or ports.

But transport isn't infrastruture like a sewer is. Maybe have a separate infrastructure build?

Or is, in the game, infrastructure meaning something different?

[Alex]

In-game, infrastructure is merely a capacity value. It summarises and simplifies all the neccessary stuff which is needed for any kind of organized economic activity. Roads, sewers, bridges, and so on.

The decision to give railroads an infrastructure bonus is certainly not the best one. Since infrastructure usage is not monetized, you need to subsidize the railroads instead. But the devs were either unable or unwilling to implement a more detailed infrastructure system, and instead, simply slapped some bonuses to railroads and ports.

[6ap6apblckaAa]

I also advise to switch railroads to gov run ownership - this way you may make them even on expenses across all country.

[TheCollector]

Originally posted by Emelio Lizardo:

Presently the only means to increase infrastructure is building railroads or ports.

But transport isn't infrastruture like a sewer is. Maybe have a separate infrastructure build?

Or is, in the game, infrastructure meaning something different?

You also get infrastructure from population, techs, state traits, ...

See the wiki
https://vic3.paradoxwikis.com/Infrastructure

[Emelio Lizardo]

Seems that the railroad and steam donkey only reduce the number of workers in the facility. The rail won't populate unless there is a demand or subsidies. From the building screen it will show a negative balance if you choose rails if the rails are not populated.

This is unexpected as I would assume rail and donkey would enhance throughput.

I'm not sure but it looks like you don't get the infrastructure benefit if the rails are not populated.

[Alex]

The transportation "production methods" reduce the number of workers by consuming "transportation".

Infrastructure, on the other hand, is the basic requirement for all buildings.

Both values are indeed provided by the railroad, but they are workforce-dependent. Which means, you need to fully staff your railroads.

[6ap6apblckaAa]

Curerently you have to always subsidize railways.
This is why turning government run is good for them - you lose same money if they are negative anyway, but you gain more for the budget if they are positive, which will be the case in some states. And those positive ones can sometimes actually cover negative ones.

[druebey]

Funniest part to me, is at start of Game period, That roads/trails/canals/waterways(major and minor rivers) are not modeled accurately nor given justice. Between the Canal only giving a moderate amount of whaterver(seen too many mods recently that fix this) and no true economic consequence. The lack of teamsters, carriages, wagons, etc to model logistics and colonization itself. To the utter idoiticy of naval power being a factor to colonization rather than desire to colonize by a proper colonizational mechanic. River and lake operations in many theatres ignored due to not wanting to place river ports/etc and having a mechanic to model this. Logistics not having a storage or strategic resource storage for military operations. all "extra" goods and materials produced just vanishing into thin air, instead of being collected and possibly being used in replacement of currency to buy land/etc as was utilized even in this period. The Native uprisiging and unreconized powers mechanics being utterly deporable for era and also the lack of interation with native powers.


My list can go on and on about this game, Why did I utilize currency I got by doing free apps and like to buy this game(not my income really but extra) you may ask... I will tell ya, Market research and /I Hoping I\ that this game would be much better than it was and actually an improvement to the genre. Instead got a finished prototype(as most games are such now and days) with no real "beef" but mostly bone. If I brought a rib this meatless to a Texas household, theyd throw me outa town.... [funny considering theres a individual that stated in a stream he was Texan on the team... YET Texas loses Texan Independence and doesnt have option for the USA to have event to model the Assistance the USA gave them... Plus how Texas truly became a US Territory].

Sadly in a game development staging, to a degree to the DLC policies of most companies, only "complete" games, IE Victoria 2; etc are considered to be out of testing stages. From Alpha releases, prototype releasing(bare bones), Beta releasing, etc... Yet people want games to have more and be released at a more frequent interval. Honestly I would like a Complete game thats not a fraction of what it could be at release(bug fix, features, etc) and be a reasonable price... than take EU4 right now, Base game is what 30 USD and all the DLC is 435 USD... for the "complete experience" and they had to release a Monthly sub at 9 USD(?) to have the experience complete.... 9*12= 108 a year..... so in 4 years..... thats price of all DLC already...... WOW a great marketing Gimick and how many Smucks fell for it?

Paradox is doing what amounts to daylight robbery at points with the DLC policies and fact of as many point out... Gamers of their games are now expecting broken, unfinished games to be released and YEARS of improvements before its even deemed a reasonable game... So why arent gamers rising up and doing something about it???

Answer : PARADOX HAS A MONOPOLY(market share of well over 68%)... Luckly theres some indies that are trying to overthrow them in this genre(GSG) but they are few and far between. Grey Eminence(no funding so cant continue development) was a studio that attempted to do so[though honestly was a copy paste of some ideas from multiple pds and other games], Wolfrus Studios is doing a WW1 based game that honestly is looking to be what BICE is on steriods and doing it better from what i have seen and talked to Wolfrus about. Guilded Destiny(not releasing like Vicky 3 did and actually releasing from looks of it[ Still in Alpha stage] as a complete contender to Vicky 3 with FULL FEATURES.) is coming out by a group that saw the niche of victorian era games. Just as examples...

So if people wanna take time to complain about PDS, yet support their actions by doing preorder/DLCs.... I included myself in this bout as I did get Vicky 3 with preorder as hoped it would be a great game/market research aspect... People need to stop supporting PDS and go to the Guilded Destiny team kickstarter(releasing in this month sometime), Get ahold of the Grey Emience guys to get a figure to do a fundme page or like, Get on patron and support Wolfrus studios. Just as examples of what to do to ACTIVELY show that PDS policies are not way to do business.

[Emelio Lizardo]

Well, maybe it's time to put together an investment group to buy up Paradox shares and dictate some changes.

[Alex]

Originally posted by Emelio Lizardo:

Well, maybe it's time to put together an investment group to buy up Paradox shares and dictate some changes.

Yeah, just send me the money, I'll set up an investment fund.

[Dave Reckoning]

Originally posted by druebey:

Paradox is doing what amounts to daylight robbery at points with the DLC policies and fact of as many point out... Gamers of their games are now expecting broken, unfinished games to be released and YEARS of improvements before its even deemed a reasonable game... So why arent gamers rising up and doing something about it???

Answer : PARADOX HAS A MONOPOLY(market share of well over 68%)

This has been discussed at length before, but perhaps it is worth re-hashing some of the discussion.

Before I start... I don't like it any more than you do, the state of the game, the dlc policies and the time we have to wait for a "finished" product. Things can always be done better, and Pdx certainly could do better.

However, having said that:
1) The modern development cycle works on the basis of Minimum Viable Product (MVP). This means that pretty much all developers work on an Agile basis, identifying, developing and releasing the absolute minimum workable product / application. Once that's out there, they go again for a next release (at MVP+1) and then again, etc.
2) They do this for several reasons: (a) It gets *some* revenue (or benefit) in as early as possible, improving the overall Return on Investment (ROI) of the product; (b) It engages the customer base as early as possible. This means that you get people interested in *your* product ahead of the competition, even if that product is not the finished article, so you start building market presence and market share as early as possible and raise the barriers to entry for competitors; (c) It allows real-life customers to give feedback on how they want the product to grow and develop, so you can focus your further development efforts on functionality that is actually wanted, rather then having to guess.
3) This means that Pdx is not just doing this to rip us off - it's standard practice. Sure, it has financial and marketing benefits for them, but it does allow players to shape the product going forwards. This can feel like we are play-testing for them, for free, and in a way that is the case, but in return we do actually get to highlight the things *we* want fixed or extended.
4) It works for Pdx, that's how they get/got the market share you talk about. But it also works for us, because *in the end* we get huge games that are worth spending 1000s of hours playing.
5) You can take advantage of the process by holding off on your purchase, if you want, until others have play-tested and shaped the product for you; or by choosing which dlc's you do and don't buy at a later point; or by giving (constructive) feedback to the developers about what you want to see in future releases.
6) But all this does mean that Pdx's approach is not going to change. They do it this way for sound commercial reasons, it's standard application development practice, and most modern developers do the same. Was Facebook, or the Apple Watch, or Ebay, great when they first came out? No. Are they still issuing "dlc's" on those products? Yes. It's just the way it's done these days.

I'm not making excuses for Pdx here, I'm just explaining some of the facts of life. Could Pdx do better? Yes. Could the game be better? Hell, yes.

But this is the way it is, this is the way it's going to stay, and these are the reasons why.

[druebey]

Originally posted by Dave Reckoning:

Originally posted by druebey:

Paradox is doing what amounts to daylight robbery at points with the DLC policies and fact of as many point out... Gamers of their games are now expecting broken, unfinished games to be released and YEARS of improvements before its even deemed a reasonable game... So why arent gamers rising up and doing something about it???

Answer : PARADOX HAS A MONOPOLY(market share of well over 68%)

This has been discussed at length before, but perhaps it is worth re-hashing some of the discussion.

Before I start... I don't like it any more than you do, the state of the game, the dlc policies and the time we have to wait for a "finished" product. Things can always be done better, and Pdx certainly could do better.

However, having said that:
1) The modern development cycle works on the basis of Minimum Viable Product (MVP). This means that pretty much all developers work on an Agile basis, identifying, developing and releasing the absolute minimum workable product / application. Once that's out there, they go again for a next release (at MVP+1) and then again, etc.
2) They do this for several reasons: (a) It gets *some* revenue (or benefit) in as early as possible, improving the overall Return on Investment (ROI) of the product; (b) It engages the customer base as early as possible. This means that you get people interested in *your* product ahead of the competition, even if that product is not the finished article, so you start building market presence and market share as early as possible and raise the barriers to entry for competitors; (c) It allows real-life customers to give feedback on how they want the product to grow and develop, so you can focus your further development efforts on functionality that is actually wanted, rather then having to guess.
3) This means that Pdx is not just doing this to rip us off - it's standard practice. Sure, it has financial and marketing benefits for them, but it does allow players to shape the product going forwards. This can feel like we are play-testing for them, for free, and in a way that is the case, but in return we do actually get to highlight the things *we* want fixed or extended.
4) It works for Pdx, that's how they get/got the market share you talk about. But it also works for us, because *in the end* we get huge games that are worth spending 1000s of hours playing.
5) You can take advantage of the process by holding off on your purchase, if you want, until others have play-tested and shaped the product for you; or by choosing which dlc's you do and don't buy at a later point; or by giving (constructive) feedback to the developers about what you want to see in future releases.
6) But all this does mean that Pdx's approach is not going to change. They do it this way for sound commercial reasons, it's standard application development practice, and most modern developers do the same. Was Facebook, or the Apple Watch, or Ebay, great when they first came out? No. Are they still issuing "dlc's" on those products? Yes. It's just the way it's done these days.

I'm not making excuses for Pdx here, I'm just explaining some of the facts of life. Could Pdx do better? Yes. Could the game be better? Hell, yes.

But this is the way it is, this is the way it's going to stay, and these are the reasons why.

I kinda went on a rant about things and appreciate a educated and thoughtful response. Problem is yes the industry and the customers that support said industry practices. "MVP" is a lazy way of saying prototype game anymore when a true finished game is called "complete". I have and always will be against the "MVP" standard but due to most people today buying such it does get t o be a new thing. its not in games only though.... I though mentioned a few alternatives that seem to be actually releasing a feature/non prototype game as a covat to stating where i would support. The game industry itself is fault for current states, as well as customers. Just as there has been practically any innovation in the Grand Strategy Genre(not my words but an actual report by a industry namesake). Yes theres so much you can do with data, but when most are going for graphics and simplification that disallows innovative products to be made but rather "mana point" central.

Dont get me wrong, Victoria 3 could, Could, be a great game. the graphical is to make it look pretty and such.. but actual events/things to do to engage players... IE infrustruture as per op, is only port and railways... Most time you can run this game in background(as i do when im home to do other things) and come back to it still building or whatever you had it doing years later without any engagement for the player. Yes the reverse sway and like was to help with that but ultimately it fails at this time to keep players truely engaged and at the edge of their seat(most games in this genre are suffereing from same thing).

As an industry standard, most games are also rehashing and keeping innovation to miniumal to maximize profits, not a bad thing for those that work for it and own shares, but bad for those that truly dont wanna clone of x y z or a partial clone of one. but with busy lives and how things are mostly at our finger tips(shopping online, news online, etc) people have forgotten that to get great things, there is a wait and even times of no communication between maker and purchaser. yes profit good, but at what cost ulitmately are we as players and the industry paying to make that profit?

[Dave Reckoning]

Originally posted by druebey:

I kinda went on a rant about things and appreciate a educated and thoughtful response.

No problem, rants are good too sometimes.

And I appreciate your thoughtful response too!

[Emelio Lizardo]

Kind of got away from the questions of infrastructure.

[Tree Diagram]

Aren't you supposed to use Urban Centers as a primary source of infrastructure?

[6ap6apblckaAa]

Originally posted by Tree Diagram:

Aren't you supposed to use Urban Centers as a primary source of infrastructure?

Sure, urban centers are the best source because it is free for the budget and even increases profit for the building!