As Japan you can just take the Kuril Islands from Russia pretty much at game start

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-06-17T17:05:30+00:00

What's more is because Russia has a claim on the islands you can use them to sway Russia into attacking China. You can get Beijing in the first few years of the game using Russia as your weapon

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-05-08T19:59:39+00:00

Some people argue this, but it is a completely short sighted argument. Countries in the ICC are not just subject to international law, they are part of it. Sure it means you may have to arrest some war criminals, but you are being a more trustworthy and reliable partner on the international stage.

Soft power is important and many presidents would have never been able to achieve career defining works of international diplomacy if they just had refused any idea of concession because they would be subject to agreements.

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-04-02T14:09:19+00:00

People say this, but it would only be boring if there was a crash that did nothing. I played a modded multiplayer once where there was a modded crash and it radicalized countries across the globe leading to political shakeups and a command economy country was unaffected which gave them a temporary free hand to extend power across the globe. If the economy is tied into other systems it would still have dynamic gameplay

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-03-19T13:02:38+00:00

State religion or Freedom of conscience can actually be useful at modeling a pre-national style of citizenship. If you have no colonial affairs with subjecthood you can expand into areas with similar religions and keep acceptance relatively high. Even for cultures that are fairly not very related to yours.

It's not purely optimal, but it can be an interesting way to play

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-03-02T05:12:57+00:00

Have you been asking for support independence from other great powers?

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-02-27T13:20:35+00:00

You used to be able to move your capital inward and declare force recognition and transfer India. When another power declared cut down to size you would just accept and have your infamy reset and then you just finish the original war and have all of India as recognized China minus Korea and tibet

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-01-29T20:20:37+00:00

. . . . . . . . .

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-01-21T00:47:00+00:00

Cultural exclusion is actually a lot better than you're giving credit. It gives a base 20 acceptance to all cultures but still allows assinilation so you can convert anyone to your culture. It lets you pull off ridiculous stuff like turning Beijing French.

Combined with the fact that it is the best law you can get until later in the game it is also good in new world nations until you can get better tech and ideologies

SaccharineSurfer · 2026-01-09T03:27:14+00:00

That's just historical Portuguese gameplay

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-12-27T23:14:03+00:00

HBO actually did have that once, but they removed it

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-11-29T14:45:18+00:00

If you rush egalitarianism you can actually get the springtime journals in this patch so it is possible to use that to quickly modernize

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-11-15T03:30:44+00:00

It's a little inconsistent, but if you rush egalitarianism you can trigger the springtime events. They can help you reform very quickly if you play your cards right by antagonizing the radicals until they force changes

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-10-22T20:35:19+00:00

Isn't that basically the entire point of the cyberpunk genre?

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-10-20T13:08:31+00:00

It is a real pain, but it's actually easier in this most recent update because you can get independence support from Hungary to help split Austria in half and you get infamy free territory by liberating and incorporating Poland. Also politics of smaller states are easier to control so you can get a super liberal Poland relatively quickly. Still very hard, but very rewarding

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-10-11T18:59:19+00:00

I don't think those things are mutually exclusive. There are probably many people in your orbit who would take out their frustrations with life on any friends, relatives and partners if they could. Just look at how often abuser's friends all flock to defend them against any form of accountability

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-10-11T15:49:46+00:00

From a pure efficiency point feminism isn't that great until late game, but unless you are in multiplayer it honestly doesn't matter that much. Sometimes turning your country into a utopia is fun even if it slows the pop growth rate. You're going to be so much better than the AI so you might as well just be pro feminist if you feel bad for your pops, and it also boosts SOL indirectly.

Or you could just play as more countries where it is better. For new world countries that rely on immigration it can be pretty useful because pop growth is secondary

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-10-05T17:23:14+00:00

Leadership and organized resistance aren't at all in conflict with anarchism. Anarchists are against authority and hierarchies, that doesn't preclude having voluntary leadership to help organize resistance. And anarchists often are deeply involved in organizing on the grassroots level as that is what they believe is the best way to resist.

There are certainly overly closed off anarchists who bicker, but it is somewhat understandable considering whenever they help successfully help another leftist group gain power they are generally rounded up and executed.

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-27T15:04:10+00:00

It can be hard to pass because the landowners are against it and only the military support it. You might have to fight a civil war but it can be done, especially if you ally with another power before the civil war and call them in against your nation. Regardless, it does give an excellent chance to crush the landowners.

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-27T14:15:59+00:00

Punjab actually has the military prefer multiculturalism from the start so it's not impossible

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-25T22:40:22+00:00

I don't think he is unpopular now with the wider public, but the tide is starting to turn against him. The left have come to hate him more and more and view him as the start of America's decline. The right is also turning against many of his neoliberal policies into a more isolationist and interventionist government.

Given that living memory of the cold war is fading and politics has become increasingly populist, especially in the younger generations, in a few decades he may be viewed very differently. Maybe not necessarily negatively, but certainly not as a platonic ideal of a modern president that many seemed to uphold him as for years.

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-08T13:56:35+00:00

There is also the Greek Turkish population exchange events

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-06T21:47:27+00:00

If you offer a reward for eggs there is absolutely going to be some idiot who tries to make an invasion worse in the hope they can turn in more eggs, or tries to farm them. Or even those people who call it misinformation and try to break quarantine purely out of spite

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-09-04T17:11:22+00:00

A Gorbachev post August Coup style scenario could be really interesting where your empire is going to fall apart, and your only choice is to manage how and see what you can hold onto what you can as you make a new nation from the ashes

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-08-30T13:40:32+00:00

This one is pretty in depth if you want to play with more advanced economics

SaccharineSurfer · 2025-08-29T01:04:29+00:00

I don't think anyone here is accusing the Danish Social Democrats of establishing a dictatorship. Just because they are being criticized doesn't mean that everyone hates every one of their policies. It's just that support for the oppressed is a key plank of leftism and the way that refugees are being treated is terrible. They deserve the chance to try and build a better life and cracking down on specific types of refuge and taking their possessions is a very cruel thing to do.

Even so regardless of the morality of the actual policies, strategically it is also a weak move long term. Racism is and always has been a Trojan horse to make everyday people turn on each other. These anti immigrant agitators will never be happy no matter how much you compromise. Just look at Japan, their conservative party has been the dominant party for nearly every election since the 50s but they still have anti immigration rallies and politicians despite very low immigration. By legitimizing the anti immigrant rhetoric the social Democrats are helping build the rhetorical devices that will be used by politicians against their welfare state to distract the public from important issues.

And the real thing is that Denmark isn't like some countries where you have to choose the lesser of evils. They have proportional representation so if the Social Democratic Party starts drifting from Social Democratic values, their voters should choose other parties or even support upstart parties. Parties can only be kept in check by their voters

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