Victoria 3: How to Use Trade to Boost Economies of Scale & Investment Pool in the Midgame

[@generalistgaming]

A quick not that during the 10 min play, part of why the investment pool transfer didn't go up by too much was that we were extracting more wealth from Per Capita Taxation. Also, I feel that I might not have emphasized enough - trading and exporting clothes and tools lets us psuedo specialize a little while longer (as we start to build elsewhere) and try and chase the economies of scale max bonus in 1-2 states. We get more from building a marginal tooling workshop than a glasswork (because economies of scale bonuses have increasing marginal utility), say, so by increasing the price of tools we facilitate chasing that bonus. We are STARTING to build other things. Once we hit the max throughput bonus on tools and clothes, then we can turn and start chasing max throughput in other industries, and hopefully by then we also have the accompanying better techs. A strategy I didn't discuss is importing finished goods that aren't tools and clothes. This might be good, but in general I'd rather not encourage the ai to build finished goods, and I'd rather create the profitable buildings myself and not pay tariffs. It's reasonable to do this w/ countries that you have a trade agreement with. Encouraging the ai to build agriculture is obviously good, but I think encouraging them to build resources (coal/iron, etc) is also good, or at the very least okay.

[@HarryMonn]

lmao the investing bots are here for vicky 3

[@generalistgaming]

You mean to tell me Avi Gilbert is not, in fact, the truth?!

[@mauromontero9052]

Hey man, awesome videos. I must have like 2 or 3 thousand hours on vicky 2 but these are still super useful for me for learning the new economy and trade mechanics. Crazy how much improved the simulation is on this one. I'm not really into blobbing/wc/gamey type of stuff so this is the type of content I'm most interested in.

[@MiguelAbd]

Yeah, me too haha. I'll only do conquest in a drive for resources I can't access because the AI won't develop it.

[@generalistgaming]

I'm not really a fan of blobbing either. I like to expand while keeping infamy under 25, and definitively turn a corner (just yoloing to 1,000 infamy) later than what is optimal

[@Presidente_Deliberto]

Your Vic 3 guides are amazing.

[@generalistgaming]

Glad you like them!

[@miguelmartins2232]

Great video! Finally someone who knows what he's talking about. I was having some difficulty finding someone who explains this stuff as well as you know do with clarity and precision even regarding the economic theories that underpin this great game. I would love to watch you making a video on how to build a command economy instead of a laissez-fairre one. The problem with the latter is that makes you geopoliticallly more vulnerable to other powers regarding diplomatic plays because of your dependence on foreign markets - I know you can make them dependent on you and that's really point in this type of gameplay, the goal being making them hurt more than you when you, and them, close the tap, so to speak, but I'd like to see how to circumvent that dependence and really play as domineering power

[@generalistgaming]

I need to look into how bad the malus is on Command Economy based on GDP size, but my understanding at this point (which isn't all that well informed) is that Command Economy is just bad, beyond the diplo malus. If the malus scales the same as the IPT malus, then by the time you can go Command Economy it ought to be terrible. Maybe I'll go back to the Poland-Lithuania run and take a closer look though.

[@miguelmartins2232]

@@generalistgaming yeah well, at least at they made Laissez-Farre really good. Beyond a certain point, your economy just starts playing by itself. You just have to give it some little nodges now and then and, like you say, keep construction growing. Maybe we'll get a good command economy next patch. Like they say: thesis, antithesis...

[@shangxi4252]

Thanks for the rundown, played about 300 hours of V3 still very clueless always had trouble managing the balance sheet! watched the entire 1 hour amazing stuff keep it up

[@generalistgaming]

Glad you enjoyed!

[@jamesoconnor8985]

Hello, I have to say your videos have been very well made and informative. I have found a lot of Victoria 3 content elsewhere to be frustrating to watch but I really enjoy watching these videos.

[@generalistgaming]

Glad you like them/they are helpful!

[@christopherharms9273]

Totally zoned out and was told to take a walk. 5 out of 5 would watch again.

[@generalistgaming]

Truly, where the true value of the video is is in the "take a walk" portion

[@omercagatayduman3924]

mate your vic3 guides are just awesome. thx

[@generalistgaming]

Glad you like them!

[@nathanoleson3344]

Great video, i like to keep taxes high early game and turn on emergency assistance in a region or two and run a deficit. High/med-high taxes takes from the aristocrats balance and clout, deficit returns the funds to the share holders which is mostly capitalists. Emergency assistance also reduces aristocrat clout and helps with loyalists and legitimacy.

[@fred5763]

Would you consider adding video chapters, for better navigating through these tutorials? I think there might even be an auto-generated version (based on how some odd chapter choices in videos I've seen elsewhere lol) Either way, very helpful thanks

[@generalistgaming]

Thank you! I looked into this before, but couldn't quite figure it out. I'll take another look into it.

[@taludas]

I really enjoy your Vic3 videos, you have excellent knowledge, and a very good voice and attitude to transfer your ideas to the viewer! Will definitely have a look into your other tutorials#

[@generalistgaming]

Glad you like them!

[@iltizioerrante7239]

Honestly i think this guy would be more competent than the Italian government in managing the budget

[@generalistgaming]

I have to imagine that the language barrier would present significant difficulties to such an undertaking.

[@Sleepytime_Gaming]

I was playing alongside, as you mentioned each criterion I was like 'Damn, that's me' lol

[@69Airmax]

5000iq plays 🤯

[@tenaciousdfan9]

This has been the most helpful video ive seen on Victoria 3, thanks!

[@generalistgaming]

Glad it was helpful!

[@somesome23231]

Very underrated tutorials. Man, make a playlist please.

[@generalistgaming]

I think this is a part of a playlist, although the organization isn't stellar. Glad you like the vids though!

[@MiguelAbd]

Very interesting position! I hadn't thought about how to influence the AI to build more relevant buildings. My AI will absolutely turn my country into a huge arts academy if I let them, not to talk about how they won't care about expanding existing buildings early on.

[@generalistgaming]

You can try to import art, but yeah, they spam a lot of art, esp if your economy is more stratified. I def like this change though, as it does make the art techs kinda good, since they give you better ownership for the buildings.

[@MiguelAbd]

@@generalistgaming Agreed! No complaint from me, it gives some real personality to your population to see how the rich would rather satisfy their needs than the country's.

[@Kirithキリス]

Random thanks: I've never heard anyone on YT ever explain about "Don't Show Videos from this Guy"! So helpful! I'm not doing that to you, I subbed, but Very Useful Tip! Came here for mega-meaty Vicky3 tutorial, got that PLUS a surprise top-notch dessert!

[@generalistgaming]

I very much wish I'd learned that earlier - there are a few creators I don't like in spaces I like, and I really got tired of seeing their content recommended.

[@Kirithキリス]

Oh! Forgot to mention in the first comment. It's chemical plant as in industry, like factory (e.g.power plant) not as in short for plantation

[@generalistgaming]

Yes! If I made this mistake in the video, it's probably because my brain was on autocomplete mode lol

[@narcommando546]

If you are playing a small nation e.g columbia, should you join a larger market early on (British market for example) or stay in your own smaller one?

[@generalistgaming]

So there's two reasons to join: stable good prices and migration. The first is pretty short, but early getting stable good prices (before you produce a lot yourself) joining a market can help, esp for dyes/silks and letting you focus even more on a single good for economies of scale. But, the benefits of this should dry up as you start to maximize throughput bonuses and have diverse industries. The second is pops. You'll siphon off pops from any country in your market, even if you're in someone else's market, if you have higher SoL (oversimplified), and so if you have pop problems, joining a market that has a lot of pops that you accept is pretty huge for gaining access to more pops.

[@thebillstir]

“Evil millet farm” -generalist gaming 2023

[@12tman12]

Is there a mention on infrastructure, I missed it if so? My issue is to make these mega factories (tools 20+ etc.) is the infrastructure. Need a best way to expand that. Just railroads, tons of ports? Or as it's an older video it's all changed now.

[@generalistgaming]

It's railroads, yeah, but also you care a lot more about MAPI now and don't push throughput like you used to

[@12tman12]

Thanks. Yeah I was keeping construction low tech to pull in more peasants, but can't do it tall in one state as you run out of infrastructure. After switching to iron-steel earlier, I could get two states with good throughput long enough to reach railroad. Now my problem is the population desire to revert one of my hard fought laws I got in, back to a crap one, and when I ignore them I get a civil war from revolution lol. Will look around to see if you've got a video for politics. Thanks for the videos!

[@lastfirst5863]

I think I remember seeing on the market map mode when selecting a good that even though the price was high in 99% of my nation, it was only slightly expensive in the state producing it. That makes me thing resources are prioritized first for the state they’re made in, then they go to the market for nationwide use and export. I’ll confirm if that’s the case when I get home, if true I may be able to better protect my essential industries from shortages.

[@generalistgaming]

My guess would be that this is a market access thing maybe, but let me know if you notice something different!

[@lastfirst5863]

I tested it, I didn’t see any change but I think there should be a bonus to local production chains, what’s odd is I noticed sometimes the price is way lower in a province for a certain good only now I don’t have any explanation for it lol.

[@generalistgaming]

@@lastfirst5863 weird. I know early on I tried to build Iron oriented industries where the mines were and noticed no difference in having vertical integration in a province. But I haven't looked at at all recently (or seen anything in a dev diary for it). I know it will make a difference if you lose market access though (so having furniture where you have logging is sliiiightly better in event of market disruption, for example).

[@lastfirst5863]

@@generalistgaming Yeah, weird choice from the devs not to include that mechanic in what’s supposed to be a sequel. Not happy with a lot of their choices to be frank, but I’m hoping for major improvement as I’m really enjoying the game for the most part. I really don’t want this to be another Imperator Rome, the decrease in quality from PDX as of late concerns me.

[@generalistgaming]

@@lastfirst5863 weird. I'll keep an eye on this I guess

[@LtKim]

When a student is ready, a sage will appear. Do you have background in education/academia? We are learning a lot from your videos here in Pyongyang.

[@generalistgaming]

Glad to hear it! I taught chess to kids in afterschool programs for a bit. Also I got started on YT on a different channel summarizing/explaining books and philosophy. I have a philosophy degree.

[@apacslol]

If i focus on university innovation cap and government building to get higher taxation caps Then it makes the paper cheaper and Then tehy build a lot of art buildings. By your stand point: if we have a good productivity economy tehy will not focused to invest art buildings, instead tehy will build manufacturing. This is awesome!

[@jrad4372]

Found this useful, Thanks.

[@boxicool]

What about game rules with disabled autonomus poll investment?

[@generalistgaming]

The strategy is still roughly the same - you still avoid agriculture early on because you want capitalist owned buildings.

[@furiousfox7712]

this is so helpful thanks a lot!!!

[@generalistgaming]

Glad it was helpful!

[@Kyle_Schaff]

Could you help me understand the green upgrade path for buildings? The ones that decrease the number of laborers needed. Does that eventually make the goods cheaper because it’s removing the cost of labor? Or is it worth keeping as many pops as I can employed for other reasons? Should I have a certain amount of education built up before kicking them out of menial jobs? Thanks

[@generalistgaming]

I'm gonna take a closer look at these PMs as part of a spreadsheet deep dive. The short answer is that you should slowly swap over to them, esp as SoL is rising, but not all at once. Except the oil ones aren't very good. The RR ones/ steam donkeys is probably the more efficient ones. Notably swapping on the RR ones can decrease subsidies (but only if the RRs that are being subbed aren't profitable, I beleive)

[@Kyle_Schaff]

@@generalistgaming I look forward to it. Your guides are incredibly helpful. If you stick with them, you’re setting yourself up to be the go-to Vic 3 guy once this game gets more content and is played more

[@loosegoose9624]

Do you think it's worth going Mercantilism or Protectionism instead of free trade in order to further your supply/demand strategy? For example using 'protect domestic supply' on all agricultural goods to discourage exports, simultaneously using 'encourage exports' on all manufactured or capitalist owned goods to help those industries go. The goal would be to actually minimize tariff revenue, but tightly control which goods are imported and which are exported. Or do you think the other benefits of free trade outweigh this method of influencing the private construction queue?

[@generalistgaming]

I think the benefits of free trade outweigh this, yeah. Since you're actively producing a lot of the industry stuff, it's unlikely another market will have it cheaper and will be able to export to you. Vice versa for agriculture (though this is the spot where it will begin to happen as the game goes on, esp after you turn up agriculture a bit following pumpjacks/publically traded).

[@Geometrys]

Very good guides and seems niche at the moment too

[@generalistgaming]

Yeah, a bit hard to find content for V3 atm. Thank you!

[@uiytresen346]

Played deficit spending in qing. All the cash went to aristocrats and i don't seem to recover it. Ow

[@connorsterrett]

Why do you prefer clothes instead of furniture again? It seems that the inputs for furniture have the same inputs as construction generally so you're going to have a nice cycle of goods going into finished products and gearing up for the next jump in construction methods. With clothes you are using goods controlled by aristocratic/shop owner ownership and therefore driving up the cost of those goods through making clothes seems counterproductive. I'm sure you've mentioned it in your videos somewhere (maybe in this video even).

[@justin-michaelemmanuel8770]

Awsome video! Your Vicky 3 vids are super helpful. I wasnt able to find this information anywhere in the comments already, but what nations would you reccomend people play who are beginners to this kind of strategy that you are describing? In another video you mentioned Japan is good to focus on your internal market, but do you have any other recommendations?

[@generalistgaming]

I mention this in my latest tutorial vid (which has come out since this comment) but I think that Russia might be my top recommendation. Super huge room for growth. A lot of laws to pass to get a feel for that portion of the game (not like France/UK which start out in a pretty good place law wise).

[@milesrout]

It feels like my economy just gets stuck lategame because I run out of population or building slots for raw resources, even with all the labour-saving technologies. I can't just import them because the AI is so slow to import natural resources. What's the solution to this?

[@generalistgaming]

Starting out as a smaller country generally has a better playthrough experience on this front, since it's like starting a little behind. Importing from pretty early in the game from them also encourages their auto construction queue to build that from earlier in the game, so doing a lot of imports before your shortages can also help. Also, being strategic with expansion to make sure you get a bunch of resources throughout the game. Zululand into Transvaal/Oranje and Borneo are both soft and have a lot of resources and won't give you a lot of infamy. Beijing and Shanxi are also good to take (if you can't get China into your market) for getting pops. Beijing gives you the unique building of The Forbidden City, and Shanxi has the most resources in the game (on top of both having a TON of pop). If you fight Russia, releasing Perm and eventually annexing it can be very good for resources as well.

[@Unfluffykitty]

When would be a good time to start focusing on building universities and admin (more for institutions) and in high pop, low lit countries what institutions are actually worth it early on? Or mid game I guess since it seems like your your literacy is low even in the 60s

[@generalistgaming]

I don't really have a good heuristic developed for this. Unis benefit a lot from economies of scale (since a majority of their cost is in the labor, not the paper), so generally I just build enough to get the journal event for extra tech progress, and then maybe around 350-500 construction I just build a single uni up to lvl 51? Still kinda developing the timing strategy for it. Re institutions, I think if you have high pop colonization is insane, since it's based on pop. If you have low pop then I think Guaranteed Liberties is really good for making sure you're getting IG bonuses from loyalists. Police force is good if you're conquering states you're going to be incorporating (in 5 yrs or less). I think welfare is bad when SoL is low. Public/private education is kinda always good - if you're a high pop country with a lot of peasants generally public education will be better. If you have higher SoL private will be better. I might make a video on this now actually.

[@generalistgaming]

I made a video on this, it will come out at 4pm PST

[@ruukinen]

@@generalistgaming Education increases minimum standard of living and doesn't benefit you in anyway except increasing qualifications. I guess it makes a larger percentage of the population politically active as well but whether or not that is a benefit is up to you. You can have a highly industrialized economy with a very bad literacy rate since universities give qualifications.

[@generalistgaming]

@@ruukinen education gives you literacy, which in turn gives you more max research speed, which is more efficient (and targeted, and can go ahead of the ai) than natural spread.

[@ruukinen]

@@generalistgaming Fair enough.

[@apacslol]

Im Only halfway of your video but i sure if you lower the demanded resources prices of the goods the it will be very very profitable 🎉🎉. Sometimes u shouldnot even start your own trade routes cause the producer goods that cheap that the AI will trade with you anyway. Its easy to do in early cause the labor wage is low as well and thats the Only way to make resources very cheap like - 20-30 % green prices.

[@pbobaggins6904]

holy construction by 1862

[@generalistgaming]

Victoria 3 players want one thing

[@ChristianDall-p2j]

It isent JUST the cash reserves in the buildings that determine YOUR debt ceiling, its also YOUR GDP as a base value and then YOUR bindings cash reserves gets added on top of that. Uh, yheah.😅

[@aurelien6966]

Hi, Great content, but maybe the format is not the best...? I'm learning a million things and glad for it, but I think it would be easier if your video was much shorter (10-15min tutorial), with mostly the keypoints and only basic reasoning, and chapters on the video too, for easier reference later (cuz here I'm not gonna watch another hour to look for the specific minute I wanted) :-) Your knowledge sharing needs a better vector !! ;-) Keep it up 👍👍

[@generalistgaming]

Thank you for the feedback! I've started to include chapters. I'm not sure yet about trying to make the video shorter - editing a lot will decrease my output by quite a lot, and a lot of people say they prefer the unedited stuff. I'll probably start doing edits on tutorials, but not gameplays