[Forum Game] World in Revolution 1861, Sign-up Thread

[JPierreD]

I'll take the French Empire then. Will give some suggestions and opinions later, the economy is being reformed in the other game as well, so no need to keep that old flawed system in here.

[Vellos]

Colonies should add to income, but decrease trade balance.

Colonies create trade deficits, as colonies are usually acquired out of a hope for resources. Citizens travel to colonies, purchasing goods there (implicit imports by travel). Furthermore, extraction-colonies rapidly export far more to the home countries than they import.

While colonies can eventually be export markets for many goods, their main purpose was usually to supply raw materials for domestic industry. European nations had most of their trade in finished goods among each other. They wanted to import cheap raw materials to export goods to each other to acquire bullion.

[vonGenf]

Your map of the 1860s US is a colonialist lie. I want to play Comancheria! 

If you won't allow it I may settle for the Union. It would be a shame not to have players where the starting event occurs.

[Lefanis]

Well, there is a big difference between colonised countries, and countries that were victims of imperialism (there really needs to be a proper word for it, as colony is a mild word.. Perhaps vassal).

The vassal states were exploited in numerous ways. If you take the example of the British Empire for instance, which had no qualms about looting the Indian Subcontinent, and extracting tribute amounting to millions of sterlings. Indian currency was demonetised, and Britain introduced their own currency to suit their needs. That's not to mention the siphoning off of gold, silver and jewels. Oh, and did I mention taxes? Those hovered at 50%. To improve the trade balance, Britain took out a lot of the rural manufacturing industry, forcing the imports of goods, especially textiles from England. In the 1860's the remitance to Britain must have been around 15 million pound sterling per year. As far as the trade situation goes, the British exported Indian goods to other European countries, pocketing the profits. The British couldn't make as much money selling Indian opium in India, so they increased domestic taxes, and sent off the rest to countries who made them earn higher margins.

IIRC, Britain had a favourable balance of trade with India, largely thanks to what it did in the country. So owning a vassal state improved its trade balance, and it's income.

[Indirik]

Can we get started already? I can't to start exploiting the Amazon forest to generate enough wealth to conquer all of South America and turn it into my personal playground.

[Lefanis]

There is also the option of starting all Trade Balances at Zero and saying "have at it from here."

I think this might be the best idea.

It allows the player to decide how he wants to treat the colony, cash cow and region to export stuff to, place to loot for resources, or place to develop as an alternative base of operations.

Of course, you could always begin with the extra state territory as it was treated at that point of time, but this is at the risk of increasing complexity.

[Dante Silverfire]

I think this might be the best idea.

It allows the player to decide how he wants to treat the colony, cash cow and region to export stuff to, place to loot for resources, or place to develop as an alternative base of operations.

Of course, you could always begin with the extra state territory as it was treated at that point of time, but this is at the risk of increasing complexity.

The only problem with this is that it is biased against those nations who would have to depend upon their trade balance to even have a respectable income. For nations like Great Britian, it doesn't matter. For the other ones it makes a big difference. For a nation like Japan or China where their trade balance would be more than their natural income.

[Vellos]

IIRC, Britain had a favourable balance of trade with India, largely thanks to what it did in the country. So owning a vassal state improved its trade balance, and it's income.

According to a report by the British parliament:
www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/SN06191.pdf

Britain's trade balance with India was approximately balanced; slight negative in 1855 and 1870, slight positive 1860, and 1880 to 1910.

Consider, though, for example, the Belgian Congo, or Indoesia, or French Indochina... I would wager all led to negative trade balances with the home country, but potentially rising trade balances with other European countries.

European powers used colonies, as far as trade stats are concerned, in the same way China uses Mongolia and other Central Asian nations: they ran big trade deficits in order to import raw materials that they could export to other more developed markets after major value-added. Of course, they also could export back to colonies (Indian cotton product politics seems like the classic example of this), but that's not the most economically efficient policy, and probably not what most colonies were being used for. I rather doubt Spain was overly concerned with making sure that Cuban sugar-farmers were consuming a large quantity of Spanish manufactured goods. Rather, they were concerned with making sure that Cuban sugar-farmers remained Spanish-controlled so that Spain could have cheaper access to sugar, both for Spanish consumers' use, and for re-export.

[Indirik]

While I'm sure that's all fascinating to ... well ... someone (Yawn) , is it really necessary to have a huge debate on global socio-political economics in order to start playing the game? So what if we're using an export of 5 instead of 7? Come on! I need to start clear-cutting the rainforests!

[Perth]

While I'm sure that's all fascinating to ... well ... someone (Yawn) , is it really necessary to have a huge debate on global socio-political economics in order to start playing the game? So what if we're using an export of 5 instead of 7? Come on! I need to start clear-cutting the rainforests!

Lol, I hear you.


I think we will go with what Vellos suggested. Unless you choose to treat you colony/possession abnormally, it will hurt your trade balance but increase your base income. How much? That will just depend on where/what your colony is and how the RP plays out with what you actually do with that colony.


I still need to write up a few more charts for my own use such as some standardization for the costs of stuff such as investing in industry, building railroads, and of course armies and navies. Once I've done that (hopefully by tonight), we should be able to start!

Although I definitely would like to add another player or two.... anyone reading who hasn't posted want to play? Please! 

I'll take the French Empire then.

Gotcha'

Your map of the 1860s US is a colonialist lie. I want to play Comancheria! 

If you won't allow it I may settle for the Union. It would be a shame not to have players where the starting event occurs.

Mmmmmm...... I would much prefer you play USA or CSA. I think it would prove a lot more fun for both you and everyone else. 

That isn't to say you can't incorporate American Indians into your RP and the storyline of your nation heavily. Hell, turn Lincoln into an Indian-Sympathizer and create sovereign Indian nations out of the American South and West if you defeat the Confederates, etc.

[Vellos]

While I'm sure that's all fascinating to ... well ... someone (Yawn) , is it really necessary to have a huge debate on global socio-political economics in order to start playing the game? So what if we're using an export of 5 instead of 7? Come on! I need to start clear-cutting the rainforests!

What, you mean you don't pore over antidumping legislation and tariff-rate-quota structures in your free time?

Golly, you're missing out.

[Dante Silverfire]

Perth, I would suggest cost scaling of nation stats to be based upon either population or size of the country while keeping costs of military increases or ship builds constant per nation. (Or base them off of the country stats)the reason for this is that it would cost a lot more to raise the infrastructure of a large nation like russia than a small nation like japan or belgium. However, it would cost the same to build a ship anywhere. Although perhpas it is slightly cheaper with improved industry?

[Adriddae]

United Kingdom stats look good, though I can't see any other nation other than Russia to compare it with.


Will players be able to join nations after the game starts?

[Lefanis]

The princely states should be a part of the British empire.  They did pull all the strings there.

[JPierreD]

Ok, as promised, here go some suggestions:

The data right now has some flaws in being too informative in the wrong places, and too little in where should be more.

Population: 29,100,000

It is not important to know the exact population, what is important is to know the approximate population in each region. To know if there are ~8 millions in England, ~15 millions in India and so on (I am giving random values in here). The population vary with the years and the censuses, so we need to know approximate values that reflect the importance of each region. The exact values are unimportant, but what they speak of is.

In the same way, how much the country makes, how stable it is, what's its industry level (though in the other game this number speaks about number of large industries), the level of infrastructure and the amount of soldiers follow the same logic. Perhaps something like this would be more interesting (using the largest Empire, in smaller nations it would be much simpler):

Nation: United Kingdom
Bank: 600
Trade Balance: 50

British Isles
Income: 200
Stability: 10
Population: 10,000,000
Industry: 10
Infrastructure: Level 7
Army: 40,000 Regulars / 0 Conscripts
Navy: 10 Large Ships / 25 Small Ships

Canada
Income: 50
Stability: 8
Population: 2,000,000
Industry: 3
Infrastructure: Level 5
Army: 20,000 Regulars / 0 Conscripts
Navy: 5 Large Ships / 10 Small Ships

South Africa
Income: 25
Stability: 5
Population:1,000,000
Industry: 1
Infrastructure: Level 2
Army: 30,000 Regulars / 0 Conscripts
Navy: 5 Large Ships / 30 Small Ships

India
Income: 175
Stability: 5
Population: 15,000,000
Industry: 0
Infrastructure: Level 3
Army: 100,000 Regulars / 0 Conscripts
Navy: 10 Large Ships / 50 Small Ships

Oceania
Income: 50
Stability: 7
Population: 1,000,000
Industry: 1
Infrastructure: Level 2
Army: 10,000 Regulars / 0 Conscripts
Navy: 5 Large Ships / 10 Small Ships

These are the concrete important values, I'd say, which players will want to manipulate. The income, population, army and navy are concrete variables for the players to measure their relative strengths, while the stability, number of industries (or industry level if you prefer) and infrastructure are abstract and more RP-oriented variables.

A "Trade Balance" would be interesting only if you introduce a system of resources (cotton, cattle, wheat, canned food, etc.), in the same way Paradox's Victoria did (and can even get the values from there), but it will complicate things a lot, giving you loads of work. It will bring an interesting economic warfare into play, but it will mean at least mapping the regions with their local products, as to then determine major effects, like strategical blockades would cause different kinds of economic crisis due to shortage of important raw materials, and economic-motivated conflicts would start. Up to you.