New rules rolled and active from this episode (since I never remembered to read them out while recording (note that the first user nominated rules are active from next episode due to the recording timeline) The Wolves of Wall Street - We must seize the Mass media and corporate CPs in the USA long enough to successfully siphon at least 1,000 of spoils profits out of the country Only what we can patent - All engineering slots must be funded at all time (and from E3 this is changed to a majority of research pips must always be in engineering) The "free" power conspiracy - These fusion power concepts sound great on paper, but the Board is concerned that moving away from power sources with easily monopolised fuel sources may damage profits - as such, space research must focus on powerplants that do rely on more expensive, rarer fuel - chemical rockets, nuclear fission, and antimatter. Protecting our investment - The rush to orbit has left us over-leveraged in chemical rocket investments. To exit those positions, we need to pump the stock. Win a space engagement of some sort using a rocket powered warship - that way we can exploit the marketing hype to offload to investors
The shareholders are concerned about the lack of dividends - we suggest at least 20% spoils in all countries at all times to get that profit margin up.
let the alien lifeform live that could be new source of profits and unknown oportunities especially on enemy teritory, bdw will you continue with rouge trader?
The colonization of Mars is great and all, but the shareholders believe that mining the asteroid belt will be cheaper, as we don’t have to worry about a gravity well dragging rockets down.
I'm guessing Roman isn't actually opposed to Mallory smuggling, he's opposed to her amateur smuggling efforts. A seasoned crime boss would of course be well-versed in making his efforts look as clean and above board as possible to lower suspicion, while miss mogul is all excited about doing the cloak-and-dagger thing. EDIT: w/r/t the USA, depoil it. Finish the job the Initiative's predecessors started and ravage the New World to build up the Old!
Quote of this episode for me: "The only thing standing between the USA and alien domination or surrender to the aliens of the entire world are the corporations and mass media controlled by the self interested corporate oligarchy" (22:00)
"The kingpin previously characterized as a bloodthirsty thug finds his conscience because of something the tech mogul does" is a great subplot for that theoretical action movie. Something the thug tells our hero as he's bleeding out as a last redemptive act. It's definitely weird that he's annoyed about "mere" smuggling, but if it's something where he draws a moral line -- krokodil, human trafficking, or something more esoteric -- that would work.
Humanity First has pretty realistic AI in this run. They do just as every militarists do: beeline for the biggest and shiniest boomstick no matter can their economy support it or not.
Be glad he did not imideatly get killed by hydra, like the one time i decided to try it without councelor protect mission at 70% and got crit failure XD.
no more borders no more borders or wait. Are we just reunifying and expanding the Roman Empire?? WAIT we have a guy named Roman! lets give him a new empire.
As a rule, How about: Fulfill Corporate Shareholder Obligations: All countries that you have executive control of must have their Spoils priority Satisfied.
My rule suggestion was probably too late, but: "I'm looking forward to seeing the events I made for this show up in your playthrough! On that note, I propose the rule: Maximize quarterly shareholder value - you must choose the maximum cash income from events when such an option is present." Although it seems like at least one is triggering incorrectly if Roman is complaining about corruption...
Restored Warsaw Pact would best complement Greater India. India is the future superpower with max research; you need the mission control and decent military of the Eurasian Union
Initiative Perun going "are you dumb? you don't have the economy to support this!" at every other research choice made by AI is so perfectly in character.
I'd vote for a big pan Asian combine, but it's up to you! small argument against going for the US of A. you will never want to assimilate nearby nations like Canada through tech because it ~would destroy your militech value~ (edit: user @Minarchist may have disproved that, although I admit I still have doubts given how fast the game's been evolving).with Asia you'll always be able to absorb more stuff
A good thematic house rule would be to have spoils on in every country. I'll leave the percentage up to someone else, but the Initiative is all about making money, and it's silly to think they wouldn't be taking some off the top for themselves to buy another yacht.
I agree, but to a lesser extent. In the aim of "don't shit where you eat" I'd rather see: put on some spoils in every country, unless you own all CP in said country.
When you're looking at where to abandon, why don't you use the Country view? It gives you a convenient list of all your CP holdings. (For anyone watching who might not have used this, it's the flag on the top bar)
I think a Greater India - Eurasian Union alliance would be fun to watch and pretty unique; China and USA show up all the time, and avoiding building up a power center in there feels like a more interesting run. Unrelatedly: the volume on the councilor speech felt really high and often drowned you out whenever you selected one and they did their bark. Maybe you can fiddle with that.
@PerunGamingAU Im guessing a full democracy can be justified for an oligarchy if you replace the political parties with corporations. Like you can vote for Microsoft or Inbev to run the government in coalition with Nestle. It's like America without the bells and whistles!
Would it be worth getting rid of the US Navy instead of the armies? That way they're still a drag on the economy but can't get anywhere to be a threat to Europe and Asia?
I think that in order to appease your shareholders, you must choose the money option at least a couple of times per episode. Even if it's a stupid idea. 🤑🤑🤑
1 interface station early with 3 social research facilities really is worth the boost cost. The 3 pips of extra strength into public opinion efforts is just a huge efficiency improvement in your opinion/control missions. They are the cheapest power usage, which allows 3 per 1 solar collector as well.
Imho you are skipping far too much - I do enjoy the little things in a playthrough - and missing a probe's arrival isn't even a small thing in my book.
I might poll on this. my goal is to be able to do a series without it blowing out to 20 episodes (and TI is a long game) but I'll consider slowing things down.
Kind of think going China or US is a relatively boring move, and we've basically seen both versions. I think it'd be a lot more interesting play through without doing either and using the Russia/India axis instead for something different.
Honestly, my thought for a suggested rule is that any country that you plan on always having should be made to produce more funding. Not spoils, funding, because you are investing in them and funding does represent actual integration of your group into the funding methods of the country.
excited to get into this series. Seen a lot of resistance runs on channels i was more familiar with but they didn't really seem to put the effort (or extensive time commitment) into understanding the game like you have. not sure i'll like this faction but will be cool to see the story from a different faction finally. best of luck with your youtube career!
America option, as a cooperation we must use that which is most reliable and capable to make profit and protect our investment. plus, sunk cost. we have used so much to get into it. might as well use it
Since the U.S. strategy is kind of...boring, I wind up now as a matter of course defanging the U.S. every playthrough. I often go even further and break it up, though I admit that's at least partially because it tickles me to see Cascadia and California as independent countries.
Once again the board has brought forth the motion for the Anti-Anti-Trust laws stating that we can not allow any regulation at all and thus must unify the world into as singular nation as possibe. IE make as many super nations as you can.
From a purely advantage point of view, having the US would make more sense. As you'd have a base of power in each corner of the world. (plus it is OP) But from a thematic point of view, and border-gore point of view, going for China instead seems much nicer.
But didn't Perun already go for the India/China megastate in his Academy playthrough? Now yes he did the North America run in his HF playthrough as well, but having a base of power in multiple parts of the world would be interesting, even if it's not optimal from a CP standpoint. And a cabal of shadowy oligarchs controlling the US does feel like the better solution than letting the alien lovers and defeatists take it over.
@@snelhestarna I dunno. I didn't watch all the playthroughs. :) I just think it fits the theme of going after easy to corrupt / less than democratic countries. I mean, you could argue that a two-party democracy is hardly a democracy at all, but still.
8:15 I do like the Mega Asia idea you have. I was disappointed when you left out parts of Siberia in your last Pan Asian Combine. Getting all of Asia, and maybe Europe added to it would be fun. Turn the New World into a Warlord Dystopia.
I'm loving this playthrough already. it's super cool to see other side objectives. I think the audio is a little tweaked. Hearing some crackles and pops, esp in the second half. And voice is much quieter than the game. Also we jumped 6 months at 5:50, skipping when you pick up Laguna Foundation.
I think the devs have some plans to make disbanding nuclear programs a bit harder. Something like you need to have owned a country for a while and can't just go in, disarm and immediately run away. Would be a good change.
I'd think it'd lead to a giant confrontation between the executive and the military if they tried to suddenly destroy the nation's nuclear deterrent, it should probably require a pretty tough roll to succeed, and if it fails it should result in a coup. It should probably be the same deal for other wild moves like a nuclear first strike, allowing the nation to be annexed by aliens, etc.
Ah yes disarm them one by one with three month cooldown is the way i think they will go with. So you are even more strangled in your CP and planning. It would be cool if the conditions where to peace nations rivals, maybe in a chain of events you need to ansver correctly or have high persuation to make chances 100%. But most of the events are "- 50% smth to your face, take it or pay a decade worth of incomes for a chance to cancel the event".
Very excited to see another playthrough! I would appreciate if you boosted your mic by 15-20%, the game sounds sometimes make it difficult to make out your commentary
I'd vote go for the waterworld achievement (raise sea levels by 3 meters) but last I checked most of the relevant events still don't work and raising the temp enough for sea level to rise passively takes centuries if you don't brake the game in ways that have were mostly patched out after version .96. Initiative is my favorite faction to play so I look forward to seeing more of this playthrough.
There was a story by a Korean Na Min Chae called 'Past life returner' I think it is a relevant story about an alien invasion and a stock broker who stands up against them using his knowledge of the future and then all the worlds wealth to make a better outcome then last time. It was a great story to read as it was translated to english.
Question: are smaller nations still MC efficient? They still reach their cap faster, but now there are huge differences on the total MC cap per region and most of the big ones are on economically strong nations
President Perun, the board would like you to help Taiwain declare independence from China soon. We see it as an important step towards our long-term plan of reunification of those two nations. It's better to start early even if it means a small war might break out...
If you'll ever need a new "interesting" scenario to play this awesome game, I have a suggestion for you: project Exodus, but only using criminal counselors (since by default it's a relatively rare trait, you can pick anyone who can acquire it, and add it asap). No government counsellors (and orgs) allowed, but you can exploit Earth in any way necessary (since it's not your problem in the end). On the day E you take your most decorated kingpin with as much cartel, terrorist and other "interesting" orgs as possible and set out to establish Space Australia in the Alpha Centaury system (or wherever those exodus weirdos want to go in the end).
Initiative Board of Directors: Profits First - The board has seen concerning indications this alien invasion may be taking focus away from quarterly profits. Ensure you keep at least one pip in spoils for every agent or fleet you field. Our yachts won't buy themselves.
Like, 15 minutes in- you kept your American pariah(?) trait tech mogul, whose main disadvantage seems to be that she isn't effective in the USA, on this mission to take a CP? Love your vids, haven't played the game since like the very first Steam release, but bruh... Gonna watch the rest of the video now lol ;p
From an optimization perspective, it's certainly better to go for china- as that can eventually lead into forming an east-asian megablock using those new nation techs later down the line. I feel like an initiative run that doesn't try to take over the world and turn it into a hive world is just not in the spirit of corporate greed. Then again, true Greed is to go for as much as possible. So to truly embody Greed, you'd have to go for both China and the US. And Greed is good!
Hey man, you said on the first episode that this will be your last playtrough on the current state of the game, as "patch 1" is on the horizon. Where did you get that information from? I'm super interested in reading all about it, but I have found no release dates, no up-to-date roadmap, not much of anything, really. So how do you know we're so close to "going out of early access"? Thank you!
The audio quality is a bit on the low end compared to your main channel, I get these are less of a priority but theres some nasty audio crackling at 42:50 if you weren't aware but love the content hope im not harping on anything you're probably very busy take care.
As a profit-oriented faction, I say we must control South Korea as their culture is very profitable to export from, as well as being a beacon of late-stage capitalism
Might be a bit too late, but it could be fun to actively attempt to steal all the other faction's orgs as a house rule. After all, what's a little hostile takeover amongst friends under a planetary siege?
I say yes to the eurasian blob, however as a house rule i say that you have to abandon the USA with the millitary fully intact. After all, several members of the board have great investment in the millitary industrial complex and wouldnt lose billions for something as petty as "the future of humanity"
Love your videos, been using them as a guide to my own play of this game. I do have a problem atm I'm hoping someone might help with: every time I turn a counselor, they immediately get fired. I assumed it means I have a traitor, but investigating all of my own counselors didn't reveal one. Is there some other mechanic causing this? Or am I failing to detect the traitor for some reason?
Honestly the USA feels really on brand for our faction, that said, our councilors excel at less developed areas. Thematically I like the USA, but it will absolutely demand all our control cap for a few years if we control all of it. On the other hand, mechanically it's almost assuredly better to spoil and leave for less green pastures.
Be a modern American oligarch. Seize the US, despoil it, then leave. Also, Warsaw Pact seems like a weak option and one where you're going to start fights with other factions. Try for SE Asia/Indochina?
In the interest of being new, I think defanging the US and working with a power base in Asia is the way forward. Everyone does US and I get why, but I want to see something new.
Defanging America is probably for the best if you don’t plan on staying there or maintaining executive control. I’d posit that the initiative would always have a hand in the pie that is America though and complete control over the nation by corporations isn’t that thematically off considering it’s how nearly every cyberpunk and most sci-fi worlds end up. Your choice but I’d think the shareholders would rather acquire the American military industrial complex rather than build one from scratch somewhere else.
Please try WARNO on the channel. It's a cold war gone hot RTS with deep combined arms battles and a large roster of period correct units and tech. It would be a joy to watch you optimize and analyze it.
I think the EuroAsian strategy might be more worth it as nobody has really invested in China yet, and from the perspektive of profit quota the bilion population in china is a good souce of consumers!
