Victoria Falls: A Post-Collapse American Nation Quest [Down With Victoria!]

Is a close race between All-Round, Just Government, and Hellfire Burns.

Wait, no, Hellfire Burns has a solid lead after you factor for votes with formatting errors.

[X] Plan Protector of the Midwest

[X] Hellfire Burns Vs. The World

DEATH OR GLORY!!

If you're voting for the military option don't vote and call it a "meme vote" especially now that it's probably going to win.

It's like being "ironically racist". People aren't stupid, everyone knows that you're actually voting for it because you want it, fucking own the fact that you want to be plunged into endless war and destruction.

Honestly speaking, I'm actually probably going to quit if it wins because I have no interest in playing the Imperium of Mankind in red, white, and blue. (Like that sounds like a sour grapes thing, and a bit manipulative, but I'm simply not interested in an endless military campaign that's going to inevitably descend into tyranny to support the army in its endless necessary wars because, again, everyone was scared of Getting a Stalin if you could vote on your boss, but this is actually how you get a Stalin! Or a Napoleon, or a Cromwell, or a Marius/Sulla/Julius or Gaius Caesar, or a Mao. This is how it happens.)

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That said, my vote:

[x] Plan All the Economy
[X] Plan All-Round Start

[X] Plan All-Round Start
[X] Plan All the Economy
[X] Plan Bare Necessities

To be honest, Hellfire looks suspiciously like a setup for a chapter in Victoria the book: A seemingly strong power beset by enemies, dysfunction, decay, and internal strife, ready to implode with the help of a few clandestine Victorian operations (with generous support from their good Russian friends...)

Taking into account feedback about how many people wish to see Efficient Bureaucracy and a more powerful navy, I'm willing to draft up another plan, one which adds Efficient Bureaucracy, Well-Preserved, Brown-Water Navy, to the previous Go Big or Go Home. To pay for this, I could add Victorian Sympathizers, Crossed Wires, and an Outbreak.

[ ] Go Bigger
-[ ] The Greatest Sin
-[ ] Disunited Currency
-[ ] Population Boom
-[ ] Victorian Sympathizers
-[ ] Outbreak
-[ ] Crossed Wires
-[ ] Nuke
-[ ] Established
-[ ] Independent Merchants
-[ ] Widespread Vaccinations
-[ ] Efficient Bureaucracy
-[ ] Well-Preserved
-[ ] Brown-Water Navy

My preference is still for the original Go Big or Go Home, as this new edition has a few more issues than I'm happy with.

There's also the option of going a bit more aggressive, perhaps with something like this:

[ ] Go Big or Go Boom
-[ ] Population Boom
-[ ] Victorian Sympathizers
-[ ] The Greatest Sin
-[ ] Import/Export Professionals
-[ ] Outbreak
-[ ] Nuke
-[ ] Established
-[ ] Independent Merchants
-[ ] Widespread Vaccinations
-[ ] Resistance Contacts

Notably, this one removes the Disunited Currency disadvantage, replacing it with Victorian Sympathizers and Import/Export Professionals. In addition, we accept an Outbreak in order to gain Resistance Contacts.

Rivenscryr said:

Taking into account feedback about how many people wish to see Efficient Bureaucracy and a more powerful navy, I'm willing to draft up another plan, one which adds Efficient Bureaucracy, Well-Preserved, Brown-Water Navy, to the previous Go Big or Go Home. To pay for this, I could add Victorian Sympathizers, Crossed Wires, and an Outbreak.

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Crossed Wires and Nuke seems like a dangerous combination.

[X] Hellfire Burns Vs. The World

[X] Plan Go Big or Go Home


We ride or we die with Hellfire Burns.

Ganurath said:

Crossed Wires and Nuke seems like a dangerous combination.

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True. Needed the extra CP if I was going to squeeze in Well-Preserved, though I suppose I could axe that and Crossed Wires, adding Import/Export Professionals instead.

It pains me to say this but if a full power government comes at cost of full blown jingoism then I must denounce it. Down with plan Burn the world! Down with jingoism!

[X] Plan All the Economy
[x] Plan Just the Government
[X] Plan: Manufacture and Tax

Edit: Burn the world appears to be defeated. So less approval vote.

VoidZero said:

It pains me to say this but if a full power government comes at cost of full blown jingoism then I must denounce it. Down with plan Burn the world! Down with jingoism!

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Counterpoint, from the OP:

...they are Nazis-in-all-but-aesthetic (those are literally the grounds on which they object to the comparison, and they apparently find it a serious objection), practice open ethnic cleansing, force all African Americans in their territory into sharecropping, unleash super-plagues that kill millions, slaughter tens of thousands of prisoners of war over roughly a week, nuke Atlanta to put down a riot, force the majority of their population into subsistence farming a la the Khmer Rouge, sell themselves to both China and Russia (primarily Russia) through various means, force the Pacific Northwest into vassalage to a resurgent Japanese Empire, burn dissidents, massacre on prime time television with swords all college professors in their territory to musical accompaniment, force women into third-class citizenry, deport all Hispanics, deliberately regress their technology to the 1930s, run a brutally repressive social regime to make their population self-enforce their own oppression, and sell an unknown number of politically undesirable women into sexual slavery overseas

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Every week we are not on the offensive against Victoria is another week they burn gay kids, sell women into slavery, and let a captive population die of preventable diseases that they don't care enough to cure.

These are people we are choosing not to save, in order to buff our economy.

[X] Plan All the Economy

I will probably end up changing this if Hellfire vs the world is still in the lead when I wake up to whatever has the best chance of beating it. This is a fascinating idea for a quest and I honestly feel hellfire vs the world is asking for it to crash and burn.

Secretariat said:

Counterpoint, from the OP:



Every week we are not on the offensive against Victoria is another week they burn gay kids, sell women into slavery, and let a captive population die of preventable diseases that they don't care enough to cure.

These are people we are choosing not to save, in order to buff our economy.

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So in the name of savings people we are going to cut a bloody path through all the polity between us and Vicky while our own starve?

[X] Go Big or Go Boom
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Victorian Sympathizers
-[X] The Greatest Sin
-[X] Import/Export Professionals
-[X] Outbreak
-[X] Nuke
-[X] Established
-[X] Independent Merchants
-[X] Widespread Vaccinations
-[X] Resistance Contacts
Credit to @Rivenscryr. This is now my most favored plan and I strongly commend it on everyone. The nuke is huge, when we consider that sooner or later, if we do not take it, it will be in the arsenal of a foreign power. This plan manages to take it along with Established and Vaccinations, at the cost of huge health and famine problems early on, foreign sympathizers, and an assassin. These are huge challenges. They may make us bleed. Yet they are challenges that we can and will beat.

Naturally, I am still approval-voting.

[X] Plan All-Round Start
-[X] Independent Merchants
-[X] Established
-[X] Good Security
-[X] Libraries
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Disastrous Start

[X] Plan Entrepot
-[X] Brown Water Navy
-[X] Independent Merchants
-[X] Ear To The Ground
-[X] Libraries
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Import/Export Professionals

[X] Plan Just the Government
-[X] Disastrous Start
-[X] Established
-[X] Efficient Bureaucracy

[X] Plan Bare Necessities
-[X] Libraries
-[X] Independent Merchants

[X] Plan Go Big or Go Home
-[X] The Greatest Sin
-[X] Disunited Currency
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Nuke
-[X] Established
-[X] Independent Merchants
-[X] Widespread Vaccinations

These are my top picks from within the QM's featured options. I'll be looking through the thread for a few more plans to approval-vote for, though. Might put one of my own together if I feel like it's needed. In particular, I would really like to see a plan that has Vaccinations and Established both without taking Disunited Currency. Well, that went much more quickly than expected. See the start of this post for my new first choice.

[X]Securing a better Tommorow V3
-[X]Libraries
-[X]Independant Merchants
-[X]Widespread Vaccinations
-[X]Brown Water Navy
-[X]Foreign-Sourced Equipment
-[X]Population Boom
-[X]Victorian Sympathizers
-[X]Disastrous Start
-[X]Compromised

[X] Plan Shadow of the Bomb, v2
-[X] Established
-[X] Well Preserved
-[X] Nuke
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Disastrous Start
-[X] Hostile Neighborhood

[X] Plan Security, Established, and Economy
-[x] Brown-Water Navy (-2 CP)
-[x] Established (-2 CP)
-[X] Good Security (-1CP)
-[X] Independent Merchants (-2CP)
-[X] Widespread Vaccinations (-3CP)
-[X] The Greatest Sin (3CP)
-[X] Victorian Sympathizers (2CP)
-[x] Population Boom (2 CP)
-[X] Hostile Neighborhood (1CP)
-[x] Libraries (-2 CP)

[X] Grand Theft BOOM
-[X] Ear to the Ground
-[X] Good Security
-[X] Aerial Reconnaissance
-[X] Brown Water Navy
-[X] Established
-[X] Efficient Bureaucracy
-[X] Well-Preserved
-[X] The Greatest Sin
-[X] Victorian Sympathizers
-[X] Import/Export Professionals
-[X] Hostile Neighborhood

Since it is an approval vote, I've tweaked a couple new options into being..

[X] Go Medium-sized Boom
-[X] Population Boom
-[X] Victorian Sympathizers
-[X] Import/Export Professionals
-[X] Established
-[X] Independent Merchants
-[X] Widespread Vaccinations
-[X] Resistance Contacts
Compared to "Go Big or Go Boom," this removes Nuke to buy off the assassin. It retains the Established/Vaccinations combo that will be crucial in fighting off disease. (Even if we didn't buy Outbreak, QM did hint at this earlier.) The medium-sized boom is so named because our collaborative bombings with the Victorian Resistance will need to rely on conventional explosives.

[X]Securing a better Universe
-[X]Universities
-[X]Independant Merchants
-[X]Widespread Vaccinations
-[X]Brown Water Navy
-[X]Foreign-Sourced Equipment
-[X]Population Boom
-[X]Victorian Sympathizers
-[X]Disastrous Start
-[X]Compromised
It's a takeoff of Tomorrow V3 that just replaces Libraries with Universities.

[X] Plan All-Round Start

[X] Plan Entrepot

[X] Plan Just the Government

[X] Plan Bare Necessities

Secretariat said:

These are people we are choosing not to save, in order to buff our economy.

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This thinking right here was a major part in why the Clan Invasion of the Inner Sphere failed. Cookie if you know what I'm talking about.

One of the bonuses that comes with having voted in Burns as the player avatar is Professionals Study Logistics. An important thing about logistics to remember is that it represents, in part, the ability to sustain the strength of one's military with the strength of one's economy. Hellfire Burns is so top heavy that it depends on pillaging to sustain the offensive... against a foe that's so technologically backward that they have next to nothing worthwhile to pillage.

[X] Plan Bare Necessities
-[X] Libraries
-[X] Independent Merchants

Ganurath said:

This thinking right here was a major part in why the Clan Invasion of the Inner Sphere failed. Cookie if you know what I'm talking about.

One of the bonuses that comes with having voted in Burns as the player avatar is Professionals Study Logistics. An important thing about logistics to remember is that it represents, in part, the ability to sustain the strength of one's military with the strength of one's economy. Hellfire Burns is so top heavy that it depends on pillaging to sustain the offensive... against a foe that's so technologically backward that they have next to nothing worthwhile to pillage.

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[IMO, the Clan invasion failed because the Clans lost track of what the Inner Sphere center of gravity was. (Also because exactly two Clans didn't have their head up their collective asses, and also the toxic legacy of Nicky K that led directly to the shitshow at Tukayyid, but that's neither here nor there)]

On that note, my take on Victoria is that its center of gravity is its army and security apparatus. The Victorian state has very little resilience -- my read is hat regime depends on coercion to keep itself going, whereas ours does not. That seems to imply that a series of showy victories against the Victorian army, and thus its ability to coerce compliance out of its population, would provoke a broader collapse.

Secretariat said:

[IMO, the Clan invasion failed because the Clans lost track of what the Inner Sphere center of gravity was. (Also because exactly two Clans didn't have their head up their collective asses, and also the toxic legacy of Nicky K that led directly to the shitshow at Tukayyid, but that's neither here nor there)]

On that note, my take on Victoria is that its center of gravity is its army and security apparatus. The Victorian state has very little resilience -- my read is hat regime depends on coercion to keep itself going, whereas ours does not. That seems to imply that a series of showy victories against the Victorian army, and thus its ability to coerce compliance out of its population, would provoke a broader collapse.

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First, have a cookie.

Second, we'd be no less fragile.

Question to @PoptartProdigy.

Technology has regressed in many parts of the U.S. right? Does this mean many have returned to using black powder in their firearms?

Will we see gunpowder firearms anywhere in quest? Because I decided that if I'll roleplay it's as an owner of a nitrary.

[X] Plan All the Economy
[X] Plan Entrepot
[X]Securing a better Tommorow V3

AKuz said:

Honestly speaking, I'm actually probably going to quit if it wins because I have no interest in playing the Imperium of Mankind in red, white, and blue. (Like that sounds like a sour grapes thing, and a bit manipulative, but I'm simply not interested in an endless military campaign that's going to inevitably descend into tyranny to support the army in its endless necessary wars because, again, everyone was scared of Getting a Stalin if you could vote on your boss, but this is actually how you get a Stalin! Or a Napoleon, or a Cromwell, or a Marius/Sulla/Julius or Gaius Caesar, or a Mao. This is how it happens.)

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Or it could be a military man utilizing the resources suddenly available to him to lock him and Victoria into a suicide pact utterly confident that other Revivalist movements will emerge to exploit the demise of the hated fascists. Because it's an all but objective fact they will- and as someone who is on his 5th go of it Burns would absolutely know this. Obviously there is concern over any overwhelming focus on military, but from what Poptart has said Burns explicitly wants civilian administration. Him pulling a Washington or Cincinattus turned up to 11 is absolutely a possibility.

If we take a step back and look at North America as a whole- Hellfire Burns is a potentially fantastic outcome for Revivalist movements in general unless Victoria miraculously comes out of it stronger, Russia returns all of it's attention to North America, or if Burns wins so hard he turns around to institute the military dictatorship you're afraid of. Win or lose, Burns will have likely utterly gutted and ripped out the heart of Victoria. I find the thought of playing a Head of State utterly willing to lose because he's confident in defeat he can deal a mortal blow and pave the way for his cause fascinating- totally reprehensible in how it readily it potentially discards the well-being of his citizens, but reassuring in that it would be potentially all but guaranteeing a democratic revival in the US. Playing a build not necessarily to win, but to so much as to guarantee the objective evil is destroyed is definitely a novel take on this sort of thing. I'm not even necessarily for it, or convinced it's a great idea- you're absolutely free to dismiss it but I can't consider it an objectively awful idea for a number of reasons.

As for the morality of it and the potential of military oppression- the more advocates like yourself who keep your skin in the game should it win, the more likely we are to wind up with Cincinattus than Cromwell.

[X] Plan Entrepot
[X] Plan Protector of the Midwest
[X] Plan All the Economy

[x] Plan Protector of the Midwest
[x] Plan All the Economy
[x] Plan Entrepot
[x] Securing a better Tommorow V3
[x] Plan Security, Established, and Economy

My reasoning is that I don't want us to devolve into a military with a state. A strong enough military to hurl back the initial invasion yes, but our leader already gives us most of that. I'd rather focus on building up and awing the rest of the old US in joining with us through superior economy and diplomacy. The bare bones plans don't do it for me because we're still going to need some kick to distinguish ourselves from the mass.

[X] Plan Protector of the Midwest