ShadyRecruitment(relations penalties for being caught spying are reduced by 33%).EfficientSpies(increases Spy Offense by 25%).Rumor-Mongering (enables Sabotage Reputation, a Covert Diplomacy option).Privateers(increase Blockade efficiency by 33%).Once this entire package is acquired, your ability to support rebels in enemy territory is boosted by 50%. These ideas focus on skullduggery and other nefarious acts. ReligiousTradition(Yearly Prestige increase of 1.00).Devoutness(Tolerance of the True Faith increased by 1.00).DivineSupremacy(Missionary Strength increased by 3%).ChurchAttendanceDuty(Stability Costs reduced by 25%).MissionarySchools(adds an additional Missionary to your pool). UnumSanctum(permanent Casus Belli against all other religious groups).Once the whole package is acquired, your diplomatic relations will increase over time by 50%. These ideas focus on the religious development and enrichment of your nation. FormalizedOfficerCorps(add +1 to your available upkeep-free leaders).Optimism (reduce Monthly War Exhaustion by 0.05).OrganizedRecruiting(reduce unit Recruitment time by 10%).KnowledgeTransfer (reduce Army and Navy Tradition falloff by 2%).ScientificRevolution (reduce Technology costs by 5%).Pragmatism(reduce Mercenary costs by 25%).PatronoftheArts (reduce Prestige falloff by 2%).Once the whole package is acquired, Advisor Costs are reduced by 25%. Plus, even though BL-Logic did eventually manage to produce a game set in the era-2020's Terminal Conflict (opens in new tab)-it wasn't well-received.These ideas focus on innovation and forward thinking. Attempting to capture that, to boil it down into a set of gameplay mechanics that still manage to capture something essential about the whole period, has already failed once. A sprawling thornbush of geopolitical rivalries, alliances, military entanglements and proxy wars, built atop an international economic and financial order that made the trade wars of the 19th century seem as straightforward and parseable as a back-alley mugging. The bones of that project, obviously, still feel exciting to me ten years later, but I have to wonder if Paradox is once-bitten, twice-shy at this point. Perhaps the reason is East vs West itself, which eventually disintegrated when everyone involved realised they had no hope in hell of meeting anything even resembling their planned deadlines. I don't mean to suggest the studio would inevitably knock it out of the park-a stroll through the Steam reviews of EU4's more recent DLC or Imperator will tell you it's more than capable of making mistakes-but the Cold War seems like such a fertile ground for Paradox's whole deal that I'm increasingly baffled by its refusal to shoot its shot. And for the life of me, I can't figure out why Paradox still hasn't plugged the yawning gap in its output. It sounds fascinating, right? Tell me that doesn't sound fascinating. And if I can't finagle my way into a situation where Chiang Kai-shek somehow ends up in charge of a communist NATO, I just don't see the point. None of them carry quite the same weird, unpredictable and systems-heavy alt-history charm that the best Paradox games do. And while there are plenty of strategy games out there that situate themselves in the defining conflict of the 20th century- Twilight Struggle (opens in new tab) chief among them-they're all a bit too stiff. The Cold War seems perfectly suited to the studio's blend of war, diplomacy, and espionage. But here we are: CK3 got some kind of horse party DLC (opens in new tab), EU4 continues to sprawl inadvisably, Cities: Skylines 2 (opens in new tab) will continue the first game's proud tradition of letting players accidentally place sewage outlets upstream of the local water supply, and yet the years 1949 to 1991 remain a big blank spot in the modern Paradox library. It makes so little sense that, naif that I am, I've been convinced that Paradox is on the brink of announcing a Cold War game at pretty much every event it's held since East vs West died, including yesterday's.
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