Victoria 3’s post-launch support marches on, bringing notable changes to the grand strategy game’s military system and more in patch 1.5, whose release date has been locked down to today, November 14.
Victoria 3’s update 1.5 patch notes are extensive, which is no surprise given how Paradox describes it as the “biggest free update Victoria 3 has ever received”. Aside from its military system, which has been the reason behind many past player complaints, local economies are also getting fleshed out, while many other areas of the game will see improvements, as detailed in the patch notes below.
Victoria 3 Patch 1.5 Release Date and Patch Notes
To reiterate, Victoria 3’s 1.5 update has locked down its release date to November 14, 2023. All its changes should make their way into the grand strategy game at some point today.
- Victoria 3 update 1.5 release date: November 14, 2023
Features such as military formations and various mobilization options grant players more control over armies and navies.
Generals on a Front advance independently, while multiple simultaneous battles can take place on a single Front. Detailed battle dioramas offer a clearer view of where troops clash.
Below, you’ll find the major features introduced in Victoria 3’s update 1.5, as per its full patch notes shared in a recent developer diary.
- Military Formations: Armies and Fleets can now be created and disbanded. You assign both commanders and units of specific types to them. All military configuration and control like unit hiring, upgrading and disbanding (including Conscription battalions) is now done through Military Formations, rather than through buildings (like barracks) and individual commanders. Disbanding units recognizes keyboard modifiers (shift/ctrl); note the tooltip is not updated to reflect this yet.
- Military Formations have an Organization score, which impacts Recovery Rate, Offense/Defense, and Morale Gain, and a Supply score which impacts Morale recovery. Also we added icons and colors for the customization of a Military Formation's visual identity.
- Mobilization Options: A tab available on Army formations lets you configure how much extra goods you want your armies to consume when mobilized, with benefits provided to all units in the formation at a goods cost per unit.
- Travel Network: Created a travel network based on state hubs and ocean nodes. Added functionality for 3D models to move over the travel network for formations. Added graphical arrows for formation travel. Military Formations will update their travel path costs/speed if connections on their route change. When a Formation fails to find a Travel Network path, it will now notify and station Formation at the closest accessible HQ/Sea Node.
- Frontline and Battle Graphics: Rather than a single battle diorama across the front when a battle is happening, you can now see your own and enemy armies spread out across the frontline at all times. Detailed battle dioramas will spawn when battles break out in a state. Units will wear uniforms indicating which country they belong to and will be wielding weapons and other accessories (artillery, horses, etc) suitable for their type. Mobilization Options such as air surveillance can also have a strong visual impact.
- Multiple Simultaneous Battles: Generals on a Front now each advances independently of the others and can start multiple simultaneous battles on a Front, one per state, deeper and deeper into the state as occupation is gained
- Shared fronts and State-based Battles: Fronts adjacent to two or more allies in the same war will now be contiguous, preventing the proliferation of fronts that could result in unmanageable gameplay. Furthermore, fronts now only move when a sufficient number of battles have been won to completely occupy an entire state, making front movement a lot more predictable.
- Companies: Each country now has a number of company slots which increases from technology and laws. A company has a number of associated building types, and improves the throughput and construction speed of those building types in its country. If a company's buildings have high productivity compared to the global average, the company will gain Prosperity over time and unlock a special bonus modifier. There are a number of basic companies that are available to all countries which can construct their associated building types, and about 100 special flavored (mostly historical) companies which are generally upgraded variants of basic companies and may be available due to factors such as culture or which states you own. A small number of countries start with a predefined historic company at game start.
- Local Prices: The degree to which the Market can influence the price on goods in a State is now capped by the Market Access Price Impact modifier. This means that local production and consumption will now always matter when determining the price of a good in a state, creating the opportunity for local synergies and supply chains.
- Unincorporated States have -10% state access price impact.
- Reverse Sways: It is now possible for a participant in a diplomatic play to offer support to either side in exchange for a desired sway
- Trade States: Implemented 'Trade States' diplomatic action that allows a country to either give away a state, request a state from another country, or offer to trade one state for another state
- Alert Settings: You can now customize which Alert types should appear inside / outside the Important Actions ball. Added a message settings tab for Alerts and Important Actions in the Message Settings window.
- Pollution: now has mechanical effects and is fully exposed in State and Building panels: high pollution now gives a malus to mortality, standard of living and migration attraction. This malus can be counteracted by the health insurance institution. Also added a map mode for pollution.
- Unit Experience: Added experience gain and veterancy levels to units. Experience is gained over time, more during battles and lost when reinforcing after taking losses.
- Commander orders: You can now always adjust Commander Orders to whatever you like at any time. If they cannot switch to it immediately (because they're in battle) they will do so at the earliest opportunity. Orders have been streamlined and indicate how the Commander should behave now, which is detached from any sort of target location. Several new Orders have been added as well, most of them unlocked by having specific Commander Traits and Military Formation composition. The default General Order has been changed to Advance, in order to make Armies at a Front active instead of passive by default.
- Naval Invasion Planner / Panel: New interfaces and mechanics for improved control and insight into your naval invasions. The Stand By and Naval Invasion commander orders have been removed. You now start Naval Invasions via Military Lens or Formations.
- Implemented a feature where each time an Admiral loses a battle, he's marked as defeated. When a fleet is composed of only defeated admirals, it's forced to return to its home HQ. Once reaching the HQ all defeated flags are cleared.
- Fleets now have a Presence in a Sea Node which affects the effectiveness of Admiral Orders in that Sea Node. Presence is reset whenever a Fleet moves.
- Naval Orders in a Sea Node are now visualized on an emblem surrounding the node
- Fleets and ongoing wars are now listed in Sea Region Panel
- Animations for both Army and Fleet Battle dioramas have been added to indicate Defeat and Victory
- Added an Impose Law on Subject feature with interface for overlords to force their subjects to change laws
- The "Start Diplomatic Play" interaction has been changed into "Make Diplomatic Demand". This allows one country to demand a single war goal from another, which if rejected will start a diplomatic play for that wargoal. It is possible to bypass the demand phase and start a diplomatic play right away (useful if you want to make multiple demands for example).
- Services, Electricity and Transportation are now local goods whose prices are fully set based on local production and consumption and whose market price plays no role at all
- Added new Frontier Colonization Law
- Units can be upgraded over time to the currently selected Default Unit Type for their group (infantry, artillery, cavalry) by pressing the according button.
- Barracks and Conscription Centers PMs that dealt with unit types have been removed for the most part. A new Training category has been added instead.
- Added a commander right-click option to quickly split a single commander into their own formation, bringing a fraction and composition of units commensurate with their command limit when compared to the overall command limit of the formation as a whole
- Added a bi-directional transfer popup to exchange units and commanders between Military Formations
- Armies can now be demobilized during wars, leading to them returning to the closest HQ and gradually reducing their mobilization consumption over 3 months
- Pursuit, Panicked Retreat, and Controlled Retreat battle conditions have been added to ensure very lopsided battles end quickly
- Added tutorial lessons for establishing a Company and creating a Formation
- Replaced Chile with New Granada as Recommended Country for the "Learn the Game" Objective
- Prussia, United States, Mexico, Texas, Russia, Ottomans, Egypt, Austria, Brazil, France, Sikh Empire, Great Britain, British East India Company, and China now start with Historical Formations
- Added new formable countries - the Holy Roman Empire/United States of Europe, United Netherlands, Rio de la Plata, the Confederation of the Rhine, Maghreb, Pakistan, and Turtle Island
- Added a new pop property called Job Satisfaction. Pops will now evaluate their satisfaction with their current job and factor this into their employment decisions.
- Reworked Revolutions to properly support Commanders, Units and Formations to defect to the revolutionary side
- There are now explicit Demands/Plays/Wargoals for increasing or reducing the autonomy of a subject. The autonomy scale for subjects goes Protectorate -> Dominion -> Puppet, Tributary -> Vassal, while a Personal Union can be turned into a Puppet/Vassal/Protectorate/Tributary if autonomy is increased/decreased
- Added new Vineyards building and Wine growing potential for states, particularly in Europe and Middle East. Removed Wine production from Farms.
- Added new Explosives Factory building
- Split Arms Industries into two buildings, Artillery Foundry now produces Artillery exclusively
- Radical pops are now more drawn to opposition interest groups, and Loyalist pops are more drawn to government interest groups
- Added "Foster National Agitation" character interaction for friendly agitators, allowing nations to use them to stir turmoil in cultural homelands owned by foreign powers
- Production methods can now specify that they require access to particular goods to be able to be activated
- Adjacent states without potential travel connections now get auto-generated 'undeveloped' crossing connections
Victoria 3’s patch 1.5 is available for free to all owners of the base game, launching alongside the premium Colossus of the South DLC as the series celebrates its 20th anniversary.
Keep updated on the latest Gaming News by following GameWatcher on X, checking out our videos on YouTube, or by giving us a like on Facebook.
