Victoria 3 How To Increase Influence [Explained]

Victoria 3 features 3 main capacities such as authority, bureaucracy, and influence, all of which combine to run the nation perfectly. Our Victoria 3 How To Increase Influence guide will focus on Influence and go in-depth about it! 

Best Ways To Increase Influence In Victoria 3 

Now, when it comes to increasing your rank, four powers will be able to provide a bonus in your Influence, and these will be the great, major, minor, and insignificant powers. Let’s discuss them in detail. 

Great powers will be able to provide players with an increase of 1000, while major powers will grant a 750 bonus influence, minor powers will increase the player’s overall Influence by 600, and insignificant powers will increase it by 500. Let’s see where the countries stand with these four ranks. 

• Great Britain: great power
• France: great power
• Russia: great power 
• East India Company: Major power 
• Austria: great power 
• Prussia: great power 
• USA: great power
• Spain: major power 
• Netherlands: major power
• Ottoman empire: major power 
• Sweden: minor power
• Belgium: minor power
• Two Sicilies: major power
• Brazil: minor power
• Portugal: minor power
• Dutch East Indies: minor power
• Bavaria: minor power
• Sardinia-piedmont: minor power
• Denmark: minor power
• Bolivia: minor power
• Norway: minor power
• Wurttemberg: minor power
• Saxony: minor power
• Spanish Philippines: minor power 
• Mexico: minor power
• Argentia: minor power
• Hanover: minor power
• Peru: insignificant power
• New Granada: minor power
• Cape Colony: minor power
• Papal States: minor power
• Chile: minor power
• Greece: minor power
• Hesse: insignificant power
• Switzerland: insignificant power
• Cuba: insignificant power
• Paraguay: insignificant power
• Venezuela: insignificant power
• Serbia: insignificant power
• Hudson Bay Company: Insignificant power
• Central America: Insignificant power
• Tuscany: insignificant power
• Hesse-Kassel: insignificant power
• Mecklenburg: insignifcant power 
• Ecuador: insignifcant power
• Grao-para: insignificant power
• Piratini: insignificant power
• Lower Canada: insignificant power
• Holstein: insignificant power
• Upper Canada: Insignificant power
• Luxembourg: insignicant power
• Saxe-Weimar: insignificant power
• Oldenburg: insignificant power
• Moldavia: insignificant power
• Mecklenburg-strelitz: insignificant power
• Modena: insignifcant power
• Wallachia: insignificant power
• Nassau: insignificant power
• New Brunswick: insignificant power
• New South Wales: Insignificant power
• Brunswick: insignificant power
• Parma: insignificant power
• Nova Scotia: insignificant power
• Anhalt: insignificant power
• Texas: insignificant power
• Uruguay: insignificant power
• Columbia District: Insignificant power
• Save-coburg-gotha: Insignificant power
• Lippe: insignificant power
• Schleswig: insignificant power
• Transvaal: insignificant power
• Western Australia: insignificant power
• South Australia: insignificant power
• Van Dieman’s Land: insignificant power
• Lucca: insignificant power
• Ionian Islands: insignificant power
• Montenegro: insignificant power
• Haiti: insignificant power
• Saxe-Meiningen: insignificant power
• Schwarzburg: insignificant power
• Schaumburg-Lippe: insignificant power
• Hohenzollern: insignificant power
• Waldeck: insignificant power
• Oranje: insignificant power
• Bremen: insignificant power
• Frankfurt: insignificant power
• Hamburg: insignificant power
• Lubeck: insignificant power
• Krakow: insignificant power

Technology Tree 

Now, when it comes to further influence increases, there will be the technology tree that can almost instantly boost up your Influence with a certain few branches. All five will fall in the social part of the technology tree. 

Empiricism

Starting with empiricism will essentially entail a viewpoint whereby it will take knowledge from empirical evidence. It will simply focus on knowledge taken from people’s experiences rather than placing its importance on the citizen’s religion or the norms they believe in since it can sometimes be biased. 

Whenever the tree is unlocked and researched upon, it will instantly grant the players an increase in their total Influence by 10%, and depending on the nation that you play, it will further unlock different things. These can be laws like total separation, public schooling, and other technology trees. 

Philosophical Pragmatism

Moving onto philosophical Pragmatism, it will entail the way that the citizens can put forth their philosophical thoughts and the way the nation is then further able to take these thoughts and notions and use them for applications in various ventures. These ventures will include that of society as well as political analysis and can be pretty useful. 

It takes approximately 10 years to research and will cost a certain amount of innovation from the player’s end. When it is researched, it will unlock psychoanalysis which will be the technology tree branch. Researching the tree will increase your total Influence by a total of 10% once again. 

Psychiatry

Moving onto the next part of the tree that will increase your influence, known as Psychiatry. It will be directly related to mental disorders and entail how mental disorders can be studied medically. Upon further studying, these mental disorders can then be properly diagnosed, and further treatment can be provided to citizens who have been inflicted with it. 

It will lead to the unlocking of philosophical Pragmatism once it has been researched, which will take approximately 28 months to research and will cost 7.5k innovation (as of the nation of USA). If players want to further research psychiatry, then they will have their Influence increased by 10%. 

Psychoanalysis 

Next up, we have Psychoanalysis, which will be theories that will entail the mental development of a human being; that will then allow doctors to further discuss and research people’s social behavior and how it impacts them. It can then be further studied to analyze how the population thinks things through. 

Researching psychoanalysis will take a whopping 31 years to research, which is already pretty high, and will further unlock technologies like behaviorism and analytical philosophy and cost 103 innovation points (as of USA). Researching it will grant players a solid 10% increase in their Influence. 

Behaviorism 

Last but not least, the main technology you can exploit will be Behaviorism, which primarily focuses on using the law of effect. Once it has been established properly, it can study behavior and then come forth with a proper model of behavior. Once it has been established, it can be further represented to the public. 

It will take players a total of 71 years to research it, which automatically puts it at risk and will cost 232k innovation. If you do end u researching it, it will require psychoanalysis technology but will increase your Influence by 10%. 

Prestige 

Now, let’s take a look at the prestige discussed. Prestige is typically determined by how your economy can hold compared to other countries and nations, which is further determined by your GDP. Apart from that, it is also decided by your power projection abilities, how your military forces can proceed, and the overall ranking of your nation. 

There are a few ways to increase your prestige, which will directly increase your ranks since both prestige and rank go hand in hand with each other. 

Romanticism 

Starting things off with romanticism will entail a form of an art movement that will be able to celebrate people’s emotions as well as imaginations to a certain extent. When it is put into direct comparison with things like rational thinking, it will be put onto another scale completely. Romanticism will typically includes history, drama, nature, and emotional feelings. 

Researching romanticism will unlock arts, academics, and laws like agrarianism in the economic system. The other thing that it will unlock will be the decree known as the greener grass campaign, as well as leading to realism technology. Researching romanticism will increase your prestige by 5%. 

Realism 

Tied together directly with romanticism, it will be lead through from it and will entail a type of artistic movement that will be able to portray reality properly. It will stay far away from notions like romanticizing everyday topics and blurring them with emotions and rather place its overall focus on realistically thinking through real-life issues. 

Researching the subject will take a total of 28 months. It will unlock realist art, which will be a production method, as well as unlocking the bourgeoisie patronage and the independent artists. It will then further lead into the camera, which will be technology. It will increase the prestige of the nation by 5%. 

Camera

Now, when it comes to the camera, it will be led through realism, as discussed before, and it will be a futuristic chemical process that will be able to “capture reality” and create a painting that is still and held at the moment. 

Researching the camera technology will then further unlock the production method, which will be the photographic art for the art academy. It will then lead to another technology being unlocked which will be the film. It will take 10 years to research and will grant you 5% increased prestige. 

Film 

Leading through from the camera, the film will be a direct part of the camera, in a way where instead of being one single capture, it will capture many photographs, and it will be able to “make the photos move in real-time”, essentially creating a film. 

Researching the film will unlock the production method, which will be the film art for arts academy, and it will then further lead into the mass propaganda technology, and it will take a whopping 31 years to research, all the while increasing your prestige by 5%. 

Organized Sports 

Last but not least, organized sports will be depicted as proper competitions rather than being seen as “child’s play”. They will be displayed as shown were players in a team who can feel at home and can feel like they ultimately belong. 

Researching takes 28 months, and it will require nationalism technology, and it will increase your overall prestige by 10%. 

What Is Influence Used For?

When it comes to the main reasons why Influence exists in the first place, there are quite a few. One of the main reasons that influence is present in a nation is to represent its overall ability to carry out diplomatic activities across its own nation as well as neighboring and far-off nations, whether with them or against them. 

Diplomatic action is also termed to be interactions that are carried out between two nations. These diplomatic actions will include the following: 

• Instant Diplomatic Actions: It is an action that is carried out between two nations, and once it has been activated, the effects impact nations almost instantaneously. There needs to be a certain condition that must be true for both nations for the actions to be activated. 
• Ongoing Diplomatic Actions: This entails a certain type of diplomatic activity that is aimed to be formed so that there is no formality between the initiation and ending. Nations are free to start the pact whenever they want to and are also free to end it whenever they feel like it. 

Alongside diplomatic actions, a diplomatic play will typically be considered a hostile negotiation between two nations. It includes tons of demands and is never friendly between nations. 

The second reason why Influence is to form pacts that will also be termed a diplomatic pact between two nations. They are typically unilateral or bilateral negotiations between two nations, and they will typically require a bit of Influence to maintain the pact. It can include subject relationships or can be broken for one reason or another, which can include relations that go too far and are broken up. 

Diplomatic pacts will essentially be used to form alliances with nations, form subject relations, and maintain trade agreements with other nations through proper contracts and differing trade routes. All in all, Influence will be aimed toward building as many relations with nations as possible. 

Determining Influence 

Now, the main way players can determine their nation’s Influence will be in one way only. The Influence will be determined and calculated with the rank you stand in compared to other nations. 

The rank will be determined further by something that is known as prestige, which is then further compared to other nations. Ranks will be able to determine what kinds of international activities you can carry out in combination with other nations and what kind of respect you have when other nations meet with you. 

Countries will typically be unrecognized at the start and need to climb up the ranking system, which can take quite a while. If your nation’s ranks are on the higher end, then you can immediately get more benefits like gaining increased overall Influence. At the same time, you will also be able to gain more interest, as well as being able to develop better diplomatic plays. 

When it comes to ranks, there are quite a few ranks that will symbolize where a nation/country stands against other nations. 

• Great Power: Starting with great power is known to be one of the most prestigious and powerful nations, and it can have global empires and gain utmost dominancy against nations. They are always in conflicts with other neighboring great power nations and want to overthrow nations who are major powers. 
• Major Power: Now, when it comes to major power, they will also have a certain amount of regional presence, and they will be a global powerhouse as well, while they can’t compare to great power nations who have a global empire in their hands, they can still go into standoffs with minor powers and aim to take them down as fast as possible. 
• Minor Power: As far as minor powers are concerned, they are still known to e on the powerful end. However, they are also considered pawns compared to major and great powers and will be used as buffer nations or puppets. Therefore, the need to establish themselves and ascend further is deemed important. 
• Insignificant Power: These will typically be nations that will not compete with countries that would be considered great or major powers since they are too insignificant (pun intended) to be compared to them. They do not have an amassed influence alone and have not climbed the social ladder enough to secure their place. 
• Unrecognized Regional Power: Nations considered unrecognized regional powers or major unrecognized powers are nations with the *potential* to overthrow other nations like the major and minor. However, the only difference is that they are not recognized and lack the needed place. 
• Unrecognized Power: For completely unrecognized powers, they will not have any kind of standings on their own. They are a nation that is not even considered exploitable by the greater powers like the USA. They must get into diplomatic plays with greater or major powers to climb the social ladder. 

Summary 

And there we have it, the main ways that you can increase your overall Influence! Some other minor ways will be through diplomat traits or the family ties trait, and other capacities like authority, money, and more are also crucial to maintain. And with that, we will wrap up our Victoria 3 How To Increase Influence guide!

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