Social Democracy: An Alternate History
Play as the Social Democratic Party of Germany in 1928, and try to stop the NSDAP from taking power. Guide the party through elections and parliamentary politics. Deal with the Great Depression and the spiraling political violence that characterized the late "Weimar Republic".
This is a quality-based narrative game using the DendryNexus engine, which is in turn based on StoryNexus, the engine originally designed for Fallen London.
Originally made for Spring Thing 2024.
Unofficial subreddit: https://reddit.com/r/RedAutumnSPD/
Cover image copyright
This is a collage of 4 images: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bundesarchiv_Bild_102-13624,_Berlin,_Versammlung_der_Republikaner.jpg. CC-BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Arbeiterbew.jpg. Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eiserne_Front_Symbol.svg. CC-BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:LA2-Blitz-0083.jpg Public DomainContent Warnings
References to antisemitism, nazism, period-typical racism, misogyny, and homophobia, obsolete terms for gender/sexual minorities.Download
Development log
- v1.3.2 - Anders als die Andern50 days ago
- v1.3.1 - Dark Mode, bug fixesMay 03, 2025
- v1.3 - Economic Expansion, Cabinet, bugfixes and minor updatesApr 22, 2025
- v1.2.1 - March on Berlin changes, Understanding the EnemyFeb 07, 2025
- v1.2 - Austrian Civil War, Education and Science, Economic GrowthJan 26, 2025
- v1.1.3 - BugfixingDec 21, 2024
Comments
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Does anyone know how to achieve the Popular Front coalition? I've tried everything but anything that makes the Communists happy will upset the Centrists and vice versa, I usually don't have a problem with DvSP/DDP
(Also yes, I've tried the Advisor who's friendly with Centrists, but usually I'm never able to get them both to a level where they'd accept the coalition)
Usually once you get Joos in power for Z, they don't get too upset at you, so just avoid building ties with the KPD until after their conference, in that time you can use Paul Levi as an advisor to grow your party's left, or embed a spy in the comintern.
Make sure to not vote against the Panzerkreuzer A, just abstaining should only cause minor issues with Z.
From what I've Found, good ways to increase approval among the communists is,
1. Embed a spy in the comintern using your foreign relations card, this lets you in on a scandal surrounding Thalmann. Prevent the Leninbund from leaking that scandal when prompted.
2. Use the foreign affairs card to build relations with the USSR for the purpose of goodwill, then ask them about the KPD affair.
By the end, if your KPD relations are good enough, you have a strong enough left faction in the SPD, and you have the scandal info, you should be able to oust Thalmanns faction and get "conciliators" in charge iirc sometime in the 30s.
Obviously do things like let the communists march freely to not antagonize.
How do I get Joos in power for Z early? Usually when that prompt comes around the Centrists aren't happy enough with me
Also, when is the KPD Conference?
For Joos, I believe its to have at least friendly relations to get Joos for free (but sometimes you still have to pay), or warm relations to get him for 1 resource.
It helps to not vote against the cruiser, but make sure to not vote for to keep the KPD happy enough,
Let the Center Party have the chancellor after the reichstag elections,
And try to improve relations at least once
They wont like you if you're using the party relations to improve relations with the KPD, so avoid doing that until after Joos.
For the KPD:
The Wirtorf Affair (Thalmann's whole scandal) is August 1928, so embed a spy in the comintern before then.
The conference where you can get the conciliators in charge is sometime in 1930 I think, i can't remember exactly when, but it won't appear unless:
1. You have asked the soviets about the wirtorf affair
and 2. You have a strong left faction, I think you probably also need at least warm relations but im unsure.
Ah alright
Is there any benefit to having the Popular Front alliance however? I just managed to get it recently (But I didn't oust Thalmann), the Communists gave me some demands that I couldn't complete, is there even any way to avoid or complete them?
Also how do I speak to the Soviets, do I need the foreign relations Cabinet? Actually, what Cabinets & Advisors are the best to stop my economy from falling apart? Every run I did even with nationalization & using advisors who can confront the crisis i still lose the vote to the nazis
Honestly it just seems kinda worse than the Weimar coalition which is easier to get n all, but for Roleplay its kinda fun. If you ignore the commands theyll dissolve the government but usually if I have the coalition im already in a position to win the next elections and recreate it.
Theoretically all of them are possible (But you need to do the left plan for the economy to do it), I haven't every really tried doing them however.
And yea, you need the foreign minister role and you should get a card titled something like "Foreign Affairs"
For the economy, I like to get Woytynsky as an advisor from the Labor camp, and use his option for "Addressing the economic crisis". This gives you the WTB plan which is what I find easiest to do.
The non-factional advisor Baade also can get you this plan, and he's good for doing farm runs (best paired with reforming the judiciary so they dont interrupt your agrarian plans) but thats not necessary.
---
To actually implement the plan you need either the financial or economic ministries, be careful with financial because the Reichsbank chancellor will just oust him right before the crisis.
I think there's a way to stop him because if you investigate the far-right the first thing you get is about far right collusion with the reichsbank but i've never done that before my finance minister is sacked.
"There is a threat to German democracy"
Müller: We should use legislative action to weaken the conservatives
Mierendorff:
I should probably comment to say that this game is great. Lots of good stories to come out of this. Good luck with your Steam release.
i suck at this but i love this
This game is so cool! Uf, I swear if you make a mod for Romania I will not be able to stop playing
You can also play for itlay if you use mod
I’m on easy mode and I can’t win chat am I dumb
No, i spend more than 3 month on easy to understand it. I can help you if you needed
omg I would love that. Thank you sooo much!
Choose maria jucha in the starting and organised women, rally last option, enemy first option don't increase due before 1st election and invest in radio before 1st election you will get 32% of vote and you will able to form weminer collation and ideology last option and improve relationship with center before November it will help you elected josheph joos as centre head of centre party. In jan 1930 choose a labour advisor last one and use it to adopt wtb , if you any other doubt you can ask me.
thank u sm!!!
I agree, you can go for a while without really understanding what to do. if you want help *spoilers ahead* once the economic crisis starts in September 1929 shuffle leadership, go to labor, then choose Wladimir Woytinsky he has some very helpful options
WAIT ALL MY ACHEVMENTS RESET NOOOOOOOOO
No my 100% achievements are ruined for the next hour until i get the new one D;
How to elect Willi Münzenberg as president?
get the conciliators in the KPD politburo,endorse Hindenburg in ‘32,then endorse Münzenberg in ‘34
Yet another cool thing I did that I had to share, 66% SPD support in the reichstag. new record for vanilla I'm pretty sure
Without mod? How to do this
I've definitely got more before and I think some other people have as well. Most of it is knowing the optimum strategy, and having insane luck in getting exactly the cards you need at exactly the right time and having your advisors be available at the right time etc.
yeah that pretty much it, i couldnt get any better without redux or sandbox my strategy was to keep dissent low, resources high, EU path, land reform, 5% vote cutoff, and using the WTB plan along with the support WTB plan option in rallies bc it can give you up to 2% vote share every time.
SA is in shambles right now,
2.4 thousand in numbers,
Militarization? Nonexistent
I understand the low number of members but how did that demilitarisation happen?
It just happens with the 'further persicute the SA' you just have to do it multiple times to see its effect
very cool ! Is there a version in German ? It would feel more authentic.
I think this is a bug in the 'Unemployment Insurance Crisis (Weimar Coalition)' event. Choosing the compromise add a month but not a month_action, which screw up a lot of my timing (economic plan, advisor actions, etc.)
Update to some previous posts, I have a really good run going for the left front, Friendly relations with the kpd, and Braun is president. I was just wondering, is there a way to get the kpd goal 'nationalization of the economy' without the left plan?
I figured out how to survive till the end and complete all of the kpds goals but i did have to use the left plan
The painful truth:nope.:(
Yeah sad, i only have one achevment left but i dont really know how to get it.
‘Otto Braun für Reichspräsident!’
‘Yeah Otto,we’ve beat Hindenburg and all the reactionaries…..What do you mean,”there’s no viable majority in the Reichstag?’’Well we can form an emergency government with Otto as Chancellor…’
‘Oh no everyone is pissed and we failed the vonc…(3 months later)You know what,bourgeois elections can not reflect the true desire of the masses so we should cancel the Constitu…I mean Reichstag elections.’
Congratulations you’ve got the achievement!(Actually you can exploit a bug and declare that there’s no majority anyway even if there is)
Thanks for the help, what do you mean by vonc?
Vote Of No Confidence
Has anybody gotten all of the achievements? I only have 3 more.
Which ones?
40% all classes support - Now completed
Left front survives kpd goals - Now completed
Use emergency powers to cancel elections - Now completed
How you are able to form left front
Just need enough votes and good relations with kpd id recommend getting the conciliators in charge though
I don't able to make conciliator in charge I am able to make it one time but i don't know what I do can you.
Autumn:’Only one more’?
*Inserts new achievement*
Marvellous!Now please try to complete all the ones in Dynamic!:)
I’m joking(do please tell me if you did some of the seemingly impossible ones like the leftist ones though,I’d really appreciate some guides…)
this is so peak
How to elect maria jucha president of Germany.?
1932 election choose hindenburg and max out womens rights abortion isn't nessasary 1934 it should make the option
And reduce presidential powers
Actually,this isn’t necessary(You need it if you want to elect Einstein,though)
I pass all women reforms and even constitutional amendments then also i didn't get option for Maria jucha. Do i have to to social welfare
Increase welfare for single mothers,then it should be alright
Don't you also need Juchacz as an advisor?
I don't think it's necessary
I would like to report a bug: I created EU but thereafter raised tariffs and armed the Schutzbände, after that I went to Breitscheid and looked at the foreign ministry, where I found out I could form the EU, eventhough I created it already.
Just speculating here but, they couldve thrown you out of the eu or dissolved it entirely because of what you did.
It is not a bug, the other eu members get angry with you as you raise tarrif and improve military.
Yeah, but it clearly says that the EU is already created becuase of the austrian customs union
Now, that could be a bug, but I don't think the EU thing is.
Should the description of the achievement “Heidelberger Programm” be tweaked a bit?I mean,the historical program was even more ambitious,calling for the destruction of tariffs,the abolition of VAT,broad socialisation of industries,secularisation of education,republicanisation of the military.etc.
A possible arrangement would to be change the text into “start to fulfil the goals of the Heidelberg Program—judicial reform,progressive taxation….” ?Thoughts?
How do you get the "women's place in the Reichsbanner" achievement?
High enough militarisation+Sender as an advisor,then a choice would pop up in the reichsbanner card
thanks
Tip: You can actually get the Weimar coalition in the 1928 election by Choosing "organizing women" with the Marie Juchacz advisor and only choosing options which give you the most vote share I.E. : media, campaigning, organizations in which you can choose media, and choosing enemies through the "anti-democratic parties" option. This gives you a much better position in the ministries and with the government in general.
I don't know if anybody has done this before, I just thought I should mention it.
https://www.paxhistoria.co/
._.
Sir your play as guest option is not working.
Has anybody gotten a SPD only majority government? The best I've gotten was 44% in the Reichstag and 46% in polls on easy.
Yes, we can!
Without any mods?
Yes don't pass abortion, women reforms, 3 times pass land reforms, people party ,win president election and snap election. In jan 1934 feb 1934 you can able to achieve it
huh. do you mean don't pass abortion, then pass women reforms or don't pass abortion, or women reforms
Got it on my next try, didn't even need land reforms since the judiciary hates me, nice.
Don't pass abortion and women reforms in family. Do this in easy mode , kick muller out and bring marie juchach in leadership in starting of a game then use her organise women option, in rally card choose last option of mix problem and in enemies card choose first , and don't fund radio for now then you will able to form weimer colation then choose justice and do 3 times minor reforms in justice then suffel cabinet and take agriculture and remove justice you can able to do land reforms.
It’s definitely possible,with the WTB and volkspartei,and gameplay wise not passing laws like abortion rights or LGBTQ emancipation might help a bit(sorry Autumn,sorry Gustav,but abortion loses you Catholic votes and LGBTQ cards doesn’t boost support and can have @return instead of root),in addition,do more rallies and radio promotions and try to pass a 5% threshold amendment before calling snap elections.
I never figured out how to make the amendments. how did you do it?
You need to control the justice ministry,have at least 4 judicial reform points(in the judicial reform card,minor gives you 1,major gives you 2,don’t choose “no action for now” since @root also costs you 1 month),and no DVP or other bourgeois conservative parties in the coalition,neo-revisionism is no longer necessary in the latest version.
Also,keep an eye on party dissent(that’s where Wels’ or Breitscheid’s discipline ability come useful),for almost every politically positive effect in the game are multiplied by (1-dissent),alas,few of the negative ones are,which is probably the reason your middle class/unemployed campaigning drives sometimes backfire horribly(high dissent+high antipathy for socialism &no volkspartei/too high unemployment respectively )
One possible historical accuracy problem:the legal working week was 48 hours,not 40 in weimar,and after the depression started,the actual working time(in some cases) fell drastically to about 43 hours per week.
Reference:孟仲捷，王琼颖《魏玛德国的社会政策研究》第一章
（I tried to send this post before but it seems to have failed due to technical reasons,nevertheless,don’t mind this if you’ve seen it before and have a good day!)
Bro, can you give a latinized version of the reference? I can't find it...
Unfortunately there isn’t any,but it in turn references from ‘Sozialpolitik in der Weimarer Republik’ S.147-148(with a list about working times),I will try to upload images later if possible
Page 55,’On Sep 1932,an emergency decree by the Papen Government officially reduced the weekly working hours to 40’
Honestly that sounds a bit strange,knowing how reactionary Papen was,but it does reference from Johannes Bähr,’Staatliche Schlichtung in der Weimarer Republik.Tarifpolitik,Korparatismus und industrieller Konflikt zoischen Inflation und Deflation,1919-1932’,S.333.
I definitely did not reenact WWII by accident
I *totally* meant to lose to the Nazis
help
I downloaded the game on windows 10 but i cant start it. whenever i try to start the game it always gives me an error saying: object window has not been identified. what should i do to fix this problem?
Is there a guide or anything? I keep trying to do different options but every time all I'm managing to do is plunge Germany into a long civil war no matter what.
Support WTB (Labor) plan for crisis and rally for that — it's like easy-win ticket
How do I get schleilers plan to declare martial law to work
50 percent or more democratic parties (not DNVP, NSDAP, KPD)
How to declare martial law? Can you please tell me.
What a fantastic game. Had a blast and learned a lot about late 1920's Weimar Republic (and, I suppose, Germany in general.)
I hope you will maintain your drive, as you clearly have the skills to accomplish fascinating and entertaining games.
Are there are any plans for an endless play mode? The game ending when it does always leaves me feeling like there's a lot more I could have done.
there are some mods that disable end in 1934
A pretty minor thing: when trying to form a minority government, the Center party routinely votes for no-confidence even if I give them the Chancellorship and have neutral relations, which feels a bit weird.
When will the release be on Steam?
I've seen that Petrograd will be adding multiplayer. Should they add it to this too?
Damn this game is difficult (I am only playing historical mode and refuse to do otherwise)
"Oh wow, the hardest mode in this game is hard!"
I like it lol
When is the Russian Revolution one coming up? And I've got a great idea for a mod.
You can play as the KPD, Zentrum, DVP, etc. And the cards can be changed based on the parties objectives, as well with the advisors and other stuff.
I'm sure it will come out at least after June.
By the way, that mod idea does sound interesting, I hope someone could turn that into reality.
Guess you're wrong?
well the page is there, but we cant play the game yet, it could still take untill after june
I can!
I wasn't able to when I posted that lol, I can now too
I stand corrected.
Also, that mod idea kind of got made in Petrograd instead of here.
So... Yay?
Good enough, yay.
Bug: Choosing compromise for the unemployment insurance crisis passes a month without reducing the cooldown for advisor actions and cards.
continue wait for update
When is it coming out?
I don't think there's one coming soon — Autumn is making a brand new game set during the Russian Revolution.
I’m trying to get the popular front and the left plan for the economic crisis in one run for over two weeks how can I?
You definetely need Paul Levi als Advisor
very interesting game but to be honest i do not know how it works. I keep getting repeat cards for the same situation. Do the choices i pick for the repeat cards even matter?
Yes it matter like there is a social welfare card in which you can increase or decrease the budget for welfare programmes every time you increase it it increases your vote share everytime you decrease it reduces your vote share and if you decrease all the time then it said now there is no more to reduce, purrsian police card you need to increase the loyalty of purrsian police to arrest and deport hitler or if civil war happened you can use them only if you control them and you enough time bolster their loyalty.
If i increase social welfare the government falls apart though because ive angered my allies
Yes if you increase it too much then your allies get angry and they get more tensions if you increase it during economic crises and if you are in a grand collation. And if you reduces it too much then your vote share will reduce so i never increase or decrease it.
I created an account simply to show off this insane stunt i just pulled LOL, no clue how it happened i just gave a bunch of resources to the KPD for them to switch support to my candidate and suddenly thalman wasn't there anymore guh?
Thats how it works. If you give them reaources they support your candidate, and Thälmann drops out