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unmerged(766678)

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Jul 10, 2013
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So I have absolutely no knowledge of Russian history, but from basic reading, Ruthenia doesn't seem like a proper "kingdom" title, more a term for the geographic region. I've never read anything about a kingdom of Ruthenia. I want to rename it, what is a better name for the kingdom? Should it be Kiev? Or am I totally wrong here and Ruthenia is perfectly fine? Any help from Russians or others versed in Russian history would be much appreciated.
 
Is there even any proper knowledge of Russian tribes before the Vikings moved to the area? Maybe the devs really did just name it Ruthenia as a geographical thing because no written knowledge exists of the place before the Vikings.
 
As I understand it, it's purely a gameplay thing. 'Ruthenia' is (in this context) just a latinized form of 'Rus'. In earlier versions, Ruthenia was part of Rus. They split it, I suppose because the resulting kingdom was too big.

Personally I undid the change in my game because the Rurikids and the tribal Russians can form too easily IMO.
 
Rename it to Kievan Rus or simply Rus. Console rename or modify the de jure Rus kingdom to Veliky Novgorod, Greater Novgorod, or Great Novgorod.

In-game Ruthenia represents the bulk of the ancient Kievan Rus grand princedom. It's mainly missing the northern Novgorod area which was probably split out for balance reasons. Since Ruthenia is an alternate Latin term for Rus it should only appear if it's held by a Catholic ruler, in my opinion. In-game Rus more closely resembles a late game Novgorod republic and is based around the city and duchy.

Honestly, de jure lands in eastern Europe need to be refined and modified by start date. What we have now is pretty inaccurate.
 
Or you can create custom kingdom that replaces de jure one. Name it after your tribe - Volhynia or Severia. Or whatever. Ruthenia is fine, but only for like 12-13th centuries and on, definetly not for 769-867.
 
Yeah, it's fine till you realise that you have two kingdoms of Russia.
 
Could be dealt with far better, however.
And it's not a gameplay necessity as having a large kingdom of Rus' would actually lead to Rurik's descendants going south.
 
I really don't understand the need to have de jure kingdoms or Empires where none existed, especially in early start dates. We already have custom kingdom titles that allow for de jure drift, while tribes have powerful CBs while already allows the AI the ability to easily expand. De jure lands should be handled by start date in this way:
- CM start date: give southern Ruthenia and western Cumania to a de jure Khazaria; Rus, northern Ruthenia, and the Russian Empire should not exist
- Old gods: same as CM but, give Rurik the ability to create a titular Rus Kingdom via decision (like it was handled for Charlie), which insta de jure drifts any owned lands into the kingdom; give him and his offspring strong claims to the (current in-game) Ruthenian lands, which is western Khazaria in my setup; start Cumania with strong claims to eastern Khazaria
- 1066: western Rus and all of Ruthenia are all de jure Rus; call it Ruthenia if you're a Catholic; keep eastern Rus and any of those northeastern tribal lands without a de jure; the idea is that Pagans should still be able to more easily expand here via their invasion CB but, Orthodox Russians should have to fabricate claims since Russian expansion into this area didn't happen for another few hundred years
 
Well, for one thing if there was no de jure kingdom in the area, the ambition to become king and subsequent subjugation wars wouldn't work for pagans, right?
 
there HAS to be de jure kingdoms because of crown laws
 
It would still cause oddities with kingdom-based cbs, such as subjugations and tribal invasions. Not saying that it isn't possible, but it's probably not worth it in CK2 due to all the systems that would have to be redesigned (not to mention that PDS will almost certainly overlook something and cause a bunch of weird bugs).