769 Start Attempt #8479¾

[TheDovahkiin97]

Ruman culture is Turkish though, isn’t it?

He is speaking of romanian culture.
How could you think that its turkish? xD
Maybe because of the turkish "Rûm" state? Idk. However romanians speak a romance language. At this time it was very close to dalmatian.

 

[Amyntas]

He is speaking of romanian culture.
How could you think that its turkish? xD
Maybe because of the turkish "Rûm" state? Idk. However romanians speak a romance language. At this time it was very close to dalmatian.

Oh lord, I did not know it was Romanian! Yeah i thought it was a Turkish/Greek melting pot in Anatolia. No offense meant against the glorious Romanian heritage!

But even so, that’s still a really bad idea. There was NEVER a Romance speaking majority in Hellas. That would make no sense either.

 

[JasperClay]

Oh lord, I did not know it was Romanian! Yeah i thought it was a Turkish/Greek melting pot in Anatolia. No offense meant against the glorious Romanian heritage!

But even so, that’s still a really bad idea. There was NEVER a Romance speaking majority in Hellas. That would make no sense either.

Parts of Hellas likely had a Romance speaking majority, as is noted by the Ruman cultured province in Thessaly at game start. I'm pretty sure even vanilla has this Aromanian population

But culture is more than language. I think it's more useful to characterize Ruman as the sub-Roman (indigenous + all kinds of admixture) population that was either Slavicized or (re-)Hellenized after Irene's 782 campaigns.

For example, I can find no evidence determining what the majority language in Skopje was in 750. Given that, afaik, Slavic didn't even have a script yet, it's probably a fool's errand to try. So was the area Slavic? The area was probably majority Latin speaking, maybe until Justinian, at the very least. Should it be Greek?

It's unlikely that Slavic migration introduced majority populations (at least into areas this far south of the Danube.) Eventually, they probably assimilated the local population in a manner similar to the Anglo-Saxons. They've been working on that project for much less time than the Anglo-Saxons in 769, however. So is Skopje deterministically going to be Slavic in 769? I doubt it. Everywhere the empire managed to reassert control around that time was "Greek" in a couple hundred years, even if it had been invaded by Slavs. Everywhere it didn't, essentially became Slavic. I think a 769 start needs to reflect that uncertainty: I don't think deterministic proto-cultures are accurate.

Obviously, there's more artful ways to do it than to expand proto-Romanian, but that's the best I see from the currently utilized cultures.

 

[TheDovahkiin97]

Parts of Hellas likely had a Romance speaking majority, as is noted by the Ruman cultured province in Thessaly at game start. I'm pretty sure even vanilla has this Aromanian population

But culture is more than language. I think it's more useful to characterize Ruman as the sub-Roman (indigenous + all kinds of admixture) population that was either Slavicized or (re-)Hellenized after Irene's 782 campaigns.

For example, I can find no evidence determining what the majority language in Skopje was in 750. Given that, afaik, Slavic didn't even have a script yet, it's probably a fool's errand to try. So was the area Slavic? The area was probably majority Latin speaking, maybe until Justinian, at the very least. Should it be Greek?

It's unlikely that Slavic migration introduced majority populations (at least into areas this far south of the Danube.) Eventually, they probably assimilated the local population in a manner similar to the Anglo-Saxons. They've been working on that project for much less time than the Anglo-Saxons in 769, however. So is Skopje deterministically going to be Slavic in 769? I doubt it. Everywhere the empire managed to reassert control around that time was "Greek" in a couple hundred years, even if it had been invaded by Slavs. Everywhere it didn't, essentially became Slavic. I think a 769 start needs to reflect that uncertainty: I don't think deterministic proto-cultures are accurate.

Obviously, there's more artful ways to do it than to expand proto-Romanian, but that's the best I see from the currently utilized cultures.

The balkans are descibed as a slavic sea... I really disagree with you on way too many levels

 

[EU3NOOB]

So, my radical solution for a lot of things in the Balkans would be to put single county Slavic leaders in charge of tribal Ruman Orthodox provinces.

Basically: make Thrace Greek and Feudal, Philippopolis Ruman and Feudal, and Thessaloniki Greek and Feudal. The southern strip from Thessaloniki to Adrianople could be Feudal or tribal, but should be Greek. Coastal strip to Athens is Greek tribal, Athens is Greek feudal, I might make Corinth Greek Feudal - but tribal is arguably fine. All of this, I would make Byzantine.

Every hill or higher, under a line drawn from the northern tip of Albania south, going east until and including Philippopolis, I would make Ruman Orthodox tribal, all expect Philippopolis under the rule of single county Slavic pagan chiefs.

The plains north of the Hemas mountains, I would make culturally Bulgarian, and part of their Khanate. This would cross the Danube until it hit the foothills of the Carpathians, which would be Ruman Orthodox tribal, again, and I know so little I won't even guess at the political situation, here.

Then, I'd write a melting pot (have it hit at, say, 850) that shifted Ruman things to Greek if they were feudal and ruled by a Christian, and to the appropriate Albanian/Bulgarian/etc if ruled by a tribal/nomadic(?) Slav(?). I'd let the tribal/christian areas stay Rumanian, or just not include some counties in the event.

That strategy uses the Ruman culture to do a lot of heavy lifting, and I'm no scholar, but I think the point of a 769 HIP-inspired Balkans is to show how weak the ERE truly was, at this point, and how its survival as a Greek proto-nation was not written in stone.

Mostly okay, however, modern Bulgarian culture didn't exist in 769. Bulgarian culture didn't truly start to coalesce into what we know as modern Bulgarian until the converted to Orthodox Christianity in the 9th century. Until then the area was ruled by Turkic Bolgars.

And until Bulgarian culture does pop up the area South of the Danube should be easily convertible to the main culture of the ERE.

Also the only reason why Bulgarian exists as a Slavic culture today was due in large part to the religious conversion of the Bolgars to Orthodoxy and the subsequent creation of a written Slavic language, creating a new cultural center of gravity centered on Bulgarian. Up until then the cultural center of gravity was centered on Constantinople.

 

[TheDovahkiin97]

Until then the area was ruled by Turkic Bolgars.

Not gonna miss an opportunity to spread my mod lol

 

[EU3NOOB]

Not gonna miss an opportunity to spread my mod lol

Yeah, I've seen it, dunno if that's what Bulgaria in 867 AD would look like (I could be convinced otherwise though), but that's more or less what it would look like in 769 with two cultural events where the first involves if the ruling Bolgar Khan converts to Christianity (eastern or western; both were a possibility back then) then an event fires where the khan can decide to convert to Slavic Bulgarian and he then receives the titular Empire of Bulgaria title and the kingdom level Bolgar tribe title is destroyed (or you can make the Empire a kingdom level title and the Bolgar tribe a ducal one) it then leads to a relatively quick provincial conversion to Bulgarian (like within 50 years of conversion modern Bulgaria is Slavic Bulgarian. The second one involves a Roman reconquest of the area before the Khan converts to Christianity with everything south of the Danube with the De Jure ERE converting to either Greek or Rumanian (mostly Greek though). This represents the efforts by the Empire to settle the Balkans with loyal Roman citizens (i.e. mostly Greek thematic troops) and a mild recovery of Balkan Latins, however, it should come at a serious cost, maybe a modifier for every Slavic culture province and some Greek cultured ones in the Empire that gives a penalty to troop levies income and revolt risk but an increase to culture conversion chance until the province converts to a Byzantine culture group (Greek or Ruman). This should be very difficult and expensive to do as it was in real life.

There can also be a decision to begin and end the effort for the Emperor character, but ending it gives every Slavic province gets a modifier that increases revolt risk and decreases levy and garrison size. Essentially holding this region should be INCREDIBLY difficult until the region is repopulated with loyal citizens again.

 

[JasperClay]

Mostly okay, however, modern Bulgarian culture didn't exist in 769. Bulgarian culture didn't truly start to coalesce into what we know as modern Bulgarian until the converted to Orthodox Christianity in the 9th century. Until then the area was ruled by Turkic Bolgars.

And until Bulgarian culture does pop up the area South of the Danube should be easily convertible to the main culture of the ERE.

Also the only reason why Bulgarian exists as a Slavic culture today was due in large part to the religious conversion of the Bolgars to Orthodoxy and the subsequent creation of a written Slavic language, creating a new cultural center of gravity centered on Bulgarian. Up until then the cultural center of gravity was centered on Constantinople.

Not gonna miss an opportunity to spread my mod lol

Yeah, agree on all of this. I think implying that it would have been easy for the ERE to evict the horseman from the plains is less important than implying the borders were in total flux in the highlands, but CKII models neither the power nor the culture of the Bulgar Khanate well. I'd toy with them as high-pop nomads in 769, just to get right how completely dominant they were in the open field.

 

[TheDovahkiin97]

Yeah, I've seen it, dunno if that's what Bulgaria in 867 AD would look like (I could be convinced otherwise though), but that's more or less what it would look like in 769 with two cultural events where the first involves if the ruling Bolgar Khan converts to Christianity (eastern or western; both were a possibility back then) then an event fires where the khan can decide to convert to Slavic Bulgarian and he then receives the titular Empire of Bulgaria title and the kingdom level Bolgar tribe title is destroyed (or you can make the Empire a kingdom level title and the Bolgar tribe a ducal one) it then leads to a relatively quick provincial conversion to Bulgarian (like within 50 years of conversion modern Bulgaria is Slavic Bulgarian. The second one involves a Roman reconquest of the area before the Khan converts to Christianity with everything south of the Danube with the De Jure ERE converting to either Greek or Rumanian (mostly Greek though). This represents the efforts by the Empire to settle the Balkans with loyal Roman citizens (i.e. mostly Greek thematic troops) and a mild recovery of Balkan Latins, however, it should come at a serious cost, maybe a modifier for every Slavic culture province and some Greek cultured ones in the Empire that gives a penalty to troop levies income and revolt risk but an increase to culture conversion chance until the province converts to a Byzantine culture group (Greek or Ruman). This should be very difficult and expensive to do as it was in real life.

There can also be a decision to begin and end the effort for the Emperor character, but ending it gives every Slavic province gets a modifier that increases revolt risk and decreases levy and garrison size. Essentially holding this region should be INCREDIBLY difficult until the region is repopulated with loyal citizens again.

Why I think that the council ignited the bulgarian melting pot:

”The decisions taken during the Council of Preslav had a great impact on Bulgarian history. The official status of Old Bulgarian gave great impetus for the development of the Preslav and Ohrid Literary Schools. The Bulgarian culture and literature entered its Golden Age under the rule of the newly elected Simeon I and the country became the cultural and spiritual center of Slavic Europe. The removal of the Byzantine clergy and the Greek language from the liturgy ensured that Bulgaria would stay away from any strong or direct Byzantine influence in its policy and religious life.
The Byzantine reaction was quick. As soon as 894 emperor Leo VI moved the market of the Bulgarian merchants from Constantinople to Salonica which was a heavy blow to the Bulgarian economic interests. This inflamed the first commercial war in Europe won by Simeon I after the decisive battle of Boulgarophygon.”
– from wikipedia

I agree that they were influenced by slavs at this point but I would say that they still saw themselves different from the locals and vice versa. They still spoke old-old-bulgarian without script which was also introduced at the council. Probably they spoke slavic too at this point but not as a native language.

 

[EU3NOOB]

Why I think that the council ignited the bulgarian melting pot:

I agree that they were influenced by slavs at this point but I would say that they still saw themselves different from the locals and vice versa. They still spoke old-old-bulgarian without script which was also introduced at the council. Probably they spoke slavic too at this point but not as a native language.

Let's be honest: None of the Cultural Melting Pots CKII really reflect well the historical reality where things were extraordinarily complex. However, as a game mechanic, having the point of conversion of the Bulgarian Khan to Orthodoxy be the moment where a Slavic Bulgarian culture sprung up is a solid abstraction to represent the general trend towards a consolidated Bulgarian cultural identity, which really didn't exist before and began to come into being afterward.

We can debate complex historical realities all we want (and in the abstract it's actually quite fun and enlightening), but we're never going to be able to represent them in-game without some sort of complex mechanic and I'd rather that effort went elsewhere. If a relatively simple solution can represent a general historical trend minus the minutia, I'd say we go for it, otherwise the mod will bog down on this point and never get finished. I've seen this happen plenty of times with otherwise very promising features becoming utterly broken due to efforts at making a complex system that fails to work as advertised.

I say we go with this and get the mod out into the wild sooner and if it turns out we CAN do a better job after that then we can always include it in a future update.

 

[LVenger]

I want to return to the topic of religion and in particular to Christianity at 769.
In Carantania, after the death of Hotimir, the catholic slavic duke, local residents rebelled against Christianity and German influence, but in 772 the Christian religion was finally established. Thus, Carantania became one of the first Christian Slavic state. So, it is not quite clear in 769 to make the whole of Carantania, which is under the rule of Bavaria, the full Catholic territory. It's better to make Catholic the center of the province in case of the mechanics of the game and the remaining regions to be slavic pagan.
It is not entirely correct to divide Christianity of that time into Catholicism and Orthodoxy, although, as it is not paradoxical, the first and second types of Christianity are derived from Greek words. If you take the classic mechanics of the game, then the Roman pope of that time is an autocephalous pentarh, which has large territorial possessions, unlike the pentarch of Constantinople. In turn, in Byzantium (Eastern Rome) the heresy of Christianity , so-called Iconoclasm, is raging, which was supported by more of the political reasons - to improve relations with Muslims. It was a much more serious situation than the Council in Trulo. Unwilling to be subject of Eastern Rome, with its policy of Caesarepopism, the pope has the opportunity, during the heresy of the Greeks, to strengthen his independence, to find support in Western Europe. As we know, the ideal candidate was Charlemagne, who was crowned as the emperor just to protect the Roman patriarch from possible influence. Accordingly, if we take the probable events that a strong leader does not appear in the West who can create a new empire, and Byzantium has time to get rid of iconoclasm and begins a new Restoration of the empire, the separation of the two churches with mutual anathemas, which firstly occurred from 863 to 867 - could not happen.
In conclusion, it seems better to me to make Chalcedonian church, which is similar in mechanics to standard Orthodoxy. However, if an empire is created in the west, and the patriarch of Rome approves it, gets new proviences - and this event starts a chain of events that lead to a complete separation into two churches by the middle of the 9th century. Why precisely such a flaccid separation? For example, Cyril and Methodius prosecutors of Slavic tribes who translated Saint works into Slavic and made the adoption of Slavic languages for Cyrillic had the support of both the Pope and the Patriarch of Constantinople.

 

[Nix71782]

Oooooooooh no, we are not diving into "Christianity should be Chalcedonian!" again. There have literally been dozens of threads asking about this all the time- the answer is that the HIP team has consciously decided that it's better to not, for a variety of reasons.
Further, let's refer back to what EU3NOOB said: if we want to make a Chalcedonian Christianity, we have to make one from scratch, including the history files, and we'd have to code an event for the Great Schism, a very very complex event with a lot of variables, and we'd spend a good 3 pages debating what traits Chalcedonian would have versus its child faiths.
No Chalcedonian.

Edit: to elaborate on this, the first, most glaring issue with making Chalcedonian Christianity is that, functionally, Catholicism and Orthodoxy have very different mechanics in-game; how do you reconcile the autocephaly and college of cardinal mechanics (even if the college didn't exist at this time)? How do you have the Pope, who was already very damn important, and the Patriarch be co-heads, since rulers would turn to either one for guidance, conversion, and temporal authority? This sort of merges into the next problem- even by the 300s AD, there were stark differences between the East and West; different theology, different authority (il Papa loved his autonomy), and different rites even. Everyone outside of the Emperor's rule took their leads from the Pope, not the Patriarch of Constantinople, who held the authority inside the empire. Hell, I think in 769 the two patriarchshave already excommunicated each other multiple times, and are currently doubly excommunicated. While you're right that, de juris, the split didn't happen until 1056, even by 769 the differences are strong enough to justify a split between Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The rites alone are a strong enough stressor to prohibit a unified Christianity. Further, the Pope better models history when he's already autonomous from the Emperor, as it gives him the freedom to crown Charlemagne. Speaking of which, you'd have to change several events, namely Charley's stuff, to fit this awkward new mechanic. And you'd have to have plan I'm check just in case the schism doesn't happen, like how the HRE's supposed to form.

All in all, its such a huge mess for so little payoff that there is no reason to pursue an idea of a unified Christianity.

 

[Ese Khan]

Trying to do more than preparing a playable 769 start is going to be the doom of this project. HIP submods already have to adapt to HF-compatible version of HIP as is, it's better not to put more stuff on the plate. But I'm hardly the first one to make such a point.

 

[duderino]

Yeah. It really needs to be up and stable before I go about fixing the set up. I'm only one guy and I have obligations etc... Plus after a few days I get a bit meh and have to take a break. As far as the great schism is concerned, I will implement it... eventually. And the balkans are proving the bane of my existence because there is so much contention as to the cultural and religious setup there. Something, something World War 1. Something, something powder keg.

So before I start today I have a general question aimed mostly at the devs. It seems in a few case that the culture groups are arbitrary. Occitan for instance is correctly in the ibero-romance group, but armenian, romanian, georgian and a few others are in the "byzantine" culture group. They weren't really in the same culture group. Why? It just seems the grouping is arbitrary in some cases. It's not that I don't understand why you would group those cultures. But why is one politically connected set of cultures linked, while the other isn't? Coptic is in the east african group, but as far as I understand it, it doesn't remotely share the cultural connection that even the iber-romance and latin groups share.

 

[Nix71782]

So before I start today I have a general question aimed mostly at the devs. It seems in a few case that the culture groups are arbitrary. Occitan for instance is correctly in the ibero-romance group, but armenian, romanian, georgian and a few others are in the "byzantine" culture group. They weren't really in the same culture group. Why? It just seems the grouping is arbitrary in some cases. It's not that I don't understand why you would group those cultures. But why is one politically connected set of cultures linked, while the other isn't? Coptic is in the east african group, but as far as I understand it, it doesn't remotely share the cultural connection that even the iber-romance and latin groups share.

Having gone back to vanilla while waiting for HIP to update, I can tell you that the "Byzantine" group was made by Paradox. Now, as to why it was kept, none of those groups have a (immediate) linguistic relationship, but all of them (minus, maybe, Alan) share a cultural relationship from their strong, overwhelming ties to the Byzantine Empire. My guess is that the Bulgarians and Russians aren't included because both groups made clear decisions to disassociate from Constantinople when possible. There's also the geographic relationship that the Byzantine group shares, and finally the in-game bonuses to opinion from sharing culture groups.
This is the same case for the Copts; Idk if this is 100% the reason why, but they probably wanted any Coptic rulers to have ties to Nubia and Ethiopia.

 

[duderino]

Having gone back to vanilla while waiting for HIP to update, I can tell you that the "Byzantine" group was made by Paradox. Now, as to why it was kept, none of those groups have a (immediate) linguistic relationship, but all of them (minus, maybe, Alan) share a cultural relationship from their strong, overwhelming ties to the Byzantine Empire. My guess is that the Bulgarians and Russians aren't included because both groups made clear decisions to disassociate from Constantinople when possible. There's also the geographic relationship that the Byzantine group shares, and finally the in-game bonuses to opinion from sharing culture groups.
This is the same case for the Copts; Idk if this is 100% the reason why, but they probably wanted any Coptic rulers to have ties to Nubia and Ethiopia.

I understand the why of it. The question was more about why occitan is of on it's own. I may be the mistaken impression that those lands had much stronger connections to france than to spain. So why is it in that group and not the other? I mean czech to had very strong ties to the HRE, as strong as the basque had to latin speaking spain. Linguistically and culturally they are much closer to the polish, but not so politically. Is my question making sense?

 

[Nix71782]

I understand the why of it. The question was more about why occitan is of on it's own. I may be the mistaken impression that those lands had much stronger connections to france than to spain. So why is it in that group and not the other? I mean czech to had very strong ties to the HRE, as strong as the basque had to latin speaking spain. Linguistically and culturally they are much closer to the polish, but not so politically. Is my question making sense?

I guess. End of the day, I'm just a player who does more guessing than he should, but with Occitan's case, keeping in mind that putting cultures in student culture groups affects maluses and rebellions (I think), it's likely that they're on their own to foster rebellion against France, because the Occitan lords, iirc, did spend most of their history rebelling against the crown in various ways. The Bohemians, Pommeranians, and Carantanians, I think, are still part of their respective groups partially for convenience with localization, and partially to stress early game political, linguistic, and historical unity with other Slavs, rather than with the Germans. Theoretically, the Bohemians could just as easily joined with the Poles as with the HRE.
But again, I'm like 90% guessing on all of this, and the cultural groups are weird to think about anyway, since they sometimes represent language unity, and sometimes cultural unity (e.g. Iranians vs Altaic).

 

[duderino]

Just to be clear, I'm not saying I want to throw Czech in the West Germanic group or the Occitans in the Latin group. Just thinking about things I may want to """"fix"""" eventually. I mean Occitan and Catalan can be off in their own group, ya know.

 

[Mr Nobody]

Oooooooooh no, we are not diving into "Christianity should be Chalcedonian!" again. There have literally been dozens of threads asking about this all the time- the answer is that the HIP team has consciously decided that it's better to not, for a variety of reasons.
Further, let's refer back to what EU3NOOB said: if we want to make a Chalcedonian Christianity, we have to make one from scratch, including the history files, and we'd have to code an event for the Great Schism, a very very complex event with a lot of variables, and we'd spend a good 3 pages debating what traits Chalcedonian would have versus its child faiths.
No Chalcedonian.

Edit: to elaborate on this, the first, most glaring issue with making Chalcedonian Christianity is that, functionally, Catholicism and Orthodoxy have very different mechanics in-game; how do you reconcile the autocephaly and college of cardinal mechanics (even if the college didn't exist at this time)? How do you have the Pope, who was already very damn important, and the Patriarch be co-heads, since rulers would turn to either one for guidance, conversion, and temporal authority? This sort of merges into the next problem- even by the 300s AD, there were stark differences between the East and West; different theology, different authority (il Papa loved his autonomy), and different rites even. Everyone outside of the Emperor's rule took their leads from the Pope, not the Patriarch of Constantinople, who held the authority inside the empire. Hell, I think in 769 the two patriarchshave already excommunicated each other multiple times, and are currently doubly excommunicated. While you're right that, de juris, the split didn't happen until 1056, even by 769 the differences are strong enough to justify a split between Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The rites alone are a strong enough stressor to prohibit a unified Christianity. Further, the Pope better models history when he's already autonomous from the Emperor, as it gives him the freedom to crown Charlemagne. Speaking of which, you'd have to change several events, namely Charley's stuff, to fit this awkward new mechanic. And you'd have to have plan I'm check just in case the schism doesn't happen, like how the HRE's supposed to form.

All in all, its such a huge mess for so little payoff that there is no reason to pursue an idea of a unified Christianity.

I might get some flak for this for being ignorant or whatever, but why not copy the CK2+ approach? Albeit with more railroading to ensure a more historical outcome.

Or at least allow the possibility for Christian rulers in historically non-Western rite(or flirted with both) realms to either heed the authority of the Pope in Rome (basically converting to Catholicism and inviting his vassals to follow suit) or stay autonomous (Orthodoxy). It shouldn't work both ways though, the patriarch of Constantinople never claimed supremacy after all. A decision followed with a set of events might be wonderful. A Catholic Byzantine emperor with a divided realm between the Catholic and Orthodox faction? Imagine that!

Even a decision to call a Council of Florence would be great, IMO. A set of conditions like being a high-intrigue ruler, or crumbling under the Mohammedans' pressure will simulate it well I think.

 

[duderino]

I will look at CK2+ for inspiration on the event chain, but it's a long ways off. Right now I need to get in a playable state before I mess around with all that. It's on my list though. The plan will be to have the split or not depending on conditions, options to restore the pentarchy and mend the other schisms, and even have chalcedonian templars and hospitalers etc. Probably use the pentarchy system to achieve it with only the two pentarchs currently in the mix, so European and the remnants of Northwest and central African Christianity will be split between the two. Won't call it Orthodox or Catholic. Maybe Chalcedonian, Chalkedon(or whatever the adjectival form is), Pentarchal, or even just Christian.