Cultural Tradition

[rickrolle88]

It seems to me that one of the biggest areas EU could expand is the culture system, which up to this point has been functional without much flavor. Furthermore, trying to create a homogeneous cultural society seems to be a poor strategic decision since Dip points could be used more effectively elsewhere especially with the addition of development. To fix both of these issues I would like to suggest Cultural Tradition.

Cultural tradition would be a rating from 0 to 100 which would measure the influence of ones primary culture. Every province would have an influence bar ranging from 0 to 100 reflecting how strong the culture of the province is on the populace. A high cultural tradition would gradually lower the influence of provincial culture that is not the primary culture every month. This would only apply to provinces that border other provinces with a nations primary culture. Once the influence of a culture reaches 0, the culture of that province would switch to match the primary culture of the nation. After the switch the cultural tradition of the nation would start filling the influence bar of the province back up to 100.

Cultural "pressure" can pass borders but would receive a big penalty to spread rate so that only nations with really high tradition bordering nations with low tradition would pass their culture to border provinces. Cultural spread would also receive penalties when converting provinces with different religion based on tolerance.

Things that would increase Tradition would be:

• prestige
• developing provinces
• maybe an idea group or traditions etc.
• maybe buildings

Things that would decrease tradition would be:

• Being at war
• War exhaustion
• Maybe a decay like prestige etc.

Lastly, a cutlural tradition of 50 or higher would give a bonus that would differ based on the culture group that the primary culture of the nation fell in.

Please add any thoughts you have!

 

[Maq]

This is just a brilliant idea!
Now, how to make it real? I'm going to think about it...

 

[rickrolle88]

Thank you! XD I'd love to hear any ideas you have.

 

[Maq]

Thank you! XD I'd love to hear any ideas you have.

Obviously, the central issue is how to evaluate 'cultural tradition' of a nation. When white settlers met Indians of Great Plains, it was quite obvious which culture would prevail - even if we abstract from any kind of violence. But how to put that into numbers?

 

[rickrolle88]

Obviously, the central issue is how to evaluate 'cultural tradition' of a nation. When white settlers met Indians of Great Plains, it was quite obvious which culture would prevail - even if we abstract from any kind of violence. But how to put that into numbers?

In my current envisioning of it, the cultural "pressure" that would affect provinces only happens if a province with the primary culture of a nation borders a province without the primary culture of a nation. So in the native american example, once the settlers conquered the territory, the tradition of the natives wouldn't affect the provinces with their culture anymore since they lost control of them. So the settler culture would start lowering the bar of influence of the provinces much faster. So while violence isn't directly in the mechanic it certainly would help speed conversion along.

 

[rickrolle88]

Just to try and clarify a bit more, nations tradition would add to opposed ticking, with the foreign culture receiving penalties for not owning the province. So if you had a tradition of 100 you wouldn't have to worry about your provinces being converted, whereas if you had a tradition of 20 and bordered someone with a tradition of 100, your provinces would slowly start converting to the other nations primary culture. The influence bar for provinces would be a sort of defense against this, because the opposing culture would have to lower it to 0 before converting your province. If you had the cultural advantage for a province with your culture, you would fill the influence bar up to 100, thus making it take more time to convert said province. I'm finding it harder than i thought to put this into words! XD Hopefully this conveys it a bit more articulately.

 

[Maq]

Just to try and clarify a bit more, nations tradition would add to opposed ticking, with the foreign culture receiving penalties for not owning the province. So if you had a tradition of 100 you wouldn't have to worry about your provinces being converted, whereas if you had a tradition of 20 and bordered someone with a tradition of 100, your provinces would slowly start converting to the other nations primary culture. The influence bar for provinces would be a sort of defense against this, because the opposing culture would have to lower it to 0 before converting your province. If you had the cultural advantage for a province with your culture, you would fill the influence bar up to 100, thus making it take more time to convert said province. I'm finding it harder than i thought to put this into words! XD Hopefully this conveys it a bit more articulately.

Well, you have put this thread into 'suggestions' subforum, so you basically don't have to worry how difficult it would be for developers to implement your idea.
Me, I'm always thinking on how to mod the game as it is. As such, your ideas would be probably extremely difficult to make real in full. But there's a core in it, a promising mechanics to make cultural conversion more logical. Cultural tradition, or cultural strength perhaps... struggling for dominance...

 

[rickrolle88]

Yeah my ideas would need the dev's magic touch for sure. However it would be cool to see any implementation of more in depth culture.

 

[BrokenSky]

One thing with this that I think should be altered is that it shouldn't erode accepted cultures; heck maybe it should spread them!

 

[Maq]

One thing with this that I think should be altered is that it shouldn't erode accepted cultures; heck maybe it should spread them!

Why so? Think of the Scots. Their culture has been fully accepted in the UK, no coercion. And yet, while remaining Scots, they willingly adopted English language, and much of English culture.
My wife was born in the Philippines. Her country proudly presents herself as the third largest English-speaking nation in the world. Being fluent in English, and imitating American manners is a way to improve one's social status in the Philippines.
Historically, we could find many similar examples, I'm sure.

 

[BrokenSky]

Why so? Think of the Scots. Their culture has been fully accepted in the UK, no coercion. And yet, while remaining Scots, they willingly adopted English language, and much of English culture.
My wife was born in the Philippines. Her country proudly presents herself as the third largest English-speaking nation in the world. Being fluent in English, and imitating American manners is a way to improve one's social status in the Philippines.
Historically, we could find many similar examples, I'm sure.

This is mainly for game play reasons. If you take humanist and try to go down the accept cultures route, having a system like this could really screw such an endevour over since it could easily put you back under accepted culture threshold. In addition there is much less incentive to adopt the traditions of another culture if yours is supported. So I guess what I'm really asking for is for accepted cultures t have their own pressure, which would be on average equal or just less than equal to the primary culture, with cultures in the same group as the primary having more than those which are not accepted or in the same group.

So basicly on average, an accepted culture would be very slow to adopt the primary culture, while a non-accepted culture province would not. In addition, an accepted culture bordering an province of a non-accepted culture which does not border a province of the primary culture would be likely to flip to the accepted culture, and one that borders both the accepted culture and the primary culture would be very likely to flip, and be more likely to flip to the primary culture than to the accepted one, but would still have a reasonably chance to go to the accepted one.

Added notes:
Suggest that more developed provinces exert more pressure.
Suggest that nationalistic provinces exert more [defensive only] pressure (resist culture change)
Suggest that cultures be more susceptible to passive change to cultures within their own group. (So it may be easier for an accepted culture in a group different from the primary culture to flip a province to that culture than for the primary culture to do it).
Suggest that their be a small chance for cultures to randomly shift to other cultures (including extinct ones) within their own group.

 

[Maq]

Ah yes. Accepted culture. Quite a while ago I have read a discussion on what is exactly meant by that. It came to no universally accepted conclusion. Me too believe that this feature is rather artificial and disputable.
I can recall one example: The Basques in Spain struggled successfully for maintaining their autonomy and local self-administration. Does it mean that their culture was 'accepted', or the reverse?

 

[BrokenSky]

Ah yes. Accepted culture. Quite a while ago I have read a discussion on what is exactly meant by that. It came to no universally accepted conclusion. Me too believe that this feature is rather artificial and disputable.
I can recall one example: The Basques in Spain struggled successfully for maintaining their autonomy and local self-administration. Does it mean that their culture was 'accepted', or the reverse?

Means that the country lets the people teach in their own language in schools.

Seriously I'm not sure; the whole culture system is kind of an abstraction really. What makes Flemish and Wallonian differ, but leaves (modern) Devonian and Liverpudlian in the same box, but not the same box as American or Canadian?

 

[Maq]

Means that the country lets the people teach in their own language in schools.

Well, quite a good dividing point, valid only from 19th century onwards, though.
I've been trying my best to find out how to simulate these immensely variable and complicated 'cultural' issues. I'm afraid there's no formula for that. In my mod, I've been introducing a completely different approach. Most people won't like it, I'm afraid, but it works and rules are clear.
Note: Pehaps you misplaced Wallonian with Dutch, didn't you?
And as for Devonian etc. For some strange reasons, many people spend their effort to divide England. All big nations are prone to dividing, so why not the English?

 

[BrokenSky]

Note: Pehaps you misplaced Wallonian with Dutch, didn't you?

plausibly. I can't remember if Flemish is french or German group, but I meant to pick 2 in the same group.

Complete side note, but out of interest, why do you highlight some words in various colours? Whats the significance you're presumably trying to denote?

 

[Maq]

plausibly. I can't remember if Flemish is french or German group, but I meant to pick 2 in the same group.

Complete side note, but out of interest, why do you highlight some words in various colours? Whats the significance you're presumably trying to denote?

Originally, I started highlighting triggers, modifiers, and effects in the modding subforum to avoid misunderstanding. Then I noticed that it's a good way to draw one's attention to a word, sentence, or my whole post. If I take the pain to type something, I like to see people reading it. Just like most people, I guess.
===
Dutch and Flemish are Germanic, Wallonian is a French dialect. The Dutch are Protestant, Flemish and Wallonians are Catholics, ... and together form Belgium. While in Luxemburg, the official language is French, but the people speak German.
And in Mauritius, people speak Creole French, the largest confession is Hinduist, but the official language is English, and they drive left. Now tell me - aren't cultures and 'accepted' cultures a mess?

 

[BrokenSky]

Originally, I started highlighting triggers, modifiers, and effects in the modding subforum to avoid misunderstanding. Then I noticed that it's a good way to draw one's attention to a word, sentence, or my whole post. If I take the pain to type something, I like to see people reading it. Just like most people, I guess.
===
Dutch and Flemish are Germanic, Wallonian is a French dialect. The Dutch are Protestant, Flemish and Wallonians are Catholics, ... and together form Belgium. While in Luxemburg, the official language is French, but the people speak German.
And in Mauritius, people speak Creole French, the largest confession is Hinduist, but the official language is English, and they drive left. Now tell me - aren't cultures and 'accepted' cultures a mess?

Well yeah. The whole thing is somewhat of an abstraction - really provinces have their own cultures, and that culture is similar to the cultures of nearby provinces, and having a strong national identity makes cultures feel together-y, but while the language and the main religions are a thing they share, the culture system is pretty abstract, to make it workable as a gameplay mechanic, and it works better than not having it. Given this, I feel justified in looking at changing the mechanics from a mostly game play PoV, only refraining from ideas which, while sound, are completely stupid fluff wise. Therefor I think every province should have a cultural strength for each major culture in the province (~10% of the population) which it exerts on its neighbors. The primary culture should exert full influence, while an accepted culture should exert 90% influence, a culture in the same group as the primary should exert 60% and an unaccepted culture should exert 30%. Say. If the pressure a province exerts is greater than the pressure of an adjacent province, it should slowly work to flip the culture. Or something. Religion could use something similar.

But either way, from a completely gameplay perspective, it would be good if accepted cultures spread into the provinces of non-accepted cultures, and bad if the primary culture spreads too much into the provinces of accepted cultures, so there needs to be a mechanism whereby accepted cultures are more resistant to erosion than non-accepted ones, and can spread themselves, although slower, into the provinces of cultures which are neither primary, nor accepted, if this system seeks to work with, rather than overhaul, the current culture system. Something similar should be the case for religion, based on tolerance.

 

[Maq]

Well yeah. The whole thing is somewhat of an abstraction - really provinces have their own cultures, and that culture is similar to the cultures of nearby provinces, and having a strong national identity makes cultures feel together-y, but while the language and the main religions are a thing they share, the culture system is pretty abstract, to make it workable as a gameplay mechanic, and it works better than not having it. Given this, I feel justified in looking at changing the mechanics from a mostly game play PoV, only refraining from ideas which, while sound, are completely stupid fluff wise. Therefor I think every province should have a cultural strength for each major culture in the province (~10% of the population) which it exerts on its neighbors. The primary culture should exert full influence, while an accepted culture should exert 90% influence, a culture in the same group as the primary should exert 60% and an unaccepted culture should exert 30%. Say. If the pressure a province exerts is greater than the pressure of an adjacent province, it should slowly work to flip the culture. Or something. Religion could use something similar.

But either way, from a completely gameplay perspective, it would be good if accepted cultures spread into the provinces of non-accepted cultures, and bad if the primary culture spreads too much into the provinces of accepted cultures, so there needs to be a mechanism whereby accepted cultures are more resistant to erosion than non-accepted ones, and can spread themselves, although slower, into the provinces of cultures which are neither primary, nor accepted, if this system seeks to work with, rather than overhaul, the current culture system. Something similar should be the case for religion, based on tolerance.

@rickrolle88 & @BrokenSky
From the gameplay perspective, your ideas are very sound. I would love the developers going in this or similar way. Just clicking a button and waiting till the work is done is far from entertaining.
That said, 'cultural strength' should be a feature which is gained neither automatically, nor easily. You should invent some ways that would increase it, something that requires attenton, sklil, time, and perhaps sacrifying some other bonuses and benefits.
I mean it. This idea is worth that effort.

 

[BrokenSky]

@rickrolle88 & @BrokenSky
From the gameplay perspective, your ideas are very sound. I would love the developers going in this or similar way. Just clicking a button and waiting till the work is done is far from entertaining.
That said, 'cultural strength' should be a feature which is gained neither automatically, nor easily. You should invent some ways that would increase it, something that requires attenton, sklil, time, and perhaps sacrifying some other bonuses and benefits.
I mean it. This idea is worth that effort.

Things that could increase cultural strength:
* promoting nationalism (somewhat later in the time-frame) - at the cost of increasing the penalties for being not accepted culture and a diplomacy malus, increase the cultural strength.
* supporting your country's arts - gives some prestige, costs a lot of money, giving a temporary bonus to cultural strength, opportunity given by event.
* breaking free from your liege (as a vassal, colonial nation or an ex-member of the HRE when the privilegia is revoked) for 10 years
* having high prestige could slowly increase cultural strength (need > 80 for a long period of time)
* having more (comparatively) provinces of your culture (a big cosmopolitan empire would have less cultural strength than a nation with one non-primary cultural province), with distant overseas provinces counting less.

Things that could decrease cultural strength:
* having more cultures in the country
* having low legitimacy/rep-trad
* having low accepted culture threshold

Things that would give high strength to cultures which were not your primary culture
* being at war with a country where it is accepted or better, while not accepted or better in your country (defensive only - slows conversion)
* being an accepted culture (aggressive and defensive - slows conversion, converts neighboring provinces which are neither accepted nor primary)
* nationalism
* effect of events

Suggested event (example)
* cultural drift: "some fluff text about people leaving" - options:
1. lose d3 development (random type(s) ) in <province a>, gain that development in <province b>, <province b> gets <cultural group> center, giving very high local defensive strength, and medium aggresive strength, <province a> becomes <primary culture>
2. lose d3 development (random type(s) ) in <province a>, <province b>, gain all that development in <province c>, <province c> gets <cultural group> center, giving very high local defensive strength, and high aggresive strength, <province a, b> become <primary culture>

where a may be several provinces, and the only difference between b and c are that b is within your empire and of the same culture as a, while c is in another country which has that culture as primary, or if that isn't possible accepts it. So you could have large-scale loss of development, for an instant culture flip as people of the non-accepted culture leave, but the development would drop. Elsewhere some other province (prioritizing nearby) gains that development and becomes harder to convert, and may even flip the provinces around it.

 

[Vistariel]

I think this is a good idea going in the right direction. Basically you're describing the religion spread mechanic from Civ5. The more cultural clout your nation has will result in the progressive conversion of your territories and impact duel with the influence of adjacent territories. I think we could make "cultural identity" a similar mechanic to legitimacy/republican tradition. To be honest I think religion should also function on a similar scale, where the religious authority of a nation slowly converts the religion of its provinces according to the influences and size of the provinces (like how centers of reformation work, but not one-province specific and much, much slower).

Instead of cultural "conversion" as we have it now, I think it would be better to make it an "assimilation" system, whereby cultures that are assimilated have the non-accepted culture penalties removed. This would symbolize the mingling of the national culture with the local culture. For example, when folks migrate or colonize newly acquired holdings of their state. The British deliberately colonized Ireland with their folks in attempts to modify the culture in a favorable way to their interests. After assimilation the province would have a MTH event trigger that would fully convert the culture to the primary culture (which would trigger significantly faster once the previous owner's cores are lost).

I think for culture:
*Base strength should be a function of the base development of all primary culture provinces (maybe increased also by diplomatic tech).
*The base strength is universally modified by prestige, legitimacy/republican tradition/devotion, religious unity, power projection, and diplomatic reputation.
*Provincial specific modifiers could be religious tolerance, autonomy (low autonomy = faster conversion), revolt risk/nationalism, and home vs. overseas (with overseas suffering major penalties) I think religious conversion.
*If not adjacent to a primary culture province, then distance from nearest primary culture province would make assimilation slower.

This would basically require provinces to have low autonomy and be the same religion to be culturally assimilated.

The religious conversion strength could be more of a point system instead of a % system, where--like diplomatic annexation--a certain number of points are applied toward the total every month. Not monarch points, just as a means of tracking progress.
*Base points required to convert a province would be development based, for example, 10*development, like annexation costs.
*Base points would be provincially modified (increased) by negative religious tolerance for the present religion, revolt risk, and autonomy. Also increased by distance from nearest province following the religion (if not adjacent).
*Universal points applied would be similar to diplomatic reputation. Instead of % increases to missionary strength we would have point bonuses, which would then be affected by % modifiers. So a country's base conversion strength would be a sum from ideas, national modifiers, decisions, government type (theocracies should get a bonus) and perhaps ADM technology (religious education was quite effective, look at the Jesuits).
*The base mission points would then be modified (+/-) by prestige, legitimacy/RT/Devotion, power projection, and maybe a universal moral authority mechanic similar to CK2, where events similar to reformation desire will impact it in addition to winning wars against other religions/heresies (divine right of kings in concert with God's providential favor upon the true religion sort of thing). Every province successfully converted could improve the MA of the converting religion and decrease the MA of the converted religion.
*Each religion could have a unique mechanic to improve the moral authority of their religion.
--Catholics could spend papal influence (symbolic of deferring authority to the Pope).
--Protestants could spend church authority.
--Reformed could spend fervor.
--Orthodox would have an increase over time as a function of high patriarch authority.
--Muslims would have the same as orthodox, caused by high piety, where negative piety may decrease it.
--Buddhists would increase by maintaining balanced karma.
--Hindu, Confucian, Shinto....don't know. Maybe they wouldn't have the moral authority mechanic since Hinduism is highly syncretistic (maybe give Hinuism a high bonus to tolerance instead) and Confucian and Shinto are more rooted in cultural tradition and identity than piety.
--A mechanic could be implemented for the Mesoamerican religions.

A gateway to begin conversion could be a gold or adm point investment to establish a mission in the province.

Oh well, I guess I went off on religion reform. I like the idea for both.