Edge of Empires: Why the Caucasus deserves the Next Overhaul

[mahidevran]

With the forthcoming arrival of Holy Fury, many long-neglected areas of the map such as Africa and the Baltics are receiving an upgrade. I couldn't be happier learning about such updates, as they make the virtual world just a little more richer. However, while it seems to many that the game has finally "filled out the map", there is one region which remains that is still in need of love and attention: the Caucasus.

Lying at the crossroads of the Anatolian plateau, the Middle east, and the Eurasian steppe, the Caucasus was historically host to clashes between greater kingdoms. Many of its cultures and languages survived through centuries of foreign rule, invasion, and war, be it by Greeks, Arabs, Persians, or steppe nomads -- though this is certainly not to say the Caucasus didn't produce political powerhouses of its own in the middle ages, namely Georgia.

For these reasons and many more, the medieval Caucasus is one of my favorite regions to read about -- and by extension, play in CK2. But the game's portrayal of the region could be fleshed out in greater detail, giving a more dynamic experience.

Map Overhaul
I don't in the least expect CK2 to be a picture-perfect portrayal of history, but I do enjoy seeing the families and entities I read about laid out in the game in a somewhat accurate manner. On this point, CK2 is seriously lacking, especially since we know as much about Georgia and Armenia during this period as we do Western Europe. Records on the North Caucasus aren't as abundant, but I wouldn't mind the developers fleshing out a believable picture based on what we do know.

Sarir and the Avar Khanate
The Kingdom of Sarir and the Avar Khanate -- not to be confused with Pannonian Avaria -- are two new political entities that should definitely be included in a Caucasus revamp. Surprisingly ittle is known about Sarir; it was a long-lasting Christian state in the Northeast Caucasus. The Avar Khanate was the kingdoms' Muslim successor state following Sarir's disintegration in the 12th century.

Circassians and Northeast Caucasians
Two small but noteworthy cultural groups can be added to fill out the north Caucasus are the Circassians (Adyghe), and another representing the related cultures of the Northeast Caucasus (more on that in a bit).

The Circassians live in the west, north of Abkhazia in the Kuban region. While they are majority Muslim today, they were Christian in the medieval era. The Northeast Caucasian culture is found in the east, notably in Derbent and Caucasian Albania, and the culture of the aforementioned Sarir and Avar Khanate.

The name of the Northeast Caucasian group is a bit of a pickle. They can't just be called "Avar" because we already have a different group called Avars, and the ethno-linguistic macro-group for this culture is Nakh-Daghestani, which is a mouthful to say. And for an area so small, further cultural breakdown would hardly be useful in gameplay.

Caucasian Cultural Group
It never seemed right to me that the Alans, Georgians, and Armenians are lumped with the Greeks into a singular "Byzantine" cultural group. Give them their own group that shares blinding and castration abilities, which was at least practiced in medieval Georgia -- and maybe a special retinue suited to battle in mountainous terrain, too.

Interfaith Marriages and Alliances
As it stands in CK2, attempting to arrange a marriage between a Christian and a Muslim dynasty is a no-go. In reality, such alliances were not unheard of, especially in this region; the marriage of the Georgian princess Gürcü Hatun to Seljuk Sultan Kaykhusraw II is one notable example from the 13th century. If certain requirements are met, interfaith marriages should be made an option.

Cultural Resistance
It's far too easy for the cultures Georgians, Alans, and Armenians to be wiped out in a century or two during gameplay, especially without player intervention; assimilation by Greeks, Arabs, and nomads are the usual culprits. I would propose a "cultural resistance" perk to grant greater fortitude against conquest and cultural change for smaller cultures that have stood the test of time.

Other Features
Some other features I'd love to see that aren't really related to the Caucasus, but could be bundled in the same package:

• Iceland as a kingdom-level entity that can be formed. (I recognize the Commonwealth can't be represented accurately in any way with current mechanics). I always though its isolation would make for interesting gameplay, but more than two counties would be more fun...
  
• Smaller cultures such as Albanian that would thrive under "Cultural Resistance" perks.
  
• A reworking of Muslim dynastic succession. "Open" succession as described by the game seems to be modeled on early modern Ottoman traditions, but in practice the mechanic doesn't even work in the way you'd expect.
• Please dump the grab-bag that is "Altaic"; there is enough cultures to form separate Turkic and Mongolic culture groups.

The title of my post takes its name from Edge of Empires by Donald Rayfield, an excellent introduction to the history of Georgia that extensively covers the medieval era and its relations with its neighbors.

 

[Taran14]

There definitely should be a mechanic for smaller cultures to survive. Especially for cultures that historically have been very resilient and survived into the present day, such as the Armenians, Georgians, Basques, Frisians etc.

 

[bauke67]

About the cultural resistance: maybe this could be tied to province geography? Historically cultures tend to survive long and become very diverse in mountainous regions like the caucasus. So if you give cultures some more staying power in mountainous regions you could somewhat acurately model at least most caucasian cultures and the Albanians.

 

[Ezumiyr]

It would indeed be a great occasion to overhaul the cultural aspect of the game. I've yet to read a fully satisfying suggestion to revamp the culture system in CK2, but a "Culture Resistance" mechanics for certain cultures would already be better.

Maybe cultures should be proportionally more resistant to eradication as they are present in fewer provinces (with some exceptions like Norse, Anglo-saxon, Frank or Wisigothic). This would make one-province cultures basically impossible to get rid of. It's not realistic, but still better than having the hegemonic medieval cultures we currently have. It would not only help to preserve historically resilient cultures, but also avoid the cases of english Irelands or French Catalunyas, and mono-ethnic blobs in general.

There should probably also be more melting pots, both historical and ahistorical, especially to cover christian invasions of North Africa, muslim invasions of Europe and other things like that. It doesn't feel right to see Morocco's countryside becoming German because it was invaded by the HRE or french farmlands to become Andalusian.

 

[Masternachos]

I really like the idea of cultural resistance being province-based. So Georgian-culture counties in Georgia are hard to convert, but if I spread somewhere else, those new Georgian-culture counties can flip just as easily as they flipped to Georgian.

 

[Serenity84]

The main issue is that you can only have one culture per province. You can't have a truly multicultural realm that way. There needs to be at least a majority / minority distinction. But it's bit a hard to really generalize one system for all places. In some areas cultural assimilation makes sense and minority cultures do disappear. In other places it makes sense for them to survive.
In other places you would have a minority culture rule over a majority (especially after a conquest).

 

[Sonmi]

I'd argue that a Caucasus-based DLC/overhaul could be very interesting. The whole point about separating Armenians and Georgians from the Byzantine cultural group and make them their own Caucasian group is especially appealing.

I would think that North Africa/Africa-focused content would be the priority for the next batch of content we're getting though.

 

[Heathen]

About the cultural resistance: maybe this could be tied to province geography? Historically cultures tend to survive long and become very diverse in mountainous regions like the caucasus. So if you give cultures some more staying power in mountainous regions you could somewhat acurately model at least most caucasian cultures and the Albanians.

100% agreed. I feel that assimilating a mountain region into a neighboring kingdom should be difficult. We often find more fragmented nation states all over mountain chains since the power projection from any one group is significantly reduced. This is why larger empires tend to butt-up against mountains too.

 

[mahidevran]

Thank you for all the constructive replies! It's great knowing others share some of the same ideas on how to improve gameplay experience.

About the cultural resistance: maybe this could be tied to province geography? Historically cultures tend to survive long and become very diverse in mountainous regions like the caucasus. So if you give cultures some more staying power in mountainous regions you could somewhat acurately model at least most caucasian cultures and the Albanians.

100% agreed. I feel that assimilating a mountain region into a neighboring kingdom should be difficult. We often find more fragmented nation states all over mountain chains since the power projection from any one group is significantly reduced. This is why larger empires tend to butt-up against mountains too.

Precisely -- many of these cultures and state's longevity is owed to terrain that may be treacherous or difficult to navigate. This not only goes for mountains, but deserts and jungles as well. I hadn't thought of tying a resistance mechanic to province terrain, but now that you mention, it may be an ideal solution since geographical data is already encoded.

The main issue is that you can only have one culture per province. You can't have a truly multicultural realm that way. There needs to be at least a majority / minority distinction. But it's bit a hard to really generalize one system for all places. In some areas cultural assimilation makes sense and minority cultures do disappear. In other places it makes sense for them to survive. In other places you would have a minority culture rule over a majority (especially after a conquest).

True, that. The manner in which CK2 encourages monocultural empires and culture conversion has always irritated me, as medieval states were hardly so homogeneous in reality. This was an era before nationalism; bigotry existed, sure, but ethnicity and culture were less important than say, religion or class or whether someone was paying their taxes. Cultural exchange was far more common. We have conquerors assimilating with the conquered, as in the case of the Persianized Seljuks. On the other hand, you have groups like the Pannonian Avars, who (according to the dominant hypotheses) assimilated with the now-dominant Slavs after their khaganate was dissolved.

It involves a complex dynamic that I don't think can be captured in the game as it stands... but it could be better. In CK2, I don't think I've ever seen AI lieges adopting the culture of their conquered people despite it being an option. And ideally, assigning allowing a vassal of the same culture as the province would help you maintain that province, so long as you remained on good terms with their lord -- but the game discourages you from the outset having vassals outside of your culture group.

Aside from implementing a variable melting-pot" mechanic -- which some have argued wouldn't be worth it for the devs at this point -- I can't think of a hardy solution. Perhaps there can be a "culturally tolerant" trait and events that cause one to embrace (or reject) diversity, each coming with its own advantages and disadvantages; that's the best I got.

I'd argue that a Caucasus-based DLC/overhaul could be very interesting. The whole point about separating Armenians and Georgians from the Byzantine cultural group and make them their own Caucasian group is especially appealing.

I would think that North Africa/Africa-focused content would be the priority for the next batch of content we're getting though.

I certainly welcome the Africa-focused content! It's an area I admit I haven't played much of, but added detail and flavor is certainly an incentive to revisit the region more often.

But yes, I'd say a culture-based DLC (that doesn't just add new ones) is long overdue, and the Caucasus would be the perfect region to revamp in such a release. As for the "Byzantine" cultural group...it never made all that much sense to me, and the addition of Assyrians (and the Copts too, I think) make it look even more like an "eastern Christian grab bag" than anything coherent. The Greeks could probably be in a cultural group of their own, and the Caucasus is such a natural areal grouping I'm surprised it doesn't exist already. That leaves the Assyrians and Copts, who seem too limited for their own cultural group, but are at the same time culturally distinct from their neighbors.

 

[yourworstnightm]

I agree that the Caucasus is a region that could be expanded upon.

 

[Fishman786]

About the cultural resistance: maybe this could be tied to province geography? Historically cultures tend to survive long and become very diverse in mountainous regions like the caucasus. So if you give cultures some more staying power in mountainous regions you could somewhat acurately model at least most caucasian cultures and the Albanians.

100% agreed. I feel that assimilating a mountain region into a neighboring kingdom should be difficult. We often find more fragmented nation states all over mountain chains since the power projection from any one group is significantly reduced. This is why larger empires tend to butt-up against mountains too.

I've modded this before and it definitely works, although my version included a complex series of different cases so that different types of culture would spread or be displaced in appropriate areas.

 

[killerbee256]

The whole point about separating Armenians and Georgians from the Byzantine cultural group and make them their own Caucasian group is especially appealing

But then how will I castrate people who cross me and then send them to China?

 

[es333]

There definitely should be a mechanic for smaller cultures to survive. Especially for cultures that historically have been very resilient and survived into the present day, such as the Armenians, Georgians, Basques, Frisians etc.

About the cultural resistance: maybe this could be tied to province geography? Historically cultures tend to survive long and become very diverse in mountainous regions like the caucasus. So if you give cultures some more staying power in mountainous regions you could somewhat acurately model at least most caucasian cultures and the Albanians.

The Estonians and Finns have lived in their area, without migrating, for a minimum of 6000 years (since the ice age to some other theories but less likely). Some think that it is because both Estonia and Finland are the boggiest countries in the world, so farming/IE languages could not spread here very successfully. It is not always about mountains

 

[Taran14]

The Estonians and Finns have lived in their area, without migrating, for a minimum of 6000 years (since the ice age to some other theories but less likely). Some think that it is because both Estonia and Finland are the boggiest countries in the world, so farming/IE languages could not spread here very successfully. It is not always about mountains

Yeah, that goes for the Frisians too. Nary a mountain to see for like a thousand kilometers around Frisia, but the area used to be a wet, boggy nightmare regularly flooded by the sea (the Frisians historically won at least one major battle against the Hollandic counts by drawing their heavily armoured knights into a swamp), although unlike in Finland or Estonia, the bogs and swamps of Frisia have nowadays almost all been completely drained and turned into agricultural land.

Cultures often survive in areas that are very difficult to access, whether it be mountains (Basques, Ossetians) or swamps (Estonians, Cajuns). I think this could be represented in the game pretty well, just add a modifier to mountainous or marshy provinces that should make it incredibly difficult or impossible for the province to convert culture.

 

[mahidevran]

But then how will I castrate people who cross me and then send them to China?

I'm not sure what you mean by this, but blinding and castration wouldn't be taken away from the Greeks, simply also given to members of the new Caucasian culture group.

Yeah, that goes for the Frisians too. Nary a mountain to see for like a thousand kilometers around Frisia, but the area used to be a wet, boggy nightmare regularly flooded by the sea (the Frisians historically won at least one major battle against the Hollandic counts by drawing their heavily armoured knights into a swamp), although unlike in Finland or Estonia, the bogs and swamps of Frisia have nowadays almost all been completely drained and turned into agricultural land.

Cultures often survive in areas that are very difficult to access, whether it be mountains (Basques, Ossetians) or swamps (Estonians, Cajuns). I think this could be represented in the game pretty well, just add a modifier to mountainous or marshy provinces that should make it incredibly difficult or impossible for the province to convert culture.

I neglected to mention wetlands, but Frisia and Estonia are also prime examples of challenging biomes that offer a bulwark against enemies. And marshes too are already encoded into the game's existing terrain data, so again, it could apply it to a mechanic that determines ease of integration/settlement. Conversely, we should consider the flip side of the equation: arable fields and farmlands should be comparatively easier to hold after conquering (and combined with other values, may make them more appealing to potential conquerors).

Per fishman786, it's already possible to mod these features into the game yourself, so if the devs never take it into consideration it's good to know I can tweak it myself to my liking. But especially after this discussion, I think it's a feature that would add depth and challenge for all players, no matter their regional interest or gameplay style.

 

[Riftwalker]

I've been thinking about how they should make a cultural DLC.

Mix technology into culture and make it so conversions make dynamic melting pot cultures more often than just overwriting a culture.

here's a post from a while ago

i wish there were procedural melting pot cultures, where it effectively adds a new culture into a different cultural group. so like, if the byzantines invade croatia, you may end up with byzantine-croatian (groupname-previousculturename) where the group name is the name of the culture group it's assimilating into.

make it then so that there's little penalty for inter group holdings. this way you spread your culture while not blast painting the cultural map. ruler's should have little problem with culture groups as their liege and will likely change their culture to their capital culture if it's within the same culture group within a few decades. groups converted this way should have a bonus to converting their origin culture as well.

if you melting pot an already procedural melting pot, just change the prefix to the new group.
(assume i mean culture group when talking about cultures from here on)
I honestly wish a cultural expansion comes out and culture is more or less treated like religion with a cultural authority, and heretic cultures(cultures that occasionally change amongst each other based on cultural authority). Cultural authority based upon a few factors but not holy sites. instead like the top 5 independent leaders of that culture give some cultural authority, and war victories influence it as well. say counts give 2%, dukes 5%, kings 10 and empires 15, just because several empires of a culture group are pretty rare, but the clout of these cultures due to their realm's strength, give them presence and appeal and so they'd have greater stability and draw.

Also i agree that cultures should have an additional tier, like religions with overall groups such as pagan, then religion and then that religion and it's heresies. where cultures that often occupied a lot of the same space and had melting pots would be in the same heretical group

and another

i mentioned in another recent culture thread. We really need a DLC that just focuses on and revamps how cultures are protrayed.

like make dyanamic melting pots more likely than just overwriting unless there's some depopulation or some such happening. give cultures cultural authority, etc. dyanamic cultures would just swap culture groups and cultures of the same culture groups would have very little being ruled by one another. the example i gave was croatian would become Byantine-Croation and this would eat croatian and vice versa like normal, but other cultures would just meld them into their culture group.

this way the map still has some distinction very far into the game, etc. I think normal culture conversion would be allowed as well semi-recently after certain casus belli, such as holy war, conquest and invasions, but otherwise would just do the above.

heads of a culture would be whomever has the largest realm of that culture and would affect their cultural authority with military and stewardship, the next 4 highest independant rules would also contribute moral authority based on their rank. maybe also an "organized versus non organized" like bonus based on if that culture has ever held a empire title.

on top of that give cultures more unique flair besides buildings, maybe change tech and have it tied to cultural progression, where each duke or higher spends their points in various areas to unlock various things, from standard tech stuff to maybe gaining a special perk such as neighbor raiding, tax income, levies, etc. this would be kinda like betting, where each duke is putting points in various areas but if something else raises first the others would be reduced to 0 again. only way to really coordinate is the AI will generally favor the either head of culture or their most liked empire of their culture.

like you're french and REALLY want to get ahistorial raiding but the AI just won't have it, so you go and create Francia and you'll be able to get the AI to focus on that or this. maybe change the cultural retinue to a better one, etc.

just think it would make culture much more important and fun.

I think if culture was treated like a method for technology and made it so culture groups are more distinct, and mutable, people would care more about their culture. Like imagine if instead of researching tier 3 legal or whatever, for the law you needed, you instead needed to advance your culture to obtain those laws, or instead you could have pressed your influence on culture to change your retinue to a better one, losing out on getting the laws. etc.

 

[mahidevran]

I've been thinking about how they should make a cultural DLC.

Mix technology into culture and make it so conversions make dynamic melting pot cultures more often than just overwriting a culture.

I think if culture was treated like a method for technology and made it so culture groups are more distinct, and mutable, people would care more about their culture. Like imagine if instead of researching tier 3 legal or whatever, for the law you needed, you instead needed to advance your culture to obtain those laws, or instead you could have pressed your influence on culture to change your retinue to a better one, losing out on getting the laws. etc.

There's been a lot of improvement fleshing out the detail in regions such as Africa and the Baltics in various DLCs and updates, but it's been on my mind since I got into the game a couple years ago. An entire installment based not just on adding new cultures, but improving the mechanics for the ones they have, feels long overdue at this point.

The melting pot model for dynamic cultures has a lot of appeal, but it isn't without its problems. For one, its a phenomenon borne out of very specific conditions. Not every instance of cultural exchange between a hegemonic power and another group ends with the formation of a new hybrid culture on both ends. Adoption of customs on one side does not always guarantee it will pass down to the other. Easily-formed, unlimited melting pots also have the potential for it to get too complicated, and not in a good way. Furthermore, making everything a melting pot is not a solution to the "monocultural empire" trend -- a melting pot culture can still end up being a monocultural empire after its formation.

Which is reinforcing my thoughts that the idea of changing how culture works may be the better idea, including reducing penalties for "different culture group" vassals. So long as they are of the same religion and government type, of course -- all much more important factors than cultures, along with individual character personalities.

I can definitely get behind granting technologies and "perks" to different cultures, though. This already exists to some extent with raiding abilities, blinding and access to succession laws, but it's rather sparse on the whole. One thing that might help is if the developers asked themselves, "what allowed this group to survive/prosper/expand in reality during the time it did?" The discussion in this thread has already investigated that question in the cases of Georgians, Basques and Frisians, with environment being a key factor.

To bounce off the theme of cultural exchange and coexistence, perhaps establishing and maintaining positive diplomatic relations with states of different cultures can allow you to adopt some of their perks as well.

Adding serious flavor to cultures in general would be a step up, too: events crafted with specific culture(s) in mind, special bonus-granting council or honorary ranks, and other unique abilities or actions.

 

[Palakus]

Just to say, adding Alans and Armenians to the "Caucasian" culture group, as the OP says, would be far more unhistorical than it is now and would ruin the immersion completely. From my point of view, Byzantine groups suits IE-language speaking Armenians far better.

Alans were wiped out in the real history just like they are being constantly wiped out in the game... So, we can say that it follow the historical accuracy on that here.

But I would really like to see Circassians and at least one East Caucasian nation in game. I guess they can just add "Dagestani" culture like they did in EUIV, especially since it's the only region which was relevant during the middle ages, with kingdoms like Sarir being established by it's peoples. It would make the game in this region more difficult, just like it was IRL. And probably it would even help these nations to survive for a bit longer, since Alans' most dangerous foes are always the nomads which surround them from all sides.

 

[Riftwalker]

The melting pot model for dynamic cultures has a lot of appeal, but it isn't without its problems. For one, its a phenomenon borne out of very specific conditions. Not every instance of cultural exchange between a hegemonic power and another group ends with the formation of a new hybrid culture on both ends.

sure but this would be represented as a culture with a strong resistance to conversion as one of it's powers, or with high cultural authority. the point is though, if you conquer the mediterranean as rome, you won't get greek everywhere, but Byzantine-Leventine, byzantine-Bedouins, byzantine-French, etc. a large issue with the map is it's too homogenous, and this would keep the areas separate but not ignore the influence of powerful empires on culture. these melting pot cultures would have the tech level of their new culture group, but still be more rebellious than homegenie, taking a VERY long time to convert between culture group members.

Which is reinforcing my thoughts that the idea of changing how culture works may be the better idea, including reducing penalties for "different culture group" vassals. So long as they are of the same religion and government type, of course -- all much more important factors than cultures, along with individual character personalities.

I agree, I almost think culture shouldn't convert except through settlement if the religion of the area is different than yours, unless you have a special government type or your religion is specifically syncretic.

I can definitely get behind granting technologies and "perks" to different cultures, though. This already exists to some extent with raiding abilities, blinding and access to succession laws, but it's rather sparse on the whole. One thing that might help is if the developers asked themselves, "what allowed this group to survive/prosper/expand in reality during the time it did?" The discussion in this thread has already investigated that question in the cases of Georgians, Basques and Frisians, with environment being a key factor.

Yes, I just think that technology and culture are intrinsically linked, and a lot of what they have as technology now is more of a cultural phenomenon. all the cultural techs are heavily cultural as the name suggests, but then so are building techniques and armor and weapon technology. I think if instead of a province thing, culture and which culture you belong to should be the deciding factor on technological benefits. If I import french to the levantine and change the culture there, you sure as hell know I brought with me the blacksmiths, architects, and customs the french have.

 

[es333]

Yeah, that goes for the Frisians too. Nary a mountain to see for like a thousand kilometers around Frisia, but the area used to be a wet, boggy nightmare regularly flooded by the sea (the Frisians historically won at least one major battle against the Hollandic counts by drawing their heavily armoured knights into a swamp), although unlike in Finland or Estonia, the bogs and swamps of Frisia have nowadays almost all been completely drained and turned into agricultural land.

Cultures often survive in areas that are very difficult to access, whether it be mountains (Basques, Ossetians) or swamps (Estonians, Cajuns). I think this could be represented in the game pretty well, just add a modifier to mountainous or marshy provinces that should make it incredibly difficult or impossible for the province to convert culture.

Frisians nor Germanics didn't even exist 6000 years ago and Indo-Europeans hadn't expanded into Europe from the steppes yet but I get your point.