Favoured culture and religion

[Martin_Mortyry]

Let's say I'm playing Ottomans and I really, really like Albanians - they were the first people that fullly converted to islam in my Empire and I'm willing to expand their cultural borders to Serbia and Greece. Yet, I won't be able to accept their culture without ridiculous acceptance bonuses or genociding every other ethnicity in the Balkans.
Now let's say I'm a powerful Russia, spanning from Одра to Камчатка. The Motherland is home for many cultures and religions, but not every citizen is happy with my rule. Lithuanians and Poles, for example, rise every second year and I plan on eradicating them and their filthy heresy. On the other hand, there are various sunni inhabitants to the south of my Empire. I don't really want to get in trouble with them, because their provinces make up 1/4 of my wide country and without bonuses from religious ideas it'd take too many years and too many dead солдатов to convert them. I don't have humanist ideas either because I wasn't planning on being a nice guy this game. Now, what should I do to keep Матушка peaceful?

The idea is to let us decide on which cultures and religions we want to favour beside of our own. The favoured culture would instantly become accepted, no matter how small it is - it could also give bonus to change cost to this culture. The favoured religion would be locked at 1 tolerance(unless we have some other tolerance modifiers: then the tolerance should be accordingly adjusted). If the religion is in country's religion group it should be allowed to convert to this religion with lower prestige penalties.
Amount of accepted cultures and religions could rise with country's rank or development. Let's say that duchies get 1 favoured culture and no favoured religion, kingdoms get +1 favoured culture and +1 favoured religion and empires get +2 favoured cultures and +1 religion(the bonuses cumulate with previous ranks). More favoured cultures and religions could be unlocked with humanist ideas.

I have a feeling this had been suggested before, but probably not in a form of a separate thread, so here it is! What do you think?

 

[gronak]

I have seen this idea before and I like it.

The favored religion, not so much however I like the idea of if your country is mostly one religion then it is easier to convert to that one.

 

[Maq]

We could argue endlessly about the 'culture' stuff because binary evaluation can never fit to real life where tiny distinctions - often superstitious - make all the difference.
From gameplay point of view, your suggestions just make blobbing easier. That's not exactly what we want.
And your example of Russia being the Motherland to many cultures... are you a Russian and kidding us, or yourself?

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

And your example of Russia being the Motherland to many cultures... are you a Russian and kidding us, or yourself?

Nah, that was just me roleplaying, from my profile pic you can guess I'm Polish. That's pretty much the only thing that keeps me coming back to these games and I want this angle expanded.

 

[Maq]

Then you'll hardly like my mod (work in progress) because it tends to simplify significantly the whole culture stuff.
Nationalism is in a way eternal, but an idea of a national state, i.e. that nation(ality) is the reason for the state's legitimate existence, belongs to 19th, and even more to 20th century.

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

Then you'll hardly like my mod (work in progress) because it tends to simplify significantly the whole culture stuff.

I'll gladly try your mod out if I get my hands on it. Even though it simplifies the culture mechanics I assume it deepens some other aspects of the game?

Nationalism is in a way eternal, but an idea of a national state, i.e. that nation(ality) is the reason for the state's legitimate existence, belongs to 19th, and even more to 20th century.

Of course, although you cannot argue with the fact that lots of nowadays nation states come from feudal formations like kingdoms of France, Poland or Bohemia, and those had their own cultures as well. And my idea doesn't have much to do with nationalism, I think? It's about being able to have some culture that you'd normally wouldn't be able to accept tolerated. It would also allow small cultures like Basque or Albanian survive in huge empires!
I'm not sure how will this make blobbing easier? Do you mean the religious favouring will allow some to blob into heathens? Well, that part could be balanced or even not included, if the devs tried to implement the culture favouring!

Besides, I wouldn't really care if people used my suggestion to blob. I am definitely not a blobbing type, but what one does in his private game is entirely his business.

 

[Maq]

I believe accepted culture enables higher income, higher manpower, lower revolt risk. (In one or another way, patches are so many that I'm sometimes losing trace.) If accepting culture gets easier, you basically get stronger, one way or another.
But what is an 'accepted' culture in the first place? What can a country / ruler / player decide about it? You're a Pole, well, Poland-Lithuania ruled many orthodox Christians for centuries. The legitimacy of such a ruling was originally based on inheritance and conquest. Later on, on tradition and relatively tolerant religious policy. Peasants of Brest-Litovsk area could not tell whether they were Russians or Belarussians or whatsoever, but they surely knew whether they were Catholic of Orthodox, and that their legitimate Lord was the King of Poland. If there was any resentment, it was based on religion, and perhaps more often, on social divisions - the aristocracy became polonized, the overseers were often Jews, and the peasants were Orthodox. Only with higher literacy, and also compulsory military service, nationalist awareness arose, and nationality became decisive. Up to a degree when relations between Poles and minorities of Polish republic became quite bitter. But that's easily after 1820.
I've observed that not only you, but many many members of this forum just LOVE nationalism, and often fall into a heated arguments about when the Ukrainian nation began to exist, etc. etc. etc. I say, for most part, during the timespan of this game nationality was not an issue. States were not standing and falling on it. Rural illiterate population even could not tell their nationality. And the most urbane and literate of all nations, the Italians, were aware of their identity and detested extra-Italian incursions into their businesses, yet not even one Italian ruler ever raised the idea of Italian national state (before 19th century). They were Venetians, Genoans, Milanians, Florentians, Pisans, etc. and any attempt of unification could be only accomplished by force and met with fierce resistance. That is: disobedience, difficult administration, revolts, refusing military service, separatism and hatred everywhere. And the game should negate this because of cultural proximity????

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

I believe accepted culture enables higher income, higher manpower, lower revolt risk. (In one or another way, patches are so many that I'm sometimes losing trace.) If accepting culture gets easier, you basically get stronger, one way or another.

Sure, but you would accept bigger cultures along your conquests nontheless and letting someone accept Basques, Samis or Estonians, though being boost, isn't anything crazy.

I've observed that not only you, but many many members of this forum just LOVE nationalism

Yes, I love nationalism, but not in it's current form. It's pretty much what saved my and your(presuming you're Czech) national identity back in XIX century and let our countries rise after WW1. This ideology evolves all the time, in time period on which EU4 focuses we see it still mostly influenced by religion, but also rise of more modern definition of nationalism. Now, you have to remember that language used to play a pretty huge role even before 1444. Take a look at Teutonic Order, for example - they settled thousands of German families in Prussia and Gdańsk mainly to make their populations Germanic: they did it not only to make communication easier but also to reduce importance of Balts and Slavs and their weird languages and already estabilished cultures(language, traditions, form of practicing beliefs and so on).
Now, cultures in EU4 are very arbitrary and they're getting even more with each patch(Bretons being in French culture group, for example). Should something be done with the system? Of course, I wrote my very first thread about it. Now, if you read it I took an entirely different position from your point of view, I actually expanded the language/ethnicity spectrum, but I think I had a reason - it would make these cultures less arbitrary, at least in part.
The culture isn't in game just because, it also keeps some tags alive. As much as I love historical accuracy I also love some diversity in my Europa, and that's what the main cultural tags provide, that why Germany and France are so culturalry divided!

You can remove differences between most of cultures in your mod, but devs have to take into account who is their target audience. Imagine the unrest that such a move from Paradox would cause, not only on this forum but also on Reddit and /gsg/!

 

[Maq]

I could stick to your example of German Ostsiedlung. This occured not only in Teutonic Order, but also concurrently in Bohemia and Silesia. Bohemian kings and Silesian Piast dukes supported it! Obviously not to 'strenghten their culture', but to gain more subjects, develop their countries. They did not mind that the coming settlers spoke different languages (there was no single 'German' language at that time), but they appreciated their higher level of development; the Germans founded new cities and boosted trade and industry.
The German settlers in Silesia were absolutely loyal to Silesian dukes, and later to Bohemian kings. Only after 1630, when Bohemia proper experienced forced re-Catholization, and Silesians remained Protestant, differences become important. And it was because of religion that Silesians mostly welcomed incorporation into Prussia after 1741.
Similarly, Mazurians even in 1920 opted for Germany - vernacular was less important than religion and traditional ties. Even in 1920!

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

Similarly, Mazurians even in 1920 opted for Germany - vernacular was less important than religion and traditional ties. Even in 1920!

This was more because of the ongoing war, as Masurians were afraid they would become part of USSR if they joined Poland.
About ostsiedlung - of course most of it was done willingly, but if we look at territories controlled by the Germans (Prussia, Neumark) you can see that for some reason these regions were germanised in a much bigger scale, as if they wanted these territories to become German. I don't want to sound anti-germanic here, but I've got a feeling that these particular examples were pretty thought out. Anyway, we're getting slightly off topic.

 

[Maq]

Anyway, we're getting slightly off topic.

Well, yes and no. You say that detailed culture stuff would make this game more attractive. Please don't suspect me being not interested in ethnography, though on amateurish level only. However, my counter-arguments are following:
1) It is not possible to subject nationalist behaviour to any universally valid rules. These things cannot be turned into numbers.
2) From a ruler / player position, you can hardly do anything about it. Can you imagine any action taken by Russian tsars to win the love of his Polish subjects? Or what did Osman sultans better in Albania than in Serbia to make Albanians convert willingly, as opposed to Serbians?
3) During large part of the game period, and in most regions completely, nationality was not a relevant factor. Any ruler could easily administer loyal subjects who spoke completely unrelated languages as long as much more important sources of loyalty and allegiance were present. Yes, loyalty and allegiance is what ultimately matters, and should be dealt with in this game. These may be gained (or lost) through various means, and nationality belongs among those less important - that's why it should be of little importance and attention in this game, too.
[So, my mod "knows" culture, but does not go deep into ethnographic stuff, it rather tries to target issues connected with population's loyalty in general.]

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

I see what you mean and I fully agree with you. Yet, these things are more representative in CK2, in EU4 it could be represented through estates... if they were implemented a little bit better. And then again, the loyalty and allegiance mechanic could be even expanded through cultures! But it all depends on how you are doing this in your mod/devs will do this if they decide to add it, and to know how you've done it - I'll have to play your mod first.

 

[Maq]

I see what you mean and I fully agree with you. Yet, these things are more representative in CK2, in EU4 it could be represented through estates... if they were implemented a little bit better. And then again, the loyalty and allegiance mechanic could be even expanded through cultures! But it all depends on how you are doing this in your mod/devs will do this if they decide to add it, and to know how you've done it - I'll have to play your mod first.

Unfortunately, I've been selling bear's skin while the bear is still alive and well in the forest.... Yep, internal politics are one of my primary goals when modding. And by the way, I've read your post about trade. I liked you criticism, less so your suggestions. But my mod contains some ideas which you'll like, hopefully. In my mod, trade goods matter, a lot, and you can do a lot to make money through production and trade.

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

Well thanks for honest opinion, it's always appreciated, especially on suggestion forums! My trade suggestions could've been... thought out a bit better but I'm still happy with some of them or with their intention, at least. The main point of that thread was to start a sort of suggestion compilation/debate thread, sort of like what we've currently got about national ideas, but I wasn't so successful due to this forum not being as popular as the general one and probably(mostly, but let me dream!) lack of people's interest in the topic.
Anyway, thank you very much for this opinion exchange on topic of culture representation.(and bumping this thread in the process, hehe) Let me know when your mod comes out, you really got my interest with your two last posts. Cheers!

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

[Shameless Bump]

I decided to change favoured religion in duchy rank to favoured culture. Small duchies are usually located in places such as HRE or India where there are many tiny cultures and a really little religious variety. Moreso, having every single prince tolerating a heresy in HRE would be quite undesirable if we want the league war to fire.

Of course, there are instaces like Lithuania or Burgundy, which are pretty massive and, in case of LIT, not religiously united, but both these tags can easily rank up, and Lithuania gets additional tolerance of heretics anyways.

 

[MoreHistory]

I love this idea. It would completely change the slow flow of the game, while making it so you can really change history as you wish

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

I mean... I guess we could say it got accepted in a way? At least the culture part? Not entirely as I imagined it to be, but still, I'm happy they're adding something similar into the game!