Improved France Map

[Mattymooz]

NOTE : You can now play with it yourself on the Workshop : http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=451040975​

After my vision of a better England was so well recieved, I'm just going to start doing other places (mainly in Europe) that I think deserve more better provvinces.

Please note that the idea of these changes is too add depth to an area and make it more accurate, but not to go completely indepth in certain areas with tiny provinces. They still need to be clickable and a reasonable size. I'm not going to make an area a mass of utrechts and maltas.

So, this time my focus was France (for me this included brittany, france and it's vassals, provence and french burgandy). Here is what I would change if I was Paradox:

The changes added a total of 11 new provinces. 1 new province for Brittany, 1 for Foix, 1 for Armagnac, 1 for Orleans, 1 for England and the rest for France proper.

Spoiler: New Provinces Images

I haven't redone the cultures this time as I don't know a lot about the cultures in France at this point in time. I would have renamed cosmopolitaine anyways (as I know that it is horribly wrong) but I can't seem to find the localisation file for the original 1.0 cultures.

I have also reformed the Base Tax (or development) of the area. This has resulted in the french vassals having more wealth than they did before, but france staying the same (in the aim that maybe the vassals will revolt and if not then whatever). But after all the vassals have been integrated + the burgundian inheritance event, they should have the same basetax as they normally do (french burgundy got nerfed as the lowlands probably need a buff)

Orleanais has gained a important center of trade but I haven't added any others as I'm not sure any more are needed

Again I will be uploading it to the workshop soon, so you guys will be able to play with it. Any amendments would be great. My expertise is in Britain not France so it could be horribly wrong!

 

[Basileios Makedon]

Here is the new map I promised :

Changements : -Briton provinces fit better their historic forms.
-Addition of the province of Albret
-Addition of the province of Vivarais. She eats voluntarily on the province of Forez, so that the troops can move along the Rhône without going into the mountains of the Alps or of the Massif Central.
-Suppression of the province of Verdun : even if correct historically, the level of details of the game makes his existence impossible.
-Improvement of some province borders : Avignon ; Forez on the west
-Addition of the Alps (western part)
And I also put the PU's and the vassal of Burgundy like in 1.12, but it's secondary according to the subject here which is the remodelling of the provinces.

Oh, but that wasteland in the Pyrenees looks so ugly!

 

[Itchel]

oh yes, please no wasteland

 

[Nucky]

Sorry for the delay of the answer.

@Mattymooz
Thanks for the map. I rearranged according to it, I will publish a new map later. However for the north and the west, It's not very possible to follow that. The Finistere can't really be cut in two parts.
For the cultural choice, the other one has his arguments but mine seems more precise to me. Biritanny wasn't a zone with uniform traditions and just a linguistic variation, but on the contrary a linguistic variation which brought cultural variations, even if the christian background in particular stayed close.
If you are interested in this french forum his name is Mundus Bellicus ! You can find it here : http://www.mundusbellicus.fr/forum/forum.php

Yes, it is much better. I agree that the west of Brittany is hard to represent. Maybe Finistere could be renamed to Cornouaille, and Armor to St-Brieuc for the sake of consistency? It's up to you. I agree that there were strong culture variations in Britanny, but people in Nantes and Rennes were feeling Bretons, in the sense that they followed Breton custom law, were represented by the estates of Brittany in Rennes. Again, culture is not language. Revolter tag should be Brittany in those provinces, not France. But Breton should be part of French culture group (as it will be in the next patch). It makes more sense with the game mechanics, and also historically, as in 1444 most of the Breton nobility spoke French.

A few remarks on the rest of the map:
- Albret does not seem really necessary to me, and was it already controlled by France in 1444?
- Shouldn't Maine and Anjou belong to England in 1444? I understand that it is secondary.
- Laval was part of Maine, not Anjou. Your Anjou goes too far north Mattymooz map is better in this regard.
- Vivarais does not seem necessary also. I think there are already too many provinces. For example I think that Angouleme should be integrated in Saintonge.
- Picardie should have Wallonian culture group, I read in another tread about the Netherlands than Wallonian represent both Wallonian and Picard in what is now Belgium.
- I'm all for wasteland in Pyrennées and Alps. It is ugly, but I find uglier to send army crossing the mountains in January. Hopefully one day new mechanics will appear for mountains.

So really great stuff, I like independant Cambray, the Flanders set-up, the Arpitan culture, the landlocked Navarra, Guise province, and many other things.

I see French names for provinces in England and Spain, I'm curious, is there a dynamic province name system in the French game, or you just deactivated it?

 

[Nijato]

Yes, it is much better. I agree that the west of Brittany is hard to represent. Maybe Finistere could be renamed to Cornouaille, and Armor to St-Brieuc for the sake of consistency? It's up to you. I agree that there were strong culture variations in Britanny, but people in Nantes and Rennes were feeling Bretons, in the sense that they followed Breton custom law, were represented by the estates of Brittany in Rennes. Again, culture is not language. Revolter tag should be Brittany in those provinces, not France. But Breton should be part of French culture group (as it will be in the next patch). It makes more sense with the game mechanics, and also historically, as in 1444 most of the Breton nobility spoke French.

A few remarks on the rest of the map:
- Albret does not seem really necessary to me, and was it already controlled by France in 1444?
- Shouldn't Maine and Anjou belong to England in 1444? I understand that it is secondary.
- Laval was part of Maine, not Anjou. Your Anjou goes too far north Mattymooz map is better in this regard.
- Vivarais does not seem necessary also. I think there are already too many provinces. For example I think that Angouleme should be integrated in Saintonge.
- Picardie should have Wallonian culture group, I read in another tread about the Netherlands than Wallonian represent both Wallonian and Picard in what is now Belgium.
- I'm all for wasteland in Pyrennées and Alps. It is ugly, but I find uglier to send army crossing the mountains in January. Hopefully one day new mechanics will appear for mountains.

So really great stuff, I like independant Cambray, the Flanders set-up, the Arpitan culture, the landlocked Navarra, Guise province, and many other things.

I see French names for provinces in England and Spain, I'm curious, is there a dynamic province name system in the French game, or you just deactivated it?

It's a question of choice. If the fact that these provinces are french prevent the tag revolt to be Britanny, I admit it's quite annoying. It would be interesting to have the mechanism of the estates of Britanny in the game because it had a great historical importance; however I stay on my choice for the cultures which is languages = cultures.
For the names : Cornouaille bothers me because it's nearly identical to Cornouailles in the british isles (Cornwall in english) which is just on the other side of the Channel. But it doesn't make it impossible of course.

1)All the english lands were integrated to the royal demesne after the HYW, Albret was french in 1444.
2)No, Maine and Anjou belonged to England at the age of the Plantagenêt (They even are buried there), so way before 1444.
3)Mmm it indeed seems that Laval belonged much more to the Maine. I will correct that.
4)I explained the reasoning : the possibility to follow the Rhône while avoiding the mountains. The size stays reasonable too. And yes it's not really necessary but when I saw the level of detail of the HRE... ^^
5)I thought about it since a while for Picardie, knowing that picard and wallon are closer than picard and french, I will change that.
6)Thanks for the support on this.

Let's add this to the debate :

Spoiler

For the names of the provinces I didn't activate the dynamic names.

 

[Itchel]

That's year 1337, in the hundred years war borders changed constantly.

 

[Nucky]

It's a question of choice. If the fact that these provinces are french prevent the tag revolt to be Britanny, I admit it's quite annoying. It would be interesting to have the mechanism of the estates of Britanny in the game because it had a great historical importance; however I stay on my choice for the cultures which is languages = cultures.
For the names : Cornouaille bothers me because it's nearly identical to Cornouailles in the british isles (Cornwall in english) which is just on the other side of the Channel. But it doesn't make it impossible of course.

1)All the english lands were integrated to the royal demesne after the HYW, Albret was french in 1444.
2)No, Maine and Anjou belonged to England at the age of the Plantagenêt (They even are buried there), so way before 1444.
3)Mmm it indeed seems that Laval belonged much more to the Maine. I will correct that.
4)I explained the reasoning : the possibility to follow the Rhône while avoiding the mountains. The size stays reasonable too. And yes it's not really necessary but when I saw the level of detail of the HRE... ^^
5)I thought about it since a while for Picardie, knowing that picard and wallon are closer than picard and french, I will change that.
6)Thanks for the support on this.

Let's add this to the debate :

I don't think that the Estates of Brittany should have something special, such structures were pretty common at the time, and did not wield much power. Maybe an event raising autonomy or something like that could be implemented.

1) In 1444, Gascony was still controlled by England, although I don't know the exact borders, so you may be right. I was curious if you had more info on that.
2) Maine and Anjou were still controlled by England, even though they agreed to give it to France in the Treaty of Tours (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Tours). They ceded it only in 1448. An event for this would be nice.
4) True, but the politics of the HRE are much more interesting than internal politics of France in this era! I can see why HRE deserves more attention. And avoiding mountains is not really important in the game, and it will probably be even less with new fort mechanics forbidding some movements. But it's just my opinion, it's not that it's wrong to put a province here.
6) I want to start playing CK2 one day, but I'm afraid to lose control on my life ^^. Really nice map, although it's in 1337.

 

[Nijato]

For CKII it wasn't for the borders but for the mountains wastelands.

 

[Therion]

In fact Charolais could easily be split in half. The eastern half would be Bresse (owned by Savoy in the earlier scenarios).

If you want to avoid using names of modern river-named departments (ala Oise and Marne) you could always find alternative ways to split the likes of Ile-de-France and Champagne (e.g. Brie or Beauce)

This map might be useful: http://www.davidrumsey.com/luna/ser...List_No,Series_No;lc:RUMSEY~8~1&mi=44&trs=257

 

[Mattymooz]

The mod has now been updated to 1.12! It now also includes Iberia, Hungary and the Balkans, though the mod has not been playtested much since the new development system so it may be slightly unbalanced (also a lot of missing forts). This will be updated over the next couple of days

Find it now on the workshop : http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=451040975

 

[Grand Historian]

Could you re-include the French Vassals? It would solve so many problems by putting them back in, make the region more dynamic, and let people see most of the HWY unit models again. Also, could you add back in Aquitaine culture as well? There might not have been a noticeable linguistic difference between the Occitan branches, but there certainly was a noticeable cultural difference between people who lived in Toulouse and people who lived in Provence at the time.

 

[ShadowCammy]

Love the French vassals are back. It's more historically accurate. That plus the Burgundian PUs would make a more historical Dutch and French regions. I like both of the maps seen very much.

Great work, Nijato and OP!

 

[Grand Historian]

Love the French vassals are back. It's more historically accurate. That plus the Burgundian PUs would make a more historical Dutch and French regions. I like both of the maps seen very much.

Great work, Nijato and OP!

Actually, the initial screenshots are outdated; the vassals were removed in 1.12 along with vanilla, but I agree that they should be brought back.

 

[ShadowCammy]

Actually, the initial screenshots are outdated; the vassals were removed in 1.12 along with vanilla, but I agree that they should be brought back.

Yeah. If Burgundy gets his historical PU's, why take away France's historical vassals?

 

[Mattymooz]

I was thinking about it as they seem to be slightly glass cannon (as in they wreck burgundy and then die to the follow-up coalition)

 

[ShadowCammy]

Right. Historically France was, in fact, very OP with their swarm of vassals. I was quite upset to see them gone, but they kind of made up for it by adding Florence in Italy so I can't complain THAT much.

 

[Grand Historian]

Right. Historically France was, in fact, very OP with their swarm of vassals. I was quite upset to see them gone, but they kind of made up for it by adding Florence in Italy so I can't complain THAT much.

True, but with the new provinces and dev system now, it's possible the Vassals will be able to become disloyal on their own.

 

[ShadowCammy]

True, but with the new provinces and dev system now, it's possible the Vassals will be able to become disloyal on their own.

I've not had an issue with vassals being rebellious due to development. Even if I did, that's what the subject interactions are for.

 

[Grand Historian]

I've not had an issue with vassals being rebellious due to development. Even if I did, that's what the subject interactions are for.

Well, usually most people don't start off with so many vassals they're at their dip relations limit either. I don't know how effectively the AI uses subject interactions, though.

And, even then, France could use both the slight buff and inhibitions provided by vassals. England's ally swarm usually overwhelms them now, and with all those free dip slots, France usually ends up making a diplomatic mess in the process.

 

[AndrejK]

Nice ! (It's me Nijato who talked here)

Here begins the translation of Lithu :

Reaction on your new map : 1) There should be a direct border between Picardie and IDF.
2) Your Beauce extend frankly outside the surproductive agricultural region centered on Chartres in the North-east whereas in the south-west a part isn't recovered.
3) Why isn't there a border between Bourbonnais and Marche ?
4)Why your Calais extend so much ? Even in the paradox version it's big.
5)Your Touraine seems weird to me in relation to the several maps I could see.

To answer your remark on Britanny : The zone between Nantes and Rennes always was in conflict, since the first centuries of installation of the britons. Then at the XII-XII century Britanny become a de jure vassal and de facto vassal of the kingdom of France. But when the HYW was at his highest, the duchy of Britanny tried to become independent. The kings of France still claimed this province as part of the realm until the union was realised in 1514. So if the cultures of provinces of Nantes and Rennes generate missions for France, It's great.

I have a new map too : Several new borders of provinces overhauled to be more historical and/or more aesthetic (like a change in the south-west so that Navarre can't have an access to the sea) ; division of the provinces of Champagne and Languedoc ; Marche is now occitan ; Add a center of trade in Orléans and IDF.

Spoiler: Cultural map

Spoiler: Commercial map

Aaaaaaand I even enabled the better graphics

I really like the cultural map...