[MOD] Imperium in Imperio EUIV Edition

[Vishaing]

ETA : A Sunday

Don't act so surprised, we all knew this day would come. I've been making increasingly blatant references to a Mod I'm planning for EUIV in pretty much every post I've made in this forum, and my Scripting Request Thread was essentially me testing the waters. Well, I've finally decided to start actually posting my specific plans, and what better time than now when Paradox's Developer Diaries are conspicuously absent?

Why am I posting this now, well before the game even has a concrete release date? Well, that should be increasingly obvious after the next post, my first "Developer Diary" as it were, which will detail how I plan to remake the Ideas System. Due to the way I'm handling this remake, I'm going to really need input from people to help with ideas for new, um, ideas, especially for culture and country specific ideas, so the earlier the better right?

Furthermore, with what we have currently seen I think I have enough information to start with, at the very least, planning the mod that I'm going to be making no matter what anyways. Obviously there are still plenty of aspects to cover, and it is possible that one or more of my intended systems may need to be extensively reworked to fit EUIV, but the worst that can happen from that is some wasted time and posts, and I worry about neither.

Lastly, I just really wanted to steal some attention, and since the Cat is Away, this Mouse will Play.

Mission Statement
The Goal of this mod is to radically re-shape the Internal Structure of managing your Country, in particular I want to make Peace-Time play more interesting, with its own ups and downs, opportunities and risks. Instead of a monolithic and largely formless government you will manage a set of provinces, each of which will have their own Local Powers that will be drawn from to make up the National Character of your Government

Managing your nation will be radically different in my Mod, and so will conquering, because the Faction System in my mod will be largely (but not entirely) Bottom-Up compared to EUIV's or even MMtG's Top-Down approach, and it is most likely that the Local Powers of a province won't just pack up and leave when someone new comes into town, but will stay and continue to pester you. By working with them you can cement your hold on a province, while fighting them will be a massive, but potentially lucrative, headache.

I will also be remaking Cores, which will in my Mod represent nations that the Local Powers consider to be valid Rulers of the Province in question. In my mod, you will NEED to play ball with the local powers in order to get Cores (and any tax at all). As such I will also be massively modifying the vanilla Overextension Modifier. I have my own system which will use the current Local Powers' authority and relation to the Central Government to apply modifiers to the Monarch Power Point Cost of actions and buildings.

Each Province will be a choice, and how you handle the organization of your nation will be an important aspect of the game. Your Provinces will have varying levels of centralization and autonomy, and reigning in local power in favor of a Central Authority will be as long, difficult, and dangerous of a process as success at it can be extremely lucrative. On the other hand, ruling your nation as an array of more or less closely related separate realms will also be an option, and which is better for you will depend largely on the situation and nature of your realm.

But don't worry, the Provinces aren't the only ones who are going to be having fun, there will be some special things for National Governments to play with, things like Succession Wars, Elective Monarchies, and other fun stuff.

Index of Developper Diaries:

	Ideas:
[url=http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?679281-MOD-Imperium-in-Imperio-EUIV-Edition&p=15247841&viewfull=1#post15247841]Rethinking Ideas (and Culture while I'm at it)[/url]
	Factions:
[url=http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?679281-MOD-Imperium-in-Imperio-EUIV-Edition&p=15564001&viewfull=1#post15564001]Building a Base of Power[/url]
Shaping a National Government
Cores, Claims, Conquest, Cultures, and You
Civil War Were Declared
	Vassals:
The Nature of Vassalage
Colonial Charters
Building your HRE in a Bottle
	Assemblies:
The General Assembly
The Growth of Political Parties
Parliamentarianism
	Dynasties:
The Heir Club for Men
Keeping it in the Family
Curse you Prussia!
	Modernization:
Tech Groups: Your place in the Global Community
Understanding your Nation's Social Structure
The Difference between Gradual and Rapid Modernization
	Table-Tastic:
List of Ideas
Faction Effects

And Lastly, before anyone suggests such. I am not doing this because I think EUIV will be Bad. I am doing this because Paradox and I are working from different Foundational Principles upon which we want to build our Political Systems.

 

[Vishaing]

DD 1 : Rethinking Ideas (and Culture while I'm at it)

I had an Idea!
Okay, that's the last Pun.
Maybe.

Now, despite the fact that this is not my primary focus, I am detailing it first because it is the area I will need the most community input for, because ultimately I'm actually not all that creative, and this system will require a lot more 'Ideas' than the vanilla system. So you guys get to make suggestions, and I'll probably incorporate all of them, because the system I have in mind is not limitted, but will only be better the more options there are that are available.

The Foundation
The Foundation of the system will probably remain largely unchanged, as I actually like what I have seen of the generic Idea System. I think I would prefer for the Ideas to be Trees (rather like Civilization 5's Policies or, more accurately but less appropriately, Skill Perks in Skyrim) rather than linear tracks, but all in all I like it so far. This may change once we actually start seeing what some of those Generic Ideas are, but I will wait until I get this information before making a judgement call.

Really, the only thing I don't like about the current system are the Country Specific Ideas, and I've already detailed my grievances, so I won't go back over them here.

As of right now, I am considering adding "Advanced" versions of some of the ideas, which will require choices and direct your nation in different directions. But I am only considering it and will need to see more of the actual Trees before I decide.

Country Specific Ideas
...No Longer exist. Well, each Country will be able to amass their own Special Ideas outside of the generic Idea Tracks, but these will not be given linearly, but chosen at select intervals from a list of ideas your country qualifies for, and I'm pretty sure none of them will truly be restricted to any specific country.

I will do this by replacing all of the Country Specific NIs with Placeholders that do nothing. Once you get one of these Placeholders, an event will fire letting you select your Ideas. I will probably need to use multiple events for players so these events are readable, as otherwise they could get several hundred possible options, and that would just be silly.

Provided you meet the requirements for the Idea in question, you can choose it. This will set a Country Flag which will allow a triggered modifier with the actual effects of the Idea (I'll have event modifiers for each one that will be applied for 1 day to let the Tooltip show the effects of the Idea). Unfortunately this means that part of the NI Interface will be completely useless, but eh, what'cha ya gonna do?

Some of the Ideas may have different effects depending on your other Ideas. A Highly quality focused Sweden choosing Hakkapeliitta for instance may wind up with the cost reduction of said Idea reduced, but instead replaced with a Discipline Bonus, or Morale Bonus, to further accentuate their existing policy of demanding that only the highest quality of soldiers serve in their armed forces.

But that is not all, for what if at some later point you no longer meet the requirements for the NI? Then you lose it. Simple as that. If you keep it gone for long enough you 'may' get the chance to choose a new National Idea.

...Or you may get some 'fun' events relating to the societal upheaval that such a loss can cause. Some NIs may not be too painful to Lose, Sweden's Hakkapeliitta for instance, being largely just a military policy, you'll (probably) 'just' see a decreased military effectiveness while the Generals get used to not having their Finnish Cavalries. But if Spain (or any other country) selects Devout Catholicism, expect any later conversion to Protestantism to be Excessively Painful...

Cultural Ideas
And here's the fun part I'm really looking forward to working with; Cultural Ideas. These begin on a Province Basis, and each province can have a maximum of 5, and some will begin at the start of the game. As time goes on, cultures will grow and change, and this will be represented by Provinces gradually accrueing modifiers with different traits and characteristics.

These modifiers can and orphan will sprout up naturally, it's not like you have total control of the populace after all, and will be influenced by the situation of the Province and the country itself, peaceful countries are unlikely to get a culture of Militarism for instance, while border provinces under constant assault may develop an extremely defensive attitude.

If the province is tightly controlled by your Nation, you may be able to influence these ideas directly, possibly even enforcing some. Which ones are available will depend on your situation.

These modifiers will then slowly spread to their neighboring provinces. They will spread most easily if the neighboring province is of the same culture, however can slowly spread to provinces in the same culture group, and even more slowly to completely different cultures. They will also spread more quickly if they don't have to cross national boundaries, or if they do, if the two countries are relatively friendly. Significant Trade Routes will also (provided I have the script techniques) also facilitate spread, as will major waterways like Rivers.

As Technology and Infrastructure advances this spread will become faster still, and with the advent of the Printing Press may allow the advances to "Jump" across provinces to other developed provinces with literate populations, but only to other Provinces in their culture group, spreading across Cultural Groups will need to be done the slow way.

Cultural Unity and The Rise of Nationalism
Oh yeah, I went there.

As the Cultural Ideas spread accross the homeland of their culture, they will gradually become associated specifically with their culture, and as more and more people of that culture identify as following this Idea, it may morph into a defining characteristic of that Culture. If two or more neighboring provinces (or closely located Provinces once the Printing Press Arrives) have the same idea, it may be adopted by the culture entirely. Once this happens, a Global Flag is set, and any country with that culture as it's Primary Culture will be granted a triggered modifier, a Nation Level version of the Province Modifier. Obviously this will radically speed up how quickly the Idea is adopted by the other provinces with that culture and can lead to existing modifiers being assimilated by this new modifier.

And this same process will slowly apply to the Culture Group as a whole. If enough of the Cultures within that group subscribe to a certain Idea, it will become a defining Idea of the entire Culture Group. At this point, any country with their Primary Culture belonging to this Group will get the Idea applied to them, although they may try to resist it and keep themselves separate from their Culture Group.

As the Cultural Group gets more of these uniting modifiers, their Cultural Unity will rise, as their people find more value in a common sense of brotherhood, of celebrating their cultural heritage, of their common, say, Frenchness. As the technology increases and communication becomes easier, the people in provinces may begin to react to developments far from their homes, whether those developments be a growing sense of National Pride after a spectacularly won war, or growing and rapidly spreading discontent at the disastrous rule of an incompetent Monarch.

I'm sure nothing could Possibly go wrong with that...

Colonial Cultures
Notice how I specifically mentioned "Homeland" in the above parts? Yeah, Colonial Cultures work a bit differently. They will still accrue their modifiers, and these will still spread, however they do not count towards the total for determining if the Idea is adopted into the main culture, and you will have no direct control over the culture's development.

Homeland is determined by Continent. Spreading the French Culture in Europe will mean those new provinces count towards the Homeland culture. I am considering also adding "Homeland" regions that provinces will require a border with in order to count as part of the Homeland culture, still thinking about it.

As these Colonial Provinces adopt these ideas, they will most likely be different from the mainland Culture's Ideas, and as more of these ideas grow, the culture will begin to mutate into a new distint form, a Colonial Culture, if you will.

Again, I'm sure nothing bad could Possibly be the result of these developments...

Assimilating Cultures
...Will be waaaaayyy more complicated than in normal EU3 or even EUIV. Rather than clicking a button and watching someone work on it, you will first need to batter down any cultural independence, while propogating traits that are similar to your culture. Only once the province has no identity that runs contrary to your culture and has at least some connection, will it be possible to assimilate the province. Larger Provinces will be more difficult to assimilate, and trying to assimilate the province will greatly upset any of the Local Grown Powers.

Implications
Well the biggest implication is in the growth of Nationalism. Cultures divided amongst numerous small and very different countries, say the Germans, will find their cultural remaining divided, while cultures almost or completely controlled by a single stable and independent country which rules only its culture group, say the French, will find their Cultural Unity naturally growing as time goes by. As the technology advances to allow rapid communication over long distances, the process will speed up.

It also means that as the concepts of Nationalism and Cultural Unity grow, that holding large Multi-Cultural Empires together will gradually become more difficult. However even by the very end of the game it will most likely be possible, provided you are willing to play ball with the Local Powers. Austria will have more trouble than France, but will still be able to survive.

Of Course, once one country has started on the path to Nationalism, if they choose to export that Nationalism...

However this also lets countries and their cultures gradually grow in a dynamic way that properly reacts to the course of the game. You will not see countries locked into a certain path just because they followed that path historically, and it may not be possible for them to follow this path if their situation has radically changed.

A Sweden who quickly loses Finland will need to adjust appropriately, or may have lost it before they ever grew to benefit, making it 'just' another lost province or 4. If a powerful Republic of Novgorod took it from them they may start using Finnish Cavalry instead of Sweden but in much the same way, or in a completely different way. If a large Duchy of Ryazan then incorporates the Cossacks into their military, you may get massive Russia-on-Russia Cavalry wars, with the Finns and the Cossacks slamming into each other en masse.

And that's AWESOME.*

The Call
So now, anyone who has any ideas for, um, Ideas, post them in the thread. If you have ideas for triggers and specific effects for the ideas that's awesome, but if you just have a general idea for an idea or an idea for some historic thing that could become an idea that's good too. I will be looking through the ideas that have been revealed and almost all of those ideas will be preserved in some form as a new idea, (Except the Edict of Restitution). If you have ideas for counter-factual ideas that would be good to, but I will want some sort of justification for them.

Well that's all for this Diary, now Bring on your Criticisms! Do Your Worst!
And now I'm going to go play Skyrim for a couple of hours.
BYE BYE!

*And actually happened in one of my EU3-HTTT-MM1356 Games as "Austria"

 

[kingofnoobs]

This looks interesting, Looking forward for more DD's.

 

[unmerged(63836)]

Sounds great. Hopefully, ideas can be altered via events - but it also may be that they're loaded when game initializes, and can't be changed on the go. As for suggestions of ideas - with huge enough numbers of well thought-out, correctly triggered, generic ideas - interesting alternate histories should just write themselves. Hard to suggest anything specific without knowing how much would be covered by the game mechanics. But you have good plan, so I'll definitely get back to you.

 

[Don_Quigleone]

You're talking about some interesting stuff. However, the big issue I could see you hitting is "event spam", particularly when you talk about things that work on a per-province basis. If I'm a multi-continental empire, I don't want to be bombarded with a notification that the nobles of Toulouse are feeling unhappy with my move towards secularism. That was a problem with Magna Mundi in it's latter incarnations, in particular the pirates system was poorly thought out.

Otherwise go crazy.

One thing I've been considering myself is that I'd like EUIV to be about a "journey to modernity". In Vanilla Europe will start with no Tech penalties and will be De Facto Modern according to how the game assigns that. Instead I'd like to see no one start as modern, but have the game organically have the European States become the most modern, and the rest fall behind (unless the player intervenes...). That could fit in nicely with what you're talking about. Of course, each player should be able to define "modern" in it's own way, and it should be within the power of the player to guide their country towards any particular definition of modernity they like(even a radical theocracy with a zealous populous).

In terms of technology, another possible approach might be that instead of focusing on putting penalties on non-european tech costs, we could instead first make it a level playing field, but tilt the system such that non-european civs end out having to spend their Monarch points on concerns other then Technology. Their could also be a bunch of triggered modifiers that Europeans tend to get (due to their activities like trading, exploring etc.) that non-Europeans don't tend to get (but can if they try to do the same activities). Understanding why some countries fell behind and others didn't is tricky though, which is why Paradox has always relied on tech groups. But maybe you could have certain combinations of the ideas you talk about give particularly good technology bonuses, while others doom you to become a feudal backwater.

 

[Burgonde]

You're talking about some interesting stuff. However, the big issue I could see you hitting is "event spam", particularly when you talk about things that work on a per-province basis. If I'm a multi-continental empire, I don't want to be bombarded with a notification that the nobles of Toulouse are feeling unhappy with my move towards secularism. That was a problem with Magna Mundi in it's latter incarnations, in particular the pirates system was poorly thought out.

Otherwise go crazy.

Good point. A solution could be to tie it to regions (assuming they are still there) instead of single provinces.

 

[Don_Quigleone]

Good point. A solution could be to tie it to regions (assuming they are still there) instead of single provinces.

Perhaps the easiest way would be to tie it to cultural regions. IE, All Occitan develop in the same way, and French provinces develop together in a more general way.

An interesting thing would be if more then one country share a culture or culture group. What happens in one, should happen in others. This would obviously be most interesting in the HRE.

 

[Lemont Elwood]

This system sounds fascinating, very well thought! Would you consider some colonial overhauls too, though? It'd be great if you borrowed the ideas in "The West" thread.

 

[Vishaing]

I LIVE! After 3 da.... what do you mean it's been more than three days?!?

Thanks all for the well wishes, I intend to have fun making and playing with this.

I am working on mitigating Event Spam, but in the event this isn't possible I will be erring on the side of Detail, even if it means there's more events firing. I was one of the people who never really minded the Pirates System, even during my one game as Colonial "Austria" where I wound up conquering, well, everything. That said, Gradual Shifts in Faction Power will be happening in a Global Event that will only fire for AI countries and which will modify variables everywhere all at once.

If a different event is there to cause a major hit, then it will describe this in the Tooltip. Even then such a hit will most likely affect multiple provinces at once, as Factions will organize together into blocs, primarily around Cultural Boundaries, depending on how completely they have been integrated into your National Government.

With respect to the Cultural Ideas I talked about, spread will still happen province by province, although as technology increases it will be able to affect multiple provinces at once. If you get the opportunity to direct your culture it will affect all of the provinces you own of that culture, but other provinces of that culture that you don't own will get to develop the way they always do. That's where the fun will come for the HRE as their many small states will mean the German Culture remains pretty divided, most likely. Although you never know...

But yes, what happens in one province of X Culture can happen in other provinces of X Culture, so there will still be an element to the game of having to work around things that develop over the course of the game in ways you may not particularly want.

Modernization will be very similar to MMtM's system, and yes, European Countries will still have to modernize. I am going to use Tech Groups to represent what "Community" you are part of, which will determine what Neighbor Bonus you receive, while Modifiers will represent different social aspects that will add penalties or bonuses to Research Cost. Granted this is NOT my focus, in the event someone else comes up with a better redesign of Modernization or any of my other non-core Modules, I'll be scrapping those Modules.

Current List of Factions (Subject to Revision, more details later) : Nobles, Merchants, Admirals, Generals, Priests, Bureaucrats, Intellectuals

BONUS, a Look at some Culture Specific Ideas
The Han Chinese Culture will start with 2 Cultural Ideas already established; "The Mandate of Heaven" and "The Heavenly Bureaucracy" which should prove to add interesting elements to play in and near China.

"The Heavenly Bureaucracy" is my method of representing the fact that China had largely passed away from Nobles taking direct control of land, in favour of a large and detailed Bureaucracy. This will make it easier for Bureaucrats to gain influence in both the Provincial and National spheres, while making it harder for other Factions to gain Power in either. As Bureaucrats provide a considerable reduction in the Administrative Weight that Centrally controlled provinces require, this will help in maintaining control over the Largest and most Populous state at the start of the game, and Han Bureaucrats will provide a further reduction.

"The Mandate of Heaven" is more complex, as it depends not only on the culture of the Province, but on the state of the country ruling said Province. If the country in question is considered to bear The Mandate, then Revolt Risk is reduced considerably. However if the Country is considered to not bear The Mandate their Revolt Risk is increased, and they will suffer a large penalty to their Tax Income in any Chinese Provinces they control. If the Mandate is currently vacant, any suitably grandiose and righteous nation which controls most of China will be able to claim the Mandate, and if recognized, will be able to more easily convert to Chinese Culture, Confucianism, and will gain Cores in China Proper at a much faster rate as the local Authorities will be more willing to accept the rule of those under the Mandate.

Of course, heaven help you should the people decide you have Lost the Mandate...

On Colonialism; It's going to have its own system...

Thoughts?

 

[anubisfike]

Well this seems extremely complicated but if you can pull it off there are some very interesting parts to it, especially the fact that managing your own country during both war and peace will be fun (hopefully). Have you thought about maybe adding more buildings? EU4 seems to have the exact same buildings as vanilla EU3 which was a huge disappointment to me. Hope you can make something interesting and fun out of your ideas.

 

[Don_Quigleone]

Thanks all for the well wishes, I intend to have fun making and playing with this.

I am working on mitigating Event Spam, but in the event this isn't possible I will be erring on the side of Detail, even if it means there's more events firing. I was one of the people who never really minded the Pirates System, even during my one game as Colonial "Austria" where I wound up conquering, well, everything. That said, Gradual Shifts in Faction Power will be happening in a Global Event that will only fire for AI countries and which will modify variables everywhere all at once.

There's no point in making something interesting if it makes the game annoying to play. If you're going to have a lot of changes, make them invisible to the player.

Also excessive detail adds very little to the game, and just slows things down. You have to kill your babies and simplify things to be elegant. For instance, I'd scrap the admiralty and merge them into Merchants/Generals. You could preserve the military, though during the period they weren't a separate group from the nobility, even in a state like China (which did have a nobility of sorts, the "Scholar-gentry", Aristocrats in all but name).

There are efficient and inefficient means to depict things as well. If you have too many modifiers players will just stop caring (and it will be hell to code too). Be ruthless and cut things. For instance, you could easily merge mandate of heaven and Heavenly bureaucracy. The two always together.

 

[FranzVonG]

Looks extremely complex to mod, but could be really fun to play. I still find that, even after four iterations, EU lacks in "fun" during peace-time, forcing you to wage war just to have something meaningful to do.

 

[Magnive]

You say that European Contries still have to modernize. Does this mean that the modernization does not stop at say, meritocracy (I believe that it's called that in MM), but instead you will be able to develop further, as time goes on?

 

[Fantaisie]

This mod definitely sounds like something I will have to try at release. The most obvious pitfall for me would be the AI, how would you make sure that the AI can handle all these new features?

 

[Vishaing]

Building a Base of Power

*How could you not, I only bring it up every five seconds**
@All: Thanks for the well wishes.

@anubisfike: Almost Assuredly now that Province Decisions don't exist anymore.

@Don_Quigleone: This mod is going to be complex. That's the Point.
I will attempt to keep the Interface clean and streamlined. The Actual Calculations are already looking to be so massive they involve at least 3 tiers of dozens of variables each being set in every owned province with yet more working on the National Scale, and that will not be changing, at all, period, unless I am literally physically incapable of achieving the level of detail I want, in which case I May simplify the actual underlying mechanics. But that is extremely unlikely as I'm already devising workarounds as I'm pretty sure I won't have half of the tools I want.

Simplifying it would be invalidating the entire purpose of everything this Mod intends to be. This will be complex, you will need to pay attention to every province, although there are ways to mitigate how much you need to deal with them, those ways will have tangible gameplay effects as they are intended to be Gameplay Choices, not just ways to streamline the interface. If you don't want to deal with the provinces at all then form a Vassal State and deal with the tangible effects of that political choice. Provinces will form groups and confront you together, but that's less to make it easier on the interface and more to make it harder on the actual game part.

And the Player of My Mod will be entirely free to 'try' and ignore the systems, in fact I encourage doing so. That way I'll be able to enjoy reading their distraught posts about how their entire nation fell apart and then drinking in their sweet sweet tears of failure. If People don't like that they are free to not play it.

This mod is going to be complex. Full Stop.

That said I did merge Generals/Admirals and Bureacrats/Intellectuals because I decided to shift those distinctions to one of the other tiers.

@Magnive: Yes
@Fantaisie: The AI is generally more robust than people give it credit for.

Now then, The Main Attraction, and with good timing concerning the last Paradox Diary;
Building a Base of Power
Those who were paying attention may have noticed* that I am actually the person who designed the Faction System that went into Magna Mundi the Game, a system I refer to as F-MK3, with EUIV's System being what I refer to as F-MK4, appropriately enough, and no, I did not suddenly begin interpreting a system I had nothing to do with as F-MK1 just so the numbers would line up nicely, nor did I start with this little naming scheme just so I could have numbers to fudge to line up nicely, that would be silly, and you are a silly person for suggesting that.
MMtG's Faction System was primarily conducted on the National Level, mine however will see the Provincial Level become far more important. As said, this system uses a Mixed Bottom-Up and Top-Down System, where your Local Governments contribute to the National Government, under certain circumstances, while your National Government will seek to manipulate the Local Governments to maintain its hold.

The Five Classes
The most Basic Element of the Faction System will be the Five Classes; The Nobility, The Merchants, The Priests, The Military, and The Bureaucracy. Each of these Five Represent different Social Classes that will have influence in your Government. The Primary distinction between the Five is meant to be how they justify their Power. Because they justify their power in different ways they will naturally be more powerful in different types of provinces, will provide different bonuses to those provinces, and will prefer different National Governments.
****That's what I thought.
The Nobility justify their Power by the Ownership of Land. The Nobility traditionally own this land by Birthright, charting their family tree backwards through Noble Titles, but that is not always the case. For instance, I would represent the late game Plantation Owners of the USA as Nobility, compared to the Merchants of the North. Because they have such a focus on land, they naturally prefer Rural Provinces populated by Serfs or Slaves, and improve the Tax Rate of these provinces.

The Merchants justify their Power by the Flow of Coin, or the Ownership of Business. They tend to be family oriented much like the Nobility, and also like the Nobility may try to cement their presence with a long history. Because they focus on business and trade they are drawn to Urbanized Provinces with valuable trade goods or Developed Industries, and improve the Production Income of these provinces.

The Generals justify their Power as flowing from the Careful use of Force and Military Might. They prefer provinces with large developped fortifications and other Military Facilities, and border provinces at that, and will reduce Recruitment Time and improve the Defensiveness of these provinces. At exceptionally high levels of power they may even increase the manpower drawn from the province, at the cost of tax and production.

The Priests justify their Power as stemming from the Will of God, and are only as strong as the faith of their people. They will naturally have some sway in Faithful Provinces, even if it is only ever small, and will reduce the Peasant Revolt Risk in that province so long as these Peasants, and the State, follow the True Faith.

The Bureaucrats and Intellectuals justify their Power as being earned through education and training, and they specialize in administrating territory. Bureaucrats thus prefer any province with a developped Local Government, however require a good Education System in the country in order to be able to function. As they Grow they will greatly reduce the Administrative Weight of the Province.

Shifting from one Class to Another on a Provincial or National level will be difficult, and potentially very painful. Home Grown people looking to enter the Local Government will be nautrally inclined to just assimilate into the existing Class Structure, especially if that Class if Powerful already, which it almost assuredly will.

Establishing a Class of Bureaucrats in particular will be quite difficult, as although establishing a good System of Education may be doable, and even easy in Wealthy Urban Communities, it will be difficult to get the graduates of this Education System to see themselves as Intellectuals First, especially if it is restricted to the Wealthy, as those are the sorts who already belong to one of the other Classes. Of course if the Bureaucrats come primarily from the Middle or even Lower Classes, and the existing Hierarchy finds itself insular and exclusive, these new Intellectuals may find themselves disenfranchised and marginalized, and they might not take that too well...
**What did you say to me?!?***
Classes on the National Scale
Your Local Power Bases will organize themselves along Cultural Lines and ally themselves with others of their group, and from there will make up the Classes that operate through your National Government. Again they will use the same 5 Classes, which will all have their unique quirks on the National Scale as well.

Each Class will have a 'favored' government which they will prefer and which will provide them a minimum Potential Influence Value of 50 in all provinces and 80 on the Country Scale. Fortunately, so long as you respect their rights they will tend to accept the Status Quo. Getting a powerful Merchant Class in a Monarchy will only be a problem if those Merchants feel the King has overstepped their bounds, and then they might seek to overthrow the government and setup a Commonwealth. However depending on what happens, you may even see the Merchants and Nobles unite in the hope of a Restored Monarchy, or it may gradually desintigrate until a powerful General imposes a Protectorate.

The Nobility tends to prefer Monarchies, particularly Elective Monarchies, but are most interested in a Noble Republic. In the Late Game, they will shift to prefering Constitutional Elective Monarchies in most cases. When Powerful and happy, they will increase your Prestige, and also help with Diplomacy, especially with other Monarchies.

The Merchants are a nautrally Republican Class, and of course favor the Merchant Republic above all else, but will eventually shift to prefering a Constitutional Republic. When Powerful and Happy, they improve the Trade Steering ability of the country, may provide additional Merchants, and can even improve Naval Morale.

The Generals generally don't care about government, but will, if 'pushed' into action by a long period of instability, establish a Despotic Monarchy or its more Advanced Cousins; the Republican and Presidential Dictatorships. When Powerful and Happy, they greatly improve Discipline and Morale, and may increase your force limits.

The Priests of course favor Theocracies, and have no advanced Government Type, but will generally support Monarchies instead. When Powerful and Happy, they greatly reduce the cost of Increasing Stability and may improve Diplomacy between Countries that share your Religion.

The Bureaucrats favor Republics, but may also try to implement a Bureaucratic Despotism. They, like Generals, will be less likely to take control of a Revolution themselves, but will be more likely to attach themselves to a different Class. When Powerful and Happy, they vastly reduce the cost to upgrade Stability, and provide a large boost to the Administrative Capacity of the Nation.

It is actually easier to modify the Classes on the National Level than the Provincial, in some cases. In Particular, the Bureaucracy will be easier to grow on the National Level, although again, if you lack the proper Educational System and Government Tech, expanding your Bureaucracy can be prohibitively expensive. Large Empires without the foundation to build a competent Bureaucracy will need to be extremely decentralized and grant great autonomy to their far flung provinces. I will detail Autonomy in the next Diary, and it should be fun.

Other Factors
Unless it proves completely impossible, I will also be assigning specific Cultures and Religions to the different Classes, on both a National and Provincial Level. Alternatively, I may regard the Province Culture as the culture of the Ruling Classes, and track the Culture of the People with variables and modifiers in a way whose similarity to the Religious Minorities system of Dei Gratia is of course completely accidental and not at all intended to be me deliberately drawing inspiration from and/or ripping off said system.
Should prove interesting.
Probably won't happen in the first version.
***Nothing Sir...****
There Can be Only One
In each Province, and at the National Level, each Class will have a certain level of Power. This will be measured numerically by Two hidden variable. Class Power is measured first as "Potential" power, which is a static variable determined by Long Term Factors like Government Type, Province Situation, National Ideas, and More, and can exceed 100 and fall below 0. This Value will determine what the "Tangible" Class Power Trends Towards, and the Greater the Difference the faster it will Trend. Tangible Class Power cannot leave the 0-100 Range.

The actual Influence will be communicated to the Player by Modifiers, and will range from Insignificant, which won't actually have a Modifier, through Notable and Significant, to Powerful, and finally to Absolute, each operating across a 20 point Range. However there's only so much power that can go around, Five People can't each take the entire Pie as it were. In the end, as you go up the scale, the less Classes there can be sharing the fun.

All Classes can of course be Insignificant Together, and can even all survive being Notable simultaneously. However there can only be a maximum of 2 Significant Classes in a Province or Nation, and those two will probably lock horns at every turn unless presented with a bigger threat (SEE: You). In order for one of them to Rise to Powerful, they will need to knock the other back down to Notable while also maintaining their hold and increasing their influence. And to get to absolute, they will have to crush all of the other classes back down to Inconsequential.

So Yes, the Classes will not just be a thorn in your side, but a thorn in each other's sides as well. They will fight over provinces and the national Government, and interesting things will happen when the situation of either changes.

Furthermore, local issues can spread. If two Classes are relatively evenly matched in a Province for instance, it is unlikely that either will truly be able to get an advantage, and they may need considerable luck, allowing the situation to fester and entrench itself until you wind up with the province firmly divided into two camps, both alike in dignity, with ancient grudges and new mutinies, a powderkeg just waiting to explode...

And Explode it Can, in a most glorious display, for no Province will exist in a vaccuum, and one, or both, of the Classes may seek aid from outside the Province. First they may look to their Brothers elsewhere in the Country, or they may form coalitions with other weak Classes nearby. They may even Petition the Ruler to favor one side or the other, with effects reaching far beyond the bounds of the province itself as every Class in your Nation will be paying at least some attention to what you do. They may even, finding no allies within, instead search for allies without, settling first for similar Classes in neighboring Lands, and next, possibly allying with funny looking foreigners recently come from across the sea...

Swear Your Allegiance
I Mentioned that a Classes Mood and the Factions they support would vary, and that is true. In this mod, Factions and Classes are different things. While Classes will be primarily a Passive System, dealing with more long term effects and causes, the Faction system will be more immediate and short term. Factions will be what you deal with the moth, because while Classes are what determine what your Power Players are, Factions determine what they Want.

Every Class will have a number of Allegiance Points they can swear to specific Factions. Specifically they will have one point per 10 Influence Points that they have, and if the country is using their Ideal Government they will gain an extra possible point of Allegiance. Classes will thus fragment the larger they get. Tiny Merchant Classes will be relatively homogenous, but a large and unwieldy Nobility won't agree on much, except that they don't want you taking any of their power.

Now then, what sorts of Factions will there be? What will they want? How will they Work? Those are all good questions, but that is another Dev Diary and shall be Posted Another Time.

Thank You Everybody, GOOD NIGHT!
Seriously.
I've just spent the past three hours walking in boots that don't fit and are falling apart anyways.
I'm goin' ta bed.

 

[Sakura]

The Actual Calculations are already looking to be so massive they involve at least 3 tiers of dozens of variables each being set in every owned province with yet more working on the National Scale, and that will not be changing, at all, period, unless I am literally physically incapable of achieving the level of detail I want, in which case I May simplify the actual underlying mechanics.

You aren't worried that all that will make the engine grind to a halt?

 

[Vishaing]

NOPE!

Okay, that's not entirely accurate. I'm aware of the possibility, and although I am generally willing to accept a Minor to Noticeable Performance Hit if it means greater detail, I do fully intend to limit this hit as much as possible. I will be breaking the calculations up to spread them out, and doing what I can to streamline everything. The first levels, which I have described here, will probably not be too bad because there are only 5 classes, and these only have two variables each, which change very slowly. The events that change them will have a MTTH of roughly ~1-2 Years. Some situations, such as a government revolution or independence, may lead to faster changes, but those will by definition be localized and will not affect the entire world, so their calculations should be small and shouldn't do much harm.

Factions will probably have a lot more variables, but they are also far more dynamic, and the events that modify them will have a much tighter focus. Their Calculations will be largely 'hidden' inside other events. Although they will also gradually change, they will primarily react to your actions as you carry them out.

 

[Panoso]

I know it is really hard to answer because it's so early but when do you expect to release this?

 

[Vishaing]

Sunday. Although a lot of the major features* won't be in until Tuesday.

*Tractor Beam, Transporter, stuff like that.

 

[Lemont Elwood]

An update! Very nice.