Question to devs about Eastern European provinces in post-AoW

[Zak Preston]

Hello!

First of all I'd like to thank for a great update and expansion, most changes are really awesome and would improve gameplay immensely. Special thanks for fixed Zaporizhya and Ruthenian NIs =) Also I'd like to thank for much desired improvements to American region and Far East. The overall quality standards for province layout have been skyrocketed. But now I feel that some regions that were left almost untouched (with some minor fixes), are unfun to play.
Let's look at the map of Eastern Europe: provinces are huge and mostly square\rectangle-shaped, three-five times larger that in North or Central America. I do understand that there are some map projection issues, lack of reliable sources or business plan that doesn't include funding changes to some minor insignificant regions that none plays after all. Alas, for now Eastern and Southern Slavic plus Balkans regions look like an outdated monstrous chessboard comparing to neat and beatiful New World, Africa and even reworked Steppes Asia. There are also a lot of complains about (Old-)Prussian region that also lacks some ev's attention.

Under spoiler you will see a bunch of screenshots with the same camera distance

Spoiler

The problem lies not only in inaccuare and untidy provinces, but also in low detailization. For example, let's look at the map of XIV-XV century of Poland and Lithuania: lots of castles, towns and cities in a large and pretty populous region (could be richer if Tartars didn't raid) which could be used as new provinces. I've also posted a sample (not quite detailed and by no means not 100% acurate) with possible provinces an example of how this region could look better with more provinces.

My sample proposal for splitting Ruthenian and Belarussian provinces

Spoiler

Ruthenian provinces:
Maramos: 1 Uzhgorod/Ungvar and 2 Khust
Ruthenia: 3 Lviv, 4 Stanislav, 5 Chern
Zhytomyr: 6 Ovruch and 7 Zhytomyr
Volhynia: 8 Zbarazh and 9 Lutsk
Novgorod-Severkiy: 10 Novgorod-Siverskiy and 11 Putyvl
Cherkasy: 12 Cherkasy and 13 Chyhyryn
Poltava: 14 Poltava and 15 Kremenchug
Kiev: 16 Kyiv and 17 Oster
Bratslav: 18 Bratslav and 19 Vinnytsya


Bielarussian provinces:
Mogilev: 1 Mogilev, 2 Mstislavl and 3 Krichev
Minsk: 4 Minsk and 5 Gomel
Turov: 6 Turov and 7 Slutsk
Pinsk: 8 Pinsk and 9 Kobrin (messed up with borders a bit)
Grodno: 10 Grodno and 11 Slonim
Polotsk: 12 Polotsk and 13 Vitebsk


BTW, accoording to the provided map Teutonic, Livonic and Pomeranian provinces should be at least doubled if not trippled

And a personal question to Wiz: could you please explain what criteria did your team follow while adding new awesome provinces? Are provinces based on relative population density, ethic groups or old administrative maps of that era? Just curious to know.


UPD1:
Another issue about Eastern Slavic region is wrong naming: most provinces tend to have Russian names instead of official ones. There may be a lot of debates about proper naming and how those cities/towns/provinces are spelled in English, but official names differ from what EU4 currently has. But there is a sad tendency about naming post-USSR provinces in Russian instead of native languages.

EU4.........................Ukrainian (Cyrillic)..........Latin transliteration........Russian (Cyrillic)..........Russian transliteration
Kiev.........................Київ [ˈkɪjiw]......................Kyiv................................Киев ['kijew]...................Kiev
Chernigov................ Чернігів [t͡ʃɛrˈnʲiɦiw] ............Chernihiv ........................Чернигов [tɕɪrˈnʲiɡəf]........Chernigov
Podolia.....................Поділля [po'dillia]..............Podillia............................Подолье [po'dollije].........Podolye
Novgorod-Seversky....Новгород-Сіверський........Novhorod-Siverskyi............Новгород-Северский.......Novgorod-Seversky

EU4.........................Belarussian (Cyrillic)......Latin transliteration........Russian (Cyrillic)...........Russian transliteration
Mogilev.....................Магілёў[maɣʲiˈlʲou̯]............. Mahilioŭ........................... Могилёв[məɡʲɪˈlʲof] ...........Mogilev
Grodno.....................Гродна[ˈhrodna]................Hrodna...........................Гродно [ˈɡrodnə]..............Grodno
Turov.......................Ту́раў['turau]....................Turaŭ..............................Туров['turof]....................Turov
Polotsk.....................По́лацк['polatsk]...............Polatsk............................Полоцк['polotsk]..............Polotsk

UPD2:
Constructive feedback on South Baltic region:
http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...n-post-AoW&p=18337327&viewfull=1#post18337327
Feedback about Polish-Prussian border:
http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...n-post-AoW&p=18336987&viewfull=1#post18336987


UPD3:

• 1. PLC's population according to Wiki:
  

  The population of the Commonwealth of both nations was never overwhelmingly either Roman Catholic or Polish. This resulted from Poland's possession of Ukraine and federation with Lithuania; in both these countries ethnic Poles were a distinct minority. The Commonwealth comprised primarily three nations: Poles, Lithuanians, and Ukrainians and Belarusians (the latter two usually referred to together as Ruthenians). Shortly after the Union of Lublin (1569), at the turn of the 16th to 17th century, the Commonwealth population was around 7 million, with a rough breakdown of 4.5m Poles, 0.75m Lithuanians, 0.7m Jews and 2m Ruthenians.[9] In 1618, after the Truce of Deulino the Commonwealth population increased together with its territory, reaching 12 millions that could be roughly divided into: Poles - 4.5m, Ukrainians - 3.5m, Belarusians - 1.5m, Lithuanians - 0.75m, Prussians - 0.75m, Jews - 0.5m, Livionians - 0.5m; at that time nobility formed 10% and burghers, 15%.[10] Population losses of 1648-1667 are estimated at 4m.[10] Coupled with further population and territorial losses, in 1717 Commonwealth population had fallen to 9m, roughly 4.5m Poles, 1.5m Ukrainians, 1.2m Belarusians, 0.8m Lithuanians, 0.5m Jews, 0.5m others[10] The urban population was hit hard, falling to below 10%.[11]

  
  Proving that PLC was quite a rich and populous state in EU4 timeline.
  
• 2. Khmelnitsky's National Liberation War (or Uprising, depending on side you prefer ) of XVII century had battles with 100-300k people on each side (sources: Eng, Pol, Ukr) that indicates about huge manpower resources both sides of conflict operated (and in EU4 terms manpower is calculated from BT, if I recall correctly).
  
• 3. There are Ukrainian researches on this matter which tend to show a bit higher numbers of population in Ruthenian\Ukrainian lands: around 4-5 millions at the beginning of XVII century and 2.5-3.5 millions at the end of XVII century.

Note that actual population could vary greatly from posted numbers. Also, IMHO, adding new provinces in Eastern European region shouldn't change overall BT much in terms of balance and historical reasons.

 

[cleef]

The whole of Eastern Europe needs a few more provinces, especially south, like the balkans...

I believe PLC looks fine... excluding Transylvania, Romania has like 5 provinces or so... -_-

 

[WKIII]

OP I totally agree with you.

Eastern Europe isn't accurate, it lacks detail, And usually boring to play compared to Western-European playthroughs.

But no matter what, PI won't give a crap on your\mines opinions. The only thing we can do is modding the game.

 

[Zak Preston]

The whole of Eastern Europe needs a few more provinces, especially south, like the balkans...

I believe PLC looks fine... excluding Transylvania, Romania has like 5 provinces or so... -_-

BTW, Transylvania (a state) has generic NIs from pre-1.8 :rofl:

 

[Zak Preston]

The whole of Eastern Europe needs a few more provinces, especially south, like the balkans...

I believe PLC looks fine... excluding Transylvania, Romania has like 5 provinces or so... -_-

IMHO Balkans (all of them), Hungary, Eastern Slavic regions and Prussian region need major updates to be playable and enjoyable =)

 

[zemuzil]

IMHO Balkans (all of them), Hungary, Eastern Slavic regions and Prussian region need major updates to be playable and enjoyable =)

Once again east slavs received enough of buffs already ,Russia got plenty of steppe provinces to conquer ,your ruthenia also recived some provinces

What need actually need province update is central ,north ,south europe

 

[unmerged(652342)]

BTW, Transylvania (a state) has generic NIs from pre-1.8 :rofl:

- so what? Anyway they will automatically change them to Romanian ones after forming it. Same thing with Ruthenia. Polotsk and Kiev have unique NI's that will be changed to Ruthenia ones if they form it but in the same time Chernigov and Galich have Ruthenian NI's from very begining...

Once again east slavs received enough of buffs already ,Russia got plenty of steppe provinces to conquer ,your ruthenia also recived some provinces

What need actually need province update is central ,north ,south europe

- i would love to see some Irish and Scottish buffs, currently it too easy to conquer them for England.

 

[WKIII]

- so what? Anyway they will automatically change them to Romanian ones after forming it. Same thing with Ruthenia. Polotsk and Kiev have unique NI's that will be changed to Ruthenia ones if they form it but in the same time Chernigov and Galich have Ruthenian NI's from very begining...
- i would love to see some Irish and Scottish buffs, currently it too easy to conquer them for England.

And I would like to see some more buffs to England so it can conquer more provinces around there and there, just like France, you know.... for fun... why not?

Why the FRA logic does not apply on ENG here?

 

[unmerged(652342)]

And I would like to see some more buffs to England so it can conquer more provinces around there and there, just like France, you know.... for fun... why not?

Why the FRA logic does not apply on ENG here?

- because its historical for FRA to go on rampage on the continent and in the same time it is not for England.

 

[migalhone]

- so what? Anyway they will automatically change them to Romanian ones after forming it. Same thing with Ruthenia. Polotsk and Kiev have unique NI's that will be changed to Ruthenia ones if they form it but in the same time Chernigov and Galich have Ruthenian NI's from very begining...
- i would love to see some Irish and Scottish buffs, currently it too easy to conquer them for England.

Base tax in Ireland has increased, Connaught has 4, Leinster has 6 and Tyrone has 6, IIRC.

 

[Zak Preston]

Once again east slavs received enough of buffs already ,Russia got plenty of steppe provinces to conquer ,your ruthenia also recived some provinces

What need actually need province update is central ,north ,south europe

I don't mind about any buffs, actually. But why won't you go and start your own thread about Central, Northern and Southern Europe update proposals instead of sh*tting in my thread?
And we are lucky that you have nothing in common with PDS dev team and your "enough" is only your opinion, which hopefully doesn't represent any official point of view.

 

[WKIII]

- because its historical for FRA to go on rampage on the continent and in the same time it is not for England.

England did conquer like a half of France at the same century the game starts on.
England did conquer all of Scotland and Ireland entirely and not only once.
France started to conquer nearby counties\duchies only after the split of Habsburg, I mean intensively.
And if We talk about Napoleon it was only in the 18th century when Britain was already an Empire.
Historically, England is a much more offensive conqueror than France. From 1066 to 1707, England was a restless conqueror nation.

 

[DevastatingTech]

Interesting.

 

[AndrewT]

Numerous inflammatory posts deleted, from both sides.

One more time: stay on topic in a thread and stay constructive, or stay out of it.

If you genuinely think someone is trolling or being overly nationalistic, report by PM to a moderator. NEVER comment on such matters in public, it just makes the problem worse, and leaves more work for us to do to clean up such threads.

 

[Zak Preston]

And I would like to see some more buffs to England so it can conquer more provinces around there and there, just like France, you know.... for fun... why not?

Why the FRA logic does not apply on ENG here?

Actually i don't ask for any buffs. Average BT could be halved for Eastern Europe, but the number of provinces could also be doubled, for example. It's just not fun to play in a world where even uncolonized African provinces are 3-6 times smaller (thus more detailed) than yours.

 

[Zak Preston]

a little up =)

 

[giant_sloth]

Thanks, Paradox, for the improvements. But why do new Ruthenian principalities have dynasties with Russian names (Potiomkin etc), instead of Ruthenian ones? You made Ruthenian principalities, so it would only be logical for them to have Dynasties with Ruthenian names. Also, I still don't like how Khmelnytskyi uprising is represented. Earlier, we had Ukrainian Nationalists as rebels, now we have Kyivan Nationalists! What sence does it make?

 

[moscal]

Khmelnytskyi was a polish noble. Michael and Boghdan Khmelnytskyi use Abdank coat of arms, and this is polish coat of arms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdank_coat_of_arms

But yes - is too small new dynasty-names for new cultures.

 

[unmerged(652342)]

England did conquer like a half of France at the same century the game starts on.

- ENG and FRA start in a "Hundred Years War", a war in which FRA ultimately turned victorious over ENG and basically ended ENG presence on the continent.

England did conquer all of Scotland and Ireland entirely and not only once.

- and? Arabs conquered north africa and spain, i demand that Hedjaz should go on conquest rampage nao.

France started to conquer nearby counties\duchies only after the split of Habsburg, I mean intensively.

- no, consult your beloved wiki for historical references.

And if We talk about Napoleon it was only in the 18th century when Britain was already an Empire.
Historically, England is a much more offensive conqueror than France. From 1066 to 1707, England was a restless conqueror nation.

- an european empire? Or just one of the many colonial empires?

 

[Zak Preston]

Khmelnytskyi was a polish noble. Michael and Boghdan Khmelnytskyi use Abdank coat of arms, and this is polish coat of arms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdank_coat_of_arms

But yes - is too small new dynasty-names for new cultures.

Bohdan Khmelnytkiy had polish roots indeed, but for several generations his ancestors were high-ranked Cossacks Starshyna and even 1 Hetman. You have a point, but not quite official.
I couldnt' try those new and shiny Ruthenian principalities because I find no fun playing in that region due to outdated province layout =)