The case for expanding Albania and Epirus (and a suggestion on Greek Culture)

[Styria]

Perhaps one could do something with the Ionian isles specifically Lefkada, Kefallonia and Zakynthos who are of a somewhat moderate size and where of import to the Venetians perhaps merging them into a province of Called the Ionian isles or each independent with straits connecting them (wouldn't be the strangest straits)

I feel like just one province for the three islands might be enough, similar in design to Genoa's Scio province which consists of Scio and Lesbos.

 

[Grand Historian]

I feel like just one province for the three islands might be enough, similar in design to Genoa's Scio province which consists of Scio and Lesbos.

One province for one Ionian Island each would be excessive, indeed.

 

[generalolaf]

The single biggest determinant of the "strength of the majors around the Ottomans" is the tech level at which the major clash occurs. Early game the OE has a 50% infantry pip advantage and a 40% cav pip advantage at game start. This starts dropping around tech 5 and is mostly gone entirely by tech 12. If the OE manages to severely weaken Poland and Hungary before they lose this pip advantage they come far closer to reaching historic threat levels. Burning 12 months on killing off yet another OPM with a coastal siege makes it that much more likely that the OE will be fighting without a pip advantage.


Please do not lie. I explicitly ran my calcs with a "minor" number. 1% is far more conservative than warranted. As far as those "other things", sorry but all of those are directly impacted by pip balances (this being the second most important determinant of AI-AI wars after net manpower). 12 months of good pip balance is far from minor.


Sure, but the Devs have explicitly said otherwise. Map concerns are explicitly secondary to gameplay balance according to the devs.

[QUOTE2. I don't think the map being pretty is a great objective, but its historicity is. Epirus existed as a polity at the start date. As such, ideally it should be included in the game. The whole start date is geared around allowing Byzantium to exist and it had a pretty similar historical footprint from 1444 onwards to Epirus (none, but that's beside the point).[/QUOTE
Don't be abusrd Byz had at least a PU over Morea which handily defeated the Toccos (not to mention the whole fact that Byz granted the freaking title to the Toccos that you are contesting). Arta, today, has a population in the 50,000s. Constantinople had that population centuries ago. Constantinople was important enough as cities go to give it its own province, Arta simply was not.


Well, I suppose even we wanted to be even more sure to have poor performance we could do multiple things at once on a large intentional scale. Kludging like this is directly responsible for some of the worst features in the current build of EUIV.



All of the nations listed did more than surrender their territory, often without a fight. The facts are that the Tocco's had already lost their primary seat and had a very poor grasp on Arta (not even controlling all of its hinterlands). This would be single weakest city based province on the mainland.


Oh please. Sicily is ahistorically represented as integral to Aragonese territory. This is BS by historical standards. Alfonso ruled both Sicily and Naples as a joint kingdom and did not divide the Kingdom of Sicily until 1458. Either it should be part of Naples (renamed Sicily) or both it and Naples should be integral Aragonese territory. Sicily exhibited far more aspects of actually being a functional state than Epirus at this point. And of course we have the other PUs of the Crown of Aragon did far more than Epirus - the County of Barcelona, the Kingdom of Sardinia, and the Kingdom of Barcelona all were extant states that were united only by personal union.

Of course there were many other states in this period. Afterall we nuked the French vassals precisely for gameplay reasons. Those feudal administrations remained long into the game period and certainly were not united in 1444. Even Transylvania arguably did more things of a separate state than Epirus at this point.

Full historical accuracy is not possible in a simulation (otherwise we would not have overextension or monarch points), boundaries were often delineated down to the yard and every remotely useful island had the potential to become its own province. Tradeoffs happen all the time, we have an ahistorically unified de jure Aragon because the simulation cannot make the PU that was the Crown of Aragon work historically. We made blatant decisions to unify France, but break up Burgundy.

Past history of EUIV suggests that indeed these goals can be mutually exclusive and will be so in this case. With current parameters, OPMs delay growth. They require a siege, often a separate war, and that is pure poison for the OE. The gain in making the 1444 map look a bit more historical is massively offset by the large number of deviations that will occur before 1500.

I think you're making a lot of good points and have pointed out some parts of my argument I haven't explained very well. I don't have time to reply properly to this now but I will do so later.

A question for now - how would you feel about the changes minus Epirus? Would that partially/fully address your concerns?

 

[Styria]

A question for now - how would you feel about the changes minus Epirus? Would that partially/fully address your concerns?

I think we should keep Epirus with these changes, to be honest. It makes things more interesting.

 

[DanubianCossak]

Inspired by this thread, Epirus lives again! (in my mod)

 

[Styria]

Inspired by this thread, Epirus lives again! (in my mod)

Aw man, that is beautiful. So many provinces.

 

[Grand Historian]

Inspired by this thread, Epirus lives again! (in my mod)

That Edrine...

 

[DanubianCossak]

That Edrine...

What, its roughly where it should be Artistic liberties and all.

 

[Lundgreen]

Really awesome idea!

 

[EldarPanic]

I think its sad that a mod map is better and more accurate than the original map...

 

[generalolaf]

I think its sad that a mod map is better and more accurate than the original map...

Why? That's the whole point of making a map mod.

 

[EldarPanic]

Why? That's the whole point of making a map mod.

I know but I meant that its sad when normal people do a better job than a developer.

 

[DanubianCossak]

I know but I meant that its sad when normal people do a better job than a developer.

Who you callin normal huh? Read my custom title.

 

[EldarPanic]

Who you callin normal huh? Read my custom title.

OH I know you're not normal you're form the Balkans lol

 

[Grand Historian]

What, its roughly where it should be Artistic liberties and all.

It's a thing of beauty...

 

[DanubianCossak]

It's a thing of beauty...

Ah good, good. I may pop screenies in your future threads

 

[Grand Historian]

Ah good, good. I may pop screenies in your future threads

Please do!

 

[Mewtini]

Inspired by this thread, Epirus lives again! (in my mod)

As well done as this is, I'm really, REALLY mad that Albania is not its proper deep red.

 

[CrabHelmet]

As well done as this is, I'm really, REALLY mad that Albania is not its proper deep red.

If states got their actual colours (as in, the most prominent colour on their coat of arms or standard in the period), 90% of the Balkans would be deep red - Ottomans would be, Albanians would be, Serbians would be, Epirus would be, Byzantium would be, Hungary would be, Athens would be... it would make for a fun map, and by fun I mean rage-inducing.

 

[Smeeved]

Inspired by this thread, Epirus lives again! (in my mod)

lol 28k serbian manpower in 1444