The problem with cities (and how to fix it)

[Landil]

The problem with cities in CKIII is that they are a type of holding. The solution is to change the holding type of 'city' to that of 'market' and make the city an optional development available within each holding tied to development (there, that's your TL;DR). Let me try to explain why.

As a historian specializing in historical demography with a focus on cities I am definitely biased. But I am also a roleplayer and have a love for game systems that marry realism with simplicity. I understand what Paradox is going for here: Castles represent the Nobility, Cities represent the Citizenry, and Temples represent the Clergy; the traditional tripartite system. The problem is that cities were not ubiquitous in medieval society. They were the result of specific cultural, economic, and political situations that did not occur everywhere at the same time.

CKIII is a game and it focuses heavily on the roleplaying aspect within the wider genre of grand strategy, so advocating a change to the economy of the game will immediately raise the debates of simplicity vs. complexity and it not being within the 'spirit' of the game. But what if the solution I present is, in my opinion at least, 'simple' and in the 'spirit' of the game? I hope to convince you.

The three types of holdings represent the three different focuses within medieval society that the game wants to represent a far more complex situation with. And this is fine. A focus on military, a focus on economy, and a focus on religion, all within a political context. This last point is important. Holdings are about the way a ruler is able to exploit the resources of a region. Markets are a good reflection of one such way of exploitation, much better than 'cities', because markets are much more similar to castles and temples in that they are places where people come together for a particular purpose.

Why is this distinction so important? Most people associate the term 'city' with a large place full of people, commerce, churches, palaces, etc. Now there could be a semantic debate stating that a place of 2.000 people with regional importance could be called a city, but that isn't an argument that is useful for the scope of CKIII as a game. Cities are entities within a region, within a holding, that stand in contrast and opposition to the rural, not to the castle or the temple. A castle or a temple or a market can be located and function within a city as much as they can be entirely independent from it.

The term 'market', on the other hand, represents a place dedicated to commerce. A market can reflect a small place of local importance where rural people trade, but it can also represent a bustling town. In short, it represents a focus, just like the 'castle' and the 'temple' seem to do in CKIII. Their name does not exclude the existence of a town or a city around these places of power that are conceptual representations more than actual places.

So a simple renaming then? But where are our cities? Well, they're in your holdings. Instead of having that feeling of awkwardness every time you go to [insert major historical city here] and see that it's a 'castle' or a 'temple', you will instead see a little UI box highlighting that lo and behold! There is a city there! The great seat of Archbishop Blabla.

Alright, so how is it going to be simple? Without knowing the intricacies of CKIII's balance, I refuse to throw numbers at you (as much as I love numbers), but the short of it is: besides the 5 building slots they seem to give each holding, with different buildings available based on holding type and culture, have another [insert arbitrary number of choice here] slots dedicated to the 'city' within the holding, and have buildings that can only be built in the city/when there is a city in the holding.

Cities for everyone?! Yes and no. I think cities should be tied to development and the 'era' system (as much as I am highly skeptical about the arbitrary nature of that system and its capability to represent historical reality). The City slot in holdings might begin as empty, with a town growing there organically as development and prosperity in the region increases, giving a minor economic bonus. But to make a place into a city and construct buildings there that are specifically urban, you or another ruler must invest resources, in return for shiny things such as prestige (because cities are prestigious). Buildings represent your personal involvement with a holding, after all.

How does this represent historical reality? Europe's cities were few and far between in 867 and 1066 CE, excepting the Mediterranean (see higher development). But by 1300 economic development and the personal investment of rulers both local and great had filled Europe with cities. A big part of this was patronage and competition, with each lord trying to outdo the other and become more prosperous by giving privileges to and investing in the construction projects of budding towns. Cities are a formalization of a growing concentration of wealth and power.

But there is a downside, and this plays into the roleplaying aspect of the game. Having cities means having a population of citizenry, no longer providing levies but providing militia (a somewhat more professional variant of the former), and these citizens want privileges. The more you develop cities, the more autonomous they want to become, especially if you're a ruler with lots of holdings. Everyone wants your attention only to tell you that they don't like you and they don't want to pay taxes. Having cities means having events. It means having an ever decreasing income from these cities as their privileges deny you their wealth, yet their wealth boosts the entire holding into more and more development. Unless you focus on Stewardship, on keeping your cities your cities.

Am I being vague? A bit. I don't know enough of the inner workings of CKIII to make more than sweeping suggestions. The point of me writing this is not to provide exact details, but to give ideas. I am aware enough of how game development works, and my expectations and chances would be very low if I were to go into numbers and historical accuracy. With this broad idea I hope to reach the developers and give them a little push in the right direction, if not for the immediate future, then one that is further away (be as cynical as you like about this). In addition, I hope anyone who reads this takes this as an opportunity to have a constructive discussion on how to improve this game and its potential for greatness that we all desire through the implementation of ideas such as the one above. I am very much aware that I have left a lot of questions unanswered, but if you have them, I will try to give my ideas on them.

 

[Dlin369]

In your system, how would landed Burghers be represented? I’m not entirely happy with the current system with inland republics but I can’t think of a good way to represent them and also make them a thorn for the nobility to deal with

 

[Landil]

In your system, how would landed Burghers be represented? I’m not entirely happy with the current system with inland republics but I can’t think of a good way to represent them and also make them a thorn for the nobility to deal with

The most basic mechanics I can think of to represent any form of autonomous citizen government without making them 'proper' factions, are to have some kind of Autonomy bar, a 'character' (either an individual or a council) representing the City, population happiness, and militia. The Autonomy bar would have various interactions and random events dictating its increase and decrease. The higher the Autonomy, the less you'll get out of a city, and the more they'll act like their own state. This would go hand-in-hand with happiness, where an unhappy City would be able to create and join factions and rebel (with their Militia becoming an army under their control). The City 'character' would depends on the Autonomy level. An autonomous city (>50% or whatever arbitrary number you want to use) would be represented by a council/mayor/??? who would can be interacted with and whose existence will cause events. A city without autonomy (going with the <50% for the sake of a mental image), would allow you to install a governor (or yourself) to rule the place, but depending on their traits, tyranny and corruption might quickly diminish the happiness of the City, triggering events that demand increased autonomy. You could also choose to let them have their own council, but this would increase autonomy by a percentage each month/year.

 

[klopkr]

I love this suggestion. I feel like if we emphasized the markets instead of 'city' slots then later on the unplayable market slot could be tied more deeply to an in game economic system. It would give the mayors a bit more leverage and purpose.

 

[Farfour]

I would suggest defining cities as any town/village with self-governance, city rights (right to hold markets, fairs, walls, etc), and/or a charter, and in post 1066 England, cathedrals or universities. I agree that they shouldn't be providing levies, per se, and I'd also add that new "city holdings" be created by promoting existing settlements or founding entirely new ones rather than the only method being the latter.

 

[Landil]

I would suggest defining cities as any town/village with self-governance, city rights (right to hold markets, fairs, walls, etc), and/or a charter, and in post 1066 England, cathedrals or universities. I agree that they shouldn't be providing levies, per se, and I'd also add that new "city holdings" be created by promoting existing settlements or founding entirely new ones rather than the only method being the latter.

That's a very narrow definition of a city that might suit Western European cities, especially those of the late 12th century and onward, but it would be too rigid to define cities elsewhere. See my above suggestion regarding self-governance for a way to actually implement such a feature without too much complexity. My idea is that to make a holding have a city, you invest in it, which can represent the ruler's interest through the giving of rights to a settlement or the foundation ex nihilo of a new city without constricting it in flavor that only makes sense for Western European culture. Not all cities had privileges or self-governance, but it was often a struggle for any ruler to keep tight control on them, regardless of location, especially when the ruler wasn't local and had more than just the one city to bother with.

As for 'cathedrals' and 'universities', I agree that those should be structures that can only be built if a city is present, with cathedrals being more prominent in Temple holdings, for example. Education, expressing itself in technological and developmental growth, should be an element that cities excel in (together with monastic sites), as well as commerce (boosted by the holding being a Market), such as through having a Mint, and militarily through having walls and militias. These functions of a city give each holding the opportunity to broaden their scope beyond that of the specialized holding type, as well as add to those specializations by providing higher tier buildings (eventually).

 

[Keizer Harm]

I agree with your sentiment and most of your points; I feel however that the term Market might be a bit of a logic hazard: when seen from the player's perspective. Churches and castles are functional buildings no matter where they are built: you could build a monastery in the middle of nowhere, as you could a fort, and they would only need some monks and knights for staff respectively. Over time, they would draw people to come live in and by them, and that's how you get new cities.

A market however is staffed by the people itself. If Byzantium conquers the Ukraine (again...) and they are trying to settle the steppes; it does not make sense for them to be building markets - there is nobody there make use of them. But also in the homeland; are there examples of a count, duke or king investing in such infrastructure? Forts and churches are built: don't markets form naturally?

Of course the term is not that important in the grand scheme of things, but this is just my only complaint about the otherwise very sensible proposal.

 

[Kimbole]

A market however is staffed by the people itself. If Byzantium conquers the Ukraine (again...) and they are trying to settle the steppes; it does not make sense for them to be building markets - there is nobody there make use of them. But also in the homeland; are there examples of a count, duke or king investing in such infrastructure? Forts and churches are built: don't markets form naturally?

Is this not essentially true of cities too though?

 

[Froggie]

I agree with your comments but how many markets is then an acceptable or unacceptable amount per county

 

[Keizer Harm]

Is this not essentially true of cities too though?

Yes; though one can kinda imagine a new city to be looking like this.

 

[ZlNT]

This idea would work nicely if Western Europe was the only playable region. As a "historian specializing in historical demography with a focus on cities " you should know that cities in other places did not enjoy that level of autonomy. Say, such rich cities of pre-Mongol era as Samarkand and Bukhara in Middle Asia were under full control of the nobles. How much autonomy the city of Constantinole had? In Russia only trade republics of Novgorod and Pskov were independent, other cities belonged to their local knyaz/duke guys.

Overall, I vote for simplified approach as it was in CK2. More events are welcome ofc, but all this city management would be a burden, I think.

 

[Tuo]

I like the idea of cities forming around holdings - this would fix that awkwardness of having great empires seated in castles, with their historically famous great cities just outside. With this, Byzantium could be seated in Constantinople, France in Paris, without having to just name a castle holding with the name of the city.

 

[Landil]

I agree with your sentiment and most of your points; I feel however that the term Market might be a bit of a logic hazard: when seen from the player's perspective. Churches and castles are functional buildings no matter where they are built: you could build a monastery in the middle of nowhere, as you could a fort, and they would only need some monks and knights for staff respectively. Over time, they would draw people to come live in and by them, and that's how you get new cities.

A market however is staffed by the people itself. If Byzantium conquers the Ukraine (again...) and they are trying to settle the steppes; it does not make sense for them to be building markets - there is nobody there make use of them. But also in the homeland; are there examples of a count, duke or king investing in such infrastructure? Forts and churches are built: don't markets form naturally?

Of course the term is not that important in the grand scheme of things, but this is just my only complaint about the otherwise very sensible proposal.

Firstly it is important to note that these holding types represent the region's specialization/focus. Obviously they can't represent every single settlement in the world on the map, and holdings would still contain castles, villages, monasteries, market towns, etc. Some kind of simplification has to be made.

As for the choice of the term Market, it is because just like Castle (fortress, citadel, etc.) and Temple (monastery, church, temple complex) it represents a type of formalization or institutionalization of a particular segment of culture, namely the coming together in a particular place or places to conduct commerce and distribute goods. And this term was, in contrast to the city, ubiquitous to the entire world represented on the map. The Norse Jarldoms in 867 CE did not have any sort of settlement approaching a city as was normal in say Italy at the time, but they did have marketplaces. Similarly, it doesn't matter if you go to Western Africa, or the Steppe, or the Himalayas, they all would have markets, but not all would have cities.

As for markets forming naturally: yes and no. Places of commerce formed naturally with demand, but were often only seen as legitimate when formalized by an authority. Similarly, authorities could form markets out of nothing, which were ventures that sometimes flopped. We don't have as many sources for areas outside of Western Europe for this, but what sources we have is that generally things worked the same everywhere, in broad terms. If you want an example of how this worked out in reality (also showing just how little CKIII can really represent in detail), see here.

I agree with your comments but how many markets is then an acceptable or unacceptable amount per county

I think that if anything this should depend on culture/region. Parts of the Dar al-Islam might have more markets than castles or temples, whereas Western Europe might have more castles and temples than markets, and India has more temples than castles or markets.

This idea would work nicely if Western Europe was the only playable region. As a "historian specializing in historical demography with a focus on cities " you should know that cities in other places did not enjoy that level of autonomy. Say, such rich cities of pre-Mongol era as Samarkand and Bukhara in Middle Asia were under full control of the nobles. How much autonomy the city of Constantinole had? In Russia only trade republics of Novgorod and Pskov were independent, other cities belonged to their local knyaz/duke guys.

Overall, I vote for simplified approach as it was in CK2. More events are welcome ofc, but all this city management would be a burden, I think.

As a "historian specializing in historical demography with a focus on cities" who has her main area of interest being the Dar al-Islam and India, yes, I am aware. I am aware that there were vast regional and temporal variations. For example in the Pala Empire the administrative system largely copied that of the Gupta Empire, where cities formed a corporation represented by a council (although the existence and importance of merchant and crafts guilds in Indian cities is not well-attested for this period, there is plenty of evidence for urbanism, especially in Bengal), who were local and not appointed by the ruler like other bureaucrats were. In the Dar al-Islam the ruler's authority was equally not absolute and differed per time and place. To quote The Great Seljuq Empire by A.C.S. Peacock as an example: "Some provinces, like Ganja, were assigned to maliks and their atabegs, while others, towns like Mosul, were allotted as iqta' to an ever-changing succession of amirs. Some cities, such as Bayhaq, Nishapur and Bukhara, were controlled by religious elites - Bukhara, for instance, was subject to a dynasty of Hanafi 'ulama who bore the title of sadr (themselves, of course, subject to the Seljuks' Qarakhanid vassals). Baghdad had several types of overlapping administration: most prominent were to the sultan's shihna, and the caliphal diwan, but other groups also controlled aspects of urban life, such as the 'ayyars. Each area had its own distinctive arrangements, and the degree of penetration of Seljuk officials beyond the major cities ebbed and flowed according to local circumstances."

What's the point, then? My idea tries to propose a system that is flexible in representing many types of arrangements: laissez-faire, patronage/sponsorship, authoritarian rule, and charters. While many places outside of Western Europe seem to embody 'despotism', their actual interactions were far more complex because they often lacked real power to project past the capital or a handful of major cities. Contrary to the typical 'Eastern' sponsorship approach, Western European countries went on a bureaucratic trajectory, especially from the 12th century onward, that brought them into conflict with their towns, who modeled after the Italian ideal of the free commune, which resulted in the institutionalization of cities. In a way, European cities became more restricted. My solution, besides the autonomy system I proposed above, is to mostly reflect the top-down sponsorship, since this was most prevalent and it most represents the focus that CKIII puts on your decisions and impact as a ruler. This is augmented by events, which can be culture and time specific. For example Western Europe might start to get events regarding the rise of the Italian 'commune' ideal and its spread to other regions in the 11th century, and further events in the north surrounding city rights in the 13th century (made dynamic by the Era system, where these events only trigger from the High Medieval era onward).

 

[Arko]

I would keep cities as -urban- holdings personally. But having very few or none of them from start, depending on regions.
A market town could develop from a castle then split as a proper holding once being big enough, or emancipated from their lord (from either a bishop or noble). I think it would be closer to what happened in reality.
This would in addition bring some thrive with the citizen/burghers fighting for their freedom, interesting on local level.
More urban civilizations like Muslim and Byzantine would get more cities, and even rule from them.
Of course new foundations would be cities from start.
At least it is how I'd see things with keeping very distinct entities and possibility narrative transitions.

 

[Landil]

I would keep cities as -urban- holdings personally. But having very few or none of them from start, depending on regions.
A market town could develop from a castle then split as a proper holding once being big enough, or emancipated from their lord (from either a bishop or noble). I think it would be closer to what happened in reality.
This would in addition bring some thrive with the citizen/burghers fighting for their freedom, interesting on local level.
More urban civilizations like Muslim and Byzantine would get more cities, and even rule from them.
Of course new foundations would be cities from start.
At least it is how I'd see things with keeping very distinct entities and possibility narrative transitions.

To reflect more closely what happened in reality you'd have to add a lot more layers. First of all you'd need to partition cities into segments, since in Europe it quite often occurred that a town would be split between for example the local duke/count and the bishop, or the king and one of his vassals, and for example in the Dar al-Islam it occurred that various groups and sects controlled different sections, such as where the Ismailis controlled various citadels within Iranian cities in the 11th century, which led to bloody conflict with the Sunni population supported by the Seljuk overlords, headed by Khoroshani officials. Yoruba and Hausa cities were divided between various kingroups, each with their own leader and specialties and districts within the city. This seems far too complex for the scope of CKIII, as much as I love complexity.

My idea makes 'cities' in a kind of promotion tier for any settlement, and these cities can be viewed as a separate part of the holding (just like citadels and collegiate churches were separate jurisdictions within cities), not necessarily located around the castle/temple/market that represents the holding. This promotion only happens with enough development and investment. And yes, of course urbanized regions such as the Mediterranean should have more of these cities in their holdings from the get-go, but whereas Amalfi might be a Market holding, Rome might be a Temple holding, reflecting the differing specializations of such areas.

These 'narrative transitions' you propose are also more difficult to implement as a mechanic, especially since holdings are now represented on the map and there is still a limited number of them in each county. My proposal would merely add another side window to the holding UI, as they have implemented in several of their games when adding new features through DLCs. Engine limitations and simplicity of design are a thing.

 

[Arko]

"Closer to reality" taking with in mind keeping a relatively clear/readable/attractive gameplay. But I agree that the reality is much more complex (and interesting) but I keep hopes for something neat enough to translate into interesting gameplay without getting too complex.
Seems that what you propose tend to look like CK2 sub-holdings but IMHO they weren't exactly good (and kind of hacky to base system, hence why they were a bit odd and too limited).
The new CK3 holding system will probably demote the interest and narrative for local management sadly.

 

[Landil]

Looking at it pragmatically, even if they only implemented this in a very basic way, it would still provide more of a framework for modders to build on. In my mind it is a wasted opportunity if they do not at least attempt to give cities a more 'rightful' place in the game, given how important cities were in the development and daily politics of the medieval elite. And that is besides this idea also 'fixing' the problem that many people seem to have with major cities being represented by a Castle or a Temple while cultures that hardly had cities at all still having 'City' holdings in an anachronistic manner.

 

[Farfour]

How much autonomy the city of Constantinole had?

Urban Prefect of Constantinople

 

[nyah]

I think you're probably right, but remember that this is a game and not a simulation. Also, it isn't likely that anything this fundamental is going to change at this point, if anything is.

 

[Landil]

I think you're probably right, but remember that this is a game and not a simulation. Also, it isn't likely that anything this fundamental is going to change at this point, if anything is.

Both these sentiments are to be found in my original post, yes, but I maintain my stance that one should be careful of being too cynical as much as one should be careful of being too hopeful and overexcited. Neither is very productive, and if these kinds of ideas aren't put forward then it is only more certain that nothing changes.