Ok so basically you are saying that feudal areas are *easier* for foreigners to control vs tribal areas. I don’t think there is sufficient evidence to back this up.
(TL;DR for this section, using historical evidence for tribal vs feudal governance doesn’t make much sense in this context, given the simplistic nature of these classifiers.)
First of all, it is certainly debatable whether Northern Europe was feudal for a long time, But let’s be honest here, that is a discussion across the map and thus a can of worms beyond the scope of this thread. Now, if you are implying that “Northern Europe” is entirely *tribal* up to the 13th century, ummm no. In fact, it’s even more messy than that as, for example, Northern Europeans formed many of the towns in an England that was dominated by smaller agrarian groups during the so-called ‘dark ages’. Even the idea that “tribal” areas are inherently less advanced than feudal ones (as CK defines them) is problematic. Part of this is the necessarily simplistic system used in CK to simplify gameplay.
Secondly, included in your second paragraph, all of this stuff already exists for feudal regions, we don’t need new special ones for tribes (IMO). Popular opinion is a thing, populist revolts are a thing, this is covered (or at least the necessary game mechanics exist). Controlling feudal regions wasn’t trivial, remember the Normans *added* keeps in England to establish control, that is the equivalent of converting a feudal region to ... feudal using your explanation. So I don’t think tribes should get or even need special extra mechanics here.
So adding this inheritance thing doesn’t add any value as far as I’m concerned. If tribals are militarily viable until high and late feudal eras, isn’t that a better solution?
I'm saying utilizing existing infrastructure and tradition of rule is easier than exerting authority over peoples that live in scarce small villages, many of them semi-permanent, in vast, hard-to-traverse lands.
Also, I'll gladly focus more on gameplay implications as well, as as you said, the distinction between tribal and feudal is largely a gameplay abstraction. That said, I wasn't implying all of North Europe was tribal, what I said was that in Northern Europe, it wasn't until quite late in the game's timeframe that these scarcely populated tribal lands were conquered and held from thereon by foreign realms - within the region there definitely was development, and this suggestion would not prevent the spread of more organized realms from within (such as the Scandinavian kingdoms).
In a manner, this stuff exists for feudal realms, yes (which kinda goes to your point of controlling feudal regions not being trivial), but not as harsh - and as such, adopting a more organized government form would help a formerly tribal realm expand beyond culture group borders. The difference is that while a county held by a ruler with wrong culture may participate in a populist revolt, a tribe ruled by an outsider directly would, due to the effective remoteness of the tribe, simply replace the foreigner with one of their own and in doing that, deny the authority of the liege. A tribal chief that is a vassal to a liege of a different culture group would conspire for independence regardless of the de jure titles of the liege, which feudal vassals don't do.
My position is such as that a soft, dynamic barrier would help make the interactions between feudal (and clan, in southern side of the map) and tribal realms feel
different from interactions within a government type group, and that that difference, that slow moving border between the feudal and the tribal worlds with its associated struggles, would ultimately be to the benefit of enjoyable gameplay - tribal realms, from how they have been described to work so far, are very volatile in their strength, and I would not like to see all of the tribal realms west of Ural conquered by more powerful feudal realms within 100 years of game start. Perhaps this is an unfounded fear, hopefully it is, but even if it is, I still believe that the additional layer of challenges presented by newly conquered tribal lands would make the game more fun, both as a feudal ruler bordering tribes, and as a tribal ruler.
Feudal realms and tribal realms are different and play different. No, I don't think making them symmetric is a better solution.
