Why does Lithuania have more development than France in 1444?

[Tacticus101]

<copied from my previous post on the subject>

PLC pop estimations from 1500-1600 period point at 8-10 millions of people in the entire PLC (which had like 900 000km2 of area). That's mediocre density to begin with, and IIRC 60% of it was the Polish part (of course not all people here were Polish - in 1444 'Poland' I include Red Ruthenia being owned by Poland since 14th century + Jews, German settlers etc), next 10-15% was Lithuania, rest of it was poor Rus.
Meanwhile estimates for Muscovian population from this era go from early 15th century's minimum estimates of 5 millions to maximum estimates of 14 millions by 1600 (please note the fact Muscovy/Tsardom was quickly growing in territory in this era) so it's pretty safe to assume Muscovy in 1444 had either similar pop to Lithuania or significantly higher - and there were more grand cities under Moscovian control! Muscovy, Yaroslavl, Nizhny, Ryazan, Vladimir and more vs Vilnius and Kiev.

Thus in fact yes, it'd be pretty fitting to decrease Lithuanian development to be on similar or slighty lower level than Muscovy

Cezary Kulko in 'the demographics of PLC' estimates population density of PLC Ucraine on 3 people per km2 compared to 6-7 of Lithuania and 20 of Poland/Red Ruthenia. In 16th century. Later it increased... because seeing unused potential of it, the colonization by Poles/Jews/Germans/Lithuanians started.

Population density is irrelevant, we are talking total population here. Lithuania (and that area) already has large provinces to help represent the much lower density.

Also, using the "1500-1600" period is incredibly misleading; not only does it include the period where Lithuania lost a third of its territory to Russia, it also includes the point where another third was transferred to Poland and the period in which Russia doubled in size, having already tripled between 1444 and 1500, plus several devastating invaions. You cannot quote any accurate Lithuanian population statistics for that entire period because they varied so much and anyway, they don't matter because we are talking Lithuania in 1444 not 1600.

The same applies to the Muscovy population. in 1500, after tripling in size their population was larger than Lithuania and your estimate of 14 million by 1600 is after they doubled in size again. Quoting numbers from that point is just misleading.

The closest number I can get for Lithuanian Population is about 4 million in 1500, compared to a Russian population of about 6 million at the time. If you look at ingame development numbers for that point it is 500 vs 335, a fairly reasonable comparison considering those numbers. since Muscovy had grown so considerably between 1444 and 1500 (tripled in land), it is reasonable to assume their population was less than that of Lithuania in 1444 (though there are no accurate time figures). Certainly by 1500 they were not so far ahead that Lithuania was an easy win, both sides had allies (Hordes, Livonian Order etc) and the wars were rather inconclusive. Before their rapid growth and the defeat of the Golden horde, Muscovy did not try to fight Lithuania, going mostly for diplomacy. I seriously doubt they would have done so if in 1444 they were stronger than Lithuania.

The number of grand cities doesn't mean much (though Muscovy did not in fact have all of those), the vast majority of both populations were rural.

 

[Xellos Slayer]

1471 - Yaroslavl gets inherited by Muscovy
1471, 1477-1478 - Muscovy conquers Novgorod
1474 - Rostov gets inherited by Muscovy (or, actually, they just bought it.)
1485 - Muscovy conquers its ex-ally Tver (Tverian's knyaz got an alliance with Kasimierz and fled to Lithuania as a matter of fact)
1487-1494 - Russian-Lithuanian War (officially, both countries were in peace as war wasn't declared). Muscovy got Vyazma and a couple of other lands in peace treaty, as well as Lithuania was obliged to end their claims in Novgorod. Both countries didn't consider this peace treaty as a final one and it led to later wars.
1500-1503 - Russian-Lithuanian War (Russia got about 1/3 of the whole Lithuanian duchy which includes Chernigov, Novgorod-Seversky, Gomel, Bryansk)
1503 - Ryzan completely gets inherited by Russia
1507-1508 - Russian-Lithuanian War (Lithuania got Lubeich and its vicinity back)
1510 - Pskov gets inherited by Muscovy
1512-1522 - Russian-Lithuanian War (Russia didn't lose any territories, but had to forfeit claims for Kiev, Polotsk and Vytebsk)
1534-1537 - Russian-Lithuanian War (Lithuania got Gomel back)
1558-1583 - Livonian War (Russia forfeits its claims on Byelorusia and Livonia, but got back some borderlands. Livonian confederation got wiped out and were partified between Denmark, Sweden, and Commonwealth. Russia got razed and burned by Crimeans, which attacked Russian lands on the whole period of this war. Sweden got southern parts of Gulf of Finlands as well as Ivangorod and a couple of other towns)


PS.
All in all, I believe that EU needs more "HRE"-like mechanics. Considering, that game starts in 1444, there should be something like "Collector of Russian Lands" with more duchies intact and a way to consolidate them in stronger power to overcome Hordes (so, de-facto the whole Russian region should start as tributary to GH with a way to break free). And similar to HRE, if Russian lands are invaded in this period, it should be cooperatively defended by all duchies there w/o separate peaces. There should be a better way to simulate Sengoku Jidai in Japan, and Chinese' Mandate of Heaven... But, well. All of this are probably pipe dreams.
In fact, Lithuania fought with Russia w/o any real help from Poland. And, iirc, their Union was broken for some period of time, when Kasimierz died, right? In game I never see Russia, that manages to beat Poland-Lithuania and get their lands (Smolensk, Chernigov, Bryansk). Even if Russia DoWs Poland-Lithuania, its just a suicide, considering OPed Polish ideas with OPed development of Lithuania. Even Muscovian ideas can't help there (especially when you consider, that they all are based on a silly idea of UNSTOPPABLE RUSSIAN HORDES, THAT WOULD SWARM YOU TO DEATH, JUST BECAUSE).
Also, Elective Monarchy is TOO rewarding. It shouldn't be _this_ good. At the very least, it should fix LA of a nation on 25% (or more). Because no matter how good polish armies were, they were tiny.

 

[ponasozis]

I am just going to write here why lithuania is so strong in this game historiclly

first of all lithuania din t enter pu just with russia attacking them they were in livonian war where sweden ,russia and lithuania was involved they each fought each other in a ffa style
poland saw it as a good time to strike to get back its personal union that jagielion dynasty had between two countries so they invaded ruthenia and other southern parts of lithuania
lithuanian was pissed but it could not fight a war on 3 fronts so instead they made buddies with poland and then beaten the crap out from russia and sweden
after that commonwealth was formed and it became super power of the region that nobody wanted to touch that is untill ottomans started going deeper into europe there were lots of wars with ottomans each one win and lose for both sides but in the end ottomans got trashed in viena and their ambitions for europe were finally ended
then commonwealth was left in peace but lots of internal problems left it decadant along with outbreaks of diseases and plagues let to later on partitions of commonwealth
the end


now historically we can t actually say how much population lithuania had at start of game
very few sources exist (mostly because lithuanians din t like to write) and they are all sketchy at best
we can only presume how much it had

so yeah
all in all a little more nerf would be needed for lithuania
but not something like total nerf where it would become completely incapable of defending against anybody

 

[Nirmara]

Here are some observations from my game as the PLC compared to the last game I played as them dating from Art of war. Keep in mind that this game is not representative of all possibilities, that I was able to avoid the Pacta conventa (like the lucky polish AI always does) and that I barely expanded beyond the historical border of the PLC.

First, the PLC really got hit hard manpower wise (like pretty much all nation) with Poland fielding about a third less and Lithuania fielding about half of what they used to pre-cs. The new vassal mechanics also doesn't seem to have buff them like it did for Burgundy.

Second, the historical PLC land are poorer, with most of their land producing grain or naval supplies, difficulties controlling the Krakow node and with the development changes lost the economical benefits from the agricultural revolution event since base taxe is weaker than it used to. The new buildings also made them weaker since you can no longer spam temples and trade depots in any province regardless of it's economical strength. Also, most since most of their development is spread out, buildings tend to be a bad investment leaving only conquest as an efficient way to increase the PLC strenght.

Third, the estate system benefited them, with the Church increasing taxes (their main source of revenues), the nobility making manpower more expandable and the Cossack estate granting them even more cavalry combat ability. Also, I'm not sure about this, but it seems there is no specific events for the PLC related to estate. It would have been a good way to nerf them by making the nobility very hard to deal with. Enabling them to go over 80% without a revolt but generating specifics problems would have been an interesting way to give some flavor for Poland while nerfing them.

Fourth, the power spike Poland get for forming the PLC is weaker than it used to be but is still quite important compared to other nations.

Fifth,the Ottomans are really not a menace for Europeans countries as it is the case in most other playthrough I did since vanilla (I played around 1000 hours). Considering how often the PLC got to war with the Ottomans, having no treat on their southern border is a big advantage for the PLC.

Sixth, if you know how to game it and with a little bit of luck, the Pacta conventa can easily be avoided enabling you to avoid all the bad events while retaining the over-average rulers. This is of course not a problem for lucky AI Poland since even foreign monarchs will have at least 2+ in each skills.

Seventh, maintaining high stability as the PLC is easy and revolts are nearly non-existant when they get humanism. Autonomy is also not an issue at all except in estate. This is probably the main problem related to the PLC right now and the elective monarchy even grant them an autonomy reduction. Giving the elective monarchy an autonomy floor like for the Celestial empire government, removing the autonomy reduction or even granting them a passive autonomy increase to represent the gradual gains of the nobility could be a solution to nerf them while still making their land valuable. After all, the problem with the PLC was not that their land was poor, it was the state that was inefficient at taxing it. Also, even after the first partition their neighbor started to fear a strong PLC due to the centralization reforms that were getting enacted. The PLC should be closer to how the HRE is, hard to reform but very scary if it is.

 

[Concrete]

They seem to be even stronger now in 1.14, at least at the beginning. Not directly but estates nerfed everyone else (that pesky LA eating away early troop limit), ai seems more aggressive and ai seems to be reluctant to have friendly attitude toward you (no alliances). To compare I started ironman game as Teutons in 1.13 and managed to ally the emperor, get into the empire and beat back Poland with some luck and become a major power, ofc that save was bugged after I loaded it to 1.14 before hotfixes. Now you can't even survive without crippling your nation at the beginning.

Alternative solution would be to make ai more likely to accept alliance if you have a common enemy (Like Hungary, when you both rival Poland as Teutonic Order) or make them go friendly after 150+ relations (not sure how new dip system works really)

I had some pretty bad RNG early on but they were still as easy as ever.

 

[amanis]

When I fully agree with OP about development in Lithuania, a few things should be clarified.

Firstly, IN game Lithuania as junior partner is not what used to be, oh no.
I play as PLC very often, at least one game each patch.
Lithuania despite of her development, she has issues to maintain 13-16k soldiers. (I don't know why, checking charts good income, good manpower)
If war extend just a little bit huge rebellions 20-25K nationalists appear across the country.

The second thing.
In the whole discussion about development, size, population, we forget that the world looked different 500 years ago.....
In the PLC cities were relatively small (the largest Gdańsk, Kraków, Warszawa), mainly because the population lived in the countryside, where were work and production. Therefore, it is impossible to compare Italy or HRE free cities to PLC or Russia areas by talking only about population of cities.

 

[Atlantians]

Also, the provinces are larger. The development is being spread over a larger area.

I do agree, though, that France needs a Development boost.

 

[PiriReis]

Solution: Transfer some of the development to Novgorod and Crimea. Both regions could use some buff.

 

[Atlantians]

I would prefer seeing buffs used to balance, rather than nerfs.

 

[in heaven]

I think problem is not in development but rather in the way internal politics are in the game. Commonwealth in real life had huge struggles with nobles. Sejm was lazy not paying taxes and refusing to fund army of country (which was already small due to lack of funding from them) and used VETO power more than anything else. In game Commonwealth has no such problems, you can easily raise huge army, you get huge income (irl Commonwealth all nobles had no taxes).

 

[eincentas]

I think problem is not in development but rather in the way internal politics are in the game. Commonwealth in real life had huge struggles with nobles. Sejm was lazy not paying taxes and refusing to fund army of country (which was already small due to lack of funding from them) and used VETO power more than anything else. In game Commonwealth has no such problems, you can easily raise huge army, you get huge income (irl Commonwealth all nobles had no taxes).

In Poland the Nobility were always very influencial even before the union. The unification with Lithuania was their idea.
I think in eu4 the Nobility estate needs to be revamped for Poland and I don't believe that just increasing Influence/Loyalty numbers through events would accurately represent the situation. I can't imagine a Noble coup happening in the PLC.

 

[grommile]

I would prefer seeing buffs used to balance, rather than nerfs.

Using buffs, rather than nerfs, to balance is probably a significant aspect of what's wrong in Eastern Europe!

 

[zsImmortal]

In Poland the Nobility were always very influencial even before the union. The unification with Lithuania was their idea.
I think in eu4 the Nobility estate needs to be revamped for Poland and I don't believe that just increasing Influence/Loyalty numbers through events would accurately represent the situation. I can't imagine a Noble coup happening in the PLC.

It can happen if you try to keep the Jagiellon dynasty, as low/very low legitimacy is a pretty nasty hit to noble estate loyalty.

 

[Darkath]

France and England were dumps in 1444 they were ravaged by a hundred year war. Do that development number include Burgundy, Provence and English possessions ?

 

[Nirmara]

In Poland the Nobility were always very influencial even before the union. The unification with Lithuania was their idea.
I think in eu4 the Nobility estate needs to be revamped for Poland and I don't believe that just increasing Influence/Loyalty numbers through events would accurately represent the situation. I can't imagine a Noble coup happening in the PLC.

I was thinking of something similar. Elective monarchy should be similar to the noble republic requiring more estates to be own by the Szlachta and making them immune to aristocratic coup.

In return, they should have a special action for the Szlachta to "guarantee privileges" making them more loyal but slightly increasing autonomy in their estates. The modifier from this action should last until the ruler death. Not having this modifier should be a requirement to fight the nobility.

Fighting the nobility should give you a -100 loyalty making it hard to fight them.

 

[Voidness]

I am a historian and from Lithuania and I quite agree, that Lithuania shouldn't be as powerful (even less so in Union).

As I see, main reasons (but not all of them) are:

1. Way too weak Teutonic order. They used to get A LOT of support from Europe, especially HRE which is totally not represented in the game... For example, in 14th century crusaders from as far as Portugal used to come to Lithuania
2. Lithuania has too much manpower and such. Centralization was low and it should be represented by WAY higher autonomy. For example lands near Black See was barely at any control of Lithuanians and at quite short time in any way.
3. After the Union, sneaky Poland took away basically 1/3rd of Lithuanian land, that is Kiev and such. They should get those land and an event or two representing problems which comes with having cossacks under control.
4. Moscow seems too weak and unorganized. They used to attack, sign a peace treaty, break a peace treaty attack etc... At 16 century Moscow would have around 100k troops to Lithuanias 20-30k (would loose none the less, but hey, not forever).
5. Lithuania had a golden age during 16 century (what is represented by the last idea) and during that time barely fought. During those 50 years or so of peace nobility forgot how to fight and later on Lithuania was never a military might which it was before. An event could make it worse here too.
6. Lithuanians were a pain in the ass for Polish nobility (de facto rulers of Poland) and Polish nobility was pain in the ass for Lithuanian political interests (mainly defense and offense against Moscow and such) - this should be represented by high liberty desire at times.

Cheers

 

[Politic Revolutionnaire]

I am a historian and from Lithuania and I quite agree, that Lithuania shouldn't be as powerful (even less so in Union).

As I see, main reasons (but not all of them) are:

1. Way too weak Teutonic order. They used to get A LOT of support from Europe, especially HRE which is totally not represented in the game... For example, in 14th century crusaders from as far as Portugal used to come to Lithuania
2. Lithuania has too much manpower and such. Centralization was low and it should be represented by WAY higher autonomy. For example lands near Black See was barely at any control of Lithuanians and at quite short time in any way.
3. After the Union, sneaky Poland took away basically 1/3rd of Lithuanian land, that is Kiev and such. They should get those land and an event or two representing problems which comes with having cossacks under control.
4. Moscow seems too weak and unorganized. They used to attack, sign a peace treaty, break a peace treaty attack etc... At 16 century Moscow would have around 100k troops to Lithuanias 20-30k (would loose none the less, but hey, not forever).
5. Lithuania had a golden age during 16 century (what is represented by the last idea) and during that time barely fought. During those 50 years or so of peace nobility forgot how to fight and later on Lithuania was never a military might which it was before. An event could make it worse here too.
6. Lithuanians were a pain in the ass for Polish nobility (de facto rulers of Poland) and Polish nobility was pain in the ass for Lithuanian political interests (mainly defense and offense against Moscow and such) - this should be represented by high liberty desire at times.

Cheers

No if you have a high ld in Lithuania you break regional balance as you basically start another kalmar union like war

 

[Beagá]

I am a historian and from Lithuania and I quite agree, that Lithuania shouldn't be as powerful (even less so in Union).

As I see, main reasons (but not all of them) are:

1. Way too weak Teutonic order. They used to get A LOT of support from Europe, especially HRE which is totally not represented in the game... For example, in 14th century crusaders from as far as Portugal used to come to Lithuania

That was true before the conversion. You have numbers of foreign crusaders post 1444?

Poland balance is a bit more crucial than people realize and they can crumble very easily... with their disturbing tendency to be lagging in military tech. Likes of Austria have little to fear...

Maybe people should play more games and up to 1700 before saying east Europe balance is broken. Because if 90% games end with union broken because of negative prestige... well.

 

[ponasozis]

That was true before the conversion. You have numbers of foreign crusaders post 1444?

Poland balance is a bit more crucial than people realize and they can crumble very easily... with their disturbing tendency to be lagging in military tech. Likes of Austria have little to fear...

Maybe people should play more games and up to 1700 before saying east Europe balance is broken. Because if 90% games end with union broken because of negative prestige... well.

yeah
crusaders stopped coming to teutonic order help after lithuania converted to catholic and teutonic order was beaten at tannenberg battle

frankly teutonic order should be completely incapable of doing anything at the game start if we are looking from historic perspective all its army was beaten only garrisons of castles remained along with bankrupt because of lost support from foreign countries and almost nobody in their army
poland just vassalised them later on

also livonian order should not exist at all but thats none of my business

 

[Martin_Mortyry]

yeah
crusaders stopped coming to teutonic order help after lithuania converted to catholic and teutonic order was beaten at tannenberg battle

frankly teutonic order should be completely incapable of doing anything at the game start if we are looking from historic perspective all its army was beaten only garrisons of castles remained along with bankrupt because of lost support from foreign countries and almost nobody in their army
poland just vassalised them later on

Well, they've put up a pretty good fight in the Thirteen Years War. Of course, their might has never fully recovered after 1410 but they still had some power.
Some events concerning their problems with the Prussian Confederation would be nice though.

also livonian order should not exist at all but thats none of my business

About this one we could discuss for a long time. The best solution would be creating a PU between LO and TO, but I don't think it's possible with monastic orders. Simply incorporating Livonian Order into the Teutons wouldn't be a good representation of how things have worked either, certainly not after the Great Polish-Lithuanian-Teutonic war.