• We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.

Dev Diary #91 - Altering the Alps and Idealizing Italy

Hello there! I hope everyone’s summer is going well, and that you are as excited for this week’s Dev Diary as I am to write it!


As I mentioned last time, this week we are going to take a look at the area around the Alps, as well as take a look at Italy. For our first preview, we will take a look at the western Alps, around the Kingdom of Burgundy, southern Germany and northern Italy.


Keep in mind that not all the changes are finalized, so there might be more updates before everything goes live. All the pictures will be taken from 1066 and with De Jure map modes, so things might look somewhat different in other bookmarks.

Clipboard01.png


Clipboard02.png


So the first change we will be talking about is the changes to the County of Burgundy. We have cut it up, and made it into its own Duchy (of Franche Comté). The old Duchy of Upper Burgundy has lost its headway into the Swiss heartlands as well, moving the county of Schwyz (old Grisons), Zurichgau (old Schwyz) and Thurgau (old St. Gallen) into the new Duchy of Upper Swabia. In the later starting date, they will be part of the Duchy of Switzerland instead of Upper Swabia, a change that can happen throughout a game as well.

The county of Vaud has been added to the game, to the old Duchy of Upper Burgundy, cut out of certain parts of Geneva and Neuchatel. The final noticeable change on this side of the Alps, is that we have added Aosta to the mountains between Savoy and Italy.

For that part of the Alps, we wanted to make smaller changes, cut up some of the larger provinces and fix a lot of the barony errors and some of the county errors (see Schwyz further up the text). It was important for us to try and fix a lot of these minor issues, as it felt weird seeing some areas so misplaced on the map.

On the other side of the Alps, we have cut up some of the larger provinces. Monferrato has been cut up to make room for Ivrea, Lombardy has been cut up to make room for Milano, Como and Leventina, and Genoa has been cut up to make room for Noli.

Clipboard03.png


Clipboard04.png


We can start out in Italy, where we left off from the previous picture. Trent has been turned into its own minor Duchy, opening up Brenner Pass between Bozen and Innsbruck. Innsbruck and Tirol has moved a bit westwards, to make room for Pongau as part of the new Duchy of Salzburg. In Bavaria, we have added the county of Regensburg, as it was the capital of the Duchy for quite a while, and we wanted to see that reflected in the game. Passau has also been moved into the Duchy.

To the east, Austria has gotten quite the rework. We have added Traungau, Steyr Freistadt, Krems and Melk as Counties, moved Znojmo into Bohemia and Passau, as previously mentioned, into Bavaria, and Styria has been moved south into its own Duchy. The Duchy of Carinthia has been cut up into Carinthia and Carniola, and the Duchy of Friuli has been added around Aquileia.

Clipboard05.png


Clipboard06.png


So for our last location, we have central Italy. I figure I will talk about the mountains first, as we have added parts of the Apennines throughout Italy. We’ve felt this has increased the tactical value of Italy somewhat, as the choices you make for movement and county conquering feels a bit more valuable, and we also felt it cut up the county more nicely, particularly considering the new Kingdom we added in central Italy (this will be discussed further down).

We have added Perugia into the Duchy of Spoleto, moving the whole Duchy a bit further north. Rimini has been added to the Duchy of Ancona, turned the two county Duchy into a three county one, to lessen the amount of chokepoints post-mountainfication.For the old county of Aprutium, we have turned it into the Duchy of Abruzzo and moved it into the Kingdom of Sicily. And we have taken parts of the old County of Firenze, and added the county of Arezzo, to make sure Firenze doesn’t stick its fingers into everyone else, as it has had a tendency to do.

Clipboard07.png


So for what I assume will be the most controversial change to the region, the two new Kingdoms added.

For Carinthia, it felt weird giving even more land to a Kingdom that is meant to reflect the historical Stem-Duchy of Bavaria, when we have the Principality of Carantania, the March of Carinthia and later on the Duchy of Carinthia as inspiration that could take the same role. We have made sure, as this is quite the small Kingdom with a lot of land held by the same person in some bookmarked starts, that the AI won’t create the Kingdom right away, so it should be more of a player goal than an AI goal.

And… For Romagna, we wanted to cut Italy into its more historical pieces, without adding a Kingdom called “the Papal States” that was only for an unplayable Theocracy. This was done for several reason: having the Pope try to seek out central Italy as he did throughout history, having the old East Roman areas be more difficult to hold onto for the Kingdom of Italy in the first bookmarks, and to lessen the massive size of the Kingdom of Italy.

So I hope the Dev Diary didn’t get too wordy this time around, and that people can learn to love the changes made to the region! Next time around, we will have a (probably smaller) Dev Diary about the changes made to Holy Orders in Holy Fury!

PS. For those of you with an interest in the Habsburg jaw and the Archduchy of Austria, we have something special for you as well! (A special decision to create the Archduchy.)

Clipboard01.png
 
Last edited:
Still. No. Release. Date.
I'm mad to see all these awesome changes and don't know how long i should wait for them. Same for EU4 and HOI4. You don't did well on this Paradox..
They can't give a release date if they themselves don't know the release date. It's better for them to finish their goals for the expansion than to rush it out and end up having it not being finished.
 
Next time around, we will have a (probably smaller) Dev Diary about the changes made to Holy Orders in Holy Fury!

Uh oh, I hope these are indeed small changes only lol.
 
The point I stated in my earlier post is that this is a step in the wrong direction to improve the "hystoricallity" of an area that is in the desperate need of an overhaul: during the years a lot of different systems were implemented, any of them could be used to improve the situation in a better way than including a pseudo-random de-jure Kingdom.
And how "including a pseudo-random de-jure kingdom" (I'm not sure about "pseudo-random" - this kingdom borders looks exactly like Papal States borders; they just didn't want to name it so) is a bad way? I mean, it should do a job. This lands would be separated from kingdom in northern Italy, and Pope would try to acquire them. I didn't tested it yet, but AFAIK mechanics it should work. What's the problem?

It was a figure of speech: i was refering to this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Crown_of_Lombardy (that IIRC it is also a relic in the game)
Ah. Well, it just came to Empire of Italia, and that would be a lot more sense. And more fun.
 
Now the main thing I don't like about the Duchy of Dauphiné as it is in CK2, is its name. The Dauphiné is such a small region compared to this Duchy, and I don't like to see Lyon as capital of the Dauphiné. Maybe this is because the region where I grew up, but it seems wrong to me.
However, I understand what the duchy of Dauphiné is supposed to represent: a constellation of small secular and ecclesiastic states under the HRE (plus the Forez and Vivarais belonged to France), which were never united into a full Duchy.

One possible solution could be to separate the southern lands from Vienne county. You would get two counties: one with the traditional counts of Albon's lands (Albon, Vienne, Grenoble, Briançon), and the second with the territories added to Dauphiné in the XIVth century (Valence, Die, Romans, Crest...)

Then you could split the duchy into a "Dauphiné duchy" and a 2 counties "Lyon duchy" (Lyon + Forez)
 
I'm liking the changes, especially to Italy, which was a super kingdom. One thing I'm torn on is the name, since now the "Italy" only represents what the HRE had under control.

I think a solution can be that if a Karling owns the kingdom, or a Holy Roman Emperor owns the kingdom, then let it be called "Kingdom of Italy". Otherwise, call it the Kingdom of Lombardy for everyone else.

Also, this would be a great opportunity to break up the monotonous Italian culture. With these new kingdoms in Italy, I can see Lombard(not Germanic), Venetian, Carinthian(?), Romagnian, Umbrian, Neapolitan, Sicilian, and Sardinian in the game. There's pretty much a kingdom for each of these cultures, so why not implement it? It'll bring much needed cultural diversity to Italy.
 
(sorry, can't avoid doing this!). >^^<
But, seriously.... *WHEN*, I think this is the most Hype patch until today. O.O


COMO!!!! COMO!!!!
oh comasco dal cuore ubriaco
di una fede su dimmi per chi
per la squadra che seguo da tempo
per la squadra che mai tradirò
noi che d’estate siam qua sotto il sole
e d’inverno tra il gelo e la neve
circondati da sbirri perchè
per l’amore che abbiamo per te
forza il como magico como
dona ai comaschi gioie e dolori
forza il como magico como
la nostra fede che mai tradirò
 
I love the Archduchy thing. Question though, does it only apply for Austria or can any king-level lord remove his title of king and being a duke among dukes. (Sort of like the AGOT mod's Lord Paramountcy thing, a kingless king-tier title.)
 
Looks like you guys are on a roll when it comes to cutting up large de jure kingdoms. Persia, Arabia, Mesopotamia, and now Italy.

Considering that, I highly suggest cutting Greece up. It will turn from one of the strongest kingdoms into one of the most oppressive, now that Italy, Persia and Mesopotamia are weaker.
Already done, Greece has been separated in two, in the update we'll have the kingdoms of Greece and Thrace
 
Funny you should ask, I've actually changed it this morning. You need to hold 80% of the land, and if any of the three southern Kingdoms (Sicily, Naples and Trinacria) exists and isn't titular nor De Jure of the Empire of Italia, you need to hold those as well. In other words, in most bookmarks you would need to hold Sicily, and in the later start dates you would need to hold Naples and Trinacria. When you create the Empire, the three Kingdom titles, if you hold any of them, will be moved into the Empire as well.

Ooooh! So I won't have to 100% control sicily for 100 years for it to de-jure drift into Italia? That way my biggest gripe in my last Venice game: I formed Italia, took a couple years getting the rest of Sicily off the Byzantines, and then took the Byzantine Empire about 50 years after that. So Italia never had Sicily in it. I suppose I could have destroyed the Byzantine empire, but I don't like destroying titles.