• 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.

Tinto Maps #25 - 8th of November 2024 - South East Asia

Hello, and welcome to another week of fun unveiling of the map of Project Casar. In this week’s Tinto Maps we will be taking a look at South East Asia, so without further ado let’s get started.

Countries
Countries.png
Colored wastelands.png

Quite a variety of countries in the area. The regional power in the decades before 1337 was the Khmer Empire, although at this point they are already in decline and have lost much of their previous hegemony. On the west, the fall of the Burmese Pagan Kingdom and the following Mongol invasions gave rise to the disunited kingdoms of Pinya, Sagaing, Prome, and Toungoo, while in the south the Mon kingdom of Hanthawaddy (also known as Pegu) also split apart. On the center, the decline of the old Lavo Kingdom and its subjugation to the Khmer gave way to the emergence of the Kingdom of Sukhothai when Khmer started its decline too, and Sukhothai is emerging as the dominant Thai kingdom in the area. However, Ayodhya is already gestating the rise of another great kingdom, as King Ramathibodi, the founder of the Ayutthaya Kingdom is already poised to gain power in the region. On the east coast, the Kingdom of Đại Việt is under the orbit of the Yuán, with constant conflict with the southern Hindu kingdom of Champa.

Societies of Pops
SoP.png

A region very rich in Societies of Pops, which will make it definitely an interesting area.

Dynasties
Dynasties.png

The dynasty of the old Pagan Empire is still alive in Prome, with many other dynasties in the region having ties with it, while the different Thai dynasties also have ties among each other.

Locations
Locations.png

Locations zoom 1.png

Locations zoom 2.png

Locations zoom 3.png

Provinces
Provinces.png

Provinces zoom 1.png

Provinces zoom 2.png

Areas
Areas.png

Unfortunately, currently the name of the sea area encroaches too much into the land (this will be fixed, don’t worry), but the blue area that gets underneath that name is Chao Phraya.

Terrain
Topography.png

Vegetation.png

Climate.png

Tropical and jungle almost everywhere, with quite a bit of comparison between the southern flatlands and the northern mountainous areas.

Development
Development.png

Not as developed as the surrounding India or China, but the main centers of power (like Angkor, Pagan, and Sukhothai) are a bit more developed.

Natural Harbors
Natural Harbors.png


Cultures
Cultures.png

A quite variety of cultures, although the southern areas haven’t had their minorities done yet so there will be even more variation there.

Languages
Languages.png

As an addition from this week one, we have a new map to show with the languages. Keep in mind that this area hasn't had any language families or dialects done yet, so there is a bit of grouping.

Religions
Religion.png

Again, keep in mind that minorities are not done, so there will be more variation added inside the Theravada block, as there has to be still quite a bit of Hinduism presence in Khmer (its conversion from Hinduism to Buddhism at that point was one of the causes of its decline), and quite a bit more of Satsana Phi among all the Tai peoples.

Raw Materials
Raw Resources.png

Raw Resources zoom 1.png
Raw Resources zoom 2.png
Raw Resources zoom 3.png
Quite a variation of resources, although dominated mainly by lumber and rice.

Markets
Markets.png

The commerce is dominated by those countries benefiting from sea trade routes, but the emergence of a strong Ayutthaya Kingdom in the middle will for sure cause a change in the balance of powers.

Population
Population.png

Population zoom 1.png
Population zoom 2.png
Population zoom 3.png
Population zoom 4.png
Khmer is still the most populated, but other countries around don’t fall that far behind, especially when they manage to unify their areas a bit. There’s also a couple of locations appearing as 0 population that is definitely a bug that will have to be fixed.

That is all for this week. Join us next week when we set sail to take a look at the maritime part of South East Asia by taking a look at all the archipelago of Indonesia (including the Philippines). Hope to see you there.
 
  • 117Like
  • 39Love
  • 3
  • 1
  • 1
Reactions:
Hi, I'm currently working on detailed feedback for Upper Burma and the Shan states, it's basically almost finished since we got to see snippets of this region in the India and China map reviews, but I have a couple lf questions:

1. How do you deal with locations that have identical names? Do you prefer to do a minor spelling variation, giving an adjective to one of them (e.g "on the ___ river"), or using a completely different but possibly smaller settlement? There are a few names like this in my feedback, and unfortunately some of them don't have any good option for a smaller settlement.

2. When assigning dynasties to a country, do they need a specific ruler? Or could I just say "this country had this dynasty but I can't say who specifically ruled it in 1337"?
 
  • 17Like
  • 3Love
Reactions:
Will the operation of Chinese tributaries be the same as in EU4 ? Will there be border territory restrictions to create new tributaries diplomatically ?
 
  • 4Like
Reactions:
Looks great!

Cultures:
- Karenni refers to a particular subgroup of the Karen people, the latter would work better as a comprehensive name
- Southern Thai/Dambro should be a separate culture, it's noticeably more distant from Thai than, for example, Lao is
- should the Miao/Hmong really be in southeast Asia back in 1337? I thought they arrived in much later migrations
- "Dai" appears to just be a cover term for all southwestern Tai peoples in China, and it includes a few different distinct languages. Dehong Dai (Tai Nuea) is pretty close to Shan, while Xishuangbanna Dai (Tai Lue) and Tai Dam (I believe it's what you have in Laos/Vietnam) are close to Northern Tai/Kham Mueang.
- there should be some Mon pops in Central and northeastern Thailand, leftover from the Dvaravati civilization.
- Palaungic minorities besides the Wa in the lands of the Shan would be nice

Languages:
- You've lumped together a lot of separate Austroasiatic branches: Bahnaric and Katuic as Khmer, Khmuic and Palaungic as Khasi, Nicobarese and Andamanese (and Aslian in Malaysia) as Mon. These are all separate branches, from the comparative linguistic perspective it's like grouping Slavic with Indo-Iranian or something. Proto-Austroasiatic is estimated to have been spoken around 3000 BCE – c. 2000 BCE, so that's quite a lot of divergence that's happened since. Andamanese languages aren't even Austroasiatic btw, they're a small independent family.

EDIT: I realize now you've followed some internal classification schemes for Austroasiatic. Still, that classification appears to be debated over the years, and even if certain branches are closer to others, I think it will feel unrealistic to have highland peoples speaking Khmer or Nicobarese/Asli speaking Mon.

- Karen as Burmese doesn't feel right. Karen is an independent branch of Sino-Tibetan
- Zhuang feels a bit too far from Thai to be considered the same language, though I'm fine with the whole of the southwestern branch of Tai being one language
- Hlai and Kam-Sui aren't even Tai languages, they're from a sister branch and rather distantly related to it. They should be separate languages. Apologies if that belongs in the China TM.

Religion:
- Should Kuy and Khmu really practice a Tai religion, being Austroasiatic peoples?
 
Last edited:
  • 22Like
  • 12
  • 1Love
Reactions:
Hi, I'm currently working on detailed feedback for Upper Burma and the Shan states, it's basically almost finished since we got to see snippets of this region in the India and China map reviews, but I have a couple lf questions:

1. How do you deal with locations that have identical names? Do you prefer to do a minor spelling variation, giving an adjective to one of them (e.g "on the ___ river"), or using a completely different but possibly smaller settlement? There are a few names like this in my feedback, and unfortunately some of them don't have any good option for a smaller settlement.

2. When assigning dynasties to a country, do they need a specific ruler? Or could I just say "this country had this dynasty but I can't say who specifically ruled it in 1337"?
1. If they are relatively close, there should not be two locations with the same name, so some kind of variation of it would be needed, either by modifying the name a bit as you said, or by choosing another name. If they are far apart enough it's not a problem as they won't be confused.
2. It is fine if no ruler is known, we also encountered this issue in some places, we have a way of assigning the correct dynasty regardless.
 
  • 44Like
  • 1
  • 1
Reactions:
I think we really need to change the color of the Yuan, there is really too much green in Asia, we see it in India, China, Indochina, not to mention Khmer. It is difficult to tell the difference between the tributaries and the independent countries which are almost the same color.
 
  • 36Like
  • 18
Reactions:
Wouldn't it be better to name the location of Ayodhya Ayutthaya instead? I mean Ayodhya, with that spelling, is more in line with the Indian pronunciation of the Indian city of Ayodhya.

And can we get a closer look of the Andaman Islands?
 
  • 6Like
  • 1
Reactions:
I think Yuán, Khmer and Delhi sharing a very similar tone of light green is a very big problem, because it's hard to determine whose vassals are the intermediary states are.

For example, if I didn't already know whose vassals are the two Vietnamese polities were, I would have no way of telling based on the map if they are Yuán or Khmer tributaries.
 
  • 35
  • 8Like
Reactions: