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Tinto Talks #39 - 27th of November 2024

Hello everyone and welcome to another Happy Wednesday, the day of the week where you get a new Tinto Talks, the special posts we make to gather feedback about the very very secret game with the codename Project Caesar.

While we may have some skills and some experience in designing games, we are not perfect, and that is why we are doing these Tinto Talks, so we can get feedback on what may be less than stellar, and for us to think about things that we may not have thought about. Sometimes it's small easy things we can do immediately and will tell you in the thread directly, and sometimes it's larger things, which we talk about later.


Our Tinto Talks from a month ago, about Great Powers and Hegemons was one of the very few we have made that had a negative reaction, but what was great with it was that there was plenty of great, constructive and usable feedback from it. Pretty much everything in this thread today has been built on community ideas that have then been revised and discussed internally.


Country Ranks
First of all, we reworked so that rank for a country is now more about the flavor and internal mechanics, moving away from the unlocking of powerful diplomatic actions, like intervene and threaten war, so that they are for Great Powers instead. There were also some modifiers that more fit being a great power than a Kingdom and Empire in name, like the power projection bonus that a rank gave.

kingdom.png

Also a new icon for the rank..


Great Powers
First of all, being a great power is not without its costs, and now being considered one increases the amount of gold your country needs to spend to keep up its legitimacy. Also, all Great Powers have a negative opinion of -25 of each other.

The bonuses you get now scale with the position you have among the great powers, where being the no.1 gives the highest one.

being_gp.png

Yuan gets a bit more than France..

Another change we did, was that the amount of great powers is now fluid, and depends on how many countries are close to the number 1 power in the world. There is always a minimum of great powers though, and a maximum, which depends on the total number of countries in the world.


Hegemonies
We have done a lot of changes to both the system for Hegemons and how they actually work as well.

First of all, we changed the hegemony system to not be unlocked by advances, but instead they become available directly when the Age of Discovery starts. Why you may now ask, well, this is important for the new mechanics, as you no longer actively decide to become a hegemon, but the hegemon is proclaimed on you by being the strongest in a particular area.

Every month the strongest in the area the hegemony concerns will be proclaimed as that hegemon. If there is a hegemon already, you need to be at least 10% more powerful in that area. So, for the Military Hegemon, if France has 200k soldiers, then Sweden needs at least 240k soldiers to become the new Military Hegemon.. Or reduce the French army to be smaller in a way. You will not lose your hegemony if you lose a war though.

Another major change though is that you can hold multiple hegemonies, and there are now some drawbacks to being a Hegemon. Of course, all other countries distrust a hegemon so for every hegemony you hold, you get a -20 opinion from every country, and a +20% extra impact on aggressive expansion. There is also an increase to expected court costs, and a monthly prestige gain.

We also removed the system of Hegemonies becoming more powerful the longer you hold them, and removed most stacking modifiers, and having them merely gives one bonus each, however, instead, each hegemony gives you two unlocks. One unique cabinet action each, and a unique diplomatic action, that each can be used while you hold that hegemony.

hegemon.png

The UI also shows you all the competing great powers… Not sure the word “competing” is relevant here though.



We also added two new hegemonies since last month, but what do the hegemonies give you then.

Economic Hegemon
This is the Great Power that has the highest income from Trade and Taxes.

As you can see in the screenshot above, their units consume less food, which can be useful over a campaign.

They can use the Diplomatic Action ‘Divert Trade’, which forces a non-greater-power country to give up part of their merchant capacity and power in all markets they are present in. This can not be done to anyone that has their own market though, but this forced divert of trade can not be broken for 10 years, unless a war breaks out between the hegemon and the target.

The Cabinet Action this hegemon gets is “Reduce Paperwork”, which increases the production efficiency in an entire area. So what is an area? An Area is a group of provinces, and a province is a group of locations. Production Efficiency is a powerful modifier which directly impacts the output of a building, without increasing its input requirements.

Naval Hegemon
This is the Great Power that has the most Heavy Ships of all Great Powers.

Their bonus is 10% less naval damage taken.

They can use the Diplomatic Action “Force Embargoes”, which makes the target non-greater-power embargo another country. An embargoed country can not trade in the market they are embargoed in, and their locations will not belong to that market, both which are rather non-ideal. This forced embargo can not be broken for 10 years, unless a war breaks out between the hegemon and the target.

This hegemon can use the Cabinet Action “Naval Focus”, which increases the maritime growth and harbour suitability of all ports in an area.

Military Hegemon
This is the Great Power with the biggest army of all Great Powers.

Their bonus is 10% cheaper warscore costs.

They have the “Violate Sovereignty" Diplomatic Action. This is probably the most requested feature ever by any warmongering player, and allows you to enforce a military and food access on any non-greater-power country for 6 months. This means that you can pretty much ignore neutrality, and make sure your army is well fed as you march it to another theatre. There is a slight drawback that the country who you march through will dislike you and get a casus belli on you.

The Cabinet Action this hegemon gets is “Soldiers as Workforce”, which gives you faster construction speed in an area. This impacts roads, buildings and rgos, so can be useful to get more barracks, forts and iron mines quickly for the war machine.

Cultural Hegemon
This is the first of the new ones, and this is granted to the Great Power with the highest Cultural Influence.

Their bonus is a 25% growth to cultural tradition growth.

They can use the Diplomatic Action “Force Change Court Language”. This forces a non-greater-power country to change their court language to yours, which further strengthens your stronghold on culture. This can not be changed for 10 years, unless a war breaks out between the hegemon and the target.

This hegemon can use the Cabinet Action “Assimilate Area”, which allows you to assimilate pops in an entire area at once, which is a few times more powerful than the Promote Culture cabinet action which can only target a province at a time.

Diplomatic Hegemon
This is the second of our new hegemonies, and it is granted to the Great Power with the highest Diplomatic Reputation.

Their bonus is 30% higher impact from Improving Relations.

They can use the Diplomatic Action “Influence Country”, which increases trust and opinion in a target non-greater-power country.

Their Cabinet Action is “Diplomatic Corps”, which allows this Hegemon to dramatically increase their diplomatic capacity while also gaining more diplomats each month.

gp_list.png

The current 5 Great Powers at the start of the game

Stay tuned, as next week we’ll go through Government Reforms, how they work, and take a look at what types we have there.
 
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Ah yes let's add the 20th century's definition of middle east to a game set in 1337.
Regions most likely won't be changed, continents or subcontinents will be used instead, with number of RP in each ranging from 0 to a few. (Think oceania having none, west africa having Mali and europe having smth like France, HRE emperor and Golden horde, hypothetically)
 
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Maybe to become the first hegemon you should need to have some % higher than the next, otherwise nobody establishes hegemony yet. It would be strange to take military hegemony because you have one more soldier than the next best when it unlocks.

I do agree that once you have it, someone should need to exceed your score by a certain %, both for the practical reason of preventing it from switching back and forth too often, but also because of inertia/path dependence. If you have been hegemon for many years then prevailing opinions, alliance networks, and economic structure wont adapt to a new hegemon overnight.
 
In general I like the changes but there are 3 things that have been brought up by others that I would like to register my support for:

1) Split the Economic hegemon into a trade and an economic hegemon.
2) The military hegemon should take into account the quality not just the quantity of the army.
3) You should not become a hegemon unless you are significantly stronger than any other great power, I think being bigger than the next two competitors is a good benchmark. This also means that there should not always be every type of hegemon, and you should loose your position as such if any other nations gets too close to your strength rather than when they overtake you by 20%. After all, it makes no sense to view country A as the X hegemon if country B is actually stronger or even on a par with them in this regard.
 
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i said it and will say again
france was nowhere near a great power in this time period like are you mad ? i am french and i know what i say
you are basically saying that :
a country who's vassal (england) is stronger than it
a country with peasantry issue
a country with poor revenue
a country with a devasted south following the genocide of the Albigensian
a country with very weak centralisation
a country that is weaker than castille militarily
a country that did truly become strongest in western europe till death of charles quint is somehow 5th strongest ?
HOW ? its not even the strongest nor richest in western europe , and if we gonna put a european as great power it should be NOVGOROD not france .
even if its so , france should be behind england , its universally and historically known that France was weaker than its vassal and this is precisely why england did dare to fight france often. it was always described in its relationship with england as the weakest of the 2 in this period.

also even though i stated novgorod , no one from europe should really be a top 10.
you just gonna put france and england in a list of countries who can easily field 40.000 in midst of black death and who have superior gun powder and gdp ?
remind you that reconquista was pretty much morocco or local taifas vs all of western europe and it still took centuries .
and the crusades were all of catholic europe + byzantine Rome vs egypt and Rum seldjouks and in many cases vs only egypt . there was no balance till the 16th century when the ottomans weakened and under developped those regions with negligence and even that it took all of the HRE and italy and spain and papacy just to conquer tunis city from a local pro ottoman garisson of tunisians .

sorry but putting any western european in that top 10 in 1337 is pure bias . they dont match with islamic or asian sphere in neither man power nor development nor hygien nor Gdp nor technology to be even top 20 . the black death had a bigger impact on europe for a very good reason such as lack of basic hospitals or the medical science to maintain the sick . average lifespam was 36 if i am not mistaken
Johan clearly stated that the balancing still isn't done. What is talked about isn't who the gp are, as they will change, but what a gp is.
 
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So it wasn't totally clear to me - is becoming hegemon is automatic upon reaching eligibility? Or is it something the player needs to _claim_ as in EU4?

automatic
 
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You seem to have not understood my comment at all. I have no problem with a language of a cultural hegemon spreading as a lingua franca, I have a problem with this spread being facilitated by government-to-government diplomatic action.

Yes, France and the French language is by all means a very good example of what is meant here as a "cultural hegemony". But France was not going around and telling kings and princes of Europe "You unwashed barbarians better start speaking our language or else...". To my knowledge this was a much subtler and gradual process that came more from other countries trying to increase their own diplomatic stature in a French-dominated European continental order and not France pressuring any foreign states to do so. That is why I asked for any actual examples of anything like this diplomatic action actually happening historically.
I agree diplomatic action may be a bad representation here. Maybe a more "mechanical tied to hegemony mechanics" could be that the cultural hegemon court language gives diplomatic advantage / their court language effective power is awfully increased compared to the others ? Eventually adding a ticking event to their neighbours inciting them to actually adopt this language (if accepted : change court language and gain temp bonus, if refused, noble estate more and more unhappy)
 
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How about great powers of a region/continent? Like, Russia, Prussia, GB, Austria and France could be great powers in Europe, but some of them might not be a global great power.

Which continent is the Ottoman Empire in? Which continent is a strong Morocco in?
 
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Which continent is the Ottoman Empire in? Which continent is a strong Morocco in?
Where the capital or where the most territory/development is. And I think that could work better for regional powers. See my other proposal.

Edit: I just processed that we were talking about the Ottomans. In that case yeah, its better with how others already said, with the ability of being a regional power or local great power in multiple areas/continents.
 
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Thats not really easily balanced.
But the idea of having hegemons since the day 1 of the Age of Discovery, that are created just because they may have even only 1 DipoRep / Heavy Ship / Coin / Regiment more than the second place, looks not the best. Those are not true hegemons.
I really like the new system more, but I think that having up to 5 hegemons ALWAYS since ~1430s till 1836 is not right.

Lets imagine Age of Discovery started:
  • The next day the game creates 5 lists to look for hegemonies within the Great Powers: DiploRep, Army Size, Heavy Ships, Income, Cult Influence
  • Now the game just proclaims the first country in the list as the respective hegemon
  • What I propose is monthly lists' update and check if the respective N[0] > ( N[1] + N[2] ) for Army, Navy, Income or N[0] > 1.5*N[1] for DiploRep and Cult Influence.
  • If in a list this is TRUE, the respective hegemon is proclaimed, if not, then there is no hegemon
  • The lists consist only of the Great Powers, so they are very short and fast to sort
Later in the game:
  • When the hegemon is already proclaimed, than your logic is applied for a new hegemon (those 20%)
  • If you become the third or further in a list, lose GP status, you immediately lose hegemony, and we come back to the point 3
I am just really curious what can be a problem with monthly checking if a > (b + c). Thanks!
 
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I think it would be fine if you become hegemon first time if you are stronger in some percentage, as some people said. Not only, i have 1 more coin then the second country need 20% more money to take it, also it could be slightly bigger so if there are some equilibrium there are no hegemons, or maybe if for some long time you are not above evereyone by some percentage in some area you lose the hegemon
 
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The first hegemon should absolutely have a big advantage over everyone else, at the very least 20% more (but I'd go with 50% because it's about being an hegemon, not "the first one in the race").
 
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The game starts in 1337. The Black Death hasn't even started yet and you're citing it as a reason they shouldn't be strong in 1337.

Please explain.
i dont , you just gonna ignore all points i stated about france ? the only thing i said about black death is how it did hit them harder for being precisely undevelopped that outside europe.
i also said the others like arabs and mongols could muster 40.000 in black death time , while europeans will keep averaging 8000 per army till the late 1400s . the french army on azincourt was considered as one of the largest fielded in europe that century and that was hardly half the size of an army fielded by the like of fes or tunis or cairo let alone the whole country.
also even before black death did strike france was severly weak after the albigensian crusade / genocide and the total devastation of the south and the issues it had with the vassals and england .
you telling me , a country who just dealt with this below is a top 5 ? what even prosperity it had outside the period of the reign of Philippe II Auguste ?
btw france in 1337 was a in an agricultural crisis since 1240


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Very strange to see what I consider the best improvement (the x% better than previous to overtake), is also the most controversial one. The system as proposed in the OP seems has my preference over all proposals since (though I doubt "10%" is enough for stable gameplay).

If you don't trust yourself to not game the system, then you should just turn off all hegemons.