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Tinto Talks #45 - 8th of January 2025

Welcome to another Tinto Talks! Happy Wednesday where we talk about our super-secret game with the codename Project Caesar, asking you for feedback!


Today we’ll go into the details of how terrain works in the game. To iterate from the Map-Tinto-Talks from almost a year ago, each location has three different attributes instead of a single one as previous games had. This creates more variation and allows us more granular control over game play.

Each location has a climate, a topography and a vegetation set. Sea locations do not have vegetation though.


Climate

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The climate of a location impacts how well pops can live there, including how much food can be produced. It also affects the maximum winter level of a location.

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Tropical

Population Capacity +50%
Development Growth -10%
Life Expectancy -5
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
No Winters

Tropical represents areas with high average temperatures and no winter.

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Subtropical

Population Capacity +100%
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
Max Winter is Mild

Subtropical represents areas with high average temperatures and mild winters.

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Oceanic
Population Capacity +50%
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
Max Winter is Mild

Oceanic represents areas with mild winters but high humidity.

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Arid
Wheat Production -10%
Life Expectancy -5
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
No Precipitation
No Winters

Arid represents an area that has a severe lack of available water.

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Cold Arid

Wheat Production -10%
No Precipitation
Max Winter is Mild

Cold arid represents an area that has a severe lack of available water but experiences winters.

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Mediterranean
Population Capacity +150%
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
No Winters

Mediterranean represents areas with a perfect climate!

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Continental
Population Capacity +50%
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
Max Winter is Normal

Continental represents areas with cold winters.

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Arctic
Population Capacity -55%
Development Growth -25%
Life Expectancy -5
Max Winter is Severe

Arctic represents areas with very cold winters.

Vegetation

vegetation.png


Vegetation represents the foliage cover of a location.

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Desert

Can have Sandstorms
Movement Cost for Armies +10%
RGO Build time +50%
Road Build time +100%
Development Growth -10%
Food Production -33%
Population Capacity +10k

Deserts are barren landscapes with little precipitation and almost no potential for plant or animal life.

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Sparse
Road Build time -10%
Population Capacity +25k

Sparse represent large flat areas of land with few or no trees.

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Grasslands
Food Production +10%
Population Capacity 50k

Grasslands represent terrain dominated by grass with little or no trees or shrubs.

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Farmland
Movement Cost for Armies +10%
Road Build time +10%
Development Growth +10%
Population Capacity +100k
RGO Maximum Size +10%
Food Production +33%

Farmland represents anthropogenic terrain, devoted to crops and/or extensive pastures.

woods.png
Woods
Movement Cost for Armies +25%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -2
Road Build time +25%
Population Capacity +50k
Development Growth -20%
Food Production +10%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea

Woods represent terrain with less dense vegetation than forests.


forest.png
Forest
Movement Cost for Armies +50%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -3
Road Build time +50%
RGO Build time +33%
Population Capacity +25k
Development Growth -25%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Land

Forest represents terrain with dense vegetation.


jungle.png
Jungle
Movement Cost for Armies +100%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -4
Road Build time +200%
RGO Build time +50%
Population Capacity +50k
Development Growth -50%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Land

A jungle represents terrain with dense forest and tangled vegetation that makes doing anything on the land difficult.




Topography

topography.png


Topography represents the roughness and elevation of the land within a location. Flatter Topography is generally better for growing Towns and Cities while rougher Topography is easier to defend.


These first ones are land related topographies.

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Flatland

No special attributes

Flatland represents terrain that does not have any major topographic variation, so there are no impediments for army movement or building development.

mountains.png
Mountains
Movement Cost for Armies +100%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -2
Movement is Blocked in Winter
Maximum Frontage in Battle -4
Road Build time +200%
RGO Build time +100%
Population Capacity -80%
Development Growth -70%
Food Production -20%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Land

Mountain terrain has high altitude and also steep slopes with relatively few and narrow flat areas, so it is more difficult for armies to cross and fight in it, and also more difficult to develop.

hills.png
Hills

Movement Cost for Armies +50%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -3
Road Build time +50%
RGO Build time +25%
Development Growth -30%
Food Production -10%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Land

A terrain with hills has variations in the topography, but the slopes are not as steep nor as high as those of mountains, so the penalties are also not as bad.

plateau.png
Plateau
Movement Cost for Armies +25%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -1
Road Build time +50%
RGO Build time +25%
Development Growth -25%
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea

They represent relatively flat areas situated at high altitude, so they have some penalties compared to flatlands due to their elevation.

wetlands.png
Wetlands

Movement Cost for Armies +50%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -3
Road Build time +75%
RGO Build time +25%
Development Growth -30%
Food Production -10%

Wetlands are terrain that is partially flooded, generally due to being near a river, lake, or coast.


The following are the naval ones.

ocean.png
Ocean
Naval Attrition +1%

This is the open seas between the continents, where only the best of ships can travel.

deep_ocean.png
Deep Ocean
Naval Attrition +2%

This is the open seas between the continents, where only the best of ships can travel, in the furthest areas from any coast.

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Coastal Ocean
No special attributes

This is the open seas between the continents, where only the best of ships can travel, but in the areas closer to the coast.

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Inland Sea
Can Freeze over during winter

Inland seas represent the land-enclosed seas like the Mediterranean or the Baltic.

narrows.png
Narrows

Can Freeze over during winter
Movement Cost for Navies +20%
Attacker Diceroll in Battle -1
Maximum Frontage in Battle -2
Blocks Vision from Adjacent Sea

Narrows are areas of sea with proximity of coast on many sides, like straits or the sea inside archipelagos, where there is not much space for movement.


Lakes, Salt Pans and Atolls exists, but are just graphical variants of Coastal Oceans, even if lakes could freeze over during winter.

Stay tuned, as next week we’ll delve into the wonderful world of military objectives.
 
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Back in the first map dev post about the netherlands you mentioned not being sure whether or not terrain change would be possible in engine. Any change in that? Any hope for polders?
Pavía recently stated that vegetation won't be able to change throughout the game.

Also what exactly makes the Mediterranean climate the best vs say subtropical, isn’t it generally drier?
Johan moved to live in Mediterranean climate, that's why.
(Leave it to the German to explain a joke...)
 
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Why are pop capacity flat per locality and not based on locality size? Doesn't this mean places that have more localities to represent fragmented regions end up with higher pop density?
 
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I have a feeling that, in the end game, the extent of these penalties will create severe disparities in development between neighboring locations within the same country. For instance, I might expect the boundaries between continental and Arctic in Sweden, or between Mediterranean and cold arid in Spain, to create pretty extreme differences between neighboring locations as the game goes on.

is there any mechanism to “blend” or even out neighboring population/development, so neighboring locations don’t become too different?
That's the point?Basque country shouldn't have the same development as Seville.
 
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Disappointed there is no distinction between rugged and rolling hills.

Please confirm or deny whether vegetation can be changed and if wetlands can be drained...
 
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Would like the dynamics in changing for examole grasslands to farmlands and backwards based on development and pipulation. Will that be possibke in vanilla game? By console? By modded events or decisions?
 
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Why are pop capacity flat per locality and not based on locality size? Doesn't this mean places that have more localities to represent fragmented regions end up with higher pop density?
There needs to be a flat base value for pop capacity somewhere. They chose to add it to vegetation and give the other terrain types modifiers instead. I'd be interested in the reasoning behind doing it like that, or if it was mostly arbitrary.
 
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Great to have a more realistic and breathing map. I agree with those wanting some degree of deforestation effects, as well as mine depletions as discussed previously.

The climate has so much gameplay potential for this time period imo. I wonder if you have considered adding storms in sea current and coastal locations?
(Crossing near the Strait of Magellan should be riskier than passing by other regular coastal locations for example, also calendar-dependant)

Even adding historical hurricanes like the Great Colonial Hurricane of 1635, or natural disasters in general? Like tsunamis, earthquakes, fires, floods and storms and specific phenomenons like El Niño–Southern Oscillation, or La Niña?

There could be a map mode for climatic disaster risk, where some locations can read info like "Earthquakes may happen around this area approximately every 2 decades. Last Earthquake was on mm/dd/yyyy", "Tornadoes may appear during winters in this province", "Tsunamis from the coast of Japan may arrive to this American coast after X days", etc, etc. The dates don't have to be fixed.

These events would be rare but would have an impact on the flow of commerce, the safety of naval units, tech and price of otherwise equivalent naval units, the safety of armies, infrastructure of affected locations, and even religious reactions of some pops dependending on the year and the culture where the disaster happened. It can also open opportunities for diplomatic action and favors, by sending aid to affected countries, or the simple fact that disasters leave countries more exposed to an external military invasion.
 
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There needs to be a flat base value for pop capacity somewhere. They chose to add it to vegetation and give the other terrain types modifiers instead. I'd be interested in the reasoning behind doing it like that, or if it was mostly arbitrary.
I don't think this is a good idea because it would really require them to basically take into account historical demographics when designing localities, which demands a complete revision of most China and India I believe...

I would have put locality size as a base multiplier too, so larger localities would also have higher base capacity... I believe meiou does it already.
 
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I imagine the life expectancy penalty for the tropics is supposed to represent disease, but what about the ones for artic and arid, neither of them are exactly prime for large agricultural populations, but I don’t see why the characters living there should have shorter lifespans (I imagine the lifespans are a character specific thing)
 
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