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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.

sparse.png
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.

flatland.png
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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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.

Well, vegetation made most sense for us
 
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"Blocks Vision from Adjacent Land" - This is super cool! I guess it means that if there is a forest, a nearby army will not be able to penetrate the fog of war into or beyond that forest? So you could get hit by surprise by an army in that forest?

yes thats true
 
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Population growth should have some impact on vegetation. This is how New York or any other settlements grow. If "urban" cannot be a terrain, at least farm should be it. Or implementing "Colonized" location modifier would do.
 
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I request that you change the Mediterranean climate to a temperate or mild climate. The Mediterranean climate can only cover a small part of the world, and its coverage area is not the most populous region. The most populous region is the monsoon climate zone, whether it is China, India, or West Africa. Even Central America is affected by monsoon climate.
If you haven't expressed the monsoon climate, you shouldn't make the Mediterranean climate a special case, but should choose a temperate or mild climate to include more regions and populations
I don´t believe we have seen a post on weather yet. Monssons, storms, droughts, hurricanes and whatever is probably coming some time. In case monsoons are included, perhaps they ad a positive modifier every time they hit. (I hope the player isn´t alerted every time though).
 
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Many terrain types affect frontage, with fixed numbers from -1 to -4. How large is max frontage in general? Does it grow with ages, tech or something else? If it's like 10 at start and 50 at end, is it realistic to have a fixed frontage modifier for terrain, or would a percentage modifier be better?

10 per box
 
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Could there be maybe a location factor based on location size (possibly even straight up proportional to the pixel size of the location) that scales up or down capacities?

I've just exposed pixel count of each location as a location_size trigger so modders can do whatever they want with that information.
Could you do the same for latitude? The map (understandably) does not appear to be anywhere near equal area, so basing it solely on pixel size will also skew capacity quite significantly. Comparing the pixel size of Great Britain vs. Sri Lanka, relative to their real-world counterparts, the capacity of Great Britain would be more than twice as large as it should be going by pixel size alone.

While the map projection does not appear to be an equirectangular one, it appears close enough that just converting the city location in the Y-axis and converting it linearly into a latitude would get you pretty close.
 
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Hence why I asked whether the effect would be diluted by technological progress, if it does, then I have no issue with it. However, it would seem strange if by the end of the games period the Mediterranean still has a significant advantage in population capacity.

Yeah im sure they have been testing that. It is just one modifier thought, based on a flat number which spain or italy is gonna be much lower on due to its vegetation. There are many more other sources of population capacity. I think that developing an economy further and having a more productive agriculture will lead to the end of the game countries like Netherlands or England to have way higher population density than Spain or Italy. At least for the IA. im sure players will be able to make a lot of countries that are unthinakable today, have one of the highest populations in Europe
 
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If you have a fort in a mountain will it still have a ZoC in the winter (when armies may not be able to move into the location to siege it)?

Separately, can I take the opportunity to ask if owners of fort locations will always have the defender bonus even if they’re moving to intercept an army already there?

yes and its controller for fort.
 
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Mediterranean is the best climate to live in. Its an objective and thorough analysis.

/Some crazy viking that moved to Barcelona a few years ago
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Barcelona is Cold Arid / Oceanic though... :p
 
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I don´t believe we have seen a post on weather yet. Monssons, storms, droughts, hurricanes and whatever is probably coming some time. In case monsoons are included, perhaps they ad a positive modifier every time they hit. (I hope the player isn´t alerted every time though).
I'm not talking about weather systems, I'm talking about climate. Apart from the Mediterranean region, the Mediterranean climate does not cover other civilization centers in the world, including densely populated China and India, as well as less densely populated Central America and West Africa.
The 'perfect climate' should cover more regions and populations, not just the Roman Empire.
 
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So location ids are just numbers and each one has an actual name as well?
That should be easier to work with than if locations are named something like x809F60...
In the script we almost always refer to the location by a name instead of a numerical id. Makes it muuuch easier
 
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