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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

climate.png


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.

tropical.png
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.

subtropical.png
Subtropical

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

Subtropical represents areas with high average temperatures and mild winters.

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

Oceanic represents areas with mild winters but high humidity.

arid.png
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.

cold_arid.png
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.

mediterranean.png
Mediterranean
Population Capacity +150%
Free Capacity Attracts Pops
No Winters

Mediterranean represents areas with a perfect climate!

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

Continental represents areas with cold winters.

arctic.png
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.

desert.png
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.

grasslands.png
Grasslands
Food Production +10%
Population Capacity 50k

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

farmland.png
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.

coastal_ocean.png
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.

inland_sea.png
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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We have some things like that, pops demand more fur in climates with higher maximum winter for example. Suggestions for more things like that are welcome
Colder climates needed more preservers for winter, and especially as they trended more to meat-based diets. Ergo salt for preserves would be higher demand in wintry locales. Honey as a preservative could also be in demand, but I don't know if that played a similar role as salt in wintry locales. Definitely a lesser role since honey was more difficult to produce, but don't know if it's enough to deserve some simulation.

I would also figure tropical locales have lower demand for types of clothes, since clothes are worn only for modesty. Fur's too.

Fruits might have lower demands in wintry climates owing to the difficulty in preserving them, as well as preserving them as you transport them long distances as they don't grow as well in distant climates (and thus need to be transported there to be consumed). But maybe this can be better handled by making it that fruits and the like just can't be moved halfway across the world? I know there were 'transport costs' mentioned in a previous dev-diary but I still don't really understand what that is. I hope it represents how a lot of goods aren't 'durable' and need to be locally produced before the spoil.
 
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I would echo that climate should affect whether mountains are passable in winter. I visited the Chilean Andes, both near La Serena and San Pedro de Atacama, in the middle of winter and there was no snow to be seen, even at 4000 m. It was cold at night but during the day the temperature was quite pleasant.

Whether a mountain pass is passable in winter also depends on its elevation.
bro did you really think there was going to be actual winter near at the equator? I assume that PDX requires at least mild winters to stop movement, I would hope at least
 
View attachment 1241244
I just want to share this greate graph made by geodiode (google his website, the reference is registered as spam), his website also contains other great sources and information regarding climate. Adding to previous posts, it seems that at least in the modern day, the subtropical climate support a denser population than the mediterranean climate.
Definitely reafirms me in my suggestion of 100 for subtro, 60 for Oceanic and Med and 30 for continental and tropical in terms of population capacity.
Also given that we now know what climate modifiers do I agree with the commenters that say that we need to separate 'cold subarid' from 'cold arid'. In game, it would be better to represent 'Cold subarid' as getting a similar pop cap to continental, but with mild winters. Perhaps if droughts are/become a thing (like a 'reverse' flood event that hurts crop production for that year) that could be another thing that could be added for the semiarid (and even mediterranean) climate.
 
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View attachment 1241244
I just want to share this greate graph made by geodiode (google his website, the reference is registered as spam), his website also contains other great sources and information regarding climate. Adding to previous posts, it seems that at least in the modern day, the subtropical climate support a denser population than the mediterranean climate.
You can't really compare modern urban conglomerations to pre-modern urban centres. Humid subtropical climates usually experience very heavy rainfall during the summers combined with major yearly floods. Mediterranean climates don't need to combat such harsh conditions.
 
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View attachment 1241244
I just want to share this greate graph made by geodiode (google his website, the reference is registered as spam) regarding global population density per climate type. Adding to previous posts, it seems that at least in the modern day, the subtropical climate support a denser population than the mediterranean climate. Geodiode's website also contains more information regarding climate, like the total population per climate type.
View attachment 1241247
this data is good, obviously important to note the discrepancies between today and 1337 in terms of various continent's share of population(Europe for example has less than 1/3 the global share it does in PC in 1337)
 
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Just an idea vut maybe sea vegitation should exist. It can make sea tiles more important for rgo production (like places with more seaweed gives flat +%10 rgo throughput or something) and would make algie forests and rifs more important for fishonomics
 
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Definitely reafirms me in my suggestion of 100 for subtro, 60 for Oceanic and Med and 30 for continental and tropical in terms of population capacity.
Also given that we now know what climate modifiers do I agree with the commenters that say that we need to separate 'cold subarid' from 'cold arid'. In game, it would be better to represent 'Cold subarid' as getting a similar pop cap to continental, but with mild winters. Perhaps if droughts are/become a thing (like a 'reverse' flood event that hurts crop production for that year) that could be another thing that could be added for the semiarid (and even mediterranean) climate.
cool_desert_area.jpg
cool_desert_population.jpg

This seems to be the case for both arid climate types, but indeed more-so the cold-arid one.
hot_desert_area.jpg
hot_desert_population.jpg
 
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this data is good, obviously important to note the discrepancies between today and 1337 in terms of various continent's share of population(Europe for example has less than 1/3 the global share it does in PC in 1337)
Geodiode's website also contains information about the distribution per country of all people that live in certain climates. So it should be possible to compensate for the difference in population distribution between 1337 and now, like so:
oceanic_population_distribution.jpg
 
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Does this mean vegetation is fixed too? Because if so that seems really disruptive to regions like North America and Ukraine who started as grasslands and forrests but end the period as farmland.
Problem's the graphics more than anything else. Your best bet is to just "negate" the vegetation effects with other modifiers. Won't change things visibly, though.
 
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Problem's the graphics more than anything else. Your best bet is to just "negate" the vegetation effects with other modifiers. Won't change things visibly, though.
Would be better if forestation was a separate thing on top of a map, like cities and castles are placed as a separate layer over terrain, but it seems to be late at this point
 
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Would be better if forestation was a separate thing on top of a map, like cities and castles are placed as a separate layer over terrain, but it seems to be late at this point
Forestation and Farmlands both.
 
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The following are the naval ones.

View attachment 1241012Ocean
Naval Attrition +1%

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

View attachment 1241013Deep 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.

View attachment 1241014Coastal 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.
What does "where only the best of ships can travel" actually mean mechanically? Are certain types of ship not able to enter these terrains or they take additional attrition? Or is this purely flavor text?
 
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if that was the ONLY factor.. maybe
Could we get a full look at one location, say berlin, on all things that effect max pop cap and pop growth. How this is effected later in game would be great as well just to help show full potential? Maybe a time-lapse of a cities growth?
 
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I still think there should be a climate category between continental and arctic..
The development penalty for woods is a little too high in my opinion..
Great to see that mountains block movement in winter and that narrow seas can freeze over..
 
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probably not gonna be feasible
Come on how hard can it be to make vegitation a variable? Americas with no farmlends an 1800 is just... at least put the farmland in and make them unusable without tech, but that is just a bad cheat. We should be albe to cut down a forest and turn it into a farmland, and we should be able to make rice fields in wetlands with appropiate tech, and that tech isn't high up on the timescale. These things while expensive, labor intensive and time consuming where done on regular basis. If you can't change these things as part of map constants you should keep them as a building or something in the code and have forest cover, and farmland as a percentage with bonus multiplier for all these bonuses, and nerfs.
 
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