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Tinto Talks #52 - 26th of Feburary 2025

Hello and Welcome to another Tinto Talks, the Happy Wednesday where we spill all the secrets about our upcoming game with the codename Project Caesar.


In a game where we simulate hundreds of millions of people, not all calamities that they get exposed to involve Warfare or Diseases. Today we will talk about how Mother Nature does her best trying to reduce the population regularly.

Little Ice Age

As the widest definition of the Little Ice Age encompasses almost the entire timespan of our game, we decided to go with the Maunder Minimum, which happened between 1645 and 1715, being the colder phase of the period. We simulate the Little Ice Age with a Situation that will affect the northern half of the Northern Hemisphere, making winters last longer.

During the Little Ice Age, food production in the affected areas is lowered, and events and other mechanics are happening which will make the experience a challenging mid to late-game phase.

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Who will survive?

Weather
We also have a rather in-depth weather system, where we simulate storms and similar phenomena moving across the planet. We currently have two categories of weather systems, the weather front, and the cyclone. We have also included in the weather fronts the monsoons, which have the particularity of going in one direction (Africa to India) from February to June, and in the other direction (Himalayas to the Indian Ocean) from October to December.



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Ireland might suffer some weather fronts during the year, yeah…


Not all weather systems that spawn are the same strength, and their strength can change as they move across the map. The strength of the weather system directly impacts the benefits and penalties they give to the locations.

Fronts are usually wide weather patterns bringing rain from the oceans into lands. This has some negative impacts on armies and navies, but it provides a large food production boost.

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This was a huge rainstorm..


Cyclones, or Hurricanes as they are known in the Northern Hemisphere, are a more narrow weather system, which causes a lot of damage due to high wind speeds.

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At least no buildings damaged? Or????


In deserts with cold arid or arid climate, there will not be sometimes beneficial rains though when a weather system passes through, but instead you will get sandstorms.

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I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere.

In any location with severe winter, where a front passes through, there will be snow instead of heavy rain.

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Didn’t stop Carl Gustaf Armfeldt trying to move his army..


Volcanos
There are locations which contain volcanos that are not entirely dormant. At any point, any one of them can erupt, spewing out long streams of lava and an enormous cloud of ash that leaves a path of destruction in its wake, causing huge devastation to the location they are present in.

It will ruin RGO’s, destroy buildings, kill a lot of people, and reduce prosperity dramatically. Afterwards, there is a small boost to food production due to volcanic soil for a few decades.

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Can be helpful longterm yes?


Earthquakes
A large part of the world is prone to earthquakes. While we do have some famous historical earthquakes likely to happen, we also have a small chance that any area with an earthquake risk can get one.

Similar to a Volcano it will destroy buildings and kill people, but earthquakes will usually not affect just a single location, but many adjacent ones as well.


Sadly there are some locations that are in the awkward position of most being in an earthquake zone, and having a volcano.

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Not the best place for a city?



Next week we’ll be talking about how mercenaries work in Project Caesar.
 
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Also First Vienna Siege of Ottomans, as Ottomans couldnt carry their heavy cannons due to heavy rain on their march to Vienna and had to abondon the siege shortly afterwards
Extreme weather could seriously hamper artillery operations. For example, during the Siege of Kazan, the Winter Campaigns of the Thirty Years’ War, the Russo-Polish War, various Ottoman campaigns in Eastern Europe, the winter engagements of the English Civil War, and Napoleon’s Invasion of Russia, severe winter conditions really compromised the effectiveness of cannons. As you said, during the First Vienna Siege, the Ottomans had to abandon their attack because heavy rain made the ground too muddy for transporting their cannons.

With this in mind, I propose that we add a game mechanic where prolonged adverse weather—whether it’s heavy rain or snownegatively affects artillery. When such weather sets in, artillery units could suffer a penalty that reduces their firing effectiveness, and the transport speed of armies with artillery might also be slowed down.

I think, a game that already includes details like frozen inner seas and armies getting stuck on ice could definitely reflect this—it wouldn’t feel out of place at all.
 
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Siege of Kazan (1552): During Ivan the Terrible’s campaign, freezing temperatures really messed up the cannons. Gunpowder acted unpredictably and metal parts contracted, causing misfires and overall unreliability.
It was other way round. The freezing temperatures weren't a problem at all. It was the sudden thaw that wetted the powder.
Russo-Polish War (1654–1667): Harsh Eastern European winters made it nearly impossible for artillery to perform consistently. The deep cold affected both gunpowder and the cannon components, limiting how much they could fire.
But that's not what happened. E.g., Polotsk was literally reduced to rubble by Russian bombardment in early February 1563 in preparation for an assault across the frozen river.
Ten years later, Livonians prepared for a siege in January 1573 but were counter-ambushed in Weissenstein (Paide), which was successfully reduced by artillery.
In another 4 years, a Russian army braved freezing temperatures and blizzards to reach Revel by Feb 1577. Despite winter conditions, the Swedish garrison fought off in an artillery duel, killing the Russian commander in the process.
 
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@Pavía Just wanted to share this regional earthquake that happened close to Alicante. I just found a small reference to it when I was looking on some old documents in an archive, and when I checked on wikipedia it didn't say anything about it. The earthquake I'm talking about is the one that happened around Alcoy in 1620, in wikipedia they only mention the bigger one that happened in 1644. Link here were they talk about it https://www.ign.es/web/libros-digitales/terremoto-alcoy#:~:text=El 2 de diciembre se cumplieron 400 años,daños económicos y un número de víctimas mortales.