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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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Well, the paradox wisdom suggests that the population capacity of subtropical climate zones such as India, Southeast Asia, China, and Japan, which have the highest population density in the world, is not as large as that of the Mediterranean climate.
Let's cheer for the Romans to build their ideal city in 100 BC
 
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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
Oh you want monsoons huh?
 
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Love the design of the icons for the different terrain types but can they please have different colours? Not even asking for some insane detail, they could literally share the colour they have on the map rather than all sharing the same desaturated yellow colour.
 
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Oh you want monsoons huh?
Not entirely, I just believe that a 'perfect climate' should cover more regions of the world, not just around the Mediterranean and some small areas.. This will result in a worse climate in the most populous and densely populated areas of the world than in less populated areas.
 
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Looking back to the Winter Dev diary, you mentioned there that "Narrows, Inland Seas and Lakes have the possibility of freezing over during winter. This can happen when a seazone has had severe winter for over a week, and will then last until winter is no longer severe in that location." However, in the above it seems that the only Arctic climate can have severe winter, which would mean that the Danish Straits cannot freeze. I thought the idea of the freezing seasons was to be able to sim the Swedish Army crossing the ice? Or perhaps there is a little Ice age event in game that shifts each climates winter by -1 so that continental climates can get severe winters?
 
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I am not sure that is the case, especially as technology advances. Certainly in modern times the population density is generally higher in places like Southern England, the Low Countries and Western Germany. If the effect is gradually diluted by tech then ok, but if not it seems very strange to me.


population+density+map+2018.png

This has nothing to do with climate. For Spain for instance, the places with the least density where the more densely populated at the start of the game and the coastal ones as the least (see tinto maps).

This has everything to do with economic development and techonology. If you have a closer look at that map, you will see that the densely populated area matches 1:1 the industrial blue banana of Europe.
 
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I take issue with the description of desert,

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

As this simply isn't true, there's plenty of animal and plant life in deserts but they aren't suitable for *agriculture* or sedentary populations.
 
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This has nothing to do with climate. For Spain for instance, the places with the least density where the more densely populated at the start of the game and the coastal ones as the least (see tinto maps).

This has everything to do with economic development and techonology. If you have a closer look at that map, you will see that the densely populated area matches 1:1 the industrial blue banana of Europe.
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.
 
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Mediterranean climate regions have never had the highest population densities and food production, I don't know why they have such high positive modifiers, the climates of India and China are massively underestimated to the point where they don't fit into historical reality.

What also needs to be said is that on the Great Plains of North China, I found a cold arid climate in the center of a large continental climate. Although in fact there is no such gap in climate in these areas, I suspect that it is the modern data calculation of the Köppen climate zone. It reflects the impact of the urban heat island effect and cannot reflect the climate at that time.
 
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