Tinto Flavour #16 - 9th of May 2025 - Brandenburg & Prussia

[Dongerino]

I don't understand what Brandenburg has to do with the Teutonic Order being the precursor to the duchy of Prussia. The text about Brandenburg seems out of place. Sure it's important in forming the Kingdom of Prussia (via personal union) but I'm not sure how it applies here...

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It looks like the smaller grey text is the historical basis for the event. Just something like "hey, this is what happened irl that inspired this if you're interested"

 

[lazprune]

It's not much of a priority for us, sadly. There are many things we want to improve and keep working on, and the depth that we can now add with the new systems of EUV is incredible. But that also means that we need to prioritize our resources and development time, as we aren't a big studio.

No Haymanot or Karaism? I will cry...

 

[MRhuman666]

Looking at it just as an issue of "Prussia was formed by the Brandenburg player too early" simplifies it too much and the simple solution - gating Prussia behind some arbitrary time period - also doesn't feel right as a result
But, in my opinion, the issue is caused by multiple things currently wrong with the game that lead to unrealistic outcomes.

1. He was able to expand way too fast in the HRE by just creating claims and then annexing allies in wars.
In my opinion, you shouldn't be able to take land in the HRE as a HRE prince by any means other than dynastic claims. What I would do is just disable all other CBs outright. You already disable no-CB, but this is clearly not enough. The HRE only devolved into an empire in name only after Westphalia. Modeling it as that in 1337 is wrong and leads to wrong outcomes like we saw in the videos with the consolidation into 10 blobs in just 100 years. The rules should become looser should the Emperor lose the "Religious war", which is what the 30 Years War is currently represented as, even though irl it was also about imperial authority. It's okay for this part of the world to play different.

2. He was able to have Poland play wrecking ball for him against the Teutons
There is no world where the Polish king would help a German prince conquer Prussia without getting anything for himself. This is also simply a problem of how alliances work in EU4 and seemingly here too. I can't think of a single instance in real life where allies joined offensive wars and helped their ally conquer land they wanted for themselves just because they liked them. If, and this is a huge if, Poland would do anyting of this sort, they would demand the majority of territories for themselves, simply because they are the bigger power.

Really the issue here isn't that he was able to form Prussia. It seems logical that the "King in Prussia" idea would've happened sooner or later once the prequisites were met - a HRE prince wants to be a king but can't because of HRE de jure laws -> rules over an independent non-HRE territory (irl the fealty to the Poles was broken by treaty during the Deluge) -> elevates his non-HRE territory to a kingdom. The issue here is that he as Brandenburg was able to blob into this state so early.

I agree with the HRE (especially the german part) only being "allowed" to expand through buying lands or inheritances. Most of the larger german states were in truth a bunch of PUs in a trench coat that are simplified into these coherent entities. It was not unheard of for the emperor/diet to deny someone a title (even when inherited). Wars were only fought over miniscule border regions, too small for the eu5 map.

 

[Polesie Admiral]

No Haymanot or Karaism? I will cry...

Judaism will be frst dlc, i wish

 

[lazprune]

Judaism will be frst dlc, i wish

I doubt it since it's an unpopular minority religion with no tags in 1337...

 

[Atromb]

Since we don't use the system 'Admin Tech = 10/20/etc' as EU4, the only way to gatelocking this effectively would be to add an 'Is Age of Absolutism' requisite, which we think would feel arbitrary and opposite to dynamic content. But we're open to suggestions on how to improve the immersion about this, as usual.

I would say that expansion just seems a tad too easy, have you consider adding lower tier 'forts' that don't block army movement, don't have area of control and take less to be sieged? It might help deal with how much of a pushover minor factions and small countries seem to be and would make wars more grindy/costly by forcing you to spend more time in sieges. As it is fully occupying your enemy (specially if they are somewhat small) seems way too easy even from the start of the game where you have no cannons.

It should also be easier to gain antagonism, bullying the ai just seems too easy at the moment.

 

[Polesie Admiral]

I doubt it since it's an unpopular minority religion with no tags in 1337...

true, they didnt even add Semien

 

[Septimus the Merciful]

I'm pretty sure this event was fired by console command for illustrative purposes so it reads rather incoherently, but in an actual playthrough it would only fire if you actually meet certain historical conditions, namely having the same dynasty on your own throne and as head of the Order.

What do you mean by the same dynasty on your throne and head of the Order? The duchy of Prussia was formed as a settlement between the disputes of the Order and the kingdom of Poland. If Albert didn't convert to Lutheranism, wasn't the maternal nephew of Sigismund I of Poland, and didn't become a Polish vassal, it may never have happened.

I get your point that it was just triggered to show the event, but the text still seems off.

 

[Atromb]

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On the note of urban locations, are we ever getting a thread were we can debate which locations should start as towns/cities? Could also be great of you could include some kind of criteria.

 

[Septimus the Merciful]

It looks like the smaller grey text is the historical basis for the event. Just something like "hey, this is what happened irl that inspired this if you're interested"

I'm not even talking about the smaller grey text. The main text reads as if control of Brandenburg was a deciding factor in the Order founding Prussia when in reality the first Duke of Prussia and the Margrave of Brandenburg were just brothers.

In theory, any Grandmaster who controls Prussia should be able to become Duke of Prussia by submitting to Poland (or even Lithuania) and becoming Protestant.

 

[LeandroB]

Where is Yellow Prussia? Is it safe? Is it alright?

 

[SAmaster]

I know it's the middle ages, but I would have thought that Brandenburg would have had more than 406 jews living in them.

 

[Atromb]

This is the approach we're, in general terms, trying to favor, basing as much as possible in the game mechanics, and trying not to gatelock the content harshly because of it not keeping up (although there may always be exceptions, of course).

The first of the issues you mention is something we're already taking a look at, as adding a few more rules about expansion in the HRE, and also trying to balance the pacing a bit more correctly. The second is also tricky, but please consider that the AI is still WIP, and not final.

I would argue that, in general it should be a lot harder as a christian power to conquer other Christian owned land, at least early game, unless you have valid claims. Such a thing could possibly result in your excommunion.
Harder here meaning higher war score cost and antagonism, pope should also gain antagonism with anyone illegally annexing catholic land (possibly leading to your excommunion) and all hre nations with anyone unlawfully annexing or vassalizing people in the hre.

 

[Ispil]

I would argue that, in general it should be a lot harder as a christian power to conquer other Christian owned land, at least early game, unless you have valid claims. Such a thing could possibly result in your excommunion.
Harder here meaning higher war score cost and antagonism, pope should also gain antagonism with anyone illegally annexing catholic land (possibly leading to your excommunion) and all hre nations with anyone unlawfully annexing or vassalizing people in the hre.

So to elaborate a little bit on this, generally speaking most Christian states were not able to declare "war". Military conflicts were seen through the lens of being "legal disputes"; the strength of one's claim is evaluated by the strength of their military. War, meanwhile, was something strictly in the religious sphere; all wars were holy and only the Pope could declare them. This was, of course, changing by the start date with the establishment of "patriotic religion" (namely in France, where the decline of relic worship as faith moved from the cult of the dead to the cult of Mary in turn started migrating what was once relic worship into worship of the relics of the Crown itself) and the consequent movement of the idea of "war as holy" to that of the conflicts fought by the state.

If you wanted to somehow capture this mechanically, you'd probably want some sort of societal value to capture the "sanctity of the state". The more you move towards the state being "holy" in that regard, the more freedom you have to declaring no-CB wars and wars without significant claim... at the consequence of losing a war having far greater harm to your stability.

You can probably wrap that into "spiritualist vs. humanist/pluralist/secular/whatever this is actually meant to be". The more faith matters, the more your wars are backed by it.

 

[MrMcGruffins]

I would argue that, in general it should be a lot harder as a christian power to conquer other Christian owned land, at least early game, unless you have valid claims. Such a thing could possibly result in your excommunion.
Harder here meaning higher war score cost and antagonism, pope should also gain antagonism with anyone illegally annexing catholic land (possibly leading to your excommunion) and all hre nations with anyone unlawfully annexing or vassalizing people in the hre.

Seconding this. While the rapid conquests can be appropriate for much of the world, it would be nice to go beyond just additional rules for the HRE to add these suggestions for catholic (or wider christian, I can't speak to which is more appropriate) flavor that slows conquests in the region in a way that ideally doesn't feel too arbitrary.

 

[Friedrich von Deutschland]

is there any way to try and prop up the Wittelsbach rule of Brandenburg as a forign tag besides never loosing the emperorship? It seems to me like any game as Bavaria or the Palatinate should have locking down Brandenburg as a major priority to assure dynastic presence within the empire.

 

[Atromb]

Seconding this. While the rapid conquests can be appropriate for much of the world, it would be nice to go beyond just additional rules for the HRE to add these suggestions for catholic (or wider christian, I can't speak to which is more appropriate) flavor that slows conquests in the region in a way that ideally doesn't feel too arbitrary.

Starting it out as something tied to the catholic church io would be a good start, it can be faced out once you reach the age of absolutism, or tied to your societal values as @Ispil suggested. But for much of the game unless you have a dinastic claim (such as the hundred years war) or an independent nation is considered dejure part of your nation (aka you have a valid claim) expanding in catholic land should result in a lot of antagonism and really piss off the pope. This antagonism/relations penalty could perhaps be mitigated if you are the papal controller (giving you a good reason to try and wrestle control over the papacy, as you could get the pope to justify your wars).

 

[Atromb]

is there any way to try and prop up the Wittelsbach rule of Brandenburg as a forign tag besides never loosing the emperorship? It seems to me like any game as Bavaria or the Palatinate should have locking down Brandenburg as a major priority to assure dynastic presence within the empire.

Yes, specially as bavaria, since you should get a PU over brandenburg after a generation if you don't lose it, so it seems rather relevant to be able to try to keep it.

 

[Dongerino]

I'm not even talking about the smaller grey text. The main text reads as if control of Brandenburg was a deciding factor in the Order founding Prussia when in reality the first Duke of Prussia and the Margrave of Brandenburg were just brothers.

In theory, any Grandmaster who controls Prussia should be able to become Duke of Prussia by submitting to Poland (or even Lithuania) and becoming Protestant.

Ah, my bad. Yeah, you have a point.

Would submission really matter? The Teutons continued as Teutons for some 50 years after their subjugation by Poland. It caused a bunch of issues though because they were also nominally HRE vassals. They were actually advised to convert to Lutheranism and secularise the Order State into the Duchy of Prussia by Luther himself. So yeah, any Grandmaster could do that.

 

[Friedrich von Deutschland]

Yes, specially as bavaria, since you should get a PU over brandenburg after a generation if you don't lose it, so it seems rather relevant to be able to try to keep it.

Was it said you could get a PU on Brandenburg? I know there’s an event for the Palatinate or Bavarian branches to form a PU should one go extinct, but I wasn’t aware of similar content for Brandenburg.