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Tinto Flavour #23 - 30th of May 2025

Hello, and welcome one more Friday to Tinto Flavour, the happy days in which we take a look at the flavour content of Europa Universalis V!

Today, a day after an infamous anniversary, we will be taking a look at the Byzantine Empire - or Eastern Roman Empire, as you’re free to pick the custom name you prefer for it, as it’s a game rule that you can set before starting the game:
Game Rule Byzantium.png

Game Rule Eastern Roman Empire.png

Let’s now start with the content itself:

Once a proud Empire that stretched from Egypt and the Levant to Iberia and Italy, Byzantium now faces a decadent period that began almost three centuries ago. During his reign, Emperor Andronikos II Palaiologos saw fit to dissolve several key institutions, such as the Navy, in an attempt to save the dying economy of the country, while the Theme System continued to be a shadow of what it was, as the Empire lost territory across all fronts.

His successor, Emperor Andronikos III Palaiologos, is now faced with the difficult task of safeguarding what remains of our once-glorious Empire. To our east, the Ottomans have started amassing a large army to wipe out our remaining holdings in Anatolia, threatening to set foot across the straits. At the same time, King Stefan Uroš IV Dušan Nemanjić eyes Thessaloníki and Northern Epirus like a vulture. Meanwhile, our treasury runs dry of precious coin, and the country may yet be thrown into a perilous civil war, as the family of our Emperor conspires with the Dynatoí behind closed doors.
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Country Selection.png

Country Tooltip.png

As usual, please consider all UI, 2D and 3D art WIP.

Byzantium1.png

Eastern Roman Empire1.png

As I don’t want to spark yet another Byzantine discussion, and its subsequent civil war, here you have a couple of map screenshots, with a different country name option each!​

Byzantium (which is the name that I will use from now on, as being the most commonly used by the community) starts with a bunch of reforms and privileges:
Estates.png

Most of the Estate Privileges are generic ones, but there’s a unique one for each estate. We will show them in a later section of the TF, as they’re related to the Byzantine Succession Crisis, a disaster that may happen to Byzantium early on.

Regarding the starting reforms, the first is a generic one, while the other two are unique ones:
Reform Autocracy.png

Reform Theme System.png

Building Thema Headquarters.png

Reform Kritai Katholikon.png

Byzantium starts with a ‘State Patriarchy’ policy, as shown last Wednesday:
Policy State Patriarchy.png

And some other unique policies:
Policy Pronoia System.png

Policy Byzantine Law.png

It also has quite a bunch of starting works of art:
Works of Art1.png

Works of Art2.png

The Theodosian Walls are also represented through a unique building:
Building Theodosian Walls.png

Byzantium also has a bunch of advances; we are going to focus on the early-game, historical ones, as they also unlock some Byzantine unique units:
Advance Heart of Orthodoxy.png

Advance Late Cataphracts.png

Unit Byzantine Cataphracts.png

Advance Akritai.png

Unit Akritai.png

Advance Shield of the West.png

Cabinet Action Extensive Conscription.png

Advance Poikilia.png

Advance Expand Varangian Guard.png

Unit Varangians.png

Advance City Taker.png

Unit Modernized Helepolis.png

Let’s now move on to the narrative content for Byzantium. As I mentioned previously, a Succession Crisis is latent in the country, and that would historically lead to the Byzantine Civil War of 1341-1347, which allowed King Stefan Dusan of Serbia to occupy Macedonia and proclaim himself emperor, the Bulgarians to recover some borderlands, and seriously debilitated the country, making it easier for the Ottomans to gain a foothold across the Sea of Marmara, from Gallipoli.

We’re portraying this latent crisis and the general state of decay of the country by some starting privileges, plus some starting inflation, low funds and stability, etc.:
Privilege Corruption Nobility.png

Privilege Corruption Burghers.png

Privilege Corruption Clergy.png

Privilege Corruption Commoners.png

This situation will also spawn in your neighborhood a couple of months after the game starts, although we will talk more in detail about it next Friday:
The Turkish Threat.png

And it’s very likely that this disaster may end up triggering early after the start of the game, if you are not careful enough:
Succession Crisis.png

Succession Crisis2.png

Succession Crisis3.png

It is something we internally call Semi-Generic Disaster. This means that while it uses the texts, panel, etc. of the generic ‘Succession Crisis’ disaster, some countries have unique triggers, events, and content attached to it, so the player can experience similar, but different crisis. The Byzantine Succession Crisis is one of those, therefore.

Independent of whether the player succeeds or not in defeating the Succession Crisis, and not weakening much in the process, Byzantium has a bunch of Dynamic Historical Events:
Event Hesychasm.png


Event Decline Palaiologos Renaissance.png


Event Reforming Kritai Katholikon.png

Reform Reformed Kratoi Katholikon.png


Event Acritic Songs.png


Event Song of Armouris.png


Event Kosntantinos Armenopoulos.png


Event Center of Learning.png


Event Gemistos Plethon.png

Event Gemistos Plethon2.png

Byzantium also has some alt-historical events, one of the few exceptions we make in the game, to include some plausible content in case that Byzantium avoid its decadence…

… However you will have to find it by playing the game when we release it, as that’s all for today! As today is Friday, this will be the schedule for next week:
  • Monday -> Tinto Maps Feedback about the Steppes
  • Tuesday -> Tinto Flavour about the Golden Horde
  • Wednesday -> Tinto Talks about Islam
  • Thursday -> Fourth ‘Behind the Scenes’ video!
  • Friday -> Tinto Flavour about the Ottomans and the Rise of the Turks situation!
And also remember, you can wishlist Europa Universalis V now! Cheers!
 
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Love me some Byz flavor!

Nothing against the Palaiologos family line but for whatever reason I enjoy seeing the Komnenos Restoration. By the looks of it, Trebizond tied to Byzantium (unsure on the color schemes of V but its clearly not a vassalage) Dare i hope against hope that there would be some flavor of the Komnenos family coming into power somehow?
 
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Pavía said:
Not a bad idea, we'll consider attaching it to the 'Decline of Empire' disaster somehow.
Click to expand...

I'd also love to see estates be able to enforce these corruption privileges if they become too powerful and/or some other criteria just via normal game mechanics. At least in my mind, societal corruption leads to the disaster, not the other way around.
 
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Palfouri said:
But if your justification for changing it is "that's what they called themselves", then 3/4s of the tags in the game are going to be unrecognizable to the average player.
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This exact argument happened in the previous Byzantine name thread, people could stay here for weeks upon weeks pointing out how this entire debate is silly and the "Basileia ton Romaion" crowd wouldn't care. They'll keep trying to "defend" the honor of a dead empire for god knows how long
 
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Pavía said:
We have an instance in which a woman character can be considered legally a male character, and thus, it can be applied to it the same rules. It's currently only used in the Hungarian content, but it's something that we can potentially expand to any other cases if needed.
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Could someone tell me to what Hungarian custom/law this refers?

I hope it's not about Mary, who - like Jadwiga - was crowned as the ruler (king), not wife of the ruler (queen), but wasn't "legally male".
 
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Why is it “Eastern Roman?” That’s even more of an example of anachronistic pop history than just calling it Byzantium… “eastern Rome” as a concept ceased to exist in 476.

Making the alternate name be “Empire of the Greeks” is unironically more immersive and fits the time period better
 
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Palfouri said:
I'm pretty sure people are arguing about "the need to use that name in game" and not about which name is more historically appropriate. But if your justification for changing it is "that's what they called themselves", then 3/4s of the tags in the game are going to be unrecognizable to the average player.
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That's strange, because since that topic was brought here a year ago that's exactly what people argue - that "Byzantine Empire" is ahistorical and there are better, historical alternatives out there. "Eastern Roman Empire" is a most welcome upgrade, but it's also ahistorical at the EUV start date.

Going back to the Lutetian Kingdom:

It's like having "Lutetian Kingdom" as default name in the game. A bit disappointing, right? You've heard it's a cool game rooted in history, you love history and so on, but then you see this. "Lutetian Kingdom". Ok, there's a game rule which changes it, but it changes it from "Lutetian Kingdom" to "West Francia". Well, that's an upgrade, but I'm sure a lot of people would just look at it and think "that's cool, but why not just call it... you know... "France"? What's with the "Lutetian Kingdom" and "West Francia" in the first place, why they avoid the "France" name so stubbornly?"


Atromb said:
Are you serious? Do you know how many Roman emperors came to power through acclamation? Roman emperorship was not determined by blood but by being accepted by the roman senate (aka papal curia). One could question the entire legitimacy of the byzantine autocracy that stablished itself already in the late empire. This is not even mentioning the obvious issue that two romans states existed at the moment of Rome's fall, the heirs of Western Rome simply tried to claim themselves to be the only true heirs, much as the eastern heirs did.
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That's cool, but how many of those Roman emperors were guys from foreign tribes, completely unrelated to Rome, "crowned" hundreds of miles away from Roman land?

Just because US presidents are elected it doesn't mean Russians can organize an "election" in their siberian village and claim they've just elected a legitimate US president among themselves just because 100 years ago Alaska was Russian, so they have a claim. It just... doesn't work that way.

It doesn't matter what pope or Charlemagne did. At all. People can sit in a circle and "crown" themselves whatever they want - king of Pluto, emperor of Lemuria, queen of Kentucky, but what does it matter and why should anyone take them seriously? They can explain it all day, try to passionately present their arguments as best as they can, cite various sources and pose as true legitimate kings, emprerors and queens, but that won't change anything in Kentucky or on Pluto.
 
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Pavía said:
We have now in this game some super cool and useful filters for things like this. For instance, if I select the Culture map mode, and then hover the Greek culture in the 'Culture' tab of the 'Society' panel, you can check that there are 3.6M Greek pops in the world, and how they're spread:
View attachment 1309586

Then, as it belongs to the 'Hellenic' culture group, you can hover it, and then in any of the cultures, like the 'Pontic' one, to check where you can find it:
View attachment 1309588

This way, the players will be able to know where it is interesting for they to expand or improve their diplomatic and cultural influence, without having to know beforehand which pops or culture is linked to another.
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I feel like the gradient for this map screen should be similar to the one used for control, the borders and stained glass effect doesn’t work well for population IMO

Also, is it colored based on percent of pops in that location with that culture (like imperator) or raw numbers of pops with that culture (like in Victoria 3)?
 
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Related to the debate about who is the "true roman empire", the only thing that matters in my mind, is that one is able to enforce their claim to be the roman empire. There is nothing "magical" that makes the HRE or ERE a more or less legitimate Roman empire, only what the rest of the world acknowledges. The Catholic world would likely acknowledge the HRE, while the orthodox world the ERE.

Although I consider the ERE the most roman state, what I think should have little impact on game mechanics. There can be more than one legitimate claimant, since who is the "real" Rome is irrelevant.
 
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Aquila SPQR said:
That's strange, because since that topic was brought here a year ago that's exactly what people argue - that "Byzantine Empire" is ahistorical and there are better, historical alternatives out there. "Eastern Roman Empire" is a most welcome upgrade, but it's also ahistorical at the EUV start date.

Going back to the Lutetian Kingdom:

It's like having "Lutetian Kingdom" as default name in the game. A bit disappointing, right? You've heard it's a cool game rooted in history, you love history and so on, but then you see this. "Lutetian Kingdom". Ok, there's a game rule which changes it, but it changes it from "Lutetian Kingdom" to "West Francia". Well, that's an upgrade, but I'm sure a lot of people would just look at it and think "that's cool, but why not just call it... you know... "France"? What's with the "Lutetian Kingdom" and "West Francia" in the first place, why they avoid the "France" name so stubbornly?"




That's cool, but how many of those Roman emperors were guys from foreign tribes, completely unrelated to Rome, "crowned" hundreds of miles away from Roman land?

Just because US presidents are elected it doesn't mean Russians can organize an "election" in their siberian village and claim they've just elected a legitimate US president among themselves just because 100 years ago Alaska was Russian, so they have a claim. It just... doesn't work that way.

It doesn't matter what pope or Charlemagne did. At all. People can sit in a circle and "crown" themselves whatever they want - king of Pluto, emperor of Lemuria, queen of Kentucky, but what does it matter and why should anyone take them seriously? They can explain it all day, try to passionately present their arguments as best as they can, cite various sources and pose as true legitimate kings, emprerors and queens, but that won't change anything in Kentucky or on Pluto.
Click to expand...
Again, feel free to feel however you like but you should stop pretending that the catholic church didn't inherit the roman administrative and bureaucratic apparatus in the western empire and then expanded them into Germany and the Baltic Coast.
 
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Lord Lambert said:
Ohhh the insults have started! How fun!
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It’s just silly to act like calling it “Byzantium” is some pseudohistorical insult when its been a word used by historians to refer to the Empire of the Greeks since the 14th century…

Having an alternate name for “Roman Empire” would be the best option IMO but that probably won’t happen because it’d overlap with the formable. Anything is better than calling it Eastern Rome though
 
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Sounds like Trebizond won't have any particular flavor but I hope there's at least a little to make me feel like I'm playing a Komnenos/Byzantine successor state, such as a unique title or access to a couple of the unique Byzantine government reforms.
 
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Aquila SPQR said:
That's strange, because since that topic was brought here a year ago that's exactly what people argue - that "Byzantine Empire" is ahistorical and there are better, historical alternatives out there. "Eastern Roman Empire" is a most welcome upgrade, but it's also ahistorical at the EUV start date.
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But that's not what I'm saying, I'm saying that Paradox uses historiographic exonyms (Egypt, Khmer Empire, Tibet, Muscovy) around the world for the sake of recognizability and so there's no reason to believe they should change it because it's "more historical". They aren't being treated uniquely here.
 
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