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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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Skash said:
I am really curious to know why you insist on this default naming. It seems like a remarkably out-of-character decision, given the team's considerable importance and effort in achieving historical accuracy. I am honestly really disappointed. This is the only tinto flavour that is just false. Please give the proper respect to the people to whom being referred to as 'Greek' would have been a great insult. The 'Empire of the Romans' is objectively the correct English translation of the name of this state.
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All games have to make compromises for recognizability but more options in the gamerule than the anachronistic eastern roman would be great... CK3 has like 5 iirc including that
 
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Just to put my two cents in on the name, the default should be 'Roman Empire' and there can be a game rule to have 'Byzantine Empire' included as an option. 'Eastern Roman Empire' is ok but there isn't a Western Roman empire at this time so it seems a bit off.
 
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Tahami Tsunami said:
Just to put my two cents in on the name, the default should be 'Roman Empire' and there can be a game rule to have 'Byzantine Empire' included as an option. 'Eastern Roman Empire' is ok but there isn't a Western Roman empire at this time so it seems a bit off.
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just as long as "empire of the greeks" is included so i can rp properly when i play in western europe
 
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RouteVenus said:
just as long as "empire of the greeks" is included so i can rp properly when i play in western europe
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I think the ideal situation in terms of historical accuracy would be that when playing a Catholic nation, the ERE would be called "Empire of the Greeks" by default, and if playing as the ERE itself or most other parts of the world it would be referred to as "Empire of the Romans" by default.
 
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Tahami Tsunami said:
Just to put my two cents in on the name, the default should be 'Roman Empire' and there can be a game rule to have 'Byzantine Empire' included as an option. 'Eastern Roman Empire' is ok but there isn't a Western Roman empire at this time so it seems a bit off.
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There is (HRE), the two Romes just don't recognise each other.
 
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3000 people are employed at the Theodisian wall, how is that? :D:D
 
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:eek::oops:o_O What HRE propagandist wrote these descriptions? First thing I will mod is name options. Roman Empire and Basileía Romaíon with historical descriptions that don't mock Roman history.
 
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I understand why but this doesn't seem like the setup for a state in terminal decline. Nothing about the disaster or standing privileges is going to stop the byz player from standing on equal footing with the countries that defined late Roman politics more than Constantinople
 
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I dont know if others adressed it but most of those works of art have known creators or suspicions of their identity...
Hagia Sophia: From the architects Anthemius of Tralles and Isidore of Miletus
Theodosian Walls: The work was carried out in two phases, with the first phase erected during Theodosius under the direction of Anthemius, the pretorian prefect of the East
Paris Psalter: Potenitally Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus

Also i would suggest some additional works of art like the 1) Strategikon of emperor Maurice (with great military bonuses but with certain condition per new ruler to use, otherwise it could be broken. For example ruler or heir would have to train in certain way to be able to use it after some years), 2) the Acathist Hymn, traditionally attributed to Romanos the Melodist (it could provide defencive bonuses to East Rome, personally i would love a nation spread buff but as this would be broken, a defencive bonus for the area of Constantinople would make far more sense), 3) The Triumphal Quadriga of the Constantinopolitan Hippodrome (i think unknown creator)(as Venice stole them and i am unaware if anything Venitian was adressed in an other Tinto talk, i would suggest that East Rome could get certain events if they siege Venice and take the statues back, leading to the reconstruction of the Hippodrone or something else). I am sure Constantinople alone has to offer a lot more works of art but the last one coming from Thessalonike would be the Arch of Galerius (commisioned by galerius himself) (again i could mention more here or other cities but there should be some limit :p)

Also i would like to see adressed in some way two things. Byzantium had two systems that helped them deal with the world. One of the was a view of the world in a matter of a family. Orthodox nations were considered brothers (without that meaning they had to be there for them, they we mostly apathetic towards them in reality), heterodox or heathen nations could potentially be friends etc. This isnt restricted to alliances or vassals. This could be represented in form of a relation modifier. As this could give an unfair bonus to good relation with certain nations you could also give a lot of minus against anybody that is a rival or has allied rivals etc. Ofcourse this is very surphase level so you could go deeper and implement more and better than this. Second would be their personal perception of the Empire as Ecumenical. The emperor and the empire were the owners of the world. Ofcourse many historians have mistakenly assumed that the Byzantines were just stupid, blinded by their refucal to see the reality of the decline of the empire. In reality said view was practical and diplomatic as many other historians has realized. Byzantines, as Romans, they were as practical as you can get. So the claim was there to give prestige and reputation among the neighboors, friends, enemies and others while they could use it as an excuse for expansion if a moment for that arose. This second idea could be an active estate privilage at start, most likely a diplo privilage rather than a military one. It could give bonuses to reputation/prestige and maybe easier time with cores, conversions etc.

As for the stupid name debate it should obviously be default Kingdom of the Romans witht he power to make it Empire of the Romans under restoring certain borders :p (even though the term Empire is a little anachronistic as we use it today so it could very well not be used at all)
 
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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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The papal curia was not the Roman Senate. It may, with emphasis on the 'may,' be a successor, but the two were not the same thing. The Western Roman senate fell in 630, when the last house was converted into a church. The Papal Curia was founded in 1089
 
RouteVenus said:
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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could I get rid of the respectfully part of "respectfully disagree"
 
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Kainser said:
And yes, that includes the state centered in Constantinople at the start of EU5 which is widely recognized in Modern English as "The Byzantine Empire". If you want this to change then I recommend you becoming a famous historian and work towards changing the historiographical consensus instead of demanding Paradox to change their naming principle in this one case.
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While i agree on the English bit, the name "Byzantium" is in no way a God damn concensus.
 
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Alyoshenka said:
@Pavía We need to remove all mentions of "Byzantion" as an area/province/location, because it's anachronistic. It should just be "Konstantinoúpoli/Konstantiniyye".
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The location is already called like that and the Area is Thrace but I assume that the problem with the province is that it can't change name dynamically so if you call it Constantinople in Turkish or Greek people are gonna get angry, as such the best option would be to use the English name for the province
 
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