Brainstorming Societal Values

[lukesilveira]

I agree with you in general; there's a reason why I interpreted "institutions" at the level of mechanical implication rather than what they were called. However, I think when it comes to societal values that it pays better dividends to do the opposite.

Why? Otherwise the system seems incredibly shallow. If societal values are little more than "country attributes", then those are just tertiary effects on top of existing policies and reforms. Why not just bake those into the policies and reforms themselves? As far as I can tell the devs seem to intend them to be "icing on the cake" for whatever strategy you're pursuing (rather than something you pursue for its own sake), but I don't think there's necessarily a need for that to be the case. That and the values themselves seem conflicted on what they actually want to be: are they genuinely reflecting societal values (like things like traditionalist and innovative would suggest) or are they reflecting a "country's attributes" (like what offensive and defensive would suggest)? I don't know, and the game doesn't seem to know, either.

We already have plenty of systems for providing bonuses to better reflect the direction of a state through advancements, policies, and reforms. To take societal values as the "country attributes" that they seem so inclined to be is to make them superfluous and better discarded. I'd rather do something far more interesting with them.

So, if we attach these "societal values" to every culture and then have them move in the direction of the states that rule over them (with much the same direction and magnitude as acculturation would work; note that acculturation still makes sense in this context because the measure of proximity is not merely that of values and there's plenty of excuses to drive wedges between people who value the same things), there becomes something interesting. Not only do you get consequences to ruling a foreign people who have entirely different perspectives on the sort of state they want to live in, but now content drawing from societal values can draw both from culture and from country.

That and now it'd be possible to actually attach modifiers to cultures in a coherent way (since the devs long confirmed that this is possible though not presently used), based on the societal values of the people. You can now actually model things like the broad "militarization" of society under the Ilkhanate that persisted after its collapse and ultimately aided Timur in his own conquests. I believe India had something similar going on.

Societal values are far more valuable if they persist than if they don't.

I completely agree. This would be far more interesting, but it's totally different from what we've seen so far. I suspect societal values will end up as shallow, redundant modifiers driven solely by the country after initial culture/tag bonuses - basically PC version of stacking modifiers in other pdx titles.

If so, I won't enjoy it as much, though it could represent historical temporary advantages certain countries had. It won't truly be "societal values" but something else entirely (I don't have a name suggestion). I'll still deeply dislike the artificial dichotomy in most societal values, and a decaying modifier would make perfect sense to represent the constant need to maintain direction and the edge needed to be apart from other countries, though.

Moving on, I've been wondering: if societal values become culture-based as we hope, how would multi-cultural countries work? What would be the player advantages and disadvantages? A weighted national average? Regional bonuses? Perhaps tie it to population, so soldiers from culture X get attack bonuses while those from culture Y get defense bonuses?

For example, if a country with offensive, naval-focused culture X annexes a country with defensive, land-focused culture Y, how would this be represented?

What about minorities and their societal values?

Could cultures diverge in regions with strongly opposed societal value influences?

(Not rhetorical questions, I'm truly curious to see wgat you think)

 

[Praetorian44]

However, looking at the actual mechanics, it's clear that societal values are almost exclusively state-driven (despite some cultures having minor fixed bonuses to either side of a societal value) with minimal foreign influence (apart from the built-in cultural modifiers mentioned earlier). I say this because changes in societal values primarily happen in response to country actions, whether through laws or other deliberate policies. In this case, I see it less as true "societal values" and more as how the State has structured itself and how it interacts with its population and civil institutions. Under this interpretation, recently conquered territories shouldn't matter much, except perhaps through some temporary modifier to represent the changes from the ways of the previous country to the new one.

Tldr, I'd prefer that societal values actually represented societal values, but imho, the game is modeling something entirely different that is mainly driven by the state/country/tag. For the sake of consistency, it should be treated as whatever that something else actually is.

That's what I was thinking as well, "societal" values seem more like "state" or "government" values mechanically. Thus for modding purposes, which does seem to be the primary concern of @Ispil post, I've been trying to decide if I should stick with this and get rid of any values don't fit with a state based model, as well as add some new ones that do, or instead make the entire mechanic actually based on the values of the society and its culture (thus no longer so state-driven). Doing this would also require the removal of values that seem too state based.

 

[Ispil]

Yeah, I think at the end of the day it'll ultimately depend on the implementation. If all of this is derived in script with nothing hardcoded at all, then I can do with them whatever I may. If they're actually some level of hardcoded, then I'll be forced to embrace the "state attribute" direction.

 

[Ispil]

Moving on, I've been wondering: if societal values become culture-based as we hope, how would multi-cultural countries work? What would be the player advantages and disadvantages? A weighted national average? Regional bonuses? Perhaps tie it to population, so soldiers from culture X get attack bonuses while those from culture Y get defense bonuses?

For example, if a country with offensive, naval-focused culture X annexes a country with defensive, land-focused culture Y, how would this be represented?

What about minorities and their societal values?

Could cultures diverge in regions with strongly opposed societal value influences?

(Not rhetorical questions, I'm truly curious to see wgat you think)

Spent some time thinking on this.

My approach would be that each culture has its own set of values, and that a country's values are the weighted average of the values of its constituent people, weighted both in number and in acceptance. That value is what would be used for country-wide value effects.

However, countries also have a series of "direction" values, based on policies and government reforms. These are instant with the change of a law or reform, but the only mechanical implication is that the difference between the direction of a country's values and the values of a culture it rules over will manifest as separatism, scaling in magnitude both on difference and on literacy.

"Direction" also works much like acculturation, in that the constituent cultures of a state will have their values move in the direction of the state based on the ratio of that culture living in that state versus total and the acceptance level of those cultures. Acculturation and values are handled distinctly; as I said before, shared values do not mean shared identity! Additionally, should a culture be pulled "in two different directions", it will ultimately split; this also mirrors acculturation in that the amount of desired change versus the amount of actual change is tallied up and when the tension becomes too great, the culture snaps in two. This is mostly overlapping greatly with acculturation but accounts for circumstances of two different states with the same primary culture but vastly different directions.

Notably, taking negative actions towards some population that you rule will also drive their cultural values away from that of the state's direction. This can also cleave through subject relationships; taking negative action towards the population of a subject as that subject's overlord will push that population in the opposite direction of the direction of their overlord. As you might imagine, doing too much of that ties into the above and can risk splintering off the culture of a subject into a culture all their own. That, to me, seems the best way to capture the emergence of "colonial culture" in more indirectly-ruled colonies.

I didn't mention it too much in the acculturation thread, but the presence of institutions can also change the values of the cultures of the pops that live there. Nationalism in particular will add a natural "acculturation to itself" that will drive similar cultures apart. Other institutions might instead cause some level of broader liberalization which will, of course, weigh against your own state direction since it will cause unrest to have your core population suddenly finding themselves disagreeing with the direction of the state.

 

[Linbot#6018]

Something I've wanted for a while in these games is a mechanic that's sort of like a hybrid of technology and societal values, innovations that unlock specific mechanics and which you can acquire progress toward by adopting it from other countries.

 

[Ispil]

Still reading through it right now, but Religious Practices and Collective Perceptions: Hidden Homologies in the Renaissance and Reformation might potentially suggest an interesting societal value related to religiosity that might pose some relevance for the Reformation:

 

[Zerodv]

Still reading through it right now, but Religious Practices and Collective Perceptions: Hidden Homologies in the Renaissance and Reformation might potentially suggest an interesting societal value related to religiosity that might pose some relevance for the Reformation:

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The first half of this page sounds really forced to me, there doesn't seem to be any real evidence that Christianity spread in France slower than in the rest of Germany, in fact the Christianization of the Southern Germans was arguably as slow as France which itself seem to have been completed by 600 CE.

There is also plenty of evidence of very blatant syncretism, the Heliand is basically a Saxonized retelling of the new testament and it's not something that the supposedly slowly and peacefully converted Gallo-Romans had afaik.

 

[Ispil]

The first half of this page sounds really forced to me, there doesn't seem to be any real evidence that Christianity spread in France slower than in the rest of Germany, in fact the Christianization of the Southern Germans was arguably as slow as France which itself seem to have been completed by 600 CE.

There is also plenty of evidence of very blatant syncretism, the Heliand is basically a Saxonized retelling of the new testament and it's not something that the supposedly slowly and peacefully converted Gallo-Romans had afaik.

The first part isn't really about the rate of conversion as it is the extent that France in particular so readily converted to the "cult of saints" in ways that Germany never did, which has more to do with Arianism than it does the actual pace of conversion. Plus Rome literally sending relics of martyrs to France to encourage things, in ways that never really took off in Germany at this point (again more to do with the fundamentals of Arianism and the like).

 

[Zerodv]

The first part isn't really about the rate of conversion as it is the extent that France in particular so readily converted to the "cult of saints" in ways that Germany never did, which has more to do with Arianism than it does the actual pace of conversion. Plus Rome literally sending relics of martyrs to France to encourage things, in ways that never really took off in Germany at this point (again more to do with the fundamentals of Arianism and the like).

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A bit skeptical of how strongly you can connect the pre-Carolingian Christianization of France and Franks to how the French state shaped and was shaped by religion a full 6 centuries afterwards, who is to say that a politically united Germany or a Germany that faced the same issues as France did instead of conflict against the pope in Italy wouldn't have had a similar character?

It also feels the 2 pages contradict themselves, on one hand it claims that in France espeicially there a collective perception of civilization and religious unity when Germany didn't, but then it says that Carolongian Saxon campaigns instilled a "quasi-crusading" flavour to German eastward expansion... so which is it?

 

[Ispil]

A bit skeptical of how strongly you can connect the pre-Carolingian Christianization of France and Franks to how the French state shaped and was shaped by religion a full 6 centuries afterwards, who is to say that a politically united Germany or a Germany that faced the same issues as France did instead of conflict against the pope in Italy wouldn't have had a similar character?

It also feels the 2 pages contradict themselves, on one hand it claims that in France espeicially there a collective perception of civilization and religious unity when Germany didn't, but then it says that Carolongian Saxon campaigns instilled a "quasi-crusading" flavour to German eastward expansion... so which is it?

If you prefer I could just send you the book rather than snippets, since I'm only still reading it myself at the moment.

 

[Zerodv]

If you prefer I could just send you the book rather than snippets, since I'm only still reading it myself at the moment.

What's the title?

 

[Ispil]

What's the title?

Religious Practices and Collective Perceptions: Hidden Homologies in the Renaissance and Reformation

 

[Ispil]

Alright, conclusions from the book:

• Bellicose vs. Pacific
• Moral Community vs. Private Devotion
• Veneration of the dead vs. Memory of the dead

The first one is fairly simple; with a more bellicose population you're gonna be egged on more to do more wars while a more pacific population will be reluctant to do so. Additionally, particularly bellicose populations might instigate religious violence within your borders.

Second one has to do with the extent that there's a broader notion of "shared religious experience" within a people versus whether religious practice is more of a private experience. Third one is perhaps a bit more nitty-gritty but has to do as a broader notion of "relic veneration". This matters a lot for the Reformation, both in terms of where it happens (the places that went Protestant generally had no issue repudiating relic veneration because they lacked much in the way of a tradition of venerating their dead in the first place) and the internal divisions among it (places that went Lutheran had much more of a tradition of private devotion versus those that went Calvinist having a bit more of a moral community).

The bellicose vs. pacific bit also has some... rather ugly relevance to the Reformation as well. In Bavaria, there was a considerable amount of progroms against the local Jewish population (starting in 1336, even before the Black Death) that, following each instance, led to the building of a shrine at the site of the massacre. This ended up over time reinforcing a notion of relic worship in Bavaria that hadn't existed there before (as a consequence of these shrines heavily reinforcing the notion of the Eucharist as a relic), which is ultimately what led to it remaining Catholic through the Reformation.

So yeah, aside from differences in political fragmentation (which ultimately led to a lot of differences in who oversaw the chantries; where there was much fragmentation, chantries were administered locally rather than by the Church with state supervision as they were in, say, France), you also have different characteristics of the people in those locations as built up both before (France had a strong moral community as a consequence of the "Peace of God" movement as well as the Crusades effectively "nationalizing" their faith; Germany did not have this particularly as a consequence of both Crusades being directed against it and the lack of veneration of the dead in the first place) and after (the aforementioned bit involving Bavaria and other parts of southern Germany) the start date ultimately deciding the actual contours of the Reformation. As an aside, there were some efforts made to "nationalize" faith in the Empire following the Habsburg inheritance of Burgundy, which carried with it a tradition of treating benefices as part and parcel with hereditary titles; this "confounding of prince and prelate" led to more of a "holy" ethos to the Holy Roman Empire. One of those things that also led the Emperor to ultimately stick with the Catholic faith; after all, the Pope had only but recently encouraged the French to ally with the Turks against them!

I think I also managed to make the values neutral enough that they can still be ascribed broadly to people across the world regardless of faith.

There's also an extent of whether "veneration of the dead" has also managed to be transposed into veneration of the state, but I don't quite know where to put that. The Divine Right of Kings was also finding its footing in this period, particularly in France; by the time of the Reformation relics of the monarchy were treated as equivalent as relics of the Church.

Maybe another value for the proximity of faith and state? Another thing heavily involved in Reformation stuff, but definitely exists outside of the Christian world as well.

As for the setup, at least in Europe... you're gonna have southern Germany be more bellicose (magisterial nobility went off to fight in the Second Crusade and beyond and carried back with them a lot of that same ethos), Germany as a whole being very much not the veneration of the dead types, and northern Germany and the lower Rhine being more private devotion (and moving more towards that with beguines and the like); the rest of Southern Germany is more in the middle. France will be much more moral community, as is England and Italy (though Italy struggles a bit on this front due to the lack of a polity which to attach any notion of "nationalized" faith; the idea doesn't really work without that dynastic succession). England's "nationalized faith" differs a bit from France's insomuch that for England there isn't really an attachment of penitent obligations to the state as there is with France, but I don't really know a good way of capturing that. Maybe just higher values. Main relevance is that it is what makes England so easily be able to declare that it is dissolving the monasteries.

 

[lukesilveira]

Hmm... How tied you think those religious perceptions should be to societal values, instead of religious specific mechanics?

Or the mechanics for religions should be a bit more generic and then be better delineated by societal values?

(Thinking about it now, specific denominations being a major factor in societal values than originally suggested by the DDs may be in order)

 

[Ispil]

Hmm... How tied you think those religious perceptions should be to societal values, instead of religious specific mechanics?

Or thr mechanics in religions should be a bit more generic and then be better delineated by societal values?

(Thinking about it now, specific denominations being a major factor in societal values than originally suggested by the DDs may b in order)

While specific denominations were borne out of principles related to their specific societal values (both Lutheranism and Calvinism reject the veneration of relics, for instance), I wouldn't want to wed these things too closely to religion as a whole. After all, the reason why Germany didn't have much veneration of their dead was because their pre-Christian traditions also didn't have much veneration of the dead of that sort (grave gifts in pre-Christian Germany generally indicated that they perceived the dead "going off elsewhere" rather than continuing to have relevance to those yet living). These things generally move along cultural rather than religious lines, though there is oftentimes a strong religious component.

For my intents, just as the land-owning country has some sway over the societal values of their people, so does the respective diocese (though not necessarily over the same set of societal values). So those doctrines which otherwise seem to impart little more than inconsequential modifiers for a state, would instead have far more significant consequences for the societal values of its people. However, I'd still want the direction for influencing societal values to be top-down, to preserve interesting gameplay (even if it might not necessarily be through you directly but instead your ecclesiastical apparatus in your state). Not that there wouldn't be some more bottom-up influencers (namely institutions), but generally I want the player to at least have some levers for which to shift the trajectories of their destiny.

 

[lukesilveira]

Very interesting. Maybe countries that share cultures could start with the same preset values for these societal values. Then, these societal values could have a certain stiffness. While individual nations could shift these values over time, the changes would be very gradual. You might even set upper and lower bounds on how much they can change vased on culture/denomination.

This way you'd maintain a top-down government control system that still respects cultural context, without making everything too dependent on religious factors alone.

 

[Ispil]

Now, if you want a more specific religious angle attached to all that... states that pushed towards the "nationalization" of their faith generally did so by effectively putting Mary on the throne. Consequently, theirs was a state that relied heavily on the notion of Immaculate Conception to justify their approach. This is in contrast to the Maculate Conception camp.

Notably, this also cuts along mendicant order lines; Dominicans are in the Maculate Conception camp while Franciscans are in the Immaculate Conception camp. Dominicans, to no coincidence, primarily had their monasteries in northern Germany; Franciscans meanwhile held theirs in southern Germany and in France. Notably the reason why things cut along these lines is that the Dominicans also started, across northern Germany, the Confraternity of the Rosary. The issue was that, given that those in said confraternity merely had to offer prayers to Mary for access to the indulgences granted to the entire confraternity, that they were concerned that in doing so they risked elevating Mary to effectively a fourth member of the Trinity. Hence the debate.

A debate that, generally speaking, was raged primarily in Germany for this reason.

 

[Ispil]

Very interesting. Maybe countries that share cultures could start with the same preset values for these societal values. Then, these societal values could have a certain stiffness. While individual nations could shift these values over time, the changes would be very gradual. You might even set upper and lower bounds on how much they can change vased on culture/denomination.

This way you'd maintain a top-down government control system that still respects cultural context, without making everything too dependent on religious factors alone.

The way that societal values would work on a country level is that your total societal value is a composition of all your respective cultures, weighed by percentage of the population and acceptance. In turn, the way that you sway the values of the culture is through a separate "value direction", which moves the values of your constituent cultures again based on acceptance and how much of that culture is within your own state.

The primary consequence of having a direction that significantly differs from the societal value of the people in your country is that it adds separatism/dissatisfaction/whatever lever I need to pull to make them unhappy. So, you can sway your people, but doing too much at once is going to do far better with instigating a rebellion. It also means conquering a foreign culture with values significantly different from your own will no doubt lead to inevitable insurrections.

 

[lukesilveira]

Now, if you want a more specific religious angle attached to all that... states that pushed towards the "nationalization" of their faith generally did so by effectively putting Mary on the throne. Consequently, theirs was a state that relied heavily on the notion of Immaculate Conception to justify their approach. This is in contrast to the Maculate Conception camp.

Notably, this also cuts along mendicant order lines; Dominicans are in the Maculate Conception camp while Franciscans are in the Immaculate Conception camp. Dominicans, to no coincidence, primarily had their monasteries in northern Germany; Franciscans meanwhile held theirs in southern Germany and in France. Notably the reason why things cut along these lines is that the Dominicans also started, across northern Germany, the Confraternity of the Rosary. The issue was that, given that those in said confraternity merely had to offer prayers to Mary for access to the indulgences granted to the entire confraternity, that they were concerned that in doing so they risked elevating Mary to effectively a fourth member of the Trinity. Hence the debate.

A debate that, generally speaking, was raged primarily in Germany for this reason.

What about specific religious orders (plus state actions) influencing those religious societal values? Then you could tie major decisions like changing state religion or even starting the Reformation itself or picking specific Protestant tenets to a certain combination of those societal values.

 

[Ispil]

What about specific religious orders (plus state actions) influencing those religious societal values? Then you could tie major decisions like changing state religion or even starting the Reformation itself or picking specific Protestant tenets to a certain combination of those societal values.

Oh don't worry I've got plans for that, too. Specific religious orders, individual dioceses; the works.