Short version:
I feel the Sultanate ideas serve their purpose of making the Sultanates stable despite being ruled by a minority.
No Sultanate fell to religious unrest in the period covered by the game (the Marathas certainly expanded far and wide but after achieving independence they did so through conventional military means, not mass revolts). The Sultanates also made very little effort to convert the Hindu population historically (and with the exception of Bengal such conversions did not really take place on the scale the game shows).
If the Tolerance is removed both will become untrue. The Sultanates will attempt to convert their populations right away and those that fail will quickly fall to religious rebels (this was after all how this region used to play out in EU3).
Longer version:
The Sultanates certainly did vary a lot in how they treated their Hindu subjects but they all had to live with the fact that the Muslim population was outnumbered drastically compared to Hindus and India's other religions and they all did so without fragmenting (perhaps with the exception of Malwa). Most had to run their states in pretty unorthodox ways to accomplish this. Some incorporated Hindus and Hindu customs to a pretty big degree such as the Deccan Sultanates like Bijapur or Golconda not to mention the Mughal Empire itself.
In the game this means an increase of tolerance to the base negative one. With a negative tolerance you'd have religious rebels popping up regularly and hundreds of years of Muslim rule would in many areas be rolled back during the first 20 years. This is why this aspect of their idea set is necessary.
It should also be taken into account that most of these Sultanates did experience very harsh and sometimes successful revolts in this turbulent time in history. Almost all of these revolts came from groups that did not dislodge the Muslim states but instead replaced them with new ones. This is therefore what should be the most common outcome in the game as well. Separatists should be the most common rebel in India (and separatists *will* create states that are Hindu in many cases), not religious zealots that try to convert the state itself.
The current situation does make the first 200 years play out a lot more realistically than without the tolerance. Muslim hegemony tends to be a lot more total and lasting than in real life however mainly due to two things:
1. The Sultanates don't fight each other enough. Historically they did not gang up on the Hindus. Instead as they where generally the bigger powers in their areas they spent most of their time fighting each-other, often with Hindu allies on both sides. There where also cases of Muslim states with Hindu overlords in the south. In the game the states in this region ally according to religion lines to a greater degree than they did historically. Vijayanagar historically had no problem allying itself with Muslim states for instance, something that's not really common in the game.
2. I certainly do agree that would be good to better model the rise of the Marathas. The events we have date back to the pre AoW era when India wasn't very developed in level of detail. The game has the means to do this in the forms of the map and tags, adding more here is something that I'd love to do at some point.
Ultimately the Marathas should be able to rise in a situation where India is dominated by Sultanates as that's what they did historically. Back in the 17th century when their polity was young India was almost entirely dominated by the Mughal Empire and the remaining Deccan Sultanates.
When it comes to the internal balance of these states the new Dhimmi estate in Cossacks really makes it possible for the Indian Sultanates to be more diversified. The Estate will allow Sultanates to decide to what extent they want to make the non-Muslim population part of the running of their state. If the Dhimmi (ie Hindus) end up with very high influence they will be splitting off from the Sultanate and forming new states.
Keeping them loyal will also will also mean reacting to various events where the non-Muslims ask for rights such as the abolishment of discriminatory taxes, the right to hold certain offices, protection against power misuse, etc.
The Dhimmi estate is much more powerful in states where the Muslims are in minority and will expect to be granted lands, etc just like the Muslim Amirs would for instance. This is a rule that was added with India and to some extent South East Asia specifically in mind (in states where the Dhimmi is not in majority they will not expect to be granted lands).
Last of all one thing needs to be clear and will thus be repeated:
It is not the view of anyone here that religious oppression did not happen in India in this era. Temple destruction was of course inexcusable. Hindus and other non-Muslims where also discriminated against through a variety of laws and taxes specifically aimed at them and we're not pretending otherwise. Much of this is actually referenced in the in game flavor events for these countries as it is.
However if you play Orissa and fight the Bengal or Jaunpur sultanates you should not be helped by a massive uprising of thousands of angry co-religionists, those wars where fought historically by Kapilendra and something like that never happened. The tolerance boosts are not meant to signify that everything was rosy and harmonious either they just try to make the game play challenges faces more akin to those historically present.
I feel the Sultanate ideas serve their purpose of making the Sultanates stable despite being ruled by a minority.
No Sultanate fell to religious unrest in the period covered by the game (the Marathas certainly expanded far and wide but after achieving independence they did so through conventional military means, not mass revolts). The Sultanates also made very little effort to convert the Hindu population historically (and with the exception of Bengal such conversions did not really take place on the scale the game shows).
If the Tolerance is removed both will become untrue. The Sultanates will attempt to convert their populations right away and those that fail will quickly fall to religious rebels (this was after all how this region used to play out in EU3).
Longer version:
The Sultanates certainly did vary a lot in how they treated their Hindu subjects but they all had to live with the fact that the Muslim population was outnumbered drastically compared to Hindus and India's other religions and they all did so without fragmenting (perhaps with the exception of Malwa). Most had to run their states in pretty unorthodox ways to accomplish this. Some incorporated Hindus and Hindu customs to a pretty big degree such as the Deccan Sultanates like Bijapur or Golconda not to mention the Mughal Empire itself.
In the game this means an increase of tolerance to the base negative one. With a negative tolerance you'd have religious rebels popping up regularly and hundreds of years of Muslim rule would in many areas be rolled back during the first 20 years. This is why this aspect of their idea set is necessary.
It should also be taken into account that most of these Sultanates did experience very harsh and sometimes successful revolts in this turbulent time in history. Almost all of these revolts came from groups that did not dislodge the Muslim states but instead replaced them with new ones. This is therefore what should be the most common outcome in the game as well. Separatists should be the most common rebel in India (and separatists *will* create states that are Hindu in many cases), not religious zealots that try to convert the state itself.
The current situation does make the first 200 years play out a lot more realistically than without the tolerance. Muslim hegemony tends to be a lot more total and lasting than in real life however mainly due to two things:
1. The Sultanates don't fight each other enough. Historically they did not gang up on the Hindus. Instead as they where generally the bigger powers in their areas they spent most of their time fighting each-other, often with Hindu allies on both sides. There where also cases of Muslim states with Hindu overlords in the south. In the game the states in this region ally according to religion lines to a greater degree than they did historically. Vijayanagar historically had no problem allying itself with Muslim states for instance, something that's not really common in the game.
2. I certainly do agree that would be good to better model the rise of the Marathas. The events we have date back to the pre AoW era when India wasn't very developed in level of detail. The game has the means to do this in the forms of the map and tags, adding more here is something that I'd love to do at some point.
Ultimately the Marathas should be able to rise in a situation where India is dominated by Sultanates as that's what they did historically. Back in the 17th century when their polity was young India was almost entirely dominated by the Mughal Empire and the remaining Deccan Sultanates.
When it comes to the internal balance of these states the new Dhimmi estate in Cossacks really makes it possible for the Indian Sultanates to be more diversified. The Estate will allow Sultanates to decide to what extent they want to make the non-Muslim population part of the running of their state. If the Dhimmi (ie Hindus) end up with very high influence they will be splitting off from the Sultanate and forming new states.
Keeping them loyal will also will also mean reacting to various events where the non-Muslims ask for rights such as the abolishment of discriminatory taxes, the right to hold certain offices, protection against power misuse, etc.
The Dhimmi estate is much more powerful in states where the Muslims are in minority and will expect to be granted lands, etc just like the Muslim Amirs would for instance. This is a rule that was added with India and to some extent South East Asia specifically in mind (in states where the Dhimmi is not in majority they will not expect to be granted lands).
Last of all one thing needs to be clear and will thus be repeated:
It is not the view of anyone here that religious oppression did not happen in India in this era. Temple destruction was of course inexcusable. Hindus and other non-Muslims where also discriminated against through a variety of laws and taxes specifically aimed at them and we're not pretending otherwise. Much of this is actually referenced in the in game flavor events for these countries as it is.
However if you play Orissa and fight the Bengal or Jaunpur sultanates you should not be helped by a massive uprising of thousands of angry co-religionists, those wars where fought historically by Kapilendra and something like that never happened. The tolerance boosts are not meant to signify that everything was rosy and harmonious either they just try to make the game play challenges faces more akin to those historically present.
Last edited:
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