Tinto Maps #3 France Feedback

[Pavía]

Hi! What's better than having Tinto Maps on a Friday? I think that getting more maps on a Thursday might do the trick.

As in previous feedback posts, here is the list of changes:

Spoiler: LIST OF CHANGES

Added the following new locations (141):

1. montreuil
2. corbie
3. breteuil
4. peronne
5. nesle
6. crepy
7. fecamp
8. louviers
9. bernay
10. laigle
11. st_sylvain
12. st_sauveur
13. belleme
14. Montmorency
15. brie_comte_robert
16. corbeil
17. villaines
18. st_sable
19. chateau_du_loir
20. le_lude
21. blain
22. beaupreau
23. passavant
24. beauvoir
25. mauleon_poitou
26. talmont
27. st_pol_de_leon
28. le_faou
29. chateaulin
30. carhaix
31. quimperle
32. hennebont
33. chatelaudren
34. monfort_sur_meu
35. fougeres
36. auneau
37. vitry_aux_loges
38. sully
39. romorantin
40. vierzon
41. st_aignan
42. chatillon_sur_indre
43. lignieres
44. boussac
45. sancoins
46. st_pierre_de_moutier
47. avallon
48. montreuillon
49. cercy
50. montcenis
51. aignay
52. arnay
53. beaune
54. auxonne
55. louhans
56. rosnay
57. villemaur
58. choiseul
59. grancey
60. montbozon
61. etain
62. fresnes
63. ligny
64. sarreguemines
65. morhange
66. vic_sur_seille
67. luneville
68. darney
69. arches
70. lichtenberg
71. benfeld
72. colmar
73. murbach
74. mulhouse
75. st_jean_dangely
76. lusignan
77. aulnay
78. charroux
79. rochefort
80. cognac
81. chabanais
82. jonzac
83. brosse
84. st_leonard
85. aixe
86. chambon
87. ussel
88. jaligny
89. montaigut
90. vichy
91. st_gerand
92. herment
93. vic_le_comte
94. allegre
95. chalancon
96. bage
97. perreux
98. villars
99. thoire
100. feurs
101. riverie
102. la_tour_du_pin
103. romans
104. privas
105. montlaur
106. la_mure
107. condorcet
108. mevouillon
109. castelnau_de_medoc
110. benauges
111. riberac
112. thiviers
113. limeuil
114. sarlat
115. belin
116. marmande
117. montflanquin
118. aire
119. orthez
120. gourdon
121. peyrusse
122. entraigues
123. verdun_sur_garonne
124. villemur
125. lautrec
126. st_affrique
127. nogaro
128. aspet
129. peyre
130. chateauneuf_de_randon
131. florac
132. st_ambroix
133. fenouillet
134. apt
135. tarascon
136. brignoles
137. barjols
138. draguignan
139. castellane
140. puget_theniers
141. bonifacio

Added the following Lakes and Impassables:

• hourtin_carcans_lake
• lagoon_of_sanguinet
• lagoon_of_bages_sigean
• lagoon_of_salses
• lagoon_of_vaccares
• lagoon_of_berre
• massif_central
• dore_mountains
• vercors_massif
• vivarais_mountains
• maritime_alps1
• cottian_alps1
• graian_alps1
• dauphine_alps1
• dauphine_alps2
• pennine_alps1

Added the following TAGs (5):

• Bearn
• Ferrette
• La Marche
• Mont de Marsan
• Perche

Reviewed:

• Vegetation and Topography
• Setup
• Pops
• Raw Goods
• Added Cathar Pops and Religion

As a note, after the review, the location density in France is more aligned with that of Iberia, while still not as high as that of the Low Countries, Germany, and Italy. As I mentioned in previous posts, this DOES NOT mean that we will be adding hundreds of new locations in each review, but that we're trying to level a map of which their first locations were added back in 2020, so we get a smooth transition between the most dense and the less dense regions.

Without further ado, maps:

Countries:

We've added a few minor countries; Béarn and Mont de Marsan are PUs of Foix, La Marche is a PU of Bourbonnais, and Perche is a PU of Alençon. Apart from that, the ruler of Ferrette/Pfirt is Joanna of Pfirt, spouse and consort of Duke Albrecht II of Austria, therefore starting on a PU with him. There are also a few meaningful changes in the shape of some countries, of which the ones for Auvergne probably are the most relevant. Oh, and also there's now a connection between the northern and southern crownlands, as per the locations of Brosse and Limoges, which makes the county of La Marche (another addition, ruled by Louis of Bourbon in PU) to be divided.

Dynasties:

Locations:

Location map with all the new locations. You might also notice the new lakes and wastelands added; the Central Masif is not any more such a complex place (although we've kept a few wastelands there), and we've improved a bit the mountain passes in the Alps, so they're now easier to understand, with less disconnected chunks, etc.

Provinces:

Lots of changes in this mapmode! We've made a great rework of it thanks to your feedback, and we think that now provinces read much more flavorful. If you would have any more naming suggestions, please let us know!

Terrain:

Regarding the topography, we've adjusted the Central Masif and the Alps, we've added some marshlands (mostly on the western coast), and some more hilly locations here and there. Regarding the vegetation, we've also read and applied your feedback; farmlands are a bit more distributed, and some regions are less forested (Britanny, Landes), while others are more forested (Auvergne). BTW, ignore the different coloring of Narbonne, it's a graphical bug that appeared while taking the screenshots.

Cultures:

Not many changes here, I just wanted to share an updated distribution of the cultures, after the new provinces were added. For this reason, there's no need to repost the religious map. Although, I'm letting you know one thing: We're adding a few Cathars to the region! However, that's not yet fully ready, as we need to gather some additional data; I'll share it with you as soon as it's fully ready.

Raw Materials:

Reviewed materials. France is no longer half-covered by Olives!

Population:

New pops! I'm not attaching the country level, as there aren't many changes (e.g. France now has 5.601M inhabitants instead of 5.646). I might also have spoiled some WIP up in the British Isles...

One more time, thanks for your feedback! We'll read your comments in this thread, and check if there are any more tweaks that we might have to do. The next region review that we will most likely share with you is Italy, as we have less feedback to implement compared to Poland and the Baltic region, and we want to make sure that we take the time we need to have a proper review of it before sharing.

See you tomorrow again, in the Tinto Maps devoted to Carpathia and the Balkans!

 

[Pavía]

It's a pity that the next feedback is not Poland and the Baltic Sea Region.

Approximately when can we expect it??? We had to wait a very long time for today's feedback, so I'm impatient.

I don't want to promise a date in advance, to be honest; as I said, we want to make sure that we have the proper time to gather and implement all the relevant feedback, as there is a lot, and we don't want to disappoint the community by rushing changes when there's no need to.

 

[Pavía]

From the pace that has been so far, it seems like feedback threads come roughly every month

It will be faster than that, or otherwise, it would take us several years to complete it. But the team is working on different pipelines, there have also been some people on vacation, etc., so the progress is not always at the same pace.

 

[Pavía]

Did you fix the Bayonne province being in Iberia? (as in it shouldn't be, it should be in France)

It now belongs to the province of Gascony, yes.

 

[Pavía]

At first glance I note a few things for Toulouse region :
- population distribution between Toulouse (49k) and Villemur (47k) locations looks weird. Maybe automatic distribution after splitting previous Toulouse location, but it should probably be much higher in Toulouse and lower in Villemur…
- Albi should have Coal rather than Lead
- I don't know if there is any sort of representation of temporary raw goods, but "Dyes" in Toulouse/Lauragués region seems to represent Pastel activity, which only lasted for a century or so (approximately from 1450 to 1560, when replaced by Indigo). The "raw good" otherwise would rather be Wheat. (I don't know how this could translate in game terms however)

My only suggestions are :

1. Switching ressources between Épernay and Vitry-en-Perthois.
2. Reviewing Reims population knowing it was way more populous than Épernay

Épernay's ressource

Épernay is the birthplace (and still the headquarter) of the main houses producing effervescent wine that is known as Champagne (Moët & Chandon in 1743, Perrier & Jouët in 1811). Dom Pérignon's Abbey is located in that location in Hautvillers who helped refine the product.

The bottom line: Épernay should be producing wine, while Vitry could be producing fruits.

Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champagne

You even have a map where today's Champagne is produced in the Champenois region : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champagne#/media/File:Vignobles_champagne.svg

Before the 18th Century, the country around Épernay was producing normal wine.

It doesn't go out as far west as Vitry-en-Perthois.

Reims vs Épernay's population

Regarding the population of Reims being lower than Épernay, the only statistics I have is from 1793, where Reims (city) was 10 times more populous than Épernay (30K vs 3k). My understanding is that Épernay was a big village throughout the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period, while Reims was a real fortified city (with around 15-20K inhabitants). You might have better historical sources that say otherwise for 1337, though. I don't know.

Just changed the resources of Albi, Épernay, and Vitry-en-Perthois. For the population, take into account that we also portray the rural population, and we portray urbanization in a different way; Toulouse is set up as a city, while Reims is a town.

 

[Pavía]

Great job!
1-Are some locations names still not fully localized right?
2-A the province names also going to be localized in some way(like Lower Poitou if the English conquer it instead of Bas-Poitou) or are they going to stay in French no matter what?
3- Can we get a map of the Areas?

1. Dynamically? Yes, that's WIP.
2. Maybe... But not in the near future, sorry.
3. Sure:

 

[Pavía]

Can we get some zoomed-in sections? France makes it difficult to read certain names ahah

Sure; let me know if after these, you still can't read any:

 

[Pavía]

When could we expect Italy? Trying to prioritize before finishing my suggestion for it or doing Balkans as the priority region for me

Maybe by the end of next week or the start of the following one, but there are some WIP Middle Eastern minorities that we need to implement first.

 

[Pavía]

For some compound feedback:

Angoulême province should be Angoumois


People from there might correct me but IIRC Haut Artois is just Artois, while Bas Artois is Cambrésis.

Montfort-sur-Meu should just be Montfort, the "sur-Meu" was added during the revolution. Some other X-sur-Y names might be in the same situation but Montfort is the only one I am certain of.

Just changed the province names, thanks. Regarding Montfort, we have two in the game (Montfort-sur-Meu, and Montfort-l'Amaury), so it's probably better to keep their names, even if they were post-revolutionary, to avoid confusion.

 

[Pavía]

Very nice seeing this! Have you considered reducing the number of different cultures by merging some langues together or would you say there is sufficient historical reason to not merge them? (e.g. Gallo merged with Angevin, Poitevin with Saintogeanais, Alpine with Provençal). Linguistically, at least, these mergers could make sense.

Yes. The one that probably is more fringe is the division between Poitevin and Saintogeanais, but any possible merge didn't feel very consistent, either (E.g.: Would you name it Poitevin, Saintogeanais, or Poitevin-Saintogeanais?).

 

[Pavía]

Are you sure about adding the Cathars? Their existence is still controversial and hotly debated among historians, so you might be walking into a historical minefield here.

I don't think their existence is controversial; there was a crusade to fight them, and we have inquisitorial records regarding their activity in the first quarter of the 14th century.

PS: I'm (or at least, I was before joining Paradox) a historian.

 

[Pavía]

From @Palando in this post.

"Secondly, the Landvogtei Hagenau (Unterelsass) shouldn't be owned by Austria, as they lost it in 1330 to Emperor Louis the Bavarian. Louis's chancellor Albert II of Hohenberg was the bailiff in 1337, and Louis handed it over to his relative, the Rhenish elector in 1341. Alternatively, they could be replaced with another tag like Lichtenberg or Fleckenstein."

He'd also like to say "Colmar was a free city that wasn't owned by the Habsburgs." Please consider the corrections.

Thanks


Now, I realised that you also added Mühlhausen, which would be another candidate for an independent tag. Colmar and Mühlhausen would be at least two out of the Decapolis (10), and maybe even Straßburg could be split into two Straßburgs - the bishopric and the free city.

The Lordship of Lichtenberg (ruled by the Lichtenbergs until 1480) and the Abbey Murbach could also be independent tags that would help representing the fractured Alsatian lands. But given the shape of the Murbach province, I think that Pavia and his team already plan to add this maybe later on, as it really nicely follows the contour of the territories owned by the immediate abbey.

The Habsburgs didn't really own anything sizeable in those areas at that time; only minor territories around Hohlandsberg and Albrechtstal (=Weilertal) (Hohkönigsburg was acquired only later during the reign of Emperor Maximilian I).

To be honest, there are a lot of adjustments to be made in the HRE lands, as it's a very tricky region. But we'll come to that in a Tinto Maps, in a few weeks.

 

[Pavía]

Thanks @Pavía and all of Paradox Tinto for the hard work

Some feedback on Normandy


Locations :
- Can't read the name of the location between Cherbourg and Coutances (It's 'saint-sauveur-le-vicomte' right ?). Renaming it to 'Valognes' or 'Carentan' would probably help.
- I'm still in favor of renaming 'Arques' to 'Dieppe' as it was already the main town.
- Now that 'Fecamp' gets its own location, Tancarville should be renamed to 'Lillebonne' or 'Harfleur' as they're major towns (Tancarville really shouldn't be the name of the location).
- Saint-Sylvain... well, it's kinda weird, because the town of 'Falaise' seems to be inside the location of 'Saint-Sylvain' (they're both South-East of Caen), also Saint-Sylvain is really tiny (like more tiny than Tancarville). So, I suggest a little tweak here. 'Saint-Sylvain' should be renamed to 'Falaise', and 'Falaise' to 'Flers'. It should work without moving the locations, but moving the border between Flers and Falaise a little to the South-West, and same thing between Flers and Domfront would be perfect.

Province :
- Ebroicien feels kinda weird with 'Evreux' beiing that far from the center. 'Ouche' would probably be a more fitting name with 'L'Aigle' and 'Bernay' in the middle of this province.

Goods :
- I know, I advised for sand in 'Harcourt', but with the locations moving, the sandpits are now in the 'Pont-Audemer' location. Swapping sand and stone between these two should do the trick.

1. It's Saint-Sauveur-le-Vicomte, correct. I think that we may change it to Valognes, as it effectively become a more important town in Cotentin.
2. Looks like a good suggestion.
3. Renaming it to Harfleur also looks like a good suggestion.
4. We'll check this, as well.
5. Ouche doesn't look as convincing to me, TBH.
6. Just swapped the materials.

Thanks for your feedback on the feedback!

 

[Pavía]

I made a further comment on Alum Production HERE

The TLDR is that France should not have any Alum producing provinces until you get into the 19th Century. Historically speaking France has an Alum insecurity and thus for the Norman Cloth market and their paper production would suffer when cut off from major Alum supplies. Initially the Ottomans cut off Europe, forcing the Papal States to secure their own Alum mine at Tolfa, and the Papal states tried to monopolise and create a cartel around the mine. This forced France to again find sources of Alum abroad or over in Liege another major production centre after the Ottomans.

This is essential to represent because it forces the Player or AI to expand or secure their own Alum supplies in the lowlands, Italy or overseas if they want to develop the industries it requires. In addition the provinces you highlight (Millau and Ventadour) I could find no references to Alum and when researching their local economies both were heavily entrenched in livestock products.


- Between Huy and Flemelle (Liege) in the low countries would also become a major production hub of which would supply all of the French needs for Alum. I know Liege is marble and I think it should remain that but maybe another location that should produce Alum instead


- Andrea Günster and Stephen Martin, 'A Holy Alliance: Collusion in the Renaissance Europe Alum Market', Review of Industrial Organization, 47 (2015), 1-23.
- Sharon Farmer, 'Global and Gendered Perspectives on the Production of Parisian Alms Purse, c. 1340', Journal of Medieval Worlds, 1 (2019), 45-84 (pp. 73-74).
- John U. Nef, A Comparison of Industrial Growth in France and England from 1540 to 1640: III', Journal of Political Economy, 44 (1936), 643-666 (pp. 653-654).
- James L. Goldsmith, 'Agriculture Specialization and Stagnation in Early Modern Auvergne', Agriculture History, 73 (1973), 216-234.

Hi, thanks! I'll check these shared sources, and review the alum resources. In a previous version of the game, we needed Alum to make the Cloth-making work, so that's why we had to distribute some here and there. After improving a bit the Production Methods loop, Alum just increases productivity, so we might review these sources.

 

[Pavía]

I like the Lorraine changes, but the boundary between Rhenish Franconian and Lorrain in the Saulnois region still seems reflective of the situation *after* the Thirty Years War and the subsequent repopulation of the Saulnois region by Romance-speakers. This led to a large chunk of the region going from Germanophone to Francophone. According to the linguist Alain Simmer (Source: https://hal.univ-lorraine.fr/tel-01750396, p. 95):

Particularly of note here is that Morhange, which in the maps posted lends its name to a predominantly Lorrain location, was just north of the affected region, whose southern boundary stretched south-east from Château-Bréhain (about 10km SW of Morhange) through Marsal (about 7km east of Vic-sur-Seille) to Réchicourt-le-Château (not far north of the modern département's southern border). That is to say, in 1337 Morhange and its environs were Germanic-speaking, and Vic-sur-Seille was not far to the west of the converted region. The below map showing the change seems to be more or less consistent with Simmer's description:
View attachment 1158286
(Note: Morchingen = Morhange, Vic-sur-Seille is a little southeast of Château-Salins)
It's a little hard to tell what areas precisely are represented by the locations of Morhange and Vic-sur-Seille, but imo considering this it's incorrect to represent Metz as having a larger Germanic minority than the area directly to its east, or the area immediately to the west of Sarrebourg as Romance-speaking.

Hi! We will review Lorraine and Alsace more in-depth when we do the HRE review.

 

[Pavía]

Nice! A few more questions:
1-Why is the province of Bresse in Burgundy?
2- Shouldn't Roussilion also be considered part of France like Bayonne?
3-I know that it wasn't the case in 1337 but can you make it so that the border with Belgium is more similar to the one we have today by putting cities and provinces like Dunkirk and Lille in the area of Picardy? They were considered in the lowlands back in the day but became permanent part of France in the timescope of this game and are still part of it to this day!

1. It was incorporated into the government of Burgundy after ceded to France.
2. No, as it was part of Catalonia for more time than it was of France for the game's period (which is the opposite of Bayonne).
3. It's not how we want the design of the game, sorry.

 

[Pavía]

It is worth stating though that several of the authors quoted on that first wikipedia page like Mark Gregory Pegg and R. I. Moore do not believe the Cathars existed. The crusade happened for sure, and they thought there was a heresy there. But the revisionist (or at least a decade ago, I have not kept up with the debate) view was that they were essentially hunting for ghosts. I would not go as far as to call the crusade purely a political one (a rather presentist thing to say) but I do believe it was more of a combination of religious hysteria and political expediency than a crusade against an actual existing heresy. It's not much of a surprise the Fournier register is from a century later. He essentially came in looking for Cathars, and thus was predisposed to finding them.

There are some views contesting it, that is true. However, I think that the consensus still is that the Cathars existed, even if the Catholic Church exaggerated their presence of characteristics, for their own interest. The Fournier register just estates that there were Cathars existing as late as the first quarter of the 14th century. The analysis that Le Roy Ladurie made for his Montaillou, also clearly states that there were some Cathar communities in Aragon; the Aragonese documentation also confirms their existence in that period, as they were still prosecuted.

Therefore, I find it preferable to follow the more consensual and accepted hypothesis regarding their existence; if at some point the 'revisionist' view becomes the mainstream view, then the consensus would need to be adjusted as well... But we're not there.

 

[Pavía]

Instead of Savoy and Dauphine you could just call it Rhone

Maybe, but then we would lose some flavor if renaming it that way.

 

[Pavía]

View attachment 1158369
Is the small Arpitan exclave intentional?

Looks like you swapped Neuchâtel and Delémont as I commented in Tinto Maps #3
However, I think you forgot to swap the cultures of the 2 locations (Arpitan and Franc-comtois) creating a weird Arpitan exclave in Switzerland

Yes, it's an overlook, we're just fixing it, thanks!

 

[Pavía]

By the way, something that I couldn't share yesterday, as there was a bug to be fixed, is the dynasty map of France; I'll also be adding it to the main post: