Upgraded Mesomerica

[BuchiTaton]

With the lastest updates all the Americas are falling behind compared to the old world in level of detail, not to forget in game balance and fun factor. So a big update for the new world is needed.

Since upgrade two continents can be a monumental task we can start with the priorities, and the american region number one is MESOAMERICA!, if you ask why these are the reasons:

- Mesoamerica was for 18/19 of the game's time range the most populated region of the Americas.
- It is calculated that Mesoamerica had between 1/3 to 1/5 of all precolombine population of America in a region that represent just 1/17 of the Americas area.
- Is the better documented region of America about their pre-european history (with writing system and calendar since BC era).
- Currently just Mexico is the 4th country in biodiversity and number of languages, that is because the great variety of climates and terrains that generate diversity of biomes and then great cultural diversity.
- Mesoamerica and the Andean regions have similar levels of society (city-states to empires). Even if the Inca Empire was more a real empire "a la Roman Empire" while the Aztecs was more a "bully extortioner" state and the andean civs were ahead in the use of metallurgy and had llamas. Mesoamerica already had early production of bronze, and were ahead in writing and mathematics.
- Also the cities in Mesoamerica were way bigger and way more numerous that the andine ones.
- Mesomaerica have something in commun with the HRE and Japan, and that is an accumulation of small warring states (some of the more appealing scenarios for competitive players).

So here are some maps to represent the changes needed for Mesoamerica:

NATIVE PROVINCE NAMES (Mainly nahuatl names).

1444 NATIVE STATES (Capital letters for "Nations" and lowercase for Kingdoms).

1444 NATIVE CULTURES (Number of provinces indicated).

EUROPEAN PROVINCE NAMES (Post conquest name and date).

1821 CULTURE MAP (For New Spain).

TERRAIN MAP.

I tried to achieve balance between gameplay and historicity (that is why some "wrong" cultural grouping like the Mixe with Zapotecs instead of with the Zoques), and between the provincial division in the precolombine Mesoamerica and the colonial New Spain (in the awesome work for Mesoamerica by the team of Meiou and Taxes, I think they have almost all their desing based in the pre-european political divisions, but lack space to relevant post conquest areas like the Bajio region).

And remember that even the smaller of these mesoamerican provinces is still bigger that the average european province (game´s map projection dont help much any region in this latitudes).

 

[Lord_Baltimore]

A few thoughts:

1 - Yuman really ought to be it's own culture group with Yavapai, Mojave and Chochimi cultures (and others if they fit on the map). If you want to make it a single culture, I'd suggest putting them in the Athabascan group, since the Yuman peoples had a lot in common with the Apache, at least by the end of the EUIV time frame. The Yavapai in particular were often known as 'Mojave Apache' and the Spanish apparently couldn't tell the two apart.

2 - The Pima and Papago tribes don't really belong with the Pueblo. Aside from being sedentary farmers, they really didn't have anything in common. The Pima would be a good fit with Northern Mexican tribes like the Tepehuan and Tarahumara. The Pueblo probably should have their own culture group with Tewa, Hopi, Zuni and Keres cultures. You can toss the Kiowa in there as well since they spoke a Tewa language and they have to go somewhere.

3 -

QUERECHOS.
At 1444 the ancestors of Apaches and Navajo were relatively new in the southwest of present USA. They are athabaskan people from the north and by the time of spanish contact (one century later) they were know as Querechos, described as nomadic bison hunters. Also we can guess that Navajos were at their current land by that time, but the Apaches were mainly at "Llano Estancado" (Mescalero province). Finally, from archeology and spanish narrations (included those about the Jumanos) its clear that the "Apaches/Navajos" of late 19th century are the result of 300 years of interaction with Puebloans and Spaniards peoples.

So would these all simply be Apache culture peoples? The problem here is that the Apache branched out quite a bit during the game time frame, but EUIV doesn't have a good mechanism for cultures changing. So you really need to start with distinct groups for the Lipan, Jicarilla, Mescalero etc. Not sure if you need separate cultures or just separate tribes. I think that at least you would want different Western Apache and Plains Apache cultures with different tags to represent the major groups within those cultures.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Thanks for you replay Lord Baltimore!

First im gonna quote myself (from other thread) to clarify some criteria about my grouping

Now, some people also touched the theme of in game cultures vs language families.

Personally I would love to have a more complex culture system with things like separated cultural elements included languages, but we know this is more a "role play" element that a relevant gameplay feature (unless somebody come with a good idea for it).
We also know that many in game cultures are more in a group because their regional position that by their language affinities, and that can sound wrong but actually there are more reasons for that apart of gameplay. Like for example:

> RELIGION:
- The orthodox romance Vlachs have more in common with the oxthodox slavic Bulgarians, that with the catholic romance Portuguese.
- The theravada austroasiatic Khmers have more in common with the theravada tai-kadaia Thais, that with the mahayana austroasiatic Viets.

> WAY OF LIFE:
- Nomadic turkic Kazakhs have many in common with nomadic mongolic Oirats, compared with the "persianized" anatolian Turks.
- Urban uto-aztec Nahuas have more in common with urban mayense Yucatecs, compared with the hunter-gatherer utoaztec Shoshone.

In fact the in game Americas cultures are a perfec example of double standard in the game's culture grouping criteria, because american groups are mainly based in language families, when in reality we can found both Siouans farmers of "long house" tradition in the NA east coast, and nomad hunter siouans in the great plains. Artic, plains and eastern Algonquians. Just Mesoamerica had at least 10 different languages families, but as other highly language diverse and urbanized regions like South East Asia or the Caucasus, is not the best idea for gameplay to have 10 diferent culture groups (many cultures in one region are OK, but not many culture groups).

I see your points about grouping some cultures together with others that share the same roots (ethnic and linguistic) as valid criteria. But since Paradox tends to give more weight to "way of life" and "geographic harmony" in regions like Europe and Middle east (see Basques, Hungarian, Turks, etc.) for gameplay reasons, then, I want to come with some contiguous and justifiable culture groups.

For example:
- There is this proposed Hokan language super family that could have included hunter-gatherer peoples from the arid plains at both sides of the Sierras of Aridoamerica. Now there is the problem that these "Hokans" also include fisher-gatherer peoples from California (that share many custom with penutian, numic and yukian tribes in the area), so the cultural term "Aridoamerican" could do a better work representing these "nomadic arid hunter-gatherers" VS the "highlanders town builders farmers" of Oasisamerica (Anasazi=Puebloans, Hohokan=Piman, Mogollon=Taracahitic).

- Now Apache/Navajo are athabaskans, but I dont see the point (for gameplay) in group them with some tribes from Alaska when they can share more of their way of life with the plains peoples (at least the eastern Apaches) or even with oasisamericans/aridoamericans (Navajos and western Apaches).

- Similar case are the Kiowa, even if they share the same origin with Tanoans pueblo peoples, they probably were in the limits between the Great basin and Plains cultural areas, and by games time range they were way more "plains indians".

I know that in real life many peoples from both Americas went trough some crazy migrations, and also the CoP migration mechanic gives you the chance of do this, but any non DLC player could use some more stable cultural borders (now there is a big contrast between the language based ones in the new world vs the regional ones in the old world).

 

[Lord_Baltimore]

Thanks for you replay Lord Baltimore!

First im gonna quote myself (from other thread) to clarify some criteria about my grouping



I see your points about grouping some cultures together with others that share the same roots (ethnic and linguistic) as valid criteria. But since Paradox tends to give more weight to "way of life" and "geographic harmony" in regions like Europe and Middle east (see Basques, Hungarian, Turks, etc.) for gameplay reasons, then, I want to come with some contiguous and justifiable culture groups.

For example:
- There is this proposed Hokan language super family that could have included hunter-gatherer peoples from the arid plains at both sides of the Sierras of Aridoamerica. Now there is the problem that these "Hokans" also include fisher-gatherer peoples from California (that share many custom with penutian, numic and yukian tribes in the area), so the cultural term "Aridoamerican" could do a better work representing these "nomadic arid hunter-gatherers" VS the "highlanders town builders farmers" of Oasisamerica (Anasazi=Puebloans, Hohokan=Piman, Mogollon=Taracahitic).

- Now Apache/Navajo are athabaskans, but I dont see the point (for gameplay) in group them with some tribes from Alaska when they can share more of their way of life with the plains peoples (at least the eastern Apaches) or even with oasisamericans/aridoamericans (Navajos and western Apaches).

- Similar case are the Kiowa, even if they share the same origin with Tanoans pueblo peoples, they probably were in the limits between the Great basin and Plains cultural areas, and by games time range they were way more "plains indians".

I know that in real life many peoples from both Americas went trough some crazy migrations, and also the CoP migration mechanic gives you the chance of do this, but any non DLC player could use some more stable cultural borders (now there is a big contrast between the language based ones in the new world vs the regional ones in the old world).

I'm somewhat confused by what you mean here. Cultures and Culture Groups are used to mostly to define who gets along well together or what people see themselves as part of the same nation. Now the developers made a few exceptions (Scots, Basques) to railroad the game towards a historical outcome and they got lazy in some places, like with the Penutian and Sonoran culture groups, but mostly its about how close people were to each other.

Defining groups based on a broadly similar material culture and living within an arbitrary space doesn't fit this dynamic and would produce some ahistoric relationships. For example, having a Plains Indian culture group would lump the Comanche and Lipan together even though they hated each other in real life. And I'm not convinced it would add anything to game play. Maybe it would make the game easier for certain start positions, but not really better.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Well have similar roots isnt either a guarantee of good relations, being of the same language group didnt helped to prevent the bloody war between Iroquois and Wyandots, the Tlaxcaltecs and Aztecs "cousins" to hate each other, some germanic tribes to ally with romans againts other germanic tribes, etc. The list is huge and we can found many examples of this.

Is natural to get in conflict with somebody that compete with you for the same spot and resourses (even if your rival is related to you), and is also natural to make allies and forge treaties with the others that can trade something or help you to defeat that rival.

Also in game we have the "historical rival" option so not a real impediment to Comanche and Lipan to fight each other.

Even more, I have tested this culture configuration in my MOD and each time 2 of the 4 Puebloan tags allied with Navajo or/and Apache against the other 2 puebloan tags.

 

[BuchiTaton]

GREAT COLOMBIA REGION:
Now I added my proposal for the Great Colombia region (Venzuela, Colombia and Ecuador) plus some details of nearby areas.

>PROVINCES NAMES AT 1444:
Mainly based in native tribes/kingdom.
- 3 new provinces in Venezuela.
- 8 new provinces in Colombia.
- 2 new province in Ecuador.
- 3 new provinces over the Amazon river (still not drawed).

POST CONQUEST NAMES AT 1821:
With conquest and/or foundation date.

NATIVE CULTURES MAP:
Pre conquest cultures groups. Some parts like the northen Andes are more clearly culturally defined, but the complex and diverse amazon basin required "mixed" grouping that give more weight to the way of life of the region that linguistic classification (tupians, arawak, cariban, etc.)

TERRAIN MAP:
The 3 new provinces over the remaining part of the Amazon are needed to add.

> AMAZON RIVER:
Actually the game have a problem with the criteria about which areas are colonizable or not. We must cosider that:
- The north route through northwest USA (Lewis and Clark route) can be colonized in game decades before their historic time.
- Worse case is the majority of Africa (of course talking about european exploration and conquest).
- Meanwhile Amazon river was explored since Orellana (1542), Teixeida even did the full route countercurrent in 1638, plus many other smaler explorations in EU4's time range. So Amazon river was beter know for european more than 250 years before Northwest USA or inner Africa.
Now of course this from european perspective, but what about natives?
- Both inner Africa and northwest USA are justifiable because the importance for native historical migrations. But is the same case for Amazonas, the regions witnessed the struggle of arawaks, caribs, tupis, ges, etc. groups.
- The early narration of Orellana about a highly populous river was considered an exagerattion for many time, but in recent years new archealogical evidence (like the Tierra Preta cultures) points that at early 16th century the Amazon and some of their main tributaries where the homeland of pre-urban societies. Problably destroyed by european diseases.

One good reference for the cultures of the area Mapa Nimuendaju.

 

[BalticM]

Awesome work!


Any chance to find space for Barcelona province? (split from Cumana)
Just an important city & settlement which shouldn't be overlooked I think.

Barcelona (city). Capital of Anzoategui State and one of the cities with the longest continuity in the country. It was founded in 1638 by Joan Orpi(Juan de Orpi) and first called New Barcelona of San Cristobal of Cumanagoto. It has a long coast, making it place of economic relevance for international trade.

Barcelona (province). Also called the province of New Barcelona, this territory was established in 1637 by Joan Orpi (Juan de Orpin) after the conquest of the Cumanagotos tribe, with the name of the province of New Catalonia. Annexed to the province of Cumana, it reappeared in 1810 when newly created Barcelona junta decided to reinstitue the province.


And for Tachira-Cabimas area I had 3 provinces of Tachira, Merida & Trujillo. Timoto-Cuica people

 

[FleetingRain]

Man, you're quicker than me with these map redrawings lol.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Awesome work!


Any chance to find space for Barcelona province? (split from Cumana)
Just an important city & settlement which shouldn't be overlooked I think.

Barcelona (city). Capital of Anzoategui State and one of the cities with the longest continuity in the country. It was founded in 1638 by Joan Orpi(Juan de Orpi) and first called New Barcelona of San Cristobal of Cumanagoto. It has a long coast, making it place of economic relevance for international trade.

Barcelona (province). Also called the province of New Barcelona, this territory was established in 1637 by Joan Orpi (Juan de Orpin) after the conquest of the Cumanagotos tribe, with the name of the province of New Catalonia. Annexed to the province of Cumana, it reappeared in 1810 when newly created Barcelona junta decided to reinstitue the province.


And for Tachira-Cabimas area I had 3 provinces of Tachira, Merida & Trujillo. Timoto-Cuica people

Thanks!

Well some criteria I used for the provinces in the Americas is historical population. This article have a good review of Latinoamerican countries from late 18th century to current time. And if we look to the numbers around the ends of EU4's time range we have something like this:
>Historical population:

- Mexico 6.8M (1823)
- Central Americal 1.3M (1820)
- Colombia 1.2M? (1780-1835)
- Venezuela 0.8M (1825)
- Ecuador 0.5M (1825)​

>My provinces number proposal:

- Mexico 101 (mainly in the southeast and central regions)
- Central Americal 34 (mainly in the west and central areas)
- Colombia 26 (mainly in the andine and coast regions)
- Venezuela 18 (mainly in the coast and mountains regions)
- Ecuador 7
​

The provinces in proper Mesoamerica have a minimum size of 10 000 km2, the ones in the Andes and coast of south America around 20 000 km2, and the deserts of northen Mexico and the Amazonian jungles over 50 000 km2 (of course this sizes varies with historical justification).

Now since Cumaná is older that Barcelona (1515 vs 1638), Sucre is just the half of the proposed size, the inner region of Anzoátegui is less dense and was colonized later that their coast, then I added the coastal region of Anzoátegui to Sucre to complete that province.

But of course there is always chance to do some changes. I just dont want to exaggerate in the number of provinces compared with the rest of the world (any new province must have some historical justification considering the balance and game performance).

A new map:

>POST COLONIAL CULTURES MAP (1821):
Includes the names of cultures of each culture group present in the map that in some cases dont have provinces any more or are out of the map.

 

[BalticM]

If anything, I think you are exaggerating with province amount in Mesoamerica & Mexico
I don't know why provinces of Colombia-Venezuela should be twice bigger as rule. They just have to be more poor. While number to depend on historical background.
New Barcelona was very important for colonial Venezuela, Merida was very important, they have to be there if possible.

Sucre is 12000 km2. Is it really too small?
Anzoategui 43000 km2. Not possible to cut in half?
Merida & Tachira 11000 km2 each with option to take some land from Maracaibo (Merida was coastal province in colonial times).

And you cut 23000 km2 Belize in half, which had population of 4000 in year 1800. So 2 provinces of ~2000 population each. Any of Venesuelan provinces had such low population? Even jungle provinces I think had higher populations

 

[BuchiTaton]

If anything, I think you are exaggerating with province amount in Mesoamerica & Mexico
I don't know why provinces of Colombia-Venezuela should be twice bigger as rule. They just have to be more poor. While number to depend on historical background.
New Barcelona was very important for colonial Venezuela, Merida was very important, they have to be there if possible.

Sucre is 12000 km2. Is it really too small?
Anzoategui 43000 km2. Not possible to cut in half?
Merida & Tachira 11000 km2 each with option to take some land from Maracaibo (Merida was coastal province in colonial times).

And you cut 23000 km2 Belize in half, which had population of 4000 in year 1800. So 2 provinces of ~2000 population each. Any of Venesuelan provinces had such low population? Even jungle provinces I think had higher populations

Belize is a good example to show your point, to be honest I feel some kind of forced my own proposition of 2 provinces for Belize. It still could become just one province to be more in the level of other low populated parts of Central America like Mosquitia and Veraguas.

But all those parts of Central America are more exceptions that rule for Central America. The mesoamerican part of Central America was the second more densely populated region of whole Americas by at least 2000 years (just behind the Mexican part of Mesoamerica and later the east coasts of USA and Brazil in the very last 20 years of EU4).
Even there are more concensus about Mesoamerica representing percentages as huge as 20-30% of all pre-european Americas, that about the total population of the continent.
Not just that, Mesoamerica was an urban region full of warring city states with written recorded history, while the only comparable region, the central Andes, was way less dense because their enviromental conditions.

>Now, specifically about Belize.
- Belize was the homeland of many mayan cities like Lamanai, Xunantunich, Lubeentun, Cahal Pech, etc. Of course the region decayed in the postclassic period, but the potential of mayans with their own technologic to sustain urban populations in the area is evident.
-The political situation of Belize played againts its own development. Trapped between the spanish ambition and the Baymen de facto control of the area with meek British suport, Belize turned in a base for the extraction of mahogany and dye wood, but neither Spain or Britain tried to did a real colonization (avoiding some serious colonial comflict).
- Like all the Americas, Mesomaerica suffered a demographic calamity because the european diseases. Spanish government tried hard to keep productivity reorganizing the remaining native population, importing slaves and encouraging colonization, and introducing european agricultural techniques, so areas like neighboring Guatemala or Yucatan started to grow faster that the buffer British Belize, dedicated to direct exploitation of jungle resourses.
- The informal nature of Belize government provoked constant comflict not just with the spaniards, but also between the baymen, the black slaves and native mayans. Creating an evironment were nobody can realy grow.

After all Mosquitia was a similar case that Belize (Spanish and British ambitions conflict), but the case for Mosquitia was better for Britain that achieve to put an afro-native protectorate. Also Mosquitia lacked the previous urban population of the mayan region, and their coast is full of marsh that obstruct their colonization.

So Belize had specific reasons that make likely a "what if" scenario where europeans or mesoamericans (make Mayans great again!!!) can bring back Belize to their past glory. Contrary to the political buffer area that it turned.

Anyway, as both Belize provinces can become just one, others provinces can be added to Venezuela (also probably Ecuador because it had more urban and dense population).

> Another map:

>NATIVE NATIONS AT 1444.
- Tribes from Amazonia and Orinoquia:

Arawak
Kalina
Omagua
Jivaro​

- Federations from the Colombia-Venezuela andine region:

Wayuu
Tairona
Zenu
Timoto
Motilon
Guane
Muisca
Quimbaya
Pijao
Yalcon​

- Ecuatorian kingdoms:

Quito
Guancavilca
Cañar​

 

[BuchiTaton]

Here is the base for the Inca region at 1444:

> PROVINCES NAMES (NATIVES AT 1444):
- 2 new provinces in Peru.
- 4 new provinces in Bolivia.
- Many redrawed provinces.
- Also many province´s names changed (Fuerte Borbon, Madre de Dios?)

> CULTURES 1444:

- COLOMBIAN GROUP
Guajira
Zenu
Chibcha
Panche

- AMAZONIAN GROUP:
Amazonic
Orinoquian
Jivaroan
Anti

- ANDINE GROUP:
Mochica
Chachapoya
Nazca
Quechua
Aymara
Kunza
Diaguita

- CARIBBEAN GROUP:
Taino
Carib
Kalina
Lokono

- BRAZILIAN GROUP:
Munduruku
Tupi
Botocudo
Xingu
Gé
Guarani
Chacoan
Guaycuru
Charrua

- PATAGONIAN GROUP:
Mapuche
Huarpe
Het
Fuegian

> NATIVE NATIONS AT 1444:

ANDES:
- Quito, Guancavilca and Cañar (Ecuador)
- Cajamarca and Chachapoya (North Peru)
- Tallan, Chanchan, Ichma, Camanchaco and Kunza (Coastal desert)
- Huayla, Wanka and Cusco (Quechuas)
- Colla, Charca and Pacajes (Aymaras)
- Omaguaca and Calchaqui (Diagitas)

AMAZON:
- Omagua
- Jivaro
- Chuncho

OPEN PLAINS:
- Chiriguano
- Guaycuru
- Guarani
- Charrua

PATAGONIA:
- Mapuche

 

[Casko]

Good point, development balance is a problem. There are some easy solutions like give almost all the provinces in this area the minimun development, but that is historicaly wrong because have provinces with at least 1500 years of history as city-state at the same level or lower that some group of hunter-gatherers from Canada is awful.

Well, perhaps one way to counter the balance of development, is to have various high development states, to represent the large cities in the region, surrounded by low development provinces. as a way to roughly speaking in more gameplay vs reality the jungles and the inhospitable regions in the area.

 

[AndrejK]

What is Anti culture? The remaining cultures make sense, but Anti?

 

[BuchiTaton]

Antis was the Quechua term refering to the jungle peoples from the lowlands east of Cusco. They were mainly Campa and Pano-Tanaca peoples, but there are even others kinds of peoples. Since Anti was a historical umbrella term for this region (Antisuyo) I think is the best option to group the peoples living there.

 

[FleetingRain]

I guess the Xingu and Mundukuru cultures are there not by cultural identity, but due to language?

 

[BuchiTaton]

Well, the southeast lower Amazon river area was dominated by Tupian peoples, and one of the more notorious of them are the Munduruku. They were know by the warlike attitute againts other tribal nations and colonists.

The Xingu is more about culture that language. Today the Xingu river area is populated by tribes of many diferent lineages (arawaks, caribs, tupis, ges, etc.) that share cultural traits despite their very diferent languages. The Xingu area is also notorious because recent archaeological evidence show the area as densely populated, with forts, broad roads, channels, etc. While the Marajoara culture (from the Amazon delta) disappears before EU4 time range, the Xingu area probably declined after the introduction of european diseases (before extensive comflict between natives and colonists).

About what I am more insecure is if Munduruku and/or Xingu "deserve" their own playable tag (for the moment Im more in the "No" side).

 

[FleetingRain]

I'd say yes tbh. I'm a bit too lenient with new tags, but considering the devs are avoiding adding tagless cultures, you'd need them.

 

[BalticM]

Comments how good or bad new map is?
Seems as Spanish Main got far more attention, while in Caribbean only Spanish possesions were touched.

 

[FleetingRain]

I particularly found Mexico terrible tbh.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Overall Im happy with the aditions, BUT:

- Dont like the drawing of the provinces, but I can live with that (or MOD it).
- The nations that I miss the most are Hopi, Zoques, Lenca and Chorotega.
- Colombia and the Caribbean can also get some more love (in form of nations) but I think that maybe the devs want those regions to be more open to colonization.
- I dont see the need to have playable Yokuts apart of have somebody from California.
- Of course Andes and the rest of South America are (by the moment) out, I guess.
- Also like the options to keep cultural diversity on the colonies.