Map Blog 2 - France and Iceland

[sumskilz]

Looks great, +rep.

Just one question on the starting settlements of the French Crown....

It seems a bit strange that the French crown starts with almost the entirety of France under its control in 1080 AD. I do know that even 100 years after this, at the time of Louis VII's death, the royal domain only extended between Paris, Orleans, Bourges, and Rheims. I know that with DOTS's new system, many of the other provinces will be represented as the dominions of great lords and allow the player almost no control over them (as it should be), but there are a couple provinces that seem as if they should be rebel provinces in 1080. Specifically Bretagne is a bit suspect. I'm aware that they entered into an alliance with Phillip I in 1075, but I'm not sure if they should really start the game as a French province. Obviously, since they were allied to the French, being a rebel province is not ideal, but I don't really think being under the control of the French crown is a good representation of the situation either. The situation in Anjou is also a bit iffy... I might be misremembering but I thought the Count of Anjou retained quite a bit of independence at this point and was not particularly friendly with the French Crown (not that any of the major lords were "friendly" with the crown in the first place).

The problem is the M2TW war engine. We made them autonomous regions within France, otherwise as rebels they would be at war with everyone.

[Alkidas]

Almost all of the principalities did in some way recognize their subjection to the French king, such as by sending men to the royal army. There were places, like Toulouse which were pretty much completely independent by the time the mod begins and I have been thinking about whether this representation of them is correct. Well, at least in these extreme cases it is a misinterpretation, but then there are few options. Making them rebel would, as sumskilz remarked, make them mindlessly fight wars against everyone - especially the king - so that would not be a better solution. There is no accurate way of doing this and our autonomy model is the best solution we've come up with and I think it's quite good overall. This way we can represent the growth of the royal power which didn't happen through one major war - king against everyone else - as in vanilla.

[WinsingtonIII]

The problem is the M2TW war engine. We made them autonomous regions within France, otherwise as rebels they would be at war with everyone.

Yeah, that's true, they should not be at war with everyone. It just seems strange to me to see France almost completely under the direct control of the Capetian crown in 1080. But as long as the player has very little control over all provinces except Ile-de-France it should be a decent representation. Plus, certain provinces could be extremely prone to rebellion.

There is no accurate way of doing this and our autonomy model is the best solution we've come up with and I think it's quite good overall. This way we can represent the growth of the royal power which didn't happen through one major war - king against everyone else - as in vanilla.

I do quite like your autonomy system, it's definitely a better representation than anything else. As I said before, I think I'm mostly just thrown off by seeing all that blue in 1080, as it sort of implies direct control. But, of course, in game it will not actually be all that direct. And of course there are benefits of having them under French control. Certainly, if any of these duchies were attacked, they would call upon the crown for help, and this helps represent that situation, whereas if they were rebels they would be actively at war with the crown.

[VINC.XXIII]

I totally agree,
so look, in France we had 12 "pairs de France ", 12 great lords( with the times many was capetians eh eh), but at the start(of the capetians), the most part of this lorddoms was handed by hostile dynasties:
Duché de Bourgogne(1 lord after the king) become capetian at the 14eme century
Comté de Toulouse, become capetian at the end of the 13eme
Duché de Bretagne, capetian at the 15eme!!
Comté de Champagne, capetian at the 13eme
Comté de Flandre, capetian at the 14eme(key of powerfullness for the Bourgogne's Capetians)
Duché d'Aquitaine/Guyenne, last lorddom of the english in France...
the others "seigneur-pairs" are powerfull ecclesiatics(bishop of Langres, and some others from the North France)
It must look the progress of the capetian dynasty in the time, all this vassals was a day the mortal enemy of the Kings. Isn't only the princes who have a problem with the centralization, many provinces have an irascible hating of the french linguage and french culture until the 14eme/15eme century, like the Bretons, the Auvergnats, the Toulousains, same the Flandre, the Guyenne, some others was the fanatic supporters of the french crown, Rheims for example or many small cities who want a communal "chart" against their lords...
good luck

[juvenus]

Just outstanding!

[Haakon]

You guys are the best, I predict mod of the century!

[SeekerAfterTruth]

according to what u have said in the first post u deliberatly positioned the roads between settlements in certain locations, however, i thought that this was impossible with the MED2TW engine? How did u do this? Or have u not really positioned the roads at all and they just ended fairly well where u wanted them?

[Resurrection]

according to what u have said in the first post u deliberatly positioned the roads between settlements in certain locations, however, i thought that this was impossible with the MED2TW engine? How did u do this? Or have u not really positioned the roads at all and they just ended fairly well where u wanted them?

Roads are very tricky, yes, but not impossible. They also require quite a lot of space in order to be created by the engine and this space is larger than space required for just passing (usually twice the minimum - two pixels in the image files). That can be used to force the roads to be created where I want them to by placing obstacles where I don't want them to while these obstacles still can be passable by characters.

[\Vazul's Ghost/]

Roads are very tricky, yes, but not impossible. They also require quite a lot of space in order to be created by the engine and this space is larger than space required for just passing (usually twice the minimum - two pixels in the image files). That can be used to force the roads to be created where I want them to by placing obstacles where I don't want them to while these obstacles still can be passable by characters.

That is extremely intuitive. Thats what I like about this team, you guys think outside of the box to get as much as you can from the frustrating limitations of the Med2 engine. Hope to see some more of the map soon!

[dmcraanen]

This and your first blog look awesome. I have never seen such detail and Im certainly going to conquer Iceland no matter what faction I ll play! Here's to hope that everything goes smoothly while continuing this mod!

[Hengest]

That is extremely intuitive. Thats what I like about this team, you guys think outside of the box to get as much as you can from the frustrating limitations of the Med2 engine. Hope to see some more of the map soon!

We're starting the process of adding PSFs and all settlements and regions are finally done so yes, I expect some map preview soon. We will probably just show a completely finished area though such as Britain and that will give you an idea of what the rest of the map will come to look like when all the PSFs are added and populated

[dmcraanen]

Where exactly will the PSF's for Iceland be? Also - because Island does not have a ''capital'' so to speak, what ''region'' will it belong to?

[dominion]

Where exactly will the PSF's for Iceland be? Also - because Island does not have a ''capital'' so to speak, what ''region'' will it belong to?

Denmark would be the most appropiate....no? => ignore that, i'm mixing up with greenland

[sumskilz]

Where exactly will the PSF's for Iceland be? Also - because Island does not have a ''capital'' so to speak, what ''region'' will it belong to?

It will now be its own region.

[Walkman810i]

It will now be its own region.

Now that's good news

[napoleonic]

may I ask what is the reason to include iceland? because most of us will find that such isolated island on the edge of the map would be useless.

[Resurrection]

may I ask what is the reason to include iceland? because most of us will find that such isolated island on the edge of the map would be useless.

It's a bit complicated but I'll try to explain. The reason was that the map is generated from various real-world data (mainly SRTM-30) in chosen projection (Van der Grinten's) and we wanted various things to be in:

- all of Arabic peninsula
- western coast of Africa
- land-pass from Sweden to Finland (all Baltic sea)

In the chosen projection the Iceland just fitted in the map of this chosen span in it's upper left corner (with very slight adjustment to fit it all).

Interestingly enough with the map of our span we include basically all relevant territory for our factions in our timeframe. So with just the exception of Seljuqs which are missing some of their eastern territory we include not only 30 factions but also their whole "spheres of influence". Iceland* may be on the edge of the map but it will still play significant role in BI campaign offering yet another place you can expect Norse raids and if captured profit from it's resources coming from Reykjavik over Faroes to Thurso or Norwegian coast and beyond.

*Arguably Norse sphere of influence was also Greenland and eastern Canada but those places were so remote that it could be hardly considered as relevant as Iceland.

[Co22]

When I read all this I'm like glowing! I want to play on this map sooo bad!

Keep up the work for the most promising mod in this forum!

[Dilettante]

Res,

Sign me up for a map generation blog!