'A question regarding the inclusion policy of regions'.

[Tuhaj bej]

Greetings!

I've been awaiting the release DotS for quite some time, and I'm really looking forward to the release and I'd like to congratulate the entire team for their dedicated work regarding this grand undertaking.

Now I'm specifically interested in the history of Central Europe, and I found the inclusion of Bohemia a great idea, as that will most certainly spice up the gameplay of the region, not to mention the added historical value of having such a unique faction.

As I was looking through the screenshots that have been posted as previews on the forum, I noticed something quite puzzling:

It seems to me, that three distinct historical regions (namely Bosnia, Croatia and Slavonia) have been merged as one.

I understand that the game has unforunately a limit on home provinces (199 if I rembember correctly), but might I inquire why three distinctly unique regions have been merged?

Another puzzling thing is that it seems to be in the possession of the Kingdom of Hungary: now according to the mod's manifesto, I understand the mod starts in 1080? During that era only Slavonia was under the control of the Kingdom of Hungary (Slavonia being the area between the rivers Drava and Sava , and a bit south of that during the middle ages).

It would seem to me that other regions (specifically eastern Europe and the Steppe) have considerabely larger regions than western Europe (for example if I see correctly England has been broken up into four regions?).

What is the policy of DotS in deciding which region get's a slot?

1. Is it based on geography?
2. Is it based on historically autonomous regions? (Which would warrant an independent Slavonia and Bosnia as Bosnia was only under the control of the Kingdom of the Croats for a small portion of the DotS timeline [if it indeed does start in 1080])

Now a member of the team, Diodredai (who if I understand correctly is the leader of the Hungarian department) said that Moldova and Wallachia will get their own province.

Now based on that assumption I'm going to go with option two, as in historically autonomous regions, as at the start of DotS the Pechenegs control Wallachia, whilst the Cumans control Moldova - even though the region was, for most of the DotS timeline known under the name 'Cumania' in latin.

It would seem that the breakup of the various 'Rus principalities is also based on autonomy (more or less).

Since the borders vary, and barely anything is known about the Cumans, I would understand why the Cumans for example have far greater regions than factions we know a lot about like England or France, but why has the Kingdom of Croatia been made into a province, when the Kingdom barely lasted ten years into the DotS timeline?

Could we got some clarity on that (as in what is the policy of inclusion)? Also, it would seem that Hungary proper is an extremely larger province compared to western Europe (where some factions have about three regions splitting an area akin to that of Hungary proper).

[Resurrection]

It is rather simple really. The first thing is the limit of 199 regions for 30 factions and the rest of the huge map.

The criteria are political autonomy/independence, significance and whether it's factional or rebel territory.

Bosnia was barren wasteland for most of our timeframe with zero impact on anything. Making it a region would be a waste even though it was de facto autonomous.

Slavonia was since the mod start part of Hungary but was not de facto independent though it was autonomous. Since Croatia fell to Hungary soon after as well and the two were ruled similarly and since 13th century by the same guy then given the limit we simply opted to protray it together instead of as separate regions (which we didn't have) and the unique situation it was throughout the Middle Ages is handled by PSF ownerships. The region is now under Biograd as capital and is not Hungarian in 1080 (only PSFs in Slavonia are).

Adding Bosnia to it was simply the matter of it not being addable to anything else around it (be it Bulgaryan thema, Hungary proper or Dalmatia).

Size of Hungary is again the product of our critera. It was always united like this and in this size and in order to break it down we would need many slots which we don't have.

I understand you are likely from the area and thus it interests you greatly but know that there many similar situations and decision on the map because the unique and complicated situations had to be portrayed in overly static and very limiting game engine of M2TW. Those you don't see but natives do, trust me. :-)

Fortunately the emphasis on regions was greatly reduced by the PSFs and it greatly alleviates these problems because we have other means to portray these situations. Similarly not every region will have the same potential. Single Hungarian region can easily be given potential of three regions elsewhere.

[Tuhaj bej]

Thanks for reply!
Get ready for the mod and see.