Thread: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

  1. #8861
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by Anubis88 View Post
    why would people live there if there was still space inside the walls? It was much more dangerous, so we have to assume that most did because they didn't have a choice, and the area inside the walls was occupied.

    EDIT: My hometown is an old Venetian walled town has around 5.000 people living in it, but had over 10.000, all within the walls years ago before people started moving away. It's like 1/100th size of walled Constantinople, and there are no large buildings since they are heritage protected, most of them are at the most 3 stories high, and the town has parks and churches aplenty. So it's not really that hard for me to imagine 300.000 people living in Constantinople.
    I think the biggest problem is supply of food and water. With modern food supply chains it's possible, but in the past most of the people would support their living with own gardens and fields. I think they settled outside the walls because they could cultivate land (part time).

    The main advantage of McEvedy over the (other) historians is that he was a medical doctor, epidemiologist and demographer, and he'd assess the numbers by himself by field trips, not using the numbers imagined by the ancient authors.

  2. #8862

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    I hope the TGC members aren't annoyed by us talking about this

    Yeah i do get your point, i just think it's not giving enough credit to the ingenuity of people in those time. Supply was harder for sure, but Constantinople had huge harbors and an excellent road system. Since there weren't any large cities close to Constantinople, the closest real city being Thessaloniki, most of the supplies from the surrounding areas were made to supply the City.

    Keep in mind, we had some huge cities before modern times like London or better example Vienna. Vienna had close to 2.000.000 people in the late 20th century. And sure they used trains to supply the city, but trains alone cannot be reason enough, especially with lack of huge harbors, which should somehow nullify the advantage of trains. London had 1.000.000 people in the late 18th century; sure technology evolved, but there is no way the technology allowed 20x better supplies compared to 500 years before. England also had a far larger population per km2 compared to the Roman Empire in the 10th century and around, and plenty more of large cities to supply, and it was doable for them.

    Constantinople also had a huge amount of cisterns for water storage all over the city and the aqueduct of Valens supplying it with fresh water as well.

    So yeah, i don't really buy those really low figures. We have plenty of visitors to Constantinople that came from "Large" European cities that mentioned how the size of the City dwarfed their hometowns, there wasn't any report that i know of of someone coming from a city of 20.000 people saying that Constantinople is just twice it's size.

  3. #8863
    _Tartaros_'s Avatar "Harzschütze"
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    no problem, at first i was astonished about this low numbers too.
    Europe has gone through rough time´s back then.

    Central Europe, Gaul and later Germany was more populated 200 bc then many parts of the former roman empire at 800 ad

  4. #8864
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by _Tartaros_ View Post
    Central Europe, Gaul and later Germany was more populated 200 bc then many parts of the former roman empire at 800 ad
    Indeed. We're living in a "growth" paradigm: all the time everything goes up, while there're collapses. I recall Ward-Perkins is interestingly talking about the collapse of the Roman Empire in this lecture.

    @Anubis: I see what you mean but I still don't buy the high numbers. I think that there's enormous difference in productivity of the people and a huge city needs to have a large and efficient countryside to be provided with food - and to have the citizens employed with production of something for (administration services included). The move from organic sources of energy to broader sources created a huge difference - partly analysed by, eg, John Landers in this book.

  5. #8865

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Indeed very interesting stuff. I still think your estimates are a bit too low, but maybe the old 500.000 people is delusional as well. I don't remember who it was, but i know a Venetian was really impressed by the size of Constantinople when visiting, at which point Venice was i think the biggest city in Europe, and he said that Constantinople dwarfs it. It is probably more on the sheer size than population.

    Regardless, i think they should have more people at the game start, no matter which numbers we accept. There are plenty of cities with 2.500 households at the start, and Constantinople only being 2.5x size i think is too conservative no matter how we look at it

    Thanks for the info btw, really interesting to think about

  6. #8866
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    right,
    but it´s more a reason to lower the number in all the other cities, but the game mechanics won´t work this way. it´s still a game and putting 90% at village + town level is kind of odd.

  7. #8867

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    From a pure gameplay point of view, giving Constantinople a large population at the start may be a problem for the Roman AI, as it will lead to higher unrest and the AI has a habit of moving the capital early.

  8. #8868
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by Anubis88 View Post
    i know a Venetian was really impressed by the size of Constantinople when visiting, at which point Venice was i think the biggest city in Europe, and he said that Constantinople dwarfs it. It is probably more on the sheer size than population.
    afaik, the highest population number for Venice in the Middle Ages was 100000. Venice never was the biggest city in Europe. iirc, Milan achieved 175000 and was the biggest in the High Middle Ages, Palermo and Codoba were in the forefront for some time but earlier (10-11th c), or maybe rather Constantinople (9-12th c.). Then Paris, to be overtaken by Kunstantinye in 16th c., and then, perhaps, by London.

    Quote Originally Posted by Kavhan Isbul View Post
    the AI has a habit of moving the capital early.
    Could you elaborate on it? I haven't got a clue when the AI would move a capital. I though it wouldn't ever do it.
    Last edited by Jurand of Cracow; January 12, 2022 at 05:42 PM.

  9. #8869
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    moving the captial is hardcoded. the CAI allways move to the optimum position (trade + public order)

  10. #8870

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by Jurand of Cracow View Post
    afaik, the highest population number for Venice in the Middle Ages was 100000. Venice never was the biggest city in Europe. iirc, Milan achieved 175000 and was the biggest in the High Middle Ages, Palermo and Codoba were in the forefront for some time but earlier (10-11th c), or maybe rather Constantinople (9-12th c.). Then Paris, to be overtaken by Kunstantinye in 16th c., and then, perhaps, by London.
    I don't remember who wrote it, but he did say Venice was the largest city at the time. His words, not mine . That said, i find it weird how you are willing to accept the figure of 175.000 for Milan, but not 200.000 for Constantinople. You cannot really compare the fame of the 2 cities relatively to their size. If you are arguing that Constantinople had less than 100.000 people, then surely Milan had less as well. There wasn't much difference in supply logistics from the 10th to 15th centuries.

  11. #8871
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by Anubis88 View Post
    I don't remember who wrote it, but he did say Venice was the largest city at the time. His words, not mine . That said, i find it weird how you are willing to accept the figure of 175.000 for Milan, but not 200.000 for Constantinople. You cannot really compare the fame of the 2 cities relatively to their size. If you are arguing that Constantinople had less than 100.000 people, then surely Milan had less as well. There wasn't much difference in supply logistics from the 10th to 15th centuries.
    Let's look for other sources on this number, I think this is interesting, and I'm not in the position tell it with confidence. I just got swayed by the arguments that most of the numbers told in the books are products by vivid imagination of both old authors and new historians - and McEvedy exposes well the sources of this misunderstandings.

    Quote Originally Posted by _Tartaros_ View Post
    moving the captial is hardcoded. the CAI allways move to the optimum position (trade + public order)
    thanks for the info!
    Last edited by Jurand of Cracow; January 13, 2022 at 06:21 AM.

  12. #8872
    Antiokhos Euergetes's Avatar Protector Domesticus
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Well you hope that the human settlers who built the real cities,put their capital city in such a location too

  13. #8873
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    even so, if rus viking, steppe horsemen and mountainoius hillbilly´s from villages and towns less then a 1.000 people came to Constantinople - a 200.000 inhabitant big cities must have look like outer space. i´m not sure about place like babylon and ktetisophon at this time - but those areas may have also bigger numbers for urban centers.

  14. #8874
    Antiokhos Euergetes's Avatar Protector Domesticus
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Indeed, just look at the long term affect Constantinople would have on the Rus

  15. #8875
    AnthoniusII's Avatar Μέγαc Δομέστικοc
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    In its high pick (8th-11th centuries) Constantinople had recovered the Justinian's Plauque and reached half a milion inhabidants .Only the Hippodrome teams offered 10000 armed men each to the city's "security" and defence. We exclude the Real Guarisson forces. Nottice the as real Greco-Romans the city had thousands of two to four store houses that did not exist in western europe untill 15th century.
    In recent measurements Paris could be in Constantinople 5 times and London 6!
    Take a look tile by tile the city's structure. http://www.byzantium1200.com/tiles.html
    Nottice that there is an agricultural area between the urban center and the land walls.
    This video about the water supply also gives a view of the urbanisation.
    https://youtu.be/uX4UJv-eIjQ
    https://youtu.be/hFXiLbnQhgQ
    Let me remind you that Nicopolis (the city Augustus build after Actium naval battle) reached almost 100000 inhabidants in 9th century and Thessalonike alsoi had similar population.
    In Middle East Islamic Urban centers with 50000 or more inhabidants were comon and that was a huge surprise toi 1st Crusaders that their "cities" had from 8 to 10000 inhabidands (the capitals).
    Last edited by AnthoniusII; January 14, 2022 at 10:27 AM.
    TGC in order to continue its development seak one or more desicated scripters to put our campaign scripts mess to an order plus to create new events and create the finall missing factions recruitment system. In return TGC will give permision to those that will help to use its material stepe by step. The result will be a fully released TGC plus many mods that will benefit TGC's material.
    Despite the mod is dead does not mean that anyone can use its material
    read this to avoid misunderstandings.

    IWTE tool master and world txt one like this, needed inorder to release TGC 1.0 official to help TWC to survive.
    Adding MARKA HORSES in your mod and create new varietions of them. Tutorial RESTORED.


  16. #8876

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Great videos AnthoniusII! I agree with you, i think people's ingenuity is underestimated by some scholars that want to make groundbreaking research to stand out. I really have no issue believing that it could house as many people.

    Jurand is basically arguing that all the population numbers are too high, including Constantinople.

    However I think the hippodrome offers a very good point; there was a reason it was able to hold 100.000 people in attendance. Even if you would argue people came from out of the city to watch the races, it's not possible that all the locals would visit the races in those events for various reasons. I'm pretty sure i've read about the hippodrome being packed at times as well. Think of modern stadiums and which % of population attends. Sure, in the Roman Empire a lot more people watched, but the city didn't completely freeze when the events were on, people were still working, you still have the children, the elderly, the injured, sick, non interested, monks etc that wouldn't attend so their numbers would add to the 100.000 watching the games.

  17. #8877
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    Quote Originally Posted by Anubis88 View Post
    However I think the hippodrome offers a very good point; there was a reason it was able to hold 100.000 people in attendance. Even if you would argue people came from out of the city to watch the races, it's not possible that all the locals would visit the races in those events for various reasons. I'm pretty sure i've read about the hippodrome being packed at times as well. Think of modern stadiums and which % of population attends. Sure, in the Roman Empire a lot more people watched, but the city didn't completely freeze when the events were on, people were still working, you still have the children, the elderly, the injured, sick, non interested, monks etc that wouldn't attend so their numbers would add to the 100.000 watching the games.
    A counter-argument to this claim is:
    - the written sources would always exaggerate on such details because all written sources are written on purpose - and in this case they're mostly to describe glory of the imperial court, of the city that's been seen in the journey etc. Just compare it to the writing of St. Ambrosius of late 4th century who described the Italian cities lying in ashes. He had his own agenda and wrote what was useful for this agenda. The archeologist provinde strikingly different picture: the apex of the Roman urbanization in Italy. I thing this is a smilar story with that hippodrome fully packed with people: the authors wanted to convery the greatness of ceremonies, so the hippodrome was packed. They even may have felt like this next to the emperor, but what they would know about the rear rows? Would they convey truth? Not necessarily - their testimonies need to be checked against the other sources.
    - even the archeological evidence must be scrutinized very carefuly: many cities from the Roman Empire times would have amphitheaters of unnecessary bit size - it was because the cities competed among themselves who can build a bigger one, and who is first in the hierarchy. Just compare it to the skyscrapers in the Emirates or Saudi Arabia - they're building skyscrapers to show off, not because it's needed due to the limited land available (as it is in New York or elsewhere).
    Last edited by Jurand of Cracow; January 15, 2022 at 06:46 AM.

  18. #8878
    _Tartaros_'s Avatar "Harzschütze"
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    that´s a good point. many of those buildings where for show and might only

  19. #8879
    AnthoniusII's Avatar Μέγαc Δομέστικοc
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    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    To clarify some things.
    In Italy and Spain there were great Urban centers as well ...In Italy despite the Justinian campaign Gothic , Lombard and ither settlers filled the gap Roman citizens left migrated to the south Italy.
    In Spain Muslims always favored great urban centers for more defensible abillity and commerse consentration. Those urban centers that remained small -always in comparisson to the rest of europe- were in the middle and west one. When Constantinople reached its high pick -later started to decline in polulation- Paris had 15000 inhabidants and London had 10000! Those were the biggest urban centers in western europe. In 8th century in the last Viking assault against Paris the city had a wooden palisade to defend and ONLY one half build stone tower! Bricks were unknown to the west untill the end of the 1st crusade. The average big urban center in the west was about 4000-6000 inhabidants when the average big urban center in Itlay ,Spain , Balknans, Middle East was 40000-50000 inhabidants. Remember that in the west urbanisation started actually after the new restart of stone mason in arount 1200 aka after the 2nd Crusade. Untill then wooden castles and small vikkges were the standard.
    TGC in order to continue its development seak one or more desicated scripters to put our campaign scripts mess to an order plus to create new events and create the finall missing factions recruitment system. In return TGC will give permision to those that will help to use its material stepe by step. The result will be a fully released TGC plus many mods that will benefit TGC's material.
    Despite the mod is dead does not mean that anyone can use its material
    read this to avoid misunderstandings.

    IWTE tool master and world txt one like this, needed inorder to release TGC 1.0 official to help TWC to survive.
    Adding MARKA HORSES in your mod and create new varietions of them. Tutorial RESTORED.


  20. #8880

    Default Re: The Great Conflicts main discussion thread. Please post here!

    By the way, i asked the question about Constantinople on reddit, where, to my surprise, there's a dedicated Byzantium subreddit, and basically everyone says that Constantinople's numbers were far higher than what McEvedy suggest. They said he is far from an expert but a popular history writer that lacks the knowledge to make such claims since he is applying modern methodology without actual knowing the historical details but in a vacuum.

    You can check out the thread here if you are interested, i think that some very good points are raised, often sourced - https://www.reddit.com/r/byzantium/c..._of_byzantium/


    Also i hope this is the right place to give feedback on my campaign so far;

    First of all, the mod really is amazing. It is clear that it's in early stages, but it's great. This is from 72 turns as the Romans; i play on H/H with the PiterAI or what's it called, the one deemed more aggressive. I don't know which difficulties are suggested though.

    1) The Chandax Emirate started really strong and annoying for me, they invaded and conquered both Naxos and Rhodes in my first campaign which i quit because of the crashes. In the 2nd run, the one i'm talking about above, they tried to do the same but i was prepared and sunk their first few attempts. They made fullstack army invasion in just 1 ship units which was easy to sink, and they stopped doing it after a while. Now they have no navy, but 5-6 full stacked armies just wondering around Crete, without trying to invade anyone. It's a shame, they really added another dimension to the defence of the Empire, a faction that you always had to worry about and could basically take any settlement with the armies they had before you could react. Very realistic, hopefully there's a way to make them wake up again, maybe if this persist even script some "pirate reinforcements" or something to add them a small fleet from time to time and make them a threat again if you are not super vigilant as the player.

    2) No trouble in the East - my Eastern border is really too pacified. There are no real issues there, the Abassids are very timid, they would be delighted to even ally with me without any issues. It really allows the player to not think about that area at all. I would suggest the Abassids getting "reinforcements" from Baghdad on some intervals, to represent that their empire was larger than what's portrayed in the map. A combination of armies and money would probably help them be more aggressive towards Rome; and they should kinda hate the Romans, they should really be against an alliance. Also, the Paulicans would be a bigger threat if they ever actually tried to take a settlement. As it is, they are just sitting there until you get a strong enough army to defeat them, and then they are not a problem anymore.

    3) No trouble in the north either. The Bulgarians are also happy staying at home, again they would be happy to ally with me. I don't know if it's because i chose the wrong AI (I declined when the option was available at the start, thinking I'm choosing the more aggressive AI). In 72 turns there was no issue with them, which allows me to really build up my empire in peace, which was hardly every the case in real life for the Romans.

    4) It seems like this mod tries to be as historical as possible, and with that i noticed that for example Taranto wasn't conquered by the Romans until 880. Even Bari wasn't really Roman at the start; it was conquered by Louis II of Italy in 871, and was only given to the Romans in 885, even though i can't find any data if it was voluntary or not, but it seems so. I think it would be nice to update the map to show this, the Romans need as many challenges as they can so that you really get into the feeling of how it was back then.

    5) I think the generals are too strong in TGC, and probably because of that the battles are really hard and imho not too realistic, because it's really hard to make any enemy break, especially if it's not the cheapest units. I've had battles with 80% casualties on both sides, with nobody wanting to rout. I think there might be too many generals with maximum stars and huge morale bonuses. They are also often terminators. I was annoyed at Basil not dying, so i took him alone and attacked a full Bogomil stack straight in the middle. I had it at speed x6, the entire unit apart from Basil died in less than 10s among the spears, but Basil took almost another 2 minutes to die alone surrounded by 2500 Bogomils Talk about being strong . So i would suggest slighting lowering the command skills and morale bonuses of the generals. As the Romans i have already 10 family members which are elite generals, and it shouldn't be that easy imho, because then the best don't really pop out over the average, and it doesn't really matter who your general is.

    6) Some more troop variety would be nice. Not saying make new units, i know how hard and time consuming it is, but some regional flavor of already existing units would go a long way. Yes in can recruit a few Italian units, but overall the Roman army is completely the same if recruited on Sicily or in Armenia. I would suggest the ability to recruit for example some muslim units, either as mercenaries in the east and south, and some frankish or Langobardian in Italy. It would add some diversity to the armies without needing to add new units.

    Hope this helps a bit

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