Suggestion: Regional Capitols.

[Trueman.]

Hi.
I just have a suggestion I've been thinking about for some time, adding regional capitols, nothing as elaborate as R2TW's system, just a reduction to the "distance to capitol" percentage if you hold certain cities, like Al-Qahira for Egypt, or Baghdad for Iraq, such administrative centers were actually used in the Abbassid and Ummuyud period.


This imagine, although slightly inaccurate, shows the most important cities at the beginning of the Abbassid Caliphate, some of them were used as the aforementioned administrative centers.

[Silesian_Noble]

Oh I will write here shocking but true thing about the Iraq capitol. THE SETTLEMENT SHOULD NOT BE CALLED BAGHDAD! Its true name in Ummayad+Abbasid period was Madinat as-Salam - in translation probably City of Peace. The name Baghdad belonged to the old settlement (which had little importance) from Sassanid period. And it was brought back to life by Mongols after they conquered it in 1258y.

[Trueman.]

The area on which Baghdad was built was called Baghdad as early as the bronze age.
"The name Baghdad is pre-Islamic and its origins are under some dispute. Some say it comes from an Aramaic phrase that means "sheep enclosure". Others contend that the word comes from ancient Persianbagh meaning God, and dad meaning gift. "The gift of God...." During at least one point in history, it certainly seemed so. The name has been found as Baghdadu on Assyrian cuneiform records of the 9th century BC, and on Babylonian bricks bearing the Royal Seal of King Nebuchadnezzar II (6th century BC).^{[7][better source needed]} However it is related to previous settlements, which did not have any political or commercial power.When the Abbasid caliph, al-Mansur, founded a completely new city for his capital, he chose the name Madinat al-Salaam or City of Peace. This was the official name on coins, weights, and other official usage, although the common people continued to use the old name.^[8][9] By the 11th century, "Baghdad" became almost the exclusive name for the world-renowned metropolis.
There are several rival theories as to the etymology of the specific name Baghdad. The most widely accepted among these is that the name is a Middle Persian^{[10][11][12][13][14][15][16]} compound ofBag "god" and dād "given", translating to "God-given" or "God's gift", from which comes Modern Persian Baɣdād. This in turn can be traced to Old Persian.^[17] A less probable guess is thePersian compound bāğ "garden" and dād "fair", translating to "The fair garden".<sup>[8][9]"

It was also called Al-Zawra', which roughly translates to "the arched", referencing the city's gates.
And Baghdad wasn't there in the Ummuyud period,</sup>

[MIKE GOLF]

It would not be too difficult to implement this concept of having regional capitals with regional governors. The only way though to reduce to "distance to capital" penalties is to adjust the settings in the settlement_mechanics file. However you could give the governors ancillaries which can reduce squalor and provide other bonuses as well (authority, trade, etc). You can even make the regions inheritable by adding traits. I did something similar for TATW MOS so I know it could be done. It would require a whole lot of scripting to do this though. This way you could have governors for the various multi-region Byzantine Themes, etc....

[Trueman.]

Well I'm not very tech savvy, and I hate messing with the game files. Plus I'm getting like 145% unrest from distance to capitol effect, it'd just make sense to implement this feature.

[hameem123]

how will regional capitals work? judging that in M2TW in every single region there will be always only 1 single settlement/castle,or am I wrong? unlike in R2TW a single region can compose of 1 to 4 settlement/cities.

[Trueman.]

I said it doesn't have to work like RTW2, a script that lowers the distance to capitol when you hold certain settlements shouldn't be hard to write. For example, if you hold Cairo, the distance to capitol in Alexandria, Bilbeis, Dumyat, Aswan, Al-Usker, etc.

[MIKE GOLF]

I do not believe it is possible to have actual "regional capitals" using the MTW II engine. The only thing you can do that I am aware of to reduce the "distance to capital" penalty is to reduce it via the settle_mechanics.xml file which IMO should be done anyway to a lower level. If that is done than I may yet again reconquer all the former lands of the Diadochi and Alexander, having an empire from Greece to India, from the Crimea to Upper Egypt and so on.....

The only way to represent graphically a regional capital is to use an ancillary with some decent bonuses or possibly even have a constructable building in select provinces (Constantinople, Baghdad, Alexandria, Cairo, Damascus, Jerusalem, Antioch, etc.) and yes I would say that a factions capital can also be used as a "regional capital" as well. Actually, in Byzantineboys, Jizya, Kafirs & Dhimmis Mod you have the "Wali of Egypt, Wali of Damascus" etc, acting as a regional type governor. This is a good idea for at least an ancillary if not an actual building to be constructed.

It may be possible, though I doubt it, to script something that will lower the "distance to capital" penalty as one captures more cities that are marked as regional capitals.