Charlemagne DLC Incoming?

[Darios]

To the layman, the Bulgarian and ERE lack the Romanticism and folklore that the Saxons, Franks and Celts do.

I get what you're saying, but I would really stay away from statements like this. There is an entire folklore of medieval Greek epic poetry concerning Akritai. Also, from what I know, Bulgarians (including their "laymen") have tons of tales and folklore stemming from this period. It was essentially their golden age.

Like I said, I get that CA is aiming at a particular and powerful market here, but please do not belittle other cultures with such statements.

That`s why I`m not a fan of Campaign DLCs. The FOTS one for S2 being an exception.

Yeah dude, mini-campaign DLCs really do not impress me anymore because they will always be half-baked to a large extent. I think that people should look at CA's recent (R2/Attila) history with mini-campaigns and really question what they're doing here...

[FrozenmenSS]

That doesn't make for better gameplay or is necessarily more interesting.

To the layman, the Bulgarian and ERE lack the Romanticism and folklore that the Saxons, Franks and Celts do.

Just because something is more advanced doesn't make it more fun or more worthy of inclusion. What makes campaigns and games memorable are the characters and the story that unfolds. I'm sorry if you disagree but the saga of the Charlemagne, the Vikings, Normans, Anglo-Saxons and Britons will be hugely popular for the majority of CA's target audience. It's a fascinating period, frequently referred to in our culture. You watch TV in the UK, France, Germany or even the US there will programs about the Celts, Saxons, Franks, Romans and Vikings - but you will hardly hear of the Slavic kingdoms. They do not have the mass appeal that the Westerners do.

The Slavic kingdoms may incite references to feats of great statesmanship and technology and that's great - but the Saxons and Franks and Celts and Vikings conjure images of bloodshed and heroic warriors - at least in popular culture. Tropes are important.

Maybe the Bulgarians Had their Charlemagne Figure at that Age. Maybe he Expanded 3 times the size of the bulgarian empire , maybe he defeated the 60 000-80 000 Byzantine Army as a revenge for the Sac of the Bulgarian Capital Pliska at the battle of the Varbitza pass and Killed the Byzantine Emperor and woulded his son - heir to the throne and he daid also from his wounds. Maybe He defeated ultimately the Avars not Charlemagne.

I wonder if CA is even aware of the titanic struggle that was going on between the Roman Empire and the First Bulgarian Empire at the time.

First Bulgarian empire under Khan Krum https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krum He was The Charlemagne Figure of Eastern Europe.Both Rulers died in 814ad.

And both Bulgarian and Byzantine Empires didnt collapsed in the next 50 years like the Charlemagne's one







814 ad



I feel pity for the customers from Eastern Europe that wanted more Nomads and Slavs as playable factions....

[Kraut]

And both Bulgarian and Byzantine Empires didnt collapsed in the next 50 years like the Charlemagne's o

The Frankish Empire did not "collapse", it was divided between Charlemagne´s grandsons. If you consider this a "collapse", then the Roman Empire "collapsed" in 395 AD

[FrozenmenSS]

The Frankish Empire did not "collapse", it was divided between Charlemagne´s grandsons. If you consider this a "collapse", then the Roman Empire "collapsed" in 395 AD

there was a civil war back then and when it showed that neither side would win - they just split the empire = collapse

[Kraut]

there was a civil war back then and when it showed that neither side would win - they just split the empire = collapse

A treaty ending a war is not a "collapse".
They split the empire becaue it was Frankish tradition to do so.

The division reflected an adherence to the old Frankish custom of partible or divisible inheritance amongst a ruler's sons, rather than primogeniture (i.e., inheritance by the eldest son) which would soon be adopted by both Frankish kingdoms.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Verdun

[Charerg]

Out of curiosity, how reliable are the numbers concerning the battle of Varpitza pass? As 60k-80k men on both sides sound rather exaggerated numbers for a medieval battle. Certainly later medieval battles never came even close to these numbers.

In terms of comparisons between Charlemagne and Krum, I'm not exactly an expert on Balkan history, but I'd venture a guess that despite his successes, Krum's legacy would ultimately be shortlived if compared to that of Charlemagne. After all, the latter was seen as the ideal model of a christian king all through the middle ages. Also, the medieval "Holy Roman Empire" and Kingdom of France both had their origins in Charlemagne's realm, whereas the First Bulgarian Empire was conquered in 1018.

That said, history is hardly a pissing contest between who was more advanced, lasted longer, or whatever. So, I don't question that the East European theater would no doubt be interesting at this time and prove a good subject for a campaign. But I think that probably should be a separate campaign, as long as we're talking about these DLC campaigns, which are intentionally limited in scope in order to focus on one conflict.

Edit:

Another question out of curiosity: Was the Bulgarian elite still Turkic during early 9th century? It would seem so as you give Krum the title 'Khan' (also, is Krum a Turkic name?).

2nd Edit:

As as sidenote, wasn't the Bulgarian Empire formed by a confederation of 'Barbaric' tribes? In essence, its formation wasn't that different from the western Germanic Kingdoms.

[Kraut]

So, I don't question that the East European theater would no doubt be interesting at this time and prove a good subject for a campaign.

Absolutely.

[Darios]

In terms of comparisons between Charlemagne and Krum, I'm not exactly an expert on Balkan history, but I'd venture a guess that despite his successes, Krum's legacy would ultimately be shortlived if compared to that of Charlemagne. After all, the latter was seen as the ideal model of a christian king all through the middle ages. Also, the medieval "Holy Roman Empire" and Kingdom of France both had their origins in Charlemagne's realm, whereas the First Bulgarian Empire was conquered in 1018.

Not going to deny that Charlemagne was seen as the father of medieval Western Europe, but the legacy of the First Bulgarian Empire also had long and far reaching consequences. The Christianization of Bulgaria had a significant influence on Eastern Europe. The language spoken by the Bulgarians at the time, Old Bulgarian (Don't kill me for this Magister Militum Flavius Aetius), became Old Church Slavonic and had a heavy influence on Orthodox Christian countries in Eastern Europe. Medieval and modern Romanian words involving religion are usually derived from Bulgarian. The influence of Old Bulgarian on literary and religious Russian is significant. The Bulgarian Empire probably also facilitated the transmission of the Cyrillic alphabet throughout Slavic/Orthodox Europe.

This isn't a boxing match or anything, I understand the appeal of Charlemagne, just saying that there were other powerful influences in play in Europe at the same time.

That said, history is hardly a pissing contest between who was more advanced, lasted longer, or whatever. So, I don't question that the East European theater would no doubt be interesting at this time and prove a good subject for a campaign. But I think that probably should be a separate campaign, as long as we're talking about these DLC campaigns, which are intentionally limited in scope in order to focus on one conflict.

The beauty of the Imperator Augustus campaign was that I could do the Iceni Rebellion, the Dacian Wars, the Roman-Parthian Wars, the Roman-German wars, the Roman Civil War, carve out an existence for Armenia, or even try to reforge the grandeur of Ptolemaic Egypt in the same campaign. It's something that I always find myself wanting to replay because there are so many different options. I do not see why CA could not include the Roman and Bulgarian Empries in Charlemagne simply for more variety and the replayability factor, especially if it is going to be the last DLC for Attila.

[AnthoniusII]

That doesn't make for better gameplay or is necessarily more interesting.

To the layman, the Bulgarian and ERE lack the Romanticism and folklore that the Saxons, Franks and Celts do.

Just because something is more advanced doesn't make it more fun or more worthy of inclusion. What makes campaigns and games memorable are the characters and the story that unfolds. I'm sorry if you disagree but the saga of the Charlemagne, the Vikings, Normans, Anglo-Saxons and Britons will be hugely popular for the majority of CA's target audience. It's a fascinating period, frequently referred to in our culture. You watch TV in the UK, France, Germany or even the US there will programs about the Celts, Saxons, Franks, Romans and Vikings - but you will hardly hear of the Slavic kingdoms. They do not have the mass appeal that the Westerners do.

The Slavic kingdoms may incite references to feats of great statesmanship and technology and that's great - but the Saxons and Franks and Celts and Vikings conjure images of bloodshed and heroic warriors - at least in popular culture. Tropes are important.

My friend if western europeans have a lack of knowlege about world history and consendrate only in their local history is a matter of incomplete education system.
Few know , for example, that St Patrick tought Irish people the Christianity we today call Orthodoxy and only UNDER the english invasions, Irish followed Catholicism!
Few know that it was Great Moravia that gave East Frankia the needed time -defending Christianity against Magyars and other pagans-to safely transform to Ottonian "Germanic" state.
Also very few Germans know that their eastern Germanic tribes in the south shores of Baltic sea were actually a merge of Germans and Slavs! (There goes the Arian race myth).
Few Germans and europeans know that NO western european can call him/her self Arian because the only real Arians are the "Iranians"!!
About romantisism. Mr Skourletis that has an experty in Digenis Acritas epic songs and poems that, rectreatd in the Slavic,Russian and Arabic versions too, found a version also in Belgium!
The Belgic poem follows the roman acritae songs style but it has a Belgic hero!
Actually western literature based on Epic songs and tales that Arabs provided to europeans through their libraries in Cordoba!

Out of curiosity, how reliable are the numbers concerning the battle of Varpitza pass? As 60k-80k men on both sides sound rather exaggerated numbers for a medieval battle. Certainly later medieval battles never came even close to these numbers.

In terms of comparisons between Charlemagne and Krum, I'm not exactly an expert on Balkan history, but I'd venture a guess that despite his successes, Krum's legacy would ultimately be shortlived if compared to that of Charlemagne. After all, the latter was seen as the ideal model of a christian king all through the middle ages. Also, the medieval "Holy Roman Empire" and Kingdom of France both had their origins in Charlemagne's realm, whereas the First Bulgarian Empire was conquered in 1018.

That said, history is hardly a pissing contest between who was more advanced, lasted longer, or whatever. So, I don't question that the East European theater would no doubt be interesting at this time and prove a good subject for a campaign. But I think that probably should be a separate campaign, as long as we're talking about these DLC campaigns, which are intentionally limited in scope in order to focus on one conflict.

Edit:

Another question out of curiosity: Was the Bulgarian elite still Turkic during early 9th century? It would seem so as you give Krum the title 'Khan' (also, is Krum a Turkic name?).

2nd Edit:

As as sidenote, wasn't the Bulgarian Empire formed by a confederation of 'Barbaric' tribes? In essence, its formation wasn't that different from the western Germanic Kingdoms.

About numbers of soldiers...
Western historians never doupt Roman legioners numbers or the numbers of their enemies, they also do not doupt the numbers of the armies of wesrtern armies.
They do doupt about the numbers of eastern armies though , starting from Marathon and end to the siege of Constantinople in 1453.
But lets look numbers in a demographic way.
Balkans had a huge number of great urban centers that Roman citizens found "refuge" when several hundreds of thousands of slavs "took control" of the countryside by creating their villages the ones Romans called Sclaveniae!
In 9th century Nikkopolis (the city August build to celebrate his victory over Mark Anthony) had a poppulation of 250000 people when Paris had only 15-18000 inhabbitands durring the viking siege!
The Romano-Bulgarian wars lasted decades simply because both sides could recruit supporters from the cities they gained and re-gained!
If the Roman Empire could support 180000 cavalrymen (stratiotae) then we safely can assume that its main opponets could field atleast half of them (in their cases both infantrymen and horsemen).
A number of 100000 warriors in total , that could lead to an expedition army of 70000 men is not over estimated for sure.
Also remember that each castle owner in feudal europe could field from 100-500 horsemen or warriors in total!
Only Constantinople's guarrison had -in the glorius days- 50000 men!
Now imagine two huge states with great urban centers with an average of inhabbidands of 15-100000 people , not to include cities like Thessalonike or Nikkopolis that could have more than 200000 people.
Bulgarians were NEVER turkic people. If we want to describe them as accurate as possible we can assume that Bulgars transformed to Bulgarians after merging their steppe tribes with slavic ones , trying to reach the lands we today call Bulgaria and finally they merged with the local poppulation of that area.
Romans called Turks only Magyars (black or north Turks) and NOT Bulgarians.

[Charerg]

Well, no doubt many kingdoms and empires (including Charlemagne's) could field a 100 000 "on paper", but whether it was practical to do so is a different matter. Belisarius, for example, is stated to have fielded about 20k men in his campaigns. Similarly at Callinicum the Sassanid Persians are reputed to have 20k, 50k at Dara. I'm using wikipedia as a source for this, btw. Also, it was fairly rare for even the Roman Empire at the height of its power to field numbers exceeding 50 000. I also highly doubt that Constantinople's "regular garrison" was 50k, if they could truly field such numbers then the Byzantine/Roman Empire would never have fallen.

Also, the so-called "western historians" probably do question the numbers of any battle, if there are grounds for doing so, or the numbers appear exaggerated when compared to other engagements of the era. Obviously some like Herodotus' claims of 2,5 Million Persians at Thermopylae are vast exaggerations, one does not even have to be an expert to see that this is an impossible number for an army of that era.

In addition, a few remarks concerning the numbers of the Slavs that conquered the Balkans and defeated the Roman/Byzantine armies, quoted from this excellent thread on the Invasio Barbarorum forums. A direct quote from DukeofSerbia:

I will continue to quote from Procopius of Caesarea - History of Wars, XXXVIII

- At about this time an army of Sclaveni amounting to not more than three thousand crossed the Ister River without encountering any opposition, advanced immediately to the Hebrus River, which they crossed with no difficulty, and then split into two parts. Now the one section of them contained eighteen hundred men, while the other comprised the remainder.

Notice: 3 000 Slavic warriors divided into two groups – 1 800 and 1 200 men.

- And although the two sections were thus separated from each other, the commanders of the Roman army, upon engaging with them, both in Illyricum and in Thrace, were defeated unexpectedly, and some of them were killed on the field of battle, while others saved themselves by a disorderly flight.

Two divided groups easily defeated Romans in whole Illyricum and Thrace! But how? And then Romans send elite cavalry units:

- Now after all the generals had fared thus at the hands of the two barbarian armies, though they were far inferior to the Roman forces in number, one section of the enemy engaged with Asbadus. This man was a guard of the Emperor Justinian, since he served among the candidati, as they are called, and he was also commander of the cavalry cohorts which from ancient times have been stationed at Tzurullum, the fortress in Thrace, a numerous body of the best troops.

So, Romans sent elite cavalry candidati under command of Asbadus to stop those bands! And what happened:

- These too the Sclaveni routed with no trouble, and they slew the most of them in a most disgraceful flight; they also captured Asbadus and for the moment made him a prisoner, but afterwards they burned him by casting him into a fire, having first flayed strips form the man's back.

Notice: elite cavalry was routed with NO TROUBLE and Asbadus was captured. Poor him - what they did to him.

Note that several Roman armies were defeated by a force comprising just 3000 Slavs. With this in mind they could have hardly numbered in the tens of thousands. It's simply illogical to ascribe such high numbers for them.

EDIT:
Another quote from DukeofSerbia, from the same thread (both quotes from post #45, btw):

Now I will quote from Florin Curta – The Making of Slavs: History and Archeology of the Lower Danube Region c500 – 700, Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001

What Curta wrote about Slavic raids?

- Later, this grandiose program was extended to the northwestern Balkans, following the defeat of the Ostrogoths and the conquest of Dalmatia. Along the Danube and in the immediate hinterland, forts were relatively small (less than 1 hectare of enclosed area).Each one may have been garrisoned by a numerous (tagma), the minimal unit of the early Byzantine army, with up to 500 men. This may explain why small armies of Sclavenes (such as those responsible for the raids in the late 5405 and early 5505) had no problems taking a relatively large number of forts. It also explains why Sclavene or Avar armies, no matter how large, moved with remarkable speed after crossing the Danube, without encountering any major resistance. The excavation of forts and the estimation of the number of soldiers who may have manned these forts in the Iron Gates area indicate that the entire sector may have relied for its defense on forces amounting to some 5,000 men, the equivalent of a Roman legion.

- The 5,000 warriors who attacked Thessalonica at some point before 586, nevertheless, is a likely figure. In any case, there is no reason to doubt the ability of Archbishop John, who may have been an eyewitness, to give a gross estimate of the enemy's force. If so, then this indicates that raids strong enough to reach distant targets, such as Thessalonica, usually aimed at mobilizing a military force roughly equivalent to a Roman legion. Furthermore, there is no evidence, until the early reign years of Heraclius, of an outright migration of the Slavs (Sclavenes) to the region south of the Danube river.

Once again, the Slavic numbers were just 5 000, yet this force was able to reach Thessalonica and pose a major threat. Again, it seems unlikely that Roman military stationed in the Balkans could have fielded a field army much larger than 20k at this time (the reign of Maurice).

[AnthoniusII]

True...but you failed to see that the descriptions are for raids and ambushes!
In the Danube front we have descriptions about Black OPs from Romans that sent small units to hunt down and kill tribal leaders and ambush units.
Slavic warriors were famous for their ambushes ussing poisoned arrows and javelins. But recent discoveries allowed historians to find out that slavic warriors were heavily influenced by Avars!
And Avars had one of the most capable cavalry that influenced ALL europe! Even the famous "norman" kite shield was actually an Avaric one.
In the balkans , Slavs and Bulgarians had to adopt in the heavily mountainear terain with huge forrests.
Speaking about armies though. Basill II blinded 15000 Bulgarians that were the last large army of theirs (not including town and castel guarissons).
15000 may seam too few, but that army was the last of the armies that fought for 50 years! When Basill II died the empire had 180000 men in army and almost 400 warships!
But the frontiers were also huge comparing to the ones of feudal kingdoms of the west too. So..large states like Romans or Bulgarians had to keep a long line of borders and cities with capable guarissons.

[Darios]

Avaric one.
In the balkans , Slavs and Bulgarians had to adopt in the heavily mountainear terain with huge forrests.

Torna torna frate!

[ayylmango]

You are extremely biased. Your nationalistic insecurity is on full display. Please, calm down with the nationalistic vitriol you spread everywhere on this forum. We get it, your country is not great today, but it's no reason to get upset about history and make up fantastical numbers like "50k garrison" or "1 million person slavic cities".

[Abdülmecid I]

In the 9th century, Nicopolis wasn't even the bishopric see of the region, Naupactus was, so I doubt that it had 200,000 people. btw, Paris' population was closer to 30,000. The Bulgarians are most probably of Turkic origin, almost every historian, based on the archaeological finds and their cultural characteristics, says so, the exception being a fringe "Bactrian origin" theory of a group of Bulgarian historians who cherrypicked a quote from an Armenian source and are closer, imo, to the ideas of Bogdan Filov, than Thycidides'. Finally, the number of soldiers that a state could possibly deploy depends (at least in the past) on its logistical capabilities. If you can't feed them, then they'll simply die from starvation and no fighting will be needed. That's why it is impossible that an army larger than 100,000 men has ever been deployed in the middle or ancient ages.

[Kraut]

(There goes the Arian race myth).
Few Germans and europeans know that NO western european can call him/her self Arian because the only real Arians are the "Iranians"!!

I don´t know where you get your Information about the alleged thinking of Germans and western Europeans, but please let me contribute:
NO sane German (but some hardcore Neonazi lunatics) think themselves being "Arians" or something like that. "Arian" was a Nazi Propaganda term and is so massively poisoned and frowned upon in Germany, you probably can hardly imagine. And every School kid learns where the Nazis took the name "Arians" from, so no worries: there is no "Arian myth" in Germany naymore, not after 1945

[Charerg]

One might also point out that "mountainous, highly forrested terrain" usually doesn't describe an area with a very high population density. Although the urban centers of the Mediterranean undoubtedly had much more population at the time than north European cities, it seems unlikely that the northern Balkans supported a greater population density than say, France or Germany at the period. Some regions like northern Italy were very likely much more densely populated than the northern Balkans.

Edit:
About the Bulgars: I'm not an expert, but it also seems the most likely possibility to me that the early Bulgarian elite was of Turkic ethnicity. That the Romans preferred to call them "Huns" or something else doesn't necessarily disprove this, they used a lot of archaic terms at times, like calling Goths 'Getae' (Dacians). The use of the title 'Khan' suggests a Turkic influence, as do the names of the monarchs (the ones I'm aware of, anyway). There's also the connection to the eastern Volga Bulgaria, and I've never heard the Volga Bulgars described as anything else than Turkic.

[Snelhest]

Good thing they're not including the Eastern ""romans"" in this campaign. The Byzantines were weak, corrupt and certainly not Roman any way so why waste time on them? This way is great, since we can get much more focus on the considerably more interesting germanic kingdoms. After all whats the point of including a bunch of weaklings larping as Romans who couldn't fight their way out of a wet papper bag in a game about war.

[Sharpe]

I wonder if CA is even aware of the titanic struggle that was going on between the Roman Empire and the First Bulgarian Empire at the time.

I have no doubt that CA have access to far greater historians and resources than we do. I've worked with museum storage collections and have seen researchers for media a few times, gaining access to sources not available to the public....

What you seeing is choice, don't blindly rush in accusing.

And back to my theme of common perception - Bulgaria to Western Europeans does not reflect war in CA's sense from the word itself like the word Frank or Saxon does. Most likely due to the country still being named Bulgaria, I guarantee you most Brits would associate Bulgaria with Dimitar Berbatov (sick player tbh), the migrant crisis and weekends away to Sofia. You'd be surprised how important a name is. No-one is downplaying their achievements - just their mass appeal.

Back OT, if there are Viking and Saxons I can finally justify playing this on loop in-game:

[barry12]

I'm a bit late to the party... but this is just what this game needs. so many mods are taking this game backwards into ancient times again, which I must say is getting rather tiresome, ancient warfare is all we've had since Rome 2, it will be nice to move nearer to medieval again. put some civility back into these ancient barbarian savages.

rather than scrolling through 14 pages of arguments on Bulgaria, can someone please tell me if there is any concrete info out on this yet?

Would love to know if this is going to be on a nice big grand-scale campaign map (like all Total War DLC campaigns should be!) and if it's coming out soon for example?

[Charerg]

I'm a bit late to the party... but this is just what this game needs. so many mods are taking this game backwards into ancient times again, which I must say is getting rather tiresome, ancient warfare is all we've had since Rome 2, it will be nice to move nearer to medieval again. put some civility back into these ancient barbarian savages.

rather than scrolling through 14 pages of arguments on Bulgaria, can someone please tell me if there is any concrete info out on this yet?

Would love to know if this is going to be on a nice big grand-scale campaign map (like all Total War DLC campaigns should be!) and if it's coming out soon for example?

All the "concrete info" is pretty much in the first post of the thread. Concrete info as in some (now removed) data that CA had let slip into the Modding Kit. There's also a nice pic of what the Campaign Map will probably look like in post #249 of the thread (on page 13).