The Reformation - idea in progress

[JoeyBritt]

The Reformation

As we all know, the shape of religion was changed drastically during the 16th Century with the advent of reformers like Martin Luther and John Calvin. However, it seems to me that whilst many mods (and the game itself) cover this period, none have actively worked to display this period of religious and social upheaval in any detail.


The Ideas

- The mod should protray the religious struggle in Europe and the manner in which the external world (namely the Turks) took advantage of this. The three main areas of Protestant vs/ Catholic are England, the HRE and France, with immediate impact from Spain (Armada, aid in French Wars of Religion), Italy (The focus of the HRE vs/ French rivalries) and the Constan/Istanbul region, which was a focus of much crusading.

- The time of the mod's start is fairly open to debate. My first impression would be an early 1500's start, with factions struggling to update tech to keep up with the new Revolution in arms. This will be interupted in the first 20 odd years by the arrival of Martin Luther and his reformation. Of course this will cause a "rebellion" in the HRE of Protestant states forming the Schmalkaldic League, who, I think at this time, should become a faction by their own right. (And hence maybe two campaigns, one that starts at this point, to allow the player to pick Protestant).

- In England Henry VIII's break with Rome will be an important event, shifting England from Catholic nation to a Protestant one, and hence giving a potential ally to the S.League of the HRE.

- Time passes in France, who are still at war in the dynastic struggle with the Habsburgs, until the rise of the Hugenot party, another protestant faction (and allies?).

- By this time, therefore, Europe is split into Catholic factions (namely France, Spain, Italy, the Papacy and the Habsburgs <HRE>) and the Protestants (England, Hugenots, S.League, various other regions).


Me, Myself and Eye

- All the while, the Turks are coming from the East and arriving as close as Vienna.

I am a historian by both studies and leisure and have recently been focused upon the effects of Luther's reformation on Germany and the French Wars of Religion between the Hugenots, the Royalists and the Catholic League, the English Reformation and The Military Revolution in C16th Europe.
As for modding, I have worked a bit on the original MTW, trying to create an Early Modern mod, but have fairly limited experience, but am willing to learn


What/Who is needed for this project

- Researchers - Whilst I can do a lot of this myself, spreading the work load is always nice!
- Coders - People to know what on earth is going on with the program code to allow the advent of various factions at various times etc. And to change religions around etc.
- Skinners - For the look of the program (loading pages, faction sheilds etc), not models or troops as the period and armies are pretty much the same as in the vanilla.
- Perhaps mappers - Add more provinces? Maybe make Europe larger and cut out africa etc?

Anyone interested?

Cheers,
Joey

[NagatsukaShumi]

This is a very untouched area of history and has so much potential, I hope that this one comes together, it has alot of interesting possibilities involved, you can even add to it with concentration towards the New World of the period later on, alot of potential available to a dedicated team.

[JoeyBritt]

Thank you very much. Yes, I think you idea of the New World is a great one. Maybe by decreasing the expansion of the map Eastwards, one could increase the amount of American terrain and hence expand the religious battle Westwards, with the likes of the pilgrim fathers.
I hope beyond hope that some skilled coders will help with this project, as although I can attempt to pick it up myself, vetarans always add so much to a project.

[=Omni=]

Ooh, this mod would be great!

However, maybe you could expand the scope of it to cover not only the religious wars, but also the discovery of the new world? Because currently there is Medieval: Total Realism in production, that will cover the timeline from 1080 up to 1453 and Pike & Musket mod from 1570 onwards. So there's over 120 year long gap between 1453 and 1570, that unfortunately covers one of the most interesting periods :( So a mod within this timeframe would be a blessing :P

Ahh, O'm only daydreaming ;)

[JoeyBritt]

Well that could be a good idea, as long as the coding would allow the advent of new factions so that the Prots could appear because the second main idea for a mod that I had which I chose the Reformation over, was the Miliatary Revolution, which occured pretty much in those dates. So I think incorporating an early start there into the mod would be great, if say the script for the Marian Reforms could be edited into a Miliatary Revolution script...but until we can unpack the files i guess we jsut have to wait.

thanks for the input and support!

[=Omni=]

As I've heard the emerging factions are still in MTW2, so having some of them pop out after introduction of Luther's theses shouldn't be a problem.

Yay, I feel so excited about filling the whole history with mods :D now we only need hellenic mods and dark agesmods :p