Axioms: Barbarian Invasion
Dynamic Social Evolution And Economic Osmosis Regarding Tribal Societies
Early Germanic Tribal Limitations
The evolution of the peripheral societies of the Roman Empire and their eventual conquest and semi-replacement of that empire are an incredible reserve of knowledge about how economic factors more than war were the transformative power of Rome. Rome was in conflict with multiple Imperial powers and advanced agricultural kingdoms and for obvious reasons we have a lot more information about those places and how they related to Rome. But we do know a lot about the Germanic socio-economic revolution caused by prolonged contact and border friction with Rome.
While the Celtic, Celtiberian, and in some cases Iberian and Gallic tribes were engaged in advanced agricultural practice and had moved slightly beyond subsistence society the north-central and north-eastern Germanic tribes primarily operated in low efficacy transitory substitence society. They didn’t engage in complex agricultural practices and they didn’t stick to permanent settlements, mostly because without complex agriculture the relatively unenriched topsoil farming they did required long fallow periods.
While Rome was capable of subduing Germanic tribes relatively easily through force of arms because of their superior technology and logistics as well as their advanced political and military organization what they couldn’t do, without taking a loss, is control the Germanic tribes or the area they lived across long timescales. The Romans marched well beyod the Rhine and they were aware of the tribes, resources, and geography even at the northern edge of what is now Polish land along the Baltic coast. Yet that land was never made part of the empire and the reason was simple.
The northern and eastern Germanic and Scythian tribes lacked the surplus food and labor to be valuable to the Romans and they didn’t have well exploited natural resources. You couldn’t get enough economic value out of them compared to the more settled societies farther south. This was relevant especially in the case where there was no competing power interfering in the land north was there anything beyond but the Baltic Sea.
Late Classical Germanic Advancement
From information we have about the 4th century we know that the Germanic tribes had advanced over time through service with Roman armies, economic and technological osmosis, and other factors into becoming much more economically interesting to the Romans and at the same time also more powerful militarily. Their argicultural advances meant that they had the surplus food and conesquently trading value to both interest the Romans and support a small full time if not professional military class. They could also engage, through military and economic encouragement, in larger more stable coalitions with each other.
Unfortunately for Rome they were experiencing a lot of internal problems just at the time that the Germanic tribes were gaining significant power. Contrary to popular belief the Romans employed a quite brilliant border diplomacy power using their foreign aid, as we should appropriately call their barbarian subsidy policy, to promote cooperative Germanic leaders, while using the big stick of the legions to cross the border every generation to beat down, quite easily, those tribes and confederations who were not behaving.
Had the Germanic tribes been at the same development stage in the 1st century as in the 4th it is likely Roman expansion would have reach the Baltic and North Sea coasts in many places where a viable river existed.
How This Matters For Axioms
Axioms models social, political, and economic systems in quite a bit more detail than any potential competitors, be they establish as Paradox is or not. This is a key factor in my goal of removing the dozens of overlapping modifiers with arbitrary causes that exist in typical grand strategy games.
Combined with a smaller focus on military this is why I consider Axioms a Fantasy DIP Strategy game. That is compared to 4X or GS games it focuses more on Diplomacy, Intrigue, and Politics. You can employ the strategy of Julian regarding your border lands or a variety of other diverse strategies. The former is not even possible in existing games much less the latter.
After the map is generated geographically a relatively consistent set of populations is generated in every province. Characters are generated after that as appropriate. Finally the simulation of fantasy history is set in motion. With some migration to lighten the food load on the provinces with harsher conditions you then would see a growth in population as small surpluses develop into capital which then creates a virtuous cycle of population growth. Of course after probably a few hundred years, around 1000 “turns”, grow will slow as the low hanging fruit as it were is picked.
Technological advancement will be in effect and depending on local conditions some areas will advance faster than others based on lucky technological boosts and also warfare and politics redistributing surplus around. Characters have a complex set of factors, part of the Consciousness class, that will impact how they employ their access to surplus. Research, capital production, warfare, magical advancement and so forth.
I am expecting, pending detailed testing, that with world gen as year zero it will take something like 4000 years for a significant percentage of the most productive areas to get to an imperial phase. It would be shorter if the political simulation didn’t cause a lot of infighting but that is the goal of that simulation to some degree. Internal conflict creates fun stories and slows down blobbing.
I expect most players to take the 4000 or 8000 year starts on the pre-genned maps in the base game. But you could start at 1000 or even 0 if you really, really wanted. There is some fun stuff you can do early but the limitations of low economic surplus limit stuff that makes up the broadest base of fun in later starts.
Imperial And Post Imperial Barbarians
Depending somewhat on the complex interactions of the simulation you will still have provinces, populations, and characters operating in societies similar to 1st century Germanic tribes even thousands of years into the game. In fact in very marginal parts of the world you could advance 10000 years and still have relatively low surplus small scale tribes.
Given the potential size of the world and time frame of the game you can have anything from a Victorian Era British Empire to a Stone Age tundra hunter gatherer operating at the same time. The technological and magi-technological systems don’t advance much beyond the Victorian age nor does the simulation support much beyond that.
So depending on some variance you could be 50000 years in stuck in a protracted and relatively static between two global super powers. You’d have to rely on intrigue and diplomacy rather than technological or economic advances to take the lead. Of course that is probably much longer into history than anyone will play. Unless you start 45000 years in I suppose.
More importantly gameplay wise you will often have the power to “uplift” David Brin style, undeveloped areas and populations to some degree. Well or farm slaves off people who can’t fight back.