Not really the same. Because Germany at least had being the part of the HRE as something of an identity. Italy just wasn’t as important either there. As a revolutionary nation it sounds good tho
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I think that the idea is to add Italians for a potential wider scenario, like the 30 years wars, the crimean wars, or the African colonization.
Also, not all Italians states were under foreign dominion, and the one that were it was for all the time period covered by aoe3.
It is true that it was a fragmented state, but savoy and Sardinia was actually a pretty important state, military and politically speaking, and Venice still was a important commercial trade hub in the mediterranean and with the Flanders, other than still having one of the most powerful fleet.
That wouldn’t be really accurate, savoy was for a brief time under napoleonic France, but so were Spain, Portugal and most of the HRE, they weren’t really “conquered” or “colonized”.
South Italy was it’s own kingdom, in the early colonial age was controlled by Spain, but it has never revolted.
The only one would be Milan and Venice during the Risorgimento, but they actually revolted against Austria-Hungary, which isn’t present in the game.
I think they they could fit in, I mean, sweden, germany and the ottomans has less colonies than Italy, also it still was an active player in the European theater.
I think that general idea is to take some characteristics of the most famous smaller states to integrate them into all Italy, but if one of them has to represent all Italy, it should be savoy-sardinia.
Savoy was a minor European power, it was at the mercy of France and Spain during most of the games timeframe. After the war in of Spanish Succession, and especially after the war of the Quadruple alliance when it’s got Sardinia and became a Kingdom it became more important. But that’s 220 years after the “start” of Age of Empire 3.
Venice was still important, but not close to what it was in the time of Age of Empires 2 for example, they got beaten back pretty badly by the Ottomans everywhere and while they expended in Italy they didn’t have too much power beyond their immediate lands. And the Venetian fleet was still powerful, that’s true, but i couldn’t compete first with the Turks and later was nowhere close to the juggernaut fleets that huge nations could field. Venice was just too small, and once the age of galleys was over they couldn’t compete with the Great Powers of Europe.
I’m a big fan of Spanish History, i even live in a city that was under Venetian rule for 700 years. But realistically they don’t deserve to be a faction prior to some others. If you want to go by big world powers that didn’t colonize the americas, you have to add nations/peoples like the Commonwealth, Oman, Persia etc… before you add Italians
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So is Napoleon, but it still present in the game, not all of the civs were powerf kingdoms when the america was discovered.
Savoy actually start to distinguish itself after the siege of Vienna, which is that late, and further strengthen the idea of some European scenario.
Yes that’s true, but still they were a rich state, and always maintained a strong fleet, even just before napoleon, it was the second mayor fleet in word, second only to England.
They did lose to the Ottomans, but that was mainly because some lands, like Greece wasn’t that worth it anymore after the discovery on the American and the Ottoman monopoly of the Silk Road, so they didn’t want to spend too much resources for defending them.
However I agree that they shouldn’t be a stand alone civ, that why merged with elements of savoy and other Italians states they could work.
I’m not against other civs too, and I agree that some take precedence, I just shared my view for a potential Italians civ, that may or may not come, before or after other ones.
However I still hope for more European scenarios, so danemak, Austria and Italians take come fisrt in my opinion.
There was no Italy during the timeframe of Aoe3, also Italian explorers were hired by other nations like Spain or Portugal so they didn’t even have colonies of their own and yeah i know the same could be said for Ottomans but i think the reasoning for having them in the game is that they were just too powerful of an empire to just completely ignore. There are other european civs i think would make more sense like Denmark.
Genoa (Corsica,Tabaraka,Crimea)
Venice (Venetian Ionian Islands, Venetian Dalmatia, Candia)
Then you have Noli, Ancona, Pisa, Ragusa that didn’t had colonies but had like overseas commercial zones in Byzantine, Spain, Portugal, Tunisia, Sicily, Malta, Levant and Algeria.
Yeah i think they deserve their own civ and fit in the context of the timeframe, as most of the colonies i’ve mentioned get dissolved in 1700’s by the encroaching Ottoman and French expansion.
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For that much there was no Italians even during the aoe2 time frame, instead the Italians were present during the last period covered by aoe3.
I mean, aoe was always known for bend history a bit…
Fair enough but Aoe2 is known for having an oversaturation of civs. The civs in Aoe3 are more based on nations than Aoe2 is and even the Germans were somewhat loosely connected through the HRE.
Exactly, the germans are now better depicted with the HRE, before it was Prussia, but both aren’t exactly Germany, Russia too didn’t really existed from the start of the time period of AoE3, not at least as they depicted it in the game.
It is true that aoe3 try to be more accurate, but there are the foundations to create a Italians civs, even if it just represents a patchwork of various smaller states (like the HRE after all…)
I just don’t know how they could make it work, the Italian civ with the tricolour flag would be very anachronistic. I guess they could add a more specific civ like Sicilians or Venetians but those countries weren’t really any powerhouses during the aoe3 timeframe.
The 4-in-1 solution is the most viable but then they should have that for Germans as well otherwise it would feel kinda weird how Venice and Sicily are in the game but not HRE states like Austria, Bavaria or Bohemia. In the end i think it gets too complicated for its own good.
Italy was never a powerful Kingdom until the really last days of the mod’s timeframe, unlike France which was the European superpower for the last 800 years, ofc not all the time with the rise of the Habsburgs and later England, but cant’ be compared to Italy.
Please provide a source for this. If they had such a huge fleet, why were they crushed by the Turks? Why did it take for the Battle of Lepanto to have an alliance with Spain and the Pope if the Venetian fleet was the 2nd largest? And after they lost the territory to the Turks the navy got smaller and smaller. There is no way they had a larger navy than the Dutch, French or Spanish.
Not true. What does the discovery of America have to do with that? If anything land was even more important since the other European powers could colonize and take new land there, while the Venetians couldn’t. They simply couldn’t hold the Ottomans at bay.
Never said that it was a super power, just that I would like to see them in the game, now that most of the European super powers are covered they could add some smaller states.
Mmm ok but it may takes some time, I read it time ago so I have to search it again.
I’m not talking about the time of Lepanto, I was talking later on. But yes, even at the time of Lepanto they had the second largest fleet, considering that they alone brought more of two thirds of the ships for the Holy league.
They lost vs the Ottomans because the Ottomans were a juggernaut, they were a huge self efficient nation, while the venetians alone couldn’t match their army on land, not without bigger nations to help them. They had the supremacy on water, and they tried to hold one to every fortresses that they had, but then they lack the manpower for really meet them in battle.
The discovery of the America and the route around Africa for spices and silk made Europe less dependent on Venice and other Italian cities for trade, up to that point they basically detained a monopoly.
Also, having no access to the Atlantic, and being cut out by the Ottomans form the Silk Road, they lost the prestige and power that they had before.
Listen if you say that nations like Denmark, or Poland, or Austria should take priority, I somehow agree, but I still think that there is room for more civs, and Italy could be a good addition to a European and African scenario.
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I don’t have an issue with that, i just have an issue with some of your claims which are obviously not true in order to boost your suggestion.
You will never be able to provide this source for example.
That’s because Venice brought all of their ships, while the Spanish Empire had most of it’s fleet in the Atlantic ocean. They never brought the big ships to the mediteranean. And the Venetians used mostly galleys which aren’t nearly as good as the Galleons and later ships of the line. And they most certainly didn’t have the 2nd largest navy later on.
It’s fine if you make a proposal, but at least give correct info and not make things up. Everybody is entitled to their ideas, just don’t create “fake news” to boost your agenda.
Wow, let’s calm down, I may be wrong, or I may had shared some flawed knowledge, my bad, I’m not historian, if I’ll find my source I’ll share it, otherwise you are correct of saying that I’m wrong, but I’m not sharing fake news, I’m onestly discussing ideas based on my actual knowledge, and frankly the accusation offends me.
Here I found my source, you were right, Venice in the 1775 wasn’t the second most powerful fleet, but it was still the fourth, after England, France and Spain, so in my opinion still worth of being notable in a potential aoe3 new civ.
I was gonna mention that!
Imagine how cool it would be to play with african civs and in african maps! Imo, it’s a vast field to explore still
My Italian is quite bad, but from what i gather it says that the Venetian fleet was comparable to the Portuguese, Swedish, Dutch, Russian and Ottoman at this point? It’s also a peculiar timeframe where the Venetian fleet might be this big, since in the century before it was probably behind all of those apart from Russia.
And not to be annoying, but a wikipedia article isn’t considered a source 
But yeah i don’t really care honestly, you just touched on a subject i think i know a lot about and i felt a sudden urge to make my point. So i hope you don’t take it personally. Cheers!
Basically yes, but even France and Spain wasn’t that bigger (Britain was the real juggernaut).
I know, but I’m not an historian, I don’t know really where to find proper sources on the matter, most of my knowledge come from some one time read article, or from museums, so I can really give you those here.
Don’t worry, but trust me, there was no malicious intent in what I wrote…
Wikipedia is a good place to start, most articles list their sources and references at the bottom of the page. You can go after those if you want more information.
Yeah but in this case it wasn’t specified. And i’m not going to read the 8 books mentioned to find the source
I think that a representation of Italians has to be in the game. I like OP’s ideas.