Then perhaps while Empires have Farmers and Citizen-Drudges ...

Kingoms could have Farmers, Noble-Citizens, and Peasants. (and Dissident Nobles)

Farmers: Medium Taxes

Citizen-Nobles: High Taxes

Drudges and Peasants: Low Taxes

Dissident Nobles: No Taxes (negative Taxes/corruption?)

Cities with stronger economies can support more Noble-Citizens, yet Nobles also require happiness. When you have too many Nobles and not enough happiness ... some of those Nobles turn into Dissident Nobles.

These are nobles that are contemplating rebellion and other non-loyal thoughts and actions.

If a city's nobles have ALL turned Dissident, then there is a chance (each turn) that the city flips (into an Independent city, most likely).

The city will start with an array of defenders that could have potentially been produced within the city's resources (defenders based on Population and Technology)

The independent city would continue to improve itself, but would focus primarily on Self-Defense (recruiting more soldiers, etc) for X turns.

If enough cities break away in such a fashion, they could "unite" to form a separate Faction, and start an active Civil War against the Sovereign.

(possible revolutions mod at least )

More random thoughts along emulation of a more realistic model

Empire -> Farmer, Citizen, Drudge

Kingdom -> Farmer, Noble, Peasant, Dissident Noble AND emigration.

Empire -> Unhappy citizens become drudges.

Kingdom -> Unhappy nobles become Dissidents, Unhappy Peasants just leave (not all at once, but slowly until equilibrium is achieved, or taxes lowered again).

Empire can hold onto their citizens ... but sloppy Kingdoms may inspire peasants to leave, and may cause nobles to rebel.

For an Empire-> the normal status is a few citizens (the strong, the masters) and many drudges

For a Kingdom -> the normal status is all citizens(merchants and craftsmen, etc). With wealthy cities being able to support nobles (usually late-game)

and farmers = peasants/serfs

Yes the western monarchies were more free than other nations AFTER the 1500s, albeit based on ideas (and laws) from the 1200s and earlier.

After the Black Plague, the worked-to-death peasants demanded better conditions. In most countires they got property ownership etc.

In england however, the peasants actually 'lost rights' as opposed to gaining them after the Black Plague.

The thing with England is that the nobility as a whole had far more power in relation to the king than the other monarchies, but its important to note that the peasants of England had to pay for their 'right' to work the land.

After the Glorious revolution, when England was ruled by an English Queen and a Netherlands King (Netherlands Incorporated), England had more experience with a corporate-like rule. All of these things led to the Industrial Revolution, which early on led to a level of powerlessness (among the working class) above and beyond what you could accomplish in any agrarian society.

However, admittedly, those with wealth (merchants and nobles, mainly just the rising merchant class though) had vast amounts of freedom to increase their own wealth and prosperity ... so of those free they were far more free than those in other nations.

What I want to know is why you posted a book about German military excellence and said that it had something fundamental to say about Freedom?

yea, please no more one-liners? They might sound cool, but they don't really communicate anything.

Sorry, I forgot to actually extrapolate on this. The brief summary of "A Genius for War" is fairly long, but worth going into.

Dupuy and Dupuy are the guys who first made accurate simulations of correlation of force for warfare using statistical analysis for games. Something that eluded them in their analysis was the statistical deviation associated with the historical record of German troops. German troops consistently outperformed their circumstances. More important than that is the realization that the two key founders of the German General Staff that made this exceptional fighting possible, Scharnhorst and Moltke the Elder, were adamantly opposed to the direction of absolute monarchy Germany ultimately took. Both Scharnhorst, who founded the General Staff training method, and Moltke the Elder, who developed it to amazing levels, were in favor of Constitutional Monarchy that limited the scope of government authority and had the military swear fealty to the State and not the King.

The importance of this classic Liberal (not the debased progressivism that goes by the name today) framework of power is that without a check on the monarch's power, there is no limit to expansion or repression in the name of the King. Without that limit inherent in the state's monopoly of force, abuse becomes inevitable. When that inevitable abuse occurs, every soul that does not wish to be subject to that tyranny must rise up against it. This is why, despite tremendously better application of force, Germany always lost. Because even the most outlandish lie of British propaganda had the grain of truth that nothing actually stopped such illusory atrocity from happening in reality. 

Arguably the ultimate result of the flawed German General Staff system was not Rommel, it was Canaris: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Canaris A man who for six years fought to keep Germany as free as he could against all enemies, foreign and domestic, by leaking information to the British while head of German Military Intelligence. If the British had delivered better quality fuses to Canaris, WWII would have ended very differently. (To be honest, Rommel was complicit in a number of Canaris' assassination plots, but he wasn't a key a player as he could have been.)

The upshot of all of this complicated background is as follows: For true rebellion, you need true tyranny. As uncomfortable as early settlements of reconstruction might be in E:FE, they are not the conditions that breed rebellion. Exhaustion, not exalted treason, is the more reasonable result of privation due to circumstance instead of flawed rule.

Hmm.

Still, from a game perspective ... they want there to be some penalty for high taxation (as they want higher taxes to always produce more gold, albeit with increasingly less returns, as opposed to bleeding the taxbase dry).

The Magna Carta was signed in part because the nobles were really upset about the excessive taxes of King John, and it is possible that they were threatening Civil War.

below is an excerpt from Wikipedia (yes I know, its wikipedia ...) to demonstrate my point.

"In 1215 some of the most important barons engaged in open rebellion against their King. Such rebellions were not particularly unusual in this period. Every king since William the Conqueror had faced rebellions. However, in every previous case there had been an obvious alternative monarch around whom the rebellion could rally. In 1215, however, John had no obvious replacement. Arthur of Brittany would have been a possibility, if he had not disappeared (widely believed to have been murdered on the orders of John). The next closest possible alternative was Prince Louis of France, but as the husband of Henry II's granddaughter, his claim was tenuous, and the English had been at war with the French for thirty years. Instead of a claimant to the throne, the barons decided to base their rebellion around John's oppressive government. In January 1215, the barons made an oath that they would "stand fast for the liberty of the church and the realm", and they demanded that King John confirm the Charter of Liberties, from what they viewed as a golden age^.

John of England signs Magna Carta. Illustration from Cassell's History of England (1902)

John prevaricated. During negotiations between January and June 1215, a document was produced, which historians have termed 'The Unknown Charter of Liberties',^[8] seven of the articles of which would later appear in the 'Articles of the Barons' and the Runnymede Charter.^[9] In May, King John offered to submit issues to a committee of arbitration with the Pope as supreme arbiter,^[10] but the barons continued in their defiance. With the support of Prince Louis the French Heir and of King Alexander II of the Scots, they entered London in force on 10 June 1215,^[11] with the city showing its sympathy with their cause by opening its gates to them. They, and many of the moderates not in overt rebellion, forced King John to agree to a document later known as the 'Articles of the Barons', to which his Great Seal was attached in the meadow at Runnymede on 15 June 1215. In return, the barons renewed their oaths of fealty to King John on 19 June 1215."

The nobles considered his rule oppressive and worthy rebellion, even though it was only sloppy rule. Primarily the reason for their rebellion was likely the high taxes.

Indeed, the American 'Revolution' in 1776 went along similar lines, although instead of placing another king in charge they went the extra mile and actually created a new form of government.

Does this mean that you disagree with the idea of dissident nobles, and the idea of a "wealthy citizen type" in the Kingdom (noble) that may lead to rebellion if not appeased by certain means?

(A wealthy but dysfunctional city will split off from the rest (in an attempt to maintain wealth and decrease dysfunction) ... ie Milan, Florence, and other Italian city states) -> albeit the circumstances of Italian city states was a bit different, during the post-Roman era, but nontheless an example I think of a wealthy city wanting either luxury or independence (so that they may attempt to better acquire said luxury, without paying homage to a home city)

and you are right, its not just a bill or a bar tab (ie empty amount of money), but instead it is the full economics of a situation.

I would argue that Economics drives culture, and Economic history is the driving force behind world history (just meaning just legal tender, but the full weight of the economy-> ie trading partners, various wealth agreements, land holdings, etc. What you mentioned would be included in this)

Did you know that before the Trail of Tears, the Cherokee were slave-owners with their own cotton plantations? their own constitution and newspaper? The initial reason for their uprooting was because those with economic power within the US wanted the Cherokee's plantations for themselves. (as Textiles were a very important commodity, and Britain was buying a lot of cotton for good prices-> from both Cherokee and American)

Hmm.

Well, I got a little side-tracked.

As far as Rebels vs Drudges, we were trying to use strictly medieval contexts.

The Nazis were able to rise to power due to the desperation brought about by economically hard times.

Actually, I'm a small fraction Cherokee myself, although I've never owned slaves or cotton plantations.

I don't see wealthy citizens and dissident nobles splitting off in the first thousand turns because the economy isn't big enough. It would help if the time scale made sense, but that would make a boring game. 

Keep in mind that at high taxes you have the perverse incentive subsidizing tax fraud, smuggling, and rebellion. One interesting study shows that over the last century, tax rates have fluctuated wildly, but tax revenues have stayed firmly tethered to 20% of Gross Domestic Product. Prohibition of alcohol subsidized a lot of criminal activity, and in fact underwrote the institutionalization of organized crime in America. High taxes subsidize unlawful behavior, up to and including treason.

One challenge this game is struggling with is defining a strong narrative of why the Kingdoms are a superior moral choice to the Empire. "I'm a supernatural power grabber and I'm getting mine before they can get theirs!" is a narrative, but not one that sells particularly well. I'd like this to be more about embracing freedom as the best method to achieve lasting security for states, but the power fantasy and goth fetishism is sapping the coherence of the implementation.

Not as much territory because they aren't as violent and power-hungry?

How do high taxes subsidize rebellion, organized crime, and possibly even treason?

And if this is the case (that taxes subsidize rebellion), then how would high taxes not lead to 'rebel citizens'?

Yes, perhaps from a game design perspective. But as an academic and/or modding exercise, I think it is worth looking into.