After another failed attempt to handle Lithuania (seriously, I still have no idea how to accomplish UHV1: Crazy Mongols + few turns to get an overwhelming number of culture. To make units or to make culture?), I tried a game with Kievan Rus'.
IMO the UHV list should be inverted. I'm used to the screen showing you chronologically your UHVs (arab, austrian, bulgarian, burgundian, byzantine, cordoban, french, genoan, german, lithuanian, norse, ottoman, spanish, swedish, venetian), and even some of them having no ending date in the middle, it's not a problem at all, as in many game it seems to fall chronogically to your accomplishments (or you can wait and focus on the next, as they have no date to finish, excluding german UHV2 of course).
The ones that have only one UHV with a finish date seems to be chronogically organized as well (english, muscovite and portuguese. Only the Dutch i'm not sure as I've never played with them, and their late start is kind of tricky)
Polish and Hungarian UHV lists seem nice too, because their first UHV is so more important that it needs to be put there. If you are accomplishing UHV1, you'll be able to accomplish polish UHV2 (a bigger empire produces more food) and hungarian UHV3 (the biggest european state has more manpower to handle the Ottomans).
For the Kievan it's true that 20000 food seems to be a lot more important then 2 cathedrals and 8 monasteries, but I think inverting the list will make the game easier for the player to understand:
UHV1 (former UHV3): 2 Cathedrals + 8 monasteries - That means you need at least 8 cities which will make 8 temples and 8 monasteries. The best two make the cathedrals after all needed temples are built. Limit year: 1250AD
UHV2: The same, get 10 provinces from the list. That means you'll need at least 10 cities each in a different province. It's an evolving situation from UHV1 and it ends just after. Limit year: 1288AD
UHV3 (former UHV1): Produce 20000 food. For this you'll need a lot of food producing cities (I admit that I've never understood this exactly, but I also admit that I'm starting my first game with the Kievan on 1.0 right now). But I think that more cities mean more food produced (or possible to), and as you need 8+ cities up to 1250AD and 10+ cities up to 1288AD, it feels right to put this UHV in 3rd place. Limit year: 1300AD
Actually I may be wrong, as this food producing UHV (that I failed in earlier rfces with Kiev, and I also failed with Poland in 1.0) is still a mystery. But I truly think this new way seems better then the one that's been used.
