If you have ever browsed the sugestion forum on this site, you would have noticed that a frequent topic is how to get more civs in there. I think a good solution would be to have several independent cities dotted around the map. This would work somewhat like in RFC, with cities breaking away from the motherland and becoming independent! So what do think of this idea?

Aren't City-Sates a decent representation of "Other" civs? Though I don't think they can break away.

city-states are in already.

As for cities breaking away, I don't see that happening. At least not in the base vanilla game. Perhaps a mod or something could achieve that.

In my experience, Civ games are poorly suited to this type of thing. I recall the schism mechanic in Civ 2 which was set up under certain conditions and if you captured their capital the civ would split into two. That was kind of too specific to ever be relevant. I liked BtS's colonies, but there rarely seemed incentive for them to break their vassalage. It would be interesting if you could somehow liberate a city as a city state, but I doubt it will appear in the vanilla game.

I hated Bts colonies thare was no incentive to make them. you stilll had to pay matinance and you had to let the Ai improve them and the Ai just didn't know haw to build courthouses first. also sometimes you end up with a bad civ to have as a vassal. in one of my games the Ai created a zulu colony. within 50 turns the zulu had broken away and taken five of this superpowers cities.

I hated Bts colonies thare was no incentive to make them. you stilll had to pay matinance and you had to let the Ai improve them and the Ai just didn't know haw to build courthouses first. also sometimes you end up with a bad civ to have as a vassal. in one of my games the Ai created a zulu colony. within 50 turns the zulu had broken away and taken five of this superpowers cities.

My biggest complaint with colonies is that I've never played a non-modded game where they were relevant. With the current game mechanics it was impossible to simulate the massive influx of people which made some of the American colonies, well at least America itself, a world power. All I ever see with colonies are a second rate power because they are usually established later in the game and it still takes them as long to build things as any other city would, starting from the ground up. Without some kind of tremendous production bonus, colonies are just useless civs.

I've played mods, namely LoR with RevDCM, which incorporates the revolutions system, which is not always perfect but makes civ games much more interesting. It also has the capability of useful civs being generated through it.

In my experience, Civ games are poorly suited to this type of thing. I recall the schism mechanic in Civ 2 which was set up under certain conditions and if you captured their capital the civ would split into two. That was kind of too specific to ever be relevant. I liked BtS's colonies, but there rarely seemed incentive for them to break their vassalage. It would be interesting if you could somehow liberate a city as a city state, but I doubt it will appear in the vanilla game.

maybe it was useless in civ 2, but it was useful in civ 1. a lot of the time, the two halves would go to war and weaken each other so it'd be easier for me to come in and beat both of them.

Independents are also represented by barbarians. barbarians represent the people who impacted history significantly but aren't a civilazation and if they were, were to minor to put in the gme like the vandals and the huns. both contributed heavily to the fall of the roman empire and threfore the creation of most of modern history but were not really civilazations. what i would like are multiple barbarian nations where they fight eachother as well as you unfortunately with the addition of a barbarian home city firaxis seems to be moving towards more unified barbs:(

I miss Civ1 style barbarian hordes. Not a few scattered units here or there, but a HORDE or angry horsemen.

maybe it was useless in civ 2, but it was useful in civ 1. a lot of the time, the two halves would go to war and weaken each other so it'd be easier for me to come in and beat both of them.
Yeah, if it happened. In my experience whenever I got the message that a schism was imminent, their capital was simply too well defended for me to do anything about it, not without taking out basically all of their empire first which defeats the point. I guess my objection is that it was a silly random chance mechanic that didn't properly model what it was supposed to model anyway.

maybe it was useless in civ 2, but it was useful in civ 1. a lot of the time, the two halves would go to war and weaken each other so it'd be easier for me to come in and beat both of them.

That would make it an exploit, which is why it was removed. The human could always put that mechanism to better use than the AI. When did you ever see the AI making a beeline for your capital in order to split your large empire into 2 smaller, weaker ones? It's just made it too easy to walk all over the other civs.

Yeah, if it happened. In my experience whenever I got the message that a schism was imminent, their capital was simply too well defended for me to do anything about it, not without taking out basically all of their empire first which defeats the point. I guess my objection is that it was a silly random chance mechanic that didn't properly model what it was supposed to model anyway.
i remember doing it tons of times.
That would make it an exploit, which is why it was removed. The human could always put that mechanism to better use than the AI. When did you ever see the AI making a beeline for your capital in order to split your large empire into 2 smaller, weaker ones? It's just made it too easy to walk all over the other civs.
that doesn't make it "an exploit." that makes it "something that can be exploited." an exploit is something totally different.
but you are right on one point. even when i did lose my capital and i had a huge empire, my civilization wouldn't split in half. that's a relatively simple thing to fix, but i can understand why they took it out, though i'd like to see them put it back in somehow.

perhaps if a region of your cities are unhappy for a set number of turns, than the region splits away from your empire. Thats how the American Civil War happened, I'm not an expert on the spanish civil war or any others but I think they would be caused by the same reason as the ACW, that one region felt neglected and decided to secede.

perhaps if a region of your cities are unhappy for a set number of turns, than the region splits away from your empire. Thats how the American Civil War happened, I'm not an expert on the spanish civil war or any others but I think they would be caused by the same reason as the ACW, that one region felt neglected and decided to secede.

If they do that your citizens would better have to be prettty darn unhappy before they broke away or else!

that doesn't make it "an exploit." that makes it "something that can be exploited." an exploit is something totally different.


That's a pretty narrow distinction. There's no such thing as a natural exploit, all the loopholes have to be used in a certain way to make them so.

perhaps if a region of your cities are unhappy for a set number of turns, than the region splits away from your empire. Thats how the American Civil War happened, I'm not an expert on the spanish civil war or any others but I think they would be caused by the same reason as the ACW, that one region felt neglected and decided to secede.

That wouldn't necessarily work well in the game though. Suppose a city in the heart of your empire was unhappy for awhile. Do you think that logically they would split from you while being surrounded by your loyal cities all around?

One of the features I loved in CIV IV was the "Revolutions MOD". Based upon citizen demands cities could revolt, form their own nation, or request to join yours.

I would love to see some of the 'popular' MODS from IV thrown into V. However, we may just have to wait for someone to MOD it in.

That wouldn't necessarily work well in the game though. Suppose a city in the heart of your empire was unhappy for awhile. Do you think that logically they would split from you while being surrounded by your loyal cities all around?

well. if they were really pissed off but yuo do make a good point.

i like the idea of the smaller independent nation from Rhyes and Fall

That's a pretty narrow distinction. There's no such thing as a natural exploit, all the loopholes have to be used in a certain way to make them so.
an exploit is basically bad coding that results in bad security. exploiting something is taking advantage of a loophole. obviously, people exploit (the verb) exploits (the noun), but that doesn't make everything that can be exploited and exploit.

Well the way I could se "Revolutions" working.

If a city with your city is unhappy enough (unhappiness would not just be a "population cap")
Then it will generate Rebels.
Rebels are
1. Linked to a particular city
2. update with Tech
3. are Really good at taking cities
4. cannot leave the 'area' around their city (probably the 3-hex radius)
5. are controlled by a semi-intelligent AI, but they won't just blindly attack the city, nor will they just sit and defend.

If the city is "Liberated" either by partisan successfully attacking, or enemy units successfully attacking and liberating it, or you deciding to liberate it
1. Becomes a new City-State
2. Becomes the capital of a new Civ...In this case it steals a portion of your culture from surrounding cities... a greater portion if They are also unhappy
3. Joins another Civ (one that has a high culture in their tiles)


If the City generating Rebels controls tiles with massive amounts of enemy culture on it, then that enemy will get to control the Rebels. (once the city is liberated, they can serve to defend the city area... or they can be disbanded... but only once the city is liberated.)

I hated Bts colonies thare was no incentive to make them. you stilll had to pay matinance and you had to let the Ai improve them and the Ai just didn't know haw to build courthouses first. also sometimes you end up with a bad civ to have as a vassal. in one of my games the Ai created a zulu colony. within 50 turns the zulu had broken away and taken five of this superpowers cities.

BtS colonies are the tits, cap like 3 adjacent coastal cities and maybe an inland city, make peace with the AI, create a colony, and bam insta-beachhead where you can land troops without being under fire or having to deal with the cities, re group, and press inland

Of course, you could do all that without creating a colony too.

Of course, you could do all that without creating a colony too.

Not what he is talking about, which is something I've done before. When you create a colony, it will automatically place garrisons in the cities. If you are taking the offensive in a war, usually the colony will be able to garrison itself just through those units, because the AI will be focused on your spearhead. But not only are you free to not worry about defending the cities, you won't have to waste a single unit guarding a city. And everytime you capture a city, you can "liberate" it immediately so all your healthy units can continue the offensive.

Sorry, I haven't created colonies in ages, but I thought they were your vassals? So if you're at war with someone, your colony is also at war with them?

Perhaps I have misremembered this.

And fair point on the free garrisons, though they're really not *that* large.

Sorry, I haven't created colonies in ages, but I thought they were your vassals? So if you're at war with someone, your colony is also at war with them?

Perhaps I have misremembered this.

And fair point on the free garrisons, though they're really not *that* large.

It's not that they aren't at war. It's that usually you can keep the AI focused elsewhere with your SoD. It's not the largeness of the garrisons that matters, it's that every 1-2 units that you leave behind because you have to protect those cities, or prevent revolts, adds up, and it sucks to realize that you are finally confronting an AI's SoD only without 3-4 of your best units. I've fought a number of wars where those 3-4 units makes the difference.

Besides that, its fun to install an ally who will take over a number of cities which will have to be rebuilt but are already well-developed. Usually I have no interest in directly administering and defending overseas property, and sometimes I don't want to restore even a capitulated ally to their full glory. If you''re really flying through the opponent, you can always completely take over their territory and turn it over to your ally.

Looks like my idea for city-states are now in :D

They were in before you thought of them.