Another Great Person

I suggest Great Politicians with such potential uses:
A) settle
B) move your capital within a turn
C) peace mission (to stop the war you have)
D) switch civics (to any of the civics, i.e. you do not need Pyramids or Constitution to switch to Representation by a Great Politician, off course no anarchy as well)

So they might have their use now and then but I believe they would not be so powerful.
For names I would suggest M.L.King, Makiavelli, etc..

What would a settled politician do? Culture, Happiness and Wealth?
How would peace missions work? Would it be like a spy in that it cannot be seen/attacked? Would you cast it from your own city? Perhaps it has to be within the enemies territory but the unit can be killed so you would need a strong escort.

As an aside but on the topic of Great People, it would be nice if you could un-settle Super specialists, either to move them or use another of their abilities. Also they should be captured (with the exception of Great Politicians (although maybe these can be captured they're just useless to another civ)), that way if you capture an enemy city and are unlikely to hold it you could take the Great People that were settled there and try to escort them back to a safe city. Also some Great Prophets could have a religion (if the city they are born in does), they should only be able to settle in cities with that religion, only they can build that religion's holy building, they can be used to convert X cities to that religion (divide the unit into that many missionaries (or at least stop any other abilities from being used once the first city is converted)).

Wow, that's horribly overpowered, to have them switch civics before you get the tech. Environmentalism in 1500 BC?

I was thinking that too but then I thought it might be nice (that great person would start a particular political movement), although it would be over powered you are right, perhaps you need an earlier technology, can't think of any examples right now but it could be a compromise.

Jerrymander said:

Wow, that's horribly overpowered, to have them switch civics before you get the tech. Environmentalism in 1500 BC?

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Yes, that is quite overpowered, but you can somehow limit the civics- to make Great Politician act as Pyramids or Shwedagona Paya (dont remember name) acts, only one of the tabs.
Other way to counter it is to give GP points only in case you have a later/more expensive wonder.
For building that would allow to run Politician I have only one idea and these are the courthouses and Roman forums which would loose their Great People points then.

Scilly_guy said:

What would a settled politician do? Culture, Happiness and Wealth?
How would peace missions work?

As an aside but on the topic of Great People, it would be nice if you could un-settle Super specialists, either to move them or use another of their abilities.

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Settled politician should do nothing as they always do
Well I guess you are right - culture, gold, money

Peace missions - my idea was to have it like Great Spy, invisible to enemy and move to his capital. But you can make him visible but indestructible so to annoy your enemy. I have one more idea, that this guy can not only sue for peace but attack before 10 turns are over as well So that in case one uses his Politician for peace with you, you still have a chance to continue your warfare.

Un-settle would be used like you settle your GA for 1000 turns in the city and then you un-settle him and let him make great work for same city.

Still I have one idea on cities and it is - to evacuate people from war zone cities - which would dramatically decrease population in given city and increase pop in inside cities by 1-2 faces. After all that was used very often in wartime, at least in XX century.

I have thought along these lines, and the best would probably be in conjunction with something like the "stability points" in the "Rhye's and fall of civilization" mod. A great statesman/politician/diplomat would have the power to stop a war (not just your own, any war), settle as any other GP (providing stability), or perform a "diplomatic mission", giving a permanent boost in diplomacy with a certain civ (doesn't work too well in multiplayer perhaps, but you'd still have the option to settle him).

Jerrymander said:

Wow, that's horribly overpowered, to have them switch civics before you get the tech. Environmentalism in 1500 BC?

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I was thinking of perhaps having Great Politicians as LATER great people. So it would be impossible for them to appear until you have entered, say, the Industrial era. Actually, no the Medieval or Renaissance would be better since by late game they would probably be restricted to starting golden ages.

with the changing civics option, it should only be civics that you currently have access to.

In my mod, I've added the Great Statesman.
Most of the time, he does nothing. Just keep him into the city, and wait.
He enables a special event (that I called "the great statesman event"), which "makes him work at the courthouse", in one of your cities where you actually have a courthouse. Every time the event is triggered, you can select which kind of activity the statesman does, giving the courthouse a corresponding bonus: extra gold, extra research, extra culture, or extra espionage.

I have also added the Great Inventor.
As the great statesman, he has just to wait a special event to be triggered (the "great inventor event"); when it happens, he "start working at one of your workshops", if you have built workshops near your cities; he tries to discover surrogates of a strategic resource of your choice (iron, coal, etc). In this way, if you don't have a particular strategic resource, you can try using the great inventor to "discover" one.

buffalo6542 said:

with the changing civics option, it should only be civics that you currently have access to.

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I disagree; I think once-off government change to any government you have access to or will within the same Age would be a neat thing to have, or even to all government options if the government options are distinct enough that you are going to need to change out of whatever you change into soon enough anyway. But then I am very much in favour of changing game balance such that more frequent government change is encouraged.

rysmiel said:

I disagree; I think once-off government change to any government you have access to or will within the same Age would be a neat thing to have, or even to all government options if the government options are distinct enough that you are going to need to change out of whatever you change into soon enough anyway. But then I am very much in favour of changing game balance such that more frequent government change is encouraged.

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I do not know if I get you correct, but I really liked the idea of Great Statesman/Politicain to open any Civics that would be available in your era. So when you enter new era - you have access to any era related civics without need to research that particular tech. So it would still be quite powerful, but no more Emancipation 1000BC.
And it makes more sence historically.

Leodavinci said:

I do not know if I get you correct, but I really liked the idea of Great Statesman/Politicain to open any Civics that would be available in your era. So when you enter new era - you have access to any era related civics without need to research that particular tech. So it would still be quite powerful, but no more Emancipation 1000BC.

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Well, I want civics abolished and fixed government types restored, but other than that you're getting the mechanic I have in mind.

rysmiel said:

Well, I want civics abolished and fixed government types restored, but other than that you're getting the mechanic I have in mind.

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the point of civics is to give more freedom to the player to decide how their goverment runs.

buffalo6542 said:

the point of civics is to give more freedom to the player to decide how their goverment runs.

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I appreciate that that's what the mechanic is supposed to do; I just do not like it, either as gameplay or as realism.

rysmiel said:

I appreciate that that's what the mechanic is supposed to do; I just do not like it, either as gameplay or as realism.

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maybe at start of game there should be a choice of fixed goverment or civics

Like I have said make custom games more customisable, I am sure it can't be too hard to make an object orientated game such as Civ IV modular and for different modules to be switch able.