However, small populations of the almost-immortal Sídhe generate substantial levels of research and culture. Great people of the Sídhe may become ancient, wise and utterly powerful, but their number will be few.
Interesting. Very hard to balance though! The whole economy of Civ is *so* dependent on population that having any variation in population across factions becomes very hard to balance. Population growth bonuses lead to bonuses in everything else, so a smaller pop has to have much higher output-per-person, but even then it is hard to scale correctly; it might be too strong in the early game and too weak in the late game. Though maybe that is thematic; Sidhe might have a head start with power of the "old ways" but then be likely overridden by the "younger races" (unless they manage to consolidate their lead); that is a fairly common fantasy trope.
Smaller pop can also break the happiness mechanics, by making the constraints no longer binding. And slower settler production/fewer cities isn't necessarily much penalty when happiness is a global pool.
Its worth thinking about how to implement lower pop too; the simplest way is a food production penalty, but that can end up having problems with small production size and rounding issues.
In early versions of our Warhammer mod, the High Elves had powerful and fast units but had a food penalty, and even a small penalty ended up meaning that happiness wasn't really much of an issue, that they were always smaller than other civs, and that they were always weak in the hands of the AI.
Just one comment.... really long invented names like this just get hard to remember. I recommend shorter words for neologisms or names. Think about the FFH names; Sheaim, Lanun, etc.
those that do and embrace Ahriman's destructive purpose
Damn! They figured it out!
The policy branch excludes both Theism and Agrarianism
Does Theism block anything other than Pantheism?
The other religious stuff sounds pretty cool!
Destroyer Destroy Éa by the practice of Sorcery, consuming the sum of all Mana (bringing Armageddon).
How does this work if multiple civs have Fallen? Victory goes to whoever used the most mana?
Do we know much about how faith points can be accumulated in code terms; just from religious buildings, or from actions too?
What is the motivation of the destroyer factions; do they know they're using up the mana, and they just want the power, and damn the consequences? Or they have a reason to destroy the world? Or they don't know the consequences?
