a civ focused on "terrorism?"

[jasper]

too much? too touchy of a concept? i remember people thinking religion would be too touchy but here we are with religious victories.

general/random ideas:

the civ would be spy and city state focused aiming towards domination victory

the civ provokes declarations of wars through terrorism conducted by spy missions. Blame/credit for your spy missions get passed on to your suzerain-ed city states.

A. spies receives additional operations.

1. sabotage entertainment district buildings in the same way it works with other district sabotages. Although i wonder why its currently not an option. fits perfectly with the civs theme.

2. Sabotage world wonder. Balance details need to to be worked out of course but this has got to be in. I'm thinking once you have done X amount of sabotage against a single civ then you can blow up the guys world wonder which sparks free declaration of war for the victim without warmonger penalty for him and light penalty for you.

The idea is you target one civ you hate, conduct your missions of terror leading to a pinnacle, peak, (whats the word I'm looking for?) finale, etc. which is the wonder being brought down. this pisses your victim off and he declares war warmonger penalty free and you get the war you want. If he opts out of the free war then you keep bombing his wonders after x mission until he does.

this might seem strong but the civ wont be getting cool UU's or versatile production bonuses so i think it needs to cause a real bang at this stage.

B(1). The civ should also get city state benefits. I like the idea of an extra diplomatic card slot similar to Greece's wild card although definitely weaker. It seems more "fun" in that you get options to play around however you want instead of just straight extra envoy points.

B(2). Other suggestion is a special option to shift a city states type to militaristic once you become the suz. or if this is too hard then once you become suzerain all city states periodically gift free units no matter their type like civ 5.

 

[RealAntithesis]

Sounds like a touchy subject. Which historically based civ (or modern civ) would you give the terrorism agenda and abilities to? Whichever it is, people with some sort of connection with that civ will complain.

 

[Silverstar]

It's morally and historically wrong. What is your definition of a terrorist state? Terrorism is a wide term. It's oftenly used for modern states (IS) focusing their effort on a terroristic agenda, whereas the Civilization game implementations you suggest covers a part of how such a agenda might look like.

To me, the mongol invasion was a act of terrorism, and from which came a empire (state)
However, they're not called as terrorists. There are even museums full of mongol relics praising them as a mighty and respectful empire.
They represented rapid expansion, death, lack of law and government and didn't last for a century. They weren't called the horde for no reason. Do they define themselves as terrorists?
And if so, would they be a Civilization just because they had more bows and horses, occupied all of europe and Asia for a few decades and lasted a century?

And if they aren't terrorist, who are?
Try to discuss this subject with a Serbian refugee concerning the Yugoslav wars, wait for their response and you'll see my point.

To me any act of war is terrorism, whatever the means or propaganda that drives it (luckily this is just a game)
Such states also didn't last long, because terrorist states never do (expect the same for IS)
And so far, Civ seems to represent empires and leaders who lasted long, or achieved something miraculous where others have failed.

Terrorism is conducted by groups and only sometimes ordered by the state.
Given that fact, barbarians themselves may represent terrorists.
And since spy operations in Civilization represent actions by another state you could fantasize it being a act of terrorism by terrorist leaders ordered by the state if you want that.
The idea is also unpopular to the point of creating negative reputation. I'm sure this is not what Firaxis wants.

 

[teks]

Its not a bad idea, but as suggested above, Terrorism isn't the right word. Terrorism is a fear word with no real definition that anyone can agree on.
As for your suggestion, I fully expect this kind of stuff is going to be in an expansion. I can't wait

 

[ShinigamiKenji]

IIRC, the devs wanted the World Wonders to be almost untouchable. Like, you would only be able to destroy a Wonder by razing a city. Dunno how it was implemented, though.

Game-wise, I wouldn't be surprised if that Civ would receive lots of complaints. Some wonders are strong enough that immediate elimination of any Civ that destroys them is a priority, even if they are on the other side of the map. That leads to warmongering, and we all know how it goes from there.

Also, if this Civ actually sees gameplay, it would be a hard nerf to cultural Civs, especially to France and, to a lesser extent, China.

Lastly, unless I was 100% sure that this Civ wasn't in my game, I wouldn't build any Wonders at all (meaning that in a Continents map I would only build Wonders post-Cartography at the bare minimum). There's no point to trying to build a Wonder if I expect the effect to last only ~50 turns.

 

[jasper]

yeah, terrorism is a pretty strong word. it would have to be altered a bit. however some things are horrible and sensitive in the real world but translate (as bad as it sounds) very well to video games and war for example is one of those. so if this is a dumb idea then so be it.

but in terms of gameplay i like the idea of a civ being hated automatically or receives unfriendly/ unwarm disposition right away. the civ would very much be anti cultural. they hate everyone and their wonders and every knows it and hates them. maybe even the terrorist civ isnt allowed to build wonders but they can destroy yours.

everything rests on striking a balance between all the ill effects of having everyone hate you and needing something to make having everyone hating you being worthwhile to the terror civ. bombing wonders i feel is one of those things thats really going to piss off people and worth all the ire you going to receive.

receiving larger gains from city states seems like another way to offset everyone hating you.

in games with few players then i agree people wont build wonders and this seems problematic. but i definately think in a 6+ player mulitplayer game people are going to risk it. odds are still in your favor the terrorist doesnt target you.

 

[ShinigamiKenji]

I think that there's still too much risk for too little reward for the early wonders. They're already risky in that you lose some precious production (that's why, in my opinion, the only early Wonder consistently worth a shot are the Pyramids). Having sacrificed such early production for the risk of having nothing in the end might make Wonders unviable, with exception of a few powerful ones. Mostly no one from Ancient/Classical eras.

As I said, with that fact alone, I can foresee that Civ to be targeted first in MP (even by, or maybe especially by, Religious and Cultural players), so they might not be played at all due to hatred and ganging. If not, then maybe no player would build Wonders at all, making your ability useless. If you then begin building Wonders, people willcovet your lands and you wouldn't survive anyway.

Larger City-State bonuses won't help since you either wouldn't survive the Ancient Era, or players wouldn't allow you to have City-States, either by allying with them or conquering them.

In SP, either I would use it, or I wouldn't risk Wonders until I was sure they would be safe (either by them not in play, or erasing them from the map).

Now, the idea of utterly destroying wonders as presented isn't viable in my opinion. But, one way of making it viable, is not destroying them, but merely disabling their bonuses for some period of time. Perhaps damaging them so their bonuses are disabled until repaired, and decreasing their tourism for some time. Of course, that idea comes with making one-shot bonuses (such as Terracota Army) more desirable than continuous ones (such as Forbidden City or Hanging Gardens).