Balanced Civ Lineup for TSL?

[ldvhl]

The trouble with picking additional African or South American civilizations is how you make them distinct in game terms.

We didn't really have a problem with that in the CiV modding community.

 

[Cyon]

Why would they be less distinct than a European civ? At least the we that we know a lot about can easily be made very different.

So to start with one of them.

I have already made a mod for Kongo but this is how I would make Kongo in civ 6:

UA: Glory of the Manikongo

+1 food, production and culture in the capital for each of your own connected other cities and +2 of those yields for each connected vassal CS.

Mbanza Kongo was one of the largest cities in the world at the time thanks to tributes around the region.

UI : Raffia mill

Can be build in jungle tiles produces culture and gold as a flat yield and additionally production for unimproved bordering jungle tiles. Our it gives a unique luxury :Raffia cloth. Could be a limited number of cloth.

UU: Pombo
Spearman or pike replacement. Has a 40% chance of evading ranged attacks completely, increased to 60% in jungle tiles, not evaded attacks do only half damage. No movement penalty in jungle.

UU: Kongo Bowman.
Replaces Archer or composite Bowman. 10% cheaper to build for each vassal city state up to a maximum of 80% cheaper , heals twice as fast and costs no upkeep in jungle tiles close to your cities, cost three times the upkeep and gets a combat penalety on non jungle tiles far away from your cities.



Skickat från min GT-I9195 via Tapatalk

 

[AriochIV]

We didn't really have a problem with that in the CiV modding community.

I think the Firaxis developers have different standards than the modding community.

 

[poom3619]

Well, depend on which modding community you're looking. Different standards doesn't necessary means lower standard.

 

[ldvhl]

I think the Firaxis developers have different standards than the modding community.

Whether or not they do, that doesn't prevent them from coming up with making African or South American civilizations distinct.

 

[Captain Fargle]

Well Ethiopia, Mali and Kilwa in particular are all really easy to make unique stuff for. Kilwa especially. Lots of Coast and Trade based bonuses. The name "Swahili" literally means "Coast Dwellers" after all.

You could even go really radical with them and have very large bonuses for coastal cities but major penalties for non-coastal ones.

My personal suggestion for a Swahili Unique Ability though would be the ability to get bonus food and Hammers from Trade Routes. +2 Food +1 Hammers for each one you send to another Civ. Reflects very nicely the general lack of domestic agriculture in the Swahili states and how they kept their population fed through imports and tarrifs.

 

[Cyon]

Well Ethiopia, Mali and Kilwa in particular are all really easy to make unique stuff for. Kilwa especially. Lots of Coast and Trade based bonuses. The name "Swahili" literally means "Coast Dwellers" after all.

You could even go really radical with them and have very large bonuses for coastal cities but major penalties for non-coastal ones.

My personal suggestion for a Swahili Unique Ability though would be the ability to get bonus food and Hammers from Trade Routes. +2 Food +1 Hammers for each one you send to another Civ. Reflects very nicely the general lack of domestic agriculture in the Swahili states and how they kept their population fed through imports and tarrifs.

Great idea!

They could in addition have a unique district/or UB that affects the harbour district:
Coral port +1 culture /appeal of the harbour district, also provides 1 housing.

a UU is slightly harder, maybe a Dhow as a galley replacement that is faster or has the Nau ability of Portugal (not so creative, please come up with a better idea)

 

[historix69]

Ideally I would like to drop Germany for another African Civ or perhaps The Maori but I don't think that's very likely.

It would be a bad idea for firaxis to drop nations which have a strong market for computer games.

Also without Germany historically there is no need for Great War / World War 2 Units (e.g. no Panzers, no Blitzkrieg) to include in the game. 20th century would have been an age of peace and wealth for the ruling classes in the British, American, French and Russian Empires.

If Firaxis is clever, they reduce the effort for Leader Animations and start with 30-40 nations right from the start and make everybody happy ... most players are tired of buying 2-3 add ons per Civ iteration to get all the nations. I think the success of Civ 5 has shown that Civ is no longer a niche product and they do not have to rely on DLCs and AddOns to finance the development.

 

[Zaarin]

If Firaxis is clever, they reduce the effort for Leader Animations and start with 30-40 nations right from the start and make everybody happy ... most players are tired of buying 2-3 add ons per Civ iteration to get all the nations. I think the success of Civ 5 has shown that Civ is no longer a niche product and they do not have to rely on DLCs and AddOns to finance the development.

Having 30-40 civs out of the gate simply cannot have the quality or uniqueness of civs added over time; this would be an abominable move on Firaxis' part. I'd much rather have civs added by DLC and expansions and have them spend more time on each civ; anyone who wants dozens of generic civs will surely have their wishes fulfilled by the modding community.

 

[ldvhl]

Having 30-40 civs out of the gate simply cannot have the quality or uniqueness of civs added over time; this would be an abominable move on Firaxis' part. I'd much rather have civs added by DLC and expansions and have them spend more time on each civ; anyone who wants dozens of generic civs will surely have their wishes fulfilled by the modding community.

Thanks for the insult!

 

[historix69]

Having 30-40 civs out of the gate simply cannot have the quality or uniqueness of civs added over time ...

To be honest, I didn't like most of the unique civ traits in Civ5 ... some of the traits made it impossible to me to play favourite civs without modding away the traits ...

The believe in "unique" civilizations reminds me of the 19th century racism ... the "unique" qualities of civs in the civilization game in real were the results of specialisation and adaption to external influences like resources, climate, geography, hostile neighbours, historical progress ... The problem is that Civ so far does not allow players to specialize to such a degree that their civs develop their historically "unique" skills / strength solely based on the Game mechanics available to all players. (For example, you could adjust the rules so that every civ would be able to research a basic unit/building and additionally the more expensive corresponding stronger "unique" unit/building. If the unique unit/building would not provide enough benefit for a civ, it might skip the unique tech and continue with the default tech tree.)

 

[Zaarin]

Thanks for the insult!

I didn't mean it that way at all; what I meant was that people who want lots of civs will have plenty to choose from thanks to modders, not that modders' civs will be of inferior quality. Sorry for my poor choice of words.

The believe in "unique" civilizations reminds me of the 19th century racism

First of all, nonsense. Civilizations are different--China is extremely different from Rome is extremely different from Persia is extremely different from America. But that aside, it's a game; playing as a different civilization should feel like a meaningful choice. Every single civ felt more or less the same in Civ4, which is boring and has little replay value. G&K and BNW were moves in the right direction; since Ed Beach designed both of them, I'm confidant that Civ6 will be a continuation of the trend. Civs like Polynesia, Venice, the Inca, Byzantium, and the Shoshone were markedly different from the "baseline" experience, and I think there need to be more civs like that.

 

[Captain Fargle]

40 Civs right out of the gate is wildly unrealistic and there is absolutely no way it's going to happen. There just isn't enough dev time available for that kind of scope.

Civ 4 and 5 both launched with 18 Civs (Technically 19 in 5's case since Babylon was day one DLC) and while we're expecting 6 to launch with more those expectations need to be kept reasonable. I'd say 24-25 is the absolute upper limit of what we can expect from Vanilla and that's REALLY pushing it.

 

[Captain Fargle]

If we look at the list of Civs I put together earlier in the thread (Revised to have Zimbabwe rather than Madagascar:

1: China
2: America
3: Egypt
4: Japan
5: India
6: Mongolia
7: Rome
8: England/Britain
9: France
10: Russia
11: Germany
12: Greece
13: The Ottomans
14: Persia
15: Siam/Vietnam/Khmer
16: Mali
17: Zimbabwe
18: Aztecs
19: Haida/Salish/Chinook
20: Brazil/Tupi
21: Inca
22: Indonesia/Majapahit

If we expand that to 25 (What I'd expect as the absolute max for number of Civs at launch) then

23: Cherokee
24: Ethiopia
25: Maori

This rounds out a TSL map very well I think, without any areas that are truly empty. South America is still quite sparce but if we could get a DLC of, for example, The Mapuche that would round things out nicely. It also leaves out series regulars Arabia and Spain but they would make excellent standalone DLC.

So:

DLC 1: Mapuche
DLC 2: Arabia
DLC 3: Spain

If we then assume two expansions, as is traditional for Civ games and 9 Civs per expansion like in 5 I'd hope for things to shake out something like the following. Again assuming a rather wide spread for filling in TSL style games:

Expansion 1:

1: Portugal
2: The Mughals
3: Kongo
4: Korea
5: Sumer
6: Iroquois (Perhaps having them under their actual proper name of Haudenasaunee this time)
7: The Mayans
8: Hawaii
9: Denmark/Sweden/Norway/The Norse/The Vikings/You Get The Idea

Expansion 2:

1: The Netherlands
2: Phoenicians
3: Swahili (Kilwa)
4: Madagascar
5: Poland
6: Tamil (Chola)
7: One of Siam/Vietnam/Khmer not included in Vanilla
8: Khwarezm
9: Canada (By far the most requested Civ since Poland got in with BNW)

That would make 46 Civs total over the course of Civ 6's lifespan and would create a fairly well rounded blend. It does however ignore a bunch of Civs that have been included in the past such as Babylon, Carthage and Byzantium all of whom who would be excellent choices for even further DLC.

 

[Stilgar08]

Never forget the importance of the market: Therefore European civs will be in a lot and I highly doubt they'll sacrifice them for african ones (which is a shame, BTW). Same with India - Many occasional players simply won't care for Mughals because they never heard of it. Same with Kilwa or Tlingit... Maybe later...

Monty will be in and Shaka will make the cut, too... Everything else would surpise me a lot!
This would mean, Mayans would be out until expansion, Incas in maybe because of TSL discussion, same for the Maori (would be awesome!) for filling the blank Australia-spot....

 

[Uberfrog]

The believe in "unique" civilizations reminds me of the 19th century racism ... the "unique" qualities of civs in the civilization game in real were the results of specialisation and adaption to external influences like resources, climate, geography, hostile neighbours, historical progress

Again the point to be made is that Civ is a game, and civ traits are a part of adding to the variety, both in aesthetic and gameplay terms. Giving a civilisation units and buildings that are historically associated with them is a huge part of the appeal of the series, and unique abilities are a further example that can reflect an aspect of how an civilisation historically behaved.

19th century racism was all about supposed superiorities and inferiorities, whereas Civ abilities at their best can show variety. At its worst (see the traits for India in Civ IV- hard workers, and in Civ V, lots of population) it can be lazy stereotyping, but in general it adds a different dimension that encourages the player to vary their Civ.

40 interchangeable civilisations out of the box, with shoddy leader screens seems to me to be throwing out the baby with the bath water.

 

[poom3619]

Never forget the importance of the market: Therefore European civs will be in a lot and I highly doubt they'll sacrifice them for african ones (which is a shame, BTW). Same with India - Many occasional players simply won't care for Mughals because they never heard of it. Same with Kilwa or Tlingit... Maybe later...

Is it wrong to hope more gamer playing Europa Universalis so they would heard of many cool people that never represented by Civ series and start to actively asking for them? Last time I checked, Africa just got dozen of nations added from free latest map rework.

19th century racism was all about supposed superiorities and inferiorities, whereas Civ abilities at their best can show variety. At its worst (see the traits for India in Civ IV- hard workers, and in Civ V, lots of population)

I can't believe you forget Civ IV "Native American" civ.

On that point, I agree in this point. It could be stereotypical with various degree, but not outright racism. Civilization and various game with same quasi-historical background (Rise of Nations, Age of Empire, Total War, etc) is basically history equivalent of Smash Bro. where you put some animated sprite cladded with samurai armor for a civ that called Japan.

Game like those never meant to simulate many aspects that shape people's culture if "Japanese" civilization start on British Isle and get invaded by "Zulu" from Scandinavia and random "Aztecs" counts from French coast. A game that actually simulate those to a marginally realistic degree would be too complex to be enjoyable for most people who still can remember what group of people they suppose to play as.

 

[historix69]

First of all, nonsense. Civilizations are different--China is extremely different from Rome is extremely different from Persia is extremely different from America.

Chinese, Roman, Persian and American (European?) history and cultural achivements are definetely different from each other. Todays political systems in China, Italy, Iran and USA may also vary.

My point is that the game starts 4.000 BC ... at that time most of the civs we play were just unknown barbarians living as hunter-gatherer, early farmer and/or livestock owner ... development of smaller and larger settlements (villages, cities) was dependent on food resources in the environment, so some had a better start (Chinese, Middle Eastern civs). The "unique" achivements of real civs were the results of specialisation and adaption to external influences like resources, climate, geography, hostile neighbours, historical progress ... they were not predefined ...

Imagine that England would have won the 100-years-war ... Englands resources would probably been used to build armies and castles to maintain their possessions on the european continent for the next centuries, leaving less resources for developing a strong fleet which they would no longer need since they would control both sides of the channel and would not fear invasion. In that scenario (England as a strong land power in europe), developing a stronger version of Ship-of-the-Line might be not the best choice ...

Predefined unique traits in Civ seem like genetic endowments which often do not fit with the strategical development of a civ in an actual game. They are ok for a specific scenario which is especially designed for that kind of traits to work, but in most games they are just wasted, e.g. if a naval civ has to focus on land, mountain civ settles on a map with almost no mountains, a desert civ settles on a map with only a few desert tiles for the start, a "barbaric" civ starts on a map surrounded by other civs but no barbarians, etc. Predefined unique traits are unflexible.

Speaking of cultural flavour (how things look and are called) is a different thing. There is no problem in naming Japan's sword warrior a Samurai and make him look like in the movies ... I think everybody expects this and it is one of the reasons to buy civ games. The question is if the Samurai should always be a unit with unique super powers, even if Japan in an actual game might be under massive attack by naval forces and would prefer a stronger ship type or stronger ranged weapons instead of a strong melee unit ...

 

[Uberfrog]

It will be interesting to see how specialised civs will get in Civ VI- research and culture boosts with Eurekas will go, I think, some way towards what historix69 is describing. If geography and agendas are as important as the developers have been making out, then we will see a different civilisation forming in reaction to their neighbours and surroundings.

I don't think this should be mutually exclusive with predefined traits, and I expect we will still see start biases by default, but it will be interesting nevertheless.

 

[Plus Ultra]

Not trying to be confrontational here, but why is Spain always discarded as a must-be-on-release day Civ?

I'm Spanish, so I'm biased (big time), but from my point of view not having Spain in a game about historical empires/civilizations is equivalent to forgetting about China, Rome or England.

-Spanish is the second language in the world with more native speakers. (source)
-The Spanish empire is the 4th largest in history (source).
-Spain financed and made possible the "discovery" of the Americas, leading to a completely new age in human history: The age of exploration.
-Spain dominated land warfare in Europe with their Tercios and maritime warfare with the Invincible Armada.
-Spain stopped the Ottomans from conquering Europe with the battle of lepanto.

... etc, etc... the Reconquista, Picasso/Velazquez/Cervantes/Goya, Civil War, Indepence war vs Napoleon... etc, etc.

The difference with other historical empires like Persia or the Aztecs is that, Spain continues to exist since 1479 as one unified country. We are only the 14th country by GDP and 29th by population today, but as always we hold a strategic geographic (entrance to mediterranean, door to africa) and political position (influence with south america).

Sorry for the rant, somewhat off topic

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On topic: I never play true-position maps, and I believe they will always be unbalanced. Getting equal or similar representation of civilizations on each continent or area is something very,very low on my priority list, just as having the same amount of women/men leaders or black/white or black/asian leaders.

If, for example, the amount of women leaders was too high, and someone thought Isabella should be swapped out for a man, I wouldn't understand it.

Not having historicly important empires on the game worries me much more. Let's have the most representative/powerful civilizations on launch and then allow DLCs to add less known Civilizations to shake things up. That is what DLC is for right? Do you imagine having to pay to have Rome in the game because its slot is being used by the Salish?