Change Civ or Change Leader?

Which do you prefer?


  • Total voters
    62
Aksum has Amina. We don't know the leaders for Songhai or Buganda yet, but that doesn't necessarily mean they don't have leaders.

The know that Franklin and Confucius are leaders for non-Antiquity civs.
Confucius is almost certainly an ancient Chinese dynasty that they weren't ready to show off yet.
 
While I could probably live with having the same leader myself, I'm a bit worried what that means for for the leaders of AI factions.
If only a fraction of the nations have their own leaders, it would also mean that the other nations would use replacement leaders.
So can we expect stuff like this when meeting other leaders?

"Meet Hatshepsut, proud leader of Eg... Mongolia?! WTF!!"
"Meet Tecumseh, proud leader of Sha... Rome?! Huh?!"
"Meet Napoleon, proud leader of Fr... China?! Hm..."
"Meet Confucius, proud leader of Ch... the USA?! Oh my..."

For me, the main identification for an opposing faction is always the leader, and in all former Civs, the leader did at least fit the nation.
I would find it very immersion breaking, if the leaders for the other nations would suddenly be completely random.
Kinda: "Yeah, for the 69 € price tag of the game we unfortunately couldn't afford leader models for all nations. But well, there's always DLC..." 🫤

And this is exactly why the civ is switching instead of the leader. The main identification for the faction is their leader. That's who you'll keep track of all game; that's who you feel like you're playing against (and as, I suppose). If something has to stay the same so you recognize you're playing against the same faction, it should be the leader (aka player).
 
Except that is like saying Europe is a single civ... only actually united at occasional points in history with lots of different people groups migrating in and through as well as drastic cultural and religious changes.

The problem is "civilization" is really amorphous as a concept and saying when a culture or civilization starts or ends can be a subject of archaeology PhDs plural.
Well, we've already seen China throughout the series have leaders that would cover all three time periods: Qin in Ancient, Yongle in Exploration, and Mao in Modern.:shifty: Wu Zetian's an outlier because she would have ruled in the "dark age" between Antiquity and Exploration.
It's quite probable that we'll get the same thing in Civ 7 anyways, regarding China. They just all might be named different dynasties instead of being under one civ called China.
I don't see any of those as continuous civilizations that span the full timeline of the game. But even if they were, how much fun would the game be with three civilizations to play?
I was just stating what possible civilizations could span all three eras with a possible leader for each. I wasn't necessarily advocating for the idea to play like this with only 3 possible civs.
 
Last edited:
For all people saying this or that is "immersion breaking", I wonder what are you criteria to find that immersion breaking while having Rome and Byzantium (which are the same civs, heck, they called themselves by the same name) or Byzantium and the Ottomans (who both exactly had the same city as their capital, but apparently that doesn't breaks immersion, perhaps people don't have object permanence and changing Constantinople into Istanbul is enough to say that it's two different things). But that's not the topic.

On the poll, I took option 1 which is objectively the best choice gameplay-wise if you want to change core elements of your faction during the game. I already explained why at other places, but let me try again (as each time I refine my thought).

First, with the question of immersion: people think of their civilization as something continuous while leaders can come and go. Except that having a leader "dying" at each age is just as nonsensical as having them for all the game. Either way their near-immortal people leading your civilization. Having them "die" at one point would be odder than them living during an entire era, in my opinion.

But the main argument for eternal leader and fleeting civs in gameplay related. The main issue that a lot of people sensibly rose with this whole system is the potential lack of identification and continuity with your civilization. "Oh, I was the romans and now we're mongolians" => sure, that might be a problem. But what is the main way you interact with other civilizations? With the civilization itself? No, it's with the leader. Each time you interact with another civ, it'll be the leader that you see, because the leader is more characterful by their very nature of being characters, that's nearly a tautology as this point.

If you want to feel a better continuity with a foreign civ, you need continuity in their flagship, in the main thing you interact with, you see in it. And, as for now and since at least Civ IV (never played before so I can't really tell), this flagship is the leader. It's their head you see, and their voice you hear since Civ V. Therefore, keeping a continuity has to go with the leader, it's in the way of things.

I returned to Millennia recently, and they don't have leaders, merely civilizations, and truth be told, I barely think of my neighbors or opponents by their culture. When I get a message "South Korea is at war with India", I just ask myself: who are those guys? Oh, never mind. While if I had a message in Civ VII saying to me: "Augustus declared war to Hatchepsut", I'd quickly know that it's the twinkish boy with stick legs who declared war on the fiery queen with no hat at all. Those leaders are characters, and we humans are designed to recognize faces and get attached to them, so we feel a better connection with the leaders than with the civ.

Elements to further my point: in caricatures in newspapers, countries are often represented by characters. We all know Uncle Sam, we French have Marianne with her phrygian hat, Germans were automatically recognizable when you saw a moustached man with a pointy helmet, and everyone and everything goes through personification. So Civ VII is taking the sensible road and having those personifications representing the civilization, despite internal changes. The French might have gone through more political forms of governments than a trostkyist assembly under acide, but Marianne was able to keep a certain continuity since the French Revolution; less so during the monarchic phases, but even there, you knew only France could be represented that way. Despite changes, despite evolutions, despite everything, now we have our phrygian hat lady representing us. Caricatures are a very potent way of depicting a civ, and that's what Firaxis is doing, because, while people might like it or not, it's objectively the most efficient way to quickly have a visual image of the country, sometimes even more easily than with the flag.

Other element to further my point: imagine you're playing a Civ VI game, and you have Chandragupta against you. Then suddenly, it's Gandhi. Two questions: 1) would you feel as if you play against the same civilization? 2) would you react the same way? Other scenario: you start a game, and one neighbour is Chandragupta, the other is Gandhi. Would you react the same way against those two neighbours? If you think of an opponent first in terms of civilization then in term of leader, then your logical reactions would be to react the same against both of them; but I dare advance that each player would react differently. Why? Because each leader is much more impactful in the way a civ is played than the civ itself.

Because if we take another situation, it's even more jarring: Eleanor. If you are in a game against both Eleanors, you (at least I) would react quite similarly. You'd now that you'd have to take an eye on loyalty as she might try to gobble up your cities with her artworks. No matter if she's keener on wonders or harbours: in both cases, the loyalty mechanic will be much more impactful and you'd play against FrEleanor quite the same way than against EnglEanor; at least, in a much more similar way than if you played against Chandragupta or Gandhi.

And if we compare with the most comparable element, we have Humankind, which utterly failed at it. Avatars in Humankind are some of the blandest elements of the game (and it's not a small proclamation for this game). Therefore, you had factions that constantly changed cultures, but you didn't even have a characterful memorable avater to keep continuity, which is was it was quite badly implemented in Humankind, something that Firaxis seemed to have taken into consideration.

That's why I think option 1 is the best way to go. You might personally prefer or think that changing leaders would be better -and it's a perfectly valid opinion, that I cannot deny and it's as legitimate as any of the other options-, but from a gameplay perspective, if you start from the unchangeable and unalterable axiom that you have to change the leader, the civ or both across the ages, the best choice to maintain a sense of continuity in the game is to have the leaders being the continuous element.
 
Other element to further my point: imagine you're playing a Civ VI game, and you have Chandragupta against you. Then suddenly, it's Gandhi. Two questions: 1) would you feel as if you play against the same civilization? 2) would you react the same way? Other scenario: you start a game, and one neighbour is Chandragupta, the other is Gandhi. Would you react the same way against those two neighbours? If you think of an opponent first in terms of civilization then in term of leader, then your logical reactions would be to react the same against both of them; but I dare advance that each player would react differently. Why? Because each leader is much more impactful in the way a civ is played than the civ itself.
I can't personally speak for everyone, but I'd much rather see Chandragupta into Gandhi, and vice versa.
Then again, I've also reiterated that I'd still keep that an option for people to choose when setting up a game.
Because if we take another situation, it's even more jarring: Eleanor. If you are in a game against both Eleanors, you (at least I) would react quite similarly. You'd now that you'd have to take an eye on loyalty as she might try to gobble up your cities with her artworks. No matter if she's keener on wonders or harbours: in both cases, the loyalty mechanic will be much more impactful and you'd play against FrEleanor quite the same way than against EnglEanor; at least, in a much more similar way than if you played against Chandragupta or Gandhi.
It was an interesting gimmick, which I think it worked out better for Kublai than Eleanor. But it's a gimmick that I don't necessarily care to see again so that wouldn't have an impact on leader switching in game.
 
And this is exactly why the civ is switching instead of the leader. The main identification for the faction is their leader. That's who you'll keep track of all game; that's who you feel like you're playing against (and as, I suppose). If something has to stay the same so you recognize you're playing against the same faction, it should be the leader (aka player).
I've always identified with the Civs, not with the leaders. When there are multiple leaders, I just viewed them as different flavors of the same Civ.
 
I can't personally speak for everyone, but I'd much rather see Chandragupta into Gandhi, and vice versa.
The question here specifically is not: "which would you prefer" but: "would you consider Chandragupta and Gandhi as similar opponents?" which, I think, you wouldn't. Playing against Chandragupta feels closer to playing against Alexander than against Gandhi, despite being the same civ. That's the point I'm trying to make: in Civ VI at least, the leader against whom you are define more your opponent than the civ they lead.

And we're not talking about the merits of including Eleanor of Kublai Khan, but about how they feel in game as opponents. And, in my experience, playing against FrEleanor or against EnglEanor feels more similar than playing against EnglEanor or Victoria or Elizabeth, or playing against FrEleanor or Catherine de Medici. They're might be a gimmick, but they illustrate the main point: that it's the leader that define an opponent more than the civilization, and that if a dev wants to ingrain a sense of continuity in your opponents, they better do it through the leaders than through the civilizations themselves.

Because a civilization is more defined by what they can do while a leader is more defined by how or why they'd do something. Because one is solely a bunch of abilities, while the other also have a personality, and it's the personality that define more how someone react. And while you might try to impose a personality over a civilization, it's easier to do it through a leader who is a human and is similar to us. Civilizations are eldritch beings beyond our understanding, and applying to them our meager ways of thought is futile, while creating a personality for a person (even them being an immortal caricature) would be more palatable for humans, and despite what some of us might project, nearly all players of Civ games are humans.

You'll have a better sense of continuity in the game if you are against a faction that might build mastabas then ordus then guillotines, but lead by the same warmongering twink, than if you played against the same civilization that, from end to finish, can build aqueducts but is successively led by a warmonger, then a urbanizer then an aesthet.

That's why keeping the leaders is the best choice in terms of gameplay. Not ranking opinions, it's purely in terms of outcomes. It's like the whole builder/worker things. Some people might prefer to move little characters along the map to build improvements, while some might prefer to do it through your pop growth, and both opinions are valid. However, in term of gameplay, of tediousness and of city management, getting rid of builders is objectively the best choice as it reduces clicks and allows more time for the player for the thinking part of the process rather than the clicking part of it. Just like identifying to the civ rather than the leader, or vice-versa, is valid both ways; but in term of gameplay and continuity, keeping the leader is the superior decision than the civ.

(And that's without taking into consideration some external choices, like you'll have civs that lack leaders in earlier or later eras, so you're bound to have leaders that aren't tied to their civilization, so you're fated to have unrelated civs and leaders at some point, so you'd always have a moment where you look at a civ through their leaders being their main communication portal, and thinking: "wait, this leader makes no sense, who are they leading again? Which diplomatic stance had I with them?".)
I've always identified with the Civs, not with the leaders. When there are multiple leaders, I just viewed them as different flavors of the same Civ.
So, genuine question: you play against Chandragupta the same way you play against Gandhi? Because if they are merely different flavours of the same civ, that's what it would entail, right? And you play against FrEleanor and EnglEanor more differently than if you played against EnglEanor and Elizabeth? Because it's not just "viewing", the most important thing is how you react to those opponents. Actions here are more relevant than thoughts.
 
The question here specifically is not: "which would you prefer" but: "would you consider Chandragupta and Gandhi as similar opponents?" which, I think, you wouldn't. Playing against Chandragupta feels closer to playing against Alexander than against Gandhi, despite being the same civ. That's the point I'm trying to make: in Civ VI at least, the leader against whom you are define more your opponent than the civ they lead.

I don't consider Benjamin Franklin morphing from the Greeks into the Mongols into America to be the same opponent either. The same way you feel about leaders here is the way many of us feel about civilizations too

I don't know why you're so fixated on Elenor either. If I was playing Civ 6 I would never play with both civs being lead by her in the first place.
 
The question here specifically is not: "which would you prefer" but: "would you consider Chandragupta and Gandhi as similar opponents?" which, I think, you wouldn't. Playing against Chandragupta feels closer to playing against Alexander than against Gandhi, despite being the same civ. That's the point I'm trying to make: in Civ VI at least, the leader against whom you are define more your opponent than the civ they lead.

And we're not talking about the merits of including Eleanor of Kublai Khan, but about how they feel in game as opponents. And, in my experience, playing against FrEleanor or against EnglEanor feels more similar than playing against EnglEanor or Victoria or Elizabeth, or playing against FrEleanor or Catherine de Medici. They're might be a gimmick, but they illustrate the main point: that it's the leader that define an opponent more than the civilization, and that if a dev wants to ingrain a sense of continuity in your opponents, they better do it through the leaders than through the civilizations themselves.

Because a civilization is more defined by what they can do while a leader is more defined by how or why they'd do something. Because one is solely a bunch of abilities, while the other also have a personality, and it's the personality that define more how someone react. And while you might try to impose a personality over a civilization, it's easier to do it through a leader who is a human and is similar to us. Civilizations are eldritch beings beyond our understanding, and applying to them our meager ways of thought is futile, while creating a personality for a person (even them being an immortal caricature) would be more palatable for humans, and despite what some of us might project, nearly all players of Civ games are humans.

You'll have a better sense of continuity in the game if you are against a faction that might build mastabas then ordus then guillotines, but lead by the same warmongering twink, than if you played against the same civilization that, from end to finish, can build aqueducts but is successively led by a warmonger, then a urbanizer then an aesthet.

That's why keeping the leaders is the best choice in terms of gameplay. Not ranking opinions, it's purely in terms of outcomes. It's like the whole builder/worker things. Some people might prefer to move little characters along the map to build improvements, while some might prefer to do it through your pop growth, and both opinions are valid. However, in term of gameplay, of tediousness and of city management, getting rid of builders is objectively the best choice as it reduces clicks and allows more time for the player for the thinking part of the process rather than the clicking part of it. Just like identifying to the civ rather than the leader, or vice-versa, is valid both ways; but in term of gameplay and continuity, keeping the leader is the superior decision than the civ.

(And that's without taking into consideration some external choices, like you'll have civs that lack leaders in earlier or later eras, so you're bound to have leaders that aren't tied to their civilization, so you're fated to have unrelated civs and leaders at some point, so you'd always have a moment where you look at a civ through their leaders being their main communication portal, and thinking: "wait, this leader makes no sense, who are they leading again? Which diplomatic stance had I with them?".)

So, genuine question: you play against Chandragupta the same way you play against Gandhi? Because if they are merely different flavours of the same civ, that's what it would entail, right? And you play against FrEleanor and EnglEanor more differently than if you played against EnglEanor and Elizabeth? Because it's not just "viewing", the most important thing is how you react to those opponents. Actions here are more relevant than thoughts.
I think the distinction you're missing is you are talking about who they're playing against, where as they're talking about who they're playing as. To which I think both are correct, and that's why I think neither should change
 
Last edited:
Here's my argument for why leader swapping is superior to civ swapping (in no particular order):

1. Leader swapping has more support from previous Civilization games

Previous Civilization games have had multiple leaders for the same Civ. This at least provides some precedent for allowing the player to switch between different leaders. Civ swapping has precisely one element of support in previous games (Eleanor of Aquitaine).

2. Leader swapping is more realistic
The premise the developers provided in their (mostly abysmal) reveal last week, was that Civilizations transform into something else when faced with a crisis. This is only really true if you look at the crisis as one of being conquered, subjugated, or colonized. Anglo-Saxons became English because they were conquered, not because they were faced with some nebulous crisis.

It is far more in line with human nature to look to a new leader in a time of crisis, rather than wholesale changes to ones culture, traditions, language, etc.

3. Leader swapping provides for more interesting gameplay
I fundamentally disagree with the developers' reasoning for adding civ swapping into the game, which is to always have civs that are well-suited to the time they are in. I believe this is a huge misunderstanding of their own game. Since Civilization 3, when we first saw differences between civs, a core challenge to Civilization gameplay has been navigating times where your civ lacks advantages and capitalizing on times where it has advantages. It makes for interesting gameplay when you have to take drastic actions to bring the situation more in your civ's favor.

With leader swapping, you would have choices of different leaders, but no guarantee that any of them are perfectly suited to the time and place your Civ is in, keeping a core challenge of Civilization in the game. Civ swapping, as proposed, removes that challenge.

4. Leader swapping removes what I believe is problematic cultural commentary
Humans are not interchangeable widgets which easily transition from one culture to another. The idea of Egypt becoming Mongolia or Songhai without being invaded and subjugated is proposterous.

5. Leader swapping allows for roleplaying or creating a new history as a civ, which many players enjoy
This isn't particularly important to me, but many players like having modern Romans, Babylonians, Carthaginians, etc. Civ swapping removes that aspect of gameplay.
 
(6) You build a "civilization that stands the test of time". That's the stated goal of civ 1. From the stone age to alpha centauri.

You're not building a leader that stands the test of time.
 
I don't know why you're so fixated on Elenor either. If I was playing Civ 6 I would never play with both civs being lead by her in the first place.
I'm fixating about her because, rather than discussing on the comet about hypothetical situations that might or might not happen, I'm actually taking experience from the closest thing to it that actually happened.

We're talking about: "what is the best: civ with different leaders or leaders with different civs?" and io and behold, we already have historical cases and actual evidences of both cases to compare it and analyze it and draw conclusions from. We have civs with different leaders (like India) and we have leaders with different civs (like Eleanor). I'm fixating on Eleanor because she's one of the two we can take example on, she was the first and the longest and most people have interacted with her than Kublai Khan that appeared later in the New Fronier Pass, at the time of which lots of people have already lost interest or not bought at all, so using him as a comparison would be less relevant.

That's why I'm talking about her, because we have the examples and experience and cases to talk about the difference between facing a civ that could be led by different leaders and a leader that could lead different civs. If you prefer to talk in a vacuum based purely on hypothetical, do it, be my guest, but that would be utterly pointless as, without factual elements to base your argumentation on apart from vague feeling, you won't really go far into the discussion.

The question to ask, that would be difficult to answer, would be: what's the biggest danger? People not identifying with their civs (while keeping the same cities, the same urbanization, the same historical unique buildings and districts, the same legacy bonuses and lots of elements except a name and a bonus), or people not keeping track of who their neighbors are, who were they at war with, who were your trade partners and who were your friends? I think, personally, that the biggest danger would be loosing track of who your opponents are rather than who you are; because we always know who we are, but it's more difficult to keep track of others. But here we enter the realms of pure personal appreciation and I have no elements that would be more factual to defend my position, so it's still in the open and at each their own appreciation.
I think the distinction you're missing is you are talking about who they're playing against, where is there talking about who they're playing as. To which I think both are correct, and that's why I think neither should change
Except that the starting postulate is: "something must change. Now, which one?". I'm sorry, but saying "none" is quite pointless to the whole exercise. It's like saying: "who would you think people should vote for the next election?" and you'd say: "I'd prefer if we were in an hereditary monarchy". Which... yes, OK, good for you, but that wasn't the point here. We weren't talking about the merit of different forms of government, but in this specific instance of this specific form of goverment where we have to have winner in the next election (and won't throw a revolution right away), who would you think we should have?

However, your other point stands out and is perfectly valid. It's just that, in lots of comments, people were also talking about how they would recognize their neighbors and opponents, so it's also a valid part to take into account. As for the: "the civilization I belong to"... Yeah, that's a personal opinion that I don't personally adhere to as I see civilization more as a bundle of abilities and skins, but skins changed over time (your cities don't have the same architecture in the Ancient Era than in the Information Era), and I saw way more often the names of other civilizations than my own. If anything, the thing I identify with most would be the name of my cities... but this will be a thing that would stay along the Ages, so it wouldn't change a thing.
(6) You build a "civilization that stands the test of time". That's the stated goal of civ 1. From the stone age to alpha centauri.

You're not building a leader that stands the test of time.
Except that it's still your civilization? You keep your old districts, your older cities keep their names, you keep legacy parts... Your civilization is the same, it just gain new bonuses (which is better gameplay wise) and changed a bit of skin (which already happened with changing architecture), but ultimately it will still be the legacy and heritage you build upon, right?

In our real world, we're still talking about the Western Civilization and we draw a continuity from the Romans and the Greeks, despite having different names, cultures, languages and borders. That's what a civilization is, right? So a civilization that evolved through the ages but staid put is standing the test of time.

That's basic object permanence. How can so many people be thrown away by such a basic thing?
 
I returned to Millennia recently, and they don't have leaders, merely civilizations, and truth be told, I barely think of my neighbors or opponents by their culture. When I get a message "South Korea is at war with India", I just ask myself: who are those guys? Oh, never mind. While if I had a message in Civ VII saying to me: "Augustus declared war to Hatchepsut", I'd quickly know that it's the twinkish boy with stick legs who declared war on the fiery queen with no hat at all. Those leaders are characters, and we humans are designed to recognize faces and get attached to them, so we feel a better connection with the leaders than with the civ.

I think you make the same mistake I did until very recently, you assume that other people's way of interacting with the thematic elements of the game are the same as yours. You try in your posts to separate the objective from the subjective, but many of the things you call objective feel that way to you because you assume some underlying conceptualisations you have are universal. Not to go through all of them, but in the example above I have the absolute opposite reaction.

If Ramkhamhaeng declared war on me, my first thought would be, "who?" Only after a second of thought would I go "oh, right, Siam - the yellowy-orange civ with the war elephants and the city-state bonuses." I think almost exclusively in terms of civilizations, with the leaders being (most of the time) just a pretty face and a slight variation on top of it. As proof of this: I remember off the top of my head that Siam was in Civ5 and what some of it's unique stuff was, but I had to google the name of the leader (which I've already reforgotten as I proof read this post).

Please note that I'm not saying one way of seeing things is better than the other. It's just wild (to me) how deep the difference goes and how it (appears to) divide the community almost right down the middle. It's fascinating because, until now, the two had been so closely tied together that they were almost the same concept, and interacting with one meant interacting with the other. It was two sides of the same coin (yes some civs had two leaders and some leaders two civs but that's a border case). Now that the coin has been split in half, it's very apparent that people had been thinking, and feeling, about this coin from two different angles all along.
 
The question here specifically is not: "which would you prefer" but: "would you consider Chandragupta and Gandhi as similar opponents?" which, I think, you wouldn't. Playing against Chandragupta feels closer to playing against Alexander than against Gandhi, despite being the same civ. That's the point I'm trying to make: in Civ VI at least, the leader against whom you are define more your opponent than the civ they lead.

And we're not talking about the merits of including Eleanor of Kublai Khan, but about how they feel in game as opponents. And, in my experience, playing against FrEleanor or against EnglEanor feels more similar than playing against EnglEanor or Victoria or Elizabeth, or playing against FrEleanor or Catherine de Medici. They're might be a gimmick, but they illustrate the main point: that it's the leader that define an opponent more than the civilization, and that if a dev wants to ingrain a sense of continuity in your opponents, they better do it through the leaders than through the civilizations themselves.

Because a civilization is more defined by what they can do while a leader is more defined by how or why they'd do something. Because one is solely a bunch of abilities, while the other also have a personality, and it's the personality that define more how someone react. And while you might try to impose a personality over a civilization, it's easier to do it through a leader who is a human and is similar to us. Civilizations are eldritch beings beyond our understanding, and applying to them our meager ways of thought is futile, while creating a personality for a person (even them being an immortal caricature) would be more palatable for humans, and despite what some of us might project, nearly all players of Civ games are humans.

You'll have a better sense of continuity in the game if you are against a faction that might build mastabas then ordus then guillotines, but lead by the same warmongering twink, than if you played against the same civilization that, from end to finish, can build aqueducts but is successively led by a warmonger, then a urbanizer then an aesthet.

That's why keeping the leaders is the best choice in terms of gameplay. Not ranking opinions, it's purely in terms of outcomes. It's like the whole builder/worker things. Some people might prefer to move little characters along the map to build improvements, while some might prefer to do it through your pop growth, and both opinions are valid. However, in term of gameplay, of tediousness and of city management, getting rid of builders is objectively the best choice as it reduces clicks and allows more time for the player for the thinking part of the process rather than the clicking part of it. Just like identifying to the civ rather than the leader, or vice-versa, is valid both ways; but in term of gameplay and continuity, keeping the leader is the superior decision than the civ.

(And that's without taking into consideration some external choices, like you'll have civs that lack leaders in earlier or later eras, so you're bound to have leaders that aren't tied to their civilization, so you're fated to have unrelated civs and leaders at some point, so you'd always have a moment where you look at a civ through their leaders being their main communication portal, and thinking: "wait, this leader makes no sense, who are they leading again? Which diplomatic stance had I with them?".)

So, genuine question: you play against Chandragupta the same way you play against Gandhi? Because if they are merely different flavours of the same civ, that's what it would entail, right? And you play against FrEleanor and EnglEanor more differently than if you played against EnglEanor and Elizabeth? Because it's not just "viewing", the most important thing is how you react to those opponents. Actions here are more relevant than thoughts.
You do bring up an interesting point about the opponents. Even though I tend to associate more with the civ I choose in game, I definitely pay more attention the leaders of the other civs probably because I do interact with them.

So yes, in regard to leader switching, I was really only thinking about the idea of you as the player switching leaders, depending on what bonuses you might want at a particular time. We've already seen that to an extent with social policies and governments etc. If that's the case, there can also always be an option for "no leader switching for the AI."

I've also said multiple times that I wouldn't tie leaders to certain eras either. If you wanted to start a game with Napoleon as France to expand quickly and then jump to Louis XIV to build wonders, or stay as Napoleon and conquer the world the whole game, it doesn't matter to me.
 
I'm fixating about her because, rather than discussing on the comet about hypothetical situations that might or might not happen, I'm actually taking experience from the closest thing to it that actually happened.

We're talking about: "what is the best: civ with different leaders or leaders with different civs?" and io and behold, we already have historical cases and actual evidences of both cases to compare it and analyze it and draw conclusions from. We have civs with different leaders (like India) and we have leaders with different civs (like Eleanor). I'm fixating on Eleanor because she's one of the two we can take example on, she was the first and the longest and most people have interacted with her than Kublai Khan that appeared later in the New Fronier Pass, at the time of which lots of people have already lost interest or not bought at all, so using him as a comparison would be less relevant.

That's why I'm talking about her, because we have the examples and experience and cases to talk about the difference between facing a civ that could be led by different leaders and a leader that could lead different civs. If you prefer to talk in a vacuum based purely on hypothetical, do it, be my guest, but that would be utterly pointless as, without factual elements to base your argumentation on apart from vague feeling, you won't really go far into the discussion.

The question to ask, that would be difficult to answer, would be: what's the biggest danger? People not identifying with their civs (while keeping the same cities, the same urbanization, the same historical unique buildings and districts, the same legacy bonuses and lots of elements except a name and a bonus), or people not keeping track of who their neighbors are, who were they at war with, who were your trade partners and who were your friends? I think, personally, that the biggest danger would be loosing track of who your opponents are rather than who you are; because we always know who we are, but it's more difficult to keep track of others. But here we enter the realms of pure personal appreciation and I have no elements that would be more factual to defend my position, so it's still in the open and at each their own appreciation.

Except that the starting postulate is: "something must change. Now, which one?". I'm sorry, but saying "none" is quite pointless to the whole exercise. It's like saying: "who would you think people should vote for the next election?" and you'd say: "I'd prefer if we were in an hereditary monarchy". Which... yes, OK, good for you, but that wasn't the point here. We weren't talking about the merit of different forms of government, but in this specific instance of this specific form of goverment where we have to have winner in the next election (and won't throw a revolution right away), who would you think we should have?

However, your other point stands out and is perfectly valid. It's just that, in lots of comments, people were also talking about how they would recognize their neighbors and opponents, so it's also a valid part to take into account. As for the: "the civilization I belong to"... Yeah, that's a personal opinion that I don't personally adhere to as I see civilization more as a bundle of abilities and skins, but skins changed over time (your cities don't have the same architecture in the Ancient Era than in the Information Era), and I saw way more often the names of other civilizations than my own. If anything, the thing I identify with most would be the name of my cities... but this will be a thing that would stay along the Ages, so it wouldn't change a thing.

Except that it's still your civilization? You keep your old districts, your older cities keep their names, you keep legacy parts... Your civilization is the same, it just gain new bonuses (which is better gameplay wise) and changed a bit of skin (which already happened with changing architecture), but ultimately it will still be the legacy and heritage you build upon, right?

In our real world, we're still talking about the Western Civilization and we draw a continuity from the Romans and the Greeks, despite having different names, cultures, languages and borders. That's what a civilization is, right? So a civilization that evolved through the ages but staid put is standing the test of time.

That's basic object permanence. How can so many people be thrown away by such a basic thing?
I've never went into the game setup page thinking about what leader I want to play as. I always decide what civ I want to play as first. If there are multiple leader options, that choice comes after.
 
Except that it's still your civilization? You keep your old districts, your older cities keep their names, you keep legacy parts... Your civilization is the same, it just gain new bonuses (which is better gameplay wise) and changed a bit of skin (which already happened with changing architecture), but ultimately it will still be the legacy and heritage you build upon, right?

Great! Then can I keep calling it Rome, have cool legion banners & red flags? After all, my civilization is the same, it just gained new bonuses? 😉

It would also be ok to call if "Rome 40k" and conquer the galaxy 😂
 
(6) You build a "civilization that stands the test of time". That's the stated goal of civ 1. From the stone age to alpha centauri.

You're not building a leader that stands the test of time.

But is that civilization the label (name, art work, adjective, map colour, etc...) that you pick at the game creation screen? Or is it the sum total of every city, unit, improvement, and wonder you've built; every technology you've researched, every missionary you've sent? Which of the two is the permanent object, and which are the malleable properties that is has? Did you take a pre-existing Babylon to space? Or did you build a new civilization yourself that had the name Babylon to space? The latter can survive a change of the label, the former cannot. The former can survive an extended loss of player control where things "randomly" change to it, the latter cannot.

[The 3rd alternative would be is that it's the leader which is the permanent object, and both of the others merely it's attribute].


Honestly, I think there's some fascinating aspect of the psychology of gaming in here.
 
Last edited:
But is that civilization the label (name, art work, adjective, map colour, etc...) that you pick at the game creation screen? Or is it the sum total of every city, unit, improvement, and wonder you've built; every technology you've researched, every missionary you've sent? Which of the two is the permanent object, and which are the malleable properties that is has? Did you take a pre-existing Babylon to space? Or did you build a new civilization that had the name Babylon to space? The latter can survive a change of the label, the former cannot. The former can survive an extended loss of player control where things "randomly" change to it, the latter cannot.

[The 3rd alternative would be is that it's the leader which is the permanent object, and both of the others merely it's attribute].


Honestly, I think there's some fascinating aspect of the psychology of gaming in here.
The game is called Civilization, not Leader. I think that sums up my feelings rather succinctly.
 
1. Leader swapping has more support from previous Civilization games
Previous Civilization games have had multiple leaders for the same Civ. This at least provides some precedent for allowing the player to switch between different leaders. Civ swapping has precisely one element of support in previous games (Eleanor of Aquitaine).
Except that, in Civ VI, you choose a leader to play, not a civ. I was the leaders that were proposed. And even in the case of Eleanor, you choose "Eleanor (France)" or "Eleanor (England)". But you didn't choose "India (Chandragupta)" or "Greece (Gorgo)". It was Chandragupta or Gandhi or Pericles or Gorgo. If anything, this point more about the leader being the defining characteristic rather than the civ.
2. Leader swapping is more realistic
The premise the developers provided in their (mostly abysmal) reveal last week, was that Civilizations transform into something else when faced with a crisis. This is only really true if you look at the crisis as one of being conquered, subjugated, or colonized. Anglo-Saxons became English because they were conquered, not because they were faced with some nebulous crisis.
Except... it's not. In both cases, you have an immortal leader. Having him die after a three thousands year instead of staying until six thousands years is not "more realistic". They're both unrealistic to such degrees that making a difference is pointless.

Also, I thought we went through it, but "realism" shoudl absolutely not be an argument in the discussions about a game where Montezuma built the Hanging Gardens in the taoist holy city of Timbuktu. Talking about immersion is much more relevant. However, I personally don't feel than swapping leader would be more immersive than swapping civs.
5. Leader swapping allows for roleplaying or creating a new history as a civ, which many players enjoy
This isn't particularly important to me, but many players like having modern Romans, Babylonians, Carthaginians, etc. Civ swapping removes that aspect of gameplay.
I'd say the opposite. Despite everthing, we're all humans, and most people have an easier time roleplaying as people (even immortal leaders) than as countries.

I spent some years on a political forums where each player was roleplaying a country; but, to be honest, we were all more roleplaying as the main characters of the countries than the country in itself. When talking to another kingdom, I was talking mainly to their queen or her ambassador more than the country itself. It was a necessary basis, but even their, where we were roleplaying countries, we naturally chose to use characters as the main roleplaying element.

And I say that as someone who loves roleplaying countries and nations and blocks like that.
I've also said multiple times that I wouldn't tie leaders to certain eras either. If you wanted to start a game with Napoleon as France to expand quickly and then jump to Louis XIV to build wonders, or stay as Napoleon and conquer the world the whole game, it doesn't matter to me.
While I personally have no problem with this idea, just imagine the uproar of the fanbase about "breaking immersion". They already can't stand having Franklin leading Rome, do you imagine how their mind would break if you could play Louis XIV after Napoléon? :lol:
Great! Then can I keep calling it Rome, have cool legion banners & red flags? After all, my civilization is the same, it just gained new bonuses?
Sure, why not? Have some generic bonuses without any cultural tie to how and why you have them, just pile them up atop from each other! That's what Humankind did, and at the end, each civ was looking exactly the same.

More realistically, the point of having a civ rather than a bunch of bonuses under a generic flag or name is that the player know what kind of bonuses they can have through a superficial knowledge of what they are. Mongolians? I can expect to have horses. Rome? I can expect them to be good builders and conquerors. Byzantium? I can expect them to be good at religion. But adding new bonuses on top of each other will cause problems, because you'll have to have generic bonuses untied to the civilization itself. Because what bonuses would you give to Information Era Romans? And what bonuses would you give to Ancient Era Americans? So, for those civs, you'd have to have "generic" bonuses that are untied to History for when you play them at those eras. And you'd loose what make each part of your history meaningful. You wouldn't be the wonder-building Egyptians, you would be the wonder-building, horse-riding, trinket manufacturing, literary artists known as the Egyptians, while the neighboring romans who made the same choices would be the city-building, horse-riding, trinket manufacturing, literary artists known as the Romans, and they would loose their identity much quicker than otherwise. Which, for people who seem to care about identity, would make you go the opposite way of what you're looking for. Instead of having civilizations you can relate to, you'll end up with a mash-up of random bonuses than end up having no identity, like in Humankind.
The game is called Civilization, not Leader. I think that sums up my feelings rather succinctly.
Except we never played civilizations. Because playing a civilization would be at the same time much more restricted and too broad to have any meaning.

Prithee, pray tell: give me a definition of civilization that could explain having at the same time British England and British Scotland, having at the same time the city-State of Venice and the nomadic Huns, that split the Romans and the Romans between two separate civilizations (here the Byzantium) while still presenting as a same civilization the Mauryas and modern day India, a definition that include at the same time the cultural people known as Maoris and the modern nation-state built as Australia, a definition that ended up separating Germany and Austria while often depicting Germany in its state where Austria was blended into the monstrosity that was the HRE? The definition of a "civilization" is so nonsensical that staying on the idea what we play a "civilization" makes no sense.

Here, we would be playing civilizations, in the way that civilizations evolved and changed name. In the way that Rome became Byzantium rather than being two distinct "civilizations". In the way that modern day Germans and Italians and French all reclaim the heritage of the Roman and Greek civilization. We'll claim the heritage of our previous "civs", while still being one age-spanning civilization that, despite what you may say, will stand the test of time, by evolving rather than monolithically staying the same.

(Also, the games Victoria, Victoria 2 and Victoria 3 dared existed while allowing us to play other people than queen Victoria. What a shame. Everyone knows that a game should stick exclusively to what the title say rather than exploring new avenues.)
 
Top Bottom