[NFP] Civilization VI: Possible New Civilizations Thread

[AsH2]

Oh I see... HIGH elves.

 

[God of Kings]

I would like to see the famed Buteo civ return!

Complete with soft fluffy solid clouds!

It won't be the first time Civ had solid clouds.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

Sea Elves? Those are Nagas.. Or if you insist on keeping it in Middle Earth - I think those Gnomes call themselves Hobbits and their land for the Shire..

Jayavarman is descended from nagas, according to legend.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

Jayavarman is descended from nagas, according to legend.

I remember hearing that from an AoE 2 Campaign Cutscene.

 

[Thenewwwguy]

Is this heading towards a "Lord of the Rings-Civ" spinoff...???

Civ taking a route where the leaders and civs are fictional but realistic, or a high fantasy spinoff would be really interesting.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

I remember hearing that from an AoE 2 Campaign Cutscene.

The story goes like this:

Nagas are important across the Hindu-[Theravada] Buddhist world, but they are especially important in mainland Southeast Asia, being kind of the patron deity of Laos and the Mekong River. The Cambodian legend went that the royalty was descended from a foreigner (a "Brahmin") and a naga queen. The king was supposed to have a liaison with a naga queen who would come visit him at times in his palace at night. There are similar stories of royal origins across the Mekong region.

People have interpreted this in a few different ways. I'll list these from wackiest to the most believable.

Some people claim that, when the Ice Age ended and sea levels rose, people adopted a kind of aquatic culture and the memory of this remains in stories about the naga. I think that's nuts.
Others point to the Naga people of eastern India, a people who speak a Tai-related dialect. I also think that's not terribly imaginative.
Others say the naga is just a local legend, but that Indian kings (esp. Ashoka) conquered the region and intermarried. Probably not, but it could be OK.
Or, it could be a bit of a metaphor. The "Brahmin" is a person of high, Sanskrit education, coming with Buddhism and Hinduism learned from abroad. The "Naga" refers to the people of Cambodia. This makes more sense if you remember that nagas are also beings of the deep earth, not just water. So they are, almost by definition, autochthonous. That's what I think.

 

[Futumch]

See there you go. I associated the word "naga" with either a stupidly hot chilli pepper, or a sort of fantasy aquatic lizardy creature.

There is a Naga chilli vodka apparently. If I was partial to flavoured vodkas I'd probably have a taste.

 

[Andrew Johnson [FXS]]

See there you go. I associated the word "naga" with either a stupidly hot chilli pepper, or a sort of fantasy aquatic lizardy creature.

There is a Naga chilli vodka apparently. If I was partial to flavoured vodkas I'd probably have a taste.

So the strange journey of the naga goes like this. Full caveat - I've written a book on naga worship.

The naga is a beast in Hindu mythology - a sacred serpent that lives in the ocean surrounding Mount Meru, the heavens. A naga was pivotal, too, in the creation of life (the gods and the asuras ["demon" in the Torah sense, not in the Catholic sense] used it to churn the ocean of milk). It is a chthonic thing, constantly at war with the aerial and divine garuda, the bird of the heavens. If you're feeling elemental, you could associate naga with water and earth, and garuda with fire and air. If you're feeling nationalistic, the naga are Laos, and the garuda is Thailand. Or the naga is Shiva's companion, and the garuda is Vishnu's.

In Buddhism, the naga is a thing that is always seeking after enlightenment, and is always getting denied. Nagas keep trying to sneak in to listen to the Buddha's sermons, keep trying to get ordained as monks, and keep getting tossed out. One naga was so piteous in his pleas to listen to the Dharma that the Buddha offered to have all novice monks named "naga" in his honor (but he still didn't get to be a monk - he had to wait for his next life). The King of the Nagas sheltered the Buddha when he was meditating, too, so nagas get to be a kind of hostile protector of Buddhism - aggressive towards people, but also in seek of enlightenment. They act as temple guardians, guardians of caves and rivers and sacred spaces. They make earthquakes when they are displeased. They tell the seeker of Buddhist truth "the dharma isn't just about you, it is about everything, even those things that would eat you".

Enter Gary Gygax. Dungeons and Dragons is looking for monsters, and Gygax randomly sees some version of this myth. Unable to really parse "good? But also eats people?", he makes good nagas and evil nagas and separates them out. "Naga," after this, has less to do with the Buddhist creature and more to do with the DnD monster. Further, "naga" in Hindi (I may be wrong here) simply means "snake", so it comes to mean "kind of aquatic snake monster, sort of hostile".

Enter WoW. If I'm right - I've never played WoW, nagas are a kind of fishy, snakey, Deep One-adjacent being? This is clearly an homage to the DnD monster, and clearly pretty far from the Hindu-Buddhist myth. And this is what a lot of Westerners think when they think "naga". But this is a Gygax thing, as much as elves get pretty far from the dwarflike craftsmen of Norse myth via Tolkien's "mega-hot people in the woods" idea.

So there's your "fantasy aquatic lizardy creature." Hindu myth reinterpreted as Buddhist temple guardian reinterpreted as DnD monster reinterpreted as WoW race.

Your pepper has a different etymology. The Naga people live in NE India and speak a Tai language. They grow really hot peppers. I do not know, or it is unclear, if the ethnonym "Naga" is related to the Sanskrit or Pali "Naga".

Finally, the only true flavored vodkas are made with horseradish or dill. Others are made for people who like tiny beach furniture in their drinks.

 

[Abaxial]

OK, I think I should just drop this here:

"…the whole earth was so overrun with ghosts, boggles, Bloody Bones, spirits, demons, ignis fatui, brownies, bugbears, black dogs, spectres, shellycoats, scarecrows, witches, wizards, barguests, Robin-Goodfellows, hags, night-bats, scrags, breaknecks, fantasms, hobgoblins, hobhoulards, boggy-boes, dobbies, hob-thrusts, fetches, kelpies, warlocks, mock-beggars, mum-pokers, Jemmy-burties, urchins, satyrs, pans, fauns, sirens, tritons, centaurs, calcars, nymphs, imps, incubuses, spoorns, men-in-the-oak, hell-wains , fire-drakes, kit-a-can-sticks, Tom-tumblers, melch-dicks, larrs, kitty-witches, hobby-lanthorns, Dick-a-Tuesdays, Elf-fires, Gyl-burnt-tales, knockers, elves, rawheads, Meg-with-the-wads, old-shocks, ouphs, pad-foots, pixies, pictrees, giants, dwarfs, Tom-pokers, tutgots, snapdragons, sprets, spunks, conjurers, thurses, spurns, tantarrabobs, swaithes, tints, tod-lowries, Jack-in-the-Wads, mormos, changelings, redcaps, yeth-hounds, colt-pixies, Tom-thumbs, black-bugs, boggarts, scar-bugs, shag-foals, hodge-pochers, hob-thrushes, bugs, bull-beggars, bygorns, bolls, caddies, bomen, brags, wraiths, waffs, flay-boggarts, fiends, gallytrots, imps, gytrashes, patches, hob-and-lanthorns, gringes, boguests, bonelesses, Peg-powlers, pucks, fays, kidnappers, gallybeggars, hudskins, nickers, madcaps, trolls, robinets, friars' lanthorns, silkies, cauld-lads, death-hearses, goblins, hob-headlesses, bugaboos, kows, or cowes, nickies, nacks, waiths, miffies, buckies, ghouls, sylphs, guests, swarths, freiths, freits, gy-carlins, pigmies, chittifaces, nixies, Jinny-burnt-tails, dudmen, hell-hounds, dopple-gangers, boggleboes, bogies, redmen, portunes, grants, hobbits, hobgoblins, brown-men, cowies, dunnies, wirrikows, alholdes, mannikins, follets, korreds, lubberkins, cluricauns, kobolds, leprechauns, kors, mares, korreds, puckles, korigans, sylvans, succubuses, blackmen, shadows, banshees, lian-hanshees, clabbernappers, Gabriel-hounds, mawkins, doubles, corpse lights or candles, scrats, mahounds, trows, gnomes, sprites, fates, fiends, sibyls, nicknevins, whitewomen, fairies, thrummy-caps, cutties, and nisses, and apparitions of every shape, make, form, fashion, kind and description, that there was not a village in England that had not its own peculiar ghost." - Michael Denham, c. 1850

Note that this is the first appearance in print of the word "hobbit" - no, Tolkien did not make it up.

 

[leif erikson]

Moderator Action: Please take the Tolkien discussion to Off Topic. Yet again, please get back to the topic of the thread.

 

[Abaxial]

Since we are led to understand that development of Civ VI is over, it's difficult to see that discussing possible new civilisations has much point to it. As for Civ VII, one assumes it will come with the "regulars" before there is any question of obscure tribes or defunct kingdoms.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Since we are led to understand that development of Civ VI is over, it's difficult to see that discussing possible new civilisations has much point to it. As for Civ VII, one assumes it will come with the "regulars" before there is any question of obscure tribes or defunct kingdoms.

I mean there's nothing wrong with the possibility of speculating anyway. Those that we want to come in Civ 6 I'm sure we'd want to come in Civ 7 too, especially if they don't make it in.

 

[Abaxial]

Those that we want to come in Civ 6 I'm sure we'd want to come in Civ 7

But to have in Civ 7 Iroquois, Haiti, Italy, Berbers instead of USA, Japan, France? Well, maybe one can make a case for it, but I don't see it happening.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

But to have in Civ 7 Iroquois, Haiti, Italy, Berbers instead of USA, Japan, France? Well, maybe one can make a case for it, but I don't see it happening.

Obviously that's not going to happen, but well Iroquois did get in the base game in Civ 5 in addition to America, Japan and France etc. We also got Kongo and Scythia this time around.
I'm not necessarily even talking about only civs in the base game of Civ 7. If Civ 7 gets close to about 60 civs yes I could easily see those get in, if they don't appear in this game.

 

[SirMediocrity]

Ngl I kind of hope America isn't a base game civ in the future but I realize that's unrealistic for marketing reasons.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Ngl I kind of hope America isn't a base game civ in the future but I realize that's unrealistic for marketing reasons.

Probably won't happen. The bigger question is will that be the only post-colonial civ in the base game?

That being said I still think we'll get Brazil and Australia eventually, unless somehow we magically get an Aboriginal civ from that area.

As for the Americas I'd be fine with choosing Argentina over Gran Colombia, and Haiti over Canada. That can make room for the return of the Iroquois and first time Muisca, at least for TSL purposes.

And I'm fine with keeping a Dutch one out.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

And I'm fine with keeping a Dutch one out.

That's for the DLC's.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

That's for the DLC's.

More like that's what Argentina and Haiti will be for. I know you would like for every group of people to get in the game but I can live without Suriname, Aruba, or the Boers.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

More like that's what Argentina and Haiti will be for. I know you would like for every group of people to get in the game but I can live without Suriname, Aruba, or the Boers.

Oh, I thought you meant the actual Dutch. I'm being idiotic today.

Yeah, I can live without former Dutch colonies as well.

 

[Thenewwwguy]

now that this whole genshin impact thing has gone down, i’m glad that firaxis cares enough about cultural sensitivity to get better at representing cultures (esp. indigenous ones) every iteration of this game.

Here’s to the Dine and Tlingit showing up eventually