Colonialism: Make settling viable in mid-late game

[Sake]

Hey guys, i thought i'd throw ideas that have been on back of my mind for some time.

In CiV, expansion had two phases: in the very early game you tried to grab best city spots before AI steals them. Because of global happiness player rarely affords to expand beyond 4 cities (also because tradition is superior to all other starters). After player manages to get their starting economy running, any further expansion will likely be thought conquest because AI has likely taken all good city locations and, even if you do find good position, any city started after renaissance era will be very far behind those that were started in ancient era. Spain has conquistadors that are specifically designed as colonial unit, but even it ends up being very underwhelming unit because it's pretty much just more expensive settler that can also fight.

I'd like VI to focus more on colonialism, not just exploration, but also overseas expansion. It was huge part of 15th to 19th century and i feel it doesn't get enough attention in Civ.

Here's some ideas i have for this ( you guys are free to throw your own ideas down below )

-After medieval era, cities get some sort of "starter boost" to help it catch up to earlier cities. This boost can be more population, free building etc and it would scale by era. Order has a policy that boosts starting pop in CiV, but that comes way too late to be relevant.
-Maybe create more maps with terra like elements (continents without civs). These continents could be small, but include a lot of valuable resources. Maybe even something to represent the natives (different kind of CS maybe?).
-Some mechanic to embrace colonial race between human player and AI's (for example, rich continents that would give special benefits to colonial cities).
-Explorer units that could do special mission like hunt for the seven cities (totally didn't steal this idea from EU4 )

 

[salty mud]

Perhaps there could be a migration mechanic where your "homeland" cities may steadily lose population whilst your overseas cities enjoy a much faster rate of growth.

PS. is it possible to find the seven cities in EU4? My explorers searched and searched and searched and found nothing, ever.

Regards.

 

[m15a]

In BNW, you can boost cities with internal trade routes (and buying buildings and units). I feel like that is a pretty strong mid-game boost.

More maps are always fun, but Civ V already has a Terra map, so that is also an existing feature. Natural wonders and city states also encourage exploration.

So, I guess the question is, with those features already in BNW, why does the game still not feel like it encourages colonization? (Or maybe it does. Not really sure.)

Anyway, one easy suggestion for Civ VI is to give a Eureka bonus for settling a city on another continent.

 

[Nixalo]

One idea I had as that if you settle a city on the same spot as a mid game explorer unit you get a bonus to food and production. A late game explorer gives strategic resources.

Think off it like surveying the area ahead of time.

 

[m15a]

It'd be better if the explorers actually found resources of value on the map since resources already exist. The map script would just have to be designed so that different continents tend to have different resources (and that diversity of resources is valued).

Maybe a good mid-game boost to colonization would be a mercantilist government card which gives a large gold yield (maybe 1 per population point) in the city tile of cities founded on other continents from the capital, maybe paired with a settler building discount. A trade-off could be that those cities can't have (or maybe can't be the target of) external trade routes.

So, basically, you found a colony and push some internal food trade routes to get the colony going, and in exchange, you get more gold, plus all the resources the city is connected to.

 

[JtW]

One valid point you raise is that the way the AI sees your behavior is conquest, not colonization. What I feel would help is if Civilization had some concept of "culture groups" - e.g., if civs didn't care if you attacked civilizations from another continent or something like that. At least until some cultural advancements of the modern era, maybe?

 

[KrikkitTwo]

The reason you don't have colonialism in the mid late game, is there isn't territory to expand into.

In Civ, 2 continents that are separated are likely to be relatively close in technology.

In Real life, the Americas/Australia were
1. so far technologically behind that they couldn't put up resistance, until they had gotten some of the invaders technology
2. vastly depopulated because of disease

For the best example, try playing a Terra map, all the Civs are on one continent, and the other has nothing more than Barbs+CS... which means with a few military units you can clear vast amounts of new terrain.

In terms of power differentials, that is what our real world history was closest to.
(Sub saharan Africa was not as big of a difference, but it was still somewhat isolated and lacking in military technology... but not anywhere near as badly as the Americas/Australia... the areas that were truly "colonized" and not just "vassalized")

 

[TheMeInTeam]

In terms of power differentials, that is what our real world history was closest to.
(Sub saharan Africa was not as big of a difference, but it was still somewhat isolated and lacking in military technology... but not anywhere near as badly as the Americas/Australia... the areas that were truly "colonized" and not just "vassalized")

Sub-Saharan Africans were not far superior to new world populations in combat ability as far as I'm aware. The primary difference between the two is that in one case disease was a damaging factor to the "colonizer" and in the other it was a damaging factor to the native populations.

The disparity in outcome in that is enormous (it's hard to attract settlers to areas they're going to die to disease, and harder to relocate populations that aren't softened by it). however, modeling disease in a game on the Civ scale doesn't make a lot of sense either.

 

[dexters]

Guns Germs and Steel provided a fairly good explanation on why different civilizations developed differently and why some had large innate advantages.
When I first heard of this in the mid 2000s, a lightbulb went off as I remembered my jungle starts were awful, or the AI civ stuck somewhere in a terrible start being far behind everyone else.

Translated to a game, it means some starts are objectively poor and human players either reroll or do something to mitigate it.

In the Civ6 gameplay style context, imagine a game where you know ahead of time you won't get certain techs in a reasonable time because ironworking requires iron for eureka and none is in your continent, or you need certain beasts of burden to get+25% hammer bonus or to build certain districts.

I think those games just won't get played. And from a gameplay standpoint, it's not very balanced to have some starts in every game to be complete losers. I mean there is always the chance of that one game where some AI Civ is stuck with nothing but Tundra and snow, but that tends to be the exception. For a fun and competitive game, we want all Civs to be more or less equal, so a colonialism mechanic might be problematic.

Not to mention it may cause political and social justice objections from some quarters.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Sub-Saharan Africans were not far superior to new world populations in combat ability as far as I'm aware. The primary difference between the two is that in one case disease was a damaging factor to the "colonizer" and in the other it was a damaging factor to the native populations.

The disparity in outcome in that is enormous (it's hard to attract settlers to areas they're going to die to disease, and harder to relocate populations that aren't softened by it). however, modeling disease in a game on the Civ scale doesn't make a lot of sense either.

Not in terms of ability, but in terms of technology.

1500s Europe was
basically the same military tech as 1500s China
ahead of 1500s S.Saharan Africa (More difference opened up later)
Vastly ahead of 1500s Americas/Australia (neither metal nor horses, Africans had metal weapons)

Disease made the difference greater between Africa, and the Americas, but it was definitely there

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Not in terms of ability, but in terms of technology.

1500s Europe was
basically the same military tech as 1500s China
ahead of 1500s S.Saharan Africa (More difference opened up later)
Vastly ahead of 1500s Americas/Australia (neither metal nor horses, Africans had metal weapons)

Disease made the difference greater between Africa, and the Americas, but it was definitely there

1. Horses are not "technology". It's hard to predict things in hindsight, but it's hard to imagine they'd not use them if available even without seeing other examples first.

2. While Inca did not have iron/steel, they did have metal working. They're probably in a class of their own in the Americas, but a couple small variances from our history and things could look pretty different.

Sub-Saharan Africa is too much an overgeneralization, disparity in tech as you're describing it directly between nations there could be pretty large.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

1. Horses are not "technology". It's hard to predict things in hindsight, but it's hard to imagine they'd not use them if available even without seeing other examples first.

2. While Inca did not have iron/steel, they did have metal working. They're probably in a class of their own in the Americas, but a couple small variances from our history and things could look pretty different.

Sub-Saharan Africa is too much an overgeneralization, disparity in tech as you're describing it directly between nations there could be pretty large.

Using horses is technology (It didn't take the natives too long once they had access, but it did take them some time to get that technology)

and I agree there was disparity within the continents' technologies (both in the Americas and in sub-Saharan Africa, so that some populations in Africa were lower tech than some populations in the Americas... but overall the Americas were lower tech than Sub Saharan Africa).


In any case, the original idea (to have "colonialism" in a civ game) basically means there needs to be an entire continent or two that is empty or at least empty of serious resistance. (like the Americas/Australia in real life.... they had people there, but people that were massively outmatched when contact occurred)

 

[Blkbird]

This guy made a suggestion for an "immigration" mechanism that serves a similar goal to colonialism and is much easier to implement (and for players to understand):

The emmigrates as a kind of settlers who can be made in cities that don't grow. They can be sent to cities of others civs who can grow. Over time the emmigrates in that city could surpass the original citizens. They could rebellion if they don't like the form of the goverment and join they original civ. Or they could have a kind of autonomy. The possibilities for the diplomacy are opened.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Migration is going to suck unless pop gets reworked heavily, you want multipliers applied where you have pop and pop moving is going to make you less efficient.

Civ IV did have a "new cities have more pop and buildings in late era starts", and you can make a case for doing this based on era regardless of which one you start in 6. I would definitely like to see new cities be a potentially competent investment into the mid-late game under some circumstances.

 

[Felis Renidens]

I think that if your "old world" cities are crowded to the limit of housing\amenities capacity but still produce food surplus it's better to have that pop anywhere than nowhere. Immigration might solve this. Once you have the tech\civics that allow you to have a higher capacity in your old cities you'll want them to grow.

This does not negate civics that may allow cities to start with more production and base buildings and higher population. I hope there will be exploration-era cards that give such bonuses. Perhaps even an "Overseas Empire" government to help with it.

 

[Ikael]

I also would like for the game to offer incentives for a second colonization wave during the age of discoveries (s.XVI) or the latter age of colonialism (s.XIX).

I think that the way to implement such a thing would be something along these lines:

- Add an "anti-expansion" mechanism in order to incentivize a logical, first wave of expansion around your capital (corruption, manteinance, you name it). During the ancient / classical / medieval era, cities far away from your hinterland would get heavy penalties and drag down your empire, so you would focus your expansion around your initial area / continent

- Unlock a technology / social policy during the mid to late game (renaissance) that would allow for far away cities to loose that initial penalty, so you can build overseas empires. You can also add a hefty boost to newly founded cities so your new colonies can easily catch up with your old ones (say, +3 initial popullation, 3 basic buildings from the start, auto-improvements, etc)

- Unlock a powerful industrial era policy that would make colonies actually better cities than your own in order to incentivize actual colonialism, thus giving you a logical reason for grabbing land outside your own. For example: "colonialism: X2 to the quantity of strategic and luxury resources generated in cities of another continent" / "mechantile empire: oversea cities generates +25% gold, have +25% to their growth"

- Introduce independence movements / anti colonial revolts in the modern / atomic era in order to avoid snowballing, break up these empires and just add exciting obstacles towards the endgame

 

[Mobfire]

My thinking is that something akin to a Colonialism mechanic will be added in an expansion pack. There's already quite a bit of new and old systems being added into vanilla, so reserving a few for DLC would make sense for Firaxis. That being said, I would be ecstatic if it was introduced regardless of when.

 

[Draco84]

In Civ Revolution, a settler will generate a size 2 city at the beginning of the game, but as you progress they produce more pop when settling.

In that game a size 5 city is already a decent city and worth building even late game.

 

[daft]

I'd say they should create a Colonist- unit separate from Settler, prohibiting settlers from forming colonies.
Colonist - Available with Map Making. Can be built in coastal cities ONLY. Can Found colony on island/continent different than the city it was built in.

Colony- At founding (by Colonist) is a Town (half sized City). Meaning it will grow, but take a bit longer than a city to get going.
You can send colonists to join Colonies (increase colony pop. size), consuming the colonist.

Explorers: (prerequisite Astronomy) can be built only in coastal cities, can defend only, ignores terrain movement penalties.

 

[dexters]

I'd say they should create a Colonist- unit separate from Settler, prohibiting settlers from forming colonies.
Colonist - Available with Map Making. Can be built in coastal cities ONLY. Can Found colony on island/continent different than the city it was built in.

Colony- At founding (by Colonist) is a Town (half sized City). Meaning it will grow, but take a bit longer than a city to get going.
You can send colonists to join Colonies (increase colony pop. size), consuming the colonist.

Explorers: (prerequisite Astronomy) can be built only in coastal cities, can defend only, ignores terrain movement penalties.

That sounds like something for a Colonization mod or scenario . I think there's enough abstraction in the settler Mechanic to keep it as is. The settlement of the Americas is a unique event in history.

A lot of colonization in classical history was fairly close geographically and well within bounds of settlers settling new cities in civ