Culture (Unit + Quarter) Speculation Thread

[BuchiTaton]

To be honest build modern Germany over what was Assyria is kind of immersion breaking itself. Even if a germany migration conquered Assyria, is doubtful that the resulting nation would name their capital Berlín, similar case with the name Germany for a nation with that history.

Maybe this great Assyrian nation conquered by germanic invasions, ended just with a germanic misspronunciation of Assur as name of their capital. Personally I would love to role play with something like this over a forced real Germany-Berlín appering from a complety different background.

NOTE: Could be nice If people with knowledge of ancient (and modern) languages made lists of alternate names of cities based on these "what if..." scenarios !

 

[Uberfrog]

To be honest build modern Germany over what was Assyria is kind of immersion breaking itself. Even if a germany migration conquered Assyria, is doubtful that the resulting nation would name their capital Berlín, similar case with the name Germany for a nation with that history.

Well this is exactly it.

Clearly the way cultures progress in the game bears no resemblance to the real passage of history. We’re all gonna have to swallow some breaks of “immersion”.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

It's unfortunate the Andean civilization continuum gets automatically shafted for New World representation by the Mesoamericans, again, as ALWAYS to be the case with these, except a RARE few cases where they co-exist. The Andean civilization continuum is such a rich and intriguing, but often overlooked, historical and archaeological horizon, and would be even more ideal here if they're glazing over lack of linguistic attestation - BUT NO, everyone loves the pyramids and snake statues everytime, instead...

Well the Maya were expected though.
South America still has a chance with either Moche or Nazca.

 

[FinalDoomsday]

Its more of a variety concern for me rather than realism or immersion. Most games you'll be seeing the same pools of ancient city names, medieval and early modern ones will pop up and may become important but the key settlements will remain the older ones. As for Industrial and beyond its hard to imagine them being anything more than satelites settled for strategic reasons.

Thats IF Humankind follows 4x tradition in your early expansions being the most important. I'd love it if newer cities could naturally eclipse older ones outside of the gimmicks of a wonder or some other anomaly. The Industrial era should in paticular allow for an explosion in growth as well as internal migration with some cities shrinking. It would be great if there was a quest to turn a city built in the early modern or industrial into one of the largest cities in the world for fame. If they could make those later settlements mean something then those civs name pools wouldent 'go to waste' so to speak.

 

[j51]

Maybe this great Assyrian nation conquered by germanic invasions, ended just with a germanic misspronunciation of Assur as name of their capital. Personally I would love to role play with something like this over a forced real Germany-Berlín appering from a complety different background.

Good point. Also, I meant this German Assur thing as an example, it's not something that annoys me in particular.

Its more of a variety concern for me rather than realism or immersion. Most games you'll be seeing the same pools of ancient city names, medieval and early modern ones will pop up and may become important but the key settlements will remain the older ones. As for Industrial and beyond its hard to imagine them being anything more than satelites settled for strategic reasons.

Thats IF Humankind follows 4x tradition in your early expansions being the most important. I'd love it if newer cities could naturally eclipse older ones outside of the gimmicks of a wonder or some other anomaly. The Industrial era should in paticular allow for an explosion in growth as well as internal migration with some cities shrinking. It would be great if there was a quest to turn a city built in the early modern or industrial into one of the largest cities in the world for fame. If they could make those later settlements mean something then those civs name pools wouldent 'go to waste' so to speak.

Yeah, now that I think about it, it's the lack of variety that is more of an annoyance, as well as the industrial era explosion of new cities not being represented in 4X games. It would be awesome if they could represent that somehow.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

. . . Yeah, now that I think about it, it's the lack of variety that is more of an annoyance, as well as the industrial era explosion of new cities not being represented in 4X games. It would be awesome if they could represent that somehow.

Civ VI stuck its Design toe in the water of addressing the population explosions in late Medieval (cut short by an unexpected visit from Mr. Plague) and the Industrial Era, the latter of which has continued almost unabated into the present Era. They didn't begin to depict the sheer magnitude of it, though, because population increase is Geometric and absolutely overwhelms everything else unless mitigated, as continued industrialization. modernization, and near-universal education seems to do automatically. Virtually every group that industrialized saw the birthrate drop to sustainment levels or slightly below.
But before that happens, the population increase, and consequent Urbanization of the country, is downright frightening. Europe's population doubled in the 19th century Industrial period, adding as many people in 100 years as had been added in previous 1400! That would require a lot more than a few more points of food per Farm that Civ VI provides.

It will be interesting to see, given what appears to be a potential massive expansion of the size of Cities in the screenshots of Humankind, what actual game mechanisms they are using to 'populate' all those Quarters.

 

[VermelhoRed]

But before that happens, the population increase, and consequent Urbanization of the country, is downright frightening. Europe's population doubled in the 19th century Industrial period, adding as many people in 100 years as had been added in previous 1400! That would require a lot more than a few more points of food per Farm that Civ VI provides.

Well, the population numbers and food icons are an abstraction though, so they wouldn't really correspond either way.

 

[FinalDoomsday]

Well today's Era Focus video has confirmed both Rome and Persia as expansionist civs which I think is new information.

So will our last civ be Agrarian as the last type not yet present in this era? Presumably so but just who could it be?

 

[VermelhoRed]

Well today's Era Focus video has confirmed both Rome and Persia as expansionist civs which I think is new information.

So will our last civ be Agrarian as the last type not yet present in this era? Presumably so but just who could it be?

Nazca!

 

[Krajzen]

Okay, so no Moche, Nazca, Nabateans or Numidians.

My remaining ideas are Picts (or some other Celtic name, but good luck finding greater than Picts after letter P), Saba, Scythians/Sarmatians/Saka and Silla.

Honestly I am really baffled by that last mysterious civ at this point. None of propositions I have given seem perfect to me. Introducing "Silla" civilization (which was much more medieval than classical) as Korea seems really strange to me. Scythians would mean second nomadic horse civilization in the same era, also occupying Ukraine (among other areas). Saba is very poorly documented and not very sexy choice. So we are left with... Picts? I'd still expect Gauls much more, or hell even generic very broad name "Celts".

 

[mitsho]

I really don't see Picts, they feel wrong in that roster and as you argue with Huns and Scythians, they are comparable to Goths. But of course they can do what they want.

Yamato, meaning pre-historic Japan, has been brought up on credit. Why not, I can see them being Agrarian. What is there else in Asia as I feel like we miss that culture group a bit for the moment? Tang is out since Han would fit way more, so I feel like we will be getting Silla or Yamato, as borderline classical as they are...

Some more options: Ptomelaics and Seleucids, but again...

I am so curious now ...

 

[ehecatzin]

I think Andean civs are more DLC material, or at least I'm resigned to it since 2 eras passed and there's not one. Maybe we'll get Incas (maybe). If that's the case I think that'd be ok, if it means that we'll get a very well done Andean tree akin to the meso one.

 

[BuchiTaton]

I really don't see Picts, they feel wrong in that roster and as you argue with Huns and Scythians, they are comparable to Goths. But of course they can do what they want.

Yamato, meaning pre-historic Japan, has been brought up on credit. Why not, I can see them being Agrarian. What is there else in Asia as I feel like we miss that culture group a bit for the moment? Tang is out since Han would fit way more, so I feel like we will be getting Silla or Yamato, as borderline classical as they are...

Complety agree!

Both Silla and Yayoi/Yamato are great options to cover both Far East and agrarian slots. Personally would prefer Yayoi/Yamato.

Do you remember when japanese troops used shields!

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I'll throw this out there but what about the "Viet", making it separate from proper Vietnam.

 

[Patine]

I'll throw this out there but what about the "Viet", making it separate from proper Vietnam.

As far as I can gather, in the "Classical" Age (and certainly Antiquity) "Viet," was one of those terms (quite ubiquitous in those old days) for an ethnicity and the land they occupied, but with no true political unity. The first political unity of the region were two or three periods under Chinese vassalage. Although the title was claimed to have been there, and "dynasties," are recorded, a true title of "Emperor," and a real, central, national government (modelled on China) is not truly evident until the Early Ly Dynasty of 544 AD, and by then you're moving into a Medieval period.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

As far as I can gather, in the "Classical" Age (and certainly Antiquity) "Viet," was one of those terms (quite ubiquitous in those old days) for an ethnicity and the land they occupied, but with no true political unity. The first political unity of the region were two or three periods under Chinese vassalage. Although the title was claimed to have been there, and "dynasties," are recorded, a true title of "Emperor," and a real, central, national government (modelled on China) is not truly evident until the Early Ly Dynasty of 544 AD, and by then you're moving into a Medieval period.

Remember. This is Humankind and these are Cultures, not civs.

 

[Patine]

Remember. This is Humankind and these are Cultures, not civs.

It is easy to forget after playing Civ and Age of Empires games for about 25 years, yes...

 

[Krajzen]

Remember. This is Humankind and these are Cultures, not civs.

Honestly, is there any difference in game context? Humankind does already contain city state amalgamates (Greece, Phoenicia, Harappa, Maya), empires (Assyria etc), a dynasty (Zhou), a culture (Olmec) nomadic peoples (Huns), and I recall they mentioning Peoples Republic of China in game, so basically EVERYTHING goes in

 

[grug]

I would also suggest the Polynesians. The largest wave of Polynesian expansion came during the medieval period, but the medieval period is likely to be too crowded so I don't know if the Polynesians would fit then, and there were some settlements made during the Classical Era like Samoa in the 800s BCE and Hawaii in the 300s CE.

If they were agrarian oriented maybe they could have a fish pond/ loko kuapa as the EQ, which would allow for aquaculture, otherwise they could have a bonus to focus on how they brought pigs and chickens with them thousands of miles across the ocean. The EU could be an outrigger canoe as a unique transport ship with either extra movement or able to cross deep ocean tiles, depending on how the game restricts naval vessels from crossing open ocean unimpeded. Another option for the EU is either Koa or Maori warriors, which would show the significance of warfare to Polynesian society but come from pretty squarely in the medieval period.

One problem with the Polynesians as Classical is the time period, with the largest period of expansion and the building of things like the Moai or Nan Madol falling in the medieval period. Another is the lack of unity, but as Humankind is showing cultures not polities that is less of an issue. Also, having Polynesians as agrarian might not be the best fit for their culture.

There's also the issue of how Humankind will deal with deep ocean tiles. For starters is yields, I know that numbers are subject to change but from the 2nd feature focus video it showed some tile yields and while coast tiles had 2 food, deep ocean tiles had nothing. Combined with the fact that cities are designed to sprawl, I don't know how plausible successfully building a city on a small island or archipelago would be. Another issue is how deep ocean tiles will be crossed prior to the compass. On a reddit post a few weeks ago CatONineTales said that "early ocean travel is handled slightly differently in Humankind than in Civilization, but you'll have to wait for the details." If deep ocean tiles are treated as a hard limit on exploration prior to the compass for other factions then being able to cross these tiles would be very useful for the Polynesians, but if there is some other difficulty that acts as a soft limit, like morale dropping for long voyages or storms, then it might not be all that useful to play them as a faction.

 

[Patine]

I would also suggest the Polynesians. The largest wave of Polynesian expansion came during the medieval period, but the medieval period is likely to be too crowded so I don't know if the Polynesians would fit then, and there were some settlements made during the Classical Era like Samoa in the 800s BCE and Hawaii in the 300s CE.

If they were agrarian oriented maybe they could have a fish pond/ loko kuapa as the EQ, which would allow for aquaculture, otherwise they could have a bonus to focus on how they brought pigs and chickens with them thousands of miles across the ocean. The EU could be an outrigger canoe as a unique transport ship with either extra movement or able to cross deep ocean tiles, depending on how the game restricts naval vessels from crossing open ocean unimpeded. Another option for the EU is either Koa or Maori warriors, which would show the significance of warfare to Polynesian society but come from pretty squarely in the medieval period.

One problem with the Polynesians as Classical is the time period, with the largest period of expansion and the building of things like the Moai or Nan Madol falling in the medieval period. Another is the lack of unity, but as Humankind is showing cultures not polities that is less of an issue. Also, having Polynesians as agrarian might not be the best fit for their culture.

There's also the issue of how Humankind will deal with deep ocean tiles. For starters is yields, I know that numbers are subject to change but from the 2nd feature focus video it showed some tile yields and while coast tiles had 2 food, deep ocean tiles had nothing. Combined with the fact that cities are designed to sprawl, I don't know how plausible successfully building a city on a small island or archipelago would be. Another issue is how deep ocean tiles will be crossed prior to the compass. On a reddit post a few weeks ago CatONineTales said that "early ocean travel is handled slightly differently in Humankind than in Civilization, but you'll have to wait for the details." If deep ocean tiles are treated as a hard limit on exploration prior to the compass for other factions then being able to cross these tiles would be very useful for the Polynesians, but if there is some other difficulty that acts as a soft limit, like morale dropping for long voyages or storms, then it might not be all that useful to play them as a faction.

Which culture of them?