Define broad civilizations to make civ switching work?

[Arent11]

It didn't fail, nor failed, it just changed with the times.

The Abbasids didn't conquer Egypt, but Egypt "changed" to Abbasids? The Greek became Normans by soul transfer?

The cities reverted to towns for no reason whatsoever?

Sorry, guys, this is getting absurd.

 

[j51]

Basically I think the idea is something resembling how Rome became “Byzantium.” It survived crises but it changed a lot. (But it was still called ‘Rome’ by its people. Hopefully they do let players keep their civ name if they want to reflect this.)

 

[chaosprophet]

The Abbasids didn't conquer Egypt, but Egypt "changed" to Abbasids? The Greek became Normans by soul transfer?

The cities reverted to towns for no reason whatsoever?

Sorry, guys, this is getting absurd.

The Abbasids can't conquer Egypt, they're an exploration civ so they don't exist on Antiquity to conquer anyone. This isn't a historical simulator, it only use historical things for flavor as people tend to like those associates with things they know.

For gameplay reasons the cities reverts to towns, albeit you can avoid that by doing very well on economy and picking an specific legacy. It is part of their leveling the playing field at the start of each age, and may even be beneficial if the civ you change to is quite different bonuses wise to the previous ones where some cities you have would be more useful as towns and vice versa. If you must create a narrative instead of accepting it as just a gameplay decision, it isn't that hard: It can be seen as a set-back caused by the crisis that even if overcome still leave some scars in your empire, or even that what would constitute as a town x a civilization would make sense to change with time, as the world becomes overall more populous.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

The Abbasids didn't conquer Egypt, but Egypt "changed" to Abbasids? The Greek became Normans by soul transfer?

The cities reverted to towns for no reason whatsoever?

Sorry, guys, this is getting absurd.

I mean, if you're going to treat any setback as a failure, then sure, every time a barbarian pillages a resource, your civilization has failed. If you lose an infantry unit in a war, you've failed.

From what we know, I don't think the game is set up to treat the era changes as player failure, but that doesn't mean you can't interpret it as failure if that's what resonates with you.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

The Abbasids didn't conquer Egypt, but Egypt "changed" to Abbasids? The Greek became Normans by soul transfer?

The cities reverted to towns for no reason whatsoever?

Sorry, guys, this is getting absurd.

The Greeks 'became' Normans be adopting the attributes of the Normans. That doesn't require any 'soul transfer'.

AND, what you are ignoring, is that they also bring some of the attributes of their original 'Greekiness' with them. No 'new' Civ you pick or play in succeeding Ages will be entirely free of attributes from your previous Civ(s).

And that is absolutely Historically based. Every post-Roman 'Germanic barbarian' kingdom kept Roman forms of administration, Roman titles, Roman military features for as long as they could. The Roman Empire may have collapsed as a political reality, but the attributes of the Empire remained in play for centuries afterward. Those attributes were centered in Towns rather than Cities, because the Cities were supported by long-distance Trade that was now impossible (no wide-spread political entity to secure the trade routes), but there is some debate now about 'massive population loss' as opposed to 'massive population movement' connected with the fall of (western) Rome (Note that massive population loss had already occured several centuries before the political 'fall' from the Plagues of the 2nd century CE).

Inability to accept a new game model of history is not absurd, and you are by no means alone, but the game design is simply different from what we are used to: neither wrong nor right, absurd nor obtuse, more nor less accurate than Immortal Kingdoms under Immortal Leaders with Immortal Attributes

 

[Arent11]

I've literally seen no one but you interpret it that way, and that's not the way it's being sold.

So how do you interprete the change Egypt -> Abbasids other than conquest and subjugation of the Egyptians? I mean, what other interpretation is there?

 

[Arent11]

Basically I think the idea is something resembling how Rome became “Byzantium.” It survived crises but it changed a lot. (But it was still called ‘Rome’ by its people. Hopefully they do let players keep their civ name if they want to reflect this.)

That's actually one change that makes sense. And you have to search these changes with a magnifying glass.

 

[Zaarin]

So how do you interprete the change Egypt -> Abbasids other than conquest and subjugation of the Egyptians? I mean, what other interpretation is there?

It's not my favorite change in the game, but you could just as easily interpret it as the Egyptians developing a monotheistic religion and an interest in theoretical science. (Which is what happened historically long before the Arab conquest anyway--there's a reason Alexandria was the intellectual and theological crown jewel of the Roman Empire.)

 

[chaosprophet]

So how do you interprete the change Egypt -> Abbasids other than conquest and subjugation of the Egyptians? I mean, what other interpretation is there?

An Ancient Egypt-themed culture changed to an Abbasids-themed culture through the years.

 

[j51]

So how do you interprete the change Egypt -> Abbasids other than conquest and subjugation of the Egyptians? I mean, what other interpretation is there?

That’s where imagination comes in. In the game’s alt history. Ancient Egypt wasn’t conquered by a succession of nations. Instead it made it into late antiquity and survived a series of crises heavily bruised but still standing. The changes that happened during the crises however transformed it from Egypt into the Abbasid Caliphates.

 

[Arent11]

The Abbasids can't conquer Egypt, they're an exploration civ so they don't exist on Antiquity to conquer anyone. This isn't a historical simulator, it only use historical things for flavor as people tend to like those associates with things they know.

So Egypt wasn't conquered, it didn't fail, the cities reverted to towns for "gameplay reasons". Nothing happened.

For pure "gameplay reasons" you are forced to abandon the Egyptians - no logical reason whatsoever - & continue playing with Abbasids.

 

[Zaarin]

no logical reason whatsoever

Civ7's system requires abandoning a literalist reading of the civ names. It took some thought for me at first, and it's perfectly fair that not everyone will like it. For me, it's not any more ahistorical--just a different kind of ahistorical--than a civ lasting for 6000 years.

 

[j51]

Take the historical Rome to Byzantium example, abstract it and universalize it, now apply it every crises that happens in your game of civ 7.

 

[Arent11]

That’s where imagination comes in. In the game’s alt history. Ancient Egypt wasn’t conquered by a succession of nations. Instead it made it into late antiquity and survived a series of crises heavily bruised but still standing. The changes that happened during the crises however transformed it from Egypt into the Abbasid Caliphates.

That's not what happened in 90% of history? And there is no reason to rewrite it?

Frankly, I think it's very dangerous to teach people such a completely wrong interpretation of history.

 

[AntSou]

A contrived "solution" to an invented problem.

But no, your civ didn't fail. It just failed.

It didn't fail. Roman culture persists in modern European legal systems. It's part of the curriculum in most (all?) law degrees in southern Europe (and maybe even in northern Europe, I don't know). It's foundational. And it's bizarre to me to call a civilization such as Ancient Egypt a failure because it didn't stand the test of eternity.

Your intent isn't honest debate. You're not the least bit curious. This is an exercise in sophistry and the ultimate point of this thread is to be argumentative and eventually mention Alpha Centauri.

 

[Zaarin]

Frankly, I think it's very dangerous to teach people such a completely wrong interpretation of history.

Because it hasn't been doing that before by teaching people that civilizations last for 6,000 years, getting perpetually stronger, the quintessential nationalist revisionist take on history? The idea that history is a constant climb upwards was abandoned by serious historians well over a century ago but persists in pop history and fringe theories so if anything, the new model is abandoning a much more dangerous pseudo-history.

 

[j51]

It seems slightly more accurate (although that’s not what Civ is about) and certainly less dangerous than representing cultures as eternal unchanging ‘spirits.’

 

[Arent11]

Because it hasn't been doing that before by teaching people that civilizations last for 6,000 years, getting perpetually stronger, the quintessential nationalist revisionist take on history? The idea that history is a constant climb upwards was abandoned by serious historians well over a century ago but persists in pop history and fringe theories so if anything, the new model is abandoning a much more dangerous pseudo-history.

The idea was to "create an empire that stands the test of time". It was always about *avoiding* the fall of civ. To have a civ that last 6000 years because you *avoid* the errors of the historical civs.

If you now want to simulate the fall of a civ, then do it correctly. Don't sugarcoat what a fall of civ truly means.

 

[Krikkit1]

That might feel disappointing to players because it happens in a stage of the game where you're not in direct control of your civ. So I think they'd shy away from that.

I think it would feel weird to survive to the crisis, get all excited about the new civ you get to play in the next age, and then die during the crisis.

You Play the Crisis.... you fight the Barbarian horde, attempt to Squash the Rebels, and prevent the damage of the Plague

The order is
The Crisis Starts
You Play the Crisis: You Survive the Crisis (with some loses)... or you Fail and lose the game
The Crisis Ends
You choose your new Civ and apply your bonuses from the previous Age


Now they really should let the player choose how they want to Interpret that last step. Do I want to imagine it as my civs replacement (Romans->Normans), as my civs change to a new name (Romans->Byzantines), or as my Empires continuity even if there is significant sociopolitical change (Japan (heian)->Japan (meijii))

If the Player is in control of their civs/city's name change it would create a lot of possibilities for better story telling by the player.

 

[Gori the Grey]

or you Fail and lose the game

what's your source for this part here?

Can the AI fail during the Crisis? I.e. you start the new age and a formerly neighboring civ is just gone altogether?


Or put my question another way. If you do this

or you Fail and lose the game

you don't still do this:

You choose your new Civ and apply your bonuses from the previous Age

right?
So your last line should read "if you don't lose the game, you choose . . ."