Define broad civilizations to make civ switching work?

[chaosprophet]

The history players might be caught by the nice graphics and deeper uniques/civics. But they will be thrown off by the civ switching.

I think that is one of the points of contention. I agree some players will be thrown off by the civ switching, and some of them will be because for them that cross a line historically. But the way you wrote, sounds like you think that a historical player will invariably get throw off by it, while me and others argued that that doesn't need to be the case at all: The previous game already had many ahistorical things to it that this game will keep, and the new system has some ahistorical parts to it (like some of the civ "historical" paths, etc while being a bit more historical that previous civs in some places(having civs being more fit for the era you can use them than previous ones, not having a civ continue without some down moments for 6000 years, etc).

There is no reason why playing civ historical means previous one were ok but this one is an objective no go. Only that for some people subjective pov, this will be a bridge too far or just cross the accumulated line of ahistoricity with all other ahistorical characteristics of the series. Likewise, it may be better for some historical players and make them like it even more because of the points in which it become more historical than previous entities.

 

[Gori the Grey]

It's not just the historical players who might be thrown off by it. It's partly a game concern, too. I've used this analogy in other threads. In games, your avatar generally stays stable through the whole game. It's part of how you, and all the other players, know who won. You don't start Monopoly as the racing car, shift over to the scottie a third of the way through, and then finish as the thimble. In Civ VII, the leader has to carry all of the load of that through-the-game identification. You are really playing as Ben Franklin--and three potentially pretty-much random civilizations he happens to control in the span of 6000 years (no one of which, incidentally, has to be connected with the RL Ben Franklin). This is a psychological question as much as it is anything else: how players identify with their game avatars. Maybe there are studies on it. Game Studies is a whole academic field these days.

I've always identified strongly with my civ and weakly with my leader. In fact, I sometimes do a historical write-up of my games, and give names to the kings who were reigning at a particular moment, completely independently of the leader of the civ. The leader is just "the spirit of the civ"

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

To be fair this theory of history is well supported by some excellent Civil War documentaries.

The Civil War documentaries provide support for undying vampire leaders.

And the Civ franchise has always been thoroughly stuck on the "Great Man/Person" view of history, but I suggest that Civ VII's basic organization of the game into Ages that are driven by the greater trends of history (Crisis based on internal and external events outside of individual control, for instance) puts some distance between the game and the Great Men for the first time ever.

Nope, they're totally doubling down on the some Great Persons are vampires theory. No, tripling down. The undying now show up in 3 times as many civilizations as before.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Nope, they're totally doubling down on the some Great Persons are vampires theory. No, tripling down. The undying now show up in 3 times as many civilizations as before.

But they only seem to be providing half as many Leaders, so that's 1.5 times at best and having removed the Undying Civilizations from the equation I think they are slightly ahead.

Besides, any nod to the actuality of history that No polity has survived for 6000, or even 3000 years intact and unchanged is, I think, a dramatic step forward. To quote Firesign Theatre:

"Forward into the Past !"

 

[Gori the Grey]

If there is a simple divide between those who like civ-switching and those who don't, I think it might be whether one can envision a "civilization" as a set of ideas that morphs with time, spreads, and can be adopted by different groups; or whether one only sees it as the static identity of a group of people, passed unchanged down the generations unless an external events kills off that group (or least replaces its leadership). This is as much a matter of definition as it is of history.

But it's not just a matter of agreeing with this in principle as a description of general historical processes. The phases of your empire will have names that have RL associations, and the sequence will be discordant against those associations. One can agree with the proposition that that "civilizations are a set of ideas that morph with time . . ." and know that Rome doesn't evolve to Mongolia. To experience it your way, a player will have to ignore the specifics of the second civ and just think of it as Generic Second Civ built on the ruins of my First Civ. But civs' specifics are a big part of how they are defined and a big part of what gives them appeal.

This is what a good early post on the matter argued (I wish I'd taken better note of it): When you're Egypt and you shift to Mongolia b/c you have three horse, don't think of yourself as Mongolia, think of yourself as Horse Civ, or Egypt in its Horse Civ stage. But unless renaming is allowed, the screen is going to read Mongolia.

 

[RandV]

Seeing the way discussion is going around 'Great Leaders' has me thinking some mod potential... how about a Great Idiots leader game mode? Where the game is populated by the great idiots of history, and rather than leader bonuses you have to work against negative traits.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Or, in a slight modification, just leaders who had less-than-impressive epithets and then funny leader traits:

60 of History’s Strangest Royal Epithets

For every William the Conqueror there’s a Vlad the Impaler. And for every Richard the Lionheart there’s an Albert the Peculiar. Sixty of the most bizarre—and in some cases the most unflattering—epithets from history are listed here.

www.mentalfloss.com

(includes Childeric the Idiot, so there's some overlap in our ideas)

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Seeing the way discussion is going around 'Great Leaders' has me thinking some mod potential... how about a Great Idiots leader game mode? Where the game is populated by the great idiots of history, and rather than leader bonuses you have to work against negative traits.

Huh. Could be an era transition thing. "Spend 3 Legacy points to pick from the Great Leader pool. Otherwise you will be randomly assigned a Great Fool to lead your civilization for the next era."

Would allow Firaxis to introduce the general public to a whole new group of historical figures.

 

[Zaarin]

Or, in a slight modification, just leaders who had less-than-impressive epithets and then funny leader traits:

unready Æthelred noises (thought strictly speaking his epithet in Old English means he was ill-advised, not ill-prepared)